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The Island of Doubt

An irregular exploration of the struggle between the power of rational discourse and the scientific method on one hand, and the forces of superstition and dogma on the other.

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me-fergus.jpg James Hrynyshyn is a freelance science journalist based in western North Carolina, where he tries to put degrees in marine biology and journalism to good use.

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for 9 July 2007

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Other Doubtful Blogs

Inspiration

The Demon-Haunted World:
Science as a Candle
in the Dark, by Carl Sagan
(A review)

The Doubter's Companion:
by John Ralston Saul (Excerpts)

Skeptic Magazine: www.skeptic.com

Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal: www.csicop.org

A poem by Yehuda Amichai:
The Place
Where We Are Right


The Meaning of the
Island of Doubt


Author's site: cyamid.net


Add to Technorati Favorites! Penetrating so many secrets, we cease to believe in the unknowable. But there it sits nevertheless, calmly licking its chops.
--- H. L. Mencken

By doubting we come to inquiry; and through inquiry we perceive truth.
--- Peter Abelard

Undisguised clarity is easily mistaken for arrogance.
-- Richard Dawkins

As for evolution, it happened. Deal with it.
-- Michael Shermer.

More blogs about island of doubt.

December 24, 2007

Has global warming stopped? I'm glad you asked...

Category: climate

It's is a dangerous and perhaps even disingenous question.

Read on »

December 21, 2007

Cross-border climate change concern gap

Category: climate

Matt Nisbet once again points out that nobody in America cares about climate change. With all due respect to the Pew survey gang, I doubt things are really that bad. Consider a recent poll of Canadians that puts the environment...

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RV reproduction

Category: humor

From the master of doom and gloom, James Howard Kunstler, comes this attempt to simultaneous amuse and depress:...

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December 20, 2007

Where the whales came from .. maybe

Category: evolution

It's pretty much exactly what's been missing in the search to fill in the gap between whatever entirely terrestrial whale ancestor and the first aquatic whales of 50 million years ago.

Read on »

December 18, 2007

A Canadian lesson for Science Debate '08: Integrity trumps science literacy

Category: politics

Sure, it would be nice if the next president of the United States could explain the difference between radiative forcings and feedbacks when it comes to dealing with greenhouse gas emissions...

Read on »

December 16, 2007

Adapt! The cry of the coward

Category: climate

To abandon any thought of mitigating climate change, to quit now while we can, at least in theory, head off the worst of what's to come, strikes me as a lazy and cowardly approach

Read on »

December 14, 2007

But what do the laws of thermodynamics say?

Category: climate

Roger Pielke Jr. asks why almost every media outlet ignored a new paper in Nature that says "global warming may have a minimal effect on hurricanes" when comparably respectable papers arguing the opposite get oodles of attention. Good question. I'll...

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December 13, 2007

Facebook Atheism: An entirely wrong approach

Category: religiosity

You don't win friends and influence people by announcing that you're better than them.

Read on »

December 12, 2007

White House science adviser on the climate change challenge

Category: climate

Just how out of touch with science is Bush's science adviser? Ray Pierrehumbert, a University of Chicago climatologist, bring us a report on a speech by John Marburger at the current meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Unfortunately there are...

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Dueling temperature records

Category: climate

Get ready for the climate change pseudoskeptics to exploit to their own disingenuous ends the inevitable disagreement among climatologists over just where the latest 12 months falls in the list of warmest years on record. See? they'll argue, the science...

Read on »

December 11, 2007

Tell us something we didn't know

Category: climate

I don't know how many hours and dollars were spent by this hot-off-the-presses official government duplication of what Chris Mooney laid out two years ago in The Republican War on Science, but I suppose it's always good to have confirmation...

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December 10, 2007

Science Debate 2008

Category: politics

Most of those who have the ears of the contenders will be arguing forcefully against taking part in a debate where you actually have to understand more than rhetorical technique

Read on »

US Navy study: seven years of north pole summer ice left?

Category: climate

Today we hear about a new study suggesting the north pole's summer ice will be gone within seven years. Not, 40, not 30, not even 13, but seven. I can't find any information from the actual study. All that we...

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December 8, 2007

The strange tale of the creationist who was also an evolutionary biologist

Category: evolution

So there was this guy, right? He worked at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. His research was specifically targeted at evolutionary processes. But he was a creationist, so he refused to address evolution in his research. So he was fired....

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December 7, 2007

Monkey Planet!

Category: humor

Enjoy your Friday by paying an objective and science-based visit to the Monkey Planet....

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80 percent by 2050 is not enough

Category: climate

"In order to stay below 2 °C, global emissions must peak and decline in the next 10 to 15 years, so there is no time to lose." -- Bali Climate Declaration

Read on »

December 4, 2007

Charles Krauthammer's embryonic brain

Category: medicine

A little press-commentary comparison shopping is in order following the recent news of a breakthrough in the effort to produce stem cells without using embryonic cells. I promise this won't take long. First, the Washington Post's Charles Krauthammer, who announced...

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Why Bali will be another missed opportunity

Category: climate

Any scheme that doesn't try to apportion emission rights fairly is doomed to failure because the developing world -- i.e., China -- will ignore it.

Read on »

December 3, 2007

Passing the Nicole Kidman's Grandmother Test

Category: religiosity

His Dark Materials is a wonderful series of stories, regardless of the philosophical message between the lines. That the message is one that disparages superstitious dogma is just icing on the cake.

Read on »

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