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Author Archive for Stephen Twigg

Secular quote of the week

Published

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on September 9, 2009

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From Albert Einstein:

"A man's ethical behaviour should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."

Fundamentalists often tell me that without their god, there are no morals. So without their god, these people believe they would rape, murder and all the rest of it. Not very moralistic is it to be good just through fear of punishment.

Creation Science Fair…arrrghhh!

Published

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on September 8, 2009

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During my wanderings around the internet, I do find, some weird and wonderful sites. These sites are pretty insane and spout some pretty nutty stuff.

I have now found a site that takes this to whole new levels of nuttyness and evil. The unfortunate problem is, that the website takes itself seriously!

The first thing that gives this site away is the fact that one of the articles covers a 2001 'creation science fair'. 'Ok' you might think, that might be nutty and a slightly interesting curiosity as to wonder what kind of entries might be found in such a contest. Perhaps some research project which shows how stratification might support the hypothesis of a global flood perhaps? No, not this particular contest. This contest takes it far beyond that!

To get an idea about how bad this site is, think back to the 1950s, when women were slaves to kitchens and childbirth, when (most) women did not have careers, or jobs (apart from looking after the family). Ok, now you've thought about that, imagine what an experiment might be like that attempted to 'prove' and justify that a woman was only suitable for such stuff! Feeling disgusted? I bet. Now throw into the mix the fact that these words are coming from secondary school kids!

This site is so bad, at first, I was convinced that it's a parody of creation science. It took me a fair amount of lookin around the site to realise that these people are actually SERIOUS!

So, without any further delay, may I present the 2001 Creation Science Fair report from Objective: Ministries. Dont worry if you think you can't stomach reading the entire thing, I have re-copied some of the highlights here, saving the best for last:

(from the middle school prize catagories)

1st Place: "Life Doesn't Come From Non-Life"

Patricia Lewis (grade 8) did an experiment to see if life can evolve from non-life. Patricia placed all the non-living ingredients of life - carbon (a charcoal briquet), purified water, and assorted minerals (a multi-vitamin) - into a sealed glass jar. The jar was left undisturbed, being exposed only to sunlight, for three weeks. (Patricia also prayed to God not to do anything miraculous during the course of the experiment, so as not to disqualify the findings.) No life evolved. This shows that life cannot come from non-life through natural processes.

I know that this is supposed to be a competition for middle school children but come on! First point first, this experiment, even if it was correct in it's elements, would be an abiogenesis experiment, not an evolution, as abiogenesis deals with the beginnings of life where as evolution deals with the variation of pre-existing organisms (although I am sure I dont need to explain that here)

Second of all, all the ingrediants of this expreiment were wrong (this is what made me at first think that this was a parody) and I dont think that any correctly trained science teacher should be even promoting this kind of logic. Five minutes of research before designing this experiment would show all the elements to be hugely wrong.

The best bit:

2nd Place: "Women Were Designed For Homemaking"

Jonathan Goode (grade 7) applied findings from many fields of science to support his conclusion that God designed women for homemaking: physics shows that women have a lower center of gravity than men, making them more suited to carrying groceries and laundry baskets; biology shows that women were designed to carry un-born babies in their wombs and to feed born babies milk, making them the natural choice for child rearing; social sciences show that the wages for women workers are lower than for normal workers, meaning that they are unable to work as well and thus earn equal pay; and exegetics shows that God created Eve as a companion for Adam, not as a co-worker.

Wow, the ignorance, even when you consider the age of the author, is overwhelming. This just shows how creation science can be used to push the degradation of members of society, in this case, women. Using physiological evidence to support your sexist position to subjugate another member of society is just despicable. What is even more despicable is that the teachers and the competition allowed this to even enter. These people should be ashamed of themselves!

It's the same line of rhetoric that was spouted from pulpits across the nations, leading to slavery taking place. The teachers supporting this should be investigated right away, what the hell kind of world-view are they pushing in those classrooms?

The videos Ray Comfort doesn’t want you to see!

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on September 8, 2009

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We've all seen them many times (or at least I assume you have), Ray Comfort's well edited videos at 'way of the master' and on his You Tube channel where he attacks some average Joe off the street and seems to successfully convince them that they are sinners and need to do exactly what his dogma says. (well, it doesn't always show you them wanting to accept but we get the inference!)

For many years it's been commented that Ray obviously isn't going to 'win them all' and that perhaps the ones he does show, represent only a small minority of his attempts.

Well, here are a couple of fish that did not bite his bait.

In this first one, watch as Ray gets completely out of his 'Comfort' (pun intended) zone:

Doesn't Ray sound angry in that, seems he can't control his emotions, even when he's full of Jesus!

In this second one, watch as Ray stumbles and contradicts himself in a desperate attempt to worm out of the dilemma he gets himself into when his victim pulls Ray away from his usual script:

I bet they never made it onto his sites :o)

James Randi on faith healing

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on September 8, 2009

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From 'Point of Enquiry' comes the following article:

James “The Amazing” Randi is a world-renowned magician, skeptic and investigator of paranormal claims and is a central figure in the founding of the world-wide skeptical movement. Perhaps best known for the One Million Dollar Challenge, in which his educational foundation awards $1,000,000 to anyone who is able to show evidence of any paranormal, supernatural or occult power or event, under test conditions agreed to by both parties. Randi has appeared widely in the media, including on Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show at least 22 times and he is also a regular on Penn and Teller’s Showtime series, Bullshit! He has received numerous awards and recognitions, including the MacArthur Genius Grant, and the American Physical Society's Forum Award for Promoting Public Understanding of the Relation of Physics to Society. He is the author of many books, including The Truth About Uri Geller, Flim-Flam! and The Faith Healers.
In this interview with D.J. Grothe, James Randi talks about the future of The Amazing Meeting, his annual popular critical thinking convention in Las Vegas. He also discusses various faith healers he has investigated, and his real motivations in doing so. He talks about the first faith healer he exposed in Toronto as a teenager. He explores reasons why faith healers he has debunked still persist in their TV empires. He shares his views of Ernest Angley. He recounts his expose of Peter Popoff, including Popoff's use of an earpiece to receive information about his congregants that they believed was revealed by the Holy Spirit. He explains why people believe in faith healers despite evidence to the contrary. Other faith healers he criticizes include Pat Robertson and his "Words of Knowledge," V.A. Grant, Oral Roberts, and Filipino psychic surgeons, recounting some of their deceptive methods they use to beguile believers. He talks about the special place "psychic surgery" has in the Pentecostal Church. He compares faith healers' methods to the methods of psychics and "cold readers" such as John Edward, and explores whether faith healers are deliberately deceptive or are merely self-deceptive. He also debates whether faith healing might actually work on occasion, due to psychological phenomena such as the placebo effect. And he talks about the role that magicians should play in exposing frauds in the public interest.
Also in this interview, James Underdown, scientific paranormal investigator and executive director of CFI's Hollywood branch, recounts his experiences with Benny Hinn's healing crusades, and talks about how Benny Hinn may or may not be like Adolph Hitler.

You can download the mp3 of the interview here.

Eric Hovind’s last desperate plea

Published

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on September 7, 2009

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Eric Hovind, son of Kent Hovind, who is incarcerated for tax fraud is at his wits end. Because of the money that his father owes the American government due to his father's fraud, the government is about to cease his ministry's property to recoup the money. Eric has until September 15th 2009 to raise $380,000 or forfeit the property. How is he attempting to raise this money? Well, here it is from the horse's mouth:

I still find it funny how he's trying to raise money from the ministry's supporters and on the other hand, just went on a trip to see his buddies Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron! I would have thought you would be saving every penny you can at the moment Eric!

Will he succeed? well, only time will tell. But I don't think that even if he does loose the properties, he's going to be down for long and the debates will rage on for years.

Science video of the week: ‘made easy’ series from Potholer54

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on September 7, 2009

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Ok, this week's science video comes curtsy of Potholer54 on You Tube. Potholer is a professional BBC reporter and has created a great, easy to understand series of eleven videos, starting with this one on the History of the Universe. The series also covers subjects such as evolution and creation science and is highly recommended.

Click through to the video to find the rest of the series.

My appologies!

Published

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on September 7, 2009

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Just a quicky to let you know that the reason I have not posted in the last few days is that, due to the bundling stupidity of my internet provider, my internet has been off since Friday. I have told them what they can do with their so called 'service' and have swapped to another provider. It's going to take a week or so for that to get set up properly, but in the mean time, I've got my mobile broadband working so I can use that. So, business as usual again hopefully. I'm not mentioning in the text who my old service provider is, as I believe a picture says a thousand words lolololol :o)

Fundamentalist quote of the week #3

Published

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on September 7, 2009

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This week's quote comes from that lovable nasty old 'expletive' fundamentalist nut job, Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition and host of the popular christian news show 700 club..take it away Pat:

"The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians."

What a narrow mided, missrepresenting, warped, judgemental old fool!

The brightest of young things visit the Creation Museum!

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on September 3, 2009

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It seems that our friends over at Thebrightestyoungthings decided to give their brains the day off and go pay a visit to Ken Ham's Creation Museum in Kentucky. He almost convinces them, almost.... You can read the friviolites that ensued here. (sorry, having a big word day, gonna slap myself out of it!!)

Evolutionary Biology’s contributions to society and science. Your turn ID

Published

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on September 3, 2009

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Here is a thought that popped into my head today. Many of the fundamentalists I speak to on the internet, when backed into a corner about evolution, usually when shown the errors in Kent Hovind's claims, shift the goalposts by asking 'But what has evolution done for society or science?'

Well, I'm going first of all give some answers to that very question and then, I am going to ask a second, very important question in response. First of all, some answers.

Taken from the paper 'EVOLUTION, SCIENCE AND SOCIETY: Evolutionary Biology and the National Research Agenda [working draft - last updated 23 December 1998]' (you see creationists, it's doesn't take long to do research):

HOW DOES EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY CONTRIBUTE TO SOCIETY?
In addition to the historical dimension, evolution is an important feature in our everyday lives. Evolution is happening all around us: in our digestive tracts, in our lawns, in woodland lots, in ponds and streams, in agricultural fields and hospitals. For short lived organisms, such as bacteria and insects, evolution can happen on a very short time scale. This immediacy brings evolutionary biology directly into the applied realm. Indeed, evolutionary biology has a long history and a bright future in terms of its ability to address pressing societal needs (L. R. Meagher & T. R. Meagher (eds.). 1994. Workshop Report: The Emerging Relevance of Evolutionary Biology to Applied to Problems and Opportunities. Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ). Evolutionary biology has already made particularly strong contributions in the following areas:

Environment and conservation.
Evolutionary insights are important in both conservation and management of renewable resources. Population genetic methods are frequently used to assess the genetic structure of rare or endangered species as a means of determining appropriate conservation measures. Studies of the genetic composition of wild relatives of crop species can be used to discover potentially useful new genes that might be transferred into cultivated species. Studies of wild plants' adaptations to polluted or degraded soils contribute to the reclamation of damaged land.

Agriculture and natural resources.
The principles of plant and animal breeding strongly parallel natural evolutionary mechanisms, and there is a rich history of interplay between evolutionary biology and agricultural science. Evolutionary insights play a clear role in understanding the ongoing evolution of various crop pathogens and insect pests, including the evolution of resistance to pest-control measures. The methods of evolutionary genetics can be used to identify different gene pools of commercially important fish and other organisms, their migration routes, and differences in their physiology, growth, and reproduction.

Finding useful natural products.
Many thousands of natural products are used in medicine, food production and processing, cosmetics, biotechnology, pest control, and industry, but millions of other potentially useful natural products have yet to be screened or even discovered. Evolutionary principles allow a targeted search by predicting adaptations to environmental selection pressures and by identifying organisms related to those that have already yielded useful natural products. Exploration of related species has also made it possible to develop natural products from more accessible relatives of rare species in which natural products have been found, as occurred when the rare and endangered Pacific yew was found to contain a substance (taxol) useful in treating breast cancer.

Human health and medicine.
Methods and principles from evolutionary biology have contributed to understanding the links between genes and human genetic diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease. Evolutionary methods help to trace the origins and epidemiology of infectious diseases, and to analyze the evolution of antibiotic resistance in pathogenic microorganisms. Evolutionary principles are used to interpret human physiological functions and dietary needs. Methods developed by evolutionary geneticists are playing an important role in mapping defective human genes, in genetic counseling, and in identifying genetic variants that alter risks for common systemic diseases and responses to medical treatments.

Biotechnology.
The interplay between biotechnology and evolutionary biology holds great promise for application to important societal needs. As genetic engineering has reached the field implementation stage, evolutionary biologists have been prominently involved in risk assessment as well as interpretation of phenotypic consequences of transgene insertion. Finally, the automation of DNA sequencing has made it possible to reconstruct the precise genealogical relationship among specific genes, such as those of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

Understanding humanity.
Evolutionary biology has contributed greatly to human understanding of ourselves by describing our origins, our relationships to other living things, and the history and significance of variation within and among different groups of people. Evolutionary anthropologists, psychologists, and biologists have advanced hypotheses on the biological bases of human culture and behavior. In addition, the evolutionary framework for understanding humanity has had a profound impact on literature, the arts, philosophy, and other areas of the humanities.

HOW DOES EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY CONTRIBUTE TO BASIC SCIENCE?

Accomplishments in the Study of Evolution
Among their accomplishments in studying the history and processes of evolution, evolutionary biologists have

• established that all organisms have evolved from a common ancestor over more than 3.5 billion years of earth’s history
• developed methods of inferring phylogenetic, or genealogical, relationships among organisms
• described patterns of diversification and extinction in the fossil record
• developed and tested general theories that account for the evolution of phenotypic traits, including complex characters such as cooperative behavior and senescence
• made substantial progress in understanding evolution at the molecular level
• elucidated many aspects of human evolution Contributions to Other Biological Disciplines
Evolution is widely viewed as central to biological understanding in general (NAS. 1998. Teaching about Evolution and the Nature of Science. National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.). Many biologists in diverse fields regard at least a portion of what they do as evolutionary. Recent accomplishments to which evolutionary biology has contributed include the following:

Molecular biology.
Evolutionary approaches have contributed insight into the function and structure of molecular processes within cells. Examples include reconstruction and functional analysis of ancestral protein sequences, and elucidation of the significance of different types of DNA. Evolutionary research thus points the way to research on fundamental molecular mechanisms.

Developmental biology.
A resurgence in interaction between developmental biology and evolutionary biology is now under way, in part through comparisons among families of genes that play critical roles in development. For example, the same genes in organisms as different as insects and mammals play similar developmental roles in some instances, and surprisingly different roles in other cases. Such studies help to identify the developmental functions of genes and lead to a deeper understanding of the processes that transform a fertilized egg into a complex adult.

Physiology and anatomy.
Evolutionary biology has long influenced the study of physiology and anatomy in animals and plants, and has the potential to make many other contributions that are only now being developed. Some of these contributions will affect the study of human physiology, including related areas such as clinical psychology. The logical perspectives, methods, and comparative data of evolutionary biology can advance our understanding of functional anatomy and physiological mechanisms, and can be applied to areas such as medicine, agriculture, and veterinary science.

Neurobiology and behaviour.
From its inception, the field of animal behavior has had a strong evolutionary base, for its goals have included understanding the evolutionary origin of behavioral traits and their adaptiveness. The evolutionary study of animal behavior has joined with comparative psychology in several areas of research, such as the study of learning and the search for adaptive mechanisms in human cognitive processes.

Applications beyond biology.
There have long been rewarding interactions between evolutionary biology and other analytical fields, notably statistics and economics. Some of the basic tools in statistics, including analysis of variance and path analysis, were originally developed by evolutionary biologists. Along the same lines, evolutionary algorithms that mimic natural selection in biological systems are currently being used in computer and systems applications.

Ok, that should have helped with your questions. Now for mine. What I want to do is to turn this question around. 'Allegedly', intelligent design is science. If this is true, and some claim it is, given what I have shown you above, evolutionary biology contributes to society and science, what exactly has intelligent design contributed to society and science. Let me put this another way, what advancements in science have been made through intelligent design?

Please tell me, I really would love to know. Perhaps some virus has been controlled through the deep knowledge that 'god did it', I don't know, perhaps you do?

Ray Comfort and creationist warp technology

Published

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on September 2, 2009

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Why have I used the title above? Because creationists like Ray Comfort have an amazing ability to take any report about a scientific subject and warp it's contents to meet their narrow minded religious agenda. To show you Ray in action doing just this, I am going to look at one of the latest posts on his blog.

First of all, for those not acquainted with the colourful character known as Ray Comfort and his ex-child actor friend, Kirk Cameron, who now run the 'way of the master' ministry, here is a video of the two in action:

Ok, I don't need to say anything more about that, I believe it speaks for itself. But at least now you know the kind of intelligence level we are dealing with here.

Ok, as I said before, Ray owns a blog, strangely named: Atheist Central -- Ray Comfort's blog. (yes, I too believe there is a slight attempt to deceive atheists there, how dishonest Ray, admit it!) Now, one of his latest entries is titled: 'Scientists recover T.Rex soft tissue. 70 million year-old fossils yields preserved blood cells.' Here is the text, it's a short one thankfully:

Could someone explain why anyone would believe that a 70 million-year-old fossil would contain "soft tissue"? See:

http://">http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7285683/

(The blood is wet and fresh, the tendon has elasticity, and the bone is like fresh bone).

Evolutionists will believe anything but the Bible.

Ok, fair enough, it seems from what Ray says that scientists have recovered soft tissue and fresh blood from a dinosaur fossil. Interesting, lets dig a little deeper. First of all, lets take a look at that msn article he sites.

Ok, looking at that post it does indeed make it seem as though they have indeed recovered soft tissue from this fossil:

WASHINGTON - March 24, 2005 - For more than a century, the study of dinosaurs has been limited to fossilized bones. Now, researchers have recovered 70 million-year-old soft tissue, including what may be blood vessels and cells, from a Tyrannosaurus rex.

So, lets look around the page. It does not take long for the lights to start flashing that the science shown in this article may not be entirely accurate. The dead give away is the news agency, MSN, oh dear, we may need to find other sources if we want a more in-depth look into what is really going on here. So, lets do what creationists such as Ray refuse to do, lets do some research into this.

Looking further around the web, it does not take long before I come across this BBC article. The first thing you notice here is the date (Thursday, 24 March, 2005). This article is actually over 4 years old! Well done MSN and Ray for being bang up to date! But I suppose I couldn't expect any better as creation science is always years behind.

Ok, lets read on....

Dr Schweitzer is not making any grand claims that these soft traces are the degraded remnants of the original material - only that they give that appearance.

Oh dear Ray, looks like your lack of research is starting to backfire on you already my friend, lets read on shall we, see what else we can find...

"This may not be fossilisation as we know it, of large macrostructures, but fossilisation at a molecular level," commented Dr Matthew Collins, who studies ancient bio-molecules at York University, UK.
"My suspicion is this process has led to the reaction of more resistant molecules with the normal proteins and carbohydrates which make up these cellular structures, and replaced them, so that we have a very tough, resistant, very lipid-rich material - a polymer that would be very difficult to break down and characterise, but which has preserved the structure," he told the BBC.

Ray, Ray, Ray, it just goes to show you that just five minutes of research could have saved you having egg on your face, yet again.

For anybody who reads the claims of people such as Ray Comfort, Kirk Cameron and Kent Hovind, don't take their claims at face value, go and actually look at the subject they are making the claims about. Don't go to some creationist website to do your research, go look at the real research. You will often find that it has been changed beyond recognition to allow these fraudsters to make their preposterous claims!

For anybody who either wants a laugh or wants to study these guy's tactics, they also have a You Tube Channel where they try and convert people. It will show you what to look out for.

DonExodus2 also has a great series of videos exposing their lies and ignorance.

Stephen Anderson prays for Obama to die of brain cancer

Published

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on September 2, 2009

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If you have not seen my first post about Steven Anderson, it is available here. It seems that since that first post, things at the Arizona Faithful Word Baptist Church have deteriorated further. In a recent interview with MyFoxPhoenix Steven Anderson, the churches oh so slightly insane pastor announced “I hope that God strikes Barack Obama with brain cancer so he can die like Ted Kennedy. You know, and I hope it happens today.”..charming.

Alarmingly, protesters in front of the church, many christians themselves, noticed that a lot of the parishioners entering the church were carrying firearms. The church gained notoriety when one of his parishioners carried a loaded automatic rifle outside of a town hall Obama was talking at.

When asked about whether he condoned violence, he said: “I will not take the law into my hands. I will not take up any arms. It’s a spiritual battle. It’s a spiritual warfare.”

In an attempt to keep the peace at the church, police were having to do regular patrols to try and keep the peace.

So what should we do about this vile turd? As already reported, it's got to the point were even fellow christians are protesting outside of his church, one protester saying "“I find it incomprehensible that someone can believe in the message of Jesus and preach hate,”

For one thing, even as a none christian, I can't see how this guy can be a christian, supposedly a religion of peace and continue to spout this vial hatred.

Should his parishioners leave his church? Well, ideally, yes, no normal person with morals could possibly sit through this barrage of madness, but I feel that even if some of them do wish to depart, there are going to be the social factors keeping them in place.

Should he be arrested? Judging by his comments, he has not, so far, condoned violence, although I think he's attempting to plant the seeds into people's minds that it's the right thing to do with that statement: "I will not take the law into my hands. I will not take up any arms. It’s a spiritual battle. It’s a spiritual warfare" Even if he's not planning to do anything himself, doesn't he realise how irresponsible it is to make such statements, suggesting that others do take the law into their own hands? Or, as I suspect, that is his intention!

Should his church be shut down? Well this is where it gets interesting. Is it me or is not a church supposed to be a place where religeoon is taught. It seems that Anderson is using his church to push his own politics. This should mean, at least, that it loose it's tax free status!

I do hope that people will arrange large protests outside this church and make as much noise and problems for the parishioners as possible so that this becomes national news and this guy is exposed to the world so that hopefully, he can be forced out. I hope that his parishoners will force him out, wouldnt that be a sign that they really do support their religeon and not the vile hatred of this excuse for a human being!

I suspect that although the government have no comment on this case, they are going to be watching every move this guy makes

Secular quote of the week #2

Published

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on September 1, 2009

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This week's thought provoking secular quote came out in a debate on paltalk quite a while ago. I don't have the nic of the person who typed it unfortunately, but it makes you think (spelling mistakes left in):

Eot has stated that due to the fact that I am an atheist, that I am possibly another Stalin. Yet I would contend that Eotjk, who concedes submission to authority, who has justified eternal torture and genocide in the name of said authority is far more closer than I could ever hope to fascism, dictatorship or totalitarianism.

Why Intelligent Design is not science

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on September 1, 2009

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From Charles McAlpin of Examiner.com comes an excellent three part series (at the time of writing) on why Intelligent Design is most definitely not science. Part 1 available here.

UK suffers creationist theme park madness too!

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on September 1, 2009

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Our American cousins will be so glad to know that they are not the only ones that have to suffer creationist theme parks such as Kent Hovind's now closed 'Dinosaur Adventure Land', we in the UK have one too it seems! (lucky us)

In an article from Yahoo news UK, it seems that if you go to Wraxall, near Bristol, you will find the wonderful 'Noah's Ark' creationist Zoo. The only good thing about this park is that at least it's in Wales so we can blame the Welsh (joke before I get hate mail).

It seems that the British Humanist Association (BHA), of which Dawkins is the Vice President has been getting all heated about this place, wanting 'South West England' and 'Visit Britain' to stop promoting the zoo as a tourist attraction.

The writer of the article, only refered to as 'the editor' says that he sees no problem with the existance of the park and it's promotion, this being a free country, and I agree. One of the joys of freedom of speech is that you are free, within certain legal limits, to express your own ideas. If you do not agree with the ideas, do not go, simple. That said, if I was in the area, I certainly would want to visit, purely seeing it as an entertaining oddity and to look at all that incorrect science and religious assumptions.

Where I and 'the editor' part in our oppinions is that he says creationism causes nobody any harm. He admits to not knowing much about the subject and through this assumption, that shows. Creationism does cause damage to society. Look at the effects it's had on science in America. Research such as stem cell has been slowed dramatically because of the belief that a 'god' creates each fetus. There are raging battles in schools with creationists repeatedly trying to get evolution removed from the classroom and their religeous beliefs slotted in instead.

Don't think for one moment that they want to 'teach the controversy', they want rid of evolution, that's their goal. If it wasn't they would welcome every creation myth going and be happy to teach that, aside of their own nonsence.

As for the zoo here in England. I do honestly believe that it's not a threat to anything, for a start, it has no political clout, it is not trying to get people into government to legislate any of it's beliefs. I'd like to see anybody try that, I remeber when Tony Blair mentioned his god belief in parliment and ended up being the butt of jokes.

Looking at the zoo's website itself, it's obvious how carefully hidden the creation aspect of the business is hidden from the casual observer, only a small link on the right hand side takes you into that section. Once the 'creation science' section, you see that it's just the usual collection of long dead creationist claims that would even embarrass 'answers in genesis'. From reading it I smell the influence of Kent Hovind videos. Although I would say that their presentation is far more mature than he could ever manage.

I believe that people over here are more level headed and better educated in the sciences to fall for this kind of convoluted klap trap. Trying to get it shut down I believe only leads to a sence of an oppinion being 'silenced' making it look as if science is really threatened by this.

Another thing that they have inadvertently achieved by trying to get this place shut down is to give it thousands of pounds worth of free advertising. Even I had not heard of before, their visitor numbers will rocket.

I think those non creationists that do visit it will see it for what it is, a quaint look at a dying old myth.

Science video of the week: How evolution works by DonExodus2

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on September 1, 2009

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This week's science video comes courtesy of DonExodus2 on YouTube and is the first in a series of videos done by him on how evolution works. It is aimed at lay people and is an excellent resource although, you may need to watch them several time and take notes to understand some of the concept, enjoy:

Journey to the centre of the Creation Museum

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on September 1, 2009

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The following article by Brook Wilensky-Lanford is reprinted from The Faster Times:

Recently, reports came out that Florida Adventure Land, a Christian dinosaur theme park in Pensacola, Florida, was shut down for tax fraud. Apparently the owner contended that he was working for God, not the federal government, and so was not required to pay taxes. But let’s back up: what on earth do dinosaurs have to do with Christianity?

Kent Hovind, the evangelist behind Dinosaur Adventure Land, is not alone in using paleontological wonders as a tool for religious outreach. Last October, I visited the Creation Museum in Bullittsburg, Kentucky, a 27-million-dollar pseudo-scientific complex built in 2006 by a group called Answers in Genesis to promote young-earth creationism. Dinosaurs were everywhere, animatronic jaws opening and closing, letting out pre-recorded elephant-like roars on a constant loop. They were hanging out with Adam and Eve in the lush recreation of the Garden of Eden, marching two by two onto Noah’s Ark.

I was confused. Wouldn’t an organization that wants us to believe the earth has only been around for 6,000 years want to distance itself from creatures which have been proven to be millions of years old?

Young-earth creationists have been around forever, but it wasn’t until relatively recently that they had 27 million dollars to throw around on dinosaurs. In the 1980s, what had been an obscure, retiring religious movement began to emerge into the limelight as a political faction, led by Jerry Falwell and others. They advanced, Rip-van-Winkle-like, back into a world of carbon dating, genome mapping, and dinosaurs.

It’s not that the mere existence of dinosaur fossils necessarily vanquished belief in a God-designed planet. In fact, the scientist credited with coining the word “dinosaur”—British Museum director Richard Owen, in 1842—did so entirely convinced that the creatures had been created, and “neither derived from improvement of a lower, nor lost progressive development into a higher type.”

But dinosaurs, along with meteors and early-hominid remains, became some of science’s most compelling discoveries–real, physical evidence of other worlds and other times. So their co-option by fundamentalist religion struck a particularly sour note. On the fundamentalists’ part, borrowing science’s headline act for pseudo-science was a savvy decision. Who doesn’t like dinosaurs? Nature’s mysterious giants would bring people, particular 10-year-old boys, into the fold like never before. Dinosaurs were, after all, too big to ignore. Beyond that, dinosaurs proved that this was a modern movement.

By 2006, fundamentalists had amassed so many converts and so much revenue that they had the confidence to create new theology on the fly, without batting an eye. They simply worked backwards: the Bible says (according to their reading) that the earth is only 6,000 years old. Dinosaurs existed. So naturally, they can’t be more than 6,000 years old.

The Museum’s cheerful placards matter-of-factly conclude that dinosaurs co-existed with humans. As a visual aid, a tiny animatronic velociraptor stands next to a giggling caveman child, a benevolent prehistoric pet. By rewriting the ancient past, Answers in Genesis could show that it was in the here and now. And rewrite they did. There were so many dinosaurs at the Creation Museum that I started to wonder whether they would appear with Christ on the cross.

The theological move is so new that the dinosaur details haven’t been ironed out. Dinosaur Adventure Land contends that the dinosaurs were all killed by Noah’s Flood, neatly explaining their extinction. The Creation Museum posits that dinosaurs did make it onto Noah’s Ark, and were saved. So why aren’t they around today? Past the food court and the gift shop, a plush-seated movie theater showed a 10-minute documentary that claims to prove that dinosaurs actually survived the Great Flood—as dragons. Which are of course real. (How else would Saint George have converted people to Christianity?) A few individual survivors—like the Loch Ness Monster, and the Komodo dragons—were still around centuries later.

It’s unclear what religious purpose this could serve…

How to ease the pain of crucifixion

Published

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on August 31, 2009

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I know I should not, but this picture is really calling to my evil side: