PRIMARY CLUE TO MATTER — The shortest lifetime of an elementary particle — only a quarter of a millionth of a billionth of a second — gives a primary clue to the structure of matter.... [S]cientists have known for about ten years of the neutral pi-meson and have been trying to pin down its lifetime. The new measurement gives theoretical physicists a new universal constant and now they must figure out why it exists or relate it to another constant. When the neutral pi-meson breaks up or decays, two photons of light are produced. These high energy photons, or gamma rays, are purely electromagnetic in character. Thus the new measurement links mesons and the electromagnetic field for the first time.

Read more...

Designing for chance The science in “Life from scratch” (SN: 7/3/10, p. 22) is extremely interesting, and I look forward to hearing further results. However, a few comments in the article play into a common Intelligent Design error. The stated aim is “to show how unguided natural events might have led to life...”; the reference to “higgledy-piggledy chance” is in a similar vein. Both the atheistic attempts to infer lack of design from science and the Design advocate’s attempts to claim holes in scientific explanation are based on the erroneous assumption that natural causes equal lack of guidance. By this reasoning, if the experiment is successful, we should infer that Szostak’s team does not exist. In reality, the experiment is very carefully designed and adjusted, even though it relies on natural processes. Science tells us about natural processes. It cann...

Read more...

September 11 Air and Space Museum’s     September Star Party near Paris, Va. See www.nasm.si.edu/events/skywatching/ September 15 – 17 Researchers and policy makers meet in Austin, Texas, to discuss aging in the Americas. Go to www.utexas.edu/lbj/caa/2010 October 4 – 8 World virologists meet in Italy about HIV/AIDS and cancer. See www.ihv.org

Read more...