Posted on 09/06/2005 5:11:42 AM PDT by billorites
Nope. The author (quite correctly) cites Holocaust denial as another example of an "argument" where one side has facts and the other side has bullsh!t, to illustrate why such cases should not be treated as if there were a real controversy to be sorted out.
Really? Got some proof? I've seen so many complete misrepresentations of science from creationists, I'd need to be persuaded they know any science at all.
Agreed. This is one of the best articles I've read on the topic. Two of my favorite excerpts:
In all cases there is a hidden (actually they scarcely even bother to hide it) "default" assumption that if Theory A has some difficulty in explaining Phenomenon X, we must automatically prefer Theory B without even asking whether Theory B (creationism in this case) is any better at explaining it. Note how unbalanced this is, and how it gives the lie to the apparent reasonableness of "let's teach both sides". One side is required to produce evidence, every step of the way. The other side is never required to produce one iota of evidence, but is deemed to have won automatically, the moment the first side encounters a difficulty - the sort of difficulty that all sciences encounter every day, and go to work to solve, with relish.If complex organisms demand an explanation, so does a complex designer. And it's no solution to raise the theologian's plea that God (or the Intelligent Designer) is simply immune to the normal demands of scientific explanation. To do so would be to shoot yourself in the foot. You cannot have it both ways. Either ID belongs in the science classroom, in which case it must submit to the discipline required of a scientific hypothesis. Or it does not, in which case get it out of the science classroom and send it back into the church, where it belongs.
"When finches arrived in new habitats on the Galapagos or Hawaiian islands, and found pristine, unpopulated environments to inhabit, we know they diverged rapidly to fill the empty ecological niches. Nebraska finches all look pretty much like finches. Explore the Hawaiian rainforest, and you can find finches that resemble sparrows, finches that resemble woodpeckers, and finches that resemble hummingbirds. But the molecular data says they’re all finches. Environmental stasis leads to evolutionary statis; environmental change causes evolutionary change. And, in any case, none of this is an argument against common descent."
Tell us how you apply the finch data to the human being data. Have you identified what, when, where, and why, we have different races?
You would cheer the undermining of science in the school systems? Sigh.
OK, if you can claim that the modern TOE has swallowed up these questions and converted them to its own advantage, you can surely stop the modern textbooks from putting out the nonsense about the black/white moths demonstrating any kind of evolution, and the fraud that there is embryonic recapitulation of evolutionary history. Or does the TOE mean you get a pass on those too, because you can roll it back to an earlier state whenever you wish?
This corresponds to my view.
Go out and do your own tests. This IS a truth search not a debating society eh?
But to cite the Holocaust is also a psy-op move. You should know that is hitting below the belt while you can so charmingly argue on a different level with different criteria that it isn't.
That is not a fraud - it was evolution.
and the fraud that there is embryonic recapitulation of evolutionary history
The modern textbooks do not teach that.
Yes, I understand ... I was making a joke about the general rejection of the value of personal achievement in public education, and noting that the exception to "everyone is the same" is found in sports programs.
This kind of world view is fine as a joke, but I'd never recommend anyone build his life on that.
No, neither would I.
If someone somewhere had the guts to say no, this is not going to be the prescribed 500 lb. canary in all fields of human thought... and most especially philosophy.
What evolution? Both kinds of moths existed at the beginning and end of the time in question. We did not get any new kind of moth out of this.
Evolution doesn't just refer to the appearance of new variants in a population, but also refers to changes in frequency of existing variants. So if pressure causes the dark variant to become more widespread than the light variant, or vice versa, that is an example of evolution.
Long before the world was created there was an island, floating in the sky, upon which the Sky People lived. They lived quietly and happily. No one ever died or was born or experienced sadness. However one day one of the Sky Women realized she was going to give birth to twins. She told her husband, who flew into a rage. In the center of the island there was a tree which gave light to the entire island since the sun hadn't been created yet. He tore up this tree, creating a huge hole in the middle of the island. Curiously, the woman peered into the hole. Far below she could see the waters that covered the earth. At that moment her husband pushed her. She fell through the hole, tumbling towards the waters below.
Water animals already existed on the earth, so far below the floating island two birds saw the Sky Woman fall. Just before she reached the waters they caught her on their backs and brought her to the other animals. Determined to help the woman they dove into the water to get mud from the bottom of the seas. One after another the animals tried and failed. Finally, Little Toad tried and when he reappeared his mouth was full of mud. The animals took it and spread it on the back of Big Turtle. The mud began to grow and grow and grow until it became the size of North America.
Then the woman stepped onto the land. She sprinkled dust into the air and created stars. Then she created the moon and sun.
The Sky Woman gave birth to twin sons. She named one Sapling. He grew to be kind and gentle. She named the other Flint and his heart was as cold as his name. They grew quickly and began filling the earth with their creations.
Sapling created what is good. He made animals that are useful to humans. He made rivers that went two ways and into these he put fish without bones. He made plants that people could eat easily. If he was able to do all the work himself there would be no suffering.
Flint destroyed much of Sapling's work and created all that is bad. He made the rivers flow only in one direction. He put bones in fish and thorns on berry bushes. He created winter, but Sapling gave it life so that it could move to give way to Spring. He created monsters which his brother drove beneath the Earth.
Eventually Sapling and Flint decided to fight till one conquered the other. Neither was able to win at first, but finally Flint was beaten. Because he was a god Flint could not die, so he was forced to live on Big Turtle's back. Occasionally his anger is felt in the form of a volcano.
The Iroquois people hold a great respect for all animals. This is mirrored in their creation myth by the role the animals play. Without the animals' help the Sky Woman may have sunk to the bottom of the sea and earth may not have been created.
Great picture, Dave!
That's the long and short of it, right there.
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