Durango Bill’s
Views on Creationists
Creationism = Willful Ignorance
The Deceitfulness and Ignorance of Creationism
Especially in regard to Geology and the Grand Canyon.
Creationists: Willfully Ignorant and Proud of it
Creation “Science” - The bastard offspring of scientific ignorance and religious arrogance
“Only two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and I am not sure about the former.” - Albert Einstein
We are living in an age when ignorant “right-wing” fundamentalist mobs are once again trying to replace science and knowledge with religious extremism. A thousand years ago, the European world suffered through an era of intolerance and superstitions. If we don’t learn from history, the advocates of Creationism will again throw us into another 1,000-year period of “The Dark Ages”. (See below for more info.)
The “Young Earth Creationists” believe the earth (and all life on it) was theologically created in its present form within the last 10,000 years. In so doing they reject and willfully ignore all the scientific knowledge that has accumulated over the last several thousand years. This knowledge spans the physical, chemical, and biological sciences. We will touch on the geological sciences here, and in particular the Grand Canyon.
Creationism =
Ignorance of Geology
The greatest geologic fiction that the Creationists adhere to is Noah’s Flood. (Please see the bottom of this page for some insight regarding the Genesis Flood story.) Their Biblical interpretation says this flood covered “all the high mountains” (Gen 7:19-20), which by necessity would also have to include the ~29,029 ft. elevation of Mt. Everest.
Creationists claim the marine sedimentary layers at the summit of Mt. Everest are proof that it was covered by water. Actually, Mt. Everest has been lifted out of the ocean (and is still rising) by the northward movement of the Indian subcontinent and its resultant subduction under (and compressional stacking with) the Asian continent during the past 65 million years. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_the_Himalaya and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Everest#Geology for more info.
The Google Earth view above shows layers of marine limestone and marble (cooked/metamorphosized limestone) above 27,000 feet on the north face Mt. Everest. The marble layers form the famous “Yellow Band”. The time sequence required many millions of years for each of the following processes:
1) Mud and lime were slowly deposited in many layers at the bottom of an ancient ocean.
2) Additional layers of sedimentary material were deposited on top of the lime and mud.
3) The weight of the upper layers slowly squeezed the water out of the mud and lime and transformed it into limestone rock. (The lower layers were subsequently cooked to form marble.)
4) The compressional collision of the Indian subcontinent and Asia fractured the rock into layers which were shoved together and stacked – much like individual cards in a deck of cards. Erosion removed the surrounding rock to leave the pyramidal summit of Mt. Everest.
There are
several obvious problems with Noah’s Flood.
1) Where did the water come from? If it came from beneath the earth’s crust (Fountains of the Deep), something would have to hold up the earth’s crust before the water was ejected. The fact that the earth’s crust has a higher relative density than water ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_density ) and would have sunk long before “Adam and Eve” doesn’t bother the Creationists. Of course, if you are “willfully ignorant”, your beliefs excuse you from knowledge about relative density. Also, if the water had come from the “Nether Regions”, then it would have been “Hot as Hell”, and the hapless fish in the oceans would have been cooked. (The temperature increases by “25-30°C per km of depth in most of the world” – see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_gradient )
If the 29,000+ ft. of water came from the sky (atmosphere - the “Vapor Canopy”), then before the 40 days of rain started, the weight of this water would have crushed anything living on the earth’s surface. One cubic foot of water = ~62.4 pounds. Thus 29,000 feet of it would have pressed down with 62.4 x 29,000 = ~1,809,600 pounds (equals about 500 average cars) of force per square foot for every square foot of the earth’s surface. It would also require an atmospheric temperature of 1,000 deg. F. to keep the water as a vapor. (See Antoine equation at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vapor_pressure ) Even if you could start with temperatures similar to current earth temperatures, the heat released by the first 2,000 feet of rain (Latent heat of condensation) is more than enough to bring the entire content of the earth’s present oceans up to the boiling point. (And there’s still another 27,000 feet of rain that hasn’t fallen yet.)
Finally, some creationists assert that the water came from a comet (or some other astronomical object). Any object falling to earth from deep space would accelerate to at least the earth’s escape velocity as the object falls into the earth’s gravitational field. Its velocity would reach at least 25,000 MPH before friction (and/or impact) slowed it down. Frictional heating (and/or impact) would raise the temperature of any incoming water to ~27,000 degrees F. (Incoming meteors are incinerated which creates the white “shooting star” streaks that we see.)
If you start with ice instead of water, you can decrease the ~27,000 degrees by 144 degrees as that is the amount of heat that would be required to initially melt the ice. (In reality, temperatures this high would rip apart water molecules into their hydrogen and oxygen atoms which in turn would be highly ionized. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_ionization )
2) Where did the water go? If the earth’s surface were covered by an additional 29,000+ feet of water, how do you get rid of it? Water is less dense than the rock of the earth’s surface. Thus it would not drain down below the surface. Even if you forced it down, where is it? No oil or gas well has ever hit a subterranean ocean 29,000+ feet thick.
Ignorant
Fallacies Based on Noah’s Flood
The “Young Earth Creationists” believe that all the Paleozoic rock layers in the Grand Canyon were deposited by Noah’s Flood - i.e. none of the strata was ever dry land. For example, they willfully ignore evidence that the Coconino Sandstone was once desert sand dunes.
The picture above was
originally posted at http://www.jwoolfden.com/gc_rocks.html
and shows preserved wind-blown sand dunes in the Coconino
Sandstone. 260 million years ago, intermittent winds from
random directions piled desert sand into randomly layered
sand dunes. When these random layers were subsequently
buried and transformed to sandstone rock, the layers formed
“cross bedding” patterns. Finally, erosion has removed the
sediments that buried the sand so that the cross bedding
patterns can be seen.
The USGS has an animation showing how windblown sand dunes followed by subsequent burial produce cross-bedded sandstone rock similar to that seen in the above photograph. http://walrus.wr.usgs.gov/seds/bedforms/animation.html
The USGS has an animation showing how windblown sand dunes followed by subsequent burial produce cross-bedded sandstone rock similar to that seen in the above photograph. http://walrus.wr.usgs.gov/seds/bedforms/animation.html
Instead (according to a popular creationist book), they claim “Sand Waves” formed the Coconino during the flood. If the Creationists had done a little homework and checked page 194 of “Grand Canyon Geology” by Beus and Morales (1990 edition), they would find a photograph of ancient raindrop impressions preserved in the Coconino.
The photograph above shows preserved raindrop impressions in the Coconino Sandstone. The original photograph plus additional photographs that include preserved animal and insect tracks in the Coconino can be seen at http://web.archive.org/web/20030217034205/http://www.psiaz.com/Schur/azpaleo/cocotr.html .
To form raindrop impressions and then preserve them in solid rock requires the following sequence:
1) Initially, a few large raindrops fall on a relatively smooth sand surface. When the large raindrops hit the sand they make “mini craters”.
2) Rainfall intensity has to be relatively light so that a relatively firm wet surface is produced, but not washed away by additional rain.
3) After the wet surface has dried to form a crust, it has to be buried by additional windblown, dry sand. The dry crust with its raindrop impressions is now safely covered.
4) Over many millions of years, the dry crust with its raindrop impressions is subsequently buried by thousands of feet of other sediments. The combination of the weight and dissolved minerals in ground water transform the sand into sandstone rock. For example, the Coconino Sandstone.
5) After still more millions of years, erosion removes the overlying layers and the preserved raindrop impressions are once again exposed.
It's a little difficult to form raindrop impressions at the bottom of a global flood, but typically, the Creationists ignore real world evidence as it would disprove their preconceived beliefs.
Their “logic” for the formation of the Grand Canyon itself requires a subsequent flood to go uphill 30 river miles before it gets to the Kaibab Plateau, and then somehow collapse a path across the Kaibab. If you look at topographic maps, this of course is impossible. However, if you are willfully ignorant, minor details such as understanding topographic maps are irrelevant, and the only requirement is faith in Noah’s Flood. It would be interesting to see what kind of inventiveness they could come up with to explain why the Green River cuts through Split Mountain instead of going around it.
Please see the Canyon of
Lodore and Split Mountain page for more information
on Split Mountain. Then use “Back” from your browser to
return to this page. Also, please see “Ancestral River
Systems of the World” - A pictorial world tour of
locations where river systems cut through mountain ranges
instead of taking easier routes around them. http://www.durangobill.com/AncestralRivers/AncestralRiversIndex.html
Perhaps nowhere else is the arrogance/ignorance of Creationists better illustrated than the contortions/delusions they go through to try to explain how the Colorado River established a path across the Kaibab Plateau. First, they invent a false argument claiming that the “evolutionists” required the Colorado River to flow uphill over the Kaibab Plateau before it started to cut down through it to form the Grand Canyon.
No legitimate geologist has ever made such an “uphill” claim, but of course the Creationists are not interested in reality.
However, ignorant Creationists fully believe that a large remnant lake from Noah’s Flood wouldn’t have had any problem duplicating the same uphill maneuver. For example, please see Eric Hovind’s Blogspot:
The original of the video was at the above URL - the Print Screen images above and below are from the same video as posted at:
http://rationaldreaming.com/tag/grand-canyon/ (Larger image and better transmission.)
As can be seen in the pictures, Eric Hovind doesn’t even know which direction the Colorado River flows through the Grand Canyon. He’s got it backwards. The river flows from east to west (right side of the pictures to left side of the pictures) through that portion of the canyon - not west to east as Eric depicts it in the video. The perspective/view in the video is correct as viewed from south to north so the image is not reversed.
Note the correct
orientation of Africa on the globe in the lower left
corner. (1st picture) Also, at the 28 second mark in the
video, Eric has an “Exit” arrow on the east side of the
Kaibab Plateau to the right and behind the North Rim’s
Cape Royal.
After Eric’s ignorant blunder was widely circulated on the Internet, he tried to blame the error on the graphics presentation. (Note: Eric would have viewed the video and given it a final OK long before it was posted on the Internet.)
It’s just Eric who is backward. (Quite possibly something he inherited from his dad - Kent Hovind.)
Ignorant Creationists: Q. E. D.
(The translation of the original Latin quod erat demonstrandum is: “Which was to be demonstrated”)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q.E.D.
Let’s look at present day topography to test the feasibility of either of these uphill routes. The South Rim of the Grand Canyon near Desert View Point (lower right in the picture) is nearly 7,500 feet above sea level. If you travel 8.5 miles to the northwest, you arrive at Cape Royal on the North Rim at about 7,900 feet. If you filled in the Grand Canyon and tried to get the Colorado River to establish its current course based on present topography, the river (or remnant lake) would have to climb to about 7,700 feet to get across the Kaibab. The Colorado River starts cutting the Grand Canyon at Lees Ferry nearly 60 miles further to the NNE at an elevation of about 3,100 feet. (Off the top right of the picture.) While the Creationists fully believe that “their lake” could climb over the 7,700 foot high barrier, let’s look at alternate lower locations (using current topography) where the water would go if you could fill a lake on the east side of the Kaibab. (All of the following lower potential routes can be verified by Google Earth.)
1) Roughly follow U. S. highway route # 89 westward through southern Utah around the north end of the Kaibab and never go above 5,640 feet.
2) Again, go west around the south end of the Kaibab between the South Rim and Flagstaff, AZ and never go above 6,530 feet. (Max altitude is near 35.68 N, 111.87 W)
3) Roughly follow Arizona highway route # 77 south from the Little Colorado River and cross over the Mogollon Rim at under 6,510 feet near Show Low, AZ. In the 110 mile stretch from Show Low to just south of Flagstaff there are multiple other routes over the Mogollon Rim under 7,000 feet.
4) Follow Interstate Route 40 east from Arizona into New Mexico and cross the Continental Divide into Rio Grande drainage at under 7,270 feet.
5) Back up the San Juan and Chaco Rivers (southeastward across New Mexico) and cross over into the Rio Grande drainage. (Cross the Continental Divide near 35.91 N, 107.44 W) at under 6,680 feet.
6) Back up the Yampa River and then roughly follow routes 13 and 789 north into the North Platte drainage in Wyoming. In the process you cross the Continental Divide at 41.487 N, 107.882 W at 6,730 feet.
7) Back up the Green River into Wyoming and follow the Union Pacific Railroad east from Rock Springs, WY. Cross the Continental Divide at 41.63 N, 108.31 W at under 6,950 feet. A “prairie” route stays under 6,830 feet when it crosses the Divide at 41.656N, 108.420 W.
8) Follow the Union Pacific Railroad west from Rock Springs, WY and cross over into Utah’s Bear River drainage a short distance west of Kemmerer, WY. Stay under 7,130 feet.
If you are an ignorant Young Earth Creationist, then the topography has had very little time to change, and you are forced into the contortion/delusion that the Colorado River/remnant lake had to flow uphill to get over the Kaibab. Of course the Creationists only have to have faith in Noah’s Flood. They are arrogantly ignorant when it comes to topography. They have “faith” that their lake could easily cross the 7,700 foot barrier of the Kaibab and ignore the lower escape routes.
The topography was obviously different 5.4 million years ago when the Colorado River established its current course across the Kaibab. Five and a half million years ago, the Kaibab was significantly lower, and the terrain to the east of the Kaibab was higher. Over the intervening 5.4 million years, there has been a renewed uplift of the Kaibab combined with over one thousand feet of erosion to the east of the Kaibab (e.g. at Cameron, AZ). Today’s topography is the result of geologic changes that have taken place in the last five and a half million years.
If you are interested in the geologic history, please see “Evolution of the Colorado River” at http://www.durangobill.com/Paleorivers_preface.html . Some 5.4 million years ago, the river’s route was downhill all the way. We’ll leave the “flow uphill” delusions to the willfully ignorant Creationists.
The Creationists insist that all the Paleozoic sedimentary layers that we see in the Grand Canyon were laid down during Noah’s Flood. So far, four thousand feet of sediments. There’s another 4,000 feet of Triassic and Jurassic sediments that were eroded away from the Grand Canyon area long ago, but they can be seen in other areas such as Zion National Park. You can add several more thousands of feet on top of this (e. g. The Mesa Verde Group - visit Mesa Verde National Park). All of this is on top of 14,000 feet of sedimentary layers that are present in the Grand Canyon Supergroup. Altogether, we’ve got an easy 25,000 to 30,000-foot accumulation of sediments. If the Noah’s Flood story is going to be true, all of this has to be eroded from somewhere, transported to the Grand Canyon/Colorado Plateau and laid down during “the Flood”. (Let’s say one year, max.). In any case, the water would have to be pretty murky as it would need enough mud to have 100 feet of sediments settle out per day.
Whales eat by swimming through the ocean and opening their mouths to gulp/eat many thousands of pounds of plankton and small fish per day. (e.g. see “All about Whales”). However, if the water were this muddy, they would be eating many thousands of pounds of mud per day. Perhaps Noah had a (very) large aquarium aboard the ark where he kept the whales. (And the sharks,…)
Or, perhaps, the Creationists have a deep psychological need to believe, and this “deep psychological need” overrides answering “the tough questions”.
The picture below illustrates the famous angular unconformity in the Grand Canyon. The original photograph was taken by Edwin McKee, and the USGS has a larger version at: http://libraryphoto.cr.usgs.gov/cgi-bin/show_picture.cgi?ID=ID.%20McKee,%20E.D.%20%20280ct
The view is part
of what you see if you look north from Moran Point
(popular viewpoint) on the south rim of the Grand Canyon.
The highlights of the photograph include a horizontal
layer of Tapeats Sandstone on top of the tilted layers of
the Grand Canyon Supergroup. The Colorado River is at the
bottom of the picture. Let’s compare a geologic
explanation for the angular unconformity (a horizontal
layer on top of tilted layers) vs. what might happen if
you ask a willfully ignorant creationist for an
explanation. A brief synopsis of the geologic story
follows:
1) Starting about 1.2 billion years ago, thousands of feet of limestone, silt, and volcanic rock (black layer) were laid down in multiple horizontal layers to form the Grand Canyon Supergroup.
2) Starting about 800 million years ago, these layers were uplifted and subjected to tensional stretching. The surface rock fractured into blocks - some of which were faulted downward and tilted in the process. Most of the rest of the Grand Canyon Supergroup was eroded away by surface erosion, but the tilted layers which had been faulted downward were safely below surface erosion.
3) Erosion beveled the surface to a nearly horizontal plane, but the tilted layers of the Grand Canyon Supergroup that had been faulted downward out of harms way were preserved.
4) About 570 million years ago, this portion of the North American continent subsided below sea level, and thousands of feet of new horizontal sedimentary layers were deposited on top of the old beveled surface. (Which included the top of the preserved tilted layers of the Grand Canyon Supergroup.) The first of these new layers was the Tapeats Sandstone
5) There were multiple episodes of sedimentary deposition and above sea level erosion over the next 500 million years, but the Grand Canyon area has been above sea level for the last 70 million years.
6) About 5.4 million years ago, the Colorado River established its current course, and subsequent erosion has sliced a deep canyon that allows us to see a major portion of the whole story.
Multiple other angular unconformities exist throughout the world. Photographs of many of these can be seen by running a Google image search using: angular unconformity
Now, let’s suppose that you ask a Young Earth Creationist how an angular unconformity is produced. You might get a 3-word reply - “God did it.” You might even get a 4-word reply - “Noah’s Flood did it”. If you ask HOW “God did it” or “Noah’s Flood did it”, in all probability they will accuse you of being an agent of Satan. They will assert that you will face eternal damnation because you are attempting to deny their “deep psychological need to believe” in an “all powerful father” who will protect them from the real world. Frequently, this is accompanied by some obscure quote from the Bible.
And then they will run someplace else and proclaim that their faith has protected them from another agent of Satan.
The photo below by Kevin Delaney of Salt Lake City, Utah shows a 2,000-foot thick section of the Green River Shale as seen in Desolation Canyon, Utah. (Animals on the far side of the river are cows.) The Green River Formation was deposited long after the sedimentary layers in the Grand Canyon were deposited.
Note the thousands of visible layers that extend for many miles. The Green River Formation has millions of varves - alternating layers of silt deposited during seasonal variations in water/silt flow. How could these millions of layers that extend uniformly over many miles be deposited in a flood that lasted less than a year?
Please see http://www.durangobill.com/DesolationCanyon.html for more information on Desolation Canyon.
Varves are common
in sedimentary rock layers. The picture to the right is a
close-up view of relatively thick varves (Green River
varves are much thinner) that show up in Little River
State Park in Vermont. (Photo courtesy of the Vermont
Geologic Society.) Each layer in the sequence represents
an annual deposition pattern that was deposited in a body
of water. (Typically a lake) Seasonal variations in water
flow (e.g. spring runoffs) wash sediments into the body of
water. Larger particles settle out quickly while smaller
particles take months to settle out. The size and
difference in composition of the particles produces
alternating layers. Seasonal variations in the amount of
organic material also contribute to the color differences.
Each light-colored layer fades into a dark layer to form a
couplet. Each couplet is a record of one year’s deposits.
In each subsequent year, a new couplet is deposited on top
of the previous year’s couplet. The sequence is repeated
over multiple years. How could a single “Noah’s Flood”
event produce these bands?
How do creationists
respond to this kind of evidence? Typically, they “squeeze
eyes shut” and yell “Does not” until out of frustration
you give up and go away. Then they will claim “victory”
because you haven’t convinced
them that their “flood” is pure fiction.
“Debating creationists on the topic of evolution is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon; it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flies back to its flock to claim victory.”
A quote from “The God Delusion”
“Faith (belief without evidence) is a virtue. The more your beliefs defy the evidence, the more virtuous you are. Virtuoso believers who can manage to believe something weird, unsupported and insupportable, in the teeth of evidence and reason, are especially highly rewarded.”
Given the Creationists’ fear of the real world (see below), they are more apt to “spout” from the first half of Matthew 6:13. (Hint: “…deliver us from evil”)
Is there any possibility that Creationists will ever be able to learn anything from scientific evidence? The answer is: “Not likely”. There are large numbers of people who choose to be willfully ignorant, and there is always the scientifically ignorant Ken Ham (and his Creation “Museum”) who revels in catering to the ignorant.
For example, see:
“Once again, creation science advocate Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis is showing his willful ignorance of old earth belief.” http://www.answersincreation.org/rebuttal/aig/daily/2005/20050912_ham_truth.htm
“Ken Ham “I bask in the praise of the ignorant””
http://hjhop.blogspot.com/2008/11/ken-ham-i-bask-in-praise-of-ignorant.html
Just imagine how easy it must be for half-wit Ken Ham to puff up his own ego when his audience is composed of TOTAL dimwits. For more on “Ignorant Ken Ham” please see: http://lists.topica.com/lists/ii_errancy/read/message.html?sort=d&mid=805451894
A common tactic used by Creationists is deliberate misrepresentation of reality to promote their own beliefs. Under the guise of “Creation Science”, and “(Un)Intelligent Design” creationism, they present their religious dogmas as if they were real science. One of their favorites is to claim that gully erosion in the Mt. St. Helens ash debris is equivalent to formation of the Grand Canyon.
The picture above shows the original banner of the Discovery Institute’s Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture - the institutional home of (Un) Intelligent Design Creationism/Evangelism - featuring the familiar picture from the Sistine Chapel of “God touching Adam.” (Courtesy of NCSE)
The Discovery Institute is the home of (Un) Intelligent Design Evangelism. The founders (and prime financial backers) of the Discovery Institute represent “an extreme faction of the Religious Right that seeks to replace American democracy with a harsh fundamentalist theocracy” http://www.dangerouscitizen.com/Articles/1090.aspx
1) Who is the Intelligent
Designer?
2) How did the Intelligent Designer do whatever he/she/it did?
3) What is the (Un) Intelligent Design reason that humans have toenails, pimples/acne, an appendix, suffer from Alzheimer’s, cancer, etc.?
4) Why would the “Intelligent” Designer populate the earth with trilobites, dinosaurs, saber-toothed tigers, “woolly” mammoths, etc. and then subsequently remove them?
5) Why does the Intelligent Designer cause/allow hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc.? It seems the Intelligent Designer exists only when religious fundamentalists wish to promote their dogmas.
Science tries to find answers to questions and uses real world evidence to support these answers. Why do the evangelists want to treat “(Un) Intelligent Design” as a science when the only answer they have for the above questions is: “An unknown Intelligent Designer did it”?
In regard to virtually all the scientifically ignorant people in the U.S. who would like to promote “(Un) Intelligent Design Evangelism” as a science, isn’t it amazing that most of them actually have a religious dogma that they are trying to promote?
A final question: What do the letters ID iots really stand for?
Answer: (Pick one from each group)
{Immeasurably, Incalculably, Infinitely, Incredibly}
{Dense, Doltish, Dumb, Deficient}
Note: A miscarriage is Mother Nature’s version of an abortion. Thus, if an “Intelligent Designer” is responsible for our world, then the “Intelligent Designer” advocates abortions.
The document
states that (Un) Intelligent Design “promises to reverse
the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to
replace it with a science consonant with Christian and
theistic convictions.”
A simplification of the Discovery Institute’s phraseology in the above statement would be that (Un) Intelligent Design promises to destroy (the “we are not capable of understanding real-world of”) science, and to replace it with a “religious faith” consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.”
As stated in plain English, the Discovery Institute wants to replace our democracy with a theocracy - with the theocracy being their own brand of religion.
(Un) Intelligent Design - The delusion that personal ignorance is better than evidence.
Michael Behe, the leading intellectual light of the intelligent design movement and author of “Darwin's Black Box”, would like us to believe that Intelligent Design is a science. He has also stated under oath that Astrology is a “science”. From the “Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District” trial, as quoted from the York Daily Record “Behe's 15th-century science” http://ydr.com/story/mike/90330/
Also please see: “Astrology is scientific theory, courtroom told” http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8178
The following is an exact quote from the court transcript.
http://www.aclupa.org/downloads/Day11PMSession.pdf Page 39, Lines 6 - 9
Thus one of the primary proponents of “Intelligent Design” has stated under oath that “Intelligent Design” is no more “scientific” than the astrology/horoscope columns that appear in newspaper tabloids.
There is a postscript to the Dover trial that confirms the true religious intention of (Un) Intelligent Design. In Nov. 2005 (shortly after the trial ended) the citizens of Dover, Pennsylvania voted to remove eight members of the school board that instituted the (Un) Intelligent Design policy and to replace them with the “Dover CARES” candidates. Subsequently, evangelist Pat Robertson used his television program, the “700 Club”, to castigate Dover with:
“For the reasons that follow, we hold that the ID Policy is unconstitutional pursuant to the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and Art. I, § 3 of the Pennsylvania Constitution.”
Page 3 at: http://www2.ncseweb.org/kvd/main_docs/kitzmiller_342.pdf
Federal District Judge John Jones: “The overwhelming evidence is that intelligent design is a religious view, a mere re-labeling of creationism and not a scientific theory.”
“Intelligent Design” is religious mythology. If you are not capable of distinguishing between reality and mythology, you have an unresolved problem in your educational background.
For an editorial from the New York Times on Creationism = Willful Ignorance,
Please see “Willful Ignorance of Evolution”
The USGS tells us how and why it is known that the earth is about 4.5 to 4.6 billion years old.
Please see: “The Age of the Earth”
NASA tells how and why it is known that the universe is about 13.7 billion years old.
Please see: http://apod.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap030217.html
The American Astronomical Society has published an excellent booklet titled:
“An Ancient Universe: How Astronomers Know the Vast Scale of Cosmic Time”. It is aimed at the grade school level and is available online at: http://education.aas.org/publications/ancientuniverse.html
There is an immense amount of information about the multi-billion year history of the earth and the universe at the Smithsonian Institute’s Museum of Natural History. (http://www.mnh.si.edu)
Measurements show multiple advances and retreats of glaciers over the last 750,000 years. http://www.museum.state.il.us/exhibits/ice_ages/specmap_graph.html
The earth’s magnetic field switches polarity about once every 500,000 – 1,000,000 years. This produces parallel symmetric stripes on both sides of mid-ocean ridges. Animation at
http://www.wwnorton.com/earth/egeo/flash/2_3.swf
The National Geographic Society is tracing 200,000 years of human evolution/migration/ancestry via DNA analysis in their Genographic Research project. https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/
Partially funded by IBM: http://www.ibm.com/genographic/
The religious crackpots continue to invent stories to perpetuate their religious dogmas. For example, you can always check out the “Young age of the Earth & Universe” at the “Answers in Genesis” website.
Then there is Kent
Hovind - the reincarnated animation of an old fashion
carnival side show barker. “Hi there rubes. I bet I can
tell more whoppers per minute than anyone else on earth.”
Kent Hovind has a long history of operating in
fantasyland. In Nov. 2006 he was found guilty of 58 counts
of tax fraud.
However, to creationists, Hovind is their hero. For more information on Kent Hovind, including his “claimed doctorate is from a diploma mill” please see: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/hovind/
Wikipedia has an article about Kent Hovind’s unaccredited “Alma Mater” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Bible_University.
The following quote is from Patriot Bible University’s catalogue. (I have a complete copy of the original “.pdf” PBU catalogue if/when PBU deletes the following quote. If you would like a copy of the original, send me an E-mail and I’ll return it with the copy attached.)
Kent Hovind’s
claimed Ph.D. degree is from Patriot [Bible] University.
PBU is another “Unaccredited Bible School”. If you just
look at the online catalogue of any of these “Unaccredited
Bible Schools”, you might not get a true picture of
exactly what they represent.
The picture at the right was taken by the author from a car window on French St., Del Norte, CO on Nov. 22, 2006. It shows PBU’s “entire campus”. I have more information and photographs at: link
“Fake degrees equal fake integrity.”
-- Don Reasons
If you are an ignorant creationist and are not qualified to get into a good university, what do you do?
Answer: File a lawsuit claiming “discrimination”.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-christian27aug27,1,7818465.story?coll=la-headlines-california
One of the things that fundamentalists try to claim is that they are morally just vs. the “atheistic scientists”. If this were true then:
1) Jail and prison populations would be limited to just atheists. In practice it tends to be the other extreme. The following quotes are from page 229, “The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins which in turn are quoted from Sam Harris’ “Letter to a Christian Nation”. (2004 election)
2) Evangelical “leader” Ted Haggard wouldn’t have had an ongoing drug and gay relationship with a male prostitute. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Haggard
3) Wikipedia would not have sections on scandals by television’s evangelicals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_televangelist_scandals
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bakker
etc.
4) Bert Thompson, the one-time director of Apologetics Press would not have been fired for “sexual misconduct”. http://exchristian.net/2005_07_01_archive.html (Includes other similar items)
5) And of course the following statistical posting wouldn’t have appeared on page 21 in the Feb, 2007 issue of Playboy.
How many has God killed?
And this represents the “morality” of “Our loving God” who commands “Thou shall not kill”.
Religious cultists, and in particular Creationists, often assert that religion is responsible for morality - and without religion there would be no morality (with resulting high crime rates). It’s obvious that, as per usual, they don’t check the facts. Fact-finding studies have found that just the opposite is true. Countries that have high religiosity (e. g. the U. S.) have the highest crime rates while countries with low religiosity (e.g. Japan and Sweden) have the lowest crime rates. The following quote is from a study published in the Journal of Religion and Society: http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Within the United States, it’s not the atheists who commit crimes. For example, see: “Atheists Supply Less Than 1% Of Prison Populations” http://www.skepticfiles.org/american/prison.htm
In the U. S., over 10% of the population is composed of atheists. If atheists committed as many crimes as non-atheists, then the ratio of atheists within the prison population should also be over 10%. If you do the arithmetic, atheists are less apt to be a criminal than non-atheists by a factor of over 100.
There are many more statistics at the above skepticfiles web site that confirm that crimes are committed by those who are religious, and not committed by atheists/agnostics.
As of the Nov.
2006 election, the creationists have once again been
relegated to minority representation on the Kansas State
Board of Education. However, radical fundamentalists
such as John Bacon and Ken Willard remain. Thus the
Board of Education continues to warrant ridicule until
their influence is gone.
The Kansas Board of “Education”:
Hear no science.
See no science.
Speak no science.
Hayseed - Kansas - Creationism:
The triplet does have a ring to it.
But Kansas did “benefit” by adopting creationism as part of their education standards.
See “Ignorance is God’s gift to Kansas.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,592-1619264,00.html
(“Creationism: God's gift to the ignorant”)
Prior to 2007, the Flat Earth Society prevailed at the “Kansas Board of Education”.
Was the pre-2007 school board interested in helping students in Kansas get a better science education? – Nope.
Were they determined to force creationism and their brand of religious ignorance down the throats of everyone else in the state? – You betcha!
According to the Creationists, “Lying for God” is perfectly acceptable. For example see:
“Lying For God: Creation Science Exposed”
“A Response to Fraudulence in the name of Religious Ethics”
http://web.archive.org/web/20031226133632/astrosun.tn.cornell.edu/students/kornreich/lfg/index.html
or just run a Google search using:
“Lying for God”
“Attempting to debate with a person who has abandoned reason is like giving medicine to the dead.”
― Thomas Paine
If you are thinking of debating a creationist to “defend science”, it’s probably a good idea to “take a rain check” for the following reasons.
1) As noted above, creationists lie. A creationist “debater” can and will make false assertions far faster than you can provide evidence to disprove these assertions. You will use up all of your time allocation giving explanations/refutations, and very few people will understand your details and facts.
2) A creationist “debater” is very similar to an old-fashion circus sideshow barker. “Step right up ladies and gentlemen to see the two-headed …”. Science is not hype and promotionalism with the intent to draw a large audience. Science is a slow, do-your-homework process where you present evidence to support your case.
3) The attention span of a creationist is about 5 seconds. This is long enough for a creationist to make a flashy assertion and for the faithful to believe it. Science is a much slower process. E. G. “Oh that’s interesting - now prove it”. Debates only allow enough time for a “5 second” presentation.
4) Creationists thrive on attention. If you participate in a “debate” you will be giving them the audience that they crave.
5) Creationists are always trying to achieve credibility. They try to discredit standard science, but at the same time they frequently use “PhD” degrees from diploma mills to try to gain credibility. If you have real knowledge, any “debate” will equate your credentials with their diploma mill degree. The creationists have worked a long time to earn their crackpot image. Why should you spoil this image?
6) You will not convince any creationist in the audience to give up their beliefs by participating in a debate. The only way to disarm creationists is to repeatedly ridicule and embarrass them about their scientific ignorance. This will erode their willingness to defend creationism. Then, and only then, will a creationist be susceptible to understanding scientific evidence.
For example: If anyone would like to place a small (or larger) wager on the above dates, please contact me and I will take the opposite side. I will have my attorney set up a binding escrow account for whatever funds that anyone would like to commit.
One of the characteristics of
religious fundamentalists is their constant/multiple
forecasts of “The End of the World”, “Jesus will Return”,
“The Rapture will save us”, etc. The “faithful” always
believe this garbage despite a long history that the
forecasts have failed. This is also an accurate guide to
the rubbish “value” of Creationism (and its pseudonyms).
In regard to these particular predictions, I will make two predictions of my own.
1) Starting on October 22, 2011, rational people will have still another piece of evidence to ridicule the irrational people.
2) Over the interval from May 21, 2011 to at least October 22, 2011, we will hear a lot of feeble excuses from the irrational people.
For a quick history of past failed “Biblical” predictions please see:
“Over 200 predictions and counting!”
http://www.bible.ca/pre-date-setters.htm
Alternately run a Google search using:
“End of the world” biblical list
There are about half a million hits which should keep you busy for awhile.
Why do religious beliefs exist? Why have people believed in God(s) throughout history and in virtually every culture that has ever existed on planet Earth?
There is no historical record of when religious worship and/or a belief in God(s) began, but religious beliefs go back at least 11,600 years. (See “The Birth of Religion”, National Geographic http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/print/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text )
No one has a photograph of a “God”. Nor is there any physical evidence that one or more Gods ever existed. All we have are paintings – such as Michelangelo’s – “Creation of Adam”.
See Wikipedia “The Creation of Adam” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Creation_of_Adam
Of note, “God” is depicted as an all-powerful father figure.
While no one will ever be able to give a definitive answer to these initial questions, there is a logical argument to the “Creationist” origin of religion, and especially, “God”.
Most animals have a fairly short “learning period” where their parents teach them how to live – find food, water, learn how to hunt, etc. Humans are an exception. It takes us at least a dozen years to learn the basics of life. Additionally, if we are going to learn a “trade” (or some other skill that enables us to earn a living), we can add at least another 10 years or so onto this figure.
During this 20+ year period of learning, we are completely dependent on our parents. If we get into some kind of trouble, we turn to our all-powerful father to solve the problem. When we need emotional support, we have a loving mother who provides comfort. Thus for our formative years, we are dependent on “All powerful and loving parents”.
This same dependency existed for our parents, their parents, etc. for many thousands of generations back into prerecorded history. We and our ancestors grew up with this dependency. Most of us never outgrow this dependency. Most of us (and our distant ancestors) have a built in psychological dependency on an “all-powerful father” who will protect us, reward us if we are “good”, punish us if we are “bad”, etc.
Even when our parents die, we still have a psychological craving for “an all-powerful father”. So, what did our ancestors do when their mortal parents died?
Answer: As a replacement for their parents, our ancestors “Created” an “All-powerful and loving God”. Their “All-powerful and loving God” had the same traits as their memories of their parents. (In early human history, civilization consisted of clans instead of a single family structure. Thus we created multiple gods to substitute for the multiple members of the clan.)
Return to Durango Bill’s Home Page
The origin of the Noah’s Flood story dates back to Sumerian/Babylonian time (about 2,000 B.C., but this was still several hundred years after the “Step” Pyramid was built in Egypt). No one knows who the author was, or what evidence (if any) there is to support it. For a list of problems with a global flood please see: http://members.shaw.ca/tfrisen/evolution/Creationism/flood.html
In any case, flood stories have been passed down via legends, Mesopotamian clay tablets, multiple language translations (and interpretations), etc. for thousands of years before being printed in present day Bibles (and there are at least 15 versions). All of this should be taken into consideration before you are convinced that every word in “the Bible” is an exact depiction of what happened.
Some of the YECs attempt to weasel out of the Genesis description, which states that Noah’s Flood covered all the high mountains. They claim that the high mountains were created after Noah’s Flood. As seen below, these people are ignorant of the Bible as well as not understanding geology. If they wish to claim Genesis is in error, let them specify exactly which verses in Genesis are incorrect:
Gen 2:14 The Tigris/ Euphrates valley existed in its present form before the flood.
Gen 7:19-20 The text specifically states the flood covered “all the high mountains”. If the mountains were low at this time, the word “high” would not be used.
Gen 8:4-5 The high Ararat mountains existed before the flood subsided. The ark came to rest on the highest portion of the Ararat Mountains ~16,800 feet. It took an additional 2 1/2 months of water subsidence before the remaining mountains of Ararat could be seen. According to Archbishop James Ussher, the ark landed on Mt. Ararat exactly on Wed. May 5, 2349 BC. (See: “The Age of the Earth: Physics vs Faith?” http://courses.science.fau.edu/~rjordan/phy1931/AGE/age.pdf - Page 6. This link is a good reference source tracing the history of Creationism vs. Reality.)
From: http://www.bible.org/netbible/index.htm
New English Translation
Gen 2:14 The name of the third river is Tigris; it runs along the east side of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
Gen 7:19 The waters completely inundated the earth, so that even all the high mountains under the entire sky were covered. 7:20 The waters rose more than twenty feet(30) above the mountains.(31)
(30) Heb "rose fifteen cubits." Since a cubit is considered by most authorities to be about eighteen inches, this would make the depth 22.5 feet. This figure might give the modern reader a false impression of exactness, however, so in the translation the phrase "fifteen cubits" has been rendered "more than twenty feet."
(31) Heb "the waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward and they covered the mountains." Obviously, a flood of twenty feet did not cover the mountains; the statement must mean the flood rose about twenty feet above the highest mountain.
Gen 8:4 On the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ark came to rest on one of the mountains of Ararat. 8:5 The waters kept on receding until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains became visible.
Web page generated via Sea Monkey's Composer HTML editor
within a Linux Cinnamon Mint 18 operating system.
(Goodbye Microsoft)
Creationism =
Ignorance of Dendrochronology
(Count tree rings)
(Count tree rings)
According to the
creationists (The
calculated date is from "Answers in Genesis")
Noah's flood occurred in the year 2348 BC - some 4370
years ago (depending on when you are reading this
webpage), If such a mighty flood had occurred, it
would have obliterated all land animals and plants.
Yet there are Bristlecone Pine trees that are hundreds
of years older than this 4370-year age.
A Bristlecone Pine tree that was cut down in 1964 had 4,862 annual growth rings. (Please see The Prometheus Story at the Great Basin National Park web page.) Since this 1964 "count tree rings" evidence, even older Bristlecone Pine trees have been found. According to the above National Park brochure, the oldest known Bristlecone Pine tree goes back 5,065 years - which would be more than 600 years older than the flood that destroyed everything.
And then there is the dove and olive leaf problem . . . "When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth." Where could the dove "find a freshly plucked olive leaf" in a world that had been obliterated by a flood? ("As a result, all the high hills and the mountains—the whole earth—was covered by a global ocean. All air-breathing life on land was swept away and perished" - Answers in Genesis )
A Bristlecone Pine tree that was cut down in 1964 had 4,862 annual growth rings. (Please see The Prometheus Story at the Great Basin National Park web page.) Since this 1964 "count tree rings" evidence, even older Bristlecone Pine trees have been found. According to the above National Park brochure, the oldest known Bristlecone Pine tree goes back 5,065 years - which would be more than 600 years older than the flood that destroyed everything.
And then there is the dove and olive leaf problem . . . "When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth." Where could the dove "find a freshly plucked olive leaf" in a world that had been obliterated by a flood? ("As a result, all the high hills and the mountains—the whole earth—was covered by a global ocean. All air-breathing life on land was swept away and perished" - Answers in Genesis )
Ignorant
Creationist Claims on how the Colorado River
established
a path across the Kaibab Plateau to start cutting the Grand Canyon
a path across the Kaibab Plateau to start cutting the Grand Canyon
Perhaps nowhere else is the arrogance/ignorance of Creationists better illustrated than the contortions/delusions they go through to try to explain how the Colorado River established a path across the Kaibab Plateau. First, they invent a false argument claiming that the “evolutionists” required the Colorado River to flow uphill over the Kaibab Plateau before it started to cut down through it to form the Grand Canyon.
No legitimate geologist has ever made such an “uphill” claim, but of course the Creationists are not interested in reality.
However, ignorant Creationists fully believe that a large remnant lake from Noah’s Flood wouldn’t have had any problem duplicating the same uphill maneuver. For example, please see Eric Hovind’s Blogspot:
Eric Hovind: “The Grand
Canyon was formed when a large post flood lake breached
the top of the current Grand Canyon and eroded a canyon
very rapidly.”
http://erichovind.blogspot.com/2009/05/evolutionists-and-grand-canyon.html
http://erichovind.blogspot.com/2009/05/evolutionists-and-grand-canyon.html
The original of the video was at the above URL - the Print Screen images above and below are from the same video as posted at:
http://rationaldreaming.com/tag/grand-canyon/ (Larger image and better transmission.)
As can be seen in the pictures, Eric Hovind doesn’t even know which direction the Colorado River flows through the Grand Canyon. He’s got it backwards. The river flows from east to west (right side of the pictures to left side of the pictures) through that portion of the canyon - not west to east as Eric depicts it in the video. The perspective/view in the video is correct as viewed from south to north so the image is not reversed.
Note the correct
orientation of Africa on the globe in the lower left
corner. (1st picture) Also, at the 28 second mark in the
video, Eric has an “Exit” arrow on the east side of the
Kaibab Plateau to the right and behind the North Rim’s
Cape Royal.After Eric’s ignorant blunder was widely circulated on the Internet, he tried to blame the error on the graphics presentation. (Note: Eric would have viewed the video and given it a final OK long before it was posted on the Internet.)
It’s just Eric who is backward. (Quite possibly something he inherited from his dad - Kent Hovind.)
Ignorant Creationists: Q. E. D.
(The translation of the original Latin quod erat demonstrandum is: “Which was to be demonstrated”)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q.E.D.
Let’s look at present day topography to test the feasibility of either of these uphill routes. The South Rim of the Grand Canyon near Desert View Point (lower right in the picture) is nearly 7,500 feet above sea level. If you travel 8.5 miles to the northwest, you arrive at Cape Royal on the North Rim at about 7,900 feet. If you filled in the Grand Canyon and tried to get the Colorado River to establish its current course based on present topography, the river (or remnant lake) would have to climb to about 7,700 feet to get across the Kaibab. The Colorado River starts cutting the Grand Canyon at Lees Ferry nearly 60 miles further to the NNE at an elevation of about 3,100 feet. (Off the top right of the picture.) While the Creationists fully believe that “their lake” could climb over the 7,700 foot high barrier, let’s look at alternate lower locations (using current topography) where the water would go if you could fill a lake on the east side of the Kaibab. (All of the following lower potential routes can be verified by Google Earth.)
1) Roughly follow U. S. highway route # 89 westward through southern Utah around the north end of the Kaibab and never go above 5,640 feet.
2) Again, go west around the south end of the Kaibab between the South Rim and Flagstaff, AZ and never go above 6,530 feet. (Max altitude is near 35.68 N, 111.87 W)
3) Roughly follow Arizona highway route # 77 south from the Little Colorado River and cross over the Mogollon Rim at under 6,510 feet near Show Low, AZ. In the 110 mile stretch from Show Low to just south of Flagstaff there are multiple other routes over the Mogollon Rim under 7,000 feet.
4) Follow Interstate Route 40 east from Arizona into New Mexico and cross the Continental Divide into Rio Grande drainage at under 7,270 feet.
5) Back up the San Juan and Chaco Rivers (southeastward across New Mexico) and cross over into the Rio Grande drainage. (Cross the Continental Divide near 35.91 N, 107.44 W) at under 6,680 feet.
6) Back up the Yampa River and then roughly follow routes 13 and 789 north into the North Platte drainage in Wyoming. In the process you cross the Continental Divide at 41.487 N, 107.882 W at 6,730 feet.
7) Back up the Green River into Wyoming and follow the Union Pacific Railroad east from Rock Springs, WY. Cross the Continental Divide at 41.63 N, 108.31 W at under 6,950 feet. A “prairie” route stays under 6,830 feet when it crosses the Divide at 41.656N, 108.420 W.
8) Follow the Union Pacific Railroad west from Rock Springs, WY and cross over into Utah’s Bear River drainage a short distance west of Kemmerer, WY. Stay under 7,130 feet.
If you are an ignorant Young Earth Creationist, then the topography has had very little time to change, and you are forced into the contortion/delusion that the Colorado River/remnant lake had to flow uphill to get over the Kaibab. Of course the Creationists only have to have faith in Noah’s Flood. They are arrogantly ignorant when it comes to topography. They have “faith” that their lake could easily cross the 7,700 foot barrier of the Kaibab and ignore the lower escape routes.
The topography was obviously different 5.4 million years ago when the Colorado River established its current course across the Kaibab. Five and a half million years ago, the Kaibab was significantly lower, and the terrain to the east of the Kaibab was higher. Over the intervening 5.4 million years, there has been a renewed uplift of the Kaibab combined with over one thousand feet of erosion to the east of the Kaibab (e.g. at Cameron, AZ). Today’s topography is the result of geologic changes that have taken place in the last five and a half million years.
If you are interested in the geologic history, please see “Evolution of the Colorado River” at http://www.durangobill.com/Paleorivers_preface.html . Some 5.4 million years ago, the river’s route was downhill all the way. We’ll leave the “flow uphill” delusions to the willfully ignorant Creationists.
Sedimentary
Layers
in the Grand Canyon
The Creationists insist that all the Paleozoic sedimentary layers that we see in the Grand Canyon were laid down during Noah’s Flood. So far, four thousand feet of sediments. There’s another 4,000 feet of Triassic and Jurassic sediments that were eroded away from the Grand Canyon area long ago, but they can be seen in other areas such as Zion National Park. You can add several more thousands of feet on top of this (e. g. The Mesa Verde Group - visit Mesa Verde National Park). All of this is on top of 14,000 feet of sedimentary layers that are present in the Grand Canyon Supergroup. Altogether, we’ve got an easy 25,000 to 30,000-foot accumulation of sediments. If the Noah’s Flood story is going to be true, all of this has to be eroded from somewhere, transported to the Grand Canyon/Colorado Plateau and laid down during “the Flood”. (Let’s say one year, max.). In any case, the water would have to be pretty murky as it would need enough mud to have 100 feet of sediments settle out per day.
Whales eat by swimming through the ocean and opening their mouths to gulp/eat many thousands of pounds of plankton and small fish per day. (e.g. see “All about Whales”). However, if the water were this muddy, they would be eating many thousands of pounds of mud per day. Perhaps Noah had a (very) large aquarium aboard the ark where he kept the whales. (And the sharks,…)
Or, perhaps, the Creationists have a deep psychological need to believe, and this “deep psychological need” overrides answering “the tough questions”.
The
Angular Unconformity in the Grand Canyon
The picture below illustrates the famous angular unconformity in the Grand Canyon. The original photograph was taken by Edwin McKee, and the USGS has a larger version at: http://libraryphoto.cr.usgs.gov/cgi-bin/show_picture.cgi?ID=ID.%20McKee,%20E.D.%20%20280ct
The view is part
of what you see if you look north from Moran Point
(popular viewpoint) on the south rim of the Grand Canyon.
The highlights of the photograph include a horizontal
layer of Tapeats Sandstone on top of the tilted layers of
the Grand Canyon Supergroup. The Colorado River is at the
bottom of the picture. Let’s compare a geologic
explanation for the angular unconformity (a horizontal
layer on top of tilted layers) vs. what might happen if
you ask a willfully ignorant creationist for an
explanation. A brief synopsis of the geologic story
follows:1) Starting about 1.2 billion years ago, thousands of feet of limestone, silt, and volcanic rock (black layer) were laid down in multiple horizontal layers to form the Grand Canyon Supergroup.
2) Starting about 800 million years ago, these layers were uplifted and subjected to tensional stretching. The surface rock fractured into blocks - some of which were faulted downward and tilted in the process. Most of the rest of the Grand Canyon Supergroup was eroded away by surface erosion, but the tilted layers which had been faulted downward were safely below surface erosion.
3) Erosion beveled the surface to a nearly horizontal plane, but the tilted layers of the Grand Canyon Supergroup that had been faulted downward out of harms way were preserved.
4) About 570 million years ago, this portion of the North American continent subsided below sea level, and thousands of feet of new horizontal sedimentary layers were deposited on top of the old beveled surface. (Which included the top of the preserved tilted layers of the Grand Canyon Supergroup.) The first of these new layers was the Tapeats Sandstone
5) There were multiple episodes of sedimentary deposition and above sea level erosion over the next 500 million years, but the Grand Canyon area has been above sea level for the last 70 million years.
6) About 5.4 million years ago, the Colorado River established its current course, and subsequent erosion has sliced a deep canyon that allows us to see a major portion of the whole story.
Multiple other angular unconformities exist throughout the world. Photographs of many of these can be seen by running a Google image search using: angular unconformity
Now, let’s suppose that you ask a Young Earth Creationist how an angular unconformity is produced. You might get a 3-word reply - “God did it.” You might even get a 4-word reply - “Noah’s Flood did it”. If you ask HOW “God did it” or “Noah’s Flood did it”, in all probability they will accuse you of being an agent of Satan. They will assert that you will face eternal damnation because you are attempting to deny their “deep psychological need to believe” in an “all powerful father” who will protect them from the real world. Frequently, this is accompanied by some obscure quote from the Bible.
And then they will run someplace else and proclaim that their faith has protected them from another agent of Satan.
Green
River Shale
The photo below by Kevin Delaney of Salt Lake City, Utah shows a 2,000-foot thick section of the Green River Shale as seen in Desolation Canyon, Utah. (Animals on the far side of the river are cows.) The Green River Formation was deposited long after the sedimentary layers in the Grand Canyon were deposited.
Note the thousands of visible layers that extend for many miles. The Green River Formation has millions of varves - alternating layers of silt deposited during seasonal variations in water/silt flow. How could these millions of layers that extend uniformly over many miles be deposited in a flood that lasted less than a year?
Please see http://www.durangobill.com/DesolationCanyon.html for more information on Desolation Canyon.
Varves are common
in sedimentary rock layers. The picture to the right is a
close-up view of relatively thick varves (Green River
varves are much thinner) that show up in Little River
State Park in Vermont. (Photo courtesy of the Vermont
Geologic Society.) Each layer in the sequence represents
an annual deposition pattern that was deposited in a body
of water. (Typically a lake) Seasonal variations in water
flow (e.g. spring runoffs) wash sediments into the body of
water. Larger particles settle out quickly while smaller
particles take months to settle out. The size and
difference in composition of the particles produces
alternating layers. Seasonal variations in the amount of
organic material also contribute to the color differences.
Each light-colored layer fades into a dark layer to form a
couplet. Each couplet is a record of one year’s deposits.
In each subsequent year, a new couplet is deposited on top
of the previous year’s couplet. The sequence is repeated
over multiple years. How could a single “Noah’s Flood”
event produce these bands? How do creationists
respond to this kind of evidence? Typically, they “squeeze
eyes shut” and yell “Does not” until out of frustration
you give up and go away. Then they will claim “victory”
because you haven’t convinced
them that their “flood” is pure fiction.“Debating creationists on the topic of evolution is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon; it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flies back to its flock to claim victory.”
A quote from “The God Delusion”
“Faith (belief without evidence) is a virtue. The more your beliefs defy the evidence, the more virtuous you are. Virtuoso believers who can manage to believe something weird, unsupported and insupportable, in the teeth of evidence and reason, are especially highly rewarded.”
Given the Creationists’ fear of the real world (see below), they are more apt to “spout” from the first half of Matthew 6:13. (Hint: “…deliver us from evil”)
Is there any possibility that Creationists will ever be able to learn anything from scientific evidence? The answer is: “Not likely”. There are large numbers of people who choose to be willfully ignorant, and there is always the scientifically ignorant Ken Ham (and his Creation “Museum”) who revels in catering to the ignorant.
For example, see:
“Once again, creation science advocate Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis is showing his willful ignorance of old earth belief.” http://www.answersincreation.org/rebuttal/aig/daily/2005/20050912_ham_truth.htm
“Ken Ham “I bask in the praise of the ignorant””
http://hjhop.blogspot.com/2008/11/ken-ham-i-bask-in-praise-of-ignorant.html
Just imagine how easy it must be for half-wit Ken Ham to puff up his own ego when his audience is composed of TOTAL dimwits. For more on “Ignorant Ken Ham” please see: http://lists.topica.com/lists/ii_errancy/read/message.html?sort=d&mid=805451894
Willful
Misrepresentation and Deceitfulness by Creationists
A common tactic used by Creationists is deliberate misrepresentation of reality to promote their own beliefs. Under the guise of “Creation Science”, and “(Un)Intelligent Design” creationism, they present their religious dogmas as if they were real science. One of their favorites is to claim that gully erosion in the Mt. St. Helens ash debris is equivalent to formation of the Grand Canyon.
The picture
above is a view looking southeast from the North
Toutle River toward Mt. St. Helens (top center).
Coldwater and Spirit Lakes can be seen in the upper
left corner. Contour intervals are 50 ft. and
viewpoint generation and scale exactly match the
pictures used in the 3-D
Grand
Canyon
Tour except the viewing angle has been reduced
from 30 deg. to 20 deg.
Volcanic ash, mudflows, and misc. debris associated with and following the 1980 Mt. St. Helens eruption have partially filled the valley of the North Toutle River which runs from the north (left) side of Mt. St. Helens to the lower edge. The former riverbed was buried under these ash/mudflows, but in this view, the river is gradually reestablishing itself as the blue line on the right (south) side of the filled valley.
If you look closely along and near the river, you will see a series of small “indentations” in the contour lines that represent more recent gully erosion in the ash/mudflows that have partially filled the valley of the North Toutle River. Steven Austin (Note 1), a popular Creationist (who also tries to claim geologic respectability), calls this series of “indentations” the “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River”. According to the Creationists, this gully is suppose to be evidence that a catastrophic flood formed the Grand Canyon. (Note: The Colorado River has taken about 5.4 million years to cut down thousands of feet through solid rock to form the Grand Canyon.)
The Creationists assert that short-term gully erosion caused by mud flows (i.e. lahars) is equivalent to the 5.4 million year old Grand Canyon. Click here for a photograph and more information about lahars. Please compare the above picture and the USGS photo with any/all of the 70 pictures that were needed to illustrate the 3-D Tour of the Grand Canyon. Then draw your own conclusion as to whether the two geologic features have similar origins.
The Creationists claim this “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River” is 1/40th the size of the real Grand Canyon. Either Creationists fantasize about the real world or Creationists lie - your choice. Photographic evidence that there is no “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River” can be seen at: http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/MSH/Images/debris_aval_images.html
Alternately, you can download “Google Earth” for free and use it to search for the “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River”. (Hint: You aren’t going to find something that doesn’t exist.)
Note 1: Steven (Steve) Austin has marketed video/VHS titles such as “Grand Canyon: Monument to the Flood”, “The Grand Canyon Catastrophe”, & “Mount St. Helens” as well as his Creationist book “Grand Canyon: Monument to Catastrophe”. Steve Austin has also been caught willfully lying to a Grand Canyon National Park Research Coordinator. “I am sorry to learn Steve Austin is not being truthful”
Ray Comfort (The
“banana-man” preacher from Living Waters Ministry) is
a classic poster child for the Deceitfulness of
Creationism / Creationists. Ray has hijacked Darwin’s
original book “(On) The Origin of Species”
and reissued a bastardized version. The new version
has a lengthy introduction by Ray which
promotes ignorant Creationism. It is a typically
creationist, factually inaccurate, example of “Lying
for God”. The result is a book that steals Darwin’s
original title and then presents a complete
misrepresentation of Darwin’s original evidence for
evolution.
(Please place mouse arrow over the “Ray Comfort Ignorance” “motivational poster” for more info.)
If you write your own book, you can honestly present your own information. If you distort and willfully misrepresent someone else’s creative work, it is blatantly dishonest. Ray Comfort’s stunt reeks of someone who has an “Attention Addiction” problem, but personal problems are a poor excuse for being dishonest.
(From: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Attention%20Addiction
Attention Addiction or an Attention Addict is a person who often does stupid things to get attention.)
Willful misrepresentation is standard operating procedure for Creationists. They frequently extract portions of legitimate scientific work, and then use these extracts in a manner that misrepresents the original meaning. (For example, see the “Misrepresentation of statements by scientific experts” section in http://www.durangobill.com/Swindle_Swindle.html .) The process is frequently referred to as “quote mining”.
Creationists don’t engage in original research work. Their modus operandi consists of trying to discredit legitimate work that has been done by honest people. Whatever happened to “Thou shalt not bear false witness”?
(But then again, Creationists consider it a virtue to “bear false witness” for their cause - and continually practice this “art” until they become experts at it.)
Political tribalism to teach willful ignorance has been dominant in the Texas Board of Education for years. Here’s a quote (in a video) from Don McLeroy - a fanatical creationist and former head of the Texas Board of Education.
“Someone has to stand up - to experts!” (1 minute into the video)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzrUt9CHtpY
“Don’t pray in our
schools, and we won’t think in your churches” –
unknown
The greatest damage that results from “Creationism” is that it teaches students that saying “God did it” or “Noah’s Flood did it” is equivalent to getting a college degree. We will need medical researchers to develop future drugs to fight diseases. If today's students are convinced that evolution is a fallacy, will they have the knowledge to keep up with the evolutionary mutations of the many bacteria and viruses? Will future medical care improve if we include “faith healing” as required courses in medical schools? Will students that do not understand basic mathematics or physics be able to design future automobiles, power plants, etc.?
Ignorant students grow up to become ignorant adults. For example, the following quote originally appeared Aug. 30, 2005 in the New York Times. (Copy at: http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t366399.html)
“One adult American in five thinks the Sun revolves around the Earth” (Use this quote for a Google search if you can not directly access the above article)
For the year 2005, the number of students graduating with engineering degrees in China was 5 times larger than the number of students graduating with engineering degrees in the U.S.
“The World Economic Forum ranks the United States 48th in quality of mathematics and science education.”
Rising Above the Gathering Storm, Revisited: Rapidly Approaching Category 5 - Executive Summary
National Academies Press: http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12999
Creationists are not only scientifically ignorant they are also ignorant about the Bible.
From: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/01/AR2007030102073.html
In short, Creationists are just plain ignorant, but that doesn’t stop them from trying to force their faith based ignorance into our school systems.
As part of
their “need to believe”, creationists frequently have
a “need to confess”. If you are a creationist and are
suffering from one/both of these “needs”, then before
you act in haste, you might want to learn the Miranda
Rights for Creationists.
1) You have the right to remain silent.
If you state that you are a Creationist, most people will think that you are an arrogant idiot. However, if you insist on broadcasting your fairy tales to the world, you will prove the matter beyond all doubt.
2) Anything you say, can and will be used against you in a court of law.
If you say something really stupid (Creationists are prone to “stupid statements”.), someone will use your statement as continuing evidence that you and other Creationists are arrogant idiots.
3) You have the right to have an attorney present now and during any future questioning.
Lawyers and scientists understand the word “evidence”. Creationists don’t. You have a right to have someone present who can explain to you exactly what the word “evidence” means.
4) If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you free of charge if you wish.
Better yet, try the Internet. There are large numbers of other Creationists that will give you free “advice”. The free “advice” will be worth exactly what you pay for it.
1) God loves you and you’re going to burn in hell.
2) Sex is the most awful, filthy thing on earth and you should save it for someone you love.
3) Legitimate scientists are deceitful Darwinists and Evolutionists - except that you can believe and have faith in the delusions of “Creation Scientists”. (You also have to ignore the fact that the “Ph.D.” degrees of the “Creation Scientists” are mostly from Diploma Mills.)
4) The Grand Canyon couldn’t have been cut over millions of years by slow geological erosion, but drainage from a remnant lake could carve it in a few days - the same lake that ignored other lower escape routes but instead flowed uphill over the Kaibab Plateau.
5) Billions of years of gradual evolution couldn’t possibly produce a complex DNA molecule, but the Creationists’ invisible friend didn’t have a problem with a one day deadline.
We can only speculate as to why the Creationists would want to be willfully ignorant. Unlike stupidity (not capable of acquiring knowledge), “willfully ignorant” indicates an individual chooses not to become educated or to obtain knowledge. Are the Creationists afraid of knowledge? Do they think Satan will get them if they don’t believe every word in the Bible? Are they afraid the “atheistic scientists” are agents of Satan? Perhaps, the Creationists think of themselves as superior to everyone else, and are afraid to find out they aren't quite so superior.
Note: There is a close connection between white supremacists and creationists. For example, please see:
1) “Other relatively mainstream institutions in which creationism and racism are intertwined include Bob Jones University”
2) “Creationism and Racism” http://home.austarnet.com.au/stear/creation_and_racism.htm
3) “Bob Jones’s True Colors” http://www-tech.mit.edu/V120/N13/col13veena.13c.html
4) (Added Aug. 3, 2009) Lou Dobbs is a typical example of the close connection between creationists and white supremacists. Lou Dobbs has been promoting the birthers (“Where is Obama’s birth certificate”) issue on CNN.
The San Francisco Chronicle (among others) has pointed out the connection between Lou Dobbs, birthers, and white supremacists.
“Lou Dobbs home to “birthers” and white supremacists”
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/abraham/detail?blogid=95&entry_id=44806
Finally Lou Dobbs has stated: “The fact is that evolution, Darwinism, is not a fully explained or completely rigorous and defined science that has testable results within it.” - a typical statement by a scientifically ignorant creationist. http://mediamatters.org/research/200505130008
E.g. The creationists fear being genetically linked to “blacks” because “whites are superior to blacks”.
Or perhaps the Creationists’ belief in the supernatural world is a mental refuge based on a psychological (primary contribution) and/or intellectual (secondary contribution) inability to understand the natural, real world. It just might be that in our technological world they fear having to make their own decisions, and thus they gravitate toward a father image who will make these decisions for them. If they are faced with anything they are not psychologically or intellectually able to understand, they turn to a simple answer that they are comfortable with - “God did it”.
There are five primary fear sources that explain the behavior of Creationists. They are:
1) Fear of evolution.
2) Fear and hatred toward gays/lesbians.
3) Fear of women.
4) Fear of death.
5) Fear of losing their all powerful father who will protect them from their fears.
A separate web page at http://www.durangobill.com/Creationists_Fears.html goes into these in more detail and gives some examples.
1) If Creationism really represented honesty, why do the Creationists resort to dishonesty and deception? (Please see “Arguments against Creationism” and “Evolution, Creation, and Lies” for details and documentation.)
2) If you are so proud to be a Creationist, why don't you include this information in your résumé?
3) (Why) Are you afraid of the truth?
Earlier, we stated that Creationists are ignorant of geology. This ignorance extends to all the sciences as Creationists are equally ignorant of gravity. It is often useful to back up a simple statement (such as this one) with iron-clad proof. Fortunately, a new entry on the Internet has appeared that provides the needed evidence. Conservapedia ( http://www.conservapedia.com/Main_Page ) has been extremely helpful in this regard. As of 3/9/07 Conservapedia’s Main Page stated:
The picture above is a Print Screen image (slightly reduced in size) of what appeared at one time in Conservapedia. Note the Feb. 22, 2007 date. Also note the level of ignorance in regard to gravity.
Perhaps someone should ask the “geniuses” at Conservapedia what the mysterious centripetal force might be that is preventing the moon from flying off in a straight line to who knows where.
You would probably get their stock, 3-word, 3-syllable answer - “God did it”.
As in any “user wiki” environment, articles are subject to change. However, the above quote was still on the Conservapedia Gravity page AFTER Mr. Andrew Schlafly, founder of Conservapedia, had personally edited the page on March 7, 2007. (A Print Screen copy of this later version is displayed on the “What causes a Creationist to be a Creationist?” page. http://www.durangobill.com/Creationists_Fears.html) Thus, Mr. Schlafly was also ignorant of the fallacy involved. Subsequently, the above quote has been removed. (Out of embarrassment?)
As for the 3.8 cm per year (which is true), one might hope that the ignorant Creationists might learn something about tides in the Earth’s oceans (and crust), and how the Earth’s rotation drags a tidal bulge out in front of a straight line that can be drawn through the center of the Earth and the Moon. Then you could analyze the resulting gravitational forces by Vector Analysis… Whoops, the gray glaze just came over their eyes as we used more than one syllable per word.
It appears that many YEC’s refer to all scientists as “evolutionists” because they quite literally:
1) don't know that chemistry, physics, etc. are different fields,
2) don't want to learn there is a difference, and
3) don't care that they don't know there is a difference.
Unfortunately, this is not a joke. Many (Actual, MOST) creationists misrepresent their educational qualifications. Typically, the “Ph.D.” degrees that they display usually originate from “Bible School” diploma mills.
“You can't convince a believer of anything; for their belief is not based on evidence, it's based on a deep seated need to believe.”
Carl Sagan
(or in current terminology - It’s useless to present evidence of reality to “Fundies”. They have mental problems that force them to believe in fairy tales. This “need to believe” overrides the recurring scandals of fundamentalist leaders. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_televangelist_scandals)
If the Creationists/“Intelligent Designers” prevail, it will not be the first time that religious ignorance has destroyed civilization and thrown the world into one thousand years of “Dark Ages”.
According to “Did Christians Destroy Classical Culture and Create the Dark Ages?” http://www.askwhy.co.uk/christianity/0780Bookburning.html
“The worst act of many vandal acts under Theodosius was in 391 AD when Christians pulled down the temple of Serapis at Alexandria which housed one of the world’s greatest libraries—said, at one time, to have had over half a million rolls—and scattered and burned the books.”
“In AD 391, riots instigated by fanatical Christians damaged the collection heavily.”
According to “The Truth About the Dark Ages” (http://www.hermes-press.com/DAtruth.htm) beginning about year 398:
Thus began over 1,000 years of the “Dark Ages”.
For more information, run a Google search using all of the following.
In the year 1600 Italian philosopher-astronomer Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by religious fundamentalists.
Q: What was his crime?
A: Bruno stated that “Innumerable suns exist; innumerable earths revolve about these suns in a manner similar to the way the seven planets revolve around our sun. Living beings inhabit these worlds.”
At the time, religious dogma stated that the earth was the center of the universe and everything revolved/orbited around the earth. Bruno was sentenced to death because of this and other “diverse horrid opinions”.
We are living in an age when ignorant Christian mobs are once again trying to replace science and knowledge with religious rituals. If we don’t learn from history, it WILL happen again!
If you are under the delusion that (Un) Intelligent Design Evangelism represents real science, all you have to do is Click Here to see the real origin of this theistic species. (Also see the archived Discovery Institute’s page at: http://web.archive.org/web/19961103063546/http://www.discovery.org/crsc.html)
Volcanic ash, mudflows, and misc. debris associated with and following the 1980 Mt. St. Helens eruption have partially filled the valley of the North Toutle River which runs from the north (left) side of Mt. St. Helens to the lower edge. The former riverbed was buried under these ash/mudflows, but in this view, the river is gradually reestablishing itself as the blue line on the right (south) side of the filled valley.
If you look closely along and near the river, you will see a series of small “indentations” in the contour lines that represent more recent gully erosion in the ash/mudflows that have partially filled the valley of the North Toutle River. Steven Austin (Note 1), a popular Creationist (who also tries to claim geologic respectability), calls this series of “indentations” the “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River”. According to the Creationists, this gully is suppose to be evidence that a catastrophic flood formed the Grand Canyon. (Note: The Colorado River has taken about 5.4 million years to cut down thousands of feet through solid rock to form the Grand Canyon.)
The Creationists assert that short-term gully erosion caused by mud flows (i.e. lahars) is equivalent to the 5.4 million year old Grand Canyon. Click here for a photograph and more information about lahars. Please compare the above picture and the USGS photo with any/all of the 70 pictures that were needed to illustrate the 3-D Tour of the Grand Canyon. Then draw your own conclusion as to whether the two geologic features have similar origins.
The Creationists claim this “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River” is 1/40th the size of the real Grand Canyon. Either Creationists fantasize about the real world or Creationists lie - your choice. Photographic evidence that there is no “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River” can be seen at: http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/MSH/Images/debris_aval_images.html
Alternately, you can download “Google Earth” for free and use it to search for the “Grand Canyon of the Toutle River”. (Hint: You aren’t going to find something that doesn’t exist.)
Note 1: Steven (Steve) Austin has marketed video/VHS titles such as “Grand Canyon: Monument to the Flood”, “The Grand Canyon Catastrophe”, & “Mount St. Helens” as well as his Creationist book “Grand Canyon: Monument to Catastrophe”. Steve Austin has also been caught willfully lying to a Grand Canyon National Park Research Coordinator. “I am sorry to learn Steve Austin is not being truthful”
The
Deceitfulness of Ray Comfort
Ray Comfort (The
“banana-man” preacher from Living Waters Ministry) is
a classic poster child for the Deceitfulness of
Creationism / Creationists. Ray has hijacked Darwin’s
original book “(On) The Origin of Species”
and reissued a bastardized version. The new version
has a lengthy introduction by Ray which
promotes ignorant Creationism. It is a typically
creationist, factually inaccurate, example of “Lying
for God”. The result is a book that steals Darwin’s
original title and then presents a complete
misrepresentation of Darwin’s original evidence for
evolution.(Please place mouse arrow over the “Ray Comfort Ignorance” “motivational poster” for more info.)
If you write your own book, you can honestly present your own information. If you distort and willfully misrepresent someone else’s creative work, it is blatantly dishonest. Ray Comfort’s stunt reeks of someone who has an “Attention Addiction” problem, but personal problems are a poor excuse for being dishonest.
(From: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Attention%20Addiction
Attention Addiction or an Attention Addict is a person who often does stupid things to get attention.)
Willful misrepresentation is standard operating procedure for Creationists. They frequently extract portions of legitimate scientific work, and then use these extracts in a manner that misrepresents the original meaning. (For example, see the “Misrepresentation of statements by scientific experts” section in http://www.durangobill.com/Swindle_Swindle.html .) The process is frequently referred to as “quote mining”.
Creationists don’t engage in original research work. Their modus operandi consists of trying to discredit legitimate work that has been done by honest people. Whatever happened to “Thou shalt not bear false witness”?
(But then again, Creationists consider it a virtue to “bear false witness” for their cause - and continually practice this “art” until they become experts at it.)
Willful
Ignorance
is a Disservice to Students.
Political tribalism to teach willful ignorance has been dominant in the Texas Board of Education for years. Here’s a quote (in a video) from Don McLeroy - a fanatical creationist and former head of the Texas Board of Education.
“Someone has to stand up - to experts!” (1 minute into the video)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzrUt9CHtpY
“Don’t pray in our
schools, and we won’t think in your churches” –
unknownThe greatest damage that results from “Creationism” is that it teaches students that saying “God did it” or “Noah’s Flood did it” is equivalent to getting a college degree. We will need medical researchers to develop future drugs to fight diseases. If today's students are convinced that evolution is a fallacy, will they have the knowledge to keep up with the evolutionary mutations of the many bacteria and viruses? Will future medical care improve if we include “faith healing” as required courses in medical schools? Will students that do not understand basic mathematics or physics be able to design future automobiles, power plants, etc.?
The cartoon above was
original posted on PZ Myers’ webpage under the
title:
“Everyone is entitled to a bad education”
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/07/everyone_is_entitled_to_a_bad.php
“Everyone is entitled to a bad education”
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/07/everyone_is_entitled_to_a_bad.php
Ignorant students grow up to become ignorant adults. For example, the following quote originally appeared Aug. 30, 2005 in the New York Times. (Copy at: http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t366399.html)
Scientific Savvy?
In U.S., Not Much
In U.S., Not Much
Dr.
Miller's data reveal some yawning gaps in basic
knowledge. American adults in general do not
understand what molecules are (other than that they
are really small). Fewer than a third can identify
DNA as a key to heredity. Only about 10 percent know
what radiation is. One adult American in five thinks
the Sun revolves around the Earth, an idea science
had abandoned by the 17th century.
“One adult American in five thinks the Sun revolves around the Earth” (Use this quote for a Google search if you can not directly access the above article)
For the year 2005, the number of students graduating with engineering degrees in China was 5 times larger than the number of students graduating with engineering degrees in the U.S.
“The World Economic Forum ranks the United States 48th in quality of mathematics and science education.”
Rising Above the Gathering Storm, Revisited: Rapidly Approaching Category 5 - Executive Summary
National Academies Press: http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12999
Creationists are not only scientifically ignorant they are also ignorant about the Bible.
From: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/01/AR2007030102073.html
Blind
Faith
Americans believe in religion -- but know little about it.
Americans believe in religion -- but know little about it.
“Americans are also
the most religiously ignorant people in the Western
world. Fewer than half of us can identify Genesis as
the first book of the Bible, and only one third know
that Jesus delivered the Sermon on the Mount.”
In short, Creationists are just plain ignorant, but that doesn’t stop them from trying to force their faith based ignorance into our school systems.
Miranda
Rights
for Creationists
As part of
their “need to believe”, creationists frequently have
a “need to confess”. If you are a creationist and are
suffering from one/both of these “needs”, then before
you act in haste, you might want to learn the Miranda
Rights for Creationists.1) You have the right to remain silent.
If you state that you are a Creationist, most people will think that you are an arrogant idiot. However, if you insist on broadcasting your fairy tales to the world, you will prove the matter beyond all doubt.
2) Anything you say, can and will be used against you in a court of law.
If you say something really stupid (Creationists are prone to “stupid statements”.), someone will use your statement as continuing evidence that you and other Creationists are arrogant idiots.
3) You have the right to have an attorney present now and during any future questioning.
Lawyers and scientists understand the word “evidence”. Creationists don’t. You have a right to have someone present who can explain to you exactly what the word “evidence” means.
4) If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you free of charge if you wish.
Better yet, try the Internet. There are large numbers of other Creationists that will give you free “advice”. The free “advice” will be worth exactly what you pay for it.
“Logical
Analysis”
According to Creationists
1) God loves you and you’re going to burn in hell.
2) Sex is the most awful, filthy thing on earth and you should save it for someone you love.
3) Legitimate scientists are deceitful Darwinists and Evolutionists - except that you can believe and have faith in the delusions of “Creation Scientists”. (You also have to ignore the fact that the “Ph.D.” degrees of the “Creation Scientists” are mostly from Diploma Mills.)
4) The Grand Canyon couldn’t have been cut over millions of years by slow geological erosion, but drainage from a remnant lake could carve it in a few days - the same lake that ignored other lower escape routes but instead flowed uphill over the Kaibab Plateau.
5) Billions of years of gradual evolution couldn’t possibly produce a complex DNA molecule, but the Creationists’ invisible friend didn’t have a problem with a one day deadline.
Is
the Willful Ignorance of the Creationists a Result
of Fear?
We can only speculate as to why the Creationists would want to be willfully ignorant. Unlike stupidity (not capable of acquiring knowledge), “willfully ignorant” indicates an individual chooses not to become educated or to obtain knowledge. Are the Creationists afraid of knowledge? Do they think Satan will get them if they don’t believe every word in the Bible? Are they afraid the “atheistic scientists” are agents of Satan? Perhaps, the Creationists think of themselves as superior to everyone else, and are afraid to find out they aren't quite so superior.
Note: There is a close connection between white supremacists and creationists. For example, please see:
1) “Other relatively mainstream institutions in which creationism and racism are intertwined include Bob Jones University”
2) “Creationism and Racism” http://home.austarnet.com.au/stear/creation_and_racism.htm
3) “Bob Jones’s True Colors” http://www-tech.mit.edu/V120/N13/col13veena.13c.html
4) (Added Aug. 3, 2009) Lou Dobbs is a typical example of the close connection between creationists and white supremacists. Lou Dobbs has been promoting the birthers (“Where is Obama’s birth certificate”) issue on CNN.
The San Francisco Chronicle (among others) has pointed out the connection between Lou Dobbs, birthers, and white supremacists.
“Lou Dobbs home to “birthers” and white supremacists”
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/abraham/detail?blogid=95&entry_id=44806
Finally Lou Dobbs has stated: “The fact is that evolution, Darwinism, is not a fully explained or completely rigorous and defined science that has testable results within it.” - a typical statement by a scientifically ignorant creationist. http://mediamatters.org/research/200505130008
E.g. The creationists fear being genetically linked to “blacks” because “whites are superior to blacks”.
Or perhaps the Creationists’ belief in the supernatural world is a mental refuge based on a psychological (primary contribution) and/or intellectual (secondary contribution) inability to understand the natural, real world. It just might be that in our technological world they fear having to make their own decisions, and thus they gravitate toward a father image who will make these decisions for them. If they are faced with anything they are not psychologically or intellectually able to understand, they turn to a simple answer that they are comfortable with - “God did it”.
Creationists are
scientifically ignorant and fear reality.
What
causes a Creationist to be a Creationist?
The answer is:
Fear!
The answer is:
Fear!
There are five primary fear sources that explain the behavior of Creationists. They are:
1) Fear of evolution.
2) Fear and hatred toward gays/lesbians.
3) Fear of women.
4) Fear of death.
5) Fear of losing their all powerful father who will protect them from their fears.
A separate web page at http://www.durangobill.com/Creationists_Fears.html goes into these in more detail and gives some examples.
The
Three Top Questions to Ask a Creationist
1) If Creationism really represented honesty, why do the Creationists resort to dishonesty and deception? (Please see “Arguments against Creationism” and “Evolution, Creation, and Lies” for details and documentation.)
2) If you are so proud to be a Creationist, why don't you include this information in your résumé?
3) (Why) Are you afraid of the truth?
Conservapedia
and
Ignorance
of Gravity
Earlier, we stated that Creationists are ignorant of geology. This ignorance extends to all the sciences as Creationists are equally ignorant of gravity. It is often useful to back up a simple statement (such as this one) with iron-clad proof. Fortunately, a new entry on the Internet has appeared that provides the needed evidence. Conservapedia ( http://www.conservapedia.com/Main_Page ) has been extremely helpful in this regard. As of 3/9/07 Conservapedia’s Main Page stated:
“Conservapedia is a
much-needed alternative to Wikipedia, which is
increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American.”
“With your help, Conservapedia will continue to be an online encyclopedia you can trust.”
“With your help, Conservapedia will continue to be an online encyclopedia you can trust.”
The picture above is a Print Screen image (slightly reduced in size) of what appeared at one time in Conservapedia. Note the Feb. 22, 2007 date. Also note the level of ignorance in regard to gravity.
“Furthermore,
experiments done by NASA prove that the Moon is
receding (moving further away) from the Earth at a
rate of 3.8cm per year, directly
contradicting the theory that masses attract one
another.”
Perhaps someone should ask the “geniuses” at Conservapedia what the mysterious centripetal force might be that is preventing the moon from flying off in a straight line to who knows where.
You would probably get their stock, 3-word, 3-syllable answer - “God did it”.
As in any “user wiki” environment, articles are subject to change. However, the above quote was still on the Conservapedia Gravity page AFTER Mr. Andrew Schlafly, founder of Conservapedia, had personally edited the page on March 7, 2007. (A Print Screen copy of this later version is displayed on the “What causes a Creationist to be a Creationist?” page. http://www.durangobill.com/Creationists_Fears.html) Thus, Mr. Schlafly was also ignorant of the fallacy involved. Subsequently, the above quote has been removed. (Out of embarrassment?)
As for the 3.8 cm per year (which is true), one might hope that the ignorant Creationists might learn something about tides in the Earth’s oceans (and crust), and how the Earth’s rotation drags a tidal bulge out in front of a straight line that can be drawn through the center of the Earth and the Moon. Then you could analyze the resulting gravitational forces by Vector Analysis… Whoops, the gray glaze just came over their eyes as we used more than one syllable per word.
Why
Creationists nearly always call real scientists
“Evolutionists”
It appears that many YEC’s refer to all scientists as “evolutionists” because they quite literally:
1) don't know that chemistry, physics, etc. are different fields,
2) don't want to learn there is a difference, and
3) don't care that they don't know there is a difference.
Unfortunately, this is not a joke. Many (Actual, MOST) creationists misrepresent their educational qualifications. Typically, the “Ph.D.” degrees that they display usually originate from “Bible School” diploma mills.
“If someone refers to
scientists as “Darwinists”, it is a virtual
certainty that the “someone” is an ignorant
creationist” – Durango Bill
“You can't convince a believer of anything; for their belief is not based on evidence, it's based on a deep seated need to believe.”
Carl Sagan
(or in current terminology - It’s useless to present evidence of reality to “Fundies”. They have mental problems that force them to believe in fairy tales. This “need to believe” overrides the recurring scandals of fundamentalist leaders. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_televangelist_scandals)
Creationism
and
our Political Leaders
Consequences
of
Religious
Ignorance and Arrogance
If the Creationists/“Intelligent Designers” prevail, it will not be the first time that religious ignorance has destroyed civilization and thrown the world into one thousand years of “Dark Ages”.
According to “Did Christians Destroy Classical Culture and Create the Dark Ages?” http://www.askwhy.co.uk/christianity/0780Bookburning.html
“The worst act of many vandal acts under Theodosius was in 391 AD when Christians pulled down the temple of Serapis at Alexandria which housed one of the world’s greatest libraries—said, at one time, to have had over half a million rolls—and scattered and burned the books.”
“In AD 391, riots instigated by fanatical Christians damaged the collection heavily.”
According to “The Truth About the Dark Ages” (http://www.hermes-press.com/DAtruth.htm) beginning about year 398:
“Illiteracy
became official Christian policy.”
“In Alexandria in 415 C.E., a "Christian" mob, incited by the bishop Cyril, attacked a few days before the Judeo-Christian Pascha (Easter) and cut to pieces the famous and beautiful female philosopher Hypatia. The "Christian" mob carried pieces of her body through the streets of Alexandria, finally burning her remains together with her books in a place called Cynaron.”
“In 429 C.E. depraved "Christian" mobs sacked the world-famous Parthenon, the temple of the goddess Athena on the Acropolis of Athens. From 440 to 450 C.E., the "Christians" demolished all the monuments, altars and temples of Athens, Olympia, and other Greek cities.”
“The bonfires set by Christian zealots reduced the science of a millennium to ash. In the new Christian tyranny all scientific thought which contradicted the Bible was suppressed.”
“In Alexandria in 415 C.E., a "Christian" mob, incited by the bishop Cyril, attacked a few days before the Judeo-Christian Pascha (Easter) and cut to pieces the famous and beautiful female philosopher Hypatia. The "Christian" mob carried pieces of her body through the streets of Alexandria, finally burning her remains together with her books in a place called Cynaron.”
“In 429 C.E. depraved "Christian" mobs sacked the world-famous Parthenon, the temple of the goddess Athena on the Acropolis of Athens. From 440 to 450 C.E., the "Christians" demolished all the monuments, altars and temples of Athens, Olympia, and other Greek cities.”
“The bonfires set by Christian zealots reduced the science of a millennium to ash. In the new Christian tyranny all scientific thought which contradicted the Bible was suppressed.”
Thus began over 1,000 years of the “Dark Ages”.
For more information, run a Google search using all of the following.
Christian mob library
Alexandria dark ages
You will get many tens of thousands of hits that
describe what has happened in the past.In the year 1600 Italian philosopher-astronomer Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by religious fundamentalists.
Q: What was his crime?
A: Bruno stated that “Innumerable suns exist; innumerable earths revolve about these suns in a manner similar to the way the seven planets revolve around our sun. Living beings inhabit these worlds.”
At the time, religious dogma stated that the earth was the center of the universe and everything revolved/orbited around the earth. Bruno was sentenced to death because of this and other “diverse horrid opinions”.
We are living in an age when ignorant Christian mobs are once again trying to replace science and knowledge with religious rituals. If we don’t learn from history, it WILL happen again!
(Un)
Intelligent Design Evangelism
If you are under the delusion that (Un) Intelligent Design Evangelism represents real science, all you have to do is Click Here to see the real origin of this theistic species. (Also see the archived Discovery Institute’s page at: http://web.archive.org/web/19961103063546/http://www.discovery.org/crsc.html)
The picture above shows the original banner of the Discovery Institute’s Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture - the institutional home of (Un) Intelligent Design Creationism/Evangelism - featuring the familiar picture from the Sistine Chapel of “God touching Adam.” (Courtesy of NCSE)
The Discovery Institute is the home of (Un) Intelligent Design Evangelism. The founders (and prime financial backers) of the Discovery Institute represent “an extreme faction of the Religious Right that seeks to replace American democracy with a harsh fundamentalist theocracy” http://www.dangerouscitizen.com/Articles/1090.aspx
Questions
for (Un) Intelligent Design believers
1) Who is the Intelligent
Designer?2) How did the Intelligent Designer do whatever he/she/it did?
3) What is the (Un) Intelligent Design reason that humans have toenails, pimples/acne, an appendix, suffer from Alzheimer’s, cancer, etc.?
4) Why would the “Intelligent” Designer populate the earth with trilobites, dinosaurs, saber-toothed tigers, “woolly” mammoths, etc. and then subsequently remove them?
5) Why does the Intelligent Designer cause/allow hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc.? It seems the Intelligent Designer exists only when religious fundamentalists wish to promote their dogmas.
Science tries to find answers to questions and uses real world evidence to support these answers. Why do the evangelists want to treat “(Un) Intelligent Design” as a science when the only answer they have for the above questions is: “An unknown Intelligent Designer did it”?
In regard to virtually all the scientifically ignorant people in the U.S. who would like to promote “(Un) Intelligent Design Evangelism” as a science, isn’t it amazing that most of them actually have a religious dogma that they are trying to promote?
A final question: What do the letters ID iots really stand for?
Answer: (Pick one from each group)
{Immeasurably, Incalculably, Infinitely, Incredibly}
{Dense, Doltish, Dumb, Deficient}
Note: A miscarriage is Mother Nature’s version of an abortion. Thus, if an “Intelligent Designer” is responsible for our world, then the “Intelligent Designer” advocates abortions.
From the
Discovery Institute’s “Wedge Document”
The document
states that (Un) Intelligent Design “promises to reverse
the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to
replace it with a science consonant with Christian and
theistic convictions.”A simplification of the Discovery Institute’s phraseology in the above statement would be that (Un) Intelligent Design promises to destroy (the “we are not capable of understanding real-world of”) science, and to replace it with a “religious faith” consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.”
As stated in plain English, the Discovery Institute wants to replace our democracy with a theocracy - with the theocracy being their own brand of religion.
(Un) Intelligent Design - The delusion that personal ignorance is better than evidence.
(Un)
Intelligent Design - a “Science” equal to Astrology -
Michael Behe
Michael Behe, the leading intellectual light of the intelligent design movement and author of “Darwin's Black Box”, would like us to believe that Intelligent Design is a science. He has also stated under oath that Astrology is a “science”. From the “Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District” trial, as quoted from the York Daily Record “Behe's 15th-century science” http://ydr.com/story/mike/90330/
“Eric Rothschild, attorney
for the plaintiffs, asked Behe about whether astrology
was science. And Behe, after hemming and hawing and
launching into an abbreviated history of astrology and
science, said, under his definition, it is.”
Also please see: “Astrology is scientific theory, courtroom told” http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8178
The following is an exact quote from the court transcript.
http://www.aclupa.org/downloads/Day11PMSession.pdf Page 39, Lines 6 - 9
Q But you are clear, under
your definition, the definition that sweeps in
intelligent design, astrology is also a scientific
theory, correct?
A Yes, that s correct.
A Yes, that s correct.
Thus one of the primary proponents of “Intelligent Design” has stated under oath that “Intelligent Design” is no more “scientific” than the astrology/horoscope columns that appear in newspaper tabloids.
There is a postscript to the Dover trial that confirms the true religious intention of (Un) Intelligent Design. In Nov. 2005 (shortly after the trial ended) the citizens of Dover, Pennsylvania voted to remove eight members of the school board that instituted the (Un) Intelligent Design policy and to replace them with the “Dover CARES” candidates. Subsequently, evangelist Pat Robertson used his television program, the “700 Club”, to castigate Dover with:
“I'd like to say to
the good citizens of Dover, if there is a disaster in
your area, don't turn to God. You just rejected Him from
your city, and don't wonder why He hasn't helped you
when problems begin, if they begin, and I'm not saying
they will. But if they do, just remember you just voted
God out of your city. And if that's the case, then don't
ask for His help, because He might not be there.”
The judgment in the Kitzmiller vs. Dover
Area School District case:“For the reasons that follow, we hold that the ID Policy is unconstitutional pursuant to the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution and Art. I, § 3 of the Pennsylvania Constitution.”
Page 3 at: http://www2.ncseweb.org/kvd/main_docs/kitzmiller_342.pdf
Federal District Judge John Jones: “The overwhelming evidence is that intelligent design is a religious view, a mere re-labeling of creationism and not a scientific theory.”
Summary
for (Un) Intelligent Design
“Intelligent Design” is religious mythology. If you are not capable of distinguishing between reality and mythology, you have an unresolved problem in your educational background.
Additional
Information
and
Links
For an editorial from the New York Times on Creationism = Willful Ignorance,
Please see “Willful Ignorance of Evolution”
The USGS tells us how and why it is known that the earth is about 4.5 to 4.6 billion years old.
Please see: “The Age of the Earth”
NASA tells how and why it is known that the universe is about 13.7 billion years old.
Please see: http://apod.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap030217.html
The American Astronomical Society has published an excellent booklet titled:
“An Ancient Universe: How Astronomers Know the Vast Scale of Cosmic Time”. It is aimed at the grade school level and is available online at: http://education.aas.org/publications/ancientuniverse.html
There is an immense amount of information about the multi-billion year history of the earth and the universe at the Smithsonian Institute’s Museum of Natural History. (http://www.mnh.si.edu)
Measurements show multiple advances and retreats of glaciers over the last 750,000 years. http://www.museum.state.il.us/exhibits/ice_ages/specmap_graph.html
The earth’s magnetic field switches polarity about once every 500,000 – 1,000,000 years. This produces parallel symmetric stripes on both sides of mid-ocean ridges. Animation at
http://www.wwnorton.com/earth/egeo/flash/2_3.swf
The National Geographic Society is tracing 200,000 years of human evolution/migration/ancestry via DNA analysis in their Genographic Research project. https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/
Partially funded by IBM: http://www.ibm.com/genographic/
The religious crackpots continue to invent stories to perpetuate their religious dogmas. For example, you can always check out the “Young age of the Earth & Universe” at the “Answers in Genesis” website.
Kent
Hovind
Then there is Kent
Hovind - the reincarnated animation of an old fashion
carnival side show barker. “Hi there rubes. I bet I can
tell more whoppers per minute than anyone else on earth.”
Kent Hovind has a long history of operating in
fantasyland. In Nov. 2006 he was found guilty of 58 counts
of tax fraud.However, to creationists, Hovind is their hero. For more information on Kent Hovind, including his “claimed doctorate is from a diploma mill” please see: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/hovind/
Wikipedia has an article about Kent Hovind’s unaccredited “Alma Mater” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Bible_University.
The following quote is from Patriot Bible University’s catalogue. (I have a complete copy of the original “.pdf” PBU catalogue if/when PBU deletes the following quote. If you would like a copy of the original, send me an E-mail and I’ll return it with the copy attached.)
“It was the study for my
dissertation that opened so many doors of opportunity
for me to preach. Thank you for the work you do and the
program you offer. Had it not been for Patriot [Bible]
University, I would have had no way to even consider a
degree. Plus, God has used you to motivate me in a much
needed field of study that has been a great help to
thousands of God’s children as I have preached around
the country.”
Kent Hovind, Creation Science Evangelism, Florida
Kent Hovind, Creation Science Evangelism, Florida
Kent Hovind’s
claimed Ph.D. degree is from Patriot [Bible] University.
PBU is another “Unaccredited Bible School”. If you just
look at the online catalogue of any of these “Unaccredited
Bible Schools”, you might not get a true picture of
exactly what they represent.The picture at the right was taken by the author from a car window on French St., Del Norte, CO on Nov. 22, 2006. It shows PBU’s “entire campus”. I have more information and photographs at: link
“Fake degrees equal fake integrity.”
-- Don Reasons
If you are an ignorant creationist and are not qualified to get into a good university, what do you do?
Answer: File a lawsuit claiming “discrimination”.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-christian27aug27,1,7818465.story?coll=la-headlines-california
“Morality”
as
defined by the Bible and by the Evangelical “Leaders”
One of the things that fundamentalists try to claim is that they are morally just vs. the “atheistic scientists”. If this were true then:
1) Jail and prison populations would be limited to just atheists. In practice it tends to be the other extreme. The following quotes are from page 229, “The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins which in turn are quoted from Sam Harris’ “Letter to a Christian Nation”. (2004 election)
“While political party
affiliation in the United States is not a perfect
indicator of religiosity, it is no secret that the ‘red
[Republican] states’ are primarily red due to the
overwhelming political influence of conservative
Christians.”…
“Of the twenty-two states with the highest rates of murder, seventeen are red.”
“Of the twenty-two states with the highest rates of murder, seventeen are red.”
2) Evangelical “leader” Ted Haggard wouldn’t have had an ongoing drug and gay relationship with a male prostitute. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Haggard
3) Wikipedia would not have sections on scandals by television’s evangelicals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_televangelist_scandals
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bakker
etc.
4) Bert Thompson, the one-time director of Apologetics Press would not have been fired for “sexual misconduct”. http://exchristian.net/2005_07_01_archive.html (Includes other similar items)
5) And of course the following statistical posting wouldn’t have appeared on page 21 in the Feb, 2007 issue of Playboy.
“Blogger Steve Wells has
counted the number of people killed in the Bible. God
takes the lives of 2,270,365 (not including the victims
of Noah’s flood, Sodom and Gomorrah, and the many
plagues and famines, etc.). Satan is responsible for
only 10 deaths, those of Job’s seven sons and three
daughters.”
How many has God killed?
“I kill ... I wound ... I
will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall
devour flesh.
-- Deuteronomy 32:39-42”
http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com/2006/08/how-many-has-god-killed.html
-- Deuteronomy 32:39-42”
http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com/2006/08/how-many-has-god-killed.html
And this represents the “morality” of “Our loving God” who commands “Thou shall not kill”.
Morality
and Ethics vs. Religious Observance
Religious cultists, and in particular Creationists, often assert that religion is responsible for morality - and without religion there would be no morality (with resulting high crime rates). It’s obvious that, as per usual, they don’t check the facts. Fact-finding studies have found that just the opposite is true. Countries that have high religiosity (e. g. the U. S.) have the highest crime rates while countries with low religiosity (e.g. Japan and Sweden) have the lowest crime rates. The following quote is from a study published in the Journal of Religion and Society: http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
“[18] In general, higher
rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate
with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult
mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and
abortion in the prosperous democracies (Figures 1-9).
The most theistic prosperous democracy, the U.S., is
exceptional, but not in the manner Franklin predicted.
The United States is almost always the most
dysfunctional of the developed democracies, sometimes
spectacularly so, and almost always scores poorly.”
Within the United States, it’s not the atheists who commit crimes. For example, see: “Atheists Supply Less Than 1% Of Prison Populations” http://www.skepticfiles.org/american/prison.htm
“In "The New Criminology",
Max D. Schlapp and Edward E. Smith say that two
generations of statisticians found that the ratio of
convicts without religious training is about 1/10 of
1%.”
In the U. S., over 10% of the population is composed of atheists. If atheists committed as many crimes as non-atheists, then the ratio of atheists within the prison population should also be over 10%. If you do the arithmetic, atheists are less apt to be a criminal than non-atheists by a factor of over 100.
There are many more statistics at the above skepticfiles web site that confirm that crimes are committed by those who are religious, and not committed by atheists/agnostics.
Creationism
and
Kansas
As of the Nov.
2006 election, the creationists have once again been
relegated to minority representation on the Kansas State
Board of Education. However, radical fundamentalists
such as John Bacon and Ken Willard remain. Thus the
Board of Education continues to warrant ridicule until
their influence is gone.The Kansas Board of “Education”:
Hear no science.
See no science.
Speak no science.
Hayseed - Kansas - Creationism:
The triplet does have a ring to it.
But Kansas did “benefit” by adopting creationism as part of their education standards.
See “Ignorance is God’s gift to Kansas.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,592-1619264,00.html
(“Creationism: God's gift to the ignorant”)
Prior to 2007, the Flat Earth Society prevailed at the “Kansas Board of Education”.
Was the pre-2007 school board interested in helping students in Kansas get a better science education? – Nope.
Were they determined to force creationism and their brand of religious ignorance down the throats of everyone else in the state? – You betcha!
The above cartoon
appeared in “Ed Stein’s View” in the June 11, 2005 issue
of the Rocky Mountain News.
If you ever
wanted to see an example of ignorant religious
emotionalism in action, all you had to do was to look
at the State Board of Education in Kansas.
The motto for the Kansas voters who elected the previous school board - “Willfully Ignorant and proud of it.”
Mike Keefe’s version of Grant Wood’s classic “American Gothic” appeared in the Nov. 11, 2005 issue of the Denver Post.
Richard Dawkins on creationists: “I don't think they read books anyway, except for one book.”
http://blog.beliefnet.com/reformedchicksblabbing/2009/10/richard-dawkins-on-creationist.html
“If we are going to teach ‘creation science’ as an alternative to evolution, then we should also teach the stork theory as an alternative to biological reproduction.” - Judith Hayes
The motto for the Kansas voters who elected the previous school board - “Willfully Ignorant and proud of it.”
Mike Keefe’s version of Grant Wood’s classic “American Gothic” appeared in the Nov. 11, 2005 issue of the Denver Post.
Richard Dawkins on creationists: “I don't think they read books anyway, except for one book.”
http://blog.beliefnet.com/reformedchicksblabbing/2009/10/richard-dawkins-on-creationist.html
And still more about
the previous Kansas Board of “Education”
“If we are going to teach ‘creation science’ as an alternative to evolution, then we should also teach the stork theory as an alternative to biological reproduction.” - Judith Hayes
Lying for
God
According to the Creationists, “Lying for God” is perfectly acceptable. For example see:
“Lying For God: Creation Science Exposed”
“A Response to Fraudulence in the name of Religious Ethics”
http://web.archive.org/web/20031226133632/astrosun.tn.cornell.edu/students/kornreich/lfg/index.html
or just run a Google search using:
“Lying for God”
Debating
Creationists
“Attempting to debate with a person who has abandoned reason is like giving medicine to the dead.”
― Thomas Paine
If you are thinking of debating a creationist to “defend science”, it’s probably a good idea to “take a rain check” for the following reasons.
1) As noted above, creationists lie. A creationist “debater” can and will make false assertions far faster than you can provide evidence to disprove these assertions. You will use up all of your time allocation giving explanations/refutations, and very few people will understand your details and facts.
2) A creationist “debater” is very similar to an old-fashion circus sideshow barker. “Step right up ladies and gentlemen to see the two-headed …”. Science is not hype and promotionalism with the intent to draw a large audience. Science is a slow, do-your-homework process where you present evidence to support your case.
3) The attention span of a creationist is about 5 seconds. This is long enough for a creationist to make a flashy assertion and for the faithful to believe it. Science is a much slower process. E. G. “Oh that’s interesting - now prove it”. Debates only allow enough time for a “5 second” presentation.
4) Creationists thrive on attention. If you participate in a “debate” you will be giving them the audience that they crave.
5) Creationists are always trying to achieve credibility. They try to discredit standard science, but at the same time they frequently use “PhD” degrees from diploma mills to try to gain credibility. If you have real knowledge, any “debate” will equate your credentials with their diploma mill degree. The creationists have worked a long time to earn their crackpot image. Why should you spoil this image?
6) You will not convince any creationist in the audience to give up their beliefs by participating in a debate. The only way to disarm creationists is to repeatedly ridicule and embarrass them about their scientific ignorance. This will erode their willingness to defend creationism. Then, and only then, will a creationist be susceptible to understanding scientific evidence.
“Ridicule
is the only weapon which can be used against
unintelligible propositions.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp, 30 July, 1816
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp, 30 July, 1816
Biblical
Predictions for “The End of the World”, “Jesus will
Return”, “The Rapture”
For example: If anyone would like to place a small (or larger) wager on the above dates, please contact me and I will take the opposite side. I will have my attorney set up a binding escrow account for whatever funds that anyone would like to commit.
One of the characteristics of
religious fundamentalists is their constant/multiple
forecasts of “The End of the World”, “Jesus will Return”,
“The Rapture will save us”, etc. The “faithful” always
believe this garbage despite a long history that the
forecasts have failed. This is also an accurate guide to
the rubbish “value” of Creationism (and its pseudonyms).In regard to these particular predictions, I will make two predictions of my own.
1) Starting on October 22, 2011, rational people will have still another piece of evidence to ridicule the irrational people.
2) Over the interval from May 21, 2011 to at least October 22, 2011, we will hear a lot of feeble excuses from the irrational people.
For a quick history of past failed “Biblical” predictions please see:
“Over 200 predictions and counting!”
http://www.bible.ca/pre-date-setters.htm
Alternately run a Google search using:
“End of the world” biblical list
There are about half a million hits which should keep you busy for awhile.
Origin of
Religion and the Belief in God(s)
Why do religious beliefs exist? Why have people believed in God(s) throughout history and in virtually every culture that has ever existed on planet Earth?
There is no historical record of when religious worship and/or a belief in God(s) began, but religious beliefs go back at least 11,600 years. (See “The Birth of Religion”, National Geographic http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/print/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text )
No one has a photograph of a “God”. Nor is there any physical evidence that one or more Gods ever existed. All we have are paintings – such as Michelangelo’s – “Creation of Adam”.
See Wikipedia “The Creation of Adam” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Creation_of_Adam
Of note, “God” is depicted as an all-powerful father figure.
While no one will ever be able to give a definitive answer to these initial questions, there is a logical argument to the “Creationist” origin of religion, and especially, “God”.
Most animals have a fairly short “learning period” where their parents teach them how to live – find food, water, learn how to hunt, etc. Humans are an exception. It takes us at least a dozen years to learn the basics of life. Additionally, if we are going to learn a “trade” (or some other skill that enables us to earn a living), we can add at least another 10 years or so onto this figure.
During this 20+ year period of learning, we are completely dependent on our parents. If we get into some kind of trouble, we turn to our all-powerful father to solve the problem. When we need emotional support, we have a loving mother who provides comfort. Thus for our formative years, we are dependent on “All powerful and loving parents”.
This same dependency existed for our parents, their parents, etc. for many thousands of generations back into prerecorded history. We and our ancestors grew up with this dependency. Most of us never outgrow this dependency. Most of us (and our distant ancestors) have a built in psychological dependency on an “all-powerful father” who will protect us, reward us if we are “good”, punish us if we are “bad”, etc.
Even when our parents die, we still have a psychological craving for “an all-powerful father”. So, what did our ancestors do when their mortal parents died?
Answer: As a replacement for their parents, our ancestors “Created” an “All-powerful and loving God”. Their “All-powerful and loving God” had the same traits as their memories of their parents. (In early human history, civilization consisted of clans instead of a single family structure. Thus we created multiple gods to substitute for the multiple members of the clan.)
Return to Durango Bill’s Home Page
Some Insight Regarding Noah’s Flood (The Genesis
Flood)
The origin of the Noah’s Flood story dates back to Sumerian/Babylonian time (about 2,000 B.C., but this was still several hundred years after the “Step” Pyramid was built in Egypt). No one knows who the author was, or what evidence (if any) there is to support it. For a list of problems with a global flood please see: http://members.shaw.ca/tfrisen/evolution/Creationism/flood.html
In any case, flood stories have been passed down via legends, Mesopotamian clay tablets, multiple language translations (and interpretations), etc. for thousands of years before being printed in present day Bibles (and there are at least 15 versions). All of this should be taken into consideration before you are convinced that every word in “the Bible” is an exact depiction of what happened.
Notes on
“all the high mountains”
Some of the YECs attempt to weasel out of the Genesis description, which states that Noah’s Flood covered all the high mountains. They claim that the high mountains were created after Noah’s Flood. As seen below, these people are ignorant of the Bible as well as not understanding geology. If they wish to claim Genesis is in error, let them specify exactly which verses in Genesis are incorrect:
Gen 2:14 The Tigris/ Euphrates valley existed in its present form before the flood.
Gen 7:19-20 The text specifically states the flood covered “all the high mountains”. If the mountains were low at this time, the word “high” would not be used.
Gen 8:4-5 The high Ararat mountains existed before the flood subsided. The ark came to rest on the highest portion of the Ararat Mountains ~16,800 feet. It took an additional 2 1/2 months of water subsidence before the remaining mountains of Ararat could be seen. According to Archbishop James Ussher, the ark landed on Mt. Ararat exactly on Wed. May 5, 2349 BC. (See: “The Age of the Earth: Physics vs Faith?” http://courses.science.fau.edu/~rjordan/phy1931/AGE/age.pdf - Page 6. This link is a good reference source tracing the history of Creationism vs. Reality.)
From: http://www.bible.org/netbible/index.htm
New English Translation
Gen 2:14 The name of the third river is Tigris; it runs along the east side of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
Gen 7:19 The waters completely inundated the earth, so that even all the high mountains under the entire sky were covered. 7:20 The waters rose more than twenty feet(30) above the mountains.(31)
(30) Heb "rose fifteen cubits." Since a cubit is considered by most authorities to be about eighteen inches, this would make the depth 22.5 feet. This figure might give the modern reader a false impression of exactness, however, so in the translation the phrase "fifteen cubits" has been rendered "more than twenty feet."
(31) Heb "the waters prevailed fifteen cubits upward and they covered the mountains." Obviously, a flood of twenty feet did not cover the mountains; the statement must mean the flood rose about twenty feet above the highest mountain.
Gen 8:4 On the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ark came to rest on one of the mountains of Ararat. 8:5 The waters kept on receding until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month, the tops of the mountains became visible.
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