Free Republic

When I learned that Dr. Stephen Meyer had written a new book on the evidence of design displayed in living cells, I expected to be impressed by it. I wasn’t prepared to have my mind blown—which is what happened. In Signature in the Cell, Meyer marshals the scientific facts and arguments to show that the staggering quantity of information contained in the “computer code” of our cellular DNA almost certainly cannot have been generated by undirected material processes. Instead, Meyer contends, in our combined human experience the kind of complex, functionally specified information that is present in living cells is...

As students step foot on campus for another school year, an intelligent design proponent has offered a few tips for the millions who will face the teaching of evolution in their science classrooms. Tip number one, "never opt out of learning evolution," says Casey Luskin, co-founder of the Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Center, according to the Discovery Institute. "In fact, learn about evolution every chance you get." Having attended public schools from kindergarten through his master’s degree at the University of California, San Diego, Luskin was taught a "biased and one-sided origins" curriculum – basically, the neo-Darwinian theory....

When Nathaniel Jeanson graduated from high school, he hadn't yet thought about becoming a doctor and researcher in one of the most cutting edge and controversial fields in medicine today: stem cells. "I knew that I didn't like insects or blood, but I liked science," he said in a recent phone interview. Jeanson attended the University of Wisconsin-Parkside and studied molecular biology, though he admitted that he didn't know exactly what it was when he started. But it involved chemistry and was related to disease research, both fields that interested him, and he graduated with his bachelor's degree in 2003....

Welcome to scientism, a belief system founded on the conviction that everything from neutrinos to supernovae to conscious beings who marvel at such things are reducible to material processes explicable through science. It is a conviction based on neither observed fact nor experimental evidence, but rather on dogmatic faith in naturalistic science. In scientism, nature is God, science is revelation, and scientists are the new exegetes. Echoing Dr. Porco, biologist Stuart Kauffman urges us to “reinvent the sacred” by embracing the universe “as a reinvention of ‘God.’” Kauffman has unflagging trust in nature, all the while acknowledging that her laws,...

Researchers recently discovered the worldÂ’s first pterosaur landing footprints, and the find has revealed precise coordination and other features in these mysterious flying reptiles. In a study published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, co-author Kevin Padian and his colleagues examined some of the anatomical and behavioral features of these creatures, which are presumed to be extinct. Based on skeletal anatomy and footprints, both found in fossilized form, it is known that pterosaurs walked on all fours. Their wings folded back so that they could walk on special forefeet located on their elbows. Their hind legs were situated underneath...

August 29, 2009 — Today’s Evolutionary Just-So Story is brought to you by New Scientist: “Girls Are Primed to Fear Spiders.” Once upon a time, while cavemen were out hunting and gathering, the women back home had to learn to avoid dangerous animals. David Rakison of Carnegie Mellon University put this all into evolutionary terms for the rest of us:...

Cambrian Fossils Still a Dilemma for Darwinism 100 Years After Discovery of Burgess Shale Exactly one hundred years ago leading American paleontologist Charles Doolittle Walcott (right) was hiking along Burgess Pass in the Canadian Rockies when he stumbled upon a slab of shale containing fossil crustaceans. His interest piqued, Wolcott made return trips to the Burgess Shale in the following years where he ultimately collected tens of thousands of fossils. Many of these fossils were extraordinarily well-preserved, and they were mysterious. They included strange forms like Anomalocaris, Opabinia, Wiwaxia, and Hallucigenia. These fossils revealed a mystery: like other Cambrian fauna,...

August 30, 2009 — Our airways are lined with cells that have beating oars called motile cilia. Like galley slaves on a Roman ship, they beat in coordinated waves, setting up currents that propel dust and foreign matter out toward the mouth. Scientists just found out another amazing capability of these motile cilia...

Most people north of the equator have an observable suntan by August. Ironically, a desire to be outside is often coupled with another strong desire to get out of the sun, as indicated by sales of sun umbrellas and other types of sunshades. From a biological standpoint, energy from the sun always needs to be controlled. This means that there is complex biological machinery in place to manage sunlight in some way. The machinery itself would not exist without information in DNA prescribing its materials, manufacture, and operation. Suntans result from this special biological machinery and function like the skin's...

Has science left Darwin so far behind that it is a complete red herring for creationist writers to analyze, discuss or rebut his views? When creationists do that, does it, as one email put it, show that such authors must be “out of touch”? We often hear such comments from our detractors in this “year of Darwin”, but with an increasing frequency the last few weeks. Hence this weekend’s feedback will respond to such charges in general. The usual emailed comments one sees about this seem to imply not only that referring to Darwin’s views is completely inappropriate, but that...

Aluminium is the most abundant metal in the Earth's crust and is used to make bikes, cars and food cans. Now, thanks to research conducted at the University of Nancy, France, the metal may also be able to shed light on the processes that occurred during the formation of the solar system.Models of the evolution of the early solar system rely on knowing the precise times at which the oldest particles in the solar system formed. Some of the oldest particles clumped together to form chondrites - primitive meteorites - and these grain-like building blocks are known as calcium-aluminium rich...

Fratricide: New Atheists vs. Framing Atheists As of late there has been a lot of spittle passed between two camps in the Darwin-sphere. Things are getting really nasty, as so often happens among atheist factions. On one side are the new atheists: Coyne, Harris, Dawkins, Dennett, Myers. On the other side are the … well for want of a better word — the "framing" atheists: Ruse, Mooney, Kirshenbaum, Nisbet, Scott. With the exception of a few theist Darwinians (an oxymoron, I know) like Ken Miller, the motivation of the combatants seems to be the same: how to best advance an...

Polling data has revealed a trend indicating that “America is not a Christian nation.”[1] Although a large majority of Americans outwardly claim to be Christian, their inward beliefs are actually non-Christian. Why is this so? Classic Christianity is based on certain fundamental doctrines that are clearly taught in the Bible, such as the universality of sin, the universality of access to the Savior, and the exclusivity of that Savior.[2] But apparently, many of those who call themselves Christians deny that Jesus Christ is the only Savior. Newsweek reported, “According to a 2008 Pew Forum survey, 65 percent of us believe...

Enormous prehistoric armored mammals called glyptodonts swung their spiked tails just as athletes swing tennis rackets and baseball bats, according to a new study. These massive animals even had a "sweet spot" on their tails right where the biggest, sharpest spike was situated. The findings about glyptodonts — which looked like a cross between an armadillo and a Volkswagen beetle car — apply to dinosaurs that also had spiked tails, the team of researchers believes.

A NASA spacecraft is again testing a creationist theory about the magnetic fields of planets. On 14 January 2008, the Messenger spacecraft, made by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory for NASA, flew by Mercury, the innermost planet of the solar system, in the first of several close encounters before it finally settles into a steady orbit around Mercury in 2011.[1] As it passed, its ‘magnetometer’ made quick measurements of Mercury’s magnetic field and transmitted them successfully back to Earth. Probably it will take the Messenger team several months to process the magnetic data accurately. I’m looking forward to...

Over the past decade or so, scientific research has revealed surprisingly young-looking features in fossils and other artifacts dated in the millions of years. The discoveries include blood vessels in T. rex[1] and hadrosaur fossil femurs,[2] mummified dinosaur stomach contents,[3] mummified dinosaur skin,[4] live cells from amber deposits,[5] fresh cellulose fibers in supposedly 250 million-year old salt deposits,[6] DNA molecules from Neanderthal skeletons,[7] and fossil feathers with clearly visible stripes.[8] Now “150 million-year–old” squid ink, which was so fresh that scientists used it to write with, adds further doubt in deep time...

The 2009 Darwin celebrations were less than three years away, when my friend and colleague Dr Emil Silvestru, geologist and speaker with CMI-Canada, told me about an idea he had for a documentary film. He reminded me that most people don’t know that Darwin saw himself firstly as a geologist, and that his evolutionary theory was very much dependent on his geological beliefs about millions of years. The strongest influence on Darwin in this regard was...

Cambrian Explosion Caught on Film David Coppedge An explosion is coming: a devastating blast against Darwinism in the form of a dynamite new film from Illustra Media: Darwin’s Dilemma: The Mystery of the Cambrian Fossil Record. The Cambrian explosion, which Darwin admitted was the greatest challenge to his theory, has not been solved in the 150 years since The Origin. In fact, it has gotten much worse. This film does more than demolish a defunct idea. It offers the only alternative that does explain the sudden appearance of all the animal phyla: intelligent design...

The HAR1F gene: a Darwinian paradox Unexpected scientific outliers are always interesting, as they offer the opportunity to either identify unsuspected causal factors or to discredit cherished theories. With this in mind, some human genes show such marked dissimilarities to those of chimpanzees that they invite careful reflection. Perhaps the data conforms well with a designed cause. Alternatively, various evolutionary explanations may be invoked. Might one interpretative framework be more plausible than the other? According to a recent report in Nature, non-random or ordered mutations can be accepted as part of an evolutionary framework. This sounds suspiciously like post facto...

Even in the heart of the Bible Belt, Texas isn’t immune to the proliferation of atheistic propaganda, whether in its public schools or now in atheist summer camps. Camp Quest—with the tagline “It’s beyond belief!”—bills itself as “the first residential summer camp in the history of the United States for the children of Atheists, Freethinkers, Humanists, Brights, or whatever other terms might be applied to those who hold to a naturalistic, not supernatural world view.”[1] The first UK Camp Quest, which received funding from the Richard Dawkins Foundation and other private donors, launched late July in England, and five other...