1. Scientists confirm shark's 'virgin birth'

Comment #263390 by Alfrescoid on October 10, 2008 at 7:46 pm

"Vewy wuffly...and fwow him to the fwoor!"

Apologies to Michael Palin.

It's a sign! Abandon the gourd - follow the one true Shark - Father, Son and Holy Cartilage.

2. Astronomers find batch of 'super-Earths'

Comment #194181 by Alfrescoid on June 16, 2008 at 2:00 pm

If millions of years of continent-sized lava flows in the Permian could not destroy life, and if an asteroid collision with a force of millions of nuclear weapons at the end of the Cretaceous could not do it, then we can't.

Agreed. But as Sagan so succinctly put it, we are unique as a species in one fundamental way - the ability to wipe ourselves (and a good portion of our cousin species) out.

Oh, life would arise again (and again), but wouldn't it be a shame if the cosmic observer aboard Sagan's spaceship would have to wait several hundreds of millions of years for the next technological society to arrive before watching them achieve the possibility of interstellar travel?

Wouldn't he think it such a tragedy to know the humans nearly made it, and probably would have if they could have stopped bickering with each other long enough?

3. Regime change in heaven

Comment #191336 by Alfrescoid on June 10, 2008 at 3:35 pm

Ladies and gentlemen, we got Him...

4. The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing, ed. Richard Dawkins

Comment #180989 by Alfrescoid on May 16, 2008 at 8:46 am

BigJohn...looks to me like it's a primal and vestigial (in most of us, anyway) response to the "look at me" principle of passing on your genes. Being seen has potential beneficial possibility of attracting a mate.

I think Monty Python had it right though...NOT being seen seems to be the way to go...fewer explosions :)

It's probably a mostly-bred-out characteristic of Homo Sapiens, but obviously there are still pockets...

5. Shaw TV Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #175077 by Alfrescoid on May 4, 2008 at 10:50 am

If this man doesn't change the world - we're all screwed (apologies to Penn)

Please, please, please Richard, come to Australia! The idiocy of religion is perhaps not quite so entrenched as in parts of the northern hemisphere (however apologists and faith-heads abound) - we might just start a mini groundswell here...my bones tell me there are many waverers in the antipodes...

Love your work.