Yet another argument on creation(ism)

All of this was prompted by an article in the Guardian on creation that I found particularly well written in a sea of poor discourse on the subject.

I am convinced that nearly everything meaningful to be said about the argument of creationism, intelligent design (ID), and evolution has been said. My position from a scientist and Christian’s point of view is straightforward. Obviously, there is a lot of evidence that exists regarding evolution. With respect to origins of the universe, there is also a surprisingly consistent amount of evidence for the big bang theory. So, my current belief, based on the evidence available, is that the big bang happened, and separately science currently paints a reasonable picture of the origin of life.

Now there’s something very intuitive about the idea that something had to precede the big bang, and that’s fundamentally what I’ll call God. (Call it what you like.) So, the event of creation, in my mind, occurred, but it’s not God placing tiny Lego humans, in their modern forms (whatever that is), on a pre-formed Earth. Creation was the release of energy from an infinitesimally small point into the expanding universe.

So that explains my theism. I am particularly Christian because I believe the fundamental story of Christ, based on all available evidence (Biblical and extra-Biblical accounts). My understanding of the canonization of the New Testament makes me believe that the Bible is more of a human document than it is handed down from God. While I’m much more inclined to take the Hebrew Bible on faith, it remains a question of faith and not science, though I’m pleased to see scientific and archaeological inquiries into the subject. Yet many of these fundamental beliefs I take on faith, and many of these questions cannot be addressed by science directly. It’s perhaps in my nature, however, to attempt to reconcile these two logical worlds in order to ensure that some sort of weird singularity doesn’t implode my head.

The theory of evolution, on the other hand, asks questions that are within the realm of science and testable science. We as scientists would be remiss if we did not admit that explicit statements about the past may well not be testable, but our observations are still meaningful, like a forensic puzzle, and we have the unique opportunity of having systems we can closely monitor in labs and in real environments to check consistency with current ideas.

For one broad example, biological conservation is striking. The preservation of even single, complex ion channels is maintained throughout species whose brains are vastly different. Just one of many, many examples of this is the human 6 transmembrane domain K⁺ channel herg, which is 70% similar in genetic sequence to a channel in the worm C. elegans and also similar to channels in the Drosophila fly and elk.

Modern evolutionary theory accounts for this. At least one alternative explanation to evolution that one might hear from the ID folks is that God could have placed these sequences in each species when God created them. This is not a testable hypothesis, and it is not scientific by definition. As far as science is concerned, until this is reconciled, end of discussion with respect to science!

With respect to education policy, and I probably have more to say at a later time on this issue, all of this sums up to the following. Evolution is a theory (like ALL other theories in science). It is not proven (like all other ideas in science). Evolution and big bang theories should be presented as a theory in science curricula. ID and creationism, on the other hand, have zero place, whatsoever, in a science curriculum. What could be explained is why this is, since it is such a curiously heated topic. As far as this scientist and Christian is concerned, it’s pretty binary.

Automatically generated YouTube subtitles

It just dawned on me that one of many compelling reasons for Google to work on its voice recognition (and search by voice) is to automate subtitles for YouTube. Thanks to my brother for sending me this ridiculous Dutch video that transcends any language comprehension.

The linear approximation of SfN

I recently came back from the Society for Neuroscience (SfN) mega-conference that draws over 30 kNeuroscientists each year. That’s right, 3×10⁴. Compare this, of course, to the annual conference for the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which draws about 10.000, or 1/3 of the number. Yet neuroscience is a subset of science, so, something funny must be happening. Is there a conference larger than SfN? I’d do well to avoid it, I think.

I looked at SfN this year from the limited but functional perspective of a computational neuroscientist. For the experimental posters and talks I attended, I tried to think of ways in which they could be modeled. On my mind notably is modeling of calcium wave propagation dynamics, which is an active area of imaging and may benefit from computational approaches. Surely there is work being done on this currently.

For the computational presentations, I tried to learn about various techniques that I have not yet been exposed to. There was a lot of basic Hodgkin-Huxley type modeling, along with a bunch of compartmental modeling. But what caught my eye was the use of stochastic processes in creating a framework for studying spiking neurons. At its best it may provide a mathematically rigorous description for certain experimentally observable data.

The most fruitful conversation I had was with a fellow grad student who had access to some very unique electrocorticogram (ECoG) data in auditory cortex of humans and had done some preliminary frequency analyses during natural, meaningful sounds (such as a spoken sentence). There is a songbird analog to this idea using natural, complex sounds that constitutes a very active area of research for auditory physiologists and others.

One interesting (to me) observation about the conference was the inelastic collision between vendors, industry, funding sources, institutions, and scientists. A lot of toys (swag) were doled out. I asked an NIH person about computational neuroscience support, and while they financially support efforts of collaborative science that include computation (a very reasonable approach, especially considering the NIH mission), they do not have but a handful of computational neuroscientists staffed at NIH.

One guy whose job was to connect industries with researchers said, when asked about the perceived value of computational neuroscientists in industry, “None yet. But keep asking.” I don’t know how indicative of greater industry he represents, but this means to me that the value of computational approaches may not have quite received full understanding in that community.

There seems to be a lot of convincing to be done.

The conference was not overwhelming as cautioned because I think I put enough (perhaps too many?) constraints on my activities. If I tried to do too much, I felt that I would have learned nothing. But focusing on learning a few things I know about and a few things I’m interested in learning pertaining to my own work, and the conference was very useful.

The immediate future of multitouch

Multitouch technology is most prominent on the Apple iPhone and iPod touch, as well as their new laptops. With respect to each new series of laptops, they introduce a number of new gestures that perform various functions. They’re a big hit with consumers, but the real innovation with multitouch will be arbitrary gestures, which will allow users to program any arbitrary gesture to any arbitrary command.

This could currently be limited by some kind of touchpad firmware issue, since I don’t know how it works, but I presume that there is at least some capacity for software interfacing allowed.

Securing VNC over ssh in OS X

I begrudgingly have to revisit the idea of Virtual Network Computing (VNC), which is a way of viewing and controlling a secondary computer over the Internet. It’s a clumsy replacement for X11 window forwarding in many respects, but it’s in a respect more functional and allows you to have complete control of a remote computer. Additionally, it enables you to continue right where you left off in work without having to think about where windows “live.”

The trouble with VNC is that it’s pretty insecure (opening up another port on the server machine), requires a lot of bandwidth (piping graphics and input back and forth), and is generally unencrypted (packets can be picked up or “sniffed” by an intruder). VNC over ssh is a way of addressing both security implications.

There’s a phenomenal article on this topic at Fotinakis.com.

Changing file handlers in OS X Leopard

If you’ve ever used the “Open With … ” contextual menu item in Finder in OS X, you may have seen several duplicates of programs that are listed there. It’s confusing and cluttered. There is a buried application to reset this particular list called lsregister. Open up a Terminal window and copy and paste the following:

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/ \
Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill \
-r -domain local -domain system -domain user

Now your Open With list should be rebuilt with just the current apps in /Applications and possibly ~/Applications. This tip was originally found at Apple Discussions, but the location of lsregister has changed since then.

Often times when migrating systems or generally screwing around in OS X, you may find that, among other things, OS X gets confused by what applications you want to use by default.

Geeky solutions to silly problems belong to the world. PS. If this isn’t in TinkerTool or Onyx, it ought to be!

Possible preventative role of statins

The role of statins in lowering cholesterol (and thus preventing certain types of heart disease) has been shown, but a recent report in the New England Journal of Medicine underlined the potential use of statins as a preventative tool for heart health in older men and women. Reports are all over the web, from the New York Times to BBC Science, but the original article is available at the NEJM site. Some excellent commentary addressing the ever-unclear issue of long-term effects can be found at the WSJ Health Blog.