Jun 30 2008
Many people have speculated that a visit to earth by an alien intelligence would have a profound impact on believers in a gawd whose image we were made in. Personally, I don’t need the existence of extra-terrestrial intelligence to poke a major hole in the anthropocentric concept of a great Gawd. Science fiction has nothing on the natural world. Interestingly enough, biologists have the lowest recorded rate of belief in deities. I can relate.
Jun 30 2008
In a couple days I’m taking a long flight to a point known in name but not in personal experience. Today I printed out a series of articles I plan on reading and critiquing during the overnight flight: Does Science Make Belief in God Obsolete?
One thing I can predict is that science will make the belief in an Intelligent Designer obsolete. What does this designer do but fill in gaps, or just “squat” in them, until they become too narrow to fit a gawd? No, it may not happen for a few decades, but the pace and quality of the evidence in support of evolutionary theory grows each day. It will eventually bury such vacuous notions as Intelligent Design as sure as telescopes and astronomy killed serious belief in a flat earth and an earth-centered universe.
One example: In today’s postings at Science Daily you will find an article titled, Lyme Disease Bacterium Came From Europe Before Ice Age. Here’s a brief taste:
The bacterium responsible for Lyme disease, Borrelia burgdorferi, originated in America, or so researchers thought. Now, however, a team from the University of Bath has shown that this bug in fact came from Europe, originating from before the Ice Age.
Every day, every single gawd-darning day, researchers are discovering the real-world mechanisms that explain how life became the way it is.
Will science completely kill “God”? I doubt it. There are still a few nutcases who believe the earth is flat. But, practically speaking, Gawd has already lost both his arms and one leg. It’s only a matter of time . . .
Jun 29 2008
I find it a bit silly when believers bow their heads before a meal and thank Gawd for thy food.
One summer my wife and I enjoyed a pineapple – something we buy very, very infrequently. Before slicing into it we didn’t thank a pineapple god or a god of all gods. Should we have thanked the local supermarket for providing thy food? Or Dole Corporation? Or the farmers who actually work in the fields and operate the machinery? For it is by their sweat that we are fed.
We saved the top of the fruit and plunked it in the ground among some ferns. Presto! The next summer we had a home-grown pineapple. For that food, whom should we have thanked? The pineapple’s DNA that guided its re-growth? But that’s not a who. As a social species, we like to thank things that are most meaningful to us. Beings, not processes. As a convenient, short-hand catch-all, some people like to thank their gawd – he with his invisible hand who guides creation and feeds the poor and rich alike.
I still think the idea is wacky.
Jun 28 2008
Lose water and life cracks. Nonetheless, tangled molecules, clots of atoms, clusters of quarks, persist. And they move. But we can’t see them, at least not with the naked, fluid-filled eye.
Jun 28 2008
Here in central Florida, swimming with dolphins is a popular attraction. Some people call it a spiritual experience. Sure, I’d think it was cool, particularly if I did it in the wild and not in 4 feet of water with a team of trainers and a few semi-domesticated dolphins circling around.
But spiritual? I try to project as little “woo” onto my experiences as possible. It only makes your keyhole to reality that much smaller. Rather than simply seeing the universe as it is (or as close to that as we can get), you see it through a lense that reflects your own wishes and prejudices back at you.
Over at ScienceDaily today they posted this article: What It’s Like To Be A Bat: Vocal Sonar Does More Than Locate Objects; It Cues Memory And Assists Flight.
“For decades it’s been recognized that a bat’s voice produces sounds that give the bat information about the location of objects,” says Moss. “We’re now recognizing that every time a bat produces a sound there are changes in brain activity that may be important for scene analysis, sensorimotor control and spatial memory and navigation.”
Flying with bats, were it possible to “see” the world through as they hear it . . . now that would be a reality-expanding experience!
Jun 27 2008
As a beginning birdwatcher I focused almost exclusively on overall size and coloration. When attempting to identify a new bird I would need to flip through the whole gawd-darn field guide. Let’s see: brown and white, about six inches tall . . . .
After years of largely self-taught bird identification I have learned that perhaps the best way to narrow your search is to first look at the bird’s bill. The shape of the bill, as Darwin’s finches manifest, is a huge clue as to what the bird eats. Does it spear fish (like the great blue heron above), poke around the nook and crannies in bark for small insects, lick nectar, crack the husks off grains and seeds?
Similarly, by examine the jaw and teeth of hominid fossils, paleontologists have been able to deduce the food of our genetic forebears.
If you want to know something about a life-form, just look it. Even the characteristics of dogs tell something of the environment in which the genes originated. One of ours has very furry paws, with long tufts of it growing out between the pads. Almost like a hairy snow-shoe. And the dog’s coat is a multi-layer ball of a shedding mess. Get the dog wet and she shrinks in size so much you hardly recognize her. Hers is a breed for cold weather (mostly Tibetan spaniel.)
Want to understand more about the world about you? Look, wonder, and discover the clues.
Jun 27 2008
Many people are unaware and/or don’t like to acknowledge that they care about their status, their social standing. Sure, in our culture we oft hear the motto, “who cares what other people think – be true to yourself.” And yet people still buy fancy cars barely within their budget; they still shop for the latest fashion. (The old fashion is apparently just too pedestrian.) In a sense, it is within our nature to strive to be elite in some shape or form: in our abilities, our income, our knowledge, our relations, our possessions.
Jun 26 2008
One of my favorite lines of poetry, by ee cummings, recited in the Woody Allen flick, “Hannah and her Sisters,” goes like this: “only the rain has such small hands.”
The stamens of the above plumbago blossoms appear thread-delicate to me. But how would they appear to an aphid? I recall seeing a magnified photo of what, to the human eye, appeared to be a clean scissor cut in paper: it was jagged as all get-out. It looked more torn than cut.
My eyes are all thumbs. How I wish it were different.
Jun 26 2008
Most of us, in ways that we are not entirely aware of, automatically associate leadership ability with imposing physical stature.
- Malcolm Gladwell (1)
What is a god but a leader of people: a judge, a master, a lord, a father. We put leaders on pedestals, probably because this reflects both how we feel about them and how we want others to feel about them. Leaders may put themselves on pedestals, real or symbolic, as a way to increase their “size” and hence position/status.
Jun 26 2008
Four quick bits of science news from over at ScienceDaily. The first three pertain to evolution, the final about what men do online more than women, and it’s not what you think.
