Here's something else Darwin didn't have

Seems like GPS and radio communication would be adequate.

NASA could instead send anti-idiocy rays down, so creos/IDiots might be able to think.

Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7

You've got to admit though, if they found something alive in those "space rocks", that would be monumental for biology and history.

Heh, take that Phil.

I'm just relieved that finally we've found something useful for these space nuts to do -- providing supplemental assistance to a biological and historical project, instead of noodling around staring at space rocks, space debris, and space vapor.

I'm still waiting for a cure for my space herpes.

> anti-idiocy rays

Non-starter, I'm afraid. They have these foil helmets.

CD

Dear PZ,

I surely hope your last paragraph is merely for sarcastic purposes as many major atheists like Maher profess some very weird world views.

@ #6

LH,

Yes twas. I am just surpised he didn't take the opportunity to jab at ye olde BA hisself Phil Plait. Oh the humanity!!

Don't knock the space nuts PZ. When they finally get humanity living in space, you biology nuts will be able to witness first hand evolutionary changes that will make the Cambrian Explosion look like a soggy sparkler!

I must side with those who observe that this still does not justify sending hominids into space. As I recall, the first American in space was a chimp (Ham); who could probably "track the Beagle" as well as the people on the ISS.

space rocks, space debris, and space vapor.

Dear Sir,

I wish to complain in the strongest possible terms about the previous post about the objects in space. Some of my best friends are rocks, debris, and vapor, and only a few of them are in outer space!

Yours, etc.,

Brigadier Sir Manfred Beltington Grasingstoke (Mrs.)

No kings,

Robert

I don't know why; maybe those pre-Victorian Space Engineers had their steam-powered space-stations all tied up trying to find the source of the Nile or plotting invasion routes into Afghanistan, or something.

Yes! Steampunk Darwin!

"I'm just relieved that finally we've found something useful for these space nuts to do"

You're just jealous because they don't give biologists ticker-tape parades.

Hi all,

I thought this was funny from your archives:
THEN:

http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/comments/graffins_new_band_will_be_c…

AND NOW:
http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/evolution-religion-and-free…

SY

Yeah... like ThirdMonkey said...

Off-topic, but I thought PZ might like this:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/oct/21/religion-advertising

We are all astronauts on a speeding rotating orbiting projectile called Earth. Space ain't 'out there' ya know! You're full of it!

Ah, you're just jealous cause Phil has an awesome book out and you're still dicking around with zebrafish.

Actually they are not looking for space rocks, debris and vapour, they are looking for space aliens, you know the type with three breasts that say 'Tell me more about this thing you call kissing' :)

Listen, that final jibe was clearly intended for you all to get pissy about. Billions and billions of bacteria or billions and billions of stars, 's'difference?

Don't sneer at godwits.

Panjandrums... Sounds like you've been reading more of Stephenson's Anathem. What'd you think of the rest of it? I just recently finished it. It'll take a couple of more read throughs to get everything he was saying. But it felt like a greatly expanded Snow Crash, just not set in the cyber-punk universe without the 'voodoo' about nam-shubs that Snow Crash had.

Yes... watching a replica of a 19th century ship is much more useful than learning how to live in space and look for alien life. God forbid we leave Earth one day and find complex alien biology on a planet around another star one day which could tell us more about evolution and the chemical makeup of living things. That would be just a horrible waste of time and money...

Darn it , I hate when I get caught.. I got upset by your last paragraph. Then I realized the parody for what it was. Just a bit of satire . In my face. And I didn't see it right away. Damn. good one.

Pre-Victorian Space Engineers would have spent their time searching for Noah's Ark.

http://miscellanea.wellingtongrey.net/2006/12/18/why-go/

Link is to a webcomic I like that speaks for itself.

Why do they need to build a replica ship? Couldn't they get most of the scientific/eductational stuff done by using an existing ship? Seems an expensive thing to do just for publicity. (And I bet it won't be a true replica anyway - safety regulations will see to that!)
Yours in cynicism...
Penny

The thing to remember is that 2009 is an interesting anniversary year - 200 years since the birth of Charles Darwin; 150 years since publishing of 'On the Origin of Species'.

I presume the replica ship is tied up with this - not sure it's something I'm in favour of. But plenty of other science activities being planned, I understand, to celebrate the anniversary. Certainly the Sci-Lit society I go to in the UK is making it their major activity next year.

I would also guess that it could be a big conflict year with creationists - so be ready!

iFun:
Re-reading that article, I was just getting into the debate (argument), when it all ended...
To me, Graffin's questionnaire seemed rather flimsy (at least from what Prof. Myers showed of it) - but has anything come of it since? Was it perhaps backed up by other, more detailed forms of research? Did Graffin save his reputation, and the day? Did he hear about that blog post and defend himself? I don't have time to read the article you linked to here...
I still hope he saved face/provided an explanation - I don't know much of his music, but I quite like the themes I've heard.
And RE: Prof. Myers - Clash, Ramones, Joy Division? Good taste in music as well as a good blogger, hurrah! And a groovy fish avatar!
That's the problem wit hold blog comments threads... They can be like a good book with the last page missing.

PS
I skipped to the conclusion of that article and I don't quite get what he's (oops - not just Graffin - they're) saying. It seems to be something along the lines of 'evolutionary scientists see religion as coming from evolution, whilst sociologists see it coming from culture', but then seems to talk about the conflict between 'hard' and 'soft' religion (theistic-ish vs deistic-ish religion) and evolution.
I don't get whether it's focussing on the religion as evolved vs 'created' by culture debate, or the religion/evolution conflicting or not debate.
That of course, would affect whether or not it was biology or philosophy, as discussed in the earlier thread.
I don't suppose you, or anybody who's read the article, can clarify?

Penny, we're building a replica ship because if we don't 2009 will come and go with little legacy of the work people are putting into celebrating Darwin's life and work. The exhibitions and lectures will have come and gone.

We are building a ship because we think science needs an icon around which academics, teachers and students can congregate and participate in the adventure that is science. I've spent six years working on sail training boats, and when young minds get on square riggers great things happen.

We're building it because when the rebuild of HMS Endeavour came to my town 20,000 people turned out to see her, and poured through her decks, learning about James Cook, science and exploration.

It seems to have some traction that trumps your cynicism: the NASA astronaut who drove the Space Agency Agreement came to us to propose the collaboration. Marine scientists are clamouring to working with us because we represent a unique sampling opportunity - there is a worldwide shortage of oceanographic ship capacity and many ordinary ships travel too fast for sampling the sea, or are too polluting to take untainted atmospheric samples. And it's the Beagle, you know the ship thatchanged history. Are you clods?

Indeed it won't be a true replica, her hull lines and rig will be the same as the Beagle in 1831. Gazza "I presume the replica ship is tied up with this - not sure it's something I'm in favour of."

Charles Darwin said 'the voyage of the Beagle has been the most important eventin my life and has detarmined my whole career' (Autobiography). That, along with the publicly stated support of the Darwin/Keynes family, and the droves of scientists from all over the world who have come to us wanting to sail, will do for me.

And (as a British commercial skipper) I feel that Britain sells its sailing and scientific heroes short. Ships have fed us, given us an empire (no value judgements, just saying) and defended us when people have sought to starve or invade these islands. 3 days ago it was the anniversary of Trafalgar Day: had the Royal Navy not tanned Villeneuve's hide, we might have been having this conversation in French. There is no square rigger sailing under the British flag that celebrates those days and that heritage. I think there should be one.

And had the Royal Navy not given the young trainee clergyman Charles Darwin a berth on one of its ships, the history of the field PZ works in might be very different. That's why we're building a Beagle.

Nah. The Victorian spacefarers were more busy with Mad Science. (Many chapters, interspersed in the regular Narbonic which also come highly recommended. Helen Beta Narbon is a MAD biologist after all.)

I could not agree more. I am fed up with all the telescopes, probes and missions to look at what, stars, nova, planets, something called microwave backgroud radiation and, as you say, more dirt and rocks? What good can possibly come from wasting all this time and energy looking beyond the reaches of the earth anyway? What could we possibly learn that we cannot learn by looking in our own back yards, literally? It is time we stop these misadventures once and for all!

@Peter McGrath

I hope I didn't offend when I said I'm not sure I agree with the project - it isn't up to me to approve of it or not really. I was really thinking what I would put my efforts into for 2009.

Certainly 2009 is a good excuse to blow the trumpet for Darwin, evolution and science generally because of the anniversaries. If that is your way of doing it then fine.

But in these days of science cafes, etc, I hope others will be putting their efforts into publising the anniversary and doing the pro-evolution education stuff in their own ways. Blogs like this, though useful, won't get that much public interest as compared to public real life events.

Chris Davis -- the MIT media lab actually did a study (http://people.csail.mit.edu/rahimi/helmet/) showing that aluminum foil amplifies the range of radio frequencies reserved for government satellites... So maybe the anti-idiocy rays would work after all.

Hey don't knock astronomy. cutting edge breakthroughs would be a lot more common if they had enough of the satellites they need. Yay for GLAST!

PZ,

You'll bite your tongue when they discover space-squid.

"I'm just relieved that finally we've found something useful for these space nuts to do -- providing supplemental assistance to a biological and historical project, instead of noodling around staring at space rocks, space debris, and space vapor."

Staring? STARING??? Oh, sure, I guess, sometimes I "stare". Like I love to "stare" at Sepia apama. Yup. They're all pretty critters, "alive" or not, at whatever scale. But that stuff is where planets and biology (and Sepia apama) comes from. That great big natural world containing our tiny mudball covered by innumerable wriggling-thingies also helps proclaim the fallacy of creationism and other foul acts of religious dogma, yes?

(PZ knows. He's just pullin' our astrophysicist tentacles).

Everything I know about satellite tracking of voyages of discovery I learned from Umberto Eco:
http://tinyurl.com/6o3yqh

YOU BASTARD!

how dare you knock the space nuts, why they give us pretty pictures of waves in a sphere of water. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyTwLAW-Z8c) WITHOUT SUCH GREAT CONTRIBUTIONS WHERE WOULD BE ? WHERE WOULD WE BE?

but in all seriousness we have the space program to thank for a lot of things, they're not useless.