One of the pitfalls of blogging is that you can go for days without finding anything worth saying, and then get a bunch of things worth noting all at once. Today is such a day. So here is a heterogeneous collection of links and topics for your delectation (I love that word, and "heterogeneous"):
1. The AAAS has released a book called The Evolution Dialogues, which addresses the relation between Christian theology and science, with a study guide to come. More power to Christians, I say, if it helps them understand the actual science.
2. Here is a release about the loss of retrocyclin, a peptide that inhibits the infection of HIV, in humans. A classic of bad science reporting, too... it starts out "As primates evolved 7 million years ago, the more advanced species stopped making a protein that University of Central Florida researchers believe can effectively block the HIV-1 virus from entering and infecting blood cells." More advanced species? How many other primates have screwed up their and everything else's environment?
3. Here is a release about an attempt to give a cash value to ecological resources. Measuring something in terms of an arbitrary and socially constructed index? It might have political value, but as science...
4. Oubouros has a couple of blogs on the evolution of ageing. One discusses the oxidative hypothesis (remember James Bond going into a clinic to get rid of the "free radicals"?), and the other the caloric restriction hypothesis. No mention of monkey glands, though...
and finally
5. Ian Musgrave at Panda's Thumb has a smackdown analysis of the actual science behind the favourite case of intelligent design - the flagellum. Or rather, it once was a favourite. They don't cite the only testable hpothesis made about it any more because it was actually testable, and it failed.
That's it. Enjoy...
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Ummm. Musgrave's analysis has very little to do with flagella. It's about centrioles, which Jonathan Wells has argued must function like turbines assisting mitosis, for the "disarmingly simple" reason that they look like turbines. That gets the smackdown alright, though.
Well, since the centriole is intintaly linked to the formation of cillia (which are often called flagella in eukaryotes), Johns not that far off. Hi John! Back from your perambulations I see. Looks like you had an interesting time.
The trouble with not putting a cash value on ecological resources is that many decisions are made based on comparisons of cash values, and anything not so valued winds up ignored. Perhaps cash value is not the best metric that could be used, but some people seem unable to consider things in any other terms.
Here's what the press release on The Evolution Dialogues has to say.
Am I the only one who finds this troubling? Are there going to be other books on the Muslim, Buddhist, and atheist responses to the "theory"?
This is a can of worms. AAAS should have stayed away from religion. They come off looking like an organization that endorses the fallacy of "theistic evolution."
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Well, there should be caution, as to how well the book is done (John Haught's endorsement is a good sign there) and there probably does need to be a similar book for Islamic reaction to evolution, though there is no reason not to address the most pressing dispute here in the United States first.
But I'm sure you can go over to alt.atheism and find any number of atheist fundamentalists to dittohead your concerns, if that is what you want, Larry. But given the distinct lack of support you've found for your so-called "fallacy of theistic evolution" at t.o., I'm guessing you are in a minority among thoughtful people much closer to one than you'd like. And your use of the label "fallacy" for theistic evolution, given your arguments so far, is, to say the least, premature.
But I don't want to bloody up John's blog with this. Why don't you go back over to t.o. and pick up one of the threads you've abandoned there or start a new one so that you can demonstrate this "fallacy."
No, by all means bloody it up here.
Hi Ian. Yep it was fun. Sorry for confusing cilia with flagella. All intelligently designed molecular machines look pretty much the same to me
No, by all means bloody it up here.
Hah! You probably encourage intramural teenage girl mudwrestling too!
(And, if it works, be sure to let me know . . . )
"Hah! You probably encourage intramural teenage girl mudwrestling too!"
I think you'll find he draws the line at mud on the carpet; blood's OK, it's a sign of healthy debate...
We have wooden floors here - highly polished to allow us to wash the blood and brain matter off the floor with a hose. Go for it, you nubile things, you...
"Go for it, you nubile things, you..."
Isn't it stretching a point to call Larry a "nubile thing"? And you've met me...
Sorry. My mistake. Somebody mentioned teenaged girls...
Somebody mentioned teenaged girls...
That would have been Pieret; damned lawyers, you can't keep their minds off them...
By the way, where did Larry go?
I've run off with my tail between my legs because John Pieret said,
That's embarrassing. I can't stand being in a minority position so I've decided to become a Christian and adopt a non-scientific, theistic, view of evolution that allows for the intervention of God.
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Wrong approach Larry. You should become an Muslim Wahabist. I'm told that's the new orthodoxy in the rest of the world...
Aw, gee, Larry, you mean your asking if anyone else was concerned by the AAAS book was just a bit of rhetoric and you weren't interested in an answer? Silly me!
But characterizing theistic evolution as a "fallacy" implies you have found a logical flaw in it. Despite numerous invitations, you have failed to demonstrate that. Unfortunately, making unsupported claims about what is logical and what is not is hardly likely to put you in any minority any time soon.