• The 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Robert Darwin (12 Feb 1809 – 19 April 1882).
• The 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species (24 Nov 1859).

The theories of Charles Darwin on the origin of man and life on earth are among the most powerful pieces of science ever published. They are the most important concept in biology and help us explain many phenomenons we encounter.

Even after being around for 150 and heavy attack from fellow scientist, religious leaders and politicians the conecpt of Evolution still stands up. When Darwin published “On the Origin of Species” he didn’t want to start a thought revolution of this magnitude. He purely focused on animals and downplayed the implications evolution has for our species. He also didn’t want to demystify the natural world. He famously concluded:

Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely the production of the higher animal s, directly follows. There is a grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved. [Chapter XV: "Recapitulation And Conclusion"]

(What Darwin describes here would later be called Einsteinian religion.)

After seeing his theories under constant attack by he did decide to apply his theories to humans. After “The Descent of Man”he noted:

[...] Man is descended from some less highly organised form. The grounds upon which this conclusion rests will never be shaken [...]

150 years later this statement is still true. It’s sad enough that there is still so much discussion about evolution and around half the population in industrialized nations doesn’t fully approve it. 2009 is an excellent opportunity to remind anyone who is still caught in 19th century-dogmas that a substantial part of the world does move on and has arrived in the 21st century.

When you want to know more about Darwin, I recomment the following resources:

Darwin Year 2009: Books and links to other resources
Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: a BBC Two program on the implications of Darwin’s ideas. (Parts 1, 2 and 3 on Piratebay)
On the Origion of Species (Project Gutenberg)
The Descent of Man (Project Gutenberg)

Happy Darwin Year!

I argued against the environmental impact about a week ago. Organic farming uses more resources than conventional farming. Therefore the productivity per ton of water or per acre of land is smaller. This is not a big problem for Europe or America. We are producing too much food anyways. But it is a problem for many African countries, where people are starving because organic food production increases world market prices of their staples by reducing the amount exported from the industrialized countries. Who wants to grow cheap rice if he can sell organic fair trade chocolate to the US?

Today I will be extremely selfish and solely focus on the health aspect of organic food. I’m not an expert in nutrition or chemistry. Thanks to the worldwide scientific community I don’t have to. There is plenty of peer-reviewed, high quality research material out there I can look at. After about 10 minutes, I found two papers that said the following:

There appears to be widespread perception amongst consumers that such methods result in foods of higher nutritional quality. The present review concludes that evidence that can support or refute such perception is not available in the scientific literature.
– Hugh Sinclair, Unit of Human Nutrition, School of Food Biosciences, University of Reading in “Proceedings of the Nutrition Society (2002), 61, 19–24“

The study showed that organic dairy farms, as compared with matched conventional farms, were producing milk without increased rates of reported CM, BTSCC, cul l i ng rat e, lameness scores or sanitation scores . Notable di ff er ences bet ween organic dairy farms and conventional farms were lower milk production per cow and smaller herd size. There was little evidence of other fundamental differences between the two farm types in other management and production parameters.
– College of Veterinary Medicine, Michigan State University in “Livestock Production Science 93 (2005) 105 – 115“

Organically produced food products have no proven health benefits as per now. That’s not the end of the story, but what we know as per NOW. In five years time we might find out that everyone who eats conventionally produced food will die a slow and painful death. Thing is we don’t know that. We could also find out that a all-mighty teapot is orbiting the sun. Could be, but it’s not likely.

I consider skepticism and fact-based reasoning as the fundamentals of Western society as it developed in Europe after the Age of Enlightenment and the Renaissance. They are the main source of our prosperity and the great life we can enjoy today. If we lose them we are no better than our ancestors during the medieval ages in (Christian) Europe, some Voodoo guys in Africa who circumcise young girls for so-called “traditional” reasons, Creationists in the US or Homeopaths.

If some hippies go out and tell people that everyone has to eat organic because it’s healthier they are no better than these kinds of people. One shouldn’t sell his ideals, morals or his imagination of a perfect world as facts. You should rather use facts to argue for your view of an ideal world. I’m sure there are people who would like to know the first name of every cow they eat. They like to imagine happy farmers working on a small picture-perfect farm with lots of happy animals. Just like they were told when they were young. It’s totally fair to have this opinion.

But it’s wrong to try to convince other people by telling them lies. If you think the agricultural industry should be like Old MacDonald’s farm, you are free to find others who share this view and open a farm that is being managed just like that. Problem is that there is

1. no measurable difference in quality and
2. it is not possible to create the kind of wealth we have today with this kind of structure.

Before the green revolution everything was organic and people back then weren’t happier either. Actually they died at around 60. Maybe younger.

I really urge you to reality check your perceptions and beliefs from time to time. You may have had them for a long time. Maybe your parents or teachers taught them to you. This all doesn’t matter. They are not infallible (Just the pope is). You are not infallible. Neither am I. We constantly need to improve our understanding of the world to make it better for us. This is just our nature.

Kick it like Locke!

If you should ever need some nice pictures for a project and don’t wanna worry about licensing, have a look at the Flickr Commons. Especially the ones from the Library of Congress. Nice stuff. I really hope they put everything on flickr soon.

I tried to extract the relevant content Dapper, a service that lets you create a feed from almost any website. Here is the feed for “The Sceptical Inquirer”: http://www.dapper.net/services/sceptical_inquirer

Works like a charm, with one entry per article. It would just be nice to get rid of the “Buy Back issue” entries. Enjoy.

Part two, three, four, five

When thinking changes your mind, that’s philosophy.
When God changes your mind, that’s faith.
When facts change your mind, that’s science.

The Edge Foundation asked the intellectual elite to comment on the things that made them change their mind. I think that this is a tricky question to ask because if you changed your mind you admit that you were wrong about something. Many people aren’t quite comfortable with that idea. But I guess if those 163 people – all of them top-notch scientists – who submitted their story can do it, everyone should.

My personal favorite is Patrick Bateson. He used to be an agnostic, but “converted” to an atheist after talking to a creationist lady. I also thought that being an agnostic is the best choice, since you can’t prove one or the other and better leave the question unanswered. But today I think that religion and the belief in the supernatural is dangerous and threatens our modern life. To be honest: our modern life wouldn’t be possible without all those brave people who stood up against the church and other misbeliefs of their time to pursue progress.

Related content:
Richard Dawkins – Enemies of Reason (Part 1)
Church of the Flying Spaghetti  Monster

Reason has built the modern world. It is a precious but also a fragile thing, which can be corroded by apparently harmless irrationality. We must favor verifiable evidence over private feeling. Otherwise we leave ourselves vulnerable to those who would obscure the truth.

The Enemies of Reason, “Slaves to Superstition” [1.01], 13 August 2007, timecode 00:46:47ff

Have you ever heard of those miraculous healers or mediums that can communicate with the dead, heal cancer or find hidden water veins.Some of my more distant relatives and parents used to be into this thing a little bit a couple years ago. When I was 10 or 12 they discovered a hidden water vein in my room (It’s in the 3rd floor) and had my bed relocated after that. I also used to be allergic to some kinds of pollen. For that I got a bottle of homeopathic wonder mixture (aka water). I had to take a spoon of it every day. That stuff never helped. Maybe I was too sceptic.Anyways. I think that those people and methods are a leftover from the dark ages and should be watched carefully. As long as they don’t harm anyone and just take unsuspecting people’s money it’s ok with me, but as soon as it’s about more serious matters we really have to stand up against them and uncover the truth with scientific methods. Here is a little roundup of things I mean by pseudo-science:

• astrology
• homeopathy
• faith healing
• cold reading
• anything that can be called “alternative”
• anything that uses “quantums” outside the original quantum theory

This list is far from complete and might be expanded soon. If you want to do some further research I can recommend an excellent movie by Richard Dawkins and a german podcast by the guys from CCC Ulm. There is also the Randi Educational Foundation, which promises 1,000,000 $ to anyone who can proof any kind of paranormal activity. I 12 years they never had to pay out the price!