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Isaac Newton

Video Presentation: Why the Debate Over Intelligent Design Really Matters

I have recently posted a new video presentation on my YouTube channel. In the video I talk about some of the reasons why I think the debate over Intelligent Design and biological origins is of great significance. Aside from just being a fascinating area, it has many implications in several areas of life. This video, while far from perfect, is a big step up from my last few videos. I’ve done a fair amount of editing on this one, and took time to make it a little more professional, with music, slides, and photos. I hope you enjoy it, and it gets you thinking a little about why this topic is of importance to you also. Why the Question of Read More ›

Isaac Newton and Richard Feynman on ancient sources who thought Earth is a sphere, orbiting the sun

So, unlike modern pundits, Newton and Feynman knew a lot about the actual carefully thought-out views of ancient astronomers. But what, after all, did they really know? None of those people had smartphones. Read More ›

Some Indian scientists nix Newton and Einstein

The BBC is now reporting on a trend in India to identity politics in science: The 106th Indian Science Congress, which was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, runs from 3-7 January. The head of a southern Indian university cited an old Hindu text as proof that stem cell research was discovered in India thousands of years ago… Another scientist from a university in the southern state of Tamil Nadu told conference attendees that Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein were both wrong and that gravitational waves should be renamed “Narendra Modi Waves”. Dr KJ Krishnan reportedly said Newton failed to “understand gravitational repulsive forces” and Einstein’s theories were “misleading”.Soutik Biswas and others, “India scientists dismiss Einstein theories” at BBC The Read More ›

Design Disquisitions: Jeffrey Koperski on Two Bad Ways and Two Good Ways to Attack ID (Part 1): Two Bad Ways

Here’s my new article at Design Disquisitions. Enjoy: In the next two (potentially three) articles I’ll be taking an in-depth look at an excellent paper written by Jeffrey Koperski, a philosopher of science at Saginaw Valley State University. Koperski has written about ID in several publications (1), which I highly recommend, and he takes a balanced and sensible approach to this topic. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t accept ID, but takes a constructively critical stance, so his work is well worth engaging with. As one can tell from the title of the paper, Two Bad Ways to Attack Intelligent Design and Two Goods Ones(2), Koperski critically analyses two common criticisms of ID, suggesting that they are highly dubious lines of argument. He then Read More ›