Posted on 09/27/2006 9:56:09 AM PDT by SirLinksalot
Why Darwinism is doomed
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Posted: September 27, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Jonathan Wells, Ph.D.
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© 2006
Harvard evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould wrote in 1977: "Biology took away our status as paragons created in the image of God." Darwinism teaches that we are accidental byproducts of purposeless natural processes that had no need for God, and this anti-religious dogma enjoys a taxpayer-funded monopoly in America's public schools and universities. Teachers who dare to question it openly have in many cases lost their jobs.
The issue here is not "evolution" – a broad term that can mean simply change within existing species (which no one doubts). The issue is Darwinism – which claims that all living things are descended from a common ancestor, modified by natural selection acting on random genetic mutations.
According to Darwinists, there is such overwhelming evidence for their view that it should be considered a fact. Yet to the Darwinists' dismay, at least three-quarters of the American people – citizens of the most scientifically advanced country in history – reject it.
A study published Aug. 11 in the pro-Darwin magazine Science attributes this primarily to biblical fundamentalism, even though polls have consistently shown that half of the Americans who reject Darwinism are not biblical fundamentalists. Could it be that the American people are skeptical of Darwinism because they're smarter than Darwinists think?
On Aug. 17, the pro-Darwin magazine Nature reported that scientists had just found the "brain evolution gene." There is circumstantial evidence that this gene may be involved in brain development in embryos, and it is surprisingly different in humans and chimpanzees. According to Nature, the gene may thus harbor "the secret of what makes humans different from our nearest primate relatives."
Three things are remarkable about this report. First, it implicitly acknowledges that the evidence for Darwinism was never as overwhelming as its defenders claim. It has been almost 30 years since Gould wrote that biology accounts for human nature, yet Darwinists are just now turning up a gene that may have been involved in brain evolution.
Second, embryologists know that a single gene cannot account for the origin of the human brain. Genes involved in embryo development typically have multiple effects, and complex organs such as the brain are influenced by many genes. The simple-mindedness of the "brain evolution gene" story is breathtaking.
Third, the only thing scientists demonstrated in this case was a correlation between a genetic difference and brain size. Every scientist knows, however, that correlation is not the same as causation. Among elementary school children, reading ability is correlated with shoe size, but this is because young schoolchildren with small feet have not yet learned to read – not because larger feet cause a student to read better or because reading makes the feet grow. Similarly, a genetic difference between humans and chimps cannot tell us anything about what caused differences in their brains unless we know what the gene actually does. In this case, as Nature reports, "what the gene does is a mystery."
So after 150 years, Darwinists are still looking for evidence – any evidence, no matter how skimpy – to justify their speculations. The latest hype over the "brain evolution gene" unwittingly reveals just how underwhelming the evidence for their view really is.
The truth is Darwinism is not a scientific theory, but a materialistic creation myth masquerading as science. It is first and foremost a weapon against religion – especially traditional Christianity. Evidence is brought in afterwards, as window dressing.
This is becoming increasingly obvious to the American people, who are not the ignorant backwoods religious dogmatists that Darwinists make them out to be. Darwinists insult the intelligence of American taxpayers and at the same time depend on them for support. This is an inherently unstable situation, and it cannot last.
If I were a Darwinist, I would be afraid. Very afraid.
Get Wells' widely popular "Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design"
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Jonathan Wells is the author of "The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to Darwinism and Intelligent Design" (Regnery, 2006) and Icons of Evolution (Regnery, 2000). He holds a Ph.D. in biology from the University of California at Berkeley and a Ph.D. in theology from Yale University. Wells is currently a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute in Seattle
Pretty funny ...
So the Pro life crowd is actually helping to preserve Darwinists ... atheists, and liberal Democrats !
Hi Names Ash Housewares. Just be careful with that photo. Some here may say it was forged to give that impression, or others will say that it's just your interpretation of the photo that it is a protoplanetary disk but since no one is there, no one knows for sure. Or you get the real luddites that will say we can't make a solar system in the lab so you have no proof and you are ripping off the taxpayers for your fantasy.
Now I have to scrape my boots of for a third time :(
There's actually not much left.
Those "lemmings", as you call them, earn significantly more than IDers. Show me a professional with an advanced degree (eg law, medicine, finance, etc) and I'll show you someone who understands scientific principles, including evolutionary biology.
ID 'tards are an embarrassment to conservatism. They fit every stereotype the left paints of uneducated mouth-breathers.
>>You're descending to name calling.
'Bye.<<
Me thinks thou doth protest too much.
Fact is, I will only say a thing so many ways (and times) until I must assume the person simply does not want to hear what I am saying or does not have the reading comprehension to understand it. Seing the phrase "cop out" repeatedly used is a sign of such debating tactics. At that point it is clearly a waste of both our time to continue to pursue the discussion.
Bye.
I noticed we separately came to the same conclusion regarding buckw.
And my favorite head spinning WHOA exhibit, the cosmic pathway, illustrating comic relative sizes, distances, and timelines to scale. FYI, if the 13 billion years histor of the Universe is laid out to scale on their ramped 360 foot exhibit, human existence is the width of a human hair.
http://amnh.org/rose/cosmic-moreinfo.html http://amnh.org/exhibitions/permanent/fossilhalls/timelines/
The smart ones know how to complete applications for immigration into the United States where they can then earn more.
Such people probably know "evolution" but are not otherwise strongly motivated by it. Like, that's hardly the most important thing in their lives.
One can believe in Darwin's God and be a faithful Christian. Read "Finding Darwin's God" by Ken Miller for enlightenment.
Darwinism has been hijacked by the atheist/agnostic crowd. Instead, the evidence supporting the theory doesn't in any way remove God from the equation but instead allows us to better understand his character. The process of evolution created the human being which then was identified by God as the species to which he breathed a soul and hoped would worship him faithfully.
Genesis reveals the consequence of our disobedience and also, God's character. St.Augustine and others have surmised reasonably that this Old Testament book should not be considered a literal historical accounting of events. If you read it as a poetic view of creation, it can be easily reconciled with the evolution of man.
"Those "lemmings", as you call them, earn significantly more than IDers."
So does Barbra Streisand.
"Show me a professional with an advanced degree (eg law, medicine, finance, etc) and I'll show you someone who understands scientific principles, including evolutionary biology."
I am missing some point here. Are you implying that anyone outside that group does NOT understand? And it is a logical fallacy to say "understands scientific principles" and then follow it up with "including evolutionary biology".
"ID 'tards are an embarrassment to conservatism. They fit every stereotype the left paints of uneducated mouth-breathers."
What is a "tard". Are you, by any chance, using ad-hominem or otherwise "name calling" with no evidence offered to support such a position.
Bummer
another great exhibit
http://www.amnh.org/education/resources/programs/origins/
Has the universe always existed? How did the Earth become a place that could harbor life? Are we alone in the universe, or does life exist on other planets? These questions and their startling new answers are presented in the four-part NOVA miniseries Origins, hosted by astrophysicist Neil de Grasse Tyson, Director of the Hayden Planetarium here at the American Museum of Natural History.
Origins takes the viewer on a cosmic journey to the beginning of time and into the distant reaches of the universe, searching for life's first stirrings and its traces on other worlds.
Viewers can enhance and extend their understanding of the information presented in Origins in their home or classroom with this Special Collection of resources. It includes articles, video animations, interactives, and student materials related to each episode, as well as additional resources.
http://www.amnh.org/education/resources/programs/origins/life.php#
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/origins/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/origins/knoll.html
What are the origins of life? How did things go from non-living to living? From something that could not reproduce to something that could? One person who has exhaustively investigated this subject is paleontologist Andrew Knoll, a professor of biology at Harvard and author of Life on a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years of Life. In this wide-ranging interview, Knoll explains, among other compelling ideas, why higher organisms like us are icing on the cake of life, how deeply living things and our planet are intertwined, and why it's so devilishly difficult to figure out how life got started.
And I to you as well. As I've said before, evolution is compatible with Christianity, but not with those who take the Bible to be literally true. Obviously, you do. That's great, but it doesn't invalidate my premise.
Everyone knows that.
"One can believe in Darwin's God and be a faithful Christian. Read "Finding Darwin's God" by Ken Miller for enlightenment. "
I don't agree but am making some assumptions by what you mean by Darwin's God. I believe genetics are real and organisms can be manipulated genetically by outside forces.
I do not believe the radical liberal scientists that control 90% of our universities. They find a couple of bones and extrapolate that into a full fledged model of the entire village. I do not believe life on this planet evolved from proteins created by lightning in raindrops or pond scum.
To believe life as we know it evolved from basic amino acids would take much more faith than to believe in a higher power that has touched my life.
The Darwinist Theory of Evolution BEGINS AFTER life has been created and AFTER this created life develops the extremely complex ability to pass on traits genetically. Darwinism sets out the first few million or so years.
Like the Church Lady says "How Conveeenient."
When it comes to the origin of life or DNA for that matter - Darwinists can only say "hell if I know"
Yet you will find freeper evo's diving into cosmological debates with their usual arrogance and bullying. It is really strange.
Evo's toggle between using evolution as cosmology and claiming "Homie don't play that" when challenged
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