The Toledo Blade is reporting:
An Ohio legislative panel yesterday rubber-stamped an unprecedented process that would allow sex offenders to be publicly identified and tracked even if they’ve never been charged with a crime.
(emphasis added.)
Over at Uncommon Descent,
Lee Bowman complains about people who say ID is a new movement:
Many cite Johnson as the founder of the current ID movement. Popularizer perhaps, but founder he was NOT, nor can he authoritatively be credited with setting its parameters. Luskin notes (as does Dembski in ‘Cosmic Pursuit’, 1998) that Charles Thaxton and Dean Kenyon first wrote on the subject during the ’80s. But is concept even that new?
“Throughout the centuries theologians have argued that nature exhibits features which nature itself cannot explain, but which instead require an intelligence over and above nature. From Church fathers like Minucius Felix and Basil the Great (3rd and 4th centuries) to medieval scholastics like Moses Maimonides and Thomas Aquinas (12th and 13th centuries) to reformed thinkers like Thomas Reid and Charles Hodge (18th and 19th centuries), we find theologians making design arguments, arguing from the data of nature to an intelligence operating over and above nature.” (Wm. Dembski, ‘Cosmic Pursuit’, 1998)
http://www.arn.org/docs/dembski/wd_idmovement.htm
(bold face added.)
If ID has such an ancient heritage, then I think it’s fair to ask why there aren’t any experimental results demonstrating ID. Who are the Isaac Newtons and James Clerk Maxwells of ID? Why isn’t there broader consensus amongst ID proponents of the basics of ID, such as the number of designers, the times and places when they operated, or even a definition of “complexity”?
If, on the other hand, ID is scientific, but too young to have produced any good results, then why should it be taught in public schools?
If you know who John Davison is, you may want to read his new new blog,
The End of Evolution.
If you don’t know, Read More
One of the things that’s got to be frustrating about astronomy is just how little astronomers have to work with. They can’t walk up to a star and stick a thermometer in it or weigh it on a scale. They can’t even go around a star and look at it from a different angle. They can’t go anywhere the Earth doesn’t want to go, and the instruments on space probes don’t go very far or very fast. They can’t collect matter samples from distant stars and planets because matter, traveling at less than the speed of light, hasn’t had nearly enough time to get here. That leaves them with pretty much nothing but light. Okay, electromagnetic radiation of all frequencies, but it’s still just photons. Basically, all they can do is stand in one spot and watch.
And what’s amazing is that they keep coming up with ways of teasing unbelievable amounts of information out of the light that reaches us. They can see what its frequency distribution is, what spectral lines have been added or removed, which tells them what atoms and molecules are involved, and also whether that matter’s moving toward or away from us, and how fast. And a million other bits of information beyond that.
To illustrate, Sean Carroll (no, not
Sean Carroll the biologist,
Sean Carroll the cosmologist)
explains how scientists recently demonstrated that dark matter really exists.
Go read
the whole thing, because it’s clearly explained, with cool pictures.
In a nutshell, though, it’s an example of what I was talking about above, of teasing out all sorts of information out of light.
If airports set up special lines at security checkpoints for Muslims, as
various right-wingers have been suggesting,
may I suggest an express line for atheists, with lighter security checks?
After all, when’s the last time an atheist hijacked a plane, or drove a car bomb into a schoolyard, or blew up an abortion clinic, an
olympic stadium,
an
office building?
For those who didn’t know, Coral Ridge Ministries is producing a TV show to appear in a few days, called Darwin’s Deadly Legacy. Judging by the preview, it’s going to be one long argumentum ad Hitlerum, along with a heaping dose of evolution denial, and a bit of Columbine thrown in for good measure.
The Pensacola News Journal has
an article
about a program called
I LOVE Science,
in which volunteers teach school children science with hands-on activities.
“Science is fun, and you get to do things that are new to you,” said Ryan Gilley, 10. “You get to know how things work and the way they are made.”
If they can instill a love of learning and science in young kids, that’s great.
But the irony of it all is that this is happening right in Kent Hovind’s back yard.
According to
Kent Hovind’s weblog,
the date for his trial (58 counts of tax evasion, for those who’d forgotten) has been postponed until Oct. 17, so we’ll have to wait an extra five weeks for him to start getting his comeuppance. Oh, well.
Bill in Portland Maine makes some sensible comments about airport security, but with more snark and links than I could muster:
A quick check on airport security:
Liquids and gels have been banned in carry-on baggage. This is silly and ineffective. But aren’t ya glad they thought of it 5 years after 9/11?
X-ray machines are reliable tools to detect explosives in shoes. Except the, uh…Liquid or gel kind.
Cargo is still not inspected nearly enough. Packages under 16 ounces don’t even require paperwork. (The explosion aboard Pan Am flight 103 was caused by a device that weighed less than 16 ounces).
The Muslims-only line—underwritten by FOX News—still hasn’t been set up yet, dammit. And new TSA officer Mike Gallagher hasn’t shown up to begin the Muslims-only full-body-cavity searches. (Apparently he’s still finishing his temp job as a nursery school crossing guard.)
Meanwhile, the TSA is under strict orders not to touch any passenger’s monkey, no matter what might be ticking inside its ass.
I feel safer. How `bout you?
Yeah. Next time I fly, I’ll be thinking of my PDA, laptop, bottle of water, Swiss army knife (the Perl of Leathermen) and other implements of destruction in the unscreened luggage compartment beneath me.
