Free Republic

Astrobiology sounds like the stuff of lava lamps and Jetsons reruns. Yet seven years after NASA launched a formal astrobiology research program, scientists of every stripe — geologists, biologists, chemists, paleontologists, oceanographers and astronomers — have rallied to the quest. They've spent as much as $65 million a year trying to solve a mystery that has underpinned religion and inspired thinkers from Seneca to Carl Sagan: How did life on the lonely Earth begin? And is Earth really the only source of life in the universe? With the help of modern tools such as the genome, high-powered computer modeling and...

S.C. House panel votes for emphasis on ‘critical thinking and analysis’ Textbooks emerged Monday as the new battle front in the evolution debate.In a 3-to-2 vote, a House education subcommittee authorized the addition of language to a Senate bill that directs the state Board of Education to approve only textbooks that “emphasize critical thinking and analysis in each academic content.” The amended bill is Rep. Bob Walker’s latest effort to break a stalemate that has stalled the approval of a single page of revisions to biology standards that guide high school teachers on how to address the subject of evolution...