ID is a religious belief. The theory of evolution is a scientific theory.
(Whistling....)
Posted on 05/08/2007 9:24:03 PM PDT by 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.
Leftist Dewey-tainted educators have violated the Constitution by adopting an Established Religion. That established religion is secular humanism. The biggest proponents of treating evolution as a fact-instead-of-theory are not the scientific educators, but, instead the social science and liberal arts educators that want all God centered religious thought dismissed as superstition and use a bludgeon of Evolution to do so by offering to young minds the blank choice of either you believe in science or you believe in God. It is done subtlely, but it is given to most of our young in just that blank a manner.
Dewey, that over-rated star in the educators heaven, promoted secular humanism as a religion. Not only that, he promoted it to replace Christianity in cultural, educational and social spheres.
We are living in the case now where most of our governmental educational system has adopted it as an established religion and the entire dismissal of theistic belief is first advanced with evolution as an established fact to dismiss biblical creation or general creation in order to undermine all religious teachings.
well it is relevent inthat it shows that the ‘evidence’ is based on sketchy circumstances. There was no evidence shown by those hypothesising that the fossils (which could very plausibly have been deformed through the fossilization process) evolved an ear structure. While it is possible for MICRO evolution to move a certain feature, to suggest that it did happen in such a way as to construct and assemble the complex hearing systems we now enjoy is a far leap of conjecture and does nothign to show a transitional experience through genetic favouring of certain traits. As well, you speak of ‘quibbling’ yet, to ignore the biological impossibilities of even the ‘beginnings of life’ and then to set two fossils next to one another and suggest evolution is being witnessed, (while ignoring the more abundant differences) is as well nothing but quibbling about speculatives that ignore the problems and impossibilities of the biology included in abiogensis. It’s like saying I have gold that I beleive came from lead, and showing some similarities between the two by pointing out the wieghts are ‘close’ or the solidness of the two metals are similiar, or pointing out that both can be easily scratched etc. The ‘evidence’ for the ‘evolution of the ear’ is suspect at best, and there are no real ‘transitional stages’ that show the complete progression of the structures to the middle ear. Showing a jaw bone with a low structure, then one with a bit higher and another with a bit higher one yet shows nothign but variation within kinds and not a progressive ‘transition’ as has been purported by those who wish to beleive the process did happen.
I will cede that the fella should not have said ‘major structural changes’ can’t happen because even a loss of limbs can be major structural changes, and we know for fact that microevolution can produce this effect- however, the proper wording should have been now NEW information has been observed in nature showing the macroevolution of one species to another KIND. NEW information is needed for NEW organs to appear where no information for such organs exist-
Because, like global warming, it's religion passing itself off as science.
you said: “The thing is, any group who insists that other views should not be allowed, expressed, or taught in a public setting is guilty of censorship. Pure and simple.”
Bingo- if the hypothesis of evolution is so sound, you’d think that there would be nothign to fear from opposing evidences- yet, because the hypothesis of evolution is so problematic and actually biologically impoissible, there is a need to keep that ‘durned crazy design based opposition’ out of the classroom in order to avoid the tough questions about the biological impossibilities of evolution
Yup- speaking of which- RI students will now need to view ‘an inconvenient truth’ by al gore in order to graduate:
Creationism is a theological theory, which has it that God created the heavens and the earth out of nothing and that he stillsustains them. This is quite consistent with evolutionary theory provided that this theory is not confined to what Charles Darwin and Thomas Huxley taught almost century and a half ago or even to what is said today. Science is based on appearances and deductions from appearances. To a degree, so is faith. Jesus appeard to his disciples after his death and this is recorded. The materialist rejects what is recorded because nothing of the sort has appeared to him. Not content with this, many of them try to contend that the Gospels are fabrications as as to rule out any possibility of asking the question: Did the disciples really see Jesus? At bottom it is because they assume that such an event is impossible.
Amazing....but then again not really. All part of why we homeschool and why I am not a big fan of a college education.
Isn't that the very definition of inter-species evolution? Evolving from one species into another? Perhaps the author confused inter- with intra-.
This shouldn’t have to be explained to any semi-educated adult. The fact that is does points up to a deliberate ignorance, or if you will, the simi-educated who really deserve simian descent.
I have replied to Fido969. Please follow the exchanges therein, below.
Colossians 1:16-17
16. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him.
17. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
This is REAL easy to say;
but REAL hard to show!
And the 'scientists' are REAL sure about this!
Granted. Trying to make logical sequence in a scientific manner might seem easy. But what is much, much easier still, stupider even, by an exponential degree, is to rely on 2000-year-old tales desert travellers cooked up when they had nothing else to do in their camps.
ID is a religious belief. The theory of evolution is a scientific theory.
(Whistling....)
A big-rig driver??
Ah...Desert Tales...
Is THIS what they call them now, in Comparative Religion 101?
LOL
That’s right.
You don’t have to tell a truck driver that the fuel going into his tanks reverses the entropy of sitting in the depot.
Yep! So sure that they PREDICTED many of the specifics of how this transition took place BEFORE the fossils were found. For instance, since the mammalian ear bones are involved in the reptilian jaw joint, and an animal obviously can't chew without a jaw joint, it was predicted that some critters among the "mammal-like reptiles" must have had a double jointed jaw, with both the reptilian and the mammalian articulations operative in the same creature.
There's not reason on earth to predict such a thing apart from the assumption that the transition really took place, must have done so by gradual steps, and basically that evolution is true (mammals did evolve from reptiles). But indeed exactly such critters were subsequently found as fossils.
Interesting. Thanks for that.
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