Is it time to declare independence from Israel?

It is, indeed, time, according to Chris Hedges writing at Truthdig.com:

Israel is currently lobbying the United States to launch aerial strikes on Iran, despite the debacle in Lebanon.  Israel’s iron determination to forcibly prevent a nuclear Iran makes it probable that before the end of the Bush administration an attack on Iran will take place.  The efforts to halt nuclear development through diplomatic means have failed.  It does not matter that Iran poses no threat to the United States.  It does not matter that it does not even pose a threat to Israel, which has several hundred nuclear weapons in its arsenal.  It matters only that Israel demands total military domination of the Middle East. 

The alliance between Israel and the United States has culminated after 50 years in direct U.S. military involvement in the Middle East.  This involvement, which is not furthering American interests, is unleashing a geopolitical nightmare.  American soldiers and Marines are dying in droves in a useless war.  The impotence of the United States in the face of Israeli pressure is complete.  The White House and the Congress have become, for perhaps the first time, a direct extension of Israeli interests.  There is no longer any debate within the United States.  This is evidenced by the obsequious nods to Israel by all the current presidential candidates with the exception of Dennis Kucinich.  The political cost for those who challenge Israel is too high. 

This means there will be no peaceful resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli

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Humble scientists with a sense of wonder

I am tired of reading creationist accusations that scientists are robotic, dogmatic and unfeeling know-it-alls, unredeemable determinists incapable of having any sense of wonder regarding the world. This general accusation that scientists lack any sense of wonder is untrue based upon my own acquaintance with scientists who I know personally as well as those who I know through published writings and videos.

It is certainly true that some particular scientists express themselves with the precision that is devoid of emotion. It is true that some scientists are dogmatic and reductionistic. The same can be said for professionals in any field. The same can be said for most creationists, whose writings display in obedience to perceived authority and a refusal to open their minds to new evidence.

I am creating this page for the sole purpose of collecting writings of scientists who have expressed themselves on scientific topics with humility and wonder. I will jumpstart this page with several quotes, and I invite others to contribute additional quotations in order to create a page to which we can point whenever we hear unfair accusations directed at scientists.

Douglas Futuyma, from Evolutionary Biology, Third Edition, page xviii (1998)

Do not expect to find many pat, dogmatic answers or simple declarations of fact in this book. Very often, the exposition of a topic builds slowly and carefully toward a conclusion, and sometimes the conclusion is that we do not know which of several hypotheses best accounts for our observations. In evolutionary biology, as

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Dawkins cuts Behe apart and throws him to the dogs

This NYT article by Richard Dawkins is just too much fun to not read. And when I mentioned "dogs," I meant it.  If mutation, rather than selection, really limited evolutionary change [as Behe argues], this should be true for artificial no less than natural selection. Domestic breeding relies upon exactly…

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