pharyngula

This strange fish is Euphanerops longaevus, which is one of two species of 370 million year old jawless fishes (the other is Endeiolepis aneri, and the paper suggests that they may actually represent differently preserved members of the same species). These are soft-bodied animals that are usually…

This week's collection of carnivals: Carnival of the Liberals #11 I and the Bird #22 Skeptics' Circle #33 Carnival of Education #64 Anyone else feel that it's a shame CoE hasn't hit #66 yet? Otherwise, you got your open thread right here.

Whatever it is, it's very kinky. (via Phil)

Paul Nelson has been twittering about ORFans for some time now—he seems to precede his talks by threatening to make us evolutionists tremble in our boots by bringing them up, but he never seems to follow through. Ian Musgrave got tired of waiting for him to give us a coherent creationist argument…

Here's a description of the contents of her newest book: Though liberalism rejects the idea of God and reviles people of faith, it bears all the attributes of a religion itself. In Godless, Ann Coulter throws open the doors of the Church of Liberalism, showing us: Its sacraments (abortion) Its…

The latest edition of the Tangled Bank is coming straight to you from Coruscant…and the opening text is almost as long as the latest from Lucas, although fortunately it doesn't say anything about the trade federation and boring treaties.

Evolution, the beer, that is.

More than once, I've said that I think the Discovery Institute is on the wane; Dover dealt a serious blow to their credibility, and demonstrated that their strategy was not an effective one for helping creationists get their way. That's really all they had, was the promise that their pseudo-secular…

My fault, the site was screwed up for over an hour—it's a really bad idea to slip when typing "</p>" and type "<?p>" instead.

I just find this whole idea bizarre. President Bush has picked Fox News radio host Tony Snow as his new White House Press Secretary and is expected to announce the choice on Wednesday, a Republican official said. Can we all agree that Fox 'News' is the propaganda arm of the Republican Party now?

There are a number of creationist organizations flourishing in America. One I've criticized many times is the Discovery Institute, which I suspect is now waning in influence after the Dover debacle; another is Answers in Genesis, which is a Mecca for the Young Earth Creationists; and one other is…

Oh, my. Inside Higher Ed has an article that has to be read to be believed: the problem with universities are their faculties, we need to get rid of tenure, hire more part-time, untenured faculty on short term contracts, cut back on those expensive bits of infrastructure like libraries and…

This really is an excellent review of three books in the field of evo-devo— From DNA to Diversity: Molecular Genetics and the Evolution of Animal Design (amzn/b&n/abe/pwll), Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo and the Making of the Animal Kingdom (amzn/b&n/abe/pwll),…

Chuck Olson has captured Geek Prom 2006 on video. Be prepared to be shocked: there's the talent show, the spaz dancing, the coronation, parades of geeks in strange costumes, and most terrifying of all…nerd nudity. Not safe for work or individuals with any sense of taste or propriety.

We're having our last Café Scientifique Morris of the 2005-2006 school year tonight, at 6:00, at the Common Cup Coffeehouse here in beautiful downtown Morris, Minnesota. Our speaker is Mark Logan of the Mathematics discipline, who's going to be talking about "Origami in Math and Science"—that…

I ♥ Bluey, the Body Rights Thingamabob.

Sciencebase has a short article on a potential new aphrodisiac. It's called PT-141, or bremelanotide, or Ac-Nle-cyclo[Asp-His-D-Phe-Arg-Trp-Lys]-OH ("PT-141" is the useful search term if you want to hit up PubMed), and it's a melanocortin agonist that works directly on the brain. It can be…

Should the godless be a little more generous in dealing with believers? Here's an argument that advocates a little more charity; that we ought to recognize that belief in the supernatural is a nearly universal human condition, that it's a useful coping mechanism for dealing with the unknown, and…

I've turned on the requirement to login and register with TypeKey in order to make a comment. Can't stand it? Things not working? Leave a comment (if you can) or mail me (if you can't). This is a trial, we'll see if it works. I'm willing to turn it off again if it causes more grief than it solves…

Poor George. He got bumped from a £3600 a night hotel room by Mick Jagger. Isn't that a little extravagant for a public servant, anyway?

I owe many people some apologies: this site has been quietly eating your comments. There are filters set up to catch and discard spam comments, and they work very well. I'm getting thousand or so junk comments a week that are not making it through to be displayed. Unfortunately, about a 5% of the…

The Mirecki case is over. The trail has gone cold in the investigation of a roadside beating reported late last year by a Kansas University professor. Douglas County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Lt. Kari Wempe said Thursday that detectives had finished their paperwork related to religious studies…

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The editor of the Raw Story has stuck a little preamble on Melinda Barton's piece…the one I criticized yesterday. It makes it worse. Editor's note: If you've arrived here, it wasn't through the RAW STORY main site, but rather one of several blogs that have latched onto this piece as an example of…

If the Argumentum ad Popularum is popular, does that make it right?

I think The Raw Story is supposed to be a progressive political web site…which, unfortunately, means I now have to be greatly embarrassed by my fellow travelers along the great liberal path. Melinda Barton has written a bizarre and poorly supported screed against atheism, or as she'd prefer to call…

Some clown at one of the ID blogs is making an incredibly stupid argument. She is claiming that my statement that I would not vote to give tenure to someone incompetent enough to support Intelligent Design creationism as a science is a violation of the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1991 because, as…

My hometown of Seattle isn't big on that NASCAR thing—instead, they've got over-motored boats scudding and bouncing around the lakes and sound at insane speeds. One reader was nice enough to remind me of the summer rituals, and also that they've got pirates, which is always a plus.

Remember when you went to the high school dance, and all the social strata of the institution were exposed? You knew who the jocks and cheerleaders were, and the stoners and the college preppies, and of course, the geeks, the A/V nerds, the chess club crowd…the ones who didn't show up very often,…

The guy who started the interesting discussion about race is Wilkins—so go argue with him. So far, I'm still on his side of the issue—these claims of correlated groups of linked genes tell us something about ancestry and history, but don't rescue the concept of race at all.