The Discovery Institute is seriously pissed off about being dissed by the Vatican, and they’re raising a stink about it through the media: The Associated Press: Rome meeting snubs intelligent design, creationism. ROME (AP) — A Vatican-backed conference on evolution is under attack from p...

I'm just re-posting some stuff without apology because I am hundreds of posts behind, and bloggers are volunteers, and making a living in these times is not easy. But it is all very interesting: 1. NPR Covers Evolution Mind Evolution Debate With Dr. Michael Egnor NPR's All Things Considered ran a st...

Neuroscience and the soul, via Andrew Sullivan: A new challenge to the science-religion relationship is currently at hand. We hope that, with careful consideration by scientists and theologians, it will not become the latest front in what some have called the “culture war� between science and re...

This is the transcript of the interview I did with Alex Tsakiris at Skeptiko. It got a bit testy at times. Here’s a snatch on the subject of reincarnation. In the context, I was trying to explain that the fact that some children know what happened to a deceased adult is not necessarily obvious...

A friend sends me this item from Urban Dictionary: Chuck Johnson Verb: related to Godwin’s law and Godwinism’s. To ‘Chuck Johnson’s’ is to label a person, group or philosophy with the reductio ad Hitlerum* tag as means to close down debate. Chuck: transitive verb, meani...

Here’s a look at the Vatican’s walking-on-eggshells attitude toward Darwin’s theory of evolution, and their apparent dismissal of the “intelligent design” form of creationism: Reconciling Science, Religion. “The ongoing and vigorous engagement of the Catholic Chur...

Mark Steyn, invincible Canadian humourist, writes that in Illinois, Like some sort of rulers of the universe, state lawmakers are considering restoring little Pluto’s planetary status, casting aside the scientific community’s 2006 decision downgrading the distant ice ball. An Illinois Se...

At Britain’s Daily Telegraph, Christopher Booker assures us that he is familiar with “the unabashed bigotry of staunch Darwinists.” Lots of us are. They glory in their ignorance. Mr. Booker writes, As an old hand at tangling with Darwinists, I was well aware that a howl of furious ...

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal is on Meet the Press this Sunday; David Gregory has a post on his blog asking for questions: The View From Here: I need YOUR thoughts on Jindal. (Hat tip: Cronus.) Thinking about the interview with Governor Bobby Jindal Sunday. He’s thought to be a serious GOP c...

Given enough time, inanimate matter — through the laws of chemistry and physics, and with enough random trials, filtered by natural selection which throws out stuff that doesn’t work — will self-organize into highly sophisticated information-processing machinery that produces the h...