Darwin Day

Alaska Pre-History from a Darwinian Standpoint.
Start Date and Time: 2008-02-12 19:00
Event Website: http://www.auofak.org

Activities:
The event will be held at the Alaska Museum of Natural History with Museum Director Katch Bacheller presenting information on geological and evolutionary changes occurring in the Great Land. Se will guide a free museun tour for early arrivals. Introductions ny Museum Board member Gordon Harper

Address:
201 N Bragaw Street,
Anchorage, AK UNITED STATES
Sponsor: Americans United of Alaskla
Contact: Al Sundquist, stellar_at_yahoo.com, 907-562-7522

Jacksonville: Tracing Our Ancestors the DNA Way--An Anthropological Adventure
Start Date and Time: 2008-02-06 11:00

Activities:
Dr. Connie J. Mulligan, an internationally-recognized anthropologist and geneticist from the University of Florida, will speak on using molecular technology to trace our human origins in the Americas and Africa.

Address:
Florida Community College at Jacksonville-North Campus, 4501 Capper RD
Jacksonville, FL UNITED STATES
Sponsor: Natural Sciences and Student Engagement
Contact: Paula Thompson, PhD, pthompso@fccj.edu, 904-766-6530

Darwin's Bulldog's presents: Darwin Day #199
Start Date and Time: 2008-02-12 19:00
Event Website: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/darwins_bulldogs/

Activities:
Sponsored by the Darwin's Bulldogs, this free-to-the-public event is a video followed by panel discussion. It is a BYOB event and you are invited to bring your favorite beverage and enjoy it responsibly.

A video by the BBC titled, “A War On Science”, examines the attack on classroom pedagogical standards by religiously motivated adherents of Intelligent Design. The 49-minute programme (after all...it is a BBC production) begins with comments from Richard Dawkins, David Attenborough and Ken Miller and proceeds to examine the tactics used by ID proponents to try and influence the high school science curricula in Dover, PA.

This event culminated in the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial and landed a devastating blow to the ID movement. But what is next? As stated in the BBC’s concluding remarks about this documentary: “Evolution supporters heralded this victory as the damning blow to the intelligent design movement. However, as history shows, law suits have little effect on the support for creationism in a country where over 50% of citizens believe that God created humans in their present form, the way the bible describes it.”

You may read more at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/war.shtml

Darwin Day and Evolution Teach In
Event Website: http://www.museum.upenn.edu/new/events/calitem.php?which=1457

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA MUSEUM OFFERS
SECOND ANNUAL FREE DARWIN DAY AND EVOLUTION TEACH IN
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1:00 TO 4:00 P.M.
• • • •

PHILADELPHIA, PA—Sunday, February 10, 2008, 1:00 to 4:00 p.m., the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology offers it’s second annual Darwin Day and Evolution Teach In, a free event held in honor of the 199th birthday of Charles Robert Darwin, the world-renowned author of On the Origin of Species—and the originator of the modern theory of evolution.

The free day features short “teach in” talks in galleries by renowned experts, a “sneak” video preview of Penn Museum’s upcoming exhibition, “Surviving, The Body of Evidence,” and a physical anthropologist’s corner with plaster casts of hominid skulls and other bones. WHYY TV co-sponsors two showings of a recent NOVA documentary, and the Academy of Natural Sciences joins in with show and tell of memorabilia related to Darwin’s membership at that esteemed institution. An ongoing children’s workshop, a scavenger hunt, free birthday cake and the opportunity to play some badminton, reputedly a favorite game of Darwin’s, are also part of the afternoon. Darwin himself (or a reasonable likeness) promises to make an appearance to enjoy the festivities, delivering short, impromptu readings of excerpts from his many writings.

February 12th is Darwin Day, celebrating the birthday of the man who did more for our understanding of biology than practically any other person. My birthday is Feb. 12th as well, and I am pretty happy to share a birthday with Lincoln and Darwin. In fact, Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were born on the exact same day in 1809...though I was born much later. What some may not know is that the Darwin family were firm abolitionists, opposing the British slave trade. From the above link:

For those of us celebrating science and humanity it is of interest to note that Darwin, as well as both his paternal and maternal grandparents, Erasmus and Mary Darwin, and Josiah and Sarah Wedgwood, were also opposed to slavery that was so prevalent in the British West Indies at that time. In fact, Josiah Wedgwood designed and manufactured an antislavery medallion that was used in the campaigns against slavery in both England and America (see below). Benjamin Franklin, who was acquainted with both Erasmus Darwin and Josiah Wedgwood through his 'corresponding membership' in the Lunar Society, was given a medallion while he was in England, and when he returned to Philadelphia received a shipment of these medallions for use in the American antislavery movement.

E'en now in Afric's groves with hideous yell
Fierce Slavery stalks, and slips the dogs of hell;