Reflectorites
Below are web article links, headlines and/or paragraphs for the
period 15-21 January, in descending date order, with my
comments in square brackets.
Steve
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http://www.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/01/21/feathereddinosaurs.ap/ CNN ...
Scientist disputes fossil is 'missing link' between dinosaurs, birds Some
believe the fossils represent dinosaurs that are the immediate ancestors of
the first birds January 21, 2000 ... BEIJING (AP) -- A fossil hailed as an
important find for the theory that birds evolved from dinosaurs is really a
composite of fossils from different creatures, a Chinese scientist says. Xu
Xing, an eminent paleontologist in Beijing, said he has found fossils that
prove the fossilized turkey-sized creature unveiled last year may not be the
evolutionary link some thought it was. ... Also at:
http://www.latimes.com/wires/whealth/20000121/tCB00V0861.html &
http://www.ngnews.com/news/2000/01/01212000/feathereddino_9321.asp
National Geographic Society ... January 21, 2000 Dino-Bird Fossil
Controversy Continued studies of a fossil specimen that was first thought
to be a missing link between dinosaurs and birds have revealed that the
fossil may be the remains of two or more extinct creatures. ...a primitive
toothed bird and another portion may be the tail of a dromaeosaurid
dinosaur. ... "It was disappointing to learn that Archaeoraptor may be a
combination of animals," said Christopher Sloan, senior assistant editor of
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC and author of the magazine's article about
the find, published last November. "But we're still convinced that
Archaeoraptor is an important specimen. After all, if it is a composite, it is
a composite of some very important 125 million-year-old fossils." ... [Now
*that's* what I call putting a positive spin on it! In the CNN and LA Times
articles, Xu Xing says it more truthfully: "For science, this is a disaster."]
http://www.cnn.com/2000/books/news/01/21/margaret.mead.ap/index.html
CNN ... 'Coming of Age in Samoa' named 20th century's worst nonfiction
... January 21, 2000 ... HONOLULU (AP) -- In 1925, a 23-year-old New
York City college student set sail for American Samoa to observe the
transition from childhood to adulthood among members of a primitive
culture. ... What she concluded after visiting the Manu'an Islands 2,300
miles south of Hawaii was that teen-age girls and boys there were free of
the hang-ups of their Western counterparts and that sexual promiscuity was
common. "Samoans laugh at stories of romantic love, scoff at fidelity to a
long absent wife or mistress, believe explicitly that one love will quickly
cure another," Mead wrote in the best-selling "Coming of Age in Samoa."
Those conclusions long have been scoffed at by American Samoans. And
now a conservative academic think tank promises to keep the debate going
by naming Mead's 1928 treatise the worst nonfiction book of the past 100
years. ... "So amusing did the natives find the white women's prurient
questions that they told her the wildest tales -- and she believed them!" the
46- year-old nonprofit institute wrote recently. ... [It is incredible that
Mead did not realise that asking leading sex questions of teenagers in a
small community would elicit the sort of response that they thought she
wanted to hear. One can imagine the teenagers comparing notes afterwards
and vying to tell the most outrageous story! Another case of science
believing what it wants to believe, going out looking for the evidence to
support its theory, and not subjecting it to rigorous testing and sceptical
analysis. Now what other science does that? :-) It would be funny if it
wasn't for the *devastating* effect such `science' has had on society.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000119/sc/science_sex_1.html Yahoo!
... Wednesday January 19 ... Male Sex Genes Evolve More Quickly,
Scientists Say LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists in the United States have
uncovered new evidence which they say supports Charles Darwin's theory
that the desire to mate is the strongest driving force behind evolution. ...
researchers from the University of Chicago said genes linked to mating in
male monkeys and humans have evolved much faster than other genes
because of competition and pressures to find a mate. ... Wu and his
colleagues discovered the accelerated evolution of the male sex genes by
studying three sets of genes linked to sperm production in chimpanzees,
gorillas, orangutans and humans. The genes from different humans were
virtually the same but when they compared the human genes with the
chimpanzees' the researchers were surprised to find they were very
different. The scientists had expected the genes to be similar in accordance
with a theory of evolution that says even after millions of years of evolution
genes of closely related species should be barely distinguishable from one
another. ... [Let me get this straight. If humans' and chimps' genes were the
same that would be "in accordance with a theory of evolution". But when
they turned out to be different that "supports Charles Darwin's theory ...
[of] ...evolution"? Wow! What a theory! :-)]
http://www.cnn.com/2000/TECH/space/01/21/earth.roll.ap/index.html
CNN ... Scientists: Ancient Earth wobble slightly shifted poles January 21,
2000 ... WASHINGTON (AP) -- Suddenly, long ago, something changed
the Earth's weight distribution, causing the planet to roll slightly before
slowly returning to normal, say a pair of scientists studying underwater
volcanoes. They're not sure just what happened 84 million years ago, but
they have collected evidence they believe shows the planet shifted like an
out-of-balance ball, relocating the poles and moving the location of
Washington to the tropics. "What it appears that happened, was a rapid
shift," followed by a "slow recovery to where things are today," said
William W. Sager of Texas A&M University. ... [If this did happen, it is
interesting that the Earth's design caused it to recover its initial
equilibrium.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000118/sc/argentina_dinosaur_1.html
Yahoo! ... Tuesday January 18 ... Biggest Dinosaur Believed Dug Up in
Argentina By Lucila Sigal BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - The bones of what
may be the largest dinosaur species yet discovered were found by a villager
in a vulture-ridden series of canyons in Argentina's southern Patagonia
region, local paleontologists said on Tuesday. The beast is an herbivore
that stormed the earth during the Cretaceous period up to 105 million years
ago. Estimates on its length hover between 157 feet and 167 feet. "Two
cervical vertebrae 3.94 feet high were found, in addition to a femur 6.56
feet in height and some other indicative bones," paleontologist Carlos
Munoz, director of the Florentino Ameghino museum in southern Rio
Negro province, told Reuters. ... [Now that's what I call a *dinosaur*! :-)]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000118/sc/health_aids_3.html Yahoo!
... Tuesday January 18 ... New AIDS Drugs Revise Treatment
Recommendations CHICAGO (Reuters) - Drugs developed in the past few
years have created new AIDS treatment options tailored to individual
patients, a panel of experts said on Tuesday in its revised guidelines for
caregivers. ... "Now we know that eradication with drug therapy alone is
not a realistic goal at this time. Our new recommendations take this into
consideration along with long-term-survival," report author Paul
Volberding of the University of California-San Francisco wrote. Patients
whose blood level of the virus does not decrease rapidly after the initiation
of therapy may not be adhering to their drug regimen, or it may reveal the
drugs are not being absorbed properly or may be a sign of drug resistance.
Changes in the body's immune system can also negate certain types of
treatment, the report said." [Sounds like a lot of escape clauses! If the virus
count goes down the drugs are OK. If the virus count does not go down the
drugs are still OK! How would they know if the drugs are not OK? And with
multiple drugs how would they know which ones are OK and which ones
aren't OK?]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000117/sc/australia_fish_2.html
Yahoo! ... Monday January 17 ... Australia Fish Fossil May Be Distant
Human Relative CANBERRA, Australia (Reuters) - A 400-million-year-
old fossilized fish recently discovered near an Australian dam may be one
of the human race's earliest relatives, according to researchers at the
Australian Museum. Museum research fellow Alex Ritchie said the fossil's
braincase showed the fish had an eyestalk connecting its eye with its brain.
It was the first fish of its type to be preserved well enough to show this.
Ritchie said in a statement it was probably a primitive type of ray-finned
fish. Previously, it was thought only archaic armored fish and some
primitive sharks had eyestalks. ... Also at:
http://helix.nature.com/nsu/000113/000113-8.html Nature Science
Update ... 13 January 2000 relics : Gone fishing HENRY GEE. ....
Although the still-unnamed fossil resembles those of primitive ray-
finned fishes already known, it differs in unexpected ways. One is the
presence of what was once an 'eyestalk' -- a piece of cartilage that
secured the eyeball in its socket. This feature is found in sharks: its
presence in a bony fish is remarkable. And disturbing. For it suggests a
number of possibilities. First, that some, if not many features thought
to be advanced and exclusive to bony fishes, were once found more
widely. We are more closely related to sharks than was once thought.
Could it be that sharks are more advanced, highly evolved vertebrates,
and that bony fishes are primitive left-overs? This would turn
conventional wisdom on its head, and horrify most researchers. ...
[There was an unwebbed article on this in an Australian magazine some
time ago that I meant to scan but didn't get a round TUIT. If anyone is
interested I could scan it and email it to them. It will be interesting how
this turns out. But, even if it doesn't it once again it shows how fragile
the evolutionist confident transitional fossils claims are. The
Talk.origins "Transitional Vertebrate Fossils FAQ" (where is the
"Transitional Invertebrate Fossils FAQ" BTW) at
http://earth.ics.uci.edu/faqs/faq-transitional/part1a.html#fish has:
"Transition from primitive jawless fish to sharks, skates, and rays".
That this could easily become "Transition from sharks to primitive
jawless fish, skates, and rays" (or any combination) without
evolutionary theory missing a beat, shows how unfalsifiable any
*specific* common ancestry claims is.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000117/sc/canada_frog_1.html
Yahoo! ... Monday January 17 ... Canadian Family Scores Hit With Virtual
Dissection TORONTO (Reuters) - A digital frog that can be dissected at
the click of a mouse could make high school biology classes easier for the
faint-hearted. A Canadian mother and son team have created Digital Frog
International, a small software company based in Pusinch, Ontario which
has developed a CD-ROM program that allows pupils to dissect a frog
without the pungent smell of formaldehyde or the ethical objections. ... [I
hope this is in before I have to cut up my first frog! For those who don't
know already, I have been accepted into a university Bachelor of Science
(Biology) degree course, part-time. My daughter told me that one of her
frogs was discovered to be still alive half-way through the dissection!
Maybe I'll try to swith to *Theoretical* Biology! :-)]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000117/sc/health_aids_2.html Yahoo!
... Monday January 17 ... HIV Infection Among the Young Down in
Zambia By Manoah Esipisu LUSAKA, Zambia (Reuters) - Changing
sexual behavior in Zambia has resulted in a decline in HIV infection in the
key age group of 15 to 19 years, AIDS researchers said Monday. ... The
report attributed the decline in HIV/AIDS infections to increase in the use
of condoms, reduction in the number of sexual partners, fear and
personalizing of AIDS, as well as increased knowledge about preventive
practices. ... About half of all new HIV infections in the world occur in
those aged 15 to 24. Nearly 34 million people in the world currently live
with HIV or AIDS and some 11 million Africans have died of AIDS, while
a further 22 million are infected. ... [One wonders how accurate the original
incidence figures were, to evaluate this improvement? The current
mortality rate of only (11*100)/(34+22) = 19.6% of all people in Africa
who have ever had HIV or AIDS, presumably over the last 10-15 years,
while bad, does not seem as bad as the media reports would indicate,
especially considering Africa's already poor background mortality rate.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000116/sc/saudi_genetic_1.html
Yahoo! ... Sunday January 16 ... Report: Tribal Intermarriage Affects
Saudi Health WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A preference for marrying
cousins has, over the generations, caused an increase in genetic disease
among Saudi Arabians, The Washington Post reported on Sunday.... the
rates of some metabolic diseases may be as much as 20 times higher in
Saudi Arabia than in countries where people cast farther afield for partners.
Such diseases include thalassemia, which causes severe anemia, sickle cell
anemia and diabetes. ... [It is interesting that sickle cell anemia is a result of
in-breeding. Maybe its prevalence in Africa and its decline in Afro-
Americans is not solely (or even mainly) the result of natural selection
conferring immunity to malaria, but a consequence of tribal inbreeding in
Africa? Maybe it's like the Peppered Moth, not proving much anyway and
just another case of Darwinists seeing what they want to be there?]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000116/sc/space_mars_4.html Yahoo!
... Sunday January 16 ... Efforts to Find Mars Lander Expected to End
Monday ... PASADENA, Calif. (Reuters) - Scientists are expected on
Monday to give up attempts to locate the ill-fated Mars Polar Lander,
which disappeared on Dec. 3 as it started a descent to the Red Planet. ...
"These attempts will end on Monday, January 17, at which time we expect
to end attempts to recover the spacecraft," the statement said. ... The
review board is looking at budget, management structure and schedules of
the Mars programs and will present its findings in mid-March. ... See also:
http://www.newscientist.com/ns/19991225/newsstory4.html New Scientist
NEWS 25/12/99 ... They have a problem. FOCUS Never mind alien life.
After a string of embarrassing mishaps, NASA could soon be fighting to
save its own skin. ITS MISSIONS have got faster and cheaper--but they
don't seem to be getting any better. After losing two spacecraft since
September, NASA's policy of exploring the Solar System on a shoestring is
in disarray, and the critics are closing in. But many space analysts warn that
the agency's problems run much deeper than the loss of a few probes. In
the post-Cold War world, they argue, NASA is in danger of losing its
raison d'etre. And by trying to reinvent itself as the torchbearer for the
search for extraterrestrial life, the agency is building its future on shaky
ground. "It's not something you can hang a $13 billion-a-year agency on,"
says John Pike, a space analyst with the Federation of American Scientists
in Washington DC. ... [It will be interesting what the review board's
findings will be. I would not be surprised if NASA's preoccupation with the
origin-of-life may be curtailed.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000116/sc/health_back_1.html Yahoo!
... Sunday January 16 ... Research Shows How Slipped Disks Fix
Themselves WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two enzymes work to help cells
in a ruptured disk fix themselves, researchers said on Sunday, adding their
finding may help doctors find surgery-free ways to treat back injuries. The
finding also explains why some people who "slip a disk" get better on their
own, while others need more help recovering, researchers at Nashville's
Vanderbilt University, said. ... [Another examples of the human body's
amazing inventory of self-repair tools.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000115/sc/health_diabetes_1.html
Yahoo! ... Saturday January 15 ... Study: Bioengineering Boosted Mouse
Insulin PITTSBURGH (Reuters) - Genetically engineered mice who
produce extra insulin may help researchers find a way to treat human
diabetics more effectively, University of Pittsburgh researchers said on
Saturday. [More possible benefits from genetic engineering. The squeaky
voice and fear of cats are just harmless side-effects! :-)]
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"The trouble was that in reading widely during my early teens I ran into the
Darwinian theory, for a little while with illusions and then with less respect
than adults with bated breath were wont to show. The theory seemed to me
to run like this: `If among the varieties of a species there is one that
survives better in the environment than the others, then the variety that
survives best is the one that best survives.' If I had known the word
tautology I would have called this a tautology. People with still more bated
breath, called it natural selection. I made them angry, just as I do today, by
saying that it did nothing at all. You could select potatoes as much as you
pleased but you would never make them into a rabbit. Nor by selecting oak
trees could you make them into colonies of bats, and those who thought
they could in my opinion were bats in the belfry." (Hoyle F., "Mathematics
of Evolution", [1987], Acorn Enterprises: Memphis TN, 1999, p2)
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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