Beach Stroll Casts Further Doubt on Some Supposed Ediacaran Bilaterian Fossils

air bladder, animals, beach, beachcombing, bilaterian animals, brown algae, Cambrian Explosion, Cambrian News, convergent evolution, Ediacaran biota, Ediacaran fossils, Evolution, evolutionary theory, fauna, flora, fossil-hunting, fossils, hemichordate worms, holdfast, kelp, kelp stipe, Kingdom Protista, Margaretia dorus, Pacific Northwest, paleontology, plants, Precambrian strata, protists, rock hammer, Science (journal), tide-pooling, Western Washington
Over the past few days I’ve been discussing an important paper in the journal Science that reveals supposed Ediacaran bilaterian animal fossils (see here and here, with more to come). Meanwhile, this past weekend, I happened to go on a trip with friends here in Western Washington to do some tide-pooling, beach-combing, and fossil-hunting. We had a fantastic time enjoying the beauty of the inland-coastal Pacific Northwest. During our excursion, I also stumbled on a few things that, with that Science paper in mind, caught my attention. In one instance I found a kelp on the beach with its holdfast still nicely attached. A photo of it is at the top (the holdfast is near the pointy “pick” end of Read More › Source
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After K–T Extinction Event, Life’s Unexpected Rebound Was “Ridiculously Fast”

animals, Austin, birds, Chicxulub impact, coccolithophore, darkness, Darwinism, dinosaurs, ecosystems, Evolution, fauna, fisheries, Geology (journal), geophysics, global catastrophe, global winter, helium-3, humans, innovations, intelligent agent, Intelligent Design, K-T extinction event, mammals, naturalism, plankton, researchers, Science and Culture Today, Science Daily, spines, sudden appearance, University of Texas
Although the welfare of plankton may not be at the very top of most people’s minds, these tiny organisms fill an important ecological niche. Source
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Why AI Can’t Replace Us Functionally

animals, arithmetic, artificial inteligence, attention, bigram model, Claude, Claude Shannon, coherence, comprehension, Computational Sciences, computer code, Conversations, Data Processing Inequality, disinformation, embedding, English, fish, food, functional capability, games, generative AI systems, GPT-5, human exceptionalism, humans, incompleteness theorem, information theory, Kurt Gödel, large language models, mathematical reasoning, model collapse, music, numbers, pixels, poetry, processing, prompts, Reasoning, René Magritte, semantics, statistical patterns, syntax, The Treachery of Images, tokens, vectors, video, William Shakespeare, word approximation, words
The map is not the territory. The symbol is not the thing. And the model is not the mind. Source
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Are We Just Animals? A Tempting Delusion

animals, bioethics, Bloodhound Gang, cats, Children, Conversation, Discovery Channel, embodied beings, friendship, Gombe Chimpanzee War, human beings, human exceptionalism, humans, incorporeal intelligences, J. Budziszewsk, laboratory animals, Laws, locusts, mammals, Pandemic of Lunacy, Parents, primates, rationality, snakes, spouses, transhumanists, University of Texas, wolves, worship
Some of my students argue that humans should be wiped off the face of the earth to make room for the other species. Source
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For “Convergent Evolution,” Darwinists Offer Awkward Explanatory Tinkering

animals, Arabidopsis, biology, circuits, co-evolution, common ancestor, convergent evolution, Darwin on Trial, Drosophila, Evolution, hair trigger, immune response, immune systems, Intelligent Design, kingdoms, Life Sciences, logic, natural selection, nematode, NLR-o-gram, pathogens, Phillip Johnson, plants, proteins, robustness, Science (journal)
How clever of separate kingdoms of organisms to have figured all this out independently! Source
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The Eclipse of the Organism: No Longer Biology’s Central Interest

animals, Ascaris megalocephala, bar code, Cenorhabditis elegans, Chemistry, chimpanzees, chromosome number, chromosomes, Cruciferae, DNA, donkeys, Drosophila, Evolution, ferns, fruit flies, genes, genetics, homunculus, humans, idiogram, Junk DNA, Lego blocks, Ninth Symphony, nucleotides, Ophioglossum petiolatum, Parthenon, physics, plants, proteins, roundworm, Salvador Dalì, wheat, zebras
Organisms have disappeared below the horizon. In many papers on DNA the organism is barely mentioned. Source
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For Good or Evil: The Contradictory Legacy of James D. Watson

Africa, animals, atheists, cellular operations, Christie’s, codes, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, digital code, DNA, double helix, Evolution, faith, Francis Crick, genes, genetic isolation, genetics, history, Human Zoos, humans beings, information, intelligence, Intelligent Design, intelligent designer, James D. Watson, John West, language, Maurice Wilkins, nihilism, Nobel Prize, Plato's Revenge, Race, Racism, religion, Richard Dawkins, Richard Sternberg, sequence hypothesis, Signature in the Cell, Stephen Meyer, The Information Enigma, theism
Let’s hope that whoever writes the future history of science will, like the bidder for that Nobel medal, be merciful to him. Source
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Are “Mind” and “Brain” the Same Thing?

Angus Menuge, animals, Artificial Intelligence, bacon, Benjamin Libet, brain, C. elegans, ChatGPT, computer, Denyse O'Leary, determinism, Dogs, free will, free won't, human exceptionalism, Humanize, large language models, machines, Medicine, Michael Egnor, mind, Minding the Brain, neural mechanisms, neuroscience, Neuroscience & Mind, philosophy, Podcast, The Immortal Mind, totalitarianism, Wesley J. Smith
Neurosurgeon Michael Egnor passionately argues that denying free will undermines moral responsibility and paves the way for totalitarian ideologies. Source
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PETA Sues NIH for Violating Its “First Amendment Right” to Talk to Monkeys

animal experiments, animals, chimpanzees, Culture & Ethics, Edward Taub, elephants, First Amendment, human suffering, illnesses, Ingrid Newkirk, journalists, National Institutes of Health, News Media, Nonhuman Rights Project, persons, PETA, Silver Spring Monkey Case, Society for Neuroscience, writ of habeas corpus
There is not one modern medical treatment or intervention that does not involve animal research at some point in the process. Source
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