How Much Longer Can They Sell Darwinism?

From Sea to Shining Sea ^ | 1/4/09 | Purple Mountains

[PurpleMountains]

All across the country, archeologists, paleontologists and biologists are taking part in what is perhaps the greatest example of political correctness in history – their adherence to Darwinism and their attempts to ostracize any scientist who does not agree with them. In doing so, they are not only ignoring the vast buildup of recent scientific discoveries that seriously undermines the basics of Darwinism, but they are also participating, due to politically correctness, in a belief system that indirectly resulted in the deaths of millions of people – those slaughtered by the Stalins, the Hitlers, the Maos, the Pol Pots and others who took their cue from Darwinism’s tenets.

[BroJoeK]

"I really don’t care what “most Christian churches” teach. A lot of denominations have strayed from the truth of scripture. If they are saying, as you infer, that “evolution is God’s plan” then they are claiming to know the mind of God."

You're playing with words here. A real theologian could give us the correct terms. Christian churches have always taught that nature is God's creation and can be investigated & understood by mankind. There is no ancient dichotomy between them, at least that I know of.

[BroJoeK]

"How many chemicals do you figure he went through (blowing himself up each time.....oh wait a minute, that would make him extinct) before he found the right chemicals?"

Evolution says that the bugs which got it right(er) would survive & multiply, while those which got it wrong would die off. Pretty simple concept, I'd say.

Now, four places come to mind, where a scientist might begin to look for some answers to your questions:

• the fossil record, though in this particular case, there probably is none.
• similar, closely related species, which could show us how many of those features are relatively common, and how many unique to this one.
• DNA analysis, which could show the genetic locations of instructions for features you find so interesting. These could be compared to similar instructions in related species, to see how different the differences are.
• Comparative embryonic development, showing when and how these features are first expressed.

But more importantly, I think your term for this is "irreducible complexity," and that somehow "proves" an Intelligent Design.

Well, I believe (along with most church teaching), that ALL of nature, not just some specific parts of it, is "intelligently designed" by God from the beginning. So God did not just occasionally intervene to make things happen -- instead, He made the Universe to develop the way He wanted it to from the beginning.

No, I'm not saying God has never intervened, that's ridiculous. But I am saying that you are never going to figure out scientifically where God specifically acted, and where He let nature take the course He originally intended for it!

But my beliefs are just that -- theology & metaphysics, not science. Science can only look for natural causes for natural occurrences.

[BroJoeK]

"Do I take that to mean that I’m no longer considered a liar?"

I'd consider you a friendly & sincere propagandist for a Big Lie. Unlike YHAOS, you limit your insults to an acceptable bantering, which I appreciate.

So you are the "good cop," to the YHAOS "bad cop," trying to work me over here.

And I'm obviously making no impression on either one of you, so we've probably long ago passed the point of any useful discussion.

Bottom line: you want us to belive that science itself is a Big Lie. I think that's unlikely, but that it's CERTAIN you are attacking science out of your own religious convictions. And I share the view that God created the Universe for His own purposes, but I also think He made the varios physical processes comprehensible by mankind.

[BroJoeK]

BroJoeK:"****Finally, on “removing God from the equation,” I’ve said before, by definition that’s what science is and does. And it has been that way since ancient times."****

schaef21:"That’s a false statement. Notice I didn’t call you a liar. Go back and research this and you’ll find that you are mistaken."

In the past, a scientist like Newton would assign to God elements of his theory that he could not otherwise explain. Then the next scientist would come along, and explain that process without reference to God. But this second scientist might decide that some other process could only be assigned to God, which then a third scientist explains naturally...

And so it has been for centuries now. That is the progress of science -- pushing "God" further and further away from our understanding of physical nature.

Today, centuries later, scientists assume that God is NOT part of nature in any scientific sense. And indeed, it would now take some overwhelmingly strong evidence to convince them otherwise.

But, imho, in all this time God's handiwork has been clear for ANYONE to see, regardless of what the scientists say.

[BroJoeK]

" It’s not your place to issue warnings or dictate actions. Leave that to the moderators. "

Hmmmm... don't I remember seeing some pretty ominous sounding warnings from YHAOS? So is that the new Free Republic rule? YHAOS can warn, intimidate and insult all he wants, but no one else can warn, intimidate or insult YHAOS?

Funny, I don't remember seeing that rule written down anywhere... ;-)

[BroJoeK]

"When your arguments are refuted, you don’t know anything better than to restate them again. "

Sorry pal, but you have not actually refuted any of my arguments. All you've done is insult me, and "yada yada yada"...

We should note, by contrast, schaef21 has offered detailed and serious arguments, including virtually no insults. I've actually enjoyed those exchanges, and if I weren't wasting so much time on you, could put more effort into responding.

So why don't you just sit quietly, listen and learn something for a change? ;-)

[betty boop]

There is not any reasoning which can convince me, contrary to my senses, that three is one, and one three. — Abigail Adams

In this, she and Isaac Newton would be in accord — both Christians, and yet "monotheists," not Trinitarians. To an empiricist mindset, Abigail Adam's observation makes perfect sense.

If it is true that John and Abigail moved "away" from Congregationalism to Unitarianism, do you consider this to be some kind of "improvement" in the status of their religious beliefs? Or as a dilution or weakening of them, in response to the spirit of the age? Just wondering where you stand on this....

YHAOS's link from the other day is a treasure trove of the writings of Thomas Jefferson. In it, there's a fascinating exchange of letters between TJ and John Adams having to do with their religious beliefs. It's interesting that both men had little use either for Platonists or Roman Catholics (and they didn't recognize much, if any, difference between the two). In many of the quotes from Adams found at your link, we find him seemingly railing "against religion" in general, when he was much more likely actually railing against the Roman Church. In this, he had all the "correct" prejudices of an old-time, Bible-based Protestant (whether Congregationalist or Unitarian).

But as you can clearly see from the Declaration of Rights of the Inhabitants of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Adams regarded religious belief, instruction, and practice (preferably Protestant) as both a "right" and a "duty" of the citizen.

For evidently Adams regarded atheism as monstrously destructive, both to the person and to civil society. In a letter to Thomas Jefferson (November 13, 1815), he wrote:

I have received Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Price, by William Morgan, F.R.S. In pages 151 and 155 Mr. Morgan says: “So well assured was Dr. Price of the establishment of a free Constitution in France, and of the subsequent overthrow of despotism throughout Europe, as the consequence of it, that he never failed to express his gratitude to heaven for having extended his life to the present happy period, in which after sharing the benefits of one revolution, he has been spared to be a witness to two other revolutions, both glorious. But some of his correspondents were not quite so sanguine in their expectations from the last of the revolutions; and among these, the late American Ambassador, Mr. John Adams. In a long letter which he wrote to Dr. Price at this time, so far from congratulating him on the occasion, he expresses himself in terms of contempt, in regard to the French Revolution; and after asking rather too severely what good was to be expected from a nation of Atheists, he concluded with foretelling the destruction of a million of human beings as the probable consequence of it. These harsh censures and gloomy predictions were particularly ungrateful to Dr. Price, nor can it be denied that they must have then appeared as the effusions of a splenetic mind, rather than as the sober reflections of an unbiased understanding.”

Of course, Adams was exactly right about this.

A catalog of quotations taken out of context really can't tell you all that much, BroJoeK.

Thanks so very much for writing!

[YHAOS]

”don't I remember seeing some pretty ominous sounding warnings from YHAOS?”

Aaaww, you poor little thing. So beset and put upon. Quit your whining; it’s not dignified. You’ve embarrassed yourself enough with your attempts to change the subject (blow smoke), because you can’t deal with the few criticisms I’ve sent your way. Get hold of yourself, man. People are watching.

[YHAOS]

Don’t you know that it is not polite to mention someone and not shoot them a courtesy beep?

You couldn’t possibly be spending any great time in your answers to me. There’s nothing there you couldn’t get out of Uncle Joe’s Whizbag of snappy talking points

”So why don't you just sit quietly . . .”

More smoke (subject changing). You would like me to go away (“sit quietly” . . . Ha!). You’ve already embarrassed yourself by demonstrating your ignorance of the answer to the most basic theistic question scientists are asked, and your lack of awareness of the chasm existing between what many distinguished scientists say (see #1612 - when a scientist is asked a scientific question about God, since he is equipped (by choice) with nothing but a materialistic methodology, as a scientist he must necessarily answer, “I don’t know.") and what they actually practice.

If you want to be treated seriously, you’re going to have to do something besides blow smoke and whine. Quit your dancing or end this discussion.

[YHAOS]

”It's interesting that both men [Jefferson and Adams] had little use either for Platonists or Roman Catholics . . .”

Yes, and it should be recalled that the bitter religious wars which had roiled England (as well as much of Europe) was too recent in memory not to have its effect on their thinking. In fact, in America its effects lasted well into the Twentieth Century.

[YHAOS]

”In this, she [Abigail Adams] and Isaac Newton would be in accord — both Christians, and yet "monotheists," not Trinitarians.”

And in this sentiment Jefferson was in accord despite the fact that he was a vestryman in the Episcopal Church most of his life.

[betty boop]

...the bitter religious wars which had roiled England (as well as much of Europe) was too recent in memory not to have its effect on their thinking. In fact, in America its effects lasted well into the Twentieth Century.

Indeed, this is so important to remember when trying to evaluate the religious ideas of the Framers, and the form they took in the drafting of the Constitution.

There's an interesting tension in the thought of both TJ and Adams WRT God and religion. On the one hand, God is the source of individual liberty; on the other, religion can be a grave threat to individual liberty (e.g., the Roman Church in their view). Not to mention that, historically, religion has often enough been the pretext for going to war; on the other hand, the best defense against tyranny is to vest the sovereignty of the state in The People (as the Framers did). But this only works on the understanding that The People are a people "under God."

In short, for TJ and Adams both, true human liberty is achieved only "under God"; where God is absent, the tyrant will fill His place.

YHAOS, thank you again for the link to the TJ archive. I breezed through it just to see what-all was there. Truly, it is the "mother lode" of TJ's writings over a lifetime. A wonderful resource!

[YHAOS]

”There's an interesting tension in the thought of both TJ and Adams WRT God and religion.”

Yes, and this tension is no better reflected than in the following outburst of Adams in a letter to TJ:

”Twenty times in the course of my late reading have I been on the point of breaking out, "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if, there were no religion in it!!!'' But in this exclamation I should have been as fanatical as Bryant or Cleverly. Without religion this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in polite society, I mean hell.”

. . . . . John Adams, letter to Thomas Jefferson, Quincy, April 19, 1817, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Albert Ellery Bergh, Editor, ME, vol. 15, pg 105.

Of interest, we might also note that this fragment of a paragraph in a much larger letter is a favorite target of Atheists to quote out of context where they cite only the first sentence, leaving out the meat of Adams’ thought which is expressed in the balance of the quote.

”. . . thank you again for the link to the TJ archive”

My honor, Dear Lady, and always a pleasure to carry on a conversation with you.

[schaef21]

****You make points here that I’ve already answered many times, but the answers don’t seem to be sinking in, do they?****

You have go to be kidding. You know, I can say the exact same thing about you.

****Do you not understand the difference between a personal opinion or religious faith (i.e., “I believe in God”), and a scientific finding (i.e., “the earth rotates in about 24 hours”)? The latter involves physics the former metaphysics.****

Yes...I’m aware of that. Here’s something I’ve told you about a dozen times as well.....

Macroevolutionary theory is not science. It violates the scientific method which was put in place to remove bias from the process. Oh goodness, I’m repeating myself again.

Macroevolution is not observable, it is not testable or repeatable and it sure isn’t falsifiable.

I know....scientists say that macroevolution can be extrapolated from microevolution....to this I say Hogwash and if you even think about it for a millisecond instead of swallowing that bilge you’d realize it as well.

A finch species having larger beaks during dry periods and smaller beaks during wet periods cannot be PROVEN (your word) to be anything but a finch with variable beak sizes.

An examination of fossils by someone who will interpret them in a way to match his worldview has a bias....which is exactly what the scientific method aims to eliminate.

On Richard Von Sternberg.....could you please stop using Wikipedia as a reference. Or better yet, wait until tomorrow and I’ll go in and change a bunch of stuff tonight so that it meets my point of view.

Sternberg got hosed. There are two sides to the story, why don’t you try to find out his.

****Do you want to explain just who, exactly, is preventing precisely whom from scientifically “investigating” the idea of Intelligent Design?****

No one is preventing anybody from investigating...they are preventing people from publishing. I seem to recall you saying over and over again how something has to be published to be taken seriously.

I can’t speak for IDers because in a strict sense, I am not an IDer, I would probably be categorized as part of a “subset” of ID....., I’ll say this...there are so many camps that fall under the heading of ID (Young earthers, old earthers, Bible literalists, etc.) that making predictions with so many camps would be difficult.

CREATIONISTS...of which I am one, make predictions all the time.

By the way....there was another thread on FR not long ago that referred to an article calling out many of the FAILED predictions of Evolutionists. It can be found at www.darwinspredictions.com ....It’s pretty heavy lifting and 60 pages long, are you up to it?

[schaef21]

****Eugenie Scott, executive director of the National Center for Science Education described Berlinski’s arguments in The Deniable Darwin as:[11]****

I could really care less what Eugenie Scott says. She’s going to trash anyone who disagrees with the orthodoxy.

****As for “casting doubts and asking questions,” I’d say that’s what scientists are supposed to do — it’s the beginning of the scientific method.****

Ah yes....the scientific method. I believe I just posted something to you about that.....observable, testable, repeatable, falsifiable. How is it again that the “pond-scum to people” theory can be observed...or tested...or repeated...or falsified.

Let me know when you figure it out will ya please?

[schaef21]

****No it doesn’t, not in the least. There’s no reason at all why these features couldn’t have developed, little by little, over time, in the millions of years during which fossils show “proto-giraffs” were relatively small.****

Another way of saying the above is.....”I can’t see the forest because all of these trees are in the way.”

The giraffe couldn’t have evolved those four parts over time, they all had to be there together. If even one was missing he’d have died off before he could have evolved further.

Your inability to process logic baffles me.

****But here’s what seem most important to me: your argument is to reject all of the physical evidence,****

What physical evidence? You mean bones? Who observed that again?

****and ask me instead to believe your non-evidence.****

And what was my non-evidence? Oh yeah...a description of the morphology of the giraffe that would require four specific parts to be there and functioning at the same time for the species to survive.

****Sorry, pal, but that just makes no sense.****

From the movie “Bull Durham”...Crash Davis speaking to Annie Savoy.....”Talkin’ to you is like talkin’ to a fungo”

I now know how Crash felt.

[schaef21]

If you travel through certain states out west, you can see fossilized trees laying on the ground. A fossilized tree will last as long as any other fossil. And if it was exposed for any time length (such as those we see out west), and later re-covered with sediments, then it might well extend over more than one geological level.****

According to your view....it takes thousands/millions of years to lay down rock layers (you may want to revisit an earlier comment that I made about Mount St. Helens as to whether I believe this to be the case.)

In order to be fossilized, something has to be buried rapidly....how exactly would a 20’ long tree trunk going through multiple rock layers get buried quickly if it takes thousands/millions of years for the layers to form?

Wait a minute....Creationists believe in Catastrophism and not Uniformitarianism. Therefore, Creationists would predict that you’d find polystrate fossils.

Sorry BroJoe...it doesn’t fit your model, it fits mine.

[schaef21]

****”Scientific confirmation” comes from the hypothesis’ ability to predict certain verifiable observations. By the way, a “verified observation” is, by definition, a fact.****

Again I say....

Go to www.darwinspredictions.com

And just a comment....

Predicting that a fish grew legs and walked on land is not a “verifiable observation”. It is wishful thinking at best and can be best described as I’ve done before....repeat, repeat, repeat.....an example of circular reasoning.

1. Evolution is true.
2. The first gene spontaneously generated in a “warm little pond”
3. The first life must have been in that pond.
4. Land animals must have evolved from water animals.
5. Fish must have grown legs and walked out on land because:
6. Evolution is true.

****One of the verified observations predicted by the theory of evolution is the sequence of fossils found in the geological column. In my simplified version, I’ve said: elephants are never found with dinosaurs, and dinosaurs never found in Precambrian rocks.****

I ain’t goin’ here again.....the geologic column exists only in the textbooks.

[schaef21]

****Actually, there was a pre-Cambrian explosion of life, of which there is much evidence in the fossil record, including some ancestors which you claim don’t exist. Indeed the earliest evidences of life are found in rocks dated to billions of years old.****

How come you told me there was a precambrian explosion and then gave me a link to the Cambrian explosion?

I went to Wikipedia (again, Wikipedia), the birthplace of the link you gave me and did a search for “Precambrian Explosion”.

Here’s what I got back:

Search results
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
You searched for Precambrian explosion (all pages starting with “Precambrian explosion” | all pages that link to “Precambrian explosion”)

No article title matches
No page with that title exists.

The good news is you can create the page yourself and put anything in there you want.....which is what makes Wikipedia a BAD SOURCE...anybody can edit it.

[schaef21]

****You’re playing with words here. A real theologian could give us the correct terms. Christian churches have always taught that nature is God’s creation and can be investigated & understood by mankind. There is no ancient dichotomy between them, at least that I know of.****

Jesus Christ verified the Creation Account as historically accurate (Mark 10:6), He also verified the creation of Adam and Eve (Matthew 19:4-5).

Any Church that teaches “theistic evolution” or anything else that disagrees with those two passages is calling Jesus Christ a liar and should be considered as aberrant theologies within the “Christian” umbrella.

They are placing the worldview (again I say it is a worldview and not proveable by the scientific method) of the scientific community and placing it above the very words of the Son of God.

I’d call that aberrant.