I'm sure most of you are aware of the current fight in the US between a group of Catholic bishops and the Obama administration regarding a proposed requirement that contraception programs be part of medical coverage for employees -- even if the employer's institution has a religious issue with using birth control.
This group of bishops has presented the president with a letter demanding that the mandate be rescinded, in the name of protecting "religious liberty and freedom of conscience for all." The result is that Obama appears to be backpedaling, working on a compromise that would give religious institutions with objections to providing contraception coverage an out. The bishops are mollified but not yet willing to withdraw their objection; contraception coverage, they say, should be removed completely, and any talk of compromise is doomed to fail. Anthony Picarello, general counsel for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, says, "It's the unstoppable force meets the immovable object."
This stance, of course, has the complete support of Pope Benedict XVI, who has himself been something of an immovable object on the subject. Three years ago, a group of fifty "dissident" bishops presented the pope with a letter entreating him to lift the Catholic church's ban on contraception. Interestingly, the letter made it clear that they were not promoting contraception because they were somehow in favor of promiscuity, a charge that has been levied against pro-contraception groups in the past. They simply stated that the ban on contraception, which was passed into church law forty years ago by Pope Paul VI in his encyclical Humanae Vitae ("Of Human Life") had, according to the letter, "had a catastrophic impact on the poor and powerless around the world."
Well, yeah. In fact: duh. It doesn't take a Ph.D. to notice the worldwide correlation between several different demographics -- lack of access to contraception, poor access for women to higher education, large families, poor access to modern medicine, and high infant mortality. (Note that I am not claiming that lack of contraception causes the others; as I harp on continuously in my environmental science class, correlation does not imply causation. But the fact that these demographics all cluster this way is certainly suggestive of some sort of connection.)
It seems clear that when women have choices to limit the number of children they have, they will do so. It becomes easier to provide for the children they do have, and it affords the mothers a better chance of doing something else with their lives besides bearing and raising children.
Despite this, the receipt of the 2008 letter served only to prompt the talking heads at the Vatican to dismiss the letter as the "insignificant attempts of the pro-contraception lobby" to influence church policy, and suggested that the letter was "paid for" by dissident groups attempting to undermine the authority of the pope. The recent kerfuffle regarding contraception in the US is indicative that things haven't changed much.
Note that I'm not especially interested in the question of whether the president overstepped his bounds in trying to induce religious groups to change their ways. That is a question for a constitutional lawyer, which I am clearly not. I'm more interested in the moral stance of the Catholic leadership in maintaining their resistance to contraception.
Population growth is reaching a critical state. You'd think that the hierarchy of the Catholic church, which is composed as a rule of extremely well-educated people, would not be unaware of this fact. Some ecologists think that the human population has already passed the point of sustainability, and that a "correction" is inevitable. (And you know what "correction" is a euphemism for.) How can it possibly be a moral stance to tell a poverty-stricken woman that if she or her husband uses birth control, they are committing a sin, and taking the chance of damning their immortal souls to hell?
So, I must ask: which is more sinful, a poor couple being provided the pill to prevent the them from having children they can't adequately care for, or the wealthy, privileged autocrats in the Catholic church sanctioning women remaining trapped in the cycle of bearing children because they truly have no other choices available to them?
Pope Benedict apparently has, like the other Catholic leaders before him, championed Humanae Vitae, stating that it was "all too often misunderstood and misrepresented." Okay, your holy popehood: why don't you explain it to us? Why do you think it's a mandate from god that you sit in your air-conditioned office in the Vatican, with your robes and golden ring and all that other nonsense, and command that some poverty-stricken unfortunate who believes every word you say has to continue to have more children, and more, and after that, more again? Tell us, clearly, why that is a moral and ethical thing to do.
I'm waiting.
Yeah. I thought so.
The Humanae Vitae told the Catholic world that it was god's wish that any sexually active couple (although presumably only doing so beneath the blessing of the church through marriage) "be open to the miracle of life." Whether life itself is a miracle depends, I suppose, on your definition of a miracle; but even given that as a premise, one thing seems pretty clear.
7 billion miracles are enough.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Beauty, ugliness, and god's plan for Aunt Gertrude
Once again, I've been involved in arguments in online forums over belief.
Yes, I know it's pointless. No, I don't seem to be able to stop myself. The problem is, while (as I mentioned yesterday) I don't really care what people believe personally, it does bother me when someone trumpets a counterfactual or illogical statement in a public fashion, and the only responses are a sort of Greek chorus of "Right on!" and "You tell 'em, brother!" and "Bless you, sister!" I feel like I am honor-bound to step in, even if it never seems to make a difference.
This particular iteration of that pointless pastime was launched by a woman who asked how anyone who was a biologist could look around at all of the wonderful things in the natural world and not be absolutely convinced that a deity, not evolution, brought them about. "Look at how pretty everything is," she was basically saying. "God musta done that."
Well, that leaves us with one teensy little problem, which I pointed out, not that it did any good. There are a lot of parts of the natural world that, well, aren't all that pretty. Each December the Hallmark stores are full of next year's inspirational calendars featuring bible verses set against photographs of rainbows, birds in flight, waterfalls, sunsets, brilliant fields of flowers. Okay, fine; if those are god's creations, and are supposed to inspire us with divine awe, then give equal time to the aphids, dung beetles, slugs, the Ebola virus, and the charred remains of trees following a forest fire, which are presumably the work of the same creator. I wonder how many calendars of bible verses set against photographs of athlete's foot fungus and naked mole-rats Hallmark could sell. One, is my guess, because I'd buy one, but I'm guessing not many others.
Funny how we're quick to attribute the Lilies of the Field to god's hand, but not the Pinworms of the Pig's Intestines. They, too, toil not, and neither do they spin, but Jesus conveniently didn't mention that. And if you claim that all of the nasty little parasites and so on were created by Satan, now you're just making stuff up, because I've never heard of a bible verse that says anything remotely like, "And then the Evil One didst fashion ticks from the dust of the earth, and he did sayeth unto the ticks, 'Go, thou ticks, and tormentest man and beast, for that shalt serveth them all right, ha ha ha.' And it was so, and the Evil One was well pleased thereof."
It reminds me of the wonderful song by Eric Idle (of Monty Python fame), set to the tune of "All Things Bright and Beautiful:"
None of this, of course, is any kind of proof or disproof of the existence of a creator; it's more an interesting feature of how our psyches work. It's just the Dart-Thrower's Bias again, isn't it? We're quick to attribute beauty, happiness, and good fortune to god, but seldom if ever do the converse. If you're crossing a street, and a Mack truck screeches to a halt within an inch of your torso, you might say, "Wow, god really had his Mighty Hand protecting me that time! He must have some grand plan for me." Whereas, if Aunt Gertrude falls down the stairs and breaks her neck, we almost certainly wouldn't say, "Man, god really creamed Aunt Gertrude, didn't he? Guess he was done with her."
My own attitude is, take your understanding, and follow where it leads. If you believe that god really does create beauty, then he created ugliness and horror, too. If he saves some people miraculously, he allows others to die in freak accidents. Use one as an explanation, and it requires you to explain the other.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
Yes, I know it's pointless. No, I don't seem to be able to stop myself. The problem is, while (as I mentioned yesterday) I don't really care what people believe personally, it does bother me when someone trumpets a counterfactual or illogical statement in a public fashion, and the only responses are a sort of Greek chorus of "Right on!" and "You tell 'em, brother!" and "Bless you, sister!" I feel like I am honor-bound to step in, even if it never seems to make a difference.
This particular iteration of that pointless pastime was launched by a woman who asked how anyone who was a biologist could look around at all of the wonderful things in the natural world and not be absolutely convinced that a deity, not evolution, brought them about. "Look at how pretty everything is," she was basically saying. "God musta done that."
Well, that leaves us with one teensy little problem, which I pointed out, not that it did any good. There are a lot of parts of the natural world that, well, aren't all that pretty. Each December the Hallmark stores are full of next year's inspirational calendars featuring bible verses set against photographs of rainbows, birds in flight, waterfalls, sunsets, brilliant fields of flowers. Okay, fine; if those are god's creations, and are supposed to inspire us with divine awe, then give equal time to the aphids, dung beetles, slugs, the Ebola virus, and the charred remains of trees following a forest fire, which are presumably the work of the same creator. I wonder how many calendars of bible verses set against photographs of athlete's foot fungus and naked mole-rats Hallmark could sell. One, is my guess, because I'd buy one, but I'm guessing not many others.
Funny how we're quick to attribute the Lilies of the Field to god's hand, but not the Pinworms of the Pig's Intestines. They, too, toil not, and neither do they spin, but Jesus conveniently didn't mention that. And if you claim that all of the nasty little parasites and so on were created by Satan, now you're just making stuff up, because I've never heard of a bible verse that says anything remotely like, "And then the Evil One didst fashion ticks from the dust of the earth, and he did sayeth unto the ticks, 'Go, thou ticks, and tormentest man and beast, for that shalt serveth them all right, ha ha ha.' And it was so, and the Evil One was well pleased thereof."
It reminds me of the wonderful song by Eric Idle (of Monty Python fame), set to the tune of "All Things Bright and Beautiful:"
All things dull and ugly,
All creatures short and squat,
All things rude and nasty,
The Lord God made the lot.
Each little snake that poisons,
Each little wasp that stings,
He made their brutish venom.
He made their horrid wings.
All things sick and cancerous,
All evil great and small,
All things foul and dangerous,
The Lord God made them all.
Each nasty little hornet,
Each beastly little squid--
Who made the spikey urchin?
Who made the sharks? He did!
All things scabbed and ulcerous,
All pox both great and small,
Putrid, foul and gangrenous,
The Lord God made them all.
Amen.
None of this, of course, is any kind of proof or disproof of the existence of a creator; it's more an interesting feature of how our psyches work. It's just the Dart-Thrower's Bias again, isn't it? We're quick to attribute beauty, happiness, and good fortune to god, but seldom if ever do the converse. If you're crossing a street, and a Mack truck screeches to a halt within an inch of your torso, you might say, "Wow, god really had his Mighty Hand protecting me that time! He must have some grand plan for me." Whereas, if Aunt Gertrude falls down the stairs and breaks her neck, we almost certainly wouldn't say, "Man, god really creamed Aunt Gertrude, didn't he? Guess he was done with her."
My own attitude is, take your understanding, and follow where it leads. If you believe that god really does create beauty, then he created ugliness and horror, too. If he saves some people miraculously, he allows others to die in freak accidents. Use one as an explanation, and it requires you to explain the other.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Beware of mermaids
It is an open question how much respect should be accorded to someone's beliefs and actions based simply on whether those form part of his/her religion.
"It's my religion" is, in many ways, a "Get Out Of Jail Free" card. It stops conversation, it stops questioning. Somehow, we're supposed to tiptoe around the subject, and not view beliefs labeled "religion" through the same critical lens as we would (for example) scientific or medical claims. According to many, religious statements do not need to rise to the same standard of evidence as anything else; they are by nature personal, impossible to analyze, beyond the realm of logic.
This is one of the major beefs that Richard Dawkins has with religion, and he goes into it in some detail in his book The God Delusion. It is also, I think, why he rubs so many people the wrong way. I remember a student telling me, "It's not even that I necessarily disagree with what Dawkins is saying. It's just that he's kind of an asshole about it." I think this view has a lot to do with the pervasive multiculturalism that is now the Flavor Of The Day in the media and in schools; we're supposed to unquestioningly respect, not respectfully question, the beliefs of others. And that respect is supposed to be given regardless of whether the belief has the remotest connection with reality.
Because this is serious thin ice for a lot of people, and because I really would rather not get any more hate mail and death threats than usual, let me take just one recent example in the news that takes it out of the realm of what most of us come into contact with.
This particular story (source here) comes from Zimbabwe, where some workers on a new reservoir were scared off the site by "mermaids." The Minister of Water Resources, Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, told a parliamentary committee that the workers were refusing to go back to work because of their encounters.
The belief in spirits, including water spirits, is common in Zimbabwe, where many nominally Christian people combine their Christian beliefs with traditional animism. So the mermaid encounters were definitely within the realm of what I'd call a religious belief, not a simple paranormal claim (such as if an American said he'd seen a UFO). And Mr. Nkomo's suggestion in response to the workers' claims makes that point even clearer; he recommended to the committee that shamans be hired to brew traditional beer and carry out rituals to appease the mermaids.
My question is, why on earth wasn't the response, "Dear Workers: There's no such thing as 'mermaids.' Get a grip on reality. Also get another job. You're fired." It may well be that Mr. Nkomo shares those beliefs -- it certainly seems likely, given his response -- but everyone seems to be going out of their way to respect the beliefs of the workmen, instead of saying, "Those are fairy tales." And lest you think that this sort of thing only happens in deepest, darkest Africa -- just last year, a factory worker in Georgia was fired because he refused to wear for one day a badge that said, "666 days without an accident," because 666 is the mark of the devil. He sued for damages and back pay -- and won.
Just to make it clear, I have no issue whatsoever with people believing whatever they want, as long as they don't mandate that I go along with them. If you'd like, you can believe that the world is a flat, triangular plate resting on the back of a giant flying wombat. (Go ahead, try to tell me this is more ridiculous than mermaids in reservoirs.) But why does labeling this belief a "religious statement" immediately accord it respect? By demanding that we hold religious statements to the same standard of critical thinking as we do anything else, does this make Dawkins "an asshole?" (He may be an asshole in other regards, I don't know him personally and am unqualified to make that judgment.)
Anyhow, that's the question of the day. I know that even asking it makes a lot of people wince -- and I do wonder why that is.
"It's my religion" is, in many ways, a "Get Out Of Jail Free" card. It stops conversation, it stops questioning. Somehow, we're supposed to tiptoe around the subject, and not view beliefs labeled "religion" through the same critical lens as we would (for example) scientific or medical claims. According to many, religious statements do not need to rise to the same standard of evidence as anything else; they are by nature personal, impossible to analyze, beyond the realm of logic.
This is one of the major beefs that Richard Dawkins has with religion, and he goes into it in some detail in his book The God Delusion. It is also, I think, why he rubs so many people the wrong way. I remember a student telling me, "It's not even that I necessarily disagree with what Dawkins is saying. It's just that he's kind of an asshole about it." I think this view has a lot to do with the pervasive multiculturalism that is now the Flavor Of The Day in the media and in schools; we're supposed to unquestioningly respect, not respectfully question, the beliefs of others. And that respect is supposed to be given regardless of whether the belief has the remotest connection with reality.
Because this is serious thin ice for a lot of people, and because I really would rather not get any more hate mail and death threats than usual, let me take just one recent example in the news that takes it out of the realm of what most of us come into contact with.
This particular story (source here) comes from Zimbabwe, where some workers on a new reservoir were scared off the site by "mermaids." The Minister of Water Resources, Samuel Sipepa Nkomo, told a parliamentary committee that the workers were refusing to go back to work because of their encounters.
The belief in spirits, including water spirits, is common in Zimbabwe, where many nominally Christian people combine their Christian beliefs with traditional animism. So the mermaid encounters were definitely within the realm of what I'd call a religious belief, not a simple paranormal claim (such as if an American said he'd seen a UFO). And Mr. Nkomo's suggestion in response to the workers' claims makes that point even clearer; he recommended to the committee that shamans be hired to brew traditional beer and carry out rituals to appease the mermaids.
My question is, why on earth wasn't the response, "Dear Workers: There's no such thing as 'mermaids.' Get a grip on reality. Also get another job. You're fired." It may well be that Mr. Nkomo shares those beliefs -- it certainly seems likely, given his response -- but everyone seems to be going out of their way to respect the beliefs of the workmen, instead of saying, "Those are fairy tales." And lest you think that this sort of thing only happens in deepest, darkest Africa -- just last year, a factory worker in Georgia was fired because he refused to wear for one day a badge that said, "666 days without an accident," because 666 is the mark of the devil. He sued for damages and back pay -- and won.
Just to make it clear, I have no issue whatsoever with people believing whatever they want, as long as they don't mandate that I go along with them. If you'd like, you can believe that the world is a flat, triangular plate resting on the back of a giant flying wombat. (Go ahead, try to tell me this is more ridiculous than mermaids in reservoirs.) But why does labeling this belief a "religious statement" immediately accord it respect? By demanding that we hold religious statements to the same standard of critical thinking as we do anything else, does this make Dawkins "an asshole?" (He may be an asshole in other regards, I don't know him personally and am unqualified to make that judgment.)
Anyhow, that's the question of the day. I know that even asking it makes a lot of people wince -- and I do wonder why that is.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Apostasy and self-contradiction
I find it baffling how many of the extremely religious can believe (on the one hand) that god is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, and omni-most-everything-else, and (on the other) that mild criticism will be enough to cause god's kingdom to topple like a house of cards.
Our most recent example of this bizarre self-contradiction comes from Saudi Arabia, where a young writer is facing probable execution for criticizing Muhammad.
Last week was the anniversary of Muhammad's birth, and a 23-year-old writer, Hamza Kashgari, was reflecting on Muhammad's role in Islam, and sent out a few posts on Twitter that could not possibly be construed as anything but gentle questioning. "On your birthday, I will say that I have loved the rebel in you, that you’ve always been a source of inspiration to me, and that I do not like the halos of divinity around you. I shall not pray for you," he wrote in one tweet.
"On your birthday, I find you wherever I turn. I will say that I have loved aspects of you, hated others, and could not understand many more," he wrote in another, and in a third, "On your birthday, I shall not bow to you. I shall not kiss your hand. Rather, I shall shake it as equals do, and smile at you as you smile at me. I shall speak to you as a friend, no more.”
Well. You'd have thought he'd recommended setting off a nuclear weapon in Mecca, or something, from the outcry that ensued. Within a day, he had more than 30,000 responses, many of them calling for his death. Alarmed, Kashgari posted a long apology, but it was too late; someone had posted his address online, with a recommendation to go and kill him, and he fled for his life. He got as far as Malaysia, but in a stunning overreach of their authority, he was arrested by agents from Interpol and returned to Saudi Arabia, where the king himself is recommending that he be tried for apostasy -- which is punishable by death by beheading. (Sources: here and here)
Okay, come on now. Either your god is powerful, or else he isn't. If he isn't, why do you worship him? And if he is, surely he can withstand a few pointed questions. You should take a look at the video in the first source, wherein Sheikh Nasser al-Omar openly weeps while describing the blasphemy Kashgari has committed -- a spectacle that would be funny if it weren't so deadly serious. Apparently this guy really, honestly believes that a 23-year-old writing that he won't pray for Muhammad on his birthday is worthy of death because he has "annoyed Allah." Oh, and after the guy's dead, Allah has "prepared a humiliating punishment" for him.
I guess Allah has a remarkably low tolerance for annoyance, then. You have to wonder how any of us escape "humiliating punishments."
My conclusion -- besides the fact that Sheikh Nasser al-Omar is a bloodthirsty old geezer -- is that if a belief system is that fragile, and its god that subject to "annoyance," there must not be much to recommend it. You'd think that it would take more than three posts on Twitter to accomplish all that, wouldn't you?
You'd be wrong. "I fear that Allah will send a swift punishment upon us," al-Omar said, in between bouts of sniffling into his beard, "for our complacency in regards to the rights of Allah and his prophet."
Please. If your religion was all you claim it is, there should be people flocking to it, converting to Islam because of the sheer force of its appeal. Instead, you have to behead people for asking questions -- which surely identifies it for what it is, which is a morally bankrupt system whose rules only exist to maintain the current power structure, and prevent any scrap of free thought. It is a belief system whose prime weapon is compulsion through fear.
And I can only hope that the news of Kashgari's arrest will trigger people across the Middle East to ask a lot more questions -- if they have not already been terrified, and brainwashed, into forever keeping silence.
Our most recent example of this bizarre self-contradiction comes from Saudi Arabia, where a young writer is facing probable execution for criticizing Muhammad.
Last week was the anniversary of Muhammad's birth, and a 23-year-old writer, Hamza Kashgari, was reflecting on Muhammad's role in Islam, and sent out a few posts on Twitter that could not possibly be construed as anything but gentle questioning. "On your birthday, I will say that I have loved the rebel in you, that you’ve always been a source of inspiration to me, and that I do not like the halos of divinity around you. I shall not pray for you," he wrote in one tweet.
"On your birthday, I find you wherever I turn. I will say that I have loved aspects of you, hated others, and could not understand many more," he wrote in another, and in a third, "On your birthday, I shall not bow to you. I shall not kiss your hand. Rather, I shall shake it as equals do, and smile at you as you smile at me. I shall speak to you as a friend, no more.”
Well. You'd have thought he'd recommended setting off a nuclear weapon in Mecca, or something, from the outcry that ensued. Within a day, he had more than 30,000 responses, many of them calling for his death. Alarmed, Kashgari posted a long apology, but it was too late; someone had posted his address online, with a recommendation to go and kill him, and he fled for his life. He got as far as Malaysia, but in a stunning overreach of their authority, he was arrested by agents from Interpol and returned to Saudi Arabia, where the king himself is recommending that he be tried for apostasy -- which is punishable by death by beheading. (Sources: here and here)
Okay, come on now. Either your god is powerful, or else he isn't. If he isn't, why do you worship him? And if he is, surely he can withstand a few pointed questions. You should take a look at the video in the first source, wherein Sheikh Nasser al-Omar openly weeps while describing the blasphemy Kashgari has committed -- a spectacle that would be funny if it weren't so deadly serious. Apparently this guy really, honestly believes that a 23-year-old writing that he won't pray for Muhammad on his birthday is worthy of death because he has "annoyed Allah." Oh, and after the guy's dead, Allah has "prepared a humiliating punishment" for him.
I guess Allah has a remarkably low tolerance for annoyance, then. You have to wonder how any of us escape "humiliating punishments."
My conclusion -- besides the fact that Sheikh Nasser al-Omar is a bloodthirsty old geezer -- is that if a belief system is that fragile, and its god that subject to "annoyance," there must not be much to recommend it. You'd think that it would take more than three posts on Twitter to accomplish all that, wouldn't you?
You'd be wrong. "I fear that Allah will send a swift punishment upon us," al-Omar said, in between bouts of sniffling into his beard, "for our complacency in regards to the rights of Allah and his prophet."
Please. If your religion was all you claim it is, there should be people flocking to it, converting to Islam because of the sheer force of its appeal. Instead, you have to behead people for asking questions -- which surely identifies it for what it is, which is a morally bankrupt system whose rules only exist to maintain the current power structure, and prevent any scrap of free thought. It is a belief system whose prime weapon is compulsion through fear.
And I can only hope that the news of Kashgari's arrest will trigger people across the Middle East to ask a lot more questions -- if they have not already been terrified, and brainwashed, into forever keeping silence.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Holy lands
It is a nearly universal tendency amongst human cultures to consider certain places holy. Christians, Jews, and Muslims are well-known for declaring particular places sacred, and there have been wars fought over guardianship (witness the Crusades -- and note that Palestine was always referred to by Crusaders as "the Holy Land," a designation sometimes still used). Even today, skirmishes erupt over who has control, or even access, to certain sacred sites. For several years, there has been an ongoing feud over which sect of Christians -- Ethiopian or Coptic -- has the ownership of the Deir-al-Sultan Monastery in Jerusalem, a site which is next to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and has connections to the life and death of Jesus. This particular incident might be funny if it weren't a microcosm of a tendency which has cost millions of lives, and if the monks in question weren't so deadly serious themselves.
However, such perceptions are not by any means limited to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Even the Buddhists, whose philosophy emphasizes "non-attachment" to the physical world as the cardinal virtue, have holy sites. These are mostly connected with the life or death of Siddhartha Buddha and are the objects of pilgrimages from Buddhists around the world. The Australian Aborigines have Ayers Rock (Uluru in the language of the Natives), which is central to their creation stories. The Devil's Tower in Wyoming is sacred to the Sioux (and apparently also was of some significance to the aliens in Close Encounters of the Third Kind).
I find this tendency fascinating. Sacred sites seem usually to fall into one of two categories -- they are either places of historical significance (a friend of mine is working on a novel that has as its central theme the contention that the Vietnam War Memorial is a holy place), or places that have some natural oddness that makes them stand out, that begs an explanation. These latter ones I find the most interesting. There is a universal need in the human brain to explain our environment, and apparently if no natural explanation makes itself known, then we almost always respond by simply making one up and telling it convincingly enough that it is remembered.
I can't say that I'm immune to this. I self-identify as a rationalist, but a friend of mine claims (with probable justification) that I doth protest too much. She once stated that if I had the balls for it, I'd be a mystic, and that in a previous age I'd have been a monk. That rather curious claim notwithstanding, I have to admit that I have been in places which strongly affected me, which (had I the balls to be a mystic) I might consider sacred. One of them is Ahlstrom's Prairie, a highly peculiar place in Washington State that I used to pass through while hiking to the ocean on the Olympic Peninsula. There's a boardwalk trail on the hike to the mouth of the Ozette River, and most of the way you are in dense Douglas fir forest, dripping and silent, with nothing but the clunk of your hiking boots on the wood planks to break the quiet. Then, without warning, you are in an open meadow, a strip of land with not a tree, perhaps a quarter of a mile across and maybe two miles wide (although I never explored it well enough to know for sure). It is an odd enough spot that I wouldn't be surprised if the Quiliute and Makah Natives who lived in the area considered it sacred. For my part, I thought it was a little creepy, and was always glad to cross it and get back under the cover of the dark trees.
Another spot in Washington, not nearly so remote, is the Mima Mounds. Near Littlerock, Washington, and right off of Interstate 5, is a wide prairie dotted with relatively circular grass-covered mounds, the largest of them about thirty feet across and maybe eight feet high. Originally thought to be Native burial sites, they are now thought to be the result of some unknown geologic process, possibly glacial. All I know is that they're spooky and mysterious. I can easily see why someone might consider this a holy place.
Lastly, I would be remiss in not mentioning a place I visited on a hiking trip in the north of England. I have always been interested in medieval history, and I made a point of visiting a number of abbey ruins, monasteries which were abandoned when Henry VIII decided that Catholicism wasn't his cup of tea, but Anne Boleyn was. Most of them were of solely intellectual interest, but one of them -- Rievaulx Abbey -- strikes me as one of those places which did not become sacred because it was the site of a monastery, but became the site of a monastery because it was sacred. It sits in a little, cup-shaped valley, with a narrow river running through it, and as I sat on a rock under the branches of an oak tree, dangling my bare feet in the cold stream water, I could almost become convinced that there was something to the idea of a place being holy.
Almost. And so I don't have my Skeptic's License revoked, allow me to state for the record that I realize that in all of the above cases, it was just the oddity, remoteness, and beauty of the site acting on my emotions and my imagination. I don't really believe that there's anything peculiar about any of these places, above and beyond the purely natural and aesthetic.
Be that as it may, there is a part of me that wishes it were true. It's not scientific, it's not rational - but it would be awfully cool.
However, such perceptions are not by any means limited to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Even the Buddhists, whose philosophy emphasizes "non-attachment" to the physical world as the cardinal virtue, have holy sites. These are mostly connected with the life or death of Siddhartha Buddha and are the objects of pilgrimages from Buddhists around the world. The Australian Aborigines have Ayers Rock (Uluru in the language of the Natives), which is central to their creation stories. The Devil's Tower in Wyoming is sacred to the Sioux (and apparently also was of some significance to the aliens in Close Encounters of the Third Kind).
I find this tendency fascinating. Sacred sites seem usually to fall into one of two categories -- they are either places of historical significance (a friend of mine is working on a novel that has as its central theme the contention that the Vietnam War Memorial is a holy place), or places that have some natural oddness that makes them stand out, that begs an explanation. These latter ones I find the most interesting. There is a universal need in the human brain to explain our environment, and apparently if no natural explanation makes itself known, then we almost always respond by simply making one up and telling it convincingly enough that it is remembered.
I can't say that I'm immune to this. I self-identify as a rationalist, but a friend of mine claims (with probable justification) that I doth protest too much. She once stated that if I had the balls for it, I'd be a mystic, and that in a previous age I'd have been a monk. That rather curious claim notwithstanding, I have to admit that I have been in places which strongly affected me, which (had I the balls to be a mystic) I might consider sacred. One of them is Ahlstrom's Prairie, a highly peculiar place in Washington State that I used to pass through while hiking to the ocean on the Olympic Peninsula. There's a boardwalk trail on the hike to the mouth of the Ozette River, and most of the way you are in dense Douglas fir forest, dripping and silent, with nothing but the clunk of your hiking boots on the wood planks to break the quiet. Then, without warning, you are in an open meadow, a strip of land with not a tree, perhaps a quarter of a mile across and maybe two miles wide (although I never explored it well enough to know for sure). It is an odd enough spot that I wouldn't be surprised if the Quiliute and Makah Natives who lived in the area considered it sacred. For my part, I thought it was a little creepy, and was always glad to cross it and get back under the cover of the dark trees.
Another spot in Washington, not nearly so remote, is the Mima Mounds. Near Littlerock, Washington, and right off of Interstate 5, is a wide prairie dotted with relatively circular grass-covered mounds, the largest of them about thirty feet across and maybe eight feet high. Originally thought to be Native burial sites, they are now thought to be the result of some unknown geologic process, possibly glacial. All I know is that they're spooky and mysterious. I can easily see why someone might consider this a holy place.
Lastly, I would be remiss in not mentioning a place I visited on a hiking trip in the north of England. I have always been interested in medieval history, and I made a point of visiting a number of abbey ruins, monasteries which were abandoned when Henry VIII decided that Catholicism wasn't his cup of tea, but Anne Boleyn was. Most of them were of solely intellectual interest, but one of them -- Rievaulx Abbey -- strikes me as one of those places which did not become sacred because it was the site of a monastery, but became the site of a monastery because it was sacred. It sits in a little, cup-shaped valley, with a narrow river running through it, and as I sat on a rock under the branches of an oak tree, dangling my bare feet in the cold stream water, I could almost become convinced that there was something to the idea of a place being holy.
Almost. And so I don't have my Skeptic's License revoked, allow me to state for the record that I realize that in all of the above cases, it was just the oddity, remoteness, and beauty of the site acting on my emotions and my imagination. I don't really believe that there's anything peculiar about any of these places, above and beyond the purely natural and aesthetic.
Be that as it may, there is a part of me that wishes it were true. It's not scientific, it's not rational - but it would be awfully cool.
Friday, February 10, 2012
Baby supervillains, faces in the clouds, and a non-mammoth
Today here at Worldwide Wacko Watch we're keeping our eyes on three stories that are showing great promise. We're not quite sure what they're promising, but we're keeping our eyes on them nonetheless, rather in the way you'd watch someone whose behavior is erratic and potentially threatening.
First, we have the strange case of the woman whose sonogram indicated that she is soon to give birth to Venom, one of the villains from Spiderman.
Perhaps even more unortunately, however, her husband is the Redditor who goes by the name of OzLebowski, so the first thing he did was to post it on the internet. Here we have a side-by-side comparison of the Bundle o' Joy, and the evil, brain-eating supervillain:
Myself, I suspect that when his wife finds out about this, OzLebowski may have more to worry about than the upcoming birth of a fanged alien. But that's just judging by how my wife would have reacted had it been me who posted the side-by-side pics.
Speaking of wacky examples of pareidolia, we next have the case of Brisbane (New South Wales, Australia) resident Gerry Wells appearing in the clouds to bid a fond farewell to his family. Fortunately for all concerned, a photographer was able to snap a photograph of Mr. Wells' parting shot.
Mr. Wells died of a heart attack on January 24, and I have to admit that the cloud photograph does resemble him a bit. Let's take a look:
The only problem is, the cloud photograph was taken on January 9, fifteen days before Mr. Wells' death. But Mr. Wells' sister, Marion Dawson, is undaunted. Her brother, she says, was flying home to Brisbane from Sydney when the photograph was taken, and therefore it can't have been a coincidence. "Someone greater than us knew what was about to happen," she said. She also said that when she saw the photograph of the clouds, which was published in a local newspaper, she got "goosebumps."
The family used the photo in leaflets handed out at the funeral.
Well, I have to admit that some cases of pareidolia can be pretty freaky, and this one certainly would have given me the shivers, had I been one of Mr. Wells' friends or relatives. Be that as it may, I don't think we have any before-the-event appearance of Mr. Wells' ghost in the clouds -- it's a chance resemblance, however much it might appeal to think otherwise.
Which is more than we can probably say for our last story, which is the alleged appearance of a woolly mammoth in Siberia.
If you haven't already seen this video, you can go here to take a look.
At first, I have to say that I was intrigued. There's nothing scientifically impossible about a large mammal going undetected in the vast, trackless birch and spruce forests of southern Siberia; and there have been other claims of sightings of mammoths before. The video, which was allegedly taken by a Russian engineer surveying for a road, is undeniably blurry, but it was supposedly shot "from a long way away." Some viewers noted the possibility that the animal was simply a bear carrying a large fish, but there's something about its outline that strikes me as unbearlike.
So anyway, I was at least prepared to admit it into evidence. Until, that is, I began to look into who had publicized it. Turns out the video was brought to light by one Michael Cohen. You might not recognize his name, but he's the one who was behind the photograph of the alien in the Brazilian rainforest taking a piss behind a tree (you can see my post about the claim, and the photograph of the pissing alien, here).
He also bills his website as the "world's only intergalactic news network."
So to say that his credibility is nil is putting it mildly, and I'm officially retracting my support from the woolly mammoth hypothesis. It's kind of a shame, really, because it'd be pretty cool to have those guys back. As long as they didn't take to stomping around in my vegetable garden.
So anyway, that's it for today -- a woman pregnant with an alien supervillain, a face in the clouds, and what is probably not a woolly mammoth. More news from the world of the weird, just to prove to you that there's still work to do out there in the critical thinking department. Here at Worldwide Wacko Watch, we're doing our best to ferret out the stories, so you can comfort yourself in the knowledge that no matter how odd people you know, there are some folks out there who are odder still.
First, we have the strange case of the woman whose sonogram indicated that she is soon to give birth to Venom, one of the villains from Spiderman.
Perhaps even more unortunately, however, her husband is the Redditor who goes by the name of OzLebowski, so the first thing he did was to post it on the internet. Here we have a side-by-side comparison of the Bundle o' Joy, and the evil, brain-eating supervillain:
Myself, I suspect that when his wife finds out about this, OzLebowski may have more to worry about than the upcoming birth of a fanged alien. But that's just judging by how my wife would have reacted had it been me who posted the side-by-side pics.
Speaking of wacky examples of pareidolia, we next have the case of Brisbane (New South Wales, Australia) resident Gerry Wells appearing in the clouds to bid a fond farewell to his family. Fortunately for all concerned, a photographer was able to snap a photograph of Mr. Wells' parting shot.
Mr. Wells died of a heart attack on January 24, and I have to admit that the cloud photograph does resemble him a bit. Let's take a look:
The only problem is, the cloud photograph was taken on January 9, fifteen days before Mr. Wells' death. But Mr. Wells' sister, Marion Dawson, is undaunted. Her brother, she says, was flying home to Brisbane from Sydney when the photograph was taken, and therefore it can't have been a coincidence. "Someone greater than us knew what was about to happen," she said. She also said that when she saw the photograph of the clouds, which was published in a local newspaper, she got "goosebumps."
The family used the photo in leaflets handed out at the funeral.
Well, I have to admit that some cases of pareidolia can be pretty freaky, and this one certainly would have given me the shivers, had I been one of Mr. Wells' friends or relatives. Be that as it may, I don't think we have any before-the-event appearance of Mr. Wells' ghost in the clouds -- it's a chance resemblance, however much it might appeal to think otherwise.
Which is more than we can probably say for our last story, which is the alleged appearance of a woolly mammoth in Siberia.
If you haven't already seen this video, you can go here to take a look.
At first, I have to say that I was intrigued. There's nothing scientifically impossible about a large mammal going undetected in the vast, trackless birch and spruce forests of southern Siberia; and there have been other claims of sightings of mammoths before. The video, which was allegedly taken by a Russian engineer surveying for a road, is undeniably blurry, but it was supposedly shot "from a long way away." Some viewers noted the possibility that the animal was simply a bear carrying a large fish, but there's something about its outline that strikes me as unbearlike.
So anyway, I was at least prepared to admit it into evidence. Until, that is, I began to look into who had publicized it. Turns out the video was brought to light by one Michael Cohen. You might not recognize his name, but he's the one who was behind the photograph of the alien in the Brazilian rainforest taking a piss behind a tree (you can see my post about the claim, and the photograph of the pissing alien, here).
He also bills his website as the "world's only intergalactic news network."
So to say that his credibility is nil is putting it mildly, and I'm officially retracting my support from the woolly mammoth hypothesis. It's kind of a shame, really, because it'd be pretty cool to have those guys back. As long as they didn't take to stomping around in my vegetable garden.
So anyway, that's it for today -- a woman pregnant with an alien supervillain, a face in the clouds, and what is probably not a woolly mammoth. More news from the world of the weird, just to prove to you that there's still work to do out there in the critical thinking department. Here at Worldwide Wacko Watch, we're doing our best to ferret out the stories, so you can comfort yourself in the knowledge that no matter how odd people you know, there are some folks out there who are odder still.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Grass, gulls, mosquitoes, and mice
A couple of days ago, I got a rather nice email from a creationist. Not, I got the feeling, a young-earth creationist, but someone who believes that a deity directed the creation of the Earth (whenever that happened), and that species can't change because they're the work of divine hands.
"I just can't believe in evolution," the writer said. "It's impossible that species can change. They go extinct sometimes, like the dinosaurs, but how could one thing change into another, like apes into humans? It makes no sense."
Again, this was light years from the snide, spittle-flecked screeds that I've sometimes received regarding this subject; I very much had the impression that the writer was simply curious as to why I find the idea of evolution persuasive. And as such, it deserves an answer.
I'm going to approach the idea of supporting evolution a little differently than most folks do. It seems like the majority of evolutionary biologists, when confronted with questions about the plausibility of the evolutionary model, usually discuss the tried-and-true body of evidence (genetic homology between related species, homologous structures, vestigial organs, the fossil record, and so on). These are well known, and in my opinion either you buy them or you don't. Those folks who don't also usually fall back on a few tried-and-true arguments against them (vestigial organs actually have a use which we just don't happen to know, the fossil record lacks transitional forms, radiometric dating is inaccurate, and so on).
More to the point, one of the usual anti-evolutionist arguments often centers around the question, "if evolution happens, why don't we see new species?" and the ordinary answer is, "because evolution occurs so slowly."
Well, sometimes. Maybe usually. But my contention is that rapid, observable evolution has happened many times, and if you don't buy the evolutionary model, there are a few real-world situations that really allow no other explanation.
So, to quote my dad, let's run them up the flagpole and see who salutes.
First, though, a definition. My understanding of creationism is that, at its basis, it states that new species cannot form. Species can become extinct, but god created the species that are here, and that's what we're stuck with. (If this statement is erroneous, I'd appreciate a correction.) So as an evolutionist, I have a twofold job; to define species (so that we all know what we're talking about), and to show that there have, in fact, been new species evolved on the Earth. If I can accomplish those two things, then I think I'll have made a pretty potent case that evolution happens.
The first task is relatively easy. While there is an increasing push to define the term "species" genetically, at present most of us (evolutionist and creationist alike) define "species" as meaning "a population of morphologically distinct individuals, all of whom are potentially capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring." By this definition, horses and donkeys aren't the same species because although they can mate and produce offspring, the offspring (a mule) is not usually fertile. All breeds of dog are theoretically a single species, because although there are morphologically distinct sub-populations (breeds), they are all more or less mutually interfertile, even though a mating between a male chihuahua and a female St. Bernard raises a mental image which is simultaneously a little disturbing and strangely hilarious.
Okay, now for the next part. Have there been any new species that have formed recently? If you buy the definition of species from the last paragraph, the answer is undeniably "yes." I know of three off the top of my head, which I'll describe below. The first two are simple, the third more complicated (but well worth the effort to try to understand, because it's way cool). And last, I'll describe a population phenomenon that I don't think is explainable unless you do accept evolution, although it's hard to classify exactly where it falls apropos of the definition of "species."
Number 1: The Faeroe Island House Mouse
About 250 years ago, mice were accidentally introduced onto the Faeroe Islands, an isolated island chain (way) north of Scotland. In the intervening years, the mice were isolated from their mainland kin, and the harsh climate was a powerful selection mechanism. Recent studies have shown that the Faeroe Island House Mouse is now no longer even potentially interfertile with mainland House Mice -- matings in the lab have resulted in no offspring or sterile ones, and the Faeroe Island mice are discernibly smaller and lighter in color than the mainland species. If you accept the definition of "species," the Faeroe Island House Mouse is a new species -- morphologically distinct, and unable to interbreed with other populations -- and it's arisen in only 250 years.
Number 2: The London Underground Mosquito
When the London Underground (subway) was built about a hundred years ago, a population of mosquitoes of the species Culex pipiens was trapped in the tunnels. Being that subways are warm and moist, the mosquitoes flourished. Culex pipiens, which mostly preys on birds, is reluctant to bite humans and will only do so if there is no other food available; in the 100 years since the isolating event took place, natural selection has favored the individuals underground who are more attracted to mammals (mostly rats and humans), and the result has been a rapid speciation event producing the aptly-named Culex molestus. C. pipiens and C. molestus will not interbreed -- in fact, in the lab they won't even mate. Genetic studies have shown that their genetic makeup has diverged rapidly (due to the heavy selection underground and the fact that mosquitoes breed quickly) -- so by any conventional definition of the word "species," they are different species.
Number 3: Cordgrass
This one is fascinating. Cordgrass (Spartina) is a genus of marine grass, with a number of morphologically distinct species. In England, Spartina maritima was the most common species, until the 19th century, when the American species S. alterniflora was accidentally introduced. The two occasionally hybridize, producing an infertile (although vigorous) hybrid, S. x townsendii.
Okay, so far, nothing amazing; it's just the botanical version of the horse and the mule. Normally these interspecies hybrids are infertile because they lack paired chromosomes, and during meiosis (sex cell formation) the process goes awry because it is impossible to evenly divide the genetic material without this pairing. But apparently at least once (possibly more), an individual of S. x townsendii underwent an odd transformation; in one of its flowers, the chromosomes spontaneously doubled. This phenomenon, called allopolyploidy, is rare in the wild but rather easy to induce in the lab (it's how the huge tetraploid and triploid daylilies you often see in gardens are created, for example). What this did was instantaneously produce an offspring with paired chromosomes, and a different number of chromosomes from either parent. It is completely fertile with others like it; is not back-fertile with either parent species; and is morphologically distinct. It's been accorded species status (as S. anglica), and for good reason, because if this is not a new species, I don't know what is. Furthermore, it's an amazing competitor, and is in many locations outcompeting both its exotic and its native parent.
And one more, just for lagniappe, as my mom used to say (lagniappe is Cajun French for "a little something extra"). If none of these convince you, then look into the concept of a ring species. A ring species is a set of morphologically distinct populations, which encircle a geographical barrier of some kind. Each sub-population can interbreed with the ones adjacent to it, except at one point in the ring. This has been observed at least three, possibly more times -- in Himalayan Greenish Warblers, in a group of salamanders (genus Ensatina) in California, and in a group of gull species (in this one, the ring goes all the way around the world!).
Let's just make it clear how weird this is; picture a group of populations (call them A through G) which go around some sort of geographical barrier (the Himalayas, the Sierra Nevadas, and the Arctic Ocean, respectively). A can breed with B, B with C, C with D, and so on. And you ring your way around the barrier, and find that A and G are right next to each other -- overlap, even -- but A and G can't interbreed!
So which are they -- one species, or many? If you say "one," then why can't A and G interbreed? Breaks the definition. If you say "several," where do you draw the line(s)? No matter where you draw the line(s), you will separate populations that can interbreed, and produce fertile offspring (and therefore should be part of the same species). So, once again: what is this? And if "species" are all divinely created, immutable little populations which don't change, how on earth did this come about?
Myself, I find it impossible to explain any of these without recourse to the evolutionary model. If anyone has a plausible alternative explanation, I'd love to hear it. Encouragement of all viewpoints, as always, is the watchword hereabouts.
"I just can't believe in evolution," the writer said. "It's impossible that species can change. They go extinct sometimes, like the dinosaurs, but how could one thing change into another, like apes into humans? It makes no sense."
Again, this was light years from the snide, spittle-flecked screeds that I've sometimes received regarding this subject; I very much had the impression that the writer was simply curious as to why I find the idea of evolution persuasive. And as such, it deserves an answer.
I'm going to approach the idea of supporting evolution a little differently than most folks do. It seems like the majority of evolutionary biologists, when confronted with questions about the plausibility of the evolutionary model, usually discuss the tried-and-true body of evidence (genetic homology between related species, homologous structures, vestigial organs, the fossil record, and so on). These are well known, and in my opinion either you buy them or you don't. Those folks who don't also usually fall back on a few tried-and-true arguments against them (vestigial organs actually have a use which we just don't happen to know, the fossil record lacks transitional forms, radiometric dating is inaccurate, and so on).
More to the point, one of the usual anti-evolutionist arguments often centers around the question, "if evolution happens, why don't we see new species?" and the ordinary answer is, "because evolution occurs so slowly."
Well, sometimes. Maybe usually. But my contention is that rapid, observable evolution has happened many times, and if you don't buy the evolutionary model, there are a few real-world situations that really allow no other explanation.
So, to quote my dad, let's run them up the flagpole and see who salutes.
First, though, a definition. My understanding of creationism is that, at its basis, it states that new species cannot form. Species can become extinct, but god created the species that are here, and that's what we're stuck with. (If this statement is erroneous, I'd appreciate a correction.) So as an evolutionist, I have a twofold job; to define species (so that we all know what we're talking about), and to show that there have, in fact, been new species evolved on the Earth. If I can accomplish those two things, then I think I'll have made a pretty potent case that evolution happens.
The first task is relatively easy. While there is an increasing push to define the term "species" genetically, at present most of us (evolutionist and creationist alike) define "species" as meaning "a population of morphologically distinct individuals, all of whom are potentially capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring." By this definition, horses and donkeys aren't the same species because although they can mate and produce offspring, the offspring (a mule) is not usually fertile. All breeds of dog are theoretically a single species, because although there are morphologically distinct sub-populations (breeds), they are all more or less mutually interfertile, even though a mating between a male chihuahua and a female St. Bernard raises a mental image which is simultaneously a little disturbing and strangely hilarious.
Okay, now for the next part. Have there been any new species that have formed recently? If you buy the definition of species from the last paragraph, the answer is undeniably "yes." I know of three off the top of my head, which I'll describe below. The first two are simple, the third more complicated (but well worth the effort to try to understand, because it's way cool). And last, I'll describe a population phenomenon that I don't think is explainable unless you do accept evolution, although it's hard to classify exactly where it falls apropos of the definition of "species."
Number 1: The Faeroe Island House Mouse
About 250 years ago, mice were accidentally introduced onto the Faeroe Islands, an isolated island chain (way) north of Scotland. In the intervening years, the mice were isolated from their mainland kin, and the harsh climate was a powerful selection mechanism. Recent studies have shown that the Faeroe Island House Mouse is now no longer even potentially interfertile with mainland House Mice -- matings in the lab have resulted in no offspring or sterile ones, and the Faeroe Island mice are discernibly smaller and lighter in color than the mainland species. If you accept the definition of "species," the Faeroe Island House Mouse is a new species -- morphologically distinct, and unable to interbreed with other populations -- and it's arisen in only 250 years.
Number 2: The London Underground Mosquito
When the London Underground (subway) was built about a hundred years ago, a population of mosquitoes of the species Culex pipiens was trapped in the tunnels. Being that subways are warm and moist, the mosquitoes flourished. Culex pipiens, which mostly preys on birds, is reluctant to bite humans and will only do so if there is no other food available; in the 100 years since the isolating event took place, natural selection has favored the individuals underground who are more attracted to mammals (mostly rats and humans), and the result has been a rapid speciation event producing the aptly-named Culex molestus. C. pipiens and C. molestus will not interbreed -- in fact, in the lab they won't even mate. Genetic studies have shown that their genetic makeup has diverged rapidly (due to the heavy selection underground and the fact that mosquitoes breed quickly) -- so by any conventional definition of the word "species," they are different species.
Number 3: Cordgrass
This one is fascinating. Cordgrass (Spartina) is a genus of marine grass, with a number of morphologically distinct species. In England, Spartina maritima was the most common species, until the 19th century, when the American species S. alterniflora was accidentally introduced. The two occasionally hybridize, producing an infertile (although vigorous) hybrid, S. x townsendii.
Okay, so far, nothing amazing; it's just the botanical version of the horse and the mule. Normally these interspecies hybrids are infertile because they lack paired chromosomes, and during meiosis (sex cell formation) the process goes awry because it is impossible to evenly divide the genetic material without this pairing. But apparently at least once (possibly more), an individual of S. x townsendii underwent an odd transformation; in one of its flowers, the chromosomes spontaneously doubled. This phenomenon, called allopolyploidy, is rare in the wild but rather easy to induce in the lab (it's how the huge tetraploid and triploid daylilies you often see in gardens are created, for example). What this did was instantaneously produce an offspring with paired chromosomes, and a different number of chromosomes from either parent. It is completely fertile with others like it; is not back-fertile with either parent species; and is morphologically distinct. It's been accorded species status (as S. anglica), and for good reason, because if this is not a new species, I don't know what is. Furthermore, it's an amazing competitor, and is in many locations outcompeting both its exotic and its native parent.
And one more, just for lagniappe, as my mom used to say (lagniappe is Cajun French for "a little something extra"). If none of these convince you, then look into the concept of a ring species. A ring species is a set of morphologically distinct populations, which encircle a geographical barrier of some kind. Each sub-population can interbreed with the ones adjacent to it, except at one point in the ring. This has been observed at least three, possibly more times -- in Himalayan Greenish Warblers, in a group of salamanders (genus Ensatina) in California, and in a group of gull species (in this one, the ring goes all the way around the world!).
Let's just make it clear how weird this is; picture a group of populations (call them A through G) which go around some sort of geographical barrier (the Himalayas, the Sierra Nevadas, and the Arctic Ocean, respectively). A can breed with B, B with C, C with D, and so on. And you ring your way around the barrier, and find that A and G are right next to each other -- overlap, even -- but A and G can't interbreed!
So which are they -- one species, or many? If you say "one," then why can't A and G interbreed? Breaks the definition. If you say "several," where do you draw the line(s)? No matter where you draw the line(s), you will separate populations that can interbreed, and produce fertile offspring (and therefore should be part of the same species). So, once again: what is this? And if "species" are all divinely created, immutable little populations which don't change, how on earth did this come about?
Myself, I find it impossible to explain any of these without recourse to the evolutionary model. If anyone has a plausible alternative explanation, I'd love to hear it. Encouragement of all viewpoints, as always, is the watchword hereabouts.
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