''The Panda's Thumb'' is a
blog
A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order s ...
on issues of
creationism and
evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
from a
mainstream scientific perspective. In 2006, ''
Nature
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...
'' listed it as one of the top five science blogs, and
Mark Pallen has called it "the definitive blog on the evolution versus creationism debate".
It is written by multiple contributors, including
Wesley R. Elsberry,
Joe Felsenstein,
Paul R. Gross,
Nick Matzke
Nicholas J. Matzke is the former Public Information Project Director at the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) and served an instrumental role in NCSE's preparation for the 2005 ''Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District'' trial. One of h ...
, and
Mark Perakh, many of whom used to have complementary blogs at
ScienceBlogs
ScienceBlogs is an invitation-only blog network and virtual community that operated initially for almost 12 years, from 2006 to 2017. It was created by Seed Media Group to enhance public understanding of science. Each blog had its own theme, spec ...
before it went defunct. The blog takes its name from The Panda's Thumb, the pub of the virtual
University of Ediacara
talk.origins (often capitalised to Talk.Origins or abbreviated as t.o.) is a moderated Usenet discussion forum concerning the origins of life, and evolution. It remains a major venue for debate in the creation–evolution controversy, and its o ...
, which is named after the
book of the same name by
Stephen Jay Gould, which in turn takes its title from the essay "The Panda's Peculiar Thumb",
[Gould, S. J. (1978)]
"The panda's peculiar thumb."
''Natural History'' 87 (Nov.): 20–30. which discusses the Panda's
sesamoid bone, an example of
convergent evolution
Convergent evolution is the independent evolution of similar features in species of different periods or epochs in time. Convergent evolution creates analogous structures that have similar form or function but were not present in the last com ...
.
See also
*
Rejection of evolution by religious groups
Recurring cultural, political, and theological rejection of evolution by religious groups (sometimes termed the creation–evolution controversy, the creation vs. evolution debate or the origins debate) exists regarding the origins of the Eart ...
References
External links
*
Status page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Panda's Thumb
Science blogs
Evolutionary biology literature
Criticism of creationism