jlynch
Posts by this author
February 5, 2009
Another “academic freedom” bill, this time in Iowa. Those little beavers over at the DI have been busy over the past few months apparently. The "Evolution Academic Freedom Act" (HF 183; “A bill for an act relating to the teaching of chemical and biological evolution in school districts and public…
February 4, 2009
February is going to be a busy month for me. Sunday I leave for Oklahoma where I will be giving the lead-off public lecture for their Darwin 2009 Celebration. I will be speaking on the 12th at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History on the topic of “Was There A Darwinian Revolution?” Any…
February 3, 2009
NCSE is reporting that a “strengths and weaknesses” bill is on the table in New Mexico. It’s your typical “academic freedom” bill that the DI has been shilling for a while now:
The department, school district governing authorities and school administrators shall not prohibit any teacher, when…
February 2, 2009
Andy Schlafly over at the Eagle Forum on Springsteenâs performance at the Super Bowl half-time show:
Springsteen sang nearly all his top hits ... except there was one glaring omission. He did not sing "Born in the U.S.A.," one of his most popular tunes of all.
Wonder why??? The Obama mind…
February 2, 2009
First there was the Darwin Correspondence Project. Then came the Tyndall Correspondence Project. And now, George Beccaloni has just announced the Wallace Correspondence Project. All very exciting for students of Victorian science.
February 1, 2009
New data on creationism in Britain. The, ahem, âhighlightsâ
51% agree that "evolution alone is not enough to explain the complex structures of some living things, so the intervention of a designer is needed at key stages." 40% disagree.
32% agree that "God created the world sometime in the last 10…
January 28, 2009
Nick Matzke over at PT has just made me aware that Mike Majerus had passed away after a sudden illness. Those of us who have followed the ID issue will know Majerus from the studies he did of melanism in peppered moths Biston betularia and the empirical work he did to refute the nonsense spouted by…
January 28, 2009
Iâve been picking on creationists for a number for years now, so it is somewhat strange for me to come out and offer one a gold star but, hey!
Todd Wood, a YEC at Bryan College had had a paper accepted over at Answers Research Journal that gives his take on the whole ridiculous âDarwin was a…
January 28, 2009
I’m quoted in a press release regarding a teacher training workshop (the “Evolution Challenges Workshop”) we’re giving at ASU to help middle and high school teachers teach evolution. Money quotes:
Studies have shown that “16 percent of high school biology teachers are essentially young earth…
January 28, 2009
Apparently I have to take 12 9 days of unpaid furlough before May 15th. And it can’t be days I teach on, i.e. it has to be Monday or Friday. All because the Republicans in the state senate want to gut K-16 education in Arizona. Seriously, in a state that hasn’t raised state taxes in 20 years, we’re…
January 26, 2009
Obama said: âMy administration will not deny facts -- we will be guided by themâ
And then actually began to do something about climate change.
A good start.
January 24, 2009
Brian Metscher has reviewed the ID “supplementary textbook” Explore Evolution for the journal Evolution & Development. Metscher describes the work as
159 glossy pages of color-illustrated creationist nostalgia All the old favorites are here — fossils saying no, all the Icons, flightless Ubx…
January 22, 2009
Asian golden cat, Catopuma temminckii Vigors & Horsfield 1827
<Click for larger version>
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January 21, 2009
Iâm still here, just still too busy to blog this week. Tuesday was the opening class for my Socratic seminar, Wednesday was the first session of my lecture course (and a faculty meeting). Today, I have a Socratic discussion of Hesiod. So Iâm guessing it will be Friday before I post again.
To tide…
January 20, 2009
A few days ago I highlighted the current state of the Natural History Museum in Dublin. Nigel Monaghan, the Keeper of the museum, contacted me and has kindly allowed me to repost a piece he wrote for Museum Ireland on the past and future of the museum. Enjoy!
The Natural History Museum
Dublin, past…
January 19, 2009
Amen, indeed.
Transcript below the fold
Welcome to Washington! The fun is about to begin, but first, please join me in pausing for a moment, to ask God’s blessing upon our nation and our next president.
O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will
Bless us with tears - for a world…
January 19, 2009
No doubt the boy in the bubble thinks heâs done a heckuva job. From here:
Toronto Star: âBush was an unmitigated disaster, failing on the big issues from the invasion of Iraq to global warming, Hurricane Katrina and the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.â
Daily Mail: âHe leaves the…
January 17, 2009
Frankly, it takes talent to suck this bad:
President Bush will leave office as one of the most unpopular departing presidents in history, according to a new CBS News/New York Times poll showing Mr. Bush's final approval rating at 22 percent.
Seventy-three percent say they disapprove of the way Mr…
January 17, 2009
A scientist, testing a formula on Univac recently, was amazed to see the computing system stop, then automatically type the reproof: “You’re trying to divide by zero.” A quick check proved that Univac, as always, was right.
Click to image to read more. 1956 good times.
January 16, 2009
Let's face it: When George W. Bush claims he's "kept us safe," it's kind of like the babysitter who lets the toddler wander into traffic the first hour she's on the job, then herds all the remaining kids into the basement and locks them in to compensate. So when the parents get home, she says: "See…
January 16, 2009
Apparently the Department of Defense’s claim this week that “61, in all, former Guantánamo detainees are confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight” is purely imaginary. States Professor Mark Denbeaux of Seton Hall University:
They have included people who have never even set foot in GuantÃ…
January 16, 2009
Arizona Republicans have proposed that education - from kindergarten through university - should be the first thing to get the chop in a proposed budget. They are looking to cut $1.5 billion from education over the next 18 months with the K-12 system being hit for nearly $1 billion of that. I agree…
January 16, 2009
It is always cute when the anti-evolutionists (in all their guises) try to do history; witness here, for example. Veteran observers are not surprised to find them trying to warp history (see here, here, here & here for that). Nowhere is this warping more evident than in how DI-hacks such as…
January 16, 2009
David Klinghoffer is promising to deliver some revisionism over at the Discovery Institute:
Starting tomorrow, I would like to devote a couple posts to the thesis that Communism has deeper Darwinian roots than many of us realize. That, in fact, even though Marx had already begun sketching the…