science

Explaining Global Warming (or Lack Thereof)

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From Prager University, to go along with the previous video takedown of moon landing truthers, here’s a simple, straightforward explanation of why global warming hysterics are silly ninnies:

Explaining Things to Dumb People

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This guy may not be Mr. Charisma, but I watched with fascination as he explained with total deadpan clarity how the moon landings could not have been faked, and how people who think they were are full of hooey: Perfect. A guy who knows his stuff laying out facts that everyone can understand and no … Read more

The Fabricated War Between Religion and Science

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We’re constantly told that science and religion are like Kanye West and Taylor Swift — arch enemies incapable of coexistence, two Venn diagram circles that don’t overlap at any point. Well, dear reader, I know smart, cosmopolitan people like you and me don’t believe that. But how did that misconception become part of conventional wisdom? Who … Read more

The Science is Settled! – Big Bang Edition

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Whenever you talk to someone who tries to end an argument by saying, “The science is settled!” just assume he’s an idiot and move on. You know the Big Bang? That science must be settled, because that’s how the universe came to be, right? I mean, how else could it? Well, turns out that maybe it … Read more

Darkness at the Edge of Science

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Via the Twitter feed of Jennifer Fulwiler, some really interesting tidbits on mysteries that science still can’t solve. Like for instance: Every so often, a discovery happens that forces us to re-imagine what we think we know about humanity, and how we got to where we are today. Turkey’s Göbekli Tepe is certainly one such discovery. … Read more

Are Crazy Religious Stories Good for Our Brains?

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Connor Wood at the Science on Religion blog thinks that yes, yes they are: To put it simply, the mind’s causal stories tend to assume that whatever has happened in the past will determine what happens in the future. In the crisp realm of Newtonian physics, this is generally a good assumption. But in the … Read more

Big Bang Science Raises Questions

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As it should. Raising questions is one of the main jobs of science, after all. But some of those questions are addressed straight on, and others are danced around harder than a boom box in either Breakin’ or Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo. GetReligion highlights some of the latter kind of questions in the coverage of … Read more

It’s Not a Fact Argument; It’s a Perspective Argument

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The re-boot of the series Cosmos (along with the recent slap fight between Bill Nye and Ken Ham) has brought science vs. religion jousting back to the front pages. And the story is exactly the same as it was the last time, and the time before that, and so on, back into infinity (or back … Read more

How Science and Religion Became the Hatfields and the McCoys

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Connor Wood has a compelling post on the history, and the future, of the ongoing slap-fight between science and religion. There are a lot of quotable parts, so I’m going to quote a lot: since the 19th century, the religion-science divide has been encouraged by the popularizers of Science for the sake of their profession. What … Read more

There is No Conflict Between the Bible and Science

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White Horse Inn is posting video answers to the most common apologetics questions, including this one about the false conflict between religious belief and science:

Babies Don’t Know Jack About Morality

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The Atlantic on studies that purport to show that babies are born with an understanding of morality: Human babies, before they learn how to speak and even hold up their own bodies, are capable of not only telling the difference between right and wrong, but of making morally fraught decisions, a finding that shocked scientists … Read more

Reorientation

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In USA Today (a paper that is just begging to get bought by some gazillionaire; Mark Cuban, wouldn’t those infographics look great on your mantle?), Nicholas A. Cummings defends sexual reorientation therapy: …contending that all same-sex attraction is immutable is a distortion of reality. Attempting to characterize all sexual reorientation therapy as “unethical” violates patient choice and … Read more

Are Extroverts Happier?

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From WSJ.com: Extroverts, those outgoing, gregarious types who wear their personalities on their sleeve, are generally happier, studies show. Some research also has found that introverts, who are more withdrawn in nature, will feel a greater sense of happiness if they act extroverted.  Experts aren’t entirely sure why behaving like an extrovert makes people feel … Read more

The Scientific Pretensions of Atheism

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David Berlinski–philosopher, mathematician, and atheist–says that, despite the proclamations of many atheists, atheism isn’t necessarily so scientific: (Via Justin Taylor)

Breaking News: A Scientist Believes in the Bible

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And over at Jesus Creed, that selfsame scientist writes about some misconceptions concerning science and faith, and why he doesn’t buy ’em: Science has proven that miracles are impossible. We’ve heard this statement in many forms and many places. It is, of course, not true. Science cannot disprove miracles, as science can only address the … Read more

Is There a Conflict Between Science and Religion?

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The stereotypical belief among the non-religious is that religious believers get some kind of rash when they come into contact with science. But as reported in the Science on Religion blog, a recent study–a scientific study, mind you–give us reason to believe that’s just not the case: The results provided quite a surprise: not only … Read more

The Heretic

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Which group is more vicious toward people who dissent from group orthodoxy: religious believers or scientific secularists? I know where I’d put my money. The Weekly Standard has a profile of one such dissenter: atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel. Though he doesn’t believe in God, he also has the temerity to say that Darwinism isn’t all … Read more

This is Your Brain on the Eternal

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An interesting post at Acculturated scratches the surface (“And believe me, it’s a surface that needed scratching.” – David Letterman) of the question of transcendence: Are religious experiences real or just a fluke of misfiring neurons in our brain? So many good quotes in that piece, it’s hard to pick just one that gives you … Read more

C.S. Lewis and the Case Against Scientism

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C.S. Lewis (pause while I squeal like a girl in the front row of a One Direction concert) made a strong case against twisting science into a tool for “perfecting” man and society, most notably in The Abolition of Man. If you don’t have time to read that, well, you probably need to loosen up … Read more

Signature in the Cell

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Dr. Stephen Meyer, author of Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design, lectures on the scientific case for intelligent design: (Via Justin Taylor)