Having received my degree in Biology from the University of Santo Tomas in the Philippines, I was schooled in the disciplines of scientific research in ways that are slightly different from students taught here. When I moved here, I learned of the concept of “consensus science,” and realized just how much the science in this nation is ruled by politics.

I know that the ubiquity of government grants and the mad scramble for research funding has something to do with the way the scientific culture has developed. While the casually scientifically literate are always a small portion of the populace no matter civilication, I expect more from Americans than I do other nationalities. It’s only right that I hold the citizens of this great nation to a higher standard than everyone else. (Read more…)

In response to Charles Johnson’s invitation for Conservative, anti-Creationists to share their thoughts, here I am, letting it rip:

Let me begin with the definition of science as discussed throughout my college years: Science is knowledge through causes. The scientific method, as popularly and academically known, is the process by which causes are investigated and discovered, leading to a scientific theory. From a National Academy Of Sciences brochure, Science, Evolution, and Creationism:

Some scientific explanations are so well established that no new evidence is likely to alter them. The explanation becomes a scientific theory. In everyday language a theory means a hunch or speculation. Not so in science. In science, the word theory refers to a comprehensive explanation of an important feature of nature that is supported by many facts gathered over time. Theories also allow scientists to make predictions about as yet unobserved phenomena.

A good example is the theory of gravity. After hundreds of years of observation and experiment, the basic facts of gravity are understood. The theory of gravity is an explanation of those basic facts. Scientists then use the theory to make predictions
about how gravity will function in different circumstances. Such predictions have been verified in countless experiments, further confirming the theory. Evolution stands on an equally solid foundation of observation, experiment, and confirming evidence

The most ubiquitous, ridiculous and superficial assault on scientific reasoning is the “it’s only a theory” dismissal. Attacking the Theory of Evolution (ToE) on linguistic grounds serves nothing but muddy the waters for students of science. Arguing the validity of linguistic attacks on the ToE is an opening for ridicule as gravitation remains a theory, and so does atomic theory, which while “only a theory” has been knowledge enough to expand our understanding of physics and chemistry.

I’ve spent the past few years on this site keeping mum about Creationism, Intelligent Design “theory” (which by the way is “only a theory,” right?) and general magical thinking simply because of the way its adherents approach the debate. There is something extremely Post-Modern about their approach, especially ID proponents. The sophistries behind concepts such as irreducible complexity boil down to basically, “we can’t explain it to a complete certainty, therefore, Someone, or Something, is responsible.” The whole debacle is too large for me to discuss in a single blog post, and there’s enough resources online to get into detail.

There is, however, one threat worth addressing, and that is the promotion of Creationism in schools, using carefully crafted legislation with the intent to mandate “fair” exposure to different perspectives on the origins of life on earth. These initiatives are motivated and informed by socially and religiously conservative folk whose general argument stems in that the ToE, along with the vast expanse of EvTheo, is an assault on the dignity of man. I don’t get it. The Catholic Church has made peace with the concept, keeping to the spiritual magisterium while acknowledging discoveries in the natural world.

Allow me to paint with a broad brush and stereotypes here. Social Conservatives who find the ToE to be insulting to the dignity of man and against the revelations of the Lord as written in the Word need to take a step back and think of the sheer irrationality of the approach. The push to teach Creationism in schools in such surreptitious means can be construed as an attempt to push religious education in public schools. The same people who go against Leftist indoctrination in the educational system are not so much pushing against indoctrination in school per se; they would rather have it replaced with something else. These people who are unhappy with the school system teaching a system of values (so they would accuse) against what they would want for their family fall too easily to the temptation to replace it with theirs, instead of taking responsibility for values education in their own home.

I think that this is what truly motivates the Creationist attack on scientific education and scientific thinking comes from two fears: one, which I’ve repeated here a lot, is that the understanding of our biological origins somehow diminishes the dignity of man, and two, that an understanding of the world around us is, if not immoral in itself, opens us to great immorality. The second motivation, in as much as magical thinking can be explained, is beyond any facility of mine to explain.

“Save the ocean. Kill a person.”

When you think about the way “environmentalism” has grown over the past fifteen years (that I have been aware of, considering my old twenty-six years of age), it all boils down to that statement. One of the reasons I despise the most vocal—squeaky wheels—of the environmental movement is because the gloom and doom with which they pollute their social circles is based on a very basic hatred of humanity.

Let us take, for example, the L.A. Times series called Altered Oceans. For your convenience here are links to the articles in the series: A Primeval Tide of Toxins, Sentinels Under Attack, Dark Tides, Ill Winds, A Plague of Plastic Chokes the Seas, and A Chemical Imbalance. Consider, however, after reading them all, that even this series isn’t as misanthropic as most of the bile that you would hear from some of usual suspects. One of the reasons I actually like Altered Oceans is that while it clearly details the effects of man on the environment and the growing chain reaction of these events, it does not take away the hope that it is still us who have the responsibility to start setting things right.

It is an irony that the very people who are creative enough to bring us ManBearPig theories can take something like this and use it as further proof that the only solution to human impact on the environment is the uncreative proposal of total removal of humanity from the planet, which Dean Esmay wrote about more than a year ago. This for me is what saddens me about this so-called “environmental awareness:” it offers nothing useful other than guilt for one’s own existence. I know I won’t kill myself in service of the environment. Whom do you know would do such a thing?

Even from a Biblical perspective of reasoning, humanity’s stewardship of the Earth never required our disappearance. Excuse me for superficially talking about this topic from a Christian point of view, but G-d made this world for us. He let the first man name the creatures of the Earth, which, if I recall a little of what I have learned going to school in Catholic institutions, is the basically the logical start to our dominion of the rest of creation.

Take away any Christian or other religious arguments out, and simply ask yourself the usual question: if a tree falls in the forest, and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound? If a rose is in full bloom and no one is there to appreciate it, is it still beautiful? We are the only species whose cognitive ability adds value to all of creation based on more than simply fulfilling our needs. It is this same ability that has led us to brand snakes, sharks, and bats as “evil” in the past, to associate them with phantom imaginings and lead us to try to exterminate them. And yet it is also in us to realize our mistakes and actually stop doing what we have done before and help their populations heal.

If it is in our ability to help heal the environment, why do so many environmentalists simply want us to disappear? I long for the day when any environmentally oriented political proposal is not based on a strong misanthropic principle: one where, not despite of, but rather, by taking advantage of the way we grow as a species, we could responsibly care for the world around us.

Dean Esmay recounts something he’s been getting at for the past year (I think):

You find yourself on a game show called “Let’s Make A Deal.” The game is very simple, as there are but three doors: door #1, door #2, and door #3. Behind one door is a million dollars. Behind the other two doors is a worthless joke prize. All you have to do is pick which door you want to open, and you get whatever is behind that door. But you only get once choice. By simple math, then, you obviously have a 1 in 3 chance of picking the correct door in the first place and becoming an instant millionaire, yes?

You pick a door. As soon as you tell Monty (the gameshow host) what door you want to open, he stops and says, “Okay, you’ve made your choice. Now, I’m going to do what we always do here on this game: I’m going to open one of the other two doors for you that I know has a booby prize.” And he does so. Then he asks, “Okay, now, would you like to stay with your original guess, or would you like to switch to the other door that’s still closed? You only get one shot, so do you want to stay with your original choice, or switch?”

Here’s the question: is there any compelling reason to switch doors?

The answer is “yes.” Dean’s comments has the zoo; Steve Verdon has the math behind it. Quick summary? The probability that your choice is right (1 in X choices) does not change even if all but one of the choices has been eliminated. If you had to pick between a thousand doors and Monty removes 998 as known to be wrong choices, that other door will look mighty appealing.

Apparently the story that broke the slow news cycle of this week was the President’s assertion that ID theory should be taught in public schools. There was no clarification as to what particular class in school it is taught, and as long as it isn’t taught in the science classes—especially Biology—I don’t have beef with it.

Why? Because my understanding of ID is that it isn’t even science, despite ID theorists publishing their work in journals and whatnot. It lacks a definite body of hypotheses that could be put through the scientific method. Instead, its body of hypotheses can be distilled down to the following statements: 1. “That couldn’t possibly have arisen randomly, therefore, Evolution is false. Therefore, ID is true.” 2. “Evolution could not explain the origin of a particular structure or species, therefore, Evolution is false. Therefore, ID is true.” I could think of a couple dozen ways we can apply that kind of reasoning in the real world to justify all sorts of falsehoods and chicanery.

The problem with ID theory is that is a philosophical, or metaphysical, concept being peddled as a scientific concept. I have no beef with people who think that God set things in motion. I have no beef with people who think that God created the universe. But for those who believe so, I would ask: “How?” Not many would fall upon what they observe through their day to day lives, because there is that old, Hellenic idea that the physical and spiritual realms are separate: that the tangible world could not possibly lead to a better understanding of the spiritual. It is a concept so ingrained in Western Civ that its influence in the faiths of our civilization is ubiquitous.

Of course, True Conservatives like LaShawn Barber would label as unGodly someone who would answer that what we observe is the process with which God shapes the universe. The True Conservatives who would would like to see ID preached as gospel truth—the manner by which Evolution, too is sold, I resent—are falling towards the same attitude that they accuse proponents of Evolution of exihibiting. Never mind that the biblical Creation Myth was itself a derivative of the Eridu Genesis. Never mind that evolutionary theory does not purport to explain away the existence of a higher power, it is the belief of the ungodly! True Conservatives like LaShawn Barber like to label people who do not believe what she believes as apostates, which effectively kills any debate.

I do have a question for anyone who insists that ID is the truth: what if the Intelligent Designer that the scientists “discover” (how they will, I do not know) is not the god that you believe in? What if ID theory ends up pointing towards the intervention by intelligent, extraterrestrial life? Or how about a “first iteration” of humanity? (Sorry, the Stargate dork in me had to ask.) Because if the only acceptable outcome from ID is that God—the Christian capital-G God—did it, then your support of ID has little to do with the free flow of ideas at all, and has more to do with crowding out an idea that may challenge what flimsy faith you have in what you believe in. How insecure some of you are in your faith that such an idea as Evolution, one that unfolds right before our eyes, could shatter what you believe in, and make you accuse unbelievers of being ungodly.

Sometimes it’s really hard to give the loud, boohooey “Christian Right” the benefit of the doubt when it comes to their antics about governance. Yesterday, three articles made waves among political bloggers: Why I’m Rooting Against the Religious Right, by Christopher Hitchens, The Christian Complex by George F. Will (probably my favorite columnist these days) and Why I’m Rooting for the Religious Right by James Taranto. Valid points made by all, and as usual the truth is somewhere in the middle, but there are days—like today—when I wonder if the benefit of the doubt that I give to these activist Christian groups is well-placed.

When spirituality of any sort encroaches on the magisterium of finding facts—instead of dealing with their moral impact—you get quotes like this:

“They are offering an answer that may be in conflict with religious views,” Harris said in opening the debate. “Part of our overall goal is to remove the bias against religion that is currently in schools. This is a scientific controversy that has powerful religious implications.”

“Sometimes the jokes write themselves,” as my friend said. But mocking aside, these Faithful have lost their way. Faith and Religion deal with the moral implications of discovered facts, not with impeaching facts on the basis of whether the facts fit the literal reading of the Bible.

[Personal note: I've tried, hard to share what I have read from Stephen Jay Gould's writings about Science and Spirituality and how there is NO conflict, but I have been engaged in discussion wherein the premise is that there IS conflict, no matter what attempt is made to show that there isn't, or at least there shouldn't be.

Abiogenesis and the "loving work of God" go hand in hand, in the magesteria of fact-finding, and faith. It's all a matter of admitting that scientifically we can't have an airtight explanation in both verbal and mathematical form on the origins of life, and, on the side of the Christians, a little bit of humility is actually good. That God, or Fred, or whoever, didn't directly create Adam our of dirt isn't an insinuation against our position of being his beloved. That maybe, what these damned scientists who keep trying to prove that there is no God, is actually discovering His work.]

This is for you, Nathan.

[...] I have made the general argument in my book Rocks of Ages (Ballantine, 1999), a book that expresses the consensus of a great majority of professional scientists and theologians, not an original formulation from my pen. In briefest summary, no dichotomous opposition can exist in logic because science and religion treat such different (and equally important) aspects of human life—the principle that I have called NOMA as an acronym for the “non-overlapping magisteria,” or teaching authorities, of science and religion. Science tries to record and explain the factual character of the natural world, whereas religion struggles with spiritual and ethical questions about the meaning and proper conduct of our lives. The facts of nature simply cannot dictate correct moral behavior or spiritual teaching

— Gould, Stephen Jay. The Hedgehog, The Fox, and the Magister’s Pox. New York: Harmony Books, 2003.

Thanks for the strong but civil discourse whenever our paths cross.

What I’m about to link to isn’t gonna be pretty. It’s not meant to be pretty, but it’s also something I wonder about a lot. Many of us—especially myself, bio background and all—have thumbed through books about diseases, and these books have pictures of how these diseases manifest themselves.

Now, there is a purpose to showing how diseases look like, superficially. For one, pictures should help you see if that little discoloration on your skin is a mole or something more insidious. Or, let’s take goiter for example. Wouldn’t it be more educational to show students how a “young” goiter would look like, so that it can be caught at its earlier stages, than to show a morbid example? How about the case of syphillis, or necrotizing fasciitis photos? I have a hunch that either of these two diseases get treated long before they get morbid, so I just wonder why the medical literature uses the most bombastic examples in their photos.

Could it be because the median pathology is just too “boring?” Describing disease isn’t supposed to be entertainment, and a little bit of “disease porn” isn’t exactly a class act in medical lit. Just wondering out loud, y’know, and all that.

There is now a vaccine against malaria:

For the first time, researchers say, a vaccine against malaria has shown that it can save children from infection or death.

The vaccine, tested on thousands of children in Mozambique, was hardly perfect: It protected them from catching the disease only about 30 percent of the time and prevented it from becoming life-threatening only about 58 percent of the time.

On initial inspection the numbers may seem dismal, but knowing about the disease more fills one with hope. Malaria used to be vulnerable to the earliest of the quinone drugs, but has a nasty ability to develop resistances to drugs used against it. I recall the lectures I attended in the past on how the development of drugs that work against Plasmodium species is slowing down such that a point may be reached when existing drugs will be useless, at the same time no new drugs against it would have been developed.

One reason for malaria’s amazing resistance is that the protozoans could never be really extricated completely from its victim Those that survive may continue to reproduce following the dormant phase, passing whatever made it resist current drugs unto its progeny.

The fact that a vaccine works is a grand step towards fighting this disease, a fight that must not be ignored just because its occurence here in the USA is relatively rare.

(Provenance: John Cole » Yggy » NYT)

Rob Smith speaks of Spaceship One very well:

Mankind’s destiny is in the stars. We have too much imagination and too much curiosity to squat right here on our puny asses on our puny planet forever. We are explorers, always wondering what lies beyond the next mountain or across the next sea. We should go there.

— Rob Smith/Acidman: A small step… in the right direction

I have observed cynics who object to space travel research, whether privately or publicly funded, that have fallen into the trap of wanting perfection before actually moving forward and doing something. The most basic thesis statement of this mentality boils down to this: “There’s so many things to attend to in our world, why bother trying to go elsewhere?”

It is with this total lack of hope that they have chosen to embrace the mediocrity that leads only to stagnation, and ultimate destruction. In a long, long time ago, in a blog I no longer recognize as my own, I wrote about how our society these days seems to have lost any sense of wonder, of enterprise, and of hope. This morning, with the successful flight of Spaceship One, that horrible old cynicism has taken a beating.

I have no doubt in my mind that when that first accident happens, when that first failure takes place — and we would all be naive not to assume that more than one will — the cynics will once more have a grand field day. They’ll probably call it a waste of money and life, that there is no hope in space, that we should spend more of our money and our effort in making our world perfect. Because for space travel research’s detractors, only a perfect world would justify such grand “excess.” The cynics may have their “happy,” mediocre stay on earth; they will be the ones who will be ultimately forgotten by history.