Free Republic

Has ET evolved to be discreet? An evolutionary tendency for inconspicuous aliens would solve a nagging paradox – and also suggest that we Earthlings should think twice before advertising our own existence. He argues that it's plausible that there is a competition for resources on a cosmic scale, driving an evolutionary process between alien species on different planets. If so, the universe would be a violent place, and evolutionary selection may favour the inconspicuous – those who lie low on purpose...

In a 70-28 vote today, the Tennessee House of Representatives passed HB 368, a bill that encourages science teachers to explore controversial topics without fear of reprisal. Critics say the measure will enable K-12 teachers to present intelligent design and creationism as acceptable alternatives to evolution in the classroom. The bill's text, if passed into state law, would protect teachers from discipline if they "help students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being taught," namely, "biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global...

Theistic evolution is a serious threat to the Christian worldview. It is a harmful doctrine that compromises Christian theology (especially anthropology and man as image of God) for the sake of upholding Darwin's theory of common decent. While Scripture teaches that God directly made the first human persons, theistic evolution says man came from non-God and non-images. The creation account and its answering of some of the most important questions of human life, probably didn't happen; most the events and characters are generally symbolic. And somehow, we are supposed to believe that all of this is compatible with Christian orthodoxy...

Exerpts from What is Eugenics, chapter 14, 1932 3rd ed.Leonard DarwinALL of us are being greatly damaged by the presence of the unfit and the inferior in the ranks of the nation. If those included in these classes have large families, this injury to our country will be slowly increased as the generations succeed each other. And in all probability, from this cause, racial deterioration is now actually taking place very slowly but very steadily. All this we have seen, and the question is, What can be done to safe-guard the nation against this treacherous disease? In the first place,...

If you want to make an omelet, you have to be willing to break a few eggs. ~ Lenin To make sure you understand the diabolical consequences of Lenin's idea, the meaning is this: To start an international revolution under communism or state socialism, you must be willing to commit genocide everywhere it is established. Revolution, or death? It ultimately means: revolution = death. In my study of history and philosophy, I have found that whenever one discusses progressivism or the ideas derivative of progressive politics, from Enlightenment Age philosophers whose ideas contributed to today's progressive revolution – Machiavelli, Descartes,...

The seemingly ineradicable opinion divide on evolution calls to mind Mark Twain's quip that everyone talks about the weather, mostly to complain, but nobody does anything about it. Pro-Darwinian educators were frustrated this week to find that most public high school biology instructors in their teaching do not wholeheartedly endorse evolution. The teachers reflect a stubborn division across American culture. For the past three decades, Americans have been locked into a basically unchanging split of views on the subject, with only about 16 percent believing in Darwin's theory of unguided evolution. Charles Darwin would have turned 200 in 2009. Will...

An angry man riding a mobility scooter plunged to his death, after he rammed an elevator door. The unfortunate incident happened at a shopping center in Daejon, South Korea. The 40 year old man who's name was Lee, obviously had a problem with his anger. That anger, for what ever reason, has been his undoing. You will see the man reach the elevator just after the woman inside pressed the button to go down. Seconds after the doors closed, Mr Lee reached the elevator and actually ran into the doors because he must have anticipated that the woman would...

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (ABP) -- A Southern Baptist seminary president and evolution opponent has turned sights on "theistic evolution," the idea that evolutionary forces are somehow guided by God. Albert Mohler Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, wrote an article in the Winter 2011 issue of the seminary magazine labeling attempts by Christians to accommodate Darwinism "a biblical and theological disaster." Mohler said being able to find middle ground between a young-earth creationism that believes God created the world in six 24-hour days and naturalism that regards evolution the product of random chance "would resolve a great cultural and...

A University Park man who killed a neighbor whose dog urinated on his lawn was sentenced today to four years probation. "This is not justice," said Gail Williams, the slain man's aunt. Charles Clements, 69, a great-grandfather, former Marine and retired truck driver who took great pride in his lawn's appearance, could have been sentenced to as much as 20 years. In declining to send Clements to jail, Will County Judge Daniel Rozak noted the episode was Clements' first contact with the legal system in his 69 years. He also said the slaying wasn't about a dog urinating on a...

By the close of WW II, Richard Weaver and countless other classical liberals apprehensively discerned that the Western civilized nations were on the road to breakdown and totalitarianism. Suffering "progressive disillusionment," Weaver perceived that old cultural restraints had failed to control man's propensity for evil. This led him to ponder the fallacies of modernist ideas that had produced the holocaust of evil visited upon the world from WW I to WW II. By late 1945, Weaver published his conclusions in his book, "Ideas Have Consequences." The subject of Weaver's book was "the dissolution of the West." Its deterioration was traced...

A state advisory panel Friday voted 8-4 to endorse a variety of high school science textbooks that have come under fire for how they describe evolution. The vote was followed more than three hours of discussion. Two of the “no” votes were cast by Senate Education Committee Chairman Ben Nevers, D-Bogalusa, and House Education Committee Vice-Chairman Frank Hoffmann, R-West Monroe. The decision likely paves the way for the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education to approve the textbooks when it meets Dec. 7-9. The textbooks that t

An Open Letter to My Physicist Friend RE: Darwinism and the Problem of Free Will By Jean F. Drew Dear A — Regarding the discussion of “free will” at www.naturalism.org, you wrote: “I am surprised to find a ‘scientific naturalism’ so similar to the utmost banality, shallowness and false superficiality of the ‘scientific materialism’ that I [had] to learn in … school [during] the communist regime.” I think this is a very striking statement; and I understand what you mean. I read in your Book of the Living Universe long ago that you were aware of the problem of “tampering”...

<p>Saiqa Akhter, 30, has been charged with a single count of capital murder in the deaths of her 2-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son, police said. Dallas County Police spokeswoman Jamille Bradfield said the single count covered a child under 5 and would probably be changed either to include multiple victims or to add a count.</p>

(Reuters) - The Russian Orthodox Church called Wednesday for an end to the "monopoly of Darwinism" in Russian schools, saying religious explanations of creation should be taught alongside evolution. Lifestyle Liberals said they would fight efforts to include religious teaching in schools. Russia's dominant church has experienced a revival in recent years, worrying rights groups who say its power is undermining the country's secular constitution. "The time has come for the monopoly of Darwinism and the deceptive idea that science in general contradicts religion. These ideas should be left in the past," senior Russian Orthodox Archbishop Hilarion said at a...

To some people's incredulity and others' satisfaction, creationism's influence is growing across the globe. Definitions of creationism vary, but roughly 10-15 per cent of people in the UK believe that the earth came into existence exactly as described in the early parts of the Bible or the Quran, and that the most that evolution has done is to change species into other, closely related species. The more recent theory of intelligent design agrees with creationism, but makes no reference to the scriptures. Instead, it argues that there are many features of the natural world - such as the mammalian eye...

Some months ago an American philosopher explained to a highly sophisticated audience in Britain what, in his opinion, was wrong, indeed fatally wrong, with the standard neo-Darwinian theory of biological evolution. He made it crystal clear that his criticism was not inspired by creationism, intelligent design or any remotely religious motivation. A senior gentleman in the audience erupted, in indignation: ‘You should not say such things, you should not write such things! The creationists will treasure them and use them against science.’ The lecturer politely asked: ‘Even if they are true?’ To which the instant and vibrant retort was: ‘Especially...

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Fossils of a previously undiscovered species of dinosaur have been found in slabs of Utah sandstone that were so hard that explosives had to be used to free some of the remains, scientists said Tuesday. The bones found at Dinosaur National Monument belonged to a type of sauropod—long-necked plant-eaters that were said to be the largest animal ever to roam land. The discovery included two complete skulls from other types of sauropods—an extremely rare find, scientists said.

Homo floresiensis, a pygmy-sized small-brained hominin popularly known as 'the Hobbit' was discovered five years ago, but controversy continues over whether the small brain is actually due to a pathological condition. How can its tiny brain size be explained? The commonly held assumption that as primates evolved, their brains always tended to get bigger has been challenged by a team of scientists at Cambridge and Durham. Their work helps solve the mystery of whether Homo floresiensis -- dubbed the Hobbit due to its diminutive stature -- was a separate human species or a diseased individual. The team combined previously published...

Two neuroscientists say that a now-extinct race of humans had big eyes, child-like faces, and an average intelligence of around 150, making them geniuses among Homo sapiens. The history of evolutionary studies has been dogged by the intuitively attractive, almost irresistible idea that the whole great process leads to greater complexity, to animals that are more advanced than their predecessors. The pre-Darwin theories of evolution were built around this idea; in fact, Darwin’s (and Wallace’s) great and radical contribution was to throw out the notion of “progress” and replace it with selection from among a set of random variations. But...

Millions of high school and college biology textbooks teach that research scientist Stanley Miller, in the 1950’s, showed how life could have arisen by chance. Nothing could be further from the truth. Miller, in his famous experiment in 1953, showed that individual amino acids (the building blocks of life) could come into existence by chance. But, it’s not enough just to have amino acids. The various amino acids that make-up life must link together in a precise sequence, just like the letters in a sentence, to form functioning protein molecules. If they’re not in the right sequence the protein molecules...