jrosenhouse | June 27, 2006The latest attempt to pass a constitutional amendment allowing Congress to pass laws against flag “desecration” failed by one vote in the Senate. It had already passed the House. Had it passed the Senate, it would surely have gotten the approval of the necessary three-fourths of the states.
Here's a brief article from the New York Times summarizing the vote.
One vote, folks. That's how stupid and right-wing this country has gotten. People who support flag-burning amendments are the sort of people who like their patriotism cheap, empty and emotional. No serious person could possibly think…
jrosenhouse | June 27, 2006My new essay for CSICOP's Creation and Intelligent Design Watch site is now available. This time: My take on the old tautology argument, inspired by Ann Coulter and Tom Bethell. I argue - surprise! - that natural selection is not a meaningless tautology. Enjoy!
jrosenhouse | June 26, 2006An interview with historian of science Ronald Numbers has been posted. It has already attracted some blog attention. P. Z. Myers rightly criticizes Numbers for some rather bizarre statements about the relationship between science and religion. Over at Telic Thoughts, Krauze offers this typically dopey reply.
The interview contains a lot of bloggable items, but I will focus on just one:
QUESTION: So, in a certain sense, doesn't this represent some sort of divide between religion and science?
MR. NUMBERS: To me, the struggle in the late 20th Century between creationists and evolutionists…
jrosenhouse | June 23, 2006The latest Ask a Science Blogger Question is:
What makes a good science teacher?
My fellow SB'ers have already unloaded a wealth of good answers.
In one of his essays for Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine, Isaac Asimov relates the story of the famous chemist who was discussing the nature of fire with an audience of ten year olds. After the presentation the chemist was stopped cold when a student asked him, “Why are they called matches?” Asimov was especially amused by this anecdote, because on the very day the presentation took place his latest essay had hit the newsstands. He was…
jrosenhouse | June 22, 2006Polymathematics has posted another excellent essay on the subject of whether .9999...repeating equals one. This time he is responding, very effectively, to various counter arguments raised by commenters.
One small comment of my own, though: The name of the blog is “EvolutionBlog.” One word.
Reading the various comments left to the post reveals two kinds of skeptics. Some are people who are perfectly willing to accept that .9999...=1, but find the logic justifying this conclusion to be hard to follow. No shame in that. The idea of the limit of an infinite series is not a simple one,…
jrosenhouse | June 21, 2006I rented The Aristocrats the other day. This was the documentary (for lack of a better description) by Paul Provenza and Penn Jillette in which numerous comedians and comedy writers were asked about a particular joke, called “The Aristocrats.” As Jon Stewart says in the movie, I'm not going to tell the joke. Suffice it to say that it is the sickest joke ever told. I mean it. Don't believe me? Rent the movie! Each comedian starts with the same beginning, and the same punchline. But the middle is a blank canvas for each performer to work with as he or she sees fit.
I can honestly say I…
jrosenhouse | June 21, 2006Paul Gross has written this useful review of John Brockman's recent anti-ID anthology Intelligent Thought: Science Versus the Intelligent Design Movement. I intend to do some posts relating to specific essays in the book, but Gross' overall assessment is the same as mine:
This collection is helpful but not because it provides the primary knowledge base for the current effort to limit the impact of the IDM - a politically potent hoax with an excellent public relations machine and adequate funding. The necessary primary sources on the IDM and on the relevant science are already available in…
jrosenhouse | June 20, 2006There's an interesting blog discussion going on about the age-old question of whether .99999..., where the nines go on forever, is actually equal to one. The answer is: Yes, it does, and if you think it does not then you are mistaken. Polymathematics got the ball rolling with several arguments establishing the equality of the infinite decimal on the one hand and the number one on the other. Mark Chu-Carroll offered some follow-up thoughts here.
One way to prove that .9999... repeating equals one is to realize that the notation “.9999...” is really just a short-hand way of writing the…
jrosenhouse | June 20, 2006As a counterpoint to yesterday's post about Ann Coulter's place within modern conservatism, check out this post from the blog Conservatives Against Intelligent Design. (Hat tip to Gene Expression for the link.
It's nice to see that at least some conservatives are willing to take on the ignoramuses within their midst. I stand by everything I wrote yesterday, however. I never claimed there were no pro-science conservatives, only that such people represent a small, fringe element within American conservatism generally.
jrosenhouse | June 19, 2006If you're wondering why only a small handful of prominent conservatives and Republicans have publicly criticized Ann Coulter, the answer is simple: Most of them agree with her, and the ones who don't are still happy to have her on their side.
Coulter is what right-wingers are all about, you see. They are constantly attacking, rather like those genetically engineered super-soldiers you see in bad science fiction movies. Getting the basic facts right means nothing to them. No one seriously believes, for example, that Coulter's arguments about evolution are the result of a detailed…
jrosenhouse | June 19, 2006The detailed responses to Ann Coulter's silliness about evolution are now coming in. P.Z Myers illustrates the insanity of claiming that there is no evidence for evolution. See also this post for further examples of Coulterian insanity.
Over at the Panda's Thumb, Ian Musgrave deals with the peppered moths issue, showing that Coulter, to put it kindly, doesn't have the faintest idea what she is talking about.
Coulter also raises the tautology objection in her screed. This is the idea that natural selection is a meaningless tuatology because it is described by the phrase “Survival of the…
jrosenhouse | June 17, 2006With all the other things going on, I never got around to acknowledging the fine performance by the United States team at the recently completed chess olympiad in Turin, Italy. Armenia took the gold medal, while China took silver. That Russia finished out of the medals is one of the major news stories of the event. More than 150 teams participated in the event. Well done!
jrosenhouse | June 17, 2006Here's the latest question from HQ:
How is it that all the PIs (Tara, PZ, Orac et al.), various grad students, post-docs, etc. find time to fulfill their primary objectives (day jobs) and blog so prolifically?
Good question. I often wonder about it myself.
In my case, a big part of the answer is that I don't have a family. Another big part is that my day job, especially in the summer, doesn't have fixed hours. One of the nice things about academic life is that outside of your courses, office hours, and various service requirements to the department, there aren't many instances where you…
jrosenhouse | June 16, 2006My old sparring partner Salvador Cordova recently posted this essay over at Uncommon Descent. Salvador describes his intent as follows:
Intelligent design will open doors to scientific exploration which Darwinism is too blind to perceive. The ID perspective allows us to find designed architectures within biology which are almost invisible to natural selection. Thus, the ID perspective is a far better framework for scientific investigation than the Darwinian perspective. What do I mean, and how will I justify my claim?
Pretty brazen, but hardly new. ID folks have been telling us precisely…
jrosenhouse | June 15, 2006MSNBC is reporting the discovery of yet another transitional form, this time linking ancient and modern birds:
Dozens of fossils of an ancient loonlike creature that some say is the missing link in bird evolution have been discovered in northwest China.
The remains of 40 of the nearly modern amphibious birds, so well-preserved that some even have their feathers, were found in Gansu province, researchers report in Friday's issue of the journal Science. Previously only a single leg of the creature, known as Gansus yumenensis, had been found.
“Gansus is a missing link in bird evolution,” said…
jrosenhouse | June 15, 2006The current issue of The New York Review of Books features this article by physicist Freeman Dyson. The subject is Daniel Dennett's recent book Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. Dyson begins as follows:
Breaking the spell of religion is a game that many people can play. The best player of this game that I ever knew was Professor G.H. Hardy, a world-famous mathematician who happened to be a passionate atheist. There are two kinds of atheists, ordinary atheists who do not believe in God and passionate atheists who consider God to be their personal enemy.
Describing an…
jrosenhouse | June 14, 2006P. Z. Myers says all the right things on the subject of replying to Ann Coulter. She's loathsome, dishonest and ignorant. But we can't simply pretend she doesn't exist. I haven't managed to get a copy of her book yet, but when I do I expect to have some things to say about her evolution chapter.
Andrew Sullivan offers this interesting post about Coulter. He reproduces the following e-mail from a reader:
Just wanted to add my little bit of insight to the Ann Coulter discussion. While interning at a cable news show a year ago, I was responsible for guest relations on a day when Ann…
jrosenhouse | June 14, 2006While I was away I managed to find time to play in the U.S. Amateur East chess tournament. You can find the full details here. I managed 4 points out of 6, which was good enough to pick up some rating points but not good enough to win any money.
I did, however, manage to wrap up the tournament with a pretty move:
Timothy Hall (2048) - J.R. (1924) Position After 22. Rh3-c3Black to Play and Win
This occurred in the sixth and final round, and emerged from my favorite Scandinavian Defense. My opponent had gotten carried away early on and launched an ill-advised pawn-storm on the king-side.…
jrosenhouse | June 13, 2006The latest Ask a Science Blogger question is:
Assuming that time and money were not obstacles, what area of scientific research, outside of your own discipline, would you most like to explore? Why?
I had to smile a bit when I saw this question. You see, one of the main reasons I went into mathematics was my distaste for actually doing scientific research. To me it seemed that mathematics had all the things I liked about science - the logic; the clear thinking; the steady, methodical progress; - without the things I didn't like. Specifically, the part where you slave away in a laboratory…
jrosenhouse | June 13, 2006Well, let's just roll up the old sleeves, sit down at the computer, see what's up in the blogosphere. Start with Science Blogs, of course. Ah, yes, there's the link over on the left. Just give it a little click there and....Holy Crap! What's this? Who are all these people? So.....many.....blogs.
It looks like I have enough reading material for a while. So let me just say welcome to all the new members of the family. And a special big hello to Mark Chu-Carroll. Always nice to have another math geek on staff. Posts on category theory? Goodness! Thought I left that behind in graduate…