Social Sciences
scientificactivist | August 24, 2006Shelley of Retrospectacle asks fellow ScienceBloggers:
"Are you for or against the death penalty, or (if its conditional), in what cases? Furthermore, do you believe that societies that sanction war are hypocritical for opposing the death penalty?"
I'm against the death penalty, and I would agree that if a society uses war as a tool of foreign policy, it would be hypocritical to oppose the death penalty. Fortunately (or, rather, unfortunately) for the US, that doesn't seem to be an issue. In addition to the usual arguments against the death penalty (not a deterrent, risk of executing the…
evolgen | August 24, 2006A couple of people are talking about this Wall Street Journal article which claims that Republicans are popping out more babies that Democrats, and this disparity will lead to an relative increase in the frequency of Republicans. It's been pointed out that the statistics and logic behind this argument are flawed, and the math in the article is atrocious.
Depending on your political persuasion, the outcome suggested in the article may be viewed as a good thing or a bad thing. Regardless of the political direction you'd like to see our country take, however, I think we can all agree that we'd…
stcynic | August 24, 2006Judicial Watch, the group founded by legendary nutjob Larry Klayman whose goal appears to be to sue every human being in the western hemisphere by the year 2050, is making a big deal out of an alleged conflict of interest by Judge Taylor. Naturally, STACLU is jumping on board, as is much of the media. It's all a bunch of nonsense. Here's the accusation:
According to her 2003 and 2004 financial disclosure statements, Judge Diggs Taylor served as Secretary and Trustee for the Community Foundation for Southeastern Michigan (CFSEM). She was reelected to this position in June 2005. The official…
clock | August 23, 2006Looking at my two yesterday's posts, one on science fiction and the other on LabLit, together with Archy's excellent post on history of SF, something, like a hunch or an idea, started to develop at the back of my mind (continued under the fold).
If you look at the way scientists are portrayed in older SF and in recent LabLit, there is a distinct difference. There is not much old LabLit, and new SF does not have many scientists in it (what with the whole flood of cyberpunk and fantasy), so I'll ignore those for now.
In old SF, a scientist is likely to be portrayed as a loner, a refugee from…
scientificactivist | August 23, 2006Lines were drawn in the sand, artillery stood armed and ready, and tensions ran high. Neither side was willing to budge, and despite the seemingly endless conflict having already tested the resolve of both sides, it looked like things were only just beginning to get rough. The whole scenario was regrettable--war always is--but it felt inevitable at the time.
Besides, how else was I going to get internet access in my house?
Wars are fought for a variety of reasons: for power or territory, for religions or ideologies, for oil, and so on. I had never counted the internet among those, but in…
clock | August 22, 2006Biologist Trying To Crack Communication Code Of Proteins:
"Proteins interact; they 'talk' to each other," the associate professor says. "It's how they know what to do, and it's how most of the things that need to happen for living organisms get done."
---------snip--------------
"To begin understanding how proteins talk, we first made random mutations--we broke things and then asked what happened," Larsen says. "That strategy worked well and allowed us to identify the key 'words.' Now we want to know what the 'words' mean, and we are starting by asking what happens when we mix the 'dialects…
clock | August 22, 2006This review was first written on April 14, 2005...
The final verdict has come from the shop: my computer is definitively dead, fried, kaputt. I will be scrambling for a replacament over the next week or so, but until then I cannot read 90% of the blogs (including my own), and while the car is in the shop (blew a gasket!!!) I cannot go to a decent computer either. That's a shame, as I cannot post links to good blog posts, read carnivals, or continue my series of Friday Good Blog Recommendations. I recommended Lance Mannion, Apophenia and David Brin's Blog so far, and intend to continue as…
retrospectacle | August 21, 2006
It is truly a challenge to write both scientifically, informatively, and accessibly. However, Christiane Nusslein-Volhard is able to strike a remarkable balance in her new book on developmental biology, Coming to Life. She succinctly summarizes crucial discoveries and experiments in the field, spanning from Darwin and Mendel to very recent work in cloning and gene therapy. But, the book does not read like a laundry list of names, dates, and reagents. Rather, the book feels more like a journey through time and science, with Nusslein-Volhard as the guide, pointing out sights and sounds along…
pharyngula | August 19, 2006
Hank Fox just dropped me a line mentioning an older article he'd found, as something I might want to blog about. Yes, it was—I wrote about it sometime ago, and here it is again. The article Hank found is also worth reading, with a strong conclusion:
Despite all its fine words, religion has brought in its wake little more than violence, prejudice and sexual disease. True morality is found elsewhere. As UK Guardian columnist George Monbiot concluded in his review of Gregory Paul's study, "if you want people to behave as Christians advocate, you should tell them that God does not exist."
It's…
stcynic | August 19, 2006I've written many times of the need for moderate Muslims to take a stand against their reactionary brethren, and the need to support mass movements toward reform in the Islamic world. One of the key voices for reformation today is that of Irshad Manji. Born in Idi Amin's Uganda, Manji's family fled to Canada where she grew up. She is the author of The Trouble with Islam: A Muslim's Call for Reform in Her Faith, a book that declares unequivocally:
"Not solely because of September 11, but more urgently because of it, we've got to end Islam's totalitarianism, particularly the gross human-rights…
razib | August 18, 2006In response to my post about Heather Mac Donald and her debate with others on the Right about the fundamental role of religion within "the movement" Steve Burton has offered his own thoughts. Roughly, I see Steve's points as being this:
The misery of the historical record does not exhibit man's natural goodness, simply, basal a morality.
Mac Donald's innate morality is not so innate after all, but is bathed in the sensibilities of a Christian culture. Take away that Christian culture, roughly, anything is permissible if there is no savior.
I think there are multiple ways to respond to Steve…
razib | August 17, 2006Update: Heather offers a follow up. Mario Loyola offers an interesting response. Here is what I find worth noting:
One of them expresses a weirdly postmodern view: We cannot know the nature of the Gods, but a good person knows in his gut the difference between right and wrong, and good people should venerate the religious rites and beliefs of their ancestors and fellows.
The problem with this assertion is that I suspect the issue here is that a particular sort of evangelical Christianity is not about the custom and tradition of the ancestors. It isn't about silent respect for the forbears…
retrospectacle | August 17, 2006From Montgomery Gentry's website (Hat tip to jc):
Troy is accused of conspiring with a professional hunting guide to improperly fill out a hunting tag. To back up this charge, the indictment claims that Troy shot a tamed bear in a cage, then made a video to appear that he did not shoot the bear in a cage, but in the wild. These claims are wildly inaccurate.
The bear in question was never in a cage or pen; not when it was killed or at anytime prior to that. This wild bear occupied its own habitat (consisting of several acres of woodlands) on a game preserve owned by the codefendant.…
oracknows | August 16, 2006Yesterday, on the way home, I was flipping through the AM dial. Yes, as embarrassed as I am to admit it, even now I still occasionally have a soft spot for conservative talk radio. At the risk of being shunned by my fellow ScienceBloggers (most of whom are--shall we say?--a bit to the left) and driving away half my traffic, I will even admit to having listened regularly to Rush Limbaugh for a period of several years back when I was in the lab fulltime. Say whatever you will about his views (which have tended to become more odious over the years), he was (and sometimes still is) a powerful and…
pharyngula | August 13, 2006Joe Carter is making a curiously convoluted argument. He's trying to get at why the majority of the American public does not accept the theory of evolution, and he's made a ten part list of reasons, which boils down to placing the blame on the critics of intelligent design creationism. We're all bad, bad people who are doing a bad, bad job of informing the public and doing a good job of antagonizing them. There is a germ of truth there—I do think we all have to do a better job of educating American citizens—but what makes it a curious and ultimately dishonest argument is that Joe Carter is a…
clock | August 11, 2006Not just in the USA. Visceral queeziness coupled with religious sentiment coupled with scientific ignorance appears in other parts of the world as well, as in the UK
The Scottish Council on Human Bioethics, a professional group based in Edinburgh, has published a report on the ethical implications of the practice in the journal Human Reproduction and Genetic Ethics. The report is online at www.schb.org.uk.
The article lists some examples of research:
Later research has spawned human-animal creations, the report said. These usually die at the embryonic stage, but often survive if the…
pharyngula | August 11, 2006
This is what living in the rural midwest is all about: the county fair! The place was packed yesterday with amazing numbers of people having a good time.
I've put a few photos below the fold.
Animal:
We've got barns full of beasts.
That horse wanted to eat my camera. Most of the animals cowed, or sheeplike, or swinishly lazy, but that guy was at least alert and interested enough to do something.
Vegetable:
These displays were even less active.
I will spare you the sheds full of 4H and FFA crafts.
Mineral:
Farmers have a fascination with huge hardware, I think.
The cannon in the…
chaoticutopia | August 9, 2006Why can't we picture a fifth dimension? One, two, and three seem so easy to grasp. We can even see how one leads to the next: a line, composed of points, is a component of a shape on a plane, which in turn is a component of a spatial object. Consider that object with an additional aspect, enduring through time, and you can almost envision a fourth--a curving sense of endurance, relative to our space. So, why not imagine another dimension, not just curved, but twisted or spun, which consists of the aspects of time, present, future and past, relating to one another? Ok... don't picture it too…
retrospectacle | August 9, 2006In addition to the below post on gene therapy, keep a watch out for a review paper on the topic (by yours truly) that was just accepted into Hearing Research.
Deafness and hearing impairment are serious medical concerns in America, with nearly 30 million Americans affected to some degree. This is such a widespread problem in our society due to the combined effects of loud noises, aging, and heredity. Hearing loss happens when cochlear hair cells are lost (for a primer on the cochlea and hair cells, go here). Mammals, including humans, are unable to re-grow hair cells although birds and a few…
catdynamics | August 8, 2006Dr Francis Collins, head of the Human Genome Project, has a book out: "The Language of God". It is about his conversion to evangelical christianity and he tries to lay out a case for religion in no conflict with science, while also tackling creationists and religions fundamentalists.
Haven't read the book, but am feeling less inclined to after Collins gives (yet another) interview in Salon.
Must say, it sounds like a good pitch for a Templeton Prize though. best of luck with that.
PZ has already dissected the interview, but since Collins is a physicist I feel an urge to comment also...…