Monthly Archives: August 2009
Three book reviews
Andre Pichot’s version of the “Darwin caused Hitler” mythography is critiqued in the THES by Simon Underdown. Rohan Maitzen at The Valve has a haunting review of Daniel Mendelsohn’s The Lost, coincidentally. And Will Thomas has some things to say … Continue reading
Tautology 5b: The issues, continued
In this post I will discuss these issues: 3. What is a function? Is it in the mind/theory, or in the world? 4. Is natural selection a mechanism? If so, what kind? 5. Is the principle of natural selection a … Continue reading
Filed under Epistemology, Evolution, Philosophy, Science
Google Books, the last, worst, library?
Geoff Nunberg over at Language Log gets stuck, justifiably, into the incredibly bad classification of books being scanned at Google Books. Give that this is, as he says, the likely last ever scan of all pre-electronic, pre-Mickey Mouse Amendment copyright, … Continue reading
Filed under History, Sermon, Social evolution
Tautology 5a: The issues
So where are we? The tautology problem has laid open some deep concerns and confusions about evolution. In this post (5a) and the next (5b), which I will return to afterwards and add and amend (in other words it’s a … Continue reading
Filed under Epistemology, Evolution, Philosophy, Science
The use of history by philosophers
So I was doing my usual schtick of criticising the use of history by a philosopher (in this case a French philosopher named Canguilhem), when I was asked the following question by one Lenny Moss: “So who do you think … Continue reading
Filed under Epistemology, History, Philosophy
Schools, if not conservative Christians, can learn from experience
The Des Moines Register reports that local schools are dropping elective Bible classes and critiques of evolutionary theory to avoid being sued (like in Dover PS). Spencer school officials will throw out a Bible class and discard a critique of … Continue reading
Filed under Creationism and Intelligent Design, Education, Religion
New paper on polyploid speciation
For a long time now, people have known of speciation by the multiplication of chromosomes (polyploidy), either of one’s own chromosomes (autopolyploidy) or by doubling a mismatched set from some other species’ chromosomes (allopolyploidy) to even up the numbers and … Continue reading
Australians can’t be young earth creationists
Or so says Fred Clark at Slacktivist: You can’t be a young-earth creationist and be from Australia. I think if you’re a young-earth creationist, you’re not even allowed to believe in Australia. That continent is evolution’s playground, it’s showroom. Ken … Continue reading
Filed under Creationism and Intelligent Design, Evolution
Thoughts of a Republican
A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations, and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever rejects it does of necessity fly to anarchy … Continue reading
Quorum sensing in bacteria and cooperation
Byte Size Biology has a post up discussing a recent paper on quorum sensing in bacteria, a process whereby the chemical signals for a community of microbial organisms can modify the dynamics of the organisms themselves. It’s interesting in its … Continue reading
