Atheist Union of Greece

On May 2010 some of the administrators of the «Atheia» blog and forum, founded the Atheist Union of Greece, an association whose goal is the promotion of secularism, religious freedom, humanism, skepticism, rationalism, critical thought and the atheist worldview. The existence of a union with legal representation offers us a means to achieve our goals and claim our civil rights.

The hidden structure of overimitation

The hidden structure of overimitation

Derek E. Lyons, Andrew G. Young, and Frank C. Keil

PNAS December 11, 2007 vol. 104 no. 50 19751-19756 doi: 10.1073/pnas.0704452104

And this is ref 98 of stored for reading.

Imitation: what animal imitation tells us about animal cognition

Imitation: what animal imitation tells us about animal cognition

Lucy A. Bates, Richard W. Byrne

first published online: 28 JUN 2010 – Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Cognitive Science, 1: 685–695 doi: 10.1002/wcs.77

Mr T4

Please, say Hello to Mr T4, my new officemate.

Right to Reply – kind of

I got a request for a “right to reply” in the comments of the origin of loss of credibility. Guess who send the request: Vincent Fleury, not Stuart Pivar. Not much of a reply to the question I was asking:

Now, maybe Vincent Fleury have something to say to the editors of this journal. The vortices aren’t apparent there

In other words: will he write to Simon Mitton, Astobiology’s (sorry for the confusion, there is a journal named just Astrobiology, my terming was confusing) the Journal of Astrobiology editor, to contest Pivar’s paper? After all, Fleury is known to write e-mails or posting letters. It seems that I’m not the only one to expect a confrontation of these two guys’ theories (I would prefer something more civilized ). Or a collaboration to build some new unified theory. (that’s terrifying)

Instead, Fleury offered a link, to the announcement of one of his seminars, planned for tomorrow, september 30 at 11 AM at the library of the Hydrodynamics Laboratory, titled “Physics of embryogenesis and evolution” (Physique de l’embryogenèse et évolution). Hopefully (for Fleury, unfortunately in general) no embryologist or evo-devo around to discuss the matter.
But, more importantly, that doesn’t answer my question, does it? That doesn’t answer either previously asked questions that are hanging out there relative to his theory and some of his assertions.

If Fleury thinks that by advertising his lecture he is adding some credit to his theory he is wrong. As much credit as it had, probably, with the invited review in EPJ AS. But maybe the content will be informative: it was in one of his presentations that he admitted not having the data which would support this assertion.

Maybe there will be a Q&A session after the speech. In this case, people attending may be interested to seek clarifications about a few points contributing to support Fleury’s theory. I will suggest:

• In “Tracheal occlusion increases the rate of epithelial branching of embryonic mouse lung via the FGF10-FGFR2b-Sprouty2 pathway” (10.1016/j.mod.2007.10.013) pressure (no data available in the paper) is supposed to drive in vitro embryonic lung growth. OTOH, it was demonstrated that pressure is certainly not necessary to induce embryonic mouse lung growth in vitro: Role of oxygen and vascular development in epithelial branching morphogenesis of the developing mouse lung (10.1152/ajplung.00185.2004). In Fleury’s paper nothing was done to properly dissociate pressure and hypoxia effects.
• 2D/3D confusions are present in Fleury’s depiction of embryogenesis, which don’t really help clarify his point of view. One of those 2D/3D related questions is still open. Maybe Fleury don’t want to waste his time explaining to a biologist, but I’m sure his fellows at LADHYX will be able to understand it and I’ll seek advice if something is too harsh for me. Hope Blake Stacey will be able and willing to help me. After all he finds the subject funny and he certainly have the credentials I’m lacking in physics.

Certainly clarifications about:

Vekris : the antero-posterior construction of animals is bullshit, the induction of limbs by genes is bullshit, the colinearity of hox genes is bullshit, the selection of tetrapods by evolution is bullshit, the duplication of genes between hindlimbs and forelimbs is bullshit

and

The pattern of tetrapods exist in the platonician space of forms, just like the sphere. You can write its essence without evolutionnary arguments

should also be asked.

If you can do attend and ask questions, the comments will welcome any direct and on focus answers.

Looking forward for the seminar’s video, if any.

the origin of loss of credibility

What degree of credibility do you attribute to a journal (International Journal of Astrobiology) publishing and highlighting Stuart Pivar’s “The origin of the vertebrate skeleton“.

The lowest possible. Congratulations to Simon Mitton (Managing Editor, astronomer [physics and astrophysics]), Rocco Mancinelli [biologist] and Frances Westall [biologist] (Associate Editors).

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And PZ Myers on the subject

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Gene Expression Programs of Mouse Endothelial Cells in Kidney Development and Disease

Gene Expression Programs of Mouse Endothelial Cells in Kidney Development and Disease.

Brunskill EW, Potter SS

PLoS ONE 5(8): e12034. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0012034

Statement of the ESHG on direct-to-consumer genetic testing for health-related purposes

European Journal of Human Genetics , (25 August 2010) | doi:10.1038/ejhg.2010.129

Statement of the ESHG on direct-to-consumer genetic testing for health-related purposes

Abstract
Many private companies offer direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing services. Some tests may detect severe and highly penetrant monogenic disorders, while other tests are for genetic variants found associated with increased susceptibility for common and complex diseases in large-scale population studies. Through its Public and Professional Policy committee followed by member and expert consultation, the European Society of Human Genetics has developed the following policy on advertising and provision of predictive genetic tests by such DTC companies: (1) clinical utility of a genetic test shall be an essential criterion for deciding to offer this test to a person or a group of persons; (2) laboratories providing genetic tests should comply with accepted quality standards, including those regarding laboratory personnel qualifications; (3) information about the purpose and appropriateness of testing should be given before the test is done; (4) genetic counselling appropriate to the type of test and disease should be offered; and for some tests psychosocial evaluation and follow-up should be available; (5) privacy and confidentiality of sensitive genetic information should be secured and the data safely guarded; (6) special measures should be taken to avoid inappropriate testing of minors and other legally incapacitated persons; (7) all claims regarding genetic tests should be transparent; advertisement should be unbiased and marketing of genetic tests should be fair; (8) in biomedical research, health care and marketing, respect should be given to relevant ethical principles, as well as international treaties and recommendations regarding genetic testing; and (9) nationally approved guidelines considering all the above-mentioned aspects should be made and followed.

To read this article in full you may need to log in, make a payment or gain access through a site license […].

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I’ll come back to this with comments, quite interesting document.

Bastards

Fotografia