Reflectorites
Below are web article links, headlines and/or paragraphs for the
period 9-26 January, in descending date order, with my comments
in square brackets.
Steve
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/01/000126080531.htm
ScienceDaily ... 1/26/2000 We Are Not Alone - Or Are We? The annals of
science fiction are filled with advanced extraterrestrial creatures like
Klingons and Wookies, Vogons and Romulans, all carrying on in a human
sort of way. And while screenwriters and novelists weave stories around
these characters, some people scour the heavens for signs that such highly
evolved beings really are out there. But a new book by two University of
Washington scientists contends that, contrary to popular thought, we just
might be alone and Earth might be unique, if not in the universe at least in
this celestial neighborhood. In "Rare Earth," published this month by
Copernicus Books/Springer, paleontologist Peter Ward and astronomer
Donald Brownlee examine the remarkable confluence of conditions and
events that deposited life-forming chemicals on Earth, allowed simple life
to gain a foothold and then protected the planet sufficiently and created just
the right environmental factors for advanced life to slowly evolve. ... [That
the Earth is special has long been part of the Christian argument from
design. The opposite view, that life in general and intelligent life in
particular is common throughout the universe has been almost an article of
faith among scientific materialists. Now more and more of them are starting
to realise just *how* special the Earth is. The article lists "Factors that
made advanced life possible" which could have come from Hugh Ross's
writings!]
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DyeHard/dyehard.html ...
ABCNEWS ... January 26, ... Elephant Seals Get Fat Males Live Large A
large bull elephant seal, surrounded by his harem, bellows to proclaim his
dominance. Size does matter when it comes to elephant seals; the heavier
they are, the better their odds of mating. (Burney Le Boeuf/UCSC) ... "The
male is three to 10 times larger than the female," says Burney Le Boeuf,
professor of biology at UCSC, who has studied northern elephant seals
(Mirounga angustirostris) for 30 years. "It almost looks like a different
species." And since only the biggest brutes get a chance to mate, the
animals are growing in size with each generation, he adds. The large adult
males come to shore at the start of the breeding season and compete, often
by fighting, for access to the females. (Burney Le Boeuf/UCSC) ... "It's not
atypical for one male to mate with 150 females in one season," Le Boeuf
says. "He might do that for four years in a row. ... Meanwhile, more than
90 percent of the males that are there, all of whom have high libidos, never
get a chance to mate. It's a power struggle, and it's based on the ability to
fight and being large." ... It apparently also has an impact on life
expectancy. Females live around 18 to 20 years, Le Boeuf says, but "no
male I know of has ever lived longer than 14 years." ... [A good example of
sexual selection. But whether it's doing anything for the long-term good to
the species is unclear.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000125/sc/britain_eggs_3.html Yahoo!
... January 25 ... Lifting of UK Ban Could Lead to Egg Banks-Doctor By
Patricia Reaney LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's decision Tuesday to lift its
ban on women using frozen eggs in fertility treatments could soon lead to
the establishment of human egg banks, a leading fertility expert said
Tuesday. Dr. Mohamed Taranissi, the director of the only British clinic
licensed to freeze human eggs, welcomed the decision and said it will help
many people.... In addition to lifting the ban on a woman using her own
frozen eggs, the Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority (HFEA) --
the body that regulates fertility treatment in Britain -- opened the door for
women to donate frozen eggs to others. ... [No thought is here seems to be
given to the children from such egg banks who, if this anonymous donor
option goes ahead, may never know who their biological mother was.]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000125/sc/cloning_dolly_1.html
... Yahoo! ... January 25 ... Dolly's 'Dad' Dismisses Cloning
Fears By David Luhnow EDINBURGH (Reuters) - Three years ago,
one of history's most extraordinary creatures was born: an unassuming
Scottish sheep named Dolly who became the world's first mammal
cloned from an adult. Now Dolly's "Dad," the scientist who led the
Edinburgh-based team that cloned her, and a former colleague have
written a book telling the story of the unlikely 20th Century icon -- a
tale they hope history will remember as one of human achievement and
not human folly. ... [The artcicle goes on to explain the "folly" part:
"the world began to ponder the possibilities both fascinating and
frightening: the cloning of humans, spare body parts made in a lab, and
designer babies." Indeed. I wonder if 100 years from now they will
wish, on balance, that we had left well enough alone?]
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000125/sc/argentina_dinosaur_3.html
Yahoo! ... January 25 ... Patagonia Vulture Valley Yields New Top
Dinosaur By Robert Elliott LA BUITRERA, Argentina (Reuters) - ...
"There is nothing comparable to this so it is probably a new species," the
wiry Apesteguia said. The tip-off were the two cervical vertebrae each
measuring 3.84 feet, the biggest ever unearthed. "They were so big they
seemed like a femur or tibia, but on closer examination they turned out to
be neck vertebrae," said Jorge Gonzalez, a technical artist from the
Argentine Natural Sciences Museum in Buenos Aires who is in on the dig.
With 10 to 12 vertebrae making up the neck, scientists envision a
planteating sauropod stretching 154-160 feet from head to tail and
towering 45 feet. That is roughly half a city block long and five stories
high. ... Also at:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/dinosaur_patagonia000125.html
ABCNEWS ... January 26, ... "The lush vegetation brought the plant-eaters
and they in turn attracted the meat-eaters," said paleontologist Carlos
Munoz, head of the Florentino Ameghino museum in Cipolletti. In the
Cretaceous period 100 million years ago, La Buitrera was a forested plain
dotted by lakes and sluiced by a huge river that probably flowed into the
Pacific, unobstructed by the Andes mountain range, which had yet to be
born. Bones of dinosaurs that died along the river were swept downstream
and dumped on a bank that is now hard, brown sedimentary rock. The
fossils of what is believed to be the largest animal ever on Earth were
found by Avelas on a ridge overlooking the canyon left by the river. The
spot is perched atop the 128-foot walls of the gorge, which is too narrow
in sections for access by vehicle or even horse. ...The "Rio Negro Giant"
now consists of some 20 individual body parts including femurs, ribs and
tail bones that lie strewn about the excavation site, patiently worked on
eight hours a day with picks, brushes and plaster by the team of Argentine
biologists, technicians and paleontology students. ... [More on the largest
dinosaur fossil ever found. It's a pity it's only plant-eating. We could have
had "Cretaceous Park"! :-)]
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/hydrothermals000125.html
...ABCNEWS ... January 25, ... Venting Life Deep Down Life Without
Sunlight. In the dark, crushing depths along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge - shown
here as the ragged, thin line running down the middle - are communities of
creatures that survive amid a toxic brew of metals and temperatures
reaching 700 degrees Fahrenheit. ... By Jennifer Viegas ... Alien creatures
with seemingly supernatural powers. Strange, smoke-filled landscapes
stretching for miles. Glistening gold nuggets strewn about. A larval shrimp
can swim long distances, traveling to other hydrothermal vents. It loses its
eyes once it settles on a site. It feeds on microbes - growing and harvesting
them off its body. ... Welcome to the ink-black depths of the Atlantic Ocean,
where cracks in Earth's crust spew toxins and superheated water, a
combination that fuels an odd menagerie of life. ... Scientists from the British
Mid-Ocean Ridge Initiative (BRIDGE) program think life on Earth may
have begun at hydrothermal vents. A recent report by the Natural
Environment Research Council stated that conditions for the origin of life
might have followed this recipe: ... scientist John Parkes and his colleagues
write, 'Why do we need to seek the origin of life in the wider realms of
outer space when the conditions were right here, on our own familiar
planet?" [Interesting article on oceanic vents with a list of conditions
needed for the origin of life. Good question about why look for the origin
of life in space when the same conditions would have applied here on
Earth. But the fact is that chemical evolutionists *have* been simulating
those conditions the last 40+ years and life has not popped into existence,
and indeed it appears to have only popped into existence *once* here on
Earth! This is good evidence that physico-chemical processes while
necessary to create life are not sufficient and that what is also needed is
*intelligence*.]
http://www.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/01/24/japan.cloning.ap/index.html
CNN .... Japanese scientists breed clone of a clone ... January 24, 2000 ...
TOKYO (AP) -- Japanese scientists have bred the clone of a cloned bull,
the first time a large cloned animal has itself been cloned, researchers said
Monday. The calf born Sunday night is part of a project to study the life
expectancy and aging of cloned animals, scientists at the Kagoshima
Prefectural Cattle Breeding Development Institute said. The three
generations of genetically identical bulls -- the original animal and the two
clones -- are being studied at the institute in southern Japan. ... Also at:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/clone_beef000124.html
[It was originally thought that the cells of cloned offspring would be have
the same age as the parent, but this seems now not to be the case.]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/asia-pacific/newsid_614000/614688.stm
BBC ... , 22 January, 2000, ... Giant dinosaur eggs found ... A
team of South Korean palaeontologists say they have discovered the
world's largest fossilised dinosaur eggs. The 20 eggs, measuring 41cm (16
inches) from tip to tip, were discovered in a giant nest thought to be 100
million years old. Experts say they could yield new information about how
dinosaurs reproduced and the sort of parental care they gave their young.
The nest, which measures 1.5 metres (four-anda-half feet) across, was
found at a site near Tongyong City. ... [What an omelette! :-) BTW, the
land egg is an *enormous* problem for Darwinists. It is amazingly
complicated and probably irreducibly complex. Evolutionists not only have
to imagine aquatic animals being prepared by the `blind watchmaker' to
invade the land, they also have to imagine it preparing their eggs to do it as
well!]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000113078204876&rtmo=kLL331kp&atmo=FFFFFFtX&pg=/et/00/1/20/ecnsal20.html
... Electronic Telegraph 20.01.00 ... Study shows why the girls give some
men short shrift By Roger Highfield TALLER men really do get the girls,
according to a study which has revealed that childless men are about 1.5
inches shorter than fathers. The discovery that women look down their
noses at short men follows decades of research on birds and animals that
has put the emphasis on the female when it comes to selecting a mate.
Given that tallness could be linked with factors that suggest a mate is "fit"
the term used by evolutionary biologists to describe someone who can sire
healthy offspring - the study shows how similar evolutionary considerations
are at work in human populations. ... [More on this tall men sexual
selection story. Note again that Neo-Darwinian "fitness" does not
necessarily have anything to do with physical fitness.]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000113078204876&rtmo=kLL331kp&atmo=FFFFFFtX&pg=/et/00/1/20/ecndna20.html
... Electronic Telegraph 20.01.00 ... New step in evolution of DNA
computing By Roger Highfield DNA, the vehicle of inheritance, could one
day be harnessed by supercomputers in order to carry out complex
calculations. ... An important step forward in the quest to use the vast
potential of DNA deoxyribonucleic acid - for tasks now performed by
silicon microchips has been reported by a team from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison. DNA computing exploits the way in which
information can be stored on DNA through the deployment of enzymes
which act like software in executing operations. ... [More on this DNA
computing story. Note that DNA and enzymes "act like software"! Maybe
that's because it *is* software?]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000113078204876&rtmo=kLL331kp&atmo=FFFFFFtX&pg=/et/00/1/20/ecfvit20.html
Electronic Telegraph 20.01.00 ... Golden chance to save eyesight
Malnutrition caused by vitamin A deficiency could be banished from the
Third World. Roger Highfield reports A GOLDEN rice that can fight
malnutrition has been created by genetic modification. This development
underlines how much of the recent GM food furore has focused on First-
World angst about the theoretical risks rather than practical benefits for the
developing world. ... Earlier at:
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-01/14/103l-011400-idx.html
... Gene-Altered Rice May Help Fight Vitamin A Deficiency Globally
By Guy Gugliotta Washington Post Staff Writer ..., January 14, 2000
... scientists have created a strain of genetically altered rice to combat
vitamin A deficiency, the world's leading cause of blindness... The new
"golden rice," ... contains three transplanted genes that allow plants to
produce rice kernels carrying beta-carotene, a compound that is
converted to vitamin A within the human body. ...[the] team is also
completing work on another genetically modified rice strain with
increased iron content. Iron deficiency-anemia, the world's worst
nutrition disorder, affects nearly 2 billion people. ... [GM has great
potential to improve the lot of humans in poor countries-assuming they
can afford it!].
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000113078204876&rtmo=kLL331kp&atmo=FFFFFFtX&pg=/et/00/1/20ecnsal20.html
... Electronic Telegraph 20.01.00 ... Saliva test finds boys with taste for
violence By Electronic Telegraph Correspondent BOYS likely to grow up
violent and disruptive can be identified by analysing their saliva, researchers
say. The early onset and persistence of such behaviour is associated with
low saliva levels of the stress hormone cortisol, they found. Compared with
those having higher or fluctuating cortisol levels, boys aged seven to 12 in
this category began anti-social acts at a younger age, exhibited three times
more aggressive symptoms, and were three times more likely to be labelled
"mean or combative" by their classmates. ... See similar but different story
at: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000116/sc/health_brats_1.html
Yahoo! ... January 16 ... Study Shows Bratty Behavior Makes Boys
Popular WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Psychologists said on Sunday they
had helped explain why some boys become bullies -- because aggressive
behavior may make boys popular with their playmates. A study of 452 boys
in the fourth, fifth and sixth grades -- ages 9 through 12 -showed about a
third of them were popular while showing antisocial behavior. "These
findings suggest that highly aggressive boys can be among the most
popular and socially connected children in elementary classrooms," the
researchers wrote in the American Psychological Association's journal
Developmental Psychology. ... [The first story claims a physico-chemical
cause for anti-social behaviour but the second finds psycho-social reasons
for what seems to be the same thing!]
http://www.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/01/19/quantum.states.ap/index.html
... Scientists tackle 'Schroedinger's cat' paradox. January 19, 2000 ...
Physicists say they have managed to nudge atoms back and forth between
our everyday world and the strange quantum realm where objects can
paradoxically be in two places at the same time. If physicists can further
refine their control over this realm, it could result in incredibly fast
quantum computers able to crack even the toughest encryption codes used
by conventional computers today. ... Also at:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_611000/611801.stm
BBC..., 20 January, 2000, ... Scientists probe the quantum world
... The researchers from National Institute of Standards and Technology
(NIST) in Colorado, US, say they were able to keep a beryllium ion in a
Schrodinger's cat-like state for as long as 100 millionths of a second. ... To
achieve this, the beryllium atom was cooled to close to absolute zero and
isolated from all types of radiation and energy sources. The team then used
lasers to force the atom's single electron into two states of spin, which also
forced the atom to be in two places at the same time. ... [It will be
interesting to see if this quantum computing will ever be economically
feasible and reliable enough for mission-critical computing.]
http://www.the-scientist.library.upenn.edu/yr2000/jan/research_000110.html The
Scientist 14[1]:13, Jan. 10, 2000 ... Chimeraplasty Potential As research
advances, hopes rise, but efficiency and safety are still concerns By Paul
Smaglik ... If single-gene disorders are akin to minor misspellings in the
human genome, then it stands to reason that the biological equivalent of a
word processor's search-and-replace function could correct them. Some
researchers are hoping that chimeraplasty can be that tool. The biological
software--a chimeric oligonucleotide constructed from both DNA and
RNA--was invented and first tested in vitro in 1994. But before it can be
"shipped" to the clinic, its developers and others must optimize it and
debug it. Gene therapy researchers, in particular, are enthusiastic about the
tool, because correcting defects in existing genes rather than flooding a
patient's body with duplicate, correct copies seems safer. ... "What's really
neat about this oligonucleotide is that it's specifically designed to correct
the misspelling of the gene that you are interested in," comments Blaese.
The molecule, designed to be homologous to the target gene, contains the
normal spelling of the genetic typo. The oligo then base-pairs with the
endogenous genomic sequence. But because it contains a correctly spelled
gene and the target gene contains a misspelling, the resulting mismatch
triggers the cell's repair machinery, researchers think. ... [This sounds
*much* better correcting the original `text' rather than trying to write a
new chapter. The analogy to a word-processor's search-and-replace
function is nice from an ID perspective.]
http://www.booksunlimited.co.uk/reviews/biography/0,6121,120156,00.html
The Guardian Observer ... Jan 09 03:41:29 2000 Biography How Darwin's
other half lived Robin McKie follows Alfred Wallace in Snadra Knapp's
Footsteps in the Forest and Gavan Daws and Marty Fujita's Archipelago ...
January 9, 2000 ... Few men have led lives that inspire so dramatically as
Alfred Russel Wallace's. Born in near poverty, denied higher education,
and refused recognition during his early life, the naturalist was afflicted by
hardships that would have broken most men. Even after becoming a
biologist he suffered appalling misfortune: a ship fire destroyed his priceless
Amazon specimens, he contracted malaria, was maimed in a gun accident,
and lost a brother to yellow fever. Yet Wallace endured and became a
noted collector of rare animal and plant specimens; invented the science of
biogeography, the study of animal distribution; and, in a fitting response to
'the ague', cracked the secret of natural selection in the midst of a malarial
fever. He became a supporter of women's rights, socialism, land
nationalisation, and - in case you thought he was too good to be true -
spiritualism. As E.O. Wilson states in a prologue to Archipelago , Wallace
succeeded because he was 'an intense young man, totally focused,
awesomely persistent, resilient to tropical disease that killed so many
others, and nobly selfless'. However, his greatest achievement remains the
unravelling of natural selection, a theory that still obsesses humanity -
though we usually associate its principles with its codiscoverer, Charles
Darwin, with whom Wallace announced joint success in their breakthrough
at the Linnean Society in London in 1858. ... He had found the key to the
origin of species and, still in an 'ague fit', sketched out a paper which he
posted to Darwin. The letter arrived on 18 June, 1858 like a thunderbolt,
for Darwin had also been pondering a similar notion. In the end, a joint
reading of papers was arranged. 'But what if Wallace, instead of sending his
paper to Darwin, had sent it to a journal in London to be published?' ask
Daws and Fujita. And what about those discrepancies in dates and postings
that lead some academics to suggest Darwin received Wallace's manuscript
much earlier and plagiarised it? Whatever else, it is clear the great
evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr is right when he says: 'Whenever one
speaks of natural selection, one ought to mention both Darwin and
Wallace.' [Although Darwin had been working on evolution by natural
selection longer, Wallace was the first to produce a paper for publication
and so should have the priority. Also it is hard not to believe that Darwin
benefitted from reading Wallace's paper in producing his own. Darwin's
prevailing of his powerful friends Lyell and Hooker to have his own
paper published at the same time as Wallace's was IMHO *disgraceful*.]
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Stephen E. (Steve) Jones ,--_|\ Email: sejones@iinet.net.au
3 Hawker Avenue / Oz \ Web: http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
Warwick 6024 -> *_,--\_/ Phone: +61 8 9448 7439
Perth, Western Australia v "Test everything." (1 Thess. 5:21)
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