As you know by now, we’re in a fierce competition between myself, the mega-behemoth of godless blogging, against a ragtag flock of motley pee-wee bloggers, all to raise money for Camp Quest.

I am privy to certain emails that have been flying, I should mention, and they reveal that my opposition are scoundrels and rapscallions. They see defeat staring them in the face, and they have a desperate plan: they hope to recruit more atheists to their team, to try and outnumber me even further…not that it will help.

In the face of this threat, I have no choice: I sought out allies of my own. And once again, I have accomplished my plan with rapidity, stealing a march on the confused forces that think they can defeat me.

Yes. Team PZ has received the Official Endorsement of…Richard Dawkins. Contribute now. Or a pair of 900-pound godless gorillas will crush you.

Coral Ridge Ministries, that awful fundagelical organization founded by D. James Kennedy, has “discovered” a couple of former workers willing to testify about the evil practices of Planned Parenthood.

“They have an abortion budget and they have a certain number of patients that you have to perform abortions on every month, and there’s a dollar amount attached to each woman.”

Everett’s business plan included outreach in schools with talks given to break down children’s natural modesty and promote Everett and her clinic associates as trusted authorities for all things sexual.

Everett wanted students to “come to us with their sexual questions so we could put them on a low dose birth control pill we knew they’d get pregnant on. Of course we passed out condoms but we never passed out high quality condoms; we always used seconds or defective condoms. Our goal was to get the kids pregnant.”

The target, Everett says, was “three to five abortions between the ages of 13 and 18 from every girl we could find.”

I know, when you’re dealing with this brand of Christian, no lie is too low. But you’d think they’d at least care about plausibility.

Oh, wait…they believe that Jesus nonsense. I take it back, neither sleazy lies nor unbelievable absurdities are barriers to these guys.

That open letter to the NCSE by Jerry Coyne really seems to have set the cat among the pigeons — it’s an amazing flurry of ruffled feathers. I don’t see how there’s any hope of reconciliation, either, as long as the apologists for religion continue to be as obtuse as they have been. Roger Stanyard of the BCSE is unloading furiously on Richard Dawkins right now:

We don’t entirely know Peter but this is very definetly an attack on both the BCSE and the NCSE by the “New Atheists” including Richard Dawkins. It’s very personal and nasty as well. Basically they want the NCSE and the BCSE to back “New Atheism” and many of the people signing the letter are very hostile to us including and working with people who are religious.

The highlighting is mine, but the stupidity is Stanyard’s. How often do we have to repeat ourselves? There is no goal of turning the NCSE or the BCSE into an atheist organization; we think having an organization that is honestly neutral on the religious issue is extremely useful in advancing the cause of good science education for all. We want the NCSE/BCSE to support neither atheism nor religion.

You know what? The atheists in this argument have a crystal-clear understanding of the difference between atheism and secularism, and are saying that the science education organizations should be secular. It’s these sloppy accommodationists who have allowed liberal christianity to become their default position who have violated the distinction.

Where’s my rusty porcupine? If you want to understand why I despise the Templeton Foundation, just read the BS from their latest hero, Martin Rees, who advocates silence in the face of absurdity.

“Campaigning against religion can be socially counter-productive. If teachers take the uncompromising line that God and Darwinism are irreconcilable, many young people raised in a faith-based culture will stick with their religion and be lost to science. Moreover, we need all the allies we can muster against fundamentalism – a palpable, perhaps growing concern,” he wrote.

So…when someone says their god (an invisible, intangible being) infused a soul (an invisible, intangible imaginary vapor) into a human ancestor at some unspecifiable date by an indescribable mechanism, hold your tongue — don’t you dare point out that that is credulous unscientific garbage.

So…when someone claims their imaginary god works miracles by diddling subatomic particles at the quantum level, and there’s no way to detect this, but he knows this is how his magic man works, you’d better not mention that he’s illogical and promoting unscientific nonsense.

So…when our politicians and bureaucrats begin their meetings by asking everyone present to beg a nonexistent ghost to sprinkle magic illusions over the participants so that they’ll do their work better, we ought to close our eyes along with everyone else—presumably so we don’t see them making idiots of themselves.

I was just listening to Lawrence Krauss talk about his new book on Richard Feynman, and he closed the lecture with a fabulously appropriate quote.

Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

Richard Feynman

At least Feynman could see the centrality of honesty in science. Too bad Martin Rees lacks that much integrity —but then, if he had it, it would have disqualified him from the Templeton Prize.

Christopher Hitchens was scheduled to appear at the American Atheist convention, but had to cancel because of his illness. He sent this letter instead.

Dear fellow-unbelievers,

    Nothing would have kept me from joining you except the loss of my voice (at least my speaking voice) which in turn is due to a long argument I am currently having with the specter of death. Nobody ever wins this argument, though there are some solid points to be made while the discussion goes on. I have found, as the enemy becomes more familiar, that all the special pleading for salvation, redemption and supernatural deliverance appears even more hollow and artificial to me than it did before. I hope to help defend and pass on the lessons of this for many years to come, but for now I have found my trust better placed in two things: the skill and principle of advanced medical science, and the comradeship of innumerable friends and family, all of them immune to the false consolations of religion. It is these forces among others which will speed the day when humanity emancipates itself from the mind-forged manacles of servility and superstitition. It is our innate solidarity, and not some despotism of the sky, which is the source of our morality and our sense of decency. 

      That essential sense of decency is outraged every day. Our theocratic enemy is in plain view. Protean in form, it extends from the overt menace of nuclear-armed mullahs to the insidious campaigns to have stultifying pseudo-science taught in American schools. But in the past few years, there have been heartening signs of a genuine and spontaneous resistance to this sinister nonsense: a resistance which repudiates the right of bullies and tyrants to make the absurd claim that they have god on their side. To have had a small part in this resistance has been the greatest honor of my lifetime: the pattern and original of all dictatorship is the surrender of reason to absolutism and the abandonment of critical, objective inquiry. The cheap name for this lethal delusion is religion, and we must learn new ways of combating it in the public sphere, just as we have learned to free ourselves of it in private. 

    Our weapons are the ironic mind against the literal: the open mind against the credulous; the courageous pursuit of truth against the fearful and abject forces who would set limits to investigation (and who stupidly claim that we already have all the truth we need). Perhaps above all, we affirm life over the cults of death and human sacrifice and are afraid, not of inevitable death, but rather of a human life that is cramped and distorted by the pathetic need to offer mindless adulation, or the dismal belief that the laws of nature respond to wailings and incantations. 

       As the heirs of a secular revolution, American atheists have a special responsibility to defend and uphold the Constitution that patrols the boundary between Church and State. This, too, is an honor and a privilege. Believe me when I say that I am present with you, even if not corporeally (and only metaphorically in spirit…) Resolve to build up Mr Jefferson’s wall of separation. And don’t keep the faith.

    Sincerely

Christopher Hitchens

I have noticed a curious phenomenon. We have large numbers of fervent theists who relentlessly push this idea associating atheists with Nazis and mass-murdering communists — I understand there was a movie with that premise, I’ve seen Kennedy’s ‘documentary’ that reveled in that claim, and of course the frauds at the Discovery Institute have a pseudo-history book that accuses Darwinists of being genocidal maniacs — but there’s also an odd bias in the apologists for religion. If an atheist should point out that these evil behaviors are not unique to atheists, that religions have also supported genocidal maniacs (for instance, a certain pope in WWII who turned a blind eye to atrocities), or if we rebut those odious arguments by pointing out that Hitler and most of the Nazis were Catholic, not atheists, suddenly we are accused of playing the Nazi card. It doesn’t matter that no one is claiming that all religious people are Nazis, just bringing up the uncomfortable realities that undermine the accusations against us makes us guilty of Godwinning an argument.

Yeah, I’m looking at you, Nick Matzke. Trying to make a false equivalence between the nasty claims of theists and creationists, and the academic replies of atheists, is rather sleazy.

Whoa, brace yourselves: Chris Mooney has broken away from the malign influence of Matt Nisbet. It’s like seeing Gollum turning into Smeagol.

I have no illusions that he’s now on my side, but at least it’s a faint glimmer of hope.

What makes a plenary session different from the other sessions here? I don’t know.

10:00-11:30 Session 6: Plenary Session (Chair: Marian Waterman [UC Irvine])

  10:00-10:30 Wei Yan (Univ. of Nevada) “The control of cytoplasm removal during late spermiogenesis”

I produced 100,000 sperm in the time it took him to say his first sentence. I’m so proud.

Part of process of spermiogenesis is removal of cytoplasm and organelles from sperm. Found late expression of Spem1 protein in maturation process which doesn’t affect sperm numbers, but mulls strongly affect motility and sperm head morphology. They have a membranous bag bending the head. Can still produce progeny through ICSI.

  10:30-11:00 Anne Calof (UC Irvine) “Feedback, proliferation, and fate in sensory epithelium development”

All about regulation of olfactory epithelium, a proliferative neural tissue.
GDF8 aka myostatin regulates muscle proliferation. Related GDF11 is neural homolog. Where is it acting in olfactory lineages? GDF11 induces cell cycle withdrawal; GDF11 mutants have thicker olfactory epi, more actively dividing cells.

Different in retinal epithelium, where it doesn’t change proliferation, but changes relative numbers of different cel types in retina.

In olfactory epithelium, GDF11 doesn’t affect morphology either. 

  11:00-11:30 Jerry Crabtree (Stanford) “Instructive roles of ATP chromatin remodeling in early development and reprogramming”

Brg/Brm ATP dependent complexes that remodel chromatin. 13 subunits & 27 genes, 12 times larger than a nucleosome; combinatorial assembly. Brg important for activation of Oct4 in ICM and repression in TE — combinatorial properties allow different functions in different tissues. Context dependent sensitivity allows for a lot of different functions.

Someone remind me that I definitely need to read up more on these complexes…man, there are a lot of complications and permutations here.

Hey, it’s all about evolution. This is the session labeled as being about evo-devo, but I’ve been thinking about evolution in all of the talks, so I guess here we’re just making it more explicit.

08:00-09:30 Session 5: Evolution of Development (Chair: Elaine Seaver [Univ. Hawaii])

  08:00-08:30 Brad Davidson (Univ. of Arizona) “Microenvironmental cues refine inductive signaling during Ciona intestinalis heart development”

Ciona heart is a simple system: only two precursors! Inductive response to FGF is dependent on cell adhesion. Cool confocal work on cell behavior.

  08:30-08:50 Yale Passamanack (Postdoc, Univ. Hawaii) “Early photoreceptor development in brachiopods, and the evolution of morphological complexity”

I’ve been here before

  08:50-09:10 Neva .P. Meyer (Postdoc, Univ. Hawaii) “Central nervous system development in the annelid Capitella teleta”

Simple nervous system, lovely images of serotonin staining. They’ve got a small brain produced by cells dividing on surface, then migrating inward by bottle cell formation. Anterior epithelium becomes multiple-layered; internalized cells do not divide further. Pro neural genes expressed — similar to insects. Knockdown of achaete-scute homolog causes loss of synaptotagmin, blocks brain formation.  Neurogenesis in Capitella resembles myriapod dev.

I think I’m going to have to talk about Capitella in my fall neuro course.

  09:10-09:30 Andy Ransick (Faculty, Cal Tech) “Developmental mechanisms accompanying the evolution of echinoid larval mesoderm”

Echinoids have a unique pattern of early divisions. What follows is an Eric Davidson style analysis of molecular circuitry. There is a kind of double negative logic to activation of this module, with parts of the network dedicated to stabilizing output.

Micromeres are an evolutionary novelty that creates a new signalling center. Ransack discusses the regulatory module that is active here.

Incoming! Here’s another dump of my notes from yesterday afternoon. I’ll be hitting you with more later today.

Disease is the pretext here, but it’s really all about development.

15:30-17:00 Session 4: Development and Disease (Chair: Jack Somponpun [Univ. Hawaii]; co-Chair: Jacqueline Ho [UPMC])

15:30-16:00 Jacqueline Ho (Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh UPMC) “microRNAs in kidney development and disease”

Congenital anomalies are most common cause of renal failure in children.  Kidneys form from metanephric mesenchyme by induction from branching tubule – lots of interactions and opportunities to go awry. She’s looking at effects of miRNA. Loss of mRNAs in podocytes of glomerulus using transgenic mice leads to fetal death — they are necessary for formation of filtration barrier. Loss of miRNAs in nephron progenitors leads to depletion of population. Imbalance between selection for differentiation vs. Self-renewal?

There is no difference in proliferation. There is an increase in apoptosis.

Next problem is sorting out which of the many miRNAs deleted are important. Using bioinformatics tools to predict miRNA target interactions. Found candidate gene target, Bim, and identified miRNAs that might be modulating it’s expression.

Balance between survival (Bcl2) and apoptosis (Bim) that is tipped by miRNAs.

  
  16:00-16:20 Jack Somponpun (Faculty, Univ. Hawaii) “Reduced embryonic Six2 expression compromises nephron development and leads to osmoregulatory defect associated with post-natal fluid and electrolyte handling”

Variation in nephron number in population: as few as 200000′ as many as 2.5 million, average of about a million. Is this normal diversity or is it a consequence or cause of health problems? Kidneys are most important organ for regulation if bulood pressure. What is the significance of low nephron number?

Brachyrrhine mutant mice — greatly reduced kidney size, shows haploinsufficiency. Six2 is expressed strongly in embryonic kidney; thought to play a role in maintaining size of progenitors populations and preventing premature differentiation. Looked at Br mouse and also used siRNA to reduce six2 in cell culture system.

Br mutants have reduced number of nephron rudiments and reduced Six2 expression.

Inhibition of Six2 in culture also leads to reduced number of nephron rudiments. Also up regulates WT1, reduces Pax2, Cited1.

Reduced kidneys in Br mice have physiological effects. Can’t cope as all with increased salt in diets — hypeerosmolalitu, hypernatremia, polydipsia, with urine-concentrating defect, comparable to chronic renal failure.

  16:20-16:40 Grant Miura (Postdoc, UC San Diego) “The T-Box Transcription Factor Tbx20 is required for the maintenance of proper cardiac chamber size”

Early development of heart: mustw balance size of ventricle vs. Atrium. Laf mutant reduces atrium size. Tinkeering with BMP pathway affects relative size of atrium/ventricle. BMP Important; what are other signals, and what are downstream targets? Screened small molecules known to cause cardiovascular defects. 

Searched for genes with SMAD binding sites, which led to Tbx20 gene. Tanscription factor with conserved expression in flies and vertebrates. Tbx20 morpholinos caused serious cardiac edema, otherwise normal. Decreased both atrial and ventricular size, but early specification was normal. Doesn’t look like laf at all. Regulates proliferation or maintenance?

  16:40-17:00 Denise Al Alam (Postdoc, Saban Research Institute) “FGFR2b signaling is required for the formation of lipofibroblasts in the developing mouse lung”

Bronchopulmonary dysplasia — preemies treated with oxygen end up with surfactant deficiency, decrease of lipofibroplasts and FGF10. lipofibroblasts required for surfactant synthesis. FGF10 through FGFR2b required for differentiation. Used Dom-neg receptor to knock down FGFR2b.  Reduces lung differentiation.