Sunday Sermon-Skit

THE SCENE: A circular room cut deep into stone; magma pits bubble left and right, all is lit by roaring torches that cast dark, flickering shadows. In the center, the Cephalopod Throne.

THE CAST: PZ Myers broods on his throne, chin on fist. He glowers at a horde of SUPPLICANTS, bowing and scraping before him. Many are speaking at once, but all have the same concern.

SUPPLICANT: “O Lord PZ…”

SUPPLICANT: “…Great Lord PZ…”

SUPPLICANT: “…Lord PZ, do you ever…”

SUPPLICANT: “…ever worry…”

SUPPLICANT: “…worry that your puissant and uncompromising godlessness might…”

SUPPLICANT: “…might frighten…”

SUPPLICANT: “…drive away…”

SUPPLICANT: “…terrify…”

SUPPLICANT: “…terrify the religious moderates?”

SUPPLICANT: “O Lord?”

SUPPLICANT: “Perhaps you shouldn’t be so hard on the soft and unthreatening believers, who might also find goodness in science?”

SUPPLICANT: “Perhaps your atheism diminishes support for science education?”

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Important information from the pre-debate conversation!

I forgot to tell you all the most important gossip I heard at the Bell last night. I had a scant few minutes to talk to Jim Kakalios, who has gone all Hollywood on us, doing consulting work for the next big superhero blockbuster … Watchmen. Ooooh, all you geeks are saying, tell us more! I can’t. All I know is that Jim promises that it is excellent and true to the graphic novel. And as a fellow follower of the Code of the Thin Tweed Line, he cannot lie to a fellow academic. This will be something to look forward to.

I tried to pump him for more information, but Hollywood has locked him in with vicious threats — if he spills the beans, a tanned and toned starlet will show up at his door, pin him to a table with her pilates-firmed thighs, and carve out both his kidneys with her long glittery nails. He places his concerns for his kidneys above his loyalty to the the Thin Tweed Line, which is a little distressing.

Maybe I should pass Jim’s home phone number on to Harry Knowles.

I get email

My crank mail can be categorized into several categories. There are the short, barely literate splutterings of abuse; the weird rants and threats; the reiteration of long-dead creationist talking points (yeah, I get email where the writer thinks he’s trumped me by saying “If evolution is true, why are there still monkeys?”); and then there are the long, rambling lectures from deeply clueless individuals. I’m afraid this is one of the latter. I’ll understand if you fall asleep partway through.

By the way, the author actually sent this to me pre-formatted in Comic Sans. I’m also rather peeved that he’s sending me a letter addressed to Eugenie Scott.

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VICTORY!

As expected, the Laden/Myers tag team utterly crushed the Nisbet/Mooney team. The decision was unanimous. Only a few crazy people might have found the framers at all persuasive. (It helps, too, that Nisbet/Mooney are on a plane flying away and won’t be able to get out their side of the story until later, and even when they do, my blog has more traffic than theirs. I win! Hey, maybe this framing stuff has some virtues.)

If you want an independent account, look in the comments. The whole shebang was taped, so I presume it will be online at some time in the near future. And hey, guess what? Your own decision based on the evidence will be far more important than any framing I try to do — so I’ll win on principle no matter what!

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Girding my loins in Dinkytown

All right, homies, I hope some of you are planning to show for the big rumble at the Bell Museum tonight. I’ve arrived, and I’m flexing and stretching on the home turf, getting ready … in other words, I’m hanging out at the Espresso Royale stoking up on caffeine. Here’s the deal:

Speaking Science 2.0: New Directions in Science Communications
Friday, September 28, 2007
7:30 p.m.
Bell Museum Auditorium
$5 Suggested Donation

I just noticed the unfortunate typo up there in the announcement: they misspelled “wrong” as N-E-W.

We’ll hash that out this evening, I think.

Flattery is nice when you can get it

Andrew Brown is so kind: he calls me one of America’s most notorious atheists in an opinion piece on the wretched Archbishop Chimoio. He also makes an interesting game theoretic argument that, in purely pragmatic terms, the Catholic Church in Africa is simply following a winning strategy that maximizes the differential fitness of their group. It’s probably true, except that I think a rational secular strategy would work best of all … if anyone were playing that side of the game.

Thoughts and Findings Related to Neurobiology Lab

As one of my fellow classmates has already described in part, we have proposed to study the effects of sleep deprivation and alcohol on zebrafish. We have a good idea of how to execute experimentation on this topic. The meaning behind it however remains, as of yet, a bit vague. The idea was brought up during our last class discussion that we could experiment with the effects of sleep deprivation and alcohol on zebrafish development or adult mating and feeding patterns. We also thought of experimenting with the behavior of zebrafish on cocaine, or with the effects of alcohol and sleep deprivation on oursleves but neither of those ideas flew too high with PZ. Understandably so.

Although, while researching, I didn’t find too many articles on intoxicated and sleep deprived zebrafish, I did find a lot of articles on genes and regeneration. In one experiment, researchers surgically removed a small portion of zebrafish hearts and then monitored recovery. The zebrafish were not only able to regenerate the removed portion of their hearts within two months, the regenerated heart tissue functioned the same and looked histiologically the same as the heart tissue of zebrafish in the control group (Poss, Wilson, & Keating). Another group of researchers discussed the effects of cyclic adenosine monophosphate on neuron regeneration in zebrafish (Bhatt, Otto, Depoister, & Fetcho). This could obviously have significant implications on human neuron regeneration.

After thinking about my findings for a moment, I discovered the reason why articles about regeneration out number articles on the effects of sleep deprivation and alcohol. Areas of research like regeneration are much more useful, not as well understood, and provide lots of room for scientific advancement. I’m not sure that I have the skill or tools required to surgically alter an organism the size of a minnow or track specific chemicals throughout the nervous system but I’ll definately be giving some thought to possibilities for regeneration experiments over the weekend. If anyone has any suggestions, I would be pleased to read them.

References:

Kenneth D. Poss, Lindsay G. Wilson, Mark T. Keating. Heart Regeneration in Zebrafish. Science. 13 December 2002. Vol. 298. no. 5601, pp. 2188 – 2190

Dimple H. Bhatt, Stefanie J. Otto, Brett Depoister, Joseph R. Fetcho. Cyclic AMP-Induced Repair of Zebrafish Spinal Circuits. Science. 9 July 2004. Vol. 305. no. 5681, pp. 254 – 258

Growing bolder in Boulder

Oh, to be young again and brave: I’m impressed with these high school students who protested the American loyalty oath to a god:

About 50 Boulder High School students walked out of class Thursday to protest the daily reading of the Pledge of Allegiance and recited their own version, omitting “one nation, under God.”

The students say the phrase violates the constitutional separation of church and state.

Back in my high school days, I simply quietly refused to say the pledge, and didn’t make an issue of it. It’s a sign of progress that now students will make their protests loud and unavoidable.

Dare I hope that more students across the country will take some inspiration from this act?

There’s also a video of the students! There are also the usual suspects: the young Neandertal who thinks that if you won’t recite the pledge, you ought to leave the country, and the blinkered administrator who isn’t going to change his dogma. Otherwise, though, look at the smart students standing up for their rights — those are the ones who matter.