jrosenhouse | September 4, 2007As a companion piece to yesterday's post have a look at this essay in the religious periodical First Things, written by Amanda Shaw. The purpose is to draw a parallel between imaginary numbers and belief in God. You see, for centuries mathematicians scoffed at the idea of imaginary numbers, but a few brave folks were able to look beyond the stiflng orthodoxy of their times and now imaginary numbers are commonly accepted.
See where this is going?
Shaw presents a passable history of imaginary numbers. But if her intention is to develop a parallel between belief in imaginary numbers and…
jrosenhouse | September 3, 2007I think my calculus students would probably not think so. But as John Allen Paulos reports, not everyone agrees:
Consider first a Baptist school in Texas whose description of a geometry course begins:
Students will examine the nature of God as they progress in their understanding of mathematics. Students will understand the absolute consistency of mathematical principles and know that God was the inventor of that consistency. They will see God's nature revealed in the order and precision they review foundational concepts while being able to demonstrate geometric thinking and spatial…
jrosenhouse | September 3, 2007I had not intended to do another post on this subject. But in response to P.Z.'s post , my fellow Panda's Thumber Burt Humburg left a lengthy comment that I feel requires a response. So I'll ask your patience as we go one more round...
Burt wrote:
You know what audiences really love PZ? The ones who are steeped in religion and have steeped their children in it to the point that they think that all of morality and goodness and apple pie proceeds fundamentally from a love of God? Those guys?
Turns out, they absolutely love it when “2 + 2 = 4” comes coupled with “Therefore, there is no god.”…
jrosenhouse | August 30, 2007Chris Mooney has a link to this analysis of recent polling data. The analysis was written by David Masci. The subject: How Americans feel about science and faith. Mooney thinks the data supports the Matt Nisbet line that people like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens hurt the cause. I disagree.
Here's Mooney main comment:
So here's my contribution: I merely wish to point out a good analysis of polling data over at Pew that strongly supports the broad Nisbet perspective. The gist: The American public doesn't generally perceive a necessary conflict between religion and science; but…
jrosenhouse | August 29, 2007And while we're perusing the Hardball transcript, here's Republican Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee commenting on the causes of cancer. Huckabee, recall, was one of three Republican candidates to raise his hand to affirm his rejection of evolution. Take it away Guv'ner:
I believe God created these wonderful bodies of ours. And they are a masterpiece, but they were designed to be used in a way that were fueled properly and then were exercised properly. And, when we don't fuel them properly or exercise them properly, it is like having a car in which you pour mud into the tank and…
jrosenhouse | August 29, 2007God is Not Great author Christopher Hitchens and Catholic League president Bill Donohue showed up on Hardball yesterday to mull over the issues raised by the Time article. I'd write some commentary, but some things simply defy comment. I have taken the liberty of putting certain choice nuggets in bold:
MATTHEWS: I want to go to Christopher Hitchens. Christopher, you have been tough. You say this is a profound revelation, that this woman did not believe.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS, AUTHOR, “GOD IS NOT GREAT”: Yes, and a very moving one, actually, and a very honest one, I have to add. She…
jrosenhouse | August 29, 2007Time's cover story this week is about Mother Teresa. Specifically, it's about her newly released personal correspondence in which she repeatedly expresses grave doubts about the truth of Christianity, even to the point of questioning whether God exists.
It's a little hard to nail down from the Time article what Teresa did and did not believe. But some of her letters are heart-wrenching:
Yet less than three months earlier, in a letter to a spiritual confidant, the Rev. Michael van der Peet, that is only now being made public, she wrote with weary familiarity of a different Christ, an absent…
jrosenhouse | August 29, 2007Last night's edition of Hardball with Chris Matthews provided more than its fair share of strange moments. There was an amusing exchange between Christopher Hitchens and Catholic League president Bill Donohue regarding the current Time magazine cover story about Mother Teresa's religious doubts. But since I only have about ten minutes until my next class, I'll save that for another post.
Instead I thought I'd bring you the following moment, from the round table discussion at the end of the show. The topic was Idaho Senator Larry Craig. I trust you've heard about it? Matthews' guest was…
jrosenhouse | August 27, 2007Perhaps you saw this article from The New York Times last week. It describes some significant new findings in protein evolution:
In work published last year, Dr. Thornton reported how his group reconstructed an ancestral protein of two hormone receptors found in humans. The two, once identical, diverged along different evolutionary paths. One is now part of the stress response system; the other is involved in different biological processes, including kidney function in many animals.
In the new study, the researchers determined the exact positions of more than 2,000 atoms in the ancestral…
jrosenhouse | August 27, 2007Have a look at this op-ed from today's Washington Post, by Susan Goodkin and David Gold :
With reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act high on the agenda as Congress returns from its recess, lawmakers must confront the fact that the law is causing many concerned parents to abandon public schools that are not failing.
These parents are fleeing public schools not only because, as documented by a recent University of Chicago study, the act pushes teachers to ignore high-ability students through its exclusive focus on bringing students to minimum proficiency. Worse than this benign…
jrosenhouse | August 27, 2007Over at Effect Measure, Revere takes a few shots at Matt Nisbet:
It's not just that the Dawkins/Hitchens “PR campaign provides emotional sustenance and talking points for many atheists,” although it does that too. It's that the various writings of Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, Hitchens, PZ and now a number of others has opened up a space -- and a wide space, not a narrow one -- to talk about belief and non-belief in ways not possible before. Even Matt's post is an example. I'm glad we are talking about the best way to talk about harmful delusions -- and make no mistake, that's exactly what we…
jrosenhouse | August 25, 2007It's that time of year again! That most worthless of weekly news mags, U. S. News and World Report, has just published its annual list of America's Best Colleges. As usual, they tinkered with their ranking system again, for the sole purpose of fiddling with the order, thereby creating some news. Will Princeton or Harvard be number one? Yawn.
Happily, Radar magazine has come out with a far more useful feature: America's Worst Colleges. They explain:
This year, U.S. News & World Report announced that their new college rankings system would involve “substantial changes in methodology…
jrosenhouse | August 24, 2007But when it comes to brain-dead venom-spewing, Kristol is an amateur compared to Town Hall columnist Lisa De Pasquale. How bad have things gotten for the right? Well, let's have a look.
A standard criticism of the phony machismo that is the stock-in-trade of right-wing politicans is that they are unwilling to see their own children fight in the wars they are so fond of starting. This is often presented as a slam-dunk argument exposing their utter hypocrisy. That's precisely what it is. The question “Would I be willing to serve, or see my children serve, in this war?” is one every…
jrosenhouse | August 24, 2007Now that it has become obvious to all that every stated reason for the Iraq War was either an outright lie or a gross exaggeration, and that any hope for a successful outcome was squandered by the incompetence and myopia of the Bush administration, the Right's know-nothing political lackeys have been reduced to bleating about the left's hatred of the military.
Weekly Standard editor William Kristol offered up his version a few weeks ago in this editorial, subtly titled, “They Don't Really Support the Troops:”
With the ongoing progress of the surge, and the obvious fact that the vast majority…
jrosenhouse | August 23, 2007Perhaps you've heard of Andrew Keen? He showed up on Colbert recently to discuss his new book The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture.
One of his points is that bloggers in particular are mere amateurs who inevitably coarsen the public debate and threaten professional journalistic enterprises with their ceaseless and ill-informed attacks.
This, of course is total nonsense.
You can always find dark corners of the internet where ignoramuses get into silly flame wars with one another. But the best blogs, and the ones that generate most of the traffic, are…
jrosenhouse | August 23, 2007Matt Nisbet has been beating his favorite dead horse again. That's the one where he excoriates people like Richard Dawkins for being just so darn mean in his discussions of religion. In this post he praises Carol Tavris for echoing his favorite talking points, and in this one he praises Michael Shermer for doing likewise.
This is a subject that comes up a lot around here. I won't do a point-by-point rebuttal of the arguments in Nisbet's posts. I notice that James Hrynyshyn (here and here) and Larry Moran (here) have already taken care of business
Instead, in the interests of doing…
jrosenhouse | August 22, 2007While I'm getting caught up, allow me to echo Ed Brayton's sentiments on the changing of the guard over at the National Center for Science Education. Nick Matzke, hero of the Kitzmiller trial, will be leaving to obtain a PhD in evolutionary biology from Berkeley. Not too shabby!
And taking his place will be my SciBling Josh Rosenau, of “Thoughts From Kansas,” who I had the pleasure of meeting this past weekend. If anyone can fill Nick's enormous shoes it is Josh, even if he does think I'm all mixed up about various religion-related issues :)
So congratulations to Nick for getting into…
jrosenhouse | August 22, 2007I'm back in Virginia after my brief visit to New York. It was really great to meet so many of my fellow science bloggers. I feel so unworthy right now! Bora has the skinny on the weekend's doings along with copious photographs.
After our big brunch on Saturday, I decided to eschew the visit to the AMNH (been there, done that) and decided to meander around New York instead. How often do I get down to the Village? I eventually ended up playing chess at Washington Square Park, eating a truly magnificent black and white cookie at The Donut Pub on 14th and 7th, browsing in Midtown Comics in…
jrosenhouse | August 14, 2007With the fall semester starting in just under two weeks, it's time to take off for one last trip. We're having a big Science Bloggers gathering in New York City this weekend, and I've just gotta see for myself that there are actual people behind all these blogs I keep reading. Along the way I'll stop off at my New Jersey office to visit the 'rents, and wander over to Brooklyn to see big bro. I'll be back next Tuesday. See you then!
jrosenhouse | August 13, 2007Salon has posted this interview with physicist Taner Edis. You might recognize Edis as the coeditor (with Matt Young) of the magisterial book Why Intelligent Design Fails.
The subject of the present interview is his new book, An Illusion of Harmony: Science and Religion in Islam. Edis has a lot of insightful things to say about the state of Muslim science, including a few tidbits about creationism, so I recommend reading the whole thing.
Actually, though, it was the beginning of the article that caught my eye:
In October, Malaysia's first astronaut will join a Russian crew and blast off…