The Lessons of Evolution

Just a reminder that the blog has moved to Wordpress

2011-12-05T18:35:00.001-05:00

I am now at Design by Evolution on Wordpress, sorry for all the scheduled posts that I didn't stop.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-11-27T22:53:00.000-05:00

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-11-20T18:49:00.000-05:00

Your Weekly Youtube: Atheist Musical Edition 3

2011-11-13T01:39:00.000-05:00

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-11-06T07:08:00.000-05:00

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-10-30T23:45:00.000-04:00

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-10-23T11:15:00.000-04:00

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-10-16T17:55:00.000-04:00

The Astronaut's Guide To Life In Space from NPR on Vimeo.

Question towards Other Wordpress Users

2011-10-13T18:38:00.001-04:00

Hi sorry to bother everybody but how do you follow non-wordpress blogs using wordpress?

I'm Moving to Wordpress

2011-10-13T18:17:00.002-04:00

This was a snap decision to move to Wordpress, but it is for the better. Blogger is a much better start up, but Wordpress is better. The new blog is Design by Evolution, please I'm looking for a better name (I am not very creative) and you can add your suggestion on this blog post or over there. I'm sorry for the lack of notice. I will make sure I post more reminders. Oh and no, I will not be able to transfer the feed automatically so you will need to go over there and put the new feed in yourself.

Creationist FAILS Part 3

2011-10-12T17:41:00.003-04:00

This is from a discussion of Lynn Margulis on our own discussion page (the referenced link is Lynn Margulis' wiki page):

How does this make us understand evolution better? Her theory isn't even one that is widely accepted by other evolutionists. Even your link calls her theory "on the fringe."

If her theory is true: where did the first DNA for either bacteria or virus come from?

Also, what evidence does she have that a bacteria causes "random" mutations that will result in a new function? (ie - how did bacteria cause a lizard to mutate to a mammal?)

This doesn't seem to clarify the evolutionary waters, only muddy it even more

Your Weekly Youtube: Remembering Steve Jobs

2011-10-09T22:20:00.000-04:00

Happy birthday Tim Minchin

2011-10-07T17:39:00.002-04:00

Yep, he was born October 7th 1975 (thank you skeptic history of the day).

Steve Jobs has died at age 56

2011-10-05T20:47:00.000-04:00

When I first heard the news I thought it was a rumour, similar to ones that have happened before (some causing slides in apple stocks) but this one appears to be true (perhaps just by sheer volume of discussions on it and the inevitability of it). Anyways it is unfortunate, as a little present here is his ted talk:

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-10-02T15:29:00.000-04:00

Your Weekly Youtube: WBC Edition

2011-09-26T00:00:00.001-04:00

This is from the friend of the blog CRL (http://rocketpropelledpeacocks.blogspot.com/). She was involved with the project.

Apparently their co-ordinator, Shirley Phelps had an illegit son (i.e. by her own standards she is going to hell):

Phelps-Roper is the wife of Brent D. Roper, and a mother of 11 children. In a 2007 UK documentary by Welsh personality Keith Allen, in which Phelps-Roper and some of her children agreed to appear, Phelps-Roper is shown admitting on camera that her oldest son was born out of wedlock. Allen found hypocritical Phelps-Roper's vocal condemnation on strangers having sexual congress outside of marriage while she herself was guilty of the same.^[8]^[9] According to Kansas City's The Pitch, Phelps-Roper doesn't deny that her son Sam, who was later adopted by Brent Roper, was born out of wedlock but refuses to reveal the identity of his biological father. The article states that estranged family members claim he was a man who was staying at a halfway house where she was doing her college internship.

The mentioned documentary is the one above.

Creationist FAILS Part Two

2011-09-25T09:15:00.004-04:00

This is mind numbing, we were talking about the age of the universe:

How can any age be based on the Sun when the current model of the Sun doesn't even fit reality?

The corona is 2 million degrees kelvin while the surface is 5800 Kelvin and Sunspots where we can see deepest into the Sun are around 4000 Kelvin. The source of a heat source is always hotter than anything else, yet the sunspots show the core of the Sun is cooler. Turn your heater on, the further you get from it the cooler it becomes, not hotter. A thermonuclear core requires it be hotter than the surface, thermodynamics require this to be so. Even a nuclear reactor is hottest at its core, not the material surrounding it. Nor does the current model even explain the corona or the solar wind. The solar wind is constantly accelerating as it gets further from the sun, out to the furthest we have been able to measure it. Anyone have a guess as to how particles are accelerated? We do it here on the Earth in experiments on a daily basis. To think the Sun is a sustained nuclear fusion goes against everything we know and all experimental evidence. Specifically study up on the second law of thermodynamics. Then try looking up particle accelerators and maybe, just maybe, you might come to the correct solution.

From:
http://www.controversialforums.com/controversial-issues-forums/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=150&start=50&st=0&sk=t&sd=a

Canadian Federation of Earth Sciences Official Statement on Evolution

2011-09-24T21:42:00.001-04:00

The CFES has one of the best official statements on evolution I have found, and not just because they're canadian :).

Christina Rad (ZOMGitscriss) is on TV!

2011-09-19T21:14:00.001-04:00

You may have heard of ZOMGitsCriss, if not look up her channel on youtube she has a lot of great videos. Anyways she was on the ABC show Q&A which I had never heard of until recently, I can't embed it so here.

Talk Like A Pirate Day!

2011-09-19T17:44:00.001-04:00

Yep, it's that day of year again where we talk like a pirate, celebrate the FSM's noodly appendages, and hope to slow down climate change by increasing the number of pirates across the planet. Aargh!! See you later, sorry about the posting (homework, internet connection, and about 50 other excuses..).

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-09-18T00:00:00.001-04:00

Look Up! The Billion-Bug Highway You Can't See from NPR on Vimeo.
For more similar sciency videos directed towards a younger audience check out "The Kid Should See this" a blog bringing together the best videos from everywhere.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-09-11T11:30:00.000-04:00

The Westboro Baptist Church schedule of terror

2011-09-11T02:03:00.000-04:00

Here is there schedule for New York:

World Trade Center in NewYork, NY September 11, 2011 7:00AM - 8:00 AM

WBC will picket the memorial dedication at theWorld Trade Center. We will hold a picketing vigil

outside your ceremony to remind you that there is aGod, there is a standard, and there is a day of

judgment coming on apace. Yet you continue toflip off God with all of your caterwauling. Not once

have you taken a breath from your red facesqual to think upon the idea that you were given a warning

and maybe, just maybe you should mourn foryour sins and obey your God. God is sick of your words!

You prop up EVERY evil person as a hero, no matterwhat they did in this life! It is shameful!

Ye have wearied the LORD with your words. Yetye say, Wherein have we wearied him? When ye

say, Every one that doeth evil is good in thesight of the LORD, and he delighteth in them; or, Where

is the God of judgment? Malachil 2:17

You saw His righteous judgment right before youreyes and yet you give the glory to another. Those

people that died in the towers were no moreevil than any other person. Neither were they heroes. They

were a remarkable example. TheLord your God has given each person a glorious opportunity to repent

from their sins and to obey Hisstandards. Instead you say in rebellious defiance: We willrebuild! Your

destruction is imminent! There is no morehope for this country!

Lower Manhattan Community Church in NewYork, NY September 11, 2011 10:45AM - 11:30

WBC to picket the Lower Manhattan Community Churchand false prophet Rick Warren where they

plan to hold "prayer" meetings and"honor the people who have kept our nation free." Where isthe

honor to God? You hypocrites. You sitaround with your so-called prayer, demanding that God fix all

the mess that you have made while you fliphim off in rebillious defiance by refusing to keep his

commandments. Warren says "Do youthink it needs prayer right now?" speaking of america. You have

actually asked a decent question for once inyour life! The answer is NO! america does not need prayer

right now. God does not hear your stinkyidolatrous prayer. What america needs more than air to breathe

and water to drink is a spirit of humility and repentance. Put away your idolatry (flag and military worship.)

Put away your adultery (divorce andremarriage.) Put away your murder (abortion.) Put away fag

marriage. Until this is done - PUT AWAY YOURFAKE PRAYERS!! They are a stink to His nose!

I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will notsmell in your solemn assemblies. Though ye offer me

burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will notaccept them: neither will I regard the peace

offerings of your fat beasts. Take thou awayfrom me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the

melody of thy viols. But let judgment rundown as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Amos 5:21-24

You should thank God for 9/11, heed the warning,and humble yourselves before His mighty hand.

Instead you caterwaul around worshipping the deadrather than the true and living God. We thank thee,

Lord of all for all thy righteous judgmentsand pray for more and worse! Your doom is coming america,

and soon!

9/11 Freedom Rally in NewYork, NY September 11, 2011 2:15PM - 3:00 PM

WBC to picket the 9/11 Freedom Rally to remind youthat the Lord your God brought this judgement

upon you to lead you into a war that youwill NEVER win. Your soldiers are continuing to come home

in body bags. Yet in defiance youcontinue to blather on about what "heroes the soldiers are"and how

"they fought for our freedoms." They don't give you any freedoms, they don't fight for your freedom -

they fight for a paycheck. The ONLY reasonyou have the freedoms that you have is because the LORD

your GOD has given them to you. Do yougive Him the glory? Of course not! You worship old glory

and pretend as though waving that flag aroundcan bring back a single one of those dead bodies. The

Lord your God has sent his servants to the streetsto blind your eyes and harden your hearts as the

destruction of this nation comes on apace. God does not hear the prayers of the wicked!

And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear yeindeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but

perceive not. Make the heart of thispeople fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes;

lest they see with their eyes, and hear with theirears, and understand with their heart, and convert,

and be healed. Isaiah 6:9-10

america is doomed! More and worse iscoming! Obey today!

New Meadowlands Stadium in EastRutherford, NJ September 11, 2011 5:30PM - 7:00 PM

WBC to picket the New York Jets vs. Dallas Cowboysat New Meadowlands Stadium. It is time for

america to lay aside her idols and worship the onlytrue and living God. You set these football players

up and worship them as gods. There is nothingthat can't/won't be worshipped in this country - from

flags and dead bodies to football players toraping priests. As you sit and worship your gods, know that

more and worse is coming!

And thus I saw the horses in the vision...the headsof the horses were as heads of lions; and out of

their mouths issued fire and smoke andbrimstone. By these three was the third of men killed...For

their power is in their mouth, and in their tails:for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads,

and with them they do hurt. And the rest ofthe men which were not killed by these plagues yet

repented not of the works of their hands, that theyshould not worship devils, and idols...neither

repented they of their murders, nor of theirsorceries, nor of their thefts. Revelation 9:17-21

It is no small thing to worship gods andidols.

Little children keep yourselves from idols. Amen. 1 John 5:21

How do you mark the passing of 9/11?

2011-09-11T00:54:00.002-04:00

  For me I have simply tried to learn more about it, right now I am watching a documentary on it on CBC's special day devoted to it. I remember watching it on TV from my babysitters well she was telling me, "this is important, pay attention" I was 5 I'm pretty sure so I was not exactly to entranced in fact I assumed since I had seen it, it must be fairly common and I grew up thinking that this was the environment we live in, now I am much more aware of the fact that this was a significant event and that this is incredibly important.
  Also, I have heard lots of speculation about a terror attack on the day, I want to make a couple things clear, although an attack on the actual memorial service would have the most headlines an attack on a major centre outside of the check points would be easier and cause more damage, ten years from now we might be memorializing the times square disaster (is that outside the check points? For all I know it could be within), a terrorist package could easily be hidden among a group of protestors such as the WBC (what are their plans about the memorial?). Or it could be a biological weapon, they are much more dangerous and can last for extended periods of time (for example the recent film contagion is about a natural contagious disease that they predict will kill 100 million in the first month according to the projections (1 billion victims in the first month, 1/10 mortality according to trailers), now imagine a human designed disease... much more than 100 million could become victims). Sarin could also be used like in Japan too. They might try a car bomb but I thinking that would likely be noticed very quickly.
  The day will probably go by uneventful but there is some risks that we should fear, we should still spread the message, see an unattended suitcase, don't go by unthinking.

Are you interested in evolution? Do you want to learn more from a perspective not constantly having to deal with creationists?

2011-09-10T23:03:00.000-04:00

Then I have the free textbook for you, on amazon the textbook "Logic of Chance" is free for a limited time on Kindles, Desktop Apps, Iphone and IPad apps (I have it for the iPod). I have only gotten according to them 2% of the way through it but so far the language is readable to a lay person and the information is well presented. GET IT WHILE YOU CAN!!!!

The 4th "BILL": Why Evolution is True

2011-09-10T11:36:00.001-04:00

If you don't know already over at panda's thumb they have a series called BILL or Brilliant And Illuminating Lectures and the fourth one is really good, it is "Why evolution is true" a lecture by the author of a book by the same name Jerry Coyne. Here is the lecture (I'm sorry I am to lazy to put any links, I have to type them because it won't let me copy and paste links so it is a lot of extra work and flaws are hard to find):

Do you have a topic you would like to see discussed?

2011-09-09T22:14:00.002-04:00

I am on a inspiration/news drought and I would like to know if there is anything you think is interesting or important that I have missed, or if there is an abstract evolutionary/biological concept that you think I should cover please mention it to me in the comments. Is there any complaints about this blog? Thank you for your time.

The Evolution of Creationism

2011-09-05T20:27:00.000-04:00

The subject of the evolution of creationism has recently received attention on some large blogs, PZ considers the defining moments in creationism the following:

The scopes trial. 1925.
The genesis flood. (Book) 1961.
The Mcleans vs. Arkansas Trial. 1982.
Intelligent Design.

I like his list but I would make one change, Dover vs. Kitzmiller should replace ID in my mind since Dover was the climax of ID creationism.

Regarding the Recent Fossil Find of an Early Bird

2011-09-05T19:27:00.001-04:00

A recent fossil find called Xianotingia has been said by many to knock the icon Archaeopteryx "off it's perch", there is a couple problems with this and the evidence is mostly thin. Even if this does turn out true the side branch it will find it's self on is close and still extremely significant and fairly close to the actual bird lineage. The fossil find is important and is helping to understand the evolutionary lineage leading up to birds but it isn't going demote Archaeopteryx very far from it's current importance if at all, and any new find could put it back at it's former position on the bird tree.
For more information see here (from the author of "Written in Stone" which I currently have in my book pile).

Who's your Daddy?

2011-09-04T17:48:00.000-04:00

The big daddy tract is fairly famous among christians, it is an idealistic picture of a creationist kid showing the atheistic teacher that evolution and gluons (particles that cause strong nuclear force) aren't real. Now a new parody has come out "who's your daddy?" at Bankrupt Artist v. 3. It is funny and worth a look.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-09-04T11:30:00.000-04:00

Objective Morality vs. Christianity

2011-09-03T14:32:00.001-04:00

Miscellaneous Awesome Links

2011-09-02T21:52:00.000-04:00

An interview with atheist Leo Behe son of famous IDer Michael Behe (the guy has a good blog).
Who's Who in Human Evolution, an interactive guide.
The Rise of Atheism from "Reasonable Christianity", a movement to make christianity a rational movement.
Why I love science, it offers up evidence, skepticism is created (peer review), and is answered (includes links to the other parts).
All 3 sets of the ten commandments (all their differences included).
Ancient DNA shows antibiotic resistance.

"If I go Extinct I will take as many Humans with me as I can"-Karner Blue Butterfly

2011-09-02T21:01:00.000-04:00

The onion is awesome.

Observation: How to make a post popular

2011-09-02T17:13:00.001-04:00

My top posts of all time that were not heavily promoted on other blogs mention one of these things:
Sex
Gays
God
Questions for Evolutionists
Punctuated Equilibrium
Or any with a Picture, hence this post

Yes this post is mostly just advertising.

Why the plague isn't coming back

2011-09-02T17:08:00.001-04:00

A new study has shown that the Black Plague that took 1/3 of Europe was two strains that are no longer found anywhere, they must have been much more virulent than modern strains, an example of evolution (because virulent strains eventually kill their host they burn off all the possible hosts limiting growth). This has happened before such as with the Spanish Flu, in fact the Swine Flu is a direct descendent of Spanish Flu.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-08-28T08:35:00.000-04:00

The Most Hated Family in America (Westboro Baptist Church)

2011-08-27T23:32:00.000-04:00

The Most Hated Family in America is probably the Westboro Baptist Church, this documentary is a discussion of the family Patriarch and it is a good look at the world's most famous hate group.

First Submission to the Secular Morals Project

2011-08-26T10:41:00.000-04:00

Might doesn’t make right, and morality is no exception to this rule. Though I am an atheist, I propose that, even if there was a god, he/she/it would not dictate morality, but instead use its infinite wisdom to figure out the right and wrong choice in every situation, and perhaps (or perhaps not) judge people accordingly, rather than throwing down tablets of arbitrary laws down from a mountaintop. While many believers criticize atheist morality because it does not come from a figure of authority, I believe that this is the greatest strength of godless (or, rather, god-free) morality. A system of moral rules based, not on some ancient tablet with arbitrary laws, but instead on an effort to make life better for all sentient beings, is backed by logic and compassion. A system based on religion is unavoidably arbitrary. “This is right.” “Why?” “God says so, and God is always right.” “Why does God think it’s right?” “Because it’s right.” (Or, the humble answer, which is a bit more logical, “Who are we to know God’s mysterious ways?”) The fact if, if you believe morality comes from god, and that there is no morality apart from god, then there is no reason to follow this morality (except to keep yourself out of hell or a hell-like-place.) If you’re willing to reduce morality to “what we do to please god and stay out of hell,” then you have no right to accuse atheists of being the immoral or selfish ones. If, on the other hand, you believe morality exists apart from god, or you’re an atheist as well, then we have something to discuss.

No, I don’t believe there is some abstract set of moral rules sitting on some cloud of perfection in some distant corner of the universe. Instead, I believe the basis of morality is something which we perhaps must take as an axiom, that man has a responsibility to fellow man/woman/chimp/sentient extraterrestrial/etc. But, just for fun, let’s make an attempt at justifying this axiom. Instead of asking why we should care about anyone apart from ourselves, I ask anyone supporting selfishness to justify themselves. Selfishness is utterly illogical: why do YOU matter more than the other 7 billion of us? Quick answer, you don’t. Yes, instinctively, you’re naturally going to be a little bit selfish, due to wanting to pass on your genome, but just because something is instinctive doesn’t make it at all logical or moral.

That said, even the blind following of instinct does not generally lead to pure selfishness. A lone human in the wilderness is unlikely to survive for very long, and has absolutely no chance of passing on its genes. As a result, humans are social animals, and have evolved a sense of responsibility towards members of our own species. That said, we come to the question of whether moral responsibility should obey species boundaries. While instinct would suggest that it would, again, I’d like to emphasize that my view of morality does not involve worship or blind following of instinct. If members of a nonhuman species, such as chimpanzees or hypothetical sentient aliens, have near-human abilities to reason and to feel pain, then it only makes sense that they be treated ethically. As to species who obviously do not have human capabilities, there is still no justification for unnecessary cruelty.

Morality, unlike the rest of philosophy, is something much better lived than debated. While I could talk (or type) about atheist systems of morality all day, they are utterly useless if they remain a set of rules on virtual paper. We do not have time to reason out a full moral system before we go out and live our lives, (perhaps this is why “prepackaged” moral systems such as those that are based on religion are so popular) but luckily, we do not need to. A simple goal of making the world a better place for all living things is all we need to go out and live a good, productive life. We have no need of arbitrary rules for each and every situation, for when we run into a moral quandary, we have the tools in our minds to examine it ourselves in the light of our goal to make the world a better. Morality becomes much more important when it is seen as something other than an ancient script which is right because it is right, and it comes to life when we live rather than just believing.

-Caitlin L. (CRL)

Remember, if you wish to submit to this project all you have to do is send your submission to ollyoxenfree AT yahoo. CA(not .com).

Concerning Post Activity

2011-08-24T18:16:00.000-04:00

I am sorry for the posting quantity recently but guests, close family death, an emerging school year, a sheer number of web material to read (I am still one day behind) and late summer room cleaning (my own version of spring cleaning) are converging against this blog, the school year will be coming soon for me so the post number may get down as low as 10 a month or lower.

Hurray!

2011-08-21T23:52:00.000-04:00

Gaddafi is a goner, the last lines of defence are breaking and by the morning he will be in custody or dead (hopefully the first one) unfortunately it is probably going like the Egyptian rebellion into grid-lock and dictator like military presence.

Leaflet

2011-08-21T16:28:00.000-04:00

via Flea Snobbery

Your Weekly Youtube: Planet of the Apes Edition

2011-08-21T08:30:00.001-04:00

Now to honour the planet of the apes I have added examples of intelligent real apes and (un)intelligent humans (see Ape with AK-47):

Call for Submissions for New Project: The Secular Morals Project

2011-08-15T20:42:00.000-04:00

I have decided to work on a new project, a project that will include guest works from any secularist/atheist/humanist who wants to share what ever they see as the reason for the maintenance and importance of some code of ethics may contribute.
If you want to make an entry it has to be between 400-1000 words (will accept longer or shorter essays) and have my approval (I will be pretty lax about this and will accept probably about 99% of essays). Other than these rules you have a lot of wiggle room here so if you have something to say about secularism and morality email me at ollyoxenfree1997 AT yahoo.ca and you could get your essay on this blog, if you would like to have a link to your own blog/website please leave a link to your own blog in the email and I would be happy to include it.

Answering the 31 question for evolutionists (19 more might be coming)

2011-08-15T19:38:00.000-04:00

Recently a contributor to the true origins archive (and fellow Canadian, famous for proselytizing PZ in Kamloops), David Buckna sent me a link to his article "Evolution: The Creation Myth of our culture", as well as a random quotation from the article. Since I like to respond to articles here is my response to the 31 questions (apparently 19 more coming). They involve a lot of large quotes so I will shorten them for this article:

1. If I understand the question properly at what point do we consider the big bang theory to be the worst option?

If there were no signature of the early universe (being in a dense state), of the large amounts of heat involved, or if there were a physics-based radical revision of dating techniques based on unforeseen forces/energy, etc. None of these predictions are likely, there is large amounts of evidence towards the big bang and other side theories.

2. Are the retrograde motions of Venus, Uranus, and Pluto predicted by the standard theory of solar system formation?

There is no way to predict or model the movement of thousands of small rocks as well as large rocks to a high level of accuracy especially with no knowledge of where the rocks were, although we can make predictions from observations, for instance it is thought based on the distribution of isotopes that the inner solar system from the Sun to Earth formed earlier than the rest of the solar system.

3. The Oort Cloud was theorized by Dutch astronomer Jan Oort in 1950 to account for the existence of short period comets. Since then, has any portion of the postulated Oort Cloud ever been directly observed?

Sedna, 2000 CR105, 2006 SQ372, and 2008 KV42. Are objects believed to be part of the Oort Cloud and they have been directly observed.

4. Most geologists believe diamonds formed deep below the earth's surface, 1 to 3 billion years ago. How do these geologists explain the presence of carbon-14 in a number of diamond samples?

When Uranium and Thorium isotopes decay they emit rays similar to the cosmic rays that can convert carbon in the area into carbon-14 including in surrounding diamonds.

5. All radioisotope dating methods assume:

a) no decay product was present initially or that initial quantities can be accurately estimated

b) the decay system was closed to outside influences through the years and

c) the decay rate was constant over time.

What conditions have violated these assumptions?

c has no exceptions, b can be tested by geologists against local rocks, a-type errors can be prevented by using multiple radioisotope dating techniques.

6. Why do textbooks claim the 1953 Miller-Urey experiment shows how the cell's building blocks may have formed on the early Earth, when repeated experimentation has never demonstrated this claim?

Actually the claim has been repeated with similar results based on up to date information.

7. All cells depend on ATP synthase, the world's tiniest rotary motor. Evolutionists have suggested that part of it was "repurposed" from helicase, a protein used to unwind DNA. But helicase cannot be manufactured, and cannot unwind DNA, without abundant ATP, which ATP synthase provides. How could ATP synthase evolve from a protein that already needed ATP synthase?

There is a model for the origin of ATP synthase, for more information see here. Though I must say this is hard for me to answer, hence the link.

8. Regarding vertical evolution (information-building evolution), is there an example of a genetic mutation or an evolutionary process which can be seen to increase the information in the genome?

He has some links attached to this, one is to an article in complexity, one is a link to a thing on the "Richard Dawkins stumped on increased information" at Creation Ministries (for a discussion of that see here), and one is a study in a secular journal that has the ability to be dramatically reinterpreted to mean what creationists want it to mean. One example of a totally new gene is nylonase in the nylon eating bacteria.

10. Evolutionists say mutation, migration, genetic drift, and natural selection produced new life forms. Why then are there so few examples--if there are any at all--of mutations building brand new organs?

Because of the timescale involved, we have been studying these for the last 50 years, totally new organs take sometimes 50 million or more years to evolve, given this it is surprising what we have seen, for example (and this is an example that the full question claims is too little change) Italian Wall Lizards when introduced to a new island switched from a primarily insect diet to a diet including more vegetation and had many new features begin to evolve including cecal valves (enlarged from a pre-existing muscle).

11. How do geologists and paleontologists explain microfossils of pollen, spores, angiosperms, gymnosperms, and at least one winged insect, in Eocambrian (Upper Precambrian) rock?

The pollen is explainable easily, see here, I have found no records of insects or any other complex organisms in precambrian rock however he does cite a couple papers describing the angio/gymnosperms in supposedly Eocambrian strata, one from 1944 and one from 1945 and no recenter papers many of which show the opposite for instance this paper states that:

Exposed stratigraphic sequence in the vicinity of Zaluch Nala consists of about one and half km thick succession of rocks of Eocambrian to Eocene age (Figure 3).

Now moving on:

12. How does evolution explain the Cambrian explosion of every major animal body plan in a single rock system?

He sees 2 problems, the speed of the change, and the fact diversity seems to be decreasing over time (supposedly it should be increasing as things change more). Evolution was quick back then because of the evolution of hard parts, an increase in oxygen, and a lot of shallow seas formed by plate tectonics created the perfect conditions for life to take over multiple niches. The second problem is because it is hard for overspecialized body plans (something few animals had become back then but all are now) to change into a totally different body plans, however this is one suggestion and other theories are discussed in "Wonderful Life" by Gould, which coincidentally is quoted in the article.

13. Trilobites have extremely complex eyes, even more so than human eyes, how are these explained?

The trilobite eye was very complex, in fact at the time it was the most advanced type of eye in the world it is evidence of large amounts of natural selection since it was complex in the trilobite fossils at the beginning of the cambrian explosion, but it did undergo evolution, in fact at we see intermediate stages of the eyes losing function and eventually disappearing entirely in the bottom feeding trilobites.

14. Jellyfish consist entirely of soft body tissues. How do evolutionists explain the existence of jellyfish fossils, in view of their argument that soft body tissues of missing intermediate forms did not fossilize?

If I understand this argument correctly it is basically: "Sometimes x fossilizes in y case so why doesn't x fossilize in n case" there is a couple problems with this first of all think about the logic of the argument applied to a different scenario, "My dog is always aggressive. How do dog breeders explain the existence of angry dogs, in view of their argument that nice dogs exist!" the case here is just as complicated, there are a lot of jellyfish and they are in a watery environment and can be buried in an anoxic mud extremely quickly, well most intermediates don't have such luck to be small and marine, at least not the ones the creationists ask for ("humanzees"). Second of all soft body tissues in other animals do fossilize, it's just rare enough that barely ever do we find a transitional fossil with soft tissue since they are even rarer. Why does it even matter whether or not the transitional forms have soft tissue to the creationist movement, we still have the bones which are just as if not more important evidence of their existence.

15. Is it possible to document from the fossil record the series of transitional forms that led up to any dinosaur species?

Actually very convenient choice, here is an example, ceratopsian evolution (go to bottom of section):

The sequence of ceratopsian evolution in the Cretaceous is roughly from Psittacosaurus (121 -99 Ma) to Protoceratops (83 Ma) to (Triceratops 67 Ma andStyracosaurus 72 Ma). In side view the skull of Psittacosaurus bears very little resemblance to that of Styracosaurus but in top view a similar pentagonal arrangement can be seen.

Moving on...:

16. How does geology explain dinosaur bones with soft tissue, supposedly dated at "80 million years"?

This is an all to common claim, preservation depend much more on other factors than age, talkorigins has a nice counter argument I think:

DNA has never been recovered from any dinosaurs nor from anything as old as them, and researchers do not expect to find DNA from these soft tissues (though they can still hope). DNA has been recovered, however, from samples much more than 10,000 years old (Poinar et al. 1998), even more than 300,000 years old (Stokstad 2003; Willerslev et al. 2003). If dinosaur fossils were as young as creationists claim, finding soft tissues in them would not be news, and recovering DNA from them should be easy enough that it would have been done by now.

I wonder how creationists account for this? For a while recently I have been thinking about creating a 10/15/25/50/75/100 questions for creationists this probably would be high up there.

17. Evolution teaches that mammals evolved from reptiles. All mammals have three bones in the ear (and the Organ of Corti) and a single bone on each side of the lower jaw. All reptiles have a single bone in the ear and on average six bones on each side of the lower jaw. Speculate how intermediate forms could have managed to hear and chew, while the necessary restructuring was taking place and the Organ of Corti was being developed.

This is a good question for an anatomist or even better a comparative anatomist, but since I nor no one I know would suit this description I'll give talk origins word on it:

In several of the known intermediates, the bones have overlapping functions, and one bone can be called both an ear bone and a jaw bone; these bones serve two functions. Thus, there is no reason to expect transitional forms with intermediate numbers of jaw bones or ear bones. For example, in Morganucodon, the quadrate (anvil) and the articular (hammer) serve as mammalian-style ear bones and reptilian jaw bones simultaneously.

In other words it did both without having to compromise either function.

18. How does evolution explain pterosaurs gradually developing fully functional wings, with their long bony fourth finger? Is there any fossil evidence for their transitional forms? The same question applies to bats from a supposed non-winged ancestor.

Bats are often used as examples of animals that the evolution has not yet explained by creationists, although in recent years the genetics has become better understood but much confusion still remains, mainly since there is a poor fossil record of bats. Pterosaurs are also poorly understood, even more so than bats because there is no living things to use as a comparison. This is unfortunate but it is inevitable that some transitions will be poorly understood because of the imperfection of the geological record. We do though have some of the transitions in between different groups of pterosaurs understood, for instance the fossil Darwinopterus, a transition between advanced and "primitive" pterosaurs, and we do have some fossils that may resemble the closest flightless relatives such as Schleromochlus we have very little knowledge of how flight got started in pterosaurs.

19. (a) Were the feathers of Archaeopteryx identical to modern flying birds? (b) Are there any undisputed true birds in the fossil record that had teeth? (c) Archaeopteryx had claws on its wings. Name three modern birds that have claws on their wings (either in the juvenile stage or as an adult).

a no a difference exists, b yes very few and only one clade, a couple do but only when juvenile in fact it is evidence for evolution because it is a vestigial feature, hence the fact it is only present in juveniles and is not useable to modern birds (as far as I know).

20. Describe one insect that was transitional between a non-flying insect and a flying insect.

There is a poor fossil record of insects because it is hard for wings and insects in general to fossilize, but we do have models today of how this could have happened and multiple theories have been created to explain the evolutionary origin of these abilities, many believe it was an inevitability due to the evolution of tall plants which would have made it so that there is a 3D environment, gliding could have evolved to slow falls from trees and to maneuver better to land back on the stem/trunk so as to avoid falling to the ground which would have had predators. As they evolved further this would have evolved into flight which would have opened up a huge range of niches, we can see animals which could resemble a transitional today, for instance gliding ants could be considered a model for past transitions.

21. Is it possible to document from the fossil record the series of transitional forms leading up to the butterfly? What do evolutionists say when asked how the process of metamorphosis (egg, larva, pupa, adult) evolved?

There is a spectrum of what could be considered metamorphosis, and there is also insects that do not go through metamorphosis and there is a logical route evolution could have taken, in cockroaches for example they begin as eggs from which they hatch as small versions of the adult form, then some insects started hatching well still developing, maybe giving a head start on feeding, these insects would need to shed their exoskeletons eventually allowing for continual growth. From there you have the egg, larva, and adult stage in what is called incomplete metamorphosis. Then there is the cocoon stage which developed to survive winters and to stay safe from predators during a vulnerable time. Unfortunately we only have 50 fossils of butterflies and specific stages tend not to fossilize so the fossil record is poor but as I was saying, it is very evolvable. For more information and further references see here.

22. a) Is it possible to document from the fossil record the series of transitional forms leading up to the honeybee? b) To identify the location of a food source too distant from the hive to be smelled or seen by the other bees, the scout does a complicated dance on the honeycomb inside the hive. If this process slowly evolved, how would all the bee ancestors have found enough pollen to survive while this system of communication was evolving?

I said it a couple times and I'll say this again it is hard for insects to fossilize so we have very little record of bee evolution although we know that like ants their ancestor was a type of wasp, however we do have a fossil that could be considered a mosaic of wasp and bee features, although the animal is clearly a bee, it is called Melittosphex and although a bee it has two mid-tibial spurs, and has a slender hind basitarsus. The dances may have evolved to excite other bees to forage and only later evolved into communication, before they could have relied on sight, pheromones, or any other number of mechanisms or just not communicated, just searching and finding it and bringing it back (a inefficient system but it could work).

23. Edward Blyth, English chemist/zoologist (and creationist), wrote his first of three major articles on natural selection in The Magazine of Natural History, 24 years before Darwin's "Origin of Species" was published. Why then do evolutionists think of natural selection as Darwin's idea?

Darwin was the first to see it as a mechanism for evolution to the extent that we now know it is. Although he was not the first to think of it, neither was Blyth, the idea of natural selection goes back to Aristotle (greek) and Al-Jahiz (Arabian) and even to Lucretius (greek) and Empedocles (greek) as well as many recenter theorists that were still older than Blyth and Darwin.

24. During the Industrial Revolution, dark-colored peppered moths appeared in larger numbers during environmental changes. Did a new species emerge, or did it already preexist? Is this macroevolution?

No new species emerged but a new genotype evolved with a radically different and easy to study phenotype, hence it's fame as an example of microevolutionary pressures causing huge changes over a short time frame.

25. "Certainly, the punctuated equilibria theory is unique. It must be the only theory ever put forth in the history of science which claims to be scientific but then explains why evidence for it cannot be found." Do you agree with Lubenow? Why or why not?

Punctuated Equilibrium is actually based on evidence, in fact both Gould and Eldridge were working on a line of evidence for their theory when it was originally developed, the evidence that is supposedly missing (transitional fossil actually do exist) is there, and PE is not the only theory like that (look at many attempts to make a grand unified theory, and think back to question one).

26. Science writer Jonathan Weiner ("The Beak of the Finch", 1994) says beak changes in Galapagos finches during a severe drought (1977) is "evolution in action", even though the changes were reversed after the drought ended, and no net evolution occurred.

No net evolution happened but a temporary change in the frequency of alleles is evolution, this is comparable to asking "Wearing a red coat for one day supposedly means wearing a red coat for a one day even though they did not wear the red coat the day before or after so how could that be the same as wearing a red coat!" in response to "Yesterday I tried a red coat on for the day" To which you would immediately see the problem (they did still wear the red coat even though it wasn't permanently attached to them it was temporary no one said in the original statement that they had it on forever).

27. Dr. Don Moeller writes in his 2003 paper, Dental fossils and the fossil record: "In summary, the fossil record demonstrates numerous highly complex coupled dento-maxillary developmental systems which can not be accounted for by any known evolutionary mechanism."

Here is a description of the developmental process (open access, technical).

28. Stern and Susman write in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology 60:279-313 (1983) that the hands and feet of Australopithecus afarensis are not at all like human hands and feet; rather, they have long, curved fingers and toes typical of arboreal primates. Why then do evolutionists insist that the footprints Mary Leakey uncovered in strata (dated at 3.5 million years old) in Laetoli were made by Australopithecus afarensis, though these prints are indistinguishable from modern man? (Tuttle, Natural History, 64)

I have found much conflicting information on the internet, so I asked the following question on Ask a Biologist (under fossils in case you would like to confirm it) (red are quotes from the above question that I added in here (i.e. not in the original question I asked)):

Hi, I have always been captivated by the Laetoli footprints. Recently I have heard about arguments over what species left the prints with some arguing that they are not ("the hands and feet of Australopithecus afarensis are not at all like human hands and feet; rather, they have long, curved fingers and toes typical of arboreal primates") Australopithecus Afarensis (commoner but with feet that may not have matched the prints) but rather A. anamensis (rarer and virtually nothing known about the feet) what is your opinion? I have also heard a lot of propaganda from creationists saying that they are human footprints and I was wondering if there is any features distinguishing them from human footprints ("though these prints are indistinguishable from modern man")? Thank you for your time.

And received the following answer:

As usual, the creationist arguments are often simply due to a lack of understanding, or misinterpretation.

A quick look at creationist sites shows misleading information... For instance, on one site I saw the argument that recent research (Crompton et al 2011 - Interface) said that the tracks had to be made by modern humans, yet the abstract states:

"...most of these functional features were already present, albeit less strongly expressed than in ourselves, in the maker of the Laetoli G-1 footprint trail, 3.66 Mya."

So that paper actually says there is a noticable difference between the Laetoli trackmaker and modern humans - the opposite of what the creationist sites are reporting!

The big problem is that as we close the gaps in the fossil record, previously obvious boundaries become blurred. Ironically, the more we find in the gaps between our ancestors and ourselves, and the better the fossil record becomes, the more those fossils will resemble modern humans, and therefore be used as evidence for no evolution by creationists.

It's not really surprising that tracks made "just" a million or so years before modern man look quite like modern man tracks - our ancestors were pretty similiar!

As to the trackway maker, the paper I reference above refers to A. afarensis as the most likely trackmaker.

However, as a track worker myself, the idea of differentiating trackmaker at species level seems optimistic at best! If there's consensus at genus level, then that's probably about as good as one can hope for, so saying the trackmaker was probably (/possibly?) Australopithecusshould be good enough!

I'm sorry for what on my part is a less than satisfactory ability to explain this properly. I believe though there still is on going discussions this settles the question that was asked, this is in no way fatal to evolutionary theory in fact a virtue of science is open mindedness and a need to see all viable options.

29. a) About 30 partial bone flutes have been found in Europe late in the Neandertal period and younger. b) A 2006 paper by João Zilhão et al. reports on evidence (ornaments and decorated bone tools) that Neandertals had genuine symbolic thought. c) Caves were used by Neandertals as family burial grounds or cemeteries in Europe and the Middle-East (Israel and Lebanon). Why then do some evolutionists insist the Neandertals were merely borrowing or imitating cultural novelties from anatomically modern humans? And why do evolutionists classify Neandertals either as a subspecies of modern humans (Homo sapiens neanderthalensis) or as a separate human species (Homo neanderthalensis)?

"Neandertal Period" wow.

a the oldest "flute" is hotly debated all the younger ones would fit into the human migrations, b we are aware they had symbolic thought, c some have argued they did it for practical reasons not religious/cultural reasons. I know of no modern evolutionist that has argued that they solely imitated human culture. They are classified as a sub-species of humans because they have anatomical differences that are different enough for it to be described as a sub-species of humans.

30. In May 2000, Michael Ruse (philosopher of science) wrote: "Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion--a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality. I am an ardent evolutionist and an ex-Christian, but I must admit that in this one complaint--and Mr. Gish is but one of many to make it--the literalists are absolutely right. Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today." If religion cannot be taught in science classes, why is evolution taught in science classes?

Ruse, M., "How evolution became a religion: creationists correct? Darwinians wrongly mix science with morality, politics", National Post, pp. B1, B3, B7 (May 13, 2000)

Funny how quotes get around I dealt with this one recently, I will quote Michael Ruse:

well, I did say that evolution is a religion but I was taken out of context -- I think that too often evolutionists take their theory in a religious fashion when they should treat it as science -- let me see if I can dig something out for you -- but really you should read my book "can a darwinian be a christian?" published by cambridge university press

michael ruse

Moving on to the last question now, it is hard to complete since it is mostly an opinion question but here is the question:

31. Contact 5 evolutionists, preferably from different fields eg. biologist, biochemist, paleontologist, etc. Bonus points for those who are well-known. Ask each: What evidence would convince you that vertical evolution (information-building evolution) is false? Record their answers. If any of the evolutionists say no such evidence exists, or indeed could exist, ask: How then can evolution be testable?

I would say, a proverbial precambrian rabbit would be good, a message from god proving the trinity saying that evolution is false, counter evidence, evidence for a young earth standing up to scrutiny... feel free to add your suggestions in the comments, sometimes I forget to add in a link where I was planning to please mention such a occurrence here or if there is any sort of error please mention it.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-08-14T18:00:00.001-04:00

All inter-theist squabbling in one minute:

Which reminded of this pic:

Oh and there is Ian Juby working to get into the Golden Croccoduck Awards:

Dirt Devil-The Exorcist from MrPrice2U on Vimeo.

How many scientists do you know?

2011-08-14T15:04:00.000-04:00

A survey shows that when asked to name a scientist 4% of americans could name a living scientist and 23% couldn't think of one. Here is a link to "Name that Scientist" a survey asking you to name famous scientists, I got 8/10 (with a little luck and a process of elimination, with out I would have only known 6/10).

The Mabus Affair

2011-08-13T16:12:00.000-04:00

I have written about Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus before that time I was writing about him in a happy mood because because I found him hilarious, laughable, at most a minor annoyance but now he has quickly evolved into a major annoyance, a creep, even a danger and a threat to people's lives. Although I believe he probably will not go through with anything physical against the people he has threatened (at least not with witnesses) please sign this petition so that the Montreal Police can begin an investigation into him.

Happy B-day James Randi!

2011-08-07T20:12:00.000-04:00

Today is James Randi's birthday, also check out the "Today in Skeptic HIstory" app (where I learnt about this from originally).

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-08-07T12:00:00.001-04:00

This video has gone the small atheist/science blog portion of the internet equivalent of viral.

A different 15 questions for Evolutionists

2011-08-06T17:52:00.000-04:00

Creation Ministries has a booklet of 15 questions to ask evolutionists here is a full rebuttal.

How did life originate?

Evolutionist Professor Paul Davies admitted, “Nobody knows how a mixture of lifeless chemicals spontaneously organized themselves into the first living cell.” Andrew Knoll, professor of biology, Harvard, said, “we don’t really know how life originated on this planet”. A minimal cell needs several hundred proteins. Even if every atom in the universe were an experiment with all the correct amino acids present for every possible molecular vibration in the supposed evolutionary age of the universe, not even one average-sized functional protein would form. So how did life with hundreds of proteins originate just by chemistry without intelligent design?

We don't know the exact steps of how it happened, but we do have a basic understanding of the process, fortunately minimal life is not the same as the minimal cell in fact the minimal life as it is proposed does not include any proteins since all you need is a self replicating molecule, i.e. a naked strand of RNA. This is a question about abiogenesis not evolution anyway. I dealt with the issue of abiogenesis before here.

How did the DNA code originate?

The code is a sophisticated language system with letters and words where the meaning of the words is unrelated to the chemical properties of the letters—just as the information on this page is not a product of the chemical properties of the ink (or pixels on a screen). What other coding system has existed without intelligent design? How did the DNA coding system arise without it being created?

Most of the bases of DNA can be synthesized naturally in the lab without human interaction, it is not unlikely this will become true for all of them in the future, it most likely evolved from an RNA system.

Why is natural selection taught as ‘evolution’ as if it explains the origin of the diversity of life?

By definition it is a selective process (selecting from already existing information), so is not a creative process. It might explain the survival of the fittest (why certain genes benefit creatures more in certain environments), but not the arrival of the fittest (where the genes and creatures came from in the first place). The death of individuals not adapted to an environment and the survival of those that are suited does not explain the origin of the traits that make an organism adapted to an environment. E.g., how do minor back-and-forth variations in finch beaks explain the origin of beaks or finches? How does natural selection explain goo-to-you evolution?

Natural Selection is one of multiple mechanisms of evolution and should be treated that way, however they are correct natural selection is not a creative process, but other mechanisms are such as mutation, recombination and in some species horizontal gene transfer are. It is ridiculous to attempt to ignore mutation as if natural selection were the only mechanism for evolution.

How did new biochemical pathways, which involve multiple enzymes working together in sequence, originate?

Every pathway and nano-machine requires multiple protein/enzyme components to work. How did lucky accidents create even one of the components, let alone 10 or 20 or 30+ at the same time, often in a necessary programmed sequence. Evolutionary biochemist Franklin Harold wrote, “we must concede that there are presently no detailed Darwinian accounts of the evolution of any biochemical or cellular system, only a variety of wishful speculations.”

This sounds to me like a rehashing of irreducible complexity when applied to biochemical cascades, since no specifics are given I will just give a link to my previous dealings with these arguments, here.

Living things look like they were designed, so how do evolutionists know that they were not designed?

Richard Dawkins wrote, “biology is the study of complicated things that have the appearance of having been designed with a purpose.” Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of the double helix structure of DNA, wrote, “Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved.” The problem for evolutionists is that living things show too much design. Who objects when an archaeologist says that pottery points to human design? Yet if someone attributes the design in living things to a designer, that is not acceptable. Why should science be restricted to naturalistic causes rather than logical causes?

Biologists can look past the superficial appearance of design and see we have a very unintelligent design from our evolutionary legacy as Neil Shubin stated in the January 2009 Scientific American "While I was struggling to understand the body’s internal structures, I was given space in a 100-year-old building that needed to be renovated into a modern laboratory. When we opened the walls to look at the plumbing, wiring and other mechanicals, we saw a tangle that made no apparent sense; cables, wires and pipes took bizarre loops and turns throughout the building. Nobody in their right mind would have designed my building to conform to the snarled mess we saw when the wall was removed. Constructed in 1896, the utilities reflect an old design that has been jury-rigged for each renovation done over previous decades. If you want to understand the twisting pathways for a cable or a pipe, you have to understand their history and how they have been modified over the years. The same is true for structures in the human body." The fact is that natural selection can create a illusion of design because it is evolving towards the optimal solution for all the problems facing an organism's ability to reproduce, and although it can look like design if you look closely you can notice the imperfections due to the fact that it is based on earlier systems.

How did multi-cellular life originate?

How did cells adapted to individual survival ‘learn’ to cooperate and specialize (including undergoing programmed cell death) to create complex plants and animals?

There is certain events that would have had to happen to have multicellular life evolve these include:

Cellular Adhesion (Stickiness).
Cellular Differentiation.
Germ Line.
A robust developmental process.

Cells learnt to communicate, pretty early on soon after cellular adhesion evolved, some organisms still hold this form of structure like the genus Gonium, a relative of Volvox made of four or five cells. When cells grew larger there developed a need for cell differentiation to maintain the structure, and instead of reproducing as a whole a germ line developed and since without programmed cell death the organism would become like a cancer the same way workers are sterile in ant's or bee's nests. This question is still largely unanswered mainly because of the unlikelihood of finding microfossils.

How did sex originate?

Asexual reproduction gives up to twice as much reproductive success (‘fitness’) for the same resources as sexual reproduction, so how could the latter ever gain enough advantage to be selected? And how could mere physics and chemistry invent the complementary apparatuses needed at the same time (non-intelligent processes cannot plan for future coordination of male and female organs).

Many reasons exist for the origins and maintenance of sex although they are mostly difficult to test. Many of the theories involve the increased speed of evolution from recombination and sexual mixing. Here is a long video most of you won't bother watching about it.

Why are the (expected) countless millions of transitional fossils missing?

Darwin noted the problem and it still remains. The evolutionary family trees in textbooks are based on imagination, not fossil evidence. Famous Harvard paleontologist (and evolutionist), Stephen Jay Gould, wrote, “The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology”. Other evolutionist fossil experts also acknowledge the problem.

There is transitional fossils such as archaeopteryx and tiktaalik, no one with sufficient understanding of fossilization would think there is millions of transitional fossils, there is barely millions of fossils alone. I think it goes without saying that the Gould quotes is misquoted the in context quote really says:

The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. Yet Darwin was so wedded to gradualism that he wagered his entire theory on a denial of this literal record: (Darwin quote and the imperfection of the fossil record)

As you can tell he was advancing Punctuated Equilibria not creationism and never argued the transitions never happened.

How do ‘living fossils’ remain unchanged over supposed hundreds of millions of years, if evolution has changed worms into humans in the same time frame?

If evolution has changed worms into humans in the same time frame? Professor Gould wrote, “the maintenance of stability within species must be considered as a major evolutionary problem.”

The answer is actually in what professor Gould was saying, because he proposed a theory of punctuated equilibrium suggesting that things may not change for long periods of time. It also should be mentioned that some of these living fossils actually are changing just not in superficial features, for instance the tuatara has the highest rates of neutral evolution. And in the time since the common ancestor with worms there has been no living fossils that have remained unchanged for the whole time, even common examples of living fossils such as Coelacanths have changed these fish have grown much larger since the cretaceous fossils.

How did blind chemistry create mind/intelligence, meaning, altruism and morality?

If everything evolved, and we invented God, as per evolutionary teaching, what purpose or meaning is there to human life? Should students be learning nihilism (life is meaningless) in science classes?

It is not an "evolutionary teaching" that we invented god or that life is meaningless in fact even in secularism there is forms of ethics such as humanism. Morality, altruism, and intelligence are bi-products of evolution for instance for group living (which has a huge advantage) brains needed to grow so that animals could understand dynamics of their group and how to behave, this is seen as inevitable by many anthropologists. Another outcome of this is religion and a sense of meaning to life.

Why is evolutionary ‘just-so’ story-telling tolerated?

Evolutionists often use flexible storytelling to ‘explain’ observations contrary to evolutionary theory. NAS(USA) member Dr Philip Skell wrote, “Darwinian explanations for such things are often too supple: Natural selection makes humans self-centered and aggressive—except when it makes them altruistic and peaceable. Or natural selection produces virile men who eagerly spread their seed—except when it prefers men who are faithful protectors and providers. When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it experimentally, much less use it as a catalyst for scientific discovery.”

Evolutionary psychology is often "just-so-stories" this is the main point of the question, and many real evolutionary biologists would agree such as Larry Moran. In fact they are often not tolerated, every time another evolutionary psychology theory comes out I see multiple critiques especially on Sandwalk, Larry Moran's blog.
All of the theories involving the evolution of life forms are vigorously attacked before reaching consensus and "Just-so-Stories" are normally never tolerated.

Where are the scientific breakthroughs due to evolution?

Dr Marc Kirschner, chair of the Department of Systems Biology, Harvard Medical School, stated: “In fact, over the last 100 years, almost all of biology has proceeded independent of evolution, except evolutionary biology itself. Molecular biology, biochemistry, physiology, have not taken evolution into account at all.” Dr Skell wrote, “It is our knowledge of how these organisms actually operate, not speculations about how they may have arisen millions of years ago, that is essential to doctors, veterinarians, farmers ….” Evolution actually hinders medical discovery. Then why do schools and universities teach evolution so dogmatically, stealing time from experimental biology that so benefits humankind?

For more information on this quote and how this is ridiculous see here.

Why is evolution, a theory about history, taught as if it is the same as this operational science?

Science involves experimenting to figure out how things work; how they operate. You cannot do experiments, or even observe what happened, in the past. Asked if evolution has been observed, Richard Dawkins said, “Evolution has been observed. It’s just that it hasn’t been observed while it’s happening.”

We can do experiments for instance the longterm e.coli evolution experiment is one of the longest running evolution experiments ever and has had surprises at every turn. And times when we cannot test we can still get an idea of what happened from fossils and other sources, think about it like forensic science, how many investigations would be dropped because no one is there.

Why is a fundamentally religious idea, a dogmatic belief system that fails to explain the evidence, taught in science classes?

Karl Popper, famous philosopher of science, said “Darwinism is not a testable scientific theory, but a metaphysical [religious] research programme....” Michael Ruse, evolutionist science philosopher admitted, “Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today.” If “you can’t teach religion in science classes”, why is evolution taught?

The Karl Popper quote is out of context and his opinion was later changed, in his mind a Metaphysical research programme was a good thing, he was discussing natural selection not all of evolution. The Ruse quote is a slightly longer story but when asked about the quote in an email he responded:

well, I did say that evolution is a religion but I was taken out of context -- I think that too often evolutionists take their theory in a religious fashion when they should treat it as science -- let me see if I can dig something out for you -- but really you should read my book "can a darwinian be a christian?" published by cambridge university press

michael ruse

Since this is based entirely on quotes and they have no actual argument you can say that answers the whole question. If this is the best they have to offer I think they are in trouble.

Why and Why Not to Believe

2011-08-04T16:17:00.000-04:00

This post is a comparison of two articles in the New Statesman "I'm a Believer" and "Faith No More", I have made a list of the reasons presented in the articles below as well as a quote by one of the people who (dis)believes because of it.
I will start with "Faith no more":

No evidence, as Philip Pullman states: "The main reason I don't believe in God is the missing evidence. There could logically be no evidence that he doesn't exist, so I can only go by the fact that, so far, I've discovered no evidence that he does: I have had no personal experience of being spoken to by God and I see nothing in the world around me, wherever I look in history or science or art or anywhere else, to persuade me that it was the work of God rather than of nature."
No need for god, as Kenan Malik says: "I am an atheist because I see no need for God. Without God, it is said, we cannot explain the creation of the cosmos, anchor our moral values or infuse our lives with meaning and purpose. I disagree.Invoking God at best highlights what we cannot yet explain about the physical universe, and at worst exploits that ignorance to mystify. Moral values do not come prepackaged from God, but have to be worked out by human beings through a combination of empathy, reasoning and dialogue."
Why this god over that god, Richard Dawkins explains: "In any case, it is a fatuously illogical jump from deistic Unmoved Mover to Christian Trinity, with the Son being tortured and murdered because the Father, for all his omniscience and omnipotence, couldn't think of a better way to forgive "sin"." Samuel Harris as had this line of reasoning: "This is nonsense: even the devout tacitly reject thousands of gods, along with the cherished doctrines of every religion but their own. Every Christian can confidently judge the God of Zoroaster to be a creature of fiction, without first scouring the universe for evidence of his absence."
Contradictions exist, as Paul Kirby stated: "I stopped being a believer when it became clear to me that the various versions of Christianity were mutually contradictory and that none had empirical evidence to support it."
The scriptures are fallible and represent human work, again with Samuel Harris: "But honest reasoning can lead us further into the fields of unbelief, for we can prove that books such as the Bible and the Quran bear no trace of divine authorship. We know far too much about the history of these texts to accept what they say about their own origins. And just imagine how good a book would be if it had been written by an omniscient Being."
God concepts are too malleable to represent one true unchanging god, as the philosopher Daniel Dennet says: "The concept of God has gradually retreated from the concept of an anthropomorphic creator figure, judge and overseer to a mystery-shrouded Wonderful Something-or-Other utterly beyond human ken. It is impossible for me to believe in any of the anthropomorphic gods, because they are simply ridiculous, and so obviously the fantasy-projections of scientifically ignorant minds trying to understand the world. It is impossible for me to believe in the laundered versions, because they are systematically incomprehensible. It would be like trying to believe in the existence of wodgifoop - what's that? Don't ask; it's beyond saying." This goes along with the argument that gods are human inventions, represented by Andrew Copson: "I don't believe in any gods or goddesses, because they are so obviously human inventions. Desert-dwellers have severe, austere and dry gods; suffering and oppressed people have loving and merciful gods; farmers have gods of rain and fruitfulness; and I have never met a liberal who believed in a conservative God or a conservative who believed in a liberal one. Every God I have ever heard of bears the indelible marks of human manufacture, and through history we can explain how and why we invented them."
God does not appeal to common sense (or it is "silly"), as Steven Weinberg explains: "I do not believe in God - an intelligent, all-powerful being who cares about human beings - because the idea seems to me to be silly. The positive arguments that have been given for belief in God all appear to me as silly as the proposition they are intended to prove. Fortunately, in some parts of the world, religious belief has weakened enough so that people no longer kill each other over differences in this silliness."
The problem of evil is an obvious one, as Polly Toynbee explains: "The only time I am ever tempted, momentarily, to believe in a God is when I shake an angry fist at him for some monstrous suffering inflicted on the world for no reason whatever. The Greeks and Romans and other pagans probably produced the most convincing gods - petulant, childish, selfish - demanding sacrifices to their vanity and inflicting random furies. At least that's a logical explanation. But an all-powerful God of goodness and love is evidently impossible. He would be a monster. Voltaire said so after the Lisbon earthquake."
God could never rationally control human actions, Stephen Hawking represents this argument: "I am not claiming there is no God. The scientific account is complete, but it does not predict human behaviour, because there are too many equations to solve. One therefore uses a different model, which can include free will and God."
Shermer's Law mentioned appropriately by Michael Shermer: "This brings me to the third reason, Shermer's Last Law, which is that any sufficiently advanced extraterrestrial intelligence is indistinguishable from God. (Because of Moore's law [of increasing computer power] and Kurzweil's law of accelerating returns, we ourselves will be able to engineer life, solar systems and even universes, given enough time.)"
Because Faith is ridiculous and illogical, as PZ Myers describes: "Religious beliefs are lazy jokes with bad punchlines. Why do you have to chop off the skin at the end of your penis? Because God says so. Why should you abstain from pork, or shrimp, or mixing meat and dairy, or your science classes? Because they might taint your relationship with God. Why do you have to revere a bit of dry biscuit? Because it magically turns into a God when a priest mutters over it. Why do I have to be good? Because if you aren't, a God will set you on fire for all eternity."

The other article is "I'm a believer" and includes people such as Michael Behe and Kenneth Miller:

They know in their heart god is real as Cherie Blair states: "It's been a journey from my upbringing to an understanding of something that my head cannot explain but my heart knows to be true." To go along with it people find consolation in their faith, as Jeremy Vine explains: "The subjective reason is that I find consolation in my faith."
The test of time is another proposed reason, again Jeremy Vine: "The objective reason is that the story of the gospels has stood the test of time and Christ comes across as a totally captivating figure."
One of the common reasons, and one used here is the god of the gaps, pushing this is Richard Swinburne: "To suppose that there is a God explains why there is a physical universe at all; why there are the scientific laws there are; why animals and then human beings have evolved; why human beings have the opportunity to mould their character and those of their fellow humans for good or ill and to change the environment in which we live; why we have the well-authenticated account of Christ's life, death and resurrection; why throughout the centuries millions of people (other than ourselves) have had the apparent experience of being in touch with and guided by God; and so much else." Michael Behe also uses this argument: "Two primary reasons: 1) that anything exists; and 2) that we human beings can comprehend and reason. I think both of those point to God."
The moral system is better than others, arguing for this is Peter Hitchens: "Having chosen belief in a God over unbelief, I find the Christian gospels more persuasive and the Christian moral system more powerful than any other religious belief."
It's emotionally and intellectually satisfying according to Nick Spencer: "I would say I find Christianity (rather than just belief in God) the most intellectually and emotionally satisfying explanation for being."
Religion is the foundation of morality according to Douglas Hedley: "Do values such as truth, beauty and goodness emerge out of a contingent and meaningless substrate? Or do these values reflect a transcendent domain from which this world has emerged? I incline to the latter, and this is a major reason for my belief in God."

The second article was shorter (hence the difference in size of arguments), if you believe I had some bias show in this post please help point it out, and any arguments in either article that you believe I missed please bring to my attention.

Poll: God's Approval Rating at 52%

2011-08-02T15:27:00.003-04:00

A new survey shows god has a 52% approval rating in the US and 9% disapproval and 39% don't know. They also did certain subjects for instance 71% approve of his creation and 56% approve of his handling of the animal kingdom (somebody doesn't like the snakes, Earthworms, poisonous spiders, tigers, sharks). However the younger generation is much more disapproving 26% not approving of his treatment of natural disasters as apposed to 12% among those 65+.

A Point of Sanity coming out of the Watsongate incident

2011-08-01T13:09:00.000-04:00

Over at Pharyngula they have posted the infamous CFI talk that really was important to the watsongate controversy, in the comments I found this ray of sanity:

After seeing the video, I can understand why Stef McGraw felt this was unfair. No, there was no insulting name or hate or viciousness, but yes, Rebecca "tore into" this student starting at 12:05 into the video. She called Stef's comment "ignorant" and "misogynistic" and gave a 3-minute lecture on exactly how uneducated and stupid it was, referring her to Feminism 101.

And worse than that, she insinuated that Stef "conveniently edited out" part of the original description of the event. That says as much as "she lied to misrepresent my side of the story".

Whether Rebecca is right or not in disagreeing with Stef's comment (I think she mostly is), this was unnecessary, uncalled for and unpleasant. When you're the keynote speaker for a bunch of students, you don't embarrass one of them in front of the rest.

Here is the actual video:

Well I think that is it, tell me if it is the wrong one.

Over 25 thousand views!

2011-08-01T10:47:00.000-04:00

That big thing at the beginning of the month is the carnival of evolution.

What would you ask a Nobel Laureate given the oppurtunity?

2011-08-01T10:00:00.000-04:00

What would you ask a Nobel Laureate given the opportunity? If you are a "young scientist" you may have the opportunity, with the Lindau Nobel Community which takes questions and gives answers. So what would you ask given the opportunity? I know I have a couple questions.

Basic Genetics, Cat gagging is caused by histidyl-glutamic acid?

2011-07-31T11:26:00.000-04:00

Your Weekly Youtube: Noah's True Story

2011-07-31T09:30:00.000-04:00

A Good Objective Perspective on the Norway Terrorist

2011-07-28T12:35:00.000-04:00

Over at the Panda's Thumb they give a perspective on the Norwegian terrorist attacks suggesting he is a moderate christian with extreme right leaning views who was originally inspired to commit the terrorist attack after 9/11.

10 things I learned at a Christian Camp

2011-07-27T14:17:00.000-04:00

Many of you will quickly realize this is a Andrew Hall Style-inspired comedy, maybe some of you won't anyways let's begin.

10. There is no hell, we all go to heaven even Hitler (not meant to be funny). And we are the liberal church (united church).
9. Jesus was definitely white. Damn evidence he was a good christian!
8. Earthquakes are part of god's plans, and they only kill non-christians (meant to give them an evolutionary advantage?).
7. God didn't care that he created hurricanes and other atrocities. Only some small side causalities.
6. Creationism is so unbelievable that a group of kids realized it was bullshit without any real influence.
5. G suspended is a holy guitar chord and most christians when discussing religion are an A suspended (funny for those familiar with guitar notation).
4. God is more costly than gold, well at least the amount of property damage he's done is.
3. When you convert to christianity you become like a child (also reinterpreted obviously).
2. You can never have enough golf balls, seriously there fun to have around.
1. Swimmer's Itch sucks it is really itchy and it's everywhere.

Sorry for this poor attempt at humour...

Creationist FAIL: Part Two

2011-07-26T17:28:00.001-04:00

Brittany is on Controversial forums when asked about genetic homosexuality she responded this way:

for years and years scientists have been looking for the "homosexual gene" in human beings. Through hundreds of researches. None have been found. Now science today can do outstanding things and discover so much. They can find the male gene, the female gene, every gene that exists they can find in a person. Yet, they can't seem to find this gene that proves gays aren't by choice but by birth? GIVE ME A BREAK. being homosexual is a choice, nothing more. If you're going to be gay, don't blame it on anything but yourself.

But don't question him or else:

You want the real answer to your question? God will not be tested. His power is almighty, and if you choose not to believe so youll find out how almighty His power really is.

Darn Another Important Event Missed

2011-07-25T23:41:00.000-04:00

On July 20th Gregor Mendel's birthday passed by I'm not exactly sure about the age.

For all of you not up on his experiments he discovered that alleles were separate objects (i.e. not liquid), overthrowing the concept of pan-genesis (forgive my poor terminology, I think it is something else, but I'm tiered and can't do much research right now.

On the 21st of July we recognize the 86th year of the Scopes Trial

2011-07-25T22:12:00.000-04:00

On the 21st July, 86 year ago, Scopes went through an 8-day trial which took the jury only 9 minutes to decide pro-butler act. I merely point it out for the importance to the development of our movement, and the knowledge that our movement has been alive and well for 86 years, the law is our only threat and now even in Texas, an almost uncompromised education exists (main problemed areas: Kansas, South Carolina, Louisiana). I give you "Inherit the Wind":

I hope to watch it in the next week, if I have enough free time. Sorry for the lazy lack of links, if you wish to see any of the information specifically such as the recent texas ruling, please feel free to ask if you have not already seen it.

P.S. Has anyone had swimmer's itch before, I have it right now (early stages) and don't know what to expect (itchy as hell already).

Science, Reason and Critical Thinking: Science, Reason and Critical Thinking Time Lords

2011-07-25T18:55:00.000-04:00

Science, Reason and Critical Thinking: Science, Reason and Critical Thinking Time Lords

He Speaks the truth, as a 3 reincarnation-long fan I agree fully.

Militant Believers

2011-07-24T17:24:00.000-04:00

Norway is attacked by a terrorist, in the first day of the attack there is wild speculation about Islamic terrorist activity in Norway (a country not known for offending islam) in the next few hours we learn it is a radical christian, anti-muslim, fundamentalist, suddenly religion disappears almost entirely from the discussion. It is suddenly a madman, someone who may have been insane. Someone obviously not a true christian. This is the way terrorism, Christians, and Islam are treated. There is no obvious marks that any certain medical condition played a part in this and it appears to be a much more obvious option to go with the theory that it was religiously motivated. However I am only experiencing the ruins from the discussion (I found out about it over my iPod as soon as I came into wifi access from CBC) so I may not have all the facts.

Your Weekly Youtube: Spoof Edition

2011-07-17T16:00:00.002-04:00

Your Weekly Youtube: Atheist Musical Edition 2

2011-07-10T20:14:00.009-04:00

Off to camp

2011-07-10T11:36:00.000-04:00

I'm off to United Church camp for two weeks (fortunately they are not based entirely around religion, less than an hour is devoted to religion a day) I will get about 24 hours at home next weekend before heading back. See you then.

Missed my blogversary!

2011-07-10T10:01:00.000-04:00

July 3rd we put up our first post, and what a year it has been, so much has changed since then...

My view on Watsongate

2011-07-06T10:29:00.000-04:00

1. A creepy guy propositioned sex to a girl in an elevator, alone, after having much public time to speak to her.
2. A crappy look at the situation is offered by someone named step.
3. Watson used her as an example along with rapists of oppression of woman in a presentation, and then did that on her extremely popular blog too.
4. Overall I'm with Steph, this was extremely unprofessional of RW.

An Article for you Theistic Evolutionists in the Crowd

2011-07-05T19:23:00.000-04:00

I do not want you to think that I have gone over to the dark side, but on an open creationist (YEC) website (more of a moderated open blog), I found an interesting pro-evolution article from a christian that I wish to link to here. I am just going to say up front that I am a confrontationalist-leaning atheist (a moderate one though) and therefore I will also post these articles slamming theistic evolution (from an atheist and theist perspective), here is a theist and here is an atheist discussing it (with more links to theists discussing it).

Your Weekly Youtube: Atheist Musical Edition

2011-07-03T19:37:00.002-04:00

And what wouldn't be complete without melodysheep:

The Carnival of Evolution #37- Happy Canada Day!

2011-07-01T01:00:00.003-04:00

Happy Canada Day to all you other Canadians. I haven't ever done a carnival before, but unfortunately if things go the way they are going multiple blog carnivals will face extinction before we have even seen them, I may never get a shot at doing it again, that is true for me, for instance I never had seen "I and the bird" until last month's CoE and that is why I am going to post this brief excerpt from the last edition at Greg Laden's Blog which I totally agree with:

Do you have a facebook account? Good. Open up a selection of the following posts and if you like them or find them interesting, post them on your wall. Let your facebook friends see some of this interesting blogging. Do you tweet? Then tweet them! Oh, and go ahead and facebook-share and tweet this very carnival. Stumble, Digg, Reddit, Whatever. The idea is go get the word out that there is some interesting stuff to read, about evolution, on the intertubes. We want Evolution Blogging to be more linky and socially networked than other topics such as, well, creationism for example.

I have made the following categories for this edition of the CoE (thanks to past writers for the ideas):

Evolution in Action.
Predicting, Correcting, and Reconfirming
Phylogeny and Systematics.
"Controversy" and Education (creationism, etc)
Genes and Molecular Biology.
Applied Evolution and Computation.
Darwin and history.
The Ecological Connection and Extinction.
Miscellaneous.

Thank you for your time, with no further ado, lets begin.

Evolution in Action
First of all, we have a post from Empirical Zeal called "Why Moths lost there spots, and cats don't like milk. Tales of evolution in our time." It discusses to examples of evolution in action, these are the peppered moths (apparently the origins of carbonaria forms has been found in their genome) and the evolution of adult digestibility of milk is also discussed. I was tempted to place this in the Molecular biology section, places that would have suited this post just as well.

Over at the Mermaid's Tale they discussed earlier this month the two mutations involved in the evolution of the deadly E .coli responsible for the outbreak in Europe.

How have viruses changed to vaccines? This is an interesting subject especially in this example where it has become evolutionarily advantageous to be more virulent in chickens (more interesting than I make it sound).

Predicting, Correcting, and Reconfirming

So you wanted to hear about chemical warfare in the cocktails of fruit fly ejaculate? No you say? Well here is what I would describe as almost the most significant post of this Carnival edition from Empirical Zeal, I give you "Flies alter their ejaculate to get the most bang for your buck".

Also from Empirical Zeal, the origins of sex and a brilliant confirmation of the Red Queen Hypothesis, an interesting story of ducks and snails evolving to outwit a hoard of platitudinous Platyhelminthes.

Phylogeny and Systematics

The tree of life has long represented evolution, but an article at "Byte Size Biology" suggests this is a false image because of the amount of endosymbiosis, I personally always thought the coral (which I believe to have heard to be Darwin's own suggestion) was a better model.

"Controversy" and Education

  Over at the Dispersal of Darwin we see a post dealing with quote-mining in a newspaper close to where said author lives.
  Over at "Evolving Thoughts" they are discussing the often loaded question; "Do you "believe" in evolution?" and it's implications.
  Over at Pleiotropy, crossing fitness valleys, and how the ID advocates are totally misunderstanding the concept of epistasis, it is amazing how much they can warp a notion to be favourable to them.
Genes and Molecular Biology

"Beacon" a NSF centre for the study of evolution in action had this interesting article by a researcher trying to confirm hypothesis' discussing why proteins conferring immunity to colicin are so diverse, even though they are extremely vital (normally meaning they stay with what works instead of changing too much). This is a real controversy in evolutionary biology, discussing an important issue, a breath of fresh air after discussing the all too familiar creationist lunatics.

Applied Evolution and Computation

In the Beacon there is a story about Digital Organisms and how it is possible to make them evolve, they were inspired by a book called "Prey" by Michael Crichton, a book I was planning on reading until someone through my copy in the river from what I saw it is a great book.

Darwin and History

Have you ever wondered what Darwin would have had on his book shelf? What collections of writers would have had the opportunity to get into his life? Well now it is online, a significant portion of his personal books have been put online in Darwin's Virtual Library, go over to this post at the Dispersal of Darwin for more details.

The Ecological Connection and Extinction

Over at the Mermaids Tale in a post labeled "Evolutionary Cascade" Anne Buchnan discusses the implications of our environmental impacts on the world and how it could lead to a cascade of extinctions after you remove just a few species that are important to the eco-system causing "eco-quakes".

Jerry Coyne at Why Evolution is True has been discussing the neutral theory of ecology, a theory that is complex but recently has been put on trial by the President of the American Society of Naturalists.

Now to NeuroDojo where we look at how the introduction of invasive species and how even in amphibians, reptiles braininess is a favourable feature if you are planning on invading, incept in Australia.

Showing an interesting case of mutualistic symbiosis in plants and ants, "Denim and Tweed" shows how if you offer free lunches you don't always get payed for them...

Miscellaneous

This post at Beacon describes how we study soil bacterium, metagenomics, how they are involved in the nitrogen cycle and how they react to fertilizers, this technical article may interest many, if you think you can deal with technical language this article is for you.

From"Books and Beasts" we find a review of the recent "Feathers: The Evolution of a Natural Miracle". I had heard very little about the book until this but this review sparked my interest, I will be sure to buy the book given the opportunity.

Thanks to "Byte Size Biology" we can look at "Zombie Science Round up" a look at forms of zombie making wasps and fungi who effect insects.

NeuroDojo has some interesting looks at warning colours in mammals, I for one before this could not think of any warning colourations I had seen I had seen in mammals (incept perhaps the skunk).

Anyways, here is a self-proclaimed physicalist perspective of behaviour, I think it is pretty interesting although still at issue, take a look.

Ever wondered what material is rejected from the Carnival of Evolution? See here for one crazy, sexist example.

Wacky Fundamentalists #4

2011-06-27T18:49:00.000-04:00

Reality Reviewed is another scary website controlled by Christian (possibly muslim) Gnostics I will do my best to present about 10% of their nonsense, that would already be enough for two posts, so let's get started with the size of the universe...

If I had to guess this picture from their website it shows a universe 10 Astronomical Units (AU) across, but he probably believes AUs are smaller but to protect his dignity a little bit we'll say he agrees about the definition of an AU and our distance from the sun, that would put the universe's volume (feel free to do it on your own) at 381874956471821 kilometres cubed (i.e. 1 followed by 27 numbers), a big number but fairly small considering the number of observable stars in the universe is in the billions of billions (let's say 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 (extremely conservative more likely around 3 sextillion (3x10 to the 27th) and the average size a pathetic, 1080000000000 km cubed (i.e. the approximate size of the Earth or a small White Dwarf Star) that takes up 1080000000000000000000000000000 Kilometres cubed (i.e. 1 followed by 28 numbers). This is impossible, unless you think perhaps that stars give off no heat and are the size of marbles in reality and they defy trigonometry (I'll just stop you there, that is impossible). However in another article he says stars are illusions...
But then he offers an alternative:

I'm not even discussing this.

They hate Jews, they are either Christian Gnostic or Muslim Gnostic (does the second exist?), can't figure it out, but sometimes Jew-bashing destroys your own religion. Look at this:

The god of the Old Testament advocates racial violence and hatred, in favour of a group that call themselves the "chosen ones," but we do not condone, solicit or incite any such behaviour.

The Old Testament is part of your version too genius. A Judge is murdered; he used to be the assistant of the secretary of the air force. Naturally it's a government cover-up of an alternative chain of command set up by Dick Cheney:

When he discovered the alternative chain of command to Cheney, he fired all military personnel who were involved. Cheney was said to have been livid. The Secretary ordered an investigation of what the Air Force press release called an 'oversight', and 70 enlisted men and 5 officers were removed from the Minot nuclear system. At the same time, people involved began to die mysteriously. Wheeler is only the latest casualty.

Was the Giffords shooting staged, he says so in a removed youtube video, check out the website to see for your self. Well this next one will be less surprising:

They say the Nazi World Order is going to take over using controlled depopulation and *gasp* forced vaccinations (when do the nanobots come in?). He has the ClimateGate emails mentioned, of course in the out of context form.
And yet another scare, he is an Aids Denier (He denies it's existence in general, not just not being a virus or god's wrath)! Based on a website created on Google Sites Builder which if I had to guess I would say is a sockpuppet, for instance they both have this:

_______ is a research site and as such is covered by Article 19 of the

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

They do however support the humanitarian efforts of Rachel Corrie in Palestine and the efforts of other advocates.

Then they got back into the craziness. With this quote I got wondering what level of critical faculties do they still have:

"You know very well, and the stupid Americans know equally well, that we control their government, irrespective of who sits in the White House. You see, I know it and you know it that no American president can be in a position to challenge us even if we do the unthinkable. What can they [Americans] do to us? We control congress, we control the media, we control show biz, and we control everything in America. In America you can criticize God, but you can't criticize 'Israel'."

Tzipora Menache

(Spokeswoman for the illegal Zionist entity)

By the way, don't google it, the original link is supposed to be a virus download. But let's continue:

Far from being an oracle, the unfortunate Prof. Stephen Hawking is almost certainly a complete vegetable, and probably has been for many years, whose body is kept from undergoing total failure and subsequent decay by those exploiting Hawking's image and synthesized 'voice' to mislead the sheeple into believing lies, such as the 'Big Bang', the insignificance of the Earth, space travel, the idea of organic evolution, the infallibility of science, and that God does not exist. (This is similar to how the idiot and plagiarist, Albert Einstein, has been cast into a platitudinous genius.

Oh and by the way 96% of the world media is zionist, 9/11 and the holocaust are frauds, swine flu, avian flu are government-made, as is morgellons disease. And this is barely the beginning of the selection.

Survival of the Sneakiest- Cricket Sex -Cartoon Explains Evolution

2011-06-26T21:42:00.000-04:00

Here is the original link.
(via Pharyngula)

Your Weekly Youtube: The Dublin World Atheist Conference

2011-06-26T11:12:00.010-04:00

A little late I know but it is interesting and my "Your Weekly Youtube" is backed up a lot.

Sorry, a little slow on Blogging

2011-06-24T21:28:00.000-04:00

I've been pretty busy today, rafting (your jealous) and recently as well, (it is nearing the end of the year, lots of catch up on work). Because of this the number of posts I have been able to put up has decreased. Right now it appears I'm going to be busy for awhile longer with camping and school ("Science Olympics" on monday). Thanks for your time, probably put out some links once I go through 5 days worth of unread blog posts (yes I go through all the posts I miss usually).
We're coming up on our first anniversary, and I will not miss that date.

Miss America States whining about Evolution: At least intellect won

2011-06-22T18:50:00.000-04:00

Yep, mostly they were saying it is bad but the winner in the end was pro-evolution (I would like to think that would be cause/effect, pretty unlikely though ;)):

Hovind Theory: Measurements of Cookery

2011-06-21T22:53:00.000-04:00

I recently heard of the Hovind (H) a unit of measurement of cookery and after thinking about it for a while I developed this mathematical formula to explain a Hovind:

Centihovind (cH)= Claim(s) x % of scientific community that deny it

For example, if I take this claim:

Well in my opinion that means that the sun was once bigger...if you take that millions of years back, it would have destroyed life on earth and not start it. Whats is your opinion?

  This was referring to the fact that the sun was burning and he supposed that the Earth might have been inside the sun if the sun is decreasing in size and the old Earth is true, this might have been a problem if the sun was decreasing in size. But 100% of the scientific community believe the sun is expanding, so let's do the calculation:
1x100=100 cH=1 H
  So this is one Hovind, if I added "evolution is false" on it's own to this, you get this:
(1x100)+(1x97)=197 cH = 1.97 H for 2 claims.
  Thank you for your time.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-06-19T10:00:00.000-04:00

Expo 150 Propaganda

2011-06-16T22:08:00.001-04:00

In our county we are celebrating our 150th year as a county, and to celebrate this we are putting on a huge expo to show our diverse culture and history, unfortunately the church played a large role in our history and this is seen in the Expo (otherwise an amazing event). I went up to some of these church's stands and looked at their pamphlets (no I was not looking for trouble, they were handing out free candy (typical me)) and was asked a question, "Do you want a colouring sheet?" I did not take this personally but I thought it was weird to ask to a 5 foot 3' person. I looked at the colouring sheet, it was a picture of animals with the quote "Genesis 1: 1-25 god created the Earth" and I knew, they had just found trouble.
"Do you believe in evolution?" I asked, and the man there said "No I don't." I asked him why, he said he believes the bible and that evolution just isn't true, he went on for a bit about the complexity of life before handing me a pamphlet "Creationism or Evolution? A christian perspective", in all the pamphlet there was three arguments, the second law of thermodynamics (wow, I didn't know that was still popular), irreducible complexity, and an appeal to auhority/ ad populum (i.e. they said that they were mainstream in the scientific community (yes, loosely fitting those fallacy catgories)). I mentioned that the second law argument was totally wrong and discussed the reasons why. And then continued on.
Next I went to the "good news radio" tent where I was actually offered the bible on CD in about 50 different editions in about 20 different languages (4 english, 1 KJV). And also asked that to them and received an argument based on three assumptions:

God exists;
Gods word is perfect and immutable;
He said that life was perfect.

And the obvious conclusion is that any change with in a species is dangerous, I brought up a few examples of beneficial mutations, extreme muscle growth (anti-myostatin duplication), bone strength, etc. Of which he came up with hypothetical down sides like broken bones for anti-myostatin duplication from extra muscle mass, etc. I brought up blue eyes as a mutation that wasn't deleterious, he a blue eyed person said apparently they "sunburned easier" which I'm not sure about, he said something about how change is normally very small before it dies from problems caused, I mentioned some speciation events, at this point he said they were very hypothetical at which point we ended the conversation. Although obviously this could have gone on.

Conservapedia is making more errors

2011-06-16T21:36:00.002-04:00

Recently I heard about this video put out by the NCSE and began watching it, at 6:00 they mentioned a survey that showed 78% of physicians believed evolution. I remembered immediately a fairly famous survey that conservapedia touted showing 1/3 of physicians (i.e. 33%) believed in creationism (meaning 66% percent believed in evolution). It turns out that they are based on the same survey, they just rounded down 12 points instead of up 2 points. I thought this might be useful to bring up on the talk page for evolution, which I now know to be locked to prevent non-approved changes incept by the CPanel so I brought decided to bring it up on their talk page... and received this message:

You do not have permission to edit this page, for the following reason:

This page has been locked to prevent editing.

If you would like to edit this article, discuss your proposals on the article's talk page or consult the protecting administrator.

Remember now that this was already a talk page without any further hierarchy of talk pages. This is extremely poor organization I just wanted to bring this up because it just shows what I would describe as, an attempt to squash dissent. But there is some other interesting features, this is part of a small exchange on the Evolution Talk page:

Oh dearie me. The RATE group anomalies are produced by flawed experimental data. Isochron measurement requires that the rock samples are cogenetic (formed at the same time from a common pool of material within which the isotopes and elements are relatively homogenous). This was never done by RATE. For example, RATE geologist Steve Austin has stated (Austin, Steven A., ed., 1994. Grand Canyon: Monument to Catastrophe) that the samples he took came from four different lava flows and an extracted phenocryst.

Austin knows he will get the wrong results this way. In Austin, Steven A., 1988. "Grand Canyon lava flows: A survey of isotope dating methods," in Impact #178, he mentions that this kind of false isochron is well known and cites (Faure, Gunter, 1986. Principles of Isotope Geology, Second Edition. New York: John Wiley and Sons pp 145-147) on the matter.

But truth is not the objective of these creationist groups. They generate propaganda in the form of pseudo-scientific articles that fool the layman into thinking that there is something suspect. To understand what is going on requires an in-depth understanding of the science that most people do not have.

And there is a ver ironic response on the CPanel page:

Ladies and gentlemen, you need have no doubt that Steven A. Austin and his colleagues thought of every issue that Mr. Splodge mentioned--and furthermore, Mr. Splodge is probably passing on misinformation from Talk.Origins. If you want some detailed explanations, then may I suggest this article:

"(Talk.Origins) Isochron date of young Grand Canyon lava is excessively old." CreationWiki, The encyclopedia of creation science. September 7, 2006, 00:26 UTC. Retrieved April 14, 2007.

Mind you, I don't suggest that Mr. Splodge is originating a fabrication. I merely suggest that he thinks he has a club with which to deal the coup de grâce to the young-earth position, when in fact he has a bruised reed. I submit this to you so that you may take it under advisement in deciding the direction of the articleTheory of evolution.--TerryH^Talk 19:19, 14 April 2007 (EDT)

If the RATE group have considered the issues I have raised, I assume you will be able to produce documentaion as to the fact? I do believe Conservapedia has a policy regarding unsubstantiated claims. Note that mine come directly from the publications of RATE group members. And if it helps any, Mr Splodge did earn a degree in Geology from Edinburgh University some 25 years ago. Splodge 07:37, 16 April 2007 (EDT)

It's a while since I have mentioned CONservapedia, this should be enough for now.

Common sayings prove the theory of evolution's irrelevance - The Daily Observer - Ontario, CA

2011-06-15T20:50:00.000-04:00

Common sayings prove the theory of evolution's irrelevance - The Daily Observer - Ontario, CA

Oh my Darwin this is funny.

Wacky Fundamentalists #3

2011-06-14T21:19:00.001-04:00

  Okay now I promised geocentrism and well looking for one I was aware of, I found enough for 7 editions of this feature.
  That is a serious problem, we deal with the creationists we know, the mainstream ones, but if there is this untapped effort, a "sleeping giant" we could be dealing with a irrational forces greater than any we have seen before if there were a call to action we would see them crowd online forums! This threat would be even more ignorant, gullible, and with poorer cognition than even the hordes of Kent Hovind! The battle we find ourselves in is in no ways a winning battle in the public arena, we barely make a mark on the world, and evolution is often considered to be on equal grounds with myths. It is amazing we have gotten this far, but this is a message of warning. Many people lose faith in our ability to win against stupidity when they see this niche in the internet that we hold. I doubt a bunch of geocentrists (my dictionary doesn't even have that word in it!) is going to help the situation.
  Perhaps I overestimate the abilities of these people to effect our lives. But I see there all-powerful idiocy and I know in my heart. I am underestimating the threat.
  Okay rant over lets have some fun with this shall we? Let's begin and look at their take on the "evolution-big bang paradigm" starting with the article "From Copernicanism Through Big Bangism":

The solar eclipse tableau involving the sun, moon, and earth reveals a truly amazing fact about the universal acceptance of the Copernican Heliocentric Model of a rotating earth orbiting a stationary sun. That amazing fact is this: The Eclipse Tableau exposes as no other illustration does the bald truth that the Helio Model is built purely on assumptions that deny all observational and experimental evidence.

Warning further reading of this post may cause an overdose of bullshit, if you experience any sudden pain contact your poison contact your local poison control centre. It goes on to discuss 7 "assumptions" of the Helio model, and get this apparently the evolutionary-big bang paradigm is based on Heliocentrism:

It must be assumed that the Sun is stationary in the "solar" system relevant to the Earth (and to the Moon) and that it has never traveled East to West daily across the sky as observed by everyone on Earth throughout all history.

Yes, because we all know that you can tell the difference between the Earth rotating and Sun revolving, because we all know that the sun revolves around the Earth at 36.3 million miles an hour (139 miles is the minimum distance we could be from the sun without boiling under the assumption that trigonometry is incorrect, and then you find the circumference with Pi x Radius Squared and then divide it by 24 (the hours in a day) (this is all conservative and should be about more than that by a lot)) , and that is much easier to swallow then heliocentrism, oh and we can't forget that the stars are farther away, even if geocentrism were true and they were say 3000 light years away (which would probably melt us from seconds worth of heat, and again is against trigonometry) and they go around once a day then that is 146 billion miles an hour!

Likewise, it must be assumed that the Earth rotates West to East ccw (counterclockwise) on an "axis" every 24 hours at an equatorial speed of c. 1040 MPH in spite of there being nothing but a mathematical model's "evidence" for this motion whatsoever.

This is hilarious in comparison with the last figures I looked at that they would even see these figures as unlikely, and they are proving themselves great at not citing real information. Let's continue:

It must be assumed that the Earth is also orbiting the Sun annually (ccw) at an average speed of c. 67,000 MPH.

It must be assumed that the Earth’s axial alleged tilt of 23.5 degrees--in combination with its assumed annual orbit around the sun--is the only available scientific explanation for the seasons.

They just say this "Oh, that is not how seasons work" but not offering an alternative, what would happen if I said "liars don't exist" what would you say, not something very friendly I predict.

The Earth’s atmosphere must be assumed to be just an airy, fixed extension of the alleged rotating Earth. It is assumed and must be assumed that this atmosphere must have the remarkable ability to synchronize speeds of objects in it at all altitudes--birds, clouds, jets, low orbit satellites, alleged geo-synchronous satellites over 22,000 miles out--and to be unaffected by alleged Earth movements of speeds ranging from 1000 MPH to 67,000 MPH to 500,000 MPH to 660,000,000 MPH. This assumption is mandatory once the rotating Earth assumption is made and can not be ignored in the helio model of the eclipse phenomena.

Oh we mustn't forget all the air molecules that are geo-sychronously (if that is the word) routed with my school bus when it drives down a high way what are the odds of that, in fact I wish to contend that the road moves, not the car like those dirty secular carists would like to make you think.

It must be assumed that the Stars do not move around the Earth diurnally (as observed by everyone who has ever lived).

Pure GENIOUS! When does he get his Laureate?!? That is already to much bullshit for one night I'm done this post.

Thanking God

2011-06-13T19:08:00.000-04:00

For we shall give thanks for the fools;
Thanks for creating me an atheist with evidential standards, not following them and then expecting me not to be one. Thank you for creating minorities telling a bunch of delirious desert herders who's ancestors would one day be just as stupid but control nuclear arms that they could enslave them. And of course thank you god, for making evolution-deniers that lie in your name and brainwash children for jeebus.
We shall give thanks for the plagues;
Thank you for giving people immune systems and immuno-deficiency viruses to destroy them and having believers think it is divine punishment for gays. And for the malaria to be dispersed through mosquitoes an uncontrollable scourge.
Thank you for evil and death;
Thank you for killing millions of innocent lives, where you did not discriminate between your "chosen people" and pagans, between the good and the bad, or the innocence and the guilty. Thank you for releasing murderers upon the world, and for breaking them out of prisons. And thank you most of all for the greed allowing millions of Africans to have their aid redirected to the wealthy, and for the workers to be paid so little so that we can get those roll backs.
For the Disasters;
For the Earthquakes for they kill the millions, for the tsunamis so that they may cause great suffering upon the weak, the hurricanes for they are your wrath. For creating a universe that at any moment may become inhospitable.

But of course I must thank you, thanks for the reason to clean up your holy mess, which might actually destroy us.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-06-12T06:00:00.001-04:00

LOL

2011-06-11T22:56:00.002-04:00

Wacky Fundamentalists #2

2011-06-08T08:00:00.000-04:00

This is from the website "Jesus is Saviour", to start off I want you to see the little icon in front of the web address:

I thought it was nice when I first saw it, it was nice and at first I thought this was just another "jesus loves you, obey me without considering other options" sort of website (Yes my internet is slow enough that I have time to consider that).

How wrong I turned out to be I came in on the page "False Religions EXPOSED!" which list multiple ignorant articles about different religions including atheism and humanism including this bias sampled:

Do you believe in Aliens? Here is a little quote:

If you are a professed Atheist, I ask you the question: Do you believe in aliens? Could not God be an alien? Yes, He most certainly is an alien. The dictionary defines the word “alien” as: “coming from or existing outside the earth or its atmosphere.” God is not of this world. The Bible teaches that God created the universe, which means that His presence transcends this universe.

It is contradictory for any Atheist to profess a belief in the existence of alien life (or at least the possibility thereof); while simultaneously denying the existence of God. If you believe that aliens may exist, then you certainly must concede that one of those aliens may be God.

Some people believe that the Pyramids of Egypt were built by aliens; but the Bible teaches that slave Israelites built the treasure cities of Pithom and Raamses (sic) for Pharaoh (Exodus 1:11). Evidence shows that it was mankind, and not aliens, that built the Pyramids of Egypt.

That is pretty sad. Here is another, "SO YOU DON'T BELIEVE IN GOD?" here is another quote I'm not going to say anything, just laugh at the ridiculousness:

Where did life begin?

How can nothing become something?

How can lifeless material bring forth life?

How can life become man?

How can nothing take on intelligence?

How can nothing evolve and reproduce?

Where did man's spirit come from?

Why don't animals have a moral conscience?

It is all utterly impossible according to every known scientific fact.

Only God!

I think somewhere I saw a joke "the three stages of evolution defence" or something, the first was reason, then mockery, and then something else that I forget, I think I have reached stage two. Okay moving on to humanists, I want to look at the article "Psychologists and Psychiatrists are Quacks!" lets just read a small excerpt:

There are several million people in America alone, who are talking prescribed DRUGS to remedy depression, and other mental/emotional problems. Most of them are running from God and need to get right with God in their hearts. As the saying goes...Give God your heart and He'll comb the kinks out of your head. When you go to a psychologist/psychiatrist, you are going to an unsaved person who has been trained in a heathen university. Even if your shrink were a Christian, they could easily lose their license if they presented the Scriptures to you.

Heathen universities? Just wow, and the internet that you are soiling was designed by a high school drop out right? Oh and also just to sum up, the rest of the website:

Abortion is bad.
Catholicism and every other form of christianity is wrong (incept his).
9/11 was an inside job.
The New World Order teamed up with the illuminati too try and destroy the world.
Evolution is a hoax, and a lie.
We are going to a Pharmagaddon.
Fascism is rampant in the church.
Catholic Priests aren't real christians they are atheists using religion as a front for getting little boys.
Homosexuals are bad. God hates Fags.
We should kill all false christians.
Chick Tracts are misleading (finally something we can agree on (from different angles)).
KJB is the only true english bible, ones like the NIV are faked.
Liquor is of the devil.

At least they are no geocentric, but that is going to come up in out next edition.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-06-05T13:00:00.000-04:00

Celebrating Evolution, Hurray!

2011-06-04T23:46:00.001-04:00

This month I will be hosting the "Carnival of Evolution" a monthly celebration of evolution, feel free to submit your own material to be part of this event. If you are not already aware this is a aggregate of submitted evolution posts from all the best websites. Unfortunately I will probably never get in to this because I don't really ever find material for news before other blogs and never cover it well enough.
I plan to organize it like this but it will be subject to change when I see submissions:

Evolution in Action.
Phylogeny and Systematics.
Controversy and Education (creationism, etc)
Genes and Molecular Biology.
Applied Evolution.
Darwin and his Times.
Human Evolution and Biological Anthropology.
The Ecological Connection.
Extinction.
Time and the Deep Past.
Miscellaneous.

My apologies to the past participants who in many of these I have copied.

Cross Creek: This is Not happening in a Third World Country!

2011-06-04T11:07:00.002-04:00

Are you feeling emotional or at all depressed right now? Save this story for later, are you in a really good mood right now? Don't ruin it wait for later. After reading this story see here to help stop it.

A Sausage Fest of Fun

2011-06-02T18:28:00.005-04:00

A follower of this blog, Shane McKee has just hit the Jackpot, he was mentioned on Pharyngula with this post on sausages (mmm... sausages):

Answers in Genes: Show me the Sausages!

Here is a little bit of the article:

The philosopher says, "Ah, behold the wonderful cogs and sprockets and
temperature-controlled mixing chambers in my wonderful machine -
surely you can see how it must produce the most fantastic sausages!"
The scientist says "Yes, that is all very interesting. Show me the sausages."
The philosopher says "How dare you, a mere scientist, question my
wonderful philosophical reasoning?"
Scientist: "I'm not questioning your reasoning - I want to know if
your machine really produces sausages."

Wonderful, I left this comment:

I come here and expect to see a normal 3 person crowd, I see your post and think to myself "maybe I'll blog this", I put a reaction, I see the number of reactions and think to myself. "hmmm..." that don't look normal. I look at comments, "what something about PZ?".
Then I see the trackbacks, "Holy shit you got mentioned by PZ" I think immediately. Congrads on the new following, I knew you had potential.

And it sure has begged for puns, you've been thinking of them, one person believes it is the wurst argument ever, another believes they are spiritual sausages, and of course there is the pedo-priest jokes.

I am happy to see Answers in Genes receive much deserved attention from the atheist community and I congratulate him on his formation of a gnu atheist meme that I'm sure will survive. So theists (priests please do not take it too literally) show us your sausages.

Wacky Fundamentalists #1

2011-06-01T18:50:00.000-04:00

Like another recent post (creationist fails) I am hoping to make this a common feature like "Your Weekly Youtube". So let's get started with some obvious ones. WBC or the Westboro Baptist Church, if that name sounds familiar perhaps you remember them from the funerals of the people involved in the Gabriel Giffords shooting or about any military funeral (or if you see there signs they often go viral), they picket these events because they believe "Jesus Christ said don't worship the dead!" They also have their website "God Hates the World" (they have a map of the world and you can choose a country to see why god hates you!). And more recently they have gotten in the news because someone counter-protested them, an who was it? The Ku Klux Klan or KKK (you know the hate group with the racists and the white robes and the burning crosses) who were counter-protesting the WBC's anti-military views:

That's it for today I already have a second edition in he work.

The Prevalence of Skepticism in a Catholic School

2011-05-31T22:07:00.000-04:00

  Today I learned that two of my best friends are atheists, I was aware of one of them but not the other being atheist. And apparently they went around the school at lunch asking people in our extremely religious creationist school "why?", or more specifically "how do you know there is a god?". When one of my friends talked about this with me he said when he got a car he wanted a bumper sticker that showed Jesus Fish belly up beside a Darwin Fish.
  On the last day of EMCP I scored a back seat, along with another kid from my school, on the 2 hour drive I learnt that he believed in aliens and he thought that this was not compatible with religion.
  Earlier in the year I learnt that one teacher that I knew was a creationist, I heard this from someone who found it funny, almost hilarious (although not actually mentioning atheism). When I passed this on someone else said "I know and he actually believes in dragons, why can't they just accept then one part of the bible was wrong."
  A friend that I mentioned at the beginning talked about this with me at the beginning of the year and said he was definitely an atheist.
  But at the same time superstition spreads one of the fore-mentioned friends involved in the lunch episode when trying to get a girl friend had this conversation:
"I heard you are not religious" (girlfriend).
"No, I'm deeply religious" (guy 1)
"No, your not" (guy 2)
"I'll pray for you" (girlfriend, then promptly leaves)
"I hate you" (guy 1 to guy 2)
  Hmmm... I see Apologists in the making.
  Our minister Peggy Dunne has a poster on her office's wall showing "faithbook" basically zombie facebook on Jesus's Profile and it has this message from Darwin:
"To say sorry doesn't cut it, as (forgotten) said "I can see clearly now""
  Well good news and bad news, this is a localized subjective analysis but is an interesting look at school life.

Creationist FAIL: Part One

2011-05-31T21:14:00.000-04:00

Creationist Fail of the Day is a great blog, look at this recent calamity:

Evolutionists don't live perfect lives, so how can their theory possibly be true?

And this:

Jump in the air.

Did you land in a different spot?

No.

So you saying the Earth spins on its axis is denying reality.

How many people said "holy fuck" when they read that?

Evolution causes University Prof. to lose their Job

2011-05-29T22:16:00.000-04:00

This obviously isn't a common problem, this is simply a creationist dinosaur rearing their heads before extinction but it is still worth a look:

The Dean called me in to his office and said, “Sabio, your chairman wants me to fire you and he is making up reasons to make it happen.” He showed me, in confidentiality, the letter he received from my boss. It charged me with not being a team player, confusing the students in the way I taught alternative medicine and turning students against the faculty. After I read it, he said, “I know these are all lies, the students tell me they love you and you reviews to date are impecable. You are an incredibly good teacher and a huge asslet to the school. I will not fire you. But I must tell you that you will never get tenure in that department — they will obstruct you the whole way. So I’d like to offer you a job in the philosophy department.”

New Anomalocaridid Find Dates Only to the Ordovician Period

2011-05-29T21:49:00.000-04:00

Previously Anomalocaridids are only known to have existed in the Cambrian, now this new fossil find pushes the age of their extinction to as recent as 475 mya. This is in the Ordovician. This seems pretty small but in this area of research this is ground breaking.

Your Weekly Youtube

2011-05-29T19:39:00.001-04:00

I may have posted this before.

AIG hits a new low in logic

2011-05-27T22:44:00.001-04:00

You have probably seen bad arguments from AiG or other organizations but this is a new low, see here for full detail but I'll just give you a quote:

Contrary to what your non-Christian friend said, circular reasoning is surprisingly a valid argument.

Ann Druyan talks about her husband, Carl Sagan

2011-05-27T22:14:00.000-04:00

This is beautiful, a message from Carl Sagan's wife:

“When my husband died, because he was so famous & known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me — it still sometimes happens — & ask me if Carl changed at the end & converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage & never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don’t ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But, the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief & precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive & we were together was miraculous — not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance… That pure chance could be so generous & so kind… That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space & the immensity of time… That we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me & it’s much more meaningful…

The way he treated me & the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other & our family, while he lived. That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday. I don’t think I’ll ever see Carl again. But I saw him. We saw each other. We found each other in the cosmos, and that was wonderful.“

(Ann Druyan, talking about her husband, Carl Sagan)

Via The Cosmic Dust