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More from the incredible Tim Minchin, well worth a listen

This could be handy if Ben or I get frostbite. . .

Nasa has quietly changed its mission statement to eradicate any mention of its original responsibility to understand and protect our home planet.
Old Version
“To understand and protect our home planet; to explore the universe and search for life; to inspire the next generation of explorers … as only NASA can.”
New Version
“to pioneer the future in space [...]

Taking a leaf from the Daily Show I thought I would point you towards some interesting articles. Prospect magazine has a great article on the rise of Islamic rationalists who are seeking to pursue change from within Islam. Over at the unintentionally hilarious conservative voice, Rob Hood explains that you can only be a Christian [...]

Continuing with Everest, University College London is looking for 200 volunteers to climb to Everest base camp as part of a study into how scarce oxygen resources affect the human body. Any takers?

The Simpsons do evolution.

Professor Steve Jones lives down the road from me in Camden Town and this year was invited to lecture to the Royal Society. His talk was forthrightly entitled ‘Why Evolution is right and Creationism is wrong‘. It’s bloody brilliant. Jones contrasts Western and Chinese creation stories (the Chinese one sounds more fun) but doesn’t spend [...]

Huge news for those interested in evolution. Scientists combing Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic have found Tiktaalik, the missing link between marine and land-based animals.

Robert Sungenis is on a mission. In a bid to dislodge that uppity duo Galileo and Copernicus, he has just finished a book in which he proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the earth is at the centre of the universe, that it does not rotate and that the sun goes around the [...]

Scientists in California are studying a woman with perfect recall. This would be quite a handy skill for our tent lecture series in Antarctica.(Via)

An interesting piece on how the body has evolved to handle acute stress. We’re pretty amazing when it comes down to it.

In another big day for the private space industry, Spacex is to launch their Falcon 1 rocket today. Fingers crossed!
Update: looks like they lost it. Remember, there is no such thing as failure, only results.

An event I was gutted to miss was the recent Selfish Gene: Thirty Years On at the LSE, which had such luminaries as Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennet riffing on each other’s work. Luckily the transcripts and recording are now online. (Via).

After mishandling the homosexual clergy debate, Archbishop Rowan Williams gets it right and hits out at schools teaching creationism.

Science writer Carl Zimmer explains how a sixty-million year old virus might hold the key to understanding our evolutionary history.(Via).