1. pharyngula
  2. Carnivalia, and an open thread

Carnivalia, and an open thread

By pharyngula on December 20, 2006.

In other news, Atheism Online is back in version 2.0. All heathens should report for registration at once.

The Tangled Bank

I'll mention again that there's a new Tangled Bank at Salto Sobrious. Any volunteers for future hosting duties? We have slots open starting in April—drop me a note if you're interested.

Tags
carnivals
Open Thread
Tangled Bank

More like this

New carnival - 'Hourglass': biology of aging
Chris Patil wrote: Ouroboros' second anniversary is coming up this weekend, and I thought it might be nice to do something special to commemorate the occasion. There's enough good science blogging about the biology of aging that the community deserves its own monthly carnival (along the lines of…
Tangled Bank Available .. I think!
The latest edition of the Tangled Bank is online at Greythumb, however, I am having trouble accessing that site. Can anyone else see it? If so, what is the magical OS-browser combination that you are using? I linked to the expanded link, and managed to see it just now, but PZ still can't see it and…
Tangled Bank #45
The latest edition of the Tangled Bank is online at Greythumb.blog. We are looking for volunteers to host future editions later this spring—drop a note to me if you're interested in spreading the word about science blogging.
Carnivals!
Check out an all-new Carnival of Education and Tangled bank (oooh, Star Wars theme!). Finally, don't forget about next week's Animalcules, to be hosted over at Discovering Biology in a Digital World. Send submissions to me or Sandra (sandy at geospiza dot com) next Wednesday, May 3rd.…

The York Dispatch reports on the one year anniversary of the Kitzmiller trial. Behe still doesn't "get it":

"(Testifying) was daunting and at once exhilarating. I very much enjoyed the back and forth in the courtroom. ... I felt my own testimony went very much better than the opinion reflects.
...
Behe said he continues to find evidence for intelligent design.
...

What is an ignostic?

Thanks j. I like it.

Last weekend on NPR's All Things Considered program they had a nice interview with Katharine Jefferts Schori, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church (which of the main Christian denominations in the US is probably the one most friendly toward science and free thought). They mention in passing that before she became a priest, she had been a marine biologist and studied squid evolution!

Has anybody else blogged about the extinction of the baiji dolphin? I read about the baiji in Last Chance to See, by Douglas Adams, my second favorite athiest (the first being Carl Sagan, sorry PZ) and was saddened to read that it's been declared extinct.

I'd like to see someone tear into this, someone giving Christianity credit for the Enlightenment:
Katherine Kersten: Culture wars over Christmas -- how about a cease-fire?

...
It's useful here to think back to what the world was like before the dawn of the Christian era. In ancient times -- from Egypt and Mesopotamia to Greece and Rome -- the idea of human equality was utterly foreign. Then the baby was born in the manger. The gospels say that there was no room at the inn, and that the news was first given to poor shepherds. Christ's birth was a glimmer of light in history, which became a tectonic shift whose consequences have changed the world.
.
Jesus' teachings introduced a new idea into European history -- that every individual, no matter how lowly, has inherent dignity. This notion, and related ideas of equality and personal freedom, coalesced over the centuries to form the foundation of democracy. They fundamentally shaped America -- from the Declaration of Independence's "self-evident" truths, to Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, to Martin Luther King Jr.'s ringing "Letter from Birmingham Jail."
...

Merry Cephalopdmas to all!