Atheists on ABC

 
ABC News broadcast a segment on the growing influence of atheists/ You can see it at Atheists Take On Religion. (If you're lucky, you won't have to watch the disgusting anti-drug commercial.)

The fact that a major network is addressing this issue relates to the debates on the blogs about appeasers, and "fundamentalist" atheists. The ABC segment mentions "The God Delusion" and "Letter to a Christian Nation" by Sam Harris. Sam Harris is interviewed by an ABC reporter. Does anyone doubt that it's the publicity generated by the likes of Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris that's driving the debate into the open? Here's what the ABC News reporter says,

This is just one example of the mounting assertiveness of atheists who are arguing loudly that religion is not only false but also a threat to civilization.

The main thrust of the story is the US Supreme Court case on Bush's faith-based initiatives. We've seen these type of challenge in the past and they've made the television news. But there's a big difference today. Look at this video clip to see the difference. What you're now seeing is some debate about atheism and the existence of God. Atheism is moving into the public consciousness and the media is starting to take it seriously.

The Supreme Court challenge is backed by an organization called "The Freedom from Religion Foundation" led by Dan Barker. He's a former fundamentalist preacher and when asked, "what are you preaching now," he replies,

Separation of state and church and reason and kindness in place of superstition.

Yes! That did not get edited out of the segment and the reporter didn't even flinch. That's progress folks. And make no mistake, we owe it to the "extremists" like Dawkins and Harris. The "kinder and gentler" approach of the atheist appeasers didn't drive any of this publicity.

[Hat Tip: RichardDawkins.NET]

Monday's Molecule #16

 
Name this molecule. You must be specific. We need the correct scientific name.

As usual, there's a connection between Monday's molecule and this Wednesday's Nobel Laureate. Bonus points for guessing Wednesday's Nobel Laureate(s).

Comments will be blocked for 24 hours. Comments are now open.

Why Intelligent Design Creationism Will Survive, According to the IDiots

 
Denyse O'Leary is worried. People are claiming that Intelligent Design Creationism is in trouble. Denyse disagrees [Why the predictions of ID’s demise are false].

The many predictions of ID’s demise, based on current theories, have been so completely and systematically falsified that it is time to look for explanations with better predictive value. Not only did ID not die out after various court cases in the United States, but it is now pretty much an international thing - contrary to many predictions.

ID is not happening because the folks at Discovery Institute are clever and nefariousor because American fundies run the planet. Four factors mainly account for its continued growth:

This is going to be fun ...

Let's see what four factors tell us that the IDiots are going to be around for a long time.

1. The general acceptance of Big Bang cosmology focused attention on the mathematical probabilities of Darwinism. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the world inside the cell turned out to be much more awesomely complex than anyone had realized. So, just when it should have triumphed, Darwinism received a one-two punch from reality. It is no accident that so many of the ID guys are in math, information sciences, and biochemistry, bioinformatics, etc.

As usual, the lead-off reason has nothing to do with intelligent design. It's all about so-called problems with evolution. Now this would be funny if it weren't so pathetic. The IDiots are always telling us that they have solid scientific evidence for God the intelligent designer but when they get a chance to show us the evidence they always fall back on whining about evolution. How pathetic.

We scientists are not the least bit worried about the "awesome complexity" of cells. It all fits nicely with evolution. Furthermore, it's very misleading to suggest that there are "many" IDiots who are genuine researchers in math, biochemistry, etc. You can count the number on the fingers of two hands.

2. Not surprisingly, the current generation of Darwinists operates on faith, mostly. The recent involvement of key ultra-Darwinists in the activities of the Church of Atheism is, under the circumstances, a normal and foreseeable development. You see, once you commit to materialist atheism, something like Darwinism must be true. That lifts a crushing burden from the shoulders of the Darwinist.

Reason #2 for IDiot survival has nothing to do with evidence for Intelligent Design Creationism. It's just more complaints about so-called "Darwinists" and atheism. If you read #2 carefully you'll see nothing that suggests why IDC should survive.

Why are the IDiots such hypocrites? Why do they always claim to have positive evidence for IDC but the evidence turns out to be just anti-evolution diatribes?

3? And the Darwinists themselves are largely responsible for the success of ID. The ID guys are smart enough to serve their turn, to be sure, but they have also been lucky in finding so many meatheads among their opponents. The persecutions of Rick Sternberg and Guillermo Gonzalez, to name two, left little doubt that Darwinists did not expect to succeed by convincing anyone of the sweet reasonableness of their cause or their methods.

Are you seeing a trend here? Reason #3 for why intelligent design creationism will survive is because the "Darwinists" are meatheads. Sheesh! Is this the best she can do?

4. The fact that Darwinism is the creation story of materialism says nothing, one way or the other, about whether it is an accurate account of origins - but an important consequence follows. Let us say, for the sake of argument, that it was an accurate creation story. The fact that it is any kind of a creation story at all means that it tends to be treated as both science AND religion. Those who affirm Darwinism often have a heavy emotional investment in it, in a way that they do not have in, say, continental drift. People notice this fact (it’s hard not to). That raises the justifiable suspicion that many arguments for Darwinism are put forward to boost faith, far beyond the argument’s actual strength.

Well there you have it, folks. The top four reasons for the success of intelligent design creationism are:

                  1. Darwinism is bad,
                  2. Darwinism is atheistic.
                  3. Darwinists are meatheads.
                  4. Darwinism is faith.

And you wonder why we call them IDiots?

A Friendly Reminder

 

Don't forget to watch the Tim Horton's Brier every day from now until next Sunday. Check your local TV listings. In my area you can catch the draws at 2:30 PM, and 7:00 PM every day. Each game only lasts three hours so that leaves you plenty of time to do other things, like run out to Tim Horton's to get a coffee.

More on Reverse PIN Numbers

 
Last January 5th I posted a article about an urban legend claiming you could reverse your PIN number at an ATM to summon police [Reverse PIN at ATM Summons Police]. The idea is that whenever you are being held hostage and forced to withdraw money from your ATM account all you have to do is key in the reverse of your PIN number. The money will be dispensed but police will be called to rescue you. This is, of course, an urban legend. No such system exists at any ATM's.

Today I get a comment on that thread from a man named Joe Zinger who claims to have invented the reverse PIN number. If you follow the link given by Joe Zingher to ATM Safety PIN you will be re-directed to Zi Cubed Inc. where you learn that Joe Zingher is located in Gurnee, Illinois. I assume that he wants to make money from his "invention" but I can't imagine how he's going to do that even if it were desirable.

Here's Joe's comment (in yellow).

I’m Joe Zingher, the inventor of the ReversePIN system referred to on this website. There’s a great deal of disinformation about the system and it’s usefulness put out by magazines, official government agencies and banking industry. For instance, Forbes magazine claims that IBM holds an emergency PIN patent of its own. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4086277/ and I’m somehow trapped in a life and death struggle with them. Contact Forbes and ask them what the IBM patent number is. They refuse to tell me.

Nobody cares whether IBM has a patent on reversing your PIN number. Nobody cares whether you do—unless you're going to be taking money from us in the form of royalties. The important point is the "disinformation" that's out there (and below) and the "usefullness" of the scheme.

The Illinois Office of Banks and Real Estate issued an official report claiming that the system requires some kind of “physical reconfiguration” of the ATM or “hardware changes” http://www.obre.state.il.us/Agency/news/atmrpt.htm The author of the report claims that it was a lawyer who told him this. He claims that at the time he wrote it, he was under the impression that it needs “new data transmission lines to handle the more intelligent communications.” I guess if you discuss the Chicago Cubs on the telephone, you use one type of telephone line, but if you’re discussing quantum physics, you have to use a different, special kind of telephone line. This is obviously incorrect to anyone who has had even a single course in computer programming.

Yes, it it so obviously incorrect that one wonders why you even bother to mention it. But that doesn't mean that the cost is negligible. As the study you referenced [ATM Report] pointed out, the system requires a complex interaction of several databases.

ATM card issuers typically issue one PIN to a customer. Under the Zi Cubed system, customers are assigned an emergency second PIN which is usually the reverse of their original number. For example, if 1234 were an individual’s PIN, then the emergency PIN would be 4321. If the PIN were 2442, then the emergency could be 4224. If the emergency PIN is entered, presumably during a robbery, the ATM processing main computer sends a distress message to the local police department. In addition to the location of the ATM, police could find out who the customer was with information taken from the customer’s bank account records. Police could also access a description of the customer from the Secretary of State’s Drivers’ Services Division. By the time police reach the ATM they would know who the customer is, what s/he looks like, and where s/he lives.

... conversion to this system requires a significant commitment in resources to writing new computer software programs that recognize the reverse PIN and then make multiple complex decisions. Currently, ATMs communicate with banks and make what are termed "binary" (i.e., simple "yes/no") decisions concerning the account and transaction information. Under the reverse PIN system, the main computer must: (a) determine and communicate with the police station closest to the ATM; (b) the computer must communicate with the bank account of the cardholder and obtain account information that is usually confidential and protected (this process is more complicated if the ATM is not from the accountholder’s bank); and, (c) the main computer must then also communicate with the Secretary of State’s office for driver license information.

I can see a number of problems here but they aren't really of much concern for the moment because the main problem is that the whole idea is just plain stupid.

So why isn’t the system in place then? The vast majority of the public seems to like it a lot.

The main reason why it's not in place is mentioned in the opening section of the Illinois State report. Here it is, in case you missed it ...

Although there is no precise data on ATM crime, violent crime against ATM users is relatively rare. Over the decade of the 1990s, ATM crime has actually decreased from approximately one crime per one million ATM transactions to one crime per 3.5 million transactions. At the same time, the use of ATMs has significantly increased. Nevertheless, public perception of significant crime at ATMs exists.

That's a polite way of saying that the crime you're trying to prevent isn't significant enough to warrant preventative action. Implementing a code to summon police on the remote chance that it could help in the extremely rare situations where it arose is just not worth it. It's about as silly as making everyone take off their shoes in an airport or requiring passports at the Canadian border.

An analysis of the reverse PIN warning system is specifically requested by Resolution No. 134. The reverse PIN system attempts to utilize current technology to provide law enforcement with the immediate location and background information concerning a potential victim. However, a consumer may be under too much emotional stress to properly utilize the system, the system would be tremendously costly to implement both as to hardware and software requirements, quick response by police is not guaranteed, and no evidence exists that the reverse PIN system would actually reduce crime.

In order for the system to be effective an awful lot of things have to happen in a timely manner. One of these is compliance by the victim. That means the victim has to be convinced that summoning police won't cause them harm.

Given that the disease for which you are proposing a cure is extremely rare and that your cure probably won't work, I suggest you look for another way to make money from the general public.

Well, I am not the authorized spokesman for the US banking industry, but here’s a short list of the claims I’ve heard about my system and why it’s not being used.

1) “An international treaty forbids it from being adopted. This treaty sets the technical standards for ATM transactions.” Actually, there’s no such treaty. It sounds like a great explanation though and one that the layman might buy.

2) “You’d have to issue all new ATM cards, costing $5 each to put the system in place. The system is terribly expensive and not worth it.” This is false too. You don’t change the card at all. All that is done is a small change in the PIN verification section of the code. This can be either at the ATM as part of the normal software upgrades or at the main link where the PIN verification software is. The invention is “transparent” to the existing software.

3) “Who could remember their ReversePIN with a gun at their neck at the ATM? It won’t work.” This is misleading because it defines a DIFFERENT crime than the one intended to be deterred. The crime pattern begins as a hostage taking in a carjacking from a parking lot or during a home invasion; the victim is then taken to an ATM and forced to make a withdrawal; then the victim is taken elsewhere, executed and the body hidden so that no one will cancel the card. There’s a LOT of lag time between the initial assault and the first withdrawal for the victim to get their wits about them. Further, EVEN PEOPLE WHO CANNOT USE THE SYSTEM BENEFIT from it. The criminal cannot know what is going on until it is too late. The goal is to get him to grab the money and run, and leave the hostage behind and hopefully unhurt. Moreover, there will be some people who can always use the system and that means they generate an umbrella of deterrence for the rest of society. Since the criminal can’t know for sure before the attack begins, does the attack ever begin?

Number 3 is the only one of these that's worth discussing. You make two claims here. They are typical examples of irrational thinking. The first is standard hype whenever you are trying to scare people into parting with their money. You construct a hypothetical scenario that serves your purpose then you hope that people won't notice how rare it is. In this case, the number of times when hostages are forced to withdraw money is so infrequent that it barely counts in crime statistics. The second claim is that when banks buy your system, crime will be deterred. What crime? Are you talking about the case where a criminal has taken someone hostage and intends to kill them when they have withdrawn a few hundred dollars from their ATM? Do you really think that a criminal like that is going to be deterred on the off chance that a cop car might show up at the ATM before they get away?

4) “If our state makes it mandatory, that means some customer from out of state won’t be able to use the ATM at all.” Why on earth would you program the computer that way? That’s just stupid.

5) “What if your PIN in reverse is someone else’s regular PIN? It would shut down the system.” Excuse me, but your PIN is already being used by at least tens of thousands of other people already. The PIN is connected to the bank account number and the bank identification number. Think about it. From “0000” to “9999” there are only 10,000 possible variations on a four-digit PIN. There are over two hundred million ATM cards in the US alone. (A PIN like 2442 is handled by the “Inside-OutPIN 4224 and a PIN like 7777 is handled by the “Plus-1PIN” 8888. Get the idea here?)

The list of ridiculous claims is just too long. And they keep changing. What does it tell you when “experts” keep coming up with different false claims about the system?

It tells me that those "experts" are stupid. On the other hand, your claims aren't much better.

By the way, to be an ACTUAL expert in the technical aspects of it, you need to have some background in computer programming, say an associate’s degree.

Hmmm ... I'm just taking a wild guess here; do you happen to have an "associate's degree" in computer programing (whatever that is)?

So what’s the real reason it’s not being used? All their answers are different. That in itself should tell you something. Here’s a thought. If you’re the head of marketing at a bank, how many of these murders per year involving your ATMs makes you jump up and down yelling “HOORAY!!! We only had “X” murders this year that involved our customers being kidnapped and forced to make ATM withdrawals”? I think that is where the root of the problem lies.

BINGO! I think you've hit upon the answer. The Bank will have lost a customer but they make up for it by not having to repay the forced withdrawal. I imagine the entire corporate headquarters celebrates with champagne all around whenever an ATM customer is murdered. If it's a big bank, you wonder how they ever get any work done at the headquarters.

Gene Genie #2

 
The second issue of Gene Genie is now available at Sciencesque. Lots of cool stuff about human genes.

The Evolution of the HSP70 Gene Family

Here's a picture of my three second year project students in front of their poster. Blerta Kolaj, Milu Jauregui, and Zarna Shah collaborated on this project to study the evolution of various members of the HSP70 gene family.

Eukaryotes contain at at least five or six versions of HSP70 genes. Two of them are present in single copies (mostly) and they were present in the common ancestor of all eukaryotes. One of these is the mitochondrial version, which is derived from the proteobacterium ancestor of mitochondria. The other is a version found in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). The ER member of the HSP70 gene family (=BiP) arose very early in eukaryotic evolution.

A phylogenetic tree of either the mitochondrial gene or the ER gene should reveal the evolution of all eukaryotic species. The two trees should be identical provided the genes evolve independently and there has been no horizontal gene transfer. Furthermore, the two trees will root each other since they join at a common ancestral node representing the split between eukaryotes and prokaryotes. The purpose of the experiment is to test this hypothesis and see if we have enough examples of ER and mitochondrial genes to make duplicate trees. The problem is that we need an example of each gene in every species we test. The fact that we now have quite a few genome sequences means that this has become more feasible than in the past.

Blerta, Milu, and Zarna were able to add in one more set of sequences; the chloroplast members of the HSP70 gene family. These genes are derived from the cyanobacteria ancestor of chloroplasts so they provide independent confirmation of the eukaryotic tree for plants and algae. Unfortunately, there aren't very many examples of species that have sequenced versions of the chloroplast gene, the mitochondrial gene, and the ER gene.

Here's the tree.

As you can see, the relationship of most species (actually genes) in the mitochondrial and ER branches is very similar. This confirms that the two family members are evolving independently. Differences occur with the protists such as trypanosomes, Leishmania, plasmodia, and cryptosporidium. This is unfortunate since analysis of HSP70 genes could have helped resolve the relationship of protists, which is very controversial. At least we're sure of the roots of each major branch—that's a big step forward.

The chloroplast and mitochondrial clades are closer together than either is to the eukaryotic ER versions of the HSP70 family. This is not unexpected since both organelle genes are prokaryotic in origin. It suggests that the universal root is along the branch leading to the ER clade.

Now my students have to turn their attention to their individual projects. They have about six weeks to finish up. I'll post summaries of their work in May. I'm pretty excited about all three projects, we could end up answering some pretty important questions using the HSP70 database.

Sandwalk DNA Fingerprint

 


Here's the Sandwalk DNA fingerprint from web2dna.

[Hat Tip: ScienceRoll]

Not Banned in China

 


My blog is not (yet) banned in China! Test your own site at Great Firewall of China.

[Hat Tip: ScienceRoll]

Me and Steve

 
Here's a picture of me and Steve Steve in North Carolina. That Steve sure gets around. At times he seems to be in two or three places at once.

Now that I think of it, this Steve doesn't look the same as the one I met in San Francisco. You don't suppose there's two of them, do you?

Could it be that the Steve Creator has learned how to clone?

Lunar Eclipse

 
Looks like we're going to miss the total lunar eclipse because of the clouds. Oh well, they're not that rare so another will come along in a few months.

Lunar eclipses come in bunches with periods of drought in between. The last one was on October 28, 2004 so it seems like a long time has passed for those who have been waiting. The good news is that there will be two more in the next year.

When they occur, a lunar eclipse can be viewed by more than half the planet. One of the unusual things about this one is that it can be seen by people on every continent. That's just a question of timing.

Some newspaper reports are saying that lunar eclipses are "rare." I suppose it depends on your perspective. To me "rare" means once or twice in a lifetime so I wouldn't say that lunar eclipses are "rare." Total solar eclipses, on the other hand are rare for any individual place on the planet.

For more information on lunar eclipses see the Sky and Telescope website [March 3rd's Total Lunar Eclipse]. I'm including a copy of their diagram to show you how lunar eclipses work. Pay attention if you're a university student 'cause it may be on the University Exit Exam.

This What Happens to your Brain on Religion

 
See this man? His name is Nathan Bradfield. He is associated with Gateway Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama.

That makes him an expert on evolution. He has a blog. He has posted an article called Hypocrisy of Evolution. He quotes many experts, like Ann Coulter. She is an IDiot. So is Nathan.

Kevin Beck says this is Easily the worst anti-evolution blogging any of us have seen. Maybe it is. Kevin invites you to pick a sentence, any sentence, and show why it's wrong. Not much of a challenge.


I didn't like this when it was an anti-drug commercial but it seems appropriate for what (some) religion can do to your brain.

Atheists and Agnostics

 
Here's a list of various countries with the percentage of atheists + agnostics. In most cases the total comes from the number who self-identify as people who do not believe in God. The number who feel comfortable labeling themselves as atheists is usually about 1/4 of the total.

The data is mostly from ...

Zuckerman, P. (2005) "Atheism: Contemporary Rates and Patterns ", chapter in The Cambridge Companion to Atheism, ed. by Michael Martin, Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, UK

Greeley, A. (2003) Religion in Europe at the End of the Second Millennium. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers

It is summarized on the Adherent Statistics website.

Australia Canada Czech Republic France Germany Israel Italy Netherlands Norway Poland Russia Saudi Arabia Spain Sweden United Kingdom United States

25% 19% 54% 48% 35% 37% 18% 43% 41% 8% 35% 0% 18% 46% 44% 4%

Norris and Inglehart (2004) Bibby (2002) Greeley (2003) Greeley (2003) Greeley (2003) Kedem (1995) Greeley (2003) Greeley (2003) Greeley (2003) Greeley (2003) Froese (2004) Zuckerman (2005) Greeley (2003) Greeley (2003) Zuckerman (2005) Encyclopedia Britannica

Sound the Alarm! Liechtenstein Invaded!

 
FOXNews reports on the invasion of Liechtenstein.

ZURICH, Switzerland — What began as a routine training exercise almost ended in an embarrassing diplomatic incident after a company of Swiss soldiers got lost at night and marched into neighboring Liechtenstein.

According to Swiss daily Blick, the 170 infantry soldiers from the neutral country wandered more than a mile across an unmarked border into the tiny principality early Thursday before realizing their mistake and turning back.

A spokesman for the Swiss army confirmed the story, but said that there were unlikely to be any serious repercussions for the mistaken invasion.

"We've spoken to the authorities in Liechtenstein and it's not a problem," Daniel Reist told The Associated Press on Friday.

Officials in Liechtenstein also played down the incident.

Interior Ministry spokesman Markus Amman said nobody in Liechtenstein had even noticed the soldiers, who were carrying assault rifles but no ammunition. "It's not like they stormed over here with attack helicopters or something," he said.

Liechtenstein, which has about 34,000 inhabitants and is slightly smaller than Washington, D.C., does not have an army.

Read this carefully. Liechtenstein doesn't have an army. The border wasn't marked. The Swiss soldiers had assault rifles but no ammunition. Only in Europe .... that's what a lack of religion leads to.

Be Like PZ

 
Just in case there are one or two people out there who don't read Pharyngula every day, here's the latest from PZ Myers: Get meaner, angrier, louder, fiercer. He has little use for appeasers and fencesitters.