TWO KINDS OF SCIENCE

Richard Dawkins

Today on CNN, on his "GPS" show, Fareed Zakaria interviewed Richard Dawkins on the subject of the current Republican candidates for president and the fact that none has publicly espoused a belief in the theory of evolution.  Dawkins says that this is "disgraceful", since evolution "is a fact".  Zakaria virtually fawned over Dawkins, who is a vociferous atheist.

When I compare Dawkins with his philosophical nemesis, Stephen Meyer, I experience emotional reactions. I can't put a finger on what distinguishes these two men from each other, but I would gladly go on a two-week vacation with Meyer, and I wish Dawkins would disappear.

Evolutionists like to re-classify Intelligent Design proponents as "creationists" so as to demean their ideas as being religious dogma.  Dawkins is a professor of evolutionary biology at Oxford.  He goes to and fro in the world preaching that evolution is not a theory but a fact of science.  98% of professional scientists agree with Dawkins.

Stephen C. Meyer

In his book Signature in the Cell Stephen Meyer (a philosopher of science) reminds us that there are two types of science. To paraphrase Meyer, here they are:

     1.  Empirical, testable science
     2.  Historical, evidentiary science

The first type involves scientific principles that can be demonstrated through experimentation.  If I start a fire under a pot of water, it will usually cause the water to boil.  You can't argue with this tested outcome because the evidence is incontrovertible.  If I let go of my glass of milk, gravity will pull it to the floor (pretty much every time).

The second type of science is the type practiced by forensic homicide detectives, paleontologists, archaeologists, and cosmologists.  They look at current situations and make inferences based on the the best available historical evidence.  When there is a bloody shoe print on the ground outside a house - matching the size-13 Bruno Magli shoes owned solely by O.J. Simpson, it is reasonable to conclude that O.J. stepped in the blood.  No one saw the murder (or the dinosaur).  No (living) person saw the birth of our galaxy or the arrival of the trilobytes on earth.

Cosmologists observe that there are radio waves pervasively distributed throughout our universe.  Many of them now speculate that the radio waves are a by-product of a "Big Bang". Some disagree.  None of us can go back in time to observe whether our universe was started by an immense momentary explosion or by the act of a benevolent God (or Gods) or by BOTH.  We are confined to examining the currently available data and evidence, and theorizing about what could have caused it to come about.  Dawkins is no exception.

Richard Dawkins insists that there is evidence of evolution so compelling that the only conclusion that sensible, sane people can come to is that we living creatures developed gradually over millions of years through slow microscopic genetic changes.  Problem is - Dawkins and his fellow believers have never produced "scientific" evidence OF EITHER KIND that shows that this is true.  Now, Stephen Meyer and I will be the first to admit that neither has the Intelligent Design community produced any evidence that God designed all the many living creatures slithering about our planet.  So perhaps it is a tie! 

We can't "test" the existence of God, and we can't "test" evolutionary change (especially if it takes as long as Dawkins insists).  All we can do is look at the information, data, material, evidence and conditions that are observable today and come up with the best scientific inference based on the available historical evidence.

If I go outside and notice that my neighbor's driveway is wet, I might conclude that it recently rained.  Yet if my own driveway is not wet, I might posit that he hosed his driveway instead.  If I happen upon a poem, I can conclude nothing but that someone penned it.  Poems don't write themselves.

If I get a microscope and look inside the external membrane of a living cell, I find numerous functioning organelles and departments - sanitation, reproduction, transportation, alimentation, defense, repair, and more.  This vast, microscopic biological universe is so complex that I find it hard to believe that it came about by chance or by gradual, undirected metamorphosis.

Without direction or intervention, EVERYTHING in the universe tends toward chaos, entropy.  Richard Dawkins knows this, but still he goes about preaching that the immeasurable complexities of life on this earth sprang into existence by the collision of organic compounds in the pre-biotic soup and then waxed ever more complex without direction or purpose. 

Scientists recently performed experiments on fruit flies by interfering a little with the early reproductive process.  They found that even slight disturbances in the DNA coding resulted in horrific mutations - legs growing out of heads, and worse.  Dawkins knows that if you tamper with genetic data, the resulting offspring are distorted and sterile.  Successful genetic changes cannot come about EXCEPT through the ADDITION of new DNA code - new information, new script.  New data cannot come about unless it is written.  New computer programs don't arise unless someone codes them.  House plans don't design themselves.  DNA blueprints and epigenetic data don't poof into existence spontaneously, and we have no evidence ANYWHERE that shows how one species of critter suddenly OR GRADUALLY morphed into a different critter.

I am reminded of Korihor and Nehor (look them up!) in the Book of Mormon, and how they went about preaching that people who believed in God were deceived by fantastical myths.  Korihor was eventually forced to admit that the devil had persuaded him to preach lies to the people, and he knew the truth.

I believe that Richard Dawkins is a modern-day Korihor.  There is surely a hidden reason why he goes about so smugly mocking believers in God, and insisting that his ideas about evolution are somehow "science".  When you challenge Darwinian evolutionists, they speak about evolutionary change in terms of, "We think it happened like this", "It may have happened like this", and so on.  Their speculation is bereft of proof and bereft of conviction.  They have to force themselves to believe and parrot it because their careers or guilt depend on it.

I recently read both of Stephen Meyer's books, and for me it is hard not to believe in a loving God after reading them.  Meyer doesn't preach religion, but he proves convincingly that life on this earth could not have come about accidentally and arbitrarily.  If you want a brief glimpse of Meyer's inspiration and brilliance, watch this YOUTUBE video of one of his lectures:

Centre for Intelligent Design Lecture 2011 by Stephen Meyer on 'Signature in the Cell'.

One Tooth

Dr. Stephen C. Meyer

I have been reading more on the topic of Intelligent Design (especially the work of Stephen Meyer).  I marvel at the venom directed at its proponents.  Darwinian evolutionists harbor so much disdain for those scientists who don't think life could have sprung into existence by way of undirected natural processes.

Darwinists allege that the idea of Intelligent Design (I.D.) is not worthy even of being called a theory - much less science.  The accusation that the belief in a designer is mere religious faith is rather hypocritical, since many of Darwin's postulations were based on his own best inferences based on historical data available in his day - a day when no one knew what a cell was.  Evolutionists' beliefs are all based on faith - faith that God does not exist.

Since evolutionists cannot demonstrate any of the biochemical events and adaptations they claim brought about life and living creatures, they rely on speculation - "The first cell could have emerged from the pre-biotic primordial soup." "The process of natural selection may have allowed monkeys to evolve into humans."

Truth is - no one alive today can state precisely how our universe started or how the first living cell found its way onto our planet.  Darwinian scientists and philosophers insist that if it cannot be demonstrated or tested today, it cannot be considered science.  That reasoning undermines much of what Darwin proposed.  For this controversy there simply will not be a level playing field.

Today I thought about teeth - individual teeth.  I still have most of mine (though some are synthetic).  It struck me as interesting that our teeth are many and separate.  Why do I not have merely two bony, enamel-clad ridges (one top, one bottom) with which to chew?  Then I realized that were that the case, I might risk losing an entire chewing ridge through injury or infection.  How wise our Creator was to let us have individual teeth so that if one goes bad, it doesn't jeopardize the rest of the mouth.

My point is - have you ever looked at your teeth?  Why do they have such remarkable anatomies?  What makes them grow into just the right shape for optimum maceration?  Think about that in light of the natural selection model.  How many generations of our human forbears had to endure having the wrong shaped teeth before the beneficent natural selection process sifted us to the current perfect arrangement?  I don't think humans have been on this planet long enough for all of that adaptation to have occurred.

I just read the book "Signature in the Cell" by Stephen C. Meyer - see

     http://www.signatureinthecell.com/

Check it out and marvel for yourself at how impossible it would have been for life to have emerged without a Designer.

The Longest Time

I swear, since I read Darwin's Black Box, by Michael Behe, I am perpetually reminded of the enduring
argument between the evolutionists and the proponents of Intelligent Design.  I am no expert.  I don't understand complex biochemistry.  I am not even familiar with all of the Darwinists' arguments.

I guess I have at least a cursory understanding of their ideas -

1.  Evolution is the result of infinitesimally small, gradual changes which occurred over an extremely long period of time (billions of years).
2.  Creatures and features that exhibited better qualities tended to survive, while organisms with less desirable or less enduring traits faced extinction (natural selection).

Please understand - I believe that BOTH of these premises are not confirmed by science.  True, if you put a tiger in Antarctica, he will freeze, but that doesn't confirm natural selection.

Here is an example of some thoughts I have had.  One of my wives is VERY sensitive about eyebrows.  She notices the eyebrows on everyone she meets - color, thickness, shape, etc.  She notices it all.  So, in the vast, epic process of evolution over billions of years, how did we end up with eyebrows?  Were they some vestigial artifact of our monkey ancestors who needed eye protection while they scampered through the jungle?  OR - did our ancestors who lacked eyebrows slowly die out in favor of the few aberrant hominids who were lucky enough to have them?  I can grasp this idea, but then there are so many other bodily features that seem to serve no real purpose (like pubic hair) - that would never really have come about by this "natural selection" process.  I have hair on my upper lip and on my lower cheeks and chin, but it doesn't grow around my eyes.  Thank God!  Imagine shaving one's temples!  What if you had eyelash hairs that grew all rogue and curly like my chest hair?  How many dead prototype homo sapiens had to go extinct to sort out all these very nuanced hair configurations?  I think the evolutionists get all giddy when some fur-clad corpse surfaces in northern Siberia and some scientist tries to say that the poor blighter lived ten million years ago.  Even when that does happen, they never find eyebrow hairs growing out of the guy's lips. 

I just don't buy it.  The other ridiculous flaw in the evolution argument is the assertion that DNA changes can be triggered by environmental pressures.  Some inquisitive walrus sees a bird soaring aloft and decides it would be fun to take flight, so she looks at her flippers and wills them to turn into wings - NAHH !!  OR she wills the eggs that are already in her ovaries to undergo DNA changes that eventually will result in her offspring being able to get airborne.  It's all stupid.  How can intelligent people spout that kind of lunacy?  I'll tell you how - they don't like God, or they wish He didn't exist.  They hope that He doesn't see their imperfections and that there will be no judgment for their conduct in a hereafter.

I didn't even begin to tackle the complicated stuff like cell division, color vision, blood-clotting and how anyone survived before the birth canal figured out how to stretch to 100 times its usual size to permit live births.

If evolution needed a very long time to accomplish all those things, I think this planet hasn't even been habitable for that long.

Intelligent

You know I have a fascination with the argument over the validity of Darwinian evolution.  Recently I have been reading a (2004) volume by William Dembski, Uncommon Dissent.  The book is a compilation of essays by fifteen intellectuals who challenge Darwinism.

One essay discusses the battle in the U.S. over whether ideas that contrast with Darwinism ought to be included in public school curricula.  This post will be brief.  I just want to echo one point made by one of the contributors to Uncommon Dissent.

Proponents of the Darwinian theory of evolution do not want Intelligent Design (ID) taught in schools.  They view ID proponents as religious fanatics.  They see religion as mere myth and fantasy.  Surely educators should not be propounding unscientific fantasies in the classroom.

Darwinists see the evolution theory as a purely scientific theory - scientific in that it is naturalistic.  The naturalistic view of the cosmos is that stuff happened naturally and randomly - without direction and purpose.  It insists on a universe devoid of God or a creator - devoid of intelligent organization or design.

Darwinists argue that evolutionary theory MUST be taught to our children because it IS SCIENCE, whereas the view that there may have been a purposeful designer is religious fanaticism.  Problem is - there are many smart scientists who don't believe Darwinism has been proved as unquestioned scientific fact either.

Einstein taught us (Second Law of Thermodynamics) that, if left to its own devices, everything in the universe will tend towards chaos, disorder, entropy.  Why then, are evolutionists so comfortable with the idea that, without intervention, biology naturally and gradually tends towards the beautiful, ordered complexity we see now in ourselves and in the world around us?

The way in which proponents of Darwinism successfully drown out the millions of adherents to the Intelligent Design theory is wickedly simple.  They re-frame the argument.  Darwinism itself is a system of beliefs.  No scientist has EVER successfully demonstrated (or even explained) how one species can morph into a different one, or even how the eye organ went from not existing to now allowing us all to see.  They say, "Well, it might have happened like this," or, "Scientists believe it probably evolved gradually over a long span of time."  Still, there is NO science in these assertions, they are just beliefs, faith in a idea.

By re-framing the argument and saying that evolution is science, and that the ubiquitous evidence of purposeful, intelligent design is fantasy, the evolutionists persuade Americans and their governments that only "science", not "religion" deserves a place in the classroom.  No other cosmic or contrasting view can be discussed - even those of scientists who are not proponents of "creationism".

The ardent evolutionist is likely always an avowed atheist who desperately wants God not to be there.  Why?  Why do they want also to control your children's minds?

Maybe you SHOULD home-school your kids.

Tipping Point

Cleon Skousen made a wise argument years ago.  He said that the big question in the choice of a government system is not between Democrat and Republican, or even Conservative and Liberal - it is the choice between tyranny and liberty.

The source of the following quote is questionable, but I like it anyway - -

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largesse out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy."

America is at an interesting point in its history.  When you look at the political landscape in America, you quickly discover that the urban, densely populated areas of the country incline towards voting Democratic, while the heartland seems to prefer the Republicans.  Union members typically prefer Democrats, as do blacks, Hispanics, women, college students, illegal immigrants, Hollywood and the vast majority of the mainstream media.

Democrats typically argue for bigger government programs, more government control, more entitlement programs, more "redistribution" of private wealth, more taxation, more regulation of businesses, and more safety net programs for the sick and the poor.

In recent presidential election cycles, the actual popular vote for president has been extremely close, sometimes swinging only one or two percent in either direction.  The electoral college system, however, makes certain states - Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Colorado and others - into pivotal swing states.  Win those states and you can be president.

There are reportedly some 12 million illegal aliens in America.  Like black people, these people would likely pick Balack Obama 99 to 1.  Why?  Because Obama wants to give them amnesty and a quickie path to U.S. citizenship.  Why?  Because he knows that if he can get these immigrants the right to vote, they will vote for him - A.) Because he was the one to let them in, and B.) Because he will give them all the free stuff he can possibly give them - free medical care, free food, free housing, free everything.

So, if the voting bloc that prefers to tax the private sector in order to fund public benefits for itself grows by millions, then the liberal Democratic model will take permanent control and never look back.

You may ask why any politician would be so stupid as to desire to take our country in such a direction.  Well, if you are the politician who doles out the free benefits from the public trough, you can control the public resources and control the people who receive them.  So we come back to the liberty:tyranny paradigm.  It is the tension between a local government controlled by the people, and a powerful, centralized government which controls the people.

Don't think that I believe that the Republicans are more righteous than the Democrats.  The tyrannies perpetrated by the Bush administration were breathtaking -  9/11, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and the Patriot act.  Corporations bribe politicians and finance their campaigns.

One thing is sure - we are at a tipping point.  We have lost our understanding of the principles of freedom.  We have embraced secular myths such as evolution and atheism.  We have entertained a melting pot of ideas and racial carmelization.  It can no longer be said that our ideals are clear and consistent.  What was a nation of Christians is now a nation of who-knows-what.  The Constitution was voided with the fraudulent passage of the 14th Amendment.  It "hangs by a thread".  Corruption and sin are rampant.  The Gadianton Robbers have confiscated all four corners of the earth.  All men are enslaved. 

We have looked into the heavens and counted some 250 billion suns (solar systems) in our Milky Way galaxy.  So far also, we have counted perhaps 250 billion GALAXIES like ours !!!  I don't believe that any of the life forms here on earth arrived here by any other means than by transplantation. The Gods know what they are doing.  They have been at this terra-forming game for a long time.  I should not be so cynical about the progress and decline of our Father's children on this planet.  He placed us here.  He knew what we would do.  He knows how it will end.  He knows what He will do to wrap things up.  He is doing what He has done on numerous other planets.  If given the chance, we will do the same ourselves one day.

Still, it is bracing to be around at this spectacular tipping point.  Here are some prophetic predictions from Nephi in America 2600 years ago:

 5.   But, said he, notwithstanding our afflictions, we have obtained a ^aland of promise, a land which is ^bchoice above all other lands; a land which the Lord God hath ^ccovenanted with me should be a land for the inheritance of my seed. Yea, the Lord hath ^dcovenanted this land unto me, and to my children forever, and also all those who should be ^eled out of other countries by the hand of the Lord.

 6.   Wherefore, I, Lehi, prophesy according to the workings of the Spirit which is in me, that there shall ^anone come into this land save they shall be brought by the hand of the Lord.

 7.   Wherefore, this ^aland is consecrated unto him whom he shall bring. And if it so be that they shall serve him according to the commandments which he hath given, it shall be a land of ^bliberty unto them; wherefore, they shall never be brought down into captivity; if so, it shall be because of iniquity; for if iniquity shall abound ^ccursed shall be the land for their sakes, but unto the righteous it shall be blessed forever.

8.   And behold, it is wisdom that this land should be ^akept as yet from the knowledge of other ^bnations; for behold, many nations would overrun the land, that there would be no place for an inheritance.

 9.   Wherefore, I, Lehi, have obtained a ^apromise, that ^binasmuch as those whom the Lord God shall bring out of the land of Jerusalem shall keep his commandments, they shall ^cprosper upon the face of this land; and they shall be kept from all other nations, that they may possess this land unto themselves. And if it so be that they shall ^dkeep his commandments they shall be blessed upon the face of this land, and there shall be none to molest them, nor to take away the land of their ^einheritance; and they shall dwell safely forever.

 10.   But behold, when the time cometh that they shall dwindle in ^aunbelief, after they have received so great blessings from the hand of the Lord—having a knowledge of the creation of the earth, and all men, knowing the great and marvelous works of the Lord from the creation of the world; having power given them to do all things by faith; having all the commandments from the beginning, and 

having been brought by his infinite goodness into this precious land of promise—behold, I say, if the day shall come that they will reject the Holy One of Israel, the true ^bMessiah, their Redeemer and their God, behold, the judgments of him that is ^cjust shall rest upon them.

 11.   Yea, he will bring ^aother nations unto them, and he will give unto them power, and he will take away from them the lands of their possessions, and he will cause them to be ^bscattered and smitten. (2 Nephi 1, 1-11)

Salmonella - Bacterial Flagellum

Salmonella Propulsion Apparatus

In an earlier post I made reference to the work of Michael Behe (professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University).  Behe challenges Darwinian theories of evolution.  He proposed the concept of "irreducible complexity".  His argument is that, when scientists stumble upon a biological mechanism of spectacular complexity AND they discover that the mechanism could not have survived or replicated without all of its components fully in place, then they must conclude that the mechanism COULD NOT have "evolved" into its current complexity.

Behe's thinking is that there are millions of mechanisms in living creatures (eyesight, blood-clotting, etc.) which could not have gradually developed.  He insists that, if we examine these complex mechanisms (like even the simple mouse-trap) we must conclude that they were designed purposefully.  He avoids trying to identify the "Designer", but it is clear that he accepts God and denounces Darwin and his evolutionist followers.

Behe has stirred up a vigorous controversy.  Some detractors insist that his irreducible complexity model is not falsifiable (and is thus mere speculation), yet they are hardly in a position to falsify it anyway.  Plus, proving the alleged occurrence of a hugely complex series of molecular biochemical evolutionary mutations is about as difficult as proving that Noah put many animals on his arc.  The following graphic shows some of the molecular structure of the base of the flagellum (whip propeller) which allows Salmonella bacteria to swim.  Remember that this critter is one cell.  The work is done by molecules and compounds.

When this machinery is assembled in this organism, the pieces and parts seem to "know" where they belong.  That is absurd, of course, because the little molecules that make up the various departments of a cell do not have a "brain".  Nevertheless, they are clearly equipped with some sort of programming code that governs their assembly and reproduction.  Where is that "data" stored?

I came across a short video which depicts the assembly process of this amazing apparatus.  Please watch it and ask yourself if you believe that this mechanism came into existence by evolutionary accident.  My opinion is that the people who argue so vociferously for the belief in evolution desperately hope that there is not a God (and all of the absoluteness that comes therewith).  CLICK on this website - -
Bacterial Flagellum - A Sheer Wonder Of Intelligent Design
                                then CLICK THE PLAY  >  ARROW
                       then watch carefully the intelligent design work of God.

If the sound on this video doesn't work, there is a volume control icon in the bottom left corner of the video window.  Click on it to remove the 'X' and un-mute.