B5-Creation
Graham Kendall
Modified 6/17/2008
Email grahamkendall74135@yahoo.com
I am found on IRC Efnet, Undernet, Dalnet as glk
Files found at http://www.grahamkendall.net
All are free to use any of this material without limit.
*******************************************************************************
==
New Front Opens on Evolution Wars
A battle over science education could soon spill into the courts in Louisiana,
where looming legislation would allow teachers to bring up scientific
criticisms of evolution, global warming and other hot-button topics. The state
House approved the bill Wednesday on a 94-3 vote. Because the Senate already
approved a near-identical measure, supporters expect the upper chamber to pass
this bill also. A spokeswoman for Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal would not say
whether he will sign the bill, saying only that he will review it when it gets
to his desk. "It's not about a certain viewpoint," said supporter Jason Stern,
Vice President of the Louisiana Family Forum, a conservative group pushing the
bill. "It's allowing [teachers] to teach the controversy. It's an academic
freedom issue." Opponents, however, say it's a thinly veiled attempt to allow
into science class "intelligent design," which they denounce as disguised
religion and warn of lawsuits if the bill becomes law. Similar bills allowing
teachers to criticize evolutionary theories have been introduced in Michigan,
Missouri, Florida, Alabama and South Carolina, though some of them have died
for the year as legislatures adjourned. The Discovery Institute, a think tank
in Seattle that promotes the "intelligent design" theory, has helped craft
many of the bills - a fact that has raised alarm among the bill's opponents.
==
They also can't get it through their heads that repeating Bible verses over
and over again doesn't make them evidence in the existence of God or creation.
It seems like, for the truly die hard creationist/ID-ist, there is a mental
disconnect when it comes to the concept of evidence.
==
Ken Miller¹s most recent book, just out, makes this point in the title ‹
Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America¹s Soul.

Understanding Intelligent Design: Everything You Need to Know in Plain
Language (co-authored with youth speaker and high-school teacher Sean McDowell)

In this powerfully argued and timely book, Ken Miller takes on the fundamental
core of the Intelligent Design movement, and shows with compelling examples and
devastating logic that ID is not only bad science but is potentially
threatening in other deeper ways to Americas future. But make no mistake, this
is not some atheistic screed  Prof. Millers perspective as a devout believer
will allow his case to resonate with believers and non-believers alike.
Francis Collins, Director, the Human Genome Project and author of The Language
of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief
==
There have been at least two private screenings for state legislatures that
have anti-evolution bills on the docket. One was held to drum up support for
Floridas Senate Bill 2692: the so-called Evolution Academic Freedom Act, which
aims to encourage the teaching of creationism by providing legal protection to
educators who present alternatives to evolution (i.e., intelligent design
and/or creation science ). Another screening was held in Missouri, where two
similar bills, House Bills 2554 and 1315, aim to promote academic freedom and
protect intellectual diversity; the latter bill was introduced by a legislator
who previously introduced a bill that would have fired teachers who didnt give
equal time to intelligent design.

==
Ayala
When people ask about the bacterial flagellum, for example, ³I bring up that
by now it has been worked out in great detail how the basic parts of the
bacterial flagellum have evolved independently and exist independently,² he
said. 
As for the moths, he conceded that in famous photographs illustrating the
discovery, the dark moths had been glued to the dark trees. But the observation
that the moths had darkened along with the trees was real, he said. ³To have
a nice photograph, we glue them,² he said. ³That is not falsifying science.
That is something for facilitating teaching.²
==
In May of 2001, the Louisiana state legislature passed a motion by a 9-5 vote,
declaring Darwin to be a racist. The measure read:

"Be it resolved that the Legislature of Louisiana does hereby deplore all
instances and ideologies of racism, and does hereby reject the core concepts
of Darwinist ideology that certain races and classes of humans are inherently
superior to others."
==
http://www.creationtheory.org/
==
Governor Henry's message on his veto of HB 2633:
------------
"This is to advise you that on this date, pursuant to the authority vested in
me by Section 11 and 12 of Article VI of the Oklahoma Constitution to approve
or object to legislation presented to me, I have VETOED House Bill 2633. Under
current state and federal law, Oklahoma public school students are already
allowed to express their faith through voluntary prayer and other activities.
While well intended, this legislation is vaguely written and may trigger a
number of unintended consequences that actually impede rather than enhance
such expression. For example, under this legislation, schools could be forced
to provide equal time to fringe organizations that masquerade as religions and
advocate behaviors, such as drug use or hate speech, that are dangerous or
offensive to students and the general public. Additionally, the bill would
presumably require school officials to determine what constitutes legitimate
religious expression, subjecting them to an explosion of costly and protracted
litigation that would have to be defended at taxpayers expense."

--
(The Governor has vetoed this bill  6/8)
Bill promotes school religion at expense of education
EDMOND  The Oklahoma House of Representatives Education Committee has just
approved House Bill 2211. The bill is expected to pass the full House, and
then to go to the Senate. Its authors describe it as promoting freedom of
religion in the public schools. In fact, it does the opposite.
HB 2211 is identical to bills widely introduced into state legislatures across
the nation, where they have met various fates. Texass Legislature passed it,
and Texas is experiencing serious problems as a result. Liberty Legal
Institute of Plano, Texas, a group of fundamentalist Christian lawyers,
drafted the bill and promoted to legislatures, including Oklahomas. It was not
written by its Oklahoma legislative authors.
The bill requires public schools to guarantee students the right to express
their religious viewpoints in a public forum, in class, in homework and in
other ways without being penalized. If a students religious beliefs were in
conflict with scientific theory, and the student chose to express those
beliefs rather than explain the theory in response to an exam question, the
students incorrect response would be deemed satisfactory, according to this
bill.
The school would be required to reward the student with a good grade, or be
considered in violation of the law. Even simple, factual information such as
the age of the earth (4.65 billion years) would be subject to the students
belief, and if the student answered 6,000 years based on his or her religious
belief, the school would have to credit it as correct. Science education
becomes absurd under such a situation.
If a student chose to take his opportunity to speak to a group of students in
a school-sanctioned assembly to tell them they must accept Jesus Christ as
their personal savior or go to hell, then that student would have a right to
do so, according to this bill. Especially, but not only if the student held a
position of honor and authority (class officer, team captain), and was
speaking in his or her official capacity, the school has clearly established
religion in violation of both the U.S. and Oklahoma constitutions.
The same would be true if the student chose to tell the assembled students
that they would not go to hell, that there is no hell and that those who
promote belief in hell are liars. What if a Wican student chose to tell the
assembled students that the only true God is Nature, or a member of a radical
religious sect advocated assassination in order to preserve Gods will?
According to this bill, those students would be free, in a forum supported by
the school, to do so. Any or all of these scenarios would lead to lawsuits.
The consequence of the bill will be to create havoc and promote discord in the
public schools. Thats already happening in Texas, where the bill has been law
for several months. Denton, Texas Independent School District, responding to
the law, has decreed that no students may ever speak in assembly, to
graduation, to the crowd at an athletic event or in other group function. As
reported in The Denton Record Chronicle Sept. 1, the superintendent there said
if no students are ever allowed to speak, then there will be no discrimination
and no basis for lawsuits. Another school superintendent in Texas said,  were
just trying to have school, and I think this is a complicating factor as
reported by Americans United for Separation of Church and State, an
organization that has spoken out against the bill.
What administrators fear as the law is implemented is a barrage of lawsuits.
School administrators in Texas are frightened. They fear lawsuits from
students who feel that the school is forcing them to endure religious activity
they do not agree with nor want to have imposed on them. They also fear
lawsuits from students who claim they have not been properly allowed the forum
the law requires. Theyll be damned (or sued) if they do, damned (or sued) if
they dont. Oklahoma will experience the same.
Students already have the constitutional freedom to organize religious groups,
to pray or to do whatever religious activity they want at school, so long as
they do not impose that on others or use public resources to support their
religion. This bill adds nothing in the way of religious freedom. What it will
do is create a stew of undesirable litigation relating to an important
constitutional issue  separation of church and state.
Both The Oklahoma Academy of Science and Oklahomans for Excellence in Science
Education have asked for the bills defeat. I agree. Dont we have better things
to do with public money, than to give it to lawyers and courts over such
matters?
==
http://www.greenvil leonline. com/apps/ pbcs.dll/ article?AID= 2008805160318
Fair introduces bill to allow teachers to discuss alternatives to evolution
COLUMBIA -- A Greenville senator introduced legislation Thursday that would
allow teachers to discuss alternative theories to evolution.
Sen. Mike Fair, a Greenville Republican, said in a statement that the bill
wouldnat advocate any point of view or preclude any theory.
"Children are being spoon-fed theories as if they are facts, and teachers are
not even allowed the freedom to debate the truth of those theories," he said.
"The very nature of science is to ask questions and to go where the evidence
leads. The evidence regarding evolution is leading away from Darwinas theory
and yet there is a political persistence, a world view that is prejudiced
within the areas of higher education and it is spilling over into the K-12
classroom."
Jim Foster, a spokesman for the state Department of Education, said he didnat
see the need for the bill. "Science teachers are already free to discuss
science," he said. "So unless the intent is to introduce content thatas not
scientific, itas difficult to see why we need this."
The purpose of including science in what students are taught, Fair said, is to
inform students about scientific evidence and to help students develop critical
thinking skills needed to become intelligent, productive and scientifically
informed citizens.
The most crucial step in the scientific method, Fair argued, begins with
asking a question, which is what he said the bill would allow students and
teachers to do.
With nine business days left in the legislative session, Fair said the bill
cannot pass this year. However, he said he hopes that it starts a debate that
will carry over next year, when he plans to re-introduce the bill.
He said he hopes to hear from educators this summer about the bill, especially
about their experiences in attempting to hold discussions on controversial
topics.
"I intend to use their experiences to inform South Carolina about
administration decisions that are impacting the education our students are
receiving," he said.
Similar bills have been introduced in five other states, according to
Education Week, which said the legislation is similar to model
academic-freedom legislation supported by the Discovery Institute, a
pro-intelligent design organization based in Seattle.
Intelligent design is a belief that human beings and other creatures show
evidence of being the result of an unidentified creator.
==
Mud Cracks
http://www.pittpath s.com/st/ 0149.htm

http://www.geology. pitt.edu/ GeoSites/ tr%2028%20dessic ation.jpg
from:
http://www.geology. pitt.edu/ GeoSites/ site%20NKENS% 205-1new. htm

Physical Geology Slides-Sedimentary Rock
http://www.uwgb. edu/DutchS/ EarthSC202Slides /SROXSLID. HTM
(See a picture of Cambrian mud cracks about 2/3 of the way down the page.)
==
Notice that mining & oil geologist, on whose opinions huge sums of money are
bet, rely not on "Flood geology" but real geology, recognizing that the
earth is billions of years old & that rock formations arise, form & weather
away over tens & hundreds of millions of years.
YECs are completely flummoxed, as they are by reality
at all times, when you point out that marine &
terrestrial strata alternate in geologic columns all
around the world, as in Mesozoic Western US & Canada
formations, for instance, where the Inland Sea came in
& went out with warmer & cooler water temperatures
from more or less seafloor spreading, among other forces.
==
If your fundamentalist faith be strong enough, exposure to
science won't dent it. No one says you have to accept
evolution. You just have to learn enough about it to
understand it & pass a test on it. Some kids will
wake up & realize that their church lies to them, but
others won't. Churches can't dictate what's taught in
science classes.
The Bible says the earth is supported by foundational
pillars & doesn't move, but that the sun does (also
the night & day are independent of the movements of
the earth & sun), for instance. Should kids then be
excused from physics class when the movement of the
earth around the sun under gravitational attraction is taught?
==
Our critiques of creationism are: (a) that it stops scientific progress in its
tracks by answering questions in a way that closes off further research; and
(b) that there is no real attempt to meld the approach with the existing
methods of science. We know that the creationists say this is not true, but
their hypotheses relate to books of obscure origin or to faith rather than to
observation.
==
Since Copernicus, science has advanced by
progressively removing God from direct intervention in
nature. The Polish monk removed the earth from the
center of the universe. Newton removed the need for
angels to operate the celestial machinery. Darwin
removed Man from the center of the kingdoms of life,
showing that God didn't need periodically to create
new living things.
This separation has been good for both science & true
religion. If God is in the gaps in our present
knowledge, as they are filled, there is less space
available for Him. Saying "God did it" when we can't
yet explain naturalistically how something happened,
answers nothing & can't help improve our knowledge,
the advancement of which has reaped so many benefits
to people since Copernicus' day.
Attempts to insert Him back into natural processes
where not needed can only retard further scientific
progress. ID shows this plainly. If Behe wanted to
advance humanity's understanding of & ability to cope
with nature, he'd have spent his time researching the
biochemical pathways in the development of the
bacterial flagellum, rather than going around the
country & writing books about its "irreducible
complexity", falsely.
==
Duane Gish is the repeatedly humiliated fool who asserted that no fossil
proto-mammal with two jaw joints would ever be found, right before many of
them were.
==
The state Department of Education disagrees with an Athens School Board
director who wants School Administrative District 59 to drop evolution from
its high school science curricula.
Director Matthew Linkletter claims evolution is an unprovable theory and
shouldn't be taught as fact. He's urged the SAD 59 Board of Directors to
consider his view during its May 19 meeting in Madison, with a goal of
removing evolution from science classrooms.
But David Connerty-Marin of the Department of Education says evolution must be
taught because, in the state's view, it's a proven science.
"For our students to be prepared for college work and life in the 21st
century, it's necessary," said Connerty-Marin.
Connerty-Marin said the Maine Learning Results program mandates the study of
evolution in public science classes.
"Evolution is not just a belief, or based on faith, it's based on scientific
evaluation," he said. "The worldwide science community supports it."
Linkletter believes that neither evolution nor creationism belong in a high
school science curriculum, because they cannot be proven.
"You can't show, observe or prove (evolution)," he said.
School Administrative District 59 includes the towns of Madison, Athens,
Brighton Plantation and Starks.
Chosen at random, two parents of Madison Area Memorial High School students
expressed some support for Linkletter's position.
"I think that's a very valid point, to tell you the truth, because evolution
is only a theory, not a hard fact," said Nancy Martin, an educational
technician at Athens Elementary School.
Martin, who has a son at the high school, said that she believes in
creationism, as outlined in the Old Testament Book of Genesis. She said SAD 59
should pull evolution from the science curriculum unless creationism is
afforded equal footing.
Laney Kirk of Madison, treasurer of the sports boosters who has a daughter at
Madison High, agreed with Martin -- to a point.
"Really and truly, they're both ideas," Kirk said. "We can teach both. But
that's where we run into a problem, when you say they're mutually exclusive.
You're never going to get everyone to agree about it, so why not teach them
both?"
Kirk said she attends most SAD 59 meetings, but missed the one last week when
Linkletter broached the topic. The board voted to table the issue and revisit
it on May 19. Kirk does not believe that the board should remove evolution
from the curriculum.
"There are people who believe that the Holocaust is a theory," Kirk said.
"It's like banning a book."
Town Manager Norman Dean, who taught science in Madison from 1962 through
1996, had stronger words for the proposal.
"That's absolutely stupid," said Dean, who once taught Linkletter. "I thought
we already had the monkey trial."
There is plenty of evidence, Dean said, that Charles Darwin's theory of
evolution is correct.
"Adaption over time is proven time and again," he said. "I believe evolution
is adaptation to the environment."
Roy Blevins is pastor of Linkletter's church, the Church of the Open Bible in
Athens. Blevins spoke in favor of SAD 59 Chairman Norman Luce's suggestion,
that a philosophy class might provide a better forum for the study of
evolution.
"That's a sane approach," Blevins said. "The evolution concept is a theory,
and not provable. If the science department at Madison High is simply teaching
theory, then you ought to leave it in the science department."
Blevins agreed with Linkletter that neither is creationism provable, and thus
does not belong in the curriculum.
==
When the Florida legislature ended its session on May 2, 2008, legislative
attempts to open the door to creationism died in the House of Representatives.
Senate Bill 2692, as originally introduced, purported to protect the right of
teachers to "objectively present scientific information relevant to the full
range of scientific views regarding biological and chemical evolution." The
bill resembled a string of similar bills in Alabama as well as a model bill
that the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, the
institutional home of "intelligent design" creationism, recently began to
promote, and was widely viewed as a backlash against the treatment of
evolution in Florida's new state science standards.
As NCSE reported, SB 2692's originally identical House counterpart, HB 1483,
was substantially altered, requiring public schools to provide "[a] thorough
presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution." The
phrase "critical analysis" is commonly used by "intelligent design" advocates
in their campaign to undermine the teaching of evolution. The sponsor of SB
2692, Senator Ronda Storms (R-District 10), then sought to smooth the bill's
passage by revising it to match HB 1483, but was unsuccessful. On receiving SB
2692 from the Senate, the House substituted the text of HB 1483 and returned it
to the Senate, which then restored the text of the bill and sent it back to the
House, where it died. HB 1483 was already tabled, and is now dead, too.
Throughout the discussion of SB 2692, its supporters maintained a studied
vagueness about what "scientific information" was contemplated. Asked by the
Miami Herald (March 13, 2008) whether "intelligent design" constituted
"scientific information" in the sense of the bill, for example, a
representative of the Discovery Institute equivocated, saying, "In my personal
opinion, I think it does. But the intent of this bill is not to settle that
question," and adding, unhelpfully, "The intent of this bill is ... it
protects the 'teaching of scientific information. '" And during debate on the
Senate floor, Storms was noticeably reluctant to address the question of
whether the bill would license the teaching of creationism, preferring instead
simply to recite the bill's text.
Storms was also unable to justify the bill's claims of persecution. A report
to the Senate Education Pre-K-12 Committee stated (PDF), "According to the
Department of Education, there has never been a case in Florida where a public
school teacher or public school student has claimed that they have been
discriminated against based on their science teaching or science course work,"
and the St. Petersburg Times (March 6, 2008) pointedly commented, "most of the
evolution-related pressure being put on science teachers is aimed at those who
want to teach the scientific consensus about evolution, not those who want to
teach the 'full range of scientific views' -- which would presumably include
the fringe notion that evolution is not backed by strong evidence."
Similarly, the sponsor of HB 1483, Representative Alan Hays (R-District 25),
was forced to acknowledge that "he didn't have any names" of teachers who
feared retribution for "teaching the 'holes' in evolution," the Miami Herald
(April 28, 2008) reported. His idea of "critical analysis of the scientific
theory of evolution" was suggested by his comment, reported by the Herald, "No
fossils have been found and no witness has ever seen one species turn into
another. This is only a theory." Representative Carl Domino (R-District 83),
voting against the bill, commented, "There are a lot of strange things out
there that I don't want teachers teaching," according to the South Florida
Sun-Sentinel (April 28, 2008).
Nevertheless, the bills passed their respective houses, as NCSE reported.
Whether due to the intransigence of their supporters or to the host of other
issues crowding the legislative calendar, however, a compromise was not
reached before the end of the legislative session. In its editorial reviewing
the accomplishments of the legislature, the Tampa Tribune (May 3, 2008)
commented, "The session will be remembered for what wasn't done to compromise
the quality of education in Florida" (emphasis in original), immediately
adding, "Sen. Ronda Storms was rebuked in her effort to infuse religion into
lessons on biological evolution."
NCSE congratulates and thanks those in the Sunshine State who fought against
these antievolution bills, including the editorial boards of the state's
newspapers, the writers and framers of the state science standards, scientists
at the state's universities and in industry, the ACLU of Florida, a handful of
vocal legislators from both parties, and, especially, the grassroots group
Florida Citizens for Science, whose spokesperson Brandon Haught commented at
the end of the legislative session, "Let us take a moment of silence for House
Bill 1483 and Senate Bill 2692, the deceptively named 'academic freedom' bills.
Time of death: 6 p.m." But looking ahead to the challenges of the next
legislative session, Haught added, "I doubt they will rest in peace, though."

==
Evolution Less Accepted in U.S. Than Other Western Countries, Study Finds

Researchers compared the results of past surveys of attitudes toward evolution
taken in the U.S. since 1985 and similar surveys in Japan and 32 European
countries.
In the U.S., only 14 percent of adults thought that evolution was "definitely
true," while about a third firmly rejected the idea.
In European countries, including Denmark, Sweden, and France, more than 80
percent of adults surveyed said they accepted the concept of evolution.
The proportion of western European adults who believed the theory "absolutely
false" ranged from 7 percent in Great Britain to 15 percent in the Netherlands.
The only country included in the study where adults were more likely than
Americans to reject evolution was Turkey.
The investigation also showed that the percentage of U.S. adults who are
uncertain about evolution has risen from 7 percent to 21 percent in the past
20 years.
Researchers from the U.S. and Japan analyzed additional information from these
surveys in an attempt to identify factors that might help explain why Americans
are more skeptical about evolution.
Led by Jon D. Miller, a political scientist at Michigan State University, the
team reports its findings in tomorrow's issue of the journal Science.
American Culture and Evolution
The team ran a complex analysis of the statistics, testing for a causal link
between aspects of U.S. culture and Americans' attitudes toward evolution.
People in the United States are much less likely to accept Darwin's idea that
humans and apes share a common ancestor than adults in other Western nations,
a number of surveys show.
A new study of those surveys suggests that the main reason for this lies in a
unique confluence of religion, politics, and the public understanding of
biological science in the United States.
Researchers compared the results of past surveys of attitudes toward evolution
taken in the U.S. since 1985 and similar surveys in Japan and 32 European
countries.
In the U.S., only 14 percent of adults thought that evolution was "definitely
true," while about a third firmly rejected the idea.
In European countries, including Denmark, Sweden, and France, more than 80
percent of adults surveyed said they accepted the concept of evolution.
The proportion of western European adults who believed the theory "absolutely
false" ranged from 7 percent in Great Britain to 15 percent in the Netherlands.
The only country included in the study where adults were more likely than
Americans to reject evolution was Turkey.
The investigation also showed that the percentage of U.S. adults who are
uncertain about evolution has risen from 7 percent to 21 percent in the past
20 years.
Researchers from the U.S. and Japan analyzed additional information from these
surveys in an attempt to identify factors that might help explain why Americans
are more skeptical about evolution.
Led by Jon D. Miller, a political scientist at Michigan State University, the
team reports its findings in tomorrow's issue of the journal Science.
==
According to a telephone poll conducted by ABCNEWS/Primetime in 2004, 
60% of US residents believe the story of Noah's Ark is literally true.
==
The FL Senate Judiciary Committee today takes up SB 2692, the "Evolution
Academic Freedom Act" which would allow educators to teach intelligent design
and other pseudo-science within the public school science classroom
==
The textbook is Biology for Christian
Schools, and the excerpt is as follows and begins now:
(1) "'Whatever the Bible says is so; whatever man says may or may
not be so,' is the only [position] a Christian can take..."
(2) "If [scientific] conclusions contradict the Word of God, the
conclusions are wrong, no matter how many scientific facts may
appear to back them."
(3) "Christians must disregard [scientific hypotheses or theories]
that contradict the Bible."
And this isn't buried somewhere in the back. This is on the very
first page of the textbook.  
==
Genetic Entropy & the Mystery of the Genome by John Sanford (October 2005)
===
JEFFERSON CITY A bit of Hollywoods right wing came to Missouri last week as
Ben Stein showed up to pitch his new documentary, Expelled: No Intelligence
Allowed.
The premise of the film is that serious scientists are systematically
disparaged, discredited and blacklisted if they dare to mention the
possibility that the infinite complexity of organisms might indicate design by
a higher power.
Stein, the monotone-voiced actor and political essayist, introduced a special
screening of the film in the Capitol rotunda. Stein said the movie was
inspired by skepticism that a single theory, based on a modest amount of
evidence, could explain the entire universe.
Were not saying teach creationism, Stein said. We just think you should be
able to question Darwinism.
The film, scheduled to open in theaters this month, questions gaps in the
theory of evolution. Scientists who say the existence of God is not science
are derided as closed-minded keepers of a secular faith who refuse to consider
any alternative explanations for highly debatable conclusions.
Charles Darwins theories of species changing through random mutation and
natural selection are depicted as the intellectual underpinnings of Nazi
Germany and the Holocaust.
And a favorite target of social conservatives Planned Parenthood is painted
as a purveyor of contraception as a way to reduce less desirable traits among
the humans not as a way to help the poor attain self-sufficiency by
controlling their fertility.
The movie is essentially a love letter to the religious right packaged as a
call for freedom of speech and a demand for freedom of inquiry at research
institutes and universities. It is being marketed heavily through churches and
socially conservative groups, with endorsements from James Dobson, chairman of
Focus on the Family, and Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for
America.
At a news conference Thursday, Stein urged lawmakers to pass Cunninghams bill
that would require state colleges and universities to promote political and
religious perspectives and competing ideas and alternative claims of truth.
He also plugged Coopers bill that requires local schools to encourage students
and their teachers to critique theories of evolution.
All (Cunninghams) bill does is protect teachers, Stein said. No one can be
told to keep his mouth shut.
Students, he said, should get credit for reasoned, well-expressed arguments
even if they dont agree with the instructors view. Pressure to conform hurts
students and shortchanges serious research, he said.
I saw political correctness at work, Stein said. Its a nauseating thing.
Stein called Darwin a genius and lauded his insight into changes that species
undergo over time. But extrapolating such insights into an overarching theory
of how life began while refusing even to allow discussion of alternatives is
folly, he said. And such ideas have even proven dangerous.
It leads to social Darwinism, which leads to the belief that some people are
superior to others, Stein said. That thinking led to the Nazi regime that
killed 6 million of my fellow Jews.
==
A great many major Christian and Jewish organisations accept that Evolutionary
science is compatible with their vision of God. These include the American
Jewish Congress; the American Scientific Affiliation; the Center For Theology
And The Natural Sciences; the Central Conference Of American Rabbis; the
General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA)
floydfp: the General Convention Of The Episcopal Church; the Lexington
Alliance Of Religious Leaders; the Lutheran World Federation; the Roman
Catholic Church; the Unitarian Universalist Association; the United Church
Board For Homeland Ministries; the United Methodist Church; and the United
Presbyterian Church In The U.S.A.
floydfp: Thank MrDav for this information
floydfp: These organisations represent substantially more than half of all
Christs and Jews worldwide.
floydfp: (Source: World Christian Encyclopedia - quoted here).
==
"Recently, the Oklahoma House of Representatives passed HB 2211, a bill
created in an attempt to increase freedom of religion in public schools. Its
intent is to let students say the earth was
created by God (Allah, Brahma, Eros, Atum, Ymir, etc.) and that humans didn't
evolve, but were intelligently designed,
in accordance with their religious beliefs, and still get a passing grade."
"As long as students say what they are being taught interferes
with their religious beliefs, they cannot be graded down."
http://media.www.thenorthwindonline.com/media/storage/paper1202/news/2008/03/27/Opinion/Column.Religion.Has.No.Bearing.In.The.Classroom-3287692.shtml
 
==
The Phillip Johnson award, the creationists' answer to the Nobel  Prize. 
The first winner of the Phillip Johnson award was Phillip Johnson. 
How nice to see it being handed out to his pals by his pals.
===
The Questionable Authority

Summary Judgment in California Creationist Lawsuit: Bottom Line, and What's
Next (Part 1 of 3)
On Friday, Judge James Otero of the Central District of California issued a
ruling granting the University of California's request for partial summary
judgment in the California Creationist Lawsuit. I've written about this case
several times before now, but it's been a long time since the last update, so
before I get into the details of the ruling, I'm going to quickly review the
details of the case.
In 2005, a group of plaintiffs that includes the Association of Christian
Schools International, Calvary Chapel Christian School of Murietta, and the
parents of several students filed a lawsuit against the University of
California. In their suit, they claimed that UC unfairly and
unconstitutionally refused to accept a number of courses taught at Christian
schools as meeting UC's admissions criteria. The courses in question covered a
range of topics, including English, history, religion, and government, but I've
mostly focused my attention on the biology courses that failed to make the
grade, because that's the area that I know the most about.
One of the specific issues that the Christian Schools are challenging in their
lawsuit is UC's decision to reject any course that uses either the A Bekka
Books or the Bob Jones University Press biology textbooks as the primary text
for the course. As I've said before, this decision makes perfect sense to me.
Even the most cursory look at some of the things that these books claim is
enough to show that the unfortunate students who are forced to use this text
are being taught things that are totally incompatible with science. The
Christian schools, it should go without saying, disagree with my assessment.
In their pursuit of their claim that it's unreasonable to reject these books,
they recruited noted cDesign Proponentsist Michael Behe as an "expert"
witness. He "reviewed" the Creationist books, found them to be fine and dandy,
submitted an expert report that said as much, and sat for a deposition last
year. (Unfortunately for his employers, the Judge apparently actually listened
to what Behe had to say. I'll have more on that in another post later today.)
Last year, both sides in the case asked the Judge to grant them summary
judgment. The Christian schools asked the judge to rule that the entire UC
policy of rejecting certain courses is unconstitutional both on its face and
as it was applied specifically to them. The University of California asked the
court to rule that the policy is constitutional on its face. UC did not ask the
court to grant judgment on the issue of the specific courses, saying that issue
involves questions best settled at trial. In order for the court to grant
summary judgment, it has to agree that there are no material differences about
the facts of the case, and that the party who is asking for the summary
judgment is clearly in the right even if the facts are viewed in the light
most favorable to the other side.
In his decision, Judge Otero rejected every single aspect of the plaintiffs'
claim, along with their entire motion for summary judgment. He accepted the
University of California's arguments, and granted their motion for partial
summary judgment.
This means two things: first, the question of whether or not the University of
California can reject courses from the Christian schools under any
circumstances has been settled in favor of UC. The judge ruled that UC has a
compelling reason to pick and choose the "content" and "viewpoints" that they
will accept as meeting their admissions requirements: ensuring that the
students they accept are qualified. The Christian schools who filed the suit
are not entitled to an exemption from that requirement simply because they are
religious extremists who fiercely reject reality as part of their faith.
Second, the issue of whether or not UC was correct in rejecting the specific
courses and textbooks in question will most likely go to trial. The Christian
schools asked the judge to rule in their favor on that issue, while UC claimed
that the issue involved enough of a dispute about the facts to require a full
trial. Here, too, the judge ruled in favor of UC.
A trial date has not yet been set, but I'll keep watching for one and will let
you know what's going on when more information is available.
I'll also have two more posts on this ruling a little later today. One of the
posts will focus on Judge Otero's discovery of various typical Creationist
argument techniques (most notably strawmen and quote mining) in the Christian
School's claims. The second will focus on the valuable, but accidental,
contribution made by Mike Behe - on behalf of the side of good science.

When are they going to learn that letting creationists like Behe testify in
their favor = Doom

The issue was the University of California's decision
to reject biology courses that used Biology: God's
Living Creation (published by A Beka) or Biology for
Christian Schools (published by Bob Jones University)
as the primary text in the course. Behe was the
plaintiff's "biology expert" (oh, the irony!) and the
court found:

Plaintiffs' evidence also supports Defendants'
conclusion that these biology texts are inappropriate
for use as the primary or sole text. Plaintiffs' own
biology expert, Professor Michael Behe testified that
"it is personally abusive and pedagogically damaging
to de facto require students to subscribe to an idea .
. . . Requiring a student to, effectively, consent to
an idea violates [her] personal integrity. Such a
wrenching violation [may cause] a terrible educational
outcome." [Emphasis added]

Yet, the two Christian biology texts at issue
commit this "wrenching violation." For example,
Biology for Christian Schools declares on the very
first page that:

(1) "'Whatever the Bible says is so; whatever man
says may or may not be so,' is the only [position] a
Christian can take . . . ."

(2) "If [scientific] conclusions contradict the
Word of God, the conclusions are wrong, no matter how
many scientific facts may appear to back them."

(3) "Christians must disregard [scientific
hypotheses or theories] that contradict the Bible."

Based in no small part on Behe's testimony, the court
found the there was, at least, a genuine issue of
material fact as to whether the rejection of the
plaintiffs' biology courses was reasonable.


==
The entire foundation of science is the examination of
all ideas and hypotheses, designing experiments to
test those hypotheses, and then evaluating the data in
light of the hypotheses. The reason that intelligent
design is not a scientific discipline is because it
has no relationship to science whatsoever. No
experiments are done, and no hypotheses are
forthcoming. It is declared by Fiat. You know, like religion.
==
More irony from the ID creationist crowd March 30, 2008
On the one hand the ID creationist crowd wail and moan about how they
supposedly face discrimination and censure (thats what film Expelled is
about), and on the other we find this sort of stuff:

Pandas Thumb reports on an article in the Washington Post that talked about
the case of Nancey Murphy of the Fuller Theological Seminary:

Nancey Murphy, a religious scholar at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena,
Calif., said she faced a campaign to get her fired because she expressed the
view that intelligent design was not only poor theology, but so stupid, I dont
want to give them my time.

Murphy, who believes in evolution, said she had to fight to keep her job after
one of the founding members of the intelligent design movement, legal theorist
Phillip Johnson, called a trustee at the seminary and tried to get her fired.

But this isnt the only example.

Back in the mid-1990s Christian biochemist Terry M. Gray was tried and
convicted of heresy by the Orthodox Presbyterian Church for daring to suggest
that humans have primate ancestors in a review wait for it of Phillip Johnsons
book Darwin on Trial (1991).

A. We charge that Dr. Terry Gray has committed the public offense of stating
that Adam had primate ancestors~ contrary to the Word of God (Genesis 2:7,
1:26,27) and the doctrinal standards of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (WCF
IV.2, W L C 17).

Fortunately Dr. Gray wasnt put on the rack or burnt at the stake for his
heresy (like they used to do), but he was censured and had to write a
recantation.

Dr. Gray has a page on links to articles on the incident: Documents Related to
the Evolution Trial in the OPC

A similar example is Christian physicist Howard Van Till, of Calvin College in
Michigan had the schools board of trustees questioning his views after he wrote
in a book (The Fourth Day 1986) in which he argued that the stories of the
Bible and sciences account of evolution could both be true (from
chicagotribune.com):

His critics on the schools board of trustees had no interest in reconciling
the religious account of creation with a naturalist explanation of how life
and the universe have evolved over the ages. For years after the books release
in 1986, Van Till reported to a monthly interrogation where he struggled to
reassure college officials that his scientific teachings fit within their
creed. Van Tills career survived the ordeal, but his Calvinist faith did not.
Over the next two decades, he became the heretic his critics had suspected.

Over a span of three years a conservative businessman Leo Peters ran thirty
full-page ads in the Grand Rapids Press attacking Van Till for his views.

Seems they can dish it out but cant take it; though they really havent had to
actually take it because most (if not all) of their claims of discrimination
or censure are nonsense.
==
Sen. Larcenia Bullard, D-Miami, made her views clear when she said she
thought kindergartners should not be taught Darwinian evolution
because "that may be brainwashing. " She also told the committee of her
own experience in college, where she refused to answer a science exam
question about evolution with the accepted Darwinian answer and
instead copied down the creation story in Genesis, Chapter 1."
http://www2. tbo.com/content/ 2008/mar/ 27/me-evolution- bill-moves- forward
It's not about letting religion creep into science classrooms, Sen.
Ronda Storms insisted.
It's about protecting the rights of students and teachers who don't
agree with the science behind Darwinian evolution, the Republican from
Valrico argued before the Senate's pre-k through 12 education
committee voted 4-1 Wednesday to approve the bill.
Despite her argument, religion kept coming up anyway, as Storms
pressed for her "academic freedom" act. Her bill would allow public
school teachers to present science-based alternatives to Darwin's
theory of evolution, a theory written into Florida's curriculum
standards and one that is held as a fundamental concept of biology by
most members of the science community.
Although professors spoke in opposition to the bill and a
representative from the American Civil Liberties Union said it would
open the door to teaching creationism, the committee voted to move the
bill forward.
"Evolution will still be taught as a matter of law. This bill does not
undo the current standard," Storms said. She added, "It's interesting
for me to note that the only folks who brought up religion today have
been those in opposition."
A debate about evolution has been swirling in the Capitol since last
month, when the state Board of Education adopted the state's new
science standards, which mandated teaching evolution. Activists
persuaded the board to qualify evolution as a "theory," but the board
did not write in any special provision for teaching alternative beliefs.
Storms filed her bill at the start of the legislative session.
Conservative activists rallied around her, with actor Ben Stein, best
known for playing a boring teacher in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off,"
showing up in Tallahassee to screen his controversial documentary
"Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed," a film about scientists and
educators who challenged natural selection and Darwin's evolution
teachings.
Those who oppose Darwin's theory of evolution aren't all religiously
motivated, backers said Wednesday, although Sen. Larcenia Bullard,
D-Miami, made her views clear when she said she thought kindergartners
should not be taught Darwinian evolution because "that may be
brainwashing. " She also told the committee of her own experience in
college, where she refused to answer a science exam question about
evolution with the accepted Darwinian answer and instead copied down
the creation story in Genesis, Chapter 1.
Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, who cast the lone dissenting vote
Wednesday, echoed what a staff analysis of the bill said - that there
have been no complaints about teachers or students saying they were
discriminated against because they presented an alternative scientific
theory of evolution.
"What we heard today was the suggestion that there are people of faith
who have some objections and they're not permitted to raise them,"
Deutch said.
Although he thinks students should be allowed to debate things
philosophically, those debates do not belong in the science classroom,
he said.
==
Nobody cares that ID'ers mostly think God created everything. What they do
care about is ID'ers claiming that they have scientific evidence God did it,
or scientific evidence that Evolution is wrong, when they do not have such a
thing. 

The purpose of ID is to provide a theory that its supporters know to be
religion-friendly, but which can be dressed up as science for legal purposes.

Tens of millions of Americans, who neither know nor understand the actual
arguments for or even against evolution, march in the army of the night with
their Bibles held high. And they are a strong and frightening force,
impervious to, and immunized against, the feeble lance of mere reason.
Isaac Asimov

'Belief' is loosely the religious equivalent to scientific 'proof'. When an ID
supporter says "proof" they mean belief.. There are then two clearly different
senses of the word "proof". 

Read about "The Wedge Document" to understand the real motive behind ID - it
is nothing more than an attempt to establish a Christian Theocracy worldwide.
They plan to destroy Universities, Modern art and create a second class
citizenry of all who do not believe in Jesus.
==
The intelligent design folks aren't being silenced, so much as they're being
silent. Because when it comes to actually
explaining anything, they've got nothing to say.
==
Ralph Muncaster's Dismantling Evolution
Phillip Johnson's Darwin on Trial;
David Snoke's A Biblical Case for an Old Earth
Fazale Rana and Hugh Ross' Who was Adam.
==
Genesis is perfectly clear about its cosmology. A
solid dome, hammered out by God's own hand, holds back
the "waters above". The dome contains floodgates
through which rain & snow fall, plus openings for the
sun & moon to come & go over the flat earth, while God
Himself operates the floodgates to water the earth
from above. God looks down on the earth through
clouds from His throne atop the dome of heaven, so
that people appear as grasshoppers to Him.

The stars hang from or are embedded in the dome, but
in danger of falling to earth, which isn't a long way
at all, since it's possible to build a 2.3 to 2.9 km
tall tower to reach heaven. The sun gets up every
morning to run his race, then at night hurries around
outside the dome or under the earth to his place of
rising. In the Book of Enoch, we learn that there are
stiff penalties for the moon & sun to be tardy.
God used to come down to earth to walk & talk with
people, but apparently abandoned this practice
sometime before Moses.
==
I find it amusing that Dubya demands more science and math
from our schools but then makes sure to install people with a very clear
agenda in specific positions so that the results of federally-funded
scientific inquiry are constrained to reach a pre-determined
political/religious/moral conclusion. Any scientific research that is
co-authored or sponsored by the federal government must now be viewed with an
extremely skeptical eye by not only America but by the scientific world
community.
The idea of science being the political tool of those
in power smacks of a return to pre-Enlightenment, to a time when one accepted
the word of the state or church (often one and the same) and those who refused
to acquiesce were ostricised at best or disposed of at worst. Voltaire said it
is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong and this great champion
of liberty and free thought, along with many others independent thinkers,
would be appalled at the present federal administration's insistence on
regressive science.
In campaigning for the presidency in 1999, Bush advocated teaching creationism
in public schools, in blatant violation of the First Amendment, a position
that obliterates his claim to be a defender of science.
The politicization of science presents a severe challenge to modern democratic
governments, which depend on a creative tension between elected
representatives, on the one hand, and unelected technocratic elites on the
other. . .[T]he politicization of science--in essence, a corruption of the
communication channels between credible experts and policymakers--weakens and
ultimately destroys this necessary relationship.
When scientific information becomes merely something to be manipulated to
achieve a political or religious end, the quality and integrity of the
political process inevitably suffer.
Under a republican banner, the Christian right having lost two landmark cases
where they failed to keep evolution out of the classroom, and failed to get
creationism in the classroom, created a marketing miracle with restyling the
latter in a new package of intelligent design. Attempting to influence a
scientifically ignorant public with fallacious claims of unexplained missing
links, and evolution's lack of certainty, they have made inroads with the more
intellectually gullible and naïve. To bolster their cause, they have enlisted
a few contrarian scientists who have carried their guidon, but have failed to
publish their stance in any peer-reviewed journal. 
In 1995, Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich fired the first political salvo
in the war on science by abolishing the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA).
This was an impartial scientific committee that provided scientific consensus
on issues brought to them from the political arena. 
Scientific progress, won within the last 400 years, seems to dissolve into
air in view of the right-wing conservative Christian fundamentalist banding
together. 
Darwin's evolution theory as a component of the biology lesson in schools is
fought by creationism or the slogan of an intelligent designer (God?),
obedient, at this point unruly teachers are threatened with dismissal.
After all, neither evolution nor the age of the universe can be traduced
without bringing into question those sciences dealing with natural history as
a whole.
Their activism ironically came from several centuries of resistance to this
same science and its displacement of age-old religious beliefs. Evolution,
contraception, Big Bang, all had the effect of undermining traditional
authority in vast regions of America, particularly in countrysides and the
South. In the fundamentalist's classically reactionary view, the moral fabric
of America was being ripped asunder and Biblical truths cast aside, while
thenatural sciences, in particular, were designated as a chief culprit. 
The evolution issue is an interesting case in point. If the Bible is literally
true, then before Adam and Eve's sin, there was no death - a death which Christ
conquered by his own death on the Cross. Imagine, then, the fix these people
are in when faced with Darwinian principles that demonstrate that death
predated humans. It is no wonder they equate belief in Darwin with atheism and
no wonder they fight evolution tooth and nail.
==
It is important to educate members of the lay public that fascism doesn't come
out of the blue, but is rather a long methodical power grab that occurs under
the radar unless the public is attuned to what is going on and oppose it
locally and nationally..
==
In Britain, creationist theory is evolving
Groups that oppose Darwin are making headway in schools.
LONDON -- After the Sunday service in Westminster Chapel, where worshipers
were exhorted to wage "the culture war" in the World War II spirit of Sir
Winston Churchill, cabbie James McLean delivered his verdict on Charles
Darwin's theory of evolution.
"Evolution is a lie, and it's being taught in schools as fact, and it's
leading our kids in the wrong direction," said McLean, chatting outside the
chapel. "But now people like Ken Ham are tearing evolution to pieces."
Ken Ham is the founder of Answers in Genesis, a Kentucky-based organization
that is part of an ambitious effort to bring creationist theory to Britain and
the rest of Europe. McLean is one of a growing number of evangelicals embracing
that message -- that the true history of the Earth is told in the Bible, not
Darwin's "The Origin of Species."
Europeans have long viewed the conflict between evolutionists and creationists
as primarily an American phenomenon, but it has recently jumped the Atlantic
with skirmishes in Italy, Germany, Poland and, notably, Britain, where Darwin
was born and where he published his 1859 classic.
Darwin's defenders are fighting back. In October, the 47-nation Council of
Europe, a human rights watchdog, condemned all attempts to bring creationism
into Europe's schools. Bible-based theories and "religious dogma" threaten to
undercut sound educational practices, it charged.
Schools are increasingly a focal point in this battle for hearts and minds.
A British branch of Answers in Genesis, which shares a website with its
American counterpart, has managed to introduce its creationist point of view
into science classes at a number of state-supported schools in Britain, said
Monty White, the group's chief executive.
"We do go into the schools about 10 to 20 times a year and we do get the
students to question what they're being taught about evolution," said White,
who founded the British branch seven years ago. "And we leave them a box of
books for the library."
Creationism is still a marginal issue here compared with its impact on
cultural and political debate in the United States. But the budding fervor is
part of a growing embrace of evangelical worship throughout much of Europe.
Evangelicals say their ranks are swelling because of revulsion with the
hedonism and materialism of modern society. At the same time, attendance at
traditional churches is declining.
"People are looking for spirituality," White said in an interview at his
office in Leicester, 90 miles north of London. "I think they are fed up with
not finding true happiness. They find having a bigger car doesn't make them
happy. They get drunk and the next morning they have a hangover. They take
drugs but the drugs wear off. But what they find with Christianity is lasting."
Other British organizations have joined the crusade. A group called Truth in
Science has sent thousands of unsolicited DVDs to every high school in Britain
arguing that mankind is the result of "intelligent design," not Darwinian
evolution.
In addition, the AH Trust, a charity, has announced plans to raise money for
construction of a Christian theme park in northwest England with a 5,000-seat
television studio that would be used for the production of Christian-oriented
films. And several TV stations are devoted to Christian themes.
All this activity has lifted spirits at the Westminster Chapel, a 165-year-old
evangelical church that is not affiliated with nearby Westminster Abbey, where
Darwin is buried.
In the chapel, the Rev. Greg Haslam tells 150 believers that they are in a
conflict with secularism that can only be won if they heed Churchill's
exhortation and never give up.
"The first thing you have to do is realize we are in a war, and identify the
enemy, and learn how to defeat the enemy," he said.
There is a sense inside the chapel that Christian evangelicals are
successfully resisting a trend toward a completely secular Britain.
"People have walked away from God; it's not fashionable," said congregant
Chris Mullins, a civil servant. "But the evangelical church does seem to be
growing and I'm very encouraged by that. In what is a very secular society,
there are people returning to God."
School curricula generally hold that Darwin's theory has been backed up by so
many scientific discoveries that it can now be regarded as fact. But Mullins
believes creationism also deserves a hearing in the classroom.
"Looking at the evidence, creationism at the least seems a theory worthy of
examination," he said. "Personally, I think it is true and I think the truth
will win out eventually. It's a question of how long it takes."
Terry Sanderson, president of Britain's National Secular Society, a group
founded in 1866 to limit the influence of religious leaders, said that the
groups advocating a literal interpretation of the Bible are making headway.
"Creationism is creeping into the schools," he said. "There is a constant
pressure to get these ideas into the schools."
The trend goes beyond evangelical Christianity. Sanderson said the British
government is taking over funding of about 100 Islamic schools even though
they teach the Koranic version of creationism. He said the government fears
imposing evolution theory on the curriculum lest it be branded as anti-Islamic.
The Council of Europe spoke up last fall after Harun Yahya, a prominent Muslim
creationist in Turkey, tried to place his lavishly produced 600-page book, "The
Atlas of Creation," in public schools in France, Switzerland, Belgium and
Spain.
"These trends are very dangerous," Anne Brasseur, author of the Council of
Europe report, said in an interview.=
Brasseur said recent skirmishes in Italy and Germany illustrate the
creationists' tactics. She said Italian schools were ordered to stop teaching
evolution when Silvio Berlusconi was prime minister, although the edict seems
to have had little effect in practice. In Germany, she said, a state education
minister briefly allowed creationism to be taught in biology class.
The rupture between theology and evolution in Europe is relatively recent. For
many years people who held evangelical views also endorsed mainstream
scientific theory, said Simon Barrow, co-director of Ekklesia, a
British-based, Christian-oriented research group. He said the split was
imported from the United States in the last decade.
"There is a lot of American influence, and there are a lot of moral and
political and financial resources flowing from the United States to here," he
said. "Now you have more extreme religious groups trying to get a foothold."
In some cases, the schools have become the battlegrounds. Richard Dawkins, the
Oxford university biologist and author of last year's international best-seller
"The God Delusion," frequently lectures students about the marvels of evolution
only to find that the students' views have already been shaped by the
creationist lobby.
"I think it's so sad that children should be fobbed off with these second-rate
myths," he said.
"The theory of evolution is one of the most powerful pieces of scientific
thinking ever produced and the evidence for it is overwhelming. I think
creationism is pernicious because if you don't know much it sounds kind of
plausible and it's easy to come into schools and subvert children."
White, the director of the British Answers in Genesis, is well aware that the
group's school program is contentious. The group has removed information about
it from its website to avoid antagonizing people.
The group operates a warehouse with $150,000 worth of DVDs, books and comics
promoting creationism, but he says he only sends speakers and materials into
schools that invite Answers in Genesis to make a presentation.
White, 63, said he was reared as an atheist and, after earning a doctorate in
chemistry, embraced evangelical Christianity in 1964.
He says that when he is asked to speak to science classes, he challenges the
accuracy of radioactive dating which shows the world to be thousands of
millions of years old and says that the Bible is a more accurate description
of how mankind began. He personally believes the Earth is between 6,000 and
12,000 years old.
"Usually I find the discussion goes on science, science and science, and then
when the lesson is finished one or two students say, 'Can we talk about other
things?' and I sit down with them and usually they want to talk about
Christianity," he said. "They want to know, why do you believe in God? Why do
you believe in the Bible? How can you be sure it's the word of God?"
Dawkins feels the effect. He said he is discouraged when he visits schools and
gets questions from students who have obviously been influenced by material
from Answers in Genesis. "I continually get the same rather stupid points
straight from their pamphlets," he said.
White is getting ready for a visit by Ken Ham, who will preach at Westminster
Chapel this spring. Meanwhile, he is pleased that small groups of creation
science advocates now meet regularly in Oxford, Edinburgh, Northampton and
other British cities.
"The creation movement is certainly growing," he said. "There are more groups
than there were five years ago. There are more people like me going out
speaking about it, and there's more interest. You have these little groups
forming all over the place."
==
There is no constitutional right to mis-educate students.  
If they're having Sunday school in science class, that's a problem.''
==
Bill could allow Intelligent Design in science class

TALLAHASSEE -- The religiously tinged evolution-questioning theory of
Intelligent Design could more easily be brought up in public-school science
classrooms under a proposed ''academic freedom'' legislation being pushed by
conservative lawmakers.
And it's not just the ACLU saying it anymore.
A leading voice for the Intelligent Design movement acknowledged as much
Wednesday by saying that the theory constitutes ''scientific information,''
which the bill expressly and repeatedly says teachers should present in
questioning and criticizing evolution without fear of persecution.
The remarks by Casey Luskin, an attorney with the Seattle-based Discovery
Institute, were made during a press conference with
actor-columnist-speechwriter-gameshow host Ben Stein, who's exhibiting a
documentary in support of the legislation.
The bill was drafted after the state Board of Education voted last month to
include repeated mention of evolution and natural selection in state science
standards for the first time in state history. The bill expressly bans the
teaching of religious theories -- which a federal court has ruled Intelligent
Design is.
But the legislation also repeatedly tells instructors to teach the ''full
range'' of ''scientific information'' about biological and chemical evolution.
So does Intelligent Design constitute scientific information?
''In my personal opinion, I think it does. But the intent of this bill is not
to settle that question,'' said Luskin. 'The intent of this bill is... it
protects the `teaching of scientific information.' It's not trying to inject
itself into the debate over Intelligent Design.''
Luskin said the institute, which advocates Intelligent Design, doesn't want it
''mandated'' in schools.
Church-state separatists say religious groups are trying to use the bill as a
Trojan horse to introduce religion in science classrooms.
''The Intelligent Design movement has embraced this political strategy to
sneak its religious views into the science classroom, and that's what you're
seeing now in Florida,'' said Howard Simon, a Florida director for the ACLU,
which filed the Dover case.
''The strategy is this: Let's call Intelligent Design scientific information,
and let's make sure that teachers can teach that scientific information,''
Simon said, adding that his organization would sue if the bill became law and
teachers began proselytizing in class.
The Discovery Institute vigorously denies that Intelligent Design is a
religious theory and says the definition of the theory holds that life shows
such patterns of design that it's the result of an intelligent cause, rather
than natural selection.
What's that ''intelligent cause?'' The institute's top scientists say God, but
they say that's not part of the theory.
Based on that belief, days of grueling testimony and something called the
Discovery Institute ''Wedge'' document outlining a strategy to make science
more ''consonant with Christian and theistic convictions,'' a federal judge in
a Dover, Penn., case ruled in 2005 that Intelligent Design was too close to
creationism for the science classroom.
Teachers can mention Intelligent Design or biblical creationism now, as long
as it's not in the science classroom. In the science classroom, it's an open
question as to whether teachers can mention these evolution alternatives.
Stein said his documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed shows that the
academic freedom bill is needed.
''If there were complete freedom of speech, I don't think this bill would be
necessary,'' he said. ``There are plenty of people who ask what seem to be
innocent, sensible questions about the flaws and gaps and lacunae in Darwinism
and they get severely punished for it.''
Stein said he didn't think the bill was aimed at ''protecting'' Intelligent
Design. One of the drafters of the legislation, John Stemberger, president of
the evangelical Florida Family Policy Council, said Intelligent Design can't
be taught, though ''criticisms'' of evolution could.
''When asked who would decide what ``scientific information'' is, Stemberger
said the teacher would have to follow the curriculum and only bring up
''relevant'' information about chemical and biological evolution. Stein said
it was the teacher who would decide.
Republican state Sen. Ronda Storms of Brandon and Rep. Alan Hays of Umatilla
say their bill's intent is not to teach alternate theories, but to ensure that
teachers and students will have the ability to freely question and criticize
evolution.
Indeed, natural selection is under active challenge from
evolutionary-developmental biologists, who say multicellular organisms can
dynamically change form under certain environmental conditions, producing
major evolutionary jumps.
Simon and mainstream scientists with the National Academy of Sciences say
that's science, and that Intelligent Design is not because it ultimately rests
on untestable supernatural entities.
Luskin, the Discovery Institute lawyer, said that's an irony: ``One of the
funniest things in my opinion is that many of the people who are claiming
Intelligent Design would be taught under this bill adamantly believe
Intelligent Design is not science. So in their own view, the text of this bill
would not protect the teaching of Intelligent Design.''
Said Simon: ``There is no constitutional right to mis-educate Florida
students. If a science teacher is teaching serious science and is censored,
that's an academic-freedom issue we would defend. But if they're having Sunday
school in science class, that's a problem.''
==
Oklahoma: One Step from Doom

The Oklahoma House of Representatives has passed a bill that says that a
student can receive a passing grade in an Earth Science class if they say that
the Flying Spaghetti Monster created the Earth an hour ago, and then planted
false memories into every single living creature on Earth to make it seem like
theyve been around longer.

Of course, thats not the intent of the bill. The intent is that a student can
say the Earth is 6000 years old and still get a passing grade. The bill itself
says that a student cannot be graded down if they say that what they are being
taught interferes with their religious beliefs.

Specifically, the bill states:

A school district shall treat a students voluntary expression of a religious
viewpoint, if any, on an otherwise permissible subject in the same manner the
district treats a students voluntary expression of a secular or other
viewpoint on an otherwise permissible subject and may not discriminate against
the student based on a religious viewpoint expressed by the student on an
otherwise permissible subject.

Its the "otherwise permissible subject" phrase thats sticky. That can easily
be interpreted as meaning tests, besides just normal classroom discussion.

For a long time, I have been disquieted by the fact that many people want to
give patently ridiculous ideas as much standing as reality. One problem with
this is that once you open the door to fantasy, any and all flavors of it can
walk on through, as in the example above. But it also elevates fantasy to the
same level as reality, and that is simply wrong.

==
Some groups of people seem so afraid of progress - fearful
of the speed at which the world is changing - that they hide within belief
systems that offer comfortable solutions but which lack logic and attack those
institutions which they see do use logic and evidence to determine the truth .
In an ever increasing materialistic world some seem to blame the very science
which has delivered us from many diseases , given us once unimagined luxuries
, has helped feed the hungry and even tempts us with the lure of the stars as
the cause of all evil plaguing modern society.
I fear the fearful . I fear the ignorant. I fear the world these people would
make for my children. I fear a world carved from the darkness of small minds.
We can not win a battle of wits againist the witless but we can teach , share
, vote , and above all openly demonstrate the power of tolerance and
open-mindedness. If the creationists , the ufologists and others can cling so
passionately to their beliefs then why shouldnt those who love reality just
the way it is .
==
Creationists 'peddle lies about fossil record'
A leading scientist accuses creationists of peddling the lie that there is no
fossil evidence of evolution.
Some Christians claim there is a lack of "missing link" fossils, halfway
between two major groups of creatures.
They say this proves Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is a fallacy and
that God created each living species from nothing.
But, in an essay published in the magazine New Scientist today, geologist
Donald Prothero claims that reports of "huge gaps" in the fossil records have
been greatly exaggerated.
Dr Prothero, a professor of geology at Occidental College in Los Angeles,
said: "Life does not progress up a hierarchical ladder from 'low' to 'high'
but is a branching bush with numerous lineages splitting apart and coexisting
simultaneously.
"For example, apes and humans split from a common ancestor seven million years
ago and both lineages are still around.
"For this reason the concept of 'missing link' is a misleading one. A
transitional form does not need to be a perfect halfway house directly linking
one group of organisms to another.
"It merely needs to record aspects of evolutionary change that occurred as one
lineage split from another."
When Darwin first proposed the idea of evolution by natural selection in 1859,
the fossil record offered little support. He even devoted two entire chapters
of the Origin of Species to the imperfection of the geological record, but
predicted that it would eventually support his theories.
Dr Prothero said the creationists are ignoring a wealth of transitional
fossils found since Darwin's era which provide proof of the evolutionary
process.
He said: "The idea still persists that the fossil record is too patchy to
provide good evidence of evolution. One reason for this is the influence of
creationism.
"Foremost among their tactics is to distort or ignore the evidence for
evolution; a favourite lie is 'there are no transitional fossils'.
"This is manifestly untrue. We now have abundant evidence for how all the
major groups of animals are related, much of it in the form of excellent
transitional fossils."
Randall Hardy, the head of the British branch of Creation Research, said last
night: "Any attempt to impose evolution stories onto these fossils is just
speculation. It's all because of the mindset of these people [scientists],
which is pre-disposed towards evolution."
==
On Wednesday, Feb. 27, the Oklahoma House Education Committee passed
HB 2211, "The Religious Viewpoints Antidiscrimination Act, identical
to a bill passed in Texas last year. The principal author was changed
from Rep. Mike Reynolds (R) to Sally Kern (R).

The true purpose of HB 2211, the disingenuously named Religious
Viewpoints Antidiscrimination Act, is proselytizing in public
schools. Its provisions purportedly aimed at protecting religious
freedom are superfluous  First Amendment Constitutional law already
protects legitimate student expressions of religion. HB 2211 includes
provisions that aim, unconstitutionally, at using state power to
privilege sectarian religious dogma by allowing it to intrude into
public education. An affront to freedom of conscience, HB 2211 would
force school children to listen to sermons, under the auspices of
school administrators. If this bill is passed, Oklahoma will face
First Amendment litigation.

HB 2221 is anti-scientific, seeking the introduction of religious
creationism in science courses. HB 2211 would damage science
education. Students would be allowed to substitute sectarian
religious explanations for scientific and historical explanations
without correction. Non-scientific religious creationist accounts of
natural phenomena could be given as answers on exams without those
answers being corrected by science teachers, making a farce out of
science education in Oklahoma classrooms, ultimately hindering the
economys high-tech and med-tech sectors, sectors vital to the
states prosperity.
==
The evidence for creationism is that actual science has not yet
explained absolutely everything.
==
Philip Johnson, the founder of the ID movement, is on the record as an
HIV-denier who thinks AIDS is caused by "an unhealthy lifestyle".
==
Storms' Evolution Bill Lets Teachers Contradict Theory

TAMPA - Florida Sen. Ronda Storms, a Republican from Valrico, is taking on the theory of evolution.
On Friday she introduced an Academic Freedom Act designed to tweak the state's recently adopted educational standard that calls for science teachers to teach evolution.
Storms said the new bill merely says teachers should have the freedom to teach what they want, including theories that may contradict the prevalent theories of biological and chemical evolution. The bill does not mention creationism or intelligent design.
The basis of her bill came from activists who failed in February to persuade the state Board of Education to allow the leeway. The board voted 4-3 two weeks ago to explicitly require the teaching of evolution.
Storms' bill states that any curriculum presented to Florida's public school students about the origins of life must not be used to promote religious doctrine, even though evolution proponents derided previous similar proposals as religious indoctrination in the guise of scientific inquiry.
The bill, in part, says that if teachers wish to present a teaching plan that doesn't conform to state standards regarding chemical and biological evolution, they could be sanctioned and that the Legislature should adopt measures to protect them.
The bill says that "in many instances educators have experienced or feared discipline, discrimination, or other adverse consequences as a result of presenting the full range of scientific views regarding chemical and biological evolution.
"Every public school teacher in the state's K-12 school system shall have the affirmative right and freedom to objectively present scientific information relevant to the full range of scientific views regarding biological and chemical evolution in connection with teaching any prescribed curriculum regarding chemical or biological origins," Storms' bill states.
The proposed law is modeled after a bill that is has been introduced to legislatures in several states during the past four years.
Backers of teaching evolution say the instruction is needed to keep Florida's students on pace with others across the nation who are being taught about the theory's general support by conventional scientific circles as valid science based on empirical evidence.
According to the state Department of Education Web site, the revised standards were developed by a committee of educators, scientists, business leaders and school administrators who held lengthy discussions about the matter during the past year.
"As part of that process, more than 10,000 individuals provided more than 260,000 ratings and 20,000 comments via a Web-based system," the state's Web site says. "In addition, the Department of Education held five public hearings throughout the state (Tallahassee, Jacksonville, Miramar and two in Orlando) to collect public feedback on the standards."
==
Originally "kind" was synonymous with "species".
But when scientists discovered example after
example after example of one species evolving
into another, creationists decided not to show
some sort of intellectual integrity and admit
that they were wrong. Instead they changed the
definition of "kind" to be something other than
speciation.
==
In regarding to teaching creationism in public school science classes,
when creationists say things like, "It's only fair (to the children)
to teach both theories," what they really mean is that since they
don't like the science, because it contradicts their religious
beliefs, they want to teach their religious beliefs to children. "It's
only fair to teach both viewpoints."
There are two serious problems with this. One is a category problem,
and the other is a serious legal problem.
The category problem has to do with the fact that in science classes
you're supposed to be teaching... well, uh, SCIENCE.
Creationism isn't science. When creationists use the term "both
theories," they're using a false comparison based on a semantic
ambiguity of two different meanings of the word "theory." Look up
"theory" in the dictionary.
A *scientific* theory is "A set of statements or principles devised to
explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been
repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make
predictions about natural phenomena" (American Heritage Dictionary,
4th Ed.). Creationism is only a "theory" in the sense of "An
assumption based on limited information or knowledge; a conjecture,"
and a faith-based conjecture, at that. These two meanings are almost
the opposite of one another. The first is based on extensive
scientific examination and testing. The second is basically an initial
hypothesis, or just a guess.
These are not the same thing at all. There is no comparison. The
scientific theory of evolution has been repeatedly tested,
experimentally refined and verified by scientific research, and is
fruitfully used to guide further scientific investigation. The
"theory" (i.e., the religious doctrines) of creationism is none of
these things. It's religious doctrine believed on faith.
Religious doctrine is not science. Anti-evolution rhetoric based on
religious belief is not science. Pseudoscience claims, motivated by
religious belief, and used to pretend creationism is scientific, are
not science.
Thus, to teach children "both theories" is to seriously confuse them,
even fundamentally mislead them, about science. It is not at all fair
to children to tell them, "We're going to teach you about science,"
and then teach them sectarian religious concepts as if they are
science, or teach them false claims about science based on religious
motivations and call it science. When something isn't science, we
shouldn't be misleading children by pretending it's science.
Creationism doesn't belong in science classes because it isn't
science. Attacks against evolution based on creationist beliefs don't
belong in science classes because they aren't science.
The legal problem has to do with the Establishment Clause of the First
Amendment of the Constitution. In numerous court cases it has been
determined quite consistently that the idea of teaching creationism as
if it's science in public schools is a violation of the First
Amendment. (Because it's sectarian religious belief, not science.)
In particular, in the 2005 case in Pennsylvania (Kitzmiller v. Dover
Area School District), it was determined that the current popular form
of creationism called "intelligent design" is simply another tactic of
the creationist strategy of trying to get religious beliefs into
public school science classes by falsely pretending that sectarian
religious beliefs are science. (The case didn't determine anything we
didn't already know about this creationist tactic, it's just that the
case is an example of arriving at the same conclusion through a formal
legal process.) Again, this is a violation of the First Amendment.
Creationist opposition to the teaching of evolution in public school
science classes is simply one major skirmish of a culture war going on
in the United States between people with conservative religious
beliefs and everyone else. We are where we are at now as the result of
our history, and in this case it's the result of religious traditions
in the United States that have opposed evolution and other areas of
science for over a hundred years. The current threads of
anti-evolution thought began with the backlash against the promotion
of science education that started in the late 1950s, most notably from
the movement started by the young earth creationist Henry M. Morris.
The young earth creationists virtually singled-handedly created the
idea of a "scientific creationism, " by generating a significant body
of literature misrepresenting and distorting science, filled with
false "scientific" information.
To this very day we are still dealing with the false "facts" and
fallacious arguments that young earth creationists put out in the
1960s and 1970s, still dealing with the fallout of a whole generation
(almost two now) of conservative religious people brought up being
taught all these false claims about science that are actually not
scientific at all. In discussions with creationists that are about
specific areas of science, the problem is not what creationists know,
but what they think they know that just ain't so. Creationists will
often say that their disagreement with scientists isn't about the
facts, but about the interpretation of the facts. Yet in actual
discussions with creationists, when dealing with the specific details
about specific areas of science, we find that creationists dispute the
facts all the time. (Most often they're simply unaware of the facts,
but when you bring them to their attention they deliberately ignore them.)
The solution to this particular skirmish in the culture war is to meet
it head on. The reason the problem has become as extensive as it is
right now is precisely because in the past when people with certain
religious beliefs attacked science, we've had the general social
tendency to "turn the other cheek" and give space to them - out of a
misplaced respect for religious belief. If people want to believe
things on the basis of faith, and they do this privately, more power
to them. But when people speak out publicly, attacking science, using
pseudoscientific claims that are factually wrong and using arguments
that are logically fallacious, they need to be confronted head on just
as publicly, specifically addressing their erroneous claims and
explaining why they are wrong. They should not be given undue respect
for publicly proclaiming manifestly false claims about science just
because their false claims are motivated by religious belief.
It's because those who came before us did not meet creationists head
on as openly, forthrightly, and explicitly as should have been done,
that the problem has festered and grown so that we have the even worse
problems we're having now. So now it's up to us to deal with it, and
now we know we cannot shy away from this because we see what shying
away from the problem in the past has led to. If we do not meet these
creationists head on, and deal with them with all the forthright
critical scrutiny they deserve, they really will sabotage science
education in this country, as has been their objective for almost 50
years. And that's the only thing that's fair to the children of this country.
==
The faith of a creationist is a belief not only without physical evidence but
contrary to all objective reality. Even a fundamentalist is able to make that
distinction. He or she might claim out of religious faith that what he
or she thinks the Bible says is true, so reality as discovered by science has
to be wrong, but most understand that physical evidence & scripture are
different bases upon which to draw conclusions. They unfortunately lie, saying
that the Bible isn't at odds with objective reality, when its literal meaning
clearly & plainly is.
==
40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, God, OxyContin, and Other
Oddities on Trial in Pennsylvania   by Matthew Chapman (Author)
Dover trial
==
Richard Feynman, the physicist, in characterizing the aim of science and the
aim of religion said that science seeks to uncover immutable laws that can
predict events. The inverse square law of gravitation, laws of motion, and the
effect of acceleration on mass, once revealed, changed how the universe is
understood. Scientific method postulates a theory and then tests it, always
open to new facts that will refine it. Oppositely, religion formulates
opinions as dogma that, like conspiracy theory, is not accountable to fact.
Dogma resists information that would compromise its premise. As long as
science could not explain phenomenon, religion took as its providence
superstitious understanding and assigned the mysteries of the world to an
all-knowing God, who spoke to human creatures through inspired texts
interpreted by anointed priests and ministered to the uneducated. Little has
changed in the process of religious knowing, but much has changed in
scientific understanding.
His faith seemed to have given him a confidence unwarranted by the facts.
==
Creationists launch peer reviewed journal

Im not making this up, I swear. Answers in Genesis, the same nonsensical
outlet that has given us Ken Hams Creation Museum, recently launched a peer
reviewed technical journal, called, of course, Answers Research Journal. The
idea, we learn from the About section of the journals web page, is to provide
an outlet for interdisciplinary scientific and other relevant research from
the perspective of the recent Creation and the global Flood within a biblical
framework. See, apparently there has been a pressing need for such a journal,
because people want to know they can trust what is published on the Internet,
and they can give you absolute assurance that the papers we will be publishing
in Answers Research Journal are of the highest scientific and theological
standard. Of course, a high theological standard is a bit of an oxymoron, but
lets not quibble on the details.
The editor of this prestigious new arrival on the scientific scene is Andrew
A. Snelling, who is so unknown and apparently insecure enough that he puts
B.Sc. (Hons) after his name, before Ph.D. (in geology, from the University of
Sidney). The esteemed (by some) Dr. Snelling has published an astounding 24
technical papers in 30 years of research, an average that would not get him
tenure at the local community college. Accordingly, in 1998 Snelling had to
content himself with joining the faculty of the Institute for Creation
Research in California. Nevertheless, in the same year he won a whopping three
(!!) prizes at the Fourth International Conference on Creationism for three
technical papers he submitted (my hunch is that they were only three papers
submitted, but I could be wrong, there may have been four). We are not told
who else is on the editorial board of ARJ, perhaps the distinguished
scientists who agreed to oversee the peer review process were afraid of losing
tenure at their institutions. Damn secularist fascists in charge of American
universities!
I simply couldnt wait to start reading about all these new exciting scientific
discoveries informed by a Christian perspective, and I wasnt disappointed. The
current volume of ARJ features the proceedings of the Microbe Forum, where we
learn that for many years the roles of microbes as part of Gods wonderful
design have been neglected. Perhaps it is because many people associate
microbes as the cause of death, disease, and suffering. I think these many
people have a point: what the hell was god thinking? Well, abstracts presented
at the Forum begin to tell us, as titles include such gems as a Creationist
Model of Bacterial Mutations, Creation Microbiology and the Origin of Disease,
the highly technical-sounding Viral/Bacterial Attenuation and Its Link to
Innate Oncolytic Potential: Implications of the Perfect Original Creation in
the Beginning, and my favorite: Pathogenicity Tools and Mycotoxins: In the
Beginning or after the Fall?
But the rest of the current issue of ARJ is not to be neglected either. For
instance, in Microbes and the Days of Creation, by Alan Gillen (unknown
academic affiliation), we learn that ongoing research, based on the creation
paradigm, appears to provide some answers to puzzling questions such as where
do microbes fit into the creation account? ... Were they created along with
the rest of the plants and animals in the first week of creation, or were they
created later, after the Fall? In a show of pure scientific balance, the author
admits that the answers to these questions are not explicit in Scripture, so
the answers cannot be dogmatic. Gillen ends up postulating that microbes were
created as biological systems with plants, animals, and humans on multiple
days [of creation week] because as we well know God made His creation fully
mature, and complex forms fully formed. Amen.
No need to go any further with this nonsense, as good as it is for a chuckle
or two. The real question is: why? Why do creationists feel compelled to have
a science museum, a peer reviewed journal, or, in the case of the Discovery
Institute Intelligent Design think tank, a recently established (but very
secretive) research laboratory? Could it be science envy? Indeed, even more
broadly, why do creationists feel compelled to argue their case at all? Isnt
faith enough? When I was living in the south of the US it often happened that
someone would engage me in an impromptu debate, where they were sure that I
would see the light of (their) overwhelming reason and convert on the spot.
When, instead, I managed to put them on the defensive, they would play with
evident pride the faith trump card: I believe in spite of evidence. OK, fair
enough (if more than a bit moronic), but then why did you just try to argue
with me? Arguing, teaching, and doing research means that one accepts the rule
of rational, evidence-based discourse. And yet creationists want to have it
both ways, and promptly retreat behind the all-encompassing shield of faith
when things get rough.
I suspect that creationists, deep down, have internalized the much-despised
secular ethos that one has to have reasons for ones positions, and they feel
that they really dont have rationality on their side. They seek respectability
through fake museums and peer review journals because they know that the Middle
Ages are over, and just shouting ones faith in god isnt gonna cut it anymore
(modern society disqualifying stoning and burning at stakes doesnt help
either). Indeed, the very progression that we have seen during the 20th
century, from the Scopes to the Dover trials, from young earth creationism
pretending to keep evolution teaching out of public schools entirely to
so-called intelligent design (which accepts a lot of science, including
natural selection) begging for a bit of classroom time, is a path of constant
retreat, away from silly biblical literalism, inching ever closer to modern
science. The most advanced of the creationist ilk, the ID supporters, have
intellectually advanced all the way into the early 19th century (after Paley,
before Darwin), while young earth creationists are still trying to come to
terms with the Enlightenment. Perhaps if we wait another century or two theyll
enter early 20th century science and make peace with Darwin. Now, that would be
a miracle to behold.
===
Maybe they don't actually desire an uneducated, servile populus, but they 
sure don't seem to have any strong repulsion for the idea.
==
Masters of disguise: Secrets of nature's 'great pretenders' revealed
A gene which helps a harmless African butterfly ward off predators by giving
it wing patterns like those of toxic species, has been identified by
scientists who publish their findings today (20 February 2008).
The mocker swallowtail butterfly, Papilio dardanus, is unusual because it
emerges from its chrysalis with one of a large number of different possible
wing patterns and colours. This is different from most butterfly species which
are identified by a common wing pattern and colour. Furthermore, some of the
different patterns that the mocker swallowtail exhibits mimic those of
poisonous species, which affords this harmless insect a valuable disguise
which scares off predators.
Biologists are interested in finding out exactly how wing pattern is
determined in the mocker swallowtail, because they believe that understanding
how these different mimic patterns evolved may shed new light on whether such
evolutionary changes occur in small gradual steps, or sudden leaps.
In the 1950s scientists realised there must be a genetic 'switch' controlling
which of the numerous possible wing patterns is expressed in each individual
mocker swallowtail, but until now the location and identity of the genes
involved have remained a mystery.
The new study, published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, shows how a
team of biologists used molecular tags and DNA sequencing in order to pinpoint
the part of its genetic code that determines wing pattern and colour. Their
study suggests that a developmental gene called 'invected', which was already
known to be involved in the early embryonic development of butterflies, is
behind the allocation of different wing patterns in mocker swallowtails.
Professor Alfried Vogler of Imperial College London's Department of Life
Sciences and the Natural History Museum, one of the authors on the paper,
explains, however, that further investigation is needed to figure out exactly
how this gene works.
"We've taken a big step here towards identifying exactly how this fascinating
insect species is endowed with such a wide variety of extremely useful wing
patterns. However, identifying the area of the genome involved in this process
is just the first step - we now need to look in more detail at the differences
in the invected gene, and another gene located next to it, to find out exactly
how they produce the different forms," he said.
He goes on to emphasise the significance of studying the mocker swallowtail,
saying: "You could argue that there would be little point in a species which
slowly evolved to mimic a poisonous butterfly over the course of generations -
the disguise is only useful if full and complete. This could suggest the
possibility of sudden leaps in evolution occurring in this species, which
would be an incredibly exciting discovery - by studying the changes in gene
sequences we will find out if this happened or not."
The mocker swallowtail is found in sub-Saharan Africa and has a wingspan of
between three-and-a-half, and four-and-a-quarter inches. Only females of the
species exhibit the wing patterns that mimic other butterflies. All the males
are yellow, with black markings and have the typical tails of most swallowtail
butterflies.
==
Why Evolution Is Important in the Classroom

It's very important that children be taught the facts about evolution, says a
report released yesterday by the National Academy of Sciences.
The report comes at an opportune time. Evolution is under classroom attack
from intelligent design, a non-scientific explanation of life's origins as
divinely manufactured; if ID-friendly curricula pass in Florida and Texas,
other states will likely follow.
Unfortunately, while the report nicely summarizes the facts of evolution, it
does a poor job explaining why learning about evolution is so important.
The press release quotes Institute of Medicine president Harvey Fineberg, who
said that "understanding evolution is essential to identifying and treating
disease." However, it's possible to disbelieve evolution's bigger picture
while accepting its role in bacterial shifts. The accompanying brochure [pdf]
comes a bit closer to the point, asserting that "teaching non-scientific
concepts in science class will only confuse students about the processes,
nature, and limits of science," but this isn't followed through in the full
report.
The report's conclusion says that understanding evolution is necessary to
making long-term decisions about resource consumption and environmental
protection, but it's hardly difficult to find common ground with a sensible
intelligent design proponent on questions of climate change or deforestation.
In short, there's little to sway a parent contemplating the introduction of
intelligent design to their child's science class.
Finally, buried in the FAQ is the advice that "critical thinking does not mean
that all criticisms are equally valid. Critical thinking has to be based on
reason and evidence. Discussion of critical thinking or controversies does not
mean giving equal weight to ideas that lack essential supporting evidence."
Those words ought to be pulled off page 52 and plastered in big, bold type
across the report's cover, right along with "good luck finding a decent life
science job" and "the rest of the civilized world will laugh at you."
==
If one of our resident creationists can propose a
mechanism for me which produces a hugely high rate of
mutation in the germ cells while excluding it from any
other cells, a Nobel Prize in medicine surely awaits
--- such information would be critically valuable to
cancer researchers. But alas, no such mechanism
exists. The rate of mutations made necessary by
creationist "arguments" would certainly have killed
all of Noah's children before they even had time to
have any kids of their own. In order to produce 400
beneficial alleles in just 4,000 years, humanity would
have been beset with cancers at a rate that would have
wiped them all out millenia ago.
Not only, according to creationists, must these new
alleles have appeared after the Big Boat, but,
according to their, uh, "theory", all of these
mutations must have appeared in the space of just
*4,000 years* -- the period of time since the Big
Flood. That gives a rate of BENEFICIAL MUTATIONS,
which add NEW GENETIC INFORMATION, of one every 10
years, or roughly two every generation ------- a much
higher rate of beneficial mutation than has ever been
recorded anywhere in nature. Nowhere today do we see
such a rate anywhere near so high. So not only would I
like to know (1) what produced this
extraordinarily high rate of non-deleterious
mutations, but (2) what stopped it (indeed, what
stopped it conveniently right before the very time
when we first developed the technological means to
study it).
Since less than 1% of observed mutations are
beneficial (the vast majority of mutations are indeed
deleterious or neutral and have no effect), that means
for every beneficial mutation which added a new
allele, there should have been roughly 99 others which
did not. So to give us roughly 400 beneficial
mutations would require somewhere around 40,000 total
mutations, a rate of approximately 100 mutations in
each locus EVERY YEAR, or 2,000 mutations per locus
for EACH GENERATION. Do you know what we call people
who experience mutation rates that high? We call them
"cancer victims". The only people
with mutation rates even remotely comparable were
victims of Chernobyl.
In order for any of those mutations to be passed on to
the next generation to produce new alleles, they MUST
occur in the germ cells - - sperm or egg. And since
any such high rate of mutation in a somatic cell
(non-sperm or egg) would have quickly produced a fatal
case of cancer, if the creationists are right this
mutation rate could ONLY have occurred in the germ
cells and could NOT have occurred in any of the
somatic cells.
==
John Calvin famously said, "who will venture to place the authority of
Copernicus above that of the Holy Spirit?"
==
1. Please explain what a "kind" is. Creationists have been using
this term for decades and still can't define it in any testible fashion.
2. Please point out some huge, unbridgeable gap for which we have no
transition fossils. I bet you can't!
3. Please explain how animals that require old-growth forests
survived 200+ years without food while waiting for forests to
redevelop after the flood, and then grow old.
==
http://www.creationism.org
==
VATICAN CITY -- The Vatican newspaper has published an article saying
"intelligent design" is not science and that teaching it alongside
evolutionary theory in school classrooms only creates confusion.
The article in Tuesday's editions of L'Osservatore Romano was the latest in a
series of interventions by Vatican officials -- including the pope -- on the
issue that has dominated headlines in the United States.
The author, Fiorenzo Facchini, a professor of evolutionary biology at the
University of Bologna, laid out the scientific rationale for Darwin's theory
of evolution, saying that in the scientific world, biological evolution
"represents the interpretative key of the history of life on Earth."
He lamented that certain American "creationists" had brought the debate back
to the "dogmatic" 1800s, and said their arguments weren't science but ideology.
"This isn't how science is done," he wrote. "If the model proposed by Darwin
is deemed insufficient, one should look for another, but it's not correct from
a methodological point of view to take oneself away from the scientific field
pretending to do science."
Intelligent design "doesn't belong to science and the pretext that it be
taught as a scientific theory alongside Darwin's explanation is unjustified, "
he wrote.
"It only creates confusion between the scientific and philosophical and
religious planes."
Supporters of "intelligent design" hold that some features of the universe and
living things are so complex they must have been designed by a higher
intelligence. Critics say intelligent design is merely creationism -- a
literal reading of the Bible's story of creation -- camouflaged in scientific
language and say it does not belong in science curriculum.
Facchini said he recognized some Darwin proponents erroneously assume that
evolution explains everything. "Better to recognize that the problem from the
scientific point of view remains open," he said.
But he concluded: "In a vision that goes beyond the empirical horizon, we can
say that we aren't men by chance or by necessity, and that the human
experience has a sense and a direction signaled by a superior design."
The article echoed similar arguments by the Vatican's chief astronomer, the
Rev. George Coyne, who said "intelligent design" wasn't science and had no
place in school classrooms.
Pope Benedict XVI reaffirmed in off-the-cuff comments in November that the
universe was made by an "intelligent project" and criticized those who in the
name of science say its creation was without direction or order.
==
Whatever terms they choose to call it (creationism vs. intelligent design)
the current ideology ultimately shortchanges the country. 
==
Florida lawmaker proudly rejects scientific expertise As Florida gears up to
revise state science standards, they seem insistent on topping the
anti-science nonsense which earned Kansas such mockery. The St. Petersburg
Times education blog reports:
Another key lawmaker says it's likely the Legislature will weigh in on the
evolution controversy. And in this case, the lawmaker, Rep. Joe Pickens,
R-Palatka, says he has concerns about the proposed state standards himself.
"If it becomes a matter for legislative discussion, then I would have opinions
that if it's going to be presented, it's presented  in a manner that is not
potentially exclusive of any other theory," including creationism, said
Pickens, the powerful chair of the House Schools and Learning Council.
Reporter Ron Matus adds:
Among scientists, there is virtually no debate about the fundamental soundness
of Darwin's theory. "But far and away," Pickens said, "most of the people who
are our constituents, and who vote for us, are not scientists."
So, you know, screw the experts, we'll decide what is and isn't science the
same way we pick the next American Idol.
Next, Florida makes a bid for those space tourism dollars by selectively
repealing gravity.
==
In surveys conducted in 2005, people in the United States and 32 European
countries were asked whether to respond true, false or not sure to this
statement: Human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of
animals. The same question was posed to Japanese adults in 2001.
The United States had the second-highest percentage of adults who said the
statement was false and the second-lowest percentage who said the statement
was true, researchers reported in the current issue of Science.
Only adults in Turkey expressed more doubts on evolution. In Iceland, 85
percent agreed with the statement.
==
Antievolution resolutions spreading through northern Florida
At least nine county school boards in northern Florida have adopted
resolutions calling for the state board of education "to revise the new
Sunshine State Standards for Science such that evolution is not presented as
fact, but as one of several theories," according to a January 23, 2008, report
from Florida Citizens for Science. These resolutions represent a backlash to a
draft set of new state science standards, which are presently undergoing
revision in response to comments from the public. The state board of education
is expected to consider the revised draft set of standards at its meeting on
February 19, 2008.
Reviewing the draft standards at the request of NCSE and Florida Citizens for
Science, Lawrence S. Lerner described them as "a giant step in the right
direction." He estimated that, evaluated by the same criteria used in the
Fordham Foundation's report The State of State Science Standards 2005, the
draft set of standards would receive a high B, adding, "With a little bit of
extra effort, Florida could bring that up to an A." The previous set of
standards, adopted in 1999, received a grade of F in the Fordham Foundation's
report.
A conspicuous improvement in the draft set of standards is the treatment of
evolution. In the previous set of standards, the e-word -- "evolution" -- was
altogether absent. In the draft set, it is not only used but even featured as
a "big idea" around which the standards are organized. Newspapers around the
state hailed the change, with the Tallahassee Democrat, for example, writing
(October 23, 2007), "For science education in our state to be competitive, it
must include the teaching of evolution and the explicit acknowledgment that
empirical evidence over the past century and a half strongly supports it."
But the county school boards in Baker, Clay, Hamilton, Holmes, Jackson,
Madison, St. Johns, Taylor, and Washington counties -- all in northern Florida
-- have adopted virtually identical resolutions opposing the improvement. Wired
Science's Brandon Keim reports (January 22, 2008), "So far, not a single
superintendent from those ... school boards has been available for comment. At
least Willard Fair, chairman of the state Board of Education, ... was willing
to get on the phone and say that he had no comment whatsoever."

Reporters in Florida were luckier in securing comment from supporters of the
resolutions, however. The Jacksonville Times-Union (January 17, 2008)
reported, "Some school superintendents say the resolutions reflect the
religious nature of their constituents in Northeast Florida," quoting Baker
County Superintendent Paula Barton as saying, "To be honest with you, we are a
strong Christian community here," and reporting Nassau County Superintendent
John Ruis as describing himself as a strong believer in biblical creationism.
Similarly, according to Ron Matus's story in the St. Petersburg Times (January
24, 2008), Dixie County school superintendent Dennis Bennett explained, "We
just wanted to get it on the record that we're a Judeo-Christian community and
we believe in academic freedom," and Ken Hall, a school board member in Madison
County, commented, "We're not asking that evolution not be taught, just that it
be taught as a theory, one of several. I'm a Christian. And I believe I was
created by God, and that I didn't come from an amoeba or a monkey."

In his report, Matus observed that existing case law suggests that the state
board of education "would face an uphill court battle if it were to include
alternative theories" as the resolutions urge. He also noted, "in the
scientific community there is virtually no debate on the fundamental soundness
of Charles Darwin's theory. Scores of scientific societies and organizations
have issued statements in support of evolution, including the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Academy of Sciences
and the National Science Teachers Association."

"one of several theories"

Several means... what? Five, six, seven? Ten? I think somebody should ask them
to list these theories.

It can't be said enough about creationist politicians: they're liars. They
have *one* other theory in mind. And they're only asking for it to be taught
alongside evolution because even they know they can't get evolution eliminated
altogether. If they could make it just their theory, they'd do it in a second.
==
a) It is not a "prediction" about the evidence at all, but just a hand-waving
assertion. No experiment or observation is proposed to test the prediction
b) It has a couple of built-in escapes--"unlikely" and "substantial"--so no
matter how much evidence of evolutionary change is found, they can always
insist "that's not substantial enough," or "OK, so maybe it happened in those
cases, but you've got to find a lot more to demonstrate that it is likely."
Creationists don't claim that there are no transitional fossils --
creationists just claim that there are missing links.
Unfortunately, that makes it totally vacuous, since there is no conceivable
mechanism for preserving every single transitional form, so "missing links"
are expected under evolutionary theory. Of course, "no transitional fossils"
would be a prediction (a wrong one, but a prediction nevertheless). But in its
typical horror of saying anything definitve, ID goes for, "There may be
transitional fossils or there may not, and we have no way of saying which will
be missing and which will not."
==
The latest issue of The Skeptic pointed out that the Templeton Foundation has
offered millions of dollars to fund experiements that will demonstrate ID. In
two years there have been no applications for these grants. IDers complain that
they are shut out of scientific research because there is no money, but when
there is money they still don't do any research. Hummm I wonder why? 
==
Mendel.
Actually, he would have counted, except for the fact that the abbot who
succeeded Mendel after his death agreed with church authorities in that
puttering around in a garden with pea plants was behavior unbecoming of a man
of the cloth, and burned all of Mendel's journals and notes. They would have
had Mendel's report destroyed, too, but, it was already published and still in
circulation.
==
ID is a complete dead-end scientifically. It just sits there and does
nothing. For scientists this an even greater defect than being wrong. An
incorrect perspective might still lead you to something useful and
interesting, even if just the discovery that our perspective needs to be
changed. ID doesn't even do that. 
==
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/bios/d_dewitt.asp
==  fundie
"Unraveling The Origins Controversy by David A.DeWitt, an associate professor
of biology at Liberty University and an adjunct professor at the Institute
for Creation Research.
==
"Ultimately, creationism is not just bad science to me, it's bad Christianity,
it's Bible worship," said Mr. Gishlick, 32, a paleontology Ph.D. "There's just
no reason to look at these patterns of layered sediment, or in the fossil
record, or at the stars, and think that what you're seeing isn't what you're
seeing. God doesn't require you to be stupid, to deny what you see, to deny
what you know."
==
Do you think God created the earth just to look old - created it with
all of the geological features that it would have had if it had been
around for millions of years - even though the earth's geological
features were not really produced by geological processes? In other
words, do you think the geologists are right about the geology, but
they're wrong just because they don't take into account that God
created the earth with these geological features in place?
==
"The U.S. National Academy of Sciences has stated that "intelligent design,
and other claims of supernatural intervention in the origin of life" are not
science because they cannot be tested by experiment, do not generate any
predictions, and propose no new hypotheses of their own"
==
Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity (Study
Guide Edition) by Nancy R. Pearcey and Phillip E. Johnson (Hardcover -
Sep 2, 2005) The second section is focused on evolution vs
intelligent design
==
Science, Evolution, and Intelligent Design
http://www.ucsusa.org/scientific_integrity/interference/intelligent-design.html
===
A man full of faith is
simply one who has lost (or never had) the capacity for clear and
realistic thought.  He is not a mere fool: he is actually ill.  Worse,
he is incurable, for disappointment, being essentially an objective
phenomenon, cannot permanently affect his subjective infirmity.  His
faith takes on the virulence of a chronic infection.
==
Huckabee: Amend Constitution to be in 'God's standards'
The United States Constitution never uses the word "God" or makes mention of
any religion, drawing its sole authority from "We the People." However,
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee thinks it's time to put an end
to that.
"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution,"
Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier
to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living
god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in
God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with
some contemporary view."
When Willie Geist reported Huckabee's opinion on MSNBC's Morning Joe, co-host
Mika Brzezinski was almost speechless, and even Joe Scarborough couldn't
immediately find much to say beyond calling it "interesting,"
Scarborough finally suggested that while he believes "evangelicals should be
able to talk politics ... some might find that statement very troubling, that
we're going to change the Constitution to be in line with the Bible. And
that's all I'm going to say."
Geist further noted of Huckabee that if "someone without his charm," said
that, "he'd be dismissed as a crackpot, but he's Mike Huckabee and he's
bascially the front-runner."
==
Strangely, ID  supporters don't seem mention one testable prediction that
follows on from their 'theory' especially since it is frequently explicitly
stated by the IDiots themselves, namely that organisms abruptly appear on
earth with no relationship to existing organisms (presumably poofed out of
this air by 'the designer'. This can easily be checked via genomic DNA
sequence comparisons which will betray any common ancestry relationships.
==
Fundies claim that eaching science, based on well-accepted theories
backed by factual evidence, is somehow promoting a particular religion
in public school. "Imagine them arguing that
the Establishment Clause would be violated by teaching a calculus
class that only expresses the 'worldview' of mathematics without any
sense of the divine."
==
Dr. John Mark Lucas, who has
doctorates in both theology and science. He is opposed to
evolution, and believes in a recent 6 day creation. He
rejects the notion that science must be naturalistic to be
science. He wrote books titled "Recent Creationism:
Biblically Consistent And Scientifically Sound"; "Theistic
Evolution -- A Compromise Mixing Oil With Water"; and
"Evolution: A Threat To Both Faith And Society".
==
Why Intelligent Design is not Science
The intelligent design movement is exceptionally good at creating
false controversies and misconceptions. Yet their basic claims are
easily debunked.

* There is scientific controversy over evolution:
There is no debate about evolution among the vast majority of
scientists, and no credible alternative scientific theory exists.
Debates within the community are about specific mechanisms within
evolution, not whether evolution occurred.

* Structures found in nature are too complex to have evolved
step-by-step through natural selection [the concept of "irreducible
complexity"( 1)]:

Natural selection does not require that all structures have the same
function or even need to be functional at each step in the development
of an organism.

* Intelligent design is a scientific theory (2):
A scientific theory is supported by extensive research and repeated
experimentation and observation in the natural world. Unlike a true
scientific theory, the existence of an "intelligent" agent can not be
tested, nor is it falsifiable.

* Intelligent design is based on the scientific method (3):
Intelligent design might base its ideas on observations in the
natural world, but it does not test them in the natural world, or
attempt to develop mechanisms (such as natural selection) to explain
their observations (4).

* Most scientists are atheists (5) and believe only in the material
world:
Such accusations are neither fair nor true. The scientific method is
limited to using evidence from the natural world to explain phenomena.
It does not preclude the existence of God or other spiritual beliefs
and only states that they are not part of science. Belief in a higher
being is a personal, not a scientific, question.
==
Modern evolutionary theory (1) provides a robust explanation for how life on
earth evolved over timethrough the passing on of traits from one generation to
the next. It is one of the most studied, tested, and accepted theories in
science. Creationist attempts to challenge evolution have been common over the
last 100 years, but recent and dangerous challenges have come mainly from the
intelligent design (2) movement.
Intelligent design is based onthe concept ofirreducible complexity (3): an
idea that some structures found in nature are too complex to be explained by
natural selection and are best explained by some intelligent cause. The focus
of the movement is on mandating that intelligent design be taught as an
alternative to evolution in the science classroom. To do this, it relies on
creating false controversy and misconceptions about scienceespecially
evolution.Themovementhas been successful at gaining support from many
community leaders, including politicians and school board members.
A particularly disturbing element of the intelligent design movement is the
attempt to circumvent laws protecting separation of church and state (4) by
claiming that it is a scientific theory not a religious belief.
==
There is a section of the human brain that allows us
to process new data and incorporate it into our memory. Studies show
that when a person is confronted with "new data" that they "cannot
believe for one reason or another", that section of the brain will
literally not 'fire off" to even begin to process the data. Just more
evidence for my case that Creationism may very well be a mental disorder
==
It's their political influence that I am opposing, not their existence. Once
they lose political influence, I see no more need to bother with
them anymore -- until and unless they gain political influence again . . .
==
Chance or Purpose:Creation, Evolution, and a Rational Faith
By Christoph Schonborn
==
Biologist Joan Roughgarden's Evolution and Christian Faith,
astronomer Owen Gingerich's God's Universe,
geneticist Francis Collins' The Language of God.
==
I completely
concur with you on your rather scathing appraisal
regarding the YEC theory. I hate to even regard it as
such because it even gives theories a bad name. It's
ludicrous that a thinking person would even consider it
for serious assessment. Like many of the mystical claims
that are deeply rooted in much of creationism, I call it
faith-based pseudoscience.
I always get a kick out of the replies that attempt to
counter an acceptable likely theory with an absurd
rebuttal. I say the moon is likely made of a materials
found on earth and they counter that it "could" have been
made from cheese! Besides idiotic, I can't remember what
the name for that type of statement is. I think it's the
anything is plausible fallback theory. Hey! I think I
just discovered a new law! Well of course anything is
plausible, but not likely.
A standard tactic used in young earth creationist rhetoric is to say,
"Well, just look at the history of science, scientific ideas are
proved wrong all the time." The unspoken argument - which is thus an
argument-by- insinuation - is that "Therefore, my idea might be right."
This is, of course, just another rhetorical trick. It is certainly the
case that scientific ideas a proved wrong all the time - indeed the
whole purpose of science is to increasingly improve our understanding
by revising what we already know by building on it and "tweaking it"
with the additional relevant information about the world that we
acquire through continue scientific investigation and analysis.
The YEC argument-by- insinuation is, of course, quite wrong, and wrong
in two basic ways.
First, it fails to recognize that we learn about the real world by
"degrees of accuracy." In other words, while an idea may not be 100%
the absolute truth about reality, it can be very close. (And this is
what revision is all about, to continually improve ideas that are
already basically correct - correct to a good degree of accuracy, but
a degree that can of course continue to be improved on.) For example,
we learned hundreds of years ago that the earth orbits the sun, rather
than the other way around. Yet at the same time, while we know this
basic idea that the earth orbits the sun is the correct one, there
have been increasingly sophisticated scientific revisions of the basic
idea over the decades and centuries.
Second, it fails to recognize falsification in a coherent manner. In
other words, the YEC argument is actually self-contradictory, because
even while the argument implicitly acknowledges that ideas about the
real world can be and are falsified by scientific investigation of the
real world, young earth creationists turn right around and argue their
belief in young earth creationism from the basis that it is impossible
for science to falsify their belief (even while the rest of us realize
that historically young earth creationism was falsified in geological
science by 200 years ago).
==
Prior to the first vote, 9-7 against, our creationist individual, Kristin
Maguire, the new chairman of the state board of education (an elected post in
SC), or one of her allies, solicited critiques of Miller & Levine's "Biology"
the Raven, Johnson, Losos & Singer's "Biology." As mentioned in a previous
post, parties from Bob Jones U. and ICR submitted screeds.
[Brief, over-simplified digression for context: SC is a slightly more
culturally diverse state than might be apparent at first take. The
Upstate (the mountainous NW corner) is most fundified (although the
rural NASCAR downstate would come in close second). Bob Jones is
here. But so are the NA hq's for BMW and Michelin, which have brought
in a fair share of cosmo dissent. Overall, still very Republican .
==
Tthe old "second law of thermodynamics
prevents increases in information" thingie. Haven't
heard this one for years now. I thought all the
serious anti-evolutioners gave up on it years ago.

Ahhhhh, but I forget -- you are channeling ICR here.
And nobody HAS taken ICR seriously for years now . . .

Anyway . . . .

According to the creationists, all humans alive today
are descended from 8 people who got off a Really Big
Boat. Anyone who understands junior high genetics will
know that 8 people have between them a maximum
possible of 16 different alleles for each genetic
locus (in reality, the 8 people on the Big Boat would
have had even FEWER, since some of them were descended
from others and thus shared alleles, but for the sake
of argument we will give the creationists every
possible benefit of the doubt and assume that they
were ALL heterozygous and shared no alleles at all in
common). That means, if the creationists are correct
that "most mutations are deleterious" and that "no new
genetic information can appear through mutation",
there can not be any human genetic locus anywhere
today with more than 16 alleles, since that is the
MAXIMUM that could have gotten off the Big Boat.

But wait ---------- today we find human genetic loci
(such as hemoglobin or the HLA complex) that have well
over *400* different alleles (indeed some have over
*700* different alleles). Hmmmm. Since there could
have only been 16 possible on the Big Boat, and since
there are over 400 now, and since 400 is more than 16,
that means that somehow the GENETIC INFORMATION
INCREASED