Another “Vestigial” Organ Turns Out to Have “Absolutely Critical” Functions: The Human Yolk Sac

biology, blood, blood clotting, bone marrow, chickens, development, duck-billed platypuses, eggs, embryo, Evolution, evolutionary interpretations, function, human embryo, immune cells, Intelligent Design, kidneys, liver, multitasker, Muzlifah Haniffa, organ functions, PNAS, Science (journal), Science Alert, toxins, Uncategorized, vestigial organs, Wellcome Sanger Institute, yolk sac
Unfortunately, despite the importance of this “absolutely critical” organ, some are still intent upon retaining evolutionary interpretations. Source
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What’s Driving Darwin’s Driverless Car?

"survival of the fittest", abductive inference, adaptation, blind drivers, CELS, Charles Darwin, Charles Kocher, Columbia University, Current Biology, Darwinian Evolution Machine, driver, driverless car, Engineering, equilibrium, Eric Anderson, Evolution, fitness ratcheting, fitness valleys, golfers, gravity, Herbert Spencer, ignition, Intelligent Design, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Ken Dill, Mars, Mars rovers, molecular machines, New Zealand, orbits, planets, PNAS, rollercoaster, Science Advances, Second Law of Thermodynamics, selective pressure, software, sponges, TEDx talk, University of Otago, University of Sydney, Victoria University, water
What drives natural selection? Evolutionary forces. What are evolutionary forces? They’re what drive natural selection. Source
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Synchronized Swimming in Siphonophores: A Design Worth Imitating

anatomy, Caltech, carbon monoxide, Cnidaria, colonial organisms, Douglas Axe, ecology, foresight, functional whole, Intelligent Design, jellyfish, jet propulsion, Kelly R. Sutherland, Kevin T. Du Clos, krill, Life Sciences, Living Waters, marching band, Monterey Bay, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Nanomia bijuga, nectosome, Oregon Institute of Marine Biology, physiology, PNAS, pneumatophore, Portuguese man-o’war, science, Scyphozoa, siphonophores, Smithsonian Magazine, swimming, synchronous swimming, taxonomy
It must be good if engineers want to copy it. Siphonophores are colonial animals that have mastered the sport of synchronized swimming. Source
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Springtails: Wingless Arthropods that Can Fly

abdomen, Adrian Smith, Antarctica, Arthropoda, arthropods, biology, Collembola, Darwinism, Entognatha, etymology, Evolution, furcula, Georgia Tech, Hexapod Gap, hexapods, imitation, insects, Intelligent Design, Isotomurus retardatus, just-so stories, Latin, Namib desert, non-insects, North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, PNAS, popcorn, Sandra Schachat, Science Uprising, South Korea, springtails, Stanford University, unfolding, Victor M. Ortega-Jimenez
The fossil record shows a “Hexapod Gap.” Unfortunately for Darwin, the two leading theories to explain the gap can be ruled out. Source
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Bees Feel Pain. Therefore…Insect Rights?

Animal Algorithms, animal rights, bees, consciousness, crops, Eric Cassell, Heather Browning, insect rights, insects, Kenny Torrella, London School of Economics, meat, neuroscience, Neuroscience & Mind, pain, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, pests, PETA, PNAS, Research, science
As we learn more from research about how various life forms respond to experiences, a more complex picture may raise political issues. Source
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Copper Reveals Its Role in Exploding Plants — and in the Miracle of Man

Angela Hay, awn, biology, Cardamine hirsuta, chaperones, copper, cytochrome C oxidase, enzymes, Ergonium cicutarium, erosion, filaree, fire-making, Geology, hairy bittercress, herbs, homeostatic mechanisms, Illustra Media, Intelligent Design, laccase, Life Sciences, lignin, lignocellulose, Max Planck Institute, metallurgy, metals, Michael Denton, minerals, plants, PNAS, popping cress, prior fitness, seed pods, soil, storksbill, The Miracle of Man, The Miracle of the Cell, zinc
The exploding pods of the popping cress send the plant’s seeds flying in all directions, as far as a meter from the parent. Source
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Real-World Data and the Lesson of Chloroquine Resistance

A Mousetrap for Darwin, biological systems, Casey Luskin, CCC, chloroquine complexity cluster, chloroquine resistance, coordinated mutations, Evolution, Intelligent Design, Laurence Moran, Michael Behe, mutation rate, mutations, PfCRT, Plasmodium falciparum, PNAS, proteins, Robert L. Summers, Sandwalk, The Edge of Evolution
The take-home lesson is that evolution, on its best day, is an embarrassingly anemic process. Source
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Evolution Is Not Like Physics

Animal Algorithms, asymmetric information flow, biology, Boyle’s Law, Casey Luskin, Darwin's Doubt, E = mc2, Eigen catastrophe, Elliott Sober, Eric Cassell, Ernst Mayr, Erwin Schrödinger, Eugene V. Koonin, Evolution, Granville Sewell, gravitation, Isaac Newton, Kirk Durston, National Academy of Sciences, National Institute for Biotechnology Information, naturalism, neo-Darwinian theory, No Free Lunch, physics, Physics, Earth & Space, PNAS, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, punctuated equilibria, Richard Weikart, RNA, Signature in the Cell, Stephen Meyer, thermodynamics, vitalism, Vitaly Vanchurin, William Dembski, Yuri I. Wolf
A new theory of evolution extends Darwinian processes, making them into physical laws based on “learning theory.” Source
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Will Earth BioGenome Project Vindicate Darwin?

agriculture, Big Data, bioindustry, biology, Canis familiaris, chihuahua, China, conservation, Darwin's Dilemma, Darwinism, Earth BioGenome Project, ecology, eukaryotes, Evolution, genomes, Intelligent Design, Life Sciences, Mark Blaxter, mastiff, Medicine, Paul Chien, phylogenetics, PNAS, sequencing, species, Sweden, United States
Compare the latest project to sequence everything to other megaprojects that may or may not answer evolutionary questions. Source
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