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Science Museums Adapt in Struggle against Creationist Revisionism
Scientific American ^ | July 12, 2007 | Elizabeth Landau

Posted on 07/14/2007 10:33:34 AM PDT by GodGunsGuts

Madonna and Bon Jovi are no match for Hawaiian flies when it comes to karaoke hits at the University of Nebraska State Museum in Lincoln. In a popular exhibit activity, visitors attempt to mimic the unique courtship calls of different species of Hawaiian Drosophila, a group of 800 different flies that may have evolved from a single species.

Fly karaoke is part of "Explore Evolution," a permanent exhibit currently at Nebraska and five other museums in the Midwest and Southwest...that explores evolutionary concepts in new ways. Such an activity is a far cry from the traditional way science museums have presented evolution, which usually included charts called phylogenies depicting ancestral relationships or a static set of fossils arranged chronologically. "Explore Evolution'' has those, too—and then some, because museum curators came to realize that they needed better ways to counter growing attacks on their integrity.

...

Under pressure from these kinds of groups, the Kansas State Board of Education in 2005 approved a curriculum that allowed the public schools to include completely unfounded challenges to the theory of evolution.

In an effort to make their case to the public, creationists raised $26 million in private donations to build the 50,000-square-foot Creation Museum in Petersburg, Ky., which opened in late May. The institution presents the biblical history of the universe. Visitors learn that biblically, dinosaurs are best explained as creatures that roamed Earth with humans. In its first month of existence, the museum drew over 49,000 visitors, according to its Web site.

"Explore Evolution," funded by a $2.8 million grant from the National Science Foundation, is one of many recent efforts by science museums to counter such resistance to evolution...

(Excerpt) Read more at sciam.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; Government; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: churchofdarwin; creation; evolution; fsmdidit; fsmdiditfstdt; museum; science
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To: ROTB
The purpose is to illustrate that evolution and the Bible are in conflict, to the dismay of confused Christians or well-meaning atheists.

OK, I understand what you were saying now. Thanks for the clarification.

41 posted on 07/14/2007 11:46:20 AM PDT by Coyoteman (Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.)
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To: pacelvi

“you “science” guys sure are spiteful angry liliputians.”

Quick test... what book is the “liliputians” in reference to?

A. The Bible
B. The New Testemant
C. Hercules and his magic ride
D. None of the Above


42 posted on 07/14/2007 11:48:07 AM PDT by Porterville (I'm an American. If you hate Americans, I hope our enemies destroy you. I will pray for my soul.)
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To: ndt

[[Nobody says spontaneously, it “sprang up” from previous versions of similar “software”. ]]

And so on and so forth- Ad infinitum, eternal like, almost God-ish in nature, superceeding the laws of nature. Right.


43 posted on 07/14/2007 11:50:21 AM PDT by CottShop
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To: DocCincy
“The THEORY of evolution is the biggest non-scientific debacle next to global warming. Nothing in the natural world tends to order, to more complexity. Second law of thermodynamics says that all tends toward disorder—that entropy is constantly increasing. Evolution flat-out contradicts science!”

No it is not. The biggest debacle is that you zealots represent yourselves as conservatives and it is embarrassing to the rest of us. I wish you guys watch more sesame street to begin your education. I know it is late in life for many of you, but I think Big Bird and the Cookie Monster can teach you a lot.

44 posted on 07/14/2007 11:50:34 AM PDT by Porterville (I'm an American. If you hate Americans, I hope our enemies destroy you. I will pray for my soul.)
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To: Porterville

D

Guliver’s Travels


45 posted on 07/14/2007 11:53:00 AM PDT by pacelvi
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To: Coyoteman

> OK, I understand what you were saying now. Thanks for the
>clarification.

No problem man. I didn’t make it clear I was addressing that guy who thought evolution and the Bible are compatible.


46 posted on 07/14/2007 11:54:26 AM PDT by ROTB (Our Constitution...only for a [Christian] people...it is wholly inadequate for any other.-J.Q.Adams)
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To: pacelvi; Coyoteman; betty boop; Alamo-Girl
Life obviously evolved to BELIEVE IN GOD..
unless life didn't speciate at all..

Darwin and Dawkins missed that..
Belief in God is a high level evolution of mentality..
Lack of belief in God or not caring is a low level mentality..
Purely logically speaking of course..

47 posted on 07/14/2007 11:55:03 AM PDT by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole....)
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To: CottShop
"Right."

No. Like I said, it's a bad analogy. A better analogy might be able to be made with polymers but that probably would be no easier to understand and hence defeat the purpose of an analogy.
48 posted on 07/14/2007 11:56:18 AM PDT by ndt
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To: ndt; metmom; betty boop; Alamo-Girl; editor-surveyor; AndyTheBear; Tailgunner Joe; pacelvi; ...

More on the motivations and conclusions of the Darwinist faithful:

“Naturalistic evolution has clear consequences that Charles Darwin understood perfectly. 1) No gods worth having exist; 2) no life after death exists; 3) no ultimate foundation for ethics exists; 4) no ultimate meaning in life exists; and 5) human free will is nonexistent.”

Provine, William B. [Professor of Biological Sciences, Cornell University], “, “Evolution: Free will and punishment and meaning in life”, Abstract of Will Provine’s 1998 Darwin Day Keynote Address.

“It is no more heretical to say the Universe displays purpose, as Hoyle has done, than to say that it is pointless, as Steven Weinberg has done. Both statements are metaphysical and outside science. Yet it seems that scientists are permitted by their own colleagues to say metaphysical things about lack of purpose and not the reverse. This suggests to me that science, in allowing this metaphysical notion, sees itself as religion and presumably as an atheistic religion (if you can have such a thing).”

Shallis, Michael [Astrophysicist, Oxford University], “In the eye of a storm”, New Scientist, January 19, 1984, pp.42-43.

“I had motive for not wanting the world to have a meaning; consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics, he is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not do as he wants to do, or why his friends should not seize political power and govern in the way that they find most advantageous to themselves. … For myself, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation, sexual and political.”

Aldous Huxley: Ends and Means, pp. 270 ff.


49 posted on 07/14/2007 11:57:46 AM PDT by GodGunsGuts
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To: pacelvi

One common thread winnows its way through each of the Darwinist’s personalities. Arrogance. It is always in the forefront of any response that questions their closely-held beliefs.

They remind me of limousine-liberals, with their condescending and insulting attitudes of assumed superiority.

Oh, yes. Let us not forget their hypocrisy. What they damn with one side of their faces, they praise with the other side, as long as it fits their particular zealotry.


50 posted on 07/14/2007 12:04:27 PM PDT by jim35 ("...when the lion and the lamb lie down together, ...we'd better damn sure be the lion")
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To: GodGunsGuts
"More on the motivations and conclusions of the Darwinist faithful:"

You seem to be trying to make an Appeal to consequences. Normally that would be frowned on as a valid argument but it seems to be the height of what passes for debate around here. So a quick question.

Assume for a second that the universe is "pointless" and there is no "meaning of life". Would you rather accept the truth or live in a delusion?
51 posted on 07/14/2007 12:04:30 PM PDT by ndt
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To: DocCincy
Second law of thermodynamics says that all tends toward disorder—that entropy is constantly increasing.

Sure, if everything were steam engines.

52 posted on 07/14/2007 12:08:48 PM PDT by RightWhale (It's Brecht's donkey, not mine)
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To: GodGunsGuts
Science Museums Adapt in Struggle against Creationist Revisionism

*****

GENESIS 1:1
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth...

GENESIS 1:21
So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living and moving thing with which the water teems, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

GENESIS 1:25
25 God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

Now, pray tell...

WHO...
..Are really "the revisionists" in this scenario?!?

Darwin's stuff is so weak in light of now-known genetic complexity of plant, animal, and human life....

I s'pect he would likewise be convinced to consider intelligent design as a good place to contoinue his quest....

Follow the evidence, Charlie....

53 posted on 07/14/2007 12:09:24 PM PDT by Wings-n-Wind (The main things are the plain things!)
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To: ndt

Assume for a second that the universe is “pointless” and there is no “meaning of life”. Would you rather accept the truth or live in a delusion?

That would be impossible. The truth has a point. If the universe is pointless and “has no meaning”, then you couldn’t trust your own conclusion about anything.


54 posted on 07/14/2007 12:09:28 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
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To: Porterville; DocCincy

[I know it is late in life for many of you, but I think Big Bird and the Cookie Monster can teach you a lot.]

So, just how much education do I have? How much does DocCincy have? How much do you have?

If your devolution into this childish banter is any indication of your education, I would submit that perhaps you should return to Sesame Street yourself, and learn some politeness.


55 posted on 07/14/2007 12:10:47 PM PDT by jim35 ("...when the lion and the lamb lie down together, ...we'd better damn sure be the lion")
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To: GodGunsGuts
"That would be impossible. The truth has a point. If the universe is pointless and “has no meaning”, then you couldn’t trust your own conclusion about anything."

That makes absolutely no sense what so ever.
56 posted on 07/14/2007 12:14:30 PM PDT by ndt
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To: GodGunsGuts; ndt

Nonsense. True is or isn't. It is objective. "Points" require value judgments and are subjective. The inability to distinguish between consensual reality and personal reality permeates creationist/ID arguments.

57 posted on 07/14/2007 12:14:57 PM PDT by Mr. Know It All (Term Limits: Stop us before we vote again!)
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To: ndt

==That makes absolutely no sense what so ever.

If the universe is pointless, then your thoughts are pointless. It would therefore be impossible to “make a point.”


58 posted on 07/14/2007 12:16:55 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
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To: Wings-n-Wind
"Darwin's stuff is so weak in light of now-known genetic complexity of plant, animal, and human life...."

You only know about the complexity of the genomes of several animals and plants (and fungi) because the information was made available to you by people, who nearly to the man accept evolution.
59 posted on 07/14/2007 12:17:06 PM PDT by ndt
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To: Mr. Know It All

But if the universe is pointless, then it is impossible to make a point...about anything.


60 posted on 07/14/2007 12:18:32 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
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