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Intelligent design (ID) basically says we've been put together by a conscious designer.

If there's anyone who understands ID, could you explain why on earth anyone with half a clue would make the recurrent laryngeal nerve that connects our brain to the larynx (voice box) do so by descending down into our chest and looping around the aorta befofe coming back up again?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recurrent_laryngeal_n...

Evolution-wise it makes sense -- because the route is much less circuitous in those animals most similar to our more distant ancestors, and as the organs have moved around with as land animals and then mammals evolved, the nerves have followed them.

Are there any published articles on the research that establishes why the mammalian recurrent laryngeal nerve goes for a bit of a wander, when it would make much more sense for it to just go between brain and larynx?

In giraffes, that extra distance amounts to about 12 feet or so. [While we're on giraffes, why do giraffes have to make do with 7 cervical vertebrae (like, well, almost all other mammals, including us, and our common, shrew-like ancestor), while tiny sparrows get double the number - 14 - and ostriches get 18?]

If there's no existing research, can someone point to any ID research /programs/ that will seek to investigate and explain the curious recurrent laryngeal nerve?

Now and then I've gotten the odd email from christians. One very common thread seems to be the crazier the email, the more likely it is in comic sans. In caps. Sometimes in a big point size, with color.

Is the 11th commandment "Thou shalt evangelize in all caps 14 point purple comic sans" or do evangelical christians just share some virus that won't let them use more readable fonts and disables spellcheck and turning capslock off?

Someone posted here about a day ago complaining that atheists misintepret the bible (I can't find it or I'd link to it).

According to wikipedia there are 38000 Christian sects.

Even /within/ a given denomination, for every ten believers you'll find 11 opinions on any question, all backed up with biblical quotes.

Is it hypocritical to say that atheists misinterpret the bible when there's no agreement among believers?

Isaiah 27:11 makes it clear that if you don't understand God's message, He will have no mercy on you.

Why endanger your eternal soul by asking questions about religion on R&S (or anywhere else)?

The Sanford affair is yet another example (in a very, very long litany) of people who talk endlessly about stuff like the "sanctity of marriage" (or Bristol Palin on abstinence) but can't actually practice what they preach.

So when will the hypocrisy finally get to the point where even the religious "get it" and realize that they need to stop moralizing at everyone else, and just look to the beams in their own eyes?

Survey discussed at

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religio...

shows that 2/3 of UK teens don't believe in god, and

'It also emerged six out of ten 10 children (59 per cent) believe that religion "has a negative influence on the world". '

What do you think has produced this astounding degree of skepticism among UK teens?

When do you think the US will catch up?

There are - and have been for many decades now, numerous documented accounts of observed speciation:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.htm...

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html

http://www.skepticfiles.org/evolut/observd3.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speciation

yet creationists keep going on about "no macroevolution" (a made-up term that immediately picks someone out as a creationist, because there's no such distinction).

Can anyone explain why they would still do this?

It makes me wonder if maybe they changed what they mean by macroevolution some time and I missed it.

Do creationists mean something else by macroevolution now?

Given that new species have definitely been seen to arise and carefully documented multiple times in the literature, what do creation

If ten Christians answer a question there will be 8 or 9 different answers, some completely contradictory.

So what is core to Christianity?

What do almost all Christians (say 97% or more) absolutely agree on?

What additional things do a large majority (say 85% or more) agree on?

What does a substantial majority agree on (say 65%)?

HIghest ratings for information pointing to surveys of actual individual beliefs (worldwide, or for individual countries - either is fine).

Failing that, listing common beliefs across major denominations would be a start [but that won't fit in well with individual beliefs - polls of individuals show a much lower belief in the existence of hell, for example, than a listing of denominations would suggest].

I did find this survey:

http://www.religioustolerance.org/rel_comp.htm

(which, given the proportion in the US who say they're christian, indicates that a surprisingly large proportion of US Christians are actually agnostic theists)

I can see "the divinity of Jesus" will be probably up there close to belief in God (since it's almost a given if you're a Christian - though a number of people who would self identify as christian don't hold that Jesus was necessarily divine).

Just how high is the belief in the divinity of Jesus among self-identified Christians?

Things like belief in Hell are lower - below 50% in the US, though it would then be a bit above 50% among christians.

Anyone have any useful links?

There's a new transitional fossil - which supports the idea that the apparent mismatch between dinosaur and bird digits is a simple frame-shift.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/06/limusau... (also see the link in the first sentence of the article to an earlier post on digit order)

So yet another transitional fossil (there's a good one every few weeks these days) ... is this something else for the creationistas to ignore -- or just to make up more fibs about?

Creationists are constantly posting loaded questions about evolution here, often with the disclaimer "but I really want to understand" (in spite of the obvious problem that anyone who wanted to understand would ask in biology).

Well, here's your chance to understand.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/2331741806807x...

(See particularly fig 1. for the short-short version.)

Please feel free to identify which of the facts there you believe to be wrong

Observation 1, 2, 3 4 or 5?

(with pointers to your evidence to the contrary please... plain denial is tiresome)

The article is one from a whole journal of explanation of aspects of evolution (http://www.springerlink.com/content/x1r804782707/?...

So is that article too hard for the creationists who "really want to understand"?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Ai29_...

is back.

So were the report monkeys PWNED by God?

Anyone notice that creationists criticize evolution because we don't see something evolution doesn't predict?

specifically, creationists complain that we don't see "X suddenly becoming Y" (such as in this question: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Av7s0...

"The guppies aren't becoming ducks.")

Which of course is NOT something you'd see if evolution was true.

So do you think creationists only attack weird straw-man versions of evolution because

(a) real evolution is too hard for a creationist brain to understand

(b) real evolution doesn't have obvious flaws, so they have to make stuff up

(c) they only ever read what other creationists say about evolution and don't even realize the theory of natural selection is NOTHING like that...?

Evolution has been observed (for the nth time):

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/09060...

(Guppies subject to different levels of predation evolve different breeding strategies - and experiment shows that it gives a survival advantage to their offspring.)

Will the creationistas twist plain facts and blather about irrelevancies, or will at least one actually try to understand what's in front of them?

What do you reckon?

Graduates or attendees of religious schools are more likely to have abortions than those from public schools:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31048153/

So if god has a plan, was it for the faithful to have the most abortions?

If I take coincidences as meaningful and personal, does this prove god exists?

Which god does it prove exists?

When I listen to fundies these days, their fanatical slogans sound so divorced from reality, so opposite-world-ish, that I can't help but think they sound like the slogans in the novel Nineteen-Eighty-Four.

consider: "War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength"

With barely a hint of change, each of those phrases is very reminiscent of quotes I have seen from fundies. And then there's all the "big brother is watching you" stuff...

So does anyone else get strong feelings of doublethink when they listen to fundies?

Are the fundies here that keep on about "A fool says in his heart" headed for hell, like is says in Matthew 5:22?

With several major advances in the last couple of years, this was pretty much the last major piece of the puzzle left. I didn't expect this to happen for a good while yet:

- RNA can self-assemble from its building blocks under simple conditions:

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/05/ribonucl...

Things already published in recent times:

- Short loops of RNA can catalyze their own formation (that is, RNA can do for itself what DNA needs both RNA and proteins for).

- many of the required building blocks for proteins and RNA components form readily in space, along with many other organic molecules (and the raw material for them comes from exploding stars). These rain down on the earth constantly.

- many more building blocks arise from naturally as a consequence of the laws of thermodynamics, simple chemistry and the most recent understanding of the conditions on the early earth.

[Oh, and by the way, this suggests that life (at least simple forms of life) is likely to be quite common in the universe, pretty much anywhere conditions are suitable. (There's nothing yet to suggest intelligent life with technological civilizations would be at all common though.) ]

So, given many of the major steps from a hot earth unable to support life to a cooled earth with replicating RNA (at which point you have natural selection operating) are now clear, with nothing mystical, or even particularly difficult about it, will the creationists now give it up and admit abiogenesis is - some time in the surprisingly near future - going to be quite well explained in step by step detail - or will they continue to stick their fingers in their ears and go "Lalala can't hear you"?

Massimo Pigliucci reports on a study that finds an evolutionary advantage

to religious belief, which shows consistent results with studies of kibbutzim:

http://www.scientificblogging.com/rationally_speak...

The result - religious belief causes nonbelievers to think believers are more generous (whether it's true or not), and so believers receive more help.

Personally I'm on the "side effect" side of the line, but I find this an interesting study.

The unanswered question is why does such an attribution of community generosity to the religious arise in the nonreligious, even when absent?

Any ideas?

I saw in the thread on the question "Question for people who don't accept evolution?"

by Mudkip Girl:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Am07c...

A lot of answers relate to "proof" like this:

"the theory that we evolved from a creature is unproven"

"Because the theory of evolution is man made, and there is no proof of it"

"There is absolutely no proof that any species evolved into a different species."

"the theory that we evolved from another creature is unproven "

[the remaining answers mostly constituted ignorance of what the theory of natural selection as an explanation for the observation of evolution actually consisted of. I don't want to pursue simple ignorance here, I want to find out if the "proof" objection is real or whether people are being disingenuous and would accept no evidence of any kind, no matter how strong.]

So -specifically- you doubters who think evolution has not been proven, WHAT would constitute proof for you?

(Please no flippant answers.)