This review of Peter Enns' short but important book, The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn't Say about Human Origins, is getting some discussion on the web. I just finished Enns' book, so I want to share some impressions of this review and what Enns is...
science
Validating Signs of Intelligence (Where We Want to Anyway)
What if someday we detect a signal from outer space that turned out to be the Fibonacci sequence? Would that be proof of extraterrestrial intelligence? Be careful how you answer!
How Research Reaches the Public and PaleoBabble is Born
Robert Cargill posted this today on his blog. It's funny because we've all seen it happen, again and again. Although the creators forgot to include the Fantasy Channel (formerly known as the History Channel).
Can Christianity Accommodate An Extraterrestrial Reality? Dr. Heiser’s 2003 God, Man, ET Lecture
I just came across my lecture from the 2003 God, Man, and ET Conference on YouTube. The event was hosted at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside. I participated in the planning of the event. Aside from myself, the speakers were Dr. Hugh Ross, Dr. Paul Nelson, Richard...
Extraterrestrial Life Comes from Earth?
The Uncommon Descent blog has some pull quotes from an article from the Technology Review/Physics Archive blog entitled, The Amazing Trajectories of Life-Bearing Meteorites from Earth that make that point. This is the idea that, when earth was struck by space objects...
Intelligent Design and Nobel Laureates
From time to time I post on intelligent design (ID) here, as that perspective on origins could be (and has been) offered as a backdrop for any intelligent ET life that might be found out in the universe someday. That is, the Designer would also have designed alien...
Is “Jesus Archaeology” Becoming Like Professional Wrestling?
That was the thought that hit me after reading "Scientists say Turin Shroud is Supernatural." Now, you all know that I'm interested in the Shroud of Turin. (How could I not be when I write a blog like this?) Despite my ambivalence toward the object (I lean toward the...
Are We Alone? A Summary of the Issues
I just listened to a short podcast from the Skeptoid blog entitled, "Are We Alone." It's a good, succinct survey of the problems and obstacles to being optimistic about other inhabited worlds and intelligent civilizations -- in terms of there being such a thing, our...
Of Sophistry and Antagonism Toward Fine-Tuning
I found this recent post entitled, "Is This the Dumbest Ever 'Refutation' of the Fine-Tuning Argument Ever?" worth the read (and a bit funny). It's about some very poor thinking on the part of British philosopher Anthony Grayling with respect to his disdain of the...
The Higgs-Boson Hype
I like to post on things like this every so often to remind readers that science can be marred by, and married to, hype. I was reading through some recent posts by mathematician Peter Woit on his Not Even Wrong blog this morning and came across several items worth...
A Blow to Inter-Dimensional ETs?
I'm not sure if the death of the multi-verse theory described in this obituary is correct, or if correct, whether that kills off the possibility of any other universe (shy of all the layers of the multi-verse). I'm also not convinced that "other universe" is an...
More Journalistic Incompetence in Reporting on "ET DNA"
You may have heard about the recent NASA news conference. Apparently the people at the Examiner couldn't process the simple centerpiece of the new event. The Examiner is an online twaddle rag akin to the Weekly World News. Here's the Examiner's headline: DNA,...
Junk DNA as Evidence of ET Life in our Genes? Try Again.
There have been a number of news items and articles recently (last year - I collect them) on how "junk DNA" is now known to not be junk. Here's an example. As genetic research continues to advance, this previously-assumed junk DNA (called so because it had no...
New Evidence for a 14th Century Shroud of Turin Date
Before you say, "well that's obvious," you should be aware that there is serious science behind the idea that the C-14 dating for the shroud is suspect due to contamination (see The DNA of God?: Newly Discovered Secrets of the Shroud of Turin; the author is a...
BioStation Alpha: Amateur Astronomer Discovers Artificial Structure on Mars?
[[UPDATE: There's now a fifth alternative interpretation -- one not listed below. Alfred McEwen, a planetary geologist at the Lunar and Planetary Lab at the University of Arizona, postulates that, "It looks like a linear streak artifact produced by a cosmic ray,"...