Neaderthals At It Again

Conservative Battleline Online ^ | January 11, 2006 | Donald Devine

[Right Wing Professor]

One word, guy. Kooks.

[MRMEAN]

What a pile of steaming dung. Anybody interested in what Judge Jones actually said should read his decision.

Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District et. al.

[beaver fever]

" Interestingly, Big Bang was fiercely rejected by the leading evolutionists of the 1960s for the same reason intelligent design is today.

...and he certainly knows nothing about this history of science! "

Nice catch, Right Wing Professor, that one was a whopper.

Biologists weighing in on the big bang with theoretical Physicists. I see them duking it out at Starbucks all the time.

[dread78645]

Tom Wolfe says Darwinism is dead

Well, Thank God for Tom Wolfe!

( Er, Who's Tom Wolfe? )

[dread78645]

One more problem for the Big Bang: Recently-discovered galaxy clusters reveal too much complex structure to be as “young” as Big Bang speculations would require.

So what would such a "complex structure" require?

... Gravitational forces could not have generated such a cluster of galaxies in such an astronomically short time.

Fascinating. And how astronomically long of a time would be required?

Also fascinating is the parts of the press release they "forgot" to quote (or at least link to):

The VLT data measured the redshift of this cluster as 1.4, indicating a distance of 9,000 million light-years, 500 million light years farther out than the previous record holding cluster.

This means that the present cluster must have formed when the Universe was less than one third of its present age. The Universe is now believed to be 13,700 million years old.

"We are quite surprised to see that a fully-fledged structure like this could exist at such an early epoch," says Christopher Mullis. "We see an entire network of stars and galaxies in place, just a few thousand million years after the Big Bang".

"We seem to have underestimated how quickly the early Universe matured into its present-day state," adds Piero Rosati of ESO, another member of the team. "The Universe did grow up fast!"

So the previous record-holder was 8,500Mya, and this one is measured at 9,000Mya. Roughly a six percent increase.

Stop the lab experiments!
Empirical science is a fraud!

</sarc>

[dread78645]

Anybody interested in what Judge Jones actually said should read his decision.

Don't be foolish, nobody on the ID side is actually interested in what he wrote.

"Most people would sooner die than think; and frequently, they do so."
-- Bertrand Russell

[Fred Nerks]

The effects of nearby supernovae on the biosphere have been the object of intensive study be geologists in recent years, in the attempt to account for abrupt changes in the history of life on this planet. Cf. D. Russel and W. Tucker, “Supernovae and the Extinction of the Dinosaurs,” Nature 229 (Feb. 19, 1971), pp. 553-554. Sudden extinctions were followed by the appearance of new species, quite different from those preceding them in the stratigraphic record. In a relatively brief interval whole genera were annihilated, giving way to new creatures of radically different aspect, having little in common with the forms they replaced. See N. D. Newell, “Revolutions in the History of Life,” Geological Society of America Special Papers 89, pp. 68-91; Cf. S. J. Gould and N. Eldredge, “Punctuated equilibria: the tempo and mode of evolution reconsidered,” Paleobiology 1977, Vol. III, pp. 115-151. Thus over the past two or three decades many geologists and paleontologists have found themselves increasingly drawn to the view that the observed abrupt changes in the biosphere, such as that which marked the end of the Mesozoic and is thought to have brought with it the extinction of the dinosaurs, among other animal groups, could best be explained by the exposure of the then living organisms to massive doses of radiation coming from a nearby supernova. The radiation would annihilate many species, especially those whose representatives, whether because of their large size or for other reasons, were unable to shield themselves from the powerful rays; at the same time new organisms would be created through mutations or “macro-evolution.” See Velikovsky’s comments in “The Pitfalls of Radiocarbon Dating,” Pensée IV (1973), p. 13: “. . . in the catastrophe of the Deluge, which I ascribe to Saturn exploding as a nova, the cosmic rays must have been very abundant to cause massive mutations among all species of life. . . .” Animals would suffer much more severely than plants—on plants the principle effect would be mutagenic. See K. D. Terry and W. H. Tucker, “Biologic Effects of Supernovae,” Science 159 (1968), pp. 421-423.].

http://www.knowledge.co.uk/velikovsky/earth.htm

Care to help me make a list of all the 'kooks' - throughout history who have been proven by time to be genius? Until recently electromagnetism was also a 'kook' theory, the Sun was SUPPOSED to be an electrically inert body...the clockwork Universe 'hung together' through magnetism and nothing but nothing dared to interfere with the rotation of the 'heavenly spheres' - yet it did, something did and quite severely. Recently. Within historical times.

Pity we can't ask the people who left us this evidence what it might have been that killed the creatures they depicted here:

[Fred Nerks]

The First Crisis in Cosmology Conference
By Tim Ventura | Published 08/30/2005 | Research | Rating:

Tim Ventura
The Linus Torvalds of Antigravity ... Since the birth of American Antigravity in 2002, Tim has been featured on a multitude of television networks, such as Nippon TV and the BBC, as well as extensively covered in print by sources as diverse as Wired Magazine and Jane's Defense Weekly.

View all articles by Tim Ventura The Big Bang was wrong
by Hilton Radcliffe [mailto:ratcliffe@iafrica.com]

Introduction: In May 2004, a group of about 30 concerned scientists published an open letter to the global scientific community in New Scientist in which they protested the stranglehold of Big Bang theory on cosmological research and funding. The letter was placed on the Internet and rapidly attracted wide attention. It currently has about 300 signatories representing scientists and researchers of disparate backgrounds, and has led to a loose association now known as the Alternative Cosmology Group. This writer was one of the early signatories to the letter, and holding the view that the Big Bang explanation of the Universe is scientifically untenable, patently illogical, and without any solid observational support whatsoever, became involved in the organisation of an international forum where we could share ideas and plan our way forward. That idea became a reality with the staging of the First Crisis in Cosmology Conference (CCC-1) in the lovely, medieval walled village of Moncao, far northern Portugal, over 3 days in June of this year.

Big Bang theory depends critically on three first principles: that the Universe is holistically and systematically expanding as per the Friedmann model; that General Relativity correctly describes gravitation; and that Milne’s Cosmological Principle, which declares that the Universe at some arbitrary “large scale” is isotropic and homogeneous, is true. The falsification of any one of these principles would lead to the catastrophic failure of the theory. We saw at the conference that all three can be successfully challenged on the basis of empirical science...

http://www.americanantigravity.com/articles/209/1/The-First-Crisis-in-Cosmology-Conference

NO ONE HAS THE LAST WORD IN SCIENCE.

[dread78645]

NO ONE HAS THE LAST WORD IN SCIENCE.

Never said anyone did. (and your subject shift is noted).

Anyhow, on to the Wide World of Wanna-be science:

Tim Ventura
The Linus Torvalds of Antigravity ... Since the birth of American Antigravity in 2002 ...

Anti gravity? This isn't the "Hutchinson Effect" is it? ... By Jove, it is!
For those playing at home, a Canadian, John Hutchinson ran 1,600Mva through a set of Tesla coils and lifted a frog off a plate. A whole flock of folks that claim it's a demonstration of telekinesis, or psychokinesis, or UFO propulsion, or anti-gravity depending on the individual's cognitive handicap.

But let's continue:

Introduction: In May 2004, a group of about 30 concerned scientists published an open letter to the global scientific community in New Scientist in which they protested the stranglehold of Big Bang theory on cosmological research and funding. The letter was placed on the Internet and rapidly attracted wide attention. It currently has about 300 signatories representing scientists and researchers of disparate backgrounds, and has led to a loose association now known as the Alternative Cosmology Group. This writer was one of the early signatories to the letter, and holding the view that the Big Bang explanation of the Universe is scientifically untenable, patently illogical, and without any solid observational support whatsoever, became involved in the organisation of an international forum where we could share ideas and plan our way forward. That idea became a reality with the staging of the First Crisis in Cosmology Conference (CCC-1) in the lovely, medieval walled village of Moncao, far northern Portugal, over 3 days in June of this year.

Oh how exciting! Alternative Astronomers having an Alternative Cosmology Conference in Moncao.

---

Alternative cosmologies

A while back Scott Hughes pointed me to the web page of the Alternative Cosmology Group. (Scott, what did I ever do to you?) These are folks who don't really believe in the Big Bang model. The Big Bang is simply the idea that we live in a universe which is nearly homogeneous and isotropic, and has been expanding from a hot, dense state for the last several billion years. Evidence for this model is overwhelming, starting with the fundamental successes of the Hubble Law (distance proportional to velocity for nearby galaxies), the existence of the cosmic microwave background radiation (a relic from the early hot state), and the primordial abundance of light elements (a signature of nucleosynthesis when the universe was about a minute old). More recently, specific models within the Big Bang framework have scored fantastic empirical successes at explaining anisotropies in the microwave background, the characteristics of large-scale structures, the age of the universe, and so on. And patient experts continue to slap down various proposed alternatives. Still, there are doubters. Remind you of any other famously successful scientific theories?

It's fun to go through the introductory paragraph of the Alternative Cosmology Group web site, searching for true statements. Fun, but not especially rewarding.

The Alternative Cosmology Group (ACG) was initiated with the Open Letter on Cosmology written to the scientific community and published in New Scientist, May 22, 2004.

Hey, that one's true! The ACG was initiated with that letter. As far as I know, anyway. (It's all downhill from here.)

The letter points to the fundamental problems of the Big Bang theory, and to the unjustified limiting of cosmological funding to work within the Big Bang framework.

No, it doesn't, since the problems are not fundamental, and the limiting is perfectly justified. We're short of funding as it is; why spend money on theories that have been disproven?

The epicyclic character of the theory, piling ad-hoc hypothesis upon hypothesis, its incompleteness and the appearance of a singularity in the big bang universe beginning require consideration of alternatives.

No, they don't. Various hypotheses may or may not be ad-hoc, but they are simply required to fit the data. We should certainly be looking for ways to go beyond the currently favored version of the Big Bang model by reducing the number of hypotheses, and tying up some of the loose ends, but any such theory will simply be an improved version of the model. You won't replace the fact that the universe is expanding from an initial hot, dense state.

This has become particularly necessary with the increasing number of observations that contradict the theory's predictions. No, it hasn't, since there are no such observations.

Big Bang cosmology has been in a crisis since the early 90's when the Cold Dark Matter model began to fail.

No, it hasn't. The most restrictive possible version of the "Cold Dark Matter Model," in which there was a critical density of matter particles, was indeed in trouble by the early 90's. Those troubles were resolved in 1998 when it was discovered that the universe is accelerating, implying the existence of dark energy. The "Standard CDM" model was swiftly replaced by the "Lambda-CDM" model (Lambda standing for the cosmological constant), and problems with structure formation and the age of the universe were resolved in one fell swoop. The Big Bang model itself, of course, was never in trouble at all. (A persistent error on the part of critics is to confuse particular scenarios within the Big Bang framework with the framework itself.)

Fifteen years later, this crisis has worsened, despite the addition of dark energy.

No, it hasn't. To the extent that it ever existed, it has gone away. Dark energy, like it or not, keeps being verified by new and independent measurements.

---

-- more at Preposterous Universe - Alternative cosmologies

[thomaswest]

Yep, Gravity is just a theory.
http://www.re-discovery.org/gravity_1.html

If you know enough science to show the errors in this account, then you might be worth replying to. Show us your answers.

[dread78645]

Tom Wolfe is an excellent author.

Oh, I agree and I'm familiar with his books.

[GladesGuru]

Fred, Fred,

All data must be verifiable or else it isn't valid data.

Additionally, I must remind you that all science is basically hypothesis, hypothesis, hypothesis.

Those wanting truths in the laboratory are sent to the church down the street.

Science can produce high probabilities, but absolute truths are the realm of theology and philosophy. Such truths are more a produce of agreed upon definitions than verified hypothesis - hence the difference between the laboratory and the church.

As the job descriptions are different, so are the lab and the church.

[PatrickHenry]

Thanks for the ping, but the evo list has had quite a few threads like this, so I'll let this one pass.

[Just mythoughts]

Well let's watch this little school to see the results. This little school is the perfect test case it is observable and testable. There is no shadow of a doubt that any part of the results can be blame on GOD.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"And if it was based on hard scientific data then it wouldn't be a THEORY, would it?"

Yes, it would. Theory is the highest level a scientific idea can achieve. There is nothing higher. That's why it's the theory of gravity, germ theory, theory of evolution, and so on.

[mewzilla]

Oh. I thought this was gonna be about the Dems at Alito's confirmation hearing.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Exactly what "hard scientific data" shows that the first cell was formed from simple chemicals?"

How many times are you going to keep insisting that evolution has anything to do with the origins of life? When are you EVER going to reply to the numerous responses to your posts? What are you afraid of?

[RipSawyer]

And if it was based on hard scientific data then it wouldn't be a THEORY, would it? >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

This is the common misconception which destroys your defense of creationism. You would do well to learn what the real meaning of scientific theory is, you weaken your own argument with statements like that one.

[MHalblaub]

"Pity we can't ask the people who left us this evidence what it might have been that killed the creatures they depicted here:"



Reminds me on of my early drawings. But my arrows looked better.

Pity we can't ask the artists in question what they got in mind. Maybe this: