[_ Old Earth _] Considerations about science

[Barbarian]

Speciation isn't a fact if it violates Gods word

Truth cannot contradict truth. Even creationist organizations like Answers in Genesis and the Institute for Creation Research have eventually conceded the fact. Yes, their particular interpretation of God did require that there be no speciation. But when the truth became inescapable, they changed to fit the truth. Reluctantly, maybe. But they did it. And they redefined "evolution" to exclude the evolution of new species.

Some Christians like Luther and Calvin once denied that the Earth moved around the Sun. Eventually, their followers acknowledged that they had misunderstood scripture, and corrected that doctrinal error. So it will be with evolution. New generations won't have invested so much pride in their personal interpretations, and will be open to reason and evidence.

Christian homeschool science textbooks have long taught young earth creationism (YEC) almost exclusively. But observers say a growing number of parents want texts that also teach evolution.


"Homeschooling has broadened so much, and now includes many Christian groups who have never adopted [YEC]," said homeschool pioneer Susan Wise Bauer, a history professor at Virginia's College of William and Mary. "Also, there are a lot of younger evangelicals who have come to a different way of understanding Genesis, while still holding [on to their] evangelical roots."


Numbers on the trend are hard to pin down. Still, BioLogos president Deborah Haarsma says that it's "fairly common" for homeschooling families to request materials from her organization, which promotes theistic evolution. Some of these parents still believe in a young earth, says program director Kathryn Applegate, but they want their children exposed to different perspectives.


Doug Hayworth, coordinator of homeschool science resources for the American Scientific Affiliation, agrees. Inquiries to his Christian association reveal not a wave of old-earth converts, but instead frustrated young-earth believers who believe that "the standard [YEC] curricula ... are very strident," said Hayworth, who homeschools. "They're looking for some advice."
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2013/may/new-creation-story.html

and most Christians don't believe evolution a fact..

The vast majority of the world's Christians belong to denominations that freely admit that evolution is consistent with God's creation. And now evangelicals are beginning to move away from man's re-interpretation of His word.

 

[Rollo Tamasi]

My turn!
Hi brother Paul, Barbarian, and turnorburn.
I really enjoy reading all that you are saying.
I don't understand it all but it's very interesting.
Please keep in mind, if you would, always talk in such a way so the average person (me) can understand.
Thank you for your consideration.

 

[Barbarian]

I'd be pleased to explain any jargon that's not familiar. Science often uses unfamiliar words to make things more succinct. Let me know whatever gets too jargonish.

 

[turnorburn]

And after brother Paul just got through saying this "Brothers it seems we have gone off topic. What are your thoughts on some considerations listed in the OP? Are they sound? Do they make sense?"

tob

 

[Barbarian]

I think it's a good and relevant issue. Often, scientists assume that people understand what they're talking about. And sometimes, it's obscure because of jargon.

 

[turnorburn]

Well then if that's the case lets discuss how your statement "The vast majority of the world's Christians belong to denominations that freely admit that evolution is consistent with God's creation." is false, evolution is not consistent with Gods creation..

tob

 

[brother Paul]

Yes, their particular interpretation of God did require that there be no speciation. But when the truth became inescapable, they changed to fit the truth.

Some interpretations yes. But speciation does not demonstrate that members of one genome (like fish) eventually become Amphibians (a different genome). They are still the same creature (though in some cases a new variation).

 

[Barbarian]

1) Scientific research can only find that which our methods and instruments are capable of finding.

This is called "methodological naturalism." The understanding that science can only examine the physical universe, and can neither confirm nor deny the supernatural.

2) Every observation includes an observer, and every experiment, an experimenter who designs it. Thus one can never be totally free of the somewhat subjective element in one’s conclusions.

It's why we test the Null Hypothesis. Requiring controls and protocols with statistical verification is essential if you want your work published.

3) Each scientific conclusion includes the physical analysis (which is concrete and for the most part objective) and a resultant mathematical and logical speculation (which is abstract and often contains unconscious bias)

It's what peer review is for. Before a paper is published, it's reviews by referees who look over it for errors in logic or method. This is why science is pretty close to the most reliable thing we can do. If theology were that good, we wouldn't have scores of different religious interpretations of the same scripture.

4) No single method of classification adequately and absolutely describes or finds everything of the subject matter being classified.

The first incompleteness theorem states that no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an "effective procedure" (e.g., a computer program, but it could be any sort of algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the relations of the natural numbers (arithmetic). For any such system, there will always be statements about the natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system. The second incompleteness theorem, an extension of the first, shows that such a system cannot demonstrate its own consistency.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gödel's_incompleteness_theorems

5) Definitions (for example what is a “species”) vary over time to include the more general variances and nuances of the one or many that are defining a thing or subject in their time.

As I pointed out, Darwin himself showed that if evolution is a fact, then it will be impossible to define "species" precisely. Only if each species was created separately would we see such a thing.

6) The whole may have qualities not found in the parts, and the parts can have qualities not clearly reflected or discerned when looking at the whole (the nature of the atom is a great example here).

Synergy is a property of all sufficiently complex systems. It is, however knowable, and can be examined, predicted, and explained.

7) There can be many interpretations of a thing, person, or event. How, when, or from what angle we look at a thing or event/process can influence our conclusions (what is the nature of an electron is a perfect example).

There is, however an objective truth, and this can be found by careful examination of evidence.

8) Anything in process or development can only be completely understood when one grasps the past of the process or development and the future or where or why it is going there (which can never actually be fully known until we actually arrive at that place).

Scientists often make predictions about future events, based on the past, and they are more often than not, right.

 

[Barbarian]

Well then if that's the case lets discuss how your statement "The vast majority of the world's Christians belong to denominations that freely admit that evolution is consistent with God's creation." is false,

It's very true. About half of all the world's 2 billion Christians are Roman Catholics. Another 20 percent, I think, are Eastern Orthodox, and a large percent of the rest are Anglican. All of these accept evolution is consistent with Christian belief. Most Lutheran bodies also agree with this, the salient dissenter being the Missouri Synod.

Evolution is not consistent with creationism, but creationism is held by a minority of Christians.

 

[turnorburn]

Christians believe Gods word when he says..

I Corinthians 15:39 All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds.

That's just one of the reasons we don't believe in evolution..

tob

 

[brother Paul]

Barbarian, thanks for #29...it really addressed the post from your point of view...

The definition of species has changed over time. I believe in recent times it has changed to support the "accepted" Evolutionary theory as a matter of convenience. Peer Journals (and I had subscriptions to Science and Nature for years) tend to discriminate and "selectively exclude" any research or articles that shed doubt on the accepted view the Journal promotes while at first accepting what appears to promote or support their perspective (Creationists do the same thing).

Then there is the problem of false or falsified data presented in them that inundates generations before being exposed (thank God for those who do the exposing for they do not lack intellectual integrity. For example, in 2012, R Grant Steen of Medical Communications Consultants, out of Chapel Hill, NC, pointed out that “Scientific papers are retracted for many reasons including fraud (data fabrication or falsification) or error (plagiarism, scientific mistake, ethical problems). Growing attention to fraud in the lay press suggests that the incidence of fraud is increasing.”

So in fact, cases of scientific fraud are increasing not decreasing. Allegedly there were 8 times as many fraudulent presentations discovered and retracted in 2009 than in 2006. This means that as more of these frauds are being exposed, the greater the fervency to commit more seems to be occurring. In other words, some scientists are intentionally determined to do whatever is necessary to convince, shape, and engineer, public and professional opinion that they will even lie and misrepresent data. For every one they catch (and even trying to catch them is only something new) four or five escape notice and brainwash us,

In an article from the “National Institute of Health” we receive this report (EMBO Rep. 2007 January; 8(1): 1). “Fraud in our laboratories?”, by Frank Gannon who informs us that “With depressing regularity, the media continue to uncover cases of scientific fraud... although the scientific community regards publicized cases of fraudulent behavior as exceptional and deviant from accepted scientific standards—fraud is an inevitable component of today's research.”

So how many “finds” and “determinations” believed in today, are actually the result of these spurious interpretations, fudged statistics, and/or doctored data? How many have escaped notice and now plague the modern mind? More than have been caught I assure you. He states these people are not above disregarding and not reporting data that is contrary to their own alleged conclusion. How many or which ones can we or should we consider factual beyond a reasonable doubt?

In another article titled, “Scientific fraud and the power structure of science” (Prometheus, Vol. 10, No. 1, June 1992, pp. 83-98), author Brian Martin tells us, “One of the most common misrepresentations in scientific work is the scientific paper itself (see P. B. Medawar, 'Is the scientific paper fraudulent? Yes; it misrepresents scientific thought', Saturday Review, 1 August 1964, pp. 42-43). It presents a mythical reconstruction of what actually happened. All of what are in retrospect mistaken ideas, badly designed experiments, and incorrect calculations are omitted. The paper presents the research as if it had been carefully thought out, planned and executed according to a neat, rigorous process, for example involving testing of a hypothesis. The misrepresentation of the scientific paper is the most formal aspect of the misrepresentation of science as an orderly process based on a clearly defined method (see John A. Schuster and Richard R. Yeo, The Politics and Rhetoric of Scientific Method: Historical Studies, Reidel, Dordrecht, 1986).” So in effect, “No scientist publishes all the raw data…Inappropriately done (usually according to someone else's assessment), this process can be called cooking, trimming, fiddling, fudging or forging the data.”

This means that when this occurs the story you are being told, that the press goes crazy with, that textbooks may represent as established fact, are in fact hogwash but yet we believe them all unquestionably as students.

Apparently this is becoming even more of a problem in our time. Fortunately those who do this do not represent the attitude and behavior of all scientists today, and many in fact are the very reason these frauds have been exposed, however for every one caught or discovered more slip through unnoticed. So pay close attention to the conclusions drawn from the data and ask yourself "Does what was found really represent the conclusion?" And are such far reached for conclusions actually "the truth"? See my next post (sorry in advance for its length)

Paul

 

[brother Paul]

For example let’s look closely at the story of the light and dark English Peppered moths. An example always used to demonstrate that evolution is affected by natural selection because of mutationally acquired characteristics in textbooks all over the world.

It is persuasively explained, in what sounds like scientific language, that the lighter colored moth is a genetic adaptation, produced by a series of micro-mutations of this type of moth’s DNA. This is used to demonstrate the reason for the alleged success of the darker variety in terms of their survival to reinforce Darwin’s version of Natural Selection.

This classic propaganda piece goes on to explain that the lighter color adaptation results in the moth’s being eaten by birds, while the darker moths escape being camouflaged against the darker tree bark! They continue to repeat this example over and over in school textbooks (drill and repetition) in the public forum. The example has been cited in interviews, in public debates, and even have used this as a piece of supporting evidence for Darwin's theory of evolution in some of the more recent court cases questioning the validity of its tenets.

The problem is, that at least as far back as 1959 this alleged evolutionary phenomena has been known among the more honest scientists (God bless them) to be merely the two color phases of the same moth’s consistently unchanged DNA, and that the entire presentation was a nothing more than a contrived hoax. These moths move in and out of this color change in the normal course of their yearly existence much like certain kinds of rabbits.

In the persistent presentations of this standard textbook example, photographs of birds literally eating the lighter colored moths off of the contrasting darker tree bark allegedly supports their theory for a greater survival rate of the darker variety, which more successfully escapes, via their natural camouflage.

Pictures like this are always displayed (image imprinting is essential in good propaganda). When you see these photos in an actual school textbook, even in Universities, and then you hear your teacher or professor (an alleged reliable authority), regurgitate the carefully prepared propaganda described above, it all sounds very reasonable, and it thus appears to the innocently inquiring minds of our young people to actually be the truth. But further investigation reveals the perpetration of an intentional hoax.

For whatever reason, which I believe to be politico-economic, the revealed truth is, that in neither phase are these moths bound to land, in any significant number, upon the bark of these trees. In fact, they rarely land on the bark at all, and rarely, if ever, are eaten by the birds in the natural course of events. This is a demonstrable and observable fact to anyone who cares to do the research. Occasionally however they do light upon the bottom of the leaves.

But it has long since been discovered, and is well known to the scientific community, that this cunningly deceptive neo-Darwinian (an outside intelligent force) literally glued these white moths to the bark as pictured in the photos, to give the false appearance (illusion) of the preconceived conclusion they wanted to brainwash us with (this is called “shaping” public opinion)! You see, there simply is no sense of intellectual integrity, or regard for truth, among this crowd. The greater scientific community has known this truth for years but these engineered contrived images still inundate the textbooks.

What I have just revealed is the FACT! Yet, the neo-Darwinian oriented curriculum developers continue to perpetuate the brainwashing achieved by this subtle piece of carefully orchestrated propaganda. Imagine? An exposed boldfaced lie being imposed as truth in our schools. Sad!

Now based upon the actual revealed facts, which we actually do know, I believe a new hypothesis must be formed that lines up more closely to the actual truth. I call it...

Paul’s Corrected Peppered Moth Hypothesis

“In the rare probability of the absence of normal foods for particular birds, if these moths in the natural white phase of their consistently unchanged DNA are unnaturally glued or pinned to a darker tree bark by an outside intelligent force, and their darker counterparts are left free to fly and escape at will, the lighter colored, intentionally glued, or securely attached moths, will have a lesser chance of survival, and may be eaten by certain types of hungry birds, thus proving the necessity for intelligent deceit, and willful outside intelligent intervention to enhance an already unnatural selection, or at least, in order to produce the illusion of a natural selection, to the gullible minds of innocent trusting school children without their or their parent’s consent“!

Thought control is always one of the goals of any successful propaganda plan.

 

[Barbarian]

For example let’s look closely at the story of the light and dark English Peppered moths.

Industrial melanism. It's been noticed in several locations around the world. Natural selection preserves the mutants that match the environment, and removes those that aren't so lucky. Happened in Michigan, too. Same results.

An example always used to demonstrate that evolution is affected by natural selection because of mutationally acquired characteristics in textbooks all over the world.

Right. The dark mutants were extremely rare before the industrial revolution. They were always happening, but of course, they rarely survived long enough to reproduce.

It is persuasively explained, in what sounds like scientific language, that the lighter colored moth is a genetic adaptation, produced by a series of micro-mutations of this type of moth’s DNA.

No. It's a single mutation. There are no "micromutations."

This is used to demonstrate the reason for the alleged success of the darker variety in terms of their survival to reinforce Darwin’s version of Natural Selection.

Right. The light mutation tends to become rare when the trees are darker, and the dark mutation becomes rare if they are light. For the obvious reason.

This classic propaganda piece goes on to explain that the lighter color adaptation results in the moth’s being eaten by birds, while the darker moths escape being camouflaged against the darker tree bark!

Yep. The moth that best matches the tree color tends to be overlooked, and the one that doesn't, tends to be eaten.

The problem is, that at least as far back as 1959 this alleged evolutionary phenomena has been known among the more honest scientists (God bless them) to be merely the two color phases of the same moth’s consistently unchanged DNA

No, No scientist said that. There are two different alleles, and that bit of DNA is different in the different mutants.

and that the entire presentation was a nothing more than a contrived hoax. These moths move in and out of this color change in the normal course of their yearly existence much like certain kinds of rabbits.

No, they are two different mutations. Moths don't change from one to another. They are stuck with whatever color their DNA gives them.
In peppered moths, the allele for dark-bodied moths is dominant, while the allele for light-bodied moths is recessive, meaning that the typica moths have a phenotype (visible or detectable characteristic) that is only seen in a homozygous genotype (an organism that has two copies of the same allele), and never in a heterozygous one. This helps explain how dramatically quickly the population changed when being selected for dark colouration.


The peppered moth Biston betularia is also a model of parallel evolution in the incidence of melanism in the British form (f. carbonaria) and the American form (f. swettaria) as they are indistinguishable in appearance. Genetic analysis indicates that both phenotypes are inherited as autosomal dominants. Cross hybridizations indicate the phenotypes are produced by isoalleles at a single locus.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peppered_moth_evolution

In the persistent presentations of this standard textbook example, photographs of birds literally eating the lighter colored moths off of the contrasting darker tree bark allegedly supports their theory for a greater survival rate of the darker variety, which more successfully escapes, via their natural camouflage.

No. The scam used by a certain creationist ( a minister in Rev. Myung Son Moon's "Unification Church) focused on a picture used to illustrate the differences. A light moth and a dark moth (dead specimens) were mounted on a tree trunk to illustrate the difference. Nothing like you've been told..

For whatever reason, which I believe to be politico-economic, the revealed truth is, that in neither phase are these moths bound to land, in any significant number, upon the bark of these trees.

Research has documented that they do:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peppered_moth#/media/File:Peppered_moth_resting_positions_1964-2000.png

This is a demonstrable and observable fact to anyone who cares to do the research.

Occasionally however they do light upon the bottom of the leaves.

Just not as often as the colored trunk and branches.

But it has long since been discovered, and is well known to the scientific community, that this cunningly deceptive neo-Darwinian (an outside intelligent force) literally glued these white moths to the bark as pictured in the photos, to give the false appearance (illusion) of the preconceived conclusion they wanted to brainwash us with (this is called “shaping” public opinion)!

That's an unnecessary libel on the scientist who did the study. He did not (I've read the research) claim that the two moths pinned (not glued) to the tree was presented as anything other than an illustration of the color differences, is dishonest. I'm not blaming you; I'm pretty sure you never read the paper. But it's still wrong.

You see, there simply is no sense of intellectual integrity, or regard for truth, among certain professional creationists. They often resort to the most blatant dishonesties

What I have just revealed is the FACT!

I'm afraid you've been lied to. It's hard to accept that people who present themselves as Christians would do this. And Jonathan Wells considers himself and the Unification Church to be Christian. But he lied. No other way to put it. Read the original research and Majerus' review of it. It's not what they told you.

 

[Barbarian]

The definition of species has changed over time.

In Darwin's time, the word was "races." But one reason scientists don't accept creationism, is that there is no way to make a clear definition of "species." If species were created individually, it would be simple. That it can't be done is a vexing problem for creationism.

As you might know, it's possible to put fraud into a paper, even to get it past journals. But the reckoning comes when no one can reproduce the claimed results. That's career-ending for a scientist. But as you see from the peppered moth scam, creationists continue to peddle dishonesties long after they've been debunked. This is one of the major differences between science and creationism.

 

[turnorburn]

In Darwin's time, the word was "races." But one reason scientists don't accept creationism, is that there is no way to make a clear definition of "species." If species were created individually, it would be simple. That it can't be done is a vexing problem for creationism.

As you might know, it's possible to put fraud into a paper, even to get it past journals. But the reckoning comes when no one can reproduce the claimed results. That's career-ending for a scientist. But as you see from the peppered moth scam, creationists continue to peddle dishonesties long after they've been debunked. This is one of the major differences between science and creationism.

That's not true, scientists that know Jesus believe every word he says about his creation..here's a clear definition, each kind has its own flesh

I Corinthians 15::39 All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds.

tob

*edit: forgot something "again"

This will explain it in detail..

 

[Barbarian]

That's not true,

It's just a fact. No point in denying it.

scientists that know Jesus believe every word he says about his creation..

Francis Collins comes to mind. The director of the Human Genome Project, a devout evangelical Christian, and a believer in God's word, as well as His evidence for evolution. And Kenneth Miller. And Francisco Ayala.

There are many, many of scientists who are Christian who accept the fact that there is conflict between God and evolution.

American Scientific Affiliation
http://network.asa3.org/

Biologos
http://biologos.org/

Creationism was never Christian orthodoxy.

 

[turnorburn]

There are conflicts because evolution conflicts with Gods word, its that simple, and those other groups have their skeletons as well.. "see the video"

Creation has always been part of Gods peoples vocabulary starting with..

http://av1611.com/kjbp/kjv-bible-text/Ge-1.html

tob

 

[Barbarian]

Creation yes. Creationism, no. One is God's word. The other is man's attempt to change God's word.

 

[turnorburn]

Can't say i know the difference, i believe that the bible is the literal word of God..and go from there..

tob

 

[brother Paul]

[QUOTE="Barbarian, post: 1082597, member: 917"]In Darwin's time, the word was "races." But one reason scientists don't accept creationism, is that there is no way to make a clear definition of "species." If species were created individually, it would be simple. That it can't be done is a vexing problem for creationism.

As you might know, it's possible to put fraud into a paper, even to get it past journals. But the reckoning comes when no one can reproduce the claimed results. That's career-ending for a scientist. But as you see from the peppered moth scam, creationists continue to peddle dishonesties long after they've been debunked. This is one of the major differences between science and creationism.[/QUOTE]

a) Origin of "Species" (not Races)
b) that there are Creationist scientists that also "engineer" false implications in the way they present data is true, AND a point I myself previously made.
c) Dishonest scientists (creationists or otherwise) that have not been cited and publicly discredited continue to allow their erroneous conclusions and sometimes intentional misinformation to continue (like the Leakys at the Olduvai gorge)....
d) I did read Kettelwell (by the way I was also an agnostic for the first 25 years of my life) and don't care about his conclusions...he chained the people and released the dogs...set ups and stacked decks by intelligent design nether prove or demonstrate ANYTHING about what happens naturally.

As for your previous response (sorry but been busy with a granddaughter’s B-day), the main point was, these are two phases of the same moth (not two mutants), and you know the photos were staged (faked to create the illusion), and that Kettelwell intentionally released an unnatural number of these specific birds to create his indoctrination tool. In natural occurrence, birds do not eat either in particular (but perhaps may, on occasion, in the absence of normal food sources), but obviously lighter ones would be more noticeable. That proves nothing however.

The fact that one allele expresses more under certain conditions is also irrelevant since I was giving the example that speciation in such cases produces variety in a given genome and do not ever produce a new genome (it remains the same moth). After the Clean Air Act in the 1950s, by 1959 it began to be noticed that the “normal” condition began to reappear. But they are still the same exact moth. My second point was just the extent that SOME less than honest EB scientists go to skew the truth (so many examples) and enhance their preconceived conclusions.

Let me give you an analogy! This would be like saying that if a scientists took 30 sapiens and chained 15 to poles leaving the other 15 free to run, climb, or hide, and then intentionally released a team of hungry wild dogs, and the wild dogs then bit and attacked the chained up sapiens, this would absolutely NOT prove or demonstrate natural selection OR “Survival of the fittest” even if I took purposely contrived photos of it occurring pretending this engineered presentation represented what happens naturally!

Also the Hebrew and Greek word for "kind" found in Genesis actually means "species" and the idea is all members of a particular "species" (kind or genetic ancestry) ONLY reproduce from their own kind and NEVER produce a new kind (genetic ancestry or only new or more rare varieties like Jacobs speckled sheep)....but now we have jimmied the definition to fit the accepted theory (bad science fits the data into the theory instead of using the data to form the theory). Besides, you know terms such as genus, family, kingdom, etc., are merely a convenient Taxonomic classification system made up by men to catalog similarities and differences.

In His love

Paul