What are Darwinists so afraid of?

worldnetdaily.com ^ | 07/27/2006 | Jonathan Witt

[BrandtMichaels]

What are Darwinists so afraid of?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: July 27, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Jonathan Witt © 2006

As a doctoral student at the University of Kansas in the '90s, I found that my professors came in all stripes, and that lazy ideas didn't get off easy. If some professor wanted to preach the virtues of communism after it had failed miserably in the Soviet Union, he was free to do so, but students were also free to hear from other professors who critically analyzed that position.

Conversely, students who believed capitalism and democracy were the great engines of human progress had to grapple with the best arguments against that view, meaning that in the end, they were better able to defend their beliefs.

Such a free marketplace of ideas is crucial to a solid education, and it's what the current Kansas science standards promote. These standards, like those adopted in other states and supported by a three-to-one margin among U.S. voters, don't call for teaching intelligent design. They call for schools to equip students to critically analyze modern evolutionary theory by teaching the evidence both for and against it.

The standards are good for students and good for science.

Some want to protect Darwinism from the competitive marketplace by overturning the critical-analysis standards. My hope is that these efforts will merely lead students to ask, What's the evidence they don't want us to see?

Under the new standards, they'll get an answer. For starters, many high-school biology textbooks have presented Haeckel's 19th century embryo drawings, the four-winged fruit fly, peppered moths hidden on tree trunks and the evolving beak of the Galapagos finch as knockdown evidence for Darwinian evolution. What they don't tell students is that these icons of evolution have been discredited, not by Christian fundamentalists but by mainstream evolutionists.

We now know that 1) Haeckel faked his embryo drawings; 2) Anatomically mutant fruit flies are always dysfunctional; 3) Peppered moths don't rest on tree trunks (the photographs were staged); and 4) the finch beaks returned to normal after the rains returned – no net evolution occurred. Like many species, the average size fluctuates within a given range.

This is microevolution, the age-old observation of change within species. Macroevolution refers to the evolution of fundamentally new body plans and anatomical parts. Biology textbooks use instances of microevolution such as the Galapagos finches to paper over the fact that biologists have never observed, or even described in theoretical terms, a detailed, continually functional pathway to fundamentally new forms like mammals, wings and bats. This is significant because modern Darwinism claims that all life evolved from a common ancestor by a series of tiny, useful genetic mutations.

Textbooks also trumpet a few "missing links" discovered between groups. What they don't mention is that Darwin's theory requires untold millions of missing links, evolving one tiny step at a time. Yes, the fossil record is incomplete, but even mainstream evolutionists have asked, why is it selectively incomplete in just those places where the need for evidence is most crucial?

Opponents of the new science standards don't want Kansas high-school students grappling with that question. They argue that such problems aren't worth bothering with because Darwinism is supported by "overwhelming evidence." But if the evidence is overwhelming, why shield the theory from informed critical analysis? Why the campaign to mischaracterize the current standards and replace them with a plan to spoon-feed students Darwinian pabulum strained of uncooperative evidence?

The truly confident Darwinist should be eager to tell students, "Hey, notice these crucial unsolved problems in modern evolutionary theory. Maybe one day you'll be one of the scientists who discovers a solution."

Confidence is as confidence does.

[freedumb2003]

Thanks for the reminder. I warned him back then.

[RFC_Gal]

From the first result

In physics, the graviton is a hypothetical elementary particle that transmits the force of gravity in the framework of quantum field theory. If it exists, the graviton must be massless (because the gravitational force has unlimited range) and must have a spin of 2 (because gravity is a second-rank tensor field).

Gravitons are postulated because of the great success of the quantum field theory (in particular, the Standard Model) at modeling the behavior of all other forces of nature with similar particles: electromagnetism with the photon, the strong interaction with the gluons, and the weak interaction with the W and Z bosons. In this framework, the gravitational interaction is mediated by gravitons, instead of being described in terms of curved spacetime like in general relativity. In the classical limit, both approaches give identical results.

However, attempts to extend the Standard Model with gravitons run into serious theoretical difficulties at high energies (processes with energies close or above the Planck scale) because of infinities arising due to quantum effects (in technical terms, gravitation is nonrenormalizable.) Some proposed theories of quantum gravity (in particular, string theory) address this issue. In string theory, gravitons (as well as the other particles) are states of strings rather than point particles, and then the infinities do not appear, while the low-energy behavior can still be approximated by a quantum field theory of point particles. In that case, the description in terms of gravitons serves as a low-energy effective theory.

Since gravity is very weak, there is little hope of detecting single gravitons experimentally in the foreseeable future[citation needed].

[Just mythoughts]

There are two different days of creation described. Those in described in chapter 1 do not fit the same description as chapter 2.

Which explains what DNA categorically proves. I did not write Genesis I only read what it says.

Further we are given Adam's generations to Noah, Noah to Abraham all the way to Christ. ALLLLLL things point to Christ that one who is called the tree of life, in more than one place.

What you call "extrapolate" comes from what you have been trained to believe not what was Written by Moses those many years ago. Moses was not in the Garden and so what he penned was inspired by the Heavenly Father for us to this day.

Now you think the Heavenly Father would not know about Darwin and his controversy???? We are talking about the one who knows our very thoughts and who knew even in that Garden there would be Christ to come and partake of flesh just as Hebrews 2:14 says.

[Gumlegs]

I knew it. You were working toward a trap, making a setup. Sorry to frustrate you. You can't dispute that Christians established hundreds of hospitals and schools, so you go back centuries and dredge up irrelevancies.

Jim Jones is not going back centuries and is hardly irrelevent. There are many documented depredations that have occurred under cover of the church. I have not claimed they are representative of Christianity (or Judiasm, or any other religion). I bring them up to illustrate how you use guilt by association. That's why I referred to the post in which you stated, "The association between evolution and totalitarian socialism can't be denied, and you make no attempt to deny it."

Any association between Hitler and the Theory of Evolution is exactly the same as the association between Hitler and Christianity: he used evolutionary theory in exactly the same way he used Christianity, but you can't seem to see that or won't admit it.

I have no desire to "dispute that Christians established hundreds of hospitals ... " etc. It's not rationally open to dispute. Originally, I was pointing out that some universities had been established by other than "Christian churches," in response to another poster. It happens to be a fact. You took it from there, claiming that there was no functional difference between Christian churches and christians. I asked if that sort of thinking pertained to anything other than founding colleges. You've been bobbing and weaving ever since.

Jim Jones was not any kind of orthodox Christian. He was a typical cult leader, with a cult of personality centered around himself (not God or Jesus), enslavement of believers, etc.

And, no doubt, no true Scotsman.

Gumlegs: Shall we save some time here and stipulate that you want to claim all good resulting from any Christian association whatever and disavow all ill effects?"

I'm going to save my time and not fall into your trap. Sorry to disappoint you.

Actually, you haven't. You've done exactly what I expected.

You anti-religious zealots always want to put your words into the mouths of others. Nice try.

No, I want to examine the logical implications of your words. I'll try and make this as plain as possible. Your position appears to be that any good resulting from a church or church-goer is to the credit of Christianity. But when it comes to science, you're saying that any possible ill effects of a scientific theory, including gross distortions and misapplications having nothing whatever to do with the theory itself, reflect badly on the theory.

You can't have it both ways.

[wyattearp]

"Look up what the word "man" means."

From Dictionary.com:

---

man Audio pronunciation of "man" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (mn)
n. pl. men (mn)

1. An adult male human.
2. A human regardless of sex or age; a person.
3. A human or an adult male human belonging to a specific occupation, group, nationality, or other category. Often used in combination: a milkman; a congressman; a freeman.
4. The human race; mankind: man's quest for peace.
5. Zoology. A member of the genus Homo, family Hominidae, order Primates, class Mammalia, characterized by erect posture and an opposable thumb, especially a member of the only extant species, Homo sapiens, distinguished by a highly developed brain, the capacity for abstract reasoning, and the ability to communicate by means of organized speech and record information in a variety of symbolic systems.
6. A male human endowed with qualities, such as strength, considered characteristic of manhood.
7. Informal.
1. A husband.
2. A male lover or sweetheart.
8. men
1. Workers.
2. Enlisted personnel of the armed forces: officers and men.
9. A male representative, as of a country or company: our man in Tokyo.
10. A male servant or subordinate.
11. Informal. Used as a familiar form of address for a man: See here, my good man!
12. One who swore allegiance to a lord in the Middle Ages; a vassal.
13. Games. Any of the pieces used in a board game, such as chess or checkers.
14. Nautical. A ship. Often used in combination: a merchantman; a man-of-war.
15. often Man Slang. A person or group felt to be in a position of power or authority. Used with the: “Their writing mainly concerns the street lifethe pimp, the junky, the forces of drug addiction, exploitation at the hands of ‘the man’” (Black World).

---

And your point is...

[HayekRocks]

ID sez that those things are part of the design. The universe works the way it does because of the physical laws and constants (actually, the constants probably derive FROM the laws). Including creating the lightning that zapped your primordial soup and caused the WTBE dandelions to evolve.

Well, the problem I see is that that goes no further than the name 'Intelligent Design'. So it was designed. How was the design carried out? Who was the designer? All ID seems to say is that somebody did it. Evolution says it happened. Evolution then goes on to ask how, and when, and why, and where it happened. What other questions should ID lead us to ask?

or the first part, you are assuming that anyone who has faith also has no thirst for scienctific knowledge. I am a network engineer, an amateur astronomer, and am constantly studying science of some type, and yet I can see the rationality of a designed universe. I am neither confused nor alienated.

I would not dream of claiming a person of faith has no thirst for scientific knowledge. What I question is why a person of faith would throw up his hands and decline to look for a scientific explanation, saying instead that somehow at some point, that we can stop looking for a scientific chain of cause and effect, and instead it must have been designed. As for spirituality, I don't see why looking for scientific explanations is inconsistent with spirituality.

[hellbender]

"The rudeness was in not pinging him -- it is FR etiquette."

There was no rudeness intended. I've never pinged anyone before, and didn't know that "rule." However, the evo-fanatics engage in real, intentional, savage rudeness and outright insults on almost every page of these threads, like implying their opponents are posting while on drugs, sneering at their qualifications to engage in debate, etc. etc.

Much of the ignorance you ascribe to others is merely an arrogant pretext for dismissing them. Ignatz is an example: obviously an intelligent and literate guy, but one who refused to bow down and worship the evoid elite, so he had to be trashed by your allies.

In fact, revulsion at the nasty rhetoric (indistinguishable from that of the Left) from the evo-obsessed, and at the insults heaped on believers, is about the only reason I post anything on these threads. Neither side ever changes its position, and the issue is hardly a central one for most conservatives. These evo threads are a waste of bandwidth.

[jwalsh07]

Wyatt, abiogenesis is an unfalsifiable proposition. To falsify the claim that life came from non life you would have had to witness every chemical reaction since t=0+.

Miller's experiment was a failed attempt to falsify biogenesis. You see the difference?

By your standards, chemical evolution (abiogenesis) can not be science if in fact your standard for judging science is falsifiability.

Perhaps you should rethink just what sceince is and isn't.

[Gumlegs]

Tell my how "God with us" is Christian doctrine.

I never said it was. The rest of your post was answered in my last post to you.

[Just mythoughts]

Wrong dictionary try the Strong's for that particular verse for the Hebrew meaning for the word man. Man can mean different things and the translation does not always give the English reader what the Hebrew actually says.

Moses penned Genesis in Hebrew not English, then the translators did the best they could per the letter attached in that King James translation back in 1611.

[xzins]

I am talking about the body that Jesus had after the resurrection. (See 1 Cor 15)

[HayekRocks]

By your standards, chemical evolution (abiogenesis) can not be science if in fact your standard for judging science is falsifiability.,

If you'll pardon my intrusion, this is a category error.

A scientific theory, according to Popper's naive falsifiability, should be falsifiable. However, is 'abiogenesis' a scientific theory? I would argue that it is not. It might be a research program. Physics is indubitably science, but it is not falsifiable.

[xzins]

Well, you are not describing the Theory of Evolution.

You do not agree that at least one presentation of the Theory of Evolution states that it demonstrates there is no God?

[RFC_Gal]

I wasn't aware that the ToE stated anything for/against God.

I assume you can provide a source to support your statement, I would take it as a kindness if you provided such a source.

[HayekRocks]

You do not agree that at least one presentation of the Theory of Evolution states that it demonstrates there is no God

I do not agree. In fact, this goes against everything I have ever been taught.

[King Prout]

fixity of species and separate creation:

"The Jews are undoubtedly a race, but not human. They cannot be human in the sense of being an image of God, the Eternal. The Jews are the image of the Devil. Jewry means the racial tuberculosis of the nations." - Adolf Hitler, during a speech. May, 1923

[js1138]

You do not agree that at least one presentation of the Theory of Evolution states that it demonstrates there is no God?

WTF are you smoking?

[jwalsh07]

You may argue anything you wish but the fellow I'm having a discussion with called it a theory. Nor were we discussing physics so you lose me there entirely.

But I'm interested in hierarchial Popperism. I take it that hypotheses that are not falsifiable may be science?

[HayekRocks]

But I'm interested in hierarchial Popperism. I take it that hypotheses that are not falsifiable may be science?

Most modern philosophers of science would say yes.

[jwalsh07]

So would I but I favor the original definition of science which was taught to me by Mrs. Mosely in high school physics, that being that science is a search for knowledge.