For the lowdown on Chuck Darwin, stupidest white man of all time and his BS theory, and on the continuing efforts of feebs like Steve Gould and Niles Eldredge to keep the charade going for another generation:
Posted on 06/17/2002 3:10:50 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
Opponents of evolution want to make a place for creationism by tearing down real science, but their arguments don't hold up
When Charles Darwin introduced the theory of evolution through natural selection 143 years ago, the scientists of the day argued over it fiercely, but the massing evidence from paleontology, genetics, zoology, molecular biology and other fields gradually established evolution's truth beyond reasonable doubt. Today that battle has been won everywhere--except in the public imagination.
Embarrassingly, in the 21st century, in the most scientifically advanced nation the world has ever known, creationists can still persuade politicians, judges and ordinary citizens that evolution is a flawed, poorly supported fantasy. They lobby for creationist ideas such as "intelligent design" to be taught as alternatives to evolution in science classrooms. As this article goes to press, the Ohio Board of Education is debating whether to mandate such a change. Some antievolutionists, such as Philip E. Johnson, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley and author of Darwin on Trial, admit that they intend for intelligent-design theory to serve as a "wedge" for reopening science classrooms to discussions of God.
Besieged teachers and others may increasingly find themselves on the spot to defend evolution and refute creationism. The arguments that creationists use are typically specious and based on misunderstandings of (or outright lies about) evolution, but the number and diversity of the objections can put even well-informed people at a disadvantage.
To help with answering them, the following list rebuts some of the most common "scientific" arguments raised against evolution. It also directs readers to further sources for information and explains why creation science has no place in the classroom.
1. Evolution is only a theory. It is not a fact or a scientific law. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
2. Natural selection is based on circular reasoning: the fittest are those who survive, and those who survive are deemed fittest. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
3. Evolution is unscientific, because it is not testable or falsifiable. It makes claims about events that were not observed and can never be re-created. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
4. Increasingly, scientists doubt the truth of evolution. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
5. The disagreements among even evolutionary biologists show how little solid science supports evolution. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
6. If humans descended from monkeys, why are there still monkeys? [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
7. Evolution cannot explain how life first appeared on earth. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
8. Mathematically, it is inconceivable that anything as complex as a protein, let alone a living cell or a human, could spring up by chance. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
9. The Second Law of Thermodynamics says that systems must become more disordered over time. Living cells therefore could not have evolved from inanimate chemicals, and multicellular life could not have evolved from protozoa. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
10. Mutations are essential to evolution theory, but mutations can only eliminate traits. They cannot produce new features. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
11. Natural selection might explain microevolution, but it cannot explain the origin of new species and higher orders of life. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
12. Nobody has ever seen a new species evolve. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
13. Evolutionists cannot point to any transitional fossils--creatures that are half reptile and half bird, for instance. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
14. Living things have fantastically intricate features--at the anatomical, cellular and molecular levels--that could not function if they were any less complex or sophisticated. The only prudent conclusion is that they are the products of intelligent design, not evolution. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
15. Recent discoveries prove that even at the microscopic level, life has a quality of complexity that could not have come about through evolution. [Rebuttal omitted to save space. See the original article.]
CONCLUSION
"Creation science" is a contradiction in terms. A central tenet of modern science is methodological naturalism--it seeks to explain the universe purely in terms of observed or testable natural mechanisms. Thus, physics describes the atomic nucleus with specific concepts governing matter and energy, and it tests those descriptions experimentally. Physicists introduce new particles, such as quarks, to flesh out their theories only when data show that the previous descriptions cannot adequately explain observed phenomena. The new particles do not have arbitrary properties, moreover--their definitions are tightly constrained, because the new particles must fit within the existing framework of physics.
In contrast, intelligent-design theorists invoke shadowy entities that conveniently have whatever unconstrained abilities are needed to solve the mystery at hand. Rather than expanding scientific inquiry, such answers shut it down. (How does one disprove the existence of omnipotent intelligences?)
Intelligent design offers few answers. For instance, when and how did a designing intelligence intervene in life's history? By creating the first DNA? The first cell? The first human? Was every species designed, or just a few early ones? Proponents of intelligent-design theory frequently decline to be pinned down on these points. They do not even make real attempts to reconcile their disparate ideas about intelligent design. Instead they pursue argument by exclusion--that is, they belittle evolutionary explanations as far-fetched or incomplete and then imply that only design-based alternatives remain.
Logically, this is misleading: even if one naturalistic explanation is flawed, it does not mean that all are. Moreover, it does not make one intelligent-design theory more reasonable than another. Listeners are essentially left to fill in the blanks for themselves, and some will undoubtedly do so by substituting their religious beliefs for scientific ideas.
Time and again, science has shown that methodological naturalism can push back ignorance, finding increasingly detailed and informative answers to mysteries that once seemed impenetrable: the nature of light, the causes of disease, how the brain works. Evolution is doing the same with the riddle of how the living world took shape. Creationism, by any name, adds nothing of intellectual value to the effort.
The Author(s):
John Rennie is editor in chief of Scientific American.
I'm an atheist. What you said is correct.
Fair is fair.
But why are these types of posts on FR anyway? How do they advance conservatism? They are not news. And on top of that, they belong in the religion section.
Again, why are they here other than to stick a thumb in the eye of the believer?
Articles I've written for the crevo threads:
*Please* Use Extreme Caution In Messing With the Speed of Light -- Perils of CDK
The Evidence for Dinosaur-Bird Transition (A Sidebar Thread)
I seldom do such, obviously, and I don't spend as much time looking for articles to post as I once did. Still, your criticism looks funny coming from you. What have you ever done except exactly what you accuse me of doing?
Them too.
For the lowdown on Chuck Darwin, stupidest white man of all time and his BS theory, and on the continuing efforts of feebs like Steve Gould and Niles Eldredge to keep the charade going for another generation:
So what do I win?
A more likely scenario is that, if I reject science for faith, and the two of us stand together in judgment before God, you may (although I can't promise it) be admitted to heaven for having stuck to your principles, but I will certainly be cast into hell for having violated mine.
There's only one reason anyone in this age will go to hell -- refusing to invite Jesus Christ into their heart to save them.
Joh 3: 16-18 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
The issue is extremely simple -- whether or not you will choose to release yourself from the debt and guilt of SIN, or, whether you, like an accessory to a cruel tyrant, like an unrepentant supporter of Pharaoh, will hold yourself in bondage, slain by sin and indebted and afflicted (doing works, even "good" works) under it.
You have an opportunity through Jesus Christ to overthrow "original sin" simply by receiving Him as Saviour. Refuse, and you remain loyal to a tyrant -- the tyrant of sin.
ALL OTHER ARGUMENT is simply smokescreen and rhetoric designed to do but one thing -- resist Jesus Christ, avoid accepting Him and setting yourself free from sin's guilt, debt and bondage, and avoid restoring spiritual LIFE to yourself through Him and by Him.
No amount of mental gymnastics and rationalizing and intellectualizing will deliver you from this one overarching moral duty and challenge set before you, one which will determine your eternal destiny: Will you receive Jesus Christ as your Saviour?
Time is short here. Delay is not prudent.
I thought that's what you were saying. I don't know how else to interpret it. Education is certainly a legitimate topic of discussion and one of the central disputes in this field is evolution/creation.
By being an atheist.
You may now argue that this statement is irrational. Fair enough. But guess what? I think atheism is irrational.
See how this works?
Rigidity is believing what you believe despite mountains of contrary evidence. Insisting upon following evidence and logic isn't belief at all but realism.
In short, you should be criticizing medved for posting his indefensible lunacies over and over and over and over in-line on thread after thread after thread. To say we have to simply post our rebuttals every time he posts his junk is to empower him to make every thread about why the Earth having ever orbited Saturn is nonsense, why instantaneous light travel is nonsense, why psychic parrots and recent dinosaurs are nonsense. He's going to post his crap on every thread because he's a nutcase. Some of us are going to call him on it because he's polluting the discussion in a brazen attempt to make everything about his delusions. You're going to nod your head and tell him what a revolutionary he is because you've got the critical faculties of a bivalve mollusc or you wouldn't be a creationist. Get used to it.
Well said. If we got Jim to put the poster's name at the top of the response, most of us could skip over the endless repetition from known whack-jobs.
If creationism raises its clamor of charges and no one answers: point for creationism. They're trying to ignore you away.
Yes, yes. They love shouting down opposition by swarming over the thread en masse. Note how fast they swarmed today! They can't let an open-minded person get a thought in edgewise or the whole ideas of Creationism or Bible-is-whole-and-literal-truth might collapse from the examination!
In all your long spew, you have not answered a single point raised by Rennie in his article. You have done nothing but assault messengers. All of Rennie's 15 rebuttals are based on hard fact. You are 0 for 15 in addressing them. The charges you raise are hypocritical.
Ain't it always the way! Hypocrites are always frightened by the prospect of self-examination. Score 10 for you.
Yeah, that one.
And the Muslims will say with equal conviction that you must follow what they preach/teach, as do the Mormons, Buddhists, Jains, Hindus...it goes on and on. I do not hate religion, btw. I find it quite interesting that so many people rely on religion. However, I think it haughty to assume that your religion is better than the next. All are equally convinced of their religion being "the one". I say let them live as they live, as long as it does not enter into areas of the public sphere where it does not belong (i.e. creationism being injected into schools)
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