Re: I have another argument that needs refuting
- From: Ernest Major <{$to$}@meden.demon.co.uk>
- Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 21:54:29 +0100
In message <1153165946.553855.41200@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, shinryuken88@xxxxxxxxx writes
The argument :
First and foremost we have to understand that there are really only two
theories on how life started. Creation, or evolution. It's one or the
other that a person must believe. Now in order to have an informed
opinion a person must weigh the evidence and decide.
The Bible states that God created everything. This took place about 6,
000 years ago. The creation process took 6 literal 24 hour days, and
everything from the stars and moon, to plants and man were created in
that time period. The Bible goes on to say that about 4, 400 years ago,
God destroyed all of life on earth except for Noah, his family, and the
animals on the ark, with a world wide flood.
Evolution states that everything in the universe came from nothing
about 20 billion years ago(by the way that number has increased
throughout the years). They say that the entire universe was compacted
down to a speck no bigger then a period. This dot spun faster and
faster until it exploded into the universe. Then in a step by step
process (through mutations, which are 99.99% negative and lots of the
time deadly, and natural selection) life started. Random chemicals came
together to create bacteria which eventually became man. Let me ask one
question before starting. Where did the dot come from?
Common descent with modification through the agency of natural selection is a fact supported by literally billions of observations, from multiple lines of evidence, including DNA sequence honologies, biogeography, anatomical homologies, vestigal features, behavioural homologies, the fossil record, observations of natural selection, observations of speciation, and so on.
The scientific method is based on observation and experimentation. It
is impossible to prove scientifically both theories of origin. Why?
Because no one was there to observe the beginning and we can not
experiment with the beginning. So why is it that creation is referred
to as a religion while evolution is called science? Evolution is a
religion also, because it can not be scientifically proven. All we can
do is study the evidence and see which religion makes the most sense.
Let me begin with biology. Extraordinary design and adaptation are
found throughout nature in such abundance, perfection and complexity as
to utterly defy evolutionary explanation. Most of these structures and
abilities simply could not have evolved piece by piece, because they
are only useful when perfect and complete. The complexity, diversity,
beauty, order and astonishing perfection of life forms defy evolution.
There are fascinating interrelationships where species are absolutely
dependant on each other. Such as mimicry, symbiosis, and parasitism.
These things clearly indicate purposeful and intelligent design.
Lets start with a species we are all familiar with. Ourselves. George
Gallup, founder of the Gallup polls, states, "Take the human body
alone, the chance that all the functions of the individual could just
happen, is a statistical monstrosity." But lets forget about the whole
human body and all it's complexity. Like the respiratory system, the
circulatory system, the nervous system, the immensely complicated
brain, or the extremely detailed DNA strand. Lets just focus on one
small body part; the eye.
The human eye has automatic aiming, automatic focusing , and automatic
aperture adjustment. It can function in almost complete darkness and in
bright sunlight. It can see an object the diameter of fine hair and it
makes about one hundred thousand separate motions in an average day!
Not only that, but while you sleep it carries on its own maintenance
work. The eye is so complex that scientists today still do not fully
understand it. Scientist R.L. Wysong says that, "granting evolutionist
generous concessions, the probability for the chance formation of the
eye is 1 in 10 to the 266th power! That's 1 in 10 with 266 zeros after
it! (1, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000,
000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000,
000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000,
000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000,
000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000,
000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000,
000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000)!! Mathematicians state that anything
with a probability less then 1 in 10 to the 50th power is impossible.
And evolutionary theory calls for the chance development of the eye
multiple times. For example, squids, vertebrates, arthropods, etc.,
etc. Basically evolution requires the impossible to happen over and
over again.
I want to move on now to other species. Lets look at two species that
are inter-dependent on each other. The Bulls Horn Acacia tree and the
gardening ants. These trees are furnished with hollow thorns that are
inhabited by ferocious stinging ants. Small bumps on the tree supply
food to the ants. Now, these ants will viciously attack any and all
intruders. They also make regular raids in all directions from their
home tree, nipping off every green shoot near the tree. So we see that
the ants get food and shelter from the tree and in return the tree gets
protection from animal predators and plant competitors (allowing plenty
of sunlight and space, which is a rarity in those parts).
These two species are so dependent on each other that experiments have
shown when all ants are removed from the tree, it dies within two to
fifteen months. How did they survive while waiting for the other to
"evolve"? Or did they somehow "evolve" at exactly the same time? And
what's the logic behind the process? Evolutionists casually label this
co-adaptation, but fail to explain how and why such an intricate
relationship might have developed through the evolutionary process.
How about another insect? The Bombardier Beetle for example. Whenever
threatened, this little creature blasts irritating and odious gases,
which are 212*F, from two tailpipes into its enemies face. The beetle
makes this by combining two very dangerous chemicals, hydroquinone and
hydrogen peroxide, along with an inhibitor that prevents the chemicals
from exploding and allows the beetle to store the chemicals safely.
When attacked, it squirts the stored chemicals into two combustion
tubes and at precisely the right moment it adds another chemical, an
anti-inhibitor. This neutralizes the inhibitor, and causes a violent
explosion in the face of the attacker.
Well, according to evolutionary thinking, there must have been
thousands of generations of beetles improperly mixing these chemicals
and blowing themselves to pieces, eventually arriving at the precise
formula. But wait a minute! What about the devolvement of the
inhibitor? You see, there's no reason to "evolve" an inhibitor unless
you already have the two chemicals your trying to inhibit. But if you
all ready have the two chemicals it's too late! You've blown up. This
obviously requires intelligent foresight and planning.
But lets give the evolutionists the benefit of the doubt. Lets assume
that somehow this beetle managed to simultaneously develop the two
chemicals and the inhibitor. The resultant solution would offer no
benefit without the anti-inhibitor. So now we are supposed to believe
that for thousands of generations the beetles mixed and stored these
chemicals (very important statement ahead!) for no particular reason or
advantage, until the anti-inhibitor was "evolved." Wait a minute! Now
with the anti-inhibitor developed, the beetle is blowing up again until
it "evolves" two combustion tubes and a precision communications and
timing network.
Why would the beetle go through such disastrous trial and error, piece
by piece evolution? Remember the important statement? Here's why its so
important. Everything in evolution is supposed to be beneficial and
have a logical purpose, or else it would never develop. But such a
process does not make any sense , and to propose that the entire
defense system developed all at once is simply impossible. Yet nature
abounds with countless such examples of perfect coordination. The only
explanation is special creation.
So, biology shows that life is far too complex and precise to be
accidental, but what about geology? Doesn't the geologic timetable
prove evolution?
First of all, because there were no eyewitnesses (experimentation and
observation) to the formations of the rocks, there is no direct
irrefutable proof as to the process(es) that formed the rocks of the
geologic column or their age. Any theory is based on assumptions and
pure speculation.
Nevertheless, based on the assumptions that uniformitarianism and
organic evolution were established facts, geologists began to compile
the geologic column. They arranged the earths strata according to the
various types of fossils they contained. Strata where simpler fossils
(presumed to have "evolved" first) had been found, were put on the
bottom of the column, while strata containing more complex forms
(presumed to have "evolved" later) were placed toward the top of the
column. Thus, the entire geologic column was founded and built on the
assumption that organic evolution was a fact!
Is that not the biggest example of circular reasoning ever? The
assumption of evolution is used to arrange the sequence of fossils. So
they say, "ok, we found a jellyfish in this limestone, so lets put that
on the bottom. And here we have a horse in the shale formation, so lets
put that at the top." They then use that sequence to say, "Ah ha! We
have proof of evolution!"
It is very important to note that no where in the entire world does the
column actually occur! No where is it in the order they say it should
be! In the field every conceivable contradiction is found. Fossils are
found in the wrong order ( too low, before they were supposed to have
"evolved" or too high, after they were supposed to have "evolved";) .
In many cases huge thicknesses of sedimentary strata are found to be in
the wrong stratigraphic order! "Older" dirt on top of "younger" dirt.
Now sure, sometimes earthquakes and such cause the dirt to shift. it's
called mechanical sliding. However, in Glacier National Park (just for
an example) there is a block of Precambrian limestone (supposedly 1
billion years old) on top of a Cretaceous shale formation (supposedly
only 100 million years old). This block of limestone is about 350 miles
long, 35 miles wide, and 6 miles thick! Henry Morris has demonstrated
that such large scale mechanical sliding would be physically
impossible, even if the planes were lubricated. The only answer then,
is that the Precambrian rocks were deposited after the Cretaceous. And
that means the entire geologic column and timetable of earth history is
meaningless.
The Bible states that about 6, 000 years ago God created everything in
six literal 24 hour days. That definitely fits into the time frame the
evidence provides. Billions of years does not fit. The Bible states
that about 4400 years ago there was a world wide catastrophic flood. Is
there geologic evidence to support this? Yes, there is.
of the earths surface is covered with sediments or sedimentary rocks
that were originally deposited under moving water. This includes the
tops of many mountains. Let me give a couple of examples.
The Tibetan Plateau (Central Asia, where Mt. Everest is located) is
located 3 miles above sea level and consists of sedimentary deposits
that are thousands of feet thick! The Karoo formation of Africa
contains an estimated 800 million vertebrate animals! The Herring
fossil bed of California (inland near Los Angeles County) contains
approximately 1 billion fish within 4 square miles!
Did you know that no where in the entire world is large scale
fossilization taking place today? I wonder why? You see, rapid burial
and lithification are essential for the formation and preservation of
fossils, otherwise they would decay or be destroyed by scavengers.
Hmmm? Seems like a world wide flood would do exactly that thing. Based
on the evidence, we must completely reject the geologic column and
timetable.
So if evolutionists timetable is incorrect, how old is the earth?
Nobody was there to witness the beginning (observation and
experimentation) so there is no proof to the exact age. But we can
build a time frame by setting upper limits.
The earths magnetic field has been measured for well over a century.
Scientist Thomas G. Barnes has shown that the strength of the earths
magnetic field is decaying exponentially at a rate corresponding to a
half life of 1400 years. In other words, 1400 years ago the earths
magnetic field was twice as strong as it is now. So if we go back as
far as 10, 000 years, we find that the earth would have had a magnetic
field as strong as that of a magnetic star! This is highly improbable,
if not impossible. Thus, it appears 10, 000 years is the very upper
limit for the age of the earth.
Sticking with the magnetic field, it is believed that the earths
magnetic field is due to circulating electric currents in its core. If
we go back 20, 000 years ago, the estimated heat produced by the
currents would have melted the earth!
It is a known fact that approximately 300 million cubic yards of
sediment are deposited into the Gulf of Mexico by the Mississippi River
each year. If we carefully study the volume and rate of accumulation of
the Mississippi River Delta and then divide the weight of the sediments
deposited annually into the total weight of the delta, we find the
delta to be about 4, 000 years old.
The rotation of the earth is gradually slowing due to the gravitational
drag forces of the sun, moon, and other factors. Every couple of years
we have to add a second. If the earth is billions of years old, and it
has been slowing at the same rate, its present rotation should be zero!
And if we calculate backwards several billion years, the centrifugal
force would have been so great that the continents would have been sent
to the equatorial regions and the shape of the earth would be flat like
a pancake.
The moon is slowly moving away from the earth. This is a known fact.
The present rate of recession is also know. If the earth were 4-5
billion years old the moon would be much further away and its starting
point would have been right above the surface of the earth. Can you
imagine the tides back then?
There is a chemical called Polonium 218. This chemical has been
considered the daughter element of the natural decay of uranium. But
polonium halos have been found in mica and fluorite without any
evidence of parents. Which means they are primordial (present in the
original granite from the very beginning). Why is this important? Well,
polonium halos should not exist because they have a half life of 3
minutes! If evolutionists were correct and the rock formations cooled
over millions of years, the polonium would have decayed into other
elements 3 minutes into the cooling process. The evidence points to an
instantaneous (less then 3 minutes) crystallization of the host
basement rocks along with the formation of polonium. Which means that
the rocks were instantaneously created! In other words, "God said let
there be land."
If the geologic column deposited piece by piece over billions of years,
why is it that only the surface rock layers provide meteoric evidence?
There is absolutely no evidence of meteoric strikes below the surface!
Evolutionists say that man has been around for at least 1 million
years. It is known that the population of man increases every year. The
present rate of increase is about 2% per year. Scientist Henry M.
Morris has calculated that an average growth rate of % per year (some
years will be more then 2%, some less if there is wars and famines and
what not) would give us today's population in just about 4, 000 years.
If the population increased at that rate for 1 million years, the
number of people in the present generation would be more then 10 to the
2100th power!! That's 10 with 2, 100 zeros after it. Only 10 to the
130th power electrons can be packed into the entire universe!
So, the evidence points towards a young earth. What about the universe?
Did it start with a "big bang" billions of years ago? Or did God speak
it into existence 6, 000 years ago? Well, lets see which theory the
evidence favors.
Comets journey around the sun and are assumed to be the same age as the
solar system. Now, each time a comet orbit's the sun, a small part is
"boiled" off. Careful studies of this effect on short term comets show
that the comets would have been dissipated in about 10, 000 years.
Based on the fact that there are still numerous comets orbiting the
sun, with no new source of comets known to exist, we can deduce that
the solar system can not be much more then 10, 000 years old.
The sun sweeps up about 100, 000 tons of micrometeoroids each day.
Also, the suns radiation pressure pushes small interplanetary dust
particles into space. This is know as the Pontying-Robertson effect.
Proceeding at its present rate the sun would have cleaned house in less
then 10, 000 years, as there is no known source of appreciable
replenishments. However, micrometeoroids are all throughout the solar
system! So we see our sun can not be more then 10, 000 years old.
Speaking of the sun, it gives off energy. This energy has been computed
to equal that of a billion hydrogen bombs going off every second! Some
stars radiate energy 100, 000 to 1 million times as fast as our sun!
That's 1, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000 hydrogen bombs going off every
second! These stars could not have contained enough hydrogen to run the
atomic fusion energy production process at such high rates for millions
or billions of years because their initial mass would have been
absolutely implausible! Therefore the stars can not be billions of
years old, but only thousands.
Evolutionists will tell you that their proof lies in radioactive
dating. They say that this method proves the earth is billions of years
old. Lets take a look at that.
Radioactive dating techniques are classified into two main categories:
Those whose information is limited to the last few thousand years
(carbon-14), and those that utilize radioactive elements (such as
uranium-lead and potassium-argon) for determining dates supposedly
stretching back into the million and billions of years. The
uranium-lead method is used to date the earth at 4.5-5 billion years
old.
Now, the first problem with radioactive dating is that in order to use
it, you must first make assumptions. Assumption number one is that the
rock contained no daughter product atoms in the beginning, only parent
atoms. Assumption two, since that time no parent or daughter atoms were
either added to, or taken away from the rock. Assumption three is that
the radioactive decay has remained constant. NONE of these assumptions
are found to be valid! Also, research suggests that certain conditions
(such as exposure to neutrino, neutron, or cosmic radiation) may alter
the rates of radioactive decay.
To prove how erroneous this method is, living snails have been dated by
the carbon-14 method as being 2, 300 years old! Wood taken from trees
that were still growing have been dated as being 10, 000 years old by
the same method. Hawaiian lave flows which are known to be less than
200 years old, have been dated by the potassium-argon method at up to 3
billion years old! If a method is unreliable like this, then we must
have a lack of confidence in any findings.
What about fossils and dinosaurs? Don't they prove the earth is old?
Well, paleontology is the branch of geology that deals with prehistoric
(no such thing) life through the study of fossils. The fossil record
reveals an absence of life forms in the lower 2/3 of the earths crust
(Pre-Cambrian). The "oldest" rocks in which fossils are found, is the
so called Cambrian period. The Cambrian deposits contain billions and
billions of fossils of highly developed life forms. Every major
invertebrate forms of life have been found! The complexity of these
animals is so great, that evolutionists estimate it would require at
least 1.5 billion years to evolve. If evolution is true then, we should
expect to find billions of evolutionary ancestors of the Cambrian life
forms in the pre-Cambrian rocks. I mean, these complex life forms
"evolved" from something less complicated right? NOT ONE single,
indisputable, multi-cellular fossil has EVER been found in Pre-Cambrian
rocks! The fossil record reveals that life abruptly appeared in
diversity, complexity, and abundance without evolutionary ancestors.
Not to mention, many fossils of plants and animals found in the
supposed "oldest" of rocks, when compared with their living
counterparts are found to be essentially the same. No "evolving" has
ever been observed!
Horizontal variation has been observed. Operating within limits
specified by the DNA for the particular organism, horizontal variation
is possible and has been used to develop many breeds. For example,
there are 200 varieties of a dog, but it is still a dog. Vertical
transformation of one kind of organism into an entirely new organism is
prohibited and simply does not occur. For example, dogs never change
into horses. By the way, if we came from monkeys, how come we don't see
"in-between" monkeys? They still have babies, how come we never see
them giving birth to in-betweens?
Evolutionists say that dinosaurs were here millions of years before
man. Is that true? Did you know that there are numerous examples of
both human and dinosaur prints found together throughout America? The
obvious conclusion is that man was here with dinosaurs. There are
places in Arizona and Rhodesia where dinosaur drawings have been found
on caves and canyon walls. Who drew those? Also, unfossilized dinosaur
bone containing blood has been found. Did it "magically" survive
millions of years? The only conclusion is that man once lived with
dinosaurs and that's contrary to the commonly accepted chronology of
the geologic column. Some say we still do. You can find thousands of
eye witness reports of people seeing them in remote areas. In the
jungles in Africa, tribes consider it no big thing to see a dinosaur.
Here are a couple of other examples that show that the geologic column
and timetable are in error. According to the evolutionary framework, 5
toed llamas became extinct about 30 million years ago, 29 million years
before the appearance of man. Yet, pottery has been found with etchings
of 5 toed llamas on it. Who made the pottery and drew the pictures?
On June 1st, 1968 in Utah, William Meister found the fossils of several
trilobites in the fossilized sandaled footprint of a man! Why is this
so amazing? Well according to the evolutionary time table, trilobites
became extinct 230 million years before the appearance of man.
It is quit obvious that the theory of evolution is very flawed to say
the least. There is not one single solid piece of evidence to prove
this theory, yet it is taught and advanced as fact. Why is this?
When a person un-biasedly studies the two theories, they find that all
the evidence points towards Creation. The evidence fits in the Bibles
description and time frame of the beginning. The evidence does not fit
in the evolutionary description and time frame. But they don't allow
any other theory to be taught. It has become the American governments
and school systems religion. And that is BAD science
If someone wants to argue that the evidence is insufficient, or that there are other explanations for the evidence, then all well and good, but to baldly claim that there is no evidence is to mark the proponents position as deeply flawed.
Now to some of the details of Gish Gallop
[one fool can ask more questions than 1000 wise men can answer,
one liar can promulgate more falsehoods than 1000 honest man can correct,
one kook can produce more nonsense than 1000 sane men can debunk]
1) He starts of with a false dichotomy. Evolution (whatever he may mean be this, as it doesn't seem to be biological evolution, which doesn't explain how life got started) and creation are not mutually exclusive. There is a least a 3rd alternative - that life always existed - tho' this does seem to be contradicted by the evidence.
2) He then compounds his error by equating the creation position with Young Earth Creationism.
3) He's not current with cosmology - the estimates of the age of the universe have settled at around 13.5 billion years, from a range of 10 to 20 billion years. His description of the Big Bang is mangled, as is his description of abiogenesis and evolution.
4) There's a bit of "too complex to have evolved" rhetoric, complete with strawmen. The probability figures are spurious, and the claim about mathematicians incorrect. For some information on Bombardier Beetles see
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/bombardier.html
For the case of the acacia tree, consider that the acacia tree doesn't require other defence mechanisms against insect predators, and may be expected to have lost them, in the absence of selective pressure for their maintenance, and selective pressure against their metabolic costs. It's not surprising that it doesn't thrive in the absence of the ants.
5) The geological column is not an example of circular reasoning. You might ask him how it is that the concept of the geological column is the product of creationists.
6) C-14 dating assumes that the organism was in equilibrium with the atmosphere is life; clearly it doesn't give accurate dates for organisms that get some of the carbon - such as snails living in calcareous waters - from other sources. (If you know what the carbon sources were you can correct for this.) Potassium-Argon assumes that all the Argon escapes before solidification. If a lava contains crystals which formed long before the lava for erupted, using Potassium-Argon you will get a date somewhere between the two ages. He also omits mention of methods, such as isochron dating, which don't display these types of problems.
7) Many multicellular fossils have been found in pre-Cambrian rocks.
8) His denial of faunal and floral succession is contrary to the facts.
9) Speciation has been observed, in the wild, under cultivation, and in the laboratory.
--
alias Ernest Major
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