I discovered that science doesn't destroy the beauty of things in secondary school, when I learned that trees aren't just collections of attractively arranged leaves on sticks. Learning of their complexity and the slow-motion fight for survival that they go through does not in any way diminish my enjoyment of of them - if anything, it makes me appreciate them all the more. Nature takes on a new dimension when you stop looking at it as an elaborate display for your benefit.

The same is undoubtedly true of astronomy. The Universe is larger than we could ever comprehend and has existed for a length of time that makes the lifespan of our entire species seem insignificant by comparison. How anyone can claim that knowing this detracts from our appreciation of its splenour is beyond me.

In other college news, the NUIM library is a fascinating place. There's an entire shelf dedicated to evolution, including Stephen Jay Gould's enormous The Structure of Evolution Theory. It's refreshing to see evolution presented in a way completely unlike the following:

The theory of evolution is regarded as one of the greatest glimmerings of understanding humans have ever had. It is an idea of science, not of belief, and therefore undergoes constant scrutiny and testing by argumentative evolutionary biologists. But while Darwinists may disagree on a great many things, they all operate within a (thus far) successful framework of thought first set down in The Origin of Species in 1859.

That's from the Amazon.com reviw of Gould's book, and it unfortunately mimicks the tone that a lot of writers, both scientist and non-scientist, feel that they must adopt when they talk about evolution. The part about evolution being an issue of science rather than belief is particularly cring-worthy in how much it panders to the morons out there. It's a sad indicator of how forcefully Creationists have penetrated the public consciousness, and I have a feeling that it will only get worse as time goes by. Thankfully, institutions of third-level education, long the prime target for anti-intellectual nuts everywhere, don't seem to be budging from their insistence that the evidence for evolution is solid.

(If you're curious, quite a bit of The Structure of Evolutionary Theory is available for free on Google Books. The contents section is fun, if only for how intimidating it is.)

Was there really a major conflict with people who believed in a flat earth vs Darwinian Science? No, not really. The very thing some atheists like to ridicule creationists about, doesn't exist. You see, back in 1874, a man name John Draper wrote a book called; History of the Conflict Between Science and Religion.

This I believe actually started the fictitious war to begin with which is still used today.  Like in the past, it's objective was to promote Darwinian science by creating a storyline about Christianity hindering the advancement of mankind by believing in a flat earth. But as one looks back historically, there were no major scholars promoting the idea, and the concept was not part of any major church or religion. This is well documented. In fact, it's was so obvious that one most beloved person in evolutionary science Stephen Jay Gould once said...

"For the myth itself only makes sense under a prejudicial view of Western history as an era of darkness between lighted beacons of classical learning and Renaissance revival  while the nineteenth-century invention of the flat earth, as we shall see, occurred to support another dubious and harmful separation wedded to another legend of historical progress – the supposed warfare between science and religion.”

Also in Wikipedia...

"According to Stephen Jay Gould, "there never was a period of “flat earth darkness” among scholars (regardless of how the public at large may have conceptualized our planet both then and now). Greek knowledge of sphericity never faded, and all major medieval scholars accepted the earth’s roundness as an established fact of cosmology."[2] David Lindberg and Ronald Numbers also write: "there was scarcely a Christian scholar of the Middle Ages who did not acknowledge [Earth's] sphericity and even know its approximate circumference."

It quite clear in the Bible, there is no such reference to a flat earth belief. Even though there was no exact word "sphericity"...

Isaiah 40:22

It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof [are] as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in"

Prov. 8:27

When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth...

Job 26:10

He hath compassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end.

The Hebrew word; "compass" means circle, a circle, circuit. So nothing here indicates a "flat earth" promoted in the Bible. If there was, it would be certainly believed among many Christians throughout history not just in a book that was published in 1874.

“An honest heart being the first blessing, a knowing head is the second.” 1

“But though an old man, I am but a young gardener.” 2

“Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.” 3

“A mind always employed is always happy...The idle are the only wretched. In a world which furnishes so many emploiments which are useful, and so many which are amusing, it is our own fault if we ever know what ennui is, or if we are ever drive to the miserable resource of gaming, which corrupts our disposition, and teaches us a habit of hostility against all mankind.” 4

Probably you had no difficulty in identifying #3 as the one that doesn’t fit. It seems to stick out like a wrong note in music: inappropriate to the man and his time, both in sentiment and expression. For me, being old enough to recall the human potential movement, it clearly has a connexion to that school of folly. Spontaneity, individualism, do whatever feels right to you (regardless of consequences to others, or even yourself), were exalted above all else. Impulse over reason. All self-expression is good. Learning, self-restraint, and practice are by implication unnecessary, and a cruel blow to one’s inner child.

“...you just get stoned, get the ideas in your head and then do ’em. And don’t bullshit. I mean that’s the thing about doin’ that guerrilla theatre. You be prepared to die to prove your point.”
Abbie Hoffman 5

“I do my thing, and you do your thing. I am not in this world to live up to your expectations, and you are not in this world to live up to mine. You are you, and I am I, and if by chance we find each other, it’s beautiful.”
Frederick E. Perl 6

But all over the net, I found that laissez–faire quotation #3,

“Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.”

attributed to our third president, author of the Declaration of Independence, a man of such parts that John F. Kennedy famously remarked, upon the occasion of a White House dinner honoring Nobel Prize Winners, “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone. Someone once said that Thomas Jefferson was a gentleman of 32 who could calculate an eclipse, survey an estate, tie an artery, plan an edifice, try a cause, break a horse, and dance the minuet.” [Please indulge me while I point out the obvious, that Thomas Jefferson did not acquire any of these abilities by simply expressing himself and “doing his thing.”]

The mis-attributed quotation came to me a few weeks ago from some newsletter list I got on, and it seemed so anachronistic to me that I started looking for who really said it. Well, according to most websources, it was Thomas Jefferson. Google it and see. I did find another person credited with it, but the Jefferson attributions were far more numerous. But truth isn’t established by majority vote, so I kept looking.

Finally I discovered The Jefferson Encyclopedia which has a page of “Spurious Quotations" but I did not find “Don’t ask. Act!” there, so I wrote to them. This, now, is a reliable source, part of the foundation which protects and restores Jefferson’s estate at Monticello and sponsors educational and research programs. The encyclopedia site is described as “Trustworthy information on Thomas Jefferson and his world by Monticello researchers and respected Jefferson scholars.” I got a prompt reply; the experts there have had more than one inquiry on the subject, and mine must have been the last straw, as they decided to add a page concerning the “Do you want to know who you are?” quotation to their informational wiki-encyclopedia.

The true author of those words? Witold Gombrowicz, of course! He was (1904-1969 ) a Polish novelist and dramatist. As Anna Berkes, the Monticello researcher who kindly answered my email query, put it:

“Also, most people would much rather put “Thomas Jefferson” on their signature line or plaque or bumpersticker than, say,
Witold Gombrowicz; so it’s often an uphill battle to try to
dis-associate Jefferson from quotations like these.”

This painting is a copy of the second life portrait of Jefferson (1805) by Rembrandt Peale. Source.

The web is the best example to date of how something can get written once, and then copied by dozens of others who rely on the authority of the first.

The late Stephen Jay Gould wrote an essay on the phenomenon, about how someone’s questionable comparison of the size of the earliest horses (Eohippus, when I was in school) to the size of a fox-terrier, was repeated by textbook publishers from 1904 to 1988 when Gould’s “The case for the creeping fox terrier clone” appeared in Natural History Magazine. (You can also find it in Bully for Brontosaurus, a collection of Gould’s essays, and in Google’s online digitization of same.) Gould’s point was the failure of textbook writers (compilers?) to consult original sources and use fresh material, instead of doing what, in a student, would be condemned as plagiarism. The only fox-terrier familiar to very many people is Asta in the Thin Man movies, but probably few people born after 1950 would know about William Powell's debonair canine sidekick. Thus, as an aid to understanding, the metaphor has outlived its effectiveness.

And copying blindly leads also—as in the case of the Jefferson mis-attribution—to just plain wrong information. The Eohippus/fox-terrier comparison may be such a case. The AKC standard for the Wire(haired) Fox Terrier prescribes a height of 15.5 inches at the withers—roughly the shoulder—for the male. Wikipedia states that Hyracotherium (formerly Eohippus) “averaged 8 to 9 inches (20 cm) high at the shoulder.”

And why did I write this post? I admire Jefferson, and I wanted to help set the record straight. So, Google, find this: Thomas Jefferson did not say or write “Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.” It was Witold Gombrowicz.

"The most important scientific revolutions all include, as their only common feature, the dethronement of human arrogance from one pedestal after another of previous convictions about our centrality in the cosmos."              Stephen Jay Gould, paleontologist, biologist, author (1941-2002)

"The radical novelty of modern science lies precisely in the rejection of the belief ... that the forces which move the stars and atoms are contingent upon the preferences of the human heart."

Walter Lippman, (1889-1974)

"For all our conceits about being the center of the universe, we live in a routine planet of a humdrum star stuck away in an obscure corner ... on an unexceptional galaxy which is one of about 100 billion galaxies. ... That is the fundamental fact of the universe we inhabit, and it is very good for us to understand that. "                           Carl Sagan, (1934-1996)

The great tragedy of science--the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.

Thomas Huxley, (1825-1895)

Sirius titles his next section "The Fossil Record Itself Shows That Rapid Burial and Preservation are Key Factors in Fossilization."  Of course he's right, this is why fossils are pretty rare.

We have fish that died in the act of eating another fish…We have animals which died in the middle of giving birth…We have large animals [which is a "sizeable" argument for rapid burial in and of itself!] which died seemingly in the midst of struggle…We have huge, mass graves where dinosaur fossils are jumbled together like so much flotsam after a flood — and little wonder if the Biblical account is true! We even have soft-bodied animals and delicate structures such as dragonfly wings which were buried quickly enough to imprint themselves in mud before the decay made that impossible.

Woe there.  Those statements are mostly correct, but where did this flood thing come from?

This suggestion is basically CH561.2. Fossils are sorted hydrologically or possibly CH561.3. Fossils are sorted by the ability to escape. Maybe even CH561.4. Fossils are sorted by a combination of these factors.

Moreover fossilization in amber does pose a problem for the Young Earth view.  See CC361. Fossils can form quickly.  Amber can take millions of years to form.

And on animals apparently involved in struggle, see a caution at CC361.3. Contorted positions of fossil animals indicate rapid burial.

Sirius then asks:

We even have trilobite tracks preseved in stone. How did that escape erasure if stone takes millions of years to form out of mud?

See CC363. Fossilization requires sudden burial.

And so to polystrates:

Add to this the puzzle [for darwinists] of polystratic fossils, tree fossils which run vertically through several strata of rock.

See CC331. Polystrate fossils indicate massive sudden deposition.

On an empirical level, the Mount Saint Helens eruption gave us a tangible example of how polystratic fossils might form.

Certainly this is the case.  No problem for uniformitarian geology there.  Catastrophic events do occur, but catastrophism cannot account for all of the geological record.

These are anamolies [mass burials all over the Earth, evidence of sudden burial of living creatures and polystrate fossils] created by the Old Earth uniformitarian assumptions, but which are easily accounted for by the Young Earth Biblical Catastrophic model.

Unfortunately for the catastrophist model, whilst uniformitarianism can easily accommodate catastrophic formations, catastrophism without uniform deposition cannot account for the geological column (which is why Sirius tries to argue that the column doesn't exist ealier in his posting).

In fact, the debate is not that flooding and rapid burial are critical elements in fossilization; the debate is now whether there were hundreds [or thousands] of small, local flood events or a single global flood such as the Bible records.

Like all creationists, Sirius either believes or wants others to believe that there is a serious debate going on here.  There is not.  There are scientists, and there are religious people.  The scientists cannot lose because the religious people are wedded to dogma and have to force a large amount of evidence through the tiny constraints of the biblical models.  They have had no scientific credibility for well over a century.

Sirius starts by showing a standard geological chart, the kind of thing you'll see in a high school classroom that shows what we find in the fossil record.  But Sirius claims it's false.  Why?

These geological strata don’t always play ball with the claims of the Church of Darwin. Quite often the early strata are flip-flopped with later ages, so that allegedly younger fossils are found below older fossils.

See Claim CD102: The geological column is sometimes out of order

He continues:

Evolutionists do explain these anomolies away when they can and chalk up the rest to “We don’t know yet, but we KNOW it WASN’T the result of a catastrophic global flood!” But you should be aware that their neatly laid out strata-age chart exists in full form nowhere in nature! It’s not observable. It’s inferred from their evolutionary presuppositions.

He's obviously wrong in the first sentence, about the hand-waving--we know that the out-of-order strata, where they occur, are always caused by folds and faults.  The kind of activity that is causing those earthquakes in California, Turkey and so on, rips the earth's crust up and moves strata around in a way that can be predicted and is easily recognized when we find it..

But in his second part, he says that the geologic column exists nowhere, in its full form, in nature.  See CD101. Entire geological column does not exist and CD103. The geological column is based on the assumption of evolution.

The facts are that creationist geologists preceding Darwin constructed the geological column.  Moreover there are several places around the world where strata from all geological eras do exist at a single spot.  Inference of the whole does not require any unjustifiable assumptions, nor does it depend on evolutionary assumptions.

Sirius then says:

All of the missing links are missing. The dots are only connected in their minds, not in the fossil record...They can speculate, but their speculations presume Darwinism; they don’t spring forth naturally from the evidence. The fossil record simply shows, as Ken Ham has famously put it, “billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the Earth.”

This appears to be a variant of CA202. Evolution has not been proved.

Sirius's next argument is the Cambrian Explosion.

The Cambrian Explosion makes a shipwreck of their nice neat chart. Rather than seeing simple life forms such as worms and jellyfish appear to be folowed by trilobites and fish and the like, we instead see representations of all major phyla appearing AT THE SAME TIME! This obvious slap in darwin’s face has caused not a few Darwinists to famously modify the theory. Punctuated equilibrium, or “punk eek,” suggests that life exists with only minor adaptations within established kinds [observable microevolution, which no one disputes], but then goes rapid changes in short spurts which leave behind no transitional forms! This is just another example of how the speculative [and imaginative!] nature of Darwinism makes it unfalsifiable.

CC300. The Cambrian explosion shows all kinds of life appearing suddenly and CC301. Cambrian explosion contradicts evolutionary "tree" pattern.  See also CC201.1.  Punctuated equilibrium was ad hoc to justify gaps and CA211. Evolution cannot be falsified.

Then Sirius makes a bid for an alternative explanation of the evidence:

They don’t tell you that there are other alternatives [such as the one illustrated in the Walker chart below] to the Old Earth uniformitarian view assumed by Darwinists and Progessive Creationists [Compromisers would be a more appropo term] which not only address the same set of facts that Old Earthers have [we all ahve the same facts to interpret, but start with different assumptions] but also address the “anamolies” that Old Earth explanations create.

The alternative chart is as follows:

Tasman "Tas" Walker's scale (above) fails at the first post because it contradicts known radiometric data  that places the formation of the earth some billions of years ago, not thousands.  Walker's theories have no traction in the scientific community and have received little serious attention, much less passed any serious peer review.  A professional geologist working for the Geological Survey of Queensland, Paul Blake, examines Walker's rock scale concept at this link, where it is easy to see why Walker isn't taken seriously.  Tas Walker's qualifications are listed on the "Answers in Genesis" website, here.  His highest relevant qualification is listed as "Bachelor of Science majoring in Earth Science, followed by First Class Honours in 1998 (U of Qld)."  Answers in Genesis quite correctly describes itself as a religious ministry, and in producing work for that website Walker adheres to its Statement of Faith, which says "No apparent, perceived, or claimed interpretation of evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record."  Nobody can produce science under such a brief, because it means that evidence that appears to contradict scripture must be discarded.

Sirius then goes on to make some claims about the process of fossilization, and I'll address those in a later posting.

How many times have you heard this? "The fossil record proves evolution!"

It doesn't. Let me tell you why. Hey, I'll even show you.

What the Geological Strata Charts don't tell you.

Now, the picture we're usually given to illustrate how evolution is demonstrated shows a cross-section of geological strata and some corresponding text to indicate that these strata represent specific ages. They're all lined up nice and neat from beginning to end. Each slice has a group of representative fossils to show how life has allegedly progressed through the ages. The first few slices show jellyfish, worms and trilobites; the next shows fish; then amphibians and early reptiles; then dinosaurs; then mammals; and finally man. Nice and neat.

Of course, it's just a drawing. Darwinists weren't actually there, so it's only their interpretation of what the fossil record means.

A few things these charts don't tell you.

1. These geological strata don't always play ball with the claims of the Church of Darwin. Quite often the early strata are flip-flopped with later ages, so that allegedly younger fossils are found below older fossils. Evolutionists do explain these anomolies away when they can and chalk up the rest to "We don't know yet, but we KNOW it WASN'T the result of a catastrophic global flood!" But you should be aware that their neatly laid out strata-age chart exists in full form nowhere in nature! It's not observable. It's inferred from their evolutionary presuppositions.
2. All of the missing links are missing. The dots are only connected in their minds, not in the fossil record. By nature of the fossils themselves, which don't come with pedigrees, birth certificates or identification tags of any sort, no one can state that one fossil creature is descended from another with absolute certainty. This is an important point. They can speculate, but their speculations presume Darwinism; they don't spring forth naturally from the evidence. The fossil record simply shows, as Ken Ham has famously put it, "billions of dead things buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the Earth."
3. The Cambrian Explosion makes a shipwreck of their nice neat chart. Rather than seeing simple life forms such as worms and jellyfish appear to be folowed by trilobites and fish and the like, we instead see representations of all major phyla appearing AT THE SAME TIME! This obvious slap in darwin's face has caused not a few Darwinists to famously modify the theory. Punctuated equilibrium, or "punk eek," suggests that life exists with only minor adaptations within established kinds [observable microevolution, which no one disputes], but then goes rapid changes in short spurts which leave behind no transitional forms! This is just another example of how the speculative [and imaginative!] nature of Darwinism makes it unfalsifiable.
4. They don't tell you that there are other alternatives [such as the one illustrated in the Walker chart below] to the Old Earth uniformitarian view assumed by Darwinists and Progessive Creationists [Compromisers would be a more appropo term] which not only address the same set of facts that Old Earthers have [we all ahve the same facts to interpret, but start with different assumptions] but also address the "anamolies" that Old Earth explanations create.

[/caption]

The Fossil Record Itself Shows that Rapid Burial and Preservation are Key factors in Fossilization

The fossil record is replete with examples of fossils which illustrate that the animals were swept up in some catastrophe and buried almost instantly!

We have fish that died in the act of eating another fish...

We have animals which died in the middle of giving birth...

We have large animals [which is a "sizeable" argument for rapid burial in and of itself!] which died seemingly in the midst of struggle... 

We have huge, mass graves where dinosaur fossils are jumbled together like so much flotsam after a flood -- and little wonder if the Biblicalaccount is true!

We even have soft-bodied animals and delicate structures such as dragonfly wings which were buried quickly enough to imprint themselves in mud before the decay made that impossible. 

We even have trilobite tracks preseved in stone. How did that escape erasure if stone takes millions of years to form out of mud?    

 Add to this the puzzle [for darwinists] of polystratic fossils, tree fossils which run vertically through several strata of rock.

If these strata allegedly represent billions of years, how did the tree survive long enough [without rotting] to become fossilized?  On an empirical level, the Mount Saint Helens eruption gave us a tangible example of how polystratic fossils might form. According to Answers in Genesis:

The volcano sent mud and debris hurtling down into Spirit Lake, sloshing a wave nearly 900 feet (300 m) up its initially tree-studded slopes. The wave sheared off trees with enough lumber to make all the houses in a large city! The trees were sheared off their roots and stripped of their leaves, branches, and bark. The “forest” of denuded logs floated out over the huge lake. As they water-logged, many sank vertically down into and through several layers of mud on the lake bottom.

These are anamolies [mass burials all over the Earth, evidence of sudden burial of living creatures and polystrate fossils] created by the Old Earth uniformitarian assumptions, but which are easily accounted for by the Young Earth Biblical Catastrophic model.

Ironically, Darwinists and Creationists both agree that in order to be fossilized, the subjects had to be buried completely and very quickly at that to keep the subject from total decomposition so that there would be anything to fossilize! In fact, the debate is not that flooding and rapid burial are critical elements in fossilization; the debate is now whether there were hundreds [or thousands] of small, local flood events or a single global flood such as the Bible records.

Guess which one the Darwinists are promoting? Yep, the one that doesn't lend credence to the Bible. It seems they would cut off their nose to spite their face, so long as they do not allow a Divine foot in the door. So much for parsimony.

--Sirius Knotts

"We are here because one odd group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could transform into legs for terrestrial creatures; because the earth never froze entirely during an ice age; because a small and tenuous species, arising in Africa a quarter of a million years ago, has managed, so far, to survive by hook and by crook. We may yearn for a 'higher' answer--but none exists."

Has Dr. Gould offered science's answer to one of the BIG questions of reality? Questions that have lingered throughout the centuries of recorded history. Questions that must be answered by every philosophy of life, every paradigm of plausibility, and every belief system out there. Some have answered these questions well, and so they have survived to this day. Some have answered these questions poorly, and so they are read about as a history of yesterday. One of these questions might be asked as follows:

Where did we come from?

Certainly, Mr. Gould has offered his answer to [or question of] the question that has been asked. Many have embraced this answer [or questioning]. But in the answering of this question, other significant questions begin to surface: assumptions? presuppositions? biases? belief system? ground of belief? worldviews? paradigms? plausibility structures? and the like.

Some of these matters are revealed in the thoughts penned by Gould that follow the thought quoted in this book of books.

"We may yearn for a 'higher' answer--but none exists... We cannot read the meaning of life passively in the facts of nature. We must construct these answers ourselves--from our own wisdom and ethical sense. There is no other way."

How does one know that no higher answer exists for such a question? Unless of course, one is assuming that no answer is the answer. This whole matter of "passively" reading anything from "the facts of nature" is somewhat disingenuous. Allow me to tell you which scientists have "passively" gone about their scientific pursuits: the forgotten and unknown ones. Those that are remembered [this would include Gould] are the ones which were driven to pursue what answers could be discovered through the discipline of science. Finally, I couldn't agree more with the matter of constructing answers from "wisdom and ethical sense."

To contend that "we may yearn for a 'higher' answer-but none exists" is a construction built on his own wisdom and ethical sense. Indeed, "there is no other way." To say that there are no answers to such a question is to presume the following answer: "None of the above."

This is an answer, is it not?

The question might appear simple, but it is not.
The answers might appear obvious, but to unpack them becomes a daunting task.

If one were to assume that this answer is supported upon a philosophy of life [not just biological life, but all of life and all of reality] that IS true, then what can this tell us of where and who we are right now? 

In this whole matter of surviving by "hook and crook," there has been the survival of this nagging little riddle. Why do we ask questions like these? Why do we yearn for answers like these? If survival of the fittest is a truth to be embraced, then what do persons like Gould do with the fact that religious beliefs are still surviving and thriving, even in paradigm shifts best described as postmodern?

Some of us may not know why we yearn, but we do know that we yearn. Others may question the significance of it, but they can't question the existence of it.

Answers may vary, but the question doesn't.
Answers may fade into history, but the question doesn't.

Everyone is faced with this yearning, many ask questions, some say there are no answers. Does this satisfy the reality that you know to be true? What is the naturalistic explanation for this yearning? What was the reason for it to evolve into the human psyche? Since it was a part of the evolutionary process, then on what basis do we have to question it or when it should be ignored? Why does it insist to persist?

We yearn.

The yearning is there.
The yearning has to be dealt with.

Here's one of the transitional animals (obviously this is punctuated equilibrium not gradualism, so take that Dr. Dawkins):

Either that or Fluffy has been putting away Red Bull at prodigious rates.

This is the story:
Ready for take-off, Tiddles? Meet the cats which have sprouted wings

Simon Kirby, also at the University of Edinburgh, thinks that the key biological attribute that allows humans to learn language might not be genetically encoded grammar but vocal learning—the ability to remember and reproduce sequences of sound, which is also seen in songbirds and bats. “We could just be a chimp that can sing,” he says.

Most of us aren't as hairy, either, but you get the idea.

Intelligence is the aggregate or global capacity of the individual to act purposefully, to think rationally and to deal effectively with his environment. It characterizes the individual's behavior as a whole; it is an aggregate because it is composed of elements or abilities, which, though not entirely independent, are qualitatively differentiable. By measurement of these abilities, we ultimately evaluate intelligence (David Wechsler, 1944). The present paper explains comparisons and contrasts of Spearman's Model of Intelligence and Gardner's Multiple Intelligences and which model is more in line with psychology today.

G- factor theory is the term given to the abstract position that intelligence is composed of single, unitary, or general factor. Professor Spearman's generalized proof of the two-factor theory of human abilities constitutes one of the great discoveries of psychology. Carl Spearman showed it through precise mathematical proof, that all intellectual abilities could be expressed as functions of two factors, one a general or intellectual factor common to every ability, and another a specific factor, specific to any particular ability and "in every case different from that of all others"(David Wechsler, 1944). Spearman's theory proved too simple, however, as it ignored group factors in test scores (corresponding to broad abilities such as spatial visualization, memory and verbal ability) that may also be found through factor analysis.

Howard Gardner (1983, 1993, and 1999), major contributor in the field of intelligence, has proposed a theory of multiple intelligences according to which intelligence comprises not just a single entity, but also multiple ones, including linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist intelligences. To develop his theory, Gardner (1983) attempted to rectify some of the errors of earlier psychologists who "all ignored biology; all failed to come to grips with the higher levels of creativity; and all were insensitive to the range of roles highlighted in human society. Gardner do not locate talents completely within the human skull, preferring to construe all accomplishments as an interaction between cognitive potentials on the one hand, and the resources and opportunities provided by the surrounding culture on the other.

There are many challenges to G. The late Stephen Jay Gould voiced his objections to the concept of g, as well as intelligence testing in general, in his book 'The Mismeasure of Man'. Many scientists are now convinced that there is no single measure of intellectual ability - no unitary intelligence (Philip Kitcher, 1985). Spearman (1904) gave persons tests of many different kinds of cognitive ability. When he examined the correlations of these tests with each other, he found that all the correlations were positive, and called this the "positive manifold." The positive manifold leads to a large first factor derived from factor analysis, dubbed general intelligence, or g. But Gardner considered various kinds of evidence about how the mind is organized (brain damage; prodigies; psychometrics; transferability of learning;). Gardner also de-emphasizes g. His theory was criticized, as there are no standard assessment techniques.

Where as Spearman’s model of intelligence continues to be influential today. Generally speaking, intelligence tests that yield a single score are built on this theoretical foundation. The accumulation of cognitive testing data and improvements in analytical techniques have preserved g's central role and led to the modern conception of g (Carroll 1993). A hierarchy of factors with g at its apex and group factors at successively lower levels is presently the most widely accepted model of cognitive ability. Elementary cognitive tasks (ECTs) also correlate strongly with g.  Creators of IQ tests, whose goals are generally to create highly reliable and valid tests, have thus made their tests as g-loaded as possible. However, tests such as Raven's Progressive Matrices are considered to be the most g-loaded in existence, even though Raven's is quite homogeneous in the types of tasks comprising it. IQ tests that measure a wide range of abilities do not predict much better than g.

To sum, intelligence is the ability to undertake activities that are characterized by difficulty, complexity, abstractness, economy, adaptive ness to a goal, social value, and the emergence of originals, and to maintain such activities under conditions that demand a concentration of energy and a resistance to emotional forces (George D. Stoddard, 1943). Factor analysis has been used in the study of human intelligence as a method for comparing the outcomes of objective tests and to construct matrices.

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Elizabeth Corey (Baylor)

RELIGION AND THE MODE OF PRACTICE IN MICHAEL OAKESHOTT

Michael Oakeshott’s religious view of the world stands behind much of his political and philosophical writing. The present essay proceeds first by discussing Oakeshott’s view of religion and the mode of practice in his own terms. I then attempt to illuminate his idea of religion by describing it in less technical language, drawing also upon other thinkers such as Georg Simmel and George Santayana, who share similar views. I then turn to an evaluation of Oakeshott’s view as a whole, considering whether his ideas about religion can stand up to careful scrutiny and whether they have value for present-day reflection on religion.

Timothy Fuller (Colorado College)

OAKESHOTT ON THE CHARACTER OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE: NEED THERE BE A CONFLICT BETWEEN SCIENCE AND RELIGION?

Michael Oakeshott reflected on the character of religious experience in various writings throughout his life. In Experience and its Modes (1933) he analyzed “science” as a distinctive “mode” or account of experience as a whole, identifying those assumptions necessary for science to achieve its coherent account of experience in contrast to other “modes of experience” whose quests for coherence depend on different assumptions. Religious experience he thought was integral to the “practical mode.” The latter experiences the world as interminable tension between “what is” and “what ought to be.” The question, Is there a conflict between science and religion? is actually, in Oakeshott’s approach, the question, Is there a conflict between the scientific mode of experience and the practical mode? Insofar as we tend to treat every question as a practical one, these questions seem to make sense. But Oakeshott’s analysis leads to the view that “scientific experience” and “religious experience” are categorically different accounts of experience abstracted from the whole of experience. They are voices of experience which may speak to each other, but they are not ordered hierarchically. Nor can either absorb the other without insoluble contradictions.

Byron Kaldis (The Hellenic Open University)

OAKESHOTT ON SCIENCE AS A MODE OF EXPERIENCE

This paper offers a critical exposition and reconstruction of Michael Oakeshott’s views on natural science. The principal aim is to enrich Oakeshott’s modal schema either by throwing light on it in terms of its internal consistency or by bringing to bear on it recent developments in philosophy in general or the philosophy of science in particular. The discussion brings forth the special place reserved for philosophy, the crucial tenet of the separateness of these modes seen as Leibnizian monads as well as the special status allowed to science. It considers the possibility of combining one moment of philosophical thinking, namely ethics, with science in the midst of such modal separateness. Section I offers a general introduction of how to approach Oakeshott’s views on science. Section II stresses philosophy and its relation to science, while Section III elaborates on what the modes of experience are meant to be and how science is placed amongst them. Section IV examines Oakeshott’s more particular views on science.

Corey Abel (USAFA)

OAKESHOTIAN MODES AT THE CROSSROADS OF THE EVOLUTION DEBATES

This paper examines Michael Oakeshott’s theory of modes of experience in light of today’s evolution debates, and argues that in much of our current debate science and religion irrelevantly attack each other or, less commonly but still irrelevantly, seek out support from the other. The paper takes this opportunity to analyze Oakeshott’s idea of religion, and finds links between his early “holistic” theory of the state, his individualistic account of religious sensibility, and his theory of political, moral, and religious authority. By doing so, it shows that a modern individualistic theory of the state need not be barrenly secular, while also suggesting that a religious sensibility need not be translated into an overmastering desire to use state power to pursue moral or spiritual ends in politics. Finally, the paper suggests that Oakeshott’s vision of a civil conversation, as both a metaphor for Western civilization and as a quasi-ethical ideal, shows us how we might balance the recognition of diverse modal truths, the pursuit of singular religious or philosophic truth, and a free political order.

Efraim Podoksik (Hebrew University)

Review of Elizabeth Corey's Michael Oakeshott on Religion, Aesthetics, and Politics

Darwinian evolution assumes that evolution is gradual. As it has developed since the advent of microbiology, incremental change in a species occurs genetically with random mutations that gain dominance. Thus, in small steps, a horse becomes a giraffe as the neck gradually lengthens and the species-specific spots occur in the giraffe's coat, allowing the giraffe to reach high up in the trees for food, and blend into the African landscape. Opposed to this principle of gradualism would be abrupt change and appearance of new species. Darwin rejected abrupt change as follows:

He who believes that some ancient form was transformed suddenly through an internal force or tendency into, for instance, one furnished with wings, will be almost compelled to assume, in opposition to all analogy, that many individuals varied simultaneously. It cannot be denied that such abrupt and great changes of structure are widely different from those which most species apparently have undergone. He will further be compelled to believe that many structures beautifully adapted to all the other parts of the same creature and to the surrounding conditions, have been suddenly produced; and of such complex and wonderful co-adaptations, he will not be able to assign a shadow of an explanation. He will be forced to admit that these great and sudden transformations have left no trace of their action on the embryo. To admit all this is, as it seems to me, to enter into the realms of miracle, and to leave those of science.

Darwin, C. (1872) The Origin of Species. Sixth Edition. The Modern Library, New York.

Science then proceeded to attempt to prove Darwin's theory and the principle of gradualism by searching the fossil record. If gradualism is a fact, then the fossil record should reveal it. Unfortunately, the fossil record revealed the opposite from gradualism, stasis, followed by abrupt change.

In reaction to the clear failure of the fossil record to support gradualist Darwinism, Stephen Jay Gould with Niles Eldridge, became "heretics" among fellow evolutionists by claiming in 1982 that the Darwinian model was incomplete. They did not believe that the evidence for microevolution and gradualism was sufficient and proposed a macroevolutionary concept of "punctuated equilibrium" where a leap of change occurred seemingly unexplainable at the microlevel, since neither Gould or Eldridge were microbiologists and did not offer a microbiological explanation. Gould and Eldridge proposed this alternative because (1) species appear in the fossil record abruptly, and (2) organisms that make up a species commonly remain virtually unchanged for millions of years before going extinct. They theorized that random mutations in a species generally were not helpful and therefore were not naturally selected. As Gould put in more succintly in a 1977 Natural History article:

A new species can arise when a small segment of the ancestral population is isolated at the periphery of the ancestral range. Large, stable central populations exert a strong homogenizing influence. New and favorable mutations are diluted by the sheer bulk of the population through which they must spread. They may build slowly in frequency, but changing environments usually cancel their selective value long before they reach fixation.

S. J. Gould, 1977. "Evolution's erratic pace." Natural History 86 (May): 12-16.

Thus, according to Gould and Eldridge, abrupt genetic change appeared at an isolated environmental "periphery" of a specie's natural history and existence over space and time such that the stasis recorded in the fossil record was faithful to the general evolutionary history of the species, which was static, and not gradually evolving. This theory caused a fury among fundamentalist Darwinists who clinged then and continue to cling to the gradualist random mutation and natural selection theory.

In Stephen Jay Gould's 1,000 page opus "The Structure of Evolutionary Theory" (2002), he states very clearly that contrary to Darwin's evolutionary theory of gradualism of species development, that "stasis and abrupt appearance represent a norm for observed history of most species." p. 761. (280 pages on punctuated equilibrium theory)

According to Gould, evolutionary biologists have not been forthcoming with the evidentiary record. Darwinian evolution proposes that evolution of new species is gradual due to random mutation. Instead of publicizing findings that the fossil record does not confirm gradualism, he wrote, paleontologists mischaracterized the evidence of stasis as no evidence of anything. Gould writes in a lengthy parenthetical illustrating the profession's unwillingness to publish the truth as follows:

(To cite a personal incident that engaged this paradox [that the "frequency of stasis in fossil species . . . was unexpected by most evolutionary biologists] upon my consciousness early in my career, John Imbrie served as one of my Ph.D advisors at Columbia University. This distinguished paleoclimatologist began his career as an evolutionary paleontologist. He accepted the canonical equation of evolution with gradualism, but conjectured that our documentary failures had arisen from the subtlety of gradual change,and the consequent need for statistical analysis in a field still dominated by an "old-fashioned" style of verbal description. He schooled himself in quantitative methods and applied this apparatus, then so exciting and novel, to the classic sequence of Devonian brachiopods from the Michigan Basin --- where rates of sedimentation had been sufficiently slow and continuous to record any hypothetical gradualism. He studied more than 30 species in this novel and rigorous way -- and found that all but one had remained stable throughout the interval, while the single exception exhibited an ambiguous pattern. But Imbrie did not publish a triumphant paper documenting the important phenomenon of stasis. Instead, he just became disappointed at such "negative" results after so much effort. He buried his data in a technical taxonomic monograph that no working biologist would ever encounter (and that made no evolutionary claims at all) -- and eventually left the profession for something more "productive.")

Gould, "The Structure of Evolutionary Theory" p. 760.

The origin of species cannot be "proven" in an experimental sense because it is "history." Nevertheless, the historical fossil record unequivocally does not provide historical evidence to support Darwinian evolutionary theory. Hence, Gould and Eldridge's theory of punctuated equilibrium, a non-Darwinian theory of evolution, rejects gradualism and tries to explain abrupt appearance. However, at this time punctuated equilibrium is a macro-evolutionary theory and has no microbiological explanation to make a "preponderance of the evidence" case. (Current Darwinian theory that incorporates microbiological science that did not exist when Darwin lived is generally referred to as "Neo-Darwinism", though technically, neo-Darwinism was coined 1895 to limit evolution to natural selection, and exclude any Lamarckian implications of Darwin's hypothesis of pangenesis, his hypothetical theory of genetics.) There is no explanation for how changed external environmental requirement, whether on Gould's "periphery" of species environment or not, could cause significant abrupt micro-biological genetic modification sufficient to adapt former species to the changed environmental circumstances. How could the DNA of a single living cell be sensitive to macro-environmental change? The significance of random mutation to Neo-Darwinism is that it removes any external causal force or condition on the living cell, whether God or nature.

Die debat oor Intelligente Ontwerp wat van Julie tot Oktober verlede jaar in Die Burger gewoed het ná my negatiewe resensie van Leon Rousseau se boek Die Groot Avontuur (Human & Rousseau) het verder uitgekring. Rousseau het in repliek op Karel de Pauw se oorwegend positiewe resensie op my boek Geloof, Bygeloof en Ander Wensdenkery: Perspektiewe op Ontdekkings en Irrasionaliteite (Protea Boekhuis), die volgende repliek versprei. Ek antwoord hom ná sy repliek hieronder.

Repliek deur Leon Rousseau

Verlede week was daar in Die Burger ’n ophemelende resensie deur Karel de Pauw van die boek Geloof, bygeloof en ander wensdenkery. (http://152.111.1.251/argief/berigte/dieburger/2007/10/15/SK/13/BBclaasen.html).  Daarin verwys De Pauw by wyse van teenstelling afkeurend na “pseudo-wetenskaplike argumente” in Die groot gedagte deur Gideon Joubert en in my boek Die groot avontuur.

Sowel Die groot gedagte (natuurwetenskappe, sterrekunde) as Die groot avontuur (ontstaan van lewe, evolusie) is bedoel om populêr in die sin van “toeganklik” te wees. Pseudo-wetenskap, daarenteen, is so ’n sterk woord dat dit meestal gereserveer word vir wilde bespiegelaars soos David Icke en Von Däniken, skrywer van Chariots of the gods, en dié is Joubert se boek en myne nie.

Later maak De Pauw die pap nog ’n bietjie dikker aan en sê “die argumente en feite [in Geloof, bygeloof . . . is] die spreekwoordelike pêrels voor die swyne wat sekere skrywers betref.” Hy verwys kennelik na my en na Gideon Joubert.

Die rede vir dié nydigheid is eenvoudig. De Pauw, saam met geesgenote soos Nathan Bond en George Claassen (skrywer van Geloof, bygeloof . . .) is ’n spraaksame voorbok in die militante ateïstiese beweging. Dié broeders in die ongeloof praat uit een mond.

Daar is ’n verskil tussen ateïste – elke mens het die reg op sy eie mening – en militante ateïste, wat die ateïsme aanhang soos pasbekeerdes wat die hele wêreld wil bekeer en selfs nie die sweem van ’n ander standpunt duld nie.

Hulle verdoem Die groot avontuur omdat ek, sonder om dit as wetenskaplike teorie voor te lê, op ’n paar plekke vertel van my indruk dat daar ’n groot intelligensie agter die wondere van die heelal moet wees. Aan dié ongeveer 1% van die boek het een van hulle 70% van ’n lang, venynige resensie bestee. In Gideon Joubert se boek speel geloof ’n nog groter rol, en hy word ooreenstemmend nog meer verguis as ek. Hulle praat van “Joubertisme” in ongeveer dieselfde toon as wat sekere Christene van “satanisme” praat.

My eie boek was onder meer ’n poging om die kloof tussen geloof en wetenskap (spesifiek evolusie) te verklein, soos ook die doyen van Suid-Afrikaanse wetenskaplikes, prof Phillip Tobias, al lewenslank probeer doen.

Omstreeks 1960, kort ná Koos Human en ek Human & Rousseau gestig het, het ek enkele briewe met prof. Raymond Dart van Wits gewissel. Dit was op ’n besoek aan Johannesburg dat hy my kort daarna aan die woeste wêreld van Australopithecus, die Suideraap, bekend gestel het.

Met idealistiese sending-ywer het ek toe by Human & Rousseau ’n boekie, Die wording van die mens, evolusie vir jongmense, uitgegee, maar kerk en staat was (in Jurie van den Heever se woorde) toe nog so stewig aan mekaar vasgesweis dat dit ons all-time worst seller was. Biblioteke was te bang om ’n boek oor evolusie te koop omdat sekere predikante dit afkeur. Dit was seker een van die dinge wat my aangespoor het om Die groot avontuur te skryf, met die doel om kreasioniste sagkens, sonder aggressie, tot ’n geloof in evolusie te bekeer. Ook in dié opsig het die militante ateïste my boek volkome verkeerd verstaan – anders as gebalanseerde wetenskaplikes soos prof Hilary Deacon, dr Sarah Wurz, prof P A J Ryke (skrywer van Evolusie) en prof Phillip Tobias, wat dit goedgekeur het.

Die groot avontuur is vroeër vanjaar met die Recht Malan-prys vir nie-fiksie bekroon, Die groot gedagte reeds vroeër met sowel die Andrew Murray-prys as die Insig-prys vir nie-fiksie.

Die polarisering tussen geloof en evolusie woed veral in die VSA al baie dekades. Kreasioniste was aanvanklik die lawaaierigste maar deesdae het ’n invloedryke groep  wetenskaplikes ewe onverdraagsaam en kleingeestig geword. En by ons is die lekepredikers vir die ateïsme more loyal than the queen.

As iemand soos Galileo in die 17de eeu gesê het, “Ek is ’n gelowige mens, maar my teleskoop wys my dat die aarde om die son draai en nie andersom nie,” kon hy groot probleme van die onverdraagsame inkwisisie verwag. As jy vandag sê “Ek glo in evolusie, maar my [onbewysbare] indruk is dat daar ’n groot intelligensie agter die wondere van die heelal is”, kan jy groot probleme van die militante ateïste verwag.

Van ’n middeweg soos die een wat ek in Die groot avontuur probeer bewandel, het dwepers nog nooit gehou nie. 

George Claassen se repliek:

Leon Rousseau se tirade waarin mense wat van hom verskil as “dwepers”, “militante ateïste”, “lekepredikers vir die ateïsme” en ander skelwoorde gebrandmerk word, herinner darem baie aan die Jesuïte se selektiewe aanbieding van feite oor hekse en ander “sondaars” tydens die Spaanse Inkwisisie.

Hy verkies om mense etikette om die nek te hang, maar sy betoog hiernaas verdraai die waarheid oor sy boek, Die Groot Avontuur (Human & Rousseau-uitgewers). Ek sal op die gebreke in sy boek konsentreer en my nie tot persoonlike beledigings wend soos hy nie.

 Hy maak beswaar dat sy boek en die soortgelyke pseudowetenskaplike boek van Gideon Joubert, Die Groot Gedagte (Tafelberg-uitgewers), nie as sodanig getipeer kan word nie omdat hulle nie “wilde bespiegelaars soos David Icke en Erich van Däniken” is nie.

 Ek verskil van hom: Altwee boeke is deurspek met pseudowetenskaplike aansprake.

Rousseau vertel ons met smaak van al die wetenskaplikes wat sy boek ondersteun het, maar verswyg om een of ander duister rede die feit dat prof. Phillip Tobias hom ná my resensie oor die boek in Die Burger in ’n brief aan die koerant van die boek gedistansieer het weens die pseudowetenskaplike aard daarvan. (Terloops, die twee beoordelaars van die Recht Malan-prys wat Rousseau se boek bekroon het, was, raai-raai ’n teoloog en ’n sosioloog. Een van hulle het daarna teenoor my erken hulle het nie Tobias se brief aan Die Burger by die beoordeling in ag geneem nie!).

In sy brief, gepubliseer op 9 September verlede jaar in Die Burger, skryf Tobias, nadat ek in my resensie gevra het of hy “die skade wat sy aanbeveling van die boek in die lig van die openlike IO (Intelligente Ontwerp)-aard daarvan, aan sy reputasie as gerekende wetenskaplike doen”, besef:

“Noudat ek die finale gepubliseerde weergawe van Die Groot Avontuur gelees het, het dit vir my duidelik geword Rousseau ondersteun die pseudowetenskaplike konsep van Intelligente Ontwerp ... Veral wil ek van hierdie geleentheid gebruik maak om myself ondubbelsinnig van daardie dele van Die Groot Avontuur wat IO ondersteun, te distansieer” (my kursivering).

Vergeet ’n oomblik my resensie (http://152.111.1.251/argief/berigte/dieburger/2006/07/17/DB/11/BBgclaassenrousseau.html) en lees dieselfde klagte teen Rousseau se boek in die resensie van die wetenskaplike Andries Lategan in Beeld (16 Oktober 2006) (http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Vermaak/Boeke/0,,3-2109-2112_2014373,00.html).  Lategan wys daarop dat Tobias se avant propos eerder met  ’n waarskuwing vervang moes gewees het soos op sigaretpakkies: “Die lees van hierdie boek is skadelik vir ’n gesonde oordeel oor wat evolusioniste sê.”

Lategan spreek hom nes ek, dr. Karel de Pauw, die resensent van my boek, dr. Jurie van den Heever en ander wetenskaplikes uit oor die openbarende toevlug wat Rousseau gereeld in sy boek by ’n Intelligente Ontwerper soek sodra hy nie iets begryp of kan verklaar nie. “ ’n Argument wat berus op iets wat onbegryplik is, kan beswaarlik deel wees van ’n gesprek oor die geldigheid van wetenskaplike teorieë ... Rousseau behoort dalk ag te slaan op Karen Armstrong se waarskuwing in A History of God dat mense wat hul godsbegrip wil haak aan die immer krimpende gebiede van natuurverskynsels waarvoor daar nog nie ’n deeglike teorie ontwikkel is nie, altyd aan die hardloop gaan bly voor wetenskaplike vordering,” skryf Lategan.

Rousseau trek so fel met onwetenskaplike bravade los teen my, De Pauw en andere asof ons die enigstes is wat nie die lig oor sy pryswennende boek gesien het nie, maar probeer dan maak asof hy godsdiens en evolusie, gelowige en wetenskaplike, nader aan mekaar wil bring en wil versoen.

Rousseau en ander aanhangers van Intelligente Ontwerp neem nie kennis van die basiese verskil tussen die wetenskap en geloof nie, dat gelowiges absoluut glo, maak nie saak wat die wetenskaplike sê nie, maar dat wetenskap deurgaans met onsekerhede werk en bly vrae vra.

Armstrong is reg: elke stukkie bygeloof wat die wetenskap aftakel en blootlê ­– en dit sluit die vasklou aan ’n Intelligente Ontwerp-scenario in ­– laat mense soos Rousseau en Joubert, wat hul godsbegrip wil haak aan alles wat hulle nie kan verklaar in die natuur nie, ’n bietjie vinniger aan die hardloop. Is dit hoekom hy so uitasem reageer op my boek wat rasionaliteit en wetenskaplike bewyse voorstaan as die enigste wyse waarop ons kan weet?

Die Amerikaanse fisikus Lawrence Krauss verwys onlangs in sy tweeweeklikse rubriek “World lines” in New Scientist na dié onhebbelikheid so deel van C.S. Lewis se werke wat die populêre standpunt inneem “that science, by explaining the inner workings of the universe, robs it of the wonder that religion provides – a viewpoint that, frankly, I find offensive.” Voeg maar Rousseau en Joubert by Lewis as die Groot Meesters van die Orde van Intelligente Ontwerp, met my oudkollega Leopold Scholtz as hul stafhoof in die hoofstroommedia. Wie sal sy vreemde en wetenskap-begriplose verdediging van Intelligente Ontwerp in sy rubriek Sake van die Dag ooit kan vergeet midde in die Rousseau-debat in Die Burger ná my resensie van Die Groot Avontuur? (http://152.111.1.251/argief/berigte/dieburger/2006/08/04/SK/8/Sakie4Aug.html).

 Krauss se volledige rubriek lui:

 LAST month I read a column in The New York Times by David Brooks (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/22/opinion/22brooks.html?_r=1&em&ex=1209096000&en=60aba79d67739095&ei=5087&oref=slogin)  that has bothered me ever since. In it Brooks describes an essay about the medieval concept of the universe entitled C. S. Lewis and the Star of Bethlehem by Michael Ward (http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2008/001/15.30.html), a chaplain at the University of Cambridge.

Brooks writes that "while we moderns see space as a black, cold, mostly empty vastness, with planets and stars propelled by gravitational and other forces, Europeans in the Middle Ages saw a more intimate and magical place. The heavens, to them, were a ceiling of moving spheres, rippling with signs and symbols, and moved by the love of God... The modern view disenchants the universe, Lewis argued, and tends to make it 'all fact and no meaning'."

Brooks's and Ward's articles both reflect a popular view that science, by explaining the inner workings of the universe, robs it of the wonder that religion provides - a viewpoint that, frankly, I find offensive. How anyone can suggest that medieval hallucinations might spark the imagination more than the actual universe that we have been so fortunate to uncover is beyond me. The "heavenly actors" populating the spiritual universe of Lewis were, like many religious myths, intellectually lazy creations of fundamentally ignorant minds. It is a far grander kind of imagination that is needed to fathom the real universe.

The night sky isn't populated with mythical beasts, but with a small slice of the 100 billion or so stars in our small island galaxy, the Milky Way, one of 400 billion galaxies in the observable universe. Each of the stars, while not alive in an anthropomorphic sense, houses an exotic world of action at a searing 10 million degrees, releasing the energy equivalent to a thousand billion hydrogen bombs going off every second - a wonder-work of nature's creation.

The light from the stars of other galaxies takes billions of years to reach us. A Hubble Space Telescope photograph, in which every speck of light represents not a star, but an entire galaxy, with each galaxy containing billions of stars, surely spurs the imagination more than any fable. Around some of these stars there may be planets that once housed life. I say once, because the stars that produced the light in Hubble's images are probably long gone. We are literally watching the history of the universe unfold before our very eyes.

In our own galaxy, a star explodes in a brilliant supernova once every hundred years or so, and is briefly as bright as 10 billion suns. Yet most such explosions are invisible, obscured by dust, so in fact the last exploding star observed from Earth in our galaxy was seen by Kepler in 1604 (http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn13514-light-echoes-help-gauge-supernovas-fury.html). Yet the universe is so big and old that these events are happening all the time. With a powerful enough telescope a region in the sky at night the size of a dime held at arms length will reveal more than 100,000 galaxies - so many that one may see up to 10 stars explode on a given night. Over time, 200 million stars have exploded in our galaxy, producing almost all the elements that make up our bodies. The atoms in your left hand may have come from a different star than those in your right: we are all star children.

If this poetry of nature does not change the way we view our place in the universe, providing not mere facts but new meaning, then we are truly spiritually bereft. Yet too many people feel that they must invent alternate realities to justify human existence.

Why does it matter if people cling to myths for solace? Because real-world problems such as climate change can only be solved by real-world thinking. Like it or not, the harsh reality is that nature doesn't exist to serve humanity, and turning to myths that put humans at the centre of creation only distract us from appropriate actions.

Brooks's column also mentioned Barack Obama's much-maligned statement that some people turn to religion for refuge from the inequities that abound in Bush's America - a truth many people would rather not hear. If we live at a time when honest questions about the role of religion and people's motivations for action cannot be voiced in public, then I worry about our future.”

 Aldus Krauss.

 Die Rousseauseaanse en Jouberteaanse pro-Intelligente Ontwerpargumente word nou in gewysigde vorm deur ’n buitengewone professor in sielkunde van die Universiteit van Pretoria, Wilhelm Jordaan, herhaal in ’n bespreking van Geloof, Bygeloof en Ander Wensdenkery in die Winter-uitgawe van Boeke-Insig, die puik kwartaalblad onder redaksie van Irna van Zyl. Koop dit gerus, veral om die verstommende vergelyking wat hy tref tussen wetenskap en godsdiens onder oë te kry. Ek lewer in die Lente-uitgawe van Boeke-Insig repliek op Jordaan.

 Intussen wag Karel de Pauw steeds op 'n antwoord van Joubert oor die verkeerde wyse waarop hy wetenskaplikes buite konteks aanhaal om sy godsdienstige sienings te probeer staaf.

 ’n Laaste gedagte: die Amerikaanse genetikus Jerry Coyne som die Rousseau- en Intelligente Ontwerp-benadering raak op: “. . . die werklike oorlog is tussen rasionaliteit en bygeloof. Wetenskap is maar een vorm van rasionaliteit, terwyl godsdiens die algemeenste vorm van bygeloof is . . . As die geskiedenis van die wetenskap ons iets wys, is dit dat ons nêrens kom deur ons onkunde ‘God’ te noem nie.”

Reseña:

Dos de los motivos por los cuales el 20 de mayo de 2002 los lectores asiduos de Stephen Jay Gould nos vimos inundados por una profunda tristeza cuando nos enteramos de su temprana aunque anunciada muerte son los siguientes. Primero porque, dado el modo personal en que se presentaba en la enorme cantidad de escritos, todos deliciosos, en los que evadía la típica aridez científica actual aunque no su rigor, difícilmente uno pudiera considerarlo menos que un amigo, en esa amistad asimétrica que se genera con los grandes escritores. El segundo de los motivos es del todo egoísta: nunca más podríamos esperar la publicación de uno de sus nuevos libros. Desde esa fecha nos vimos condenados a releer sus textos, condena, de todos modos, en absoluto ingrata. Sus dos últimas obras publicadas en vida fueron, la monumental (entre otras cosas por su tamaño) The structure of evolutionary theory, libro técnico que puede ser considerado, y de hecho era considerado por el mismo Gould, como la obra de su vida, y la no menos importante publicación del último de su serie de libros no técnicos en los que se compilaban los ensayos que mes a mes publicaba en Natural History desde hacía 20 años sin interrupción. Los lectores de habla castellana que habitan estas latitudes (Argentina) pueden esquivar la segunda de las tragedias acercándose a alguna librería y simulando que Gould todavía vive y escribe, pues ha salido la traducción de este último libro no técnico con el título Acabo de llegar, frase que refiere a la que el abuelo de Gould escribió en la gramática inglesa recién comprada al llegar a Estados Unidos el 11 de septiembre de 1901, y que fue título de su ensayo publicado en Natural History el 11 de septiembre de 2001, ensayo que abre el libro, y que, en inglés –I have landed-, refiere también a la idea de consecución de un objetivo (los sentimentalismos deben ser perdonados a los que saben próximo su fin).

Por supuesto el lector no familiarizado con los libros de Gould estará esperando que le diga qué tipo de libro es Acabo de llegar y de qué trata. Ninguna de las dos respuestas es fácil. Stephen Jay Gould es un paleontólogo profesional, conocido en el ámbito de la Biología por diversas tesis acerca de la evolución. Sus libros no técnicos, y este en particular, son libros escritos por un científico. El camino más fácil sería caracterizar este libro con el mote impolíticamente incorrecto de “Divulgación científica”. Ese era el nombre de la pequeñísima sección en la que encontré el libro en una librería muy importante y conocida de Buenos Aires. Típicamente los libros que caen bajo este rótulo listan en tono de certeza las últimas novedades de la ciencia. Esta no es, sin embargo, una buena descripción de los contenidos de los libros de Gould.

En el prólogo Gould alardea con que la literatura científica no técnica no tendría porque ser menos profunda conceptualmente que la técnica. Aunque, por supuesto, hay una tensión inevitable entre la no-tecnicidad y la profundidad, se puede sostener que este es un rasgo característico de este libro en particular, y de todos los que conforman la serie de diez libros: profundidad conceptual no técnica. El lector no especialista en estos temas se verá enfrentado, en un lenguaje completamente comprensible, a tesis originales y reflexiones profundas de toda índole. La mirada es siempre la de un naturalista, los temas no. No es necesario defender, por supuesto, la existencia y la importancia de una literatura no técnica pero profunda. Basta con pensar algunos ejemplos algo exagerados como los diálogos de Platón o el mismo Origen de las especies, escrito concientemente por Darwin de un modo accesible a los no especialistas en el tema. La profundidad, la influencia y la importancia de estos libros son indiscutibles. Su calidad literaria y fácil lectura también.

Es imposible contar de un modo que no sea tedioso los 31 ensayos que conforman el libro. Puedo mencionar alguno de ellos para generar una vaga idea de la diversidad que contiene el libro. Por ejemplo, la doble vida de Nabokov como entomólogo profesional especializado en un tipo particular de mariposas le sirve de excusa para reflexionar acerca de las relaciones entre la Ciencia y el Arte. En otro de los ensayos, el libro que Nettie le regaló y dedicó a su marido Thomas Huxley, amigo de Darwin y abuelo de Aldous Huxley, y una vez muerto aquél, regaló y dedicó a su nieto, el biólogo Julien Huxley, hermano de Aldous, le permite reflexionar acerca de la continuidad de la vida, su improbabilidad, contingencia y fragilidad, y ‘la grandeza’ que la concepción darwiniana de la vida esconde, en alusión a las últimas palabras de Darwin en el Origen de las Especies. Este último tema se puede encontrar también tratado en La vida maravillosa, uno de sus mejores libros. En un tono de enigma chestertoniano, y con una resolución al nivel, Gould escudriña en otro ensayo, las razones que podía haber tenido E. Ray Lankester, un caballero ultraconservador discípulo de Darwin, para ser una de las nueve personas que asistió al funeral de Marx. También muestra, en otro ensayo, cómo detrás de muchas de las tesis más importantes de Freud subyacía una concepción biológica lamarkista. En fin, la lista es larga. Menciono algunos temas de los ensayos por ser llamativos. Los ensayos que no tratan de personajes tan conocidos, los más, no son menos interesantes.

Tienen algo en común todos estos ensayos, además de, por supuesto, su autor. En el segundo ensayo del libro Gould cuenta cómo Nabokov importunaba a sus alumnos repitiéndoles una y otra vez “acariciad los detalles, los divinos detalles, en el arte elevado y en la ciencia pura”. Según Gould, este enfoque sería común a la obra científica y literaria de Navokov. Tal vez ésta sea la frase que permitiría caracterizar la mirada de Gould sobre todo aquello sobre lo que escribió en esta serie de libros no técnicos, pero también en los libros técnicos. En esta mirada tal vez podamos encontrar lo que da unidad a todos los escritos de Gould, quien prefería ser llamado ‘historiador natural’ más que ‘naturalista’, justamente por este motivo. Cada uno de sus ensayos trata sobre algún detalle de la naturaleza, de la historia de la Ciencia, o de lo que fuere (recurrente a nuestro pesar es el tema del béisbol), y de la enseñanza universal que ese detalle encierra. Esta mirada probablemente, provenga de su profesión. Los paleontólogos, muchas veces, deben reconstruir la historia evolutiva de ciertos organismos, a partir del examen de muy pocos fósiles.

Nadie mejor que el propio Nabokov, citado por Gould en el capítulo que le dedica, para describir el amor y la pasión con que algunos pueden acercarse a detalles de la naturaleza:

Dark pictures, thrones, the stones that pilgrims kiss
Poems that take a thousand years to die
But ape the inmortality of this
Red label on a little butterfly.

En castellano:

Pinturas oscuras, tronos, las piedras que los peregrinos besan
Poemas que tardan mil años en morir
Pero imitan la inmortalidad de esta
Etiqueta roja sobre una pequeña mariposa.

Para información sobre Stephen Jay Gould y para leer algunos de sus escritos, ingrese a www.stephenjaygould.org
La página web de Natural History Magazine en donde Gould publicaba mensualmente sus artículos no técnicos es www.naturalhistorymag.com. En la sección de archivos se puede acceder a la versión original en inglés del último artículo publicado en esta revista, que da nombre al libro reseñado, así como a otros artículos de Gould. Para acceder a “I have landed” directamente haga click aquí .

“The history of most fossil species includes two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism: 1) Stasis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear; Morphological change is usually limited and directionless. 2) Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transormation of is ancestors; it appears all at once and ‘fully formed.’” This has been more recently affirmed by others.

Of course, there is much more to that Gould quote, but that wasn't what really interested me, personally.  What I really enjoyed was this bit from a user named Magistra:

And incidentally, “fully formed” is in the eye of the beholder, just as all points on a line are “fully formed” points rather than simply part of a line. Transition fossils are being found all the time, but you can always claim there are “missing links” just as you can claim there are still points between any two “fully formed” points on a line. However, the fact that there are still “missing” points doesn’t mean you can’t connect the dots.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

You may also enjoy reading this post from Skeptic Con: Why Creationists Are Delusional About the Fossil Record.

(See this & more airline cartoons here)

Among 'low-level ecstasies' that I have spotted recently, finding yourself unexpectedly in a bulkhead seat with lots of legroom in the economy class of a very long international flight with no one occupying the 3 seats next to you and absolutely no babies in sight, is a pretty difficult one to beat. But then, world aviation today is so character-forming that occasional mercies merit joyous indulgence.

As I forsake business travel for leisure trips and consequently do more coach than upper class, my approach to flying is getting highly refined. John Playfair the British philosopher wrote (in another context of course - he did not have the advantage of modern long distance flying to sharpen his philosophical approach),

"It were unwise to be sanguine

and unphilosophical to despair"

While one can write reams of 'how to' tips on Flying, the good John's snappy two-liner seems to pretty much cover it.

And, as I stood in queue with about 8 gazillion people for 2 hours in the Dubai International airport recently, trying to hand over my bag to someone in Emirates, I thanked ol' John. 'Twas good advice.

Incidentally, 'low level ecstasy' is a term coined by Bill Bryson, for which he gets my vote as the Philosopher of the Year. And while I am on the subject of giving credit where it is due, let me add that the John Playfair quote above is from Stephen Jay Gould's book, Rocks of Ages. And just in case Mr Gould stumbles upon my blog : yes, I do think Rocks of Ages is an intriguing book - in spite of having phrases like Non Overlapping Magisteria.

just_another_future_song, originally uploaded by earthpages.

]]> http://naturecalendar.wordpress.com/?p=219 Thu, 26 Jun 2008 22:06:08 +0000 naturecalendar http://naturecalendar.es.wordpress.com/2008/06/26/trapped-on-jelly-world/

by Erik Baard

The Long Island City Community Boathouse hosted a “brunch paddle” from Anable Cove in Hunters Point down to “Dumbo Cove” in Brooklyn Bridge Park. On the way, one participant was surprised, and then reassuringly centered, by a simple encounter:

“Nature sightings started before we even left off when Dan saw a jellyfish bobbling around. There are jellyfish in the East River? Sure, that makes sense,” wrote Wren Longno.

As a tidal strait completing the circle of Long Island from the harbor to the Sound, the life of the East River (or as I prefer to call it, the Gotham Strait) is entirely oceanic. It’s easy to forget, however, with highrises, highways, skyscrapers, parking lots, airports, and sitting parks bounding the entire length of the waterway. The gulls, seaweed, salt air, and the humble jellyfish remind us of the salient fact of our location. We are ocean islanders.

But recent research has added a new dimension to our relationship with the jellyfish: their recent population boom might herald worldwide decline of marine ecology.

“When you knock out species, other species fill in the gap, sometimes from lower down the food chain. The problem with that in this case is that jellyfish are not exactly pleasant, they don’t have much commercial value, and they’re a pain in the neck for many communities,” said Dianne Saenz, North American communications director for Oceana, a global ecology advocate. Oceana provided the above photo, by Carlos Suarez, of the jellyfish now plaguing Spain.

We’ve over-fished sharks, turtles, and tuna, among other creatures further up the food chain. Jellyfish are reproducing without checks and have less competition for the feeding on fellow zooplankton. Once their biomass tips the scales in a region, even restocking fish won’t work because it’s hard to shoehorn species into vast seas of jellyfish. Indeed, some of the invertebrates eat the very fish (especially juveniles) we’d seek to reintroduce.

Waves of jellyfish are chasing swimmers back to shore in the Mediterranean. The Gulf of Mexico has been a pool of jellyfish in some recent summers. In Northern Ireland, global climate change is being eyed as possibly contributing to a jellyfish invasion that wiped out stocks of penned organic salmon. Chinese and Japanese fishers are trying to contend with jellyfish crowding out the fish that provide their livelihoods. We can’t even accurately measure how had the problem is, or how fast it’s advancing, because jellyfish don’t show up on radar, sonar, or satellite images very well. After all, they typically are composed of up to 98% water, less than one percent collagen, salt and other trace minerals.

One thing biologists often slap lay people for is referring to some creatures as “primitive.” I understand their argument; adaptation is measured in genetic success – longevity and progeny, not brains or beauty. Some, including the great Stephen Jay Gould, go as far as to say that bacteria rule the Earth, not our self-involved primate species. This pushes the argument too far; the facts are left wanting for a poetic thread. I believe in the inherent value of complex order within individuals as well as ecosystems. Whether your sentiments are those of an artist or an engineer, nature teaches an appreciation of refinement.

Yes, many species of jellyfish have a ghostly beauty, and they have a fascinatingly simple, elegant structure. They are most prominently a bell and tentacles (in most species). There’s no brain or central nervous system but they can see changes in light and shade with a 360-degree scope and can smell and touch. They thrive without specialized digestive, respiratory, or circulatory systems. Some glow with sublime bioluminescent displays. But I don’t want them crowding out the dizzying array of species who have developed in the 650 millions of years since its Cnidaria or Coelenterata phylum appeared on the scene.

One solution, offered by the Japanese on the island of Fukui, is to eat them in cookies. But, as Florida State University food scientist Yun-Hwa “Peggy” Hsieh cautioned me, jellyfish don’t provide a complete nutritional protein. Once dried, what remains is nearly pure Type 2 collagen, she said.

According to Hsieh, Florida has the first large U.S. jellyfish export industry, mostly to Asia, but species in that region are smaller than in northern Asia. That means they have a higher waste proportion, and so they require more labor. In short, the real economic benefit is to tourism, by keeping beaches desirable, not the fish processor.

Cosmetics companies frequently send queries to Hsieh, seeking advice on turning jellyfish into Angelina Jolie pouts and other Cosmo Girl miracles. Hsieh politely takes their calls but the real goldmine, she believes, is in using their Type 2 collagen as a therapy for rheumatoid arthritis.

“Chicken collagen has been tested, but it seems that a more homogenous might be more effective. We may be creative and really original with this work, but I don’t have the research funding for that right now,” said Hsieh, who has grants to pursue other questions. “If I had a sponsor, I could easily produce more interesting data. I would like to do a clinical study on rheumatoid arthritis because the animal studies were very good.”

One can imagine a government program to seed industrial interest in using jellyfish for adhesives or biomechanics and implants, or a George Washington Carver of jellyfish promoting many uses for the species.