Posted on 02/24/2006 1:26:26 PM PST by PatrickHenry
"A mendacious bit of hucksterism" is Robert Camp's description of the "teach the controversy" slogan frequently used to promote the teaching of "intelligent design" in the public schools. And it's not just idle rhetoric. Rather, it's based firmly on the results of a survey that he conducted of the heads of biology departments in colleges and universities around the country. As Camp explains, "If there are authoritative voices on the purported existence of a controversy among biologists regarding mechanisms of evolution, they belong to those individuals who are well aware of the most current scholarship in their field and are in touch with daily discussion of that scholarship."
In his new article Turn out the lights, the 'teach the controversy' party's over, posted on the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal's Creationism and Intelligent Design Watch website, Camp reports on his survey, in which he asked the heads of biology departments whether, with respect to "intelligent design," there is "a difference of professional opinion within your department that you feel could be accurately described as a scientific controversy." Over 97% of his respondents answered in the negative. "As an attempt to put empirical weight behind that which has been well understood all along," Camp concludes, "the numbers here are unambiguous."
And the remaining 3%, representing two of the 73 respondents? Camp explains, "One, a 'No, but ...,' observed that there was virtually no professional controversy within their department but acknowledged that one colleague had spoken favorably of the concept publicly .... And the only assent to controversy came from an institution [which Camp elsewhere describes as "a theological medical university"] dedicated to an ideological view of the world, including the world of biology," adding, "This may serve as evidence of a 'controversy' in that particular university. But in the larger context, its effect is only to put the overwhelming consensus into sharper focus."
It is people like you on both sides of the argument that always make these debates into a 3rd grade insult fest. I have more reason than most people in this world have, and I am adamant that the world was created in 7 days.
Hmmm, you have evidently not read much of Darwin then, or much of evolution at all. Evolution is based on an invisible "force" that supposedly drives evolution, totally discounting that fact that DNA remains the same in animals regardless of the outside influences.
Therefore, evolution must be an invisible force that somehow changes DNA of animals so they become other animals. Is that about it?
Evolution itself is based on an invisible being, or force, that somehow causes animals to "evolve", and evolution does this without any proof, none, just like religion, or ID, does.
Both theories are wrong, there is a third theory just waiting to be discovered but of course our scientists are too caught up in Darwinism to actually try to find out the truth. Evolution is a religion, Christianity, or ID, is a religion, they are both wrong, and have been proven to be so. Get real and grow up, both sides.
Nicely put, I couldn't agree more.
What science has proved to my total satisfaction is that the universe is several billions of years old. I'm responsible for reconciling my own personal faith with that.
No, science (when used properly) exists within a seperate paradigm from religion. Science is concerned with how stuff works and physical answers to why it works that way. Meta-physical answers don't matter. The question of evolutionary science is "how (mechanically) did all the species get here, why (mechanically) are they the way they are, and will we see this happening some more?" Is there or isn't there a God and what was his role in all this is outside the scope of the question, as it is with all scientific inquiry. When scientists study lightning they aren't with whether or not God had anything to do with it, they just want to know how lightning works, same thing with evolution.
>evolution must be an invisible force that somehow changes DNA
Errr.... no. Evolution is the *result* of DNA changing.
> DNA remains the same in animals regardless of the outside influences.
Uh-huh. Never heard of mutation?
HA! Beat you by 50 minutes! I win!
Did he, now.
I know, I repeated it for the creationists.
LOL
No. Science can say very little about the nonexistence of hypothetical supernatural beings. Best it can do is show that natural phenomena can have plausible natural explanations, and that supernatural explanations are unnecessary.
http://forums.fark.com/cgi/fark/comments.pl?IDLink=1928552
Great thread on "Biblically Correct tours to museums"
No, he said variations in a species would favor one species over another. He then went on to say "This preservation of favourable variations and the rejection of injurious variations, I call Natural Selection" (Chap4 Origins of Species). And there are variations within one species is there not? If not... well then we are all clones... you look just like me... have brown hair, brown eyes... etc... right? Sorry mate... try again.
totally discounting that fact that DNA remains the same in animals regardless of the outside influences.
Well he certainly discounted DNA because it was unknown at that time right. Also Darwin never said a individual animal had his DNA changed due to outside forces. Where in the heck did you dig that up?
Evolution itself is based on an invisible being, or force, that somehow causes animals to "evolve", and evolution does this without any proof, none, just like religion, or ID, does.
Wow... no that is not what Darwin said in Origin of Species. In a nutshell he said that species evolve over time based on variations in the species to be better adapted at survival.
I posted in another thread how there are Canadian geese on Maui and Kauai but they have evolved over thousands of years. They are now mostly flightless and their feet are much less webbed for walking and climbing around the rocks. The locals call them the Nene and they look exactly like Canadian geese except the feet and they seem to have slightly different markings. But if you know what a Canadian goose looks like... you know this bird is very closely related to it. I mean it looks just like it except it doesn't fly or swim. There is no invisible force involved here... it is variations over different generations helped keep those better adapted to survive long enough to mate.
Both theories are wrong, there is a third theory just waiting to be discovered but of course our scientists are too caught up in Darwinism to actually try to find out the truth. Evolution is a religion, Christianity, or ID, is a religion, they are both wrong, and have been proven to be so. Get real and grow up, both sides.
I suggest before you tell the Evolutionist they are wrong you should understand what they are saying. Darwin never pointed to "invisible intelligence" at work in how evolution works. No offense, but you are just plain wrong about that.
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