Category: Modern Science

More Evidence Against Iron as a Preservative for Biomolecules in Fossils

Chicken femur bones after 90 days of exposure to water, sand, and the three chemicals listed. (image from the study discussed in the article)

Those who want to believe that dinosaur fossils are millions of years old are faced with two very difficult challenges. First, carbon-14 has been detected in significant quantities in all dinosaur bones that were tested for it. This is a problem, as carbon-14 should decay to unmeasurable levels in about 60,000 years. Second, soft tissue and biomolecules have been found in many dinosaur fossils (see here, here, here, and here, for example), and at least according to some paleontologists, it is a common feature of the fossils. Of course, there is no known way that soft tissue and biomolecules can withstand decay over millions of years, so fervent old-earth scientists have been trying to find one.

Dr. Mary Schweitzer, who was the first to find soft tissue in a dinosaur fossil, proposed a possible explanation more than 10 years ago. Based on an experiment that lasted two years, she and her colleagues proposed that iron from the dinosaur’s blood could have acted as a preservative for the soft tissue and the biomolecules that comprise it. As you can read in the post I linked, I was initially very skeptical of such an explanation. Two years later, two chemists who are much more knowledgeable than I am gave what I consider to be definitive arguments as to why iron cannot do what Schweitzer and her colleagues want it to do.

One of my readers (Victor Ferreira da Silva) recently sent me a study that can be considered the death knell of Schweitzer and her colleagues’ proposal. In addition, it strengthens the case that the fossils are not millions of years old. In the study, the authors soaked four chicken femurs in sand to mimic the conditions under which most scientists think fossils form. They then passed a different solution through the sand for each bone: pure water, water + calcium carbonate, water + iron, and water + phosphate. After 90 days, they examined the bones with three different techniques to see how much decay had occurred. They measured the amount of the most abundant form of collagen (a biomolecule) that remained. They found that iron was the worst preservative, and calcium carbonate was the best. Specifically, they estimate that the chicken bones retained 90% of their collagen when exposed to water + calcium carbonate, but only 35% when exposed to water + iron. The ones exposed to water + phosphate retained 60%, while the ones exposed to pure water retained 80%. Under realistic conditions, then, iron is a horrible preservative for biomolecules.

But what about calcium carbonate? When mixed with water, it preserved more collagen. That’s true, and the authors suggest that it’s because the calcium carbonate mineralizes the outer parts of the bone, protecting the inner parts from microbial activity that tends to break down biomolecules. While that seems reasonable, notice that in a mere 90 days, even the “best” preservative had already allowed 10% of the collagen to decay. That doesn’t provide much confidence for its ability to act as a preservative for millions of years!

Interestingly enough, even though I think this study is the death knell for Dr. Schweitzer’s proposal that iron can preserve soft tissue and biomolecules over millions of years, she was indirectly involved in the study. As the authors note:

This project would not have been possible without the support of Mary Schweitzer, who graciously opened her “Modern lab” at North Carolina State University to two of us (PVU and KKV) to conduct the ELISA and immunofluorescence assays for this project.

I applaud Dr. Schweitzer and the authors of this study for trying to figure out an explanation for soft tissue and biomolecules in dinosaur fossils. Of course, I think there is a much simpler explanation: the fossils are thousands of years old, not millions of years old. But I look forward to any more studies done on this issue. If I am right, more studies will simply strengthen the young-earth case. If I am wrong, we will discover some new, exciting chemistry.

The Motivation for Modern Science was Theological

Werner Heisenberg (December 5, 1901 – February 1, 1976), one of the most important pioneers of quantum physics.
Werner Heisenberg was a giant in the field of physics. He developed his own formulation of quantum mechanics, for which he won the 1932 Nobel Prize in physics. He later developed his famous Uncertainty Principle, which continues to guide physicists in their understanding of the behavior of atoms and subatomic particles. In short, had it not been for him, physics would be a very different field from what it is today.

On April 24, 1973, about three years before his death, he gave a lecture entitled “Tradition in Science.” It draws on the knowledge he gained through nearly an entire lifetime of scientific experiences. The talk has been reprinted many times in publications such as the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. Early on, he draws a distinction between descriptive science (which was championed by great thinkers like Aristotle) and mathematically-based science, which he calls the “new method.” He then writes:

Therefore two features are essential for the new method: the attempt to design new and very accurate experiments which idealize and isolate experience, and thereby actually create new phenomena, and the comparison of these phenomena with mathematical constructs, called natural laws. Before we discuss the validity of this method even in our present science, we should perhaps briefly ask for the basis of confidence, which led Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler on this new way. Following a paper of von Weizsäcker, I think we have to state that this basis was mainly theological. Galileo argued that nature, God’s second book (the first one being the Bible) is written in mathematical letters, and that we have to learn this alphabet if we want to read it. Kepler is even more explicit in his work on world harmony; he says: God created the world in accordance with his ideas of creation. These ideas are the pure archetypal forms which Plato termed Ideas, and they can be understood by Man as mathematical constructs. They can be understood by Man, because Man was created as the spiritual image of God. Physics is a reflection on the divine Ideas of Creation, therefore physics is a divine service.

Now, of course, what he calls the “new method” is essentially the way we do modern science. In other words, science in its current form was motivated by theology, specifically the Judeo-Christian idea that man is made in God’s image.

I have written previously about the fact that science is a product of Christianity (here, here, here, and here, for example) but Dr. Heisenberg’s lecture emphasizes that fact. Anyone who tells you that “religion” (or Christianity in particular) is incompatible with science shows not only a shocking ignorance of the history of science, but also an ignorance of what science is to begin with.

Do Rising Carbon Dioxide Levels Cause Warming or Vice-Versa?

Sometimes, it’s easy to determine cause and effect. Other times, it’s not! (click image for credit)
We know that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. In other words, we know it absorbs infrared radiation coming from earth’s surface, warming the atmosphere. In fact, as far as we can tell, it’s what makes the earth warm enough to support life. It is thought that if there were not enough carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere, the earth would radiate too much energy back into space, causing it to be far too cold for life to flourish here. Common sense, therefore, requires us to believe that when carbon dioxide levels rise in the atmosphere, the earth’s temperature will rise.

Unfortunately, science often does not follow common sense. I use quantum mechanics in my field of research all the time, and it violates common sense at every turn. Nevertheless, I am forced to use the theory because the data strongly support it. Thus, even though “it makes sense” that rising carbon dioxide levels will increase the earth’s temperature, we don’t know that for a fact. Indeed, the majority of the data have consistently shown that this is not the case. Several analyses of ice-core data show that on long time scales, the average temperature of the earth rises, and then carbon dioxide levels rise (see here, here, here, and here).

Now, of course, all these studies use proxies to estimate global temperature, and that can be tricky. In addition, producing the time scale involves making several unverifiable assumptions. Thus, I have never put much stock in such studies. However, others who are interested in climate change (aka Global Warming) take these data seriously. They generally say that these long-term trends are showing the effects of changes in earth’s orbital cycle, which changes the energy it gets from the sun. Thus, they aren’t relevant to what is happening right now. Also, there are at least some ice-core analyses that show carbon dioxide rising before temperature does. In other words, it’s complicated.

However, a recent study (which actually builds on two previous studies) looked at the modern data that has been collected for carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere and global temperature. In other words, it analyzed what is happening right now. Of course, there are several sets of data for global temperatures, and they don’t really agree with one another, but the authors used a well-accepted one. What they found is that even on this relatively short time scale, carbon dioxide levels rise after temperatures rise. In fact, here are three graphs from the abstract:

From the graph on the left, it is clear that temperature (red line) rises first, then carbon dioxide level (green line) rises. The other two graphs show this even more convincingly. On those two graphs, changes in carbon dioxide and temperature are only correlated with one another if you consider the change in carbon dioxide level after the change in temperature, not before.

But wait a minute. How can temperature affect carbon dioxide level? Well, one of the major places the earth stores carbon dioxide is in the ocean (and, to a lesser degree, in fresh water). When temperatures go up, carbon dioxide becomes less soluble, so the oceans release carbon dioxide. From that point of view, it “makes sense” that rising temperatures will cause rising carbon dioxide levels. But once again, science doesn’t always make sense. Thus, it’s probably very complicated. Most likely, rising temperatures cause rising carbon dioxide levels, and those rising carbon dioxide levels cause more rising temperatures.

Which is more important? If you trust this study, it’s the former. In their appendix, the authors estimate that the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels caused by increasing temperature is three times greater than the increase in carbon dioxide levels caused by human emissions. Now, of course, that still means human emissions increase temperature. However, it also means that (not surprisingly) the global climate models aren’t properly taking this into account. As a result, global climate models are exaggerating humanity’s contribution to global warming. While I think that has already been well-established, this study gives at least one of the explanations for it.

More Evidence That the Early Church Believed in the Divinity of Christ

An early Christian mosaic found in the Megiddo church, near Tel Megiddo, Israel. Based on several clues, it is dated around AD 230.

For some reason, I missed the discovery of this amazing mosaic when it was announced. However, a pastor friend of mine recently shared this article, which indicates that the mosaic might be coming to the Museum of the Bible here in the U.S., so I looked into it and decided some of my readers might be interested.

The story begins in 2004 when a prison in northern Israel was planning some new construction. Archaeologists came to ensure that the construction wouldn’t destroy any historically-valuable material, and it’s a good thing they did, because they found that the prison had been built over an ancient Christian house of prayer. It is now thought to be the earliest known Christian prayer hall, dated to be from approximately AD 230!1

More importantly, a portion of the mosaic (shown above) says, “The God-loving Akeptous has offered the table to God Jesus Christ as a memorial.”2 The table isn’t there, but it probably functioned as an altar. However, the message of the mosaic is clear: Jesus Christ is God. This is important, because some popularizers of Christian scholarship claim that the early church didn’t believe in the Divinity of Christ. For example, in her book, A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Karen Armstrong claims:3

After his death, his followers decided that Jesus had been Divine. This did not happen immediately; as we shall see, the doctrine that Jesus had been God in human form was not finalized until the fourth century. The development of Christian belief in the Incarnation was a gradual, complex process.

If that sounds familiar to you, you might recognize it from Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. No serious scholar of early Christianity believes such nonsense, because there is ample evidence that says otherwise. Nevertheless, since it was in the popular book-turned-movie, I encounter a lot of people who believe it. Well, here is a mosaic that predates the fourth century by about one hundred years, and it says that at least those who came into this prayer hall knew that Jesus is God.

Of course, we don’t need this mosaic to tell us that the early church believed in the Divinity of Christ, since lots of early church fathers are on record about it. Here is a sampling:

Ignatius of Antioch (c. AD 50 – c. AD 110):

I Glorify God, even Jesus Christ, who has given you such wisdom. For I have observed that you are perfected in an immoveable faith, as if you were nailed to the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ…
[Epistle to the Smyrnaeans]

Hence every kind of magic was destroyed, and every bond of wickedness disappeared; ignorance was removed, and the old kingdom abolished, God Himself being manifested in human form for the renewal of eternal life.
[Epistle to the Ephesians]

Justin Martyr (AD 100 – AD 165):

And that Christ being Lord, and God the Son of God, and appearing formerly in power as Man, and Angel, and in the glory of fire as at the bush, so also was manifested at the judgment executed on Sodom, has been demonstrated fully by what has been said.
[Dialogue with Trypho]

…but now you will permit me first to recount the prophecies, which I wish to do in order to prove that Christ is called both God and Lord of hosts…
[Dialogue with Trypho]

…the Father of the universe has a Son; who also, being the first-begotten Word of God, is even God. And of old He appeared in the shape of fire and in the likeness of an angel to Moses and to the other prophets; but now in the times of your reign, having, as we before said, become Man by a virgin, according to the counsel of the Father, for the salvation of those who believe on Him…
[First Apology]

Irenaeus of Lyons (c. AD 130 – c. AD 200):

For I have shown from the Scriptures, that no one of the sons of Adam is as to everything, and absolutely, called God, or named Lord. But that He is Himself in His own right, beyond all men who ever lived, God, and Lord, and King Eternal, and the Incarnate Word, proclaimed by all the prophets, the apostles, and by the Spirit Himself, may be seen by all who have attained to even a small portion of the truth. Now, the Scriptures would not have testified these things of Him, if, like others, He had been a mere man…. He is the holy Lord, the Wonderful, the Counselor, the Beautiful in appearance, and the Mighty God, coming on the clouds as the Judge of all men;—all these things did the Scriptures prophesy of Him.
[Against Heresies]

Like many things we learn from our culture, then, the idea that the early church didn’t believe in the Divinity of Christ is demonstrably false. This Mosaic simply adds more evidence to the huge pile.

REFERENCES

1. Yotam Tepper and Leah Di Segni, A Christian Prayer Hall of the Third Century CE at Kfar ‘Othnay (Legio), Publication of the Israel Antiquities Authority, p. 50, 2006.
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2. Ibid, p. 36.
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3. Karen Armstrong, A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, (Ballatine Books, 1993), p. 81
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A Really Good Flat Earth Documentary

I have written a lot about the idea of a flat earth. While you might think that most ancient people believed it, that’s just not true. (see here, here, and here). I have also compiled a list of resources that have observations you can make today which clearly show the earth is not flat. Well, a reader of those posts made me aware of a documentary called Behind the Curve, which you can watch for free. I don’t watch a lot of documentaries, but the premise of this one sounded intriguing, so I decided to give it a try. I am glad that I did!

The documentary follows several flat-earthers as they try to make a case for their position. It allows the flat-earthers to talk and never attempts to refute any of their arguments. Between these scenes, however, there are scientists who discuss the flat-earth movement. Those scientists don’t offer any criticisms of the flat-earth arguments, either. They just discuss their impressions of flat-earthers. Refreshingly, the scientists don’t insult the flat-earthers. Instead, the scientists just discuss their impressions of how flat-earthers think as well as why they believe in such an easily-refutable idea. It’s a very interesting juxtaposition.

What I loved most about the documentary, however, is how it shows flat-earthers doing experiments that attempt to “prove” that the earth is flat. In one of the experiments, for example, a person bought a $20,000 ring laser gyroscope. Once it is set to point in a specific direction, it unerringly points that way, no matter how it is moved. Well, if the earth is flat and not rotating, the gyroscope would never change its orientation once it is set and left stationary. However, if the earth is mostly spherical and rotating, the gyroscope would have to change orientation to continue pointing in the same direction. Since the earth goes through a 360-degree rotation every 24 hours, the gyroscope would have to drift 15 degrees every hour.

The flat-earther discussing this experiment (Bob Knodel, an engineer) says that when they set it up, they did, indeed, see it drift at a rate of 15 degrees every hour. They didn’t like that result, of course, so they decided that there must be something else going on. Thus, they repeated the experiment, this time putting the gyroscope in a container that excludes magnetic fields. They thought that the dome of stars above the flat earth was influencing the gyroscope in some way, and the container should remove that influence. Unfortunately for them, they got the same result. Now they are trying to find a chamber made out of bismuth into which they can put the gyroscope. I am not sure why they think that might stop the dome of stars from influencing the gyroscope, but Knodel says it is the next step of the experiment.

The other experiment is much more direct. Jeran Campanella wanted to shine a laser down a nearly 4-mile stretch of canal. He wanted to put three posts along the way and measure where the laser hit the posts relative to the canal’s water level. On a flat earth, the laser would hit each post at the same height. On a curved earth, the laser would hit the middle post at a lower point. Of course, a normal laser pointer wouldn’t be visible over such a distance, so he bought a 3-Watt laser, which is very powerful. Unfortunately, when he and others did the experiment, there was just too much dispersion. As a result, the “spot” on the laser was so large that it was impossible to find where the center hit the post.

In the end, they did an ingenious variation of the experiment. They made two blinds with holes that were 17 feet above the the surface of the water. They put a camera on one end of the roughly 4-mile stretch of canal and a person holding a light on the other end. The camera was positioned level at 17 feet above the water, pointed at the hole in the nearest blind. With that setup and a flat earth, the person should hold the light at 17 feet above the water for the camera to see it, as shown in this diagram that is in the documentary:

On a curved earth, the person would have to hold the light higher for it to hit the camera, as shown in this diagram, which is also in the documentary.

The documentary shows them trying to see the light on the camera’s screen when it is held at 17 feet, and they don’t see it. However, when the person with the light holds it high above his head, they see it on the camera’s screen. Campanella’s comment upon seeing this demonstration of earth’s curvature was, “Interesting.” Another experimenter suggested that the light was hitting leaves, which is why it was blocked until it was raised higher.

If you are interested in trying to understand why people today believe an idea that was thoroughly refuted more than 2,300 years ago, this documentary might provide you with some insights.

Blood Clots Cast Even More Doubt on the Current Ancient-Earth Explanation for Soft Tissue in Dinosaur Fossils

Blood clots in a fossil that is supposed to be 270-300 million years old (Image from the article being discussed)

Mark Armitage is doing some of today’s most exciting research on fossils (see here, here, here, here, and here). He recently presented some of his research at the 2023 Microscopy and Microanalysis annual meeting, which published its proceedings.

To my mind, there are three important takeaways from the presentation. First, he finds blood clots in fossils that are much older that what has been commonly reported. Most of these reports are about fossils that are supposed to be 65-70 million years old. Some of the fossils he reports on here are supposed to be 270-300 million years old! That’s what the illustration at the top of this article shows. On the left is a standard microscope image of an early Permian amphibian fossil. The yellow material is bone, and the image is centered on a canal that runs through the bone. When the specimen was alive, the canal held blood vessels and nerves. The white area is empty, and the dark material between the empty space and the bone tissue is clotted blood. On the right, you see what happens when that same sample is hit with ultraviolet light. The dark splotches you see come from iron in the blood clot. When hit with ultraviolet light, iron emits light of a specific wavelength, and that’s the wavelength emitted here. Thus, we know this is iron, and since it is in the clot, it is iron from the animal’s blood. If you want to believe the old-earth timescale, then, you have to believe that a blood clot is able to exist for 270-300 million years without rotting away!

That brings me to the second important takeaway. In a desperate attempt to explain how soft tissue can be in fossils that are supposed to be millions of years old, Schweitzer and her colleagues published a paper suggesting that iron is the key to this remarkable preservation. In that paper, they show how iron from blood can reduce the degradation of blood vessels over a period of two years. However, the experiment required that the blood be treated with an anticoagulant. That way, iron could diffuse throughout the tissue that was being preserved. Armitage’s results show that’s not realistic. Instead, the blood clots trap the iron so that it is not available to the rest of the tissue. This adds to the other arguments which indicate that Schweitzer’s iron-preservation hypothesis is not valid.

The last very important takeaway is how these results affect research that has already been done. As Armitage’s paper says:

We also note that many histological dinosaur bone studies reveal unreported clots, thus we encourage workers to examine their sections for iron auto-fluorescence response under UVFL.

In other words, because of Armitage’s work, we can look at past images that have already been published and see that there are blood clots in previously-described fossils that were not recognized by the researchers who published the studies. Thus, paleontologists have the opportunity to learn more from the fossils that they have already examined. I truly hope that at least some of those scientists are curious enough to take Armitage’s suggestion!

Archaeological Confirmation of Joshua’s Altar at Ebal?

X-ray tomographic reconstruction of the artifact discussed in the article. (image from the scientific paper linked below)

NOTE: Here is a good analysis of this find. It looks like the claims are not very well-founded.

Last year, a team of archaeologists led by Dr. Scott Stripling of the Bible Seminary in Texas announced that they had found the oldest example of Hebrew writing, and it contained the word “Yahweh,” the divine name for God that was used by the Israelites. If true, this would show that the Israelites were literate long before many historians think they were. In addition, it would provide strong evidence for the historical accuracy of an event reported in Joshua 8:30-35. Unfortunately, the team revealed their discovery through social media instead of in a scientific peer-reviewed journal. As a result, I was hesitant to discuss the discovery when I first learned about it, despite how exciting it is. Well, the team has now published a paper in a peer-reviewed journal, and I have to say that while I find the discovery intriguing, I am not nearly as excited about it as I was initially.

The discovery was made when the archaeologists were searching through material that had been discarded more than thirty years ago during the excavation of ancient altars on Mount Ebal. In sifting through that rubble, they found an object that was about the size of a postage stamp. When cleaned, the object was recognized as a small lead tablet. Since lead is soft, it was often used as a surface upon which to scratch words. The material found around the tablet was consistent with the older of the two altars that had been excavated, and that altar is thought to be from a time consistent with the book of Joshua. Thus, it could be the one that Joshua built on Mount Ebal as described in Joshua 8:30-35.

The tablet is folded and could not be opened without damaging it. However, the authors used X-ray computed tomography to look inside. At a certain depth within the tablet, they got the image shown on the left at the top of this article. Since the tablet had been deformed, they used a computer to virtually “flatten” the tablet. That produced the image on the right.

What do you see in those two images? I see a lot of dimples, but there are clearly some scratches that seem to form shapes, one of which looks like a stick figure of a person. The authors indicate that this is what they see:

The authors’ sketch of what they think is on the lead tablet (drawing from the scientific paper linked above; note that each X-ray image shown above is a mirror image, so this drawing reverses the image shown on the right)

I don’t see much of that, but then again, I haven’t been studying the raw X-ray images in detail. It’s possible that if I spent enough time with all the images they have, I might see everything they see. However, their own note towards the end of the scientific paper indicates that one author sees more letters than the other authors.

So…assuming the things drawn above really are on the tablet, what does it say? According to the authors, it says:

You are cursed by the god yhw, cursed.

You will die, cursed—cursed, you will surely die.

Cursed you are by yhw—cursed.

This, of course, would be consistent with the account in Joshua 8:30-35, since verse 34 says:

Then afterward he read all the words of the Law, the blessing and the curse, according to everything that is written in the Book of the Law.

While this is a potentially very exciting discovery, the scientific paper leaves me skeptical. Apparently, I am not the only one.

Whether or not this tablet ends up being what the authors think it is, I have no doubt that the events in the book of Joshua happened in just the way they are reported. However, it is always nice when archaeology confirms the Biblical record.

Another Example of the “Scientific Consensus” Being Wrong

A red-tailed monkey (click for credit)

There are many people (including many scientists) who really don’t want to think for themselves. As a result, when it comes to a given scientific issue, they simply rely on the “scientific consensus.” After all, with our modern knowledge and technology, how could the scientific consensus possibly be wrong? Sure, it has been wrong in the past, but science has greatly improved over the years. Thus, if the scientific consensus says something, it must be true.

Consider the case of humans being born with “tails.” Dr. Karl Giberson tells us:

On rare occasions, humans are born with tails — real functioning tails that can even be “wagged” via voluntary muscles contractions in response to emotional stimuli. Although the birth of a baby with a tail is frightening for parents and typically requires surgery, the remarkable human tail is an important part of the even more remarkable tale of our origins — namely evolution.

Basically, he tells the reader that we evolved from animals that had tails, and evolution simply switched it off in people and great apes. However, every now and again, that switch gets reversed, producing a tail. He then goes on to talk about “crazy creationists” and how they try to argue against the reality of this obvious fact. Not surprisingly, he mischaracterizes their explanations, but what is interesting to me is how he tells the reader to evaluate the creationnists’ arguments:

Note the reasoning process here, keeping in mind that 1) there is a consensus in the scientific community that humans are sometimes born with real tails that are evolutionary throwbacks; 2) the gene for tails has been located in the human genome is the same one that mice use to produce their tails; and 3) the issue is not the human tail, but the problem of bad design in nature.

Dr. Giberson is utterly convinced that when babies are born with a “tail,” it is a result of the “tail gene” that humans inherited from a common ancestor being “turned on,” even though evolution turned it off. Why? Because it’s the scientific consensus, and because there is a gene found in both mice and humans, and we “know” that gene produces the tail in mice. There’s just one problem: the latest research indicates that this argument is most likely false.

As Science Alert informs us, there are typically two types of “tails” that babies can be born with: “true tails” and “pseudotails.” While evolutionists originally thought that one or both of them were vestigial remnants of evolution, we now know better. Neither one of them are related to tails in any way. In fact:

As it turns out, both rare appendages probably represent an incomplete fusion of the spinal column, or what’s known as a spinal dysraphism. This suggests their formation is not a harmless ‘regression’ in the evolutionary process but a concerning disturbance in an embryo’s growth most likely resulting from a mix of genetic and environmental factors.

So, not only was the “scientific consensus” wrong about why these babies are born with “tails,” but it probably resulted in some of those babies not being treated properly. After all, if the extra appendage is really the result of abnormal development in the womb (instead of a vestige of evolution), it is probably a warning sign that the baby should be screened for various neurological disorders.

Yes, we do have many genes in common with many mammals, including mice. Many of those genes (not just one) are involved in tail development in some mammals, and they are also involved in the development of the caudaul eminence, a neurological structure that is unrelated to a tail in people. Unlike Dr. Giberson indicates, this isn’t the result of bad design. In fact, it is a result of excellent design, where the Engineer has used a single biological process as the basis by which many different structures are produced. That basic process is then just “tweaked” to produce the specific outcomes that are desired in different organisms.

Now don’t misunderstand my point. Science is continually changing based on new knowledge, so I don’t have a problem with the fact that the scientific consensus has been shown to be wrong in this case (as well as many others). The problem is that people like Dr. Giberson slavishly follow that consensus without ever considering the fact that it might be wrong. Furthermore, they mock other scientists who actually try to follow the evidence without reference to the scientific consensus. This is contrary to the scientific method, and it could inhibit young scientists from ever questioning the scientific consensus. After all, why should newcomers want to expose themselves to such mockery from more experienced scientists?

My advice to young scientists is to ignore the mocking from condescending people like Dr. Giberson. Challenge the scientific consensus whenever you think the evidence requires it, and don’t worry about the opinion of people who won’t think for themselves! My advice to Dr. Giberson is twofold. First, stop slavishly following the scientific consensus. Second, retract the article I am discussing, since we now know the scientific consensus you relied on is most likely wrong.

The Real Reason Some Scientists are Upset with India for Removing Evolution from One Part of Its Curriculum

A politician (Bhupesh Baghel) inspects an Indian school’s chemistry lab. (click for credit)

The two most important science journals in the world (Nature and Science) are aghast at the news that India has dropped evolution from one part of its curriculum (Std X, which is taken by students who are typically 14-15 years old). Indian scientists are similarly dismayed. An article written by Indian scientists L. S. Shashidhara and Amitabh Joshi puts it this way:

…other than basics of how the human body functions, evolution is perhaps the most important part of biology that all educated citizens should be aware of and, therefore, it should remain in the Std X curriculum which all students study before they choose different specializations in Std XI.

The authors of the article point out that younger students (ages 12-13) will still learn about evolution, and if older students decide to specialize in biology, they will learn about it again. Nevertheless, the authors think it was a huge mistake to remove it from this particular year of study.

Why? They regurgitate the typical evolutionary propaganda that has been repeated over and over again in an attempt to make evolution more important than it really is. For example, they quote Theodosius Dobzhansky’s nonsensical comment that “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution” and Sir Peter Medawar’s inane idea that the only alternative to evolutionary thinking for a biologist is no thinking at all. In fact, flagellate-to-philosopher evolution makes very little sense in the light of modern biological data, and biologists not thinking in evolutionary terms have made incredible scientific discoveries (see here, here, here, here, and here, for example).

If you read Shashidhara and Joshi’s paper closely enough, you will find the real reason they (and others) are upset:

Following the Copernican and Newtonian intellectual revolutions in Europe, living organisms were the last bastion of “religious” or “supernatural” explanations in nature. The Darwinian intellectual revolution showed, that just as in the case for movement of celestial bodies after Newton, there was no need to invoke supernatural explanations to understand the living world, the diversity, relatedness and adaptedness of life forms, or of human origins (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xppn7ITteZw&pp=ygUeQW1pdGFiaCBKb3NoaSBFdm9sdXRpb24gUG9ldHJ5). Thus, evolution is also a central concept in our modern rational world-view, as opposed to a superstitious or mythological one…

In other words, Shashidhara and Joshi decry the loss of evolutionary content in one part of India’s curriculum because it hinders their attempt to root out any hint of religious or supernatural thinking in science. Never mind that religious thinking produced modern science and is used successfully by modern scientists today (see here, here, and here, for example). They don’t like it, so they want to keep Indian students from considering it.

It’s sad when scientists conflate their personal worldview with science. It’s worse when they try to force students to learn that worldview under the guise of “science education.”

To Believe the Climate Change Hype, You Must Ignore History

A 19th-century artist’s interpretation of New England’s “Dark Day,” which occurred on May 19, 1780.

There are many politicians and media figures (as well as a few scientists) who are desperately trying to convince us that global warming (aka “climate change”) is a dire problem that requires radical action right now. One of their most effective tools is to discuss a current event as if nothing like it has ever happened before. That way, they can blame it on climate change. This works, in part, because history education is so poor that most people don’t know what happened in the past.

Consider, for example, the terrible air quality in the New York City area recently. Vox reported on it with the headline, “Why some of the US has the most polluted air in the world right now.” It correctly blames the situation on wildfires in Canada, but then it says:

…this extreme fire event and its long-ranging smoke trail indicate a much larger and concerning trend: wildfires are getting worse, lasting longer, and occurring more frequently, primarily due to climate change.

Of course, none of that statement is even remotely true. According to satellite imagery, here is the area of land burned globally by forest fires each year since 1980:

Notice that there is no trend in the data. From a global perspective, wildfires haven’t changed in 40 years! This is backed up by the most comprehensive study on global wildfires, which states:

…many consider wildfire as an accelerating problem, with widely held perceptions both in the media and scientific papers of increasing fire occurrence, severity and resulting losses. However, important exceptions aside, the quantitative evidence available does not support these perceived overall trends. Instead, global area burned appears to have overall declined over past decades, and there is increasing evidence that there is less fire in the global landscape today than centuries ago.

But what about the air quality in New York? We’ve never seen anything like it before in the U.S., right? Wrong! Historically, the worst air quality recorded in the U.S. occurred on May 19, 1780 in the New England area. It’s referred to as New England’s Dark Day because the sky was so filled with smoke and fog that candles were required starting at about noon. What was the cause? It is impossible to know for sure, but the major contributor seems to be forest fires in the Algonquin Highlands of Ontario, Canada. As discussed in the link above, studies of tree rings in that area (as well as historical records) confirm that a major wildfire occurred there that year.

So while these things don’t happen often, they have happened in the past. Indeed, while one of these new fires might break it, the current record for the single worst forest fire in North America was the Chinchaga fire of 1950. In addition, the available data say that such events aren’t increasing in frequency or severity. Unfortunately, history and science education is incredibly poor these days, so most people just don’t know that. As a result, ignorant (or malicious) politicians and journalists (as well as some scientists) can prey on that lack of knowledge.