As with other anti-evolution bills, Tennessee's seems to be based on sample legislation written and promoted by the pro-ID Discovery Institute.
Sponsor Rep. Bill Dunn (R–Knoxville) said Fowler submitted the legislation to him in early February. The latter's organization is associated with James Dobson's conservative Christian Focus on the Family and advocates for "biblical values" and "godly officials".
Dunn could not explain why a Christian organization would be pushing legislation that supposedly has nothing to do with inserting religion into science class. He referred the question to Fowler.
Fowler, who would not say whether he is a young earth creationist ("I think that's irrelevant," he noted), said he is trying to correct the "dogmatic" presentation of science in the classroom. "This is about open discourse," he said, adding, "Good education requires critical thinking."
Fowler has spoken with members of the Discovery Institute—he would not say specifically whom—and said he drafted the Tennessee bill based on sample legislation the Institute created.
Dunn explains: "We've reversed the roles of the Scopes Trial. All we're saying is let's put all the scientific facts on the table."
Dunn said the bill would not allow the teaching of intelligent design. But in his Chattanoogan op–ed piece Fowler specifically says it would protect a teacher who wanted to teach the concept, which a federal court ruled unconstitutional in Kitzmiller v. Dover.
"The bill is likely to result in significant violations of students' and parents' First Amendment rights," says Hedy Weinberg, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee. "It is not necessary; and it threatens to undermine science education across the state, endangering the educational and employment futures of Tennessee's students as well as the state's own economic and job prospects."
With 60 percent of U.S. public high school biology teachers are already shying away from evolution in the classroom, according to the results of a recent Pennsylvania State University survey, these anti-evolution bills send a warning message to ambivalent teachers to avoid the subject, Rosenau said.
Separation of church and state
While the fight heats up in Tennessee, anti-evolution battles continue in other states.
Next month, Texas's SBOE will begin the four-month review process of "supplemental materials," which will be used in place of costly new science textbooks. The creationist sympathies of several members of a board-appointed volunteer review panel have raised questions about whether the SBOE intends to use these additional publications to eventually open a door to creationism and ID-friendly materials into the classroom.
Meanwhile, in Louisiana a 17-year-old Baton Rouge Magnet High School student has begun a long-shot campaign to get lawmakers to repeal the state's anti-evolution law. Zack Kopplin has lined up support of one senator, who has said she is willing to introduce the legislation. Gene Mills of the Louisiana Family Forum (also affiliated with Focus on the Family) said he welcomes the attempt. "It's healthy to have discussions," Mills says, "but I don't think it's going anywhere."
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Add CommentI can not see from a quick online search of creationists if they are pushing forward the Judeo-Christian creation story only or just the idea that some unknown deity started it all, but it couldn't have been "science".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf they require that all creation theories to be taught along side evolution, big bang theory etc., then they will have to spend a lot of time compiling the thousands of creation myths from history and explain that they like their own belief could also have been true.
It is not so much the origination 'theory' that is the purpose here. It is a foothold to introduce other sectarian teachings (Since, if you believe something strongly enough, it's the truth. Right?). I think one of the most important ones is the imparting of the 'knowledge' that you will suffer in Purgatory unless you undergo a specific water ceremony (The release procedure for Purgatory is a complex topic, beyond the scope of this forum).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"70% of the "mutatoins" are negative, bad, harmful to the genome. 29% are considered to be neutral, and 1% may be positive."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYep, that's what its all about. That 1% (or less) contributes to greater fitness and produces more and/or fitter offspring than the others.
Hmmm...I'll repeat, there is nothing in the biological theory of evolution that states that there must be improvement or advancement of species. You cannot choose just one definition, the one that fits your belief, and only argue that one. Any scientist will tell you that it is part of the scientific method to make changes or alterations to current or past theories as new evidence comes along. Look up the CURRENT definition of biological evolution, because THAT definition has been altered to fit the new evidence to support that Natural Selection, and Darwin's studies aren't the ONLY method of evolution. Look outside the box. Scientific Progress is halted when people get stuck on past ideas and refuse to look at new evidence and accept the changes that accompany them. You earlier compared dogs to wolves stating that wolves are more fit to the environment...well, they ARE more fit to their environment, while dogs are more fit than wolves in the environment in which they live. I would never welcome a wolf from the wild into my home, feed him, care for him and doctor him. Yet, we humans breed dogs for their companionship and care for them to elongate their lives. You have to take in ALL factors. To believe that evolution means things are getting better would mean that there wouldn't ever be any interactions of species that might cause disruption, and that just doesn't make sense. For this reason, tall grasses don't grow in the forest beneath the canopy. They used to be there until another species moved in and disrupted their population and that species died out. Humans, like the tall grass in the forest, won't last forever. We are a dying species. We have a lot of disruptions, especially in our environment, both biotic and abiotic that interferes with our genes and 'gradually changes them over time.'
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is great to see Lauri Lebo write for SA.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPredictably, we have one creationist spewing nonsense. In this case, someone who claims, "70% of the "mutatoins" are negative, bad, harmful to the genome. 29% are considered to be neutral, and 1% may be positive. That is evidence for de-evolution."
This is badly ignorant. I'll start with the most obvious- Can the claim, "70% of the "mutatoins" are negative, bad, harmful to the genome." be true? Just a little thought proves that it cannot be true. A random mutation of any DNA base to another will never have any effect over 50% of the time, because over 50% of (human) DNA is non-coding. Even a random mutation in a transcribed segment cannot change the resulting gene product in about 40% of the time because of codon base redundancy. This takes care of nearly 80% of mutations that in fact do nothing immediately, and at most could make some later mutation slightly more likely to actually do something.
Then asks an informed person, can "1% may be positive. That is evidence for de-evolution." be true? And of course it is untrue.
Let's first debunk the notion that "Random DNA changes is certain death." We know that from one generation to another there are "random DNA changes." We know that this is not "certain death." We can even induce random, or selected mutations, and we observe that this is not "certain death." So, what does happen with those mutations that are deleterious? This depends on what the specific alteration has done, and what the current environmental conditions are. The classic example would be the mutation that all primates share that blocks our ability to make our vitamin C internally. Since we can extract this essential vitamin from our mixed diet, there is not particular loss of life due to what is obviously a negative mutation. But, if this same mutation were to occur in a carnivore, say a lion, then any offspring inheriting this mutation would die.
And this explains why the notion of "devolution" is bogus as well. Negative mutations are eliminated from the gene pool at a rate about as rapid as they occur. In human studies, we find that even common double recessive gene illnesses, (eg. sickle-cell anemia, or Tye-Sacks), are associated with a disease protective consequence when inherited as a heterozygous gene. In the sickle-cell example, an improved survivability of just 5% was enough to drive the selection of this gene mutation 3 times, in three separate populations.
GoodScienceForYou: You may want to save the wear and tear on your keyboard. Everyone stopped reading your comments after you stated, "If you were to actually study genetics, DNA, fossils, ERV's. And genetic diseases, you would realize, quickly with objective reasoning that evolution has never taken place." This singurlarly unique interpretation of this information is the most faith-based idea I've ever heard.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHmmm. GoodScienceforYou seems to be spouting opinion rather than good science. I wonder, is this a manifestation of the "Tea Party" phenomenon where anti-intellectualism is the preferred stance towards learning, and the goal is to derail critical thinking in favor of loudly shouted opinions?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI really think that there is no controversy here. The evolution model works!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf critical thinking is applied correctly, one can only state that a creator is a sufficient but not necessary cause for life and the universe. Creationists can go no further. They have yet to come up with an experiment or observation to support their model.
Creationists have, however, shown the existence of yet another possibility: devolution. They are its evidence.
Now you have an issue where I agree with S/A. I would agree that evolution is the means by which life has risen to the level of intelligence it has reached today. That does not mean evolution is not directed in some sense by a Greater Being, but I believe in evolution. Funny, the great enemy of evolution, who prosecuted Scopes was - a noted Democrat, William Jennings Bryan, the Great Commoner, who ran for president as a Democrat at least twice. If Bryan were alive today I bet he'd be preaching for belief in Global Warming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTime for educated citizens, especially of the scientific or atheistic bent to emigrate from the USA. Australia and China offer hope to you people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNothing in biology makes any sense without evolution. Its like trying to understand astronomy without the theory of gravity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour comments in general and your examples are explained easily giving some critical thinking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1) Mammoths are more fit than elephants: I'm not even going to go into the ridiculousness of comparing a long extinct species to a living one and how that speaks to their respective survivability, but they had adapted to different climates. A mammoth would not survive in an elephant's habitat or vice-versa. They both, through environmental stressors and genetic changes adapted to their respective environs. Elephants are in no way a de-evolution.
2) Same with wolves and dogs: For one, dogs came from wolves mostly through human interference. Humans have selectively bred canines for millenia resulting in the domesticated dog species we have now. Also, though there are obviously other factors behind it, dogs have been infinitely more successful than wolves.
3) Humans are de-evolving: This actually may be true, but this isn't proof that evolution isn't real, quite the opposite. You seem to have a misconception of, or are deliberately ignoring, the basic tenets of evolution. Your idea that evolution says that it always leads to something more powerful or is on some kind of linear progression through the ranks of a biological training acumen is a gross misinterpretation. Evolution is to put it very simply Survival of the fittest in a given environment. So your uber advanced mammoths would not stand a chance in the jungle let alone the ocean because they are not adapted to its environment. Only traits that increase an individuals chances of survival and by extension his chance of passing down his genes sexually matter. Humans have exited that world. We radically conform the environment to us, we no longer adapt to the environment. As such, genetically 'weaker' humans(a subjective) are able to breed just as successfully as 'strong' ones. This makes it more likely that physical and mental defects will be passed along in the gene pool since these shortcomings in general do not affect the ability of one to pass his/her genes. Seriously, posting on scientific american as anti-evolution you should at least know your enemy, not some bible-thumping interpretation of it.
Allowing religious fanatics to sabotage our public education, particularly in the southern states where public education is weak, is absurd. Their attempt is no less than the undermining of our future. It is no wonder why private schools and charter schools are so popular in these states. It is the only way to educate a minority to cope successfully with future technological, political, and cultural demands.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Seems the strongest argument against evolution is the lack of it in those that oppose it."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs we know, evolution is not teleological, and evolution doesn't mean progress. The sustained and adapting strategies of those opposed to evolution ironically seems to argue for it, as does their continued survival in a changing environment. Can rational people demonstrate the same perseverance and ingenuity? The struggle only strengthens the opposition until environmental change determines the survivor. Science is a fairly new phenomenon in our specie's repertoire and has shown amazing potential in a few centuries. We can't expect science to quickly displace religions and cultures that have been effectively supporting survival for thousands -- if not millions -- of years. Eventually science, skepticism, and rational thinking will prevail. Will it be our species or another?
I am a serious, serious student of the bio-sciences, of the sciences generally, of the philosophy of science and philosophy generally.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs such, I am amazed at how naive are some of the argumentations on both sides of what constitutes science, truth, proof, certainty, knowledge...
Of the plethora of comments preceding this one, the most ludicrous is the one indicating that it is less obtuse to believe "science" created life than to believe some "unknown god," did it.
Of course the word "science" can be, and is, defined in numerous ways. Most academicians define it as a study of something. Some call that something "nature." Some of the finest minds of man have spent some of their finest hours trying to define nature in such a way as to satisfy all the unanswered questions implied in any attempt.
All the most brilliant and most objective theologians and all the most brilliant and objective students of science, or nature, could martial all the certainties and all the resolved questions ever asked by any and all humans, and would not have enough hard evidence to resolve who or what started, created, triggered, banged,invented... life.
Meanwhile futile polemical stances are veritably shouted on multiple sides of what is nothing more than a shouting match.
Most evidence in science is circumstantial and descriptive, only, and without interpretation (which is never more than subjective) nothing more than a collection of unrelated facts.
It's a tempest in a teapot, a lot of sound and fury, signifying SOMETHING... namely, that few humans are able or willing to look into the pit, as it were, and see how little certainty any of us has of anything.
"...pure evidence that this has never happened." Congratulations! You have proved a negative and completely discredited yourself as a source of valid information. The use of words such as "never," "morons," and "retards" was also a red flag. I find it difficult to believe that we live longer, healthier lives than ever before in our recorded history because we are de-evolving. You present an interesting conspiracy theory though.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think that there is actually a fairly simple solution to the dilemma of how to deal with scientific theory and religious theory in the classroom. I believe that we all would like for our children to understand just how we create or arrive at knowledge itself.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor eons we humans have used our own experience, intuition, logic of various types, observation, guesswork, deductive reason, inductive reason, and the development of myth and superstition to arrive at knowledge. Study the Classics and the Classic Philosophers and this is what you will be studying.
A few hundred years ago another method of creating knowledge began to be developed: the scientific method. By requiring the experimental testing of hypotheses and replication of proof this method was a radical departure from previous practice and is still not accepted as valid by many people in the world.
I think that we need to teach our children how each of these methods work; their assumptions, their relative strengths and weaknesses, and how their results may compair to our actual perceived reality.
Too many of us confuse faith and fact; belief and proof. We need to know what each is, how it is arrived at, and what it means before we can think clearly about this argument.
In that regard comparing the science of evolution with the belief of creationism might be a valuable way of teaching our children how each reaches its conclusions and perhaps the relative validity of each method's results.
I think that such an approach would increase critical thinking in our students. And, I believe that these concepts can be taught in such a way that neither is unfairly critiqued. After all, faith is at least important as fact for many. We all need to understand how and why we arrive at each and of what value each is to us.
A major problem in this debate is that the socalled scientific position is not based on scientific practices. Science is expected to test its assumptions, but biology has made Natural Selection a Law on which it based its rules and assumptions. Biologists defend their assumptions from challenges by Creationists, as well as from scientific challenges expected of genuine science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLack of scientific testing means that Natural Selection can best be regarded as a cultural artefact that originated from the beliefs of the 19th century English society in which Darwin grew up, now cocooned in the rules and assumptions of biology.
Those beliefs can be seen in the writings of Thomas Malthus, Herbert Spencer and Darwin's cousin, Francis Galton, that social and economic outcomes were external signs of internal qualities. The poor were poor because they were innately inferior. Malthus wrote that populations had increased beyond the limits of the food supply, resulting in competition for scarce resources and misery for those least equipped to compete. Improving their conditions and educating them would only encourage them to have more children. Strangely, those have proved to be the very factors that reduce population growth and the populations of England and the world have since grown six times, calling into question the idea of scarce, finite resources. What does that say about Natural Selection, which Darwin described as the doctrine of Malthus applied manifold to nature?
The error in Darwin's explanation began with his decision that external conditions had no direct effect. He attributed change to internal qualities that favoured individuals in struggle involving competition for scarce resources. Change came from variations that directly favoured improved individuals, so change had to be continuous and incremental (contrary to evidence from fossil records), and the more variations, the more change.
Genetics have proved all those assumptions wrong. Variations accumulate as genetic diversity. More variations are a sign of lack of change. The driver of evolution is the elimination of part of that diversity by survival pressure from external conditions, the factor that Darwin specifically excluded from his explanation.
It is time for biology to join the ranks of genuine sciences that test their hypotheses. Then they might produce explanations of evolution that the general public find credible. If Thomas Huxley could see what modern science has done with its evidence, he would probably say "how extremely stupid..."
In my day there was no word such as evolution in school. For some reason atheists or 'forces unknown' believe evolution HAS to be taught in school. Religion was not taught in my school .. evolution was not taught in my school. Science can progress at an effective pace without the teaching of either religion or evolution in schools. The drive behind the DEMAND to SPECIFICALLY teach an unneeded course should be investigated and those 'forces' behind the drive to teach an unREQUIRED course should also be investigated for OTHER activities which may bear out their 'conflicts of interest'. Imho.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRealityBound seems to miss one or two rather interesting historical documents. He says that we have never lived longer.etc. I note that in the Genesis record ( and there are, so far, no archaeological discoveries that contradict it), that men from Adam to Noah were consistently living 800 to 950 plus years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOther writers talk of the relative fitness of woolly mammoths and elephants. What Velikovsky writes, and I have not yet seen it disproven, is that when woolly mammoths are dug out of ice, the often have tropical vegetation in their mouths and in there stomachs.
In other words, their extinction was sudden and catastrophic, not gradual.
As far as I can see, both evolution and creation require a decision of belief, a step of faith.
Science is limited in what it can do. It must first, define, and then, measure, so that there is uniformity in what the evidence is, and how it is perceived. To be fully scientific, the results must then be confirmed by others.
Science is limited in that it cannot scientifically define many things, such as emotion, or matters commonly called spiritual. In many cases, they are real, but, by simple definition, not of themselves either defined, or measured. It is possible that we may, in fact, eventually be able to define and measure them, and thus bring them into the realm of science.
Some are explicitly excluded. My Bible tells me that spiritual things are spiritually discerned. And again, the natural man cannot receive the things of God.
Science has always tried to understand the natural world around us. We have developed some tools to help us do that. We may discover more tools to help us understand more of the world around us.
There are some very interesting (scientific) questions in the Bible, in the book of Job. You will find them in chapters 38 through 41. I would suggest that those of you who have never looked at them, actually do so, and then consider how many of them that you, personally, can answer.
Scientifically, our genome is called the genetic code. It is my understanding that all codes are designed, and therefore have a designer. Who or what is that designer? Is it chance, the environment, or a wonderful being called the living God?
* A caveat that I agree wholeheartedly with jeenius. A person without doubt should be doubted*
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think the direct comparison between religion and evolution is a logical fallacy. One is a description of all existence by an omnipotent (sometimes) omnibenevolent, given some anthropomorphic qualities for believers to better relate to and is totally dependent on the blind faith of belief. While a minority of people may show the same faith in evolution, that has nothing to do with evolution itself. Evolution, first and foremost, is a falsifiable scientific theory explaining the how life adapts and grows in its environment. It is not a grand unified explanation of the universe and all existence, despite many creationists misinforming people otherwise. The reason evolution is so prominent is not only because of the foundation it lays for the biological sciences, but for the heaps of evidence that grow daily in support of it. Not teaching one of the most fundamental and important theories of modern times because some people treat it as science's pseudo-religion, is like saying we shouldn't teach geography because its comparable to the blind faith of people who believe the world is flat.
There has never been, and never will be a shortage of opinions, views, or passion on either side of this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have observed that where there is fear of discussion, science and the transformation of hypothesis into plausible models...or maybe even "facts" is stiffled. The pursuit becomes mired in passions and fears. We should never fear discussion and critical thinking.
My personal hypothesis is that science is a tool that reveals the incredible intelligence of "God".... Yes I am one of "them". One of those "boobs" :-) that is fascinated by the findings of science, open debate, and the pursuit of evidence and facts.
One cannot let fear preclude investigation and consideration, and then claim the title of "Scientist".
I don't know if I'm misreading this, but I get the impression that you believe that science hasn't progressed since Darwin. We introduce evolution with it's history beginning with Darwin, and Malthus, for that matter. In addition to that, further studies are also discussed including geographic isolation, emigration, random mutations and sexual selection. A big subject that is starting to find their way into college campuses as full semester courses is epigenetics which specifically studies how the environment, or external factors including the food we eat and the temperature in which we live, can affect our genes. Likewise, we teach Genetics beginning with Mendel, but we all know that it isn't just simple dominance and recessive traits that build all individuals. We are aware of hereditary traits that include codominance, incomplete dominance, multiple alleles with multiple phenotypes, and polygenic inheritance. We are also aware that certain external factors, some long-term like aging and some short-term such as a 24-hr illness, are capable of turning some genes off. Individuals with the exact same genes may very well express them completely different from each other. In fact, Gregor Mendel didn't live long enough to even know what a gene is. We owe Mendel the foundation to genetics for his pea plant experiments. Likewise, we owe Darwin the foundation for offering his theory of natural selection.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@Sinome - excellent post, very well said. The creationists want to frame the issue as one of providing alternate viewpoints when in fact it's clear what they want is to edit or filter the way science is taught to conform to their religious beliefs.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI recently took a college biology course and on the first day the instructor said something like "this course teaches evolution because it's the basis of biology today. If you believe something else that's OK, but this is what we're teaching". I have no problem with that. Think the creationists would be happy with that?
@GoodScienceForYou
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"70% of the mutations are negative, bad, reducing fitness."
.
Almost all point mutations in multi-cellular organisms are strictly neutral, and 93-98% of all point mutations in humans are strictly neutral. you must update your sources.
Each human generation, has about 90 to 110 mutations,
Creatinism is based on lies and distorion. Not facts
@GoodScienceForYou
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"They say there are over 100 average 128 "random mutations" from human parents to offspring.
If that were real, we would have been extinct within the first year of reproduction. "
No, because most of our DNA is junk. A mutation in junk DNA is neutral, does not cause good or harm, and is not affected by natural selection. But.. since mutation rate is almos constant, it allows to work as a clock that allows us to proove evolution.
shoul shall not lie... and distort the truth is lying.
I sincerely hope that the principle of intelligent design can be established, and the designer identified. When that happens, I will sue that person, and his terrestrial agents, for malpractice and gross negligence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat idiot would have designed humans with such a propensity towards cancer and arthritis, not to mention the appendix? Should we not all be entitled to live out our three score and ten? And why should the patriarchs get to live 900 years and up, while the healthiest of us are limited to less than 120?
I intend to file a class action suit on behalf of all who suffer from cancer and arthritis and all those who have lost loved ones to cancer. I will ask as damages every penny this entity and all of His terrestrial agents have got. Then there's punitive damages.
@GoodScienceForYou:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I explain there is no random in this universe. It violates all of science. "
So you have never heard of "heisenberg uncertainty principle"?
Random is at the core of the structure of the universe.
Stephen Hawking:
Not only does God play dice, but... he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen.
@. hoamingin
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Lack of scientific testing means that Natural Selection can best be regarded as a cultural artefact"
Seems you are still living in the xix century.
Natural selection has been tested in the lab and in the field.
Malthus, did not expected the Technology would increase so much our food production. But, also he is old news. the science of ecology is beyong what Malthus have imagined, and ecology is based on evolution.
today nothing in biology makes sense if not seen trough evolution, and that is because evolution has, not only a capacity for explanation, but to predict. As any other science.
ZebulonJoe: I've got to assume you are kidding with your entire comment. That Genesis/1000 year lifespan stuff is truly silly. Everyone knows that. I mean, it comes from a book where they even state that a person was dead for three day and then came back to life! Come on. Seriously. Don't mix in ancient fable with science, they're two different things. Next thing you'll be suggesting we mount and expedition to the South Pole to feed the turtle that the earth is resting on.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHi my name is Sandy, I am a Christian.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would like you to take into consideration three things:
1)I am not aware of any examples of current cross species mutation. Even with all of our technology we only find adaptation mutations within "a" species. Believing that God provided the "Big Bang", and then the Genesis story followed is more believable to me.
2) The Mount St. Helens explosion in 1980 has shown stratification already and that happened only 31 years ago. It does not appear to take millions of years, as our children are being taught.
3) Supporting the Genisis story of creation, are satelite pictures of a large boat on mount Ararat. I believe that to be Noah's ark. Take a look at them and answer the question, "How did a boat this big and so well described in scriptures thousands of years ago end up on a mountain, if the biblical account is not true?
Why God is alowing the technology of today to clarify His truths about creation in our generation is beyond me, but it can't be ignored.
If the creationists and intelligent designers wanted to do something that would have real popular appeal, they would challenge the notion that 2+2 must always equal 4.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAfter all, mathematics is a purely human invention, having no basis in Scripture.
Consider, if your bank claims that you have a debt of $10,000, and you send in a payment of $1. Should your bank be able to charge you for all of those extra zeroes, when zero is worth nothing?
My proposal is gaining critical acceptance. A few years ago, then Vice President Richard Cheney stated that President Ronald Reagan had proved that deficits didn't matter. Such a statement would have been considered utter nonsense to those enslaved by the diktat that 2+2=4.
Lamorpa, thanks for at least reading my post.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would make a few suggestions.
1 Have you read those chapters in Job?
2 The gospels are eye witness accounts. Although there is a German proverb, "As reliable as an eye witness", (and I DO have some German ancestry) I have reliable reports of similar things actually happening in the world today
3 The turtle at the south pole is from a different society, and a different time. Scripture actually says, "He hangeth the circle of the earth upon nothing".
4 It also says that he has named each star. I seem to remember reading that EVERY star has its own spectrum, and that no two stars are the same
If you were interested in the truth of Genesis, perhaps it would be an idea to look for scientific reasons for the following
a Why did lifespans dramatically decrease from the time of the flood onwards and
b Why did God change diets through Genesis and Exodus? What, if any, was the connection between the two?
c What effect do telomeres have in the changes above? Perhaps their shortening came into existence after the Garden of Eden, thus making us mortal.
d Why is science suggesting that our natural life span is about 120 years, which, in fact, is clearly stated in Genesis 6, verse 3.
For Silverwolf13 Mathematics is the SCIENCE of numbers. While the number systems that we use are of human origin, and can be to any base (common are binary, decimal and duodecimal) they all follow rigid rules, which are common to ALL number systems. The human part is so-called imaginary numbers, necessary because not everything that is numerical fits within any limited man-made sets of rules
Honestly Sandy, I would not recommend claiming to be a Christian, and then making such blatantly ignorant and false statements. The Church Father, Augustine of Hippo (A.D. 354-430), wrote, "Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion. {Augustine here has referred to 1 Timothy 1.7}” "De Genesi ad litteram libri duodecim" (The Literal Meaning of Genesis" translation by J. H. Taylor in "Ancient Christian Writers, volume 41" Newman Press, 1982.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou should also consider the more recent observation, "Tis a dangerous thing to engage the authority of scripture in disputes about the natural world in opposition to reason; lest time, which brings all things to light, should discover that to be evidently false which we had made scripture assert.” "Telluris theoria sacra" (From the 1684 English edition, “The Sacred Theory of the Earth” Preface, pg. 10), Reverend Thomas Burnett (1635?-1715).
For just one example of your "mischievous false opinions," there are dozens of published observations of newly emerged species. We have observed this in both laboratory and natural settings in organisms ranging from bacteria, plants, fish, reptiles, birds and mammals.
Every one of your other "facts" are also false.
"jeenious," I wish you'd try harder to live up to either your nickname, or your claims of being a "serious, serious student of the bio-sciences." They are neither in evidence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe origin of life, AKA abiogenesis, is a very active field of research. This is particularly true in the context of searching of life beyond the earth, typically called "astrobiology." For a brief taste of where this research is today, take a look at, NASA's division of astrobiology here: http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/ . How the study of the origin of life on Earth contributes to the overall NASA scientific mission, review the presentations at the recent NASA on-line conference on, "Molecular Paleontology and Resurrection" : http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/nai/ool-www/program , or their on-line seminar series, http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/nai/seminars/
Homo erectus wasn't dumb enough to invent the internet. Don't forget that.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs human behavior - the invention of technology - the technology itself - part of evolution?
"All, and I mean all the evidence in fossils, and in living specimens of the ancestors, the ancestors were more fit."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf our ancestors were more fit, why are they all extinct? Africanus, Robustus, homo habilis, homo erectus, etc. are all gone and homo sapiens are now 6.9 billion strong. Humans are so prolific that overpopulation has become a major problem. Our big brain made us more fit.
"When we have specialtion, there is only gene loss, and a general reduction of strength, fitness to survive, lost features and a direction towards extinction."
Humans don't have to be stronger and faster to survive bec. we are smarter. We can built a crane to lift 3,500 tons and a sportscar to run 200 mph. None of our more fit ancestors can beat us in armed combat. Stone ax vs. AK-47 who do you think will survive? On average who do you think has longer life span - homo erectus or Americans?
"There is no "evolution" towards more complex or more fit. We have all the evidence on this now and DNA shows this clearly."
One billion yrs ago the only life on earth were bacteria. Today we have humans. I think humans are more complex than bacteria. Don't you think?
Not GoodScienceForYou - your understanding of complexity and evolution is not correct; life did not devolve from more perfect ancestors, but changed according to genetic and phenotypic adaptations to environmental opportunities. If this is the new twist to intelligent design, it's not much intelligent, and is constantly devolving to lower intelligence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution is a matter of knowledge or an organized body of information. Creationism, and intelligent design are a matter of power use. The question is about mind control through dogmas. The dogmas are against human freedom. So being dogmatic leads to controversy but knowledge doesn't. Frankly, what is knowledge is not brain washing else mind bending.
HSTeacher, I did not say that science has not progressed since Darwin, but the rules and assumptions of biology are well and truly stuck on Darwin's incorrect explanation of the mechanism of change.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis leads biologists to continue to attribute species change to the qualities and behaviours of individuals and ignore the effect of the external conditions that created the change by eliminating those unable to survive. All that survivors do is to keep doing what they were doing and they are unaffected by the external pressures.
What still stuns me is that the logical errors are so obvious, and that even geneticists attribute evolutionary change to Natural Selection, when their own science proves its assumptions wrong.
Mendel's experiments were simple and beautiful conceptions. They were published in 1865 and Darwin was sent a copy. He was in a better position than most to recognise its value, but he made no comment and Mendel's work lay unremarked until other researchers rediscovered it in the early C20th when they were about to do similar experiments. Rather than Mendel founding genetics, it was more like genetics researchers finding him, and I bet they were peed off when they found he had done it before them.
Darwin certainly created one of the largest advances in understanding in the history of science. That advance was the understanding that all species evolved from common origins. Reverence for that contribution should not blind scientists to the obvious logical errors in his explanation, Natural Selection.
Darwin had to make up the term Sexual Selection because he recognised that behaviours of many species at a time that was critical to which individuals were perpetuated into following generations were not compatible with the assumptions of Natural Selection. Instead of considering whether that might be evidence that his explanation was wrong, he made up another set of rules that individuals obeyed during mating, then reverted to Natural Selection in other situations.
I recommend reading chapters of Origin online. See if you can follow his argument in ch. 3 (or any other chapters) and understand why Thomas Huxley, rereading it for what he called the nth time to set out the argument of the book, still described it as the most difficult book to understand that he knew of. The difficulty comes from Darwin's descriptions that argue fro the effect of external conditions, which he then attributes to internal qualities of individuals.
http://darwin-online.org.uk/contents.html#origin
Homo erectus wasn't dumb enough to invent the internet. Don't forget that.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs human behavior - the invention of technology - the technology itself - part of evolution?
nanahuatzin, I describe Natural Selection as a cultural artefact for two reasons. First is that it came from the culture in which Darwin grew up. Darwin described it as the doctrine of Malthus applied manifold to nature because they, and Spencer and Galton all grew up in the same culture and they all had the same cultural attitudes that show in their writings. One of those beliefs was that resources were finite, so population increase must create competition. In reality, nature and human society are dynamic. All of Malthus' assumptions proved wrong, I have written about all of Darwin's assumptions being proved wrong, yet biologists still base their rules and assumptions on Natural Selection.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhich brings me to point 2. Please send some evidence that biologists test their assumptions. I have looked, particularly at propagation of bacteria or plants in close proximity. I have found no reports that give evidence to support the assumptions of Natural Selection, but have found a few that say just the opposite, but those comments have gone unnoticed.
So, my friend, I am not, as you claim, in the xixth century, but the assumptions of biology are.
Technology requires high intelligence, and high intelligence require a big and complex brain. The big and complex brain is part of evolution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is not about the teacher protest, no need to tangle separate issues.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut seriously, when will these people stop with this nonsense? Give up. Don't they have enough time to horribly mislead their children at home??
Only an indoctrinated zealot would find a problem with legislation that says, "helping students understand, analyze, critique and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught." Seriously, get a grip already. Is it going to hurt to critique the Theory of Evolution? I don't think so. If it's as accurate as its defenders claim, there's nothing to worry about, right? Relax.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScience is the communication of ideas. Some have to be considered; some have to be proved yet. But foremost it is an endeavour of the mind. Without it no science happens. Teaching right or wrong is in my opinion bad. Rather teach the open mind and provide the skill set to explore. Science faces religion in this case the craetionist view because we should still be humble in our search for knowledge. Science means gathering more knowledge of something. Hence some views are born in this limited scope of our knowledge. They do not harm eachother. It is simply our inheritance of our past. What I think is appalling is that non believers call believers names because they do not instantly fall for their arguments. How is this form of intolerance any better than the intolerance of believers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAny explanation is an attempt to deal with reality. Scientist are not synonymous with non religious people or non believers. In other words passing a bill about what to teach should be about neutral skills. How to ask questions and how to find good answers. But it should also teach how to understand spiritual believes from the past. Since biology is a scientific invention the rules are scientific creations. This means every other debate should be held in another major. Preferably a class that follows the topics in the science classes and is of an philosophical and reflective nature. Only in this way we can do right to both the scientific mind and our inheritance of the past. Freedom of speech also implies freedom of thought. Whether this is right or wrong. But it should not hinder the courage to explore our ideas with confidence that we might have it wrong. Evolution is change and therefore ideas change.
Evolution is based on SELECTION! notjust mutation,nature decides what will win the idea that people were more fit in the past is like THERE WERE GIANTS IN THOSE TIMES.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think that goodscienceforyou is a creationist in disguise. There is no place for creationists in the scientific society.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSLEB1: I agree completely (that you know absolutely nothing about science)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisZebulonJoe, I guess, thanks for at least reading my post.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy original comment stands: I've really got to assume you are kidding.
Forming literal interpretations of the Christian bible is no different than waiting for Thor to smite your enemies with his mighty hammer. I took that Christian course, 'Circular Logic,' oops I mean 'Alpha,' and could not believe functioning adults could even sit through it, let alone actually believe any of it. Seriously.
Allow me to share the following anti-evolutionary statement:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The success of Darwinism was accompanied by a decline in scientific integrity....I do not contest the fact that the advent of the evolutionary idea, due mainly to the Origin, very greatly stimulated biological research. But it appears to me that owing, precisely to the nature of the stimulus, a great deal of this work was directed into unprofitable channels or devoted to the pursuit of will-o'-the-wisps....Darwin himself considered that the idea of evolution is unsatisfactory unless its mechanism can be explained. I agree, but since no one has explained to my satisfaction how evolution could happen I do not feel impelled to say that it has happened. I prefer to say that on this matter our information is inadequate."
One may be tempted to ask what creationist wrote that comment. The answer is, no creationist wrote it. Prof. W. R. Thompson, FRS wrote it in the "Introduction" to one of the 1956 Editions of Charles Darwin's "...Origin of Species..." Creationists, however, did have some influence on the issue. The members of the British organization, Evolution Protest Movement, obtained permission to reprint the "Introduction" in booklet form in 1967. The quoted material is on pages 17, 16 and 12.
dbtinc are you an idiot? Thats not an attack but a ligitimate inquiry. Obviously creationists are not illiterate. Obviously some thought went into the proposal to teach children to look objectively and critically at prevailing scientific thought. Something you might concider trying. How can looking at the strengths and weaknesses of the theory of evolution be a bad thing for science? Shouldn't that by very definition of scientific process be the norm? Why is anyone who questions the dogma of evolution classified as stupid/ anti science? Such accusations are hardly constructive to furthering discussion of the topic and do nothing to foster an open dialog when a true concensus might be reached.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTelrunya: You specifically state where things go wrong. It is no more a useful topic for high school students to spend time questioning that validity of evolution theories in biology class than it is for them to question the theory of multiplication in mathematics class or grammar in English class. Students are taught the best available validated information. They shouldn't have to spend time getting involved in disguised sectarian debates. Scientific theories are questioned on the basis of evidence, not on the fanatical number of times or ways illogical or irrelevant questions are posed. The root of all creationists' questions are either 'I believe...' 'I have faith...' or 'Given that the deity I hold a faith-only-based belief in...'
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@laurenra7
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Is it going to hurt to critique the Theory of Evolution? "
The problem is not the critique. The problem is the teaching of religion in a science class.
lamorpa, I have given you some items from the Bible, and asked you to examine them. Rather than do that, you discard them without any test at all. Again, you call the Bible myth. Perhaps if you would test the statements, looking for evidence both for and against, instead of discarding it without question, which is what you accuse others of doing (Telrunya, for example).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI repeat, there is not one single archaeological statement in the Bible that has been disproven. In fact, recent research, mainly by digging, is proving more and more of them to be true.
Real question. If the archaeological statements are being proven true, perhaps it is worth examining some of the other statements to see if they, also, are true?
I am reminded of Galileo's remark after the conclusion of his trial for heresy.
"But the earth still goes around the sun".
By refusing to look at the evidence, either for or against, you are proving yourself to be totally unscientific. You are letting dogma stand in the way of science.
Incidentally, you call mathematics "scientific." I would prefer to call maths an exploration of the rules governing numbers. Numbers are needed in science, but whatever system of numbers you use, so far, they have limitations. Is quantum physics part of the regular set of rules for numbers, or do you need new rules, new ways of looking at numbers to understand it? Do the old rules still work? By your own statements, if you need new rules on the use of numbers to deal with new situations, then the old rules cannot be, of themselves, scientific. Or, perhaps, just a glimpse of the real world of numbers. Incidentally, while I am no mathematician, I understand that the world has one theoretical explanation (among how many?) using, I think, 11 dimensions.
Again I say, check the statements to see if there is truth within them. If there is truth there, find out why, and what it is. You are doing what you accuse others of doing, in essence, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
ZebulonJoe: "I repeat, there is not one single archaeological statement in the Bible that has been disproven."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAw, come on. People living >900 years? Noah's ark? Jonah and the whale? Samson and Delilah (do you really think physical strength is related to hair length?)Immaculate conception? Coming back alive after being dead for three days? It is a book of philosophical fables. I hope it does many people a lot of good, but it's not a historical or factual record. Even if there wasn't a sectarian motivation behind the authors, it's been rewritten to many times to be accurate. This is not a serious discussion.
Kudos for your perseverance in writing that long message explaining your view. What it demonstrates is that you don't understand the mechanism of discarding individuals that are unable to compete, and misinterpret it as a deterioration.of life forms. If that were true, the humans, cats, dogs, and jack-asses with which you are intimately familiar are less evolved than the primitive amoeba (or its forebears). It is possible that you are unable to learn even from a popularized publication like SciAm, and that a subscription to Bat Man Comics might serve you better.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisZebulonJoe: "Is quantum physics part of the regular set of rules for numbers, or do you need new rules, new ways of looking at numbers to understand it?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd here is your real point. You know as well as I do that things like quantum physics and number theory are not taught in high schools. Just as analysis of evolutionary biology is too advanced to be a high school subject.
The only reason you want to have to have an 'open debate', etc. over evolution at a high school level is because you want to introduce religous education into public schools. Keep your self-centered pious faith to your family and church. That's where they belong.
I am not advocating either religious teaching, nor yet that it should be taught anywhere, under any condition. What I am suggesting is that this debate is about two things.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst, the validity or otherwise of the Bible.
Second, about the validity or otherwise of the theory of evolution. So far, I have only seen emotional responses to both sides of the debate.
As regards evolution, I personally find that it is still only a theory. The biggest and strongest argument against it is the genetic code itself. As I said in my first post, all codes need a designer. The rule in the universe is of entropy, not development or advancement. Please note. It is called "The LAW of entropy." evolution is just a theory, and it is in contradiction to a law of the universe.
Regarding the Bible, I notice that no one has taken up my suggestion to have a serious look at what it says, particularly in light of discoveries already made in the field of archaeology. Not a single one of those discoveries has disproved any statement in the Bible. On the contrary, they consistently confirm the Bible. In other words, if it is right in that one field, surely it is worth examining and testing in other fields of knowledge.
Regarding this, we are celebrating the 400th anniversary of the publication of the King James version. It is being lauded as a literary masterpiece, even by noted atheists.
Again, I have yet to find anyone here who has actually looked at those chapters in the book of Job, 38-41. They are full of scientific questions. If you are scientists, you should at least read them to find out what they say. And good luck with the answers.
The one thing that I find surprising in this debate is the almost complete lack of rational thought. I would have thought that scientists would at least listen to reason. Also, that Christians would at least try to reason, and not fall back on emotional arguments.
Both fields here, religion and science, have a large element of faith. To exalt one over the other seems to me to completely beggar the question.
The original theory proposed by Darwin has an interesting problem. In the preface of his book, he says, specifically, that it was proposed because he could not believe in creation by God. I note that he withdrew that statement very late in life. What he is really saying is that the debate is of two different sources of faith, a choice that we must all make.
I have no difficulty with science, but, please, keep this debate on fact and not emotion.
Forget about Creationism vs. Evolution. The systemic fraud by most paleontologists is shocking.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisChris McGowan, a zoologist and paleontologist who is the author of five books on the topic of dinosaurs, proved in his book Make Your Own Dinosaur Out Of Chicken Bones: Foolproof Instructions for Budding Paleontologists that animal bones can be reconstructed to become almost anything.
On her July 2010 radio show (WOR 710AM in New York) national talk-host Joan Hamburg spoke about her early career as a paleontologist and confessed “When we dig up something we don’t really know anything. We just make it up.”
Pro-evolutionist, Bill Bryson in his best-seller “A Short History of Nearly Everything” wrote “If you correlate [fossil] tool discovery with the species of creature most found nearby, you would have to conclude that early hand tools were mostly made by antelopes…”
Especially read the entry on the ultimate arrogance of The American Museum of Natural History life-sized African diorama with two hairy homonids based on a set of footprints!
On almost every other page he writes about the chicanery, dishonesty, fraud—even murder in paleontology and archaeology. READ HIS BOOK AND FIND OUT FOR YOURSELF.
If you don't start with the bible as a premise...you'd never even bring it into a discussion...talking snake, adam and eve, santa claus, fairies, witches, dragons, zeus. Try starting by looking everywhere but the bible for an explanation...nothing leads back to it...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFurthermore, if we wish to teach high school folks about creationism; we'd need to teach everyone's (religious) versions to show just how they all measure up to the test of reasonability...don't you think?
ZebulonJoe: 1) Your definition of an emotional argument is one in which the premise of conclusion is something you do not agree with. 2) You may want to restrict your Christian bible promotion to the choir you must be used to preaching too. Sadly, your arguments remind me of Alpha: all circular logic.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisID and creationism are not not taught in science class for one reason and one reason only and that it that they are not scientific theories, they are purely philosophical in nature. Teaching them would make as such sense as studying Plato during math class.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBesides in high school you are so busy learning the basics like the table of elements, chemical reactions, terrestrial systems, electricity, cell anatomy, etc. There is practically zero time to study boarder issues like evolution. That is what Anthropology 101 is for when you get to university.
1 in 3 Americans will die from Cancer. That is evidence that 70% of the mutations are bad. It is absolute evidence that humans are not evolving but are degrading.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Human Genome Project clearly shows all the defects are mapped out in all the subjects they tested. And they spent $3,000,000,000 on this. That is absolute evidence of de-evolutoin.
This is the original definition of "evolution". It has specific etymology or word origins and meaning.
Evolution: "that theory which sees in the history of all things organic and inorganic a development from simplicity to complexity, a gradual advance from a simple or rudimentary condition to one that is more complex and of a higher character." Webster's Encyclopedic Dictionary of the English Language
Computers evolve become more complex and more fit for more work.
Humans are not. This is in absolute evidence that cannot be refuted.
Goto http://www.evolutionforum.info and read.
True.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEffectiveness is replaced by greater effectiveness. The Roman Legions defeated greater, stronger, more motivated foes because they were better organized, not because of higher I.Q.s.
Was that organization part of the evolution? Is high level behavior (including collective behavior) part of the evolved species?
Is the cosmos not made of behavior?
"I repeat, there is not one single archaeological statement in the Bible that has been disproven."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.worldagesarchive.com/Reference_Links/False_Testament_%28Harpers%29.htm
"1 in 3 Americans will die from Cancer. That is evidence that 70% of the mutations are bad. It is absolute evidence that humans are not evolving but are degrading."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWrong. 1 in 3 deaths is 33% mortality rate. That's 100 million Americans. U.S. mortality rate is only 0.8%. Deaths due to cancer is only 0.18% not 33%.
Americans are getting healthier. In 1800 the mortality rate was 3% and life expectancy was less than 40 yrs. Today, mortality rate is 0.8% and life expectancy is 78 yrs.
Intelligence and human behavior are products of evolution and culture. The cosmos is made up of matter and energy, including intelligent life.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"1 in 3 Americans will die from Cancer..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is helpful that you put this sentence first. At least anyone with the most fundamental knowledge of our current reality knew it was pointless to read further. Have you ever noticed that you are off by more than an order of magnitude in your daily life?
"Computers evolve become(sic) more complex and more fit for more work. Humans are not. This is in absolute evidence that cannot be refuted."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOh, yeah. Those computers that are designing the new computers are breaking ground with their new work. Oops, wait a minute, I forgot, isn't it humans who are designing the new computers...
Please read your history. No one was trying to remove Scopes from his job. He and his ACLU lawyer visited parents personally soliciting their signatures on a complaint so they could get the matter into court, obtain a conviction, and then appeal to overturn the law on constitutional grounds. That proved to be very difficult since Scopes was so well liked and highly regarded that no one wanted to get him into trouble even though they believed in creation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe trial itself was a circus, largely a publicity stunt for the county. Bryan and Darrow had the time of their lives. The defense had to request the jury to convict since they also didn't want to get Scopes into trouble. The penalty was overturned at first appeal based on a technicality that the judge had imposed a larger fine ($100) than he could without jury approval. The Constitutional aspect was not tested. You could say that both lost that one.
Shades of Gallilo when the establishment starts to try to legislate the "truth" and surpress falsehood in the name of scientific orthodoxy. Saying creationism shouldn't be taught because it is not science makes about as much sense as when they said evolution shouldn't be taught because it isn't religion. The problem here is both sides are claiming to have the right to surpress the other's viewpoint because it doesn't match their beliefs. Shouldn't the scientific viewpoint be to foster the examination of ALL ideas, even those that seem to be nonsense at the time, like the idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun? At one time that was nonsense. Where we be today if the powers that be had legislated that it could only be taught that the sun revolved around the Earth? Who knows? In 50 years science might discover there is a supernatural creator, or might prove there isn't. But, the dialogue will most likely continue forever.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are so many lies in the comments made by ZebulonJoe that it is hard to know just where to start. And as they show little ability to learn, it is hard to know whether to bother. But, in the hope that someone might find some advantage in a thorough debunking, I’ll post a series of remarks based on ZebulonJoe’s Comment #60 in this thread.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHis last lie in that post will be my first to rebuke. ZebulonJoe wrote, “In the preface of his book, he (Darwin, gh) says, specifically, that it was proposed because he could not believe in creation by God.” One assumes “his book” referred to “The Origin of Species.” The first edition makes no such claim. Neither does the second. Nor does any other edition or authorized printing. This is one of the more obvious of ZebulonJoe’s lies. In the front piece of Darwin’s book he selected this quote from Francis Bacon, “To conclude, therefore, let no man out of a weak conceit of sobriety, or an ill-applied moderation, think or maintain, that a man can search too far or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or in the book of God's works; divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavour an endless progress or proficience in both." Advancement of Learning.
Not the sort of thing we associate with atheism. And, Darwin personally never considered himself an atheist. At the end of his life, he wrote an autobiography for his children that was totally candid, and not intended for publication. His son Frank decided to published and edited version in 1885, and an unedited version was published in 1958 by one of his granddaughters, Nora Barlow. From the 1958 edition we can learn about Darwin’s actual religious evolution, and how it motivated his thinking about science. Darwin’s gradual lose of orthodox faith began when he realized that the geological facts exposed in the rock ridges and canyons walls could never be reconciled with the “biblical Flood geology.” But the ultimate break with the notion that Christianity was a honest revelation came with the death of his 10 year old daughter in 1851, and Darwin’s realization that according to the theology of eternal damnation of non-Christians, his father, and most of his brother’s and friends were condemned to torture by a “loving God..” He correctly called this a “damnable doctrine.”
Continued
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut, what were Darwin’s beliefs about the possibility of a telelogical universe with a supreme being? In his autobiography he made two important statements regarding his final position. These are in the quotes below;
“Another source of conviction in the existence of God, connected with the reason and not with the feelings, impresses me as having much more weight. This follows from the extreme difficulty or rather impossibility of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe, including man with his capacity of looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity. When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look to a First Cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a Theist.’
And, he continued, “This conclusion was strong in my mind about the time, as far as I can remember, when I wrote the Origin of Species; and it is since that time that it has very gradually with many fluctuations become weaker. But then arises the doubt—can the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animal, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions? May not these be the result of the connection between cause and effect which strikes us as a necessary one, but probably depends merely on inherited experience? Nor must we overlook the probability of the constant inculcation in a belief in God on the minds of children producing so strong and perhaps an inherited effect on their brains not yet fully developed, that it would be as difficult for them to throw off their belief in God, as for a monkey to throw off its instinctive fear and hatred of a snake. I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic.”
So, an Agnostic in the original sense of Huxley (who invented the concept) is someone who claims that the existence, or non-existence of a god, or gods, cannot be determined rationally. And, as Darwin states, he is a theist, in the same sense as Spinoza, when contemplating to complexity of the Universe as a whole.
Bottom line, ZebulonJoe has lied.
Bendale: "Shouldn't the scientific viewpoint be to foster the examination of ALL ideas"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAll scientific ideas, Yes. Sectarian beliefs, No. They have nothing to do with science. How could you miss such an obvious distinction? If you believe religious beliefs should be taught in public schools, do you then think scientific concepts should be explained in the Sunday morning sermon?
Special for Gary Hurd. I regret that I have never read the ctual preface that you
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisquoted. I have heard it from many sources, and have believed it to be true. If I have lied, I apologise. I will certainly check my sources more next time. On the other hand, while I have not checked the web address given earlier, I have yet to hear of any archaeological evidence that contradicts the Bible narrative. I will have time to research that info later tonight, and examine what it says, and the evidence it supplies
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe next baseless assertion made by ZebulonJoe I’ll debunk is, “As regards evolution, I personally find that it is still only a theory. The biggest and strongest argument against it is the genetic code itself. As I said in my first post, all codes need a designer.”
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere are one obvious error and two subtle ones; 1) science is not subjective- Your personal opinion is worthless without supporting data, 2) theory is the culmination of scientific work- Theory is superior to minor “laws.” The gross error is confusing the analogy of DNA transcription to human languages with actual genetics.
The first is easily disposed with; the scientific results of an experiment, properly preformed, will have the same statistically valid results whether performed by a Christian, Muslim, Jane, Jew, Hindu or miscellaneous other. If personal opinion alters experimental results, then either science is done for, or someone is cheating. There are only creationists who are unable to replicate scientific results in geology and evolutionary biology. The second of ZebulonJoe’s errors is more subtle. Successful theory is the ultimate truth in science. Evolutionary theory, might be simply reduced to “Hereditable variation (mutations) within an interbreeding population (species) is subjected to selection. Accumulated mutations will result in daughter populations reproductively isolated from the original populations (speciation).” This has been directly observed in laboratory, and natural setting. I have assembled a large selection of examples posted on “Stones and Bones,” “Emergence of New Species” http://stonesnbones.blogspot.com/2009/03/emergence-of-new-species.html
Continued
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisZebulonJoe’s next error is more difficult to expose, because it requires a bit of learning about genetics. First, the (almost nearly) universal genetic code is a strong support for Darwin’s idea of universal ancestry. Even better, the “universal” DNA code isn’t universal, and the variations are expected, and consistent with evolutionary theory. Among the most primitive of Earth’s life forms, we find that there are DNA variants, and these are consistent with our expectations from evolutionary theory. What was pleasantly surprising was that they have survived into the present.
That these genetic ‘codes’ require god(s) for their existence is debunked by research showing they are chemically demanded. See for example;
Trifonov, Edward N.
2004 "The Triplet Code From First Principles" Journal of Biomolecular Structure &
Dynamics, ISSN 0739-1102 Volume 22, Issue Number 1, (2004)
Or,
Woese, Carl
1998 “The universal ancestor” PNAS Vol. 95, Issue 12, 6854-6859, June 9
These most possibly primitive forms of life can form naturally, as demonstrated by;
Reader, J. S. and G. F. Joyce
2002 "A ribozyme composed of only two different nucleotides." Nature vol 420, pp 841-844.
Turk, Rebecca M., Natayliya V. Chumachenko, Michael Yarus
2010 “Multiple translational products from a five-nucleotide ribozyme” PNAS vol. 107 no. 10 4585-4589
Ura, Yasuyuki, John M. Beierle, Luke J. Leman, Leslie E. Orgel, M. Reza Ghadiri
"Self-Assembling Sequence-Adaptive Peptide Nucleic Acids"
Science Vol. 325 no. 5936 pp. 73-77
(There are lots more possible references, but these more than demonstrate my point).
ZebulonJoe admits, "I have never read the actual preface that you quoted. I have heard it (lies about Darwin's publications, gh) from many sources, and have believed it to be true. If I have lied, I apologise. I will certainly check my sources more next time."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRather than "check" your fraud creationist "sources," read the actual publications by Darwin. They are all avialable on-line at: "Darwin Online"
http://darwin-online.org.uk/
and, the Darwin Correspondence Project:
http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/home
ZebulonJoe wrote: "Scientifically, our genome is called the genetic code. It is my understanding that all codes are designed, and therefore have a designer. Who or what is that designer? Is it chance, the environment, or a wonderful being called the living God?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOooh... you used the word 'Scientifically', so you must know what you're talking about, and you must not be making a false analogy between genetics and computer coding in a shameless rhetorical trick. Right?
Have you ever noticed that you are off by more than an order of magnitude in your daily life?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think GoodScienceForYou is off the rails on a crazy train that's more than an order of magnitude too large to miss the sign post up ahead, the sign post saying Twilight Zone...
It is getting past my bedtime, but one more of ZebulonJoe’s falsehoods won’t take long. That would be the classic “Second Law of Thermodynamics” lie that we have dealt with since Henry Morris, and Duane Gish started using it in public debates in the early 1970s. in ZebulonJoe’s words, “The rule in the universe is of entropy, not development or advancement. Please note. It is called "The LAW of entropy." evolution is just a theory, and it is in contradiction to a law of the universe.’
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs I have mentioned, a scientific “law” is weaker than a scientific “theory.” Let me give a solid example. Ohm’s Law (1827) relates Volt’s measure of electrical potential V measured in Volts, the resistance (R) of the circuit measured in “Ohms,” and electrical conductance, I. This “law” is written; I=V/R. This illustrates a common feature of scientific “laws,” they are easily written mathematical formulas based on empirical generalizations. However, Ohm’s Law cannot generate a theory of the atom. It was in fact known well before the existence of atoms, or electrons were scientifically demonstrated. On the other hand, the general atomic *theory * as presented by Wolfgang Pauli in 1924, can derive, and more importantly *explain * Ohm’s Law.
So, there are three obvious ways to debunk the lie that the Second Law of Thermodynamics blocked Evolutionary Biology. First, the 2nd Law applies to isolated systems, that is, physical systems that have neither material, or energy inputs from outside sources. The Earth is not an isolated system. The earth constantly is bombarded with material (cosmic dust, to meteors), and energy (heat (low energy photons) to neutrinos). In this rich flux of matter and energy, complex chemical molecules and their interactions (life) are actually to be expected. Second, life does expend much more energy than non-living matter. This expenditure of energy does increase the Universal Entropy, and per the 2nd Law, life is nearly demanded as a way to maximize Entropy. (The way I came to understand this idea was to consider the energy requirements of an eddy in a river, or stream. The whirlpool of an eddy actually takes matter "up current" against the gravitational force, increasing the stream's entropy. Consider a cell as an chemical "eddy" adding to universal entropy.
But, the most important rebuke of this lie is that Evolutionary Theory is a scientific explanation of the variation, and distribution of life today, as we find it. Evolutionary Theory is independent of any particular origin of life event.
(more to follow)
"Scientifically, our genome is called the genetic code. It is my understanding that all codes are designed, and therefore have a designer. Who or what is that designer? Is it chance, the environment, or a wonderful being called the living God?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPhilosophically, if all designs need a designer, then the designer is also a design that needs a designer, ad infinitum et reductio ad absurdum. Infinite regression, circular reasoning and absurdity.
Mathematically, patterns or designs can emerge without a designer through self-organization or self-replicating principles. Conway's Game of Life is an example of this.
Scientifically, Miller and Urey produced animo acids, the building blocks of life, in lab experiments by chance not by design.
IMO no need for designer. Chance and environment are enough.
"The rule in the universe is of entropy, not development or advancement. Please note. It is called "The LAW of entropy." evolution is just a theory, and it is in contradiction to a law of the universe."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution does not violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics (entropy). Life on earth is powered by the sun. Plants make their own food through photosynthesis using sunlight. Animals including humans eat other animals and plants for food. All life depends on the sun (except for those using geothermal energy).
Life on earth decreases entropy but earth receives only a tiny fraction of the sun's total radiant energy. All of its energy dissipate in space as heat loss increasing the entropy. The total entropy of the solar system is increasing in accordance with the 2nd law of thermodynamics.
I forgot last night to add two URLs for good resources about thermodynamics;
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Entropy and the second law of thermodynamics"
http://2ndlaw.oxy.edu/
"Nonequilibrium thermodynamics of small systems"
http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0511629
ZebulonJoe wrote, “Regarding the Bible, I notice that no one has taken up my suggestion to have a serious look at what it says, particularly in light of discoveries already made in the field of archaeology. Not a single one of those discoveries has disproved any statement in the Bible.”
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are archaeological identifications of specific places named in the Bible, and even inscriptions identifying some individuals. The nearer in time the biblical references, the more likely there is independent confirmation that such a place, or person existed.
But, I will also point out that the Harry Potter books mention London, and other places that do exist. And many common artifacts known to archaeology, such as automobiles, trains, and broomsticks are frequently mentioned in the Potter Cannon. This does not make children flying on broomsticks likely, or scientifically believable.
Archaeology has disconfirmed at least two of the more important early biblical claims, the Noah’s Flood, and the great adventure story of Exodus. I recommend three books in this regard;
Finkelstein, Israel, Neil Silberman
2001 "The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts" New York: The Free Press
Dever, William
2005 “Did God Have A Wife? Archaeology And Folk Religion In Ancient Israel
Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company
Young, Davis A., Ralf F. Stearley
2008 "The Bible, Rocks and Time: Geological Evidence for the Age of the Earth" Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press
(To get the most for reading Finkelsten&Silberman, and Dever, you will also need at least;
Mazar, Amihai
1992 "Archaeology of the Land of the Bible: 10,000-586 B.C.E." The Anchor Bible Reference Library New York: ABRL/Doubleday
Stern, Ephraim
2001 "Archaeology of the Land of the Bible, Vol. II: The Asserian, Babylonian and Persian Periods (732-332 B.C.E.)" The Anchor Bible Reference Library New York: ABRL/Doubleday
But I would also recommend;
Black, Jeremy, Anthony Green, Tessa Rickards (illustrator)
2003 "Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia" Austin: University of Texas Press.
Dever, William
2001 "What Did the Biblical Writers Know & When Did They Know It?: What Archaeology can tell us about the reality of ancient Israel" Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company).
I spent much of this morning editing a comment on the Book of Job. But, the SiAm nannybot didn't like it, and I finally gave up trying to guess the problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInstead, I posted it to my blog, "Stones and Bones."
http://stonesnbones.blogspot.com/2011/03/scientific-american-nannybot-objected.html
Hi Gary...I visited your blog. Been on the San Diego a few times myself in my prior life. Arguing these points with the religious is a waste of time. No matter how many degrees we have, their preacher is smarter than us. And how can we argue with his immense intelligence...he has all these people believing his lies and he even makes a living at it. For example, I see the story of Job as something to make you fear the god. After all, a god that would make a bet with the devil that he can't torture a man so much that he would renounce his faith is a pretty fearsome entity. But a preacher will tell you that it is a story about FAITH in god. Faith and fear are synonyms in religion.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut the idea of teaching proper science in the schools has great importance. All we can do is keep chipping away at the new generations with our goal of becoming a truly secular society.
Side note...Australia was soooooo lucky. They have a VERY secular society, and do you know why? They got the criminals and we got the puritans. Criminals can adapt. Puritans are stuck in the bible.
Cheers
It is most sad there are so many people who are unable to even percieve that their faith-based idea of a creator deity only exists within that personal faith-based belief. Many are so singularly indoctrinated they use the term (capitalized)'god', referring to only the Judeo-Christian version. They'll ask the question, "Do you believe in God?" when what they mean is, "Do you actually not believe in the Judeo-Christian god that I 'know' exists?" (None have actually ever shown 'him' to me) I am glad people feel their beliefs with such strength. I wish they could understand that it does not make it any more true for someone else.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Theists, encountering someone not believing in their
deity, feel they must call them atheists or fiends."
Everyone's personal faith-based beliefs are precicely correct for just one person: themselves, and cannot be made 'true' for someone else. Sadly, the ones I am addressing will not be able to grasp this (and hope I 'wake up' and see what is so 'obvious' to them).
Gary, thanks for the invitation re the flood, and the Exodus.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe bible narrative on the flood does say that there were survivors, but only Noah and his family from the descendants of Seth (Gen 4:20ff names them). Also, there is at least SOME archaeological evidence. Sir (Edward?) Woolley, writes, re his excavations of Ur of the Chaldees, that there was an earlier Ur, under about 8 feet of clay on the same site. The probable cause of the flood was the collapse of the walls of a Russian lake, plus a few other major events. Yes, I actually have his book on my bookshelf.
re the Exodus. You are obviously missing data that came out of the First Gulf War. Just like the great US trek westward is still visible by satellite photos, so there is still evidence of the Exodus. Satellite pics c 1991 still show it. The only problem is that people have been looking in the wrong place. The actual exodus was across the Sinai peninsula, and crossed the Red Sea about a third of the way down the Gulf of Aqaba. The remains of Egyptian chariots have been reported recovered there in the last few months.
I have a video tape of the actual places named, and they are all in Saudi Arabia. From memory, it is called "The mountain that burned." The place of crossing leads directly to an oasis of bitter water, called Meribah in the OT. It actually has pictures in it of most of the events named in Exodus. It is about one hour in length. Yes, I mean events. There are still calves engraved in the rocks, and the rock that was split is massive. And the mountain really is black, burned.
Because the places are in Saudi Arabia, very few people have access, so the real exodus has been hidden for a long time.
And, thanks for the addresses for Darwin's books. I will read them with pleasure.
btw, I have been using Ohm's Law since my early teens, so I do know the the difference between a law and theory. At present, on that subject we are really discussing semantics. To me, a law is higher than a theory. A theory is an UNproven proposition, a law is set. The theory may have supporting evidence, but it is still open for new evidence, and different interpretations.
Re amino acids made in the lab. I remember the reports when it first happened. I also seem to remember that the added energy was in very large amounts, electrical discharge in a flask. And there is still no sign of the actual source of the spark of life.
ZebulonJoe, "To me, a law is higher than a theory. A theory is an UNproven proposition, a law is set. The theory may have supporting evidence, but it is still open for new evidence, and different interpretations."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou do not know the difference, or even what a scientific theory is, regardless of the particular science. So-called scientific "laws" are a data regularity that can be easily expressed in a formula. A hypothesis is a prediction based on theory, which has yet to be tested, or observed. Testing a hypothesis is how we confirm, or disconfirm the validity of a scientific theory. This is freshman philosophy of science.
A key hypothesis of evolutionary theory is the emergence of new species. This has been confirmed. A key hypothesis of evolutionary theory is the matching taxonomies based on either physical attributes, or DNA sequence. This has been confirmed. And so on... Every competently constructed challenge to evolutionary theory has confirmed the validity of evolutionary theory. Darwin predicted that the evolution of the eye was due to minor variations that accumulated over time. This has been confirmed. He also predicted the existence of fossils which would be intermediates between existing species. This has been confirmed, repeatedly.
Theory that has successfully answered challenges for 150 years is more securely, and generally true than any "law."
"Re amino acids made in the lab. I remember the reports when it first happened. I also seem to remember that the added energy was in very large amounts, electrical discharge in a flask. And there is still no sign of the actual source of the spark of life."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe electrical discharge in the experiment was a simulation of lightning in nature. Lightning was the 'spark of life' so to speak. Btw, not only animo acids but also synthetic DNA, synthetic virus and synthetic bacterium had been created in the lab.
Gary, you are not listening. I gave my reasons for considering that a law is of greater value than a theory. Yes, it is semantics. But you have simply either refused to understand my reasoning, or are taking my arguments completely out of context. If we are not using the same understanding of words, we cannot hold any rational discussion. I seem to remember that The Queen of Hearts gave your reasons for words. Or is it the other way around?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd you have yet to answer my comments on either the flood of Noah, or the Exodus.
ZebulonJoe, you are referring to Sir Charles Leonard Woolley (1880 –1960), a British archaeologist known for his "strong biblical bias" and "vivid historical imagination." His excavations in Mesopotamia were published as “Ur of the Chaldees” (1929) reissued 1954, 1965 as “Excavations at Ur.” He claimed he had discovered the "Flood," a claim that was repeatedly shown to be untrue.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suggest you read a sober account of the so-called “archaeological support for the Flood.” Specifically, “The Flood: Mesopotamian Archaeological Evidence” David MacDonald (1988) Reports of the National Center for Science Education, Volume 8, Number 2: 14–20.
http://ncse.com/cej/8/2/flood-mesopotamian-archaeological-evidence
You insist on using terms and concepts incompetently, and egocentrically (eg. law, theory, hypothesis). You seem determined to remain ignorant. I see no further reason to reply to you.
ZebulonJoe: I'm not sure if you realize this, but this is a Scientific American forum, not some fundamentalist, creationist choir you are preaching to. Just repeating and repeating your points, coming up with new unsubstantiated rumors, or referring to the work of disguised sectarian 'scholars' does not further any assertions in a scientific community. Each time you post, your points are shown to incorrect by one or more scientifically referenced sources. You seem to think that if you keep posting you 'win' and you may, in your mind, but in reality, it just gets more and more comical. What else can I say? Preach to the christian choir who want to hear this kind of pseudo(at best) 'science'. You'll have a happy (albeit ignorant) audience.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGary,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou have some facts that are not yet proven or have been controversial among scientists. Darwin was hesitant about the structure of the eye. This has proven difficult to say it has evolved gradually over time. In fact, in most circles the eye is seen as a development of "punctuated evolution" or when changes occurred not gradually but in certain instances by leaps. Many evolutionary "facts" are still problematic because unlike physics or chemistry they cannot be tested in the laboratory. They are interpreted fossil records. This is not to say evolution did not occur, but these facts are not known with certainty. There is a lot of historical reconstruction and interpretation involved.
Darwin selected the evolution of the eye because it had been emphasized in William Paley's "Natural Theology (1827)." In Chapter VI or "The Origin of Species" Darwin starts a section called "Organs of Extreme Perfection" with Paley's position, and then presented his explanation of the evolution of visual systems. It was mostly correct. Things I think Darwin did not give enough attention to was the independent evolution of many kinds of eyes. But, he correctly inferred that eyes generally would share a light sensitive chemistry. We in fact have found the homologous chemical, and genetic origins of our eye chemistry in bacteria.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrankly, anyone writing "in most circles the eye is seen as a development of "punctuated evolution," is obviously someone who is miles distant from any serious discussion of evolution.
A short article that should sweep the cobwebs from your eyes;
Dan-E. Nilsson and Susanne Pelger, 1994, "A Pessimistic Estimate of the Time Required for an Eye to Develop," Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, vol. 256. pp. 53-58
For a much wider vision of eyes evolving:
"Evolution: Education and Outreach" Volume 1 / 2008 - Volume 3 / 2010
http://www.springerlink.com/content/m3k441k67q3n/
I would point out that for professionals, the amount of "guess work" in paleontology seems far less than it appears to people perfectly ignorant of the field. That extends also to the false idea that evolutionary facts are not testable in laboratory, and natural settings.
Oops. Paley published "Natural Philosophy" in 1802.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDangnabit,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Natural Theology; or, Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity" William Paley (1802).
Scheech.
Those who still think that creationism is scientific. Read the case briefs of Edwards vs. Aguillard. It was a landmark case of creationism vs. evolution that reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987. Both sides presented their best arguments. 72 Nobel laureates, 17 state academies of science and 7 scientific organizations argued for evolution. The Supreme Court decided in favor of evolution and ruled that creationism is religion not science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBtw, the bible flood story was probably just copied by the Hebrews from an older Sumerian myth that told the same story but predates the bible by over 1,000 yrs. (2800 BC)
If the flood story was true, then the real Noah was Sumerian not Jewish and did recognize the Jewish god Yahweh. No wonder the archeological evidence supposedly supporting the flood story was found in Ur - an ancient Sumerian city.
But it was probably not true due to the impossibility of fitting millions of species of animals including their food and water in a 450 by 75 by 45 feet boat. How do you prevent them from preying on each other?
Correction: If the flood story was true, then the real Noah was Sumerian not Jewish and did NOT recognize the Jewish god Yahweh.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Sumerian flood myth and 'Noah' predates Judaism and Abraham, the biblical ancestor of the Jews.
There is no more science behind evolution than there is creation. Thats why it's called evolutionary theory, not fact. In fact you can come closer to proving creationism than evolution. Creation demands a creator. Did your television evolve? How about your car? Use common sense people. Evolution can not be proven.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisjlh69's comment, "Creation demands a creator. Did your television evolve? How about your car?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisjlh69, can your TV reproduce? How about your car? Do they have blueprints (does anything still have blueprints?) that are able to replicate? And do these self replicating blueprints recombine chemically with viable variations that are subjected to natural selection?
Life results from the chemical environment enclosed in a membrane. Trillions of these experiments in evolution happen every second. Even with that sort of rate, it took billions of years to grow an organism more elaborate than a colonial bacterial slime.
Creationism is based on science denial, and halucinations. There is no sciecne of creationism.
The Exodus story was probably a myth not history because it contradicts archeological evidence. According to biblical chronology, the exodus happened 1450-1400 BC. Joshua defeated the Canaanites and took over the Promised Land (Canaan). But based on archeological evidence, Jericho was uninhabited at that time. So the biblical battle of Jericho occurred when the city was uninhabited.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEither the battle and the exodus never took place or they didn't happen at the time the bible said they did. That's indicative of human error not divine wisdom.
http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2011/03/05/news-to-note-03052011
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this5th article down.
You may want to put some basic essential things into a comment before posting it (like truth or coherence).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHello psu80. I want to bring up that The Big Bang Theory is as "unscientific" as Creationism. The idea that the universe created itself violates the rules of thermodynamics. Also, it deifies nature. Finally, the whole naturalistic set of so-called "science" is only an attempt to explain away God.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually, the job in the science classroom ends with examining the evidence to determine whether the universe was created or just "happened." After that, it is up to theology and history.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHello. I shall start 3 "mini" debates. This is the first of those. I'll try to keep it as scientifically based as possible, but if anyone wishes to start a theological branch of the debate, I shall be happy to accommodate. Here is the first debate starter: The Big Bang Theory is not scientific. It violates the Laws of Thermodynamics to say that the universe made itself (sorry for the oversimplification). This is not to say that intelligent design is "scientific." It is simply to pull naturalism off its scientific "higher ground."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy second debate starter: How did life begin? as of so far, I have not heard a convincing (or possible) naturalistic explanation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy third debate starter: There is much evidence of the earth being 10,000 years old as opposed to 2-3 billion. Much of this evidence is on www.icr.org. How do you account for that? Please do NOT say "under education" as my last opponent did. He is still trying to refute the specific examples of evidence I brought up.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou don't understand the evidence. We are not getting better. Our genomes are degrading and faster than ever.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suggest you stop the religious arguments. DNA is absolutely, irrefutable, physical evidence that all creatures have de-evolved from a condition of better fitness to much weaker, less intelligent and less able to survive.
They have mapped over 4,000 genetic defects and we are just getting started, that are propagating in the human species.
People live longer because of artificial means.
If you take a modern human and put them in the wild with no medical care they will die young. The human genome cannot survive in harsh environments. It has been weakened as is shown in the absolute evidence, atavisms, gene losses (pseudo genes), poor cell replication from screwed up protean instructions, dead genes that are completely stopped from producing cells, and just plain diseased genetics.
Evolution is a fraud, and is full of mystical human "magical thinking" emotion mental garbage faith and belief. There is no magic "evolution fairy" that fixes our genomes.
If you want to believe in evolution you are just delusional.
This is THE definition of evolution:
Evolution: "that theory which sees in the history of all things organic and inorganic a development from simplicity to complexity, a gradual advance from a simple or rudimentary condition to one that is more complex and of a higher character." Webster's Encyclopedic Dictionary of the English Language.
There is no advances towards more intelligent, more complex nor more fit to survive. Humans are heading for extinction by not taking care of their existing genomes from self destructive habits.
Wake up from you delusions and look at the facts.
Do you religious Evotards ever look at any of the recent findings that refute all of what you believe? HMM?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is no evolution. All of the hominids are degenerated humans. There is evidence of humans living in Israel at 400,000 to 500,000 years ago.
The Herto is far superior super human compared to the retarded homo erectus which is retarded by radiation that destroyed much of its genome until it went extinct.
Just like the Chimpanzee is now nearly extinct and so is the Gorilla, and Orangutan. These creatures are from the same genetic lineage as humans. They are retarded, and de-evolved to the point of extinction. This is exactly where humans are heading.
There is no magical "mutations" that fix the genome once it is damaged. It is a religious ideology that does not fit with reality.
DNA evidence is (listen read carefully) absolutely, irrefutable, physical evidence of de-evolution.
There is only genetic loss, atavisms, genes that are not performing correctly, and just plain dead atrophied genetic functions. That is not evolution. That is the Truth!
Unless you can find the magical mystical mutations that are saving us from extinction, then shut up!
Evotards are religious nut cases, who disguise their religious beliefs in science. You degrade science and make a mockery of science.
How stupid does a person have to be to think the humans evolved from fish??? It is outrageous human moronic religious crap.
While you are promoting this human garbage belief, humans are now having severe genetic diseases, and it continues to degrade from our lifestyles that is basically ruining our planet and our genome faster than ever. There are over 4000 genetic defects mapped so far, and we are just starting.
Any Evotards need to be mocked and put in jail for fraud, for teaching this crap to our children. It is a form of religious mental abuse to inflict this crap on young children and victimizing them as you have been victimized by this disgusting Evodelusionism religion.
Unless you have absolutely irrefutable physical evidence to back your stupid beliefs, then shut the F up! You are degrading science.
Do you religious Evotards ever look at any of the recent findings that refute all of what you believe? HMM?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is no evolution. All of the hominids are degenerated humans. There is evidence of humans living in Israel at 400,000 to 500,000 years ago.
The Herto is far superior super human compared to the retarded homo erectus which is retarded by radiation that destroyed much of its genome until it went extinct.
Just like the Chimpanzee is now nearly extinct and so is the Gorilla, and Orangutan. These creatures are from the same genetic lineage as humans. They are retarded, and de-evolved to the point of extinction. This is exactly where humans are heading.
There is no magical "mutations" that fix the genome once it is damaged. It is a religious ideology that does not fit with reality.
DNA evidence is (listen read carefully) absolutely, irrefutable, physical evidence of de-evolution.
There is only genetic loss, atavisms, genes that are not performing correctly, and just plain dead atrophied genetic functions. That is not evolution. That is the Truth!
Unless you can find the magical mystical mutations that are saving us from extinction, then shut up!
Evotards are religious nut cases, who disguise their religious beliefs in science. You degrade science and make a mockery of science.
How stupid does a person have to be to think the humans evolved from fish??? It is outrageous human moronic religious crap.
While you are promoting this human garbage belief, humans are now having severe genetic diseases, and it continues to degrade from our lifestyles that is basically ruining our planet and our genome faster than ever. There are over 4000 genetic defects mapped so far, and we are just starting.
Any Evotards need to be mocked and put in jail for fraud, for teaching this crap to our children. It is a form of religious mental abuse to inflict this crap on young children and victimizing them as you have been victimized by this disgusting Evodelusionism religion.
Unless you have absolutely irrefutable physical evidence to back your stupid beliefs, then shut the F up! You are degrading science.
Evolution: "that theory which sees in the history of all things organic and inorganic a development from simplicity to complexity, a gradual advance from a simple or rudimentary condition to one that is more complex and of a higher character." Webster's Encyclopedic Dictionary of the English Language.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou morons have even changed definitions to fit with your religion. There is only degradation shown in all the evidence of ALL multi-cellular creatures.
IF you had any objective awareness you can easily see this in all the fossils. The oldest was bigger, stronger better fit to survive. I don't care what creature. The mouse was much larger, much stronger, had better bone structure. The cat, go look you morons. The elephant. The dog. It is friggin obvious as hell.
The common religion of Evodelusionism is now taught in most schools. It is just a mythological ideology, basically another Human Emotional Mental Garbage religion.
I mean you people really believe that fish got out of the water, grew lungs, legs, and decided to become human? WTF is the matter with your brain? Could it be politically driven HEMG, by a bunch of retarded humans?
This is absolute evidence of human stupidity.
The absolutely irrefutable physical evidence is in the DNA. It negates any form of this religious BS.
70% of the mutations are deleterious..BAD, harmful, weaken the cell structures or completely screw up the original DESIGN.
1% "may be". positive. This is from peer reviewed evidence.
Goto any site that lists genetic diseases.
If Evolution were true, there would be no diseases! PERIOD. There is no magical BS that fixes screwed up genetics. That is like crashing your car and by some magical scientific process it fixes itself. Are you really THAT gullible and stupid?
That is 70 to 1 against any form of positive advancement.
There is only retardation, loss of gene expression, atavisms, genetic dysfunction, and genetic diseases. The rest is what is left of our genetic engineering.
How gullible are you to believe in fairy tales of "Evolution". It is called "Evodelusionism" the religion of the weak minded.
goto The "Neutral Evolution Forum" and learn. Google it.
In case you don't ever take a look around. You and your family are sick from genetic diseases.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe odds of you being limited by genetic degradation is 100%
There are over 7000 known genetic diseases. We know these are diseases because we have specimens of the prior fit condition in the human species. Read that a few hundred times until you understand it.
The statistics on genetic diseases is very alarming. 1 in 10 people have rare genetic diseases. 1 in 3 people ages 15 to 64 will die from cancer in the US.
In case you don't ever take a look around. You and your family are sick from genetic diseases.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe odds of you being limited by genetic degradation is 100%
There are over 7000 known genetic diseases. We know these are diseases because we have specimens of the prior fit condition in the human species. Read that a few hundred times until you understand it.
The statistics on genetic diseases is very alarming. 1 in 10 people have rare genetic diseases. 1 in 3 people ages 15 to 64 will die from cancer in the US. 1 in 12 have diabetes and the percentage is rising. From 1975 to 1995 the rate of childhood invasive cancer has risen 129% and is higher now. 1 in 15 have heart disease. Childhood Suicide is related to genetic brain diseases.
This does not account for what we consider to be normal malfunctions of structure, like bad backs, bad knees, flat feet, knocked knees, short legs that make us walk in circles in the desert from being out of symmetry.
I have asked thousands of scientists on various forums to produce any positive mutations in the human genome studies. So, far all of them are associated with diseases.
There is no genetic mechanism that causes increased fitness. DNA is absolutely irrefutable on this.
When a genetic structure is damaged by a mutation, it is damaged.
There is no magical mutation fairy that makes improvements. This violates the laws of science.
Evodelusionism is a religion of people who like myths and don't want to see what is really going on. The truth is we are heading for extinction. First we will continue to degrade and we will start having shorter and shorter lives with more suffering and less intelligence as we progress towards the point of extinction.
There are at the present time over 47000 mammals and birds on the endangered species list. I a short time, comparatively, we will be on that list, but there will be no one with any brain left to make the list.
If you have an sanity left, you would start to support ways of preserving what is left of our genome.
Actually the idea of Evolution of simple life from fish to humans is a religious myth. I don't think that any religious ideas need to be taught to our children in public schools.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually, I think we should abolish public schools, since they only seem to be the indoctrination ground for political correctness, and removing freedoms from children.