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You know, this has been happening for a while, but I just didn’t notice it. It took another post by intelligent design proponent David Klinghoffer for me to make the connections – was I oblivious before because I’m a lowly undergraduate? Hah. The Discovery Institute has a strange relationship with online criticism. On one hand they hate it, because – naturally – it shows how wrong they are about most things. On the other, they love it, because they can derive thousands and [...] Last week, I was lucky enough to attend the Genetics Society of AustralAsia 2012 conference as an undergraduate volunteer. One of the fascinating presentations I had the pleasure of sitting in on was given by mammalian geneticist Jenny Graves, on the evolution of genetic sex determination in vertebrates – and, like many a talk at GSA2012, I livetweeted it. Somehow, that got back to the fine folk at COSMOS, a well-respected Australian science magazine, and I was asked if I would like to write a news piece [...] Why have I been staying away from writing about the Discovery Institute? Stuff like this keeps happening: Yesterday our friends at Biologic Institute were being pestered on their Facebook page by science writer and Discover magazine blogger Carl Zimmer on the subject of Science and Human Origins. Facebook is really no place for a substantive debate — the format is such that it doesn’t repay the time you put in. So I wrote to Zimmer to invite him to participate in a genuine and informative online debate here at ENV, [...] » Continue reading “Patience: lost” Regular readers of this blog may know of “Will”, a frequent commenter on my posts about evolutionary biology and intelligent design who seems to disagree with absolutely everything I say. Some would, and have, called him a troll – I’m a little more lenient in my descriptions, but I usually restrain from responding to him too much, given that his comments are often filled with semi-decipherable appeals to “natural genetic engineering” and consciousness in bacteria and other organisms. In short, I really don’t have time to wade through the murky [...] » Continue reading “Am I an evolutionary ideologue?” What? You1 haven’t heard of Louis C.K.? Really? Then you’ve been missing out on one of the best stand-up comedians alive today. His bits on the inquisitiveness of young children and why the world is amazing, yet nobody cares were formative in my appreciation of good comedy. He’s a comedy [...] » Continue reading “Tabletop Transitional – Comedian Louis C.K. on evolution” The Novellatron1 – the skeptical, alien-made robot also known as Dr. Steven Novella – has many detractors in the worlds of pseudoscience and antiscience, but none that I would call his nemesis: other than perhaps that of Dr. Michael Egnor, conservative Catholic neurosurgeon and ID proponent. Hmm, then again, maybe “nemesis” is too strong [...] » Continue reading “How To Reclaim A Derogatory Nickname, with Michael Egnor” Don’t worry, I’m still alive! It’s nearing the end of my exam period, with three exams already done and dusted. My last exam – Principles of Genetics – is on Friday, and then I’m free. Stress levels haven’t been too bad, but as you’re probably aware, it’s taken the wind out of my blogging. Oof!1 I’ve also learnt that I’m not a huge fan of medical microbiology, especially when it comes to memorising specific antibiotics. Why would [...] » Continue reading “The burden of (exams and) proof” Intelligent design-inspired hip-hop wasn’t the only thing of note I found in a recent trawl of the now-defunct blog ID Arts. Oh no, I stumbled upon this gem written by the Discovery Institute’s very own Casey Luskin back in July of 2008: a parody template of a generic conversation between a “Darwinist” and an “ID Proponent”. Here’s a taste1: ID Proponent: Judge ignored pro-ID research. [...] Today’s science link is the YouTube channel of QualiaSoup. Science and critical thinking communication can be tough through the medium of text. Sure, you can have a few pictures in there now and again, but the majority of the information must be absorbed through people sitting there and actively reading what has been written. While that’s legitimate and all well and good, it’s obvious that most people would prefer to watch a visually-stimulating and entertaining video than read text, no matter how well written it is. [...] » Continue reading “Monday Science Link – QualiaSoup’s excellent science communication videos” |
Homologous Legs is the personal blog of Jack Scanlan, an Australian science communicator and biology student. Topics of interest here include the intelligent design/evolution "war", biology, philosophy, religion, music, and mostly coherent thoughts from a scattered brain. 
 
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