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Over the course of the past 200 million years, our planet has experienced four major geological periods (the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous and Cenozoic) and one major ice age (the Pliocene-Quaternary glaciation), all of which had a drastic impact on plant and animal life, as well as effecting the course of species evolution. For decades, geologists have also understood that these changes are due in part to gradual shifts in the Earth’s orbit, which are caused by Venus and Jupiter, and repeat regularly every 405,000 years. But it was not until recently that a team of geologists and Earth scientists...

This week, I looked at some striking parallels between the ratification of the National Firearms Act of 1934 (arguably the first major piece of gun control ever passed in America), and how modern politicians approach pushing new gun control tactics today. The NFA was fraught with ignorant legislative texts, draconian taxes to be levied against regular Americans, and outright bans and restrictions on firearms and accessories that were never discussed when the bill was even written. Proponents of the NFA, including then-Attorney General Homer Cummings, used four key tactics to push the NFA to Federal law: 1. A false sense...

Washington is one of six states with high risk or red flag laws. But in the wake of the Parkland school shooting, the Brady Campaign says at least 30 states are considering them...Even gun rights advocates, who are afraid of government abuse, say it appears to be working...“We’ve seen the downside of people who are distraught or crazy taking out their problems on the general public,” said Dave Workman of the Bellevue, Wash.-based Second Amendment Foundation. “We don’t want that to happen here.”

If Catholics who have divorced and remarried without obtaining an annulment can in some cases be given permission to receive communion, will this do more harm than good? That’s the question at the heart of the controversy over Pope Francis’ post synodal apostolic exhortation, Amoris Laetitia. Other questions are so easily answered that we can skim over them very quickly. For example: 1. Is the text too long? It is long, yes. It used 95 pages coming out of my printer, with 391 footnotes. But it is not out of keeping with other post-synodal apostolic exhortations on complex topics, for...

In our planet's early history, 720 to 640 million years ago, thick sheets of ice covered the majority of the surface, as the Earth was locked in a deep freeze. But explosive underwater volcanoes changed the chemistry of the Earth's oceans and were key to breaking the planet from its icy state, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Southampton believe underwater volcanoes helped to thaw out "Snowball Earth", and even led to runaway chemical chain reactions, which created the conditions for an explosion of life on Earth. While much of the driving forces behind glaciation during...

Pondering “Gradualism” and the “Midterm” Report By: Msgr. Charles PopeThe so-called “midterm” report of the Synod is out. Please remember, it is only a rough draft and the final report may in fact look very different. Frankly, I am not sure why we are even being permitted to look at a rough draft. Nevertheless, presuming the Pope is serious about inviting discussion, let me consider a certain aspect of the report and a few particulars.A governing principle that seems to permeate the report’s reflections is one that some refer to as “gradualism.” As a pastoral strategy, gradualism can be an effective, even necessary approach in...

Not to mince words - the modern synthesis is gone --snip-- "The discovery of pervasive HGT and the overall dynamics of the genetic universe destroys not only the tree of life as we knew it but also another central tenet of the modern synthesis inherited from Darwin, namely gradualism. In a world dominated by HGT, gene duplication, gene loss and such momentous events as endosymbiosis, the idea of evolution being driven primarily by infinitesimal heritable changes in the Darwinian tradition has become untenable." ...

Papers have been flapping with new headlines about the latest in a long line of alleged dinosaur ancestors of birds. This one is claimed to be a sensational dinosaur with feathers on its hind legs, thus four ‘wings’.1 This was named Microraptor gui—the name is derived from words meaning ‘little plunderer of Gu’ after the paleontologist Gu Zhiwei. Like so many of the alleged feathered dinosaurs, it comes from Liaoning province of northeastern China. It was about 3 feet (1 meter) long from its head to the tip of its long tail, but its body was only about the size...