darwins beagle's blog

Creationists often claim that they are being discriminated against. They say that both sides should be taught, and the student allowed to make up his own mind. I could (and have) go into a lengthy post about how modern science is what is published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature.  Read More »

How can you tell when a creationist is lying? He starts to quote an evolutionist.  Read More »

I have posted this before, but there seems to be a new batch of Christian fundamentalists that keep repeating the creationist canard about "missing links". I thought I would write this up as a stand-alone blog that I could easily reference in response to them. Here is the challenge:

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I have recently been arguing that religious beliefs should not be extended unearned respect simply because people believe them and believe them deeply. If the belief is ridiculous perhaps someone should come out and say it is ridiculous. I think I've convinced myself that now is the time.  Read More »

I have been looking into my genealogy recently. I thought I would combine some vignettes about some of my ancestors with some evolutionary science and combine it into a rather loosely related blog.

Presently, I have no living ancestors. I am orphaned at the tender young age of 56. But one year ago I did have a living ancestor.

1 year ago:
My mother was alive. Or at least alive in body. Her mind had checked out six months to a year earlier. She was barely conscious and in bed at a nursing home and was about a month away from her death. I live a thousand miles away from her. I had gone to visit her for the last time a month or so earlier. She was more agitated then. In fact, she was a pest.  Read More »

I have an RSS newsfeed from Google News for articles on Atheism. As anyone who has read my blog knows, I am an atheist and atheism is one of my interests. I have noticed that many articles use the term "militant atheism". The term is usually in response to the recent books by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett.

These books ARE highly critical of religion, especially Islam and Christianity, but since when does criticism constitute militancy? Perhaps, one could argue that it is fully appropriate to use the term. One of the alternate definitions of the term "militant" does include "having a fighting disposition for a cause". Certainly the books by Dawkins, Harris, et al. DO have a "take no prisioners" approach when it comes to dealing with religion.  Read More »

Science is a very important. But very few people actually understand exactly how it works. And unfortunately scientists have not communicated the everyday aspects of science to the public very well.

Science is a search for objective truth. It is by far the most productive way to search for it. In fact, it is the only reliable way I know of. The general public is aware of this and have a romanticized view of scientists as being open-minded people free of biases. I can assure you this picture is not true.  Read More »

I love science. I cannot say enough good things about it. I think it is the one endeavor that sets humans apart from all other known lifeforms. It has also been at the root of almost all human progress since the enlightenment.

Given that humans are the only ones known to make and critically examine hypotheses and doing so has taken us from horse and carriages to the moon in less than a century, one might think we are good at it. But generally speaking we are not.

That is both sad and dangerous. It is sad because science is too important a part of our world to be left in the hands of a scientific elite. It is dangerous because claims with a veneer of science can use science's reputation to instantly garner undue credulity.  Read More »