Anti-Creationists Backed Into a Corner?

AgapePress ^ | February 24, 2003 | Jim Brown

[Remedy]

More than 200 evolutionists have issued a statement aimed at discrediting advocates of intelligent design and belittling school board resolutions that question the validity of Darwinism.

The National Center for Science Education has issued a statement that backs evolution instruction in public schools and pokes fun at those who favor teaching the controversy surrounding Darwinian evolution. According to the statement, "it is scientifically inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible" for creation science to be introduced into public school science textbooks. [See Earlier Article]

Forrest Turpen, executive director of Christian Educators Association International, says it is obvious the evolution-only advocates feel their ideology and livelihood are being threatened.

"There is a tremendous grouping of individuals whose life and whose thought patterns are based on only an evolutionary point of view," Turpen says, "so to allow criticism of that would be to criticize who they are and what they're about. That's one of the issues."

Turpen says the evolution-only advocates also feel their base of financial rewards is being threatened.

"There's a financial issue here, too," he says. "When you have that kind of an establishment based on those kinds of thought patterns, to show that there may be some scientific evidence -- and there is -- that would refute that, undermines their ability to control the science education and the financial end of it."

Turpen says although evolutionists claim they support a diversity of viewpoints in the classroom, they are quick to stifle any criticism of Darwinism. In Ohio recently, the State Board of Education voted to allow criticism of Darwinism in its tenth-grade science classes.

[Ichneumon]

[Well sure, but a pre-biotic world would not be at "equilibrium conditions", so the whole chapter is irrelevant. Sure looks purty though, don't it?]

You mean like Mars?

Earth is quite a bit different from Mars -- or hadn't you noticed? But Mars isn't in "equilibrium" either, in case you were wondering.

Where or how did you find out what the pre-biotic world looked like?

Well for one thing, it's pretty safe to say that the Sun was still shining at the time, so even the pre-biotic world would necessarily not have been "at equilibrium", and thus the linked twaddle would still not apply.

Is it on video? Or maybe the Discover Channel did a feature animation?

You're not even attempting to seriously consider the discussion, are you? No wonder you're a creationist.

That is a total baseless lame response, but a catchy punchline nonetheless. 6 point for style, 0 points for substance.

This only goes to show that you failed to understand it (or are pretending not to in order to have a cheap excuse to avoid dealing with it). Here, let me try in smaller words: The linked material did a lot of fancy math and citations in order to try to convince the reader that it was being "scientific" and actually concluding something useful about whether life could or could not have arisen naturally. Unfortunately, either by design or incredible cluelessness, it fired an arrow right into the wrong target. It (correctly, as near as I can tell) showed that chemical processes would take place too slowly to form life "at equilibrium". Well peachy keen, but only an idiot (or liar) would claim that conditions on the Earth have ever been "at equilibrium". So the whole chapter was vastly irrelevant to the topic at hand. The only question was whether they were doing so because they were stupid, or dishonest. Neither option inspires confidence.

Now, are you going to actually deal with that point, or are you going to just sit there and giggle some more?

[guitar Josh]

If it is made of wood, then it would have been alive at one time.

[f.Christian]

443

[f.Christian]

444

[Youngblood]

I think that Danish statistitian who questioned Global Warming would beg to differ, as would Albert Wegner. Although I don't agree with the creationists, I also realize that science can be just as dogmatic as religion.

I can't comment on Stromberg as I haven't read too many of the reviews, but Wegener's "continental drift" theory (I presume that's what you're talking about) didn't find favour because neither he (nor anyone else at the time) could provide a plausible mechanism and many of the details of his theory were incorrect. When complementary evidence from sea-floor studies and seismology turned up in the 1960s, plate tectonics was quickly accepted. Similarly, the idea that species evolved was around before Darwin, but it did not gain acceptance until Darwin came up with natural selection. If you want your ideas to be accepted by the scientific community, you have to convince people with evidence.

[jennyp]

But then please tell me how a single celled organism, which does not “select” to reproduce, but instead divides itself, evolves into a multi-celled organism. And how an organism with 2 cells divides to become a four celled organism, and so on and so on until we reach humans. Has science ever noted a single cell ameba divide into a multi celled organism?

PMFJI, but it probably started out as colonies of single-celled organisms that became confederations, which became federations, which became dictatorships, which became organisms. (So to speak. :-) Just today there's an item in Nature Science Update on something like this.

[Heartlander]

Did it ever occur to you that there might be people who believe in God and in evolution?

Did I say something to make you believe otherwise?

[edsheppa]

I've never seen a live coffee table, not even one made of wood.

[Junior]

It's hard to tell with you evos-- whether you are just plain ignorant of the information out there or whether you want to see if creationist can find it. I suspect the former because when we present it your view loses. Read it and weep:

When US President Benjamin Franklin wrote "nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes", he should have checked with a scientist. A recurrent ordeal for all is the tribulation that follows the triumph. For the "eureka" moment, when the years spent poring over test tubes come good, is not the end of the road to fame or even professional respect.

'Nuff said.

[balrog666]

If it is made of wood, then it would have been alive at one time.

And it would have had ancestors. So, you gotta point to make here?

[f.Christian]

From your site ...

Isn't this oxymoronish // moot ? ? ...

Creation/Evolution: The Eternal Debate

It's the consensus biological theory of mainstream science. Yet it's one of the Internet's longest-running debates. Why is the Theory of Evolution such a point of controversy? Let's discuss it here.

Jenny's Picks of the Cr/Evo News...

fC ...

There are // will be -- no debates in eternity !

Should be worldly (( these will pass away )) debates !

Main Entry: 3moot
Function: adjective
Date: circa 1587
1 a : open to question : DEBATABLE b : subjected to discussion : DISPUTED
2 : deprived of practical significance : made abstract or purely academic

[f.Christian]

Main Entry: 3moot
Function: adjective
Date: circa 1587
1 a : open to question : DEBATABLE b : subjected to discussion : DISPUTED
2 : deprived of practical significance : made abstract or purely academic

[edsheppa]

would that make the individual ignorant, an idiot, or dishonest?

Not necessarily any of the above but such a belief would IMO not be a scientific one.

But you're missing the point. The poster was making this claim of creationists' attempts to disprove evolution. This largely matches my experience and there is ample evidence on these threads.

[f.Christian]

Frog pond pecking --- croaking order ?

[guitar Josh]

So science has proven that single cells can and do join together to become multi-cellular, and then divide into more multi-cellular organisms? And keep in mind, I’m not talking about a sperm fertilizing an egg, but about 2 identical cells joining together and then becoming one multi-celled organism.

Another example would be the idea that choanocytes, special collar cells in sponges which aid in food gathering, came from single-celled choanoflagellate ancestors. The cells are very similar. The cells don't really spontaneously grow in this case: they come together, and eventually, this adaptation becomes a trait that aids the survival of the species.

Has anyone found fossilized sponges with these single-celled collar cells?

[Heartlander]

Did you read the correction?

[guitar Josh]

But, at one time, it was alive.

[Heartlander]

Fine. Define creationist…

[atlaw]

Once again, the real world has intruded. I have to go to New York tomorrow (yes, the God-forsaken city) so I don't think I'll be able correspond much. I will, however, endeavor to address your question (with the understanding that we are talking about Biblical creationism) when I return.

In the meantime, I am quite familiar with (though I confess, lately not particulary conversant in) both the Genesis account of creation and the affirmations of that account by Jesus in the New Testament. I do not doubt for an instant that Jesus both credited his Father with creation, and that God is responsible for creation. What I have a problem with is the subsequent interpretation of the words of Jesus in his affirmation. They do not seem to me to preclude what we, as children of God, have discovered of his creation since the time that Jesus lived, i.e., evolution.

And ok, you're right about my somewhat hasty accusation against you and Dataman. I'll attribute it to that most sinful merchant ever known to man -- Starbucks.

[guitar Josh]

Yes: since it was alive at one time, it would, according to Darwinism, be related to everything that ever lived.