Creationism gains foothold in schools
THE government has cleared the way for a form of creationism to be taught in Britain’s schools as part of the religious syllabus.
Lord Adonis, an education minister, is to issue guidelines within two months for the teaching of “intelligent design” (ID), a theory being promoted by the religious right in America. […]

In a December 26 comment, Larry Arnhart, author of Darwinian Conservatism, asked,
Why would “family values” conservatism be contrary to Darwinian conservatism? In my book, I show how Darwinian science supports family values and traditional morality as rooted in human biological nature. So where’s the conflict?
Where’s the conflict? Well, how about from the beginning to the […]

“The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” -William Shakespeare
In The Grand Canyon is How Old? PZ Myers whines like a little girl that the National Park Service includes in its bookstore The Grand Canyon: A Different View. The book attempts to explain the formation of the Grand Canyon from a young earth creationist point […]

Carl Zimmer hears the sound of taxonomy exploding. PZ Myers, in his haste to dismiss the notion that genotype and phenotype aren’t increasingly at odds in where to place different critters in the so-called Tree of Life, inadvertently refers to an article by his comrade-in-arms Carl Zimmer which backed up the very point I […]

Back in June I made a post here at UD that included my foreword to Ken Poppe’s book RECLAIMING SCIENCE FROM DARWINISM (see here). In the post, I did not indicate the book to which it would be a foreword since the book was not yet out and I didn’t want to jeopardize its reception. […]

Here’s an old study that I recall reading about as an undergraduate psychology major. It is about groupthink, those who adopt it and those who don’t. As you read it, ask youself who in the debate over evolution and ID is following the path of compliance and, alternatively, the path of independence (note that the […]

It is my speculation the notorious Beyond Belief Conference and Dawkins call to make religion illegal are signs secularism could be on the brink of crisis. Ironically, Daniel Dennett unwittingly gives powerful “scientific” reasons why secularism is doomed and why religion (which tends to be ID-friendly) will prevail as the dominant paradigm in […]

You know you’ve arrived when you’re the topic of a board game (look for “ID — The Movie” next).

TO PURCHASE: http://www.livingwaters.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=536

Cornell geneticist John Sanford pointed out many problems confronting the theory of Darwinian evolution, particularly human evolution. (See: Genetic Entropy ) Many of his arguments were subtle. Among them was his discussion of a somewhat obscure paper: Estimate of the Mutation Rate per Nucleotide in Humans by Nachman.

Nachman writes:
The high deleterious mutation […]

I just watched Cracking the Ocean Code on the Discovery Science Channel last night. It’s on again at 3pm Eastern Time today and tomorrow. Really amazing. Venter basically circumnavigated the globe stopping every 200 miles to sample the microscopic life in the ocean which he is now shotgun sequencing back at his […]

I hope to blog on Larry Arnhart wondering why family values conservatives do not embrace Darwinism tomorrow. Meanwhile, if you need a news fix, go here, here, and here, where I have been posting news and comments from the ID controversy for several days, between stabs at various jobs.

There’s a bigger genetic jump between humans and chimps than previously believed

A lot more genes may separate humans from their chimp relatives than earlier studies let on. Researchers studying changes in the number of copies of genes in the two species found that their mix of genes is only 94 percent identical. The 6 percent […]

I’m a big fan of the Telic Thoughts blog, and I would encourage UD readers to visit TT.
For me, one of the great joys of visiting TT is Joy, one of my favorite TT authors and commentators. In a recent TT post, Orr Fisks Dawkins, Joy makes the following comment:

In the DVD Case For A Creator, in the Q&A section, Michael Behe was asked, How would you respond to the claim that intelligent design theory is not falsifiable?
Behe responded:
The National Academy of Sciences has objected that intelligent design is not falsifiable, and I think that’s just the opposite of the truth. Intelligent design is […]

For links to all go here.
1. A recent ChristianWeek column: Faith@Science: The God gene? Spot? Circuit? Okay, maybe a Module?
(Note: This is the column I wrote shortly after finishing my work on The Spiritual Brain, explaining why notions of a God spot, gene, module, or circuit in the brain are completely ridiculous.)
For more go here.

Excerpts from Denyse’s comments on some recent books:
Of course, I have forgotten or omitted lots of worthy titles, but fundamentally it was much easier then [five years ago] than now to rhyme off the key titles you would need to read to really keep up with the ID controversy. Today, you need a library shelving […]

PZ Myers!
By removing all the irrelevant bloviation he’s succeeded in getting Pharyngula’s content compressed to its core essentials. A remarkable invention in blog efficiency. Follow this link to see how the invention works.

When biological evidence fails to establish Darwinian evolution, go instead for digital evidence. Here at last digital proof positive for the Darwinian evolution of the bacterial flagellum (if Kitzmiller v. Dover wasn’t enough to sink ID, this surely will):

For more on digital evolution, check out MSU’s Digital Evolution Lab. For the logic underlying digital evidence […]

Silent Mutations Are Not Always Silent
“Mutations leading to identical amino acid sequences can change protein folding and function”… 12/21/06
Silent Mutations Speak Up
“Biologists have realized that the genetic code harbours a layer of information that they have largely ignored. Again.” 12/21/06

For a great, free, downloadable MP3 lecture series visit:
http://www.maclaurin.org/mp3_group.php?type=MacLaurin+Campus+Lectures
There’s lots of interesting stuff on ID, Darwinism and related topics by such people as Denyse O’Leary, Mustafa Akyol, Michael Behe, Del Ratzsch, John Angus Campbell, Alvin Plantinga, and more.

I’m considering offering $250 for the winning entry in a flash animation contest. I’d like the flash animation to incorporate the following elements:
(1) Portray Richard Dawkins as a cult deprogrammer.
(2) Portray a 7-year old Stephen Colbert as the theist he must convert to atheism. (See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UuXpysYEhgA and below)
(3) Employ 10 classic Dawkins quotes.
(4) No violence.
(5) […]

The Scientist reports today on the unfolding Congressional probe into the Sternberg case. The following paragraph caught my attention:
NCSE spokesman Nicholas Matzke said his group was not part of an effort to dismiss Sternberg. “A lot of people at the Smithsonian were mad because their journal was dragged into a political issue. We wanted them […]

Barbara Forrest, the official historian for the anti-ID side, has a piece of revisionist history in the latest Skeptical Inquirer (see here). It is titled “The Vise Strategy Undone.” Since I’m the inventor of the Vise Strategy and one of the principal targets of her piece, let me offer a few corrections:
(1) I wrote up […]

They say ID is dead yet they just can’t stop talking about it on Panda’s Thumb. I counted 21 mentions of “ID” and “Intelligent Design” on just the home page without expansion of any articles or comments.
If they believe ID is dead that means the thumbsters are necrophiliacs. Gross. I’ll add that […]

YouTube Clips from the Beyond Belief Conference…
Neil deGrasse Tyson tirade on Stupid Design
Melvin Konner mocking Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins on Religious Child Abuse
Sam Harris replies to Scott Atran
Steven Weinberg’s Crazy Old Aunt Analogy of Religion
Sam Harris—Religion is only for lunatics and idiots

“The phylogeny of the animals is currently incompletely resolved and has undergone major reorganisations over the past few years, mainly as a result of analyses of rRNA gene sequences”…

Settlement puts lid on thought
By LARRY TAYLOR
Published on: 12/21/06
Once again, the potent combination of a liberal judge and the deep pockets of the American Civil Liberties Union have proved too much to overcome.

I blogged about the possibility of parthenogenesis in mammals a month or so ago. Here’s another newly discovered case of it in a higher animal.
Virgin Dragon Prepares to Give Birth
Dec 20, 1:36 PM (ET)
By MARIA CHENG
CHESTER, England (AP) - In an evolutionary twist, Flora the Komodo dragon has managed to become pregnant all on […]

A colleague wrote [my emphasis]:
The S. purpuratus genome will help us “understand on sight the logic functions they execute in response to the sets of transcription factors in given cells at given times.” “The sea urchin genome will directly contribute to solving the principles of design of gene regulatory networks for embryonic development.” “Such principles […]

A friend pointed me to an article in the Los Angeles Times, extolling the current “godless chic,” which has attracted the attention of other bloggers here. There is the “your God is a fraud” thing (Jesus never existed; men stupider than him made him up) or Blasphemy Challenge thing (deny the Holy Spirit on YouTube […]

The “science” of evolution can’t withstand even mild criticism so they resort to financial intimidation to win the day.
Cobb county, Georgia, didn’t teach evolution at all in their high schools. A few years ago they decided to start teaching it and placed the following sticker in the textbook:
This textbook contains material on […]