Science

Creationists concede defeat

The ICR has conceded defeat and given up its quest to issue MS degrees here in Texas:

Now, with the federal ruling against ICR, the Texas government may mandate that any private sector college, even those that accept no government funding, may be regulated by the THECB,

…

However, please know that, while ICR’s legal battle is over, we will not retreat from other public efforts to fight the “Dragon” and his minions.

Sorry, but I had to snip out all the crap about how not letting them piss on the furniture is discrimination. You can read the whole thing here.

A Master of Science in Creationism?!

The loons are determined to take over Texas with State Rep. Berman of Tyler introducing a bill that would allow The Institute of Creation Research to grant a Master of Science degree in creationism:

State Rep. Leo Berman (R-Tyler) proposed House Bill 2800 when he learned that The Institute for Creation Research (ICR), a private institution that specializes in the education and research of biblical creationism, was not able to receive a certificate of authority from Texas’ Higher Education Coordinating Board to grant Master of Science degrees.

Berman’s bill would allow private, non-profit educational institutions to be exempt from the board’s authority.

And no, Berman does not accept evolution:

“I don’t believe I came from a salamander that crawled out of a swamp millions of years ago,” Berman told FOXNews.com. "I do believe in creationism. I do believe there are gaps in evolution.

What the fuck is next? A masters in intelligent falling?

Darwin the Abolitionist?

Did you know that Charles Darwin was an abolitionist as were other of his family members and that it may have motivated his research into natural selection?

Science historians Adrian Desmond and James Moore have compiled compelling new evidence which reveals Darwin was passionately opposed to slavery and this was the moral impetus behind his work.

Private notes and letters uncovered by the pair reveal that Darwin’s opinions on slavery were far stronger than had previously been believed.

Notebooks from his five year voyage on HMS Beagle, during which Darwin first began to form his famous theories on natural selection, detail his revulsion at the slavery he witnessed in South America.

The historians have also discovered letters written by Darwin’s sisters, cousins and aunts that reveal the family as highly active abolitionists. Darwin’s grandfather and uncles were also key members of the anti-slavery movement.

The pair claim in a new book that Darwin partly chose to highlight the common descent of man from apes to show that all races were equal, as a rebuttal to those who insisted black people were a different, and inferior, species from those with white skin.

I find this interesting because it points out something that often goes unrecognized. The connection between “creationism” and white supremacy.

Consider for a moment that the people most likely to have a conniption fit over the teaching of evolution are straight white Christian men who are also prone to fits about the civil and humane treatment of anyone who isn’t a straight white Christian man.

Reality rules! Superstition Drools!

Or in the words of Adam of Daylight Atheism:

…the age of reason is also an age of wonder. The devotees of superstition and pseudoscience do not know what they are missing. In grasping after fool’s gold, they have missed the true vein. The universe is a grander, more majestic and more beautiful place than any human being has ever imagined, or can imagine. The unsubstantiated and anthrocentric claims and inventions of people can never compare to the true wonder and mystery held by reality as it truly is, and now that we truly have begun to understand how the cosmos works, we are at last getting a glimpse of that awe and wonder.

Consider what we witness when we peer into the cosmos with our telescopic eyes. We see light born billions of years ago in the crucible of dying stars, shining out across the cosmos and becoming ever more diffused, until at last our telescopes captured the lonely few photons that arrive bearing news of stupendous, ancient catastrophes. We see colliding galaxies, matter swirling into the abyss of black holes, and stars exploding with titanic force, sending out jets of energy visible across the known universe.

I simply insist that you leave my site and read the whole post over at Adam’s.

Quote of the day: Albert Einstein on God

Albert-Einstein “It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. … Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust.

A man’s ethical behaviour should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.”

-Albert Einstein

Evolution vs. Creationism, the Texas version

evolution

It looks like Texas is planning to enter the “debate” over the teaching of evolution. After fighting for nearly three years about how to teach children to read, the Texas Board of Education has decided to take on the science curriculum this summer.

One of the goals of the board is to undermine the teaching of evolution by making it a requirement to teach the “strengths and weaknesses” evolution. Vice Chairman David Bradley of Beaumont calls this “hogwash”, but goes on to say that “evolution is not a fact. Evolution is a theory and, as such, cannot be proven. Student need to be able to jump to their own conclusions” (source).

And what better way to have them “jump” to the conclusion that magic man did it than by forcing teachers to bluntly lie about evolution?

Ted Turner: Global Warming will lead to cannibalism

Here’s something to perk you up this morning. According to Ted Turner, 30 to 40 years from now most of humanity will be dead because the planet will be eight degrees hotter causing a near total crop failure. The survivors will be living in a failed state such as Sudan or Somalia and will have to draw sticks I suppose to see who gets to be dinner.

If steps aren’t taken to stem global warming, “We’ll be eight degrees hotter in 30 or 40 years and basically none of the crops will grow,” Turner said during a wide-ranging, hour-long interview with PBS’s Charlie Rose that aired Tuesday.

“Most of the people will have died and the rest of us will be cannibals,” said Turner, 69. “Civilization will have broken down. The few people left will be living in a failed state — like Somalia or Sudan — and living conditions will be intolerable.”

If that isn’t enough to tick people off (ask yourself this: when’s the last time you heard a white man talk about cannibalism becoming a part of survival for white people), his comments on the Iraqi resistance are sure to. In the same interview he stated that the Iraqi resistance members are ‘patriots’ who don’t like us because we invaded their country. He went on to say that we (American civilians) if they’d taken over Washington, DC.

I think that they’re patriots and that they don’t like us because we’ve invaded their country and occupied it. I think if the Iraqis were in Washington, D.C., we’d be doing the same thing: we’d be bombing them too. Nobody wants to be invaded.

I have to say I agree with that statement. I don’t know how it was in Iraq before our invasion, but America is stuffed to the gills with patriots/nationalists and I have no doubt that any invasive force would find out that there were far worse things than dying.

British lab creates 3 parent embryos

An apparent breakthrough has been made in the treatment of serious diseases with a British lab claiming that it has made up to 10 embryos from two women and one man. If all goes well it could lead to the eradication of inheritable diseases by lowering the chance of women passing those genes on to their children.

The Newcastle University team believe the technique could help to eradicate a whole class of hereditary diseases, including some forms of epilepsy.

The embryos have been created using DNA from a man and two women in lab tests.

It could ensure women with genetic defects do not pass the diseases on to their children.

The technique is intended to help women with diseases of the mitochondria – mini organelles that are found within individual cells.

They are sometimes described as “cellular power plants” because they generate most of the cell’s energy.

Faults in the mitochondrial DNA can cause around 50 known diseases, some of which lead to disability and death.

About one in every 6,500 people is affected by such conditions, which include fatal liver failure, stroke-like episodes, blindness, muscular dystrophy, diabetes and deafness.

At present, no treatment for mitochondrial diseases exists.

All I can say is “wow!”. This is major. Critics of the research are toting out the “designer baby” argument, but I think that’s bunk. What’s so bad about eradicating biological diseases such as diabetes and muscular dystrophy to name just a few things that appear to be inherited from our mothers?

Pope Benedict: Don’t fire me, bro!

The Bishop of Rome has once again opened his mouth about science, this time declaring that science must be accompanied by research in “anthropology, philosophy and theology” to give insight into “man’s own mystery, because no science can say who man is, where he comes from or where he is going”, the Pope said.

Science, of course, has already answered those questions. Thanks to some brave folks (theist and atheist) we know we’re nearly hairless apes who evolved from other primates in a “line” that stretches back billions of years and after a very brief stretch of time we die and and the atoms that make up our bodies go on to make other things.

That the pope and other like minded individuals and groups don’t like those answers means absolutely nothing. Of course, the truth of the matter is theology has lost so much ground over the centuries it’s almost amazing. The ground it lost is now occupied various branches of science.

Theology really has only one factual issue left and that is where life itself came from and the scientists are closing in on the answer to that question. Theology is quite at risk at being the things fairy dust and magic men are made of and is in fact one of humanity’s greatest testaments to the sheer arrogance we are capable of.

Why does the Bishop of Rome rail against (implicitly) godless science? Because various branches of it undermines the theological idea that our species is the center of everything that was, is and ever will be. We cannot be “”respected as the centre of creation” because we are not.

Science has humbled us and it’s essentially kicked theology’s arrogant little ass and one day we may finally get to the point where we look all the theologists in the eye and state in a clear voice:

“Dude, you’re fired.”

Ben Stein is bribing schools to watch his movie

As you may be aware, Ben Stein is starring in the movie “Expelled”, a pseudo-documentary about how creationists are being systematically shut out of American academics by evolutionists. The whole thing has been a shady affair with the producer Mark Mathis lying to people such as PZ Myers, Richard Dawkins and Eugenie Scott in order to get them to agree to interviews.

Now it seems they’re bribing “Christian” schools to have their students, faculty and adult community members watch the movie by offering up to $10,000 to the school that returns the most ticket stubs:

To engage Christian schools to get as many students, parents, and faculty from your school out to see Ben Stein’s new movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (opening in theaters April 2008).

Here are some suggestions as to how to do that:

Organize a school field trip and invite parents to attend as well.
Offer extra credit to your students to go on their own time.

What is the reward?

Generous donations can be awarded to schools according to the number of movie ticket stubs they turn in. By accepting this challenge, your school could be awarded a donation up to $10,000, just for bringing your kids to see this film!

Your school will be awarded a donation based upon the number of ticket stubs you turn in (see submission instructions in FAQ section). That structure is as follows:

0-99 ticket stubs submitted = $5 per ticket stub
100-299 ticket stubs submitted = $1,000 donated to your school
300-499 ticket stubs submitted = $2,500 donated to your school
500 ticket stubs submitted = $5,000 donated to your school

Each school across the nation will be competing for the top honor of submitting the most ticket stubs with that school having their $5,000 donation matched for a total donation of $10,000!

I’ve never liked Ben Stein so I’ve lost no respect for him, but damn. Is he expecting the movie to bomb so bad he’s got to pay people to see it if just to come out even??

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