Posted on 01/02/2006 4:14:37 AM PST by PatrickHenry
The mechanisms driving the process of evolution have always been subject to rigorous scientific debate. Growing in intensity and scope, this debate currently spans a broad range of disciplines including archaeology, biochemistry, computer modeling, genetics & development and philosophy.
A recent $2.8 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation to the Cambridge Templeton Consortium [link] is providing the resources for further investigation into this complex and fascinating area. The funds will support 18 new grant awards to scientists, social scientists and philosophers examining how complexity has emerged in biological systems.
Attracting 150 applications, the grant process has generated much interest from a wide range of disciplines. Unique in the interdisciplinary nature of their applicants, the Cambridge Consortium grants will encourage and enable high quality research that approaches the issue from many angles, and will also sponsor collaborative work by people from different academic specialties. All of the work will study how biological systems (molecular, cellular, social etc) become more complex as they evolve.
"This is clearly an emerging area of science, and we are pleased that these grants are specifically aimed at encouraging work that would not easily fall under the parameters of any other grant-awarding body," says Consortium Chairman, Professor Derek Burke.
Questions to be addressed by the projects include:
* Why are biologists so afraid of asking 'why' questions, when physicists do it all the time?Among the institutions receiving grants from the Cambridge Templeton Consortium are Duke University, Harvard University Medical School, University of California, San Francisco, University of Cambridge, UK, and Australian National University.* Can experiments using a digital evolutionary model answer why intelligence evolved, but artificial intelligence has been so hard to build?
* What lessons can rock art and material remains teach us about the development of human self-awareness?
* Can the geometric ordering of specific sheets of cells throw light on the questions currently being raised about design in nature?
* What principles allow individuals to develop social and colonial organizations?
The mission of the John Templeton Foundation is to pursue new insights at the boundary between theology and science through a rigorous, open-minded and empirically focused methodology, drawing together talented representatives from a wide spectrum of fields of expertise. Founded in 1987, the Foundation annually provides more than $60 million in funding on behalf of work in human sciences and character development, science and theology research, as well as free enterprise programs and awards worldwide. For more information about the Templeton Foundation, go to www.templeton.org [link.].
[Omitted some contact info, available at the original article.]
And this has been known for as long as I can remember. Why, then, are the estimated times for ancient human expansions always so long? I mean, once humans had set foot on Eurasia from Africa, why wouldn't they have wandered over the entire continent in just a few hundred years?
Well, that is expected of you. You are of the second group, so you are understandably confused by legitimate curiosity.
Here anomaly!
There anomaly!
Everywhere a nomaly nomaly!
Ol' witch doctor had a mask!
Oogety-boogety-boo!
ROTFL!
Perhaps a slight contrast to another cast member already mentioned?
I was simply commenting that it appears the Templeton Foundation is willing to fund research that might confirm/prove evolution.
As you certainly must know, it has been my long-held position that both evolution and ID are models rather than theories.
The question implies that anything established as fact need not and should not be researched. Science thus should NEVER ask "Why?" if you're right. The only legitimate question is "Is that fact or non-fact?"
I'd guess most research is aimed at understanding something we know to be true but not necessarily why it is true. As we sometimes patiently explain to creationists here, "Theories do not grow up to be laws. Theories explain laws."
Anyway, you can fight it out with those of your side condemning evolutionists for never asking "Why?" We seem to be getting it from both sides just now.
Your puzzlement is reflective of some misconception that science is reasoned and argued the way religion seems to be, from supposedly revealed authority and supposedly unshakeable fact. That's why people from your side are always telling us evolution is religion. That may appear true if you think everything is about religion, or you just don't know any other way of approaching things.
.500 is good in baseball.
Questions to be addressed by the projects include:
* Why are biologists so afraid of asking 'why' questions, when physicists do it all the time?
* Can experiments using a digital evolutionary model answer why intelligence evolved, but artificial intelligence has been so hard to build?
* What lessons can rock art and material remains teach us about the development of human self-awareness?
* Can the geometric ordering of specific sheets of cells throw light on the questions currently being raised about design in nature?
* What principles allow individuals to develop social and colonial organizations?
Scientific research questions??
These questions would be debunked in the first week of a first year Philosophy course.
Your 'knowledge' as to the truth of evolution is really based on a considerable amount of faith. You believe evolution is true, but you do not know why it is true. If fact, it may not be true at all. sounds like a religion to me. Of course, I am obviously referring to macro-evolution.
Jeepers ... that bad? Thanks for the ping!
and barefooted. When you're catching fish and shellfish by hand and trying to get to the seaweed before it bakes not to mention the occasional beached whale, you've got to stay on the move.
It is said that no land animal can outdistance a well-conditioned human.
A herd of horses, gazelle, etc; can outrun a tribe of humans for days but the persistent humans on the trail will eventually come up on a herd too exhausted to run and can pick off the weakest at will. I'm sure that played a big part in pre-modern evolution even with the questions of shoes, predators, and lack of home base. The problem of home base would be partially solved by running a herd into a valley or perhaps a beach peninsula (which would reduce problems with sore feet and predators).
Back to the beach. Wouldn't a diet of high protien seafood supplemented with seaweed and grains contribute to brain growth? I'm a layman here to learn and the idea I'm getting is that apes live in the jungle, bipedal hominids evolved on the savannahs and plains, but the very small group from which modern humans decended made the first of their two major evolutions on the beach. The 2nd "great leap forward" occured after glacier melt opened the Eurasian rivers.
Sorry about the lack of spell check there...
It's based on the "faith" that evidence means something. We have lots of evidence.
An excellent example! As I recall from reading, he marched his men over 600 miles in 12 days fighting several large battles and about 40 skirmishes along the way. He motivated his men by shooting stragglers. There's a famous anecdote where his soldiers with bleeding feet asked for shoes and he told them that if they wanted shoes they should kill a yankee. Back on subject, it's a clear example of a large group of humans averaging over 50 miles a day for a moderately extended period of time with the only real problem being sore feet for the ones who were out of shape.
Not nearly as much evidence as there exists for the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
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