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The Vatican gave the Creationist lobby a left right sign of the cross today, announcing it would stage a conference on Darwinism next month and declaring that it was one of the Fathers of the Church that thought up the idea in the first place. At one point the conference at the Pontifical Gregorian University wasn't going to give Creationism or Intelligent Design a hearing at all. But apparently the organisers have relented, and will consider Intelligent Design as a "cultural phenomenon" rather than as a valid scientific theory, giving US-based IDers the chance to be smirked at by a...

Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture, said while the Church had been hostile to Darwin's theory in the past, the idea of evolution could be traced to St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas. Father Giuseppe Tanzella-Nitti, Professor of Theology at the Pontifical Santa Croce University in Rome, added that 4th century theologian St Augustine had "never heard the term evolution, but knew that big fish eat smaller fish" and forms of life had been transformed "slowly over time". Aquinas made similar observations in the Middle Ages. ...

The traditional understanding of DNA has recently been transformed beyond recognition. DNA does not, as we thought, carry a linear, one-dimensional, one-way, sequential code—like the lines of letters and words on this page. And the 97% in humans that does not carry protein-coding genes is not, as many people thought, fossilized ‘junk’ left over from our evolutionary ancestors. DNA information is overlapping-multi-layered and multi-dimensional; it reads both backwards and forwards; and the ‘junk’ is far more functional than the protein code, so there is no fossilized history of evolution. No human engineer has ever even imagined, let alone designed an...

The 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birthday on February 12 serves as a reminder that in his name scientific McCarthyism is alive and well in America's system of education. The same mentality that kept Galileo under house arrest for the last years of his life is today punishing science teachers who dare to raise scientific questions about Darwinian orthodoxy. Secular fundamentalists have so little confidence that the theory of evolution can stand up to rigorous scrutiny that they are gagging voices of dissent. For instance, one of the world's leading proponents of intelligent design is Dr. Scott Minnich, a biologist...

Here is some interesting, and unexpected, polling data. According to the Discovery Institute’s website : A new Zogby poll on the eve of Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday shows a dramatic rise in the number of Americans who agree that when biology teachers teach the scientific evidence for Darwin’s theory of evolution, they also should teach the scientific evidence against it. Surprisingly, the poll also shows overwhelming support among self-identified Democrats and liberals for academic freedom to discuss the “strengths and weaknesses” of evolution.   Over 78% of likely voters agree with teaching both the evidence for and against Darwin’s theory,...

Tiny Ocean Plants Offer Biochemical Enigma by Brian Thomas, M.S.* Phosphorus, number 15 on the periodic table of elements, is considered a basic component of all cell membranes. But the recent discovery of single-celled photosynthetic organisms surviving without the chemical element in their membranes is going to require some major rewrites to biochemistry textbooks.1 Phosphorus is in short supply in the Sargasso Sea, located in the north Atlantic, where researchers from numerous institutions and universities found several autotrophs, including some diatoms and four different genera of photosynthetic bacteria, that can make cell membrane substitutes. In their study published online in...

Darwin, Intelligent Design, and Freedom of Discovery on Evolutionists' Holy Day By Casey Luskin Posted February 10, 2009 February 12 used to be universally recognized as the birthday of Abraham Lincoln—a day celebrating freedom. Needing a patron saint, Darwinists in recent years have converted February 12 into "Darwin Day." There's nothing wrong with celebrating Darwin's birthday—if that's what you really want to do. But in recent years the advocacy of evolution has become increasingly associated with attempts to subvert freedom. To reclaim February 12 for those who love freedom, Discovery Institute and others in the intelligent design (ID) movement are...

Teamwork Between Shining Bacteria and Squids Evolved? by Brian Thomas, M.S.* Certain strains of bacteria, named Vibrio, can establish a mutually beneficial link with a squid by a single gene switch, according to researchers at the University of Wisconsin.1 Could this precisely specified biochemistry really have evolved from the comparatively “simple” switching-on of just one gene, as their study suggests? Vibrio bacteria have a well-orchestrated capacity to interact with specialized tissue found on the bobtail squid and the Japanese pinecone fish.2 A biochemical “conversation” takes place between animal and bacteria whereby the animal’s specialized tissue secretes a gummy substance that...

... is going to sponsor and host a four-day conference on biological evolution and Darwin's theory of the origin of species. From Vatican Information Service:INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON BIOLOGICAL EVOLUTION VATICAN CITY, 10 FEB 2009 (VIS) - In the Holy See Press Office this morning, the presentation took place of an international conference entitled: "Biological Evolution: Facts and Theories. A critical appraisal 150 years after 'The Origin of Species'". The event is due to take place in Rome from 3 to 7 March.  The congress has been jointly organised by the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and the University of Notre...

...Coyne and Pigliucci tell us (again) that there is such overwhelming evidence for evolution. OK, put up or shut up. They don’t know what a species is, they don’t know what the target of selection is, they don’t know if natural selection is a queen or a jester, they don’t know what adaptive radiation is, they don’t know how speciation operates (the main reason for Darwin’s little storybook), and they can’t connect mutations to any actual benefit to an organism. Other than those little minor matters, evolution is so supported by such mountains of evidence that only a fool with...

Let’s listen in on a hypothetical conversation between a biblical creationist (C) and an evolutionist (E) as they discuss some recent scientific news headlines: E: Have you heard about the research findings regarding mouse evolution? C: Are you referring to the finding of coat color change in beach mice? E: Yes, isn’t it a wonderful example of evolution in action? C: No, I think it’s a good example of natural selection in action, which is merely selecting information that already exists. E: Well, what about antibiotic resistance in bacteria? Don’t you think that’s a good example of evolution occurring right...

...Sir David, 82, said the devastation of the environment has its roots in the first words that God supposedly uttered to humankind, as detailed in Genesis 1:28: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” An atheist raised in an academic, non-religious family, Sir David said Genesis peddled untruths about how animals and plants appeared on earth and was also at the root of why there was now serious environmental degradation...

...I was always amazed at how many creationists were studying Science degrees, where they were force-fed evolution. I remember sitting in a Chemistry lab one day and in the course of conversation the man across the table said he was creationist. I said ‘Wow, so am I!’ and my lab partner piped up, ‘I am too, actually.’ We all paused, astonished and the man across the table said, ‘What are the chances of that? That three people at this table are creationist?’ And his lab partner corrected him, ‘Four.’...

No Tolerance Allowed: Stein declines university speech after 'hundreds' of angry emails by Christine Dao* Comedian/economist/lawyer Ben Stein backed out of delivering a spring 2009 commencement speech because of complaints to the university about his views on evolution. The University of Vermont’s president, Daniel Mark Fogel, was bombarded with angry messages, including one from British atheist and Darwin fanatic Richard Dawkins, after inviting Stein to deliver the university’s commencement speech. Stein had given a sold-out economics lecture at UVM on April 25, 2008, and it was for his economics expertise, not his views on evolution, that Fogel invited Stein back....

Evolutionists Hunger for Morality Feb 09, 2009 — Nature is completely sold over to naturalistic evolution, yet cannot escape the question of morality. Science depends on morality, but it is not clear in their statements that they acknowledge any universal moral standard. Christian standards of honesty seem to be assumed. But if everything in biology (including human behavior) emerged by natural selection, then so did morality. Can one derive honesty, trust, or responsibility by an unguided natural process?...

As councils ran out of the grit they had failed to stockpile because they fell for the Government line that climate change made it unnecessary, Britain was last week doubly-carpeted, partly by snow, partly by a blizzard of tributes to Charles Darwin. What did these have in common? In contrast to the centenary of Darwin’s death 26 years ago, what has been noticeable about this homage, not least on the BBC, is how relentlessly reverential it has been. One would never have guessed from the adulation heaped on the great man by the likes of Sir David Attenborough that there...

The universe’s birth certificate Once you let go of the Bible as history, all Christian doctrine begins to disintegrate. Dr Nigel Leaves, the Warden and Dean of Studies at John Wollaston Anglican Theological College in Perth (Australia), provides a typical example in The God Problem: Alternatives to Fundamentalism.1 He says ‘the major factor in the waning of the Christian faith is its continuing insistence on a supernatural God—the Almighty, the lawgiver and judge.’ He considers four alternatives to ‘fundamentalism’ (i.e. believing in the God of the Bible), saying, ‘Traditional beliefs about God cannot be sustained in the light of the...

This past weekend I was speaking on the Intelligent Design vs. Evolution debate. After my lecture a student approached me and asked, “Mr. Carlson, when I tried to defend Intelligent Design in my public school science class, my teacher asked me, ‘which version of Intelligent Design are you talking about? Christian? Native American? Hindu?’ He went on to say to me, ‘If you want to talk about Intelligent Design, you can’t avoid having to give equal time to everybody’s story of creation. This is why it’s best to leave religion out of the science classes.’ Well, I didn’t know how...

In reality, evolution has done nothing to help real science, and has actually hindered it in many ways...

...Apparently, in Texas you can be astoundingly dishonest and advocate teaching pseudo-science to children, and still be reappointed to a job you’re not remotely qualified to hold...