Baylor University and Evolution

Baylor University in Waco, Texas is the largest Baptist University in the world, and has a pretty good science department.  I always thought the Baptists were creationists/fundamentalists…

From the Biology Department at Baylor University:

Statement on Evolution
“Evolution, a foundational principle of modern biology, is supported by overwhelming scientific evidence and is accepted by the vast majority of scientists. Because it is fundamental to the understanding of modern biology, the faculty in the Biology Department at Baylor University, Waco, TX, teaches evolution throughout the biology curriculum. We are in accordance with the American Association for Advancement of Science’s statement on evolution. We are a science department, so we do not teach alternative hypotheses or philosophically deduced theories that cannot be tested rigorously.”  http://www.baylor.edu/biology/index.php…

From the Baylor University Geology Department:

“Whether biological evolution occurs has NOT been a matter of scientific debate for more than a century. It is considered a PROVEN fact. The specific mechanisms of biological change over time continue to be a topic of active research, and include mechanisms proposed by Charles Darwin as well as more recently developed ideas based on our growing knowledge of genetics and molecular biology. Using the methods of modern science, our knowledge of the fundamental mechanisms of life has grown enormously since the initial characterization of the role of DNA in reproduction, inheritance and evolution in the mid-1950s.”   My emphasis http://www.baylor.edu/geology/index.php…

DOWNLOAD the 1 MB PDF file Evolution and the Fossil Record by Pojeta and Springer.
http://www.agiweb.org/news/evolution.pdf

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Ice Core Says No Noah’s Flood

“Recently an ice core nearly two miles long has been extracted from the Greenland ice sheet. The first 110,000 annual layers of snow in that ice core (GISP2) have been visually counted and corroborated by two to three different and independent methods as well as by correlation with volcanic eruptions and other datable events. Since the ice sheet would have floated away in the event of a global flood, the ice core is strong evidence that there was no global flood any time in the last 110,000 years.” Paul H. Seely

Paper can be found at:  http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/2003/PSCF12-03Seely.pdf

The above link is to a Christian site for God believing scientists.  

Just one more hole in the Christian Bibles myths.

“Geology, paleontology, zoology, botany, comparative anatomy, molecular biology, population genetics, biogeography, embryology, and others–all independently converge to the same conclusion: evolution happened.” –Michael Shermer–Skeptic Magazine

Egypt, Ethiopia and the Beginning of Biblical Time

Recent DNA Genome studies of the human race, from all over the world, have shown that, long ago, we all came out of Africa.  From North and South America, Australia, China, Asia, Europe, India–All the world’s bloodlines converge in Africa, and the approximate time they came out of Africa can be tracked. This technology is less than three decades old now and it has changed genealogy and criminology forever. Looking into our human past is now very easy and I’m sure many more uses will be discovered.

Below are some short excerpts from a very smart lady writing of Egypt and Ethiopia in 1920’s/1930’s that I think is remarkably prescient. Science and archaeology seems to continue verifying her conclusions, as scientists have been saying for some time now that the Ethiopian area is probably the ‘Cradle of Life’, and we know that Egypt is the first truly great civilization. Much evidence coming out now that Libya, Egypt, and Ethiopia have been populated more than 10,000 years.

“Out of anthropology, ethnology, geology, paleontology, archaeology, as well as history, I have dug up an irrefutable arsenal of facts that Harvard or Yale or cowardly scholarship in our race dare not refute. How can a leadership point the forward way that is utterly ignorant of the past?”

“Stephanus of Byzantium, voicing the universal testimony of antiquity wrote, “Ethiopia was the first established country on earth and the Ethiopians were the first to set up the worship of the gods and to establish laws.” The later ages gained from this ancient empire, the fundamental principles upon which republican governments are founded. The basic stones of that wonderful dominion were equality, temperance, industry, intelligence and justice.”
*******
“The priests of Sais said to Solon, “You Greeks are novices in all the knowledge of antiquity. You are ignorant of what passed here or among yourselves in the days of old. The history of eight thousand years is deposited in our sacred books, but we can ascend to much higher antiquity and tell you what our fathers have done for nine thousand years. I mean their institutions, their laws, and their brilliant accomplishments.” Baldwin points out that neither Solon nor Plato thought this improbable. The Greeks could tell nothing of their progenitors and but little of the Pelasgian race that preceded them in Hellenic lands. “There can be no doubt,” says Baldwin, “that the Egyptians preserved old records of the early period of their history extending beyond Menes.” This knowledge was lost to our times by the destruction of the Alexandrian library and the fanatical zeal which destroyed all pagan manuscripts.”
*******
“Egypt falls into natural divisions, Lower and Upper. Lower Egypt stretches from the Mediterranean to the limit of the Delta. Upper Egypt extends six hundred miles south of the Delta to the first cataract. The broad plains of the Delta and the comparatively narrow valley higher up make up the divisions of Egypt. In the primitive days Upper Egypt was wholly Ethiopian. Bunsen says that the early monuments reveal the primitive Egyptian, with head low and elongated, the forehead not amply developed, the nose short, thick, the lips full and large, the chin short and receding. In those days the rulers of Egypt were wholly Ethiopian. Look at authentic plates of early Egyptian Pharaohs, they are undeniably Cushite. The Great Sphinx, emblematic of an earlier king, is the full featured Ethiopian type. Look at the astounding countenance of Cheops. The counterpart of such a face can only be found among Ethiopians today. He is a perfect representation of the Cushite Ethiopian race that cast such giant shadows on time’s dawn.”  Drusilla Dunjee Houston, writing in late 1920’s to early 1930’s, in public domain.

This is a pretty fascinating read for anyone interested in human beginnings and our path to civilization.  One thing I found interesting was that the Egyptians and Ethiopians were circumcising male children-before the Hebrews and their gods even thought about it.

“Circumcision was a rite universally practiced as a part of the religion of the old Egyptians, as long as the native institutions flourished. It was a rite of the ruling Ethiopian element. Under Greek and Roman rule it fell into disuse but was always retained by the priesthood and those who desired to cultivate ancient wisdom. Herodotus said that all Ethiopians circumcised. Lenormant calls it original with them. The Coptic Church practices it to this day. Abyssinians do the same. They did not adopt it from the Jews for they circumcise both sexes. Oldendorpe finds the rite in western Africa. It must be a relic of ancient African customs. It is older than Mohammed, who did not regard it as a religious rite. Southern Arabia had the rite from Ethiopia. Himyartic Arabs (Cushites), circumcise their children on the eighth day. Pocock found that other Semitic Arabs circumcise between the tenth and fifteenth years.”

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Real Truths About Religion and God

People have responded to many of my posts about religion by asking me where my proofs come from. I suspect these people are just religious believers who want to convert me, and others, who write about non-belief.

There is information on any subject you can imagine on the Internet (as I’m sure you all know), including original research papers on subjects relating to Biblical truth. The popular science-type magazines all have a web presence. And contrary to some Christians beliefs, they are not part of an evil cabal out to satanize all who view them.

I have a blogroll type list of websites I use to gather information from, on the right side of my site…if you’re reading this…you will see it as you scroll down. These are legit sites and they have reliable, mainstream, real world information. If Christians were to ever actually seriously research their Biblical beliefs they would soon see how much they have been misinformed, and how wrong the Bible is.

I am a realist however, and I just put the stuff out there with the hope that it will strike a chord with someone who is searching for the truth, and maybe cause them to go to real world proofs, instead of Hebrew myths, that are a waste of precious time and energy.

The famous site listed below has all the answers to flood myth lined up and they are checkable. Other parts of the site have some of the best general information about scientific origins of the earth, universe, humans, etc. They have been around since the early nineties. If you take time to explore it thoroughly you will find links to original research and real world explanations of our earth, and all who live on, and in it. The people who write there are experts-who happen to not have a Doctorate of Divinity.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html

If the Noachian Flood can be disproven (and it has been), then other parts of the Bible are also suspect of being wrong. And there are many other disproven Biblical assertions. Many Christians just don’t accept the truth. They cling very hard to a 2800 year old Hebrew myth, a view of a childish God, that people of the time didn’t have enough knowledge, or intellectual sense of the world, to question.

That the Christian faith has survived this long is not an indicator of its being true. To the contrary, it is an indicator of how easily the church adjusts its theology to conform as much as possible to currant social conventions (think slavery, polygamy, prostitution, kings killing on a whim, etc.). The church is known to burn papers (and people) that disagree with currant theological thought.

Think about the currant ‘state of the religion.’ Now, about 2008 years since the birth of Jesus (?) Roughly 1700 years since Christianity got the official ‘okey-dokey’ from secular rulers, and its still in a state of disrepair. There are maybe thousands of sects and they all differ. Muslims believe in the same God…so they say, and they are out to kill us…for heresy. Catholics believe Protestants practice heresy, and vice-versa. Mormons…who knows what they believe. There is either one that is right…or none is right. There is not two of them who are right…or three, or four…

Through manipulation of human thought and incorrect reasoning, physical threats, actual physical harm, and burning at the stake, or as little as social/societal ostracism, Christians have spread their evil plot to take over the world and control humans…every actions and thought…for more than two thousand years. Think about it for a while; think about the whole long history of Jews and Christians and what they have always wanted from us.

What has been, and is, their ultimate goal? It’s to take over control of all humanity and tell us how to think and act…they actually have that kind of control of a significant portion of the US population…think Bible belt and the Deep South. Churches are the social center and source of information, on how to conform…of many hundreds of thousands or millions of Evangelical Fundamentalist type people. I think those people are afraid that if they don’t belong to a church, they’ll automatically go out and start sinning in the worst possible way.

There is some evolving news about change in the Catholic position on humanity. They are actually starting to accept that humans have a looong history. Go to the site below and check it out. Notice in the upper right hand corner where the paper comes from. That old fossil…the Catholic Church…might have some life and intellect left after all. http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/zim/zim_251adamandeve.html

Below is a quote from the article mentioned above.

“The Catholic position on this is clear. St. Thomas says that “one should not try to defend the Christian faith with arguments that are so patently opposed to reason that the faith is made to look ridiculous.” It is simply nonsense to say that the world is only 6,000 years old (Catechesis, Creation and Evolution, Zenit News, Dec. 19, 2005).” My emphasis.

The Catholics are leading the pack in the changing of theological thought to match what is known to be true nowadays, although their present thought is a little dopey. I look forward to following this change. I also look forward to how the Evangelical Fundamentalists will continue to deny In-Your-Face truth.

Some suggested Google search terms that I have followed: Religion, God, Jesus, El, Elohim, Yahweh, Jehovah, biblical tribes, Scripture, Noah’s flood, Ur of the Chaldeans, city of Dan, city of Laish, sea people, Babylon, age of earth, Hebrews, Christian myth, Sumerians, Akkadians, Mesopotamia, Jericho, Chaldea or Chaldeans, Assyria, Indus valley civilization, ancient Egypt, Hammurabi, Gilgamesh, flood stories, flood myths, Myths, ancient native Americans, Solutrian, Clovis points, cave paintings, Adam and Eve, African civilization(s), Bronze age, iron age, ancient Briton, ancient Europe, Neanderthal, Hebron, Abraham, Lot, biology, Midrash, Torah, Jewish myths, ancient languages, archaeological dating, carbon dating, dating methods, Dendrocronology, stratigraphy, oil geology, Permian, Paleontology, DNA, rNA, genetics, human history, human pre-history, ancient India, ancient Iran, Stonehenge, henges, pyramids, stelas, Rosetta stone, cuneiform writing, hieroglyphs, Euphrates river, Tigris river, Geology, life sciences, and on and on….

The above terms represent maybe one twentieth of the search terms (sorry they aren’t alphabetized) I have used in following the paths of Christian religion. I have been doing this for about two years now, in my spare time. If the site is religious sect sponsored, they will often try to deny real world science by any means they can, including, but not limited to, lying and misdirection. There are a few exceptions that are starting to tackle the problem head on though, and the Catholic Church, as mentioned above, is one of them.

There is not one or two sites that can disprove all things religious untrue, though talkorigins.com comes close. I find you have to visit and really absorb many, many different viewpoints and disciplines and slowly let them simmer in your head. Good hunting.

For latest post go: Here

Lady Explains Truth of Noah’s Flood

After months, even years of dangerous and terrifying web surfing, and suffering the slings and arrows of bad websites and false information, I came across one site that has the best explanation for Noah’s flood I’ve ever heard. 🙂

The logic and clearness of the explanation are exceptional for a writer that is obviously Christian and evangelical. If you are a religious fundamentalist, or evangelical, or Young Earth Creationist, or even Old Earth Creationist, I urge you to read the linked pdf file (Here) with as open a mind as you can muster, because this may just be the right story. (Caution-the pdf file is 14 pages long-you might want to have broadband for this)

All my adult life I have not believed in the Noachian Flood, because the evidence was never there, or what ever theories were being pushed sounded so unbelievable that I could not wrap my brain around it.

Now don’t misunderstand me…all I’m saying here is that if the Old Testament is a compilation of Hebrew folk tales…this is how the story should be interpreted. It doesn’t require the logic and mind-bending gyrations and back-flips that every other religious explanation seems to necessitate.

“The Noachian Flood has been one of the sharpest centers of controversy in the long history of warfare between biblical theology and science. It also has been one of the main stumbling blocks to faith, especially for scientists. Was this a universal flood responsible for all fossils and sedimentary rock on the face of the Earth, as some biblical literalists maintain, or was it a local flood confined to the limits of Mesopotamia?”

It starts by placing Noah and the Flood in about 2900 BCE (Jemdet Nasr Period in the area), which just happens to be when there is real archaeological evidence for a Large flood in the Mesopotamian area. At later dates (2200-2700 BC) there is no physical evidence of a large horizon-to-horizon flood event.

The writer continues by saying that you need to take the Bible text at ‘face value’, and not read into it words that are not there. We’re talking the original text here, not one of the many modern interpretations. She states that the real scientific disciplines of geology, geography, archaeology, biology, and physics can be accurately applied to these events of ancient times.

“The Bible can be taken at face value; that is, the biblical writer was accurately recording historical events of ancient times, viewed within the culture of those times. By taking the Bible at face value, nothing is to be read into the Bible that is not explicitly stated in its original (autograph) text.”

Another thing one has to appreciate is the language of the times and the different descriptive terms used. I am not an ancient language expert, but the explanations given seem very logical, and most importantly, they make the story…make sense…in light of modern knowledge, and don’t require a fantastical jump in logic.

The part where she takes on the Flood Geologists makes me smile. It shows up the wrong-headedness that some religious people put into trying to explain the unexplainable.

“Flood Geology. In addition to a lack of any real geological evidence for flood geology, there are also no biblical verses that support this hypothesis. The whole construct of flood geology is based on the original assumption (which is wrong) that the Noachian Flood was universal and covered the whole Earth. Since the Flood was supposedly worldwide, then there must be evidence in the geologic record left by it. Parenthesis comment added.”

The Flood Geologist has to bend and distort logic and resort to lies of omission to try to make the story come out the way they want, instead you just read the story the right way, and voilá, the science and logic lines up.

I have just skimmed the surface here. The author goes into Geological, archaeological, linguistic, historical, and geographic evidence and ties every thing together better than anyone I have-ever-read. Although she uses some religious sources, she also has a long list of secular scientific sources. Her name is Carol Hill, she is a geologist, and her analysis of this matter needs to be taken into serious consideration.

But, thats just my opinion. What’s yours?

For latest post go: Here

Evolution, Flood, Neanderthals

Today’s Evangelical preachers and those who urge that “The Bible is the Accurate Word of God” (Answersingenesis) seem to be repeating a 170-year-old arguments

The Reverend William Buckland, the first professor of geology at Oxford University, rejected a single flood theory in 1837, 22 years before Darwin’s seminal work. He wrote:

“Some have attempted to ascribe the formation of all the stratified rocks to the effects of the Mosaic Deluge; an opinion which is irreconcilable with the enormous thickness and almost infinite subdivisions of these strata, and with the numerous and regular successions which they contain of the remains of animals and vegetables, differing more and more widely from existing species, as the strata in which we find them are placed at greater depths. The fact that a large proportion of these remains belong to extinct genera, and almost all of them to extinct species, that lived and multiplied and died on or near the spots where they are now found, shows that the strata in which they occur were deposited slowly and gradually, during long periods of time, and at widely distant intervals.” My emphasis.

Even in 1837 some preachers were trying to tell us that Noah’s flood caused the stratigraphy record. Any person with just a bit of intelligence, and no preconceived notions, can see what Reverend Buckland saw. And yet, the religious right continues to push the same old argument

Neanderthals
“In 1996, Jean-Jacques Hublin and colleagues (1996, p. 224) proved that the human remains at Arcy-sur-Cure were Neanderthal. This site is a Chatelperronian site–the Chatelperronian being the earliest Upper Paleolithic technological complex. The importance of this was the association of Neanderthals with personal ornamentation, including pendants and necklaces. The necklace made the cover of Nature magazine. At that time, Hublin et al suggested that Neanderthal had obtained the necklace by means of trade or imitation. The assumption was that Neanderthal could not be intelligent enough to have invented such a symbolic object.” Wrong…see full Article: http://www.asa3.org/archive/ASA/199809/0030.html

Also see: The case of a Neanderthal skull that was carved into a drinking cup. This also has symbolic implications http://www.archaeology.org/online/news/neandertal.html.

There is already pretty good info out there that implies Neanderthals were a living, intelligent entity, well before any supposed worldwide flood.

All Neanderthal remains are found WAY below biblical era/supposed flood era relics and artifacts. This fact was noted in the 1800’s when they were first found, but it just doesn’t seem to sink into “Genesis” people and evangelicals. They just continue to deny facts. The evidence sits there, both in the field, and documented in museums.

Everyone in science sees it, understands it, knows it, and goes on with their life. The people that hold on to their superstition have a blind spot in their mind. Their mind just does not register what’s there. It filters through misrepresentations and what comes out is superstition. Any effort to lay out the truth before them is, they think, the work of the devil testing them.

Politicians are reaching out to suck up that power.

They are succeeding.