jlynch | March 19, 2007Following on from parts one and two, here is the penultimate portion of the talk.
The Binaries of Creationism and The Long War
To many Creationists, Darwin "merely revived ancient paganism, clothed in apparently sophisticated modern apparel, but underneath there was still the same old pantheistic materialism of antiquity", a modern day form of the "evolutionism" of the ancient Greeks, Romans, Babylonians, and others.
This amalgamation of very divergent philosophies and belief-systems is highlighted by Morris' assertion that "if the universe was not created by a transcendent Creator God […
jlynch | March 19, 2007The third-seeded Lady Sun Devils worked past a terrible start, and rallied from a 14-point deficit in the final 11 minutes to beat Louisville 67-58 on Monday night to reach the Sweet Sixteen for the second time in three years. Which is more than the men have been able to do.
jlynch | March 19, 2007March 20th
Events
1916 - Albert Einstein publishes his general theory of relativity.
1987 - The Food and Drug Administration approves anti-AIDS drug AZT.
Births
1735 - Torbern Bergman, Swedish chemist
1879 - Maud Menten, Canadian biochemist
1895 - Fredric Wertham, German-born psychologist
1904 - B. F. Skinner, American psychologist
Deaths
1727 O.S. - Sir Isaac Newton, English physicist
1878 - Julius Robert von Mayer, German physician and physicist
1899 - Franz Ritter von Hauer, Austrian geologist
1940 - Alfred Ploetz, German physician, biologist, and eugenicist
1983 - Ivan Matveyevich…
jlynch | March 18, 2007Following on from yesterday's section, Here's the second installment.
Creationism, Cultural Politics and Clashing Ideologies.
If this were solely an issue of scientific observations or the veracity of hypotheses, it is doubtful that the Creation/Evolution debate would inflame such passions. While purely scientific controversies excite the scientists within the respective fields, they rarely make headlines, and never become part of legislation, or rulings of the Supreme Count. It is clear that what is being argued about here, at least as far as the ICR is concerned,
is the status of biblical…
jlynch | March 18, 2007March 19th
Events
1915 - Pluto is photographed for the first time but was not recognized as a planet
Births
1684 - Jean Astruc, French physician and scholar
1865 - William Morton Wheeler, American entomologist, myrmecologist, pioneer in ethology
1883 - Walter Haworth, British chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1900 - Frédéric Joliot, French physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
1943 - Mario J. Molina, Mexican chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1871 - Wilhelm Karl Ritter von Haidinger, Austrian mineralogist
1914 - Giuseppe Mercalli, Italian volcanologist
1950 - Walter Haworth,…
jlynch | March 18, 2007Over at the Discovery Institute's Media Complaints Division, Casey Luskin makes much of a piece by Peter Williams decrying the use by paleontologist Richard Fortey of the phrase "IDiots". Williams exclaims:
"While Darwinists provided their own name, this childishly rude title does not allow the proponents of the ID theory to choose their own name for their theory. Descending to name-calling is not going to help the Darwinist cause shift the appearance of 'a threatened Establishment'! Rather, it confirms it."
Well, first of all, I'm not a Darwinist, so don't call me one*. Secondly, I don't…
jlynch | March 17, 2007I don't really get cricket. Growing up in Ireland, it was always seen as a British game and the Irish national squad was a bit of a joke. Barring a 1969 win over perennial powerhouse, the West Indies, nothing of note every really happened. Things are now, however, apparently getting interesting. In 1996 Ireland became the inaugural winners of the European Championships and in 2005 a defeat in the ICC
Trophy resulted in a World Cup berth seeded 13 of 16. Which brings us to this week.
On Thursday the squad drew with 9th seeds Zimbabwe. Yesterday, they beat a 4th seed Pakistani squad. Next up?…
jlynch | March 17, 2007March 18th
Events
1906 - Traian Vuia flew a self-propelled heavier-than-air aircraft which took off without any external means
1909 - Einar Dessau uses a short-wave radio transmitter becoming the first radio broadcaster.
1965 - Aleksei Leonov, leaving his spacecraft Voskhod 2 for 12 minutes, becomes the first person to walk in space
Births
1602 - Jacques de Billy, French mathematician
1640 - Philippe de la Hire, French mathematician and astronomer
1690 - Christian Goldbach, Prussian mathematician
1858 - Rudolf Diesel, German inventor
1905 - Thomas Townsend Brown, American scientist
1907 -…
jlynch | March 17, 2007Nearly ten years ago I started a book on Creationist misuse of intellectual history. I never finished it, which is probably for the best. The file is unfortunately MIA and all I have remaining was a section that I turned into a talk that I gave at ASU in 1999. Over the next few days, I'll be posting the text of that talk. Enjoy and feel free to comment.
"Pithecophobes of the World, Unite!"
Revisionist 'History' and Creationist Rhetoric.
"This monkey mythology of Darwin is the cause of permissiveness, promiscuity, pills, prophylactics, perversions, pregnancies, abortions, pornography,…
jlynch | March 17, 2007Ireland have agonizingly missed out on winning the Six Nations 2007 despite beating Italy 51-24 in Rome. Ireland's win meant that France faced Scotland knowing they had to win by a margin of 24 points or more. The French did what they had to, winning by 46-19 thanks to a last-gasp try.
jlynch | March 16, 2007March 17th
1764 - Death of George Parker, 2nd Earl of Macclesfield, English astronomer
1780 - Birth of Thomas Chalmers, Scottish pastor, social reformer, author, and scientist
1782 - Death of Daniel Bernoulli, Dutch-born mathematician
1834 - Birth of Gottlieb Daimler, German engineer and inventor
1846 - Death of Friedrich Bessel, German mathematician and astronomer
1853 - Death of Christian Doppler, Austrian physician and mathematician
1870 - Birth of Horace Donisthorpe, British entomologist
1881 - Birth of Walter Rudolf Hess, Swiss physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate
1950 - Researchers…
jlynch | March 15, 2007March 16th
1750 - Birth of Caroline Herschel, German-born English astronomer
1789 - Birth of Georg Simon Ohm, German physicist
1794 - Birth of Ami Boué, Austrian geologist
1859 - Birth of Alexander Stepanovich Popov, Russian physicist
1867 - First publication of an article by Joseph Lister outlining the discovery of antiseptic surgery, in The Lancet.
1918 - Birth of Frederick Reines, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1925 - Birth of Luis E. Miramontes, Mexican chemist, co-inventor of the combined oral contraceptive pill
1926 - Robert Goddard launches the first liquid-fueled rocket…
jlynch | March 15, 2007
This beauty is a Bornean clouded leopard (Neofelis diardi ), a new species native to Borneo and Sumatra.
For many years the clouded leopard was traditionally regarded as a monotypic genus with four subspecies. But recent molecular genetic analyses (mtDNA, nuclear DNA sequences, microsatellite variation, and cytogenetic differences) have revealed that there is however a strong case for reclassification and the defining of two distinct species of clouded leopard - Neofelis nebulosa (mainland Asia) and Neofelis diardi (Indonesian archipelago). This case for two clouded leopard species based…
jlynch | March 15, 2007March 15th
1713 - Birth of Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, French astronomer
1813 - Birth of John Snow, English physician
1854 - Birth of Emil Adolf von Behring, German physician; Nobel laureate
1890 - Birth of Boris Nikolaevich Delaunay, Russian mathematician
1898 - Death of Henry Bessemer, English metallurgist
1920 - Birth of E. Donnall Thomas, American physician, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
1930 - Birth of Zhores Ivanovich Alferov, Russian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1962 - Death of Arthur Compton, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
2004 - Announcement of the discovery of…
jlynch | March 13, 2007March 14th
1835 - Birth of Giovanni Schiaparelli, Italian astronomer
1854 - Birth of Paul Ehrlich, German scientist, Nobel Prize laureate
1879 - Birth of Albert Einstein, German-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1882 - Birth of Waclaw Sierpinski, Polish mathematician
1995 - Death of William Alfred Fowler, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
jlynch | March 13, 2007Mike Dunford responds to a pedophile ("Sam") that has appeared at Shelley's blog - an idiot who compares the treatment of pedophiles to the treatment of Jews and African-Americans and feels that "[p]edophilia needs no endorsement, it is a beautiful and natural part of the world's culture." Mike handled this in a more restrained manner than I ever could. "Sam" is entitled to spew this crap online - thats why we have a First Amendment. I just hope that he never puts his words into actions.
jlynch | March 12, 2007March 13th
1720 - Birth of Charles Bonnet, Swiss naturalist and writer
1733 - Birth of Joseph Priestley, English scientist and minister
1781 - William Herschel discovers Uranus.
1781 - Charles Messier publishes final catalog of Messier objects.
1781 - Carl Wilhelm Scheele discovers tungsten.
1784 - Birth of Jean Moufot, French philosopher and mathematician
1855 - Birth of Percival Lowell, American astronomer
1899 - Birth of John Hasbrouck van Vleck, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
1925 - The Butler Act in Tennessee prohibits the teaching of evolution. This would lead to the Scopes…
jlynch | March 12, 2007
Image of Io taken by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) on New Horizons at 11:04 Universal Time on February 28, 2007. The picture shows the enormous 290-kilometer (180-mile) high plume from the volcano Tvashtar. See here for more details.