90% True

.: When taking an open-book test, be sure to bring your textbook.

.: On a slightly related note, I’ve seen several guys hit the showers in their underwear. What’s up with that?

.: You do remember him, right? It was only two posts ago, so it should be fresh in your memory. Well, he said a few more silly things today.

.: Today (the last day of class) we covered various court cases on religious expression in public places, which eventually segued into court cases about teaching evolution and creation science in classrooms. You can guess which side our dear friend The Jester took. His character asked a typically clueless creationist question, in pitch perfect tone, “Why can’t we just teach both theories in the classroom?”

.: Initially I wasn’t going to respond to his hilariously moronic statements, but fearing that someone would actually take his stultiloquence seriously I raised my hand:

“Because it isn’t science.”

.: It was a simple response, and though I did feel a tad bit silly for engaging with an obvious parody, I still felt I did the right thing. Would you believe me if I told you that was it and the lecture quickly moved on? If you would, then you clearly have little faith in our dear friend’s comedic abilities, for he shot back with a classic creationist ripost:

“Yes it is. And besides, 80% of our taxpayers believe in God, and only 40% believe in evolution, so why not teach both?”

.: I was nervous, and I was also thankful I was sitting in the backrow where people couldn’t see my leg bouncing up and down.

.: Should I really continue with this clown? Would I be advancing an understanding of science if other people couldn’t see he was clearly not being serious? He really wasn’t being serious, right? Was I wrong in my original assessment?

.: By then other students were chiming in with their own thoughts, so I told myself, “Fuck it. You can’t tell a creationist from a parody anyway, might as well treat them both the same way.”

.: And on it went, for the rest of the period. After about five minutes, some people would ignore the professor and ask questions their questions directly to me instead. After about ten minutes, if a student happened to ask the professor a question, she would simply direct them to me. It’s an odd feeling you get whenever an entire class of students is deeply skeptical of everything you say.

.: I tried to focus the discussion on the legal aspect of teaching evolution and creationism, but in any situation like this it always comes down to “Where are the transitional fossils, HMM?!” For every pertinent point I could bring up (”Look up the ‘Wedge Document’ and you’ll see a clear case of religious motivation”) they would always counter with something from the asinine (”For some, science is just as much of a religion as Christianity, so if you’re not going to teach creationism then shouldn’t you not teach science as well?). I was reminded of a passage I read from a new blog I discovered this morning:

We don’t argue with cranks. Part of understanding denialism is knowing that it’s futile to argue with them, and giving them yet another forum is unnecessary. They also have the advantage of just being able to make things up and it takes forever to knock down each argument as they’re only limited by their imagination while we’re limited by things like logic and data. - denialism blog

.: And here I was, arguing with people who thought differently from me. I wouldn’t consider them cranks (save for Mr. Jester), just mistaken people. I did my best to keep my tone civil and measured. I didn’t interrupt anybody when they were talking, I didn’t belittle anyone’s deeply held beliefs, and I even pointed inquiring minds to Baylor’s very own biology department for further information.

.: When I recommended the writings of Ken Miller, Jester responded, “And I would recommend the writings of MOSES!” People laughed at that, which made me think, “Good, they don’t take him seriously.” He did say he was a religion major, so for all intents and purposes — Jester or not — he probably did mean it. I really can’t tell at this point.

.: All in all, it was a fun period. I got to talk for half an hour on a subject I find interesting, and I got to experience the thrill and entertainment of That Guy In My Political Science Class for one last time.

.: I just returned from a lecture given by Simon Conway Morris called, “Darwin’s Compass: How Evolution Discovers the Song of Creation.” I read about it in today’s Lariat, and the fliers in the science building certainly piqued my interest:

ABSTRACT: Is evolution a random, open-ended process without inherent predictability? “Rerun the tape of life,” claimed Stephen J. Gould and the outcome will be entirely different: no humans, for example. I will argue the exact reverse. Evolution is far more predictable than generally thought, whether we are talking about molecules or societies. This means human-like intelligence is very probable, perhaps inevitable. So this not only indicates a deep structure to evolution, but also reopens the question posed by Fermi: where are the extraterrestrials?

.: I was skeptical about his conclusions before going, and I remain so, but the talk was certainly interesting, and I appreciate some of the things he said.

.: Before the lecture started, I made a little bet with some friends:

Me: I’m going to keep a tally for every mention of Stephen Jay Gould and Richard Dawkins; who do you think he’ll mention more?

Friend 1: I’m thinking Gould. He’s mentioned right there in the abstract, and it’s mainly his science that Conway Morris disagrees with.

Friend 2: Me too. Gould seems far more likely.

Me: Ah yes, but keep in mind we’re at Baylor. He might tailor his talk to fit the audience, and mentioning Dawkins in a negative fashion will surely work to his favor.

.: From what little research I did beforehand, I know that Conway Morris is a theistic evolutionist who latest book, Life’s Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe, argues against both Gould’s and Dawkins’s views of evolution. For Gould, evolution is all about contingency and expansive diversity with no possible chance for predictability of outcomes. For Dawkins, modern evolutionary theory undercuts the most powerful arguments for the existence of a creator God. Throughout the talk, Gould’s views were more often critiqued than Dawkins’s, who was barely mentioned. (The final tally, by the way, was two for Dawkins and six for Gould.)

.: The whole of his lecture consists almost exclusively of one fascinating topic: evolutionary convergence. That is, two different lineages independently evolving similar traits. Birds evolved from a wingless ancestor, as did Bats. Of course, bats did not get their wings from birds; they simply evolved on their own. Conway Morris argues that convergence is a predictable consequence of certain constraints inherent in evolution. For example, the vast majority of possible configurations of a certain trait or pathway simply won’t work. He gave one example of trying to reach a certain protein sequence where there are 120 possible mutation pathways. Of the 120, only 18 are viable. The other 102 are non-possibilities. If that protein served a basic life function, such as capturing a stray election for energy or breaking down a common molecule, then, he argues, you would expect to see it over and over again in distinct lineages.

.: As for running the tape of life backwards, Conway Morris concedes that if certain historical events were changed — say, a stray asteroid didn’t hit the earth 65 million years ago — then of course we’d see something different today. But he argues what we would see would have several similarities with what we have today. A few of the features he covered in depth were the following:

Eyes. Both fish and cephalopods have camera-like eyes, which superficially resemble each other a great deal. Both types of eye have transparent lenses and retinas, and both evolved independently — another remarkable example of convergence. Yet he was also quick to point out some major differences. The cephalopod eye has the photoreceptors on top of its blood vessels, while the vertebrate eye has it backwards (a somewhat clumsy arrangement, actually — imagine having thin red lines painted all over your car’s windshield). Also, in vertebrate eyes, the nerves all converge into one stalk (the optic nerve) as they travel to the brain; in cephalopod eyes the nerves are more like roots, which consequently restricts eye movement.

.: Conway Morris seems to be willing to ignore these differences and suggests that evolution approaches a more idealistic, “platonic” form of the eye. Never mind the small differences, he argues, it’s the big picture that’s important. The basic scheme of the camera eye is incredibly effective and therefore it’s unsurprising to see it appear in nature more than once. It’s certainly true that the camera-like eyes create a more detailed picture of surrounding environments than the compound eyes of insects and other such creatures, but there are many independently evolved compound eyes as well, and species with such eyes seem to be doing perfectly fine here on Earth.

Limbs. He showed a slide of octopus tentacles and a human arm, noting that they “couldn’t be more different” in appearance. But in terms of behavior, one can easily see convergence: octopuses, by means of special electric signals, create an artificial three-sectioned arm comparable to that of a human arm. Why does it do this? Because it turns out the three-sectioned limb is the more efficient setup, mechanically speaking. To me, this really stretches the concept of convergence. (You’ll thank me for avoiding any “out on a limb” puns here.) In a sense, evolutionary processes certainly can find idealized forms for mechanical structures. An example that immediately springs to mind is the structure of blood vessels, which Richard Dawkins mentions in this clip from The Blind Watchmaker (fast forward to about 4:10).

.: But tentacles and arms are still very different things, despite this one mechanical similarity. I think it’s safe to conclude that, in another world, the three-sectioned limb will surely show up here and there, but if something as distinct as an octopus’s tentacle is considered convergent with a human arm, then Conway Morris’s “inevitable humans” are an amorphous lot indeed.

Teeth. Two different lineages of mammals evolved saber-teeth: one was a placental mammal, the other was a marsupial. Eutheria and Metatheria diverged quite a bit ago, but these particular saber-toothed species closely resemble each other to an uncanny degree. This one isn’t as impressive as the the camera eye example; it’s actually quite mundane. These are just two animals whose ancestors walked around on all fours biting other animals to death. Those same ancestors also independently evolved larger teeth so they could more easily bite other animals. Okay. And other animals didn’t evolve crazy-large teeth.

.: Conway Morris wants to argue against the idea that humans are mere flukes of evolutionary history — my guess because he doesn’t like the implicit denigration of our species as “nothing special” — and he does so by pointing out several motifs in life’s history, then concludes that human-like creatures must result from an evolutionary process. After all, certain features of humans appear in other animals, so it’s inevitable that if the tape of life were run again all those features would coalesce into a roughly humanoid figure. But at the same time, compound eyes, segmented bodies, and wings all independently evolved in other lineages. Why bother singling out humans? His book might as well be subtitled Inevitable Dragonflies in a Lonely Universe.

.: All of that said, I really did enjoy most of the talk. Simon Conway Morris is an engaging speaker, and he’s really quite funny to boot. He was also careful to point out directionality and predictability in evolution need not at all imply teleology. We’re in the natural world; things are going to operate by natural law, so he reasoned. This was significant, I thought, because there was a special guest visitor in the audience which made the quote all the more appropriate: William Dembski.

.: I was actually quite impressed by Dembski’s appearance: not once during the entire presentation did he make a single fart noise. He even got to ask a question, too! It was something about the convergence in the pre-biotic world, and how Conway Morris was overstating the case on abiogenesis and blah blah blah western science has abandoned God blah blah blah I don’t work at this university anymore blah blah blah why do I claim to be a mathematician when I don’t publish anything mathematical? blah blah blah my God I’ve wasted my life blah blah blah. I was hoping for more fun from Dembski, but he left before the Q&A session was over.

.: All in all, tonight was really quite a treat. Not only did I get to attend a lecture by a distinguished member of the Royal Society, but I also got to sit a mere three aisles behind one of today’s biggest intellectual losers. I wish I brought my camera.

.: Two weeks ago my molecular genetics professor, Dr. Chris Kearney, made an announcement in class about a local elementary school teacher needing volunteers to judge at the school’s science fair. My friend Larry and I decided we were up for it, and today we woke up an hour early and drove across town to harshly critique appraise and encourage burgeoning young scientists.

.: It was your typical science fair scene in all its tri-panel glory. I walked up to a kindergarten student — official clipboard in hand — and asked her what she did in her experiment. “I mixed oil and water and food coloring and I found out that it creates two colors that separate after you shake them up.” I asked her if she knew what she wanted to be when she grew up, and she said she didn’t know.

.: Some of the experiments were good, practical experiments that a kid could easily create on their own. One such experiment was the simple question, “Can you taste the difference between splenda cookies and regular cookies?” It’s a good question, and the student even went through the trouble of making a survey sheet for everyone involved (216 people!). It was a good project, and it was clear that the parents only helped with the implementation of the experiment, not with the ideas behind it. I was a little dismayed, though, when I learned that — after making sure to record all the data about which variety of cookie the people preferred, and whether or not they thought they would be able to determine the difference — the student never wrote down the figures for whether or not people could actually tell the difference between the two cookies!

.: With few exceptions, the best projects showed tell tale signs of deep parental involvement — and of these, the best were from parents who were also scientists. Compare and contrast the following statement from one third grader:

I took the pennies and I stacked them ten at a time and placed them on the scale and I took their weight and the the boat that held the most pennies was also the biggest boat and my conclusion was that the bigger the boat the more pennies it could hold.

… with this from another third grader:

Light enters the eye by first passing through the cornea, which is the outer layer of the eye, then on through the lens, which is an adjustable clear structure that stiffens with age — which is why older people need glasses more than younger people. Once light passes through the lens, it is projected onto the retina, but because of the curvature of the lens, the image is inverted. The image is then converted into signals by the retina and the signal is sent to the brain by the optic nerve. Once in the brain the image is flipped right-side up again, and the end result is what you see. I’ve constructed a model eye which demonstrates the image-flipping property of a convex lens.

.: The first third grader was helped by his mom, who as near as I could tell was your regular non-scientist mommy. The second third grader was helped by her dad . . . who was an optometrist. However, the second third grader really knew what she was talking about. It wasn’t the case of a parent doing all the work and sending their clueless child to a science fair with a whole bunch of mysterious writings pinned to a cardboard display. I pressed her on a few questions (questions that not even some of my friends would know), and she didn’t even hesitate in answering them correctly. I asked her if she wanted to be a scientist when she grew up. She said, “No, I want to be a doctor.” I laughed.

.: I asked every kid, “Who came up with the idea for this experiment?” and the most common answers were “My mom/dad” and “We just picked it out of a science project book.” In those cases, I would ask questions to make sure they knew what the purpose of the experiment was. But my favorites were the kids who picked their own topics after seeing something their siblings did. “I saw my brother accidentally spill some vinegar on the counter and it made neat bubbles, so I experimented with all kinds of liquids to see if they would make bubbles with vinegar.”

.: For other kids, I would suggest further things they could do that were related to their experiment. One girl collected a whole bunch of liquids and performed litmus tests for all of them (her father was a chemistry student). I saw that she tested 7-UP, so I told her to ask her dad if they could test 7-UP again. I suggested she shake it up to get all the bubbles out and test it one more time to see if the pH changes (it will of course become less acidic as the carbonic acid converts to water and carbon dioxide, which leaves). I also noticed that she listed the pH of saltwater as 10.0. I asked her if she used tap water for her saltwater; she said yes, so I further suggested she ask her dad for distilled water to use for the next round of saltwater. I think she’ll be pleasantly surprise.

.: My favorite project, though, was by a particularly enthusiastic third grader. I walked over to his presentation and before I could ask for his name he started immediately:

In genetic engineering they use a technique called knockout mutation, where they take a gene in a mouse and remove it to see what kind of mouse results. If the mice run around only in circles then they know that gene has something to do with navigation. In my experiment I made knockout muffins where I removed a single different ingredient from each batch of muffins so I could determine what role that ingredient played. The muffins without baking powder failed to rise, the muffins without sugar tasted like biscuits, the muffins without flour hardly looked like muffins at all . . .

.: I was blown away. Here’s a third grader . . . talking about knockout mice! The kid knew what he was talking about, knew the importance of each step in his experiment, and even knew how to relate it to other areas of science. Clearly there was parental involvement, but of the most positive kind. Then I looked at the name on the tri-panel:

B. Kearney.