In reading Steven Pinker’s How the Mind Works, which has been a slow burner (both in terms of time taken to read it and time taken to get into the really interesting stuff [Now long finished]), I have just started to read about the importance and ontology of emotions. I
Category Science
I was worried recently when I read the phrase “goal-directed evolution” in some philosophy writing. This annoys me since it shows what I consider to be a fundamental misunderstanding of what evolution is and does, and philosophers should know better.
Dr Caleb W. Lack, purveyor of the fine opinions and science over at Great Plains Skeptic here at SIN, already has two Onus Books publications:
Mood Disorders: An Introduction
Anxiety Disorders: An Introduction
These great little introductory texts illuminate the latest understandings on these conditions. Look out for one on OCD to come. Further to such contributions to the Onus Books portfolio, he is, with a fellow psychologist, producing a text called “Psychology Gone Astray: A Selection of Racist & Sexist Literature from Early Psychological Research”. Here is a post from his blog to describe the project. In reading the MS to edit it, I am finding much of interest in this early, pseudoscientific era of the discipline:
In connection to the rant I made about Randy Everist and his Nazi, unfair and unjustified comment strategy he has on his blog, here is a post from the Popular Science website which a Twitter follower and friend from Portsmouth Skeptics in the Pub sent me. Hopefully they won’t mind me posting it here. Some interesting research regarding commenting and negativity bias:
The BBC report this fascinating discovery which seems to confirm the start of inflation (I would take issue with the slight implication that the BB is definitely the start of everything coming into being) or the Big Bang:
Scientists say they have extraordinary new evidence to support a Big Bang Theory for the origin of the Universe.
Researchers believe they have found the signal left in the sky by the super-rapid expansion of space that must have occurred just fractions of a second after everything came into being.
So now it is time to return to the idea of homosexuality and Christianity about which I posted the other day.
Having looked at biblical issues concerning the position of deeming h/s morally wrong, let us now look at what makes people h/s and whether it is fair for an all-loving god to judge them.
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I would like to give a good synopsis of the current tate of biology and sexual orientation. First of all, it is interesting to note that the drivers for male and female h/s are understood to be often very different. It is not one rule fits all. Furthermore, there are also a whole host of reasons that can lead to h/s – biological, genetic (and epigenetic), and environmental and social.
Let us look firstly at the biological causes and theories.
OK, so most people of neutral, skeptical or commonsensical persuasion understand that the global flood claims of Genesis are nonsense. Yet the meme still persists amongst literalists and fundamentalists. I love GearHeadEd’s comment over on DC. It shows that that much water is truly a ridiculous concept. I wrote extensively once on why people believe such silly things. Here is Ed’s comment:
William Lane Craig is ubiquitous in conversations about theistic and Christian apologetics. Being the foremost modern philosopher/theologian still operating, he is often called upon or used as a source for theistic and Christian arguments, winning many debates in the process (on technique and rhetoric, in the main). I have part critiqued his Reasonable Faith book here.
Another fascinating video from skydivephil, the pair whom I interviewed here (well worth checking out). This time, the ‘before the Big Bang’ idea is investigated in interviewing Sir Roger Penrose with regard to the cyclical universe.
The end is Nye!
Sorry, made that joke last time, but now it seems better suited.
So last night was the much-trafficked debate between Bill Nye, the Science Guy, and AiG founder Ken Ham. Now, I am obviously biased towards the scientific consensus; evidence tends to do that. However, I have to say that I was pessimistic about how the debate would go. I didn’t figure either side would really win, but rather it seemed there would be a lot of talking past each other. And while that happened to an extend, overall I think Nye handled things rather well.
Paper.li is a cool way of disseminating information, blogs, articles and what have you. I have signed the Skeptic Ink…
OK, it might take you a while to stop laughing. Now, these days, I don’t really get involved in evolution arguments with people who flatly deny evolution on such blatantly anti-intellectual terms. I see it as self-delusion, and having written before that such people are impervious to reason and evidence, and that showing such actually entrenches their views, I try not to be bothered by such positions. But often fail.
The discovery of well-preserved pelves and a partial pelvic fin from Tiktaalik roseae, a 375 million-year-old transitional species between fish and the first legged animals, reveals that the evolution of hind legs actually began as enhanced hind fins. This challenges existing theory that large, mobile hind appendages were developed only after vertebrates transitioned to land. The fossils are described by scientists in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, online on Jan. 13.
Good ole Andy. Always says sensible stuff. Well, this one pops up fairly often in conversations with IDers. Andy uses…
So I have a question. I will detail the following research. For ‘free will’ to be true, it has to explain the following. Or more accurately, the following has to be fully explicable within the free will hypothesis. How does it do that?
Certain fears can be inherited through the generations, a provocative study of micereports. The authors suggest that a similar phenomenon could influence anxiety and addiction in humans. But some researchers are sceptical of the findings because a biological mechanism that explains the phenomenon has not been identified.
Using novel techniques to extract and study ancient DNA researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, have determined an almost complete mitochondrial genome sequence of a 400,000-year-old representative of the genus Homo from Sima de los Huesos, a unique cave site in Northern Spain, and found that it is related to the mitochondrial genome of Denisovans, extinct relatives of Neandertals in Asia. DNA this old has until recently been retrieved only from the permafrost.
Researchers have discovered a gene that regulates alcohol consumption and when faulty can cause excessive drinking. They have also identified the mechanism underlying this phenomenon.
This is a fascinating article which will feed in to a post I will write about my own twins, and the power of genetics over behaviour, with its necessary mitigation of free will. From Science Daily:
In a new study, Dartmouth researchers rule out a controversial theory that the accelerating expansion of the universe is an illusion.