History and Philosophy (often of Science)
jlynch | May 16, 2008Philosopher Robert Solomon in Waking Life:
The reason why I refuse to take existentialism as just another French fashion or historical curiosity is that I think it has something very important to offer us for the new century. I'm afraid we're losing the real virtues of living life passionately, sense of taking responsibility for who you are, the ability to make something of yourself and feeling good about life.
Existentialism is often discussed as if it's a philosophy of despair. But I think the truth is just the opposite. Sartre once interviewed said he never really felt a day of despair…
jlynch | May 13, 2008A new letter has surfaced from Einstein which would appear to once and for all clarify his views on theism. Writing to Eric Gutkind (Jan 3rd 1954), Einstein states:
The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this.
Later in the letter he describes religions as "an incarnation of the most childish superstitions." So once again, I think we can classify Einstein’s "God" as the God of…
jlynch | May 12, 2008It seems Stuart Kauffman has come out as a pantheist. Discussing his new book Reinventing the Sacred: A New View of Science, Reason, and Religion for New Scientist, he writes:
The unfolding of the universe - biotic, and perhaps abiotic too - appears to be partially beyond natural law. In its place is a ceaseless creativity, with no supernatural creator ...
Shall we use the "God" word? We do not have to, yet it is still our most powerful invented symbol. Our sense of God has evolved from Yahweh in the desert some 4500 years ago, a jealous, law-giving warrior God, to the God of love that Jesus…
jlynch | April 27, 2008With much time being now spent by ID supporters on the Darwin/Eugenics meme (as opposed to any actual research), it is worth while revisiting this essay by Dennis Durst which discusses the engagement evangelicals had with eugenics between 1900 and 1940. Durst notes:
[O]n the whole the evangelical mainstream in the decades following the turn of the century appeared apathetic, acquiescent, or at times downright supportive of the eugenics movement. In this article, I argue that the evangelicals often accepted eugenics as a part of a progressive, reformist vision that uncritically fused the…
jlynch | April 26, 2008Onias raises an interesting question (to which I have no answer) in another thread, namely:
I was wondering if any of you folks at science blogs can discuss the issue of LGBT people in science. Apart from Jim Pollack, Alan Turing and a few others, we seem to be underrepresented. Is it due to something essential or innate in queer people? Is it because there is cultural pressure for gay people to work in other disciplines like fashion etc.?
Have at it folks. Any thoughts?
jlynch | April 21, 2008I want to share one of my favorite quotes ever from an historian of science: George Sarton writing in his magisterial (and sadly unfinished) A History of Science:
The influence of Timaeus upon later times was enormous and essentially evil. A large portion of Timaeus had been translated into Latin by Chalcidius (IV-1), and that translation remained for over eight centuries the only Platonic text known to the Latin West. Yet the fame of Plato had reached them, and thus the Latin Timaeus became a kind of Platonic evangel which many scholars were ready to interpret literally. The scientific…
jlynch | April 20, 2008Wilkins has a little Aesopian fable that you may want to read.
Still grading, so your Monday Mustelid will be late ... i.e. not on Monday!
jlynch | April 18, 2008Some quickies ...
The University of Oklaholma has announced its year-long Darwin 2009 celebration: This View of Life. Apparently it is being launched on February 12th with a public lecture by some guy called Lynch. Yeah, that Lynch. More of that later, no doubt.
Set Ben Straight and win stuff. See here.
Ed Brayton revisits the Sternberg affair for E-skeptic.
The Pandas Thumb has been continually blogging reviews of Expelled as they roll in. Wander on over to witness the carnage (includes a bonus ’D’ grade from BeliefNet).
Jim Lippard has revisited his predictions for Expelled’s opening…
jlynch | April 17, 2008Hofstra University solicits submissions for an interdisciplinary conference titled "Darwin’s Reach: A Celebration of Darwin’s Legacy across Academic Disciplines," to be held March 12-14, 2009.
Primatologist Frans de Waal, paleontologist Niles Eldredge, and Judge John Jones (who wrote the Dover decision on teaching evolution) will be among the keynote speakers.
Darwin’s Reach examines the impact of Darwin and Darwinian evolution on science and society in celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Robert Darwin and the sesquicentennial of the publication of Darwin’s On the…
jlynch | April 16, 2008Darwin’s papers held at Cambridge are now online. Major props to John van Wyhe and the people at the Darwin Online project for this.
jlynch | March 29, 2008Matt Nisbet has coughed up yet another post on PZ and framing. It begins:
You don’t have to be a social scientist to recognize that the distribution of opinion among people who comment at Scienceblogs is very different from the perspective found among the wider science community and even among leaders in the atheist movement.
As I pointed out:
This is a little data-free, now isn’t it? No information on views "among the wider science community" and a link to a single comment by D.J. Grothe (who may or may nor be a leader "in the atheist movement"). As I said before, the issue here is not…
jlynch | March 29, 2008If it wasn’t enough that PZ is wondering why Ben Stein doesn’t have it in for Newton (what with his clear connection to Nazism), Orac now wonders:
The above principles for eliminating the Jew from Nazi territory are clearly those of Pasteur and Koch, not Charles Darwin, and Hitler repeated this rationale on many occasions, as did his underlings! Oh, the perfidy! Where is Ben Stein on this one? How is it that he can’t recognize the true sources of Hitler’s evil. Not Charles Darwin. Robert Koch and Louis Pasteur!
All goes to show how simplistic the cdesign proponentsist view of history is.
jlynch | March 17, 2008Births
1640 - Philippe de la Hire, French mathematician and astronomer
1905 - Thomas Townsend Brown, American scientist
1907 - John Zachary Young, British biologist
Deaths
1907 - Marcellin Berthelot, French chemist
jlynch | March 16, 2008Events
1950 - Researchers announce the creation of Californium.
Births
1870 - Horace Donisthorpe, British entomologist
1881 - Walter Rudolf Hess, Swiss physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate
1931 - David Peakall, British scientist
Deaths
1764 - George Parker, 2nd Earl of Macclesfield, English astronomer
1846 - Friedrich Bessel, German mathematician and astronomer
1853 - Christian Doppler, Austrian physician and mathematician
1956 - Irene Joliot-Curie, French physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
1983 - Haldan Keffer Hartline, American physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate
jlynch | March 15, 2008Events
1867 - Publication of an article by Joseph Lister outlining the discovery of antiseptic surgery.
Births
1750 - Caroline Herschel, German-born English astronomer
1789 - Georg Simon Ohm, German physicist
1794 - Ami Boué, Austrian geologist
1834 - James Hector, Scottish geologist
1851 - Martinus Beijerinck, Dutch microbiologist and botanist
1918 - Frederick Reines, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
1937 - Amos Tversky, Israeli psychologist
Deaths
1935 - John James Richard Macleod, Scottish-born physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate
1998 - Derek Harold Richard Barton,…
jlynch | March 15, 2008John Wilkins and I have been at the Edges and Boundaries of Biological Objects workshop here in Salt Lake City for the past few days. John live-blogged some of the talks, so you may want to check his posts out. Lots of interesting stuff was discussed about populations (here and here), the fossil record (here), ecosystems (here and here), system dynamics and boundaries (here and here), DNA bar-coding (here and here), species, rank-free classification, and homology. All in all some really thought-provoking ideas that will take me a good while to digest.
Discussions are likely to continue at the…
jlynch | March 14, 2008Events
2004 - Announcement of the discovery of 90377 Sedna, the farthest natural object in the Solar system so far observed.
Births
1713 - Nicolas Louis de Lacaille, French astronomer
1813 - John Snow, English epidemiologist
1821 - Johann Josef Loschmidt, Austrian scientist
1854 - Emil Adolf von Behring, German physician and Nobel Prize laureate
1920 - E. Donnall Thomas, American physician and Nobel Prize laureate
1925 - Bert Bolin, Swedish meteorologist
1930 - Zhores Ivanovich Alferov, Russian physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1898 - Henry Bessemer, English metallurgist
1951 -…
jlynch | March 13, 2008Events
1942 - John Bumstead and Orvan Hess became the first in the world to successfully treat a patient, Anne Miller, using penicillin.
Births
1835 - Giovanni Schiaparelli, Italian astronomer
1854 - Paul Ehrlich, German scientist and Nobel Prize laureate
1862 - Vilhelm Bjerknes, Norwegian physicist
1879 - Albert Einstein, German-born physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1995 - William Alfred Fowler, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
jlynch | March 13, 2008Events
1781 - William Herschel discovers Uranus.
1925 - Scopes Trial: A law in Tennessee prohibits the teaching of evolution.
1930 - The news of the discovery of Pluto was telegraphed to the Harvard College Observatory.
Births
1720 - Charles Bonnet, Swiss naturalist and writer
1733 - Joseph Priestley, English scientist
1855 - Percival Lowell, American astronomer
1899 - John Hasbrouck van Vleck, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1773 - Philibert Commerçon, French naturalist and explorer
1990 - Bruno Bettelheim, American psychiatrist
jlynch | March 12, 2008Births
1824 - Gustav Kirchhoff, German physicist
1835 - Simon Newcomb, American astronomer and mathematician
1838 - William Henry Perkin, English chemist
1863 - Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian mineralogist
1880 - Henry Drysdale Dakin, British-American biochemist
1881 - Gunnar Nordström, Finnish physicist
1907 - Dorrit Hoffleit, American astronomer
1925 - Leo Esaki, Japanese physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Deaths
1991 - Ragnar Granit, Finnish neuroscientist and Nobel Prize laureate