Yeast Mitochondria

 
There's a paper in this month's issue of Developmental Cell that uses the technique of electron tomography to examine the fine structure of a yeast cell. This technique involves slicing the cell into many thin sections then taking electron micrographs of each section and reconstructing a three-dimensional model of the cell.

The species is the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe and the results are spectacular. The image on the left was part of the Bio News Net press release.

The emphasis in the paper is on the organization of microtubules. Those are the thin green lines runing down the length of the cell. It turns out that many of the vesicles and mitochondria are associated with these microtubules. Here's the abstract of the paper ..

Polarized cells, such as neuronal, epithelial, and fungal cells, all display a specialized organization of their microtubules (MTs). The interphase MT cytoskeleton of the rod-shaped fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe, has been extensively described by fluorescence microscopy. Here, we describe a large-scale, electron tomography investigation of S. pombe, including a 3D reconstruction of a complete eukaryotic cell volume at sufficient resolution to show both how many MTs there are in a bundle and their detailed architecture. Most cytoplasmic MTs are open at one end and capped at the other, providing evidence about their polarity. Electron-dense bridges between the MTs themselves and between MTs and the nuclear envelope were frequently observed. Finally, we have investigated structure/function relationships between MTs and both mitochondria and vesicles. Our analysis shows that electron tomography of well-preserved cells is ideally suited for describing fine ultrastructural details that were not visible with previous techniques.

One of the most interesting things about this paper is that it illustrates the structure of mitochondria. Look at the picture on the right from their paper. The gold things are mitochondria and they appear to be stuck to microtubules. Individual mitochondria are shown in the inserts in order to illustrate the convoluted and branching structures of those that are associated with microtubules. (The one labelled "G" is not stuck to microtubules.)

Most people don't realize that mitochondria are so complicated. Furthermore, the structures are dynamic—they can change significantly in the space of minutes.

Höög, J.L., Schwartz, C., Noon, A.T., O'Toole, E.T., Mastronarde, D.N., McIntosh, J.R., and Antony, C. (2007) Organization of Interphase Microtubules in Fission Yeast Analyzed by Electron Tomography. Developmental Cell 12: 349-361.

James Randi and Richard Dawkins

 
It's a shame when you get two smart people like this on the same stage and all you get are banalities. The audience must have been very disappointed.

Nobel Laureate: Paul Hermann Müller

 
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1948.

"for his discovery of the high efficiency of DDT as a contact poison against several arthropods"


Paul Hermann Müller won the Nobel Prize in 1948 for is discovery that DDT was an effective insect poison [see Monday's Molecule #16 and DDT Blocks the Voltage-Gated Sodium Channel]. Müller was looking for a contact poison that would protect plants from insects. He extended the work of others who discovered compounds that could be applied to wool to prevent them from being ruined by moths. These compounds resembled DDT but they were not as effective. Müller's approach is described in the presentation speech ...

Paul Müller went his own way and tried to find insecticides for plant protection. In so doing he arrived at the conclusion that for this purpose a contact insecticide was best suited.

Systematically he tried hundreds of synthesized organic substances on flies in a type of Peet-Grady chamber. An article by the Englishmen Chattaway and Muir, gave him the idea of testing combinations with the CCl3 groups, and this then finally led to the realization that dichloro-diphenyl-trichloro-methylmethane acted as a contact insecticide on Colorado beetles, flies and many other insect species under test. He determined its extraordinary persistence, and simultaneously developed the various methods of application such as solutions, emulsions and dusts.

In trials under natural conditions Müller was able to confirm the long persistent contact action on flies, Colorado beetles and gnats (Culex).

Subsequent work revealed that DDT was effective against a wide variety of insects and was harmless to mammals. Among the insects that were killed by DDT were lice, the carriers of thyphoid, and malaria mosquitos.

At the time, Müller was working for the J.R. Geigy Dye-Factory Co. in Basel Switzerland and he had given samples of DDT to the Swiss Army for testing. The results demonstrated that insect borne diseases could be controlled by DDT.

At that time, the Allied Armies of the West were struggling with severe medical problems. A series of diseases transmittable by insects, diseases such as typhus, malaria and sandfly fever claimed a large number of victims and interfered with the conduct of the War. The Swiss, who had recognized the great importance of DDT, secretly shipped a small quantity of the material to the United States; in December of 1942 the American Research Council for Insectology in Orlando (Florida) undertook a large series of trials which fully confirmed the Swiss findings. The war situation demanded speedy action. DDT was manufactured on a vast scale whilst a series of experiments determined methods of application. Particularly energetic was General Fox, Physician-in-Chief to the American forces.

In October of 1943 a heavy outbreak of typhus occurred in Naples and the customary relief measures proved totally inadequate. General Fox thereupon introduced DDT treatment with total exclusion of the old, slow methods of treatment. As a result, 1,300,000 people were treated in January 1944 and in a period of three weeks the typhus epidemic was completely mastered. Thus, for the first time in history a typhus outbreak was brought under control in winter. DDT had passed its ordeal by fire with flying colours.

By the late 1950's it became apparent that extensive use of DDT to control insects leads to its accumulation in the environment. This, in turn, leads to its concentration in the tissues of some animals, such as fish. The long term build up of DDT causes illness and death and it was finally banned in most countries in the 1970's.

Alcoholics Anonymous: 12 Steps

 
This month's reader's Digest has a couple of articles on Alcoholics Anonymous. The gist of the articles is that the famous 12 steps really don't work all that well. Apparently, there's no data to support the claim that Alcoholics Anonymous is successful at getting people to stop drinking.

I had no idea what these 12 steps were until they were published in the articles I read yesterday. For those of you who don't know, here they are [Alcoholics Anonymous]. I'm not surprised that this isn't a magic bullet but I am surprised at how religious AA must be. They must think that most alcoholics are Christians.

THE TWELVE STEPS
OF ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol ﾗ that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Atheists: Get Out of the USA!

 
From my [confined] space comes this copy of a letter to the editor. I don't know which paper it appeared in.

Let me know if I can help out. I can arrange temporary residence in Canada and help you find a good job. I'll teach you how to speak Canadian and how to go about cancelling your health insurance. I can even put you in touch with someone who will buy all your guns.

I'll even treat you a curling broom and a Toronto Maple Leafs sweater to help you get adjusted as quickly as possible. Do you like poutine?

DDT Blocks the Voltage-Gated Sodium Channel

 
Monday's Molecule #16 is 1,1,1-trichloro-2,2 bis(p-chlorophenyl) ethane, better known as DDT. DDT is a powerful insecticide. It binds to the voltage-gated sodium channel and locks it in the open state. Prolonged influx of sodium ions causes the nerves to fire repeatedly and this causes death of the insect.

The reason DDT is so powerful is due to its specificity. It binds to insect channel proteins but not to those of other animals (or plants, fungi, protists, and bacteria). Thus, it is an effective insecticide used to fight malaria and other insect borne diseases.

Unfortunately, even though DDT is not immediatly toxic to other animals it does have one disadvantage: it is extremely stable—its biological half-life is about eight years. Furthermore, DDT is stored in fatty tissues and its buildup in birds and fish resulted in considerable loss of these species. That, coupled with the evolution of DDT resistant insects, led to a ban of DDT in most countries by the 1970's.

Rachel Carson is largely credited with launching the environmental movement in 1962 with the publication of Silent Spring. The title refers to a world without birds. While I was writing this up I did a quick survey of the graduate students in the nearby labs and none of them had ever heard of Rachel Carson. Not only that, neither had several of my colleagues. I feel old.

One of the main targets of Silent Spring was DDT. By the time the book was published it was estimated that DDT had saved the lives of millions of people through prevention of malaria and thyphoid but it's effectiveness was much diminished. That's why the ban was not as controversial as it might have been.

Let's look at the biochemistry of DDT. We have already learned about the simple voltage-gated potassium channel. The Na⁺ (sodium) channel is closely related to the K⁺ channel protein. Recall that the K⁺ channel consists of four identical subunits surrounding a central hole through which K⁺ ions enter the cell.

The Na⁺ channel protein is much larger than the K⁺ channel subunit because it consists of four of the smaller subunits fused into a single polypeptide chain. The tolopology of the Na⁺ channel protein is shown below.

Each of the domains (I-IV) corresponds to a single subunit of the K⁺ channel. Like the K⁺ channel, the four domains of the Na⁺ channel protein are arranged around a central tunnel through which sodium ions enter the cell. The S5 and S6 helices line the tunnel.

The toplogy diagram above shows the locations of mutations conferring resistance to DDT and similar drugs. Each one represents mutants identified in resistant houseflies, fruit flies, mosquitos, or moths. The important mutations are substitutions at the 932 position normally occupied by leucine (L932) and at the 929 position normally occupied by threonine (T929) (blue dots). For example, the substition of isoleucine for threonine at 929 (T929I) confers almost complete resistance to DDT.

Incidently, the methionine at 918 (M918) is what confers sensitivity to DDT in the insect voltage-gated Na⁺ channel. Other animlas have a different amino acid at this position and they are not sensitive to DDT.

O'Reilly et al. (2006) modeled the structure of the Na⁺ channel using the known structures of the K⁺ channel proteins. This is necessary because the Na⁺ channel has not been crystallized. It's an excellent way to get a structure when you know that two proteins are homologous (descended from a common ancestor).

From the model, the authors were able to focus on the probable site of DDT binding based on the known mutations to resistance. In this case, they looked at the interface between helix S5 in Domain II and nearby helices S6 from Domain II (IIS6) and S6 from Domain III (IIIS6), which packs against IIS5 in the structure. They tried docking various insecticides in this region and came up with a good fit in all cases. The DDT binding site is shown below.

Note that the side chains of T929 and L932 interact directly with DDT. These are the sites of mutations to high levels of resistance. It looks like changes to these amino acids prevent binding of DDT and that's the basis of resistance.

The S4-S5 linker helix is shown in yellow in this figure. Recall that this is the helix that responds to membrane potential by reorienting to a more vertical position. This, in turn, shifts the S5 and S6 helices to more vertical postions and closes the channel. In the presence of DDT the S5 and S6 helices are effectively cross-linked and they cannot shift to a position where they move closer together. This prevents closing of the channel. DDT locks the channel in the open conformation leading to a continual influx of Na⁺, uncontrolled firing of the nerve, and eventual death.

O'Reilly, Andrias O., Khambay, Bhupinder P. S., Williamson, Martin S., Field, Linda M., Wallace, B. A., and Davies, T. G. Emyr (2006) Modelling insecticide-binding sites in the voltage-gated sodium channel. Biochem. J. (2006) 396:255–263.

Joni Mitchell Sings About DDT

 
Here's part of the lyrics from Big Yellow Taxi. I don't know about the rest of you but I'd much rather watch and listen to Joni Mitchell than Al Gore or David Suzuki. You may not recognize the song until you hear her sing it.

They took all the trees
Put 'em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see 'em

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

Hey farmer farmer
Put away that DDT now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees
Please!

Voltage-Gated Ion Channels

 
Cells have to import and export ions in order to survive. Since ions are charged molecules, they do not pass through the cell membrane. This means they have to be transported by proteins that are embedded in the membrane.

There are many different kinds of transporters. Some of them use up energy to move ions across the membrane by a process called active transport. Some of them simply open a channel and allow ions to pass through. Let's look at some channel proteins.

A typical channel protein consists of several subunits arranged around a central hole that permits passage of ions. In this case we'll be dealing with ion channel proteins that allow movement of Na⁺ (sodium) or K⁺ (potassium) ions from the outside of the cell (top) to the cytoplasm (bottom). The part of the protein that spans the membrane is usually an α helical region. In fact, there are usually several α helices in a channel protein.

The flow of ions must be regulated, so these channel proteins must be capable of opening and closing to allow or restrict the flow of Na⁺ or K⁺. This is why they're called gated channels. There are several ways of controlling the gate. We are going to be discussing mechanisms that respond to the membrane potential—the difference in charge on either side of the membrane. For example, the wave of membrane depolarization that occurs as a nerve impulse, or action potential, moves along the axon of a nerve cell.

These channel proteins are called voltage-gated ion channels.

The simplest kind of voltage-gated ion channels are the K⁺ (potassium) channels found in bacteria and in eukaryotes. The role of potassium channels is to allow influx of potassium if the concentration inside the cell drops below some minimal value. Normally the concentration of K⁺ in the cytoplasm is about 100 times greater than the concentration outside the cell because K⁺ ions are actively transported into the cell as Na⁺ ions are pumped out. The concentration of Na⁺ outside the cell is about 10 times higher than the inside concentration.

From time to time, these concentrations are perturbed (e.g., during the firing of a nerve impulse) and the sodium and potassium channels will open to restore the resting state concentrations. The gates in the ion channels will only open for 1 millisecond but this is enough to allow entry of thousands of ions per channel.

The structures of several bacterial K⁺ channels are known and recently the structure of the homologous channel from rat was solved. The structures are very similar. Let's look at the rat voltage-gated K⁺ channel (Longe et al. 2005a; Long et al. 2005b).

The complete channel consists of four identical subunits colored red, green, yellow, and blue in the figure on the left. The crystallized protein has an additional β subunit at the bottom attached to the T1 cytoplasmic domain but I've removed it in order to simplify the description. The β subunit contains an oxidoreductase activity that's coupled to the influx of potassium.

If you look at the structure of the single red subunit you can see that it consists of a bundle of four transmembrane α helices labelled S1-S4 on the left and two others (S5 and S6) on the top right. The S5 and S6 helices are the ones that form the central channel when the four subunits come together. This is most easily seen in the top view at the bottom of the figure. The black dot in the middle represent a K⁺ ion about to pass through the channel.

The structure shown is the open conformation that allows passage of ions. The closed conformation was modeled from the known structure of the bacterial channels and experimental data that implicated the S4-S5 linker helix in the gating process. You can see this linker helix in the figure above. It joins the S1-S4 bundle to the S5, S6 bundle. It is not one of the transmembrane helices. The results are shown below.

In the closed conformation, the S4-S5 helix responds to changes in the membrane potential by twisting from a horizontal position to a slightly more vertical position. This causes the S5 and S6 transmembrane helices to also adopt a more vertical orientation. Since the same conformational change occurs in all four subunits, the net effect is to make the entire protein more narrow and this closes the channel in the middle of the protein. The switch between the open and closed conformations is extremely rapid and it is very sensitive to changes in the membrane potential.

Long, Stephen B., Campbell, Ernest B., MacKinnon, Roderick (2005a) Crystal Structure of a Mammalian Voltage-Dependent Shaker Family K+ Channel. Science 309:897-903.

Long, Stephen B., Campbell, Ernest B., MacKinnon, Roderick (2005b) Voltage Sensor of Kv1.2: Structural Basis of Electromechanical Coupling. Science 309:903-908.

Ann Coulter Finally Gets Something Right

 
A Gentleman's C (love that title!) quotes Ann Coulter from her book Godless,

...Professors are the most cosseted, pussified, subsidized group of people in the U.S. workforce. They have concocted a system to preemptively protect themselves for not doing their jobs, known as "tenure." They make a lot of money, have health plans that would make New York City municipal workers' jaws drop, and work -- at most -- fifteen hours a week.

At last she gets something right ... or almost right. Well ... maybe a little bit right.

Tenure doesn't protect us from not doing our jobs, it protects us when we're doing our jobs. If you don't do your job you're going to lose it and tenure won't, and shouldn't, protect you. Tenure means that if Ann Coulter were a Professor she couldn't be fired for being such an ass, as long as she works hard at it. But that's a minor difference. For Ann Coulter, being 180° wrong is close enough.

Some Professors make a lot of money, but only when they get old. Most Professors make far less than they could if they were in the private sector. Some make less than a high school teacher. But that's a minor discrepancy. Ann Coulter is probably not familiar with how the real world lives.

Canadian Professors have a good health plan. But that's not very special since all Canadians have a good health plan. It's one of the benefits of living in a civilized society. Ann Coulter ought to try it sometime. Maybe she should move to Great Britain or Australia. They are pro-war staunch American allies. She'd like it there.

As for workload, I checked with my colleagues and they all agree that 15 hours a day is too much. The average seems to be closer to 10-11 hours a day during the week and another 10 or so hours on the weekend. The total comes out to about 60 hours. In this case Ann was being too generous. Professors put in a lot of hours but 15 hours per day is not sustainable over the long haul.

[Hat Tip: John Lynch]

Joni Mitchell Inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame

 
Joni Mitchell was born in Fort Macleod, Alberta but moved to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan at a young age. She's really a Saskatchewan girl.

Famous not only as a singer-songwriter but also as an artist, she was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame on January 28, 2007 at the Toronto Convention Centre Gala. The performances, including James Taylor singing Woodstock, were just broadcast this evening on CBC.

Here's Joni singing one of her most famous songs Both Sides, Now also known as Clouds. Look below the fold to see her singing Woodstock. Here's a link to Chelsea Morning [lyrics], one of her signature songs. They just don't write 'em like that any more.

By the time we got to Woodstock
We were half a million strong
And everywhere there was song and celebration
And I dreamed I saw the bombers
Riding shotgun in the sky
And they were turning into butterflies
Above our nation

We are stardust
Billion year old carbon
We are golden
Caught in the devil's bargain
And we've got to get ourselves
back to the garden

Centre for Inquiry

 
Visit the Centre for Inquiry, Ontario. The new facility is just two blocks south of the main University of Toronto campus, and just a short walk from my office.

The grand opening is this Saturday night. I know you've got nothing better to do on Saturday night (the Brier semi-finals are in the afternoon) so come on out and help them get the ball rolling.

Don't forget to keep Thursday, March 22nd free for "God and Evolution."

God and Evolution

 
This is in my building. I'm going. Email me if you want to meet for dinner before it starts. (That includes you, Denyse. I'm buying!)

Brian Alters

Dan Brooks

The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls

 
I watched the TV show [ABC Special] on the The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa. It's very impressive. I'm certain that by educating the best and the brightest girls in South Africa (and perhaps all of Africa) Oprah is doing more to ensure the future of Africa than most others. The empowerment of women in Africa was a constant theme in the speeches of Stephen Lewis. I'm sure he's right and Oprah is helping. You can't help but be impressed by these young girls.

But this is the same Oprah Winfrey that fell hook line and sinker for "The Secret" [Oprah Winfrey Has a Secret]; a point that PZ Myers returns to today in Shame on Oprah. An article on Salon [Oprah's ugly secret] makes the same point. (PZ's comments are based on the Salon article.)

Here's some of the things Peter Birkenhead says in the Salon article.

Oprah's TV special about the Leadership Academy, essentially an hourlong infomercial, was just as well-coiffed and "visuals"-heavy. In fact, when Oprah was choosing her students, her important criteria must have included their television interview skills. On-camera interviews with the girls were the centerpiece of the special, but as one spunky, telegenic candidate after another beamed her smile at the camera, I couldn't help wondering how Joyce Carol Oates or Gertrude Stein or Madame Curie would have fared -- would they have "shined" and "glowed," or more likely talked in non-sound-bite-friendly paragraphs and maybe even, God forbid, the sometimes "dark" tones of authentic people, and been rejected. Sadly, the girls themselves (and who can blame them, desperate 12-year-olds trying to flatter their potential benefactor) parroted banal Oprah-isms, like "I want to be the best me I can be," and "Be a leader not a follower" and "Don't blend in, blend out," with smiley gusto.

When the special was over, I found myself equally impressed and queasy, one part hopeful, one part worried. I was happy the school was there, but disturbed by the way it created an instant upper class out of the students, in a country that doesn't exactly need any more segregation into haves and have-nots. I was hopeful for the students but nervous about what, exactly, they will be taught in a place called the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy. Will it be more "best me I can be" bromides? Will "The Secret" be on the syllabus? Oprah herself is going to teach "leadership classes" at the school, after all.

Has Oprah ever done anything that didn't leave people with mixed feelings?

Good point. The answer is yes, and no. I don't have any mixed feelings about her descent into superstitious nonsense and her gullibility when it comes to being duped by modern snake-oil salesmen. She's just plain wrong about "The Secret" and that other nonsense, and her popularity is hurting the cause of rationalism.

On the other hand, I really admire what she's trying to do in South Africa in spite of the "elitist" criticism. I'm not afraid of elitism when it's based on merit and achievement. But that admiration is tempered by the mixed feelings that Peter Birkenhead refers to. I wish there was another rich woman who felt passionately about educating black girls in Africa but who didn't come with Oprah's baggage.

I never thought about the kind of girls Oprah is selecting. I wonder about a 12 year old Gertrude Stein, or even a young Madeleine Albright. Would Jane Goodall have made the cut? What about Jane Fonda—would she have been picked? or Anne Frank?

There's no doubt that Oprah's doing a lot of good with her South African project, and with many other charitable works. And yeah, I know, her book club "gets people to read," and yadda yadda yadda. But there's also no doubt that a lot of us have been making forgiving disclaimers like that about Oprah for years. And that maybe they amount to trains-running-on-time arguments. Maybe it's time to stop. After reading "The Secret," it seemed to me that there were basically three possibilities: 1) Oprah really believes this stuff, and we should be very worried about her opening a school for anyone. 2) Oprah doesn't believe this stuff and we should be very, very worried about her opening a school for anyone. 3) Oprah doesn't know that any of this stuff is in the book or on her Web site and in a perfect world she wouldn't be allowed to open a school for anyone.

The things that Oprah does, like promoting "The Secret," can seem deceptively trivial, but it's precisely because they're silly that we should be concerned about their promotion by someone who is deadly earnest and deeply trusted by millions of people. It's important to start taking a look at Oprah because her philosophy has in many ways become the dominant one in our culture, even for people who would never consider themselves disciples. Somebody is buying enough copies of "The Secret" to make it No. 1 on the Amazon bestseller list. Those somebodies may be religious zealots or atheists, Republicans or Democrats, but they are all believers, to one degree or another, and, perhaps unwittingly, in aspects of the Oprah/"Secret" culture. And yes, sure, a lot of the believing they do is harmless fun -- everybody's got some kind of rabbit's foot in his pocket -- but we're not talking about rabbits' feet here, we're talking about whole, live rabbits pulled out of hats, and an audience that doesn't think it's being tricked.

This is a tough one. In an ideal world we would like to think that Oprah would come to her senses and realize that her personal philosophy is flawed. We would like to believe that she can change her mind and become rational. Then we would have the best of both worlds—a rich rational woman who is willing to spend her fortune to improve the world.

It ain't gonna happen, is it? At some point we need to make a choice. I'm hoping that the school will be taken over by more rational people when Oprah loses interest. I'm hoping that those bright young girls are too smart to fall for the pseudo-intellectual nonsense of "The Secret" (or religion, for that matter). Maybe they're a lot smarter than the women who show up for the taping of the Oprah Winfrey Show in Chicago. Wouldn't that be wonderful? How delicious it would be if five years from now a bevy of graduates from the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy were to denouce "The Secret"!

Here's the bottom line. It's scary when you put it like this.

Not that any of this is new. Aimee Semple McPherson, "The Power of Positive Thinking," Father Coughlin, est, James Van Praagh -- pick your influential snake-oil salesman or snake oil. They were all cut from the same cloth as Oprah and "The Secret." The big, big difference is, well, the bigness. The infinitely bigger reach of the Oprah empire and its emissaries. They make their predecessors look like kids with lemonade stands. It would be stupidly dangerous to dismiss Oprah and "The Secret" as silly, or ultimately meaningless. They're reaching more people than Harry Potter, for God-force's sake. That's why what Oprah does matters, and stinks. If you reach more people than Bill O'Reilly, if you have better name recognition than Nelson Mandela, if the books you endorse sell more than Stephen King's, you should take some responsibility for your effect on the culture. The most powerful woman in the world is taking advantage of people who are desperate for meaning, by passionately championing a product that mocks the very idea of a meaningful life.

That means something.

Six Reasons Why You Shouldn't Elect a Christian

 
John Wilkins makes the case for not electing a Christian to public office in the USA [Why Christians don't make good politicians].

1. They are exclusive, and will favour their own over the welfare of all. Minorities like Jews, Muslims, Hindus and other religions, as well as those who lack any religion, will be marginalised.
2. They have no moral sense, and will do whatever anyone in their faith community tells them they should do. They are religious relativists.
3. They try to impose their own views on others by law. They will try to make religious dogma binding on those who don't share their faith. They will "normalise" their own religious beliefs.
4. They are hypocrites, and will say one thing and do another. They will espouse Christ's teachings, and yet do the exact opposite - no fraternising with prostitutes or tax collectors, no care of strangers, no poverty vows for them.
5. The constitution (American or Australian) prohibits the establishment of religion.
6. They will try to impose religious holidays on the social calendar. Secular government must not make religious decisions on behalf of all people.

Are you convinced? Find out where these six reasons came from by going to John's blog.

Saskatchewan Beats New Brunswick 6-5

 
Team Saskatchewan beat New Brunswick last night to move into a three-way tie for third place with a record of 2 and 1 [CURLCAST].


The lead for Team Saskatchewan is Steve Lacock. Steve was the skip of the Canadian and World's Junior Champion teams in 2003 (left). He was born in my hometown of Yorkton, Saskatchewan and is the son of Gary Laycock, my cousin on my mother's side.

Mendel's Garden for March

 
The latest edition of Mendel's Garden is up on Behavioral Ecology Blog. Read it at Mendel's Garden: March 5, 2007.

There are articles on sex, milk, and spiders. You can also read about the future of evolution, how to decipher genomes. and DNA fingerprinting. There's an interesting article about what molecular biologists should be doing but in order to see it you have to join MySpace and that ain't gonna happen in my lifetime.

I'm pleased that I was the only contributer who actually mentioned that famous monk, Gregor Mendel, in my submissions! I love religious scientists.

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).

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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.

Aspartame Is Poisonous

Friday's Urban Legend: FALSE

The idea that aspartame is poison is widespread—much more common than most rational people would care to admit. You can hear people whispering about the dangers of aspartame in the coffee shops and on the commuter trains. If you believe what they're saying then aspartame is one of the most poisonous products that has ever been foisted on the public by unscrupulous international corporations. It's part of a vast conspiracy to murder innocent citizens in the name of corporate profit. This sort of thing is just a small part of a growing belief in all kinds of irrational, superstitious nonsense that threatens to make a mockery of science.

Here's a typical claim from a site called "Ethical Investing" (sic).

The artificial sweetener aspartame (NutraSweet, Equal, NatraTaste, Canderel) is without question the most toxic and health-destroying "food" sold to consumers. The number of people who have recognized toxicity reactions or damage from chronic aspartame ingestion is well over one million people in the U.S. (based on the reported toxicity reactions divided by the estimated reporting rate). While many people's health has already been destroyed by this product, the more serious concern is the long-term nervous system damage, immune system damage, and irreversible genetic damage known to be caused by aspartame's metabolite, formaldehyde. Formaldehyde can cause severe health problems at exceptionally low levels of exposure.

Here's another, from a website called "The Light Party."

Diet Coke is poison. And it's addictive, some victims drink several liters a day and keep it on their nightstands. If Coke changes the formula to remove aspartame the world will heal and the surge of hatred and vengeance by the disabled and bereaved shall certainly destroy Coca Cola.

The poison in Diet Coke is aspartame. As a member of the National Soft Drink Association Coke opposed FDA approval of aspartame for beverages. their objections, running to several pages published in the Congressional Record of 5/7/85, said aspartame is uniquely and inherently unstable and breaks down in the can. It decomposes into formaldehyde, methyl alcohol, formic acid, diketopiperazine and other toxins. In a study on 7 monkeys 5 had grand mal seizures and one died, a casualty rate of 86%.

This is all nonsense. The false claims are countered by dozens of scientific studies that show no adverse effects of aspartame. Snopes.com has a summary at Kiss My Aspartame.

[In a sop to the superstitious, you can also buy Diet Coke sweetened with SPLENDA®]

A Sophisticated Christian Philosopher Critiques The God Delusion

 
Richard Dawkins is often accused of being naive. Some of his fiercest critics are moderate Christians who claim that the religion Dawkins attacks is not their religion. The claim is that Dawkins is attacking a strawman version of Christianity and not the real intellectually sophisticated version that they believe in.

This form of criticism is called the Courtier's Reply an amazingly apt response invented by PZ Myers.

Now, one of the "really sophisticated" Christians has posted a review of The God Delusion. Alvin Plantinga is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. It will be interesting to see how a believer in modern sophisticated Christianity performs. Jason Rosenhouse dissects the review at Evolutionblog (Plantinga on Dawkins: Part One). It doesn't look good. Superstition is superstition no matter how you dress it up.