Ancient DNA Shows Early Irish Incestuous God-Kings

Newgrange burial mound, County Meath, Ireland

Photo credit: Ken Williams"

DNA study reveals Ireland's age of 'god-kings' - BBC News

It makes a pleasant change to be able to write about something that isn't related to covidiot religious fundamentalists doing their bit to spread the Covid-19 virus, debunking creationist frauds with facts as revealed by science or to Catholic priests abusing children for recreation.

This is about Ireland and Irish history, something in which I have long taken an interest and written about in my popular book, A History of Ireland: How Religion Poisoned Everything".

Religion seems to have played as big a part then as it did until recently in the island of Ireland.

Evolution News - Refuting ID With the Bombardier Beetle

Bombardier beetle, Brachinus elongatulus

How the Beetle Got Its Bang | Stevens Institute of Technology.

One of creationism's favourite arguments from ignorant incredulity - how the bombardier beetle's explosion couldn't have evolved - has now been refuted and the gap closed. No gods or magic were involved.

A team from Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, NJ, has worked out how the beetle concocts the chemical cocktail that it uses as a deadly defence mechanism and discovered how it had evolved.

Unintelligent Design - Hummingbirds and Suboptimal Human Eyes

Male Broad-tailed hummingbird, Selasphorus platycercus

Photo Noah Whiteman
University of California-Berkeley

Wild hummingbirds see a broad range of colors humans can only imagine

One of the more idiotic and demonstrably false claims by intelligent [sic] design creationists is that the human eye is so perfectly designed that it must have been intelligently designed by magic. This claim is even hilariously repeated by spectacle-wearing Ken Ham of the disinformation site, Answers in Genesis, blissfully oblivious of the contradiction his vision-correcting spectacles betray.

However, a few minutes studying vision in other vertebrates will show that the human eye is actually fairly ordinary and unremarkable as vertebrate eyes go. It lacks the visual acuity of an eagle's eye for example, and now, as this study shows, we can see (sorry!) our eyes lack the colour vision of birds; in this case a broad-tailed hummingbirds, Selasphorus platycercus.

Covid-19 - Be Safer. Wear Face-Covering!

Texas A&M Study: Face Masks Critical In Preventing Spread Of COVID-19 - Texas A&M Today

Not wearing face-covering dramatically increases the risk of catching Covid-19, according to research led by a Texas A&M University professor. This has special significance as countries emerge from the drastic lock-downs imposed in the early stages of the pandemic, if a more serious second peak is to be avoided.

The team, which included Nobel Laureate Professor Mario Molina of University of California San Diego, found that face covering reduced the number of infections by 78,000 in Italy and by 66,000 in New York, according to a paper by Renyi Zhang, Texas A&M Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Sciences and the Harold J. Haynes Chair in the College of Geosciences, and colleagues from the University of Texas, the University of California-San Diego and the California Institute of Technology.

Covidiots - Muslims For Covid-19

Ala Hazrat Dargah Islamic Seminary, Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India.
"Alcohol-based hand-cleanser is 'Haraam'"

Use of alcohol-based sanitizer in mosques sparks off debate among scholars- The New Indian Express

In another astonishing example of the danger religious superstition poses in a Covid-19-infected world, a Muslim cleric, Mufti Nashtar Farooqi, in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India, has declared alcohol-based hand-cleanser 'haraam' (evil, banned) and therefore prohibited to Muslims. In particular they should not bring it into or use it in a mosque because it is ‘napaak’ (impure). He gets this from a passage in the Qur'an which forbids the drinking of alcoholic beverages - as though people drink the hand-cleanser - and his seminary, Ala Hazrat Dargah, has issued a fatwa against them

Malevolent Design - Helping Covid-19 Kill You

Tissue sections of mouse lungs, after infection with influenza. The image on the left is the control and the image on the right is from mice without receptors for interferon lambda. The lungs where interferon lambda signalling is blocked (right) shows improved epithelial cell growth and differentiation (in red).

A protein that helps to fight viruses can also block lung damage repair | Crick

More evidence of just how malevolent and exquisitely nasty or grossly incompetent any intelligent designer who designed both the mammalian immune system and Covid-19 would need to be to design this most nasty of viruses.

A team of researchers at the Francis Crick Institute have discovered that the proteins, type I and III interferons, our immune systems produce to combat the virus, make it more difficult for your body to repair the damage to your lungs later on. This in turn means the virus can do even more damage.

Covidiots - Another Faith Healer Dies

'Godman' Aslam who 'cured' by kissing hands, dies of coronavirus

In another reminder of the danger of religion and the stupidity it can encourage, an Indian Muslim 'Godman' or Aslam, who claimed to be able to cure Covid-19 with a kiss, has died in Madhya Pradesh’s Nayapura district or Ratlam. Amongst the people who visited him for his magical 'cure' 19 have now tested positive for the virus. The district of Ratlam has now become an Covid-19 hotspot.

29 Other faith healers offering similar magical cures, which includes drinking water the 'faith healer' has blown into, have now been put into government quarantine facilities while tests are carried out on them and their clients.

Christian Fruitloops for Trump

Pastor Robert Henderson - "God's chosen running mate"

Robert Henderson Says His Patriotic Shirt Makes God 'Remember the United States of America' | Right Wing Watch

The extent to which American talibangelical Christianity has taken over Christian fundamentalism and how desperate it is for Trump and his GOP colleagues to continue in government, can be seen in the ravings of right-wing extremist, pastor Robert Henderson of Robert Henderson Ministries.

Henderson, who appears to believe he has a direct line to God, nevertheless feels God needs his help, especially for a little amnesia problem. He has taken to wearing a shirt made from the US flag as a reminder to God that he is under instructions from Henderson to ensure Trump wins the forthcoming presidential election for a second time.

Unintelligent Design - Creating Problems

Leopard marking its territory

Simulations reveal interplay between scent marking and disease spread: Accounting for individual animal movement could boost understanding of emerging infectious diseases -- ScienceDaily

In a paper published in PLOS Computational Biology a couple of days ago, Lauren White of the University of Maryland's National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center, Annapolis, MD, and colleagues have shown how a solution to the problem of parasitic infections, can create an opportunity for parasites to spread infections in a classic twist of an arms race.

Animals are liable to pass infections between them by physical contact, so one solution to this problem is for some species to be solitary and live within a territory. However, this solution only works if individuals are able to signal the borders of territories to other members of their species. Unlike birds, which often use song or calls, many species use scent markings placed at strategic positions.

Evolution News - Creationists Losing It

Good news: US classrooms are warming to evolution, thanks in part to scientist outreach

The Discovery Institute's plan to subvert the US Constitution and teach creationism at public expense in US public schools is failing badly, according to a recent report published in Evolution: Education Outreach. The proportion of science teachers teaching creationism as valid science in US public schools fell from 32% in 2007 to just 18% in 2017.

Astonishingly, in 2007, two years after a federal court ruled in Kitzmiller vs Dover District, that 'Intelligent design', like its predecessor, 'Creation Science' lacked any scientific merit as was nothing more than fundamentalist, Bible literalist religion dressed up to look like science, American public schools were in breach of the 'Establishment Clause' by allowing creationism to be taught in science class. Only just over half of teachers (51%) were teaching evolution unequivocably as factual.

Fundamentally Violent

Christian crusaders take Jerusalem and massacre the Jewish and Moslem inhabitants

Why People Kill in the Name of God | Psychology Today

Anyone who spends any time talking to religious fundamentalist on social media will be acutely aware of how quickly the conversations turns to abuse and threats of violence, especially towards those who challenge and dispute the claims of religious fundamentalist. Questioning their beliefs or presenting opposing arguments that threaten to undermine them, seem to provoke aggression instead of reflection and honest consideration.

The reasons for this were explained by a study led by Daniel N. Jones, of the University of Nevada Reno, published in the Sage Journal, Social Psychological and Personality Science last April.

Sadly, the paper is behind an expensive firewall but the conclusions are presented in an article in Psychology Today, by Professor David Ludden, PhD, a professor of psychology at Georgia Gwinnett College.

Malevolent Design News - How Meningococci Make Us Sick

False color scanning electron micrograph of meningococci (orange) adherent to human host cells (green).

Image credit: Alexandra Schubert-Unkmeir / Universität Würzburg

Small Protein, Big Impact - Universität Würzburg

Entering the strange world of intelligent [sic] design we find numerous examples, like Covid-19, of the sheer malevolence of any intelligence that could design such things.

Take for example, this recently discovered mechanism whereby the Meningococcal bacteria cause life-threatening meningitis and meningococcal septicaemia. It was discovered by research groups led by the Würzburg University scientists Christoph Schoen and Jörg Vogel and published in the journal Nature Communications a few days ago.

Another Factual Finding Debunks the Bible Narrative

Recent view on the Selenga River close to the archeological site Ust-Kyakhta-3.

© G. Pavlenok

Oldest Connection with Native Americans Identified Near Lake Baikal in Siberia | Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History

Some 35,000 years before the origin myths in the Bible were being invented by Bronze Age Canaanite hill farmers, the ancestors of Native Americans were living in the Lake Baikal area of Siberia, and even dying of plague.

This was the conclusion of a massive study led by the Department of Archaeogenetics at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.

As their press release explains:

Bible Debunked Again by Science Without Even Trying

Illustration of one of the early settlers in the Caribbean. The Caribbean Sea served as a kind of ‘aquatic highway’ that connected the islands with the mainland.

Illustration: Tom Björklund.

Ancient DNA provides new insights into the early peopling of the Caribbean – University of Copenhagen

According to a new study by an international team of researchers from the Caribbean, Europe and North America, led by Cosimo Posth, of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, humans were busy populating the Caribbean islands from North and South America at around the time the Bronze Age pastoralists who wrote the Bible were recording their origin myths. These myths include that of a global mass genocide and repopulation of a sterile world from 8 survivors, just a few thousand years ago.

A Life Damaged by Christianity - Rev. Louis Sheldon

Rev. Louis P. Sheldon,
Leading homophobe and persecutor of the LGBTQ community, dies aged 85.

Rev. Louis Sheldon, Who Fiercely Battled “the Homosexual Agenda,” Is Dead at 85 | Terry Firma | Friendly Atheist | Patheos

Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, founder of the extreme homophobic Traditional Values Coalition, has died, aged 85. Few in the LGBTQ community will mourn his passing.

Preacher of hate, Rev. Sheldon has dedicated his life to promoting the bullying, alienation, demonization and stigmatising of homosexuals, based entirely on a passage in the Christian Bible that appears to forbid a man "laying with another man as with a woman" (something a gay man does not do, of course, unless anal sex with a women was the norm in Biblical times).

Evolution News - Europeans' Mixed Ancestry

Maps showing inherited genetic component from hunter-gatherer (blue) and Anatolian Neolithic (orange) populations along time slices. The expansion of the Anatolian component carried by Neolithic migrants and the differences in proportions observed regionally and chronologically illustrate the diversity of processes at work during the Neolithic expansion in Europe.

© Maïté Rivollat

Interaction Between Neolithic Migrants and Hunter-Gatherers | Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History

A team of French and German scientists have worked out how modern Europeans are derived from two different waves of migration by two different routes, as Neolithic farmers replaced the earlier hunter-gatherer people, but the degree of admixing varied widely, suggesting a complex relationship between the two neolithic groups.

The Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History press release explains:

Analyzing the first archaeogenetic data from the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition in Western Europe, a team of French and German researchers documents levels of admixture between expanding early Neolithic farmers and local hunter-gatherers seen nowhere else in Europe.

Covidiots - Minnesota Catholic Church 'Above the Law'

Bernard Hebda
Archbishop of St. Paul and Minneapolis

Showing Backbone, MN Bishops Defy State

Showing not the slightest sign of contrition or humility, following the bankruptcy of the St. Cloud diocese in Minnesota, because of the $22.5 million payout to the victims of its predatory paedophile priests, the Catholic bishops of Minnesota issued a defiant letter about the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown, calling for the ban on assembly in places of worship to be lifted and declaring the church to be above the law.

In defiance of Minnesota governor, Tim Waltz, the letter asserting the "independence of Body of Christ has from secular authority" and announced the resumption of public Masses beginning May 26.

Astonishingly, they felt entitled to announce that they had given their parishioners "permission for the resumption of the public celebration of Mass on Tuesday, May 26, which will give us time to be ready for the celebration of Pentecost on May 31." They feel they have the authority to "give permission" to Catholics to defy the lawful instructions of an elected state governor!

The letter, signed by all six bishops (only one of whose dioces is not now in a state of bankruptcy due to having to pay their share of the $210 million paid to 210 victims of their priests) states that the lockdown order is an order "that defies reason." Presumably, a Catholic bishop knows more about viruses and epidemiology than virologists and epidemiologists.

Unintelligent Design - Spittlebugs and Bacteria

Spittlebug, the nymph stage of the froghopper, Clastoptera proteus

Two bacteria allow spittlebugs to thrive on low-nutrient meals | Krishna Ramanujan, Cornell Chronicle

Imagine you're an omniscient, omnipotent designer of living organisms and you've designed an insect you want to live and thrive. How do you go about providing it with food?

Well, you design it to live on the low-nutrient sap obtained from the xylem of plants, then you provide it with a ludicrously complex system of symbiotic bacteria which take this poor food supply and turn it into the essential chemicals the insect needs to live on, apparently.

Of course, you need to design special structures for these bacteria to live in. For some reason, you forgot all about the metabolic processes you designed for millions of creations, so you designed this unique one afresh, like re-inventing a wheel.

Evolution - Letting God Off The Hook for Covid-19

Evolution of Pandemic Coronavirus Outlines Path from Animals to Humans | Duke Health

One of the few amusing aspects to the Covid-19 pandemic is watching intelligent [sic] design creationists trying to explain why their putative creator created the virus in the first place. Attempts have included - er... it wasn't our god but another creator - Satan, and God wanted to teach us a lesson because [fill in whatever hobby-horse is currently upsetting local fundamentalists]. The other problem for creationists to explain was why the virus seems to be spread more easily amongst people who regularly gather in places of worship than amongst those who stay at home.

Now however, some scientists from Duke University Medical Centre, Los Alamos National Laboratory, the University of Texas at El Paso and New York University have shown that it wasn't creationism's creator god who made the Covid-19 virus after all, but a perfectly natural process we call 'evolution'. This process caused the common coronavirus to change into SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) and to become highly infective and dangerous to humans.

The Duke Health press release explains:

Closing Another Gap - Consciousness

General anesthesia has been in use for nearly 175 years, but its mechanism for causing loss of consciousness has been unknown until now. So momentous was the first use of ether that it was memorialized in this painting, "First Operation Under Ether," by Robert C. Hinckley.

Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine,
Harvard Medical School.

Solving the 175-year-old medical mystery of anesthesia’s effects | Scripps Research

Scientists may not have fully explained consciousness and how the brain monitors its own thought processes but, as this piece of research by scientists from the Scripps Institute shows, consciousness does not exist independently of the brain, as some woo-peddling charlatans claim, but is an integral, materialist function of neurophysiology.

Scripps Research News explains:

Using modern nanoscale microscopic techniques, plus clever experiments in living cells and fruit flies, the scientists show how clusters of lipids in the cell membrane serve as a missing go-between in a two-part mechanism. Temporary exposure to anesthesia causes the lipid clusters to move from an ordered state, to a disordered one, and then back again, leading to a multitude of subsequent effects that ultimately cause changes in consciousness.