The Heart: The Most Efficient Machine on Earth

http://www.harunyahya.tv/videoDetail/Lang/4/Product/37803/THE_HEART:_THE_MOST_EFFICIENT_MACHINE_ON_EARTH

This is a REALLY interesting video. This is from the organization that I researched, the Science Research Foundation. The president, Haruna Yahya made this video and a TON of others to show that Allah created everything and that evolution is wrong. From 4:50 on, he illustrates an analogy between the human heart and a water pump. The arguments he makes are easily falsifiable and often not relevant but the video is really flipping cool. It's all in the presentation. If I didn't have a basic understanding of evolution or if I was looking for a reason to believe in Allah and hate Darwin, this video would do the trick. It is really easy to make an analogy, pair it with a video and a soothing voice and BAM. It makes sense. That is why the best history teachers, in my opinion, are like story tellers; it makes the information stick. I sometimes take issue with analogies because of this. Like Kelly and the Lemon Test, I feel like they can be twisted to for situations of you want them to.

Regardless, this is worth watching.

Op-ed Piece on Creation Research Society

Looking for Answers

Have you ever wondered why the information you were taught in Sunday school does not match what you learned in science class and in general society? Does it seem like you are losing your faith because your rational mind cannot reconcile modern science like the Big Bang Theory and Evolution Theory with your faith? If you answered yes(,) then you have taken the first step out of the darkness caused by anti-Creationist propaganda. The Creation Research Society can help you find the peace for which you are searching between science and your faith. We are a not-for-profit organization of religious scientists and lay people who believe that God created the world and that the Bible is a direct and complete account of the formation of the world and the origin of humans. Our mission is to provide evidence and stimulate a dialogue about Creationism through the use of modern day technology.

The Creation Research Society is an organization steeped in half a century of tradition. We were formed in 1963 by ten like-minded scientists who saw the scientific community was greatly lacking in respectable journals that were unbiased towards evidence that did not support Evolution Theory. Their first objective was to publish research supporting Creationism and make it public knowledge. We have been publishing the Creation Research Society Quarterly since July of 1964. Through private funding and grants, we also support modern research that is developing and scientifically testing Creation Theory. In addition, we schedule lectures for Creation scientists and provide qualified scientific speakers for groups and churches interested in learning more about Creationism science in the modern world.

The Creation Research Society does not engage in any political lobbying for Creationism-friendly legislation. The articles in our journal are not pseudo-science meant to get bills passed, like our Evolution Theory counterparts claim, nor do we fudge results to make our data fit Creation Theory. We publish a respectable peer-reviewed journal that only accepts articles from dedicated and educated scientists. Those who publish in the Creation Research Society Quarterly have earned post-graduate degrees and are respected individuals in their fields. Our journal is a place where scientists can publish the evidence they have found supporting Creation Theory. As leaders in a diverse range of disciplines, we see it as our duty to spread the word about the scientifically supported evidence in favor of Creationism that the government does not allow to be taught in public schools. As an organization we are completely autonomous and are not affiliated with any other organization, religious group or church body. We have removed ourselves from the politics of the matter and simply provide the facts for those who are searching for answers; people just like you.

Does this sound like it is a cause you can get behind? If so, Creation Research Society memberships are available online. Different levels of membership are available depending upon your educational background and religious beliefs. Voting membership requires a postgraduate degree in a recognized area of science. However, for those interested in learning more about origin, but without an advanced science degree, we offer non-voting status membership. Full-time students enrolled in high school, college, or graduate programs are also offered membership at a reduced rate. With regular annual dues set at only $35 for those living in the United States, it is extremely easy to stay abreast with modern Creation science.

Because we are an organization founded on several basic beliefs, in addition to paying dues, all members must sign a statement of belief in the organization’s four core beliefs. These beliefs are straight forward but firm. First; the Bible is the written Word of God, and because it is inspired throughout, all its assertions are historically and scientifically true in the original autographs. To the student of nature this means that the account of origins in Genesis is a factual presentation of simple historical truths. Secondly, all basic types of living things, including man, were made by direct creative acts of God during the Creation Week described in Genesis. Whatever biological changes have occurred since Creation Week have accomplished only changes within the original created kinds. Thirdly, the great flood described in Genesis, commonly referred to as the Noachian Flood, was an historic event worldwide in its extent and effect. Finally, we are an organization of Christian men and women of science who accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. The account of the special creation of Adam and Eve as one man and one woman and their subsequent fall into sin is the basis for our belief in the necessity of a Savior for all mankind. Therefore, salvation can come only through accepting Jesus Christ as our Savior. All levels of membership require a simple pledge which indicates you share the same beliefs on which we base our lives and research.

We currently have 1,700 members that are spread across the globe doing what good scientists do; searching for the truth. We are not hindered by the narrow-mindedness of Evolution Theory, because through God, anything is possible. Our organization has served as a light in the darkness for many faithful believers who were ready to abandon their beliefs because the world considered them old fashioned and outdated. Join our growing numbers. Learn about Creationism. Its story does not end when we close the Bible on Genesis but is present in all aspects of our lives; from everyday plant life to meteorites from outer space. Come see what the Creation Research Society has to offer at our website: CreationResearch.org. Come read what we have discovered. You will be amazed. God speaks to us through science only if we are open to his message.

It All Traces Back to Kids

          While discussing the court case, Kitzmiller vs. Dover, and watching the documentary about it, I continued reverting back to one thought: it all traces back to kids. A lot of people are taken to church the very first Sunday after they are born. There is no way to explain to these children what religion is and ask them if they want to go to church. They have no choice. So they continue going to church and attending Sunday school. They continue taking in the word of God without questioning anything because they are young and that is what they have always done. Personally, I didn’t start second guessing what I was learning in church until I started taking confirmation classes in sixth grade. Up until confirmation classes, Sunday school was all about forgiveness and joy and Jesus loving everyone. Then you walk into confirmation and the teachers tell you things you can and can’t do, and you learn about the “evils” of homosexuality, sin, and evolution. Maybe it was because my parents never pushed religion on me and had talks with me about homosexuality, but when those topics were brought up in my Sunday school classes I knew something was wrong. I didn’t agree with the things I was being taught, and I wasn’t going to sit there and say I believed in things that I didn’t. I was lucky enough to have parents that let me make my own decisions. Even though I wasn’t sure exactly what I did believe in, I knew I couldn’t continue being a Lutheran. Ever since then I have been taking in information about religion and science and I am still learning things about my belief system and myself.           

            Some people are raised in a strict religious atmosphere and are never exposed to anything else. They didn’t have a choice in the beginning and they might not have ever gotten a choice depending on how strict their parents were or how strong their faith was. There is nothing wrong with having a strong faith, what I have a problem with is the fact that these kids usually aren’t allowed to learn anything about things like evolution. So when they get to science class and the teacher brings up natural selection or evolution, they automatically go into defensive mode and refuse to learn about it, instead of opening their minds to something new and at least thinking about it. This isn’t completely their fault though, they were raised to believe that evolution is wrong and learning about it is wrong, so naturally they aren’t going to accept it being taught in school.

            Evolution is often referred to as the theory of evolution. According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, a theory is defined as “the analysis of a set of facts in their relation to one another.” Evolution is a big idea formed from many scientific facts. It explains processes in nature that didn’t just occur millions of years ago, but are still occurring now. There is no reason it shouldn’t be taught in high school science classes. Even if it does go against certain people’s religions, there is no reason why they can’t learn about it. Religion should be taught in church and evolution should be taught in schools. They are totally different and are taught differently and serve different purposes. I understand that religious parents argue that they don’t want their kids learning about evolution at all, but just because they are learning about evolution, doesn’t mean they have to accept it. I think they should be taught evolution in order to be able to make an educated decision for themselves about what they believe or accept. It is ignorant to go through life never learning about evolution. 

Noah's Arc vs. The Dinosaurs

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1vrwMu/cartoonist.name/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/bizzaro-1.jpg

I just stumbled across this cartoon and thought it was pretty funny!

Motivated reasoning, rationalization, and what it all means for science...

http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/03/denial-science-chris-mooney

Since we started this new blog, I've found several articles that had potential to be posted here. In fact, there were so many great ones, I thought I'd actually have a hard time choosing! Part of why there is so much going on might be because of the political changes and increased legislative action against evolution, with the prominent lawsuits and local school board controversies. But in the end, I decided on an article that was less centered on any specific event and more on the psychology of how people receive and interpret factual evidence. The article is a little lengthy, but it's a fascinating read and I highly recommend reading the whole thing, if you can. It makes some great points throughout, even if it only mentions creationism briefly.

I kind of geeked out about this article and basically read the whole thing in one breath, but it really is relevant to the theme of our class because it addresses the endless and maddening question of why some people blatantly deny logically and scientifically presented data such as evolution or climate change. The biases these people have built their entire lives are going to be a tough—usually impossible—shell to crack. Okay, we already know that: people are loath to toss out their sacredly held lifelong beliefs in favor of a wholly contradictory theory on the same subject, regardless of the amount of scientific evidence behind it. Various research studies cited in the article actually showed that being given evidence to the contrary of their beliefs only changed the minds of a very small number of subjects.

Of course people judge the validity of evidence based on prior established beliefs. Everyone rationalizes—devout believers as much as atheists; liberals as well as conservatives; the list could go on and on. And it doesn’t come down to just matters of science or faith; we rationalize across the board, with the more deeply contentious issues being those that reflect strongly held beliefs. You may be easily convinced to go for chocolate over vanilla, but then have a scientist talk your ears off with proven facts, but refuse to accept them.
Science has fallen prey to an impervious mindset that calls into question the very legitimacy of the discipline. The article acknowledges the potential fallibility of individual scientists, but argues that the express purpose of the scientific method is to counter these kinds of personal biases: "Even if individual researchers are prone to falling in love with their own theories, the broader processes of peer review and institutionalized skepticism are designed to ensure that, eventually, the best ideas prevail."

This pattern extends well outside science alone. Mooney brings up various political and societal examples of rationalization and motivated reasoning, showing that this effect is universally observed. This is where it gets interesting—the actual capacity to rationalize and apply an impulsive and emotional, rather than reasoned and deliberative, response to contradictory information is considered to be an evolutionary defense mechanism. The article explains it in more detail, but it has to do with responding quickly to threats, not only those which cause physical harm (the original evolutionary purpose), but also those that attack the integrity of our cherished ideas. This means that, in an ironic and fascinating turn of events, the tendency to deny evolution actually sprung up from an evolutionary trait (my mind really was temporarily blown by this).

One of the most resonant takeaway messages from this whole concept has to do with using this knowledge of how humans respond to new data to tailor specific ways of communicating to different groups. The media can have a harmful role in reinforcing the views of already narrow target groups, but manipulating the way information is presented to certain groups can go a long way in increasing understanding and promoting critical thinking. Mooney recommends to “set the issue in the context of different values than those from which environmentalists or scientists often argue." In my mind, this line of thinking immediately invoked the Clergy Letter Project and the idea that religious leaders must take the lead in educating their congregations with small steps. A familiar and local voice knows how to shape the argument, and certainly has more authority in their community than the words of the most eminent scientist with an arsenal of irrefutable facts.

Religious Intolerance

It seems to me that there are multiple ways of privatizing religion. On the one hand, I completely agree with Kennedy that “what made America so special was its revolutionary assertion of freedom of religion. No nation on Earth had ever framed in law that faith should be of no interest to government officials.” Separation of church and state is a huge part of what the United States stands for, and it is of utmost importance that candidates should be judged based on their political decisions, not based on their religion. I completely agree that there should be no religious “test” for office and that religion should remain privatized in the sense that it should be separate from politics.

However, it seems that religion may be too privatized in the sense that most Americans are religiously illiterate and religion has become, in many cases, a sort of taboo topic that is not frequently discussed. Why is this a problem? Because it is clear to see that religious intolerance is a huge issue. We talked in class about how Bryan Fischer argues that the First Amendment rights apply only to Christians and not to Muslims. How do you even get to such a claim as “but [building mosques] is a privilege that can be revoked if, as is in fact the case, Islam is a totalitarian ideology dedicated to the destruction of the United States” (Fischer)? You do not have to know much about Islam to know that it is not a totalitarian ideology dedicated to the destruction of the United States. Islam began way before the United States was even country. Why do people believe this? A lot of that has to do with fear and hatred, but I think that ignorance is the more fundamental problem. If people were more aware of what Muslims believed, they would never fall for such a statement.

So, it seems that religious intolerance would be less of an issue if people were more educated about what people of different religions believe. It is much more difficult to demonize Muslims if you are friends with them or if you know something about what their beliefs actually entail. But how is this religious education to be achieved? I never learned anything about other religions (besides Christianity and Hinduism) until I took a class at Butler, and I still don’t know as much as I should about them. Teaching World Religions in schools would be disastrous because it would violate all three prongs of the lemon test. It would be impossible to regulate the curriculum to make sure that it was not biased in favor or one religion and to control all teachers to make sure that they taught objectively. Not all religions could be included, but it would not be fair to include some and to exclude others. All in all, it would not work. But still, it seems that religious education would help people to empathize with people of other religions rather oppressing them. Is it possible to ensure that religion remain privatized in the sense that it is separate from politics, but at the same time to de-privatize it in a way that would allow people to become more aware and accepting of beliefs other than their own? Or is this the wrong way of approaching the issue?

Creationism taught at universites?

Just came across this article:

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2011/04/11/Calif-college-in-creation-teaching-debate/UPI-79551302552587/

This talks about a university in Riverside, CA called La Sierra University that is under pressure by a local Seventh-day Adventist Church to include Creationism more in their biology curriculum. This drew the attention of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges which is responsible for accrediting the university. This is very interesting to me because we have pretty much only talked about the problem of teaching Creationism in middle and high schools. It hadn't really occurred to me that this was a legitimate problem in some universities as well. I mentioned that I have been in a biology class all semester, and coincidentally we are talking about the Creationism vs. Evolution debate in class right now. Don't worry, I made sure to mention this class. In this university setting, it is taught that evolution exists, and we studied in depth the reasons why and the evidence for it. All that was said about Creationism was that it is pretty much a load of illegitimate claims. The discussion about the debate was very open dispite the number of people in the class, and I was surprised that people were actually willing to talk about it when it is such a touchy subject. But the point is, here, the common opinion is that, duh, evolution exists. I can't imagine having Creationism pushed on me in a university biology setting, and I was shocked to come across this article addressing just that sort of situation.

Lucy used tools!

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2009968,00.html


The majority of this article discusses what the professor from IU talked to us about when he presented the slide show on Australopithecus afarensis. It goes into further detail and describes a new discovery that has been made, "Two animal bones, excavated in Dikika, Ethiopia, bear what the authors call "unambiguous stone-tool cut marks for flesh removal and percussion [i.e., smashing] for marrow access." With this discovery, researchers can conclude that the hominids of this time had a level of intelligence. It is so interesting to me how much scientists can conclude from a rock or a piece of bone. I am excited to see what new discoveries are going to be made and how they will fit into the fossil record and help further explain evolution. I just don't understand how creationists can simply dismiss all of these discoveries as nothing. 

Response to Aja's post

This was supposed to be a comment on Aja's post, but it was too long and it wouldn't let me post it. So this is actually a comment, not my own post.

Aja, I can definitely see what you’re saying about it being hypocritical to only pick some parts of Christianity to believe in, and it’s definitely something that I’ve thought a lot about. I mean, I still have a ton of doubts about Christianity, so maybe I’m not the best person to ask if you want to understand how a strong Christian would approach the issue, but here’s what I’ve come up with in terms of what to believe/not believe.

First of all, the Bible is made up of 66 books all written by different authors in very different genres, so I think some interpretation methods have to change as a result of genre. Why would I ever take poetry literally, for example? In the English Bible, the first chapters of Genesis are formatted, more or less, in the form of a prose narrative. I’ve heard the first two chapters of Genesis read in Hebrew before, and it sounds like a poem. In my Spanish Bible, it is also formatted as a poem, and I know that the Spanish version is an interpretive translation just as much as the English version is, but it just goes to show that a lot of people view the first few chapters of Genesis as a poem, and it could be that the original Hebrew text was as well.

Secondly, if God is infinite and we are finite, then it is impossible for him to be completely comprehensible to us. Because of that, I think that any language we use to describe God must be symbolic. It seems natural that people would come up with symbols that relate to their experience—for example, God is continually referred to in the Bible as a king and as a shepherd, but those symbols aren’t particularly pertinent to our experience, so we tend to not use them as much. It’s not that God is literally a king or literally a shepherd, but rather that those are symbols for some of his attributes—that he is powerful, that he leads his followers, that he is good to them, etc. In the same way, why should the symbol of Creator be any different? Maybe he did literally create the world and made it look like it evolved, but maybe he didn’t. It seems natural that people would use the role of Creator to describe him in order to express that God was their source of life, their source of purpose, and that their way of life was ordained by God. Like we talked about earlier, it was their way of explaining how the world works and what their experience of God was like. In the New Testament, there are several passages where the language used sounds exactly like the language of Plato’s Republic, which doesn’t mean that it isn’t valid, it just shows that people express truth through the language that is known to them, and in a society heavily influenced by Greek philosophy, that is the language the Bible was written in. According to Tillich, “The criterion of the truth of faith therefore is that it implies an element of self-negation. That symbol is most adequate which expresses not only the ultimate but also its own lack of ultimacy…Ex: Biblical research has shown the impossibility of considering the Bible as containing the infallible truth of faith” (Dynamics of Faith p 112-113). That doesn’t mean that the Bible isn’t important. It still expresses truth about a great many things and teaches us much of what we know about God, but I think it does so symbolically, and I think that it would be more of a perversion of faith to interpret the entire Bible in the exact way and to take all of it literally than it would be to accept the uncertainty inherent in faith and recognize that everything we express about God is merely a symbol for what he really is because God is too big for us to wrap our minds around and describe concretely.

Thirdly, there are SO many different interpretations of the Bible, that I think it would be difficult to say that one is completely right and all the others are wrong. I mean, when they blatantly contradict each other, one must be more right than the other, but how can you ever know for sure which one is? You can argue which one best fits your experience of reality and which one makes the most sense, and eventually accept one to follow, but that doesn’t mean it’s absolutely 100% true. What Ham refers to as a “compromise” is anything that goes against his particular interpretation, but how does he know for sure that he is right?

You said, “Even if we were to define the Biblical account of creation as merely a parable, we would have to admit that it does provide a solid basis for the concept of sin, the Fall of humanity through Adam’s rebellion, and the subsequent curse followed by death, disease and suffering. It wouldn’t be false to claim that this account of creation provides the solid basis upon which major, overarching concepts of Christianity stand.” What you’re referring to is the Augustinian model, which is what pretty much all Western Christian churches follow. Basically, it’s cyclical. God created everything and it was a perfect paradise. Then Adam and Eve were tempted and they sinned. That is when evil entered the world, and from then on, the world exists in a state of sin and irreparable brokenness. Then Jesus died on the cross and if you accept him as your Savior, then you will be redeemed and eventually go back up the way things were initially intended to be after you die. And if you don’t accept him, then regardless of how good of a life you lived, you go to hell.

This is what I was always taught in church, and I agree that it does explain why evil came into the world, why Jesus needed to come to save us, why there is so much suffering in the world today, etc., but I also think there are a lot of problems with the model. First of all, one thing that many Christians (mostly Calvinists) believe is that God’s grace is irresistible. But if that is the case and if God is immutable, then why was his grace not irresistible in the Garden? If Adam and Eve were living in a perfect paradise in perfect communion with their God, why did they fall? Is a part of God’s image corruptible? Secondly, where did evil come from? How did it come about out of nothing, or rather how did a part of good just stop existing (since good is a substance, but evil is merely the negation of the good and has no substance of its own)? Did evil come about because of God if he created a world in which he knew that Adam and Eve would inevitably fall? Is he really good if he created people in order to send them to hell? How were Adam and Eve supposed to know that eating the fruit was wrong if the tree was what contained the knowledge of good and evil? Pride, which is a sin, came before the fall. Thirdly, if it was impossible for Jesus to sin, then did he really have free will? And if he didn’t have free will, then was he really human? Most people who follow this model also claim God to be omnipotent, which poses a problem for them if they think that he is also omnibenevolent, but I'm not sure where in the Bible it says that God is omnipotent. It says that he is very very powerful, but I think there is a difference between being very powerful and ALL powerful.

Also, according to this model, the world makes no sense without a very particular view of God, and so is contrary to the reality that much of the world experiences. This model paints a picture of a God who is perfectly just and perfectly good, as witnessed by the fact that the responsibility for sin is placed entirely on humans for eating the fruit. Justice, at least at some level, is one of the very few things that I’m pretty confident I know for sure (e.g. murder, rape, child abuse, etc. are terribly wrong). But if God is perfectly just and his view of justice does not correspond to my view, then he must be right because he’s God and he is the standard of justice. Which means that my view of justice must be wrong. If that’s the case, then how can I trust myself at all? How can any of my experiences, thoughts, or feelings be valid if everything I know is based solely on what God “tells” me to believe about the world rather than on my experience of the world itself? Shouldn’t God correspond to reality rather than contradicting it? I’ve always thought that you have to trust yourself at least a little bit to trust anyone else because if I trust you, it’s because, based on my experience of you, I deem you to be a trustworthy person. That means I must trust that my experience of you is valid and I must trust my ability to determine whether or not you are a trustworthy person. Hence, I must trust myself to a small extent to be able to trust you. Thus, if the very act of believing in a God who is so contrary to everything that I know destroys any trust I have in myself and forces me to deny my experience of reality, then how am I supposed to be able to trust him either?

In my religion class, we recently learned about an alternative model called the Irenaean model, which, as far as I can gather, is what the Eastern Orthodox church follows (which is a lot of people—this isn’t just a small group of Christians who believe it). Irenaeas also came before Augustine did, so this isn’t just a new form of liberal Christianity. Instead of being cyclical, this model is linear. The universe was created a long time ago and God is distant from the universe. Evil was built into the way things were at the beginning of the universe. By the time humans came into being, there was already death and destruction in the world because animals had been killing each other for a long time. The story of the fall is taken to mean that Adam and Eve were initially children, and they, like all other humans, lost their innocence as they grew into adulthood. Jesus came to pay a ransom for our sins and so that we could become God-like. This line of thought views man as being still in the process of creation, because humans strive to become more like God. This process of “soul-making” is something that won’t be finished until after you die. For them, the soul is a sort of cognizant awareness, and the Bible need not be taken literally because it was a way for people to explain what they saw using language, which is subjective. This model also claims that humans and God both have equal responsibility for sin. God put them into a world where they would almost inevitably sin, but humans still made that decision. It would be as if you put a recovering alcoholic into a room full of alcohol and told him not to drink it. If he drank it, it would be partly your responsibility for doing that to him, and partly his for actually doing it. But one of the most important aspects of this model is the fact that evolution is perfectly compatible with it because it does not take the Bible literally and because “creation” is viewed as a process (both the physical evolution of species as well as the evolution of the soul to be more like God). Granted, there are lots of problems with this model too, and it still doesn’t explain exactly where evil came from, it’s just something that has always been there. And there may be some glaring inconsistencies in the model that I haven’t discovered because I just learned about it in class and have not studied it extensively, but based upon what I know about it now, it seems to make more sense of my experience of how the world works than the Augustinian model does, and it is perfectly compatible with science and evolution.

So, all that to say, maybe you’re right and it’s hypocritical to take some parts of the Bible literally and to understand others as metaphors, but I’m not sure how it’s possible to avoid doing that. First of all, I think genre is important in interpreting the Bible, and I think that the only way to express truth about God is through symbols—and we need to recognize that they are merely that: symbols, not concrete, absolute truth. And secondly, there are so many different interpretations of the Bible that I think it’s important to consider different ones and to make sure that religious belief is consistent with your experience of reality. There are many other interpretations of Genesis that are compatible with evolution, such as the Irenaean model, which I’m pretty sure most of the Eastern Orthodox Church accepts. Not that I’m going to convert to Eastern Orthodoxy or anything, but I do find their approach to the Bible as literature is helpful. I still have a ton of doubts about Christianity, mostly due to the problem of evil, the issue of whether and to what extent God can be experienced, and there are a ton of problems I have with the church, but none of my doubts about Christianity are really related to science because I think there are enough different ways out there to understand how the two can be compatible.