Free Republic

If any trait reflects the genes we inherit from our parents, surely it's hair color. Brunettes tend to have dark haired children, and an auburn beauty undoubtedly has a redhead among her ancestors. But hair gets its color from melanin, which is not made directly by genes. Instead, it's formed when the body's metabolism treats a molecule called tyrosine the way a toddler treats a Lego creation: breaking it into component parts. When there's enough copper in the diet, tyrosine breaks down and melanin darkens the tresses. When copper is in short supply, tyrosine doesn't decompose to yield melanin....

Claims A. God of the Gaps/Unsolved Mystery Assumes that if science cannot PRESENTLY explain something, there is no natural explanation. B. Personal Incredulity  Assumes that their inability to comprehend or understand how something could have occurred naturally is proof that it did not. C. Post-It Note God/Morris Effect Gives a supernatural deity credit for a natural event, or "well, god CUDDA done it that way !""There is no observational fact imaginable that cannot, one way or another, be made to fit the creation model." - Henry Morris D. Scriptural Assault  Use of bible verses as 'evidence'.  Usually either as...

Two Republican congressmen are playing fast and loose with accepted definitions by suggesting that their home state should alter its science curriculum to include references to the so-called intelligent-design (ID) theory. Representatives John Boehner and Steve Chabot of Ohio want the curriculum amended to include the language, "Where topics are taught that may generate controversy (such as biological evolution), the curriculum should help students to understand the full range of scientific views that exist." This might seem unobjectionable, except that most observers agree that the language is being used as a Trojan horse for a theory that is decidedly unscientific....

Two House Republicans are citing landmark education reform legislation in pressing for the adoption of a school science curriculum in their home state of Ohio that includes the teaching of an alternative to evolution. In what both sides of the debate say is the first attempt of its kind, Reps. John A. Boehner and Steve Chabot have urged the Ohio Board of Education to consider the language in a conference report that accompanied the major education law enacted earlier this year..... ....Intelligent-design proponents -- such as Phillip E. Johnson, a University of California at Berkeley law professor whose 1991 book...

Premiere evolves into protestFilm argues for expanded scope of science education    By Haley Clark, News Editor    Published: 5/15/2002 Saul Renderfrance The "Icons of Evolution" documentary, which highlights what some scholars regard as problems with a number of pieces of evidence commonly used to support Darwinian evolution, premiered in Third Gwinn Friday night. Friday evening’s premiere of the film "Icons of Evolution" met with dissension from people within and without the bounds of SPU. These dissenters include members of the SPU biology department and a group called Burlington-Edison Committee for Science Education (BECSE). Prior to the event, in the...

Fossils in rocks deposited 1.2 billion years ago could be the oldest evidence of animal life discovered so far. Australian researchers believe a worm-like creature left a trail in sandstone found off the western tip of Australia. If confirmed, it would be the oldest example of an animal comprised of more than one cell. Until now, it was thought that multicellular animals, or metazoans, only appeared about 600 million years ago. The rocks in question come from the Stirling Range Formation of south-western Australia. Fine ridges in the sandstone may be "casts of mucus-impregnated strings of sediment left by an...

Scientists say they have found the fossilised remains of the earliest known flower. It was discovered in a slab of stone in north-east China and the plant is thought to have lived at least 125 million years ago. Researchers at the University of Florida say the species could be the predecessor of all flowering plants. They say it probably grew in shallow lakes shared by dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures. The plant, called archaefructus sinensis or "ancient fruit from China," is of a species never before seen, said David Dilcher of the Florida Museum of Natural History and the University...

Evidence has emerged to suggest the Neanderthals had a war-mongering nature. The early hunter-gatherers got into fights and used weapons, according to the results of a study of a skeleton uncovered in French caves. A crack in the skull of the 36,000 year-old Neanderthal was caused by a sharp tool, say anthropologists. An early modern human may have struck the blow. They think another Neanderthal or an early human attacked the young adult. The Neanderthal survived but would have had to be nursed by other members of the tribe. The findings indicate that the contemporaries of early modern humans were...

The Black Death of the 1300s was probably not the modern disease known as bubonic plague, according to a team of anthropologists studying on these 14th century epidemics. “Although on the surface, seem to have been similar, we are not convinced that the epidemic in the 14th century and the present day bubonic plague are the same,” says Dr. James Wood, professor of anthropology and demography at Penn State. “Old descriptions of disease symptoms are usually too non-specific to be a reliable basis for diagnosis.” The researchers note that it was the symptom of lymphatic swelling that led 19th century...

Rare fossilized tube feet suggest functional shift through time CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Fleshy tube feet preserved in a rare fossil suggest an ecological shift through time, and may settle a long-standing debate about the preservation of soft parts, say paleontologists at the University of Illinois.Discovered in the Hunsrueck Slate of Germany by an amateur collector, the specimen is a brittle star, Bundenbachia beneckei, of the phylum Echinodermata, which includes starfishes and sea urchins. In life, the tube feet were fleshy extensions of an internal plumbing system called the water vascular system, and projected from the animal like so many small...

<p>SEATTLE (AP) --  It looks like a helpful Microsoft Corp. security bulletin, but an e-mail that says it will protect a computer from viruses actually carries a virus itself, Microsoft officials warned Friday.</p> <p>The bogus e-mail, called "Internet Security Update," reads much like a typical Microsoft security bulletin and even makes reference to a legitimate security update released several weeks ago.</p>