Most atheists dont know about science (Page 288) (Post deleted by staff ) (Post deleted by staff )  Blackshoes: "Recently I talked to a man with a fantastic amount of faith. Not one shade of doubt crept into his animated description of man's origin and destiny. He was an evolutionist I met on an airplane. With incredible confidence he bridged the eons of prehistoric time to explain the existence of modern plant and animal life. His detailed description of human ascent from a tiny, one-celled monad was so vivid and convincing that one could almost believe he had seen the microscopic amoeba turn into a man. What is this evolution doctrine that inspires so much faith in its disciples? How has it turned great scientists into dogmatic opponents of any other viewpoint? Many evolutionary scientists have united their professional influence to forbid any classroom instruction contrary to their own views. Does the theory of evolution merit this kind of fanatical support, which would silence all opposing ideas? When religious people take such a position, they are called bigots, but scientists seem to escape that charge. In February of 1977, nearly 200 members of the nation's academic community sent letters to school boards across the United States, urging that no alternate ideas on origins be permitted in classrooms. This indicates that the evolutionists are feeling the threat of a rising revolt against the stereotyped, contradictory versions of their theory. Many students are looking for honest answers to their questions about the origin and purpose of life. For the first time, the stale traditions of evolution have to go on the defensive. But let's take a look at what they have to defend. Then you will understand why these evolutionary scientists are people of such extraordinary faith, and why they are so fearful of facing competition at the school level. Spontaneous Generation How does the evolutionist explain the existence of that first one-celled animal from which all life forms supposedly evolved? For many years the medieval idea of spontaneous generation was the accepted explanation. According to Webster, spontaneous generation is "the generation of living from nonliving matter … [it is taken] from the belief, now abandoned, that organisms found in putrid organic matter arose spontaneously from it." Simply stated, this means that under the proper conditions of temperature, time, place, etc., decaying matter simply turns into organic life. This simplistic idea dominated scientific thinking until 1846, when Louis Pasteur completely shattered the theory by his experiments. He exposed the whole concept as utter foolishness. Under controlled laboratory conditions, in a semi-vacuum, no organic life ever emerged from decaying, nonliving matter. Reluctantly it was abandoned as a valid scientific issue. Today no reputable scientist tries to defend it on a demonstrable basis. That is why Webster says it is "now abandoned." It never has been and never can be demonstrated in the test tube. No present process is observed that could support the idea of spontaneous generation. Obviously, if spontaneous generation actually did take place in the distant past to produce the first spark of life, it must be assumed that the laws that govern life had to be completely different from what they are now. But wait a minute! This won't work either, because the whole evolutionary theory rests upon the assumption that conditions on the earth have remained uniform throughout the ages. Do you begin to see the dilemma of the evolutionists in explaining that first amoeba, or monad, or whatever formed the first cell of life? If it sprang up spontaneously from no previous life, it contradicts a basic law of nature that forms the foundation of the entire theory. Yet, without believing in spontane¬ous generation, the evolutionist would have to acknowledge something other than natural forces at work—in other words, God. How do they get around this dilemma? Dr. George Wald, Nobel Prize winner of Harvard University, states it as cryptically and honestly as an evolutionist can: "One has only to contemplate the magnitude of this task to concede that the spontaneous generation of a living organism is impossible. Yet here we are—as a result, I believe, of spontaneous generation." Scientific American, August 1954. That statement by Dr. Wald demonstrates a much greater faith than a religious creationist can muster. Notice that the great evolutionary scientist says it could not have happened. It was impossible. Yet he believes it did happen. What can we say to that kind of faith? At least the creationist believes that God was able to speak life into existence. His is not a blind faith in something that he concedes to be impossible. So here we are, face to face with the first contradiction of evolution with a basic law of science. In order to sustain his humanistic explanation of the origin of life, he must accept the exploded, unscientific theory of spontaneous generation. And the big question is this: Why is he so violently opposed to the spontaneous generation spoken of in the Bible? A miracle of creation is required in either case. Either God did it by divine fiat, or blind, unintelligent nature produced Wald's impossible act. Let any reasonable mind contemplate the alternatives for a moment. Doesn't it take more faith to believe that chance could produce life than it does to believe infinite intelligence could produce it? Why did Dr. Wald say that it was impossible for life to result from spontaneous generation? That was not an easy concession for a confirmed evolutionist to make. His exhaustive search for a scientific explanation ended in failure, as it has for all other evolutionary scientists, and he had the courage to admit it. But he also had an incredible faith to believe in it even though it was a scientific impossibility. A Christian who confessed to such a faith would be labeled as naive and gullible. What a difference the cloak of higher education makes upon our easily impressed minds! How much simpler and sweeter the faith that accepts the inspired account: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" (Genesis 1:1). Chance Life—A Ridiculous Improbability What would be involved in the accidental development of a single living cell? The fact is that the most elementary form of life is more complicated than any man-made thing on earth. The entire complex of New York City is less complicated than the makeup of the simplest microscopic cell. It is more than ridiculous to talk about its chance production. Scientists themselves assure us that the structure of a single cell is unbelievably intricate. The chance for a proper combination of molecules into amino acids, and then into proteins with the properties of life is entirely unrealistic. American Scientist magazine made this admission in January of 1955: "From the probability standpoint, the ordering of the present environment into a single amino acid molecule would be utterly improbable in all the time and space available for the origin of terrestrial life. " A Swiss mathematician, Charles Eugene Guye, actually computes the odds against such an occurrence at only one chance in 10(160). That means 10 multiplied by itself 160 times, a number too large even to articulate. Another scientist expressed it this way: "The amount of matter to be shaken together to produce a single molecule of protein would be millions of times greater than that in the whole universe. For it to occur on earth alone would require many, almost endless, billions of years" (The Evidence of God in an Expanding Universe, p. 23). How can we explain the naive insistence of evolutionists to believe something so extremely out of character for their scientific background? And how can we harmonize the normally broad-minded tolerance of the educated, with the narrow bigotry exhibited by many evolutionary scientists in trying to suppress opposing points of view? The obvious explanation would seem to be rooted in the desperation of such evolutionists to retain their reputation as the sole dispensers of dogmatic truth. To acknowledge a superior wisdom has been too long cultivated by the evolutionist community. They have repeated their assumptions for so long in support of their theories that they have started accepting them as facts. No one objects to their assuming whatever they want to assume, but to assume happenings that go contrary to all scientific evidence and still call it science is being dishonest. Mutations—How Big the Changes? Now let's look at a second basic evolutionary teaching which is contrary to scientific law. One of the most necessary parts of evolution, which is supposed to provide the power for changing the amoeba into a man, is mutation. This refers to abnormal changes in the organism that are assumed to be caused by chemical changes in the genes themselves. The genes are the hereditary factors within the chromosomes of each species. Every species has its own particular number of chromosomes that contain the genes. Within every human being are 46 chromosomes containing an estimated 100,000 genes, each one of which is able to affect in some way the size, color, texture, or quality of the individual. The assumption is that these genes, which provide the inherited characteristics we get from our ancestors, occasionally become affected by unusual pairing, chemical damage, or other influences, causing them to produce an unusual change in one of the offspring. This is referred to as a mutation. Through gradual changes wrought in the various species through mutation, it is assumed by the evolutionists that the amoeba turned into an invertebrate, which became an amphibian, then a reptile, a quadruped, an ape form, and finally a man. In other words, the species are not fixed in the eyes of the evolutionists. Families are forever drifting over into another higher form as time progresses. This means that all the fossil records of animal history should reveal an utter absence of precise family boundaries. Everything should be in the process of changing into something else—with literally hundreds of millions of half-developed fish trying to become amphibious, and reptiles halfway transformed into birds, and mammals looking like half-apes or half-men. Now everybody knows that instead of finding those billions of confused family fossils, the scientists have found exactly the opposite. Not one single drifting, changing life form has been studied. Everything stays within the well-defined limits of its own basic kind and absolutely refuses to cooperate with the demands of modern evolutionists. Most people would give up and change their theory when faced with such a crushing, deflating blow, but not the evolutionist! He still searches for that illusive missing link which could at least prove that he hasn't been 100 percent wrong. But let's look at the vehicle that the evolutionists have depended upon to provide the possibility of the drastic changes required by their theory. Sir Julian Huxley, a principal spokesman for evolution, said this: "Mutation provides the raw material of evolution." Again he said, "Mutation is the ultimate sources of all … heritable variation" (Evolution in Action, p. 38). Professor Ernst Mayr, another leader of the evolutionists, made this statement: "Yet it must not be forgotten that mutation is the ultimate source of all genetic variation found in natural populations and the only raw material available for natural selection to work on" (Animal Species and Evolution, p. 170). Please keep this clearly in mind: Evolutionists say that mutation is absolutely essential to provide the inexorable upgrading of species that changed the simpler forms into more complex forms. BUT—the scientific fact is that mutation could NEVER accomplish what evolution demands of it, for several reasons. As all scientists agree, mutations are very rare. Huxley guesses that only about one in a hundred thousand is a mutant. Secondly, when they do occur, they are almost certain to be harmful or deadly to the organism. In other words, the vast majority of such mutations lead toward extinction instead of evolution; they make the organism worse instead of better. Huxley admits: "The great majority of mutant genes are harmful in their effect on the organism" (Ibid. p. 39). Other scientists, including Darwin himself, conceded that most mutants are recessive and degenerative; therefore, they would actually be eliminated by natural selection rather than effect any significant improvement in the organism. Professor G. G. Simpson, one of the elite spokesmen for evolution, writes about multiple, simultaneous mutations and reports that the mathematical likelihood of getting good evolutionary results would occur only once in 274 billion years! And that would be assuming 100 million individuals reproducing a new generation every day! He concludes by saying: "Obviously … such a process has played no part whatever in evolution" (The Major Features of Evolution, p. 96). Does this sound sort of confusing to you? They say mutation is necessary to make the changes required by their theory, yet they have to confess that it is scientifically impossible for multiple mutations to make the changes. This is too typical of the puzzling twists and turns made by our evolutionist friends in their efforts to uphold an exploded theory. So the second point of contradiction with true science has been established. Mutations, of course, do effect minor changes within the basic kinds, but those changes are limited, never producing a new family. They can explain many of the varieties of both plant and animals but can never explain the creation of basic kinds as required by evolution. Fossils Support Creationism Since we have discovered that the fossil record gives no support to the idea of species gradually changing into other species, let us see if fossil evidence is in harmony with the Bible. Ten times in the book of Genesis we read God's decree concerning the reproduction of His creatures—"after its kind." The word "kind" refers to species, or families. Each created family was to produce only its own kind. This forever precludes the drifting, changing process required by organic evolution where one species turns into another. Take note that God did not say there could be no changes within the family. He did not create all the varieties of dogs, cats, horses, etc., in the very beginning. There was only a male and female of each species, and many changes have since occurred to produce a wide assortment of varieties within the family. But please keep it straight in your mind that cats have always remained cats, dogs are still dogs, and men are still men. Mutation has only been responsible for producing a new variety of the same species, but never originating another new kind. Selective breeding has also brought tremendous improvements such as hornless cattle, white turkeys, and seedless oranges, but all the organisms continue to reproduce exactly as God decreed at Creation—after its kind. The "common ancestor" that evolution demands has never existed. There is not a "missing link." Man and monkeys are supposed to stem from the same animal ancestry! Even chimpanzees and many monkey groups vary tremendously. Some are smart, others dumb. Some have short tails and some long. Some have no tails at all. Their teeth vary in number. A few have thumbs and others do not. Their genes are different. Their blood is different. Their chromosomes don't jibe. Interestingly enough, apes only breed with apes, chimpanzees with chimpanzees, and monkeys with monkeys. But when we start comparing humans with monkeys, we get even more impossible differences than those among the simian types. In fact, these differences constitute another unanswerable support for the Bible rule of "after its kind." The fact that some monkeys can be trained to smoke a pipe, ride a scooter, or even hoist a test tube in a laboratory does not prove that scientists are evolved animals, or that monkeys are retarded, developing humans. It has already been stated that evolutionists expected the fossil record to support their theory of species changes. Their doctrine demanded vast numbers of scaly reptiles transforming their scales into feathers and their front feet into wings. Other reptiles supposedly should be changing into fur-bearing quadrupeds. Did they find those thousands of multi-changing creatures? Not one! No matter what particular strata they sifted through, all the fossils were easily recognized and classified within their own families, just as God decreed. If the evolutionary doctrine were true, the strata would be teeming with hundreds of millions of transition forms with combination features of two or more species. Not only so, but there would have to be millions upon millions of observable living links right now in the process of turning into a higher form. Darwin confessed: "There are two or three million species on earth. A sufficient field one might think for observation; but it must be said today that in spite of all the evidence of trained observers, not one change of the species to another is on record" (Life and Letters, vol. 3, p. 25). How interesting! Then why insist that it had to be that way? This is one of the marvels of those who cling to a traditional theory. Even the most ancient fossil forms in the lowest fossil beds have stubbornly retained the same features of their modern counterparts, and it is amusing to listen to the exclamations of surprise by the evolutionists. The creationist is not surprised at all. His Bible told him it would be that way, and he hasn't been forced to puzzle over contradictory evidence. The Mystery of the Empty Strata Another frustration for the poor evolutionist is the strange case of the empty strata. As one digs deep into the earth, one layer or stratum after another is revealed. Often we can see these layers clearly exposed in the side of a mountain or roadbed cut. Geologists have given names to the succession of strata that pile one on top of another. Descending into Grand Canyon for example, one moves downward past the Mississippi, Devonian, Cambrian, etc., as the scientists have tagged them. Now here is the perplexity for the evolutionists: The Cambrian is the last stratum of the descending levels that has any fossils in it. All the lower strata below the Cambrian have absolutely no fossil record of life other than some single-celled types such as bacteria and algae. Why not? The Cambrian layer is full of all the major kinds of animals found today except the vertebrates. In other words, there is nothing primitive about the structure of these most ancient fossils known to man. Essentially, they compare with the complexity of current living creatures. But the big question is: Where are their ancestors? Where are all the evolving creatures that should have led up to these highly developed fossils? According to the theory of evolution, the Precambrian strata should be filled with more primitive forms of these Cambrian fossils in the process of evolving upward. Darwin confessed in his book, Origin of the Species: "To the question why we do not find rich fossiliferous deposits belonging to these assumed earliest periods prior to the Cambrian system I can give no satisfactory answer … the case at present must remain inexplicable; and may be truly urged as a valid argument against the views here entertained" (p. 309). How amazing! Darwin admitted having no way to defend his theory, but he still would not adjust his theory to meet the unanswerable arguments against it. Many other evolutionary scientists have expressed similar disappointment and frustration. Dr. Daniel Axeliod of the University of California calls it: "One of the major unsolved problems of geology and evolution" (Science, July 4, 1958). Dr. Austin Clark of the U.S. National Museum wrote concerning the Cambrian fossils: "Strange as it may seem … mollusks were mollusks just as unmistakably as they are now" (The New Evolution: Zoogenesis, p. 101). Drs. Marshall Kay and Edwin Colbert of Columbia University marveled over the problem in these words: "Why should such complex organic forms be in rocks about 600 million years old and be absent or unrecognized in the records of the preceding two billion years? … If there has been evolution of life, the absence of the requisite fossils in the rocks older than Cambrian is puzzling" (Stratigraphy and Life History, p. 102). George Gaylord Simpson, the "Crown Prince of Evolution", summarized it: "The sudden appearance of life is not only the most puzzling feature of the whole fossil record but also its greatest apparent inadequacy" (The Evolution of Life, p.144). In the face of these forced admissions of failure to find supporting scientific evidence, how can these men of science continue to press so dogmatically for their shaky views? No wonder they fight to keep students from hearing the opposing arguments. Their positions would crumble under the impartial investigation of honest research. The absence of Precambrian fossils points to one great fact, unacceptable to the evolutionists—a sudden creative act of God that brought all the major creatures into existence at the same time. Their claims that creationism is unscientific are made only to camouflage their own lack of true evidence. The preponderance of physical scientific data is on the side of creation, not evolution. Uniformity or the Flood? The subject of strata beds leads into the interesting question of how these layers were formed, and why the evolutionists have guesstimated their age in the billions of years. The dating of those layers has been done on the basis of the theory of uniformity. This theory assumes that all the natural processes at work in the past have operated exactly as they do today. In other words, the creation of those strata can only be explained on the basis of what we see happening in the world now. Scientists must calculate how long it takes for sedimentation to build a foot-deep stratum. Then that age is assigned to any 12-inch layer, no matter how deeply located within the earth. Is that a valid assumption to make? Have all the natural forces of the past been just what we can demonstrate and understand today? How naive and conceited to compel ages past to conform to our limited observation and experience! We can assume what we please, but it proves absolutely nothing except our own gullibility. The Bible explains very graphically about a Flood that ravaged the face of this earth, covering the highest mountains and completely destroying all plant and animal life outside the ark. The destructive action of the Deluge is expressed by these words in the Bible: "The same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights" (Genesis 7:11, 12). The existence of those strata can be scientifically accounted for in perfect harmony with the Bible record. The universal Flood of Genesis provides a much more reasonable explanation of the strata than evolution's speculations. As the waters receded from the earth, powerful tides and currents carved out the great canyons in a short time. Layers of debris, according to the specific weight, were laid down, compressing plant and animal life into a compact seam or stratum. Only thus can we explain the vast oil reserves and coal beds around the world. These are the result of vegetation and animal bodies being buried under extreme heat and pressure. No such process of fossilization is taking place today. No oil or coal is forming by present natural forces at work. Uniformity fails here. The fact is, there had to be a gigantic cataclysmic overturn of nature, killing and burying millions of tons of plant and animal life. The position of some fossils standing upright through one or more strata indicates that the process was not slow or age long. The material had to be deposited quickly around the body of the animal, or it could not have remained in its erect position. The flood buried millions of fish, many of them contorted as though suddenly overtaken by a phenomenal force. Marine fossils have been recovered from the highest mountain ranges, and a checklist on other scientific evidences points to a universal deluge over the entire planet. Survival of the Fittest "Natural selection" is a coined phrase of the evolutionist to describe the survival of the fittest. Simply stated, it is the natural process that enables the strongest of each generation to survive and the weaker, more poorly adjusted ones to die out. The assumption of evolution is that since only the strongest survive to father the next generation, the species will gradually improve, even advancing into other more highly developed states on the evolutionary scale. Darwin believed that natural selection was the most important factor in the development of his theory. Many of the top teachers of evolution today are hopelessly at odds on the question of how vital it is. Sir Julian Huxley believes in it, as this statement indicates: "So far as we know … natural selection … is the only effective agency of evolution" (Evolution in Action, p. 36). He is disputed on this by another one of the heavyweights in the field, Dr. Ernst Mayr: "Natural selection is no longer regarded as an all-or-none process but rather as a purely statistical concept" (Animal Species, p. 7). G. G. Simpson, who is regarded as the leading interpreter of the theory today, rejects these opposite views. He said, "Search for the cause of evolution has been abandoned. It is now clear that evolution has no single cause" (The Geography of Evolution, p. 17). By the way, when you read about the great unity and agreement that exists among the scientists regarding evolution, don't believe a word of it. Each one is busily experimenting with new speculative possibilities as to how the changes took place and then abandoning them as they appear more and more ridiculous. The one basic tenet they do agree on is that there was no divine fiat creation as described in the Bible. But come back a moment to the matter of natural selection. What is the evidence that it can actually reproduce all the changes involved in the transition from amoeba to man? Is there scientific proof that it can even make one small change? When it comes right down to answering those questions, the spokesmen for evolution do some of the fanciest footwork in semantics you ever saw and make some of the most amazing admissions. Even though Simpson supports natural selection as a factor, he recognizes the scarcity of evidence in these words: "It might be argued that the theory is quite unsubstantiated and has status only as a speculation" (Major Features, pp. 118, 119). But listen to Huxley's circular reasoning on it. He says: "On the basis of our present knowledge natural selection is bound to produce genetic adaptations: and genetic adaptations are thus presumptive evidence for the efficiency of natural selection" (Evolution in Action, p. 48). Did you follow that gem of logic? His proof for natural selection is adaptation or change in the organism, but the change is produced by natural selection! In other words: A=B; therefore B=A. His “proof” proves nothing. Were the changes produced by natural selection, or did he invent natural selection to explain the changes? It is just as likely that the changes produced the natural selection theory. The ludicrous thing is that even the changes from species to species have never been verified. As we have shown already, there is not one shred of fossil evidence or living evidence that any species has changed into another. So Huxley's proof for natural selection are changes which never happened, and the changes which never happened are offered as proof for natural selection. Surely this is the most vacuous logic to be found in a science textbook. But let us continue with Sir Julian's explanation about the reliability of this natural selection process: "To sum up, natural selection converts randomness into direction and blind chance into apparent purpose. It operates with the aid of time to produce improvements in the machinery of living, and in the process generates results of a more than astronomical improbability which could have been achieved in no other way" (Evolution in Action, pp. 54, 55). Don't miss the force of that last sentence. The evolutionary changes wrought by natural selection are "astronomically improbable," but because our friend Huxley sees no other way for it to be done, he believes in the astronomically improbable. Poor man! He is wrong when he said the complex order of life today could have been achieved in no other way. God created the wonders of cell and gene and all the millions of processes that leave the Nobel Prize winners baffled. But since Sir Julian doesn't believe in a divine creation, he has to invent a miracle-working process to explain the existence of these complex creatures—obviously got here somehow. To illustrate the omnipotence of his "natural selection" god, Huxley computed the odds against such a process. The computations were done on the likelihood of every favorable evolutionary factor being able to produce a horse. Now keep in mind that this is all a chance development through the operation of nature, time, mutation, and natural selection. In his book, Evolution in Action, Huxley gave the odds this way: "The figure 1 with three million naughts after it: and that would take three large volumes of about 500 pages each, just to print! … No one would bet on anything so improbable happening; and yet it has happened" (p.46). We commented before about the faith of evolutionists to believe in the impossible. Since this figure of compound probability is effectively zero, how can a scientific mind, in the absence of any demonstrable evidence, be so dogmatic in defending his theory? Why did Huxley employ a mathematical formula to illustrate the impossibility of his theory working? Perhaps he used the figures to accent his personal testimony. Just as born-again Christians seek occasions to bear their personal testimony of faith in Christ, Huxley demolishes the scientific possibilities of his theory in order to magnify the personal faith aspect of his personal testimony for the god evolution. Marshall and Sandra Hall in their book The Truth—God or Evolution? share their reaction to Huxley's absurd faith in the chance production of a horse. It will provide a fitting climax of proof that evolution indeed flunked the science test. "And, let us remind you who find such odds ridiculous (even if you are reassured by Mr. Huxley), that this figure was calculated for the evolution of a horse! How many more volumes of zeros would be required by Mr. Huxley to produce a human being? And then you would have just one horse and one human being and, unless the mathematician wishes to add in the probability for the evolution of all the plants and animals that are necessary to support a horse and a man, you would have a sterile world where neither could have survived any stage of its supposed evolution! What have we now—the figure 1 followed by a thousand volumes of zeros? Then add another thousand volumes for the improbability of the earth having all the necessary properties for life built into it. And add another thousand volumes for the improbability of the sun, and the moon, and the stars. Add other thousands for the evolution of all the thoughts that man can have, all the objective and subjective reality that ebbs and flows in us like part of the pulse beat of an inscrutable cosmos! Add them all in and you long ago stopped talking about rational thought, much less scientific evidence. Yet, Simpson, Huxley, Dobzhansky, Mayr, and dozens of others continue to tell us that is the way it had to be! They have retreated from all the points which ever lent any semblance of credibility to the evolutionary theory. Now they busy themselves with esoteric mathematical formulations based on population genetics, random drift, isolation, and other ploys which have a probability of accounting for life on earth of minus zero! They clutter our libraries, and press on the minds of people everywhere an animated waxen image of a theory that has been dead for over a decade. Evolution has no claim whatsoever to being a science. It is time all this nonsense ceased. It is time to bury the corpse. It is time to shift the books to the humorous fiction section of the libraries" (pp. 39, 40). " Joe Crews  chronology: Blackie perhaps some people would benefit from looking closer at the creation story. For most fundamentalists in the United States they have a kindergarten like cartoon idea of the Biblical story of mankind's beginnings with the Devine Being. The story in genesis is a snapshot of the epic story of God's activities on earth. His building and destroying of civilisations goes back way beyond mankind's inhabitation of the planet. The real problem with just reading Genesis and not looking closely into the story is that people get the impression that God has somehow forgotten the world and Jesus is up in the clouds on sugar candy mountain. If people knew U.S. Air Force every day intercept'uknown' tracks as they call UFOs, and that these odd Craft seem to be associated with Satan's former kingdom or some past civilisations that are suggested at in the OT, then they may take the Bible more seriously. On my Trivia Blog I mentioned Dragon's the other day. Most people just assume that Satan is called Dragon as a nickname or something. Personally I believe there were real living live Dragons at the time when John wrote Revelation. They were very large Reptiles. Some even had wings, but like I said on my Blog, U.S. Park Service Staff would calculate flight to be impossible for such heavy animals with such wing sizes. And yet over and over we hear of Dragons flying. Evolutionists are closed minded, locked in a dark age of dogma. But some creationists are not far behind them. MJ59: Ole  the ayatollah of Appalachia, the world’s holiest man who knows more about religion and science than everyone elseand only speaks The Truth™.The Top 10 Claims Made by Creationists to Counter Scientific Theories: One of the most challenging tasks for the modern day creationist to is reconcile the belief in a 6,000 year old Earth with the ever-growing mountain of scientific evidence pointing to a vastly different conclusion — namely a universe that's 13.5 billion years old and an Earth that formed 4.5 billion years ago. So, given these astoundingly dramatic discrepancies, biblical literalists and 'young Earth creationists' have had no choice but to get pretty darned imaginative when brushing science aside. Here are 10 arguments creationists have made to counter scientific theories. 1. Humans and dinosaurs co-existed Quite obviously, creationists aren't able to gloss over the fact that dinosaurs existed. They are clearly a part of the fossil record. But in accordance with the Bible, creationists insist that they lived contemporaneously with humans. And in fact, they say this explains why dragons play a prominent role in our mythological record. Moreover, creationists claim that human footprints have been found alongside dinosaur tracks at Paluxy, that a petrified hammer was found in Cretaceous rocks, and that some sandal footprints have been found alongside trilobites. Other theories suggest that the Great Flood shook up and redeposited the fossil record so that it appears that dinosaurs lived millions of years before humans arrived. Real evidence and proper interpretation of the fossil record, however, supports the idea that humans first emerged about 200,000 years ago — long after the demise of dinosaurs who went extinct 65 million years ago. 2. Biological systems are too complex to have evolved This is what biochemist Michael Behe refers to as irreducible complexity. He and other creationists complain that a complex biological system, what is comprised of many interacting parts, would cease to function properly in the event of any alteration. Proponents of intelligent design use this argument to claim that anything less than the complete form of a fully functional biological system (or organ) would not work at all — what would be catastrophically detrimental to an organism. In other words, all mutations have to be bad. The only way for an organism to evolve, the ID defenders say, is for God to guide the process every step of the way. This is silly, of course — organisms are not that fragile. And in fact, evolvability is an indelible aspect to life. 3. We can see light from distant galaxies because the speed of light is not constant When we look up at the sky at night, we're actually looking back in time. Given the vastness of the universe, it can take upwards of millions and even billions of years for the light from the most distant celestial objects to reach us. Creationists have a rather convenient explanation for this problem: The universal constants, including the speed of light, are not constant at all. It's quite possible, they surmise, that the speed of light was significantly faster in the past, allowing it to reach the Earth in time for Adam to see it. Others speculate that the Big Bang theory is simply wrong, and that a new ‘creationist cosmology' is required to reconcile the apparent anomaly in our observations. As the Creation Answers Handbook claims: The basic biblical framework, because it comes from the Creator, is nonnegotiable, as opposed to the changing views and models of fallible people seeking to understand the data within that framework (evolutionists also often change their ideas on exactly how things have made themselves, but never whether they did). Failing this, creationists can always default to the most convenient of explanations: God simply created the light ‘on it's way,' so that observers on Earth could see the stars immediately without having to wait. Mmmm, handwaving.... 4. All hominid fossils are either fully human or fully ape Given that Scripture doesn't provision for evolution, the discovery of ancient human relatives like Australopithecines and Neanderthals is deeply problematic. To explain this away, creationists argue that anthropologists are misreading the fossil record and inaccurately conflating Homo sapiens with other ape species. When it comes to Neanderthals, they say there was no such thing — that these are human remains and not some distant relative. And to explain the morphological differences, creationists simply argue that these were disfigured humans, or people suffering from rickets or arthritis. 5. Stars and planets could have never formed from dust According to Abraham Loeb, an astrophysicist from Harvard whose work gets cherry picked by creationists, "The truth is that we don't understand star formation at a fundamental level." Creationists, like Jonathan Sarfat, have used the arguments of Loeb and others to make their case against the ‘nebular hypothesis' — the theory that stars and planets formed over the course of billions of years as gravity brought gasses and particles together to create large masses. It's impossible, they say, for stars to form from nebulas. They claim that terrestrial planets could never congeal from "blobs" of gas and dust, as other objects would constantly provide resistance and disruption. Creationists also argue that the temperature of nebulas following the Big Bang would have been far too hot to facilitate contraction, and that the particles would have pushed away from each other. Other inconsistencies include the sun's axial tilt and the presence of inexplicable gas giants. As Sarfat notes, the best explanation comes from the Bible, "By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host." In other words, when in doubt, attribute any kind of natural phenomenon to God. Gotcha. 6. The Second Law of Thermodynamics prohibits evolution The second law of thermodynamics states that the universe and all its systems are progressively moving towards disorder, or entropy. Evolution, on the other hand, implies the improvement of a species — what creationists say is a gross violation of the Second Law. This contradiction, say the creationists, implies that ‘evolutionists' are fundamentally wrong in their assumptions — that changes to systems should be regressive and not progressive. What they fail to understand, however, is that the 2LT should only be applied to the universe as a whole, or a closed energy system — which the Earth is most certainly not. But moreover, evolution does not always lead to improvement or increased complexity. Organisms are either well adapted or poorly suited to their environments at any given point in time. And in fact, some species evolve towards too much complexity (i.e. over-specialization) and detrimental adaptations that can lead to outright extinction. Evolution is by no means a process of improvement; it's merely an autonomous system that's driven by variation and selection. 7. The Flood caused the ice age Like the presence of dinosaurs, the ice age is another conundrum that demands a response — a glacial period that occurred during the last years of the Pleistocene, approximately 110,000 to 10,000 years ago. Actually, this is an easy one, say the creationists. According to Genesis, most of the Flood water came from underground — what resulted in warmer than average oceans and a significant increase in global snowfall. This gave rise to the ice sheets and the pluvial periods. In addition, large amounts of volcanic dust in the atmosphere blocked crucial sunlight, which caused cooler summers. Moreover, the ice age is a geological phenomenon that can also explain why there's no trace of the Great Flood in the sedimentary record. And on a related note, some creationists contend that the sedimentary layers were caused by the tremendous weight of the flood waters above the ground. 8. Radiocarbon dating doesn't work For years, scientists have used radiocarbon dating to get a sense of how old ancient objects really are. They're able to do this by exploiting the naturally occurring radioisotope carbon-14 (14C) to estimate the age of carbon-bearing materials. To sweep this inconvenient truth aside, some creationists claim that radioisotope decay rates aren't constant — and that all processes in nature vary according to different factors. Others argue that carbon dating gives inaccurate results, pointing to changing ratios of 14C in the atmosphere and varying amounts of cosmic rays reaching the Earth — what would affect the amount and ratios of 14C produced. Additionally, some claim that the Genesis Flood would have greatly upset the carbon balance; the water, they argue, buried huge amounts of carbon (which became coal, oil, etc.) lowering the total 12C in the biosphere. Read this to see why they're wrong. 9. DNA is God's signature on all living things Some creationists argue that DNA, by virtue of the fact that it contains stored information that can be read by humans, must be the result of intelligence. The information within DNA — what facilitates the assembling of proteins and enzymes — wouldn't be coherent if someone, namely God, wasn't scripting it. Creationists clearly need to ramp-up on information theory if they ever hope to understand how complex systems actually work — and how the scientific endeavor is largely an effort to translate the mysteries of the universe into a language we can understand. 10. The Grand Canyon was formed by receding flood waters The Grand Canyon formed about 70 million years ago — at a time when the dinosaurs still ruled the Earth. This geological time scale is obviously a problem for creationists, who simply respond by suggesting that it was created in one fell swoop when the flood waters retreated (it's amazing how many things can be explained by the Great Flood). Not only is there no evidence to support this claim, it is a geologic impossibility. Moreover, it would have likely created a huge, straight, washed out chasm, and not the intricate and winding Grand Canyon we know today. And of course, creationists are loath to explain why there's only one Grand Canyon on Earth. (Edited by MJ59) chronology: The problem some would see with your viewpoint Blackie Old Chap is that you have no problems with the book of Revelation, but you assume that a Reservation Policewoman in New Mexico who saw either a Thunderbird or a Dragon is not worthy of consideration. Blackshoes: Chron I make almost no assumptions and again you Judge what you assume I'm thinking? I don't know what you're talking about when you speaking of Dragons. Outside of the fact that Dargon is often a reference to Satan, and that in ancient times when the Chinese found fossilized Dinosaur bones they called them Dragons. Dragons to my knowledge are nothing more than mythical creation of writers. What anyone saw or either past or present? I have no knowledge of nor do I know what your referring to about a PW from New Mexico (Edited by Blackshoes) chronology: Well blackie you are falling into the same mire virtually everyone does who usually just laugh whenever Dragons are referred to. Up to about 400 year's ago most people in Europe and elsewhere considered Dragons as real as Comodo Dragons today. The Dragons of around 1000 years ago were huge Reptiles, around 40 meters long. They were regarded as aggressive and man eating. Some Dragons were described as having Wings. They flew across the Sky, often to some distant land. People of all walks of life described seeing Dragons. From the Rocky mountains to Egyptian Deserts to the lush plains of India. The problem with the Dragon reports we have is that they don't comply with the basic law's of physics. But even today people who see Dragons, like the woman recently in the Rockies, or the Reservation Policewoman, are still seeing Flying Dragons. But the Policewoman anticipated your scepticism when she was describing her Big Bird or Dragon encounter when she said 'I know people will think am crazy, or exaggerating, but I know what I saw, it was a huge flying bird. Dragons are Reptiles not birds. All I say is that reliable, often down to earth people, are reporting still seeing these creatures. A Private Aircraft Pilot back in the 60s reported a huge'bird' sighting. It was flying below him on the U.S. East Coast. Was it really a huge bird? Or was he too afraid of ridicule to say it looked like a Dragon? Personally I keep an open mind about these reports. The U.S. Park Service often receive reports of Big Foot and Thunderbird sightings. But Agency never mention Dragon Reports. Now that is interesting because people still insist they have seen Dragons. The media never mention Dragon sightings, presumably because they sound so far out. The Dragon reports from the past appear to be of huge exotic Reptiles similar to today's Comodo Dragons.  kittybobo34: Violating the laws of physics is kind of a big deal, which eliminates flying dragons. For the sake of fun, lets assume that they store huge amounts of hydrogen in some kind of bladder for breathing fire of course, and they use Hydrochloric acid in their gut to generate the hydrogen. So if they died, the acid would eat up any remains, and the gas would allow them to fly. chronology: Am with you on this one kitty, it is just impossible for a creature of such weight and wing dimensions to fly. But we have almost countless reports of them doing so. The Thunderbird of First Nation America is still seen around 10 times a year, usually down in New Mexico and in the Siarra Nevada mountains. kittybobo34: The Volume of gas to body would have to be a factor of 8 to 1 at least, Picturing a 10' creature with a 80' gas bag Blackshoes: Again Chron I do my best never to laugh at anyone's opinions? I learned a long time ago everyone has opinions presupposition and experiences I have not been exposed to? Laughing at others can often make a fool of those that laugh  I have never claimed to know all things! I do know more than some, and less than others! Does my opinion suggest that I believe Mythical Dragon may exist? No I don't (Edited by Blackshoes) (Post deleted by staff ) AchillesSinatra: You, of all people, should know. Now why are you filling my thread with irrelevant shite? Blackshoes: Sorry A SIN, I mistook you for gentlemen with a little bit of intelligence. My bad', I'll not be bothering you again! Note this isn't your forum! (Edited by Blackshoes) AchillesSinatra: You said that earlier. How many times do you intend to not bother me? (Edited by AchillesSinatra) (Post deleted by Blackshoes ) | Science Chat Room Similar Conversations |
