Posted on 12/29/2001 5:05:05 PM PST by cantfindagoodscreenname
The following article is from Free Inquiry magazine, Volume 21, Number 4.
Creation “scientists” have more need than most of us to parade their degrees and qualifications, but it pays to look closely at the institutions that awarded them and the subjects in which they were taken. Those vaunted Ph.D.s tend to be in subjects such as marine engineering or gas kinetics rather than in relevant disciplines like zoology or geology. And often they are earned not at real universities, but at little-known Bible colleges deep in Bush country.
There are, however, a few shining exceptions. Kurt Wise now makes his living at Bryan College (motto “Christ Above All”) located in Dayton, Tennessee, home of the famed Scopes trial. And yet, he originally obtained an authentic degree in geophysics from the University of Chicago, followed by a Ph.D. in geology from Harvard, no less, where he studied under (the name is milked for all it is worth in creationist propaganda) Stephen Jay Gould.
Kurt Wise is a contributor to In Six Days: Why 50 Scientists Choose to Believe in Creation, a compendium edited by John F. Ashton (Ph.D., of course). I recommend this book. It is a revelation. I would not have believed such wishful thinking and self-deception possible. At least some of the authors seem to be sincere, and they don’t water down their beliefs. Much of their fire is aimed at weaker brethren who think God works through evolution, or who clutch at the feeble hope that one “day” in Genesis might mean not twenty-four hours but a hundred million years. These are hard-core “young earth creationists” who believe that the universe and all of life came into existence within one week, less than 10,000 years ago. And Wise—flying valiantly in the face of reason, evidence, and education—is among them. If there were a prize for Virtuoso Believing (it is surely only a matter of time before the Templeton Foundation awards one) Kurt Wise, B.A. (Chicago), Ph.D. (Harvard), would have to be a prime candidate.
Wise stands out among young earth creationists not only for his impeccable education, but because he displays a modicum of scientific honesty and integrity. I have seen a published letter in which he comments on alleged “human bones” in Carboniferous coal deposits. If authenticated as human, these “bones” would blow the theory of evolution out of the water (incidentally giving lie to the canard that evolution is unfalsifiable and therefore unscientific: J. B. S. Haldane, asked by an overzealous Popperian what empirical finding might falsify evolution, famously growled, “Fossil rabbits in the Precambrian!”). Most creationists would not go out of their way to debunk a promising story of human remains in the Pennsylvanian Coal Measures. Yet Wise patiently and seriously examined the specimens as a trained paleontologist, and concluded unequivocally that they were “inorganically precipitated iron siderite nodules and not fossil material at all.” Unusually among the motley denizens of the “big tent” of creationism and intelligent design, he seems to accept that God needs no help from false witness.
All the more interesting, then, to read his personal testimony in In Six Days. It is actually quite moving, in a pathetic kind of way. He begins with his childhood ambition. Where other boys wanted to be astronauts or firemen, the young Kurt touchingly dreamed of getting a Ph.D. from Harvard and teaching science at a major university. He achieved the first part of his goal, but became increasingly uneasy as his scientific learning conflicted with his religious faith. When he could bear the strain no longer, he clinched the matter with a Bible and a pair of scissors. He went right through from Genesis 1 to Revelations 22, literally cutting out every verse that would have to go if the scientific worldview were true. At the end of this exercise, there was so little left of his Bible that
. . . try as I might, and even with the benefit of intact margins throughout the pages of Scripture, I found it impossible to pick up the Bible without it being rent in two. I had to make a decision between evolution and Scripture. Either the Scripture was true and evolution was wrong or evolution was true and I must toss out the Bible. . . . It was there that night that I accepted the Word of God and rejected all that would ever counter it, including evolution. With that, in great sorrow, I tossed into the fire all my dreams and hopes in science.
See what I mean about pathetic? Most revealing of all is Wise’s concluding paragraph:
Although there are scientific reasons for accepting a young earth, I am a young-age creationist because that is my understanding of the Scripture. As I shared with my professors years ago when I was in college, if all the evidence in the universe turns against creationism, I would be the first to admit it, but I would still be a creationist because that is what the Word of God seems to indicate. Here I must stand.
See what I mean about honest? Understandably enough, creationists who aspire to be taken seriously as scientists don’t go out of their way to admit that Scripture—a local origin myth of a tribe of Middle-Eastern camel-herders—trumps evidence. The great evolutionist John Maynard Smith, who once publicly wiped the floor with Duane P. Gish (up until then a highly regarded creationist debater), did it by going on the offensive right from the outset and challenging him directly: “Do you seriously mean to tell me you believe that all life was created within one week?”
Kurt Wise doesn’t need the challenge; he volunteers that, even if all the evidence in the universe flatly contradicted Scripture, and even if he had reached the point of admitting this to himself, he would still take his stand on Scripture and deny the evidence. This leaves me, as a scientist, speechless. I cannot imagine what it must be like to have a mind capable of such doublethink. It reminds me of Winston Smith in 1984 struggling to believe that two plus two equals five if Big Brother said so. But that was fiction and, anyway, Winston was tortured into submission. Kurt Wise—and presumably others like him who are less candid—has suffered no such physical coercion. But, as I hinted at the end of my previous column, I do wonder whether childhood indoctrination could wreak a sufficiently powerful brainwashing effect to account for this bizarre phenomenon.
Whatever the underlying explanation, this example suggests a fascinating, if pessimistic, conclusion about human psychology. It implies that there is no sensible limit to what the human mind is capable of believing, against any amount of contrary evidence. Depending upon how many Kurt Wises are out there, it could mean that we are completely wasting our time arguing the case and presenting the evidence for evolution. We have it on the authority of a man who may well be creationism’s most highly qualified and most intelligent scientist that no evidence, no matter how overwhelming, no matter how all-embracing, no matter how devastatingly convincing, can ever make any difference.
Can you imagine believing that and at the same time accepting a salary, month after month, to teach science? Even at Bryan College in Dayton, Tennessee? I’m not sure that I could live with myself. And I think I would curse my God for leading me to such a pass.
Richard Dawkins is the Charles Simonyi Professor of Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University. An evolutionary biologist and prolific author and lecturer, his most recent book is Unweaving the Rainbow.
The series of hominid skulls presented to us posed a serious problem for me due to my very conservative protestant upbringing, and until Kurt's talk I was unable to resolve my dilemma. Kurt's message was very simple: He believed utterly in Creationism but couldn't prove it. I respected that, but it did nothing to relieve my anxiety. About halfway through his talk he mentioned one thing in passing that has literally changed my life...Salvation does not depend on a belief in Creationism.
As a scientist, I believe that Natural Selection is the best theory we have to date. As a Christian, I know that God created everything, but how He accomplished this is irrelevant to my faith and Salvation.
Kurt, if you are reading this, I will always be grateful to you for helping a very unsettled undergrad reconcile her science and her faith. Your message made it possible for me to continue with my studies. Thank you!
Hardly fair. Scientists change their interpretation of the natural world when new evidence comes to light. The theory of evolution itself has undergone quite an evolution. Are you trying to "interpret it away" when scientists alter their theories based on new evidence? Are they bound to their initial interpetation?
The thing is, once somebody reaches this level of intelligence, there is no longer any dogmatic constraint on their understanding of biology. They can easily believe that evolution answers "how" and religion answers "who" made life, and there is no necessary contradiction between them: no internal hypocrisy required. I think this is the current official position of the Roman Catholic Church.
I and most of the creationists on this board have reached that level, we accept an old Earth. Still, the evidence does not support macroevolution unless one dogmatically rules out in advance the possiblity that even the most dramatic changes we see in the fossil record came about by divine intervention.
Creationism is therefore properly understood as a problem of those who cannot abstract ("brutes abstract not" -Locke) and are trapped in a literal (mis-?) understanding of the Bible. The rest of us can look past the scientific errors in the Bible (after all these particular donkey jokeys never were the most technologically advanced tribe) and can attempt to find Truth and Beauty in the myths and poems.
But I and others on this board CAN abstract, yet we are creationists. Better re-examine the conclusions in the first sentence of the above paragraph! It is too easy to write us all off as nit-wits, as you do in the first sentence. Or, as you do at the last sentence, to dismiss the Word that has had far more influence on Human History than any other book, as the product of camel jockeys rather than Divine inspiration.
Agreed. This article has the stench of one who knows more than everyone else...
It leads me to believe that the polar opposite of a man with faith is one who absolutely must be right at all costs.
Same old talk.origins BS.
Actually:
genetic drift - any change in gene frequency due to a change in population.
Thus, if all redheaded woodpeckers are eaten by a redheaded woodpecker predator, only the non-redheaded woodpeckers will survive. Redheaded woodpeckers will cease to exist as long as the predator survives to eat them. This is NOT a mutation of genes.
Mathematics was still considered a "science", last I heard. Ever take a math course? The dialectic here is between evolution and mathematics; they're basically incompatible.
Not entirely true. While there are "agendas" out there in science-publication-land, authors generally must follow a little something called "The Scientific Method" in their research. Peer review investigates just this. While some authors are favored over others, in general the scientific community as a whole is subjected to these rigors from the initial proposal for research and funding through final publication.
I apologize for inserting my personal experience into your thread. And yes, I've taken 1 or 2 math courses. I don't believe I could have gotten a degree without them.
I'm amazed at how creatively the creationists ignore and misread what Dawkins is saying here.
Copycat, it's incredible that you would agree with this statement by thucydides which does not jive at all with the content of the article. Dawkins admits that Wise's scientific training qualifies him for a position far above that which Wise actually holds, teaching science at a small and obscure religious school.
Dawkins spends basically spends the entire article dissecting the implications of Wise's blandly confessed avowal that faith trumps all the evidence in the universe. Ahban, he only anecdotally and indirectly attacks Young Earth Creationism by mentioning Wise's own refutation of a supposed Carboniferous human bone, yet you earlier managed to say that the article's logic was strawman because Dawkins attacks only YEC-ism.
Various other posters have contented themselves with citing Dawkins's as arrogant, as if somehow that refuted his point, as if that were all that one could get. Does Dawkins write so poorly that one can't read the article and tell what he's talking about? I didn't think so, but went back for a second read just to be sure.
Paragraph one indeed brings up the subject of creationist credentials. Paragraph two makes it clear that Wise far outshines his C-side colleagues in genuine academic achievement.
In paragraph three, Dawkins tells us where he's going: Wise, despite his familiarity with the evidence, chooses "Virtuoso Believing" over all. Here Dawkins establishes his theme, which the rest of the essay will enlarge.
Paragraph four expands on Wise's knowledge of science and his honest recognition that evidence exists against his chosen position. "Unusually among the motley denizens of the 'big tent' of creationism and intelligent design, he seems to accept that God needs no help from false witness."
Paragraph six begins the almost spooky analysis of how even education and integrity are subsumed by irrational belief. It is here that Dawkins shreds Wise, for Wise in his honesty has admitted what no scientist can admit and still call himself a scientist, that the evidence means nothing against his preconceptions.
Admittedly, Duane Gish, Kent Hovind, et. al would not have Wise's embarrassment here, for they are brazen. So are most of the Cs on this forum. It doesn't matter that anyone can see what's going on.
GIGO. The assumptions upon which the mathematics are based are questionable. All the math in the world, no matter how well done, doesn't amount to much if what it's based on is false.
BWAHAHAHA! (Not count good.)
All papers deserve publication.
This is not exactly a novel, free speech idea. (Nor is it an obscure view in the research community.) Remember that anonymous peer review is a recent innovation and, as a rather non-specific filter, generates a tremendous amount of waste, both in research time and review time, in the science community. Public peer review has a place in assigning limited funding. But, in this day of electronic media, there is ample opportunity for all papers to be published while editorial discretion can determine where they are published.
Question 2) Why had no one propounded the idea of evolution until Darwin?
Question 3) Can anyone name a missing link between species whether living, dead, or fossil?
Question 4) What evidence is there that the earth is over ten thousand years old, millions or billions of years old?
Question 5) Since there is no evidentiary proof of evolution, how can people call themselves scientists who believe it and propagate it without factual evidence?
Question 6) Doesn't the theory of evolution raise more questions than it tries to answer?
Question 7) Why do people continue to beat their heads upon rocks in order to try to deny Genesis 1:1: In The Beginning, God Created the Heaven and the Earth.
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