Update from Bunk 3

Well, we finally hear from Kent Hovind following his conviction on tax-related charges January 19th. Obviously the first couple of weeks in prison have not swayed Kent's own self serving view of his case. He still claims innocence and persecution stating:

The last six months of my life have been both a challenge and a blessing at the same time. July 13, 2006, the day before my thirty-third anniversary, my wife and I were arrested without notice or warning that the IRS thought we were doing something unlawful. We were shocked to say the least—and even more shocked when the jury found us guilty.

Why he was shocked (especially after listening to his recorded jail tapes) boggles the mind, but there he is still feigning ignorance about what put him there. I suppose that the first reaction to a long prison sentence would be denial, so I guess that's no surprise. Reading through the comments on Hovinds blog makes understanding Jonestown, David Koresh and Heaven's Gate a little easier.
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On to other stuff. Islamic creationists are not far behind the fundamentalist Christian creationists. The National Center for Science Education reports...

Tens of thousands of copies of The Atlas of Creation, by the Turkish creationist known as Harun Yahya, were recently sent to French schools, colleges, and universities, according to Le Figaro (February 2, 2007). The newspaper reported that the "richly illustrated" 770-page book purports to show "the secret links between Darwinism and bloody ideologies like fascism and communism." It also contains a photograph of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center, with a "stupefying legend" blaming terrorism on "Darwinism" and calling it the "only ideology that valorizes, and therefore encourages, conflict."

to continue reading...

I've never been able to grasp why people are so afraid of being one of many evolved species. We are special enough in that we evolved to a point where we can think about these things. We are special enough in that we have learned to harness and use the natural resources on earth. We are special enough to develop the technologies that allow the sharing of good information in a split second. Unfortunately we are also capable of shoveling craploads of misinformation like creationism/intelligent design in a flash. If evolution is responsible for evil, then it must also be responsible for good, love, inspiration, creativity, intelligence and, I suppose breaktaking inanity.
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Finally, in the 'oh shit what just happened' department, we are in the process of running some zircons for U-Pb dating on Cambrian sediments in western India. The sediments lie on top of a rather large 770 Ma (million years ago) granite-rhyolite province called the Malani Igneous province. Zircons are ubiquitous in granites and rhyolites so we expected to see many, many zircons of 770-750 Ma (the age of the granites and rhyolites). Instead, we see an overwhelming abundance of ~850 Ma zircons and there is no nearby source (at least in present-day India). So now we are searching for the source of these zircons. Science, unlike dogmatic fundamentalism is full of surprises.

Cheers

Joe Meert

PS: Just saw this 'spoof' on the Bush Commemorative coin