Blog on hold till November 30

Because I am writing a book and working for a living, I have regretfully decided that the only time management solution is to put this blog on hold until November 30, 2011.

I thank all regular readers and occasional donors.

Always glad to share a good read and thoughts thereon. The blog search box at the top left will give you access to all past stories.

I will still be blogging at Access Research Network (bottom row of headlines), Salvo, and Uncommon Descent.

Good luck to all in the happy hunting ground of materialist nonsense that so much pop science has become.

Exoplanets expert thinks intelligent beings rare in galaxy

Here, Space.com's Mike Wall interviews astronomer Geoff Marcy on "Life on other planets?" (2/1/2011):

Leading expert weighs in

Marcy has had a hand in finding more alien planets than anyone else. He helped spot 70 of the first 100. He also found the first multiplanet system around a sun-like star, and he discovered the first planet that transits — or passes in front of — its star from our perspective on Earth

[ ... ]

Space.com: Our solar system is so young, compared to the universe. And the universe is so big. So there's been lots of time and opportunity for advanced civilizations to get started, and to try to contact us. Some people think that the fact that we seemingly haven't been contacted means that we may well bealone in the universe.

Marcy: Well, you have to fold it in. The absence of an intelligent radio or television wave from any advanced civilization represents one indication, not a proof, that maybe habitable planets that sustain Darwinian evolution for a billion years —maybe they're rare. Maybe.

Space.com: What do you reckon? Do you have a gut feeling about this?

Marcy: I do. If I had to bet — and this is now beyond science — I would say that intelligent, technological critters are rare in the Milky Way galaxy. The evidence mounts. We Homo sapiens didn't arise until some quirk of environment on the East African savannah — so quirky that the hominid paleontologists still can't tell us why the australopithecines somehow evolved big brains and had dexterity that could play piano concertos, and things that make no real honest sense in terms of Darwinian evolution.

The whole is worth reading. He thinks $billion should do the trick.

New atheism, civil rights, and Martin Gaskell

Here's Richard Dawkins, as a friend puts it, "coming out ... as a religious bigot" in analyzing the Martin Gaskell case ("potentially evangelical" astronomer settles for $100K):

The University of Kentucky has caved in and agreed a settlement, out of court, with the allegedly creationist astronomer Martin Gaskell. ...

[ ... ]

If Martin were not so superbly qualified, so breathtakingly above the other applicants in background and experience, then our decision would be much simpler. We could easily choose another applicant, and we could content ourselves with the idea that Martin's religious beliefs played little role in our decision. However, this is not the case. As it is, no objective observer could possibly believe that we excluded Martin on any basis other than religious...
A smoking gun, it would seem, ...

- Should employers be blind to private beliefs? (Jan 24, 2011)

He then goes on to make a case for discriminating against job applicants on the basis of religious beliefs (other than atheism).

Curious thing about the new atheists: One thing they'll sure get rid of is civil liberties as commonly understood.

I was giving a talk at a church recently, and the adult education leader told me that many older churchgoers worried about whether their children and grandchildren would have jobs. They remember a more sane and tolerant society, but don't know how to get back there. I hate having to tell them that the answer begins with losing all interest in the question of whether people think they are nice. They could end up being just nice enough to make sure their grandchildren can't get jobs unless they disown them. (Historically, that has happened before.)

Scientist? Take the peer review pressure off at the Journal of Universal Rejection

Here the Journal promises to save you masses of bother by guaranteeing to just reject your submission up front:

The founding principle of the Journal of Universal Rejection (JofUR) is rejection. Universal rejection. That is to say, all submissions, regardless of quality, will be rejected. Despite that apparent drawback, here are a number of reasons you may choose to submit to the JofUR:

You can send your manuscript here without suffering waves of anxiety regarding the eventual fate of your submission. You know with 100% certainty that it will not be accepted for publication.

There are no page-fees.

You may claim to have submitted to the most prestigious journal (judged by acceptance rate).

The JofUR is one-of-a-kind. Merely submitting work to it may be considered a badge of honor.

You retain complete rights to your work, and are free to resubmit to other journals even before our review process is complete.

Decisions are often (though not always) rendered within hours of submission

There. Now you can go back to trying to find that elusive particle of dark matter. Then, Nobel assured, fame and fortune in sight, you can publish in the Journal of Fizzics if you want to.

Hostility to life is norm for exoplanets, senior astrophysicist says

Artist's conception of  Kepler-10b, NASA

In “Kepler-10b - The first extrasolar system rocky planet”, British physicist David Tyler notes,

The presumption that there are millions of Earth-like planets in habitable zones is based on theory that is not supported by evidence. This point has recently been made by Howard Smith, a senior astrophysicist at Harvard. He has made the claim that "we are alone in the universe" after an analysis of the 500 planets discovered so far showed all were hostile to life.

"Dr Smith said the extreme conditions found so far on planets discovered outside out Solar System are likely to be the norm, and that the hospitable conditions on Earth could be unique.
"We have found that most other planets and solar systems are wildly different from our own. They are very hostile to life as we know it," he said."

never mind rare Earths, there aren’t any spare Earths, period. Better take care of the one we got.

Telic Thoughts weighs in on Coppedge case

Bradford for Telic Thoughts comments on the Coppedge case:

Another issue merits attention. Coppedge is not merely a creationist, he is a Christian version of one. There are Muslim creationists and creationists of other non-conventional religious persuasions when assessed by American cultural norms. That group falls within a different category within the tortured minds of PC advocates. We need to practice diversity when dealing with them. Understanding. Tolerance. The contradiction is nauseating but perhaps explainable.

Oh, but this is common, Bradford. In Canada, for example, anti-Semitism isn’t tolerated - except when it is Islamist anti-Semitism. The political motivation is obvious: Islamists, like leftists, restrict intellectual freedom, so they are useful to the left. (Though, in fairness, many bystanders here are starting to wake up, led by courageous younger Jews.)

PC is a very successful strategy of the new hard left. Tolerance means nothing more than what the NHL choose to tolerate, in the process of limiting free or thoughtful inquiry. As Theodore Dalrymple has pointed out, PC's real value is forcing most people to lie. They are morally ashamed of themselves for succumbing so readily to making cowardice a virtue, make nervous little jokes, and blame anyone who expressed honest opinions for bringing the storm on themselves.

Bradford offers,

IDists have been tagged as wedge practitioners by critics. But the dubious charge never had substance. If some IDists did have a wedge strategy in mind they were clearly ineffectual. Take notes from the pros. PCers are experts at wedging.

Yes, the political correctness thugs assume, as do most humans, that everyone thinks as they do. If PC enforcers turn any institution they take over into a stinkpot of closed, mediocre minds, it goes without saying that everyone else must want to do the same, but they got there first.

Smart on the Telic guys’ part to take an interest, because they are next. In a PC environment, even asking questions, other than the prescribed ones leading to the approved answers, is a sure sign that you are trouble.

What if scientism had to pay its own bills?

Here's commentator David Klinghoffer's comments on the purging of astronomers Gaskell and Gonzalez and NASA mission specialist David Coppedge, among others, for doubting the Central Dogma of biology:

For years I've collected accounts of scientists who voiced doubts about Darwin and ended up paying a high price. In February, the University of Kentucky will defend itself in court in a discrimination case brought by astronomer Martin Gaskell, now at the University of Texas. He argues convincingly that he was turned down to direct Kentucky's observatory because of remarks on his personal website noting reservations about Darwinian theory and an openness to intelligent design.

Gaskell's attorneys present records of email traffic among the faculty search committee. Professors falsely tarred Gaskell as a "creationist" while a lone astrophysicist on the committee protested that Gaskell stood to be rejected "despite his qualifications that stand far above those of any other applicant."

The case resembles another at Iowa State University. Astrophysicist Guillermo Gonzalez was refused tenure, despite a spectacular research publication record, because of a book he co-authored arguing that earthly life is no cosmic accident. Again, email traffic told the tale. The department chairman had instructed faculty that intelligent design was a litmus test for tenure, "disqualify[ing] him from serving as a science educator."

[ ... ]

This year, a top-level computer specialist on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Cassini mission to Saturn, David Coppedge, sued JPL for discrimination after being demoted for circulating among colleagues a couple of DVDs favoring intelligent design.

- "'Science Says' Is Now Just Another Special Interest Claim" (Human Events, January 6, 2011) January 30, 2011

Interestingly, Gaskell ($100, 000 settlement) and Gonzalez (new observatory) didn't do so badly out of it, and one hopes Coppedge will also land on his feet.

The key thing to see here, in my view, is that the scientism lobby can't hope to both treat science as their private game park and expect public funding. Or can they? Let's see what the Coppedge case brings.

Cassini flies past fizzy ocean on Saturnian moon

Here:

Cassini found the little moon busily puffing plumes of water vapor, icy particles, and organic compounds out through fissures (now known as "tiger stripes") in its frozen carapace. Mimas, a nearby moon about the same size, was as dead as researchers expected, but Enceladus was precociously active.


Many researchers viewed the icy jets as proof of a large subterranean body of water. Near-surface pockets of liquid water with temperatures near 32o F could explain the watery plumes. But there were problems with this theory. For one thing, where was the salt? In 2009 Cassini's cosmic dust analyzer located the missing salt – in a surprising place.


"It wasn't in the plume gasses where we'd been looking for it," says Matson. "Instead, sodium and potassium salts and carbonates were locked up in the plumes' icy particles.* And the source of these substances has to be an ocean. Stuff dissolved in an ocean is similar to the contents of these grains."


The latest Cassini observations presented another intriguing discovery: thermal measurements revealed fissures with temperatures as high as -120o Fahrenheit (190 Kelvin).

More heat out there than we think could mean a lot of things.

(This was Coppedge's project, of course.)

So what will you do when they come for you?

David Coppedge

Nathan Black reports for Christian Post "Intelligent Design Proponent Fired from NASA Lab" (Jan. 26 2011).

David Coppedge is an information technology specialist and system administrator on JPL’s international Cassini mission to Saturn, the most ambitious interplanetary exploration ever launched. A division of California Institute of Technology, JPL operates under a contract with the federal space agency. Coppedge held the title of “Team Lead” System Administrator on the mission until his supervisors demoted and humiliated him for advancing ideas that superiors labeled “unwelcome” and “disruptive.”

He favoured intelligent design and talked about it, and one superior didn't like that.

There was no workplace policy that forbid discussing private opinions at work, and claims that Coppedge harassed fellow employees proved unsubstantiated.

Here's columnist David Klinghoffer on the case:

What did Coppedge do to get himself in trouble? He occasionally chatted with interested colleagues about the scientific case for intelligent design, he passed around a couple of pro-ID DVDs, which made good sense since JPL's officially defined mission includes the exploration of questions relating to the origin and development of life on earth and elsewhere. His supervisor severely chastised him for this, humiliated and demoted him.


Now he's been fired. JPL claims it was a cost-cutting measure. ... The truth will emerge when Coppedge's lawsuit comes to trial, but the appearance here certainly suggests a final strike at Mr. Coppedge for his offense of introducing fresh ideas to co-workers.

In the light of this case and the recent, similar Martin Gaskell case, one hardly knows what to make of doubt that Ben Stein was right. There is an Expelled factor. Today, you can doubt anything except Darwin, and you must contrive not to know about or speak of the growing mass of evidence that contradicts the stuff government forces students to learn in tax-funded schools.

But there is no freedom for adults either, it turns out. Darwinism today has nothing to do with the science and everything to do with protecting the cultural status of an icon that has given government everything from compulsory sterilization to scientific racism to ... the right of tax-funded institutions like JPL to run inquisitions powered by devotion to that icon.

Sadly, Klinghoffer writes,

It's bad enough when private universities clamp down on the free exchange of ideas. But public institutions have often seemed to be the worst offenders of all in this respect, and that is something taxpayers have every right to protest.

Klinghoffer suggests that Americans phone: 202-358-1010 or e-mail Charles Bolden, charles.bolden@nasa.gov Yet will they?

I've covered ID stories for about a decade now, and on the way, I learned something interesting: What is keeping Darwinism alive right now is not evidence; the evidence is leaning sharply against Darwin's "information for free" mechanism.

What keeps Darwinism alive is the awful passivity of the taxpayers who doubt it, yet continue to fund its long, persecutory march through the institutions.

Christians are the worst, incidentally.

Galaxies produced in "cosmic blink of an eye"?

Adam Mann reports at Nature News (26 January 2011) that "Oldest galaxy is lone ranger: Discovery of the most distant known object hints at empty early Universe." (26 January 2011)

Astronomers have glimpsed the most distant galaxy ever detected — a lone object 13.2 billion light years from Earth. The discovery implies that the fledgling Universe was emptier than was previously imagined.

[ ... ]


The near-barrenness of this epoch stands in contrast to a period roughly 650 million years after the Big Bang, in which the team has found around 60 galaxies.


The results suggest that in fewer than 200 million years — a cosmic blink of an eye — large galaxies rapidly built up from smaller ones, and the rate of star formation increased tenfold. "It's telling us that there is a very dramatic change taking place at this time period," says Garth Illingworth, an astronomer at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a co-author of the paper.


The sparseness of galaxies raises a mystery.

It's almost as if a blueprint was unfolding, but no ... Actually, it would be interesting of some design-oriented and non-design-oriented astronomers made sealed predictions abut this stuff and see who is closer to the mark.

4% solution: Ultimate Copernican revolution is “We’re different”?

In “The challenge of the great cosmic unknowns” ( New Scientist 24 January 2011),

Dan Falk reviews Richard Panek’s The 4% Universe: Dark matter, dark energy, and the race to discover the rest of reality:

As he nears the present day, Panek weaves together two separate yet closely related storylines. In the first, he takes us to sophisticated laboratories around the world where researchers are trying to isolate particles of dark matter. Their best guess is that dark matter is made of WIMPs (weakly interacting massive particles), which were created at the time of the big bang and are now fiendishly difficult to detect.


In the second storyline, we join the hunt for dark energy, which began in the late 1990s when two teams of researchers studying distant supernova explosions reached a stunning conclusion: that the expansion of the universe is not slowing down, but speeding up.

The Amazon site features an interview with Panek:

Q: Sounds like science is a pretty straightforward process of discovery and follow-up.

Panek: Straightforward, maybe. Pretty, no. As I show in The Four Percent Universe, the discoveries involved a lot of behind-the-scenes rivalries that sometimes turned ugly—rivalries that continue to this day. But in a way, these rivalries have been good for the science. When scientists who would like nothing more than to prove one another wrong wind up agreeing on a weird result, their peers can’t help but take the result seriously. Astronomers hate to say it—they’re as superstitious as anyone else, and they think they’ll jinx their chances—but there are Nobel Prizes at stake here.

Q: So this is real. Astronomers actually believe that 96 percent of the universe is "missing"?

Panek: Yes. They call it the ultimate Copernican revolution. Not only are we not at the center of the universe, we’re not even made of the same stuff as the vast majority of the universe.

Hmmm.

New proposed explanation for the double slit experiment

In "Which-way detector unlocks some mystery of the double-slit experiment" (January 21, 2011),
Lisa Zyga reports at Physorg:

- One of the greatest puzzles of the double-slit experiment – and quantum physics in general – is why electrons seem to act differently when being observed.

[ ... ]

Overall, the results suggest that the type of scattering an electron undergoes determines the mark it leaves on the back wall, and that a detector at one of the slits can change the type of scattering. The physicists concluded that, while elastically scattered electrons can cause an interference pattern, the inelastically scattered electrons do not contribute to the interference process.

A friend writes, "Not sure this trumps the Copenhagen Interpretation and Schrodinger's Cat, but interesting for QM physics buffs."

Tethering the drifting balloons of imaginative cosmology ...

Claus Beisbart asks, "Can we justifiably assume the Cosmological Principle in order to break model underdetermination in cosmology?"

(I think he means something like this: Many proposed models of the universe today begin by assuming that basic observations so far are untrustworthy for other parts of the universe or multiverse - which justifies a number of theories that would otherwise be considered entertainment, not science. He hopes to use the Cosmological Principle as a ground rule.

The Cosmological Principle holds that

isotropy for all observers (all places in the Universe) implies homogeneity for all observers. ... A corollary to the cosmological principle is that the laws of physics are universal.

In other words, if it looks the same in all directions, that's because it really is the same, and the known laws of physics apply elsewhere in the universe.

Beisbart's Abstract

If cosmology is to obtain knowledge about the whole universe, it faces an underdetermination problem: Alternative space-time models are compatible with our evidence. The problem can be avoided though, if there are good reasons to adopt the Cosmological Principle (CP), because, assuming the principle, one can confine oneself to the small class of homogeneous and isotropic space-time models. The aim of this paper is to ask whether there are good reasons to adopt the Cosmological Principle in order to avoid underdetermination in cosmology. Various strategies to justify the CP are examined. For instance, arguments to the effect that the truth of the CP follows generically from a large set of initial conditions; an inference to the best explanation; and an inductive strategy are assessed. I conclude that a convincing justification of the CP has not yet been established, but this claim is contingent on a number of results that may have to be revised in the future.

A friend comments, "This is a very good article. The author also has done some work in
cosmology with Buchert, so he is a reliable guide in physics as well as philosophy."

Christian cosmologist says universe not fine-tuned for life: A response

Here's Rob Sheldon again, on the recent paper by Christian cosmologist Don Page on why our universe is not fine-tuned for life:

a) "fine-tuning" is in the eye of the beholder. All Page demonstrates is that his eye is different than yours. Hence the only real question is whether "fine-tuning" exists at all, not what its magnitude is. If it does exist, no matter what its size, then the universe is "special", "indeterminate", and "not necessarily so". So "fine-tuning" is a scientist's placeholder for a philosopher's contingency.

b) "Optimality" is in the mind of the beholder, depending on what the beholder knows. The "optimum" shape for a human is a sphere, if we are trying to achieve 98.6F on a planet that averages 40F. Obviously, we've left a lot out of our calculations, and equally obviously, we will never know if we left out some crucial factor. Thus we never know if our "optimum" solution is global (contains all relevant factors) or local (misses some). Drawing global (e.g., theological) conclusions from some local guess is sheer hubris, and should be laughed to derision.

c) Lambda =10^-122 Planck units means that the observations are only about 122 orders of magnitude off from what theoretical physics would estimate for this number (the Planck units.)

Let that soak in for a moment. Dembski's universal probability bound is 150 orders of magnitude, only slightly greater than this number. The 10^122 ratio of theory/observed has been called the biggest unsolved problem in physics.

It is also orders of magnitude smaller than typical error bars on other physical constants. So distinguishing it from 0.0 is more an article of faith than of science. Therefore making conclusions about revelation (what God did as observed by science) using theology (how God should work as assumed from theory) may be a fine thing for seminarians, but makes lousy science.

I'm on a hobby horse here, but putting assumptions in our method that turn out to determine our conclusions is a no-no that should invalidate a science paper. One of the many ways that peer-review has failed, is that logical nonsense doesn't get flagged any more. Science should be inductive, not deductive, and when our conclusions are contained in our assumptions, we're being deductive.

For Page to conclude that lambda =/= 0, he had to assume a model with Lambda in it to start with. Einstein inserted Lambda to get a steady state universe, and removed it when Lemaitre's expanding universe was shown to be a simpler solution. It has been reinserted to (a) explain a small anomaly with Type Ia supernovae intensities and (b) solve a "flatness" contingency problem. So if we invented it to solve the metaphysical contingency problem [and I purposely discount (a)], we cannot therefore claim that its observed existence solves the contingency problem.

d) The baryon density, which is the middle term of this deductive syllogism that goes from cosmological constant to contingency, is itself another controversial subject. The cosmological constant is all about dark energy, baryon density is all about dark matter, while "fine tuning" is all about contingent creation. Page has managed to combine the three most controversial subjects in cosmology into a logical syllogism and claim some sort of deductive power. This ought to be scientifically humorous.

The more uncertainty we add into model, the more certain our specific model must be wrong (the ratio of actual solutions/possible solutions --> 0). The fact that global warming models do not include clouds, cosmic rays, precipitation, past climate or repeatability does not mean that climate change is inevitable and deniers are being dogmatic. So also the fact that dark energy assumptions change dark matter assumptions which affect contingency assumptions should tell us our conclusions are woefully uncertain and most probably wrong.

So, did the 1976 NASA mission find evidence of life on Mars? Has anybody?

Friend Rob Sheldon writes,

First of all, the 1976 Viking lander did NOT find organics on Mars. This is not just because the mass-spectrometer they flew was 3 orders of magnitude too insensitive to find organics from either the Atacama desert or the dry valleys of Antarctica, but also because sulfur poisoned the palladium foil that was intended to concentrate the organics for analysis.

The labelled-release experiment of Gil Levin, however, did find evidence of bacterial metabolism. You can read the papers on his website: http://mars.spherix.com/mars.html. It was tested against soils in Antarctica and Atacama, and in both cases found microbes unlike Carl Sagan's mass spectrometer. Carl ran interference and made sure Gil's work didn't get published, but I've told that story elsewhere.

But being a mass spectrometer, and being designed for low-molecular weight gases, Sagan did NOT find perchlorates in the soil either. They would have seen them had they been there. They would have seen the chlorine too--it has an unmistakeable signature. And it would sorta have explained Levin's data because the perchlorate would have oxidized the organics to produce CO2. But they didn't see it. Nothing. Nada, despite there being good explanation if it had existed.

So Carl Sagan argued for super-metallo-peroxides. Why? Because they would produce hydrogen peroxide when water was added, which presumably would evolve carbon dioxide as measured in Gil Levin's experiment without leaving a telltale signature in the mass spec. This theory persisted despite not finding any hydrogen peroxide in the atmosphere which the chemistry required.

So once again. The results of Viking were no organics due to insensitivity and poisoning, and certainly no perchlorates.

Fast forward 32 years to 2008, and we have the Phoenix lander that decided NOT to use mass spectroscopy, but wet chemistry to determine the makeup of Mars soil. In my mind, I can't find a single reason why this is a better measurement. It's less sensitive, less accurate, less general, less power-efficient, less lightweight, less robust, etc. But nothing in the Mars program makes sense without understanding the politics, so I just assume there was someone who had the ear of a congressman. Well, in order to prep the spacecraft for detecting organics, they had to remove finger prints (or as my mechanical engineer used to say, fried chicken grease) from the satellite. How did they do this? Why, with a perchlorate wash of course.

Do you suppose...Nah, the team reported, it couldn't possibly be contamination. Why, it agreed with the Viking results!

Arguments for multiverse mutually exclusive?

Some of us have long wondered when it would become more generally apparent that most "multiverse" stuff is really just playing games around theories. Maybe now?

In Nature (19 January 2011), "George Ellis reminds us that Brian Greene's beguiling book on parallel worlds is more theory than fact.

The book is The Hidden Reality: Parallel Universes and the Deep Laws of the Cosmos (Allen Lane: 2011), and Ellis comments,

... Greene's nine types of multiverse are as follows. First, if space extends forever, an infinite number of domains similar to ours might lie beyond the part of the Universe that we can see. Second, some versions of inflationary theory — the idea that the newborn Universe had a fleeting period of super-fast accelerating expansion — predict the existence of innumerable other universes, with different characteristics from our own. Third, string theory, the pre-eminent theory of quantum gravity, suggests that our Universe might be one of many four-dimensional 'braneworlds' floating in a higher-dimensional space-time.

This option is developed further in the fourth and fifth proposals, which involve cyclic universes, or variations on physical parameters that are possible in the string-theory landscape. The sixth is a quantum mechanics idea that many worlds simultaneously exist as branches of the wave function of the Universe. The seventh suggests that the Universe is a holographic projection. The eighth states that we live in one of a set of artificial universes created as simulations on a super-advanced computer. The ninth argues that it is a philosophical necessity that every possible universe must be realized somewhere, in “the grandest of all multiverses”.

By presenting this plethora of theories, Greene gives the impression that the multiverse is on a sound scientific footing, but these nine arguments are mutually exclusive.

Yes but, in a multiverse, "mutually exclusive" is meaningless by definition.

More from the “They Thought the Earth Was Flat” file ...

antikythera, main hub (Wiki Commons)

Here we learn,

A mechanical instrument made from bronze and wood in ancient Greece was a calendar for predicting solar eclipses and the dates of the Olympic Games, scientists have discovered.


X-ray analysis of the device, known as the Antikythera Mechanism, has revealed that it marked the timing of sporting events around Greece – including at Olympia. It was made in the 2nd century BC. The device was found by sponge divers in 1900 off the island of Antikythera.


[ ... ]


The mechanism ran on a complicated set of dials and bronze gears and was decorated with elaborate but indiscernible inscriptions.


- Steve Connor, "Ancient device was used to predict solar eclipses and Olympic dates", Belfast Telegraph (26 November 2010). Read more.

Did you know?: They didn’t know where babies come from either.

Breaking, breaking: University of Kentucky Pays “potentially evangelical” astronomer $100, 000 settlement

University of Kentucky Pays $100,000+ to Settle Gaskell Discrimination Lawsuit

According to news articles, the University of Kentucky (UK) has settled the discrimination lawsuit filed against it by Martin Gaskell, an astronomer who was denied a job due to his perceived doubts about neo-Darwinian evolution. The case was scheduled to go to trial on February 8th, but today counsel for both sides filed a joint motion to dismiss the case pursuant to the settlement. According to the Associated Press:

The university has agreed to pay $125,000 to Martin Gaskell in exchange for Gaskell dropping a federal religious discrimination suit. Gaskell claimed he was passed over to be director of UK's MacAdam Student Observatory in 2007 because of his religion and statements that were perceived to be critical of evolution.

Court exhibits showed Gaskell was a top candidate, but some professors called him "something close to a creationist" and "potentially evangelical" in e-mails.

Gaskell was represented by the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), which said:

"The standard of suspicion -- rightly described as a 'McCarthyism of the Left' by one UK professor -- applied by some to Gaskell because of his religious writings and statements should have no place in universities of all places," Manion added. "The ease with which some of the people involved in this process were willing to tar Gaskell with the labels of 'scientific creationist,' 'evolution-basher,' and other pejoratives based on half-remembered hearsay and extremely selective reading of his non-professional writings was truly disturbing to witness. We can only hope that this case will send a message throughout academia that religious intolerance is just as unlawful as other forms of prejudice and bias."

For more, go here.

Interesting: In general, the astronomers haven’t done too badly out of the Darwin troll attacks. Guillermo Gonzalez got a new observatory and Martin Gaskell got a nice (unintended) ssendoff.

Will the University of Kentucky be adding the cost of Darwin troll maintenance to their budget soon?

To be fine tuned for life, the universe should have been tuned differently?

At Slashdot “News for Nerds.Stuff that Matters” we learn:

eldavojohn writes
"A common argument one might encounter in intelligent design or the arduous process of resolving science with religion is that the physical constants of our world are fine tuned for life by some creator or designer. A University of Alberta theoretical physicist claims quite the opposite when it comes to the cosmological constant. His paper says that our ever expanding universe has a positive cosmological constant and he explains that the optimum cosmological constant for maximizing the chances of life in the universe would be slightly negative: 'any positive value of the constant would tend to decrease the fraction of matter that forms into galaxies, reducing the amount available for life. Therefore the measured value of the cosmological constant, which is positive, is evidence against the idea that the constants have been fine-tuned for life.'" [Links at site.]

Well, when we find a good many of Stephen Hawking’s other universes, we can see whether any are negatively constanted, and if so, whether they have more life.

Word on the street: The clock did SO start at the Big Bang!

Here Edwin Cartlidge reports,

Our view of the early Universe may be full of mysterious circles — and even triangles — but that doesn't mean we're seeing evidence of events that took place before the Big Bang. So says a trio of papers taking aim at a recent claim that concentric rings of uniform temperature within the cosmic microwave background — the radiation left over from the Big Bang — might, in fact, be the signatures of black holes colliding in a previous cosmic 'aeon' that existed before our Universe.

[ ... ]

Penrose, however, thinks that the Universe's great uniformity instead originates from before the Big Bang, from the tail end of a previous aeon that saw the Universe expand to become infinitely large and very smooth. That aeon in turn was born in a Big Bang that emerged from the end of a still earlier aeon, and so on, creating a potentially infinite cycle with no beginning and no end.

Now Gurzadyan and Penrose's idea is being challenged by three independent studies, all posted on the arXiv server within the past few days, by Ingunn Wehus and Hans Kristian Eriksen of the University of Oslo2; Adam Moss, Douglas Scott and James Zibin of the University of British Columbia3 in Vancouver, Canada; and Amir Hajian of the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics in Toronto, Ontario4.

- “No evidence of time before Big Bang: Latest research deflates the idea that the Universe cycles for eternity.” Nature News (10 December 2010)

Sounds like bash Roger (“eternally cycling universe”) Penrose”time again (he’s fronting the view they oppose, that things happened before the Big Bang).

Best guess: Penrose gets all the press because the pop sci public needs new universes.