Bill Nye the Science Guy says creationism not good for kids

Reuters ^ | August 28, 2012 | Lily Kuo

[YHAOS]

"What’s a “dirty chemical?”"

A chemical that tells off-color stories?

[CottShop]

in order to go through abiogenisis, only pure chemicals could be used i nthe ‘evolutionary’ process however nature doesn’t provide pure chemical- You’ll have to talk with Betty Boop about that as it was she I beleive that had that discussion about a 1/2 year ago- or perhaps it was alamo girl- dirty chemicals foudn in nature would have mucked up the process of abiogenisis- That discussion was a long time ago and I don’t remember all the specifics right off hand but it was a fascinating htread- and if you find it please do ping me to it-

In a somewhat related issue Man when he was created started out with pure genes- then as time whent on and mutaitons occured the gene pool became more andm ore corrupted- and htis can be traced baqck and shown through dna sampling (MTDNA I beleive it was? The Eve project- the further back they went the more pure the genes were foudn to be- which is apparently why family coudl mate without ill effect before it became geneticlly not feasible to do so due ot complications i nthe offspring- -

[whattajoke]

In a somewhat related issue Man when he was created started out with pure genes- then as time whent on and mutaitons occured the gene pool became more andm ore corrupted- and htis can be traced baqck and shown through dna sampling (MTDNA I beleive it was? The Eve project- the further back they went the more pure the genes were foudn to be- which is apparently why family coudl mate without ill effect before it became geneticlly not feasible to do so due ot complications i nthe offspring.

Stop. Just stop. Although you've only written one paragraph, I still can't figure out where to begin with it. I know this is a common creationist meme, and you're just doing your part, but come ON.

The biggest issue with this whole idea is that you are citing things like genetics and mitochondrial DNA and the work of those who study human evolution and have twisted it so fantastically to suit your needs. I simply cannot understand how someone who believes Adam was zapped into existence X number of years ago can offer up human genetics as some sort of evidence. You can not do that. You are citing primate/human DNA evolution to come up with the cockamamie idea that there is no such thing as human evolution. I can't wrap my head around that.

But playing your game, ok, Adam was "perfect," whatever that means. He had a "perfect" genome. What does that even mean? And why then, did his perfect genome, from which a genetically identical (yet somehow not the sex chromosomes) Eve emerged. But Eve wasn't perfect, because she succumbed to a magic talking snake. Not so perfect?

Yet still perfect enough to mate with her genetically identical except for the whole XX/XY thing to produce two perfect sons. Except one of them wasn't so perfect because he was a murderer. So two perfect humans created two perfect humans, one of which committed murder, one of the worst sins imaginable.

Help me out here.

Furthermore, depending on your definition of "perfect," the more "similar" one's specific genome is to a mate's genome, the less viable sexual reproduction is. So when we had a few perfect people running around mating with their mothers and sisters, their viability would be even less than in incestuous relationships today. (Of course, your "out" is that biblical "perfect" means they were supernatually perfect and "we can't know" and *poof*! It was magic and worked out great. Except for the 50% of the first kids were murderers thing.)

But you yourself say that the farther we go back in human history, the less mutations we see. (Again, ignoring what mutations actually are and actually mean, since in creationist-land there are no such things as "good" or "indifferent" mutations.)

I'll stop. I'm confused.

[CottShop]

[[The biggest issue with this whole idea is that you are citing things like genetics and mitochondrial DNA and the work of those who study human evolution and have twisted it so fantastically to suit your needs]]

I’ve twisted nothign- I referred to what a secular source showed- they proved apparently that the further they went back the more pure the dna became- and this is proven out by the fact that close relatives could at one point in history mate without ill effects on offs[pring- today that is an impossibility due to myriad of mutaions

[[ I simply cannot understand how someone who believes Adam was zapped into existence X number of years ago can offer up human genetics as some sort of evidence.]]

Really? Then explain my above statement? Whty did genetics start otu pure and degrade over time until relative matings were no logner possible?

[[You can not do that.]]

Why? Because it conflicts with the hypothesis of evolution? It is direct verifiable scientific evidence- not just somethign that has to be guessed at like abiogenisis which has no direct evidence except to show that it coudl NOT work as proven out by the Miller experiments which showed that amino acids when ‘created’ were both left and right handed and woudl have destroyed each other as well as environmental conditions beign fastal to the process and survival of said acids etc etc etc unless compeltely and itnelligently isolated and cotnrolled under wholly unnatural conditions

[[You can not do that. You are citing primate/human DNA evolution]]

I did? Whwere did I do that? UIf you are sinmpyl goign to make stuff abotu abotu what I said and didn’t say- well then there’s simpyl no defendign anythign against you apparently as you can simpyl say whatever you want as though it were fact- I was reciting what researchers studied and found when they traced back human lineage and dna

[[He had a “perfect” genome. What does that even mean?]]

Very simply he had no genetic mutations (as once again, the research bore out- almsot- the further back they went, they found less and less mutations)

[[Eve emerged. But Eve wasn’t perfect, because she succumbed to a magic talking snake. Not so perfect?]]

Wow! Are you serious? Character defects are an indication of genetic defects too? Good Golly!

[[Yet still perfect enough to mate with her genetically identical except for the whole XX/XY thing to produce two perfect sons. Except one of them wasn’t so perfect because he was a murderer.]]

Again, WOW!

[[Furthermore, depending on your definition of “perfect,” the more “similar” one’s specific genome is to a mate’s genome, the less viable sexual reproduction is.]]

Whaaaat? That’s not what I said at all- I’ll explain, although I’m sure it wil ldo no good because you’
ll simpyl further twist what I said somehow- again making it nearly impossible to defend anythign I say- but whatever-

I said that genetically pure parents will produce genetically pure offspring, or offspring with onlyvery slight genetic mutations- those with slight genetic mutatiosn will pass them along to next generation who will have perhaps further genetic mutations and on aqnd on it goes until it’s no longer feasible fopr close relatives to mate- to get to this point qwould take several thousands of years

[[. (Of course, your “out” is that biblical “perfect” means they were supernatually perfect and “we can’t know” and *poof*! It was magic and worked out great.]]

Well not quite- they were spiritually perfect to begin with- but they did have the choice to be imperfect if they so chose to which of course they did- but I digress- that’s not what we’re talkign about here- we’re talkign abotu genetics- not supernatural abilities- genetics are fully natural- nothign supernatural abotu degreding genome- if the genome WERE supernatural, then it would not have degraded naturally- hence the ‘super’ in the super natural-

[[Except for the 50% of the first kids were murderers thing]]

What the !@#!@$!! has that got to do with genetics? So Adam fell into sin, and one of his children did too- what’s your point? That character problems somehow translate into genetic problems? That’s a couple of times know you’ve tried to make that connection

[[But you yourself say that the farther we go back in human history, the less mutations we see.]]

No sir- I’ myself did not say that- I repeated what researches said- please be more careful when attempting to quote or paraphrase-

[[Again, ignoring what mutations actually are and actually mean,]]

How does that ignore what mutaitons ‘really are and mean’? It perfectly describes how mutations have a deletorious effect on once mutation free genomes- just because soemthign is mutaiton free does not mean that mutations can’t affect it later-

[[since in creationist-land there are no such things as “good” or “indifferent” mutations.) ]]

That’s not what creationists beleive- of course we beleive there can be ‘indiffrent’ mutaitons- we do not however belive in ‘good’ mutations- while sickle cell anemia MAY help someone fight off malaria (which is a ‘good’ SIDE-EFFECT of a delterious mutation, NOONE can say sickle cell anemia is a ‘good thing’ for thsoe that suffer from it-

There are plenty of mutaiotns that appear to have no effect- what you might call ‘indifferent’ mutations, however there is even dispute about wherther those ‘indifferent’ mutaitons as to wehther they were somehow not as benign as claimed-

But whatever- the main thrust of my original post was about pure verses dirty chemicals and whether it was scientifically possible for impure chemicals to proiduce the first protiens and buioklding blocks of life- the fact is that it woudl have taken clean chemicals in order for mutatiosn to even begin having a VERY slight possibility of ‘creating’ the building blocks of life- but even then - even if the very first building blocks of life were created, they face impossible odds- not just im[probable odds, but impossible- meanign that it coudl not have happened, and that’s not just coming from the ‘creationsit side of the fence’ either, that comes from the secular science conferences where it was almost unanimously declared that it was impossible-

These aren’;t my findings- these are secular sources I’m referrign to

[Hacksaw]

Case in point, what's this unchallenged for 150 years nonsense? The better question is of course: What scientific theory requires so many lawsuits to prop it up?

Well, in my opinion, the teaching of evolution is litigated so ferociously because many of proponents are attached to it as a vehicle for atheism and nothing more. They have no more use for science than Jesse Jackson has a use for condoms. Talk to them about the logical extensions of evolution as far as human societies and IQ levels, and they suddenly lose their Darwin faster than Michael Moore downing a Domino's 5-cheeser.

It's also equally pathetic of those who state that those who don't accept that God zapped Adam and Eve into being as is written verbatim in the Bible (which was revealed by God but penned by quite fallible Men) are somehow anti-Jesus or other such balderdash.

As for me, I don't really care anymore - my opinions on the matter are my own and not open to vetting.

[betty boop]

"...Consciousness seems like a radical novelty in the universe, not prefigured by the after-effects of the Big Bang; so how did it contrive to spring into being from what preceded it?"

To say that consciousness "seems" like a radical novelty in the universe somehow does not square with the ubiquity of some form of consciousness — along the gamut running from basic sentience through self-consciousness, depending on the complexity of the living organism — among all biological beings. Amoeba have been shown to display simple learning behaviors in experimental laboratory settings. Likewise, WRT bacteria:

Recently, it has become clear that simple bacteria can exhibit rich behavior, have internal degrees of freedom, informational capabilities, and freedom to respond by altering itself and others via emission of signals in a self-regulated manner.... Each bacterium is, by itself, a biotic autonomous system, having a certain freedom to select its response to the biomechanical messages it receives, including self-alteration, self-plasticity, and decision making, permitting purposeful alteration of its behavior.... [B]acteria and other unicellular organisms are autonomous and social beings showing cognition in the forms of association, remembering, forgetting, learning, etc., activities that are found in all living organisms....

I agree with McGinn that "there seems to be no naturalistic explanation" for consciousness, let alone its universality in all living organisms. But to say that consciousness "borders on sheer magic" is nonsense. It only means that Neodarwinism will not look outside of the box of its naturalistic presuppositions.

One might say that some form of consciousness is a fact of LIFE. It would be magical only if it is an "epiphenomenon" of matter — just as the abiogenesis theorists believe life itself is an epiphenomenon of matter.

So, I wonder, who's doing the "magical act" here? I'd say on this point, it is the Neodarwinists.

Moreoever, to say that "Nature did it!" is just as uninformative as to say "God did it!" It is the job of biologists to tell us how Nature (viewed as matter + random variation + natural selection) did it. And evidently — given their metaphysical naturalistic presuppositions — they cannot.

Crispin Wright states, "If we reject naturalism, then we accept that there is more to the world than can be embraced within a physicalist ontology — and so take on a commitment, it can seem, to a kind of eerie supernaturalism."

I agree with Wright about what the rejection of physicalist ontology logically entails. But his following conclusion seems a non sequitur to me: For consciousness is obviously an empirical feature of living nature. How then can it be "supernatural?" If anything, this shows that Nature really cannot be reduced to a strictly physicalist ontology; Nature really cannot be reduced to naturalist/materialist explanations.

Neodarwinists have no trouble believing that the laws of physics exist, and that Darwinian theory is "true." Do they then consider that laws and theories are also supernatural — because they cannot be reduced to the status of material objects? If so, it would seem logical to conclude on this point that much that goes on in the living world is "magical." So if we want to understand that world, perhaps we'd better fire the scientists and call in the shamans?...

Dear TS, you wrote:

Brute matter cannot give up what it does not have. It cannot give what it does not have. Like Alamo-girl often reminds us..."in the absence of time events cannot occur, in the absense of space things cannot exist."

This should be obvious to anyone who bothers to think about it in a fair-minded (i.e., undogmatic) way.

As to Alamo-Girl's telling point, physical cosmologists who hold that the Big Bang was a random, spontaneous quantum event still must account for the quantum vacuum necessary for such an event to take place. Where did IT "come from?" Plus absent time, no event of whatever description can take place. Likewise, absent space, there can be no quantum vacuum in which events can occur.

Unless you want to wrap yourself up in an infinite causal regression (which would make the world senseless, unintelligible in principle), there must have been a first uncaused cause — just as Aristotle said.

That is, the quantum vacuum, space and time all had "beginnings" — they are the effects of a primaeval Cause. They didn't just "magically" pop in out of thin air (so to speak), out of physical nothingness. The first cause can be regarded as "supernatural" in a certain sense; i.e., as "above" or "beyond" the physical world. But its effects in the physical world are not.

One effect is the natural laws themselves. What they tell us is that our universe is "informed" and thus intelligible. Scientists implicitly depend on this statement being true; otherwise what they do would be senseless and pointless.

Of course, if we speak about "information," we necessarily invoke the ideas of intelligence, consciousness, communication — which as you show, dear TS, cannot be explained on the basis of the evolution history of "dumb, blind matter." Rocks are not conscious; but rabbits are.

Thank you for your outstanding essay/post, Texas Songwriter!

[MHGinTN]

Are we getting tot he point of accepting that LIFE is as much a dimension as time and space? That Life erupts in the Universe of dead matter because a threshhold point where the dimensions can intertwine is reached, much the way dimensions space and time intertwined during the initial setting of conditions done by The Creator? The very nature of life is ‘processing information, something dead matter does not do. Yet matter follows the initial conditions for it, designed by The Creator. I wonder, does the entropic principle govern dead matter, and an ‘animatic’ principle govern the matter intertwined with life force? ... And a ‘spiriatic’ principle govern life intertwined with spirit dimension?

[hosepipe]

[ One might say that some form of consciousness is a fact of LIFE. It would be magical only if it is an “epiphenomenon” of matter — just as the abiogenesis theorists believe life itself is an epiphenomenon of matter. ]

It appears that “consciousness” “IS” life.. and life “IS” “consciousness”.. Awareness is another matter.. Maybe awareness is the “quality” of “consciousness”.. Looking around me at humans and other living creatures it seems so... Some creatures are just more “aware” than others..

Aware of “Whom, What, Where”?... Now thats an interesting subject...
Amazing that “awareness” can appear to be quite low in certain “creatures”.. that I’m aware of..

Wonder if MY awareness or yours is quite primitive to others more aware?...
Interesting question BUT I’m not sure I have that much humility..
Hmmmmm.. does humility bring “awareness” with it?...

[tacticalogic]

Moreoever, to say that "Nature did it!" is just as uninformative as to say "God did it!" It is the job of biologists to tell us how Nature (viewed as matter + random variation + natural selection) did it. And evidently — given their metaphysical naturalistic presuppositions — they cannot.

Since they can't do their job, should we fire them all?

[Texas Songwriter]

I agree with Wright about what the rejection of physicalist ontology logically entails. But his following conclusion seems a non sequitur to me: For consciousness is obviously an empirical feature of living nature. How then can it be "supernatural?" If anything, this shows that Nature really cannot be reduced to a strictly physicalist ontology; Nature really cannot be reduced to naturalist/materialist explanations. Neodarwinists have no trouble believing that the laws of physics exist, and that Darwinian theory is "true." Do they then consider that laws and theories are also supernatural — because they cannot be reduced to the status of material objects? If so, it would seem logical to conclude on this point that much that goes on in the living world is "magical." So if we want to understand that world, perhaps we'd better fire the scientists and call in the shamans?...

You have struck upon a thought which is called to mind. It was either C.S.Lewis or Dave Hunt who referenced these scientists as "materialist magicians". What is so disconcerting is that these physcalists clearly see theirs is a blind ally leading to no clairity on the issue. They simpy have an a priori commitment to metaphysical naturalism despite their own conclusions. I believe a sound thinker goes where the argument takes him. An unsound thinker goes where his motives and interests invite him.

They are convicted by their own presuppositional commitements. They seem to have a a "First Cause" explaination...that being that "We will consider any cause, except a Transcendent First Cause...they say they cannot allow the divine foot in the door. This is the basic underpining of all of their declarations.

[MHGinTN]

Not intending to defend the ‘materialist magicians’, but does a thought exist in a spacetime sence? If so, then we are very long way to go for comprehnding the extent of dimensions space and time, as well as life force and spirit.

[tpanther]

Fantastic bettyboop!

Worthy of future reference book-marking!

HOO-rah!

[Texas Songwriter]

Not intending to defend the ‘materialist magicians’, but does a thought exist in a spacetime sence?

The short answer to your question is No, thought does not exist in space/tune. Thought is a mental event and Dualist believe are immatrial. Physicalists refute this saying mental events supervene on physical but then fail to offer an epistemic and ontological explaination. This is what I was telling Betty in the post.

{The term materialist magician, I now remember, was the term C.S.Lewis used in The Screwtape Letters instructing the junior demon to delve not-too-deep into the scriptures, and that their goal was to produce a secular scientist materialist, but one who is open in his thinking to acquire those techniques of the Shaman who is a 'traditional nature worshiper' such that the human would acquire the teachings of the Shaman, all the while declaring a devotion to materialism and scientism.}

[MHGinTN]

And my short reply is, YES, a thought is generated via aspects located in spacetime, thus it must have some linkage to the spacetime coordinate system in order to be created. BUT, our current conceptualizations of dimensions space and time and life and spirit are so weak that we are unable to 'dream of reality' beyond our sensing patterns. If a thought exists inside The Universe God created, then a thought has some aspect variability relationship to the dimensions which God created to define that Created Universe. [Now for the longer ramble, if you wish to tune out at this point.]

There is of course the possibility that dimension life (the dimension from which God brings forth our soul to be united with our body) is not dimension space nor dimension time, but a separate dimension, and that the spirit comes forth from yet another dimension which, too, is not dimension space or dimension time. Will we ever search for the threshold by which another dimension of God's Creation comes to intertwine with the dimensions we sense, like space and time?

I've been cogitating on the threshold linkage between dimension space and dimension time. Over the past decade I've conceptualized 'a' how these two dimensions became intertwined during the earliest Creation of God's Universe for our existence. But we know by indirect association that the Universe God Created for our existence has more than just dimensions space, time, and life force, for we humans have been blessed with a spirit dimensionality, and God has instructed us that the spirit aspect is 'timeless' in the sense that it exists 'eternally' in a state of 'God-life' or a state of 'God-death'. Jesus taught on this but His disciples didn't catch it well enough to opine over it in ways that our epoch of humanity would recognize.

I am of course operating this line of reasoning on the notion that what is the Universe for our existence is not God, that God is all that is outside the Universe of our existence yet God Created this Universe, upholds the statistically impossible balance of same, and permeates this Universe by His Word and Will.

Axioms/corollaries of what I contemplate might read something like the following: what is not the Universe IS God; what is not God, is the Universe God created/creates. God may choose to bond with some aspects of His Creation. ... There is no where when which God cannot reach; there is some part of what God has created or will create which God will not choose to reach 'into'.

[betty boop]

We will consider any cause, except a Transcendent First Cause...they say they cannot allow the divine foot in the door. This is the basic underpining of all of their declarations.

You're citing biologist/geneticist Richard Lewontin, formerly of MIT, now at Harvard. regarding that "divine foot in the door."

The full quote definitely supports your insight about a priori commitment to metaphysical naturalism:

We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism.

It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.

Yikes. Looks like a "rigged game" to me. Of what possible value is this "commitment" WRT the scientific discovery of what is actually going on in the real world?

RE: Lewontin's statement: It seems to me the rhetoric we use ought to conform with reality, and not the other way around. The latter approach certainly isn't science. Your insight about "materialist magicians" is clearly on the mark.

This sort of inversion of the classical rules of scientific discourse is getting all too common these days....

What I can't figure out is why such folks think what they're doing is even science?

Thank you, dear Texas Songwriter, for yet another "spot-on" essay/post!

[YHAOS]

“Stop. Just stop. Although you've only written one paragraph, I still can't figure out where to begin with it.”

The application of just a little Derrida Deconstructionism should be of benefit in figuring out where to begin. Otherwise, if you are sufficiently familiar with biology, you should be able to blow Cott’s thesis out of the water (with scientific reasoning – not with polemics). If you can do the latter, then, by all means, prey continue.

It seems my smarty-pants observation about a “dirty” chemical being one that produces “off-color stories,” did have the benefit of eliciting an explanation from Cott sufficient to gain an idea about that of which he was speaking. (Thanks, Cott)

“I simply cannot understand how someone who believes Adam was zapped into existence X number of years ago can offer up human genetics as some sort of evidence.”

So far as I know, scientifically you would understand that process the same way you could understand that Life was “zapped into existence X number of years ago” . . . likewise offering up genetics (if not specifically human) as evidence. But, I’ll leave that to the experts who have a handle on everything.

What interests me are the sociological and ethical issues aroused by these “scientific” discussions, as I outlined in #258.

Your wonderment at how a “perfect” Eve could succumb to the serpent’s temptation, or at how a “perfect” Cain could murder his brother, accompanied by your references to genomes and mitochondrial DNA, indicate to me the possibility that human failings, viewed scientifically, are beyond the human ability to control (poor dears).

The philosophical and moral consequences of this perspective should be obvious.

[MHGinTN]

The pre-exitence of paper and ink does not explain the meaning of a message found on a sheet of paper via ink applied to the paper. Following C.S. Lewis’s reasoning, a human is a spirit invested with a soul, riding through spacetime in a body. But it will not be an eternal ride in an all too time-limited body. For that journey, God has promised a body more fit to a very long duration.

[YHAOS]

“a human is a spirit invested with a soul”

And, by definition, Science can acknowledge neither.

[hosepipe]

[ “a human is a spirit invested with a soul” / And, by definition, Science can acknowledge neither. ]

Like a monkey inspecting a ROLEX science cannot understand either the spirit or the soul... They are shiney mendations makes noises but what they are is a mystery.. And look more interesting in the sunlight than in darkness.. Science seems to like darkness..

By science I mean “scientists”.. After all what good is a ROLEX to a monkey?.. Maybe as entertainment..

[tacticalogic]

Since the biologists can’t do their job, should we fire them all?