My New and Hot for this week is the research I'm currently working on at the Heller Lab in the Biology Department here at Stanford.
Dr. Bud Ruby is currently researching circadian rhythms--namely sleep/wake cycles--in Siberian hamsters. Circadian rhythms are daily cycles that are highly conserved throughout nature. While nearly every organism displays sleep/wake cycles, no one currently understands their exact role. Dr. Ruby's lab is studying their effects on both immunology and learning & memory.
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Kate's New and Hot (Week 2)
Pseudo-Darwinism?
Hey all,
My new and hot this week is from Evolution News & Views from the Discovery Institute.
Here's the link: http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/04/pseudodarwinism.html
In this article, Michael Egnor tries to defend his view that Darwin had nothing to do with the discovery of the structure of DNA and the genetic code....or anything else really. This bio stuff isn't really my area of expertise, so I was hoping some of you humbio kids might have some interesting ideas about this. Egnor begins the article with a rebuttal of an argument made by biologist Reed Cartwright, whose response, to my never-ending amusement, can be accessed here.
Here is an excerpt from Egnor's article:
"This is the age of pseudo-Darwinism. Pseudo-Darwinism is the synthesis of Darwin’s theory and ‘anything you can think of.’ We have the synthesis of Darwin's theory and the discovery of the genetic code. We have the synthesis of Darwin’s theory and the biotech industry (transgenic organisms are designed and bred to produce human insulin—thanks to Darwin!). We have the synthesis of Darwin's theory and cancer research. We have the synthesis of Darwin’s theory and psychology (evolutionary psychology), Darwin’s theory and sociology (sociobiology), Darwin’s theory and culture (memes), Darwin’s theory and literature (literary Darwinism), Darwin’s theory and cosmology (multiverses), and Darwin’s theory and, well, everything (Dennett’s universal acid). None of these have anything to do with Darwin’s theory—the theory that all natural biological complexity arose by non-teleological variation and natural selection." (par. 9)
I'm not quite sure what to think about this...other than maybe they're both crazy. Any opinions?
Amazon review of the autobiography is up here.
See you next week,
Kate
Hey all,
My new and hot this week is from Evolution News & Views from the Discovery Institute.
Here's the link: http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/04/pseudodarwinism.html
In this article, Michael Egnor tries to defend his view that Darwin had nothing to do with the discovery of the structure of DNA and the genetic code....or anything else really. This bio stuff isn't really my area of expertise, so I was hoping some of you humbio kids might have some interesting ideas about this. Egnor begins the article with a rebuttal of an argument made by biologist Reed Cartwright, whose response, to my never-ending amusement, can be accessed here.
Here is an excerpt from Egnor's article:
"This is the age of pseudo-Darwinism. Pseudo-Darwinism is the synthesis of Darwin’s theory and ‘anything you can think of.’ We have the synthesis of Darwin's theory and the discovery of the genetic code. We have the synthesis of Darwin’s theory and the biotech industry (transgenic organisms are designed and bred to produce human insulin—thanks to Darwin!). We have the synthesis of Darwin's theory and cancer research. We have the synthesis of Darwin’s theory and psychology (evolutionary psychology), Darwin’s theory and sociology (sociobiology), Darwin’s theory and culture (memes), Darwin’s theory and literature (literary Darwinism), Darwin’s theory and cosmology (multiverses), and Darwin’s theory and, well, everything (Dennett’s universal acid). None of these have anything to do with Darwin’s theory—the theory that all natural biological complexity arose by non-teleological variation and natural selection." (par. 9)
I'm not quite sure what to think about this...other than maybe they're both crazy. Any opinions?
Amazon review of the autobiography is up here.
See you next week,
Kate
Darwin's cane toads
WOW!So far I am very impressed with the postings
Here is a fun little item I came across on cane toads:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17809210/
Not only is the story about the interrelationship of organisms - disturbed, but it rather convincingly disputes any notion that organisms that evolve in any niche are going to be the best suited for reproductive success in that niche.
It is also cool because these creatures are so bizarre.
Simpson's aficionados will recognize them as key players in the Australia episode.
Check out the little one on top of the big one.
But my favorite part is that they are taking over Darwin, Australia.
Coincidence???
Josh's New and Hot
The (unnecessary) controversy between "intelligent design" and "darwinism" continues!
Even though this article comes to us courtesy of the The Gospel Herald, it gives a rather straightforward account of the recent uproar at Southern Methodist University over an intelligent design conference. Click here for the article.
In brief, a very conservative Christian group called the "Discovery Institute" is hosting an intelligent design conference this weekend at Southern Methodist University (SMU). In late march the anthropology, biology, and geology departments sent similar letters signed by the faculty objecting to the event. The letter from the Anthropology department read, "These are conferences of and for believers and their sympathetic recruits. They have no place on an academic campus." In response to this critism, the event's organizers invited the professors to speak which they just recently declined.
The fact that this conference is occuring at all is, of course, troubling in itself. But occurring, it is. The question then is whether it is appropriate to be held at an institution of higher learning.
It is understandable that the science professors were so incensed the presence of such a conference that clearly undermines some very basic principles upon which their entire fields rest. Clearly research has been conducted and scholarship advanced all under the basic principle that evolution is a fact. To have to defend this position would be as if the math department, after publishing for years on incredibly complex theories, was asked to host a conference asserting that 2+2 was not equal to 4. Why should these professors be asked to denigrate themselves by joining a pseudo-scientific "debate" that really is only a debate to a select group of religious fanatics?
Also, check out my Amazon Book Review of Darwin's Autobiography here.
One last "Also", Here are some cool Youtube videos that I found.
Even though this article comes to us courtesy of the The Gospel Herald, it gives a rather straightforward account of the recent uproar at Southern Methodist University over an intelligent design conference. Click here for the article.
In brief, a very conservative Christian group called the "Discovery Institute" is hosting an intelligent design conference this weekend at Southern Methodist University (SMU). In late march the anthropology, biology, and geology departments sent similar letters signed by the faculty objecting to the event. The letter from the Anthropology department read, "These are conferences of and for believers and their sympathetic recruits. They have no place on an academic campus." In response to this critism, the event's organizers invited the professors to speak which they just recently declined.
The fact that this conference is occuring at all is, of course, troubling in itself. But occurring, it is. The question then is whether it is appropriate to be held at an institution of higher learning.
It is understandable that the science professors were so incensed the presence of such a conference that clearly undermines some very basic principles upon which their entire fields rest. Clearly research has been conducted and scholarship advanced all under the basic principle that evolution is a fact. To have to defend this position would be as if the math department, after publishing for years on incredibly complex theories, was asked to host a conference asserting that 2+2 was not equal to 4. Why should these professors be asked to denigrate themselves by joining a pseudo-scientific "debate" that really is only a debate to a select group of religious fanatics?
Also, check out my Amazon Book Review of Darwin's Autobiography here.
One last "Also", Here are some cool Youtube videos that I found.
Richard Dawkins interviews the Bishop of Oxford
A BBC Newsnight Report from December 4, 2006 about the debate between Evolution and Intelligent Design
Becca's New and Hot-- Week 2
My new and hot tidbit, located at http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-bchapman_10edi.ART.State.Edition1.43d902d.html, asks (from the perspective of an intelligent design supporter): "Are the Darwinists afraid to debate us?"
What a fascinating spin on the issue-- the reason it is difficult for Darwinists and intelligent design supporters have trouble finding common ground is that the Darwinists are afraid that they're wrong. According to the article, "it is disheartening" that science professors object to the intelligent design scientists and philosophers who wish to speak at a conference at Southern Methodist University. Bruce Chapman and John West, two supposed scientists at a think tank, complain that "unfortunately, would-be censors are trying to get the conference banned from campus by ludicrously comparing intelligent design proponents to faith healers or even Holocaust deniers." This is an interesting, if inflammatory, comparison. Few in the United States would dare to deny the existence of the Holocaust-- that would be ludicrous. Far from the comparison being ludicrous, as the writer states, I wonder if supporting intelligent design is indeed equally absurd as denying the Holocaust. Is it possible for a Holocaust denier and a non-denier (believer?) to find common ground to even begin a debate? Can evolutionists and intelligent design supporters "engage in genuine dialogue", as the authors believe they should? In both cases, the approach and evidence to the issue are so entirely opposite that it's hard to see how they could. Darwinists are not so much afraid to debate intelligent design proponents as unable.
Becca
What a fascinating spin on the issue-- the reason it is difficult for Darwinists and intelligent design supporters have trouble finding common ground is that the Darwinists are afraid that they're wrong. According to the article, "it is disheartening" that science professors object to the intelligent design scientists and philosophers who wish to speak at a conference at Southern Methodist University. Bruce Chapman and John West, two supposed scientists at a think tank, complain that "unfortunately, would-be censors are trying to get the conference banned from campus by ludicrously comparing intelligent design proponents to faith healers or even Holocaust deniers." This is an interesting, if inflammatory, comparison. Few in the United States would dare to deny the existence of the Holocaust-- that would be ludicrous. Far from the comparison being ludicrous, as the writer states, I wonder if supporting intelligent design is indeed equally absurd as denying the Holocaust. Is it possible for a Holocaust denier and a non-denier (believer?) to find common ground to even begin a debate? Can evolutionists and intelligent design supporters "engage in genuine dialogue", as the authors believe they should? In both cases, the approach and evidence to the issue are so entirely opposite that it's hard to see how they could. Darwinists are not so much afraid to debate intelligent design proponents as unable.
Becca
Dani's New & Hot (Week 2)
Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus (2006)
"Flock of Dodos is the first feature documentary (84 mins.) to present both sides of the Intelligent Design/Evolution clash that appeared on the covers of Time and Newsweek in 2005. Filmmaker and former Evolutionary Ecologist Dr. Randy Olson tries to make sense of the issue by visiting his home state of Kansas. At first it seems the problem lies with intelligent design -- a movement labeled recently as "breathtaking inanity" by a federal judge -- but when a group of evolutionists convene for a night of poker and discussion they end up sounding themselves like...a flock of dodos." - Official Website
Go to the official website (http://www.flockofdodos.com/) and there's a funny trailer. I think it would be interesting to watch this movie. Reviews say that it presents a well-balanced argument for both sides of the debate even though the filmmaker is an evolutionist.
The "Flock of Dodos" title serves as a metaphor. Originally, when Portuguese sailors arrived at the island of Mauritius, they found that the dodo bird was a great prey because it was not afraid of humans and could not fly. And since the bird could not evolve in order to avoid predation, it became extinct by the 17th century. The movie attempts to find the contemporary dodos in the evolution vs. intelligent design debate; which belief will survive in today's society?
---
As a brief background, in 2005 both Time and Newsweek published articles discussing the intelligent design vs. evolution debate. Also in 2005, in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case, a US federal court ruled against the Dover (Pennsylvania) school district's decision to teach intelligent design (that some higher intelligence created the universe) in science classes as an alternative to the subject of evolution. The main argument was that because intelligent design had no supporting scientific evidence, it is "essentially religious in nature." (Wikipedia.org)
Here's a link for more information about intelligent design: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design
Here's a link for more information about dodo birds:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodo
---
Amazon.com review is up at http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Charles-Darwin-1809-1882/dp/0393310698/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-5828627-0155228?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1176241364&sr=8-1
"Flock of Dodos is the first feature documentary (84 mins.) to present both sides of the Intelligent Design/Evolution clash that appeared on the covers of Time and Newsweek in 2005. Filmmaker and former Evolutionary Ecologist Dr. Randy Olson tries to make sense of the issue by visiting his home state of Kansas. At first it seems the problem lies with intelligent design -- a movement labeled recently as "breathtaking inanity" by a federal judge -- but when a group of evolutionists convene for a night of poker and discussion they end up sounding themselves like...a flock of dodos." - Official Website
Go to the official website (http://www.flockofdodos.com/) and there's a funny trailer. I think it would be interesting to watch this movie. Reviews say that it presents a well-balanced argument for both sides of the debate even though the filmmaker is an evolutionist.
The "Flock of Dodos" title serves as a metaphor. Originally, when Portuguese sailors arrived at the island of Mauritius, they found that the dodo bird was a great prey because it was not afraid of humans and could not fly. And since the bird could not evolve in order to avoid predation, it became extinct by the 17th century. The movie attempts to find the contemporary dodos in the evolution vs. intelligent design debate; which belief will survive in today's society?
---
As a brief background, in 2005 both Time and Newsweek published articles discussing the intelligent design vs. evolution debate. Also in 2005, in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case, a US federal court ruled against the Dover (Pennsylvania) school district's decision to teach intelligent design (that some higher intelligence created the universe) in science classes as an alternative to the subject of evolution. The main argument was that because intelligent design had no supporting scientific evidence, it is "essentially religious in nature." (Wikipedia.org)
Here's a link for more information about intelligent design: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design
Here's a link for more information about dodo birds:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodo
---
Amazon.com review is up at http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Charles-Darwin-1809-1882/dp/0393310698/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-5828627-0155228?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1176241364&sr=8-1
Monday, April 9, 2007
Lauren's New and Hot (week 2)
“Darwin's doubts revealed in his letters to friends”
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article2432460.ece
The above-linked article tells about the publication of the correspondence of Darwin and Asa Gray, the Harvard botanist who presented Darwin’s ideas in the United States. This article is interesting because in describing the contents of the letters, it highlights the challenges Darwin faced in convincing his fellow scientists of mechanistic evolution; many of them were religious and unwilling to accept a scientific theory that eliminated God as the designer of species. It also shows that some of those scientists still supported Darwin’s theory because they recognized that it was well grounded in scientific evidence, and that therefore it was most likely true. The article also mentions that a play has been written based on those letters. I was amused by the mention of the play because it shows how creative people can be when trying to teach history. Hopefully the play can help raise awareness of and respect for Darwin’s ideas; if introduced in this country it could help reverse the trend towards anti-evolution views.
On another note, here is the link to the website I mentioned last week that contains all of Darwin’s published works: http://darwin-online.org.uk/
And another tangentially related link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=2cpNjyVvqK0
This is a video segment called “Evolution vs. Creation” that starts out making a valid claim: that before blindly accepting evolution, we should learn the facts for ourselves. It deplores the tendency to believe in anything a person in a lab coat tells us, but does something just as dangerous as couching false statements in the guise of science. While claiming to be presenting the facts that people need in order to form their opinions on evolution and urging us to approach the information with an open mind, the woman in the segment clearly does not have an open mind herself. She says that everything in the Bible is accurate and can be taken for fact (an odd claim given that various portions of the Bible contradict each other) and claims that there is no empirical evidence for evolution. The segment also quotes a man who is supposedly a science teacher who says that he does not accept evolution because the accepted mechanisms and information keep changing, but that he accepts religion because the word of God has not changed in 2000 years. He cannot be much of a science teacher if he does not recognize that by necessity science constantly changes. It looks like this is only one in a series of similar segments. I find this segment quite worrisome because it shows how easy it is to trick people into believing false claims. With the existence of segments like this one, it can be no surprise that otherwise reasonable people can be persuaded to discount evolution in favor of creation.
Here is the link to my amazon review: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0393310698
Lauren
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article2432460.ece
The above-linked article tells about the publication of the correspondence of Darwin and Asa Gray, the Harvard botanist who presented Darwin’s ideas in the United States. This article is interesting because in describing the contents of the letters, it highlights the challenges Darwin faced in convincing his fellow scientists of mechanistic evolution; many of them were religious and unwilling to accept a scientific theory that eliminated God as the designer of species. It also shows that some of those scientists still supported Darwin’s theory because they recognized that it was well grounded in scientific evidence, and that therefore it was most likely true. The article also mentions that a play has been written based on those letters. I was amused by the mention of the play because it shows how creative people can be when trying to teach history. Hopefully the play can help raise awareness of and respect for Darwin’s ideas; if introduced in this country it could help reverse the trend towards anti-evolution views.
On another note, here is the link to the website I mentioned last week that contains all of Darwin’s published works: http://darwin-online.org.uk/
And another tangentially related link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=2cpNjyVvqK0
This is a video segment called “Evolution vs. Creation” that starts out making a valid claim: that before blindly accepting evolution, we should learn the facts for ourselves. It deplores the tendency to believe in anything a person in a lab coat tells us, but does something just as dangerous as couching false statements in the guise of science. While claiming to be presenting the facts that people need in order to form their opinions on evolution and urging us to approach the information with an open mind, the woman in the segment clearly does not have an open mind herself. She says that everything in the Bible is accurate and can be taken for fact (an odd claim given that various portions of the Bible contradict each other) and claims that there is no empirical evidence for evolution. The segment also quotes a man who is supposedly a science teacher who says that he does not accept evolution because the accepted mechanisms and information keep changing, but that he accepts religion because the word of God has not changed in 2000 years. He cannot be much of a science teacher if he does not recognize that by necessity science constantly changes. It looks like this is only one in a series of similar segments. I find this segment quite worrisome because it shows how easy it is to trick people into believing false claims. With the existence of segments like this one, it can be no surprise that otherwise reasonable people can be persuaded to discount evolution in favor of creation.
Here is the link to my amazon review: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/customer-reviews/0393310698
Lauren
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