Creationist Idiocy

Fairness and Balance

2009-07-03T15:57:00.000-07:00

As well as Creation, there's a second movie about Charles Darwin being released this year. It's called The Voyage That Shook The World, and is funded by Creation Ministries International, so expect nothing less than some hardcore creationist propaganda. According to PZ Myers:

They got several Darwin experts (Peter Bowler, Sandra Herbert, and Janet Browne) to appear in the "documentary" by concealing their motives. And then they admit to cherry-picking the interviews to put together their story.

The movie's website has a page entitled Digging Deeper, which promises "more information about origins from leading sources of both viewpoints". Sounds reasonable, right? Wrong. The page offers two links, one for creation and one for evolution. The creation link leads to the pretty, expensive-looking Creation Ministries website:

...while the evolution link leads to this:

When Idiots Collide...

2009-06-30T15:39:00.000-07:00

Hovind Junior's blog is attracting some real intellectuals. Check out the comment left by this geological genius:

The continents move an estimated 0.75 inches (19 millimeters) annually. When India "collided" with Asian, would the impact really have been hard enough to cause the formation of a mountain range?

John "Wrong"

At least the guy chose an accurate username.

Feedback

2009-06-29T14:20:00.000-07:00

So your entire website is based on childish mockery in which you seek to ridicule someone else's beliefs? Wow.

Oh noes, nasty internet man is cruels to us.

There is so much on here, I actually question your employment status.

What? I post two or three times a week, it's hardly a full-time job.

I for one do not question all of evolutionary theory, some of it is very viable.

Unhelpful. Tell me which bits you do question and we might make some progress.

I will say though as a Christian, that not all of us believe in the book of Genesis as a true history and that not all creationists beleive that the world in less than 6000 years old.

If you don't subscribe to biblical literalism, there are many prominent creationists (Ham, Comfort, Sarfarti) who would question your faith and even your right to call yourself a Christian.

I do see that your website is based on hate of differing views other then your own.

No, but it is partly based on my hatred of creationist lies and propaganda.

In the end, Creationists are usually happier people, who base their lives around community and understanding while evolutionists are usually just hateful, selfish people who end up with nothing out of life.

Sure. Right.

Even if an afterlife does not exist, nothing is lost to anyone, but if there is.....

I'm happy to take my chances, thanks.

Anyway, we all need to live a meaningful life and stop trying to make people feel stupid for their beliefs.

If everyone was willing to keep their groundless beliefs to themselves, that would be fine.

BTW, I hold a Masters of evolutionary studies and a Masters of Div.

Not impressed, sorry.

Its rewarding for any intelligent person to study both sides of an argument.

I've probably read more creationist literature than pro-evolution. I've found it invariably to be either stupid or plain dishonest.

In the end, neither group can claim to have the one answer of how the beginning started.

But there are true answers out there, and those offered by religious texts have been long disproven.

Moron of the Month: Sean McDowell

2009-06-27T05:20:00.000-07:00

Sean McDowell runs Worldview Ministries, whose mission statement is "Teaching Truth to Transform Lives". Despite the ninth Christian commandment, it's clear that Sean is quite happy with a pretty loose definition of the word truth. He co-authored a book on intelligent design with William Dembski, describing ID as a "scientific endeavor" that is "revolutionizing science", and he has a whole bunch of moronic essays online here. Let's start with his article "Is the Chimp-Mauling Darwin's Fault?":

This week we received the sobering news that a 55-year old woman was nearly killed by a 200 pound chimp. [...] How is it that we live in a culture where people think it's safe to have a chimpanzee as a pet? [...] In fact, there is one culprit for the idea that human beings and chimps are really not that different and should be treated that way: Darwinism. [...] If humans and chimps are really not that different, then why not expect chimps to act civilly?

You only have to walk through a city centre on a Friday night (or watch Cops) to understand that it's not just chimps that are wild, dangerous animals, but people too. Darwin's ideas can provide explanations for this behaviour, while the Genesis account (Eve robbed a piece of fruit, so nobody's perfect) is at best... unsatisfactory. The bible's notion that we are made in the image of God also poses further questions, like why would God need toenails? Do they grow? Does he have to cut them? And does God look anything like this:

Elsewhere, Sean gets confused between HIV (a virus) and AIDS (a disease):

Probably no challenge is raised more frequently than the seemingly "evil designs" in nature, such as the AIDS virus or the Great White Shark.

...and comes up with the worst definition of evil I've ever heard:

Simply put, evil is when things are not as they are supposed to be or are they way they are not supposed to be.

It does annoy me when my wife leaves too many pairs of shoes in the hallway instead of putting them in the closet where they belong, but I wouldn't say she was evil. That's harsh.

Next, Sean demostrates his intimate knowledge of particle physics:

If protons were 0.2 percent more massive than they actually are, they would be unstable and would decay into simpler protons.

Simpler protons? I sometimes feel a pang of jealousy that creationists can spew out this kind of bullshit like a fountain and be safe in the knowledge that their target audience doesn't know the first thing about science, and likely doesn't even care, whereas scientists like me have to constantly strive for accuracy and clarity when communicating with our peers, for fear of looking like a dumbass.

Lastly, Sean criticises Obama's views on creationism:

Obama directly contradicts himself. In one instance, Obama says that religion is merely an act of "faith." Yet at the end of his statement he says that opposition to evolution does not hold up to scientific inquiry.

No contradiction so far.

Which is it? Is evolutionary-opposition merely a private matter of faith, or is it based upon empirical claims about the world? If such opposition is merely based upon faith, then Obama (and other secularists) cannot claim that such views have been disproved by science.

Why not? There are plenty of religious beliefs that are entirely based on faith and that have been disproved by science.

Obama (and secularists) can't have it both ways. Either opposition to evolution is scientific or not. If it is scientific, then it may have a claim on the scientific curriculum. If it's not scientific, then they need to stop making the claim that it doesn't "hold up to scientific inquiry."

Sean seems to think that only scientific principles can be scientifically tested. What utter crap. Any crazy idiot can invent some half-baked idea right off the top of his head with no evidence to support it. Here's a good example, recently discussed on Pharyngula. Some wacko comes up with a theory about biological development based on deformation of donut-shaped balloons, writes a book about it, then gets upset when a real biologist points out that the theory is contradicted by even the most basic observations.

This brings us back to the root of the problem. There are many people out there, like Sean McDowell, who have already made up their minds based on blind faith and simply aren't interested in the evidence.

Creation: The Movie

2009-06-25T05:35:00.000-07:00

I'm really unsure how I should feel about the upcoming movie "Creation". That title is clunkingly inappropriate and seems to be little more than a gimmick to stir up controversy for publicity's sake. On the other hand, it has a great cast and the trailer shows promise. I just hope it does a decent job of putting the science across. I don't really care if it takes an accommodationist approach with religion as long as Darwin's theories are presented accurately. Is that too much to hope for?

Check out the trailer and tell me what you think.

A Horribly Lame Attempt at Apologetics

2009-06-22T18:05:00.000-07:00

Francis Collins, renowned geneticist and Christian apologist, included this image in his presentation at a recent conference on the compatibility of science and religion:

Now, he's not a creationist in the usual sense, but I just found this image to be so utterly contrived and pathetic that I thought I'd post it here. You can read a full transcript of his talk here, if you can stomach it.

Veggiesaurus

2009-06-18T13:32:00.000-07:00

The recently discovered crocoduck fossil dealt a serious blow to the creation camp. Unfortunately this newly unearthed specimen could provide them some ammo - a new species of vegetarian dinosaur:

The dinosaur, now named Psittacosaurus gobiensis, was a ceratopsian, a group of "bird-hipped" dinosaurs, such as Triceratops, that are thought to have ground up tough vegetation with their prolific teeth. The fossil remains were found in the Gobi Desert of Inner Mongolia in 2001.

Paleontologists recently studied the specimen and found skull evidence that the dinosaur ate nuts and seeds.

We'll have to file this one alongside Tyrannosaurus Herbivorus:

Image from LOL god.

Krazy Kent Hovind

2009-06-17T17:19:00.000-07:00

If evolution is true, you could not know that it's true because your brain is nothing but chemicals. Think about that.

Kent Hovind

Hovind Junior: Confusionism

2009-06-15T18:02:00.000-07:00

Eric Hovind's blog is going to be a great source of stupidity for me to mine, I hope he manages to provide updates more regularly than I do! Take this post for example, in which he tries to defend his use of the term "evolutionism" by, first, posting a wikipedia definition, second, posting a contradictory dictionary definition, and third, providing his own definition which is different to both of them. Then he makes this boob:

It is an ...ism because it is a religion.

Right. Just like electromagnetism, the belief that Nikola Tesla will one day return to Earth and create world peace through the power of alternating current.

In another post, Eric is trying to hawk his Dad's latest book, the cover of which made me LOL:

Noah's Arse

2009-06-10T15:32:00.000-07:00

We all know the story of Noah's ark, when God singled out Noah for the job of saving all life on Earth. Hard to imagine a more daunting task, but nonetheless Noah got the job done without a hitch. Well, this is one of two events in Noah's life that God deemed worthy of being recorded in the history book of the universe for all future generations to contemplate. The second event was, to be frank, regrettable, and one has to wonder why God decided to embarrass Noah by including it. Here's what happened:

Some time after the Flood, Noah was enjoying a well-earned glass of wine that he'd fermented from his own personal vinyard. It's not certain just how much he drank, but it must have been a hot evening because he ended up falling asleep in his tent stark bollock naked. Unfortunately, one of his three sons, Ham, discovered his dad in this state and went and informed his brothers, Shem and Japheth, who came back with a blanket and covered Noah while he slept. The next morning, presumably a little hungover, Noah saw the blanket and put two and two together. Feeling embarassed and probably more than a little grumpy, he called on God to... curse and enslave Ham's son, Canaan, who wasn't even involved. Ham's opinion of this harsh punishment isn't known.

So it would be great if any Christians who read this post could suggest why Noah acted like this, or even why this event was deemed worthy of entry in The Holy Bible. And if you think I'm just making this all up, go read Genesis 9:18-27.

All Hail Time-God

2009-06-05T15:08:00.000-07:00

Wow, this page is going to keep me busy for quite a while. It claims to show ten scientific facts that disprove evolution. I'll probably go through some of these in future posts, but for now here are a few amusing quotes from the introductory section:

If natural selection were true, humans in the tropics would have silver, reflective skin to help them keep cool, but they don't. They have black skin, just the opposite of what the theory of natural selection would predict.

Evolution is a Religion - the Worship of a Make-Believe Time-god. Time is the god of evolutionists. The evolutionists' claim their time-god is very slow but infinitely powerful. The time-god is credited with the ability to accomplish anything and everything given enough time. It simply takes the time-god millions or billions of years to accomplish it. Scientifically impossible events are credited to the time-god. Evolutionists keep their time-god close at hand where they can watch their god's hands move around slowly, slowly, slowly trying to evolve new species but never succeeding.

Are left-wing, liberal professors mentally nuts? Well, yes. An eminent psychiatrist claims those who possess a liberal ideology are suffering from a clinical mental disorder.

Here is the book he's referring to, by the way. Now, please ensure that your irony detector is turned down to its lowest setting before you read the last one:

The human mind has a very detrimental character weakness. Humans would rather believe an error for the rest of their lives than admit they had been wrong. People who believe in evolution have been brainwashed. Their main problem is not the arguments for and against evolution and creation. Their problem is they can't bring themselves to reject evolution, because they have already rejected God. Humans have a big mental fault. They are not able to admit they were wrong. Therefore, they are trapped in their previous decision to reject God.

KABOOM!!

Creationists That Look Like Apes: Kevin Wirth

2009-06-03T05:58:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Ron Britton of Bay of Fundie for the suggestion.

Feedback

2009-05-27T15:07:00.001-07:00

This afternoon Creationist Idiocy had a visit from an anonymous reader who left half a dozen comments on various posts. Whoever it was, they apparently took objection to my Creationists That Look Like Apes series, calling it:

stupid and unscientific

They appear to have missed the point of those posts by quite a wide margin:

i can make evolutionist monkeys too

The reader was also upset by my blog's sub-heading, which they countered with:

I think this blog is clear evidence that you can't spell "evolutionist" without "insolent".

...which would almost be clever if not for the fact that there's only one n in evolutionist. Anyways, I much prefer "You can't spell evolutionist without i love u".

Hovind Junior: Still Confused

2009-05-26T14:21:00.000-07:00

Hovind Junior's latest (and final?) creation minute video is out:

Chemical evolution is the origin of all the elements we have today.

Wrong. That's nucleosynthesis.

Stellar evolution is the origin of stars and planets.

Wrong. Stellar evolution describes how the properties of individual stars change during their lifetimes.

Organic evolution is the origin of life from non-life.

Wrong. That's abiogenesis.

You might wonder why Hovind seems to have decided to attack other branches of science unrelated to Darwinian evolution. Take stellar evolution, for example. The processes by which stars alter in their structure and luminosity might not seem at first to pose any problems to creationists. Not true. Cosmologists have found (through observation and study, Eric) that stars go through very distinct stages throughout their lifetimes and depending on their type. There are logical and testable theories that describe and explain this stellar evolution in detail, and these are fully consistent with other areas of science such as nuclear physics and thermodynamics. These theories, however, prove that the universe must be much older than 6000 years (to make an understatement). Here lies a big problem for creationists. It's not just Darwinian evolution that debunks their creation myth, it's pretty much every field of science. And heck, not just science, but history too. So if creationists get their way and Darwinian evolution is banned from school science classes, which subject will they go after next?

Flood Geology?

2009-05-24T05:25:00.000-07:00

I've just returned from a two week vacation, so I'll be posting here more regularly from now on. During our trip, my wife and I visited Bar Harbor, Maine, where I snapped this photo:

It's a large boulder sitting on the side of a mountain looking rather out of place. How did it get there? It's near the top, so it can't have fallen from somewhere higher up. The answer is that it was carried there by a glacier. Anyone who has seen a glacier will know that they move very slowly, so glacial action/transport can become a problem for young-Earth creationists since these pesky ice ages appear to have occurred over much longer timeframes than 6000 years. The "solution" that creationists have come up with is "flood geology". Creationists will talk about this as if it's a fully developed theory with true explanatory power, but really it's as vaccuous as their "God did it" explanation of how the universe was created:

Q: How are mountains formed?
Geologist: Upheaval caused by colliding tectonic plates.
Creationist: Noah's flood did it.

Q: How did sedimentary rocks form?
Geologist: Layer by layer deposition and high pressures over many years.
Creationist: Noah's flood did it.

Q: How is it that large boulders that don't match surrounding rocks can appear on top of mountains?
Geologist: They were carried there by glaciers.
Creationist: Noah's flood did it.

The problem with that, of course, is that rocks don't float. But flood geologists don't tend to let something so trivial as logic get in their way. Check out Hovind Junior's latest creation minute:

A handful of creationists have tried to expand upon "the flood did it" and have come up with some seriously bizarre theories and models. I'll be posting some of these soon, so watch this space.

Creationism and Intelligent Design: Which is more Scientific?

2009-04-30T14:25:00.000-07:00

Fool.
UK journo Melanie Phillips has made a fool of herself with this article, in which she whines that intelligent design is different to creationism. It is different, actually, but she gets the reason why completely ass-backwards. Here's what she says:

[Ken Miller said] that Intelligent Design was nothing more than an attempt to repackage good old-fashioned Creationism and make it more palatable. But this is totally untrue. Miller referred to a landmark US court case in 2005, Kitzmiller v Dover Area School District, which did indeed uphold the argument that Intelligent Design was a form of Creationism in its ruling that teaching Intelligent Design violated the constitutional ban against teaching religion in public schools. But the court was simply wrong, doubtless because it had heard muddled testimony from the likes of Prof Miller.

The court heard from a wide variety of experts on both sides of the controversy, including Professor Miller, an evolutionary biologist and Christian who has written several books on the subject. During the court case it was established that the main intelligent design textbook was a carbon copy of an older book on creationism, with the word "creationists" sloppily replaced with "design proponents" throughout. But according to Melanie, intelligent design is real science, and has nothing to do with religion:

The fact is that Intelligent Design not only does not come out of Creationism but stands against it. This is because Creationism comes out of religion while Intelligent Design comes out of science. Creationism, whose proponents are Bible literalists, is a specific doctrine which holds that the earth was literally created in six days. Intelligent Design, whose proponents are mainly scientists, holds that the complexity of science suggests that there must have been a governing intelligence behind the origin of matter, which could not have developed spontaneously from nothing.

Actually, Melanie, biblical creationism is far more scientific than intelligent design. Let me explain why.

Like real science, biblical creationism is based on evidence*. Intelligent design is based purely on the gaps in our knowledge, gaps that are constantly shrinking. Thus the amount of information "supporting" intelligent design is actually decreasing with time.

Like real science, biblical creationism makes very specific predictions**. Intelligent design does postulate the existence of objects that couldn't have evolved by natural means, but it offers no theoretical framework that could be used to predict what these might be, or where they might be found.

Like real science, biblical creationism is falsifiable***. Since intelligent design makes no positive assertions, no piece of evidence can be envisaged that could refute it.

None of this means that creationism is good science, of course. The failing of creationism as a science is ultimately the same failing of intelligent design; that is they are both founded on immovable religious ideas which themselves have no scientific basis.

And it takes some gall to deny that intelligent design is religion in disguise. Please. Intelligent design advocates may go to great pains to assert that the designer could be an alien, but when they wrap up their case they'll almost always finish by saying something like "...and we believe that this intelligent designer is the Christian God. Praise Jesus!".

At least biblical creationists have the self-confidence to stick to their founding beliefs (no matter how crazy those beliefs are) instead of cowardly dressing them up as something else entirely.

*The evidence being the Bible. I didn't say it was reliable evidence.
**Predictions like "the Earth is six thousand years old". I didn't say the predictions had to turn out to be true.
***And indeed it has been falsified countless times.

Hovind Junior: Confused

2009-04-29T15:20:00.000-07:00

The latest batch of (mercifully brief) creationist propaganda videos are already gaining notoriety across the blogosphere. They're presented by Eric Hovind, son of "Krazy" Kent. I would have thought that Eric would want to avoid the spotlight after his dad's antics. I mean, everyone finds their dad embarassing once in a while but Hovind senior is considered a real fruit-cake by most creationists. I've even deemed him worthy of his own category here at Creationist Idiocy. But judging by this video, the apple doesn't fall very far from the tree:

So according to Eric, there's an "evolution formula" which states that the universe created itself out of "nothing + time". Hang on though, evolution isn't about how the universe came into existence, is it? That's the big bang theory. And a little googling into that subject will show that (a) there's no consensus on what came before the singularity (certainly there is no evidence to suggest there was "nothing"), and (b) the expansion of the universe from the singularity that preceded it was extremely rapid, thus not requiring a whole lot of time at all. What hope for creationists if Eric can't distinguish between such radically different scientific theories as the big bang theory and evolution by natural selection?

I also struggle to see the point that this video is trying to make:

It's something like "God is roughly the same size as Arcturus", or possibly "Wow. God is really, really... big. Wow.". Still, impressive production values. It seems you really can polish a turd.

It's Competition Time Again

2009-04-26T17:04:00.000-07:00

Your task is to write a limerick about creationism. The funniest one wins. Here are some possible ideas for the first two lines, or you can come up with your own:

In the Christian Bible we’re told
That the Earth is six thousand years old

In the Genesis book is a tale
Of a man who lived inside a whale

Some people today still believe
In the story of Adam and Eve

Moron of the Month - David Klinghoffer

2009-04-24T12:29:00.000-07:00

The Discovery Institute's David Klinghoffer recently posted a couple of articles that, in essence, blame the Columbine high school massacre on Charles Darwin. You heard me right. Let's see what he has to say:

On April 20, 1999, two boys at Columbine High School in Colorado massacred 12 fellow students and a teacher, wounding 23 as well before shooting themselves. The 10th anniversary with its morbid recollections is upon us, but there's one aspect of the horrible memory that you can be sure you will not hear much about.

When one of the assailants, Eric Harris, was autopsied, the medical examiner found that under his black trench coat the boy had on a white t-shirt emblazoned with a peculiar slogan. The slogan was "Natural Selection." It was later reported but little commented upon that, on his website, Harris had written, among other paeans to the Darwinian mechanism, "Natural SELECTION!!!!!! God damn it's the best thing that ever happened to the earth. Getting rid of all the stupid and weak organisms...but it's all natural!!! YES!"

In this way, Klinghoffer seems to be claiming that these boys were simply following Darwin's ideas to their logical conclusions. One of the most obvious flaws in this theory is that gunning down random people is by definition neither natural nor selective, and dying a virgin as these boys undoubtedly did is clearly not the way to go in passing on your own traits to future generations. Given that the attack was carefully planned in advance by the pair, the massacre would be better described as having been intelligently designed.

Darwinism's modern day advocates prefer to forget that ideas have consequences. Yet even a scientific idea may have disastrous consequences, as Darwin's earliest critics foresaw. One such prophet was Darwin's own professor of natural science when he was at Cambridge, Adam Sedgwick.

In a letter to Darwin dated December 24, 1859, just after the Origin of Species had been published, Sedgwick warned that if the new book were successful in making its case, then "humanity, in my mind, would suffer a damage that might brutalize it, and sink the human race into a lower grade of degradation than any into which it has fallen since its written records tell us of its history."

Ideas can have consequences, but not inevitable consequences. Just because I can doesn't imply that I must, or even that I should. And in any case, consequences have no possible bearing on the truth value of the ideas they spring from. What we do with the knowledge we gain from science is up to us, and is a result of human behaviour, not the facts themselves.

A commenter, GHitch, posts:

Darwin predicted the slaughter of blacks and 'savages' by whites. His prediction was based entirely upon the logical conclusions of his theory. [Darwin stated that] "At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked, will no doubt be exterminated."

But this never happened, it was one of Darwin's predictions that turned out to be false. Does it therefore refute his theory of evolution by natural selection? No. It refutes the creationist's idea that Social Darwinism is an inevitable consequence. Yet Klinghoffer is insistent on this:

Ideas have consequences.

Now does that mean that the Darwinian idea is false as a scientific description of how life developed? No, obviously it doesn't mean that. As I've argued all along, Darwinism's social record is simply and nothing more than a good reason to take a second look at the science behind it.

So, the science may be true but let's pretend it's not? I don't really know how to reply to this bizarre concept. It's like saying that we should reconsider nuclear physics because of the terrible destructive power of the atomic bomb. "Let's invent a new model of atomic theory in which nuclear fission is impossible! Then we won't have to worry about nukes any more!".

Commenter Damien puts it another way:

What are you going to suggest in you next column? "That the theory for light and colour is the cause of racism?!"

If you've got a strong stomach and want to probe further into Klinghoffer's mindset, check out davidklinghoffer.org, which is mostly about his latest book "How Would God Vote? Why the Bible Commands you to be a Conservative".

I often write about materialism, a spreading, corrosive belief that material stuff is the only reality in the universe, that people are just an aspect of nature, more highly evolved versions of a fish or an ape.

That’s just a nice way of saying the end of Judaism, Christianity, and any sense that moral truths bear the stamp of divine authority – which in turn means the end of any really powerful argument for moral behavior.

It makes it much harder for all of us to be good, sapping our will to make hard moral choices.

Oh, boo hoo, we'll have to think for ourselves and take our own responsibilities. Grow up, David.

Richard Dawkins: Intricate and Beautiful

2009-04-21T17:40:00.000-07:00

I don't know if I'm the right person to be doing jokes about religion. In the last few months I've become religious, I've started believing in God and creationism and intelligent design, and the reason that I now believe in God and creationism and intelligent design is because of Professor Richard Dawkins. Because when I look at something as complex and intricate and beautiful as Professor Richard Dawkins, I don't think that could have just evolved by chance. Professor Richard Dawkins was put there by God to test us. Like fossils. And facts.

Stewart Lee

You can watch Lee's show about religion here.

Bathtub Arks Make the Story of Noah Seem Silly

2009-04-20T15:03:00.000-07:00

PhD-loving creationist Jonathan Sarfati hates "bathtub" arks:

I would recommend discarding most modern children’s ‘Bibles’, geared more toward entertainment than education, that present sanitized Bible stories. These caricatures of history reduce Noah’s Ark and the Deluge, for example, from a chronicle of sin, punishment, and redemption to a tale more in line with Ol’ MacDonald’s Farm, complete with ‘bathtub ark’ illustrations showing protruding giraffe necks and lacking dinosaurs. Consequently, when the children become adults, they erroneously believe that the Bible is disconnected from the real world.

Noah's ark without dinosaurs? How preposterous! Ken Ham agrees:

When children see the ‘bathtub ark’—what is it really saying to them? I suggest that, in a sense, it is reinforcing what the world is claiming: that Noah’s Ark was just a ‘story’ or ‘fairy tale,’ and that Noah couldn’t have accommodated all the animals on board—and certainly this kind of ark would not have survived a Flood. In the past, this issue may not have mattered as much, but in our present world, where the majority don’t want to believe they are sinners, under the judgment of a Holy God, they thus scoff at the event of Noah’s Flood.

They're right of course. Bible history shouldn't be dumbed down for children. We need more books like this one:

If Pixar Were Creationists...

2009-04-19T05:15:00.000-07:00

This animation attempts to refute evolution and unwittingly provides a great example of natural selection:

I Just Love This Creation Stuff

2009-04-09T17:50:00.000-07:00

Every so often I come across a creationist website so amateurish that it actually fills me with a sense of pity, and makes me feel a twinge of shame at drawing attention to it. It doesn't help when the site features pictures of the owners innocent, wide-eyed children. CreationSeminar.net is one of those sites. Now I can forgive the horrific layout, crazy fonts and text colors, and the dreadfully composed background image. We're not all experts of web design, after all. But the content is even more laughable than the way it's presented. This page is entitled "Evidences for a Young Earth". What evidence do they offer?

Outside of Shamokin, Pennsylvania a family has soda straws growing in the ceiling of their basement level garage. They gave us the four pictured on the right, which are on display at our conferences.

My gosh. I might just have to get tickets to their next conference so I can see these remarkable soda straws in person. They look so impressive in the photo:

The Earth is only 6,000 years old. Don't believe me? Check out these bad boys!!
Elsewhere on the site they're trying to hawk a bunch of DVDs on various creationism topics. I'm so tempted to order a set; judging from the website and this advertisement, these DVDs must have lower production values than the original Star Trek:

Topics on these DVDs include: Dinosaurs and Man Living Together, Dinosaurs Still Alive, Evolution is Dangerous, The Humanists Agenda in the Textbooks, and Animals and their Special Features. Order the complete set for just $120.

Wait, how much??

From the feedback page:

I just love this creation stuff. I can’t seem to get enough of it. This is one of the major areas which Satan has effectively used to deceive non-believers and simple minded Christians as well. If Satan can get us to put our faith in Darwin and his ilk, half his battle is won. Your very effective presentation of the Biblical account of creation has strengthened the saints of our church. You have provided us with answers to many of our questions, as well as given us knowledge to completely repel the enemies attack against the Biblical account of creation.

God bless you as you continue to labor for Him using common sense to explain the fallacies of Satan's hellish doctrine of Evolution.

Sounds Like A Fun Theory

2009-04-07T15:08:00.000-07:00

It's just a typo, but it's a good one:

They are starting to piss me off, the earth is not billions or millions of years old. They have no proof that the big band theory is true, but they teach it like it really happened.

I found it here, on the blog A-Deistic.

Creationists That Look Like Apes: C Everett Koop

2009-04-04T15:07:00.000-07:00

A Tale of Two Hitchens, Part II: Peter

2009-04-03T10:59:00.000-07:00

Christopher's younger brother Peter is also a journalist. He writes for British tabloid The Mail on Sunday, and unlike Chris, he has strong religious beliefs and has written several articles in favour of intelligent design. Let's look at a few quotes from these:

I didn't give my own view on the [evolution vs. intelligent design] controversy. This can be summarised in the words 'I have no idea who is right... and nor have they'.

Evolution is an established fact, Peter. It's been proven beyond doubt. Just because you are ignorant of the facts doesn't mean that everybody else is too.

'ID' is unlike Darwinism in that it specifically doesn't seek to offer a general theory of the origin of species. It is a sceptical current. It says 'there is something in the Darwinist argument which requires re-examination in the light of knowledge we didn't have until recently'.

The fact that intelligent design is religiously motivated is obvious to everyone, and only a nitwit would claim otherwise. So actually, the various, conflicting branches of intelligent design, like Christianity, Judaism and Islam, do indeed offer very specific theories regarding our origins, to be found in the relevant religious texts. Many pieces of scientific evidence (not just from biology) refute these theories.

Since Darwinism is orthodoxy, on which many careers have been built and continue to prosper, is it likely that an attack which threatens that orthodoxy is going to be sympathetically treated by other scientists?

Since evolution is true, many successful scientific predictions and discoveries have been made in light of it, and continue to be. Is it likely that any predictions that contradict this theory are going to be proven true?

Darwin's theory cannot be tested.

Of course it can be tested, it can also make predictions and can be very easily falsified. The famous example is J.B.S. Haldane's reply when asked what evidence could destroy his confidence in evolutionary theory. He simply answered "Fossil rabbits in the pre-Cambrian".

It is amazing how many supporters of [evolutionary] theory cannot see the difference between the micro-evolution of adaptation or alteration within species, and the far more ambitious developments of macro-evolution, in my view qualitatively different, which Darwinists believe in.

Peter, Peter. Imagine if you had never laid eyes on a dog before and I introduced you to the following two animals:

Could you honestly say that you would consider these animals to be the same "kind"? Their appearance, size and behaviour all differ dramatically, on a macroscopic level. This, right here, is macro-evolution, and it has occured over an incredibly short time (it's been around twelve thousand years or so since humans started to domesticate and selectively breed dogs from wolves). If this amazing variety can be obtained in such a short time, it's really not hard to extrapolate this and imagine what could happen over a few million years.

"Ah," you say, "but I could look at the anatomical structure of these creatures, even their genetic makeup, and I could prove that they are all dogs. They are still the same species." But biologists have applied these exact methods to thousands of living creatures all over the planet, and it turns out that we are all related, and the whole of life on Earth is laid out in a nested hierarchy, just as predicted by Darwin's theory:

The Tree of Life

As you might imagine, Peter and Chris don't get on so well. You can watch a terrific debate between the Hitchens brothers here.

A Tale of Two Hitchens, Part I: Christopher

2009-04-02T13:44:00.000-07:00

Christopher Hitchens, adapted from his recent Newsweek article:

[Creationists] now say that they ask for evolution to be taught only with all its "strengths and weaknesses." But in this, they are surely being somewhat disingenuous. When their faction was strong enough to demand an outright ban on the teaching of what they call "Darwinism," they had such a ban written into law in several states. Since the defeat and discredit of that policy, they have passed through several stages of what I am going to have to call evolution. First, they tried to get "secular humanism" classified as a "religion," so that it would meet the First Amendment's disqualification for being taught with taxpayers' money. (That bright idea was Pat Robertson's.) Then they came up with the formulation of "creation science," picking up on anomalies and gaps in evolution and on differences between scientific Darwinists like Richard Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould. Next came the ingratiating plea for "equal time"—what could be more American than that?—and now we have the rebranded new coinage of "intelligent design" and the fresh complaint that its brave advocates are, so goes the title of a recent self-pitying documentary, simply "expelled" from the discourse.

It's not just that the overwhelming majority of scientists are now convinced that evolution is inscribed in the fossil record and in the lineaments of molecular biology. It is more that evolutionists will say in advance which evidence, if found, would refute them and force them to reconsider. ("Rabbit fossils in the pre-Cambrian layer" was, I seem to remember, the response of Prof. J.B.S. Haldane.) Try asking an "intelligent design" advocate to stipulate upfront what would constitute refutation of his world view and you will easily see the difference between the scientific method and the pseudoscientific one.

But that is just my opinion. And I certainly do not want it said that my side denies a hearing to the opposing one. In the spirit of compromise, then, I propose the following. First, let the school debating societies restage the wonderful set-piece real-life dramas of Oxford and Dayton, Tenn. Let time also be set aside, in our increasingly multiethnic and multicultural school system, for children to be taught the huge variety of creation stories, from the Hindu to the Muslim to the Australian Aboriginal. This is always interesting (and it can't be, can it, that the Texas board holdouts think that only Genesis ought to be so honored?). Second, we can surely demand that the principle of "strengths and weaknesses" will be applied evenly. If any church in Texas receives a tax exemption, or if any religious institution is the beneficiary of any subvention from the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, we must be assured that it will devote a portion of its time to laying bare the "strengths and weaknesses" of the religious world view, and also to teaching the works of Voltaire, David Hume, Benedict de Spinoza, Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson.

Christopher Hitchens

How Many Creationists Does It Take To Change A Light Bulb?

2009-04-01T14:15:00.000-07:00

Three. One to insert the light-bulb, one to pray for the light-bulb to turn on, and one to explain how the light turning on is evidence of an intelligent designer.

Congrats to Mr Vorhias. Your prize is a genuine fossilized dinosaur saddle, which you can collect as soon as those creation scientists manage to dig one up.

Yahya's Minion

2009-03-30T14:11:00.000-07:00

I've posted recently about the infamous Harun Yahya, and now it seems that one of his worshippers is following this blog and leaving comments in defense of his idol. Jamshed Kunnoth is his name, and here is his blog, which is essentially a Harun Yahya link farm. I've no problem with creationists leaving spam in the comments section (see these other examples). This actually helps me out by increasing the amount of creationist idiocy on the site. So thanks Jamshed.

Anyways, I was checking out Jamshed's blog and, as you'd expect, it has some truly nutty content. Take this post for example, classic creationist paranoia about a worldwide "Darwinist conspiracy" and the "intellectual mafia". This part caught my eye:

[This global Darwinist mafia] bans books opposed to evolution

Well they're not doing a very good job of it! The last time I went to a bookstore, the science section had a frustratingly large number of books on intelligent design, like Darwin's Black Box by Michael Behe and Icons of Evolution by Jonathan Wells. I know that, technically, the subject of these books is evolution, but they are pure creationist propaganda masquerading as bona fide science. The only thing that stopped me from complaining to the store manager (aside from my wife) was the fact that the bibles and korans in the neighboring aisle were sharing shelf space with books on the occult, astrology, mysticism and witchcraft. At least they got something right.

And while we're on the subject of bannings, guess who persuaded the Turkish government to block access to Richard Dawkins' website?

Strangely, Jamshed's blog has links to Creationist Idiocy, as well as to other anti-creationism blogs like Pharyngula and The Sensuous Curmudgeon. Is this purely in the spirit of fairness and debate, or is Jamshed in fact a spoof? Jamshed?

UPDATE: As you can see, he's already replied below (ALL CAPS). And he's just put up a new post on his blog, which is his funniest ever. I still can't tell if he's the real deal or not. Go read his new post, decide for yourself, and vote in the poll at the top right.

UPDATE 2: Here's how people voted:

Jamshed: Real or Spoof?

Real - 1 (Is this you, Jamshed?)
Spoof - 3
I can't tell - 6

Harun Yahya's Dream Recording Device

2009-03-28T06:14:00.000-07:00

Harun Yahya, author of the lengthy creationist tome The Atlas of Creation, is starting to seem like a parody of a creationist with his vilification of Richard Dawkins, but even I admit that this is pretty funny.

Jesus and his Pet Dinosaur

2009-03-26T17:52:00.000-07:00

Via LOL god.

Competition Time!

2009-03-25T14:23:00.000-07:00

Come up with a punchline for the following joke. The wittiest answer will win a mystery prize!*

How many creationists does it take to change a light bulb?

*Prize may disappoint.

The Theroy of Evilution

2009-03-24T14:20:00.000-07:00

Time for another terrible creationist video. In this one, you can easily lose count of the fallacies, bad logic, misunderstandings and outright untruths, but the "revelation" at around the 1:10 mark (cued nicely to the music) and the, frankly, disturbing animation at the end elevate this video to so-bad-it's-good territory:

And if this video wasn't dumb enough for you, check out some of the comments left underneath it. CAUTION: The quotes below will likely knock your IQ down by several points. Please read them responsibly and in moderation.

Evolution IS EVIL!!! Evolution calls God and His Inspired Word liars!Evolution say's that we are nothing but an accident and that there is no real purpose to life,eat,drink and be merry for tomorrow we die, it goes against everything the Inspired Scriptures teaches us.Evolution is responsible for six million jews being m#acred in nazi Germany,seventy-four million people in China,thirty million in the USSR and untold millions in Cambodia,Vietnam,Uganda and other parts of the world!

for those of you who believe we evolved from apes 1 question. Why are there no more human lines walking out of the jungle evolving from current lines of the ape species.

Its amazing that christians are a threat to atheism . If they dont beleive in God why are we a threat ? Because deep down in there heart they are afraid that God is not a fairy tale . Evolution will always be a fairy tale and God is real . I hit two rocks together the other day and could not make a human , go figure .

Evolution is so absurd that it is widely accepted by absurdity proponents. Like I stated before, evolution is just a side-stepping mechanism to accountability.

I don't care if 100% of the biological community accept it. If you purposely take God out of the equation you are being *dumb on purpose*.

evolution is not a fact. It is a theroy. The reason it is called a theroy is that it can't be proved.

Finally, here's my favourite:

Science is catching up with and confirming the Bible. Not to mention that the Bible also foretold vast communications technology such as television and satellites. When in Matthew 24:30 it says everyone will see the Son of Man coming in the Clouds. Revelations says every eye will see him. This given at the time in which none of this was possible.

That's right, you heard it here first. The second coming of Jesus Christ will be seen across the globe: live via satellite, on pay-per-view!

A Fundamental Difference in Method

2009-03-23T14:43:00.000-07:00

This cartoon from Answers in Genesis illustrates the creationist argument that science and creationism are just two different ways of interpreting evidence; that since both approaches start with ad hoc presuppositions, they are equally valid. Which is, of course, nonsense. Science makes no assumptions, it simply follows wherever the evidence leads. In reality, the difference between science and creationism is more like the cartoon below:

Unintelligent Design III: Whale Leg Bones

2009-03-20T14:50:00.001-07:00

This image shows leg bones removed from a humpback whale captured off the coast of Britih Columbia in 1919, including femur, tibia, tarsus and metatarsal. The whale had two symmetrical hind legs, which were over four feet long and covered in normal blubber and skin. There's no doubt that this whale was a rare anomaly, and that its legs were a mutation, but why would a whale possess the genes for making hind legs in the first place? It seems that either whales evolved from four-legged land-dwelling animals, or that God was, let's say, a little sloppy when he magicked them out of thin air.

You can read more about vestigial organs here.

The Vatican Embarassment Continues...

2009-03-19T05:37:00.000-07:00

Just days after the Pope warned against "superstitious religions" (!!!), Vatican astronomer Guy Consolmagno describes creationism as:

a "kind of paganism" because it harks back to the days of "nature gods" who were responsible for natural events.

He's wrong, most creationists don't claim that God is responsible for natural events. Rather, they claim that events like the creation of man are entirely God's work, with no natural explanation at all.

And is the Vatican now admitting that God isn't responsible for natural events? Sounds like deism to me...

Finally, about the Pope, he says:

It's not like he has a magic power, that God whispers the truth in his ear.

Bill Jack's Freudian Slip

2009-03-18T14:17:00.000-07:00

That Washington Post article that I posted about a few days ago has a brilliant Freudian slip that I somehow missed the first time I read it. It's from Bill Jack, a Christian leadership instructor who works for a company called Biblically Correct Tours:

Why should we be afraid to test our worldview against reality?

Bill Jack

Michael Shermer: The Patience of a Saint

2009-03-16T15:47:00.000-07:00

I have no idea how Shermer keeps such a cool head in this interview with God-fearing creationist Georgia Purdom. What a guy:

If you couldn't stomach the video in its entirety, the following quote is a good summary of Georgia's position:

I have a five year old daughter. She's a guilty sinner.

Georgia Purdom

Via PZ.

Creationists That Look Like Apes: The Duggars

2009-03-14T08:16:00.000-07:00

The Four Components of Creation Science

2009-03-13T05:58:00.000-07:00

Pharyngula's PZ Myers just posted another classic gaffe from a creationist blog, and this one made me laugh out loud:

Anyone who knows me at all knows that I break down creationist biology into four main components: design, natural evil, systematics, speciation, and biogeography.

Todd Wood

DeWitt-less Fool

2009-03-11T14:07:00.000-07:00

There's an article in the Washington Post describing Liberty "University" Professor David DeWitt's creationism-themed tours around the Smithsonian. Here's what he has to say about the museum:

There's nothing balanced here. It's completely, 100 percent evolution-based.

I think he means: "There's nothing supernatural here. It's completely, 100 percent evidence-based."

This man is shamelessly indoctrinating students with archaic and long-disproven theories. Like the tale of a 6000-year-old Earth that was somehow magically constructed by a mysterious entity that exists outside of physical space. And he calls himself a Professor? Let's hear about his institution, from a proper scientist:

God Tube is now "Tangle"

2009-03-09T15:16:00.000-07:00

Here's another creationist video from "Tangle" (I guess "God Tube" exposed their intentions a little too clearly) that dredges up some of the more naive creationist arguments:

They're correct that evolution is not repeatable in the sense that we can watch humans evolve from fish again, but it is observable. Check out Richard Lenski's Long Term Evolution Experiment for a great example of this.

And Darwin was concerned about the lack of transitional fossils in the geological record, but that was well over a century ago. Since then, hundreds have been discovered, including transitional forms between fish and reptiles, reptiles and birds, and apes and humans.

This page goes into fascinating detail about the evolution of whales from land-dwelling quadrupeds, with half a dozen transitional forms described. This evidence alone is utterly convincing, and it's just a fraction of what we have.

It would be nice if creationists could present just a single piece of evidence for their own theories beyond a 2000 year old book.

More laughably inept creationist propaganda from "Tangle" in future posts.

Moron of the Month: Jonathan Sarfati

2009-03-07T05:48:00.000-08:00

Australian-born creationist and chess chimp Jonathan Sarfati helps to run Creation Ministries International, an organization that while openly founded on biblical literalism, pushes the "creation science" angle and attempts to refute real science such as evolution and the big bang theory using scientific-sounding ideas.

One of the ways this organization tries to make its theories sound more credible is to constantly remind people that many of its contributors have PhDs obtained from "secular" (i.e. genuine) scientific institutions. This is a very common creationist tactic which I've written about before, and Jonathan Sarfati is one of the worst offenders I know of. Sarfati has a PhD in physical chemistry, and recently I've been trawling through creation.com's feedback section and counting the number of times he's drawn attention to this fact. I've found so many instances of this, I've had to cut my search short, so the following list is far from comprehensive:

I speak as one with a Ph.D. in physical chemistry

Dr Sarfati is a Ph.D. physical chemist

(Dr) Jonathan Sarfati

I have a Ph.D. in physical chemistry as well as being trained in formal logic,

As a Ph.D. physical chemist, needing no instruction in thermodynamics,

I’m a Ph.D. scientist

I’m one of many creationist Ph.D. scientists

I’m a Ph.D. physical chemist

Dr Jonathan Sarfati, whose Ph.D. is in physical chemistry, of which thermodynamics is an important part.

Ph.D. physical chemist Dr Jonathan Sarfati

Since my speciality for my Ph.D. thesis and the incorporated published papers was vibrational spectroscopy, I'm extremely familiar with harmonic oscillator wavefunctions.

one does cover such things in a chemistry Ph.D as one of us (JS) has earned

Which particular parts of human knowledge are we supposedly ignorant of? Perhaps chemistry, although I have a doctorate in it?

Ph.D. chemist Dr Jonathan Sarfati

Nice to meet a fellow Ph.D. chemist :)

I actually wonder whether Miller or this critic actually understand quantum physics (an important part of my own Ph.D. research).

I myself have an earned doctorate in science, and co-authored a paper in Nature on high-Tc superconductors when only 22.

Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D. (which included papers involving NMR spectroscopy published in secular journals, incidentally)

He does indeed have his name on a 1987 Nature paper, although his exact contribution to the paper is not clear. As well as this he has five other papers published in scientific journals, but he hasn't published outside of creationist literature since 1995 and his h-index currently stands at a lowly 3, with several of his papers having never received a single citation.

As well as responding to criticism from christians and non-christians alike with a sneering and condescending tone, Sarfati is also keen on quoting scripture, so I'll finish by doing the same:

When pride comes, then comes disgrace; but with the humble is wisdom.

Proverbs 11:2

Ray Comfort at Yale?

2009-03-05T14:23:00.000-08:00

I'm trying not to post too much about Ray Comfort because, since rising to notoriety after his banana video, he seems to have embraced his reputation as "that dumb creationist" all too readily, and is unashamedly milking this persona to gain publicity. But this article on WND about his amusingly-titled new book has a quote too good not to mention:

...if I can convince myself that there is no God, it means I am not morally accountable, and evolution opens the door to a whole lot of sinful delicacies such as pornography, fornication, lying, theft, and of course writing bad reviews for a book I haven't read.

Porn is a "sinful delicacy"? How repressed can he get?

The article also states that Ray "has argued against atheism at Yale University". This is exactly why Richard Dawkins is reluctant to debate him. Allowing the guy to participate in a debate at Yale only lets him boast of this fact, even if he performed terribly and lost the debate (and does anyone doubt that this was the case?). He's using this to create an illusion of academic respectability that he hasn't earned and doesn't deserve.

At the end of the article it says that he's been "snubbed" by Dawkins. No, Ray. People of importance, people that matter, are snubbed. People like you are simply ignored.

Conscious Atoms, Confused Bees and the Evil Face of Richard Dawkins

2009-03-04T14:30:00.000-08:00

I've quit my other blog to concentrate on this one, partly because there is just so much creationist stupidity out there. Take this page for example. It's by creationism's Turkish Titan Harun Yahya, and there's enough comedy gold on this single webpage alone to keep this blog going for the rest of the year. The theme is "What Darwinists Never Realize", and you often really have to wonder what point he's trying to make. Example:

Darwinists never realize that the atoms they claim gave rise to all life on Earth are in fact unconscious entities.

What, he thinks that evolution requires atoms to talk to each other and to organize themselves into DNA via a little committee meeting?

Darwinists never realize that the theory of evolution, a fictitious hypothesis put forward under the primitive 19th-century understanding of science, has not been confirmed by any scientific findings or experiments so far.

Fictitious hypothesis? And the 19th century's understanding of science was at least more advanced than the Koran.

In claiming that life emerged as the result of blind chance, Darwinists never realize that the odds of a single, average-sized protein molecule forming by chance are 1 in 10300.

Uh-oh, I think he missed a superscript somewhere...

Darwinists never realize how it is possible for the queen bee, whose brain is just a few cubic millimeters in size and consists of very simple nerve nodes, to understand of her own will and with her own intelligence for what purpose the comb cells are built and to lay the appropriate eggs, with no confusion ever arising.

Lack of confusion in bees = death of darwinism? Seriously?

Elsewhere on the site he's posted some scary looking photos of Richard Dawkins in what appears to be an effort to demonize the guy. But what looks scarier? This:

Or this:

Cast your vote in the poll on the right!

EDIT: In a remarkably close contest, Harun Yahya's spooky visage wins by 16 votes to 11.

The Crocoduck Exists!

2009-03-01T06:43:00.000-08:00

(via The Friendly Atheist)

A new specimin of Cameron and Comfort's required proof for evolution, the Crocoduck, has been found:

Pelagornithid

The unusually intact fossilized skull of a giant, bony-toothed seabird that lived up to 10 million years ago was found on Peru's arid southern coast, researchers said Friday.

With fossils discovered in North America, North Africa and even Antarctica, the birds were ubiquitous only a few million years before humans evolved and scientists puzzle over why they died out. Some believe they are related to gannets and pelicans, while other say they are related to ducks.

Let's keep an eye on Ray Comfort's blog to see his response.

Knitted From Embryos

2009-02-26T15:16:00.000-08:00

More fun courtesy of Creation on the Web. This time it's a letter responding to a poll about stem cell research:

I cannot believe that so many visitors of your web-site would be in favor of this research. They must know that this process kills the embryos. God knit us in our mother’s womb — from embryos.

Creationists That Look Like Apes: Ray Comfort

2009-02-24T16:00:00.000-08:00

The easiest one I've ever done.

Marriage According to Genesis

2009-02-21T13:40:00.000-08:00

And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah.

Genesis 4:19

...so don't ever let a creationist (or christian for that matter) tell you about the traditional meaning of marriage being between "one man and one woman".

Creationism's Biggest Flaw

2009-02-18T05:23:00.000-08:00

From SMBC.

Where are the Transitional Fossils??

2009-02-17T05:31:00.000-08:00

Well, here's one (thanks Ron):

And here's the fascinating story behind its discovery, well worth taking the time to watch:

Beware of the Blob!

2009-02-15T12:50:00.000-08:00

I'm currently trawling through Creation on the Web's feedback section for an upcoming post on PhD scientist Dr Jonathan Sarfati, PhD, who has a doctoral PhD in physical chemistry at PhD level. That should give you a clue as to the subject of the post (HINT: he has a PhD!), meantime I found the below quote here:

I have never believed in evolution because I knew My God was more powerful than that and would not have made a blob in His image!

Helen Wright

Happy Birthday Charles Darwin

2009-02-12T06:35:00.000-08:00

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.

Charles Darwin

Morons of the Month: A Holy Trinity of Stupid

2009-02-09T15:03:00.000-08:00

Since there are far more creationist morons than there are months in the year, it's time to play catch up. Here are February's top three morons:

3. Theology professor Tom Frame

For this embarassing article, in which he wonders why people who accept the fact of evolution don't let it utterly dominate their lives:

[Richard Dawkins] won't take his depiction of Darwinism to logical conclusions. A dedicated Darwinian would welcome imperialism, genocide, mass deportation, ethnic cleansing, eugenics, euthanasia, forced sterilisations and infanticide. Publicly, he advocates none of them.

PZ Myers effortlessly swats this bothersome fly:

While Newton described the acceleration of falling bodies accurately, it does not imply in any way that he he advocated pushing people off of tall buildings. Rational people might be able to see that.

2. Answers in Genesis' UK Spokesperson Paul Taylor

For making the UK look as retarded as Kansas in this debate. Watch how, as his tired old arguments fall flat, he gets frustrated and his head starts to redden and swell up like a big balloon. Quick, somebody loosen his tie or it's gonna explode!

Peter Atkins owns everyone right there. That's how it's done.

1. Marie Jon

For one of the most unconvincing and poorly-written piles of drivel I've ever had the misfortune to read. Marc Draco has already posted about it on his blog Abusing the News. Apparently Marie is aspiring to become the new Ann Coulter. On the basis of this piece, she's far more likely to become the new Sarah Palin. I'll let you decide which is worse. Rather than provide a proper critique of the article, I can't resist picking out a select few of Marie's insightful observations:

Why should young people believe in a half-hearted Creator who willy-nilly allowed things to sort of fall into place?

Animals, bugs, trees, and plants do not have the capacity to reason as human beings do.

A big brown-eyed raccoon might be capable of figuring out how to open your garbage can, but not one raccoon has ever celebrated a wedding anniversary, or thought of buying its mate a birthday present.

At this very moment, a mansion is being prepared for those who love Him. There is no housing debacle where the most Holy God abides. Your heavenly home has already been paid for by a loving Savior.

She also claims that "only people have minds that can critically think and deduce complex things". Her article is convincing evidence to the contrary.

Marrying Relatives: Inadvisable

2009-02-08T15:56:00.000-08:00

On Cain marrying his sister (or possibly mother):

...there was nothing ‘sick’ about it, because laws against brother-sister intermarriage were not introduced until the time of Moses. Before then, there were few genetic defects (mutations) that today make it inadvisable for close relatives to marry. For example, Abraham was able, both biologically and morally, to marry his half-sister Sarah (and their descendants are the Jewish/Hebrew people).

From here.

Creationists That Look Like Apes: Buddy Davis

2009-02-04T17:51:00.000-08:00

Attenborough on Evolution

2009-01-30T15:38:00.000-08:00

Creationist Logic (or lack thereof)

2009-01-28T15:37:00.000-08:00

I was browsing Creation Moments for something quick to post, and it didn't take me long to find this gem. It's from an article discussing whether Noah's flood was local or global:

After the Flood, God made a covenant promise with Noah and all mankind that the waters would never again become a flood to destroy all flesh (Gen. 9:11-15). There have been many local floods since, so either God has broken His covenant promise or the Genesis Flood was global.

This lazy, sloppy logic reminds me of CS Lewis's pathetic "trilemma" argument, in which Lewis states that since Jesus claimed to be God, he must either be "Lord, liar or lunatic", then sets out to disprove the latter two options (and fails). Lewis's brand of apologetics is famous for featuring false choices presented as logical arguments, and is easily refuted.

Baraminology

2009-01-26T05:49:00.000-08:00

Modern genetics proves conclusively that all life on earth is related to a single ancestor, and provides a remarkably accurate way to determine how closely certain species or animal populations are related to each other. Creationists, however, reject evolution and common descent, which poses problems for them with regards to the classification of life. Baraminology is the ham-fisted, pseudoscientific result. It stems, of course, from the bible:

Then God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind: cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth after their kind"; and it was so.

Genesis 1:24

So God created the different kinds of animals, and you'll often hear creationists talking about "kinds" as if it's a definable term. But it's a vague and imprecise distinction, and we really need better definitions than "creeping things" and "beasts". Baraminologists therefore attempt to classify life into kinds, or "baramin", using techniques shamelessly stolen from evolutionary biology. Since God created the "dog" kind, but not individual breeds of dogs (these are man-made by selective breeding, a genuine form of evolution which even the most hardened creationists are forced to admit to), baraminology has to include in its model some genetic mutation and diversification down the generations. Sound familiar? Check out one of their diagrams:

...which bears more than a little resemblance to the evolutionary "tree of life":

From creationwiki:

Genetic and physiological similarities are not seen as evidence of common ancestry, because there is no evidence available to refute the possibility that the genetic similarities are a result of a similar design being used on different "kinds."

This is the same flawed logic as saying "the theory of gravity is rejected because there is no evidence available to refute the possibility of God pushing objects downwards".

While the baraminologist's model is basically evolution-lite, and concedes a lot of ground to the opposition (including the occurence of macroevolution), it does go some way to explaining how Noah fitted all those animals onto his ark, since he would only have needed two of each kind, not two of each species. This is the main reason for the popularity of the word "kinds" among creationists, and is a good demonstration of how these ignorami place a greater importance on their ridiculous and childish stories than on the real world.

You can read more about the fascinating world of baraminology here.

Remarkable Precision

2009-01-22T18:54:00.000-08:00

Heaven and earth, centre and circumference, were created together, in the same instant, and clouds full of water. . . . this work took place and man was created by the Trinity on the twenty-third of October, 4004 B.C., at nine o'clock in the morning.

John Lightfoot (Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge), 1859

Creationists That Look Like Apes: George W Bush

2009-01-19T15:23:00.000-08:00

In honour of his last day on the job.

Unintelligent Design II: The Panda's Thumb

2009-01-16T14:31:00.000-08:00

The Panda's Thumb is a much more serious and scientific blog countering creationism, and I recommend it. It's named after a very famous piece of unintelligent design. A panda's paw consists of five digits each with a claw, similar to a regular bear. But pandas also have a sixth digit, a rudimentary opposably thumb that evolved from a small bone called a radial sesamoid, which in bears and other creatures is only used for strengthening connective tissue. Pandas can press this thumb against their palms and use it to grip bamboo shoots. If the panda had been designed for eating bamboo, it would make much more sense to have a "proper" opposable thumb like the rest of us.

You can read more about the panda's thumb here.

Where Did The Light Come From?

2009-01-13T14:32:00.000-08:00

Grigory taught [Smerdyakov] to read and write, and when he was twelve years old, began teaching him the Scriptures. But this teaching came to nothing. At the second or third lesson the boy suddenly grinned.

"What's that for?" asked Grigory, looking at him threateningly from under his spectacles.

"Oh, nothing. God created light on the first day, and the sun, moon and stars on the fourth day. Where did the light come from on the first day?"

Grigory was thunderstruck. The boy looked sarcastically at his teacher. There was something positively condescending in his expression. Grigory could not restrain himself. "I'll show you where!" he cried and gave the boy a violent slap on the cheek.

The Brothers Karamazov

Slow Evolution and Slow Mindedness

2009-01-11T08:16:00.000-08:00

It must be impossible to distill creationist stupidity into a more concise form than the following statement, made by North Carolina resident Joel Fanti:

If evolution is so slow, why don't we see anything evolving now?

Joel Fanti

Via PZ.

Creationists That Look Like Apes: Ben Stein

2009-01-09T12:28:00.000-08:00

Where Did The Earth's Water Come From?

2009-01-08T14:24:00.000-08:00

If you thought the email in my previous post was stupid, wait until you read this letter, published in the Dothan Eagle and brought to the blogosphere's attention by Pharyngula's PZ Myers. Here's an excerpt:

Of all the mysteries surrounding evolution, the one that is most baffling to the evolutionists, is "water." Where did all the oceans come from?

As explained on the National Geographic program, it came from a massive collision in space. As the Earth was cooling from the Big Bang, it was approached by a stray planet that was teeming with water. It collided with Earth, spilled its water onto the Earth, then careened off into space.

Talk about fairy tales. By the way, where did the stray planet get its water?

Come on evolutionists, surely you can develop a more plausible explanation that can be easier to swallow. Until then, I accept the Bible's answer. After all, the 4,000-year-old book has a perfect track record.

But here's the rub: the bible doesn't actually provide an answer to where the Earth's water came from. Here's what it says:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
And God made the firmament and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

Genesis 1:1-7

So it seems that the water was already there to begin with, before god even showed up.

The Pterosaurs of Guantanamo

2009-01-07T14:28:00.000-08:00

An email posted on this webpage:

This year I bought a computer, got on the web and am enjoying the fruits of this "Information Age". Naturally, I've investigated sites which are of especial interest to myself...such as Pterosaurs. Why pterosaurs? Because in the summer of 1971 while stationed at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, I saw 2 of them flying leisurely overhead at no more than 200 ft distance. I haven't had much success telling people about it - they're all believers of the lies of evolution, etc. Now with the internet I've seen some corroboration. When I wrote to National Geographic years ago they informed me that Pterosaurs have been extinct for millions of years. Shows what they know. The arrogance of people amazes me. They're in New York, I was in Cuba; but they feel confident telling me what I saw. I wish someone would shoot one or capture it alive and cram it down National Geographic's throat.

Thanks for the site,

Eskin Cuhn

Henry Rollins on Intelligent Design

2009-01-06T14:35:00.000-08:00

Henry Rollins sums it up nicely:

Via Josh Stein.

Dust Shalt Thou Eat

2009-01-05T14:44:00.000-08:00

And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.

Genesis 3:14

When was the last time you saw a serpent eating dust?

Ken Ham: Man is a Sinner

2009-01-03T08:38:00.001-08:00

Sinner

BM: Scientists line up overwhelmingly on one side of this issue. It would have to be an enormous conspiracy going on between scientists of all different disciplines, in all different countries, to have such a consensus. That doesn’t move you?

KH: No, not at all, because from a biblical perspective I understand why the majority would not agree with the truth. Man is a sinner, man is rebelling against his creator.

BM: All these scientists are sinners?

KH: Well… (shrugs)

Ken Ham, discussing creationism with Bill Maher in the documentary Religulous.

Moron of the Month: Steven Robinson

2009-01-01T07:08:00.000-08:00

Steven Robinson runs the website earthhistory.org.uk. As you might expect, it's intellectually vacant drivel with the usual moribund creationist arguments, but at least it has some originality. Here's his theory:

In this website it is suggested that the world, although created, was subsequently destroyed and thereby metamorphosed, so that its ultimate origin was hidden. This is inferred from both rocks and fossils. We cannot go all the way back to the beginning, but what has been preserved and can be investigated points back to a creation.

So God is covering his tracks?

If all the evidence suggests that the Earth and life arose by natural processes, what should we conclude? That indeed they did, or that God made them look that way? Ever heard of Occam's razor, Steven? He goes on:

‘Life’ is something different from molecules. Life has to do with consciousness. Although bacteria and plants use the same DNA language as other organisms, they are not life in the sense that animals are. Our own experience as conscious beings tells us that there is more to reality than can be accounted for by molecules, however complex their organisation.

“Life has to do with consciousness.” It should be obvious to a child that defining life in this way can't work. First, is an unconscious person dead by this definition? Second, how do you know animals are conscious in the same way that we are? Granted that cats and dogs seem to be conscious on some intuitive level (which is already difficult to define), but what about a worm or a clam? Are these animals "less alive"? There is no clear line one can draw to separate organisms that seem conscious from those that appear not to be. And if Steven concedes that plants are material objects that could have come about by natural processes, then why not animals too, since they are made from exactly the same building blocks.

This is a classic example of how creation science is invariably wordy, superficial and lacking in any real substance once you probe beyond the surface and start asking about the details. Where is the evidence for this claim? Where is the data? Steven has none, just his own ill-conceived opinions.

Certain ancient oral traditions about the beginning could be an important part of the total evidence. Unless we assume at the outset that the world is billions of years old, these might go back a long way and represent an authentic collective memory of how things originated. Science seeks to build up a historical explanation that is independent of this memory, but since it addresses the same questions (‘How did the world come into being? Where did man come from? Where did animals come from?), might not each throw light on the other?

Ah here we go. Now, Steven, why only certain ancient oral traditions? How would you discriminate between the countless thousands of ancient stories, texts and traditions? Surely not based on your own particular religion? That wouldn't be very scientific, would it?

Circumnavigating the Intellect

2008-12-29T16:18:00.000-08:00

Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort, from creationist propaganda video "The Evolution Zone":

Cameron: “When you learn how to speak to a person’s conscience and circumnavigate the intellect, the subject of evolution seems to disappear.”

Comfort: “... this is real good news for people like me. It means that I don’t have to become an expert on the fossil record and learn big words like Rhinorhondothackasaurus...”

Cameron: “Now are we trying to be anti-intellectual or avoid talking about the subject of evolution? Of course not...”

Here's the full video:

Creationists That Look Like Apes: Francis Schaeffer

2008-12-22T05:36:00.000-08:00

Eddie Izzard on Genesis

2008-12-19T10:05:00.000-08:00

Another Bizarre AiG Cartoon

2008-12-17T17:39:00.000-08:00

Well, unlike the last AiG cartoon I posted, I can at least kind of see what they are trying to say with this, but there are so many things wrong with this diagram. First, how is evolution an opinion? It's a scientific theory that has been established as a true fact. Truth isn't a matter of opinion. Second, how on earth can homosexual behaviour stem from evolution when procreation is the driving mechanism? Same applies to abortion, if we want to evolve as a species we should be squeezing kids out left, right and centre. Third, how does believing in creation provide an answer to the meaning of life? Do any creationists reading this care to explain?

Noah's Ark Zoo Farm

2008-12-15T14:26:00.000-08:00

Noah's Ark Zoo Farm is a creationist-run zoo in the south west of England, aimed (admirably) at teaching children where food comes from, but also (far less admirably) at brain-washing kids into believing religious claptrap. The Guardian's James Russell visited the farm a couple of years ago:

When I visited Wraxall with my son's nursery group, we went to the animal show and learned the difference between a cow's horn and a deer's antler. We learnt that ewes have udders, and we watched the presenter milk a ewe and drink the milk. Then events took a curious turn. A donkey was led in and the presenter traced a marking on its back. Did we know that the domesticated donkey has a dark cross marked on its back, he asked us casually, whereas the wild donkey doesn't? Did the cross not remind us that the donkey carried Jesus?

This page on the farm's website claims that "Evolutionism is as much faith as Creationism is". Putting aside the poor grammar, as well as the dreadful, misleading word "evolutionism" (should we start refering to doctors as "medicinists"?), this claim is of course indefensible. Science is based on evidence, not faith (which is defined as belief despite a lack of evidence). The page goes on to give a brief run-down of some of the major steps in evolution, implying that they are each unsupported by any facts or data. For example:

13. Birds such as Archaeopteryx, complete with wings, feathers etc, evolved from an unknown theropod dinosaur.

This is a common creationist tactic; creationists have not a shred of evidence for their beliefs, so one strategy is to point out weaknesses in the alternative. These "weaknesses" usually amount to a certain specific detail that has not yet been accounted for. Richard Dawkins summed it up: “I bet you don’t know how the elbow joint of the lesser-spotted weasel frog evolved. You don’t? Right then. God did it.”

This approach is doomed to failure.

In order for their case against evolution to be understood by their audience, creationists must first present evolution, how it works, and what it implies. But given the simplicity of the theory, and the fact that it can be understood without recourse to any mathematics or advanced concepts, and the sheer number of phenomena that it can explain so satisfactorily (Dobzhansky said that "nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution"), do creationists really want their followers to be exposed to it?

A theologian recently thanked the organizers of the UK atheist bus campaign for keeping God in the public sphere. Well, the same applies to evolution. Creationists are bringing Darwin and Wallace's theory directly into the churches and sunday schools, and Noah's Ark Zoo Farm is planting the seeds of the theory directly into the minds of young children before they've even attended a science class. We can only hope that these kids are bright enough to figure out the truth for themselves.

Bay of Fundie

2008-12-12T18:53:00.000-08:00

I've recently discovered Bay of Fundie, a popular blog by Ron Britton that aims to "keep the radical right at bay":

The Bay of Fundie is dedicated to preserving the Constitutional separation of Church and State, which is under attack by extreme Christian fundamentalists. It features commentary on news and politics, and an in-depth analysis of the fundie agenda.

Ron has kindly added Creationist Idiocy to the site's blogroll, for which I'm grateful. Bay of Fundie currently has 119 posts on the subject of creationism, so I'll no doubt be reading through these in the future for "inspiration" (read: robbing him blind). In the meantime, head over there and check out his blog for yourself.

Creation Science FAIL

2008-12-12T05:33:00.001-08:00

This page describes an "eight-year scientific research project", the results of which were presented at a community church in 1997. Let's look at one of their findings:

Dr. Andrew Snelling, an Australian geologist on the team, performed a detailed study of radiohalos (microscopic circular marks left on mica crystals from radioactive decay). He studied over 3,485 slides made from seventy rock samples from Australia, England, Norway, and the United States. The radiohalos caused by the decay of uranium and polonium strongly suggests rapid decay, not a gradual decay process over billions of years. This evidence of rapid nuclear decay, creation scientists believe, is due to catastrophic conditions produced by a worldwide flood.

A flood affecting the rate of nuclear decay? FAIL.

No Parking Without God

2008-12-11T05:49:00.000-08:00

The Secular Alliance of Indiana University recently visited the Creation Museum, and made a video about it. It's both frightening and hilarious:

Visit their blog to read more.

Krazy Kent Hovind

2008-12-10T05:18:00.000-08:00

What I think happened is, the hippies of the sixties are now the college professors. They are still radical Communists who still want to destroy this country. One of the things they must do to be successful is bankrupt this country, make the currency useless, and put the people in poverty. Environmental issues are a great way to bankrupt the country.

Kent Hovind

Moron of the Month: Buddy Davis

2008-12-05T12:48:00.000-08:00

Watch in horror as Buddy Davis simultaneously perverts the fields of science and the arts:

Other classics songs by Buddy include Billions of Dead Things (a sing-along tune written for kids*) and Where Did Cain's Wife Come From:

Neanderthal's man was as human as us
But there's a big problem that we must discuss
It's a puzzle that bothers my life
Where in the world did Cain get his wife?
Genesis four seventeen stumps me
It's about Cain and our family tree
When Cain slew Abel and he had to run
Where did Cain's wife come from?
Hmm...

CHORUS:
Brother married sister when the earth was young
People married their close re-la-tion
Adam and Eve had daughters and sons
In the beginning that's how it was done

Yup, we're all descendents of an incestuous murderer. Isn't God wonderful?

*There was a video of this song on YouTube a while ago but it's been taken down. I'll keep an eye out for it and post it if it returns, it really is something to see.

A Minor Victory, but a Victory Nonetheless

2008-12-02T14:39:00.000-08:00

PZ Myers, University of Minnesota biology prof and owner of Pharyngula (one of the biggest science blogs out there) recently raised awareness of an evil plot by Ken Ham's Creation Museum to team up with Cincinnati Zoo and sell joint tickets to both institutions. As PZ rightly points out, this is a tactic to give the Creation Museum some cred by partnering it with real science. While the Creation Museum might appear at first to be a harmless, kitsch curiosity, its purpose is to indoctrinate people with harmful creationist beliefs. As Pharygula commenter BobC puts it:

The lying scum Ken Ham mentally abuses children while their brain-dead parents watch approvingly.

Well, as soon as PZ brought this news to the blogosphere's attention, Cincinnati Zoo started recieving complaints by phone and email and has now cancelled the scheme! And poor old Ham, he's not too happy about it, blaming his defeat on "intolerant evolutionists":

These people basically worship Darwin — they worship evolution and cannot tolerate anyone who doesn’t agree with them!

Actually, there might be an element of truth in that first part...

Another Bizarre Cartoon from AiG

2008-11-26T05:34:00.000-08:00

Krazy Kent Hovind

2008-11-24T05:34:00.001-08:00

I believe the Great Pyramid was built to be the Bible in stone. The Egyptians did not build it.

Kent Hovind

Lamest Cartoons Ever?

2008-11-21T08:19:00.000-08:00

These cartoons are by Daniel Nuckols, who has a whole bunch of them online. They're so bad that they're kind of fascinating. Some of them are just downright bizarre, though. Apparently, evilutionists aren't the only sinners he's slicing up with his razor-sharp satire. He seems to have something against vegetarians:

Oh, and the loch ness monster is real:

Fast Fossilization

2008-11-19T13:34:00.000-08:00

Recently this petrified human brain site has been getting some attention. I have no idea whether it's real or a parody, but this kind of thing is certainly common among creationist arguments. I've already posted about the fossilized teddy bear, and the below image shows what is apparently a fossilized human foot, still inside its boot:

These nutjobs don't seem to realize that the time it takes for fossils to form is entirely irrelevant. What matters is the age of the fossils since formation, and many independent dating techniques (radiometric dating, fission-track dating, paleomagnetism, amino acid dating) all agree that dinosaur bones are many millions of years old.

Indoctrination

2008-11-17T11:57:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Josh Stein for the video.

The Creationist's Survival Kit

2008-11-12T16:44:00.000-08:00

Krazy Kent Hovind

2008-11-08T15:26:00.000-08:00

Obviously, several different colors of people exist on the earth that have distinctive characteristics, but they are the same race. One theory says that Adam and Eve were medium-brown, possibly because they were made from the earth.

Kent Hovind

Moron of the Month: Ken Ham

2008-11-06T05:32:00.001-08:00

The most ape-like of all creationists, Ken Ham runs the notorious Answers in Genesis, which epouses a literal interpretation of the biblical account of creation, and also opened the Creation Museum in Kentucky. The Answers in Genesis website is a treasure-trove of idiocy (and even blatant, almost Nazi-esque rascism), and as with last month's moron Kent Hovind, Ham has been so active that he's almost too easy a target for this blog (another blog has torn him to pieces recently too). Of all Ham's articles and quotes that I've come across, the following is my favourite. Ken Ham clearly believes that he's some kind of philosophical ninja. Don't try to use logic against him because he'll blow your mind:

A young man approached me at a seminar and stated, ‘Well, I still believe in the big bang, and that we arrived here by chance random processes. I don’t believe in God.’ I answered him, ‘Well, then obviously your brain, and your thought processes, are also the product of randomness. So you don’t know whether it evolved the right way, or even what right would mean in that context. Young man, you don’t know if you’re making correct statements or even whether you’re asking me the right questions.’

The young man looked at me and blurted out, ‘What was that book you recommended?’ He finally realized that his belief undercut its own foundations —such ‘reasoning’ destroys the very basis for reason.

On another occasion, a man came to me after a seminar and said, ‘Actually, I’m an atheist. Because I don’t believe in God, I don’t believe in absolutes, so I recognize that I can’t even be sure of reality.’ I responded, ‘Then how do you know you’re really here making this statement?’ ‘Good point,’ he replied. ‘What point?’ I asked. The man looked at me, smiled, and said, ‘Maybe I should go home.’ I stated, ‘Maybe it won’t be there.’ ‘Good point,’ the man said. ‘What point?’ I replied.

This man certainly got the message. If there is no God, ultimately, philosophically, how can one talk about reality? How can one even rationally believe that there is such a thing as truth, let alone decide what it is?

Ken Ham, AiG

For Those Voting Tomorrow...

2008-11-03T05:21:00.000-08:00

Here's what the democratic candidates think about creationism:

I’m a Christian, and I believe in parents being able to provide children with religious instruction without interference from the state.

But I also believe our schools are there to teach worldly knowledge and science. I believe in evolution, and I believe there’s a difference between science and faith. That doesn’t make faith any less important than science. It just means they’re two different things. And I think it’s a mistake to try to cloud the teaching of science with theories that frankly don’t hold up to scientific inquiry.

Barack Obama

I refuse to believe the majority of people believe this malarkey!

Joe Biden

Unintelligent Design I: The Brain of the Giant Squid

2008-10-31T05:49:00.000-07:00

The giant squid has a donut-shaped brain, with its oesophagus passing straight through the hole in the middle. This means that it has to chew up its food very thoroughly. If it tried to swallow something too large, it could suffer brain damage.

Creationists That Look Like Apes: Duane Gish

2008-10-28T18:18:00.000-07:00

Krazy Kent Hovind

2008-10-25T07:34:00.000-07:00

One theory is that the pre-Flood Earth had a canopy of ice above it that squeezed the atmosphere down to, say, 15 miles [...] If you squeezed the air down to 15 miles - instead of 100 - it would be more clear because there would be less distortion - atmospheric twinkle it's called. And probably this canopy of ice would act as a photo-amplifier where you would actually see things much more clearly. That's one theory that [in] the pre-Flood world you don't need a telescope - you could see incredibly well.

Kent Hovind

Intelligent Geography

2008-10-23T14:26:00.000-07:00

Science in Seattle

2008-10-20T16:41:00.000-07:00

The reason I haven't made any posts for a while is because I've been on holiday. My wife and I went on a road trip around Washington state and British Columbia, and spent a couple of days in Seattle, home to the conservative think tank and creationist stronghold The Discovery Institute. This is the organization responsible for the "Teach the Controversy" strategy to get religion taught in school science classes. From Wikipedia:

In 2005, a federal court ruled that the Discovery Institute pursues "demonstrably religious, cultural, and legal missions", and the institute's manifesto, the Wedge strategy, describes a religious goal: to "reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions".

It was gratifyingly ironic that just a half-hour walk from this fortress of ignorance, at the Pacific Science Center, the remains of a 3.2 million year old humanoid fossil was on display. Named Lucy (after The Beatles' Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds), she's one of many "missing" links between the modern human and our ape-like ancestors. The exhibit was superb, and Lucy was part of a much larger collection of fossils as well as cultural artifacts from Ethiopia, where she was discovered.

Lucy

At the end of our tour we exited through the obligatory gift shop, which had a ton of books for sale on evolution, Darwin and the invalidity of intelligent design. Not a single creationist book was to be found, I'm glad to say. If the Discovery Institute can't even influence the science in their own city, it bodes well for the rest of the US...

"cdesign proponentsists"

2008-10-09T07:23:00.001-07:00

A short video about one of the creationism movement's biggest blunders:

Moron of the Month: Kent Hovind

2008-10-06T06:06:00.001-07:00

Undoubtedly the most infamous of all creationists, and with enough moronic gaffes under his belt to warrant several dedicated webpages, Kent Hovind's story reads like an epic tragedy. Having received a PhD from the non-accredited Patriot University in Colorado (his thesis is critiqued here), he reinvented himself as Dr Dino, and opened the creationist theme park Dinosaur Adventure Land in Pensacola, Florida. Alas, his success came to a shameful and embarassing end in 2006 as he was convicted of tax fraud and sentenced to ten years in prison. The juicy details of his crimes, and his actions during the court case and after, are too numerous to list here, and if you want to read more on Hovind, the links above are all good sources. Rather than rewrite his story here, I've selected just a few of my favourite quotes of his. He's been so prolific with his wacky ideas and crazy conspiracy theories that you can expect to see him make further appearances in future posts. For now, enjoy:

If Evolution is true, there is no Creator, so laws come from mans opinion. That is called a democracy, which is a terrible form of government. Democracies always degenerate into dictatorships. In America, it is sad to say, has become a democracy.

I sincerely believe that I am not a person required to file a Federal Income Tax Return. This belief is a result of extensive research that I have done.

Boys, don't touch the girls until you're married to them. Now, if you don't want to touch them, you stay away from me please. I saw your kind in San Francisco.

Did you know that in Switzerland every household must have a fully automatic machine gun and 1,000 rounds of ammunition? Have you noticed that Switzerland has never been invaded? Would you invade a country like that? Gun control is stupid!

I did not even know what being a humanist meant. I was only sixteen, and the brain doesn't even start developing until about twenty

We ought to execute criminals for certain crimes. The prisons are overcrowded because a lot of them should have been executed. If everyone that should have been executed was executed it would do wonders for detouring crime and lowering the prison population.

The globalist, the Council of the Committee of Three Hundred, has as one of their goals to reduce the world population from six billion to one-half billion people. There are too many people here that cannot be controlled; so get rid of them. That's why AIDS was purposefully developed in a Maryland laboratory to wipe out population.

Some people say that demons came in human form and cohabited with women and begat half demon and half human, and their offspring were men of renown; people that were able to great things. They were supposed to have had wings on their feet, and to be able to fly. This is where the Greek mythology originated, which may not be too far fetched.

Kent Hovind

A History of Creationist Thought

2008-10-03T15:43:00.000-07:00

Ken Miller Refutes Intelligent Design

2008-10-01T09:38:00.000-07:00

Kenneth R. Miller is a biology professor at Brown University, is Roman Catholic, and is one of the strongest opponents of creationism and intelligent design. In this video, he picks apart the intelligent design movement bit by bit, demolishing their arguments and exposing their lies and underhanded tactics. It's a long talk, but it's informative and, above all, very entertaining.