Molecules; Paddlefish; Whale Brains; and Dog Paws – the week of Jan 23

Yes, I haven’t posted in a week. Here’s what you missed from Mr Thomas, all in one go. See your doctor if adverse reactions persist.

WednesdayThursdayFriday

It’s happened again – I’m a good week behind in DpSUs, so it’s a good thing there’s not much to them. First, Marine Reptile Fossil Rewrites Evolution.

Speedy Selection

The DpSU for last Tuesday was called Researchers See Fish Adapt in One Generation.

The source is a paper – you can see the full text here – that details an experiment investigating the speed at which fish adapted to breeding in hatcheries. They found that the fish managed to do so in a single generation, but that this came at a cost to their survivability in the wild. Mr Thomas, author of the DpSU, expresses his incredulity at this being the result of natural selection, as was credited.

Step Canyon

Finally, a That’s a Fact video that’s more creationism than theology. Indeed, it’s about the most famous of creationist canards – namely, that the Grand Canyon. Or rather, something they call the “Little Grand Canyon“:

(I’m not actually sure why that is working, considering that the previous one still wont display. The ICR is weird.)

Superstitious From the Beginning

To return, at last, to the DpSU for Thursday, last week – Oldest Temple Topples Evolutionists’ History of Religion. To give you some background, the relevant Wikipedia article begins:

Göbekli Tepe is a Neolithic (stone-age) hilltop sanctuary erected at the top of a mountain ridge in southeastern Anatolia, some 15km northeast of the town of Şanlıurfa. It is the oldest known human-made religious structure. The site was most likely erected by hunter-gatherers in the 10th millennium BCE (c. 12,000 years ago) and has been under excavation since 1994 by German and Turkish archaeologists. Together with Nevalı Çori, it has revolutionized understanding of the Eurasian Neolithic.

It seems that it’s taken all this time for Mr Thomas to notice. Here’s the picture of the site that everyone’s using, for some visual context: (you can find a gallery of images here)

IEE: 2011 Rewind

I warned you that this week of posts from Science Essentials would be boring – even despite the introduction of two new posts a week. Why? Because Dr Forlow is just regurgitating her old stuff. Paradoxically, this is quite a long post.

Antivaxers on the ICR’s Facebook Page

I take a look at the ICR’s facebook page from time-to-time, just to see how much dissent there is among the ranks. You will remember the DpSU from Friday, More Scientific Misconduct, where Andrew Wakefield was listed amongst other cases of scientific fraud. Now, Wakefield has his supporters, has quite a few of them as it happens, so it was inevitable that there would be at least somebody defending him in the comments. With a link to Natural News in one case:

More Scientific Misconduct

Before I get to Thursday’s DpSU, about origin of religion, I’m going to quickly deal with the latest one, Is Scientific Misconduct on the Rise?

You may remember, from back in late November, two consecutive articles from Christine Dao on this very subject – the first was Mistakes and Misconduct in Science, and the second was More Transparency Needed in Science Textbooks, Museums. This article is by Brian Thomas, but there isn’t much in it that is new and so going to those two previous links will really suffice for a DpSU discussion for today.

IEE: Junk

Last week’s Science Essentials posts began with Are You Made of Junk?

Frozen Mammoth Proteins

Today’s DpSU is more soft tissue stuff: Over 100 Frozen Original Mammoth Proteins Found. The age for this lot is 43,000 years, much younger than usual for a B.T. article on the subject.