Scientific American presents 15 Answers To Creationist Nonsense. You might want to bookmark this one in case you need to address, well, creationism nonsense.
{ 2006 01 08 }
{ 2006 01 08 }
Scientific American presents 15 Answers To Creationist Nonsense. You might want to bookmark this one in case you need to address, well, creationism nonsense.
yongi | 08-Jan-06 at 1:08 am | Permalink
And another one: http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Hangar/2437/
Lono | 10-Jan-06 at 12:39 pm | Permalink
Firstly, I think this post is a little dishonest – as the SA article you site, and arguably your intention, is to not debate pure Creationists (as is impossible because pure creationism is faith based – i.e. fossils exist because God created them), but rather to discredit those who propose Intelligent Design as an alternative to modern Evolutionary Theory.
That being said anyone who has studied evolutionary theory in detail, as I have as part of my degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology, can see that SA’s points skirt around Evolutionary Theory’s short commings and attacks only those Creationist arguments that can be easily challenged.
Point 7 for istance is a MAJOR hole in Evolutionary Theory – and they don’t even explain why. The problem is that the conditions necessary to create an “RNA World” are extremely hostile to phospholipids make the “evolution” of the cell quite impossible without some sort of mechanical or intelligent intervention.
However go into any museum or Biology textbook and you will find the incorrect assertion that the Miller/Urey Experiment proved the spontaneous origin of cellular life on Earth. It is now well known that not only does this experiment incorrectly account for the Earths chemical composition, but the mixture used is very toxic to any living cell, and thus impossible to be assumed as a reasonable catalyst for early cellular life.
The SA article does nothing to elucidate this theoretical problem and instead relies on the “faith” that maybe asteroids or aliens did something to solve this problem.
Point 8 is also a major problem for Evolutionary Theory in that they completely underestimate the rate of non-deletrious Mutation that would be required to build such complex structures in such a short time. When one realizes that all these structures have evolved not in 3.5 Billion years since single cell life appeared on Earth but rather in the mere 540 million years since first multi-cellular life appears in the fossil record – you realize the rate of speciation and novel phenotype creation must have been incredible to create the diverse animal and plant life found on the Earth today.
And if that is the case then Point 12 becomes all the more poinant.
If as they freely admit that nearly no new speciation has been documented excepet in experiments where that desired result was literal bred into them, then it severly contradicts the rate of which speciation must be occurring on Earth to account for the current diversity of forms presently seen.
and then taht brings us to the falacy of Point 14.
Point 14 states that Darwin’s argument of Gradual Evolution accounts for the lack of design in nature. However, as all Evolutionary Biologists well know, and as is articulated in SA’s own defense of point 12, speciation can almost always only occur in Punctuated Equilibrium, otherwise as Japanes biologists have shown, neutral evolution completely counteracts any dramatic phenotypic change due to selection pressures in a medium to large population.
This has been well established, making Darwins studies quaint but completely inadequate to explain the fantastically intricate features found at all levels in living things.
Finally even if all these theoretical holes could be explained away in light of some new evidence or breakthroughs it would only serve to prove the existance of God in the first place.
This is the crux of the Evolutionary Paradox – if evolution proves that the diversity of forms found on Earth could have occurred in a mere 3.5 Billion years, then we can accurately predict that evolution of complexity (and sentience as seen in many mammals) is a natural process given the physical laws of the known Universe and therefore given a sufficently long period of time the Universe itself would become sentient from it basic interacting electromagnetic molecules.
This, to me, makes it clear that the Universe is in fact sentient having at least 15+ Billion years (and likely a nearly infinite time before the Big Bang) to achieve sentience.
If our “Evolution” occured after the sentience of the Universe, and we are all composed of elements that were forged in the heart of stars as modern astronomy tells us, then it would indeed be impossible for the sentient Universe to not have an effect on our evolution and we are merely a subset of it existance.
Therefore the reality of an Intelligent Designer is, in fact, inescapable as predicted by modern evolutionary theory itself.
Thus when it was said that God made us in his image – it is the very evolution of our complexity and sentience, not our phenotipic form, that “he” is refering to.
I do not believe that any one can find my Intelligent Design argument to be any less sufficent to describe the current physical evidence than Modern Evolutionary Theory.
Therefore, please, lets not become presumptious in mocking the beliefs of others.
Lono | 10-Jan-06 at 3:16 pm | Permalink
Hmm… I didn’t realize “Governor” Perry was pushing this issue in Texas to distract people from his horrible record/funding of Texas education.
Still despite his ignorance, ID should not be dismissed out of hand, just as Evolutionary Theory’s current shortcomings should not be glossed over in school textbooks.
Man when will Texas get a decent Gov. again?
yongi | 12-Jan-06 at 2:48 pm | Permalink
I had a hunch this one would rile you
I don’t have a problem with ID in the same way that I don’t have a problem with Baptist belief. Believe what you want, but don’t force it on me. My concern with ID in this case is not the well-stated approach that you take, Lono. My problem with it is when it is used (as is almost exclusively the case right now) by people who don’t really believe in it, either to try to force BS Christian, biblical creationism into our schools by casting science into doubt. The article I linked to is intended to address that approach to ID, not yours. I suspect you know that already, though, since you know me.
Perhaps it was disrespectful to have linked “creationist nonsense” directly to the ID folks’ website. But it seemed like a good idea at the time
In any case, to paraphrase Texas gubernatorial hopeful (and former Texas Supreme Court Justice) Bob Gammage, let’s stick to science in schools and religion in churches. And Lono, for the purposes of everyone I’ve ever met who was a proponent of ID except you, ID is about religion, not science. And again, that’s where my concern lies right now.
-y-
p.s. When will Texas get a decent Gov. again? Maybe this year, if my fellow Texans wake up and elect the Kinkster.
Lono | 13-Jan-06 at 4:25 pm | Permalink
Heh Heh – No offense taken!
Sometimes I feel as if it is necessary to take up arms on this issue as Evolution has become a faith to some people just as Christianity is to others – and science should never become dogmatic – but rather remain the open minded search for truth it inherrently is.
I can’t help but think it would really help these ID proponents if they made me their national spokesman, because at least I know what I’m talking about – but really, many of these ID pushers wouldn’t recognize Jesus if he up and bit’em.
It really is a national tragedy that people don’t understand that while ID is likely true it can never be a theory because it can not be used to predict results (at least in comfirmable ways – although some may argue it could in properly designed quantum supercomputer simulations) and that any current scientific theory including Evolutionary Theory was a mere hypothesis until it sucessfully did so.
Its time for a 2nd Renaissance – and I have just the plan to usher it in – non violently of course