Creationists teach evolution, too!

Great Debates
1

I took some homeschooling for one year (10th grade) and then bailed. I will not say what school for fear of being sued (or wrath of God, whichever comes first). Many may know what school (David?). Har-har.

Anyway, during my ‘education’ there I took Biology. A large part of this book was on debunking evolution. They debunked several already-lame topics that have been proven wrong and outdated even by evolutionists. But they had some freaky ways of debunking evolution. Case in point:

Case: Moths ‘evolving’

Synopsis: Over the years, a moth native to the UK has changed color from off-white to dark brown. Evolutionists say this is proof of evolution.

BUT… The school says that no, this is not evolution. There were always brown moths. The trees that these moths live on are dark brown. Thus the white ones get eaten, leaving the brown ones to live (because the birds can’t see them… They blend in with the bark). Thus, more brown moths.

So… I was thinking… THAT IS EVOLUTION, YOU MORONS!

Is that not a basic fact of survivial of the fittest? Is that not evolution?

Why – if not how do they teach this as creationism? Because… They make you think that something so obvious, something you, as a 10th grade kid, can understand – must be more simple than sheer evolution. They shroud, twist the facts into covering up the very proof that it points to! They do it so well that you never question the logic. You think - “Ah, yes, that’s it… The moths are just being eaten.” without putting it together and thinking “Well, that must be what sparks the moth ‘evolution’.”

Anyway, has anyone else come across similar freaky teachings? Anyone else have background in creationist teachings and later realize that they were pretty crapped up? Some of you have never had the pleasure, so feel free to ask questions.

I do believe in God. But the earth is not only 6000 years old and them moths there do prove at least a limited form of evolution. And the bang was big.

Thoughts on modern teachings in private/public schools? Questions?

Infamus

2

Color me confused. Isn’t homeschooling at, well, home?

:slight_smile: They usually get around this by claiming it’s “microevolution” and that it somehow has nothing to do with “macroevolution.” However, the mechanisms are actually one and the same, with the only difference being one of scale.

You have just done a pretty good job of summing up “scientific creationism.”

All creationist teachings are pretty freaky.

3

Well, I don’t think biology/ecology textbooks really put a major emphasis on the moth color morph example of being a great example of evolution per se. At least I didn’t come across it in my studies as anything more than an aside.

The moth is still a moth of the same species. It has not “evolved” into something else. A change in the color morph ratio within a given species in not evidence of “evolution.”

It is evidence of natural selection, which of course, can lead to evolution. But regardless of how this is presented, I can see no compelling reason for pointing out this example as a refutation of evolution or as a support of creationism. To me, it is basically a distinction of scale (we aren’t likely going to see evidence of evolution in a case such this over a period of just decades), or one of basic semantics.

4

I didn’t understand your definition of home-school either. Talk about confusing semantics!

5

Sorry, no. That is not evolution. That is an example of how evolution MIGHT occur, but is not an example of evolution itself.

The observed speciation of the Tragopogon is a much more convincing example of evolution in action.

6

For anyone who hasn’t previously explored this topic, a great place to start is the Geological Society of America’s web page on creationism vs. evolution, with annotated links: http://www.geosociety.org/criticalissues/index.htm

Both viewpoints are presented. Links include discussion groups, reports from the media, and court cases.

7

JoeyBlades, that is evolution, as it is a change in allele frequency of a population. It isn’t speciation, but it is definitely evolution.

8

:unscrewing the top of a giant can of worms:

OK - question.

mealworm said:

Then good ol’ DavidB said:

OK - question (deep breath):

Let’s assume
[list=1]
[li]There is a God,[/li][li]He (for lack of a better term) created Everything and[/li][li]He was motivated for some reason to keep the facts of His existance and the stipulated Creation veiled from His creations.[/li][/list=1]

Where is the flaw? Why must we use terms like “shroud” and “twist the facts” to describe people’s sorry attempts to explain that which is, by design beyond their abilities to explain?

DavidB, fire away. :wink:

PS - mealworm, I am sorry about the Hijack - if you ask me to, I will kill the discussion and take it to another thread.

9

Well, it’s lunchtime, so if I may I’ll fire the first shot. {grin}

Many people accept and believe in your three assumptions. However, few if any “scientific creationists” do. Why? Well it is a fact that your three hypotheses do not form a scientific theory. The model in your message is not falsifiable or testable, and is therefore outside the purview of science.

Many people, including myself, believe that “scientific creationists” do not advance such a model at least partly because it is ipso facto not scientific (which does not mean, of course, that it is necessarily wrong, although IMHO it is unlikely). Their agenda is to convince people that "scientific creationism’ is indeed scientific and worthy of being taught alongside or instead of other sciences, e.g. evolution. They’re not going to succeed at that with your model.

Many people, including myself, further believe that the agenda of most “scientific creationists” is really oriented towards forcing the teaching of religion in schools. To get this religion around the Constitutional prohibition, they try to cast it as science; to do this, they are forced to “shroud and twist” or ignore the facts, or just plain make up the “facts”.

There’s a proposed taxonomy of “scientific creationists”, with some discussion and links, at What is Creationism?. Among the many other interesting articles at this site is The General Anti-Creationism FAQ, which discusses (in varying levels of detail) many of the instances of misrepresentation, misunderstanding, and falsehood perpetrated by “creation scientists”. While I’m at it, NMSR Debates Intelligent Design proponent Jonathan Wells of the Discovery Institute has a lot of information relating to the infamous peppered moths.

10

Let’s assume:

  1. There is a giant interstellar turtle (named “Gamera”)with indigestion

  2. About ten billion years ago this turtle vomited forth the universe in an event known as “The Big Turtle’s Technicolor Yawn.”

  3. At some point Gamera will get over his indigestion, get hungry and attempt to swallow the universe down again.

  4. This will create indigestion which will lead us back to step one.

You will notice that my theory actually fits the facts better than Sdimbert’s, or any creationists for that matter. It also doesn’t conflict with evolution or the observed state of the universe.

Therefore, I would like this theory to be taught in schools alongside evolution and creationism.

Thanks for your help.

11

[QUOTE]
Let’s assume
[ul][li]There is a God,[]He (for lack of a better term) created Everything and[]He was motivated for some reason to keep the facts of His existance and the stipulated Creation veiled from His creations.[/ul][/li][/QUOTE]

oy!

Let’s examine this a bit. If [list=a][li]an omnicreative god exists and []said god then deliberately conceals any evidence of said god’s existence[/list=a]then there are some deeper implications here![/li]
If we believe this, then we must also believe:[ul][li]all those religions which claim to have revealed knowledge of God must be false, because “B” above or[]if at least one religion based on revelation is true, said god is confused/insane/not very effective at hiding[/ul][/li]
We must also ask why said god would leave so much false evidence around in support of evolution.

Since I don’t want to make this an outrageously long post, I’ll skip the possible theological arguments for and against your proposition, and merely summarize a few of the religious and moral conundrums it generates:[ul][li]Are all religions false?[]If my religion is not false, then why does God hide from others?[]If God is neither crazy nor stupid, why did he leave such compelling evidence in support of evolution?[/ul][/li]
Personally, I’ll go with a simpler explanation — religious stories of creation are allegorical or are myths and fables from the cultures which gave rise to the religion. Perhaps the real questions regarding the universe - whether created by a supreme entity or not - should be pursued through rational inquiry.

12

sdimbert: Why must we assume that there is a god? Or anything else? Every time that this particular argument comes up, the first assumption that people are asked to accept involves the existence of a god. Or, if you prefer, God.

Mankind has science to ascertain certain things. And in so doing, does not need to assume a creator. Surely you’ve heard someone (in my case, someone using hallucinogens more often that not) wonder, “What if the universe is a fourth graders science project? And what if he got a ‘D’?” Why can we not assume that, instead of the existence of a deity? I dunno, I’ve seen this come around so very many times by now, and this particular aspect irks me.

Waste
Flick Lives!

13

I agree with hardcore. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that the main problem creationists have with biological science, is with speciation. So their quarrel shouldn’t really be with Darwin; correct me if I’m wrong, but Darwin talked more about natural selection (competition between species) than about speciation (creation of new species). Since natural selection can take place in a short period (less than six thousand years, certainly) it fits into the “young Earth” theory; speciation takes too long.

Don’t get me wrong - I’m not claiming any amazing insight into the creationist brain. I don’t always know what they’re talking about, but I’m trying to assemble the emergent properties of their arguments.

The simplistic description of evolution is: one species turns into a newer, better species. A pretty bogus description, granted, but one which seems to have lodged itself in a lot of minds.

A less simplistic description would be: one species possesses several communities, some of which change. Some of the changes are radical enough to produce new species. The new species and the parent species compete and sometimes cooperate for limited resources. Some of the species go extinct.

The problem the creationist has with the second description is the part about communities changing radically enough to produce new species. God created all the species on whichever day it was. Some of them have gone extinct due to natural selection, but no new species can ever be created.

Unsolicited Freudian perspective: Creationists have a dichotomic view of God and nature. God is the father; nature is the mother. Being jealous of woman’s ability to create life, or perhaps being annoyed at man’s inability to create life on his own, the creationists have assigned 100% of species-creating powers to God. Simple compensation. Nature takes a subservient, caregiving role, killing off nasty dinosaurs and providing space for man to procreate. So, to believe in speciation is actually gender treachery - it steals the exclusively male life-giving role to woman, who should not be meddling with anything so important as speciation. The fact that females bear children doesn’t change any minds - it’s what the creationists are so mad about in the first place.

In short, creationists want to keep nature barefoot and pregnant. While nature slaves over pasta, God can go around fathering prophets with other men’s wives and creating extra species to see which goes extinct.

14

Boris B[adenov] wrote:

Speciation doesn’t always take too long. Viz. these observed instances of speciation: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html, and these other observed instances of speciation: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html.

15

Boris B also wrote:

Say … was the Endangered Species Act, by any chance, partially motivated by Creationists, who were worried that the world might run out of species if we let them go extinct?

16

[armor-piercing] tracer wrote,

Those links are bogus. I know for a fact that my great-grandmother was a Faeroe Island mouse, and my great-grandpappy was a Boston subway mouse. And they interbred just fine!

Seriously, though. Your links are highly informative. The only example of speciation I had previously known about I think involved a microscopic organism. Not that that doesn’t count, but I don’t think it would impress our opponents too much (these are folks who believe Adam and Eve were dinosaur contemporaries, after all). So I figured we were still looking for authentic speciation among macroscopic critters in less than 6000 years. I am very surprised at the 250 years figure … I was off by two orders of magnitude. Oh well, live and learn.

I was thinking creationists wouldn’t like the Endangered Species Act, since the more species we drive extinct, the sooner the Second Coming of Christ will occur. Don’t know who gave me that idea though … James Watt?

17

mealworm, I think I may know what type of school you went to. Just tell me . . . do the names of Ace and Christy ring a bell?

I went through five years of Christian School hell. I resisted the indoctrination of the idiocy they called “biology.” Your OP gives me hope that not all of the kids who are force-fed this crap in similar schools turned into mindless, accepting, unquestioning numb-skulls.
I talked to a person that graduated with me the other day (and bought the whole creation thing hook, line, and sinker) and I was getting scared that I was the only only one who escaped with a critical mind intact.

18

OK - let me simplify - Why can’t we assume that God created everything and made it look like something else?

That’s really the question that keeps my religious upbringing intact in the face of scientific skepticism.

As far as motivation? Why would God do such a thing? Hell, I don’t know - that’s a different question. But the sticky point is that, yes, when held up to the cold, hard light of the scientific method, Creationism doesn’t hold water. But, neither does the theory of Evolution. That’s why it’s called a theory.

So, the religion in me says, “if they can’t prove it, they’re really no better off than they say I am!”

Comments?

19

hardcore wrote:

What definition of evolution are you using? Every definition of evolution I’ve ever seen requires that the organism in question must change morphologically and physiologically from their ancestors. The moths haven’t changed, there just happens to be more brown ones than white ones. In fact, one study I saw a year or so back indicated that white was dominant and if the moths were allowed to live in an environment free of predators, the white ones flourished.

I readily agree that this could be an example of how natural selection could drive evolution, but it’s not an example of evolution in and of itself.

20

JoeyBlades:

I am using the scientific definition of evolution. You can read about it here.

sdimbert:

Please tell me you are not serious.