A better evolution simulation

Reader Ted sent along a rebuttal to that pathetic evolution “simulation” written by a creationist—it’s a much better simulation that was presented at TAM5, called IC Evolver. The simulation plays a simple game that has a strategy that can be encoded in strings, and it starts with a set of randomized strategies, which it then uses and modifies, generation after generation, to maximize the score. Two cool things about it: one is that it modifies the strategy with common genetic operations, like insertions, deletions, point mutations, and recombination, and displays them graphically so you can see what’s happening. Another is that it tests for irreducible complexity—when there are 5 components, and removing any one of them reduces the score it can get to 0, it flags it.

You can see the scores steadily improve, and you can also see irreducible complexity evolve.

Turn it loose and let it run in the background. It works fairly quickly.

A great idea: blogroll amnesty day

Atrios has declared today to be Blogroll Amnesty Day, a time to purge those tired old links to sites that you’ve always got up on your page, but that maybe contain a few blogs you’ve grown tired of, or lacks the sites that you’ve been browsing recently. It’s a fine idea; if you feel like clearing boring ol’ Pharyngula off your list, go ahead, I won’t cry too much. It would be nice if you replaced it with some fresh new place that you like very much, of course.

I personally police my blogroll about once a week—I build it from the opml file from my newsreader, so I’m regularly adding new sites to it, and I’m fairly ruthless about deleting blogs that have no new content for 30 days.

In which I waffle undecidedly over the Democratic field

When will the Democrats learn? We are in an unpopular and failed war, and what a successful presidential candidate has to do is openly and uncompromisingly slam this unjust travesty and the incompetents who initiated it, yet Clinton and Edwards are enabling war fever, if not directly feeding it. Face it, war with Iran is off the table. It is not an option, unless we want to ruin our military and our economy; and the nuclear option is evil and unconscionable, and would utterly destroy our fast-fading moral standing. I wish we had a candidate who would just come out and say that.

I hate to say it, but Barack Obama seems to be one of the rare candidates thinking about doing something against the war. He could still win me over, especially if he continues to make specific proposals like that, but I’m still worried that any presidential race with him in it would turn into a “Who’s Holier?” piety contest, and we simply do not need more religiosity in American politics.

I might be willing to overlook that (for now) if we can just get a candidate who shows some real awareness and concern about policy, is unambiguously against war and torture, doesn’t use the prospect of terrorism to terrify the populace, and is pro-science and pro-education. An anti-George W. Bush, in other words.

That’s more like it

While it’s nice to have the Dilbonians* still whimpering and howling in frustration and fury, here’s an even better testimonial to my talents:

PZ, I’m sorry I slighted you. I now have seen the light. You lull your victims into a false sense of security by manifesting as a mild-mannered biology prof, but in reality you are an unspeakably hideous hybrid of Cthulhu and the Flying Spaghetti Monster, living in a shadow lair beyond time and space, called Minnesota. You suck your victims’ brains out through their eye sockets and gorge until sated. You are the very embodiment of evil.

I am well pleased. I shall let him live a little longer, although I may have to sup on his bandwidth a bit more.

*What I’m finding amusing right now is all the Dilbert fans who are showing up in the comments and complaining that I’m obsessed and that I need to stop picking on poor Scott Adams…5 days after I wrote the post. I wonder; do they think the post goes away when they don’t look at it, and I’m busily retyping it over and over again so it’ll be there when they look a second time? Peek-a-boo is cute when played with 2 year olds, but I expect people who know how to use the internet to have mastered the concept of object permanency.