ecoli

can you explain what a scientific object is? I know a lot about science and have come across many objects, but I've never heard science being referred to as an object.

padren said it: "white people" are not a voting bloc, but african americans, for the most part, are. The religion aspect in this campaign is going to get interesting, considering many Evangelicals do not consider Mormonism to be a true Christian religion, while the black Democrat Barack Hussein Obama is a Baptist/protestant. Though of course, politics is not about being internally consistent.

So lanes 5, 6, 7 are the size of the full plasmid.. but something funky is obviously going on with your measurements of the double digests. These gels are fairly low res so its ok if the numbers don't work out perfectly, the the sums of each of the bands in lanes 2-4 seem way off. You might improve accuracy in your standard curve by doing a simple linear regression to get the equation of the best fit line and interpolate from that (can be done easily in MS excel or other spreadsheet software).

You need to be clearer with your language. A lane representing a doubly digested plasmid (with two different restriction enzymes) should have two bands per lane - assuming the plasmid has single restriction sites for both of the REs you used. Now be clear... what are the sizes for each band in each lane, and what restriction enzymes did you use for each lane and how many of what kind of restriction sites does your plasmid have?

The only reason to convert to the log base pair is so the graph of migration vs fragment size is linear. After finding the log fragment size of the bands from your standard, convert those numbers into the fragment size on only work with those numbers. Working with these real numbers, the sum of the double digest should equal the band from the single digest, allowing some error for accuracy/gel resolution.

Do you actually need vizualization of cells? If you're having problems visualizing GFP, than FISH wouldn't be much of an improvement. However, you could do Flow/ FACS / cell sorting with an anti-GFP antibody (no visualization or microscopy necessary) and you get quantitative composition of a mixed cell population.

Yes, they should... the size doesn't change. But keep in mind for a single digest you're cutting a circular plasmid once (assuming the plasmid only has 1 restriction site), to get a 'linear' piece of DNA, so the band running after a single digest will be the size of the whole plasmid.

No, the log transform is just so it fits the linear model. Remember, the inverse of log is the exponential - log10; 10^x.

Added note: for multicellular life, fitness/reproduction is no longer dependent on how fast you can replicate the genome, so duplication events (for example) are not selected against.

Ah.. thought this might be your problem. A standard curve must be made with your standard to calculate the mol weights of your test fragments. The question says as much: "Construct a standard curve (graph) of migration distance versus log molecular weight (in base pairs - bp) for the molecular weight standard bands" [emphasis mine]. You make the curve with the fragments from you ladder (lane 1) and interpolate the weights of the bands in lanes 2-7

So you're saying the problem is that the migration distance of your test bands are farther than your ladder fragments? If so, you need to use a different ladder. You can't extrapolate band migration, since migration is nonlinear. edit: actually could you put the picture of the gel up? I have a feeling you're not graphing the ladder fragments.

You already have the data to do this. Just graph the log of molecular weight vs migration distance and interpolate the point in question. If you digest the whole plasmid into fragments, the whole will simply be the sum of its parts. This is given by the fragment sizes.

This is your strongest point, IMO. But I don't think a minute of silence is all that disruptive of life. Remembrance and tribute is not the same thing as the "terrorist winning" the attention game. Or are yearly 9/11 memorials also a waste of time? Keep in mind, of course, that one of those terrorists is still alive today. Probably in hiding in Libya, but accepted by his gov't (& people ?) as a hero, and not a murderer. And, the most important point: If the IOC decides not to have this moment of silence to keep from agitating those nations which are hostile to Israel... then haven't the terrorist "won"? Those dead should be honored. We should fund research into aging-related diseases (which is the world's worst killer!). But honoring 11 dead people does not decrease the importance of those other dead. Especially considering that 1) these murders happened during the olympic games 2) 11 people was a significant chunk of the Israeli team and of olympic athletes in general. The Olympics are a symbol of peace and cooperation... which was shown to be an utter farce in 1972 due to the failures of the olympic committee and Germany host. Remembering the past doesn't preclude getting on with life, but forgetting the past does leave you prone to repeating it. A rather poor strategy, wouldn't you say? But people do remember... especially events that are within living memory (its not like we have big public displays of Pearl Harbor memorials every year anymore). And don't forget, ignoring what, for some, represents a highly emotional moment does contribute to anger - due to feelings of marginalization, politicization of their grief. Just look how pissed people are getting about this perceived snub. If they were given their moment, that emotion is expressed and no other ill-will need arise.

Ok, good to know where you stand. Do they? I think I remember something from the Old testament about people being made in God's image: AKA they have the power of choice (incompatible with predestination). We can measure all of the classical forces, yet cannot predict dice rolls with any accuracy. So either 1) there is true randomness built into physical systems (and beyond the classical level) that we cannot ever predict with certainty or 2) physics is deterministic, but just too complex to model in any detail that would result in high accuracy. http://www.random.org/analysis/ Either way, I don't see much room for purpose in outcome.

Strong words rigney, but even some small gesture would go a long way, I believe.

I said heterodox ideas. As in, non-mainstream. That has not been proven. But please don't follow up as its off topic (start a new thread). So if I roll a 1 on a 100 sided die, is that also divine intervention?

Given how much personal time and expense people devote to their religions, maybe they should expect more from their God(s).

being an atheist is not the same as not having an ideology. Penrose holds quite a few heterodox ideas, regarding human intelligence, etc. How do you equate a low probability event with directed purpose?

! Moderator Note Alan, you are now verging dangerously close on Ad hom territory. Please watch your tone and restrict your replies to address the points that Moontanman actually raised.

It's more than that... lets way you have a billion sided die, roll 21,566 and we all exist, roll anything else and we don't. How likely is it that we observe that roll? It is impossible that we DON'T observe that roll. Not because we're fated to exist, but that we wouldn't observe anything if that's not how the die roll went.

Be careful with the word 'parasite'. Not all viruses are detrimental to their cellular hosts. There's some energetic costs to replicating DNA that has viral DNA inserted into it, but this is not necessarily actively pathogenic. Interestingly the global virus burden is estimated to be ~ 10^30

yes they can. It has nucleic acids that can mutate and those changes can be selected for (or against) resulting in different forms.

The OP premise relies on a logical fallacy that completely overlooks observation effects. Lets rephrase using the same probability assumptions: If there existed [math]10^{40000}[/math] universes, and each universe had a [math]10^{-40000}[/math] probability of evolving life, what is the probability that we'd observe our universe containing life? The answer, of course, is near 1, or almost certain. Since we are life forms making this observation, we can't observe a universe that doesn't contain life.

Its interesting how the second amendment issue is one of pure semantics. Some say that the right to bear arms is only protected in the context of a militia. OF course, this view has been overruled by the supreme court in the DC handgun ban overturning.

Its not about what seems reasonable, its about what is constitutionally permissible. You want to change the constitution to restrict gun rights? Pass a new amendment. That would be perfectly reasonable.