Answers in Genesis: Is Science Secular?

Look what appears today at the website of Answers in Genesis (AIG), the online creationist ministry of Ken Ham (ol’ Hambo). This is their new article: Is Science Secular?

That’s a peculiar question. We might also ask: Is chemistry secular? Or physics? Or astronomy, geology, or — gasp! — biology? Surely they’re not religious endeavors! Well, let’s see what AIG can do with their question. Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us and AIG’s scripture references omitted:

Many people today insist that science can only be done by people who have a secular worldview — or at least by those who are willing to leave their religious views at the door as they enter the science lab. Several popular atheists and evolutionists have contended that people who reject the big bang and the evolution of living things are so backward that they cannot even be involved in developing new technologies.

We suppose it’s possible for a chemist to believe in Noah’s Flood. That bible tale is unlikely to interfere with his chemistry work — but he’d certainly be a strange individual. More from AIG:

A friend of the ministry was recently challenged by the comment that science can only be done through a purely secular evolutionary framework. We have decided to publish a response for the sake of teaching. Such statements are blatantly absurd and are a type of arbitrary fallacy called an “ignorant conjecture.” In other words, these people simply do not know the past, nor are they familiar with what science really is.

A “purely secular evolutionary framework” is necessary for science? We doubt that physicists need to think much about evolution while doing their work. Let’s read on:

If science is a strictly secular endeavor without any need for a biblical worldview, then why were most fields of science developed by Bible-believing Christians? For example, consider Isaac Newton, Gregor Mendel, Louis Pasteur, Johann Kepler, Galileo Galilei …

Yeah, yeah — we’ve seen the list before. Those people lived before Darwin (except Pasteur, who was a contemporary), and their work had nothing to do with biological evolution. Not only that, but their work had nothing to do with creationism either. Nothing in science — absolutely nothing! — is based on six-day creation, Noah’s Flood, or any other scriptural miracles. AIG continues:

Even in modern times, the inventor of the MRI scanning machine, Dr. Raymond Damadian, is a Christian working with Christian principles.

What, pray tell, is “Christian” about the MRI scanning machine? Is it based on six-day creation? Or on anything else that was ever taught by the creationists of AIG? Here’s more:

And those who recently founded the scientific field of baraminology are also Christians.

Baraminology? BWAHAHAHAHAHA! Okay, we’ll give them that one. What else have they got?

And let’s not forget Werner Von Braun, the young-earth Christian who was the founder of rocket science and led the U.S. to the moon.

Okay, we’ll credit creationism for The Blitz. Maybe von Braun used Noah’s Ark as a model for his V-2 rockets, but we doubt it. [Addendum: Werner von Braun wasn't a YEC, as is pointed out in the comments.] Moving along:

Furthermore, science comes out of a Christian worldview. Only the God described in the Bible can account for a logical and orderly universe. God upholds the universe in a particular way, such that we can study it by observational and repeatable experimentation. Because God upholds the universe in a consistent manner, we have a valid reason to expect that we can study the world we live in and describe the laws that God uses to sustain the universe.

Hogwash. AIG’s scriptural concept of the universe is riddled with impossible events that are impervious to rational analysis — such as the aforementioned six-day creation, the global flood, and an Ark-load of other miracles and divine interventions that make no scientific sense whatsoever. Another excerpt:

In the secular view, where all matter originated by chance from nothing, there is no ultimate cause or reason for anything that happens, and explanations are constantly changing, so there is no basis for science. … On what basis should we expect a universe that came from nothing and for no reason to act in a predictable and consistent manner? When non-Christians do real science by observable and repeatable experimentation, they are actually assuming a biblical worldview, even if they do not realize it.

That was a difficult paragraph. We’ll pause for a moment while you untwist your brain. Everybody okay now? Very well, on with the article:

It makes sense why “science” in the U.S. is losing out to other nations since our science education system now limits science in the classroom exclusively to the religion of secular humanism.

Ah, so that’s the reason the US is falling behind — not enough creation science is being taught in our schools. What other insights does AIG have for us?

So, the debate is not “science versus religion.” It is really “religion versus religion.” Sadly, science is caught up in the middle. The battle is between the religion of secular humanism (with its variant forms like agnosticism, atheism, and the like), which is usually called secularism or humanism for short, and Christianity.

[...]

Humanism has astronomical evolution (big bang), geological evolution (millions of years of slow gradual changes), chemical evolution (life came from non-life) and biological evolution (original, single-celled life evolved into all life forms we have today over billions of years) in its view of origins. In other words, evolution (as a whole) is a subset of the dogma of the religion of humanism in the same way as biblical creation (as a whole, with six-day Creation, the Fall, global Flood, and the Tower of Babel) is a subset of the dogma of Christianity. It is a battle over two different religions.

Aaaargh!! How much more can we take? Not much, and this is a long essay. We’ll give you one more nugget, and then we’ll have to abandon this one. Here it comes:

[E]volutionists have continued to popularize Darwin’s scientific observation of the changes in beaks of Galapagos finches as proof for the evolution of one animal kind into another. This is a great example of the bait and switch fallacy where scientists present real scientific evidence (the difference in finch beaks) but stretch the truth to say it gives validity to the Greek mythology of microbes to man evolution (the “switch” part of the fallacy). This trick leads many to believe that evolution is real science. …

People are baited with this good methodology of science (again developed by a Christian named Francis Bacon) and then they are told that evolution is science while subtly appealing to another added definition: that of “natural science” or “naturalism.” This is like saying another definition of science is “Nazism.” Then Nazis could say they are “scientists” and get into a classroom! This is what has happened with humanism.

That charlatan Darwin — all he had to support his theory was a few finch beaks. Okay, we have to stop our descent into AIG’s pit of madness or it may overwhelm us. Go ahead, dear reader, click over there and read it all. Who knows? You may be persuaded that we should abandon our concept of science and embrace theirs. Their viewpoint may be the one that takes us to the stars. But if you’ll forgive your Curmudgeon, we have serious doubts about that.

Addendum: We must give AIG’s article our Rosie Ruiz award. They have claimed the prize, but they haven’t run the race.

Copyright © 2013. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Creationist Voyeurism: Case #6

We may need to start a new section of our Table of Contents for these cases. As you recall from our recent post, Another Creationist Bathroom Voyeur, we are developing a new scientific hypothesis:

[T]here may be some heretofore unsuspected — what shall we call it — Creationism-Voyeurism Syndrome — CVS? Maybe, in honor of the first case we learned about, it should be called the McConaghie syndrome. [A reference to David McConaghie -- see Creationist Suspected of Bathroom Voyeurism.]

The question we’re asking is this: Is there something deep within the creationist brain that causes such perverted behavior? Or maybe creationism isn’t the trigger; perhaps there’s some disorder that produces both creationism and voyeurism? We don’t know, and we realize that at this point we’ve collected only a few of these bathroom voyeurism cases — and not all of them were reliably reported as being creationists. That’s understandable. Except for preachers, where the creationism is obvious, few perverts are asked about creationism.

The evidence keeps piling up — especially on slow news days when there’s nothing else to write about. We learned of today’s case study in The Province of British Columbia. Their shocking headline is Ont. hockey volunteer faces dozens of child porn, voyeurism charges in locker-room video probe. Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us:

PETERBOROUGH, Ont. — A man who police say was very active in the Peterborough hockey community is facing 62 charges in connection with a child pornography and sexual assault investigation by two Ontario police forces.

Police say the charges stem from alleged incidents involving multiple victims, including dozens of child porn and voyeurism charges linked to videos allegedly made in locker rooms, primarily in the Peterborough area.

[...]

Police say a search warrant was executed on Monday at a home in Peterborough and James Alex Brunton, 65, was arrested.

Yes, dear reader, we can anticipate your reaction: Come on, Curmy, there’s lots of voyeurs out there, including the bathroom type, but where’s the creationist connection? That’s coming right up. The news story says:

Police say Brunton is very active in the Peterborough hockey community and has served as secretary, manager, assistant or volunteer for the Peterborough Minor Petes AAA, the Lakefield Chiefs Jr. Hockey, the Peterborough Junior C Lakers and the Kawartha Komets Special Needs Hockey.

He has also volunteered at the Telecare Distress Centres of Canada, police said.

That last group is the connection we’re looking for. Here’s their website: Telecare Distress Centres of Canada. If you click on “History” you’ll find this:

The Telecare model for a crisis intervention telephone ministry originated in Sydney, Australia in 1963. … The first LifeLine related service in Canada was founded in Sudbury, Ontario on October 4, 1965, by the Rev. D. Bruce MacDougall of St. Peter’s United Church.

Here’s the website for that church: St. Peter’s United Church. If you click on “About us” you’ll learn that their parent organization is the United Church of Canada. We don’t find them in the National Center for Science Education’s listing of Statements from Religious Organizations that accept evolution, so until demonstrated otherwise, we’ll assume they’re creationists. [Addendum: as pointed out in the comments, they're not a creationist denomination.] Back to the news story:

Brunton is further charged with 25 counts of voyeurism, 12 counts of making child pornography and 12 counts of possession of child pornography stemming from his alleged involvement in covertly making videos in hockey team locker rooms.

All right, that’s enough. We now have another data-point for our hypothesis of a deep and disturbing connection between creationism and bathroom voyeurism.

At what point should we regard our hypothesis as a well-established theory? A few more cases should do the job. Until then, it’s certainly prudent to regard creationist organizations — and their bathroom facilities — with suspicion.

In our Curmudgeonly benevolence, we cry out to all creationists: Repent! Learn some science. Abandon your foolish creationist beliefs before you follow the path that leads inevitably to personal ruin!

Copyright © 2013. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Evolution, Political Opinions, and Muscles

When creationists write about — and always criticize — Social Darwinism, they inevitably select what they see as undesirable activity and then attribute it to Darwin’s theory of evolution. They never attribute such behavior to evolution itself — the existence of which they deny. They blame it on Darwin personally, notwithstanding that he never advocated any of the social movements they associate with him.

It never matters to creationists that racism, eugenics, genocide, communism, and “ruthless” laissez-faire capitalism — for which they claim Darwin’s theory is responsible — all preceded Darwin’s existence. Facts don’t matter to creationists. They blame Darwin anyway.

What? You have a question? We hate interruptions! Well, okay, go ahead. You ask: How can creationists blame Darwin for both communism and capitalism? We don’t understand it either, but they do. See this from the Institute for Creation Research: Darwin’s Influence on Ruthless Laissez Faire Capitalism.

Besides blaming Darwin for humanity’s dark side, creationists attribute humanity’s better attributes to their peculiar views. So to them, if something is bad it’s Darwin’s fault, and if something is good it’s because of their religious and creationist beliefs. It’s rather simplistic, and it totally ignores the consequences that evolution itself may have had on what we call our human nature.

The creationists are as whacky about “social Darwinism” (a field we regard as pseudo-science) as they are in understanding the actual science. The result is that we rarely pay attention to “news” about the social consequences of Darwin’s theory — except to ridicule the creationists.

But today we found an article in London’s Daily Mail that seems related to all that, although it’s really not. The headline is Men who are physically strong are more likely to have right wing political views. Here are some excerpts, with bold font added by us:

Men who are physically strong are more likely to take a right wing political stance, while weaker men are inclined to support the welfare state, according to a new study.

Researchers discovered political motivations may have evolutionary links to physical strength. Men’s upper-body strength predicts their political opinions on economic redistribution, according to the research.

Makes you think, doesn’t it? Okay, all you hollow-chested left-wingers with pencil-thin arms, and all you broad-shouldered conservative, muscle-bound brutes, pay attention as we proceed with the article:

… Professor Petersen and Professor Sznycer [Michael Bang Petersen, of Aarhus University in Denmark, and Daniel Sznycer, of the University of California] hypothesised that upper-body strength – a proxy for the ability to physically defend or acquire resources – would predict men’s opinions about the redistribution of wealth. The researchers collected data on bicep size, socio-economic status, and support for economic redistribution from hundreds of people in the United States, Argentina and Denmark.

Their paper is in Psychological Science, but you can’t even access the abstract unless you’re registered. So phooey on them. Let’s keep reading the newspaper article:

In line with their hypotheses, the data revealed that wealthy men with high upper-body strength were less likely to support redistribution, while less wealthy men of the same strength were more likely to support it.

So what? All that tells us is that if someone is wealthy, he’s unlikely to favor redistribution. We could have guessed that. The article continues:

Professor Petersen said: ‘Despite the fact that the United States, Denmark and Argentina have very different welfare systems, we still see that – at the psychological level – individuals reason about welfare redistribution in the same way.

We could have guessed that too. Come on, guys, get to the good stuff! Here’s more:

In all three countries, physically strong males consistently pursue the self-interested position on redistribution. Men with low upper-body strength, on the other hand, were less likely to support their own self-interest.

[...]

Professor Petersen said: ‘Our results demonstrate that physically weak males are more reluctant than physically strong males to assert their self-interest – just as if disputes over national policies were a matter of direct physical confrontation among small numbers of individuals, rather than abstract electoral dynamics among millions.’

That is interesting. There may be a genuine pattern here. But what about the ladies? That’s coming up:

However, the researchers found no link between upper-body strength and redistribution opinions among women. Professor Petersen argued that this is likely due to the fact that, over the course of evolutionary history, women had less to gain, and also more to lose, from engaging in direct physical aggression.

Also, at least in our limited experience, women have other ways to get what they want. One last excerpt:

Professor Petersen [said]: ‘Many previous studies have shown that people’s political views cannot be predicted by standard economic models. ‘This is among the first studies to show that political views may be rational in another sense, in that they’re designed by natural selection to function in the conditions recurrent over human evolutionary history.’

So, class, what did we learn from this? Anyone? Anyone?

Copyright © 2013. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Rev. David Rives — God and the Space Race

The technicians who keep things running here haven’t yet finished installing a replacement Retard-o-tron™, but even without it we managed to find the latest video by the brilliant and articulate leader of David Rives Ministries. It’s a featured article in WorldNetDaily — described in the Cast of Characters section of our Intro page.

WND’s headline is Amid America’s space race, God appears. That’s quite a headline! We had to see this one.

The title of the video is Walking on the Moon. The rev spends most of the video’s precious time retelling the history of the Space Race between the US and the old USSR. We assume that you know all about that, but it’s good to hear it from the perspective of a holy man like the rev.

Then, right near the end of the video’s two minutes, the rev reveals the startling news. We won’t ruin things for you by telling you here what this is all about, but it involves Wernher von Braun. What a career that guy had — from launching V-2 rockets at London, to launching manned missions to the Moon, and then — the crowning achievement — he’s quoted by Rev Rives.

As we’ve done before with the rev’s videos, please feel free to use the comments section as an Intellectual Free Fire Zone. You know the rules. Okay, now go to it.

Copyright © 2013. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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