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By Neece
 Happy Darwin Day everyone! Today is Darwin’s birthday and in honor of him, I thought I’d post this article about Liquid Glass, which could possibly be the coolest nanotech material I’ve seen in some time. I think it’s so cool mainly because of its versatility and the fact that it’s already in use in Germany, the UK and Turkey.
Why am I talking about nanotech on Darwin’s birthday? If you think about it, without evolution, we wouldn’t be able to manipulate our world so deftly and with such finesse. About 195,000 years ago homo sapiens first appeared in the fossil record. We started leaving Africa about 70,000 years ago, and migrated as far as the Americas 14,500 years ago.
A mere 10,000 years ago, we were mostly hunter-gatherers in nomadic groups. The first proto-states were developed only 6,000 years ago. Think of that! Look how far we’ve come in such…
By Neece
I found this 2 part video Richard Dawkins did for the BBC in 2006. It’s a very good overview of his ideas and concepts of religion, evolution and atheism. See below for the descriptions of each episode.
I thought this would be good to see more of what the “religion is a virus” concept was all about, right from Dawkins, since we’re reading The God Virus this month for the book club.
The Root of All Evil? Part 1: The God Delusion. (Richard Dawkins, 2006) – 47:51
The Root of All Evil? – The Virus of Faith (2 of 2) – 47:58
Here’s a description of the first episode:
By Neece
 At Sunday’s meeting, Brent talked about John Maynard Smith and a talk he gave to the Royal Institution in 1995. He was a British theoretical evolutionary biologist and geneticist.
So here is that video. It’s about an hour long and quite interesting.
A few of his books include:
By Neece
 ~ Update: We had a nice meeting about Darwin and evolution. We talked mainly about what people were thinking before Darwin, observable evolution since the Industrial Revolution, and all kinds of other interesting topics.
Thanks for braving the weather and roads to join us everyone! 
~
We are meeting February 7 at 5pm, probably at the Blue Moose. Our Topic of the evening will be celebrating Darwin and Evolution.
Please bring something to do with Darwin, his life, his work, or evolution in general to share with us.
Darwin Day is on or around February 12, his birthday, so we’re celebrating a bit early. You might find information and inspiration to share at the International Darwin Day Foundation. They have pages on Darwin’s Life, Evolution, and even have a free online evolution course. This foundation is administered by the American Humanist Association (AHA).
By Neece
Growing Up In The Universe is a series of lectures by Dr. Richard Dawkins, Oxford professor. He presents five lectures on life, the universe, and our place in it. With brilliance and clarity, Dawkins unravels an educational gem that will mesmerize young and old alike. Illuminating demonstrations, wildlife, virtual reality, and special guests (including Douglas Adams) all combine to make this collection a timeless classic.
This is from 1991 but besides the antiquated computer technology, it’s interesting and enlightening for young and old alike. You can buy all 5 hour long episodes on DVD from Dawkin’s store.
Episode 1: Waking Up In The Universe
By Neece
Monday, October 12, 2009 at 7:30 pm in the Mountainlair Blue Ballroom.
You are invited to the 2009 Eberly College Distinguished Lecture, sponsored by the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences, in association with the Division of Sociology and Anthropology, on Monday, October 12, 2009. Dr. Jonathan Marks, professor of anthropology at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, will be delivering a presentation entitled Darwin’s Ventriloquists, at 7:30 p.m. in the Mountainlair Blue Ballroom. There will be a reception held afterwards in the Gold Ballroom.
This event is intended as a counterpoint to last spring’s lecture by J. Philippe Rushton.
Human evolution expert Jonathan Marks, Ph.D., professor of anthropology at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, believes today’s training of modern scientists commonly shields them from the history and politics of their work, forcing generations of evolutionary geneticists to rediscover the intimate connection between science and culture.
“What we…
By Neece
Here is a video clip from the Colbert Report the other night (Sept 30). Stephen Colbert interviews Richard Dawkins. It’s almost 6 minutes long:
Oh, and take note of Dawkin’s tie! It’s Crocoduck tiled! LOL! 
Cross-posted from Heaving Dead Cats
By Neece
PZ Myers talked about science education in America the other day. It was based on a scientific review of the country regarding evolution and the science curriculum standards of each state. Here is a handy map from the review:
As you can see, West Virginia got an F. There was a review in 2000 by another group (see the review for links) where we also got an F. So over 9 years, we have made barely any improvements in science standards regarding evolution. Apparently there is no mention of human evolution at all, but a reference to some biological evolution. Unfortunately the F grade means there is either creationist jargon included and/or disclaimers.
Unfortunately the information on West Virginia in this review is sparse. But in their appendix, is a table that shows the grade for various aspects of evolution in state science standards. Here is…
By blally
Here is a 3 page article about evolution and livestock and the overuse of antibiotics. It’s originally dated September 2005, but is very interesting for getting an idea of evolution in action, and there is an August 2009 update to the article on page 2.
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Happy Darwin Day everyone! Today is Darwin’s birthday and in honor of him, I thought I’d post this article about Liquid Glass, which could possibly be the coolest nanotech material I’ve seen in some time. I think it’s so cool mainly because of its versatility and the fact that it’s already in use in Germany, the UK and Turkey.
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