Poor Darwin's false religion

WorldNetDaily ^ | February 3, 2007 1:00 a.m. Eastern | Pat Boone

[Tim Long]

There it was, glinting in the sand, something catching the searing sub-Saharan sun. The half conscious, desperately thirsty British airman first thought he was hallucinating. As he staggered toward the shiny object, he prayed it was something liquid, something that would cool his parched throat. But it wasn't; as he grasped it in his hand and shook the sand away, he realized he was holding a watch.

A watch!

And not just a watch; soon after, when he'd been rescued and returned to England, he showed it to his superior officers and then to scientific experts. At first, no one could identify the maker or even how old the timepiece was. Nothing quite like it had ever been seen. It was fashioned of finest 24-karat gold, the design magnificent, the face a gloriously transparent crystal, the wristband intricate and obviously very expensive. And the most amazing feature: The sweep second hand was moving gracefully in one fluid motion around the Roman numerals – keeping absolutely perfect time – and it seemed to need no winding or even motion to keep it running!

(Column continues below)

Eventually, Darwinian scientists concluded that this exquisite artifact had not been manufactured; it had evolved, starting as a primitive sun dial from prehistoric times, swept and carried along and burnished by howling winds and abrasive sands, colliding over the millennia with other whirling objects and substances, melting and freezing and morphing finally into this magnificent timepiece, purely by happenstance. And, because of its primary ingredients and millennial buffeting by the elements, it now was so in tune with the universe that it kept atomic clock-type time!

Anybody gullible enough to believe that sappy saga? No? Well, how about one even more farfetched and absurd?

The vast universe, operating in such dependable precision we can confidently send human beings a quarter million miles into space, all the way to the surface of the moon, and back, safely. Our earth, moving in quiet orbit around the sun, so perfectly placed that life of all kinds flourish, while just a little distance closer or farther away, and the globe would not support life at all. And the human body, to say nothing of the mysterious brain, is made of such a myriad collection of mechanisms and infinitesimal organisms, all functioning in unexplainable synchronicity, that all the scientists who've ever lived have yet to understand more than a fraction of its workings. And all of this just "happened." No blueprint, no design, no intelligence, no creator or creation process. Just blind chance, and something called "evolution."

As absurd, as nonsensical as this concept is, it's being swallowed whole and taught to our kids by college-educated, highly intelligent professors, encouraged by the National Education Association and militantly defended by the ACLU. Not one of these Ph.D.s can explain what started it all, where the mass and energy (the basic ingredients of which all things consist) began or came from. They posit a "primordial ooze," little one-celled organisms, some cataclysmic "big bang" explosion from which our unfathomable universe was created, and buy into a fantastic theory in which millions of life forms "evolved" into what we now see all around us – and apparently on only this one relatively small rock in all of space. Nowhere else.

And not one Ph.D. I've ever heard – totally aware of one of the basic laws of science, "every action creates an equal and opposite reaction" – can hope to explain what the "action" was that created the "equal and opposite reaction" we call matter.

In his wonderful book, "Darwin's Black Box," author Michael Behe details the current "biochemical challenge to evolution." As true science has developed and modern technology is ever more able to peer deeply into the whirling universe of subatomic particles, the concept that life marched forward, mutation by mutation, from "simple" cell to complex organism has been knocked into the proverbial cocked hat. There is no "simple" cell, and never has been. Behe describes, even depicts, the "irreducible complexity" of the most microscopic living cell, which is in itself enormously complex and populated by intricate subsystems – all necessary for cell function.

The more powerful and probing our microscopes become, the more diverse and dizzyingly complicated the simplest building blocks become; each is a tiny pulsing universe in itself!

Consider this. In 1925, in the infamous Scopes "Monkey Trial," ACLU attorney Clarence Darrow took the position that it was bigotry to teach just one view of human origins! He was defending the right of the science teacher to offer the theory of evolution as an alternative to the long-accepted account of creation. And now, that same ACLU is instituting lawsuits all over America wherever anybody dares to offer Intelligent Design or any other alternative to the theory of evolution! What blatant hypocrisy!

Here's one more pertinent consideration, never reported by the most devoted Darwinian: Charles Darwin's own statements, especially as he approached his own demise. Earlier in his life, he openly acknowledged "the extreme difficulty or rather impossibility of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe … as the result of blind chance or necessity." His subsequent disciples evidently dismiss that thought. Doesn't fit the "theory."

But in a fascinating book, John Myers' "Voices from the Edge of Eternity," we find the detailed personal account of Lady Hope, of Northfield, England, who visited the aging scientist often at his bedside during his last days. It's too long to recount well here, but she tells of the Bible he was reading constantly and of the worship services that took place regularly in the summerhouse in his garden. She says that when she brought up the controversy still raging between believers in the Genesis account of creation and the growing group of scientists and teachers dismissing that account in favor of his "The Origin of Species" and related theories, he seemed distressed. And "a look of agony came over his face as he said 'I was a young man with unformed ideas. I threw out queries, suggestions, wondering all the time about everything. To my astonishment the ideas took like wildfire. People made a religion of them.'"

Exactly.

Charles Darwin may have birthed flawed theories, but in this case he proved prophetic.

Now, Dr. Jonathan Wells states flatly, "I think in 50 years, Darwinian evolution will be gone from the science curriculum. People will look back on it and ask how anyone could, in their right mind, have believed this, because it's so implausible when you look at the evidence."

But 50 years could be enough to destroy the faith of two generations of our young, enough to replace it with a bankrupt false religion. Will we have the courage, the gumption, to make sure that doesn't happen?

[Tim Long]

Pat Boone, King of Metal, gets it right.

[Alter Kaker]

This same crap article was already posted last week. Pat Boone should stick to what he does best -- covering R&B tunes badly and without attribution to the original artists.

[Alter Kaker]

My apologies. Apparently Pat Boone has actually written two ill-informed, incomprehensible anti-science screeds in the span of one week.

Here is the other. Pat Boone is as literate on evolution as Barbra Streisand is on energy policy.

[microgood]

Why I believe in evolution

[raj bhatia]

Nice response. Now the anti-science zealots will post images of a brain, a cross-section of the human body along with arguments that has not been published in any half-decent science journal.

[billybudd]

Yet another journalist who failed high school science attempting to get in a word. How about actually addressing the predictions of and evidence for theories of evolution by natural selection? Nah, too much brainpower required.

[wireman]

Pat Freakin' Boone!

I guess THAT settles it once and for all!

[Hoplite]

Here's the brian.

Which is as far as I got
before the writer's block set in.

[Hoplite]

B-R-A-I-N.

Oh, that's going to leave a mark.

[Coyoteman]

But in a fascinating book, John Myers' "Voices from the Edge of Eternity," we find the detailed personal account of Lady Hope, of Northfield, England, who visited the aging scientist often at his bedside during his last days. It's too long to recount well here, but she tells of the Bible he was reading constantly and of the worship services that took place regularly in the summerhouse in his garden. She says that when she brought up the controversy still raging between believers in the Genesis account of creation and the growing group of scientists and teachers dismissing that account in favor of his "The Origin of Species" and related theories, he seemed distressed. And "a look of agony came over his face as he said 'I was a young man with unformed ideas. I threw out queries, suggestions, wondering all the time about everything. To my astonishment the ideas took like wildfire. People made a religion of them.'"

Pat should stick to singing.

From Index to Creationist Claims:

Claim CG001:

Darwin renounced evolution on his deathbed.

Source:

Enoch, H., 1916. Darwin's final recantation. Bombay Guardian, 25 March 1916, quoted at http://www.forerunner.com/forerunner/X0724_Darwins_Final_Recant.html

Response:

1. The story of Darwin's recanting is not true. Shortly after Darwin's death, Lady Hope told a gathering that she had visited Darwin on his deathbed and that he had expressed regret over evolution and had accepted Christ. However, Darwin's daughter Henrietta, who was with him during his last days, said Lady Hope never visited during any of Darwin's illnesses, that Darwin probably never saw her at any time, and that he never recanted any of his scientific views (Clark 1984, 199; Yates 1994).
   
   
2. The story would be irrelevant even if true. The theory of evolution rests upon reams of evidence from many different sources, not upon the authority of any person or persons.

Links:

Greig, Russell, 1996. Did Darwin recant? Creation 18(1): 36-37. http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1315.asp

Yates, Simon, 1994. The Lady Hope story: A widespread falsehood. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/hope.html

References:

1. Clark, Ronald W., 1984. The Survival of Charles Darwin: A biography of a man and an idea. New York: Random House.
2. Yates, Simon, 1994. (see above)

Further Reading:

Clark, Ronald W., 1984. The Survival of Charles Darwin: A biography of a man and an idea. New York: Random House.

[Alter Kaker]

FYI to Mr. Boone, the "Lady Hope" story of Darwin's deathbed recantment is (like the rest of this article) a complete fabrication.

Don't trust me on this -- even the creationists agree that the Lady Hope story is nonsense. "Answers in Genesis" says, "It... appears that Darwin did not recant, and it is a pity that to this day the Lady Hope story occasionally appears in tracts published and given out by well-meaning people.

[Alter Kaker]

"Recantation" not "recantment." Forgive me, English is not my native tongue.

[Taft in '52]

Pat, you're out of your ball park. Please go back to Speedy Gonzales.

[fivecatsandadog]

[AnotherUnixGeek]

The story of Darwin's recanting is not true. Shortly after Darwin's death, Lady Hope told a gathering that she had visited Darwin on his deathbed and that he had expressed regret over evolution and had accepted Christ. However, Darwin's daughter Henrietta, who was with him during his last days, said Lady Hope never visited during any of Darwin's illnesses, that Darwin probably never saw her at any time, and that he never recanted any of his scientific views (Clark 1984, 199; Yates 1994).

And even if he had, so what? Evolution is science - whether Darwin continued to believe it or not matters as much as whether Newton continued to believe in gravity.

[Axlrose]

As the anti Bible zealots continue to deny the Word.....

[wireman]

As the anti Bible zealots continue to deny the Word.....

Yeah, that three-quarters of the planet's population who aren't Christian are a bunch of losers.

[highimpact]

I love that clip. "You're the retarded offspring of five monkeys having butt sex with a fish squirrel." ROFL!

[freespirited]

Pat Boone is as literate on evolution as Barbra Streisand is on energy policy.

You may be giving him too much credit.

[Alter Kaker]

As the anti Bible zealots continue to deny the Word.....

I can't speak for anybody else, but I'm not anti-Bible. The Bible is a religious text, it isn't a textbook.