Posted on 07/27/2006 3:00:03 PM PDT by 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.
>>I commited the capital crime of saying that AC was against modern science.
It appears to have upset some people.<<
No, you referenced one website and told another poster to PM you for more information. People can read the whole thread if they like.
I really don't think upset is the correct term. But I do have to say that I have kiddies to get to bed and so I will wish you a good night.
It is a THEORY. Theories do not ever get "proven."
There is a gap between every different kind of fossil. That would be not thousands of holes but brazillions. It's not a theorem, and certainly not theorems, but a mere classification scheme.
How about ligers? </Napoleon Dynamite>
Gasp!
And yet you're still here!? Well, well ... well done then!
Okay. Don't bring up posts from an unrelated thread.
The problem is that in the public schools, ONLY Darwinism is taught.
Isn't it against the rules to post tons and tons of links? If it isn't against the rules it still isn't very polite so I didn't do it.
I produced one such link a published it on the public side. I also replied to someone in private and provided 4-5 links. I reused the link because it saved time.
Being on dial up I don't have the speed to download all the information and review it so I didn't post a lot of random links that I didn't have time to verify.
The Torah predates the Illiad by 3 centurys! Nice try!
Look, if you think she's a troll, report her to the authorities.
Otherwise, leave her the ____ alone.
I commited the capital crime of saying that AC was against modern science.
Actually two crimes: 1) criticizing AC and; 2) supporting the Theory Of Evolution. These two positions will draw attacks and trolls on FR like few others. When combined they can create, at the right time, an almost perfect troll attack storm. And I say 'troll' because you'll find few substantiated assertions and mostly religiously based and factually foundation-less criticism.
The Bible is not scientific evidence. If anybody is willing to claim it as such, I (and others, I am certain) would be more than happy to point out the scientific errors and contradictions scattered throughout the Bible.
Examples:
Four-footed insects:
Leviticus 11: 21-23
[21] Yet these may ye eat of every flying creeping thing that goeth upon all four, which have legs above their feet, to leap withal upon the earth;
[22] Even these of them ye may eat; the locust after his kind, and the bald locust after his kind, and the beetle after his kind, and the grasshopper after his kind.
[23] But all other flying creeping things, which have four feet, shall be an abomination unto you.
Coneys and Hares chewing their cud:
Leviticus 11: 5,6
[5] And the coney, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you.
[6] And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you.
Are you really sure that you want a scientific analysis of the "truth" contained in the Bible?
Feel lucky. They used to burn folks at the stake for speaking the truth.
It is not against the rules to put links. However they are rarely used since they don't contribute to discourse. Now and then someone will post a monstrously huge list of links on a topic, which is for specialist use mainly such as data mining.
And the Epic of Gilgamesh predates the Torah. Pointless try.
King James published the evidence back in 1611. Actually God wrote the evidence down on some tablets back about 2000 BC.
Finally just look at your hand and tell me it wasn't designed. I suggest that if you deny that intelligence had anything to do with that design, you may one day have to answer to the designer. I know that if I created a masterpiece and someone said that I didn't make it or design it, but that it was just something that crawled out of the slime, I might get a little upset.
http://www.apologetics.org/articles/founder2.html
A lecture about the "Blind Watchmaker" theory that you might find interesting.
You know why Noah had seven pairs of each kind of clean beasts on the Ark but only one pair of each kind of unclean beasts? No joke, history.
I've gotten to reply two and already we have two insults.
"What are Darwinists so afraid of?
The evolution of their irrelevancy!
All of that nonsense is rebutted here:"
No need to insult the Darwinists. They will never be irrrelevent even if they haven't figured out the mechanics by which God(imho) created all life they may do so one day and it might not match our assumptions made from Genesis.
All that nonsense? I read the article they were all valid points. You dismiss them as nonsense. Sure, encouraged me to go look at your posted link. Must be an article by another sober rational person like yourself.
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