Darwin-mania!

Well, being the 200-year anniversary of Darwin’s birthday, and the 150-year anniversary of his Origin of Species, there has been a lot of Darwin, and evolution, in the spotlight:

• Just in the past few weeks I’ve watched a 3-part television series on a history of Darwin (CBC Nature of Things – hosted by David Suzuki).
• Last week I attended a lecture on evolution and embryology.
• Also, last week, the Ray Comfort version of Origin of Species (see post) was dropped at the University of Alberta (it can only be assumed that they showed up unexpectedly to avoid possible pickets of the book – and unfortunately I was unable to get my hands on a copy of it).
• And tonight I was lucky enough to attend a sold-out lecture at the University of Alberta entitled “Darwin’s Sexy Science” hosted by Discovery Channel’s Jay Ingram (a University of Alberta alumnus).

These are only to name a few examples of which I have taken part in. It’s interesting to note how Darwin’s original theory has been expanded and applied throughout the past 150 years to explain such a wide variety of natural phenomena – it serves as an integral part of our understanding of the fabric of reality. The implications of evolution are far reaching and are felt in nearly all academic disciplines (for example: the role of Dawkins’ evolution in Deutsch’s unified theory of everything).

See below for evolution-inspired links:

• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epistemology-evolutionary/
• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/game-evolutionary/
• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sociobiology/
• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evolution-cultural/
• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evolutionary-genetics/
• http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evolutionary-psychology/

A quick internet search will yield even more results, showing the widespread influence of evolutionary explanations in various schools of thought (not to mention the less obvious examples of emerging theories that rely on evolution as a grounding point).

H1N1 Level 6 Pandemic (WHO)

This summer the H1N1 was officially up’d to a level 6 pandemic.
Read more: http://www.healthnews.com/alerts-outbreaks/swine-flu-h1n1-reaches-level-6-pandemic-3279.html

A level 6 pandemic is characterized by community level outbreaks.
Read more: http://www.who.int/csr/disease/avian_influenza/phase/en/index.html

Despite the level increase, medical associates are skeptical of any increased danger.
Read more: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13431

Now, that’s for regular run-of-the-mill H1N1… not the genetically mutated version dubbed “H1Z1” – the “Z” is for “zombie.”

Greenpeace & Shell

You can read the Edmonton Journal report here: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Stelmach+dismisses+protesters+tourists/2063562/story.html

He was “visibly irate”, according to the Edmonton Journal and various other sources.

Stelmach was quoted as saying that “‘the efforts [of Greenpeace protesters] are really aimed at harming our economy, putting Albertans out of work, putting Canadians out of work and really diminishing our quality of life.'”