Discovery Institute's Blog, page 202

Is That Life Forming Before My Eyes? Will I Be in the National Academy of Sciences Someday?

In the age of Xbox, we're not sure how in demand they are as a Christmas gift anymore, but look here, Amazon still sells them. They are "Magic Rocks" kits and if you're of a certain age you may remember how, as a kid, you added "Magic Solution" to pebbles in a container of water and watched colorful crystal pillars grow right before your eyes. You could almost imagine a miniature civilization flourishing among the castles and towers that emerged, like magic, from the liquid.

Some of your peer...

Looking for a Good ID-Friendly Christmas Gift? Give a Friend a Subscription to Salvo Magazine

We've been talking about holiday gift-giving here at ENV lately, and I'd like to suggest one more gift idea: buy a subscription for a friend (or yourself) to Salvo Magazine.

Salvo unblushingly offers an honest, rational, and respectful take on hard questions about sex, science, and society. Salvo directs the conversation where many are afraid to go. Of interest to ENV readers, every issue offers ID-friendly articles written in an informed and compelling manner. The latest issue contains my fir...

Rosetta Probe Shows "Comets 'Did Not Bring Water to Earth'" -- So Where Did It Come From?

The abundance of water on Earth is one of the most important parameters that make our planet finely tuned for life. But how did Earth come to be so rich in this vital resource? That is a question that has vexed scientists for some time. Smithsonian Magazine explains the problem:

Water molecules were surely part of the dusty swirl that coalesced into the Sun and its planets beginning about nine billion years after the Big Bang. But Earth's early history, including epochs with high ambient temp...

PNAS Paper Admits Understanding the Origin of Cellular Features Is a "Glaring Gap" in Evolutionary Biology

In 2001, biochemist Franklin Harold wrote in an Oxford University Press monograph that "there are presently no detailed Darwinian accounts of the evolution of any biochemical or cellular system, only a variety of wishful speculations." Last month, a new paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, "Evolutionary cell biology: Two origins, one objective," admitted much the same thing. The article states (emphasis added):

All aspects of biological diversification ultimately trace to...

Do Computers Store Memories?

Dr. Michael Egnor wrote the other day:

A singular consequence of the materialist-mechanical metaphysics that permeates our culture and our sciences is that we commonly hold basic beliefs that are abject nonsense. One such belief is the almost ubiquitous one -- among ordinary folks as well as neuroscientists and surprisingly many philosophers -- that the brain "stores" memories. The fact is that the brain doesn't store memories, and can't store memories.

Read the rest here. But what about the m...

For Earth-like Planets, You Need the Right Galactic Environment

Editor's Note: As a series at ENV, we are pleased to present "Exoplanets." Daniel Bakken is anengineer who teachesastronomy at the college level, and an entrepreneur in compound semiconductor crystal growth. In a series of articles he critically examines recent claims about exoplanets beyond our solar system, asking whether our own planet Earth is a rarity, or common, in the cosmos. For previous articles in the series, see here.

The galactic environment contributes to habitability in several...

Biologist Ann Gauger Asks, "How Did the Link Between DNA, RNA, and Protein Come About?"

As ENV mentioned earlier today, our neighbor the Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen has just invested $100 million in a new center devoted to trying to illuminate how cells work. What, you thought scientists had that all figured out? Hardly, and his investment stands as a demonstration of how much remains unknown despite claims to the contrary.

Meanwhile our colleague biologist Ann Gauger has an admirably clear and accessible new essay in a Christianity Today publication, The Behemoth, which ex...

No, Determinism in Nature Has Not Been Demonstrated Scientifically

Jerry Coyne is a professor of evolution at the University of Chicago. He has written extensively about his denial that we have libertarian free will. I have pointed out several times the incoherent and even self-refuting nature of his claims. I'll take this opportunity to consider a few things that he gets very wrong in his arguments. For the moment I'll focus on his assertion that determinism is true and therefore that free will can't be true. I'll follow up later, discussing his denial of...

Courts Should Punish Animal "Person" Litigators

The Nonhuman Rights Project lost a unanimous opinion in a ruling by the Appellate Division of New York's State Supreme Court deciding -- properly -- that chimpanzees are not persons. From the New York Times story:

In a blow for animal lovers and simian-rights advocates, a five-member state judicial panel unanimously ruled on Thursday that a chimpanzee could not be considered a "legal person" and thus sue for his freedom.

Oh, good grief, reporter Jesse McKinley: That is not a "blow foranimal l...

Michael Lynch Is at It Again, Trying to Evolve Molecular Machines by Blind Mechanisms

Despite intellectual and scientific roots going much further back, the modern intelligent design movement (if that label is appropriate; Paul Nelson thinks it's more of an ID community) was launched arguably in 1991 with Phillip Johnson's Darwin on Trial. In that book and others, Johnson identified the central question of evolution as whether unguided processes are creative. Could blind, aimless variation and natural selection produce the exquisite instances of design (real or apparent) we se...