ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 593
January 8, 2016
Fossil Friday
Whose skull is this? If you think you know the answer, write it on a postcard or on the flyleaf of a first edition of On the Origin of Species, and mail it to NCSE, PO Box 9477, Berkeley CA 94709-0477. Or just leave a comment below.
Islamo and Atheisto Phobia
by Herb Silverman
Muslims and atheists have nothing in common theologically, but they do share some unenviable commonalities. Since 1937, Gallup has been asking people if they would vote for a generally well-qualified presidential candidate nominated by their party if the nominee belonged to various minorities. The good news is that there is now less discrimination against minorities, and in the most recent poll in 2012 all nine categories received more than 50 percent. Muslims were next to last at 58 percent while atheists bottomed out at 54 percent.
All religious freedom is not created equal, as shown in a poll last month. Americans place the highest priority on religious freedom for Christians, with the lowest priority for Muslims and atheists. Only about 60 percent thought protecting religious freedom for Muslims and atheists was important. Part of this problem is that some define religious freedom as the right to break the law and discriminate against those of other faiths and none, as happened with Kentucky clerk Kim Davis who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
No law prevents a person from being a religious bigot, but we are all required to respect the rule of law. Religious freedom means nothing if it doesn’t allow for people to worship differently or not at all. As an atheist I think all worship is wrong, and I have the right to refrain from worshipping any deities.
At the moment, Muslims are more concerned about such bigotry than are atheists because in some parts of the country Muslims have been receiving threats to themselves and to their mosques. It’s more difficult to spot an atheist, and atheists don’t have any houses of worship to damage.
Read more by clicking on the name of the source below.
Iceman Otzi Died With A Bellyache
Otzi—or as he’s also known, the Iceman—was discovered frozen in the Alps in 1991 by two German tourists. The 5,300-year-old body has been analyzed in various ways and been the subject of numerous scientific publications. And now it’s been looked at again. Because scientists realized that the contents of the Iceman’s stomach were still intact. Which gave them the chance to look for evidence of the common stomach bacteria Helicobacter pylori, or H. pylori. What they found tells us more about Otzi—and more about how Otzi’s ancestors came to Europe. The study is in the journal Science. [Frank Maixner et al, The 5300-year-old Helicobacter pylori genome of the Iceman]
The researchers were able to extract genes from H. pylori in the stomach to produce the oldest known genome sequence of a pathogen. The Iceman seems to have been infected with a virulent strain. So in his last days on Earth, Otzi probably had one bad bellyache.
“The strain had already reacted with the Iceman's immune system. This we could show. So we showed the presence of marker proteins which we see today in patients infected with Helicobacter.” The University of Vienna’s Frank Maixner.
It’s estimated that more than half the world’s human population harbors various strains of the ulcer-causing bacteria. And different strains are associated with different places on the globe.
“We use then Helicobacter as a surrogate for what humans were doing at various stages of our pre-history.” Yoshan Moodley from South Africa’s University of Venda.
Europeans today mostly harbor H. pylori that’s a mix of Indian and North African strains. But Otzi’s bacteria matched only the Indian variant.
“This one genome has put things into wonderful perspective for us, answered this question that we've been trying to answer for years. We can say now that the waves of migration that brought these African Helicobacter pylori into Europe had not occurred or at least not occurred in earnest by the time the Ice Man was around.”
That finding does not mean that North Africans themselves migrated into Europe after the time of the Iceman. The new strain may have evolved in the Middle East and then been introduced by later waves of farmers migrating out of the Fertile Crescent. More clues into human migration from H. pylori genes may be forthcoming. Just as soon as we find more perfectly preserved stomachs in long-frozen bodies.
—Cynthia Graber
(The above text is a transcript of this podcast)
Philosophy for our times: cutting edge debates and talks from the world’s leading thinkers
Watch more videos on iai.tv
Time, Space and Being
We think space and time are the structure of the universe. Yet Einstein argued ‘space and time are modes by which we think and not conditions in which we live’. And philosophers, Kant and Heidegger, saw space and time as the framework of thought not the world. Are space and time just a human fantasy?
The Panel
Physicist and author of The End of Time Julian Barbour, Cambridge metaphysician Huw Price and philosopher of science Michela Massimi think outside space and time.
The “Tree Of Death” Is As Terrifying As It Sounds
Photo credit:
arctic_whirlwind/Flickr. CC BY-ND 2.0
Although it resides on chilled-out, tourist-friendly beaches, the manchineel tree (Hippomane mancinella) seems hell-bent on its vendetta against humanity.
Ancient Romans Were Riddled With Parasites, Despite Sanitation Innovations
Photo credit:
Despite the introduction of public sanitation, parasites such as roundworm became increasingly prevalent in the Roman Empire. Peter Bernik/Shutterstock
The importance of personal hygiene is one of the first things that children learn these days, although back in Roman times, the introduction of public sanitation measures was something of a novelty. However, despite all the praise that the empire has received for its efforts to improve the cleanliness of its subjects, new research indicates that ancient Romans were in fact more riddled with parasites than those who lived in the Iron Age or medieval Europe, when sanitation was virtually non-existent.
Philosophical Truth or Dare (Comedy)
January 7, 2016
Visible Light From A Black Hole Spotted For The First Time Ever
Photo credit:
The black hole is circled here. Michael Richmond/Rochester Institute of Technology
In a cosmic first, astronomers have spotted visible light coming from a black hole during a violent outburst of energy. The discovery, made from observations of a nearby black hole binary called V404 Cygni, suggests other black holes could be studied in this way – with nothing more than a backyard telescope.
Researchers Have Made Insulin-Producing Cells From Human Skin Cells
Photo credit:
Human pancreatic beta cells (green) inserted within a mouse, breaking down glucose (purple). Saiyong Zhu/Nature Communications
Scientists at the Gladstone Institutes and the University of California, San Francisco, have managed to convert human skin cells into fully functioning, insulin-producing pancreatic cells. The new study in Nature Communications reveals that this novel approach to cellular reprogramming not only works, but has the potential to be scaled up in order to produce trillions of these cells in a careful, controlled manner, helping to treat those who suffer from diabetes.
Sea Turtles Aged Using Carbon From Nuclear Bomb Tests
Photo credit:
Hawksbill turtles are found throughout the world in tropical waters, but are now rare around Hawaii due to over hunting. abcphotography/Shutterstock
Determining the age of sea turtles is notoriously difficult. The size of the creatures cannot be used as a measure, and the lack of teeth rules out another potential marker. Estimates vary on the age the marine reptiles can reach, with many experts suspecting that they can probably get to around 100 years old.
ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog
- ريتشارد دوكنز's profile
- 106 followers
