All entries by this author

Darwin’s “Delay”

Feb 20th, 2011 | By Allen Esterson

Most people interested in the literature on Darwin are aware that he alighted on his theory of natural selection a short time after returning from his five-year Beagle voyage in 1836 (Sulloway 1982). It is rather less well-known that during the first decade following his return he produced a large body of work not directly related to his evolutionary theory: Journal of Researches of the Voyage of H. M. S. Beagle (1839 and revised in 1845); five volumes of Zoology of the Voyage of H. M. S. Beagle (1840‑1843), which he edited; three volumes of the Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle (1842‑1846); and numerous papers and reviews (Richards 1983, pp. 46-47).

Darwin started jotting down notes on the … Read the rest



Libya: death toll “tops 200” *

Feb 20th, 2011 | Filed by

Residents told Al Jazeera that at least 200 people had died in the eastern city of Benghazi alone.… Read the rest



Tony Blair wants more “respect” for “faith” *

Feb 19th, 2011 | Filed by

Does his “I am a lamp” dance for emphasis.… Read the rest



Separation

Feb 19th, 2011 2:06 pm | By

I’ve been thinking about segregation, because I’ve been thinking about the Muslim Brotherhood and sexual segregation. The MB of course mandates sexual segregation where it can, and would mandate it throughout Egypt if it got the power to do so. Many non-MB Egyptians think sexual segregation is right and good.

Marwa, a nursery school teacher who did not provide her last name, stood with some 200 women of all ages who chanted for the downfall of the regime. She wore a veil covering her hair.

‘I cover my body and support gender segregation during the protests, not as an Islamist statement, but because it is not right for men and women to have physical contact,’ she said.

What I’ve … Read the rest



Pretending that evidence is difficult and complicated *

Feb 19th, 2011 | Filed by

Things get tricky when evidence collides with what people would simply like to crack on and do anyway.… Read the rest



Coyne on Vernon on “ultra-Darwinism” *

Feb 19th, 2011 | Filed by

There is nothing numinous or celestial about DNA replication.… Read the rest



Mark Vernon on “ultra-Darwinism” *

Feb 19th, 2011 | Filed by

“Ultra-Darwinism is the kind associated with the new atheism.” Eh?… Read the rest



Clamp down on those pesky women’s shelters *

Feb 19th, 2011 | Filed by

Women have no business trying to escape violence. Who do they think they are?!… Read the rest



Bullies win another round

Feb 18th, 2011 5:04 pm | By

If you haven’t already, sign the petition to Karzai to save Afghan women’s shelters.

UN analyst Una Moore explains why.

Conservative politicians and media personalities have long railed against Afghanistan’s few women’s shelters and demanded that the facilities be closed. Two years ago, the government appointed a hard-line mullah to lead a commission to investigate shelters and recommend reforms…

Now, the shelter commission’s verdict is in. The government will seize all women’s shelters countrywide and place them under the control of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and the police. Women and girls seeking protection will have to plead their cases before an admissions panel of government employees and undergo medically dubious “examinations” to prove they are not guilty of

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HRW to Afghan government *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

Support, rather than control, the work of shelter providers to ensure that women fleeing domestic violence are able to find safe and secure refuge.… Read the rest



Afghan government’s attack on women’s shelters *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

In effect, Afghanistan’s few refuges for abused women are about to become prisons.… Read the rest



Values and the New Atheism *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

What’s “missing” from the New Atheist world view is the siren call of easy assent to illegitimate authority.… Read the rest



Journalist has tiny crush on Muslim Brotherhood *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

Its youth wing, that is. Sure, they want to establish Sharia, but they’re so young and energetic and passionate.… Read the rest



Egypt: “moderate” Islamist to head panel on constitution *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

And a former Muslim Brotherhood MP, Sobhy Saleh, will be among the members of the panel.… Read the rest



Petition to save women’s shelters in Afghanistan *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

Under a new bill, women and girls would have to appear before a panel which could decide to send them home or charge them with “adultery.”… Read the rest



Johann Hari: get bishops out of lawmaking *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

Which two nations still reserve places in their parliaments for unelected religious clerics? Iran…and Britain.… Read the rest



Religious discrimination in “faith” schools *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

The new Education Bill would allow a Muslim or Catholic school, for instance, to recruit entirely on religious grounds.… Read the rest



Ahmadinejad on true, Islamic feminism *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

It’s not Zionist.… Read the rest



Free Church minister resigns over music in services *

Feb 18th, 2011 | Filed by

Music is Satan’s fishing rod.… Read the rest



Blatant discrimination against a Christian

Feb 17th, 2011 6:15 pm | By

When is it ok to decline to hire a particular person for a scientific job and hire someone else instead? James Hannam says not when the particular person in question is a creationist. For why? For because that is a religious belief, and it is the particular person’s right to have a religious belief and that right is trampled on when someone else is given the job as director of the student observatory at the University of Kentucky. Martin Gaskell was the best guy for the job as any fule kno and so it was no fair to give that job to someone else.

[T]he mere fact he was sympathetic towards creationists and kept an open mind about evolution appears

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