Amalgamated Friday the 13th

Creation Museum Opens

I have a confession to make: when it comes to the evolution vs creation debate, it bores me to tears. As far as I can tell, this is not a winnable debate because to quote Stephen Jay Gould, religion and science are non-overlapping magisteria. But it's important news, and thank goodness a lot of people still find it worth discussion. Especially this week, when the Creation Museum, a museum full of fictive dioramas based on the Bible and nothing else, opened in New York.

• Adam and Eve in the Land of the Dinosaurs, Edward Rothstein on the NYT.
• Answers in the New York Times, about the softball review in the NYT from John Hawks
• Inside the Creation Museum, by Gordy Slack in Salon
• Salon Sucks, from PZ Myers, on the Salon review
• Long Live the Creation Museum, from Greg Laden
• In which American superiority manifests itself!, PZ Myers in Pharyngula
• New Creation Museum Mostly Illustrates that Creationists Have Lots of Cash, Christopher Mims on Scientific American
• Meet the Flintstones: Bloggers on the new Creation Museum, essentially a blog roundup (like this one!) on Slate last week.

Around About.com

• Get involved in the world of microcredit, Matt Rosenberg, Geography
• Periods of Ancient China, N.S. Gill, Ancient History
• English agriculture, Melissa Snell, Medieval History
• The Ruthwell Cross, Melissa Snell, Medieval History
• A Virtual Tour of Evora, Portugal, a photo gallery of the Medieval and later architectural elements of this European town, from James Martin, Europe for Travelers on About.com.

Videos

• 500 Years of Female Portraiture on Youtube via Shelley Esaak on About.com's Art History
• Caral, a 10 minute video on the ancient archaeological site of Caral-Supe, from Peru, in Spanish. Lots of others are linked in the sidebar.
• In Transit, 15 minute video on a famous archaeological 'dig' on a van used on the Ironbridge project, from Greg Bailey on TAC (their 100th!). An interesting introduction to archaeological methods.

Archaeology

• A report on Shields Pueblo called Archaeology and Intelligent Design: The Lesson of the Awl, from Afarensis
• European Man Found in Ancient Chinese Tomb, Study Reveals, Tim Jones on remote central
• Martin Rundkvist writes about ethnicity and rock art in Your folks, my folks in prehistory
• According to Christopher O'Brien's column, The Antikythera Mechanism And Intelligent Design: A Response To Egnor, some idiot is using the Antikythera Mechanism to prove (?) ID. Hmmm. What they won't think of next?
• In Pompeii, eat like its AD 79 (until June 26), Libtina reprints an AP story (with recipes)
• Egyptology, Archaeology: What's the Diff?, Anthony on Archaeoblog reports on a debate going on in the Egyptologists' Electronic Forum
• On the European Journal of Archaeology website, Cornelius Holtorf asks Anthropology Matters! - But does Archaeology?
• Proof that at least a knowledge of history matters can be found in this amazed posting by (the normally acute) Cory Doctorow in Boing Boing, Ad from 1934 promises to help you get fatter, in which he fails to point out that 1934 was the height of the Depression and therefore there were not a lot of problems with obesity at the time. (To be completely fair, Doctorow made no comment at all)
• Notes from Central America: Palenque, old books and DNA, from Xeni Jardin on BoingBoing

Critters

• Who killed the Honeybees?, a roundtable in Salon, brought to our attention by blivet

Open Access

• AAA Open Access FUD, Kerim Friedman on Open Acctss Anthropology
• Internet Archaeology converting to oA, Peter Suber on a news story I missed completely, but what great news it is!

Mix-ellany

• But how will I know when I've run out of ink?", Greg Laden on new 'invisible ink' printers
• When Did Bipedal Locomotion Begin?, Afarensis
• Taking advantage of globalization: a view from Portugal, Vitor Oliveira Jorge on Trans-Ferir

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