Monday's Molecule #4

Name this molecule. You must be specific, we need the exact name! Comments will be blocked for 24 hours. Comments are now open. Remember that you have to name the exact molecule!

Do You Want the Terrorists to Win?

Wow! I've never scored this high on a test before. And I didn't even study, .... well, not very much.... Okay, so I crammed all night. But it was worth it.

Do you think the Prof will adjust the grades?

Your 'Do You Want the Terrorists to Win' Score: 98%

You are a terrorist-loving, Bush-bashing, "blame America first"-crowd traitor. You are in league with evil-doers who hate our freedoms. By all counts you are a liberal, and as such cleary desire the terrorists to succeed and impose their harsh theocratic restrictions on us all. You are fit to be hung for treason! Luckily George Bush is tapping your internet connection and is now aware of your thought-crime. Have a nice day.... in Guantanamo!

Do You Want the Terrorists to Win?
Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

The British Centre for Science Education

 

From the BCSE Home Page ...

The British Centre for Science Education (BCSE) is a newly formed organisation with the primary purpose of stopping the teaching of Creationism in UK state schools. Our main role is to act as a coordinating group, providing support to other groups and individuals who share our purpose, and to develop and implement activist tactics to achieve our purpose.

The BCSE is fully supported by its members throughout the UK, and draws on the experience and expertise of like minded professional people resident in North America, Australia, South Africa and continental Europe. Our members come from a broad variety of fields - science, business, theology, education, academia, engineering, IT and research. We have two things in common - knowledge of the creationist movement and a deep concern for the proper science education of children.

BCSE is a part of the broader international campaign against Creationism. The creationist movement itself is international with strong connections in the USA, where much of the money comes from, and Australia. We believe that working with similar groups throughout the world considerably strengthens the organisation in terms of contacts, knowledge and expertise.

Natalie Angier's God Problem

 

It's been three years since Natalie Angier first wrote "My God Problem." There's a copy of the essay on Edge. It should be required reading for every scientist. Here are some excerpts,

No, most scientists are not interested in taking on any of the mighty cornerstones of Christianity. They complain about irrational thinking, they despise creationist "science," they roll their eyes over America's infatuation with astrology, telekinesis, spoon bending, reincarnation, and UFOs, but toward the bulk of the magic acts that have won the imprimatur of inclusion in the Bible, they are tolerant, respectful, big of tent....

So why is it that most scientists avoid criticizing religion even as they decry the supernatural mind-set? For starters, some researchers are themselves traditionally devout, keeping a kosher kitchen or taking Communion each Sunday. I admit I'm surprised whenever I encounter a religious scientist. How can a bench-hazed Ph. D., who might in an afternoon deftly purée a colleague's PowerPoint presentation on the nematode genome into so much fish chow, then go home, read in a two-thousand-year-old chronicle, riddled with internal contradictions, of a meta-Nobel discovery like "Resurrection from the Dead," and say, gee, that sounds convincing? Doesn't the good doctor wonder what the control group looked like?

More from an Appeaser

John Brockman is literary agent for many authors, including Richard Dawkins. His website, "Edge," carries interesting debates. The latest is started by Scott Atran's diatribe against the views of Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris. Atran, Dawkins, and Harris were together at the recent "Beyond Belief" conference at the Salk Institute. Atran writes,

I find it fascinating that among the brilliant scientists and philosophers at the conference, there was no convincing evidence presented that they know how to deal with the basic irrationality of human life and society other than to insist against all reason and evidence that things ought to be rational and evidence based. It makes me embarrassed to be a scientist and atheist. There is no historical evidence whatsoever that scientists have a keener or deeper appreciation than religious people of how to deal with personal or moral problems. Some scientists have some good and helpful insights into human beings' existential problems some of the time, but some good scientists have done more to harm others than most people are remotely capable of.

This is a silly argument. Atheists do not claim they can solve all the problems of an irrational society. What they (we) claim is that one important step is to reduce irrationality and promote rationality. One big step in that direction is to eliminate religion.

I am one of those people who would rather live in a society that was rational and evidence based. Surprisingly, Scott Atran is happy to remain in an irrational society that doesn't care about evidence. He's right to be embarrassed.

Daniel Dennett and Sam Harris respond to Atran. Read the Harris response. He elaborates on the following point ...

Atran's comments, both at the Salk conference and in his subsequent essay, miss the point. The point is not that all religious people are bad; it is not that all bad things are done in the name of religion; and it is not that scientists are never bad, or wrong, or self-deceived. The point is this: intellectual honesty is better (more enlightened, more useful, less dangerous, more in touch with reality, etc. ) than dogmatism. The degree to which science is committed to the former, and religion to the latter remains one of the most salient and appalling disparities to be found in human discourse.

There's another interesting point made by Harris. He explains that there are only three good reasons for appeasing the superstitious.

(1) Certain religious beliefs are true (or likely to be true); here's why…
(2) Religious beliefs, while not likely to be true, are so useful that they are necessary; here's the evidence…
(3) Many religious people are so irrational that it is simply too dangerous to criticize their beliefs. Please keep your mouth shut.

I agree. I'd like to hear from the Neville Chamberlain Appeasers. Which one of these three arguments do you support?

Bacteriophage Therapy

 

It was all the rage in the 1920's. Bacterial infections were controlled by treating patients with massive amounts of bacteriophage—small viruses that killed the bacteria. The idea was promoted by Félix d'Hérelle, a Canadian working at the Pasteur Institute in Paris.

Today bacteriophage therapy is rare but it might be making a comeback. Kurt Kleiner writes about it in The Toronto Star [The new age of the phage?].

Google Shuts Down the TalkOrigins Archive

 

Last week Google decided that the TalkOrgins Archive, a leading evolution website, should be de-indexed. All references to any article were removed because the site violated Google policy. Wesley Elsberry writes about it in Me Against Google. Shame on Goggle!

The IDiots Don't Understand Junk DNA

So what else is new?

The chief IDiot (Casey Luskin) over at Discovery Institute claims that junk DNA is a science-stopper. This is such old news.

Every time scientists find a function for some non-coding DNA we are treated to another diatribe against junk DNA. In fairness, it's not just the IDiots who do this. Some so-called scientists are just as guilty. They don't understand junk DNA.

Here's a clue. Junk DNA is DNA that has no function. It is not non-coding DNA. Lots of non-coding DNA has a function (regulatory sequences, origins of replication, centromeres, telomeres, SARs, etc. etc). But, in mammals, most of it doesn't. Most of the human genome is junk.

Just because we discover a function for some little bit of non-coding DNA does not mean that all of it has a function. Use your head. This is elementary rationalism. Oops, I almost forgot, that's not their strong point.

Think of pseudogenes or degenerative alu sequences, for example. They will always be junk DNA.

Uncool Film Wins in Toronto

Denyse O'Leary is on to us. She reports that a religious film won the People's Choice Award at the Toronto film festival in September. O'Leary says, ...

Materialists, it seems, cannot count on the support of the public, not even in secular Toronto. Give the people a vote and everything’s lost. Hence the importance, to the materialist, of indoctrinating students at public expense in the school systems and suppressing dissent at the universities.

I apologize to all my materialist friends for letting you down. I tried to bribe as many film goers as I could by giving out free Tim Horton's gift certificates but I ran out. (And it was raining on two of the nights.) I warned them not to vote for Bella 'cause it would foil our attempts to keep the IDiots from getting tenure.

Alas, I failed. I've submitted my resignation to the The Grand Poobah of the World Materialist Conspiracy.

"So-called" RNA polymerase II???

The journal Cell has issued a press release announcing a paper from Roger Kornberg's lab in their Dec. 1st issue. [Nobel Laureate Finds “Elegant” Explanation for DNA Transcribing Enzyme’s High Fidelity, see Biology News Net for permanent link]

Last month, Roger Kornberg of Stanford University won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his efforts to unravel the molecular basis of eukaryotic transcription, in which enzymes give “voice” to DNA by copying it into the RNA molecules that serve as templates for protein in organisms from yeast to humans. Now, Kornberg and his colleagues report in the December 1, 2006 issue of the journal Cell, published by Cell Press, new structures that reveal another critical piece of the puzzle: how the so-called polymerase II enzyme [my emphasis] discriminates among potential RNA building blocks to ensure the characteristic accuracy of the process.

It's an interesting paper. That's not what I want to talk about.

I'm curious about Cell's use of the phrase "so-called polymerase II." This seems very strange to me. When I use the term "so-called" I intend to call into question the meaning of the words that follow. For example, if I refer to Bill Dembski as a "so-called" intellectual, it means I don't think he's an intellectual.

Are Americans in the process of changing the meaning of "so-called" in the same way that they're changing the meaning of "begs the question?" If so, it indicates an interesting trend toward strict literalism and away from more subtle meanings.

Should I avoid using "so-called" because Americans won't get the sarcasm?

Monty Python - The Galaxy Song

Watch the original below, and a cartoon version here.

I'm told by reliable sources that there are astrophysics professors who can sing the entire song.

Biochemists Have Songs Too

 
See the original below and hear the much better biochemist version here. (Thanks to Greg Crowther.)

Moran on Miller

Over at EVOLUTIONBLOG, Jason Rosenhouse has written a little essay criticizing my interpretation of Ken Miller's beliefs. [Moran on Miller]

I suggested that Miller's God can tweak evolution and John Rosenhouse replies,

I am not aware of any instance where Miller argued that God tweaks mutations to get what He wants. In fact, it seems to me that Miller's view of evolution is almost indistinguishable from that of Richard Dawkins. For example, in Finding Darwin's God Miller has nothing but praise for Dawkins' description of evolution in The Blind Watchmaker.

Miller lays out his case in Finding Darwin's God: A Scientist's Search for Common Ground between God and Evolution. Chapter 7 ("Beyond Materialism") sets the tone for the last half of the book. Here, Miller stresses the importance of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle (p.200). This is the basis for his statement that, materialism is wrong at its core (p.203).

Miller then goes on to his main point; namely, that ...

... the fact that mutation and variation are inherently unpredictable means that the course of evolution is, too. In other words, evolutionary history can turn on a very, very small dime—the quantum state of a single subatomic particle.

This is an important part of Miller's argument. Let's make sure everyone understands it. Miller is saying; (a) tiny changes can have profound effects, and (b) there is fundamentlal uncertainly at the subatomic level so we can never be sure of what caused something to happen. It's important for Miller's argument that evolution appear to be fundamentally a random process. I know from personal experience that Richard Dawkins does not agree.

The dénouement comes in Chapter 8 ("The Road Back Home"). The goal in that chapter is to find a way where God can be present and active in the world without being detectable by science. The solution is very ingenious,

Fortunately, in scientific terms, if there is a God, He has left Himself plenty of material to work with. To pick just one example, the indeterminate nature of quantum events would allow a clever and subtle God to influence events in way that are profound, but scientifically undetectable to us. Those events could include the appearance of mutations, the activation of individual neurons in the brain, and even the survival of individual cells and organsisms affected by the chance processes of radioactive decay. Chaos theory emphasizes the fact that enormous changes in physical systems can be brought about by unimaginably small changes in initial conditions; and this, too could serve as an undectable amplifier of divine action. (p.241)

So, God can guide evolution and perform miracles and we have no way of knowing it that he meddled. But meddle he does. That's an absolute requirement in Miller's religion.

Jason Rosenhouse continues,

It is likewise absurd to say that Miller's view of evolution is nearly indistinguishable from Behe's. Miller believes that God set up the initial conditions for making evolution possible, but then natural forces took over. He is quite clear in his book that the course of evolution was not foreordained by anything God did. This fact is crucial to Miller's view of Christian theology. He argues that a world in which God constantly intervenes, or one in which the course of evolution was foreordained by God, would also be a world that could not be viewed as truly separate from God Himself.

Miller's God has to perform miracles; that's an essential part of the Roman Catholic faith. What Miller is trying to do is explain how his God can do it while not conflicting with science. The passage that I just quoted is the answer. But let's be clear about one thing. Miller's religion is not deism, in spite of what you (John) might have thought.

Yes, it's true that Miller doesn't want a God who intervenes all the time. That's why he says that "God's miracles are not routine subversions of the laws of nature" (p.239). But that doesn't mean that miracles are forbidden—not by any reading of Miller than I can see. Instead, Miller argues that "when God does act in the world, He does so with care and subtlety."

Jason, the answering of prayer is another example of a God who is active in the present-day world. This is not consistent with your claim that Miller believes in a God who set up the initial conditions then stepped aside. Miller says,

... any traditional believer must agree that God is able to influence the thoughts and actions of individual beings. We pray for strength, we pray for patience, and we pray for understanding. Prayer is an element of faith, and bound within it is the conviction that God can affect us and those for whom we pray in positive ways.

That's not a deist God. That's not even the God of Michael Denton. At the risk of beating a dead horse, let's quote Miller once again to prove to you that he believes in an active God who intervenes in nature,

Remember, once again, that people of faith believe their God is active in the present world, where He works in concert with the naturalism of physics and chemistry. A God who achieves His will in the present by such means can hardly be threatened by the discovery that He might have worked the same way in the past.

According to Miller, the end result of evolution is to have "given the Creator exactly what He was looking for—a creature who would know Him and love Him ..." (p.239). Miller says that "... we can certainly see God's will emerging in the grand and improbable tree of life" (p.238). It's true, as you say, that Miller never explicitly states that God guided evolution. Instead, what he does is explain that there's a purpose behind the universe and that God is active in the world today and has been in the past. Miller then describes ways in which God could have undetectably guided things if He had wanted to, by fiddling with quantum indeterminacy. You are left to draw your own conclusions.

The most important difference between Behe and Miller is that Behe thinks you can actually detect God's handiwork while Miller thinks it is so well hidden that scientists can can never detect it. Miller recognizes it only through his faith.

The Atheist Delusion

In the interest of fairness, I present the other side of rationality. Check out The Atheist Delusion video by Eddie Current. It's hilarious.

Drop Cloning

New Scientist reports that biologists want to drop the word "cloning." Apparently, they want everyone to say "somatic cell nuclear transfer" instead.

It'll never fly. There are too many people who can't pronounce "nuclear."