Evolution

City shouldn't use tax money for this With reference to the Mailbag entry July 29 "City shouldn't pay for move," regarding the move of the Armenian Relief Society, we too have never heard of a city using taxpayer's money to move a private organization after it's property had been purchased by the city. While we are most concerned that the Glendale City Council would give out $250,000 of taxpayers' money to move the Armenian Society of Los Angeles, this is nothing compared to the favoritism they showed to this group when they approved the payment of $5 million to purchase this tiny building on a 7,500-square-foot parcel without even getting an appraisal of that parcel.

Councilmen?s ?no? vote was warranted Regarding Thursday?s article, ?Council says no to home expansion,? and your inquiry as to our thoughts on the council?s action, I would like to thank Mayor Ara Najarian and Councilmen John Drayman, Frank Quintero and Bob Yousefian for denying the proposed overdevelopment of a lot on Hermosita Drive in the Verdugo Woodlands. It took more than looking at numbers on paper to understand that the subject lot is so constrained by its significantly irregular shape, which narrows into a hillside at the rear, its 197 feet of street frontage, the change in elevation from front to the rear and the mature oaks in front and back ?

Chuck Benedict My "eldoer" generation is going through the expected "growing pains" of social and material changes; some welcome, some not. We approve of the switches from ice box to refrigerator; from outhouse to tiled bathroom; from Pony Express to mail, telegrams, phones, airmail and, finally, Internet. They give life a faster-than-ever ride. However, there are things we wish the changing world would deed back to us, like sensible pitching management in baseball, censorship of tasteless street language, reverence for sex as a private matter and what we see as an arrogant defiance of the proper use of grammar.

Out with the old and in with the new. The Glendale Police Department is cycling out its standard Kawasaki motorcycles used for traffic enforcement to bring in a new Honda model with updated equipment and features. “We’ve moved away from the Kawasaki, which has been the mainstay and workhorse of police work out here for a long time,” Lt. Carl Povilaitis said. About 10 of the new 1300SP models are now out on the street, with plans to have all traffic officers on Hondas in about a year and a half.

First Congregational Church of Glendale, United Church of Christ , will be one of more than 900 congregations from across the country and around the world to participate in Evolution Weekend Feb. 13 to 15, a period designed to recognize that religion and science, two fields of critical importance to humans, should be seen as complementary rather than confrontational. The fourth annual Evolution Weekend event is particularly timely this year since this is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his book, “On the Origin of Species.

Once upon a time there was a word that meant “a male or female child.” One day, people started using it wrong. For some reason, they started using it to mean only a female child. Suddenly, a term that had long included males meant “definitely not male.” We can imagine the fallout. Surely some people were misunderstood. Surely others decried this change as imprecision in the language. Still others likely saw it as part of a disturbing trend - a dumbing down of the entire language.

The U.S. National Academy of Sciences last week issued a defense of evolution as the core principle of biology, arguing that it must be taught in public schools. In its defense of evolution, the academy took issue with creationism and intelligent design, saying they are not science, and therefore should not be taught in public school science classes. What do you think? ? Religious beliefs are a basic part of American society, and are as integral to it as the study of science.

An upcoming concert will showcase the evolution of Armenian music by combining traditional with contemporary sounds and provide a platform for up-and-coming young musicians, organizers said. This year, the lineup for Mosaic II Concert ranges from rock and jazz to Armenian folk music, said Lori Tatoulian, artistic coordinator of the Hamazkayin Armenian Educational and Cultural Society. “Basically, we are bringing different styles of music to form the current picture of young Armenian musicians in Los Angeles and the United States,” she said.

Burbank now boasts a martial arts museum that city officials say will diversify the city’s entertainment attractions. The Martial Arts History Museum, founded by President Michael Matsuda in 2007 in Santa Clarita, has relocated to Burbank, and it officially opened with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on June 25. In the floor plan, Matsuda has kept in mind the progression of the martial arts beginning in Asia and their introduction to the United States...

Michael Shermer stopped by the Flintridge Books and Coffee Shop on a recent night to talk about his book ?Why Darwin Matters? and to sign copies. The book is a fact-finding mission on the debate between theories of evolution and intelligent design. In 1925 the state of Tennessee charged school teacher John Scopes of violating the state?s Butler Act, which outlawed the teaching of Charles Darwin?s theory of evolution in Tennessee schools. Shermer, reading passages from his book aloud, focused much of his reading on the infamous Scopes trial that ensued.