Answers in Genesis opened their Creation Museum yesterday. I am very excited and proud of this project. My parents have made special vacation plans to go see it this summer.
What never ceases to amaze me is how controversial it has already become. All the familiar arguments are thrown out against those of us "naive idiots" who believe in Creationism instead of Evolution. If you don't believe in evolution you are a considered by the elite to be an uneducated minority who is anti-science. The school board members in Kansas that wanted Intelligent Design to at least be offered as an alternative theory to Evolution were ridiculed as being anti-science kooks. If you take the time to study you'll find that science backs up Creationism a lot more than it does Evolution.
In my high school debate class I was involved in a debate on whether Evolution was true or not. My friend freaked out when she found out we were on the side against Evolution. She was convinced that the evidence was overwhelmingly for evolution and we were sure to lose. I just smiled. I did a ton of research and we came prepared and kicked their butts and won the debate hands down!!! To be honest, it is one of my favorite memories of high school. We never sought to prove Creation, only to disprove Evolution.
Evolution has A LOT of holes in it and their is ABSOLUTELY NO PROOF of evolution and yet it is taught in every single public school today. Both Evolution and Creationism are theories that can't be proven because no one can go back in time and watch the beginning of the world taking place. People talk about how Creationism involves faith but it takes a lot more faith to believe in evolution over creation. To this day there has never, ever been a transitional form found to prove that Evolution takes place. Yet, it is taught as FACT in all public schools.
When you consider how Intelligent Design can't even be taught as an alternative theory to Evolution in schools it amazes me that Evolutionists can't even stand the thought of this museum. How dare someone plant the idea that Evolution might not be true? My belief is that Evolutionists wouldn't be so threatened if they really believed their theory was true.
Contrary to popular belief there are a lot of scientists (scroll down on the link to see the list) that don't believe in Evolution and do believe in Creationism. For those of you who insist that Evolution has to be true because all the "experts" say so and its what you've always been taught take the time to check out what organizations like Answers in Genesis have to say. To start, read this article, Can Creationists be Scientists?
I know many will disagree and be 100% convinced that I am an anti-science kook for believing in Creationism. Thats okay, but take the time to study the other side. Evolution is one of those "politically correct" issues that has been rammed down our throats with no alternative allowed. If Evolution is so fool-proof why do so many want to silence the other side?
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7 comments:
there is proof of evolution within species. there is none of evolutionary speciation.
you see one of the hurdles is that at some point the off-spring have to be different species than the parents.
"gene pool drift" is a theory which attempts to explain it. there is slight change OVER TIME. each generation is "close enough" genetically to be the same species as its immediate foprebears but not it's greatgreatgreatgreatetc grandparents.
the gradual drift is the result of mutations and "natural selection"/"the differential of reproductive success" = which means individuals who contribute more to the gene pool have a bigger influence on which way it drifts.
but this PRESUMES that genetic variations located in one individual are IDENTICAL to those in another indiviual of the opposite gender who is fertile at the same time as the other mutant an that they will meet and mate and that their offspring will carry the mutation and be fertile and that this mutation will have e beneficial effect on the differential of reproductive success.
this is a lot of BIG IFS.
and the pro-speciation crowd will answer: "WELL... OVER TIME..." over eons...
This catch all is more scientific-FEELING than God.
It appeals to their HUMANISM and their hominocentric worldview.
bottom-line: God could use whatver means He choses to do anything. He makes the rules. Man can only discover them.
And there are things in the Bible which are true figuratively. Just as there are in SCIENCE.
Like STRING THEORY - in which a string is a figure.
the "days" in Genesis might be a figure which encodes a very sophisticated understanding of the universe.
Many physics profs think this is the case.
here are some links:
http://www.amazon.com/Science-God-Gerald-Schroeder/dp/product-description/076790303X
From Library Journal
Schroeder (Genesis and the Big Bang, LJ 9/15/90) is an Israeli physicist and scholar of Genesis who maintains that a properly understood Bible and a properly understood science provide consistent sets of data. In recent decades, scientific discoveries in cosmology, paleontology, and quantum physics do not demonstrate or prove the activity of God, but they do remove conflict with that activity. Rapprochement occurs when believers read the Bible on the Bible's terms, avoiding literalism, and when scientists realize that science is powerless to pronounce on a purpose for life. Schroeder is very lucid in explaining difficult scientific concepts, such as the passage of time according to the theory of relativity, and religious data, such as the original Hebrew words. Schroeder's careful and responsible handling of the data on origins from science and Genesis 1, combined with a fresh, judicious correlation between the two, is compelling. Highly recommended.?Eugene O. Bowser, Univ. of Northern Colorado, Greeley
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
http://www.yasharbooks.com/
Challenge.html
http://www.etheric.com/
LaVioletteBooks/Book-BBB.html
HERE'S WHAT ONE RABBI WROTE:
http://www.beth-elsa.org/abv100804.htm
The Compatibility of Science and Faith
Sermon given October 8, 2004, by Rabbi Allison Bergman Vann
How was the earth and the universe formed? How did we get here?
These questions were motivated this evening by the Torah portion of this Shabbat: Breshit, or Genesis, the creation story. A few moments ago, I read from Genesis chapter 1, verses 1 through 8, the biblical account of the first two days of creation. The entire first chapter of Genesis is faith's answer to these questions.
If you go to your favorite search engine on the internet, and type in “science and faith”, many articles point to the origins of the world as the starting point of the struggle. Ultimately, when contemplating creation, it seems we are urged to deal with issues of the compatibility of science and faith.
When we look to these questions, the answers form a cosmology. A cosmology is the metaphysical study of the origin and nature of the universe. With the story of creation, we learn how the earth came into being from nothing, and how God created humankind.
[Let me make a brief side note before we get too far in our discussion: Most cosmologies, for example, perhaps, from Greek mythology, also include a battle between the gods, for most powerful deity. Our cosmology does not. Rather, it begins with an assumption of God's omnipotence and immanence. For purposes of our discussion this evening, I too, will take the stance of Genesis, and assume our collective belief in God.]
As Genesis looks to how and why we got to be here, so too does science. Of course, the most popular and longest lasting theory is known as the Big Bang. This is science's cosmology.
As I am a rabbi and not a scientist, for this evening I will stick with a relatively simple explanation of the theory. At one time, likely about 13.7 billion years ago, the universe was filled with energy and was extremely hot. As the distances in the universe grew, the temperatures dropped and the forces of physics and elementary particles, such as hydrogen and helium atoms, were created. Over time, as the matter became more dense, gravity began to form the clumps of particles into clouds, stars and galaxies. And, as a result of these initial processes, over time, the earth, and the universe came into being.
As science continues to explore the origins of the world and the universe, different issues have arisen concerning the Big Bang Theory. Since 1918, it remains the most viable theory and continues to be refined through ongoing research.
Yet, we, as contemporary liberal Jews, seem to have little issues with these two cosmologies of science and faith. How is it that they are compatible?
Let us begin by looking at Saadia Gaon and Maimonides, both important commentators from the Middle Ages. Saadia Gaon argued that “ a biblical passage should not be interpreted literally if that made a passage mean something contrary to the sense of reason.” ( Tigay) Radical for its' time, Gaon purported that science, not biblical interpratation, should rule if necessary and provable.
Maimonides agreed with this principle, and when even a bit further: he insisted that the creation story as a whole was written metaphorically! “To Saadia and Maimonides, belief in the truth of the Bible does not require a denial of science, when the two seem to conflict. . . .
Harold Schulweis, a contemporary Conservative Rabbi and thinker, furthers our commentators ideas: he writes that science and faith actually don't coexist at all. He believes that they are in totally different realms, and serve different purposes. He writes in a sermon from 2002: “Science is concerned with facts. Torah is concerned with value. Science is concerned with "what is". The Torah is concerned with "what ought to be." History is concerned with "what was". Torah is concerned with "what should be".” In other words, it doesn't matter what science claims about the creation of the world, because Torah is about belief and moral values, and science is about provable facts.
Even before Schulweis, the early Reformers found science and faith compatible. In fact, when it was formally organized in the United States, and the first platform was written, in 1885, they wrote: “We recognize in the Bible the record of the consecration of the Jewish people to its mission as the priest of the one God, and value it as the most potent instrument of religious and moral instruction. We hold that the modern discoveries of scientific researches in the domain of nature and history are not antagonistic to the doctrines of Judaism, the Bible reflecting the primitive ideas of its own age, and at times clothing its conception of divine Providence and Justice dealing with men in miraculous narratives.”
The Reform Movement embraced the critical, also called at times scientific study, of the bible. They were open to modern thought and interpretation as a way to inform faith. This was strengthened when, in 1937, the movement again declared a series of principles. The tenet entitled “Nature of Judaism” reads, in part:
Judaism welcomes all truth, whether written in the pages of scripture or deciphered from the records of nature. The new discoveries of science, while replacing the older scientific views underlying our sacred literature, do not conflict with the essential spirit of religion as manifested in the consecration of man's will, heart and mind to the service of God and of humanity.
Each platform, while a reflection of the times that they were written, declare that both science and Torah are necessary. They serve different purposes. Torah, and our entire compendium of Jewish literature, is filled with prose and poetry; allegory and parable. . . it is a literature that reminds of moral and value, and importantly, of wonder and of our need for belief and faith. We know the Bible's writings are not based on empirical evidence, nor does it claim to be!
Science, on the other hand, as a pragmatic endeavor, seeks to remove the magic, and researches the mysteries of the world. With science, we move from wonder to fact. With the facts that we gather, we create and develop.
Together science and faith help us understand our world and the universe. We need the Torahs' description of the creation of the world, for through it, we develop our faith and our role in the ongoing creation of the world. We need science to know how and what is, to help us unlock the nuts and bolts of what is. And they each answer our fundamental questions-just in different ways. Science looks to the how; faith looks to the why. Together, with science and faith, we have a full picture of the world- miracles and inquiries; divine and factual; rational and irrational; wisdom and knowledge. We further creation of the world when we use science to heal; we repair the world when we use our faith to ease others' burdens.
In Genesis we learn that we are made in God's image. We also learn that we are stewards over the earth. Our mission is to further the ongoing creation of the world by continuing to unlock its mysteries. Together, science and faith: the mystical and the tangible, the divine and the ordered, will help us to unlock the mysteries of the world.
"I don't believe you have the answer,
I've got ideas too,
but if you've got enough naiveté,
and you've got conviction,
then the answer is perfect for you"
- The Answer, Bad Religion
The alarm sounded by "evolutionists" is that you have religion masquerading as science. What these people do is not science in all sense of the word.
I will leave it at this. The Creationists claim to have scientific evidence that backs up the bible, that there are wholes in evolution, and that no transitional forms have been found. They say all that, but fail to actually present the "evidence" that backs up the bible, fail to point out the "holes" in evolution, and fail to see the many, many transitional forms that have been found(Tiktaalik, for example). Their tactics involve distorting facts to fit their argument and denying that the "evolutionist's" evidence doesn't exist.
Oh, and one more thing. Did you really win that debate? Since none of the readers of this post can go back in time and see you do it, how do we know you really won?
Reliapundit:
I agree with you on the big ifs and the scientific feelings.
Indarctos:
I'll give you my teacher's & all my fellow classmates' phone numbers so you can call them to verify. You may disagree with me but I don't lie, Punk!!
I'd avoid DNA studies if I was you guys.
It will ruin your day.
The one thing I'm happy for is that you guys are OK with microevolution. I'd be careful though. It is only one small step from there to the full blown disease.
Little Miss Chatterbox:
just what makes me a punk? Could be that you can't handle my argument and have to resort to calling me names? well, check out this post, http://thiswholecreationmuseumbusiness.blogspot.com/
it might put things in perspective for you.
The problem is that narrative is being interpreted as scientific evidence even as the Creationist debunks the scientific method when it is directed towards the very objects that gave rise to it! Narrative is not "evidence" nor should we presuppose that there is objective data pointing to the validity of Genesis. This is a matter of faith not science. The basic epistemological truth is that the scientists ought not distort theological argument by assimilating it into scientific discourse and the theologian ought not distort scientific method by assimilating it into theology. But this does not mean that both areas of knowledge and understanding of the world in which we live and all of the life therein ought not discuss similarity in the midst of difference in their respective understandings of it. There should rather be more room for both to let the other discipline stand on its own ground and then to engage it on its own terms as an other.
Much more on http://musings.tatuskofam.com
OK, I don't know where you are getting your information, but it was obviously by some kind of monkey (no pun intended).
Its obvious to me that you have not been "informed" about evolution. It is not a politically correct theory, there are tons of logistics and evidence, from things such as DNA sequencing, fossils (and the carbon dating thereof) as well as the age of the earth, actual evolution in progress within our lifetimes (not many examples, but some good ones), vestigial organs (remnant organs that serve no purpose, they just haven't been weeded out yet. This includes a kiwi's feathers, a cavefish's eye sockets that have no eyes, and the rubber boa's hind-limbs, which are tiny and useless), the transitional forms you say are non-existent, evidence of common ancestry (how a cougar, lion, tiger, jaguar, leopard, and house cat are all felines and have many similarities and differences), homology (the sameness - how bats, dolphins, horses, humans, and moles have different shapes of forearms and different functions, but have the
exact same arrangement and type of bones), radiometric dating (analyze the decay of elements and determining how old something is from the rate of decay, kind of like a tree's annual rings).
There ARE such things as transitional forms and the best example is the classic bird-like and reptile-like Archaeopteryx. It had bird feathers and wings, but lizard head and teeth and claws, among other things. There are other transitional forms, too, namely the Basilosaurus. This was an ancient whale that was clearly an aquatic mammal, and yet it had hind-limbs that were from its terrestrial ancestors. Now how could that be? In truth, the Basilosaurus is, was, and always will be a transitional form between your typical whale today and Ambulocetus natans, a land-dwelling whale.
Another thing you need to know is that you are indeed correct about the creation accounts of evolution. They are theoretical, but at least there's a lot more proof than from the bible. At least walk away with this bit of knowledge: the mechanism of evolution has already been proven. In the 1970s and 1980s finches on the Galapagos Islands evolved different beak sizes based on the weather conditions for their lifetime. Early on, normal beak sizes were prevalent.
Subsequent generations into the next decade had larger beaks because larger beaks were more adaptive in that time period. By the end of THAT decade the beak sizes returned to what they were originally. Why you ask? Because food became more scarce and only certain types of beaks can open certain types of food effectively. And if you don't believe me, you can look it up in Scott Freeman and Jon C. Herron's 2004 textbook "Evolutionary Analysis" which has a multitude of references from other professional sources. This is what's known as a citation, something that is important in science.
If anything, it is the perpetrators of ID that have a politically correct agenda. They are just angry that their tight grip and fear-mongering are being lost to an increasingly secular culture, so they try to discredit science with lies. Granted, I think there are too many evolutionists who are so vehement in their views that they actively criticize people's religion, and I think that is stupid. I'm a moderate who believes God did whatever, it's not like we can prove or disprove Him. But at least I know how science and logic work.
I believe the reason you won that debate was that you knew more of evolutions tiny, TINY holes than your classmates knew about evolution at all. That's the most logical answer. If you don't know anything about it of course you're going to lose the debate.
Here's a few other things to consider:
1) Sure, we can't prove by experience, but if you say that then you are also saying that gravity doesn't exist because we can't see it. Or better yet, you are inferring that there are no such things as electrons. No scientist has ever seen an electron, and yet they exist. We can also prove things by inference and logical induction/deduction.
2) The HIV epidemic is a perfect example of evolution in action because the Human Immunodeficiency Virus is the fastest mutating organism on the planet. Since it exists in such large numbers inside a host, any medication that could kill off most of the viruses would still leave a few remaining. Why? Because they were a mutant strain that would not be harmed by the viricide. And thus with a suitable and plentiful environment they quickly repopulate but are resistant to that viricide. So you see, that is evolution in action. It's always fighting the last war.
3) I assume that you also believe the Earth to be 6-8 millennia old. Of course, since I'm not you or know you, I can't prove that. I'm just making the inference. Even in Darwin's day, the argument was that "we already proved that the Earth is older than what the Bible suggests, so why are we still insisting that humans and animals didn't change when there is evidence of that as well as landmasses changing?". Well, radiometric dating has identified life forms that existed on this planet over a billion years ago. Last I checked, 1,000,000,000 was a larger number than 8,000.
4) Intelligent Design and other such so-called Creationism "sciences" are not sciences. They are an insult to God and to science because while they claim to be true they are not based on any fact whatsoever. It is blasphemy to what God really did - and we can see that in the evidence.
5) When they say evolution is a theory, it's not the same kind of theory you and I would assume to be a synonym for "idea" or "postulation". No, no. It is a SCIENTIFIC theory and scientific theories have EVIDENCE to back them up. Are you going to tell me you adhere to "Intelligent Jumping" as well?
All of the information you have read here I got from Freeman and Herron (2004) "Evolutionary Analysis". I would be happy to find other books on evolution to back this up. Or you can concede defeat and admit you know NOTHING of evolution at all.
And I would just like to reiterate that this is no way an argument AGAINST God, religion, Christianity, or Genesis. This is an argument in support of evolution. I enjoy religions and that sort of thing and I think that the truly smart people are those that can balance science with religion.
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