This is another archival repost from the old blog — this time from March 2009. The past few weeks seem to have seen laments for the decline of journalism and obituaries for old media reaching a critical mass. BoraZ has kindly collected a few dozen so that I don’t have […]
This is another archival repost, written for the old blog in January 2008. The central dogma of molecular biology, first described by Francis Crick in 1958, describes the flow of information between DNA, RNA, and proteins.[1] The central dogma is interesting, but I believe that its use in teaching is […]
Before the last random meandering tour of the hills and mountain ranges of England and Scotland (idea for a book: find the least flat end-to-end route) I briefly mentioned the latest accessories with which I had pimped my ride. A few people asked questions about both the handlebar smartphone mount […]
This is another archival repost originally written for my old blog a few years ago. I caught the last couple of minutes of Extreme Pilgrim (BBC 2, Friday 9pm) and was intrigued, so fired up the iPlayer to watch the whole thing. It’s Vicar of Dibley meets Ray Mears’ Extreme […]
(This is another archival repost, written for the old blog in 2009.) If you’ll excuse my tabloid headline writer… A year ago, I wrote Lies, damn lies, and tissue culture, describing some of the reasons why caution and healthy skepticism are required when assessing the conclusions of tissue culture studies. […]
This is another archival repost from the old blog — this time from april 2009. I found on the iPlayer the latest in BBC2’s series of Darwin documentaries, Did Darwin Kill God? This is theologian Conor Cunningham’s attempt reconcile science and religion, and show that their differences are all just […]
This is another archival repost of something posted on the old blog in 2007. What is it with Channel 4 and the examination of excretions? During How Toxic Are Your Kids (C4, Thurs 8pm) I had to check the television guide to make sure that Armando Iannucci (The Day Today, […]
This is another repost from the old blog, for archival purposes. I’m watching Peter Owen Jones’ Around The World In Eighty Faiths. You might recall Owen Jones as the public school hippy ex-ad man anglican vicar from Extreme Pilgrimage. This time ’round, Owen Jones is on a world tour, looking […]
I’ve posted a quick review of The Way The World Is, physicist-vicar John Polkinghorne’s attempt at explaining to other scientists why he is a Christian. It’s a tedious and embarrassing piece of work. The book, that is. The post, I hope, is at least entertainingly sarcastic. Read it here.
A quick review of this week’s Law In Action on Radio 4, which looked at photography and the law — particularly jobsworth office managers who think it’s their job to harass people, and other police initiatives that lack any credible evidence-base. Read it at cotch dot net.
Christina Odone reviewed Bill Maher’s film Religulous on Radio 4’s Front Row (start: 9m). “He gets some very good replies from some terribly soft targets.” She’s thinking particularly of creationist-sympathising US Senator Mark Pryor (D-AK). She goes on, “… but the most revealing moment is when Maher faces down a […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. There are those who declare Darwin’s literary brilliance, and those who proudly announce that The Origin is beyond their wit and attention […]
I recently posted on the phenomenon of British creationism, and my belief that it is not nearly as widespread and organised as the creationists would like us to believe. So it was fun this evening to come across a genuine British creationist blogger, while researching, of all things, the pub […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. In chapter eight, Darwin looks at instincts. Instincts are subject to the same processes of variation and heredity as everything else in […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. In chapter seven, Darwin responds to some more objections to his theory of natural selection. One such objection is that “many characters […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. Chapter six is where Darwin humbly acknowledges that his work is not entirely watertight, explains some of the problems that have been […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. Chapter 3 is the struggle for existence. If The Origin had been written a hundred and twenty years later than it was, […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. Chapter 2 is “variation in nature”. You can’t solve a problem without first defining terms, so if the problem is the origin […]
This post is part of a series on The Origin Of Species. It was originally posted on the old blog in feb 2009, during the Darwin 200 celebrations. In Chapter one of the Origin, Darwin discusses inheritance and variation. It’s an interesting choice for a starting point, because as everyone […]
This is another archival repost from the old blog — this time from July 2008. So, the following video was brought to my attention, and I was so impressed that I had to share. Admittedly, it took me some time to getting around to the sharing bit: it’s difficult to […]
This is another archival repost, originally written for the old blog in May 2008. Darwin’s 1837 phylogeny, with root and branches. I’ve talked about Horizontal Gene Transfer (HGT) on the blog a few times before, particularly in the context of bacteria acquiring genes for things like antibiotic resistance, and in […]
This is another archival repost from the old blog — this one from feb 2008. Somebody in the Nature Podcast editorial team is clearly not a fan of “new atheists”. The “guest rant” spot, or whatever it is they call it — podium, I think — has been given to […]
This is another archival repost from the old blog, this time from jan 2008 Tina Beattie was on Start The Week this morning, talking about the New AtheismTM. I only caught little bits of it, but I’ve managed to find the time to flick through the podcast. You can guess […]
This is an archive from the old blog, originally written in 2007. The “Thursday Paper” column on the blog is for reporting on a recently published peer-reviewed research. Apologies if this one isn’t so polished, but I have a train to catch. It would appear to be medical genetics week […]
This is another archival repost, originally from oct 2007. Are you an addict? I bet you are (I saw you gambling addicts coming!). It might be coffee, chocolate, or tobacco, rather than alcohol, heroin, or self-harm, and you might not be wasting away because of it, but you’re probably addicted […]