It all seems obvious in hindsight:
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.]
Sure we know why. It's called natural selection.
Looks like William Shatner to me.
I have no problem with natural selection. Natural selection is no explanation for macro-evolution.
Gosh, what an obnoxious post.
Recall Sulu's quote from the beginning of Star Trek IV:
"San Francisco. I was born there."
It all makes sense now.
I'm really shattered over this. Now, whenever I see a rerun from the original series, and Kirk says: "Standard orbit, Mr. Sulu," I'll imagine that Sulu is thinking: Yeah, pretty boy, standard orbit around Uranus!
Uh oh!
Social scientists and philosophers are fine so long as they admit the limits of applicability of their conclusions (just like any other practice, including the natural sciences, or even religion, for that matter).
Social scientists themselves aren't always the culprits; it's usually the (generally liberal) activists who are too eager overextrapolate the usefulness of their 'theories'.
It all seems obvious in hindsight:
Yes ... hindsight!
Oh, you horrible man! How could you make Sulu into a "Cross-dresser"?
I see you are for free speech.(and post 152 and 153 aren't obnoxious?). In any case, someone has decided post 109 is hurtful to the mind. So be it. A picture posted from NCSE along with some text from the same site is obnoxious. I kind of agree with you.(although it might have been the question mark that was offensive?)
The solid evidence would be when we have a technical understanding of the genes of hair.
Until then, knowing that later Australopithecus (with the larger brain case) indicates that a primate had an improving diet of meat and fats. From this diet of meat and fat we obtain DTA and DHA, two fatty acids essential to developing brain tissue.
Going from shellfish & scavenging to hunter-gather seems to be a relatively short step. Loss of fur would've been part of that step -- giving a rough date of ~1.5 Mya.
YMMV INAA (I'm not an anthropologist)
Should've included you in #156
"Okay. Who left their feather boa at the Darwin Central New Year's Eve party?"
It's the anatomical references and personal abuse. Come off it, you ain't this stupid, or weren't, before you decided to sacrifice your brain to the creationist group mind.
As far as free speech; you are free to say it, and I am free to express my contempt.
What anatomical references and personal abuse? The post is now gone so any reference will be uncorroborated thanks to the complaint department. I posted exactly what was on the NCSE site. You can go there, http://www.ncseweb.org/ourstaff.asp, and see for yourself. I now ask you what anatomical reference did I make? What personal abuse did I heap on "Phina"? You brain is fried. Your contempt is returned.
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