Well, wow, for the second year now one of my posts has been selected for inclusion in the science blogging anthology, The Open Laboratory. Last year it was the teosinte review; this year the honor goes to the post on Darwin's tomatoes. This year's anthology includes 50 blog posts on various scientific topics, and it looks like an excellent collection.
The standard simplified narrative of evolutionary adaptation goes something like this. A population of organisms is exposed to a challenge of some kind. Perhaps a new predator has appeared on the scene, or the temperature of the environment has ticked up a degree or two, or the warm little pond is slowly accumulating a toxic chemical.
Well, it's the first sampler since June, but I won't try to make up for lost time. Todd Wood has started a blog, and it's excellent. His slant is unique -- he's a young-earth creationist -- but his writing is superb and his expertise in genetics and genomics is world-class. My favorite entry so far: a commentary on a recent report describing genetic variation among humans.
I've mentioned before that we've had an intelligent design proponent (code named Timaeus) as an official guest on the ASA email list. The discussion has been mostly useful. One thing that became clear early on was the fact that Timaeus is not a scientist and has not read much science outside of the works of ID defenders.
It is understandably typical for Christians to consider evolution as something that confronts and challenges faith. To say that North American evangelicals consider evolution to be largely incompatible with Christian belief is to state the painfully obvious.
About 2 months ago, I finished a series on Michael Behe's latest book, The Edge of Evolution. I concluded that it was a terrible book, displaying significant errors of both fact and judgment. The book's main argument is a population genetics argument, and Behe seems to have little knowledge or understanding of that difficult subject.
Okay, wow, that was a long hiatus. I can explain, really I can. Here's a report on my activities in the last six weeks. I wandered into Telic Thoughts in search of intelligent intelligent design advocates.
In case your local news hasn't picked up the story yet.
Various book memes have come across my path, and they can be inspiring and interesting. Here's one I chose to pass along because it should result in the evolution of a pretty good list of recommended popular science books. (The originator calls it the "great pop-sci book project.") If you choose to pass it on, follow the instructions and link to the source, which is Cocktail Party Physics.
What kind of universe should one expect to see, as a Christian, or as an atheist, or whatever? Is design (conveniently defined by fellows of the Discovery Institute) something that a Christian should expect to see? That's the question I ask over at Clashing Culture, reflecting on some of the weird theological claims of some ID proponents (and of Richard Dawkins). Wander over and weigh in.
In a previous post, I started to explain a fact that some people (who don't know me) seem to find surprising or noteworthy. Michael Behe is a Christian who accepts common ancestry and an ancient cosmos, so you'd think I would be excited about the work of a fellow "theistic evolutionist." But I'm not. Two overall problems come to mind.