Game time!

I would encourage anyone to reply to this thread with an argument for the existence of non-physical entities (gods, your particular god, spirits, souls, etc.) Which has not been already destroyed by other philosophers, scientists, or itself. This is a challenge, as I do not think it can be done. Here are the rules:
1) it must be an argument FOR your side, not an argument AGAINST something else, the reason for this is simple, you are automatically presenting a false dichotomy, which is not a valid argument.
2) it must be clear and concise, verbosity is not permitted
3) it must not employ any other logical fallacies
4) if you present a completely flawless argument which cannot be explained by myself, a philosopher, or another scientist in 24 hours, you win.

Oh, Jonny boy...

Is Louisiana really as backwards as this guy thinks? It's no surprise John G. West is happy about the Louisiana Science Education Act. I mean, he is, after all, one of the senior fellows of the Discovery Institute, which has, so far, not really discovered anything. I have yet to read a scientific paper published by them which provides valid evidence of their claim that life must have been designed. I know they haven't done this because I've read EVERY PDF paper they have available. It is nothing but pseudointellectual jargon full of invalid arguments based upon faulty assumptions. So I think it's time to tear into Mr. West.

Yet in many schools today, instruction about controversial scientific issues is closer to propaganda than education. Teaching about global warming is about as nuanced as Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Discussions about human sexuality recycle the junk science of biologist Alfred Kinsey and other ideologically driven researchers. And lessons about evolution present a caricature of modern evolutionary theory that papers over problems and fails to distinguish between fact and speculation.

Of course they caricature modern evolutionary theory. Your stories do, too. The reason is for simplicity. It would take YEARS of education to teach someone all the evidence for evolutionary theory. Your's, on the other hand, is caricatured much like a piñata. Hollow but for the things which taste good, but rot your teeth. In this case, it rots your understanding of biology and your brain, but it keeps with dogmatic beliefs...

In these areas, the “scientific” view is increasingly offered to students as a neat package of dogmatic assertions that just happens to parallel the political and cultural agenda of the Left.

I'm sorry, but perhaps it's time for you to revise your beliefs if the truth is offensive.

Real science, however, is a lot more messy — and interesting — than a set of ideological talking points. Most conservatives recognize this truth already when it comes to global warming.

Really, so why is it that so little is being done? And just because they acknowledge one theory is true (finally), this doesn't necessarily mean that these people are smart. What it means is that what scientists have known for years (the Earth is warming), and was denied by conservatives for years, was FINALLY accepted by them. This shows that scientists do, sometimes, know what they are talking about. Why do you think we don't know what we're talking about when it comes to evolutionary biology? Your example doesn't show that conservatives are smart, it shows that they are years behind scientific knowledge...

They know that whatever consensus exists among scientists about global warming, legitimate questions remain about its future impact on the environment, its various causes, and the best policies to combat it.

And what scientists don't agree with evolutionary biology? Is it because of some biased assumption? Is it because they have money involved in subverting the scientific community? (cough, Behe, cough)

They realize that efforts to suppress conflicting evidence and dissenting interpretations related to global warming actually compromise the cause of good science education rather than promote it.

Could they, you know, keep up with the science? They would have known global warming since the 1990s. Hell, many geologists knew about it before that. Again, you're not being completely honest, because there IS no evidence. I read every one of your papers, your "evidence" can just as easily be explained by other means without the need of a "designer."

The effort to suppress dissenting views on global warming is a part of a broader campaign to demonize any questioning of the “consensus” view on a whole range of controversial scientific issues — from embryonic stem-cell research to Darwinian evolution — and to brand such interest in healthy debate as a “war on science.”

There will never be a consensus in science, that's partially why it works so well. We are constantly improving our understanding of things. Teaching what we know is useful, teaching what we are unsure of is not useful. We KNOW animals evolve, we KNOW one of the mechanisms is natural selection, we KNOW that another mechanism is genetic drift, we KNOW DNA is a heritable material, we KNOW new traits can arise via evolution, we KNOW how these traits arise, we KNOW all animals on Earth now share a common ancestor, we KNOW lots of things and with what we know, we speculate, propose hypotheses, and test these hypotheses. With these new observations, we apply those data to modern theories to see if it refines any of our understanding. THAT is science.

The Louisiana Science Education Act offers such teachers a modest measure of protection. Under the law, school districts may permit teachers to “use supplementary textbooks and other instructional materials to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review scientific theories in an objective manner.”

Yes, I'm sure these materials will be provided by the Discovery Institute, also...

The act is not a license for teachers to do anything they want. Instruction must be “objective,” inappropriate materials may be vetoed by the state board of education, and the law explicitly prohibits teaching religion in the name of science, stating that its provisions “shall not be construed to promote any religious doctrine.”

Yea, but will it be religion in the guise of pseudoscience?

Of course, that hasn’t stopped the usual suspects from denouncing the bill as a nefarious plot to sneak religion into the classroom. The good news is that the disinformation campaign proved a massive failure in Louisiana. Only three members of the state legislature voted against the measure, which attracted nearly universal support from both political parties.

I never said our legislators and governor were intelligent. Not once have I ever said that of many politicians... I doubt any of them would know "objective" aside from the definition as "main goal" when used by military leaders...

Efforts to prevent local scientists from supporting the bill also failed. At a legislative hearing in May, three college professors (two biologists and one chemist) testified in favor of the bill, specifically challenging the claim that there are no legitimate scientific criticisms of Neo-Darwinism, the modern theory of evolution that accounts for biological complexity through an undirected process of natural selection acting on random mutations.

It's the Modern Synthesis, Neo-Darwinism doesn't tell the whole picture. It also implies that Darwin had a huge play in it, implying that it is rehashed old ideas. Too bad the Modern Synthesis isn't that simple. Is that why you can't understand it, Mr. West?

Facts have implications. If it really is a “fact” that the evolution of life was an unplanned process of chance and necessity (as Neo-Darwinism asserts), then that fact has consequences for how we view life.

Well, it is true that the evolution of life was unplanned, but I would not say evolution is by chance or necessity. It is a complex interplay of plasticity, naturally occurring genetic variation, which is SELECTED for based upon evolvability (which relates to developmental plasticity). This is a straw man argument, IDiot...

In a Darwinian worldview, even God himself cannot know how evolution will turn out — which is why theistic evolutionist Kenneth Miller argues that human beings are a mere “happenstance” of evolutionary history, and that if evolution played over again it might produce thinking mollusks rather than us.

Shouldn't this give you pause? You know, that Kenneth Miller - a theist - is convinced that evolution happens? Lenski put forth a pretty cool paper recently involving evolutionary probability and what leads to it... I think Lenski put another nail in the hollow coffin of ID. Also, animals with large brains are not a teleological result of evolution. It is a result of selective pressures, if they select for larger brains, then larger brains will result.

Today, science is typically portrayed as self-correcting, but it took decades for most evolutionary biologists to disassociate themselves from the junk science of eugenics. For years, the most consistent critics of eugenics were traditionalist Roman Catholics, who were denounced by scientists for letting their religion stand in the way of scientific progress. The implication was that religious people had no right to speak out on public issues involving science.

Roman Catholics who killed millions during the crusades? The ones that helped Hitler? Those Catholics were not convinced of eugenics? They were practicing eugenics! Also, I would like to call into question what makes eugenics wrong other than our social contract? It is a subjective idea that killing humans is bad. I am actually in favor of culling humans to lower numbers, not based upon some arbitrary race, but by how useful the individual is to society, how much they can benefit society, and whether the job they do for society is useful. In other words, instead of support life-long criminals and multiple repeat offenders which are simply a detriment to society, let's study their brains, their genes, their cells, figure out what makes them tick. If it is genetic, sterilize them, if it is developmental, prevent them from raising children. If it is a combination of the two, as it seems to be with modern evidence, sterilize them anyway. Now, the part about eugenics which WAS incorrect is that differing races are somehow "inferior" or "superior" to one another. THIS was the major part which was incorrect.

That was also a justification for a bias. Instead of simply saying that some group was, in hindsight, wrong about a certain thing, you should explain WHY scientists are wrong now, which you still haven't done. You are simply saying that "hey, these people made a mistake, look, see? They're wrong again! Oh, I can't support that claim, but they are!" Even though pretty much every practicing scientist from the early 1900s is dead or at least no longer a scientist. What makes you think the current generation of scientists are equally wrong about something which HAS LOTS of evidence to support it? Quit bitching and produce evidence, this is all we ask.

More on HIV

I came across a very funny comment here. I'll just get to the meat of the issue.

The findings state that HIV just happens to attach to the black host without any resistance; as if the disease was created just for blacks. This should now be the focal point how one race of people hit the HIV lottery.

No, it demonstrates how genes interact with diseases, it's not so much a race issue as a gene issue. It doesn't matter what your race is, it's about what allele you possess.

This needs to be further researched because I truly believe this disease is killing all of us because someone had a problem with one race.

Really, you think that the first cases of HIV, which go back as far as 1959, were caused by a person designing it? Do you also think that this supergenius geneticist at about the same time as we determined the structure of DNA? That's kind of silly...

So if it is man made which probability agrees it is than we definitely have the capability to find the cure or release the cure or whatever it takes for US ALL to no longer be at RISK!

I wish it was this simple... But even if it IS manmade, if your assumption is correct, the person that designed this virus is probably long deceased as he/she designed it before 1959, so unless he or she was less than 30 at the time of this, it is pretty much guaranteed he or she is dead.

Bottomline this disease would not be smart enough to only want to attach and thrive best through a black host; unless it was genetically engineered to do just that.

It's not "smart," it does what it does via the basic interactions of it's molecules... It wasn't designed...

By the way how is this not headline news, but 1200 people with food poisoning can outweigh the 40,000 new cases of African-American HIV victims that will die from this disease in this society.

You should study some social psychology; the 1200 people with food poisoning are near us, and it immediately puts us at risk, HIV does not, provided we modify our own behaviors to account for this virus; it is easier to avert than food poisoning. We must eat to live, we don't have to shoot heroin with contaminated needles, we don't have to have unprotected sex without medical exams and long-standing relationships, we can even have a long-standing, monogamous relationship and have children knowing full well that neither individual has this blood-born/sexually transmitted virus.

There is no way a world where promiscuity runs rapids in all societies should blacks who only make up 12% of the world's population should attribute for more than 70% of new HIV cases.

Yes, well, it originated in Africa, and while I think we should try to find a treatment, your harping about it being a conspiracy doesn't help matters, it simply confuses the issue.

Once again I'm asking whoever is reading this article and understands the magnitude of this message please forward it along. This is not just OUR scientist fight, this is OUR fight. OUR family members and OUR friends are dying from this disease and they don't care why they got it, they just want to know how to get rid of it.

And perhaps here is the issue; it cannot be cured as of yet, we are working on it...

So, before another dollar gets spent on some research that is driven towards a global cure for mans most recent plague than do me a favor and save your findings because we are still burying OUR sons and daughters, OUR brothers and sisters, OUR mothers and fathers and worst of all OUR babies and elderly are dying from this lobotomy created disease.

Lobotomy created? Do you mean laboratory? Perhaps you should modify your behavior as the rest of the world has done to cope with the means by which this disease is transmitted rather than crying about how horrible it is.

PLEASE MANKIND we don't deserve to have a weapon of mass destruction pointed directly in to all off OUR bedrooms please let's stand for something.

You are insinuating that 1) it is a weapon, which I have already explained why it was not created by humans and 2) it's so horrible for you because you can't prevent it, which I've already explained to you that you CAN.

I do not pity anyone that gets this disease if he or she has access to a computer and internet. I do, however, pity those who are uneducated in the matter or contracted the disease due to circumstances beyond their control, i.e. infected blood transfusions, rape, malevolent use of infected needles, etc.. I would also like to tell you to please shut up when it comes to HIV research, because you clearly are ignorant of thousands of bits of evidence which would enlighten you to what HIV is, how it is transmitted, and what can be done to prevent it. Were it manmade, someone very stupid designed it to be transmitted via bodily fluids instead of specifically targeting genetic markers present only in the target population and spreading rapidly by contact.

If you would like to find out what I'm doing to continue this movement please e-mail me @ francwaa1981@aol.com. I am only one man but I have several thousand people who believe in the eradication of this disease just as strongly as you and I do.

What exactly ARE you doing besides telling researchers to quit looking for a cure?

Science Reporting

Here are some examples of why reporters discussing science need a background in the science they are reporting.
Instead of just reporting what the researchers said, as this author did, someone educated in epigenetic modifications, the individual could ask questions like "how were these samples supplied" and "from what cells were these samples taken." Epigenetic modification is useful for individual cells, just because certain genes are unmethylated or acetylated at one point in time and then later are methylated does not mean that the these genes are methylated in all cells. The only thing they demonstrated here is that certain genes which are unmethylated can later become methylated. This is something we've known for a very long time. The only thing to be taken from this article is that John Hopkins was wasting money. Now, what they didn't say was that we've known this for the better part of a decade. They also didn't explain what research paper this was put in, or will be put in, or if it was purely speculative.


This one completely misses the point that prions ARE understood far better than this article leads us to believe. The "replication" of prions isn't replication at all, it is auto-catalytic refolding of the normal protein into the other conformational state. Look up PrP or just check this out.

Here's a gem of an article lacks any evidence for the claims being investigated. It's about as useful as speculation only without giving the evidence that leads someone to speculate.

Please, people, if you're going to report on something, tell me what leads you to conclude these things, not just what the speculations or conclusions are.

Please listen to the evidence

It would seem someone from "pleaseconvinceme" finally read my letter:
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Search Engine Phrase pleaseconvinceme
Search Engine Name Google Blog Search
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City Mission Viejo
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doesn't look like they changed anything, so I'll break down their claims and explain WHY they are wrong.

How can you even begin to question something as well established as evolution?'

Well, you might be surprised to find that the ‘fact’ of evolution is really not a fact at all. Like any other notion of how we got here, it is simply another theory that needs to be fairly examined. I think that enough time has passed since Darwin first proposed the idea for us to now look at it with fresh eyes and the wisdom of years of research. Let’s see if the theory can be supported by the evidence.

Actually, animals do evolve, this has been demonstrated COUNTLESS times, but here's a really good short list of Lenski's experiments which are pretty good ad explaining why you're wrong. Also, Darwin was not the first to propose that things evolve, that was done by MANY scientists long before, Darwin provided a mechanism and the modern evolutionary synthesis is FAR from Darwin's original, now relatively uninformed, proposal.

'Isn’t the evidence overwhelming?'

Yep, it surely is, but let's see what you have to say...

That all depends on what definition of evolution you are trying to prove. If you are trying to argue that the all life here on planet earth evolved from non-living chemical elements (macroevolution), then very little has actually been demonstrated by science.

Except, you know, abiogenesis is NOT evolution, it's fundamentally different. For the second part dealing with "macroevolution," you can also look at phylogenetics research around the world which ALL SUPPORT evolution knowing what we know about genetics.

To believe in this form of evolution, one has to have an fair amount of faith; far more faith than is required to believe that a creator God is responsible for the diversity of life that we presently see.

All you demonstrated is a lack of understanding of what evolution is, you put up a straw man of your idea of what abiogenesis is (a very inaccurate one at that), called it evolution, and then proceeded to strike it down. This is neither evidence, nor valid argument.

'But aren’t you biased as a Christian?'

Let me answer this for you, "yes."

Well, I wasn’t always a Christian, and in the years that I was an atheist, I simply accepted the theory of evolution without truly investigating its claims.

Really, you were? Not a very educated one. I would go so far as to say you still aren't very educated in evolutionary biology, genetics, and natural history, but you may very well be educated in them and are just being intellectually dishonest with both yourself the public.

But for the record, as a human being, I definitely have a point of view. Please remember, however, that EVERYONE has a point of view.

Some are based upon evidence, others are based upon dogma...

No one comes to ANY question without a history and perspective.

Except, you know, you can learn the technique to rid yourself of bias when it is necessary. It is a very useful tool.

The real issue is: does my point of view prevent me from fairly examining the evidence?

My question is, what evidence, you haven't presented any yet. This reads like a work of post-modern literature, both verbose and empty.

Let’s simply do our best to lay out the evidence and you be the judge about what it happens to say about the ‘fact’ of evolution…

Very well, let's do so, but the only evidence you present is your personal incredulity. This does not make for a very good argument.

HIV-1 and DARC

I think I'm going to put up something a little more scientific this time, so if you haven't read Abbie's posts on gag, pol, and env, you should do so, even thought it won't make any difference for this post, it's just good reading on retroviruses in general. You should also check out the BBC's article on DARC and HIV-1. Once you've done that, I'm going to get to the science of why DARC plays a role in HIV-1 infection and progression.

So far, we know:
HIV-1 can bind to DARC on red blood cells (RBCs)
RBCs can act as a reservoir for HIV-1 if they express DARC
What this means is that HIV-1, in individuals lacking DARC, is capable of binding far fewer targets than in individuals with DARC expressed on RBCs.
This means that HIV-1 binds to CD4+ T cells far easier when DARC is not present, allowing infection to begin far faster.
This also means that it is much easier to acquire HIV-1

Now, if DARC is present, HIV-1 will bind to RBCs instead of CD4+ T cells slowing infection rate and possibly preventing it in low level innoculations due to the limited viability of HIV-1. If the virus is successfully prevented for a period of time, I would suspect viability would decrease further from room temperature when at body temperature making extremely low titers of virus far less likely to lead to infection.

My next virus-related topic will be something like "why are retroviruses so damn hard to get rid of"

Better than creationism!

Oh damn, I came across an awesome webpage with people that can't even touch the creationists. If anyone wants to roll around on the floor laughing hysterically.

Read, enjoy, don't hurt yourself...

Here it is.