Reflectorites
Here are excerpts from web articles for the period 14 September - 2
October, 2000. My comments are in square brackets.
Steve
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=003535318014601&rtmo=V6fVg3SK&atmo=rrrrrrvs&pg=/et/00/9/28/ecfrex28.html
Electronic Telegraph 28.09-00 What really killed T. Rex? A deep impact
and colossal explosion on Earth 65 million years ago is blamed for wiping
out the dinosaurs... but the asteroid may be innocent. ... The ultimate
disaster movie scenario is based on a serious scientific hypothesis proposed
in 1980 by the American team Professors Walter and Luis Alvarez, who
carried out what was undoubtedly one of the most remarkable pieces of
detective work known to science. They started with the investigation of a
thin layer of dirty sulphurous clay in Gubbio, Italy. This clay marked what
scientists call the K-T boundary, which marks the junction between rocks
in which the fossils of dinosaurs and their peers are found, and those above,
in which dinosaur bones are never found but have been replaced by a new,
more modern fauna. ... the Alvarezes were able to track back and find
evidence for a giant impact on the Earth exactly 65 million years ago. In
1991 the Chixculub impact structure was discovered, centred on the
Yucatan peninsula in Mexico, and dated at exactly 65 million years and so
they were proved to have been spot on. .. But the next step in the story - a
hypothesis blaming the impact for the K-T extinction - is not nearly so neat.
Many Earth scientists were coming up with a different scenario for the
disappearance of 75 per cent of life on Earth. ... The Deccan Traps in India,
stretching from Bombay almost to the Himalayas, form 200,000 square
miles of layer upon layer of such black basalt lava flows. ... These flood
basalts were extruded from long fissures in the Earth at exactly the same
time as the dinosaurs died. ... In the late 1980s a number of scientists
started to turn to the Deccan as a possible cause of environmental
degradation leading to the K-T extinction. The most prominent of these
scientists was ... Prof Vincent Courtillot, who has now risen to become the
chief scientific adviser to the French government. .... ... The beauty of
Courtillot's idea is that it provides a possible cause for the whole K-T
extinction, and not just the dinosaurs. For the extinction struck the sea as
well - the elegant coiled ammonites and the great sea reptiles, the
plesiosaurs, ichthyosaurs and pliosaurs were among the marine fauna wiped
out. ... Despite this compelling evidence, the world and the media still
favoured and accepted as fact - the Alvarez theory of asteroid impact. This
is probably due, in part, to the fashion for disaster movies at the time, and
to the strong personalities and charisma of the Alvarez team. ... "I feel
very aware that the K-T impact bandwaggon has crushed a lot of valuable
scientific evidence under its wheels," says Bob Spicer. "The facts of one
part of science have become distorted and used by another branch to justify
public spending." ... [Phil Johnson mentions on one of his tapes that Luis
Alvarez (who he knew personally) bragged that he had by marginalised his
main competitor, Prof. Dewey McLean (see link from this page) in order
to get his asteroid impact theory established. If it turns out that McLean
was right all along, this would be another example of how political power
and the spirit of the age are more important in science than it's more
uncritical devotees believe. Now what other important theory does that
remind me of? :-)]
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/World/Middle_East/2000-09/sculpture240900.shtml
The Independent ... 'Lump of rock' turns out to be world's first sculpture ...
24 September 2000 A stone dismissed by experts as no more than a lump
of rock has been identified as the world's first sculpture and the oldest piece
of figurative art ever seen. New scientific data suggests that early humans
were producing representations of life 220,000 years ago ... It is a
discovery which could revolutionise our understanding of human
development. Italian and American archaeologists used powerful
microscopes to prove that a figurine-like piece of volcanic stone from the
Golan Heights ... is in fact a primitive sculpture, deliberately chiselled and
shaped by human hands. ... The sculpture, which has been widely ignored
since its discovery in 1986, is now likely to be acknowledged by most
scholars as the world's oldest work of figurative art. Significantly, this
recognition comes at a time when indirect evidence of other equally ancient
artistic activity is coming to light in Zambia, Kenya and Europe. .... Such
discoveries may have a profound impact on our understanding of the
evolution of human thought. Archaeologists have always considered
symbolic thought, as represented by art, to be the exclusive preserve of
homo sapiens, our species. Although symbolic thought only really
blossomed 100,000 years after the final emergence of homo sapiens some
150,000 years ago, the new research suggests it may have existed in a
simple form much, much earlier - between 200,000 and 350,000 years ago.
Depending on what further discoveries are unearthed, archaeologists may
have to start rewriting the origins of human thought, with homo sapiens in
the role of developer rather than originator. ... [If this is the Berekhat Ram
"Golan Venus" it is old news. It is only 1 inch long and looks *vaguely*
like a woman's figure, with cut marks near the `neck'. Whether the cut
marks were to accentuate the `neck' or just a failed attempt at making
something else, or even naturally occurring scratches, is the question. From
an ID perspective this is another example of archaeologists using a form of
design inference to tell an artefact from a geofact-what Ratzsch calls
"counterflow". If it is confirmed, I personally would not have a problem
with incipient symbolic thought developing in a line leading to Homo
sapiens (maybe even being anatomically modern H. sapiens?) 200-350 kya,
since it would fit within my modified Pearce's two-`Adam' model.]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_940000/940613.stm BBC
... 24 September, 2000 ... Following in Darwin's footsteps ... A guest house
landlady is to follow in Charles Darwin's footsteps after unearthing a rare
first edition of his iconoclastic book the Origin of Species. Kathy
Bickerstaff, 51, bought the book, published in 1859, for 50p at a church
fete ...12 years ago. She only realised what the book could be worth when
one of her guests noticed it was a first edition. It eventually fetched
o11,600 at auction. ... Ms Bickerstaff...will fulfil a childhood dream when
she travels to the Galapagos Islands, off Ecuador, where Darwin conducted
his research for the book ... Darwin, travelling on board the ship HMS
Beagle, discovered a volcanic archipelago that had remained much as it
was millions of years ago. ... Darwin's theory - that the various types of
plants and animals, including man, have their origin in other preexisting
types - contrasted sharply with the teaching of the Church ... which claimed
God had created the first humans, Adam and Eve, in his own image. There
was strong resistance to Darwinian thinking but nowadays the theory of
evolution is at the centre of mainstream science. ... [It is interesting how
the story has become more mythological over time, i.e. 1) Darwin
"discovered" the Galapagos -it was actually discovered in 1585!; 2) He
"conducted his research for the book" - Darwin claimed to be a creationist
at this stage and that he only thought of transmutation of species late in the
voyage; 3) the implied claim that Darwin's theory contradicted the Bible's
teaching that "God had created ... humans ... in his own image" (so much
for Gould's NOMA!); and 4) that "the theory of evolution is at the centre
of mainstream *science*!]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_938000/938915.stm
BBC ... 23 September, 2000 ... Amazon geneticist 'killed hundreds' ... A
US geneticist who died earlier this year has been accused of deliberately
infecting thousands of Yanomami Indians with measles, killing hundreds of
them. The geneticist, James Neel, worked in the Yanomami homeland in
Brazil and Venezuela in the mid-1960s. A book to be published ... says
Neel vaccinated the Yanomami as an experiment to test the effects of
natural selection on primitive societies. The AAA is extremely concerned
about these allegations ... it says his work was funded by the US Atomic
Energy Commission, which wanted to research the consequences for
communities of the mass deaths caused by a nuclear war. The book,
Darkness in El Dorado, has been written by Patrick Tierney, a journalist. ...
Professor Terry Turner ... who has read the proofs, has told the American
Anthropological Association that the book reveals a "nightmarish story - a
real anthropological heart of darkness". .. Neel also studied effects of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs on survivors ...[that] Neel's group had
been involved in experiments in the US which included injecting people
with plutonium without their knowledge. [and] Tierney's book will put the
entire discipline of anthropology on trial. Although Neel himself is dead,
many of his associates from the experiment are still alive. ... See also:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000929/sc/yanomami_dc_2.html [To
be fair these allegations have not yet been proved. But if they are true the
Darwinist eugenics connection may prove to be very embarrassing for
Darwinists following recent furores about claims by some social Darwinists
that infanticide and rape is OK.]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=003535318014601&rtmo=Ll37hh3d&atmo=Ll37hh3d&pg=/et/00/9/28/ngre28.html
Electronic Telegraph ... 28 September 2000 'Ignorance' of Greens berated
by scientist ... James Lovelock, 81, who is best known for his Gaia theory
and the many environmental prizes he has won, said: "Too many Greens
are not just ignorant of science, they hate science." Named after the Greek
goddess of Earth by the novelist William Golding, Gaia theory says that
creatures, rocks, air and water interact in subtle ways to ensure the
environment remains stable. Gaia has exerted great influence on the Green
movement, but in Homage to Gaia: The Life of an Independent Scientist,
published today, Lovelock says that he has "never been wholly on the side
of environmentalism". He likens Greens to "some global over-anxious
mother figure who is so concerned about small risks that she ignores the
real dangers". He wished they "would grow up" and focus on the real
problem: "How can we feed, house and clothe the abundant human race
without destroying the habitats of other creatures?" Unlike most Greens,
Lovelock backs nuclear energy. "Some time in the next century, when the
adverse effects of climate change begin to bite, people will look back in
anger at those who now so foolishly continue to pollute by burning fossil
fuel instead of accepting the beneficence of nuclear power. "Is our distrust
of nuclear power and genetically modified food soundly based?" he asks, ...
his disenchantment ... is similar to that of Patrick Moore... a founder of
Greenpeace ... has an Orwellian view of the environmental lobbies as they
are today." ... [Personally I think that much (not all) of the Green
Movement is just nature worship, i.e. paganism, perhaps without even
realising it? Still Lovelock is partly to blame for choosing the name Gaia.]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_943000/943489.stm BBC
... 27 September, 2000 ... The smell of success ... Scientists believe our
sense of smell played a crucial role in evolution, helping our Stone Age
ancestors to hunt, avoid poisonous food and even select a mate. By
comparing tiny variations in the DNA sequences of chimps and humans,
researchers in Israeli have concluded that changes in about 1,000 smell
receptor genes contributed to the rise of the human race. ... The authors
believe smell receptors are one of the few examples of adaptive molecular
evolution in humans - mutations in DNA that gave our ancestors an
advantage over other early humans. ... The researchers found that the
olfactory genes we use today had evolved through the mechanism of
positive or advantageous selection. "Imagine everyone has the same gene
and thus the same ability and then one human is born with a mutation in
that gene and it changes its ability for the better," said Yoav Gilad ... "It's
got a better sense of smell now. It can smell something that only he can
smell, others cannot. "Let's say this smell is a smell of a poisonous plant.
He knows by a smell that it is bad for him, while others might try it. It gives
him an advantage. We call that a greater fitness. "Sooner than later,
everybody will have this mutation, this new variant of gene, because this is
an advantageous mutation." ... The work raises an intriguing question: why
maintain a sharp sense of smell when it is no longer needed? One theory is
that smell, even today, plays a role in sexual attraction. ... [Another `just-
so' story for a laugh! It never seems to occur to Darwinists that they can
pick out just about *anything* as "advantageous" and claim it was naturally
selected, simply because it survived (how do we know it was
advantageous? Because it survived. Why did it survive? Because it was
advantageous). In this case there is even a `just-so' story to explain why it
the "advantageous" trait declined but not completely-see tagline.]
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/09/000919081338.htm Science
Daily Source: NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory ...... 9/19/2000 Experiment
Shows Mars Needs To Take Antioxidants For Life Intense ultraviolet
radiation that pierces Mars' thin atmosphere produces an abundance of
oxygen ions, a common free radical, at the Martian surface that destroys
organic molecules - - the building blocks of life ... Scientists have been
puzzled since the mid-1970s when NASA's Viking landers failed to find
any organic materials, not even traces delivered to Mars by meteorites.
That discovery led scientists to recognize that there were oxidants in the
Martian soil capable of destroying organic molecules. .... This combination
of surface conditions exists on Mars today and the superoxides are
generated during daytime exposures to ultraviolet radiation. "Our research
does not address whether life ever formed on Mars, but it does give us
more information about where to look for life or evidence of past life," ...
[This explains at last the initial `fizz' that occurred when Viking landed on
Mars and conducted it's tests. More evidence that life could not exist on
Mars?]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/education/newsid_930000/930708.stm
BBC ... 18 September, 2000... Primary science 'too hard' Children can be
confused by abstract principles, like light and darkness The science
curriculum is pitched too high for primary school children, research
suggests. Up to a third of topics are "too difficult" for five to seven year
olds, according to a survey of more than 120 science teachers. ... [This
doesn't mention evolution but it could be an argument for why
macroevolution should not be taught to school children in Kansas and
elsewhere. After all if Dembski (with six degrees including physics and
maths) and Johnson (who topped Chicago law school) cannot understand
macroevolution then what hope do school children have? :-)]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_944000/944790.stm BBC
... 27 September, 2000 ... When slime is not so thick ... Scientists have
discovered that a single-celled organism can negotiate the shortest way
through a maze. It means that some of the lowliest creatures in the plant
and animal kingdoms, such as slime and amoeba, may not be as primitive as
once thought. Pieces of slime mould, an amoeba-like organism, were
enticed through a 30-square-centimetre (five-square-inch) maze by the
prospect of food at the end of the puzzle. The researchers believe the slime
is exhibiting some form of primitive intelligence. Toshiyuki Nakagaki ...
placed pieces of the slime mould Physarum polycephalum in an agar gel
maze comprising four possible routes. Normally, the slime spreads out its
network of tube-like 'legs', called pseudopodia, to fill all the available
space. But when two pieces of food were placed at separate exit points in
the labyrinth, the organism squeezed its entire body between the two
nutrients. It adopted the shortest possible route, effectively solving the
puzzle.... "This remarkable process of cellular computation implies that
cellular materials can show a primitive intelligence," ... [This might support
Roger Penrose's claim that there is a form of quantum computing built into
the cellular cytoskeleton so even the simplest living thing would exceed the
fastest computer in processing power by orders of magnitude.]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=003535318014601&rtmo=V6fVg3SK&atmo=rrrrrrvs&pg=/et/00/9/28/ecfoly28.html
Electronic Telegraph 28.09-00 How to spot an Olympic cheat with a
calculator... Extremes make a mockery of averages, and raise an interesting
challenge of their own: for how can one tell if a record-breaking result is
just "averagely" impressive, or so exceptional as to be suspicious? It is a
question that is likely to be raised several times over the coming week in
the athletics events at the Olympics. Everyone hopes for record breaking
performances, but as past Olympics have shown, there is such a thing as
being too exceptional: disgraced Ben Johnson's astonishing 9.79 seconds in
the 100 metres at the 1988 Seoul Olympics being a notorious example. ...
During the Twenties statisticians made the startling discovery that extreme
events follow a mathematical law. Known as the Extreme Value (EV)
distribution, its derivation stems from some sophisticated probabilistic
arguments, but it still fits the common-sense view that the more extreme
the event, the less likely it is to occur. Just how less likely can be worked
out by analysing the past history of events. The idea of being able to
predict extraordinary events strikes even some statisticians as somewhat
fanciful, but EV theory is already being used by insurance companies to set
premiums against such things as floods. Indeed, the whole of the
Netherlands is protected by EV theory, whose equations were used to
predict the optimal height for its sea dykes. One of its most impressive
successes has only just become clear, however. In 1996, Prof Richard
Smith, a British expert on EV theory, produced disturbing evidence that
the world records set by the ... women trained by the Chinese coach Ma
Junren were drug-assisted. ... Analysing the trend in the times for the 3,000
metres, using EV theory, Prof Smith found that the probability of anyone
breaking the record by so huge a margin was so small that "something very
unusual" was taking place. Precisely what became clearer earlier this
month, when Ma Junren's latest batch of runners were thrown out of the
Sydney Olympics. They had tested positive for the banned substance
erythropoietin (EPO), for which a test has only just become available. The
suspicion must now be that the equations of EV theory had already
detected the whiff of banned substance hanging over those astonishing
figures in the record books. ... [An example of using low-probability theory
(a la Dembski's explanatory filter) to detect intelligent design (i.e. drug
cheating) as opposed to chance (athlete had a `peak' day) and law (what
drug-unassisted human body can do)!]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=003524361757613&rtmo=gwnrbgju&atmo=tttttttd&pg=/et/00/9/14/ecnsci2014.html
BBC 14-09-00 ... Unborn child 'can detect language' ... BABIES learn to
recognise their mother tongue in the womb, can distinguish a foreign
language within days of being born and are intrigued by magic tricks at a
very young age, child psychologists said last week. Their findings suggest
that babies' memory and recognition are more highly developed at a
younger age than previously thought. ... See also
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000928/sc/health_memory_dc_1.html
[More evidence that language is `hardwired' into humans? And more
ethical problems for what is euphemistically called `pro-choice'? See next
story]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000929/sc/abortion_approval_dc_7.html
Yahoo! ... September 29 ... Questions Shift to Abortion Pill Access, Use
... WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Now that U.S. women can use drugs rather
than surgery to end pregnancy, abortion rights supporters and opponents
are looking to see whether patients will choose the new option and how
many doctors will offer it. On Thursday, the Food and Drug Administration
(news - web sites) approved the pill known as RU-486 or mifepristone,
which can cause an abortion early in pregnancy. The pill should be available
to doctors in about a month. In France, where RU-486 has been available
since 1988, more than onethird of all abortions are done with medication.
Overall abortion rates have not gone up. "Some women will (choose
mifepristone). Others won't. The importance of the option is that women
now have a choice," said Dr. Paul Blumenthal, medical director for Planned
Parenthood ... See also:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000928/sc/abortion_approval_dc_6.html
[Orwell would be proud of these euphemisms: "choice" - not saying
what is chosen, i.e. to end a potential or actual human life. And "Planned
Parenthood" which is really planned *non*-parenthood!]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001002/sc/health_genetics_dc_1.html
Yahoo! ... October 2 ... Embryo Selection Technique a Medical First
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Doctors... were awaiting the outcome of an
unprecedented medical procedure in which a test-tube embryo was selected
to try to save the life of a 6-year-old girl. The girl, Molly Nash, needed a
bone marrow stem cell transplant that could cure her of a life-threatening
blood disease. To find the proper stem cells, doctors at the Reproductive
Genetics Institute first formed several embryos with eggs and sperm from
the girl's parents. Then using genetic screening techniques, they checked
the embryos for disease and picked one with a tissue type that matched the
couple's ailing daughter and would provide her with an immune system to
fight her disease. That embryo was implanted and a boy, Adam, was born
to the mother. Taking stem cells from Adam's umbilical cord, the girl
received the transplant last week, said Charles Strom, director of medical
genetics .... He said it marked the first time that an embryo diagnosis before
implantation had been used for this purpose. "It has been used to just get a
healthy baby but not to save the life of a sibling," ... He predicted there
would be an explosive growth in the technology because the correct stem
cells can fight other conditions such as sickle cell anemia and childhood
cancers. ... it would be another week before doctors know if Molly Nash's
stem cell transplant has been effective in curing her of an inherited blood
disorder ...that probably would have killed her in a year. ... See also:
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001003/sc/health_genetic_dc_2.html
[As one researcher said: today it is growing and discarding embryos to save
a life. Tomorrow it will be to get blonde hair. Hello `Brave New World!' :-
(]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000922/sc/space_eros_dc_2.html
Yahoo! ... September 22 ... Asteroid Eros May Be Older Than Earth ...
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Romantic love may be ageless, but the
asteroid Eros may be older than Earth. The asteroid named for the Greek
god of erotic love is probably one of the most primitive bodies in our solar
system, scientists reported, and could give astronomers clues to how Earth
and other rocky planets formed. Using instruments aboard the unstaffed
NEAR spacecraft, researchers determined that asteroid Eros was probably
about 4.55 billion years old. Earth is estimated to be about 4.50 billion
years old. ... [I included this because of the latest age of the Earth date-4.5
byr not 4.6. The difference of 0.1 by is *100 million years* so evolutionists
have just lost that much time to explain how advanced cyanobacteria were
already in existence 3.85 billion years ago!]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000920/sc/health_safrica_dc_1.html ...
Yahoo! ... September 20 ... South Africa's Mbeki Sees HIV-Aids Link
CAPE TOWN (Reuters) - South African President Thabo Mbeki ... refused
again to acknowledge that HIV causes AIDS (news - web sites), but said
an assumed link did form the basis of his government's response to the
AIDS crisis. ... "When you ask the question 'Does HIV cause AIDS?', the
question is: 'Does a virus cause a syndrome?'. It can't....A virus cannot
cause a syndrome. "The syndrome is a group of diseases as a result of
immune deficiency, of the acquired immune deficiency syndrome," he said.
... the Mail and Guardian newspaper devoted its front page Friday to a
headline: "Just say yes, Mr. President." ... [It is interesting how the science
establishment's pressure groups work trying to enforce conformity of
thought, rather than answer the scientific question: How exactly *does* a
single virus cause a *syndrome*?]
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"However, there is a real danger that in explaining so much the theory
actually *explains* nothing. This is the core of the philosophical doubt
facing Darwinism. An example of the perils of 'explaining too much' can be
seen in the notion of adaptation. When a biologist finds a creature with an
intricate and useful adaptation-such as the chameleon's ability to change
colour to match its background-he immediately explains it in terms of
natural selection and evolution. In fact the existence of such adaptations is
frequently taken as proof of the power of selection. But what will the
biologist say when he finds a similar lizard *without* this camouflage
adaptation? The chances are he will conclude that such an adaptation is
unnecessary for the survival of the second lizard, or that selection has not
been strong enough to 'create' it. Both of these conclusions may be valid-
they seem reasonable enough-but we are tempted now to ask him what sort
of evidence would *contradict* the idea of selection? If the presence of
adaptations is evidence for selection, but the absence of adaptations is not
evidence against selection, then is it possible to deny the existence of
selection at all? In other words if selection can explain everything then it
really explains nothing. Good scientific theories should be testable and even
falsifiable." (Leith B., "The Descent of Darwin: A Handbook of Doubts
about Darwinism," Collins: London, 1982, p.21. Emphasis in original)
Stephen E. Jones | Ph. +61 8 9448 7439 | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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