http://www.dbskeptic.com Skepticism. Critical thinking. Podcast. Community. Sat, 14 Aug 2010 01:54:54 +0000 en-us hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 Digital Bits Skeptic brings skepticism and critical thinking to a world of new age, religion and credulous pop culture. Andy Kaiser clean Andy Kaiser skeptic@dbskeptic.com skeptic@dbskeptic.com (Andy Kaiser) 2009 Skepticism and critical thinking in a world of new age, religion and credulous pop culture skeptic, skepticism, critical thinking, new age, religion, pop culture, skeptical articles, critical thinking articles, philosophy http://www.dbskeptic.com/images/dbskeptic-logo-144.jpg http://www.dbskeptic.com/category/evolution/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2010/03/14/what-it-means-to-be-scientifically-proven/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2010/03/14/what-it-means-to-be-scientifically-proven/#comments Mon, 15 Mar 2010 02:50:12 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1971 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2010/03/14/what-it-means-to-be-scientifically-proven/feed/ 9 Science Reason & Rationality by Nick Josh Karean from Science, Reason & Rationality Article ID: 148 "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.” - Carl Sagan, by Nick Josh Karean from Science, Reason & Rationality Article ID: 148 "We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.” - Carl Sagan, American Scientist (1934-1996) How many times have you heard someone claim that their products, theories or beliefs are "Scientifically Proven”? They often do this before completely taking over your brain and gaining absolute access into your wallet. Almost anyone can claim that their ideas are “scientifically proven” or “scientifically tested”. Judging by how gullible and ignorant most of us are, it really doesn’t take much for this claim to convince someone. What is science? So, how can you tell which claim is truly scientifically proven and which one is not? To understand, we first need a basic understanding of what science is, and how to ensure that those who claim to be “scientifically proven” have followed the required procedures to really deserve that title. Okay, let’s get to work. What exactly is science? Science is a method, a procedure, a technique by which we use to examine our surroundings and gain knowledge from them. With sometimes painstaking accuracy, science produces precise unbiased data. It’s not a belief system. Science is fact-based, not faith-based. For example, mathematics is a form of science: one plus two equals three. ‘One plus two’ is the method and ‘three’ is the answer derived from that method. The answer ‘three’ does not require your belief. It is a fact whether you believe in it or not. This factual approach is the best and the most reliable method for achieving accuracy. No matter how many times you repeat the process, it will produce the same results Expecting others to believe that one plus two equals four (without using any systematic scientific method to prove it) is not the right method of gaining knowledge and it is always prone to error. Another example of a factual approach is in the court of law. The court looks for evidence first before making a verdict. The judge and jury do not start with a conclusion – they develop one based on available evidence. “While anybody is free to approach a scientific inquiry in any fashion they choose, they cannot properly describe the methodology as scientific, if they start with the conclusion and refuse to change it regardless of the evidence developed during the course of the investigation.” - Judge William Overton of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas (1939-1987) The scientific method The 10 Commandments of Science (inspired by science journalist “Potholer”) Thou shalt base thy conclusion on the evidence. Thou shalt measure objectively, not guess subjectively. Thou shalt back up thy statements with evidence. Just claiming something is a fact doesn't make it a fact. Thou shalt use large sample sets. Thy tests shall be double-blinded. Thy tests shall have observable controls. Thou shalt cite thy sources of information. Thy sources of information must be reliable, verifiable and backed up by evidence. Thy opinion is not a fact. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Don’t lie! Well, actually, the above are not really divine commandments, but they're a good basic guide to scientific observation. All scientific knowledge is based on two things: observation and logic. Thus, good research follows these rules to produce true scientific data and genuine knowledge. As we said earlier, such rules are applied in the court of law to preserve or uphold justice. The rules exist to ensure impartiality, fairness and the most truthful of results. Now that we’ve understood the basics of science, let’s go a little deeper to see what exactly is involved in this whole scientific procedure thing. We’ll create a scenario, apply the basics of the scientific method, and see what happens… 1. Andy Kaiser clean 16:42 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/11/22/a-review-of-on-the-origin-of-species-by-charles-darwin/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/11/22/a-review-of-on-the-origin-of-species-by-charles-darwin/#comments Mon, 23 Nov 2009 02:20:56 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1662 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/11/22/a-review-of-on-the-origin-of-species-by-charles-darwin/feed/ 13 Nicholas Covington By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1346 - I have just finished reading what is now one of my favorite books. At the time of this writing, it was published precisely 150 years ago. Ever since, it’s been a brilliant, revolutionary, and even dangerous work. By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1346 I have just finished reading what is now one of my favorite books. At the time of this writing, it was published precisely 150 years ago. Ever since, it’s been a brilliant, revolutionary, and even dangerous wo... Andy Kaiser clean 12:27 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/06/28/was-life-on-earth-an-alien-creation-a-critical-look-at-directed-panspermia/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/06/28/was-life-on-earth-an-alien-creation-a-critical-look-at-directed-panspermia/#comments Sun, 28 Jun 2009 17:28:22 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1158 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/06/28/was-life-on-earth-an-alien-creation-a-critical-look-at-directed-panspermia/feed/ 0 Nicholas Covington By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1328 - Life may have been the result of intelligent aliens sending bacterium to Earth. This theory is called "directed panspermia". It was proposed thirty-five years ago by Francis Crick, co-discoverer of DNA, By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1328 Life may have been the result of intelligent aliens sending bacterium to Earth. This theory is called "directed panspermia". It was proposed thirty-five years ago by Francis Crick, co-discoverer of DNA, and Leslie Orgel, a highly respected British chemist. I found the original paper they published. Here I examine it and provide some comments[1]. A common objection to the theory that aliens brought life to Earth is the problem of infinite regress: If life on Earth was created by aliens, who created the aliens? And who created those creators? And so on. Crick and Orgel get around this problem by speculating that some planets may have chemical properties that make the origin of life much more probable than it is on Earth. Although it's not mentioned, I think it's possible that there are forms of life more likely to originate from non-living matter (and without the guidance of an intelligent designer). Citing the work of astronomer Carl Sagan, they conclude that life traveling on a meteor would probably be destroyed by radiation long before it would arrive at Earth. But what if an alien civilization designed a special radiation-proof microorganism-carrying ship? Then the "life-from-space" proposal would once again be plausible. In the paper, Crick and Orgel say, "[I]t is quite probable that planets not unlike the Earth existed as much as [6.5 billion years] before the formation of our own solar system." This allows life to originate, evolve and spread before Earth even existed. They go on with arguments supporting their theory: "Infective theories of the origins of terrestrial life could be taken more seriously if they explained aspects of biochemistry or biology that are otherwise difficult to understand. We do not have any strong arguments of this kind, but here are two weak facts that could be relevant. The chemical composition of living organisms must reflect to some extent the composition of the environment in which they evolved. Thus the presence in living organisms of elements that are extremely rare on the Earth might indicate that life is extraterrestrial in origin. Molybdenum is an essential trace element that plays an important role in many enzymatic reactions, while chromium and nickel are relatively unimportant in biochemistry. The abundance of chromium, nickel, and molybdenum on the Earth are 0.20%, 3.16%, and 0.02%, respectively. We cannot conclude anything from this single example, since molybdenum may be irreplaceable in some essential reaction - nitrogen fixation, for example. However, if it could be shown that the elements represented in terrestrial living organisms correlate closely with those that are abundant in some class of star - molybdenum stars, for example - we might look more sympathetically at 'infective' theories." Crick and Orgel's second argument for their theory is the genetic code. As you may know, the genetic code is universal[2]. It is the same in plants, animals, and bacteria. Crick and Orgel believed this means all life on Earth shares a common ancestor with a complete and fully developed genetic code[3]. They reasoned that if an alien civilization sent life to Earth, then it would have developed an organism with that same genetic code. On the other hand, if life originated naturally, the common ancestor of all living things may have simply had a primitive genetic code which coded for only a handful of amino acids (later on, this species would have split into several different lineages which had genetic codes that coded for more types of amino acids using the codons which originally did not code for anything). In this scenario, all life would have genetic similarities, but would also have significant differences. The moral of the story is that directed panspermia would show a universally shared genetic code. A non-panspermia origin could produce a single, universal genetic code, or many codes with significant similarities). Andy Kaiser clean 9:32 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/06/07/answers-to-objections-about-atheism-and-evolution/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/06/07/answers-to-objections-about-atheism-and-evolution/#comments Sun, 07 Jun 2009 18:46:58 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1107 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/06/07/answers-to-objections-about-atheism-and-evolution/feed/ 13 David Annis By David Annis Article ID: 1325 - Atheism and evolution are two topics that I write about and discuss with my religious friends. I encounter the same objections for both. Repeatedly. - - Myth: "If you do not believe in God, By David Annis Article ID: 1325 Atheism and evolution are two topics that I write about and discuss with my religious friends. I encounter the same objections for both. Repeatedly. Myth: "If you do not believe in God, you have no basis for morality.  Anything is permissible." I can and do have a system of morality. It's based on what kind of world I want to live in, not on belief that a supernatural being wants me to behave in a certain way.  Wars, genocides, pogroms, holocausts, discrimination, terrorism, and slavery have all been justified based on religion.  I donate to charity, know that murder is wrong, and teach my children right from wrong (there are no toy guns in our house). Show me empirical evidence that the religious behave in a more moral way than non-religious and you might have an argument, but the evidence is not there.  I know many atheists that donate to charity, love their wives, abide by the law, and otherwise act in a moral way. And I know many religious people that do not. If you maintain that belief in God is needed as a foundation for a moral system, is any God sufficient?  Are Xenu, Shiva, Allah and the Christian God, all equally moral?  If so, isn't picking a God just taking the easy way out?  Instead of grappling with the difficult questions you are swallowing a belief system whole. Since you took the easy way out, if a premise fails you end up with a moral structure that can't support itself. If all Gods are not equally moral, how can you be sure that your God's system leads to real morality? Myth: "You can't prove a theory, so the Bible may be literally true." This argument falls into two pieces.  The first piece says that an omnipotent being could change the Universe in all sorts of ways.  Physical laws that work one way today may have worked differently years ago, so we should not believe the evidence before us.  Carbon may decay at a different rate then than it does now, geological process may have been different one thousand years ago, and so on.  Yet, those who make this claim also assume their refrigerator, car, and home heating system will still work just as well tomorrow. They rely on medical and agricultural systems built upon scientific methods.  That's intellectually dishonest. The second piece of this objection is that science only proves that a theory is highly improbable. It doesn't say something is impossible. A scientific theory can be overthrown.  I can't prove that I can't jump to the moon.  I can't prove that I can't pray my way there.  Using the scientific method, however, I can prove that it is highly improbable that either method will put a man on the moon.  Gathering insights about how the universe behaves is what allowed Neil Armstrong to take his giant leap for mankind. Myth: "I can't see evolution happen." Some people protest that they can't see evolution happening right before their eyes.  Plant speciation has been observed and used by farmers for hundreds of years, though not under laboratory conditions.  In a previous post, I discussed macro-evolution occurring in the laboratory, but still got a response saying something like, "Gee, that's a long way from seeing a bacterium turn into a horse." So, why don't we see a bacterium turn into a horse right before our eyes?  It's because we observe over too short a period of time.  My 10-year-old son is growing, but he looks no taller now than he did last week.  There is rich evidence of evolution in the fossil record, in the genetic sequences of the plants and animals alive today, in our ability to breed new varieties of plants, pets, and livestock, and in the changes we observe in the natural world around us.  We can't see changes within our lifetime because these changes normally take hundreds or thousands or millions of years. Does this mean we should conclude these changes aren't happening? If my son isn't taller this week compared to last week, does this mean he's not growing? Andy Kaiser clean 8:24 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/05/24/evolution-the-genetic-code-and-message-theory-a-response-to-walter-remine/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/05/24/evolution-the-genetic-code-and-message-theory-a-response-to-walter-remine/#comments Mon, 25 May 2009 02:51:07 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1062 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/05/24/evolution-the-genetic-code-and-message-theory-a-response-to-walter-remine/feed/ 29 Nicholas Covington By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1322 - [Editor's note: This article and its comments are here in entirety, but a continuing response by the author can be found at this link.] - This article is a response to a blog post at Uncommon Descent by Walter R... By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1322 [Editor's note: This article and its comments are here in entirety, but a continuing response by the author can be found at this link.] This article is a response to a blog post at Uncommon Descent by Walter Remine[1]. I will begin by quoting part of his essay: "Life is unified by an abundance of complex biochemical features possessed by all, or virtually all life. Such features are known as biologic universals. The list includes: DNA, RNA, a triplet-nucleotide genetic code, and the method of translation of the genetic code into sequences of amino-acids in proteins. Proteins constructed of left-handed alpha-bonded amino-acids, the same set of 20 amino-acids (out of several thousand amino-acids that exist). The lipid bilayer construction of cell membranes. Adenosine triphosphate, biotin, riboflavin, hemes, pyridoxin, vitamins K and B12, and folic acid implement metabolic processes everywhere. For a given complex trait, there are rare, very minor variations away from the standard form. For example, there is now known about two dozen microorganisms that have slight variations on the universal genetic code." I have no problem with this. I do have a problem with Remine's further comments: "Leading evolutionists acknowledge that each of the biologic universals is too complex to have been in the first life - nothing even remotely like known life could have originated by known natural processes aided by chance and the available time. The probability is staggeringly too small, even on the scale of the universe. This should have falsified evolution, but instead evolutionists compensated by making their theory unfalsifiable. That is, without any serious evidence, evolutionists now make three bold, untestable, unfalsifiable, unscientific assertions: 1.    There exists an infinitude (a very large number) of other biochemistries suitable for life. Evolutionists make this unscientific assertion in order to artificially increase the likelihood of life arising by chance. Evolutionists acknowledge the chance origin of any known lifeform is vastly too unlikely, but they claim the chance origin of some lifeform (when allowing for the infinitude of other possible lifeforms) is quite likely. They say there is nothing 'special' about Earthly lifeforms, instead life just happened by chance upon the type of life we see on Earth. 2.    The first lifeforms were vastly simpler than any life known today. The first lifeforms possessed essentially none of the biologic universals. 3.    Many evolutionists further assert that life may have originated more than once on Earth, perhaps many times." The first life by definition would have to have structures to perform things like replication, metabolic processes, etc. Although it is theoretically possible for something to reproduce, and break down energy without having the specific structures that our type of life does, if all life is descended from one primordial organism then the structures performing these functions could not have changed much as we'll discuss further on. As for Remine's allegation that evolutionists make "three unscientific assertions": I would love to see a source for point 1 - "There exists an infinitude of other biochemistries suitable for life", as I have never heard any evolutionist say anything like that. Point 2 - "The first lifeforms were vastly simpler than any life known today" - is false because the first life form would have had several of the biologic universals, as I will explain later. As for point 3 - "Life may have originated more than once on Earth" - it is a possibility that life originated multiple times, but I know of no one who insists that this is the case. Once again, no source is cited. Remine says: "With those assertions in mind, if evolution predicts anything clearly on this matter, it predicts the opposite of what we observe - it predicts that countless lifeforms lacking all, or most, Andy Kaiser clean 17:46 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/05/10/the-swine-flu-crisis/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/05/10/the-swine-flu-crisis/#comments Mon, 11 May 2009 02:07:30 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1002 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/05/10/the-swine-flu-crisis/feed/ 9 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1320 - The news lately has been buzzing about the swine flu. Excuse me, I mean the "H1N1 virus". Or the "2009 H1N1 influenza virus". Or the "H1N1 swine flu". - You know what? I'm going to forego the medical designation and ju... By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1320 The news lately has been buzzing about the swine flu. Excuse me, I mean the "H1N1 virus". Or the "2009 H1N1 influenza virus". Or the "H1N1 swine flu". You know what? I'm going to forego the medical designation and... Andy Kaiser clean 15:22 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/04/19/the-drake-equation/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/04/19/the-drake-equation/#comments Mon, 20 Apr 2009 04:06:03 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=955 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/04/19/the-drake-equation/feed/ 15 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1317 - I'm about to prove to you that aliens exist. I'm talking space aliens. Whether they're the traditional Little Green Men, bug-eyed monsters, or something incomprehensible to the human mind, they exist, By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1317 I'm about to prove to you that aliens exist. I'm talking space aliens. Whether they're the traditional Little Green Men, bug-eyed monsters, or something incomprehensible to the human mind, they exist, they're intelligent, and they're trying to find us. I'm going to prove this to you by using the most powerful tool on Earth: mathematics. Ready? Here we go: The number of stars in the Milky Way galaxy Our planet Earth resides comfortably in the Milky Way galaxy, a pinwheel-shaped collection of at least 200 billion stars. You know how our sun is just ONE star? Give it 200 billion friends. That's 200,000,000,000. At the time of this writing, this is roughly thirty times the number of humans living right now on this planet. Personally, I can't even visualize a number that high. Again, that's why we're using math - even if we can't see it or fathom it, we can represent it and come up with meaningful answers. So, we have 200 billion stars. We know this number fluctuates - new stars form and die. Astronomers think that the birth rate of stars in the Milky Way galaxy is roughly one star per year. The percentage of stars that have planets Next, let's look at all those stars. How many have planets around them? They're hard to see, but we're sniffing them out. NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory tell us we've so far found hundreds of "extrasolar planets".  As of April 2009, the count was at 344. Some astronomers think at least fifty percent of all stars have planets! We'll be more conservative. Let's cut the ratio in half, and estimate twenty-five percent of all stars have a planet. The number of "Goldilocks planets" per star Now look at the planets spinning around all those stars. Of those planets, how many (per star) are capable of sustaining life? Such habitable places are sometimes humorously called "Goldilocks planets", meaning that conditions for life (as we know it) are not too cold, not too hot, but just right. In our own solar system, we have an idea of this number. Earth is such a planet. As we explore further, we may find that other places in our solar system are also "just right". Or say you have a solar system with a Venus-like planet, where the greenhouse effect has escalated beyond control and turned the planet into an acidic-raining wasteland which is hot enough to melt lead. Take that hellish planet and move it away from the sun. Get it out far enough and you'll find a sweet spot, where the planet is warm enough (thanks to the greenhouse effect), but not so hot it kills everything on the surface. There are endless possibilities and plenty of conjecture as to the number of habitable planets per star. For now, let's use the number as dictated by our only example, ourselves: let's assume that of the stars which have planets, one planet is capable of supporting life in some form. The fraction of planets where life evolves This leads us to a conversation about life itself: on planets capable of sustaining life, what are the chances that life exists? Some biologists think that if life can exist somewhere, it will. Their opinion is bolstered by so-called "extremophiles" - Earth-based life that has adapted to some truly nasty conditions. Extremophiles can exist without sunlight, or under massive pressure, or bombarded by amounts of radiation that would make The Incredible Hulk blush. With evidence here on our planet, this is why many suggest that if life can exist somewhere, it will. Others say that getting to that point - the point where life begins - is very difficult. We know it's possible, of course, because I'm writing this and you, my fellow human, are reading it. But let's err on the side of caution. Let's say that on life-capable planets, only one percent of those will harbor living beings. The fraction of life evolving into intelligent life So we've got a lot of stars. They have a lot of planets. Andy Kaiser clean 13:50 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/17/more-original-versions-of-classic-fairy-tales/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/17/more-original-versions-of-classic-fairy-tales/#comments Mon, 17 Nov 2008 06:59:08 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=477 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/17/more-original-versions-of-classic-fairy-tales/feed/ 30 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1260 - [This article is a companion piece to "Original meanings of classic fairy tales".] - Fee! Fie! Foe! Fum! I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he live, or be he dead, I'll grind his bones to make my bread. By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1260 [This article is a companion piece to "Original meanings of classic fairy tales".] Fee! Fie! Foe! Fum! I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he live, or be he dead, I'll grind his bones to make my bread. It's a cool speech. But when you think about its literal meaning and the murderous intent of the giant ogre in "Jack and the Beanstalk", you know - even as a child - that some fairy tales have strong undercurrents of gore and violence. You can confirm this by examining classic fairy tales and learning their original versions. Many of today's fairy tales have been retooled to save our children from terrible stuff like blood, guts, sex, and unplanned pregnancies. Unfortunately, that means the original lessons of many fairy tales have been mangled or lost entirely. Parents and teachers, this is a warning. Here be sex, gore, and worse: the potential destruction of fun childhood bedtime stories. The original story of Jack and the Beanstalk and Jack and His Bargains An interesting aspect of this story is that Jack's adventure with the beanstalk was not his only tale. There were many stories in what is called the "Jack cycle". "Jack and the Beanstalk" just happens to be the most popular one. One example from the Jack cycle is called "Jack and his Bargains". This story starts with Jack and his father, and can be thought of as a sequel to Jack and the Beanstalk. Jack is asked to sell the family cows for money. And like the Beanstalk story, he doesn't, but instead trades the cows for magical items. In this case, the items are a magical stick (which physically beats anyone once Jack activates it by saying, "up stick and at it"), a singing bee, and a fiddle which plays beautiful music. Jack uses these items to impress a local princess, after which they get married and have "baskets full of children". On to the beanstalk: in "Jack and the Beanstalk", Jack sells the family cow for magic seeds, as the cow (named "Milky White") no longer gives milk. These seeds are planted, and a giant beanstalk grows out of the ground and high into the sky. Jack climbs the beanstalk. At the top, nestled in the clouds, is a giant castle. A huge ogre lives in the castle. The ogre gives us the memorable line of "Fee! Fi! Fo! Fum!" Jack makes three trips, and each trip has a similar plot: he hides from the giant (twice in the giant ogre's oven, and once in a cooking pot), and steals the ogre's possessions (a bag of gold, a hen that lays golden eggs, and a golden harp). An fun twist is that the ogre is married. The ogress actually helps Jack hide from her husband, and she and Jack get along great together when the ogre isn't around. As Jack escapes after his third theft, the golden harp in his hands comes alive and starts screaming for help. The ogre chases after Jack. Jack descends the beanstalk with the ogre close above him. He calls for his mother to cut down the beanstalk with an axe. The mother gets the axe, but freezes - she can't do it. Jack drops to the ground, frantically chops down the beanstalk, and the ogre dies from the fall. I end up feeling sorry for the ogre husband and wife. They seem to have lived a pretty good life in the clouds, in their own castle, along with some pretty cool magical gadgets. And here comes Jack to ruin it all, with no moral justification for his repeated burglaries and his final murder of the ogre. The morals of the original Jack and the Beanstalk: Grow up and stop being an infant. You must be able to independently strike out alone to provide for a family. The killing of the giant by destroying the beanstalk is a nicely phallic representation of the need to supersede male influence, taking control of one's own life and rejecting superstition and magic. The original story of Beauty and the Beast The father is rich. There is no mother. The father has three sons and three daughters. The youngest daughter, the most attractive, Andy Kaiser clean 25:17 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/10/the-god-confusion/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/10/the-god-confusion/#comments Mon, 10 Nov 2008 05:35:53 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=466 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/10/the-god-confusion/feed/ 13 Science Reason & Rationality by Science, Reason & Rationality Article ID: 1259 "It is said that men may not be the dreams of the Gods, but rather that the Gods are the dreams of men." ~ Carl Sagan - Hello. My name is God, and I am an atheist. by Science, Reason & Rationality Article ID: 1259 "It is said that men may not be the dreams of the Gods, but rather that the Gods are the dreams of men." ~ Carl Sagan Hello. My name is God, and I am an atheist. I don't believe in gods because there are no gods who created me and there's no one else here to compare myself to. I just have always existed. I didn't evolve from anything. I am now just as I always have been, and will always be that it in the future. Messes with your head, doesn't it? Think of how I feel! But, what if there is a god who created me? I don't see any other gods here except me, so why should I believe in another god? How about faith? Can faith establish that there is another god? No way! That's just being silly. Even if I do have a creator, who created that god? No, that's a faulty line of reasoning. I am the one and only. There is no other god but me. Right? Before I could know of another god, there must first be hard evidence and genuine scientific proof. That's not going to happen, because I am God, I'd know of such things. Okay, just me then. Now that I've got that question solved, what am I going to do now? There's a lot of black empty space out here and I'm getting really bored! I gotta do something. Maybe I should create a "Big Boom" or a "Big Bam" or some kind of huge explosion and see what happens. [A gigantic, mind-numbing, multiverse-shaking explosion ensues...] ...Okay, so I guess that was more of a "Big Bang". Not bad, not bad at all. I'm an instant artist! Look at these beautiful stars, planets, and galaxies. I'm impressed. I'm the greatest thing in this whole universe. But then, I'm the only one here, so I'm greatest by default. I suppose I could create other gods, and challenge them so that I can see for myself if I am indeed the greatest. On second thought, that may be a bad idea. What if they beat me? Or form evil alliances against me and revolt? That'll be embarrassing. And what if they ask me who created me? Since I am the one who created them, they might think there must be some other god who created me. They'll stop worshipping me, and look for other gods. Not acceptable. Moreover, they're not gonna believe me if I said I just came into being out of nothing. Still, I could force them to believe whatever I want them to believe. Or I could punish the non-believers. I'll have to give this some thought. [Some time later...] I'm bored. I've created everything I wanted to create. Am I going to be the only one admiring my own work?  That would be lame. ...I know! What if, instead of creating new gods, I create some tiny little creatures on one or more of these planets? They won't be as powerful as a god, so they won't be a threat to me. I'll design them unable to see me, but they can see all my genius works. They can admire my work and praise me for it. It'll be fun seeing them trying to figure out what the heck is going on. I can see it now: some will claim that they know me and have spoken to me or I have spoken to them, and they'll use my name to start a religion. Soon, there will be a whole bunch of them and they'll be killing each other to prove which Me is the one and only "true" Me. And I'll never speak to any one of them. Anything they think is my voice will be misinterpretation or self-delusion. This will be good entertainment. Should keep my boredom away. I get to be movie director. Producer too. And the whole special effects production crew. To paraphrase someone I'm about to create, "it's good to be the god!" Okay, got a little sidetracked there. Back to the plan. Those "religion" businessmen will use really effective marketing strategies in order to control others, making people behave with a predetermined right and wrong. All in my name, of course. That'll cause problems, but those are their problems, not mine. I just want an audience. Now, what will my creatures look like? I can't make them all look exactly like me. Andy Kaiser clean 10:31 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/02/evolutionary-science-and-creationism-a-skeptical-response-to-duane-gishs-creation-scientists-answer-their-critics/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/02/evolutionary-science-and-creationism-a-skeptical-response-to-duane-gishs-creation-scientists-answer-their-critics/#comments Sun, 02 Nov 2008 05:39:24 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=455 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/11/02/evolutionary-science-and-creationism-a-skeptical-response-to-duane-gishs-creation-scientists-answer-their-critics/feed/ 2 Matthew Green By Matthew Green Article ID: 1258 - Controversy over creation and evolution persists. For most secularists, the battle was won long ago. It began with the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species and the ensuing debates between Darwin's defenders and ... By Matthew Green Article ID: 1258 Controversy over creation and evolution persists. For most secularists, the battle was won long ago. It began with the publication of Darwin's Origin of Species and the ensuing debates between Darwin's defenders and his opponents. Creationism persists today for a simple reason: fundamentalism persists today. Creationism is nothing more than Christian apologetics attempting to validate the historical inerrancy of the creation accounts of the Hebrew Bible's Book of Genesis. Creation "scientists" such as the late Henry Morris, Duane Gish, Jonathan Sarfati, and others use whatever "facts" to support Genesis, while rationalizing away anything to the contrary as a result of sloppy thinking or dishonest ulterior motives. They say that skeptics have more to do with "misotheism" (hatred of gods) or "compromise" than with honest scientific objectivity. These creationists believe that skepticism or disbelief is more from a desire to avoid a "relationship" with Jesus Christ and an existential involvement with the gospel. These pathetic attempts to construct a "science" out of creationism are attempts to present Christianity as intellectually respectable to the modern world. This ensures that the gospel isn't dismissed out of hand by a more educated public. What it all comes down to is evangelism. Apologists are doing what they can to make the Bible look scientifically inerrant so they can have an easier time convincing people to become Christians. This article shows that: 1) Creationists use Karl Popper's universally accepted concept of "falsifiability" as a valid criterion for what constitutes a scientific theory. 2) Creationists do not seem to realize that evolution meets this criterion. 3) Creationists cannot pass this criterion on theological grounds because it is inconsistent with the nature of the Christian God. Karl Popper's criterion of "falsifiability" Karl Popper was a science philosopher who proposed the criterion of "falsifiability" as a necessary ingredient of science. Falsifiability means that that an assertion can be proven false by observation or experiment. This is the biggest criterion used to demarcate authentic science from pseudoscience. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says this about Popper's criterion of "falsifiability": "It is easy, [Popper] argues, to obtain evidence in favour of virtually any theory, and he consequently holds that such ‘corroboration' ... should count scientifically only if it is the positive result of a ... prediction, which might conceivably have been false. For Popper, a theory is scientific only if it is refutable... Every genuine test of a scientific theory, then, is logically an attempt to refute or to falsify it, and one genuine counter-instance falsifies the whole theory. ...In a word, an exception, far from ‘proving' a rule, conclusively refutes it. Every genuine scientific theory then, in Popper's view, is prohibitive, in the sense that it forbids ... particular events or occurrences. As such it can be tested and falsified, but never logically verified. Thus Popper stresses that it should not be inferred from the fact that a theory has withstood [testing and has been verified]; rather we should recognize that such a theory has received a high measure of corroboration and [is] the best available theory until it is finally falsified ... or is superseded by a better theory." So the hallmark of a genuine scientific theory is "falsifiability". It has to be capable of being refuted or falsified in order to truly qualify as a scientific theory. A theory is scientific only if it is refutable. This can be an observation, an experiment, or any other empirical test that can decisively refute it. Theories cannot be verified but they can be refuted and the failure of experiments, observations, or any other empirical test gives scientists greater confidence that the hypothesis or theory is, in fact, true. Andy Kaiser clean 21:02 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/10/27/original-versions-of-classic-fairy-tales/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/10/27/original-versions-of-classic-fairy-tales/#comments Mon, 27 Oct 2008 05:39:27 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=412 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/10/27/original-versions-of-classic-fairy-tales/feed/ 23 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1257 - [This article is a companion piece to "More original meanings of classic fairy tales".] "Oh Grandmother, what big ears you have!" "All the better to hear you with, my dear." "Oh Grandmother, what big eyes you have! By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1257 [This article is a companion piece to "More original meanings of classic fairy tales".] "Oh Grandmother, what big ears you have!" "All the better to hear you with, my dear." "Oh Grandmother, what big eyes you have!" "All the better to see you with, my dear." "Oh Grandmother, what big hands you have!" "All the better to grab you with, my dear." "Oh Grandmother, what big teeth you have!" "All the better to eat you with, my dear." Thus begins the true terror of Little Red Riding Hood. Do you know what happens in the original story? Find out, and this Halloween you may think twice when you see certain costumes. This Digital Bits Skeptic article keeps to the usual credo of skepticism and critical thinking. But since it's a Halloween special, it also gets pretty creepy. A quick alert to parents and teachers - this article doesn't have forbidden words, but revealing the dark nature of beloved childrens' fairy tales may be too much for young kids. It's almost Halloween. In less than five days, young children will dress up, put on makeup or a mask, and knock on strangers' doors, expecting oodles of free candy. And they get it. The kids are happy, the strangers are happy, everyone wins except dental insurance companies. When I was younger, the cool costumes were made from anyone from the Star Wars movies. I too donned the smelly, sweaty plastic mask, and trick-or-treated as Darth Vader. Being probably three feet tall made me a much less imposing figure. My friends all did the same. Movies and TV shows dictated our choices. A costumed resurgence occurred at the time Disney started remaking classic fairy tales, like The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, and rereleasing older movies like Cinderella and Snow White. The Little Mermaid was big. Girls everywhere dressed up like Ariel and knew line-by-line the story of unrequited love eventually rewarded. Yet, this isn't the original story. Did you know that the original Little Mermaid story by Hans Christian Anderson ended with the Little Mermaid's death? She essentially committed suicide because she was unwilling to kill the prince, who was already married to someone else. It's not quite the happy Disney ending. Yet, I remember being a kid, being somehow more satisfied when I heard the "real" endings of fairy tales. It's like watching the TV-edited version of an R-rated movie. The R-rated version is invariably better, and was the director's original intent. Even though the original fairy tale storylines deal with nasty issues, they are truer than hiding behind a Disney-esque ending. They reflect the original violent themes of some fairy tales: that the world is a dangerous place, certain behavior is tolerated and some isn't, and some people are here to protect you, and some will hurt you. For those who really like to dig deep, fairy tales also involve heavy symbolism and psychology. The Hansel and Gretel story is an examination of children's emotional growth and eventual rejection of parental supervision. Many tales (like Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, and Sleeping Beauty) have a heavily sexual tone, and explore sexual awakening and desire. Now that we've mentioned sex and violence, let's get to it and find about the original versions of classic fairy tales. The original story of The Three Little Pigs The Three Little Pigs is sanitized for today's children by telling the violence-packed story without the violence. We're left with a cautionary tale that shows how being smart is a good thing. The original has lost a lot. The original Three Little Pigs is a lot longer, as the Big Bad Wolf doesn't stick with blowing down houses. He does do that to get the first two little pigs. Those unfortunate morsels are quickly terrorized and eaten. The third pig - the smart one - is the holdout. Unable to blow down the third pig's house, the wolf tries guile. He tries to tempt the pig out of the house, Andy Kaiser clean 15:13 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/26/five-atheist-logic-tests-and-how-to-pass-them-a-skeptical-response-to-how-to-make-an-atheist-backslide/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/26/five-atheist-logic-tests-and-how-to-pass-them-a-skeptical-response-to-how-to-make-an-atheist-backslide/#comments Sat, 27 Sep 2008 04:05:40 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=241 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/26/five-atheist-logic-tests-and-how-to-pass-them-a-skeptical-response-to-how-to-make-an-atheist-backslide/feed/ 122 Navin Kumar By Navin Kumar Article ID: 1250 - Theists have been doing their best to try and trip atheists with 'logic' for a long time. (These attempts are respectable when they don't contain raving about sin and hellfire). By Navin Kumar Article ID: 1250 Theists have been doing their best to try and trip atheists with 'logic' for a long time. (These attempts are respectable when they don't contain raving about sin and hellfire). Digital Bits Skeptic stumbled upon a webpage adapted from a booklet titled "How to make an atheist backslide" - which turns arguments against atheist theory into loaded, presumptuous 'tests'. Here is a test-by-test takedown of all these tests (except test six, which isn't really an argument and isn't worth dignifying). 1) The Coca-Cola can and designer of the banana Although a good deal more coherent than the other 'tests', this test simply serves to highlight how ignorant anti-evolutionists are of the theory. It assumes that the only alternative to creationism is a chaotic system of random events and outcomes. This is not evolution. Evolution is the opposite of pure chance. The tester points out that a Coca-Cola can is perfectly suited for use by human beings. So clearly, it must have a maker. In the same way, a banana is perfectly 'designed' for human beings, as illustrated by the following points: It's shaped to fit in the human hand It has a non-slip surface It has outward indicators of inward content: Green - too early Yellow - just right Black - too late It has a tab for the removal of the wrapper It's perforated on the wrapper The wrapper is bio-degradable It's shaped for the human mouth Has a point at top for ease of mouth entry It's pleasing to the taste buds It's curved towards the face to make the eating process easy The test claims that because of its human-specific attributes, the banana must have a designer. It concludes by saying, "To say that the banana happened by accident is even more unintelligent than to say that no one designed the Coca Cola can." Evolution - when defined by the tester as random cause and results - cannot explain this. Properly-defined evolution can. Human beings evolved and learned to use fruits a source of sustenance, while plants evolved to use animals as a medium to spread their seeds. Plants must send their offspring far away in order to prevent population from building excessively in an area which would result in resource depletion. Plants have different ways of propagating their seeds: daffodils use the wind; coconuts use the ocean. Many fruits - like the apple or the banana - use animal carriers: the animals eat the fruit and spread the seeds (by throwing them away or through their feces). A plant that successfully gets animals to eat its fruit has a better chance of replicating than a plant that produces tasteless, hard-to-eat fruit. Take banana-proof number three: "It has outward indicators of inward content: Green - too early / Yellow - just right / Black - too late." An animal is more likely to pick and eat a fruit if it can be assured that the fruit isn't unripe or rotten. A plant loses out if an animal starts spreading its seeds before they're ready to be spread. So a plant that provides an outward indicator of the state of its fruit is more likely to replicate itself than a plant that doesn't: this one loses most of its reproductive energy in unripe seeds. So a strain of ripeness-hiding plants would die out, while the plants showing their ripeness would successfully pass on genes to their offspring. Now, here's your Digital Bits Skeptic Bonus Throwback Question: A coconut is delicious - yet it's so hard to open and eat. Why is this? The case is understandable from the coconut's point of view: a coconut doesn't depend on animals for replication and so has an interest in actively discouraging animals with a tough shell. So why are coconut milk and flesh so tasty? Is it because an organism, like man, is more likely to survive if it recognizes edible matter? Or is the coconut God's way of rewarding humanity for the eventual invention of the machete? 2) The "impossible" complexity of the eye Andy Kaiser clean 13:09 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/08/03/sexual-selection-and-how-the-peacock-got-its-tail/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/08/03/sexual-selection-and-how-the-peacock-got-its-tail/#comments Mon, 04 Aug 2008 04:01:57 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=103 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/08/03/sexual-selection-and-how-the-peacock-got-its-tail/feed/ 2 David Annis By David Annis Article ID: 1242 - The tail of the peacock is a magnificent and beautiful thing to behold.  In a previous article, I explained how complex structures (like eyes) evolve through a series of small steps, By David Annis Article ID: 1242 The tail of the peacock is a magnificent and beautiful thing to behold.  In a previous article, I explained how complex structures (like eyes) evolve through a series of small steps, each of which gives the animal better vision. But how do ornamental things evolve, like the tail of a peacock?  The answer is sexual selection. Charles Darwin actually proposed the concept of sexual selection in his book "On the Origin of the Species" in 1859.  Evolution is caused by the competition to leave offspring. Genes of individuals that have random variations that make them more likely to be able to successfully leave offspring will be passed on to future generations, and the characteristics of those individuals will be inherited by future generations.  One way in which individuals compete to leave offspring is by competing for mates: individuals that mate more successfully are more reproductively fit than their counterparts. Sexual selection can take many forms. One form is combat, where an animal can fight with potential rivals.  For example, take two male bettas (also known as Siamese fighting fish). Place these in an aquarium. The male bettas will fight viciously with one another.  Battles for mates sometimes lead to the evolution of features that are used in the fights, like antlers of deer and moose. Sexual selection can also be "cryptic". This means that a female can increase the odds of fertilization by the sperm of desirable males and decrease the odds of fertilization from less desirable males. In many animals, sexual selection takes the form of elaborate ornamentation - often in just the male of the species.  Two well-known examples are a peacock's feathers and the brilliant red plumage of the male cardinal.  Scientists like Robert Trivers have theorized that in most species it is the male that competes for female access because the female makes a larger contribution to the offspring.  In one experiment, scientists were able to vary the relative contributions to offspring in Katydids and they observed that when the males' contribution was more valuable, females began to compete for males. However, there is significant cost to these ornaments. So why would the genes that direct the growth of ornamental structures not reduce reproductive fitness?  After all, the energy that a peacock uses to produce his tail could be used to find a mate or produce sperm.  In this example, there are two hypotheses about sexual selection. One is that the ornament is a signal that the male is healthy. After all, a sickly male can't produce and maintain the elaborate ornamentation.  The second theory is that females select males with elaborate ornament, because doing so ensures that their sons will be "sexy" and have a lot of mating opportunities; it becomes a sort of self perpetuating selection mechanism. Sexual selection can be measured experimentally by exaggerating a sexually-selected characteristic.  Methods that scientists have used to study sexual selection include lengthening and shortening long ornamental tails in swallows, and painting spots on butterflies. Even in monogamous species sexual selection can play a role in a single breeding season.  An example comes from DeLope and Moller, who lengthened and shortened the tails of male swallows during a breeding season and found that the females adjusted their reproductive efforts in response (including the clutch size and number of clutches in a season). So, the next time that a creationist claims that the great beauty found in nature can't be explained by evolution, remember just how sexy beauty can be. Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/21/macro-evolution-observed-in-the-laboratory/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/21/macro-evolution-observed-in-the-laboratory/#comments Sun, 22 Jun 2008 04:19:50 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=91 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/21/macro-evolution-observed-in-the-laboratory/feed/ 27 David Annis By David Annis Article ID: 1233 - Evolution can easily be observed in the laboratory and in the world around us.  We can see moths evolve their coloring to match the color of soot that covers their habitat, By David Annis Article ID: 1233 Evolution can easily be observed in the laboratory and in the world around us.  We can see moths evolve their coloring to match the color of soot that covers their habitat, watch bacteria evolve antibiotic resistance in hospitals, and my favorite variety of grapefruit (that's Rio Star) was made by scientists who exposed seeds to radiation to increase the mutation rate.  In the face of such overwhelming evidence - including knowing the exact DNA changes effecting such change - it is impossible for the creationists to deny evolution with a straight face. To get around the problem, creationists often try to separate evolution into two types, micro-evolution and macro-evolution. They argue that micro-evolution can make minor changes, but can¹t build new structures or make other major changes to organisms. Although "the attempt to differentiate between micro-evolution and macro-evolution is considered to have no scientific basis by any mainstream scientific organization" (according to Wikipedia), creationists often claim that a chain of small micro-evolutionary steps can¹t add up to a macro-evolutionary step. Indeed, it's hard to simulate our planet's biodiversity in a laboratory, because all laboratories are much smaller than the planet and have been operating for a far shorter period of time.  Nevertheless, we can now say that macro-evolution has been observed in the laboratory under carefully controlled conditions, and that the results can be replicated.  The results are described in a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences titled Historical contingency and the evolution of a key innovation in an experimental population of Escherichia coli. In 1988, scientists at Michigan State University created twelve population lines of E. coli so that they could watch them evolve.  Since then, the bacteria have been growing under carefully controlled conditions in a culture containing low concentrations of glucose and high concentrations of citrate.  Under oxic conditions (that is, when oxygen is present), E. coli cannot grow on citrate and "that inability has long been viewed as a defining characteristic of this important, diverse, and widespread species."  Many traits were observed changing over time. Creationists dismissed these changes as micro-evolution.  For over 30,000 generations, the E. coli in the experiment did not evolve the ability to grow on citrate. Finally, one of the populations evolved, and gained this ability. Each population experienced billions of mutations in the first 30,000 generations. Since every possible point mutation was tried many times, scientists were either looking at a rare mutation (such as a large piece of DNA inverting) or a mutation made possible by the cumulative mutation history of prior generations.  If this was just a rare mutation, then a sample of bacteria taken just before the trait first appeared would be no more likely to evolve the trait again than a sample taken from the other populations at the same point in time.  However, if the ability to use citrate was from an accumulation of "micro-evolutionary" changes, then a sample from earlier generations of the E. coli would be able to evolve the ability to use citrate again. Fortunately, the scientists had frozen samples of each population every 500 generations.  Sure enough, when they revived earlier samples, they watched the citrate-growing ability evolve in the "micro-evolutionary" line, but not from samples taken from other lines. We know that in one population, a series of changes that happened between the 15,000th and 20,000th generations laid the groundwork for a major evolutionary advance. Here we have a clear example of macro-evolution under carefully controlled laboratory conditions. Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/04/the-ten-percent-of-the-brain-myth-a-fractional-truth/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/04/the-ten-percent-of-the-brain-myth-a-fractional-truth/#comments Thu, 05 Jun 2008 03:16:11 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/04/the-ten-percent-of-the-brain-myth-a-fractional-truth/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/04/the-ten-percent-of-the-brain-myth-a-fractional-truth/feed/ 6 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1229 - In writing this article, I tried to use ten percent of my brain. I really did. But I got stuck pretty fast on the method of how to actually use only ten percent of my brain. There seem to be many ways to go about it. By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1229 In writing this article, I tried to use ten percent of my brain. I really did. But I got stuck pretty fast on the method of how to actually use only ten percent of my brain. There seem to be many ways to go about it. For example, I could just think this article in my head, and only write down every tenth word. But the results would be incomprehensible. I could decrease my writing quality to 10% of its usual stellar technique. But that would be annoying for any future readers. I could remove 90% of my writing tools, and type this article using only one finger. But that would just slow me down significantly, when I'd be getting the same final result. Wait: I could encode the characters in this article into their base-10 ASCII equivalents. I'd then take the resulting numeric string and increase its value by a factor of 10, then convert the results back from ASCII into plain text. Mathematical perfection. Granted, it would be unreadable mathematical perfection. That's counterintuitive to the purpose of Digital Bits Skeptic, so maybe that's not the best idea. No, as much as I'd love the symbolism, I can't easily write this article using ten percent of my brain. Yet there are some who argue that's what everyone does all the time. Everyone, that is, apart from a few special gifted people. The first time I heard the myth of "you only use 10% of your brain" was when I was very young. Oddly, I was probably about ten. I had a respected family member fill me in. She said that the human potential had yet to be fully realized. Humans had dormant skills and talents. These super-cognitive powers were trapped in the brain, and using them required special training or a lot of luck. She said that there were a few people (she specifically mentioned Edison and Einstein) who used a little more of their brain, and they were able to really understand the world, and create and invent and make life better for all mankind. And, she said, these world-changing scientists only used "maybe twenty percent" of their brains. Wow! The implications were staggering. I thought, if I could use just twenty percent of my brain, I'd be up there with Einstein and Edison? Not bad. At school, I only paid attention half the time. If I paid attention full-time, then oh, baby: I'd be a genius. Of course, this analysis is pretty goofy. And it's meant to be. I'm trying to show how a tool (like the human brain) doesn't mesh with the idea of partial use. How do you use ten percent of a hammer? The concept doesn't make sense. Yet we hear it often in pop culture, from referencing revered geniuses like Einstein, or when self-help gurus claim psychic powers or life-changing self-help. Granted, a brain is far more complex than a hammer. Think of it instead as a collection of tools. But again, are the "10% believers" saying some tools are lying dormant and unused? If humans use only ten percent of their brains, what is the other unused ninety percent? What tools in the toolbox are never touched? Let's look at some detail. This article in Psychology Today gives several tips to improve brainpower. Note that none of them talk about anything earth-shattering, as is proper for tried and true techniques. These are established methods, from regular exercise to eating your beans. The theory of multiple intelligences is an educational theory by Howard Gardner. The theory disagrees with the definition claiming a person is either a genius or not, or a smart person or not. Gardner says that if a person is deficient in one cognitive area (for example, math), that person can be above average in another area (for example, music). This concept details how all humans have potential, but motivation and other factors determine if a person uses that skill. To use a personal story, I went to high school. One of my schoolmates was a pretty big guy - that's "big" as in tall and muscular. He was over six feet, Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/05/19/evolution-makes-testable-predictions/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/05/19/evolution-makes-testable-predictions/#comments Tue, 20 May 2008 03:35:56 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/05/19/evolution-makes-testable-predictions/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/05/19/evolution-makes-testable-predictions/feed/ 6 David Annis By David Annis Article ID: 1226 - In the late 1850s, Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace introduced the world to the theory of evolution. The theory of evolution is a scientific hypothesis that describes how species descended from a common ancestor, By David Annis Article ID: 1226 In the late 1850s, Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace introduced the world to the theory of evolution. The theory of evolution is a scientific hypothesis that describes how species descended from a common ances... Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/04/04/christopher-hitchens-debates-peter-hitchens/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/04/04/christopher-hitchens-debates-peter-hitchens/#comments Fri, 04 Apr 2008 05:16:41 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/04/04/christopher-hitchens-debates-peter-hitchens/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/04/04/christopher-hitchens-debates-peter-hitchens/feed/ 23 Andy Kaiser by Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1218 - [The Hitchens vs. Hitchens video is available. Scroll down to find it.] - Watching a debate between Christopher Hitchens and Peter Hitchens is fascinating on so many levels. They are both very good speakers and debaters, by Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1218 [The Hitchens vs. Hitchens video is available. Scroll down to find it.] Watching a debate between Christopher Hitchens and Peter Hitchens is fascinating on so many levels. They are both very good speakers and debaters, so the oratory mastery is impressive on its own, and the technique is fun to watch.  The topics discussed are easily inflammatory: just ask anyone, "How do you feel about the Iraq war?" Or, "How does God affect your life?" You'll receive very heartfelt responses. Finally, as you may assume upon reading their last names, Christopher Hitchens and Peter Hitchens are indeed related. They're brothers. What's interesting about their relationship is that it's not what you'd expect. Or, at least not what I expected upon seeing them debate for the first time. To specify: 1) this was the first time I'd seen either one debate any one else, and 2) this was the first time Peter and Christopher have publicly debated each other in the United States. Let me set your expectations with a little third-party information. What would you expect if you saw the following ads about the debate: "One-on-one for the first time ever, brothers will clash" - From Grand Valley State University's ad. (GVSU was the host for the debate.) "Hitchens Brothers: Anatomy of a Row" - An article from The Independent You may think this sets expectations for a heated - perhaps angry and shouting - debate. After  attending the debate itself, I'm glad to report that there was no bloodshed, no torn clothes, nor any physical violence. While the debate did at times involve angry, emotional words, the outcome was on a balanced give-and-take debate. Christopher Hitchens and Peter Hitchens have a history of being alienated for years, with only a recent reconciliation. That behavior, at least, met my expectations. The brothers are both excellent and well-focused speakers. There was no camaraderie during the debate, no emotional winks towards the other. No sign of a brotherly relationship. There was, actually, more signs of antagonism, more "polite impoliteness"  than usual. Since I haven't seen either Hitchens debate until now, I was unable to tell if that was just the way they normally carry their debates, or if - being related - they were pushing each others' emotional buttons. Christopher seemed to be the better composed of the two. If he was aggravated by any part of the debate, he rarely showed it, whereas Peter became exasperated at a few points. When the moderator asked him for comment after a particularly heated exchange, he gestured dismissively and exclaimed, "Why? It's futile!" (To Peter's credit, Christopher had evaded Peter's direct question, was talking over Peter at that point, and the moderator hadn't done anything.) That's not to dismiss Peter Hitchens' debate skills or the presentation of his content. He was the right-leaning conservative in this debate. Based on audience responses to debate points (clapping and cheering), I'd say the strong majority - perhaps eighty percent - were liberal (and perhaps atheist), like Christopher. Far less were conservative (and perhaps religious), like Peter. The forum was a college-sponsored event, and GVSU students were given many free tickets. The audience makeup ranged from young college age on up. College students certainly didn't dominate, though. It was a good mixture of ages. When I arrived at the venue - a large, ornate Catholic church, one of many beautiful buildings in downtown Grand Rapids, Michigan - I heard from an event coordinator that they were booked up way beyond expectations. There were over 1100 people attending.  Many were Christopher Hitchens fans. A college student setting behind me excitedly told her seatmate, "I heard about this an hour ago, but when I heard Christopher Hitchens was here I had to be here too!" So Christopher Hitchens had more fans. He had his books available for purchase, and autographs afterward. Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/12/29/the-flight-of-dragons-book-review-how-dragons-could-have-evolved-and-existed/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/12/29/the-flight-of-dragons-book-review-how-dragons-could-have-evolved-and-existed/#comments Sat, 29 Dec 2007 05:55:01 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/12/29/the-flight-of-dragons-book-review-how-dragons-could-have-evolved-and-existed/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/12/29/the-flight-of-dragons-book-review-how-dragons-could-have-evolved-and-existed/feed/ 9 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1111 - - Dragons existed. Real ones. They breathed fire. They flew through the air. They dripped poisonous blood and horded tons of gold. At least, that's what the book The Flight of Dragons says is possible. By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1111 Dragons existed. Real ones. They breathed fire. They flew through the air. They dripped poisonous blood and horded tons of gold. At least, that's what the book The Flight of Dragons says is possible. It's not telling us dragons definitely existed. But given certain evolutionary adaptations, they could have. The book The Flight of Dragons by Peter Dickinson is an entertaining and intelligent experiment in critical thinking. It entertains children while respecting an adult intelligence. It exposes the reader to a believable "fantasy" world built on a foundation of reality. I'll quote Peter Dickinson in his introduction: "This book is called The Flight of Dragons because my theory is that the particular specialisation of dragons was that they evolved a unique mode of flight. They grew to their enormous size because size was necessary if they were to fly successfully. They breathed fire because they had to. Their "blood" had seemingly magical properties because a particular chemical reaction was necessary for their mode of flight." The book is 132 pages of showing just how dragons could have lived and flew and, yes, breathed fire. Why is The Flight of Dragons a book for critical thinkers and skeptics? Because it presents a very interesting theme: it doesn't say "dragons never existed". It doesn't say "dragons did exist". It says, in essence, "Dragons are most likely mythological creatures. However, there are so many myths about them, so many shared dragon characteristics between cultures, that if they did exist, here is one possible explanation how dragons evolved the way they did." The book is an evolutionary analysis of the dragon, and the result is brilliant: well-researched and entertaining, fun for dragon buffs, fantasy buffs, or critical thinkers and skeptics. In addition to massive amounts of scientific analysis and critical thought, the book also provides a great amount of history of dragons and dragon myths. Here's a chapter by chapter breakdown for The Flight of Dragons: Introduction: A concise introduction by the author, Peter Dickinson: it is his view that dragons really existed, and that he can "put together a coherent theory which is at least as probable as the theory that dragons are completely legendary." Flight: In a book titled "The Flight of Dragons", it makes sense that the first chapter after the introduction be a discussion of the mechanics of flight. It introduces the concept of a wing-size-to-weight ratio, and emphasizes that the heavier an animal is, the larger the wingspan needed to fly. In addition, dragon legends speak of dragons having abilities that would add to their body weight: they are fast fliers. They can hover. But these attributes require a sturdy and strong body, contrary to a light body weight. Dickinson realizes there is something wrong with the usual assumption about how dragons were thought to fly, and that weight was the critical factor: If dragons flew, it was because they were weightless. The Flying Brick: This two-page spread is a visual explanation of what was described in the previous chapter: as the weight of an animal increases, the wing size required for flight increases significantly. This is why the animals and insects that do fly are generally very small and very light. Fiery Breath: Why does a dragon breathe fire? How does a dragon breathe fire? This chapter answers these questions, while also describing Dickinson's revelation about the mechanics of dragon flight: 1) Dragons could fly because their bodies were lighter-than-air. Think of a blimp. 2) Also like a blimp, dragons were large because their bodies needed to be large in order to fly. 3) Dragons would therefore not need huge wings, since they were more for maneuvering than actual flight and lift. 4) "Dragons breathed fire because they had to." The gas that gave dragons their lift was hydrogen. To prevent possible explosions (think of the Hindenburg), Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/11/04/apophenia-definition-and-analysis/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/11/04/apophenia-definition-and-analysis/#comments Sun, 04 Nov 2007 05:11:10 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/11/04/apophenia-definition-and-analysis/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/11/04/apophenia-definition-and-analysis/feed/ 0 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/#comments Tue, 16 Oct 2007 13:53:21 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/feed/ 2