Why evolution is a political question

Morse Code ^ | May 8,2007 | Chuck Morse

[Chuckmorse]

During the May 3 Republican presidential debate, moderator Chris Matthews asked the candidates “How many of you don’t believe in evolution?” Sen. Sam Brownback, Gov. Mike Huckabee, and Rep. Tom Tancredo all raised their hands indicating that they did not believe in it. Rep. Barney Frank raised the same question in 2004 when he accused me, his opponent that year, of questioning the theory of evolution. Liberals are confident that those who question the theory of evolution will be held up for public ridicule and scorn. Many liberals pride themselves on questioning everything in life except when it comes to the theory of evolution, which they accept as bedrock science. But is it?

The theory of evolution is just that, a theory. There is not a shred of evidence to indicate that mankind evolved from the amoeba, which evolved into the fish, which evolved into the bird, which evolved into the mouse, which evolved into the monkey, which evolved into man. While there is evidence of inter-species evolution, there is no proof of the basic thesis presented by Charles Darwin which is that one species evolves into another. In fact, science seems to favor creationism, also just a theory, as recent DNA evidence indicates that mankind is descended from one mother.

It could be therefore argued that the theory of evolution, since it is not science in the sense that there is no documented or empirical evidence to back it up, is based as much on religious belief as is creationism. Both theories are based on faith as opposed to scientific certainty and, I would argue, creationism contains better science. Yet the liberal establishment demands that the federal government mandate by law that only evolution is to be taught in the public school science class.

I would argue that Intelligent design, which is the theory that mankind was created by divine intervention, could be introduced into education in tandem with the theory of evolution without getting into any particular religious scenario, such as the Genesis story in the Bible, and without endorsing any particular religious denomination. If intelligent design were to be given equal time with evolution, the faith of the atheist would be no more compromised than that of the theist. In fact, such a presentation would be more honest and balanced since scientific inquiry is supposed to be open to all plausible theories.

The theory of evolution is a political question in American politics because liberal supporters demand that the federal government mandate it’s teaching and insist on a gag order when it comes to any discussion of intelligent design in the classroom. This is contrary to American traditions of free speech and the free and open expression of ideas. This also violates the right of the taxpaying citizen to have a say in the education of their own children and supplants the ability of local educators and elected local school board officials to determine curriculum.

Teaching intelligent design alongside evolution would open doors to important thought and inquiry. When the young student contemplates the possibility that mankind is more than just an evolving animal, amoral and bound to nature like other animals, than perhaps the student becomes aware of the uniqueness and value of every single human life. Implied in the theory of a divine creator is that there is a larger purpose to life and that there is a moral code. Intelligent design sets the stage for the individual to look to a higher power than the government, which is perhaps why liberals so adamantly oppose it. In these times of rampant school violence and moral relativism, the teaching of intelligent design, in a non sectarian way and alongside the teaching of the theory of evolution, would serve many positive purposes besides a simple striving for truth.

[tacticalogic]

If you’re basing your belief on the results of the test, then it either isn’t based on faith any more, or there’s nothing that isn’t based on faith. Which is it?

[tacticalogic]

nope the answer is 2 - Jesus and Stephen

Okay. In the span of recorded history there are only 2 people that have ever died in the name of religion.

[CarrotAndStick]

I think he's trying to say we may live longer, but die of SOMETHING anyway.

Oh alright. But you can't take away the fact that science and technology has enabled the life expectancy of people to rise. People today live more than twice as long, on average, as those in the Middle Ages. People are probably much less religious now than the ones used to be in the Middle Ages. Isn't that something to ponder about?

[Stultis]

Evolutionary biologist William Fix

LOL! William Fix evolutionary biologist?! Where do you get this stuff?

Fix is a "pyramidologist" and general "new age," brain dead nutter. (He believes in faith healers, psychics, ufo's, "ancient astronauts," etc, etc, ad nauseum.) He has no formal training, and no research or field experience, in any scientific field. He's not even a (lay) evolutionist. He rejects both evolution and creationism in favor some vague, eclectic, nutty newagey "theory" of "psychogenesis". Creation by psychics, spirits, aliens or "ascended masters" or some such. I have one of his books (The Bone Peddlers) but he's such a nut case and such an idiot that it's hard to make out a positive theory, at least a coherent one.

[jonathanmo]

Yours is truly the most inane post of the week. Thanks for the laugh!

[tacticalogic]

That list was of people weilding the power of science and technology for evil.

It seems that if science was involved at all (I'm guessing anything involving fire and the wheel, and upwards from there) then it's science's fault. For instance, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were apparently unrelated to the Japanese people attacking us because their God, the Emperor told them to.

[Alter Kaker]

Yours is truly the most inane post of the week. Thanks for the laugh!

I think we're going to need to start retracting medals from war heros who were mistakenly recognized for saving lives. Apparently, they didn't save lives, they've only delayed the inevitable!

[CarrotAndStick]

Lol! Or the Catholic Church bludgeoning the Jews and “heretics” during the Inquisition(now wait and watch the denials arise), or the Jews and Muslims(well, only the latter, these days) stoning people to death, or the Hindus allowing widows to commit suicide on their dead husband’s pyres or the... it goes on and on and on!

[Stultis]

Now where is the intermediate critter with this floating bone HALFWAY between it's jaw and it's ear?

Yeah. There is no such creature.

Apparently you don't savvy how the ear works in reptiles and mammals. There is (and was) already a single ear bone in reptiles -- the stapes -- connecting the inner ear to the jaw. (So reptiles in effect heard, i.e. received sound vibrations, through their jaw.) The stapes was already "halfway" between (and connecting) the jaw and the inner ear.

What happened is that, in the evolution of mammals, additional bones, from the jaw, got incorporated into this linkage. There was never any point where the bones were just floating free and unconnected, nor did they need to move any great distance. Here are some pictures (from this page) that may help:

For completeness here's the side view using the same color codes, and now showing one of the intermediate states:

The pink bone, the reptilian angular, a major jaw bone in reptiles, becomes in mammals the tympanic annulus, the ring of bone that surrounds the ear drum.

[ColdWater]

Evolution doesn’t explain everything about how we became what we are.

The theory of gravity doesn't explain everything about the universe.

As a matter of fact, you’d think entropy would prevent it.

Nothing about entropy would prevent evolution.

[Tribune7]

Your pedantry is noted without comment.

Dude. That's a comment.

[Stultis]

Here's another picture I found that shows a few more of the intermediate stages and places them on a timeline representing the geological positions of the fossils. This gives you a pretty good picture of the progressive changes in these bones, and how they changed size and shifted their position, orientation and function while still remaining connected or in close association:

[Tribune7]

But you can't take away the fact that science and technology has enabled the life expectancy of people to rise.

Science is good.

People are probably much less religious now than the ones used to be in the Middle Ages.

The 20th century was probably the most violent and bloody in history.

Anyway, you have to define what religion is.

Is it an attempt to appease supernatural forces through various rituals for purpose of obtaining material benefits? That is superstitution and that is bad.

Is it an attempt to control others for personal aggrandizement? That is bad.

Is it a recognition that there is an absolute, universally recognized set of morals and a power beyond the material to which we must account. That's good. And true.

[Radix]

To be honest, I have not been able to keep up with the voting patterns concerning school items all over the country.

I’ll assume that your post was intended as sarcasm, and that you are saying that people really do want only TOE taught in schools.

Well no sheite Sherlock.

I posted earlier on this very thread about the impact of Public Education in our Society.

You can support a culture that is involved in censorship and depriving generations from the opportunity to have even an introduction to alternative notions concerning the origin of life.

That probably makes a lot of sense, to a mind numbed product of a cultural attack on just about every idea that was ever contrived that got our modern Civlization where it is/was.

I’m not even sure if we disagree, because I am not familiar with those votes in what to me are obscure places.

Whatever, give your children ignorance, and surely you should anticipate fair compensation.

As for me and my house (to almost quote the Bible here, Joshua 24:15) we shall serve education, knowledge, and understanding of more than the droppings of a bunch of egg heads Fascists who regularly eat more than their fair share of slop at the trough of the fruits of my labors.

[metmom]

Oh, and you really believe that some poor, Chinese peasant farmer had the wherewithal to fake a fossil that took years between it’s *discovery* and NG’s article announcing that find, for scientists to reveal it was a fake?

And NG rejected it out of hand before or after it published the article concerning the find?

It still supports the contention that some people want the ToE to be *proved* so badly that they are willing to fake a fossil in an effort to deceive people. Some one made it and passed it off as authentic. That’s deliberate and I doubt it was a creationist who did it.

[metmom]

Ack, wrong magazine.

[Coyoteman]

Oh, and you really believe that some poor, Chinese peasant farmer had the wherewithal to fake a fossil that took years between it’s *discovery* and NG’s article announcing that find, for scientists to reveal it was a fake?

Years? Found July 1997. First studied and found to be both halves of the same fossil (1998?). Announced by National Geographic Soceity October 1999. Proved fake January 2000.

And who said the Chinese farmer was a peasant? He could have been an educated or wealthy farmer. He must have been more than a peasant to fake the fossil.

It still supports the contention that some people want the ToE to be *proved* so badly that they are willing to fake a fossil in an effort to deceive people.

More likely he faked the fossil to get more money for it on the black market.

Your distrust of science, most likely because you disagree with some of its results, seems to have made you very cynical and bitter indeed.

[metmom]

Agenda in science? Fraud in science? Aren’t scientists pure as the new driven snow in their quest for knowledge and truth?

Studies examine withholding of scientific data among researchers, trainees

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1565120/posts

It May Look Authentic; Here’s How to Tell It Isn’t

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1563746/posts

Who woulda thought?

[metmom]

Skeptical. The rest of your attempts to disparage my character is pure speculation. Or would you like to provide some evidence to support your personal attacks?

I doubt it was even a farmer. The person who did this knew what they were doing, what they wanted to demonstrate, what the implications were if the *find* was accepted, and had the technology to do it.

2,000 - 1,997 = 3. Yes, *years* -plural. It should have taken THAT long?

It still provides evidence to support my contention that the person doing it was trying to put the ToE on unquestionable grounds and that some will go to any length to deceive just to support their theory. Something which you keep avoiding addressing. Nor is this the first time, and attempted frauds to try to bolster the ToE have been happening over a period of decades. It doesn’t say much about the evidence supporting the ToE if people have to resort to those kind of tactics to support it.

[CottShop]

Sultis said: “I have one of his books (The Bone Peddlers) but he’s such a nut case and such an idiot that it’s hard to make out a positive theory, at least a coherent one.”

And all your maligning refutes the following how? “The older textbooks on evolution make much of the idea of homology, pointing out the obvious resemblances between the skeletons of the limbs of different animals. Thus the `pentadactyl’ [five bone] limb pattern is found in the arm of a man, the wing of a bird, and flipper of a whale, and this is held to indicate their common origin. Now if these various structures were transmitted by the same gene couples, varied from time to time by mutations and acted upon by environmental selection, the theory would make good sense. Unfortunately this is not the case. Homologous organs are now known to be produced by totally different gene complexes in the different species. The concept of homology in terms of similar genes handed on from a common ancestor has broken down”

As for your post 172 I’m aware that some bone fragmentsof certain species have been found and there has been a comparison between a few fossils that have been aranged to appear as though there was this great evolutionary process going on- however, as I pointed out in the gold/lead example still stands- simply becausewe find two (or even in htis case more than 2) similiar examples doesn’t mean the two are in any way related- I can set the gold and lead next to each other, and we can postulate all day long about the similarities and suggest that one ‘evolved’ from the other because of these similarities- however you simply don’t get gold from lead, ever- despite many similarities.

In the case of the few examples given of ‘early mammals’, while anyone can set the examples next to others and suggest a connection, it’s quite a stretch to state that there is a ‘clear case of transitions’ going on especially concidering the fact that if we’re to point out common descent, then we have to account for the myriad of differences between all species that simply do not show any such ‘progressions’ if indeed progressions did happen which is doubtful.

The illustrations that you’ve provided don’t point out that the cynodont was 15 times larger than the rat sized Morganucodon. The drawing is deceitful inthat it shows the two as being the same size in an effort to suggest that the supposed bone migration was proportionally consistent and thusly a nice smooth process clear for anyone to view- however, suggesting that a pig sized animal and a rat sized one are related simply because they share some similiar jaw features in slightly different configurations comes down to a highly subjective interpretation/acceptance and is anyhting but ‘clear evidence for transitions’ or even ‘clear evidence for the evolution of a major structural form’