Whether you are a creationist or not ICR’s website is worth going to and seeing what is available. Hopefully after a visit you will visit often and perhaps if you are an evolutionist you will even begin to question evolution and just believe the Word of God.
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 The same was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
‘Even nonscientists can face problems for suggesting that there might be a serious intellectual debate over Darwinism. At Baylor University, philosopher and legal scholar Francis Beckwith was initially denied tenure despite an outstanding record of academic research and publications.1 Although Professor Beckwith was well known for his prolife views, he was most controversial for his law review articles and an academic book defending the constitutionality of teaching about intelligent design as an alternative to Darwinism.2 It is important to note that Beckwith did not advocate that intelligent design should be taught in public schools — only that it was constitutional to teach it in an appropriate manner. But that nuanced position was too much for some of his colleagues, who were defenders of Darwin’s theory. Fortunately for Beckwith, after a public outcry, the president of Baylor later granted him tenure.3
College professors are not the only targets in academia who face discrimination because of their skepticism of Darwinism. Students can be even more vulnerable. Ohio State University doctoral candidate Bryan Leonard had his dissertation defense put in limbo after three pro-Darwin professors filed a spurious complaint attacking Leonard’s dissertation research as “unethical human subject experimentation.” Leonard’s dissertation project looked at how student beliefs changed after students were taught scientific evidence for and against modern evolutionary theory. The complaining professors admitted that they had not actually read Leonard’s dissertation. But they were sure it must be unethical. Why? According to them, there is no valid evidence against evolutionary theory. Thus — by definition — Leonard’s research must be tantamount to child abuse.4
Outside of academia, there have been similar cases of discrimination in government-funded science organizations. David Coppedge was a senior computer systems administrator for the Cassini Mission to Saturn at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in California. He faced demotion and discharge after he offended his supervisor by occasionally offering to loan colleagues DVDs about intelligent design.5 No one had ever complained to Coppedge about his offers of DVDs, but when the supervisor found out, Coppedge faced a punitive investigation. His employment evaluations, which had been outstanding, suddenly became negative, and ultimately he lost his job. Coppedge’s dismissal was justified as a budgetary reduction unrelated to his views on intelligent design, but that explanation was questionable given the facts of the case.
Evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg faced similar retaliation by officials at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) after accepting for publication a peer-reviewed article supportive of intelligent design in a biology journal he edited. A research associate at the museum, Sternberg said that after the article was published, he was told to vacate his office space and was shunned and vilified by colleagues. Efforts were also made by administrators to discover Sternberg’s personal religious and political beliefs.6 Investigators for the U.S. Office of Special Counsel concluded that “it is…clear that a hostile work environment was created with the ultimate goal of forcing [Dr. Sternberg]…out of the [Smithsonian].”7
Smithsonian officials denied any wrongdoing, but Sternberg was demoted from a research associate to a research collaborator without explanation.8 A 17-month investigation by subcommittee staff of the House Committee on Government Reform subsequently confirmed and elaborated on the previous findings of the US Office of Special Counsel. In a detailed report released to the public, subcommittee investigators concluded that they had uncovered “substantial, credible evidence of efforts to abuse and harass Dr. Sternberg, including punitively targeting him for investigation in order to supply a pretext for dismissing him, and applying to him regulations and restrictions not imposed on other researchers.”9
Congressional investigators further accused NMNH officials of conspiring “on government time and using government emails…with the pro-evolution National Center for Science Education (NCSE)…to publicly smear and discredit Dr. Sternberg with false and defamatory information.”10 The NCSE even provided a set of “‘talking points’ to…NMNH officials on how to discredit both Sternberg and the Meyer article.” In addition, the NCSE was asked by senior museum administrator Dr. Hans Sues “to monitor Sternberg’s outside activities…The clear purpose of having the NCSE monitor Dr. Sternberg’s outside activities was to find a way to dismiss him.”11 Congressional investigators concluded that “the extent to which NMNH officials colluded on government time and with government resources with the NCSE to publicly discredit Dr. Sternberg’s scientific and professional integrity and investigate opportunities to dismiss him is alarming.”12
When asked about Sternberg’s plight by the Washington Post, Eugenie Scott of the NCSE seemed to suggest that Sternberg was lucky more was not done to get rid of him: “If this was a corporation, and an employee did something that really embarrassed the administration, really blew it, how long do you think that person would be employed?”13
Science teachers in K-12 schools also face challenges if they criticize Darwinian theory. In Minnesota, high school teacher Rodney LeVake was removed from teaching biology after expressing doubts about Darwin’s theory. LeVake, who holds a master’s degree in biology, agreed to teach evolution as required in the district’s curriculum, but said he wanted to “accompany that treatment of evolution with an honest look at the difficulties and inconsistencies of the theory.”14
In Washington State, longtime high school biology teacher Roger DeHart faced continuing harassment from pro-Darwin activists, who succeeded in getting his school district to prohibit him from discussing scientific criticisms of modern Darwinian theory with his students. DeHart was even banned from sharing mainstream science publications with students that corrected textbook errors about evolution. Although DeHart complied with his district’s gag order, ultimately, he was removed from teaching biology. When he took a job in an adjoining school district so that he could continue to teach biology, the harassment continued. He was eventually reassigned from teaching biology in that district as well, even though there were no allegations by his new district that he was not following the prescribed curriculum. DeHart finally was driven from public education altogether.15
The following statement was recently made in an online political article. ‘New arrivals to the region will have a chance to embrace the world’s oldest continuing culture through a series of events being supported by the NSW Government.’https://dugaldsaunders.com.au/funding-to-bring-cultures-together-on-country/
Is that statement really true concerning the aboriginal culture? The majority of the world has swallowed the evolutionary tale which is diametrically opposed to the Biblical teaching. The following is from Creation Ministries International which I trust you will read with an open mind.
‘Today’s feedback from Chris B. of Australia, concerns media reports about when Aboriginal people settled Australia. It’s answered by CMI’s Dr Tas Walker.
Hello,
In recent years the media has reported ever increasing ages that the Aboriginal Australians have inhabited the continent, and progressively, figures of 10, 20 and up to 40 and 50 thousand years have been given. The evidence of these dates mostly come from artefacts like cave painting or rock engraving. Recently, however, these sorts of dates have been claimed to arise from comparing DNA of Australian Aboriginals with that of the people indigenous to the Highlands of New Guinea. The theory is that at one time they had the same genome, but, genetic drift over time can be seen by comparing the DNA, thus “counting back” to when they were one people.
Is this technique of genome comparison a valid way to date how long Aboriginal people have been living in Australia, or does the technique contain certain evolutionary assumptions? Does CMI have any information refuting such DNA based dating that you can kindly refer me to?
Kind regards,
Chris B.
CMI’s Dr Tas Walker responds:
Hi Chris,
The dating technique you mention is called a ‘molecular clock’. It involves very sophisticated laboratory techniques for comparing DNA sequences. However, like all ‘scientific’ clocks, a date cannot be calculated without making a number of unprovable assumptions about the past (see Fatal flaw). The reason the technique gives long ages is because the rate of genetic change is calibrated to provide results consistent with the standard evolutionary long-age timescale. However, when the rate of genetic change is ‘calibrated’ against the rate actually measured in organisms at the present time the timescales are much shorter—consistent with the biblical timescale.
The article Evolutionary molecular genetic clocks—a perpetual exercise in futility and failure explains the principles of the molecular clock and discusses the problem with the method. In summary, genetic clock methods assume evolution and deep-time by calibrating against the paleontological timescale. In addition, the methods have multiple problems: 1) different genes/sequences give widely different evolutionary rates, 2) different taxa exhibit different rates for homologous (similar) sequences, and 3) divergence dates commonly disagree with paleontology despite being calibrated by it. And finally, the molecular clock idea is directly tied to the neutral model theory of evolution, which assumes mutations occur in the so-called junk DNA. However, recent discoveries undermine the idea of pervasive junk DNA, thus negating its foundational premise.
The article Empirical genetic clocks give biblical timelines shows that when measured rates of genetic change are applied, ‘molecular clocks’ yield ages consistent with the biblical timescale. The article concludes, “A straightforward empirical approach constricted to analyses within a single taxa, typically yields dates of not more than about 5,000 to 10,000 years. Thus, when the hypothetical evolutionary constraints are removed, and the data is analyzed empirically, biblical timelines are achieved.”
One recent media article about the dating of Aboriginal occupation of Australia was reported in Science Daily,1 based on research published in Nature.2 This analysed hair samples collected from Aboriginal people across Australia. The genetic relationships between people within Australia and outside Australia from this analysis are likely to be reasonable. All people on earth today are descended from the eight people who were on Noah’s Ark that came to rest in the Middle East, and so the emigration paths described in the paper would be compatible with the biblical account. However, the multi-thousand-year dates are not, for the reasons outlined above.
The article The dating game discusses various efforts to date Aboriginal remains, in particular the individuals dubbed Mungo Man and Mungo Woman, found in sand dunes in south-western New South Wales. This article was published in 2003 but is still relevant. It describes how published dates, based on a range of different methods, progressively rose higher and higher. In 1999, when researchers at Australian National University in Canberra published a date of 62,000 years, other evolutionary researchers objected. It created an international problem for theories of human evolution. Such an early occupation of Australia by Aborigines would require the whole out-of-Africa theory of human origins to be rewritten.
However, the new molecular clock researchers are not so ambitious, citing dates of 50,000 years. Perhaps some sort of a compromise is being sought by settling on a number that won’t run afoul of the out-of-Africa scenario but still have very old dates for Australian Aborigines.
These scenarios for Aboriginal occupation of Australia are based on evolutionary assumptions, and these contradict biblical history. Especially they ignore Noah’s global Flood. However, the Bible provides a solid interpretive framework for scientific investigations into human origins. The first Aboriginal settlers to Australia were descended from people as intelligent and inventive as all other people alive at that time. Like everyone else, they were descended from Noah, who built and managed the Ark, and from a people who developed an advanced civilization around the Tower of Babel. So, as the DNA research reveals, the Australian Aborigines were related to other people groups, including those in India and Papua New Guinea. This aspect of the DNA research fits nicely with the biblical account.
However, the idea that the Aboriginal people of Australia are a primitive culture that had not evolved as much as people from other cultures is wrong. It’s evolutionary racism. Rather, they lost some of their technological know-how when they reached Australia. This can happen in a generation if parents do not pass their culture onto their children, or if small populations become isolated. Perhaps it was this isolation and the pressure to cope with a worsening climate as the continent dried out after the post-Flood Ice Age. But, they, like all other peoples, are made ‘in the image of God’ (Genesis 1:26), to have a relationship with God.
In summary, the dates produced by the ‘molecular clock’ are not valid because it begins with an incorrect calibration and has numerous fatal problems. However, if measured mutation rates are used as calibration then dates consistent with biblical timescales are obtained. But the method still has problems, which is why scientists do not rely on the dates it produces until they have checked other research to decide which dates to accept. On the other hand, the genetic relationships between people groups revealed by DNA comparisons are likely to be reasonably sound, and may help sort out migration routes of people since disembarking from Noah’s Ark in the Middle East about 4,500 years ago.
All the best,
Tas Walker
Scientist, Writer, Speaker
Theistic evolutionist ‘Dr. Francis Collins, former director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and founder of the evolutionary creation advocacy group BioLogos, has become a lightning rod within evangelicalism for promoting vaccines for COVID-19, especially among pastors and other faith leaders.
In a BioLogos-sponsored webinar last week, Collins chided many of his fellow white evangelicals for not getting the vaccine and alleged “the culture war is literally killing people.”
Collins cited Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that vaccine hesitancy or resistance contributed to more than 100,000 deaths from COVID-19, the Religion News Service reported. He suggested vaccine resistance was partly the result of Christians falling for misinformation.
Yet in a recent Daily Wire article that’s been widely circulated, conservative writer Megan Basham questioned why evangelicals haven’t interrogated Collins more rigorously before sharing their platform with the federal official she called “Caesar’s agent.”
Citing news reports, Basham accused Collins of trying to suppress questions surrounding the source of COVID-19 and the efficacy of the federal COVID-19 response. She also accused Collins himself of being “willing to compromise transparency and truth for PR considerations.”
Basham also questioned whether it was appropriate for Collins to recruit evangelical leaders like Wheaton College dean Ed Stetzer to help him spread the government’s preferred narratives about COVID-19.
On a podcast with Stetzer in September, Collins said, “I want pastors once again to try to use your credibility with your flock to put forward the public health measures that we know can work.”
But Basham asked, “(I)s it truly the pastor’s job to tell church members to ‘trust the science?’”
Spokespeople for the NIH and BioLogos didn’t immediately reply when The Roys Report reached out asking for a response to the Daily Wire piece. TheDaily Wire didn’t receive a response when it reached out to Stetzer, public theologian Russell Moore, and other high-profile evangelicals mentioned in the piece.
Collins regularly cites his faith in BioLogos podcasts and elsewhere, sometimes comparing his path to Christ to that of C.S. Lewis. Collins, who headed the Human Genome Project, is author of the best-selling book The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, which won a Christianity Today Book Award.
Because of his substantial scientific credentials and professed Christian belief, The Washington Post described Collins as being in an “unusual position to address people of faith.”
In last week’s BioLogos webinar, Collins said he was surprised by how much his shared faith mattered to Christians. Researchers, he said, have found that “unless that truth comes at you from somebody you trust, you’re not going to call it truth at all.”
Collins also highlighted how white evangelicals were somewhat less likely than average to have gotten vaccinated for COVID-19.
About two-thirds of white evangelical Protestants had gotten at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine when Pew Research polled Americans in late August. At the time, 70% of black Protestants had done so, and almost three-quarters of Americans in general.
Collins told RNS he blamed “misinformation and lies and conspiracies” for part of white evangelicals’ hesitancy about COVID-19 vaccination. He also thought his messaging about the pandemic could have been better.
However, Basham called Collins’ credibility with evangelicals into question.
Under Collins’ watch, she wrote, the NIH has funded research using abortion-derived fetal tissue and factored in diversity criteria when awarding grants. NIH funding has also gone to research on “sexual and gender minorities,” she wrote.
BioLogos, which Collins founded, also advocates for “an evolutionary understanding of God’s creation.”
According to Pew Research, only about a third of evangelicals think humans evolved and a majority oppose abortion and same-sex marriage.
Basham suggested Collins gained his credibility from “character witnesses” like Stetzer and former Southern Baptist leader Russell Moore, who praised Collins’ “Christian humility.”
After the article’s publication, Basham noted on Twitter that BioLogos suddenly canceled an interview she had scheduled with Collins on a different topic. When she asked why, an organization spokesperson replied that “the tone and claims” of her article were “inconsistence” with BioLogos’ aims.
Responses Mixed
Responses to the controversy have been mixed.
Jay Richards, a research fellow with the Heritage Foundation, urged pastors and religious leaders to apologize for “this naïve propagandizing for Collins.”
Kelley Owens, a kids director at a church in Indianapolis, tweeted: “If nothing else, this pandemic has served to increase my discernment and give me pause before I uncritically accept any position . . . Even if it comes from someone I have previously trusted.”
However, a medical doctor noted on social media that Collins was “far from the only medical doctor urging, masking, vaccination, and reasonable public health interventions. In fact there have been doctors and nurses in churches all across the country giving the same message to evangelicals.”
One reader likened the pushback against Collins to how Christians interacted with former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop.
Erick Erickson, a conservative Christian pundit, initially said he was “disturbed” by Basham’s article. But later, he published a blog post calling for an end to what he characterized as “infighting” among Christians trying to bolster their own credibility.
“(M)aybe those in positions of leadership need to realize there are others they’re inspiring to tribalism, not to the trials of the Christian life,” he wrote. “Maybe instead of picking sides, pick Jesus.”’https://julieroys.com/francis-collins-draws-fire-vaccine-advocacy-top-evangelicals/?mc_cid=27c313549b&mc_eid=b13d34ad49
If you have read this far Collins is wrong in both his belief on how God created and on the effectiveness of the Covid vaccines. Genesis 1:31 ¶ And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day and THERE IS NO WAY OF GETTING THEISTIC EVOLUTION out of that!
I attended a public high school and thank the Lord I had a biology teacher that spent only one hour in seeking to explain evolution. However, I do remember when she was sick for several days and we had students from the University of Iowa substitute and they sought to push the evolutionary theory during those few days. Now, I wasn’t a real knowledgeable student in creation science or the Bible back then but I did ask questions which made the substitute teachers just a little upset. Anyway, as I grew in my faith and researched things I became more and more convinced that in the beginning God….
Here’s another video from Search For The Truth. ‘As a kid, did you ever dream of being a superhero who could become invisible to defeat the bad guys? Well, God shows us how that dream plays out in His creation!’
Psalm 78:45 “He sent divers sorts of flies among them, which devoured them; and frogs, which destroyed them.”
Borneo is home to some strange creatures. We are familiar with the orangutan, widely considered to be the creature that gave rise to the myth of the Wild Man of Borneo. Another very strange animal from Borneo is the Bornean flat-headed frog (Barbourula kalimantanensis). It is not the flat head that makes it unusual, but rather the fact that it has no lungs. Other internal organs occupy the space where the lungs would normally have been in the 2-inch-long creature, and the result is that the frog is flatter than most other frogs. The frog is able to “breathe” by absorbing air through its skin. Most frogs do this anyway, in addition to using lungs.
Evolutionary scientists have suggested that the flat-headed frog has evolved that way in order to adapt to the cold, rapidly flowing streams in which it lives, to avoid being swept away. But there are other frogs that live in cold, rapidly growing streams. Why have these frogs not similarly evolved lunglessness if this is seen as an evolutionary advantage in Borneo?
It is much more likely that this species is suffering from a congenital disease. A mutation in a tadpole prevented the formation of lungs – a mutation that would be fatal in mammals, reptiles, or birds, but the resulting lungless adult frog has been able to get enough air through its skin. Creationists would suspect that this isolated Bornean population would probably be able to interbreed with related frogs in the Philippines.’https://creationmoments.com/sermons/a-frog-with-no-lungs/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=a-frog-with-no-lungs&mc_cid=c6758dbcfa&mc_eid=00c1dcff3c
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