Dawkins and Bacon

I was fortunate enough - if that is the right word - to hear Richard Dawkins being interviewed by Richard Bacon yesterday afternoon.

The Good Prof had a book to plug - and it sounds like quite an interesting one. It would have been nice to hear all about it. Unfortunately he had to spend quite a lot of time swatting Bacon's attempts to get him to attack belief in God, which the Good Prof clearly wasn't there for. Dr Dawkins is clearly a good time manager. In his diary, yesterday was clearly marked as "Push the Book", not "Attack Religion (Tuesday)" or "Reminisce with Lalla about how great Douglas Adams was (Friday)". I didn't make notes (as that is illegal whilst driving) but some of the conversation went a bit like this. Apologies for any minor discrepancies.

RB: You're talking about the wonders of science. But some religious people don't believe in Evolution, do they?

RD: No educated person doesn't believe in Evolution.  The Archbishop of Canterbury, for example, believes in Evolution. Now, about my book...

RB: But Christians have to believe in the Resurrection and the Virgin Birth, don't they?

RD: Some of them do. But that's a different debate. Have you read my book?

RB: But you can't believe in God and Science can you?

RD: what's that got to do with my book? Can we get back to the point? I've got a book to sell and I'm talking to somebody more intelligent than you in 8 minutes. Look - there in my diary - "Plug book with someone more intelligent than Richard Bacon".

And so on. Bacon came across like an over-excited fanboy meeting Gary Numan in a data processing centre in Walsall. Prof D came across as an intelligent, reasonable man trying to sell a book. I'm going to buy it. Or, at least, borrow it off Richard Bacon.

The Age of Aquarius

Some have been asking why the Beaker Folk paid so little attention earlier this week to the Transit of Venus.

Now, don't get me wrong. It's not that we were unaware. And we are as full of excitement as the next bunch of pseudo-traditionalist tree-huggers over the discovery that when a small rocky object goes in front of a big shiny object, it makes a small dark dot.

But our belief-system says that we should treat these astronomical phenomena with the same awe and respect that our Beaker foremothers would have done (Beaker forefathers, of course, did what they were told).

And that amount of awe and respect was - precisely none at all. Lacking the simplest set of welder's goggles, the ancient Beaker Folk would never have watched it. Clearly they couldn't have used a Camera Obscura as even the words are Latin.

Besides, it was wet and it was cloudy. We'll wait for a decent astronomical event, like the International Space Station going over. Now that would have awed the Ancients.

The "Phases of Water" Heresy

As Trinity Sunday heads our way, I've had to slap Young Keith down hard. He was planning to carry out an illustration of the doctrine of the Trinity, using the concept of ice / water / steam. I've told him he's heading smack into Monarchian Modalism.

Ever inventive, Young Keith has now pointed out that a better picture for the Trinity might be the Triple Point of water - the combination of temperature and pressure at which all three phases exist in equilibrium. Ice, water and steam - each distinct, each interrelating, each of the same substance. I'm pretty sure it's heretical as well, something to do with dividing the essence and therefore heading for Tritheism. But because working that through is giving me a headache, instead I'm banning this one on "Eileen's Rule", which states that if you need to explain your illustration before you use it, you might as well do without it.

This Sunday's motto is henceforth to be "It's a mystery - get over it". We're going to project The Hospitality of Abraham on the Moot House ceiling and leave everyone to puzzle it out for themselves.

Richard Dawkins' Victory on Pasty Tax

I may have become completely confused by the issue by now, but I'm still backing Michael Gove's attempts to put  Richard Dawkins into every school in the country. Although I'm not sure whether Dr Richard will be so keen when he finds out he has to have Gove's name printed on his spine.

Still, a further twist in my understanding of the whole affair comes in this BBC news story.  It would appear that Dr Richard has managed to get the pasty tax reversed - at least that's the only explanation I can think of for why he appears to be posing in front of a huge cheese & onion slice.

Burn Down All the Forests

With a doff of the pointy archdruidical hat to Doug Chaplin (albeit on Twitter) for bringing this to my attention).

The BBC tells us that, thanks to CO2 emissions, the next ice age (which was due to being in about 1,500 years) will now be postponed.

This throws climate scientists who believe in warming (the majority) and those who deny (a few, and a lot of bloggers and people in bars) into a quandary.

Because a climate-change sceptic can't argue that we should keep on generating CO2 to stave off an ice-age, if they deny that producing the gas has any effect on the climate.

On the other hand, if you're one of the ones who say we should reduce carbon emissions to prevent global warming, but preventing global warming lets in an Ice Age in 1,500 years by the back door - then by how much should we reduce emissions safely? Do we try to reduce emissions to save the people of the next century, and hope the people of the next millennium will be able to help themselves?

It's really very hard to know what to do. It seems that if we take one path, this is it - we're all going to die.
Whereas if we take the other - then this is it, we're all going to die.

I've a sneaky feeling that religion got there before science on this one, with the very sane conclusion that we are all, indeed, going to die. But don't burn down the forests really - it's a silly idea but a catchy title.

Chimera Monkeys

Just two years somebody invented glowing monkeys for a bit of a laugh, Scientists are celebrating the creation of monkeys made from cells taken from two or more separate embryos.

The team that carried out the work says the advance could have "enormous" importance for medical research. Although one member of the team, Dr Igor, added "Buh-wah-hah-hah-hah".

Invisible Forces

Google's doodle today celebrates the great scientist Marie Curie.

She and Pierre, her colleague and husband, first got to know each other through a shared interest in the powers of magnetism. Which I suppose goes to prove that magnetic Poles attract.

Liturgy for the Birthday of Antonie van Leeuwenhoek

We left this liturgy as late as possible so that people didn't get all itchy and antsy about the various "animalcules" that this great man discovered. Leeuwenhoek was father of Microbiology, expert lens-maker and a devout Christian who could see the wonders of Creation in the little beggars crawling around on his microscope slide. And showing in his dialogue with the British Royal Society a case study in doing proper science - repeating the experiments to confirm the validity of the experiments, peer-reviewing - it's all great stuff.

Sadly we never really got to the liturgy itself. Just spent an hour trying to work out how to pronounce his surname. And now nobody wants to go to bed, because they'll be suddenly so aware of all the munchkin mini-beasts that will be awaiting them. Could be a long night in the Common Room.

A Cold and Lonely Universe

This is how the world ends -
Not with a bang but a whimper.

As galaxies spattered across the universe gently burn away into nothing - even the black holes will dry out - and nothing much will happen, like a Saturday in Slough forever.

It makes me feel kind of comforted, really. All the hope about building a better world for the future did sound a bit over-optimistic. And if you thought that was the way forward you'd just feel really let down when your planet boiled off into the ultra-violet.

Feeding the Hand that Bites Him - or Something

I'd like to thank Steve for his contribution to our Great Evolution Debate. As I said in my own comments, I mostly agree with him. And as normal with Steve that means I agree with his science. Although I quail at the mental picture he comjured up of naked people waving straw men.

I disagree however with his assertion that I can't attack Dr Dawkins' attack on literalism and also literalism itself. That's exactly what I can do - it being my blog. And saying that Creationists are wrong is not yet a crime - unless it is, under one of those over-arching pieces of thought-crime legislation that Tony Blair invented. In which case I'll see Steve in court - where we'll both be in the dock.

No, I have every right to criticise Dr Dawkins for his own straw men - which I presume he did not create, but rather has evolved painstakingly from straw monkeys in his lab. The idea of a Creationist in every school is a McCarthyite invention of great ingenuity. But the positions of those fundamentalists within the churches who definitely exist are also there to be attacked. It's just the fundamentalists that hold these views aren't really off running the schools. But they do poison and polarise the debate - which makes it easy for middle-brow newspapers such as the Daily Mail. For the purposes of a nice easy characterisation, on one side there are Dr Dawkins, the EU, Human Rights lawyers, comedians, Health + Safety enforcers and New Labour. In the blue corner we have England, the King James Bible, old maids cycling to the Rose and Crown after Evensong, the Common Person, Biblical literalism and the Little Baby Jesus.

It's a view that gives Dr Dawkins media time when he attacks fundies. And it makes fundies appear like they represent the norm when they present their ideas as being what Jesus said - in that strange Gospel land where Jesus, despite being wholly human with a man's limitations, also has total knowledge of science and yet is oddly quiet on the existence of America.

It all gets complicated in reality when we have more shades than that in the whole of life. In this reality we can find that not every one who is anti-Gadaffi is therefore a peace-loving democrat. But nor are they all Al Qaeda sympathisers. Not all Christians are fundamentalists. Not all vicars are either gay, or women with dodgy taste in the colour of clerical shirtings. Not all blokes with beards smoke pipes. Not all IT people wear anoraks.Not all scientists are atheists. And not all atheists are good scientists. And Dr Dawkins can write perfectly good books such as Blind Watchmaker or Greatest Show on Earth while still writing preposterous name-dropping laziness and choir-preaching like God Delusion.

So I say a plague on all your houses. This is an Oasis of Fuzzy Thinking. Because reality is fuzzy.

Darwin was - More-or-Less - Right

My post remarking that Richard Dawkins is right attracted quite a few comments. Although the roof of the Moot House now accountably has a number of items of headwear on it.

But one commentator suggests that whereas the people at Cern who found the superphotonic muon neutrinos are willing to put their findings up to inspection. Whereas if anyone dared suggest Darwinian evolution was wrong they'd be howled down. That the Theory of Evolution is in some way dogma.

And I'd like to start by recognising that it's the howling of fundamentalists on one side, and the cheesy dismantling of straw men on the other by Dr Dawkins, that give us this impression of a war between religion and science. The fundamentalists do it because they've invested too much on their version of Bible interpretation - their house of cards is only too likely to collapse. While Dr Dawkins presumably does it because he enjoys the adulation of spotty, anoraked earnest students and 2nd-rate or fading comedians. And for the money. And, of course, because he really does believe religious belief is dangerous.

But on the question of who is right about the science behind the Theory of Evolution - God is with Richard Dawkins. I base this on the statement by Jesus that "I am the Truth". And if Christ is the Truth then he as Logos - the organising and creating force behind the universe, the source and origin of Log-ic and rationality - is with Dawkins on the science.

Much play is made by some of it being "only a theory" of Evolution. Well, it's "Only a theory" of Relativity as well. But that doesn't stop some flat-earthers trying to hijack it into a proof - against all evidence and common sense, based on one naive reading of Holy Scripture - that the universe is actually remarkably young.

The Theory of Relativity does what all good scientific theories do. It explains observable facts and it enables us to make predictions which we can then construct experiments to test. And in general (and in Special.... ho, ho) it works. As I mentioned previously if someone tells you Einstein is wrong, your first step is to doubt your experiment.

Which is why, all joking about Higgs Bosons aside, the guys at Cern have done what they have done. They've said - "we appear to have found something remarkable here. Please can everyone look at it and prove us wrong? Ta ever so much."

But the Theory of Evolution is much the same. It's a theory which is as well-tested as to say - it's a fact. What Darwin gave us - not knowing about genes, not understanding the underlying physical causes of mutation - was a theory that fits the facts as they can be observed, and also enables us to make predictions that can be tested. As usual with these things we can have tweaks and even quite large changes and refinements - as General Relativity expands Special into the realms of gravity, and as Quantum Theory gives us new strangeness to the universe again - but the basic over-arching theory is sound.

In fact, and this may just be my view but I'm going with it, for me it's easier to imagine the Theory of Relativity being fundamentally re-assessed (as it will have to be if those neutrinos are really that quick) than that Evolution will be. Evolution at root isn't a physical theory - it can't be supplanted by a new constant, or a bigger atom-smasher or a surprising discovery that a universal constant changes over time. It's statistical. It's descriptive. And it works. If you read Dawkins's Greatest Show on Earth you will realise how and why.

Evolution is a scary thing. It challenges our picture of God. It makes you re-evaluate a lot of things. But then it should do. Because it's true.

Two Suns in the Sunset

Fascinating story of the planet Kepler-16b as it orbits its two suns. scienceblog.com compares it to Tatooine, although it is not a desert planet. But I remember those other planets that orbited multiple stars in their different ways - Helliconia and, especially, Magrathea:

"Night's falling," he said. "Look robot, the stars are coming out."
From the heart of a dark nebula it is possible to see very few stars, and only very faintly, but they were there to be seen. The robot obediently looked at them, then looked back.
"I know," he said. "Wretched isn't it?"
"But that sunset! I've never seen anything like it in my wildest dreams ... the two suns! It was like mountains of fire boiling into space."
"I've seen it," said Marvin. "It's rubbish."
"We only ever had the one sun at home," persevered Arthur, "I came from a planet called Earth you know."
"I know," said Marvin, "you keep going on about it. It sounds awful."
"Ah no, it was a beautiful place."
"Did it have oceans?"
"Oh yes," said Arthur with a sigh, "great wide rolling blue oceans..."
"Can't bear oceans," said Marvin.

Keep Space Tidy

Another in a series of reports on junk in space.

Apparently it's cluttered up there. What with all the bits of old booster rocket, the remains of satellites hit by meteors, left-over rubbish from the making of The Clangers and unsold copies of John Prescott's autobiography. And I've a nasty suspicion, now I think of it, about astronauts' sanitary arrangements. In short, it's increasingly dangerous to anything or anyone else coming up to join them, what with spanners and fuel pods and positron drives whizzing around at high speed. A bit like driving through Dunstable on a Friday night, is where I'm trying to go here.

And it makes me think. What is it about this species that we can't leave anything as we found it? Our roadsides littered with McDonalds cartons (other fast-food litter is also available): plastic floating round in circles in the North Pacific; guillemots covered in oil: hedgehogs trapped in beer can plastic collars - we just trash the place. And given all the mess we've made on earth, we're doing it to the sky now.

I know that Original Sin, like Papal infallibility and biblical inerrancy, isn't actually in the Bible. Although of course the first two Laws of Thermodynamics are. But even so, you sometimes wonder if there's just a grain of truth in old St Augustine (of Hippo, not the other one) and his pessimistic view of the world. But then I remember that on some measures the good ol' USA is one of the most Christian of countries, and it can't be that only the unredeemed are involved in blasting stuff into space and then leaving it up there.

So I despair. In good scientific manner, a solution is of course proposed - in the same way that we had to invent lung cancer treatments because we invented smoking, and some scientists want to chuck iron filings in the ocean to counter global warming. And we invented cars so we had to build the M25 and invent the Congestion Charge. So a giant space-net is suggested, to catch all the orbital debris. Sounds like another excuse to build some cool stuff and make whizzy-bang noises. But knowing the way this species behaves, we'd probably end up accidentally catching Space Dolphins as well.

Nativity of Erwin Schrödinger / Glad to be Grey

A very complicated end to the day, Dear Readers, but I had such fun for most of it. It being the Nativity of Erwin Schrödinger, we Beaker People have spent most of the day jumping in and out of boxes in the great Liturgy of Doubtful Wave Forms. Thankfully, since Archdruid Eileen is away, we weren't playing with real geiger counters or dangerous chemicals this year.

For those of you who aren't up on these things, Schrödinger is famous for many things. One is his famous "Cat". Which he didn't have. As the Archdruid has pointed out in the past, it wasn't a real cat. No cats were harmed in the course of Schrödinger's experiment. For good legal reasons, I have to stress the paucity of cats in the experiment. Except imaginary cats. And if a cat is multiplied by the square root of -1 does it have a wave function at all?

But in going into the details of Herr Schrödinger, I realise I have forgotten what I really wanted to share with you.

I was wandering back from the Moot House, wiping the Wave Forms from my brow, when a snatch of Tangerine Dream told me that someone was calling my mobile telephonic apparatus. The trouble with using Phaedra as a ringtone, of course, is that it's 17 minutes until you can actually answer the phone. But when I eventually answered it, it turned out to be my charge card company.

I say "my". It actually says "Beaker Folk of Husborne Crawley" on the card. But Eileen insists that it's registered in my name, and I then claim expenses. She says she prefers the indirectness of the attribution of purchases. It does causes me problems occasionally - although Eileen tells me that credit card records do have a habit of spontaneously combusting like that.

When I was told that an order had been placed for 75,000 T-shirts, naturally I phoned up the producers of T-shirts. Of course, if Hnaef (who is officially in charge) is ordering so many T-shirts, then who am I to argue with him? But still, I reckoned the motif on the shirts was a mistake. "Some People are Beaker. This Should not Present You with a Problem." There aren't that many Beaker People, and I wouldn't like to scare anyone. And Hnaef's always wanted to be part of a minority. So I thought it would be best to tweak the message - and a visit to the Asda next to Ikea yesterday gave me some inspiration. Based on the title of one of their checkouts, I revised the message to "1 in a million people or less are Beaker. This should not Present You with a Problem". And I tweaked the pink colour to something more grey - less likely to encourage outbreaks of  creativity. I'm sure Hnaef will approve all round.

Nativity of Gregor Mendel (1820)

Today we celebrate a great monk and scientist.
We have hunted for evidence that he lost his faith, gave wild parties, or once employed a former journalist from the News of the World. Unsuccessfully. We reckon he was just a good guy and a decent scientist (albeit one who accidentally created a race of killer bees).

Young Keith won't be joining us, he's in the Stretching Room trying to create a race of long-necked spiders. Some people won't be told.

Introit: Four Peas - a Jolly Good Fellow

Confessional: The Gene Genie

Gradual: Don't be silly, this is genetics,.not blending inheritance.

Offertory: Runny from the bee

Recessional: All we are saying, is give peas a chance.

That Eureka moment

Everyone knows about the original "Eureka" moment. That was when the Greek scientist Archimedes ran down the street, stark naked, shouting "Eureka" - the Greek for "Where's the servant who filled my bath with cold water?"

But by co-incidence - or maybe, for I ascribe nothing to chance - Dawkins-incidence, I read about such experiences twice this morning . Firstly in relation to the young Australian student who seems to have found the Universe's "missing mass".

Ms Fraser-McKelvie said the ‘Eureka moment’ came when Dr Lazendic-Galloway closely examined the data they had collected.

And the second was in relation to the BBC's report of  lost pyramids found by looking - ironically, in reference to the previous article - down from space at the earth.

"We were very intensely doing this research for over a year. I could see the data as it was emerging, but for me the "A-Ha" moment was when I could step back and look at everything that we'd found and I couldn't believe we could locate so many sites all over Egypt."

But I can't for the life of me see how either of these are really "Eureka" or even "A-ha" moments. For far from extolling instant inspiration and brilliance, what both these articles seem to be suggesting is that if you want a "Eureka" moment you need to put in the spade-work - metaphorically, if not literally - first.

Surely if we applied this to spiritual life, the whole Beaker ethic would be shot to pieces. Instead of chasing after experience, lighting tea lights and adopting increasingly "creative" liturgy, we would find our spiritual moments at the end of long periods of quiet prayer, helping others, giving what we possess to those that need it (in a sustainable, long-term, planned way - not an end-of-the-world kind of way) and generally being nice, holy people. And where's the instant payback in that?

No, give me some proper scientists, I say. Scientists who spend their evenings guzzling cider and blackcurrant, their afternoons on the cricket field and every week, just as a form of light entertainment, dash off the equations that explain the 19th dimension of physics. That other type are boring, and just find stuff out after loads of hard work. Not the same at all.

* First link thanks for the information, @Pekingspring. A prolific provider of scientific information - although with the occasional habit of tweeting strong language from outside London nightspots.

Atheism is boring

I have previously used comments on atheism to express the belief that they are people too, and assert that the Nazis were not atheists, as some erroneously claim.
And in the past I have occasionally strayed onto and read articles - and made the occasional comment on - blogs of some atheists where we can find comments that are not flecked with the spittle of hate and pointless rage. For good-humoured and intelligent atheists do actually exist.

But I've realised that I've not bothered looking for quite a while. And I think that the reason is that they are just boring in the end.

Sure, there are plenty of atheist comedians out there.  I heard one last week, on Radio 5 I believe, telling us all that his wish was that his (believing) father would die an atheist. And I wondered what kind of achievement that would actually be. And wondered whether that was actually atheist evangelism as a form of the Oedipus complex. But it's kind of symptomatic of the atheism we hear in the media. A kind of intellectual parasitism - a creed that consists entirely of negatives. Of course, that means atheist comedy can be funny, but it can only be funny as long as religion exists. After which it would be... well, just empty.

Reflecting on the absurdities of religion is terrific. I do it occasionally, I am told, myself. But the reason it is fun, is because religion is actually interesting. Take Neo-paganism:  like neo-Celtic Christianity it has largely been invented over the last fifty years. It's based on wishful thinking and a deliberate re-creation of an imaginary past. It is a lovely target for satire. And it's still more interesting than atheism.

I guess it's because atheism, of itself, has nothing.  Let us take science, for science is often held up in opposition to religion.  Science is brilliant, science is scary, science opens up all kinds of avenues into great things we can do with the world. And begs all sorts of questions. Last week the Large Hadron Collider captured anti-hydrogen for the first time. Or so they say - I've not seen the pictures yet. And it asks all sorts of questions - not least what was the point? But it's fascinating stuff. And it's fascinating whether you have faith or not. In fact, it's probably more fascinating if you do have faith. Because questions about the origin of the universe - about sexual ethics - about the morality of the latest big, scary bomb - we can ask these questions and reflect on them in the light of our founding texts, of the nature of the God, god or gods we believe in (or not, if you're certain kinds of Buddhist). And then we can still follow the experiment through to see what happens next. The world is even more colourful, more rounded, more interesting.

Clockwork

I have been pondering more theological issues, and have carried out some careful studies. I have a number of clockwork mechanisms, including 2 watches, 1 wind-up mouse, 1 clockwork truck and a comedy clown that has given me intermittent nightmares since my 3rd birthday. I also found a kitchen timer, and was about to borrow this when Mrs Hnaef, pouring herself a cherry brandy, made it clear that it was needed if we were to enjoy any desserts this Christmas. I quickly withdrew from her domain and retreated to my study to carry out my experimentation.

The outcome of my theological deliberations is that the the time of today's sunrise may well only have been predictable to within 3-15% accuracy (or 35-80%, if I was supposed to carry the 7 on the 2nd line). More worrying, if the clockwork predictability of the sunrise is based on clown clockwork, not only may the sun not have risen at all (due to a frenzied attack with a toy cricket bat around my 9th birthday), but it may also have been accompanied by Common Entrance examinations carried out with no clothes on, except a poorly tied dayboy prefect tie, or severe beatings carried out by clangers bearing the visage of our Archdruid.

I am making my way forthwith to present my findings directly to the Archdruid.

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Modern life is Rubbish

I wonder about the research, reported in the Telegraph, that claims that modern life causes cancer, as it was virtually unknown in Ancient Egypt.

I mean, obviously we know some things in modern life have this effect - smoking's effect, for example, or the case of 19th century chimney sweeps, or the effects of asbestos. But there seems one vital  aspect they seem to be swept under the carpet slightly - the effect of age.

The reporters say that there is evidence of age-related diseases such as hardening of the arteries, but then they also admit that the average life expectancy of the mummies varied from 25 to 50. Yet average onset of prostate cancer, for example, is 70. Onset of breast cancer is generally over 40, and the average about 60. Which says to me that they may be right - that modernity and the chemicals that go with it may increase the incidence of cancers - but that 1000 mummies aged roughly up to 50 isn't a brilliant group to make this pronouncement on.

None of which, of course, changes the key message - that cancer is something we can and must do a great deal about - but the question is whether that "something" is weighted towards preventing the causes, or healing the disease.

Sexual Dimorphism and Evolution

This may be from an unreliable scientific source, since it comes from a correspondent in Birmingham.

He suggests that women may have evolved smaller feet than men, in order to stand closer to the kitchen sink.

And in many ways this exposes the myth of Evolution. For in the days when, according to the priests of Evolution, men and women were developing dimorphic podologies, there were no sinks and no washing up. So even under the absurdities of evolutionary theory, the different sizes of men's and women's feet would reveal Intelligent Design.

No, clearly the different size of men's and women's feet are a sign of the wonders of Creation. Maybe the Creator made women's feet shorter to assist with washing up, as my correspondent has suggested. But I prefer to think that He had a second, more important intention - that of enabling men to stand comfortably, balanced on their larger feet, while preaching at the front of churches.