I've often wished that I had a short list of impressive transition fossils handy for the next time a creationist claimed to me that there were no such transition fossils. Well, here's the list I've been looking for, published by the National Geographic. The first fossil on National Geographic's list is the especially compelling find, Tiktaalik, the "fishopod."
In the shadow of all the antivax buzz lately, I'd like to recommend a process of intellectual inoculation for children. This post is based on Best Practices 5: Encourage religious literacy from The Meming of Life. It illustrates the benefit of teaching your children about religion, to protect them from its excesses. McGowan argues that parents who want their kids to follow in their secular (agnostic/atheist/ignostic/etc) footsteps should not obsessively protect them from all exposure to the churchy crowd. Rather one needs to gradually expose them to doses of gentle strains of all the relevant faith memes. If not, they will be vulnerable to the first virulent strain to come along when they begin independent thought, and have a "teen epiphany". (Excerpt)
Struggles with identity, confidence, and countless other issues are a given part of the teen years. Sometimes these struggles generate a genuine personal crisis, at which point religious peers often pose a single question: "Don't you know about Jesus?" If your child says, "No," the peer will come back incredulously with, "YOU don't know JESUS? Omigosh, Jesus is The Answer!" Boom, we have an emotional hijacking. And such hijackings don't end up in moderate Methodism. This is the moment when nonreligious teens fly all the way across the spectrum to evangelical fundamentalism.
A little knowledge about religion allows the teen to say, "Yeah, I know about Jesus"-and to know that reliable answers to personal problems are better found elsewhere.
It is best to start early. Bedtime stories should have consistency for the comfort of the child, and variety to hold the interest of the child. Maybe do a month of "how we got here" stories from various cultures. Kipling, Torah, Norse, Navajo, Hindu, and so on. Show the richness of cultures and the similarities of ideas that underlie all the world religions. But parents need to be prepared. Learn about oral traditions and the power of mythos. Read Joseph Campbell , Homer , and The Arabian Nights . Know of Gilgamesh and Beowulf and Odin , the Ring of the Nibelungen and the Bhagavad Gita , and certainly know the current local favorite, the Torah .Here's what often happens when you videotape police. The priest who tried to videotape this incident eventually got his camera back, which is more than you can say for many other folks who have tried to photograph law enforcement officers in public places. Here's a related post dealing with threats of arrest for taking photos in public places. And be careful when you consider blogging about your First Amendment rights, especially when arrogant judges get wind of it.
Welcome! We'll still be tweaking things a bit, but if you made it here, you are now on DI's new server. Thanks for your patience as we've been working through some technical issues. Erich
Normally, a nosebleed seat is not the pick of the prince, but since tonight's performance is an audio-visual one, it's prime! I can see the tendons in each dancer's calves; the sweat flying off their faces (visceral, if nothing else); but best of all, I can observe pre- and post-entrance dancer behavior in my sliver of a view into the wings. The verdict? Gasping for breath, these dancers still stand erect even after they've slid offstage. One of Mozart's last symphonies is Symphony No. 40 in G minor - and tonight, the Hubbard Street Dance Chicago company performs Marguerite Donlon's Strokes Through the Tail to Symphony No. 40's rippling anticipation. There goes Robertson with his knees again. Bouncing with the beat, crouching low to pull the oboe in like a thick, heavy rope, his hair isn't flouncing as much as usual. It's been cut. In a brief pause, we see that the orchestra is as cool as a cat, though it's sounding jittery with the suspense of unresolved harmony. Suddenly, the lights dim, and you guessed it! Physicality as the instrument arrives with the second movement. In deference to Mozart's wired lyricism, Principal Female plays a wind-up doll, fleety-flighting in unpredictable directions with each musical shove. Then, hooray! Guys without shirts on! These young 'uns are wearing tailcoats, but their breasts are bright white in the stage light. Synchronous scampering ensues. These could be members of a boy band. Individuals all - the super-young innocent, the mustachioed Borat character, and a slavic-looking baldy with a long scar next to his left eye - nevertheless chained in imitation, they showboat their long legs and make nearly identical half-turns, one after the other, like fancy dominoes. Principal Female and her boy wonders prod each other with the crown of their heads or chest-bump like blind zygotes to transfer electricity. Tailcoats vibrate with each dancer's buzzy shudder and periodically, a head-nudge causes one to crinkle her fingers as if she's received a shock. No wonder David Robertson wasn't wearing a tailcoat tonight. These Tailcoats conduct kinetic energy among themselves and direct each other's movements like a bevy of conductors. The leader-follower imitation mime-time carries over into garb. Briefly, Principal Female solos in white chiffon and tulle. Then the boys are back - but without their jackets! Donning delicate white skirts, they perform the lotus gait behind Principal Female in a long line like ducklings ... until we notice that the (mustachioed) little swan hasn't arrived yet. Swinging torsos - elephants turning their heads: where is mustache? Ah, here he is! Men's legs in white light - I quite enjoy them in transparent chiffon! Principal Female returns to the stage wearing blinding-bright pride, black boxer briefs and a tailcoat of her own. (The lacy chiffon top remains.) Tightly-bound, consequential, sequential movements conduct kinetic speed betwixt each person as they pass it on - pass it on - with a biological yearning to bond and release with and from one another. Time and again, Innocent Boy falls behind, missing a wardrobe adjustment or curling into comfy nap time in the background as the show carries on without him. Then, to reward his audacity, Innocent Boy gets a mini solo as he runs after the others in slow motion or fancies himself autonomous. Mustachioed Joe is even gladder than Principal Gal to return to the stage himself - the first to be back this time, in black boxer briefs and his original tailcoat. No more downy feather-skirt for him. The audience has been chuckling and giggling for some time now. We've bonded with the dancers. Maybe it was the yearning-bonding-slacking-off-then-falling-in-again that drew in our empathy; that and the shocking virtuosity of these athletes who skate across our vision as if on ice.