Category: Science
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Off the shelf
I had a listen to Off the Shelf yesterday, where they were reviewing Darwin’s Legacy by John Dupré. A really fascinating 30 minute discussion on creationism and evolution. Professor David McConnell, philosophy lecturer Fr. Brendan Purcell and presenter Andy O’Mahony are well worth listening to. Listen here with Realplayer.
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Pic of the day..
Hubble’s Sharpest View of the Orion Nebula
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Smallest Earth-like planet found
It’s just a matter of time before a smaller one is found… An international team of astronomers has found the smallest Earth-like planet yet outside our Solar System. The new planet has five times the Earth’s mass and can be found about 25,000 light-years away in the Milky Way, orbiting a red dwarf star. ……
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Go for launch
We are go for launch at 7pm GMT…watch it here.
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Pluto launch
I was all geared up to watch the New Horizons launch, and now its been scrubbed for another day :-(. Here’s hoping it lifts off tomorrow.
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Mission to Pluto to launch Tuesday
The vastness even of our own solar system is astonishing, that it would take just a year to get to Jupiter, and then another eight to get to Pluto gives you some sense of scale. Because of the orbits of the planets, this mission really has to go ahead before February 14th, or else the…
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Probe 'gathers asteroid material'
It still amazes me that humans can do this kind of thing, not only send things into space, but land them on objects like asteroids.
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Kansas school board redefines science
More on science and religion, the Kansas Board of Education has approved new public school science standards yesterday that cast doubt on the theory of evolution. Notes CNN: The challenged concepts cited include the basic Darwinian theory that all life had a common origin and the theory that natural chemical processes created the building blocks…
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Evolution in the bible, says Vatican
I think the phrase here is ‘flip-flop‘: Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture, said the Genesis description of how God created the universe and Darwin’s theory of evolution were “perfectly compatible” if the Bible were read correctly. His statement was a clear attack on creationist campaigners in the US, who see…
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Viral hanky-panky
Olivia Judson, an evolutionary biologist at Imperial College London has a piece on avian flu in today’s IHT. She notes: The influenza virus that caused the infamous Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 had only eight genes – but it brought about more than 20 million human deaths. And alas, its lethality cannot be blithely attributed…