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The leaves are turning as I write in early October. Also turning is my stomach, from the accounts coming out of something called the Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C. According to Sarah Posner writing online in Religion Dispatches, talk-radio host Bryan Fischer went out of his way to attack me. And probably you. Anybody, really, who accepts science as an arbiter of reality. Fischer told the assembled that America needs a president who will “reject the morally and scientifically bankrupt theory of evolution.”
Evolution is a strange process indeed, to cobble together organisms who so completely and emotionally reject it. Well, evolution concerns itself only with differential survival, and brainpower may not be a crucial factor. Fischer may as well have gotten out of a car at the convention center and proclaimed that the car had not brought him there and did not in fact exist. To thunderous applause. One’s only reasonable response to this whole scene is to bring forefinger to mouth and rapidly toggle the lips while humming, so as to produce a sound roughly in accord with a spelling of “Blblblblblblblblblb.”
A few days before the summit, over in the rational world, Saul Perlmutter won a share of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics. He and his fellow laureates, Adam Riess and Brian Schmidt, showed that the universe is not only expanding, the expansion is accelerating. (On hearing this news, my brother asked me if there was a limit. I told him yes, no more than three people can share any one Nobel Prize.)
Perlmutter’s Nobel led to an additional, highly coveted prize. His University of California, Berkeley—home to 22 Nobelists over the years—gives newly minted laureates a campus-wide parking permit. And, if asked, every time Perlmutter exits his car he will no doubt respond that he arrived in it and that it exists.
Perlmutter the driver also surely has the good sense to know that alcohol impairs judgment and neuromuscular skills. Contrast that mind-set with Miami Herald reporter Jose Cassola—well, former Miami Herald reporter now—who ran a stop sign shortly before Perlmutter was getting news of his Nobel and then told the cop who pulled him over, “You can’t get drunk off of vodka.”
As Cassola explained to the arresting officer: “I’m fat, I won’t be able to get drunk from only seven shots.” He later expounded on his unique theories about alcohol and its effects to media-watch reporter Gus Garcia-Roberts of the Miami New Times: “Dude, I go to Chili’s all the time and have two-for-one margaritas, and then I get in my car. Am I drunk? No!”
The disoriented mind pronouncing itself whole is always a wonder to behold. Which brings us back to the Values Voter Summit. Oddly, Fischer’s enraptured audience may have been morphologically identifiable. That notion appears in an article in the June 25, 1885, issue of the journal Nature by Charles Darwin’s half cousin Francis Galton. (It’s probably a good example of our information inundation that less than an hour after I discovered this 126-year-old article, I cannot re-create the steps by which I wound up reading it. E-mail? Twitter? Link within a link? It’s all part of the mystery.)
Galton found himself at a boring lecture and decided to study the sea of heads in front of him. He noted that “when the audience is intent each person ... holds himself rigidly in the best position for seeing and hearing.” In other words, they sit up straight. When the talk got tedious, “the intervals between their faces, which lie at the free end of the radius formed by their bodies, with their seat as the centre of rotation varies greatly.” In other words, they lean.
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52 Comments
Add CommentDear Steve Mirsky (I think)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI just got the December issue and immediately turned to your column. I was doing OK until I got to that last paragraph. You really shouldn't spring those things on an unprepared public! After ROFLOL as the kids say, I now have to find a dry pair of Depends.
Keep up the good work.
I have heard of black birds being baked in pies, but never proofs being baked in puddings. The proof of the pudding is found in the tasting thereof. Subtitle may read: The proof of the pudding is in the tasting, only if you concede the fact of the taster.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust wanted to point out that Steve Mirsky, in his column 'Anti Gravity,' gave air time to Sir Francis Galton, half-cousin of Charles Darwin, who studied the degree of boredom in lecture goers. Colleen Fitzpatrick in her article, "Arm in the Ice" mentioned Galton's 1892 work in using fingerprints for identification. My point? Just kind of interesting.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEnjoyable as always. But please note two errors by Steve or his editor. It's not true that "Fischer may as well have gotten out of a car". He won't have, no matter what we do or say now. But he MIGHT have. Second error is about what the universe is not only doing. What do these two writing errors have in common? As Steve says, "it's all part of the mystery."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSorry if this gets posted twice. SA's posting method tied to logging in is unpredictable.
While I agree with Mr. Mirsky regarding the unwillingness of some to examine evidence and draw a logical conclusion, I am disappointed to find that this commentary could be summarized as, "People Steve Mirsky disagrees with are stupid." Using bigger words doesn't make a good argument or make the sentiment less rude. I hoped to read better.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOr perhaps "These people are acting stupidly"...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust because you point out that some people are begin stupid doesn't mean you are saying all people you disagree with are stupid...
Most likely if someone Steve Mirsky disagreed with made reasonable points based on facts and sound arguments, he wouldn't call them stupid. But I think everyone is too careful these days to call irrational and ignorant people what they are... irrational and ignorant. If you do so, someone will say you are elitist or will over generalize your point (as you did in your comment).
But when a huge percentage of people in America today glory in bashing experts, insist on denying facts, and go out of their way to belittle rational thought, it is dangerous to not call their behavior what it is.
I must agree with Ron Portz (posted 3:58pm 11/22/11). Mr Mirsky's sophomoric term makes me embarrassed to be in agreement with the position he is supporting. Is the use of ridicule an effective way to show the value of accepting the results of evidence and rational thought? Or does it show the opposition that you're using as "religious" a mode of thinking as they are, allowing them to question your objectivity?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI thought I thoroughly read the article until I read the comments. After reading the comments, I thought I must had missed something critical in the article, so I went back and reread the article; the article hadn't changed. Was this article about fact -v- fiction or creation -v- revolution or John Doe -v- Jane Doe? Or was I correct in assuming that the article spoke something about revolution and expansion of the Universe? I am so confused!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI always thought that it was common knowledge that if there is something created - say, like humans - they are going to evolve to accommodate their environment...or am I still thoroughly confused?
One can literally make oneself sick thinking about these people. During the election of 2000 I nearly had to take anti depressants to deal with the rise of Lil' Bush. I recommend yoga or Zen archery or something. Zen archery is good because you can learn to be tranquil while you're actually shooting at something.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Is the use of ridicule an effective way to show the value of accepting the results of evidence and rational thought?" Yes. Micha, please do not mistake these lunatics for people with valid ideas but different conclusions. These are people who lie, distort facts, pander to base human emotion and exploit the scientific illiteracy of the american people in order to advance their personal agenda. These people want to politicize science so they can manipulate it to give them the answers they want. They aren't good people with bad information, these are malevolent people who want to drag the world into a new dark age. Just as communism (totalitarianism) was the scourge of the 20th century, religious fascism is becoming the scourge of the 21st century and we shouldn't be tripping over ourselves in order to avoid offending those who believe we deserve to be tortured for eternity in hell for doing nothing more than revealing the nature of the universe. If a person advances a reasonable argument then one can argue about its relative merits but the issue here isn't an error in interpretation; the issue is the character flaws of the fanatics who are immune to rational argument. In such cases it is appropriate to direct comment to the source of the problem, hopefully in the most amusing way possible.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'd say the irrational group will question the objectivity (and everything else they can)of the more scientific group regardless of the tone used.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy point is that if you are too polite and treat abject irrationality with more respect than it deserves, you elevate it and actually provide positive feedback to the crazies by acting as if their babble stands on equal footing with more rational dialog.
I'm not advocating nothing but name calling, but I do advocate calling an irrational comment irrational, a false comment false, an absurd statement absurd, etc.
I don't think it helps the situation to just grimace and be quiet when large groups of people get together and spout lunacy... or to act as if they are simply making rational arguments we disagree with. When people and groups cross the line between honest, reasonable disagreement and plain falsehood and irrationality, I think they deserve to be mocked for it, at the very least to put that kind of thinking in the position it deserves.
It is vitally important to respect different rational, factual points of view, but there is no need to respect wildly irrational lunacy that actively derides facts, expertise, and reason. And frankly the groups that embrace that kind of craziness won't treat your arguments or facts any differently if you pretend they offer serious points or if mock them... they have already decided their truth, and it has nothing to do with the real world.
Thariss,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Speaking" as an Orthodox Rabbi, I think you underestimate the passionately religious mindset.
If you present ideas calmly and logically, eventually the religious find a way to integrate your ideas into their faith system. The Catholic church accepted Copernicus, eventually.
If you present your ideas in a way that reinforces a false conception that science must necessarily be a thread to religion, they will dig their heels in deeper. You're best off not "cornering the rat".
(After all, which vision of God is greater: One Who can design all the pieces so well that they naturally fall into place on their own, or One Who needs to tinker to keep the process going? To my mind, requiring Divine Intervention in response to anything other than wills He chose to keep free [arguments about free will aside for the moment] belittles the Deity.)
I used your Zin archery theory and I shot at a photo of Lil'Bush, with whom I also had to take anti depressants to get through; it worked like a charm...thanks for the tip.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe best case that can be made for creationism is the fact that somehow the idiot believers have not been evolutionarily eliminated from the gene pool...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think that it is possible that the mind of Steve Mirsky is contracting. But this doesn't mean that the mind of everyone os contracting!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHi Micha,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI appreciate the nice response... but I think the groups/people discussed by the author are not the subset of the religious that are willing to consider a rational argument... if they were, they wouldn't be so far gone into irrationality.
Unfortunately, even for the "moderate" religious person, a key requirement of religion is faith, the determined habit of which works against the ability to consider science. If you have trained your brain to just believe things without facts or reason (even a subset of things that are difficult for science to currently explain) then you have trained your brain to resist rational scientific thought. You have elevated believing something because you want to over the scientific method, and thereby have given up on rationality in favor of whatever pretend game takes your fancy.
Sure, some very smart, very rational people are, and have been, deeply religious, but only by a feat of mental gymnastics whereby they apply their scientific thinking to one area, and abandon it in another... the mind is an amazing thing in that it has little difficulty hold two or more conflicting ideas at once.
I realize that some people try to blend science and fantasy by compartmentalizing their life... saving this part for reason and that part for faith... but while that might work as long as their compartments are maintained, it is logically inconsistant and doomed to fail at any point where science (ever growing in understanding) moves into an area previously reserved for religious beliefs. It has happened time and again, as our scientific knowledge grows, but people just further constrict the area of their fantasy to a smaller and smaller sphere... still claiming that that sphere holds some special imaginary truth... until it shrinks again, and then THAT one holds the truth...
Eventually science will burst that whole bubble, but that will probably take a long time, and in the interim, otherwise intelligent, rational, scientifically minded people that make excuses for the irrational part in order to preserve some "melding" or "balance" with religion, just fool themselves further and delay the inevitable for everyone else.
I wish them well as people, even as I regret all the wasted time, effort, and especially, rational thought.
Thank you, Steve Mirsky. Slices of humor rolled around a core of truth are always palatable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree with the title of this unit. And the examples that we can feel in our day to day life are real to be trusted. We say mind have no limit but it has if the surrounding conditions are limited...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe use of might here means "possibly did happen". The use of MAY
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe use of Might means "could have happened". The use of MAY is PERMISSION. If-then.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am a SPIRIT FILLED CHRISTIAN in a SPIRIT FILLED CHURCH. And i agree totally with RSchmidt. And , secondly, his very politigue (sic) way of saying it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRabbii, these three are writing of the Controversy Over Evolution, as it is contrived for POLITICAL PURPOSES. The controversy is not genuine. The Controversy is a ruse. The purpose is to manipulate the fears and uncertainties of a people already in the thrall of a False Fundamentalism. A fundamentalism that places faith not with ones own judgement, but with the dilectician, and his story. Those who for their own personal gain, separate the citizen from their good reason. Their argument isn't religious. It is as all fascism must do, an attack on the intellectual. Not the people that are intellectuals, but literally the mental process that is intellect. In that way truth can only be known by consensus. And that consensus is achieved solely by propaganda. Those who control the media of discourse decide what the consensus is and therefore what the TRUTH WILL BE. And that's a crime. Because as Our Master says " Know the Truth and the truth will set you Free". That threatens domination, and any threat to domination threatens the Status Quo. And there it is. Fascism. Meaning to say Rabi, that the critics of evolution don't have a religious agenda but a political agenda. They rule the world.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs You indicated Rabi, there really is no threat to Fundamental Christianity by evolution. The Living Word fears no opposition. But as Jesus said "Love thy God with all thy Heart, all they Soul, and all thy Mind' and, like Buddha, "Be a lamp unto thy self". When a Christian relinquishes that responsibility he cannot implement the truth. As Buddhists say THE TRUTH IS NOT TAUGHT , IT IS REVEALED. thnQ Rabi
Revealed Truth, which is the basis of Faith, forget the religion word, it's about faith -revealed truth is no different then the theories we get from science. Yes i know theories are Solid Truth , they are actually Fact, but theory, if you ask a PhD, is working truth, not absolute truth. Likewise, we of faith hold revealed truth, the truth as we an individual see it, as an ever evolving understanding of the nature of the Cosmos, not something immutable or absolute. For us the absolute cannot be spoken. As i said, the truth isn't taught , it's revealed. Like science we have our authorities and critics, but if one CONSIDERS FAITH HIS PERSONAL JOURNEY, What we're told is SECONDARY TO THE TRUTH AS IT REVEALS ITSELF TO US PERSONALLY. That's what both Science and Faith are looking for. The revealed truth we may know. I agree with You that the anti-evols are merely fascists trying to get a hold on the majority. But please don't confuse them with those of faith. After all some of us are right.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are people which think they know the Truth. It is in the Bible, in religions, and so on. They follow the Logic, but Logic has no meaning if there are no proofs. The Truth is not so easy to grasp, and it is only with doubts, doubts over doubts, and especially with proofs that one can come a bit more near the Truth, but never reaching it all. For many people it is too hard to think of it. They prefer to lie to themselves and to trust who has more Charisma, and to lie down in a bed of certitude. And also, not to think of a God, they are loosing their mental equilibrium.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut people of Science are not doing enough to help.
It is for example psychology which could teach that when one is doing something bad on purpose she or he gets a wrong reward. And this unconscious reward is pushing the next time to do it again and again. But it seems that no one knows it, and who doesn't know thinks that only a God can judges that.
"I make Light, I make Darkness. I make Good, I make Evil.." GOD
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this'Yeh, the darkness hideth not from Thee. But the Night shineth as the Day. The Darkness and the Light are both alike to Thee." Psalms 139:12 concordances are just bother.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI repeat better what I said before.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are people which think they know the Truth. It is in the Bible, in the Holy Books, and so on. They follow the Logic, but Logic has no meaning if there are no proofs. At the time of the holy books dope was considering only a drug which helps, like indigenous peoples of South America are chewing coca leaves. So one can not be so sure that everything written in those books is the Truth, even if they are so beautiful writen.
The Truth is not so easy to grasp, and it is only with doubts, doubts over doubts, and especially with proofs that one can come a bit more near the Truth, but never reaching it all. For many people it is too hard to think of it. They prefer to lie to themselves and to trust who has more Charisma, and to lie down in a bed of certitude. And also, not to think of a God, they are loosing their mental equilibrium.
But people of Science are not doing enough to help.
It is for example psychology which could teach that when one is doing something bad on purpose she or he gets a wrong reward. And this unconscious reward is pushing the next time to do it again and again. These bad people underestimate the consequences and the risk of what they do. But first or later they will pay the bill, or in the best case for them, they are "poisoning" with their wrong thinking who is trusting them.
It seems that no one knows this, and who doesn't know it thinks that only a God can judge that.
I repeat better again what I said before.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are people which think they know the Truth. It is in the Bible, in the Holy Books, and so on. They follow the Logic, but Logic has no meaning if there are no proofs. At the time of the holy books dope was considering only a drug which helps, like indigenous peoples of South America are chewing coca leaves. Also hallucinations and schizophrenia were thought as a miracle of God. So one can not be so sure that everything written in those books - even if they are so beautifully written - is the Truth. And in any case, they are not updated!
The Truth is not so easy to grasp, and it is only with doubts, doubts over doubts, and especially with proofs that one can come a bit more near the Truth, but never reaching it all.
For many people it is too hard to think about it. They prefer to lie to themselves and to trust who has more Charisma, and to lie down in a bed of certitude. It more easy to have faith then to have proofs.
And also, if they are not thinking of a God, they are loosing their mental equilibrium.
But people of Science are not doing enough to help.
It is for example psychology which could teach that when one is doing something bad on purpose she or he gets a wrong reward. And this unconscious reward is pushing the next time to do it again and again. These people are underestimate the consequences and the risk of what they do. But first or later they will pay the bill, or in the best case for them, they are "poisoning" with their wrong thinking who is trusting them, which of course will run the same risk.
It seems that many people are ignoring this, and who doesn't know it thinks that only a God could judge that.
It is very strange that some people deny evolution. And what are fossils then? And more over the catholic church accept evolution. It is not in contrast with Bible, like everyone is accepting that the Earth is not at the centre of the universe or it is impossible that someone in the Bible stop the Sun to go, just to finish and win a battle.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReligious people don't realize that their God is a Dictator like Ghaddafi or Hitler. The Nature (and so God) is very beautiful but very cruel: also animals are suffering like human beings and they have not even the hope to save their souls!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat benefit comes when we of the academic and intellectual class are so condescending to others? We may look clever to one another and enjoy a chuckle or two, but what possible good can come from insulting people? I believe that most people can be persuaded to value objective science if approached in the right way. May I be so bold as to suggests that the pages of Scientific American ought to be one place where intellectuals refrain from the vitriol that permeates the rest of the media?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrom the point of view of evolutionary theory, the drawing next to the title - which depicts the "tree of life" - is wrong. It should be a "bush" or, as in Darwin's only drawing on the The Origin, akin to a coral.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisConfusion, even more than curiosity, will kill the ape.
One should be tolerant and having respect for all other opinions, but not - at least for me - when these opinions are puting the world in danger. For instance, religions which follow the Bible are against condoms, and this is not helping the demographich problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe human kind will be destroyed by religions, the dope of exagerated cupidity to make a lot of money, and the stubborn proud of many countries like Iran, Hamas and Israel. All these opinions should be condemn explaining why they are very dangerous.
Tolerance and respect one must use for other opinions, but not - at least for me - when such ideas are putting the world in danger. For instance, religions which follow the Bible are against contraceptives, and this is not helping the demographic problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe human kind will be destroyed by religions, the dope of exaggerated greed to make a lot of money, and the stubborn pride of many countries like Iran, Hamas and Israel. All these opinions should be condemn, explaining why they are very dangerous.
Francis Galton would have agreed with you on that point.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSteve Mirsky,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNormally, your writing is very professional. Are you really so thin-skinned, to respond to the likes of Bryan Fischer and company with such a vulgar rant? It disappoints this scientist/reader to see you sink to such a low level of unprofessional writing.
The really good writers know that they will be attacked, and they make every attempt to maintain some dignity. They know that when they fail to be detached and above the fray, the only people who will listen to them are those who agree with them. Instead of responding with ad hominem characterizations, your readers should expect an experience science journalist to set a better example.
"...Anybody, really, who accepts science as an arbiter of reality."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am very happy to see that you did not say that science is the ONLY arbiter of reality. This point has been debated for a thousand years, and we still have no broad consensus, either among scientists or philosophers, because it depends on how you define reality. Only the most narrow, restrictive definition of reality would hold that all reality must be measurable via scientific method. In fact, that definition eliminates all mathematics from reality, so science coud not be founded on mathematical relationships! QED.
Science is an enormous labyrinth with many blind paths, and to know which one is blind one must go to the end of it. This can be don by Mathematics, Physics, Philosophy, but sometime even by Science fiction. But are only proofs which say that the path is good for going on.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSteve Mirsky has a very good way to stimulate discussions, because it is with opposite view that more ideas are coming, and one can see it from the comments!
Steve, I did find your rebuttal amusing re:Mr.Fischer. I would have found it enlightening if the discourse would have involved some discussion of evolutionary social mechanisms that reinforce human grouping, perhaps with a tidbit about the practice of shunning? Begging your pardon, I have seen enthusiastic group bonding at movies, clumps of traffic on the highways, church revivals, music concerts, and clusters of scientists gazing in mutual wonder as a laser reflects off a mirror and thru a dense medium. Looks all the same to me. Why do we do what we do? lets mine the data and reproduce the mechanism!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn interesting discussion of Mirsky's statement, and I quote, "Fischer told the assembled that America needs a president who will “reject the morally and scientifically bankrupt theory of evolution."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is evident to me that if one means by "evolution", "the survival of the fittest", there is no question. The fittest ALWAYS survive best.
But if "evolution" is taken to mean "abiogenesis", then it is surely scientifically bankrupt. Since recent science has discovered that all living things possess a long and complex code that directs their composition and development, it seems abundantly clear that complex Life could never self-assemble by blind chance. By complex, I mean even the simplest virus.
I have one question that no one has answered satisfactorily. "Is it possible for ANY code to have NO author?"
Some folks seem to be so quick to claim that anyone who believes in Creation is irrational. I find it irrational to imagine that all of Life just developed out of a puddle of inorganic mud with no guiding force other than blind chance.
This silly notion seems to be as ignorant as the old alchemist notion that somehow gold could be chemically cooked up from some desperately sought after recipe of cheaper stuff.
Why was that a silly notion? Because it just is not done that way.
All Living things have been shown to be dependent, not only on a correct recipe but additionally, on a large amount of special information that identifies specifically which chemicals to use and how and when.
Tell me, which is the truly irrational view?
I am still waiting for someone to help my unbelief by showing me a true code that can be unambiguously proven to have NO author.
Great article, but as an Australian I am disappointed Brian Schmidt was the only one of the three not to have a link to his credentials. Note Brian jointly led the study with Adam Riess in 1998 for the High-z Supernova Search Team which first reported evidence that the Universe's expansion rate is now accelerating through monitoring of Type 1a Supernova. For information on Brian refer http://msowww.anu.edu.au/~brian/ and
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Schmidt.
So, evidently not a scientist or mathematician, whether amateur or professional, then. Try a Mandelbrot set: oceans of complexity and all triggered by one simple algorithm. Or (at the risk of bringing back 5th grade physics) interference patterns from light passing through parallel slots. Or an Einstein cross, an apparently ordered shape formed by gravitational lensing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt may "seem abundantly clear" that complexity cannot arise from chaos but (i) sorry, but it does, all over the place; and (ii) it's a really big universe and life is pretty diverse, so the odds (and yes, they are calculable) are not that bad and (iii) the process and the outcome can even be simulated, as for example in Bartel and Szostak's 1993 experiment synthesising RNA.
Believe what you like, but please don't insist that it has a reasoned, let alone empirical basis. Or you could, instead, try to learn something - like, for example, that we can now make gold out of "cheaper stuff" with a particle accelerator, although probably not so as to make money in the process.
The car metaphor is clearly understood as representing evolution. Let's look at the car without the scoffing, aforementioned usage, but examine from another angle. All three cars, four if you count the police officer's, mentioned in the article at some point had designers of each part assembled, and each car was built for a specific purpose. Imagine driving a continuous supply of cars down a long runway off a cliff for a million years. Will one of the cars "decide" to become an airplane? To deny that the car had a designer and a builder is to shrug off reality, realistically speaking. Now, these cars represent created objects, designed for the road, and never able to decide to fly. If a car could make decisions, could it decide it had no creator?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is interesting how so many folks who believe in the evolution of Life from non-living matter by blind chance, seem to imagine that everyone who doesn’t share their pet hypothesis somehow has a midget mind.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe complexity of Life is far greater than any number of Madelbrot sets, interference patterns of light or the Einstein Cross. In fact, the Einstein Cross is probably NOT a case for gravitational lensing at all because of the four relatively distinct images surrounding the central object you mentioned. A true gravitational lens would form curved distortions of the background object, and NOT the four (or any other number) discrete images that are seen, since gravity works in all directions equally. This curved distortion can actually be seen in other real cases of gravitational lensing.
Your comments about complexity are missing my point entirely. I am not talking about simple complexity such as Madelbrot sets or snow flakes. I am talking about the very specific instructions and information that is inherent in all genetic codes. You may want to look up the definition of “information.” It only EVER comes from intelligent sources. I am still waiting for someone to provide a real example of information arising from non-living sources for no reason other than chance. I am NOT holding my breath! In any case, I notice that Bartel and Szostak's experiment included interference by them to salvage what they thought were significant substances to support their hypothesis.
You also seem to have missed my point that gold cannot be cooked up by CHEMICAL means. I am very aware that gold has indeed been synthesized from isotopes of other elements as early as 1941 by nuclear means. I would suggest that your comment that, “although probably not so as to make money in the process.” is a gross understatement. There is DEFINATELY NO money to be made in any of those processes!
Sorry, My previous comment #44 was in reply to MaxGroti.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo, Quizzical, if you are so convinced that life had to be created by some other intelligent creature, who or what created that intelligent creature?????? I am still waiting for someone to answer that question!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Bible teaches that the Living God is eternal - from the everlasting past to the everlasting future. God had no beginning and will have no end! I know, we humans have a hard time getting our minds around the issue of eternity because everything we experience does have a beginning and an end.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI can only offer this poor analogy: Just because my gold fish, from their view point cannot understand trigonometry, their inability does NOT prove that trig is a fictional concept.
Likewise, we have a hard time conceiving of an eternal God who we are told created all of matter, energy, time and information by the Spoken Word. This inability to understand that, does NOT mean that He does not exist and that He did not create the universe.
The very essence of sin is failing to believe in our Creator God.
I understand your reluctance to believe that concept but I sincerely hope you will come to a positive conclusion that God is indeed real. BTW, you do NOT need to check your intelligence at the Door.
Many folks are too quick to knock the Bible and its full message to us before they have actually read all of it with an open mind.
RESPECT FOR EVIDENCE – REALLY!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSteve, I read your article on Respect for Evidence at first with unbelief, then I simply laughed at the defense of your dogmatic premise on Evolution “Theory,”(and a theory is simply an unproven idea.) You start by stating the “Proof is in the Pudding only if you concede the fact of the pudding.” There we agree in principle but you pretend the pudding is actually hot dish.
You then go on the attack of Bryan Fisher and use the elementary argument that if he arrived in an auto he would proclaimed the auto did not exist. Actually, I bet most of the readers understood that he actually would have expounded on the existence of the automobile, as it is a product of “Intelligent Design.” You then go on to insult you own brother who seemed to have asked a reasonable question of someone he had some respect for. I wonder if he still does?
Then you imply that people who disagree with your position on Evolution are in some way mentally impaired. Your statement “The disorientated mind pronouncing itself whole is always a wonder to behold.” I immediately thought of you with that statement, as you have been ignoring the considerable evidence taking place in molecular biology for the last 20+ years.
What I find humorous with you Darwinist types is your total absolute lack of scientific objectivity. I would really like to understand what you are afraid of, and why you accept an unproven theory, postulated by a person with a Degree in Divinity who had no real scientific knowledge or training. It is well known that Ernst Haeckel deliberately fudged the drawings of different embryos for Darwin to make them appear much closer, and most text books still display these erroneous drawings today.
Ask yourself this: Today, if a person with only a religious degree, and no background in science or scientific education or PHD's, came out with a controversial theory about whatever, because he took a boat trip, would you or anyone in academia or the scientific community even listen to what they had to say? Then why Darwin?
I am familiar with the term “Scientific Dismissiveness,” where it is far easier to make rude statements, and ignore new evidence (remember your pudding statement), and try to destroy a competing scientists credibility. Being a cynic or critic takes no knowledge, talent, skill, ability, or understanding. It only takes a closed mind and a closed mind will never explore new fields, or ever find true meanings. In your case I will add smarmy, insulting and plainly outclassed in this field of endeavor.
Molecular biology has shown us just how intricate living things are, especially the genetic code and the genetic process. Interestingly enough, the genetic code can be best understood as an analogue to the human language. Charles B. Thaxton PHD found that applying the so-called Shannon information laws provide a device for making the code readable, and we now know that our DNA is a coded message for our bodies.
The question is, where did this code come from, and how is it that mathematics can be applied equally to our DNA and to the movement of the Cosmos? I will need to jump around now as there is just too much information to cover.
Lets talk of the Cambrian explosion and the recent finds of animal phyla in a world previously composed of algae and bacteria, excepting the Ediacara fauna which do not fill the gap as transitional intermediaries, and the failure of life to diversify into new phyla after that. I wonder if you had ever heard of the Canadian Cambrian fossil finds in the Burgess Shale, or the huge Cambrian fossil finds at the village of Chengjiang in the Yunnan Provence where hundreds of new Cambrian life form fossils are being found yearly, and this includes soft bodied creatures that were preserved in the mud of time.
This is especially interesting in the fact that evolution theory postulates that as things mutate there is a growing number of them later on, kind of like a triangle point down. These new finds are making scientists all over the world realize that in the real world, they are finding that the triangle is actually point up, with fewer and fewer variations later on. This does not even take into account of how things continued to evolve through the 4 major and 5 minor ice ages, and follow on extinction cycles.
That brings me to “Irreducible Complexity” theory, which has been demonstrated in bio-chemestry and has been subject to considerable peer review. For your edification: “something is irreducibly complex when it is composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that all contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning.” Michael J. Behe, PHD in bio-chemestry, University of Pennsylvania,
Behe mentions the bacteria flagellum, which he states is “like an outboard motor that some bacteria use to swim.” It uses a rotary device which in turn rotates a propeller to move. It consists of a number of parts that include a long tail that acts like a propeller, the hook region that attaches the propeller or tail to the drive shaft and the motor and uses a flow of acid from outside the bacterium to the inside to power what could be called a stator, which keeps the structure stationary etc. In the absence of any one of the parts mentioned you do not get a flagellum that moves slower. It either works or it does not, or it doesn't even get constructed in the cell.
These are now called “Macromolecular Machines” and look much like something we would make if we understood how to do so. Intelligent design? Looks like it.
Many have calculated the probability of chance or accidental origins of life in the so-called prebiotic soup. Imagine being handed a Rubik's Cube and being blindfolded, just to insure all moves were random. It has been calculated that a person would need 1,350 billion years, at a rate of one move per second, to solve the puzzle. That is 300 times the accepted age of the planet.
Our enzymes also serve to refute Darwin. There are some 2,000 of these catalysts in our body, and the chance of finding all 2,000 by accident “is about the same as the chance of throwing an uninterrupted sequence of 50,000 sixes with an unbiased dice. There are an estimated 1080 atoms in the universe, and our odds for random emergence of all enzymes are 1 in 1040,000. The possibility of an E.coli bacterium, a relatively uncomplicated cell, arising in the prebiotic soup over a period of 5 billion years has been estimated at 1 in 1010(110).
Even Carl Sagan, a renowned atheist, estimated the difficulty of the chance of evolution creating a human at 10-2,000,000,000.
Your picture of cutting off the branch you are kneeling on is a perfect analogy to your dogmatic stance on evolution theory. If all you have are some sophomoric smarmy comments to defend your position on evolution, you need some new material. By the way, where was your science?
Evolution has never been tested, has never been duplicated in a lab (Barry Hall only removed one component of his bacterium and added an artificial inducer IPTG, so B-glactosidase did not evolve in his experiments – it was by intelligent design - his), has never been mathematically validated. It is considered a social science and therefore is not subject to the scientific tests Darwinist's demand of counter theories.
Back in the 17th century there was a notion to separate rhetoric from true science, to remove the empty rhetoric, subterfuge and style embellishments so common. So the Royal Society in London called for its members “to separate the knowledge of Nature from the colors of Rhetorick, the devices of Fancy, or the “delightful deceit of Fables,' and to “reject all the amplifications, digressions, and swellings of style:to return to the primitive purity, and shortness, when men deliver'd so many things, almost in an equal number of words . . . bringing all things as near the Mathematical plainness as they can . . “ (qtd. In Pera 130. I bet their heads were facing forward when this was presented to them.
I would find your Anti-Gravity page far more informative if it was grounded in fact and actually had some scientific references, rather than the programmed rhetoric and examples you did not think through.
Until then all I hear from you is “Blblblblblblblblb.”
RESPECT FOR EVIDENCE – REALLY! You have been ignoring the considerable evidence taking place in molecular biology for the last 20+ years.What I find humorous with you Darwinist types is your absolute lack of scientific objectivity. Ask yourself this: Today,if a person with only a religious degree,and no background in science or scientific education came out with a controversial theory about whatever, because he took a boat trip, would you or anyone in academia or the scientific community even listen to what they had to say? Then why Darwin? Molecular biology has shown us just how intricate living things are,especially the genetic code and the genetic process. Lets talk of the Cambrian explosion and the recent finds of animal phyla in a world previously composed of algae and bacteria,and the failure of life to diversify into new phyla after that.I wonder if you had ever heard of the Canadian Cambrian fossil finds in the Burgess Shale,or the huge Cambrian fossil finds at the village of Chengjiang in China where hundreds of new Cambrian life form fossils are being found yearly.This is especially interesting in the fact that evolution theory postulates that as things mutate there is a growing number of them later on,kind of like a triangle point down.These new finds are making scientists all over the world realize that the triangle is actually point up, with fewer and fewer variations. Then there is “Irreducible Complexity,”which has been demonstrated in bio-chemestry and has been subject to considerable peer review."Something is irreducibly complex when it is composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that all contribute to the basic function,wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning.” Taking a simple flagellum: In the absence of any one of its parts you do not get a flagellum that moves slower.It either works or it doesn't even get constructed in the cell. There are an estimated 10/80th atoms in the universe,and our odds for random emergence of all enzymes are 1 in 10/40,000th. The possibility of an E.coli bacterium arising in the prebiotic soup over a period of 5 billion years has been estimated at 1 in 10/10(110)th. Even Carl Sagan,a renowned atheist, estimated the difficulty of the chance of evolution creating a human at 10-2,000,000,000. If all you have are some sophomoric and smarmy comments to defend your position on evolution, you need some new material. You may wish to read "Darwinism under the microscope"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUntil then all I hear from you is Blblblblblblb
I appreciate your very informative comments!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen I realized that there are more than 1,152 quadrillion ways to randomly arrange only 30 base pairs of nucleotides in a DNA sequence while there are fewer than 474 quadrillion seconds of time in 15 billion years, I became a SERIOUS skeptic of the irrational notion that Life could have ever self-assembled from nonliving chemicals by random chance.
Check out the following link and others by David Berlinski, PhD.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHeSaUq-Hl8&feature=related
BibleHebrews11:1, "Will one of the cars "decide" to become an airplane? To deny that the car had a designer and a builder is to shrug off reality, realistically speaking."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen you say idotic things like this proves that you have no idea as to what evolution is all about.
charlie
If "evolution concerns itself only with differential survival", then why can't evolution and Creation be compatible with each other. "In the beginning" the Creator provided the raw materials and life in its original state. Since then, life, in its many diverse forms, makes differential changes to improve its survivability.
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