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Human interaction with animals could be causing evolution to go into reverse, says a report by the Royal Society, Britain's science academy. A study of finches on the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific – finches are the same birds that were said to have inspired Charles Darwin's groundbreaking work on evolution - has shown that some could be losing their distinctive beaks in response to living near humans. Finches on the islands have developed different sizes of beak - but when people live in close proximity to the birds, their beaks revert to an intermediate size, the report says. Andrew...

Evolutionary Theory: Verified or Vilified?   01/26/2006     Jeffrey Schwartz has reason to be happy that his particular theory of evolution received some support recently, according to a press release from University of Pittsburgh.  But look at the pedestal he is standing on: the ruins of classical Darwinism and neo-Darwinism.  In supporting his own theory, he kicked out the props from under standard evolutionary theory (emphasis added in all quotes): Fossils:  The missing links Darwin expected to find “have not been found because they don’t exist,” he claims.  The gradualistic theory “glosses over gaps in the fossil record,” he accuses....

Most published scientific research papers are wrong, according to a new analysis. Assuming that the new paper is itself correct, problems with experimental and statistical methods mean that there is less than a 50% chance that the results of any randomly chosen scientific paper are true. John Ioannidis, an epidemiologist at the University of Ioannina School of Medicine in Greece, says that small sample sizes, poor study design, researcher bias, and selective reporting and other problems combine to make most research findings false. But even large, well-designed studies are not always right, meaning that scientists and the public have to...

Specific Evaluation Criterion In general, an "A" requires full disclosure of the truth, discussion of relevant scientific controversies, and a recognition that Darwin's theory -- like all scientific theories -- might have to be revised or discarded if it doesn't fit the facts. An "F" indicates that the textbook uncritically relies on logical fallacy, dogmatically treats a theory as an unquestionable fact, or blatantly misrepresents published scientific evidence.