creationism
pharyngula | January 7, 2011Ken Ham is not happy with the Pope. If the Pope claims that his god started the Big Bang, that is an acknowledgment that the Big Bang, which is not in the Bible, actually happened, and you know what that leads to? Madness!
Now, if the book of Genesis is an allegory, then sin is an allegory, the Fall is an allegory, the need for a Savior is an allegory, and Adam is an allegory—but if we are all descendants of an allegory, where does that leave us? It destroys the foundation of all Christian doctrine—it destroys the foundation of the gospel.
Yes! Exactly!
If Genesis is an allegory then the…
gregladen | January 6, 2011It is difficult to imagine how point mutations, a large number of which are neutral, a certain number of which are deleterious, and a tiny number of which are fitness-enhancing, can add up to the sorts of evolutionary diversity and adaptive elegance we see in real life. However, there are only two possible explanations for what we see in nature: 1) Evolution happened more or less as we think it did or 2) God created life and made it look exactly like evolution happened. Take your pick. I'm betting on number 1.
People will get mad at me for suggesting that it is hard to figure how all this…
gregladen | January 4, 2011Ken Miller and Henry Morris answer questions from the audience.
Since these videos are scattered across the blog, I'll put them all here. The final one is at the bottom.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Thanks to the NCSE
gregladen | January 3, 2011According to the Louisville Courier-Journal, the developers building the new Noah's Ark museum in Kentucky are asking for the gummit to build 'em a road to the place. The State Transportation Cabinet, as they call it there, is officially stating that no commitments have been made, which I'm sure means, "The deal's done and we'z gonna build that road before you ask about it again" or words to that effect.
This is not that unusual or abnormal, actually. State transportation departments normally make road improvements when new things are built. Why, in Kentucky, the state spent 45 million…
gregladen | January 3, 2011The other day, a science teacher remarked that a student who had previously declared herself to be a creationist, and who's parents had previously expressed concern over the teaching of evolution, was suddenly all talky-talky and engaging the teacher in more or less polite and friendly discussion about the topic, coming to visit the teacher outside of class and everything.
I thought at the time, "That's unusual. But it does happen."
What I wasn't thinking is that a recent court decision supports the idea of a teacher who teaches evolution to christians, who does not cave when the…
pharyngula | January 2, 2011This brief exchange captures it all.
Just to put it in text: creationist ignoramus posts amazing "fact" in his status:
** Fact- if the earth was 10 ft closer to the sun we would all burn up and if it was 10 ft further we would freeze to death... God is amazing!
Someone politely replies, stating the actual astronomical facts.
to anyone wondering, that's not true. 1) Earth's orbit is elliptical and the distance from the sun varies from around 147 million kilometers to 152 million kilometers on any given year. 2) Every star has a habitable zone that is affected by the size of the star and its…
tfk | December 31, 2010Denyse O'Leary â I call her D'OhLeary for short â quotes John Templeton making the ontological argument for God:
Would it not be strange if a universe without purpose accidentally created humans who are so obsessed with purpose?
But this is an awful argument, and especially badly stated here. Let's try something:
Would it not be strange of a universe without Japanese tentacle sex monsters accidentally created humans who are so obsessed with Japanese tentacle sex monsters?
Or in a more classical form:
Would it not be strange of a universe without a horse for everyone to ride accidentally…
pharyngula | December 31, 2010What is it with these loons? They've got nothing, but they're continually telling us what they could accomplish, if only they…what? I don't know.
The latest trend in kook blogs is to tell us all the things that would happen if we only accepted their weird premises. Here, for example, is Terry Hurlbut, explaining what America would be like if creationists controlled science.
This hypothetical creation-oriented society would take scientific education, research, and investigation in a new direction. Astronomers would stop looking for "dark matter" and "dark energy," and instead develop a uniform…
tfk | December 31, 2010Ed Brayton has been doing yeoman work to expose the overtly religious agenda of various parts of the armed forces, especially the Air Force. Today he posts the second part of a story about the Army's "Soldier Fitness Tracker," a survey which evaluates "spiritual fitness," and can require soldiers to undergo "spiritual remedial training" if they underperform. This is Orwellian and deeply offensive to atheists. It should also offend religious folks of other stripes, as the government has no business telling them that their spiritual life needs remediation. Given the military's long history…
pharyngula | December 29, 2010If any of you are writing to Governor Beshear of Kentucky about the life-sized Noah's Ark the state will be underwriting, don't wait for a reply — he's sending out a standardized form letter, which many people have been forwarding to me. Here it is, in case you haven't got one.
Thank you for contacting me with your concerns about proposed "Ark Encounter" tourist attraction. I appreciate knowing your views.
Bringing new jobs to Kentucky is my top priority, and I believe this project will be beneficial to our future, providing an estimated 900 jobs and $250 million in annual revenue for the…
pharyngula | December 29, 2010People don't realize how insane the literal interpretation of the Bible can get. There is no room for ambiguity or error in the book of Genesis, so when God tells Noah to put at least a pair of every living thing on the big boat, he didn't offer any exceptions — therefore, every living thing had a representative aboard.
And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.
Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every…
tfk | December 28, 2010
Mark Cothren of Kentucky cannot recognize a raccoon with mange. This is noteworthy mainly because Texans can't recognize a dog with mange, either.
It's also noteworthy because it's possible Mark Cothren is related to Martin Cothran, and there's a new blogger at Martin Cothran's blog. He signs off as "Thomas Cothran," who is either an Oklahoman or a Tennesseean serving a 112 year sentence for vehicular manslaughter, or someone else entirely.
He asks: Is the Opposition to Climate Change Ecological or Technological?, and trips over himself right from the first sentence:
Let's set aside the…
pharyngula | December 27, 2010Joe wrote me a letter because he doesn't think my arguments against creationism are very good. Unfortunately, his arguments are…well, pretty much the standard inconsistent and incoherent tripe I always get from creationists. But at least Joe has an excuse: he's only 12.
By the way, his email actually was in Comic Sans. Part of it, anyway: a large random chunk in the middle was set in good ol' Comic Sans.
Hello. This is not Spam. I would like to have a discussion on your post 'The five best arguments for creationism ever.' (http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/09/…
pharyngula | December 26, 2010Via Sandwalk, this is a clip of Paul Nelson praising Jonathan Wells and his godawful gemisch of bad scholarship and lies, Icons of Evolution. They were making a big to-do over the ten-year anniversary of publication of this ghastly hackwork, and here Nelson is piously praising the premise.
It's infuriatingly dishonest. Notice what he repeats over and over: the textbooks "diverge from the actual evidence," they're "out of touch with the actual evidence," we "need to take these standard stories back to the evidence." This, from the Discovery Institute, a propaganda mill with no evidence for…
gregladen | December 26, 2010I hereby nominate Oklahoma as the Stupidest State in the Union.
According to KTEN, Brecheen is using the tired old argument that because creationism exists as a belief it must be taught in science classes. This is exactly like saying that because some crazy people think bigfoot is real, bigfoot must be included in science classes.
"If we really are going to use science in the classroom, let's use the full science, let's not just be selective in our science. That's what my legislation is designed to do," Brecheen said.
Idiot.
Creationism of any form, including "intelligent design," simply…
pharyngula | December 22, 2010Oh, actually, shaved apes would be an upgrade from Josh Brecheen, who is more like a shaved and bipedal member of the subgenus Asinus. He's a new legislator who has announced his intention to introduce creationism into Oklahoma schools (or, as perhaps I should refer to them, "skools") for a set of reasons he laid out in a notably ignorant column in the Durant Daily Democrat.
His column is amazing. The faculty of Southeastern Oklahoma State University are covering their eyes in shame right now, since apparently this creationist-cliche-spewing plagiarist and professional goober managed to…
pharyngula | December 19, 2010In their invisible feasibility study, proponents of the very silly Ark theme park in Kentucky claimed it would create 900 jobs. Now a mysterious consultant claims it will be even more effective:
The ripple effect of the first year in job creation will be over 14,000 new jobs.
But wait! That's not big enough! Here comes Ken Ham to fluff the statistics a little more.
A lot of left-wing media and bloggers have reacted very negatively, writing a lot of false information. They only represent a minority of the people in this nation. The majority of people in this area and across the nation are…
pharyngula | December 19, 2010Creationists say the weirdest things. Every once in a while, someone sends me a creationist quote that reveals exactly how clueless and ignorant these guys are, because they start lecturing people on biology, a subject they clearly know nothing about. We've got a local boy named Brock Lee in Owatonna who is fond of writing amazing letters to the newspapers — I've mentioned him before — and here's a remarkable example of creationist inanity. Look at the conclusions he draws from the biological species concept:
What is a species? The evolutionary answer seems simple enough: a species is an…
pharyngula | December 17, 2010This is a remarkable bit of news about the magical Ark Encounter in Kentucky. You know that feasibility study, the one written by Ken Ham's good buddy and co-author, the one that justified the them park because it would bring in 900 good jobs and swarms of tourists? The governor never saw it. Nobody in the Kentucky government has seen it. The state never received a copy to file. They refuse to show it to the press, even. The report is reportedly 10,000 pages long, with just the executive summary being 200 pages long, and apparently the only people who have seen it are Ham and his cronies, and…