Then when you find a science topic you are interested in, read a lot of books about it so that you can be comfortable enough with the topic to think critically about new discoveries and claims and to explain it to others.
The blogs I listed tend to recommend more good books than I can keep up with.
Be warned though. Skepticism and science are addictive and fun and tend to piss off the intellectually lazy.
A company called Wildblue offers broadband access over satellite. They have nation-wide coverage in the US. The service is very similar to cable modem service. The only difference is that you get a dish on your roof (similar size to dish tv, etc) instead of a cable connection from the street. It costs a little more than cable modem or DSL service but lots less than some of the solutions I've seen in the comments.
I would like to see more in depth and specific explanations about where the candidates stand on important issues and what they would do to fix some our important problems. Obama and Edwards each have an "issues" page that is easy to find. Clinton doesn't even have that! Unfortunately the issues pages are light on content. Some issues, such as the environment and fighting global warming, and how to deal with Iran without war are not mentioned by any of the Democrats. A brief overview is a great thing, but a web page is a perfect place for these guys to thoroughly explain what they want to do as president.
I haven't reviewed any of the Republican sites yet. Maybe they do a better job of this.
Don't forget that Evolution and other scientific principles are not true or untrue based on a single piece of evidence. It's not all or nothing as many creationists would have you believe. In other words there has long been 'proof' of evolution, human and otherwise. It is the details of specific changes that are sometimes unclear, not whether or not they happened at all and if it is possible for them to have happened.
Phrases like 'missing link' and 'proof of evolution' are misleading because they imply that without the new small piece of information, or if one piece of information turns out to be wrong that we have to throw out the whole theory.
It would be nice if news feeds, AFP in this case, would use more precise language in their headlines instead of perpetuating misconceptions about such politically charged issues. It's depressing that this issue is so politically charged. If more people read Gould,Dawkins,etc maybe it wouldn't be.
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To get started learning about skepticism read blogs and listen to podcasts such as these:
http://www.skeptic.com/index.html
http://www.badastronomy.com/
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/
http://whatstheharm.net/index.html
http://www.expelledexposed.com/
Then when you find a science topic you are interested in, read a lot of books about it so that you can be comfortable enough with the topic to think critically about new discoveries and claims and to explain it to others.
The blogs I listed tend to recommend more good books than I can keep up with.
Be warned though. Skepticism and science are addictive and fun and tend to piss off the intellectually lazy.
A company called Wildblue offers broadband access over satellite. They have nation-wide coverage in the US. The service is very similar to cable modem service. The only difference is that you get a dish on your roof (similar size to dish tv, etc) instead of a cable connection from the street. It costs a little more than cable modem or DSL service but lots less than some of the solutions I've seen in the comments.
Oops, just noticed that Edwards does say he wants to fight global warming in his issues page. Still nothing about Iran though.
I would like to see more in depth and specific explanations about where the candidates stand on important issues and what they would do to fix some our important problems. Obama and Edwards each have an "issues" page that is easy to find. Clinton doesn't even have that! Unfortunately the issues pages are light on content. Some issues, such as the environment and fighting global warming, and how to deal with Iran without war are not mentioned by any of the Democrats. A brief overview is a great thing, but a web page is a perfect place for these guys to thoroughly explain what they want to do as president. I haven't reviewed any of the Republican sites yet. Maybe they do a better job of this.
Start with Richard Dawkins' "Ancestor's Tale". I'm not being sarcastic. It's actually really interesing and may answer a lot of your questions.
Don't forget that Evolution and other scientific principles are not true or untrue based on a single piece of evidence. It's not all or nothing as many creationists would have you believe. In other words there has long been 'proof' of evolution, human and otherwise. It is the details of specific changes that are sometimes unclear, not whether or not they happened at all and if it is possible for them to have happened. Phrases like 'missing link' and 'proof of evolution' are misleading because they imply that without the new small piece of information, or if one piece of information turns out to be wrong that we have to throw out the whole theory. It would be nice if news feeds, AFP in this case, would use more precise language in their headlines instead of perpetuating misconceptions about such politically charged issues. It's depressing that this issue is so politically charged. If more people read Gould,Dawkins,etc maybe it wouldn't be.