Posted on 06/21/2006 8:33:46 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
In a veiled attack on creationism, the world's foremost academies of science on Wednesday called on parents and teachers to provide children with the facts about evolution and the origins of life on Earth.
A declaration signed by 67 national academies of science blasted the scriptural teaching of biology as a potential distortion of young minds.
"In various parts of the world, within science courses taught in certain public systems of education, scientific evidence, data and testable theories about the origins and evolution of life on Earth are being concealed, denied or confused with theories not testable by science," the declaration said.
"We urge decision-makers, teachers and parents to educate all children about the methods and discoveries of science and to foster an understanding of the science of nature.
"Knowledge of the natural world in which they live empowers people to meet human needs and protect the planet."
Citing "evidence-based facts" derived from observation, experiment and neutral assessment, the declaration points to findings that the Universe is between 11 and 15 billion years old, and the Earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago.
Life on Earth appeared at least 2.5 billion years ago as a result of physical and chemical processes, and evolved into the species that live today.
"Commonalities in the structure of the genetic code of all organisms living today, including humans, clearly indicate their common primordial origin," it said.
The statement does not name any names or religions, nor does it explain why it fears the teaching of evolution or the scientific explanation for the origins of planetary life are being sidelined.
Signatories of the declaration include the US National Academy of Sciences, Britain's Royal Society, the French Academy of Sciences and their counterparts in Canada, China, Germany, Iran, Israel and Japan and elsewhere.
It comes, however, in the context of mounting concern among biologists about the perceived influence of creationism in the United States.
Evangelical Christians there are campaigning hard for schools to teach creationism or downgrade evolution to the status of one of a competing group of theories about the origins of life on Earth.
According to the website Christian Post (www.christianpost.com), an opinion poll conducted in May by Gallop found that 46 percent of Americans believe that God created humans in their present form within the last 10,000 years or so.
Scientists say hominids emerged around six million years ago and one of their offshoots developed into anatomically modern man, Homo sapiens, about 200,000 years ago, although the timings of both events are fiercely debated.
Nearly every religion offers an explanation as to how life began on Earth.
Fundamentalist Christians insist on a literal interpretation of the Book of Genesis in the Bible, in which God made the world in seven days, culminating in the creation of the first two humans, Adam and Eve.
A variation of this is called "intelligent design" which acknowledges evolution but claims that genetic mutations are guided by God's hand rather than by Charles Darwin's process of natural selection.
US President George W. Bush said last August that he believed in this concept and that he supported its teaching in American schools.
The academies' statement says that science does not seek to offer judgements of value or morality, and acknowledges limitations in current knowledge.
"Science is open-ended and subject to correction and expansion as new theoretical and empirical understanding emerges," it adds.
"If any of my dead relatives came knocking on my door, I would instantly become a hard core true believer"
Howdy Dumpster Baby;
This is just one man's testimony of what happened to him in a NDE...there are thousands of other testimonies from folks that have gotten a tiny glimpse of eternity.
Just follow the links:
Saved From Hell
Rev. Howard Storm's near-death experience
Before his near-death experience, Rev. Howard Storm, a Professor of Art at Northern Kentucky University, was not a very pleasant man. He was an avowed atheist and was hostile to every form of religion and those who practiced it.
He often would use rage to control everyone around him and he didn't find joy in anything. Anything that wasn't seen, touched, or felt, he had no faith in. He knew with certainty that the material world was the full extent of everything that was. He considered all belief systems associated with religion to be fantasies for people to deceive themselves with. Beyond what science said, there was nothing else.
On June 1, 1985, at the age of 38, Howard Storm had a near-death experience due to a perforation of the stomach and his life was forever changed.
His near-death experience is one of the most profound, if not the most profound, afterlife experience I have ever documented.
His life was so immensely changed after his near-death experience that he resigned as a professor and devoted his time to attending the United Theological Seminary to become a United Church of Christ minister.
The following is the account of Pastor Howard Storm's near-death experience, which is an excerpt from his book, My Descent Into Death, reprinted by permission.
http://www.near-death.com/storm.html
Well then the next question should be easy for a man of your talents.
Here's the proposition:
Life on Earth arose from inorganic matter.
How can that be falsified?
Are you suggesting that scientists believe the first living things contained no carbon?
Let's try this proposition.
Life on Earth arose from non-living matter.
Much broader in scope.
How would that proposition be falsified?
And FWIW, the term inorganic does not exclude carbon but I got your drift.
Define non-living.
But I'll be a nice guy. You can define life as the consensus criteria cited by most scientists. Non life will be defined as matter not satisfying all those criteria. The criteria is yours to choose.
You claimed my claim is nonsense. Unless I see some attempt to falsify the proposition it will be evident who is steeped in nonsense.
By showing that life on earth had origins from outer space, you know, like aliens landed here.
You got pictures?
Thank you for retracting your claim.
LOL. Since you have no pictures you must have a test for the aliens. I'm very interested in that test but I'm even more interested in how you prove that life didn't come from non-life on Earth 4 billion years ago. I suppose if you hired enough illegal aliens and sent them through a time warp they could watch every nook and cranny of early Earth but man that's a lot of illegal aliens.
Nice duck. You chastised us for not stating how the hypothesis could be falsified and I told you how. Please admit your error.
When you do, I'll expect you to return....
Humbly.
Oh yeah, you'll need more illegal aliens, the universe is a big place and 15 billion years is a lot of ground to cover.
ok and?
I see humor in stuff like that and so I like to point it out so others can join me in a chuckle.
theories about the origins and evolution of life on Earth are being concealed, denied or confused with theories not testable by science," the declaration said.
Hey guys, let me know who wins after you hash all this stuff out.
Creation Or Evolution? - Is evolution just a theory? You can prove creation. Order free booklet.
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