I just finished listening to the Non Prophets podcast from October 10th of this year. P.Z. Myers, of the science blog Pharyngula, was on as a guest. The topics covered Bill Maher’s award at the AAI convention, Maher’s crazy ideas on vaccination, Ray Comfort’s forward for “The Origin of Species” and some of the sexual scandals in the church.
You can download a copy here . It’s well worth listening to.
It appears that a group of creationists have decided to collect all of their inaccurate and anti-scientific claims in a single place, The Creation Wiki. Depending on your mood this could make for some hilarious reading.
And the distortions don’t just stop at scientific fact. Check out the article “Anticreationist youTube Debate Tactics” for their version of the facts surrounding a number of arguments between prominent atheists and creationists on youTube. I almost spit out my coffee when i read their speculations that the atheists have an inside man at youTube keeping the creation truth down.
It’s been brought to my attention that (young earth) creationist Ray Comfort has decided to give away copies of Darwin’s seminal work, “On the Origin of Species” [1]. The book is to be given out on college campuses across the US to commemorate the 150 year university of the book’s publication. There is only one catch. It’s an abridged copy complete with a brand new 54 page introduction laced creationist propaganda.
I had a look at Comfort’s introduction, which is available here. As you might expect, Comfort pulls out some vintage stuff; “a book can’t spontaneously form, therefore evolution is wrong”, “all us dumb scientists think everything came about after nothing exploded”, and even that old timeless classic “Hitler was motivated by evolution”.
This whole endeavor stinks of an attempt to get creation onto university campuses or into public schools. I suspect that in the next few weeks we’ll learn of plans to donate a number of these copies to various public schools.
Comfort is claiming the original text has been left unaltered and that he hasn’t inserted commentary throughout it. I would love to verify this and so want to get a look at the actual volume they give away. If you’re back to school, and happen to run into this giveaway, please grab me a copy and we can work something out for shipping.
[1] On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.
An interesting and anticipated discussion between prominent youTube atheist Thunderf00t and professional apologist Ray Comfort appeared on youTube a few days ago. Thunderf00t is responsible for the “Why do People Laugh at Creationists” series while Comfort is a co-host of the show “The Way of the Master” and is the man responsible for the infamous banana argument. Many on youTube were quite excited when Thunderf00t announced that Comfort had agreed to meet with him and film the discussion.
Here is the first part. You can find the remainder of it on Thunderf00t’s channel.
The conversation meanders through a number of topics ranging from evidence for evolution, the source of morality and even as far as specific biblical passages. As a result, it lacks the focus many hoped it would have but, nonetheless, it is still worth while watching if you have been following these sorts of debates.
In the few days that the video has been available it has generated a lot of discussion. It’s even brought VenomFangX out from under his melodramatic rock with a video response offering his typical unimaginative, illogical and simplistic analysis. This is almost fitting, since VFX’s style of thinking is much like Comforts.
Like all apologists, throughout the discussion Comfort continually moves the goal post. Whenever Thunderf00t provides a good natural explanation for a phenomena, such as how snow is made, Comfort would simply move the goal stating that his God created the process Thunderf00t just described. Unfortunately, Thundetf00t didn’t press Comfort enough when he did this, much to my disappointment.
The contrast between the questions posed by the two debaters and depth of their respective answers was also telling to me. Comfort tended to frame things in simple black and white terms, offering definitive answers that essentially boiled down to “God did it”. When asked for evidence of any kind the response was inevitably some variant on “because the bible says so”. Such answers are deeply unsatisfying to anyone interested in truly understanding what is knowable about the world and Thunderf00t didn’t seem to be satisfied by such simplicities.
Throughout, Thunderf00t looked to what we know from scientific progress over the years, allowing for much more sophisticated answers with a deeper insight into underlying causes. When asked if murder was immoral he not only stated that is was but also offered an explanation as to why we find it immoral. He is addressing not only the question of what fits into our moral framework but why our framework is shaped the way it presently it is.
When pressed back to the “origin of the universe” Thunderf00t first pointed out that the question contains the underlying assumption that there was in fact a beginning, a point completely lost on Comfort. Thunderf00t then continued by pointing out that it what happened prior to the big bang was currently unknown by scientific standards. At first this may sound like a cop out but it isn’t. It is simply accepting that there are limits to our present scientific understanding and an unwillingness to compromise our understanding by invoking unsubstantiated claims to fill the gaps.
Over the years I have come to realize that, if one values correctness, simple answers are difficult to come by. When they are obtainable, they usually require years of study and contemplation. The discussion between Comfort and Thunderf00t reflects the thinking of two different kinds of thinkers. One who has accepted a simple answer without verification and one who seeks out simple answers but not at the expense of correctness. I will leave it to you do decide who’s who and which is the better approach.
This was brought to my attention by a friend of mine back home. The Harper government has been slashing science funding anywhere it can and now our conservative Science minister basically comes out against evolution. I have to say, at times like this I am somewhat embarrassed to be a Canadian.
Source: The Global and Mail
ANNE MCILROY
From Tuesday’s Globe and Mail
March 17, 2009 at 2:00 AM EDT
Canada’s science minister, the man at the centre of the controversy over federal funding cuts to researchers, won’t say if he believes in evolution.
“I’m not going to answer that question. I am a Christian, and I don’t think anybody asking a question about my religion is appropriate,” Gary Goodyear, the federal Minister of State for Science and Technology, said in an interview with The Globe and Mail.
A funding crunch, exacerbated by cuts in the January budget, has left many senior researchers across the county scrambling to find the money to continue their experiments.
Some have expressed concern that Mr. Goodyear, a chiropractor from Cambridge, Ont., is suspicious of science, perhaps because he is a creationist.
When asked about those rumours, Mr. Goodyear said such conversations are not worth having.
“Obviously, I have a background that supports the fact I have read the science on muscle physiology and neural chemistry,” said the minister, who took chemistry and physics courses as an undergraduate at the University of Waterloo.
“I do believe that just because you can’t see it under a microscope doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It could mean we don’t have a powerful enough microscope yet. So I’m not fussy on this business that we already know everything. … I think we need to recognize that we don’t know.”
Asked to clarify if he was talking about the role of a creator, Mr. Goodyear said that the interview was getting off topic.
Brian Alters, founder and director of the Evolution Education Research Centre at McGill University in Montreal, was shocked by the minister’s comments.
Evolution is a scientific fact, Dr. Alters said, and the foundation of modern biology, genetics and paleontology. It is taught at universities and accepted by many of the world’s major religions, he said.
“It is the same as asking the gentleman, ‘Do you believe the world is flat?’ and he doesn’t answer on religious grounds,” said Dr. Alters. “Or gravity, or plate tectonics, or that the Earth goes around the sun.”
Jim Turk, executive director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers, said he was flabbergasted that the minister would invoke his religion when asked about evolution.
“The traditions of science and the reliance on testable and provable knowledge has served us well for several hundred years and have been the basis for most of our advancement. It is inconceivable that a government would have a minister of science that rejects the basis of scientific discovery and traditions,” he said.
Mr. Goodyear’s evasive answers on evolution are unlikely to reassure the scientists who are skeptical about him, and they bolster the notion that there is a divide between the minister and the research community.
Many scientists fear 10 years of gains will be wiped out by a government that doesn’t understand the importance of basic, curiosity-driven research, which history shows leads to the big discoveries. They worry Canada’s best will decamp for the United States, where President Barack Obama has put $10-billion (U.S) into medical research as part of his plan to stimulate economic growth.
But in the interview, Mr. Goodyear defended his government’s approach and the January budget, and said it stacks up well when compared to what Mr. Obama is doing.
He also talked about how passionate he is about science and technology – including basic research – and how his life before politics shaped his views.
Now 51, Mr. Goodyear grew up in Cambridge. His parents divorced when he was young. His father was a labourer, his mother a seamstress who worked three jobs to the support her three children.
His first summer job was laying asphalt when he was 12. At 13, he got a part-time job at a garage, pumping gas. At 17, the young entrepreneur started his own company selling asphalt and sealants.
He was in the technical stream at high school, taking welding and automotive mechanics. No one in has family had ever gone to university, but he secretly started taking academic credits at night school so he could get admitted to the University of Waterloo. He didn’t want his family to know.
He took chemistry, physics, statistics and kinesiology, and was fascinated by the mechanics of human joints. After three years of university, he was admitted to the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College, where he was class president and valedictorian.
He had his own practice in Cambridge, where he settled down with his wife Valerie. He worked as chiropractor for two decades, and set up private clinics to treat people who had been injured in car accidents, sometimes using devices that he invented to help them rebuild their strength and range of motion.
He had sold that business when, before the 2004 federal election, a friend approached him about running for the Conservative nomination in Cambridge. His two children were then in their late teens, so he agreed. He took the nomination and won the seat. He was re-elected in 2006, and again in 2008, when Prime Minister Stephen Harper named him science minister.
“Now I have got a portfolio that I am absolutely passionate about and frankly connected to,” he said, adding that his days of experimenting with engines in high school automotive class gave him an appreciation for what it feels like to come up with something new.
“When I was in high school, we were already tweaking with a coil that would wrap around the upper [radiator] hose and it got an extra five miles to the gallon. … So I’ve been there on this discovery stuff.”
Commercializing research – the focus of the government’s science and technology policy – is an area where Canada needs to make improvements, he says.
“If we are going to be serious about saving lives and improving life around this planet, if we are serious about helping the environment, then we are going to have to get some of these technologies out of the labs onto the factory floors. Made. Produced. Sold. And that is going to fulfill that talk. So yes, we have to do all of it, we have to do discovery … but it can’t end there.”
Here is a good video that appeared on youTube today, by the user DonExodus2. It poses a number of interesting questions to creationists regarding their objections to the theory of Evolution.
I would love to hear some comments from the creationists.
I found this article over on another atheist blog and thought it might be of some interest to my readers.
