pharyngula

As I mentioned before in my review of Stuart Pivar's LifeCode: The Theory of Biological Self Organization, I'm actually sympathetic to the ideas of developmental structuralism. This is the concept that physical, mechanical, and chemical properties make a significant and underappreciated…

It's never too early to start advertising: Skatje is starting up a new campus organization next fall, with another student, Collin Tierney, as co-chair. The group is called the Campus Atheists, Skeptics, and Humanists - Morris Chapter, and if you're an interested UMM student, they'd like you to…

Blake Stacey has taken the first step towards becoming another Mike Godwin or Bruce Salem*: Blake's Law has a Wikipedia page. *Relative obscurity, known only for a kneejerk phrase on the web?

Why me, O Lord, why me? One of the more recent books sent to me is Thank God for Evolution!: How the Marriage of Science and Religion Will Transform Your Life and Our World(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll) by Michael Dowd. I have read it, and I'm feeling biblical. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?…

The new burned-over district lies in the wreckage of Russia — take a look at the new weird cults flowering in Siberia. Jesus is hanging out on a hilltop there, even. There's something strange in the human brain that, when people are uncertain and stripped of security and bewildered by too much…

The New York Times is reporting that Adnan Oktar aka Harun Yahya, the Turkish creationist, has sent a mass mailing of his fancy, glossy, Atlas of Creation to scientists all over the country. It's an 800-page, professional piece of work, even if the contents are garbage. These Islamic creationists…

A religious group in England is terribly upset at the lack of respect their beliefs have received lately. In particular, they are indignant at the mockery made of one of their holy sites. (Careful on clicking through—fortunately, I saw this at a late hour of the night, or my howls of laughter might…

This is all topsy-turvy. Iceland was raided by pirates 380 years ago? I should hope they would have responded by manning the longships and returning the favor.

Weirdness comes in waves, I guess. Both Karmen and Kevin are talking about strange road signs. I've got a sign to top them. This is a sign … of the Apocalypse!!! Wait…not enough exclamation points or emphasis. A SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE!!!!! I'm not kidding, man. Seriously. According to Rapture…

One of the traditional ways to explain a scientific subject is the historical approach: start at the beginning of the endeavor and explain why people asked the questions they did, how they answered them, and how each answer blossomed into new potential. It's a popular way of teaching science, too,…

Ema finds a typical case of a newspaper article that mangles the whole idea of Plan B contraception. It's really not that hard to understand. Is it just that there are so many lies out there from the anti-family-planning mob that lazy journalists are easily confused?

Sheril seems like a well-intentioned person, but when she decides to step into the science/religion wars, it's a horrendous mistake to label atheists as "fundamentalists" (a term I despise) and compare me to Rush Limbaugh. Without even saying a word about her position on the issue, it's quite clear…

This may sound like pro-religion news, but it's really not: Wal-Mart is going to sell Jesus action figures. Maybe it is spreading religious mythology through cheap general stores, but it is also the commodification of a religious hero…so it's devaluing Jesus. The other thing to consider is what…

As a major fan of Natalie Angier, I was well-disposed to favor The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll) — and overall, my opinion of the book is favorable. I'm afraid, though, that it's filling a very narrow niche and most of my readers here won't be…

Religion can be used to justify anything. Even the virtues of killing the innocent. It's amazing how the combination of needing to control sexual behavior and the presence of an accommodating religious impulse can lead to deeply deranged behavior. A Cypress man charged in the death of a Southwest…

No, I don't mean the infamous cruise of diarrhea and vomiting, I mean something far, far worse — a trip that would make a week locked in the head with fluids gushing from your orifices seem enticing. I mean… The National Review's Cruise. Neo-cons. Casual racism. William F. Buckley, Dinesh D'Souza,…

Some of you have noticed I've irked Stuart Pivar with my review of his old book, Lifecode, and as he's been quick to tell me, he has made substantial revisions in his new version, which has the same name. Anyway, he has left comments here, here, here, here, and here, and I've got a mailbox…

I cringed.

You better watch out, because Skatje is glaring at us, and she shoots laser beams out of her eyes.

I never did trust those astronomers. Now I learn that they have been conspiring to keep us stupid.

Weirdly, Phil Plait expresses some of the same sentiments that I did in my last post. I probably shouldn't have consented to those Borg implants.

This week, I tossed off a casual, flippant comment that launched a thousand ineffectual bastinados. I described a map that purported to show the frequency of religious adherents in the US this way: It shows the concentration of ignorant, deluded, wicked, foolish, or oppressed victims of obsolete…

There is a little girl dying of cancer in Seattle (there are, of course, little girls dying of cancer everywhere). There's a positive aspect to the story, of a community pulling together and providing support for her family, but there is also a poisonous taint to it all—most of the support isn't…

Did you know… …that men never get abortions? If you aren't strong enough to have that baby, you've got no grounds to complain about male privilege. …some of the instruments used in abortions are just like the ones used in transgender surgery? …that every woman who gets an abortion would…

As Revere points out, Michael Moore gave Sanjay Gupta a whomping. What I missed in the Moore-Gupta match, though, was the big picture. Basically, they argued over details: Gupta put together a "fact check" that claimed Moore fudged various numbers, while Moore showed that his numbers were…

Gee, people seem to have slowed in sending me announcements, or it's a slow summer week, but I only have two carnivals to report: I and the Bird #53 (it's their second anniversary!) and Friday Ark #147. I can also say that next week is time for the Tangled Bank, to be held at The Voltage Gate on…

You can listen in on George Johnson's and Sean Carroll's conversation at Bloggingheads right now. I'm doing this next week with John Horgan, so I should have closed my eyes—Sean is so much prettier than I am. Don't let that stop you, though. It's interesting stuff throughout, and one of the better…

This is turning up all over the place — at Brad DeLong's, Crooked Timber, and this pair is from Cosmic Variance — it's the most sublimely, awesomely, wickedly stupid example of fudging a curve ever. The two graphs below have exactly the same data points, and the only difference is the curve that…

It's like a flood of papers on that curious cnidarian worm, Buddenbrockia. Now you can also read about its thoroughly bizarre pattern of development — there are unicellular amoeboids, plasmodial masses, and syncytia involved, so be prepared to be titillated.

Professor Steve Steve, how could you? He will be going into rehab, and promises never to do it again. (via Zeno)