ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 217

VA Lawmaker Behind Bible Bill Says He Wouldn’t Support Similar Qur’an Bill

By Hemant Mehta Virginia State Sen. Charles Carrico is one of several Republicans across the country to introduce a Project Blitz-inspired piece of legislation to push the Bible in public schools. His bill, SB 1502, would force public school districts in the state to offer Bible courses to students. While the bill calls for religious neutrality, forcing such classes on …

Bizarre Space Object ‘Oumuamua Could Be a Monstrous Corpse of Comet Dust

By Meghan Bartels ‘Oumuamua, the first known visitor from beyond our solar system, is long gone, but it’s still leaving scientists guessing. A new explanation proposes that the strange object was a “monstrous fluffy dust aggregate” — that’s a technical term, apparently — produced by a busted-up comet. That’s the explanation laid out by Zdenek Sekanina, …

The magnetic North Pole is quickly moving toward Siberia — and no one knows why

By Brian Resnick If you take out a compass and follow the needle north, it won’t take you directly to the North Pole — or 90 degrees north latitude. Instead, your long journey by land and sea and ice would currently take you to a spot in the Arctic Ocean a few hundred miles away …

Pope Acknowledges Nuns Were Sexually Abused by Priests and Bishops

By Jason Horowitz and Elizabeth Dias ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE — Pope Francis said on Tuesday that the Roman Catholic Church had faced a persistent problem of sexual abuse of nuns by priests and even bishops, the first time he has publicly acknowledged the issue. Catholic nuns have accused clerics of sexual abuse in recent …

Trump Called for a ‘Late-Term’ Abortion Ban in the State of the Union. Abortion Rights Advocates Are Pushing Back

By Katie Reilly President Donald Trump called for a federal ban on “the late-term abortion of children who can feel pain in the mother’s womb” during the State of the Union address on Tuesday, doubling down on his criticism of a new law expanding abortion rights in New York. “To defend the dignity of every …

New Star Map Reveals the Milky Way Is Warped

By Ryan F. Mandelbaum A new analysis of pulsing stars has revealed the Milky Way’s twisted shape. Scientists have known since the 1950s that the spiral-shaped Milky Way’s disk is warped, bending by thousands of light-years at its outskirts. Now, researchers have created a map of stars called Cepheid variables in order to create a 3D map of …

The Mythology of a Cross: A Dozen Bladensburg Claims Debunked

By Monica Miller 1. Myth: The Bladensburg cross was originally placed on private property. Fact: The cross was built on the Town of Bladensburg’s land with the approval and involvement of the town’s commissioners in 1919. The Town of Bladensburg gave American Legion Post 3 the “care” of the land and the cross after it was …

Legislative Lowlights: Missouri Conservatives Won’t Stop Introducing Anti-Choice Restrictions

By Brie Shea Rewire.News tracks anti-choice and anti-LGBTQ legislation as it works its way through state legislatures. Here’s an overview of the bills we’re watching. A Republican in Missouri wants to criminalize abortion and substance abuse during a pregnancy, another state wants fetal “personhood” on the ballot, and lawmakers in South Dakota continue to target trans kids. Arkansas Last …

An asteroid could destroy humanity like it did dinosaurs. A Hopkins team has a plan to save the world.

By Tim Prudente A team of scientists, astronomers and engineers meets weekly in a conference room on a Howard County, Md., research campus and plans to save the world. “Keep calm and carry DART,” reads a poster on the wall. DART — the Double Asteroid Redirection Test — is their plan to avert catastrophe. It’s …

Scientists are on the verge of imaging a black hole’s shadow for the first time

By Nicole Karlis Though we have plenty of data confirming that they exist, humanity has never directly seen an image of a black hole, the mysterious singularities that warp the spacetime continuum by virtue of their huge masses, producing such gravitational force that not even light can escape . There have been many simulations and …