Thursday, December 20, 2012

Cultural Morality?

Cultural Morality?
Phil Sanders, Ph.D.

    More than twenty years ago, Allan Bloom observed in his book, The Closing of the American Mind, that “there is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of: almost every student entering the university believes, or says he believes, that truth is relative…. The students, of course, cannot defend their opinion. It is something with which they have been indoctrinated” (25).
    Bloom was not merely speaking about whether one can know any absolute truths (epistemological relativism) but also whether there are any absolute moral truths (moral relativism). Moral relativism argues that there is no absolute and no objective right and wrong. Relativists believe moral rules are merely personal preferences and arise as a result of one’s cultural, ethnic, or sexual orientation.
    Moral relativism has become the norm on television, in academia, and among politicians. For instance, how long has it been since anyone has spoken out on television against two unmarried people sleeping with each other? How long has it been since state universities spoke out against same-sex relationships? They wouldn’t dare today. How about those politicians who say they are personally against abortion but support the mother’s right to choose? Isn’t this morally confusing to say “I think it’s wrong for me to take the life of an innocent unborn; but I won’t oppose your taking an innocent life”? When such doublespeak becomes the accepted norm, our younger generations fall into confused amorality.
    In the 1960’s, Joseph Fletcher argued that it was sometimes right to do wrong. Philosophers like John Warwick Montgomery and pulpits around the nation condemned his “situation ethics”; but the notion of situational morality did not die. Fletcher believed love, or the “agape ethic,” was superior to the “law ethic,” so that things done out of love fulfilled God’s ethic even if they violated God’s law. This notion of love as a justification for our behaviors has rapidly spread throughout American society.
To many, same-sex love overrules God’s edicts condemning homosexuality (Rom. 1:24-32; 1 Cor. 6:9-10). Letha Scanzoni and Virginia Mollenkott argued in their book, Is the Homosexual My Neighbor?, that the New Testament passages dealing with homosexuality did not argue against a committed, loving relationship.  They said,
The Bible clearly condemns certain kinds of homosexual practice (. . . gang rape, idolatry, and lustful promiscuity).  However, it appears to be silent on certain other aspects of homosexuality--both the ‘homosexual orientation’ and ‘a committed love-relationship’ analogous to heterosexual monogamy (226).
This assertion is fantasy. The Scriptures speak to all homosexual behavior; whether with love or without, homosexual behavior is still condemned in Scripture.
    For moral relativists, abortion is preferable to raising an unwanted child. They believe it is better to end a child’s life than to have him grow up unloved or disadvantaged. Of course, they rarely consider how they may feel about that unwanted child in later days. Pro-choice people rarely speak of the long-term emotional trauma many mothers of aborted babies face.
    God, however, hates the taking of an innocent life (Prov. 6:16-19); and that is what abortion is. Abortion never shows love to the unborn child. It is almost as if no one considers that an unwanted child could become wanted or that adoption to a loving family is a possibility.
    It never occurred to those who followed Fletcher’s thinking that law was a means to define love. They continually characterized law as a lower ethic, cold, mean-spirited, intolerant, exclusive, and judgmental. They ignored the goodness and protective nature of the law.
    Paul argued that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully (1 Tim. 1:8). The law was designed to protect the innocent from the evil and ungodly sinners. Moses said, “And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day” (Deut. 6:24 ESV).
    Any husband knows that he must learn how to love his wife. He may have the deepest of affections in his heart for her; but unless he is sensitive to what she requires, his affection will, nevertheless, appear brutish and cruel. Knowing another person’s will teaches us how to please and love that person. One loves his neighbor by fulfilling the law; “love is the fulfillment of the law” (Rom. 13:8-10). The separation of an “agape ethic” from a “law ethic” is myth.
    The law teaches one how to love God and one’s neighbor. Jesus said, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words” (John 14:23-24).
    Moral relativists often think they are taking the higher moral ground by not judging or excluding anyone. They speak in relative terms but practice judging and excluding in absolute terms. Their claim does not match their practice. While they practice inclusiveness with the immoral person, they slander and exclude anyone who disagrees with their inclusiveness.
    Moral relativists often claim that the belief in absolute moral truth is mean-spirited, intolerant, exclusivist, and judgmental. Obviously, an objective view of morality will hold some things to be wrong; but the relativist contradicts himself because he also holds some things to be wrong. He believes that anyone who says there is objective moral truth is wrong. This conclusion makes the relativist judgmental and, possibly, intolerant. If the relativist believes the absolutist to be wrong, he is just as exclusive as anyone else.
    Robert Williams displays the irreverent mindset of the moral relativist when he argues:
The point is not really whether or not some passage in the Bible condemns homosexual acts; the point is that you cannot allow your moral and ethical decisions to be determined by the literature of a people whose culture and history are so far removed from your own.  You must dare to be iconoclastic enough to say, “So what if the Bible does say it?  Who cares?” (Just As I Am 128).
Williams does not realize that he is imposing his irreverent and amoral views on those who disagree with him. He further ignores the dominating influence of the literature of the Bible in America from its inception.
    The Bible is unlike any other book. It shows its timeless transcendence of culture and geography. By God’s design, it appeals and applies to every culture in every nation in every century. Jesus sent his apostles out with the gospel to all nations for all time (Mt. 28:19-20). Jesus tasted death for all people (Heb. 2:9). Jesus is indeed Lord of all flesh (Jn. 17:3). The God of heaven commands all men everywhere to repent (Acts 17:30-31).
    The moral relativists may argue that moral norms arise from culture and ethnic origin, but all men find their origin in God. Differences in culture and norms do not make the Lord any less the Lord of all. Nor does the relativists’ claim make the Bible any less binding upon all people in all places for all time. Jesus’ words will not pass away (Mt. 24:35), and the faith was once for all time delivered to the saints (Jude 3). God’s morality does not change, nor can any person or group of people change it. God’s morality found in his Word is settled in heaven (Ps. 119:89). It is not going anywhere. On the last day it will judge us (Jn. 12:48; Rev. 20:11-15). For this reason, we must pay even more attention to what we have heard from God (Heb. 2:1).

Monday, November 12, 2012

Ungodly Irrationality Surrounding Unwanted Infants

The Ungodly Irrationality Surrounding Unwanted Infants


To say that the descendants of Abraham were growing in number is an understatement. According to Exodus 1:7, while in Egypt “the children of Israel were fruitful and increased abundantly, multiplied and grew exceedingly mighty; and the land was filled with them.” The more the Egyptians afflicted them, “the more they multiplied and grew” (1:12; cf. 1:20). As Jehovah had promised, the “few” had become a “mighty” nation of “many” (Genesis 46:3; Deuteronomy 26:5)—so many, in fact, that the “Egyptians were in dread of the children of Israel” (Exodus 1:12). Even Pharaoh became alarmed to the point that on two different occasions he called for the slaughter of all male Israelite newborns. In an attempt to thwart Divine Providence’s promised growth of Israel (Genesis 12:2; 22:17; 46:3), Pharaoh took it upon himself to call on “all his people” to throw Israel’s neonatal sons into the river (Exodus 1:22). Infanticide ensued. “Drown the Hebrew infants.” “Destroy those abominable babies” (cf. Genesis 43:32). “Feed them to the crocodiles.”
Some 80 years later, God severely punished Egypt for their wrongdoings. He brought ten dreadful plagues upon Pharaoh and all his land (Exodus 7-12). Moses described God’s “great” and “mighty” judgment upon Egypt as “the chastening of the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 7:19; 11:2). The psalmist wrote how God “cast on them [the Egyptians] the fierceness of His anger, wrath, indignation, and trouble, by sending angels of destruction among them. He made a path for His anger; He did not spare their soul from death, but gave their life over to the plague, and destroyed all the firstborn in Egypt” (78:49-51). Granted, Egypt’s sins were many—from their idolatry, to their mistreatment of the Hebrews, to their refusal to let God’s people leave Egypt—but do not think for a minute that Jehovah had forgotten Egypt’s massacre of Abraham’s innocent descendants. Those precious children were “a heritage from the Lord” (Psalm 127:3). Jehovah had “graciously given” them to Israel (cf. Genesis 33:5). He created them in His own image and gave them life (Genesis 1:26-27; Acts 17:25; Ecclesiastes 12:7)—life that Pharaoh had no right to choose to take from them (only God has that right; see Butt, 2009, 29[12]:89-95).
Three thousand six hundred years ago, Egypt was plagued with baby murderers. From the tyrannical king, to all those who assisted him in drowning Israelite infants in the Nile River, Egypt revealed itself as a bloodthirsty country. (Interestingly, the first punishing plague God sent upon Egypt was turning water to blood, while the last was striking down all of Egypt’s firstborn.) Scripture repeatedly affirms that God detests the sin of murder. In patriarchal times, murder was wrong, and punishable by death: “Whoever sheds man’s blood, by man his blood shall be shed” (Genesis 9:6). Under the Law of Moses, the prohibition of murder was listed as one of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:13), and likewise carried a punishment of death (Numbers 35:30). The wisest man who ever lived (aside from Jesus, of course) noted in the Old Testament book of Proverbs: “[T]he Lord hates...hands that shed innocent blood” (6:16-17; cf. 1 Kings 3:12). According to the New Testament, governments have the God-given authority to take away the physical life of murderers (Romans 13:4). Furthermore, impenitent murderers will also “have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death” (Revelation 21:8). From Genesis through Revelation, God emphasized the sanctity of human life, while simultaneously making clear His hot displeasure with those who disregard it.

CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD

In ancient Egypt, only Pharaoh was considered to be like a god, the supposed incarnation of the Sun god, Ra. Pharaoh also was thought to be the sole person who bore “the image of god.” The Egyptian canal digger and the merchant, the taskmaster and the Hebrew slave, all were thought innately inferior because they were not divine image bearers (or so they had been told). Such a designation was not applied to the common man in Egypt, nor anywhere else for that matter. Outside the Bible, archaeologists and historians have never found where mankind in general was said to have been created in the “image” of a particular god. Three Akkadian texts from the Sargonic period of Assyria’s history use the Akkadian cognate of tselem (“image”), but it is employed only in a context where kings are being discussed (Miller, 1972, 91:294-295). The rulers of empires were the sole beings referred to as “images” of gods.
According to the first chapter of the Bible, however, the Creator of the Universe has honored all humans by endowing them with certain qualities that are intrinsic to His nature. Genesis 1:26-27 describes all mankind with language that previously had been applied only to the supreme rulers of nations:
Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female
He created them.

Make no mistake: “In the day that God created man, He made him in the likeness of God” (Genesis 5:1). [For a discussion of what being made in the image of God means, see Lyons and Thompson, 2002.] Thousands of years after Creation, James warned Christians not to curse men because they “are made after the likeness of God” (3:9, ASV, emp. added). [NOTE: The English verb “are made” (ASV) derives from the Greek gegonotas, which is the perfect participle of the verb ginomai. The perfect tense in Greek is used to describe an action brought to completion in the past, but whose effects are felt in the present.] Although Adam and Eve are the only two humans to have been specially created by God (Genesis 2:7,21-22), all humanity shares the honor of being made in God’s likeness—which is why God condemns murder. Following the Flood, God said, “Whoever sheds man’s blood, by man his blood shall be shed; for in the image of God He made man” (Genesis 9:6, emp. added). Murder is forbidden because man is made in the image of God.
The newborns that Pharaoh drowned in ancient Egypt were Divine image bearers. Likewise, the infants that Herod slew some 1,500 years later also bore the likeness of God (Matthew 2:13-17). They were all 100% human beings. They were not rocks or plants. They were not animals. They were not merely blobs of living tissue. They were humans who had been given living spirits by “the Father of spirits” (Hebrews 12:9). What’s more, these babies were pure and sinless. They were (by creation) children of God, who had never separated themselves from Him (Ezekiel 18:20; cf. Matthew 18:3-5), and who now live in the afterlife in paradise (cf. 2 Samuel 12:23).

ABORTION

Pharaoh slaughtered infants for population control purposes. Herod butchered babies in hopes of killing the King of kings. These men were wicked rulers who implemented hideous policies and practices. However, what is taking place in America today is no less revolting. The morally inept leadership of the United States, and those who willfully chose to put them into office, are just as guilty as the bloodthirsty, tyrannical baby killers of the past. Why? Because every year in America far more babies are brutally murdered than were killed in Egypt and Palestine in the days of Moses and Jesus.
More than one million innocent, unborn children are slaughtered each year in the United States of America (“Facts...,” 2008). In 2008, Guttmacher Institute reported that “from 1973 through 2005, more than 45 million legal abortions occurred” (“Facts...”). Forty-five million! That is more people than currently reside in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Tennessee...combined. The murder of unborn children has occurred with such frequency since the Supreme Court legalized abortion in 1973 that few people ever stop to consider the brutality involved. I recently became aware of one high school student who went to school pregnant, left to have an abortion, then returned to finish the school day. (No, her parents were not informed of her “choice” beforehand.) “Just a casual procedure in a doctor’s office, that’s all it was.”
In truth, there is nothing casual about the slaughter of an innocent child. Have you ever considered what mothers and doctors do in order to abort a baby? (Most abortionists don’t want you to know, much less see, how abortions are performed!) In a murderous abortion procedure called “suction aspiration,” doctors use a knife-like device, and suction from a powerful hose and pump (“29 times more powerful than a household vacuum cleaner”—“Abortion Methods,” 2010), to chop and suck a baby out of the mother’s womb. In the “dilation and evacuation” abortion procedure, doctors actually use plier-like devices to twist and tear four-month-old unborn babies into pieces. Usually this requires crushing the baby’s skull and snapping the child’s spine in order to extract them. When mothers choose to abort their unborn babies who are older than four months, doctors often use a procedure called “saline injection” (i.e., salt poisoning). The strong salt solution that doctors inject through the mother’s abdomen acts as a corrosive and burns the baby inside and out. Normally, the child will suffer for an hour or more before dying. However, in some cases the children survive and are born alive. In most of these instances, they are helplessly left to themselves to die outside the womb. Still, a few have survived and lived to tell their story (see “Gianna Jessen,” 2006). When performing partial-birth abortions doctors normally deliver all of the baby except the head, then puncture the base of the skull with a pair of scissors, before removing the child’s brain with a hollow tube (“Abortion Methods,” 2010). This is sick! This is sadistic! Today’s abortions make Pharaoh’s command to cast the neonatal Israelites into the river sound like compassionate killing. No doubt, the cries of America’s innocent infants are being heard by the Creator. The shed blood of these blameless babies has been witnessed by our holy, just God who “hates...hands that shed innocent blood” (Proverbs 6:16-17).

THE HUMANITY OF THE UNBORN

Some people believe that unborn humans at various embryonic stages are more animal-like than human. Ernst Haeckel first proposed this idea in the latter part of the 1800s. He insisted that what lived inside a woman during her pregnancy was not human until the latter part of the gestation period. Even though science disproved Haeckel’s ridiculous idea long ago, it is a myth “popular culture has never fully abandoned” (Gould, 2000, 109[2]:44). Sadly, some pro-abortionists still try to comfort themselves by insisting that the human embryo may be going through the stages of our alleged evolutionary ancestors, and thus they supposedly are not really human when aborted (see Jackson, n.d.). Other pro-abortionists seem happy to just take a “leap of faith” and hope that what is inside a pregnant woman is not a living, human being. Still others, like pro-abortion President Barak Obama, claim not to know when an unborn child is fully human. In a Presidential Candidates Forum on August 16, 2008, President Obama declared that knowing when an unborn child deserves human rights is “above my pay grade” (“Saddleback...”). Though the President claims ignorance on the matter, his hypocritical actions speak volumes: he still strongly supports pro-abortion policies. If President Obama truly does not know when an unborn infant deserves human rights, then why is he “a consistent champion” of allowing millions of Americans to mutilate their unborn children (“Women,” 2009)?
The fact is, common sense, science, and Scripture all show that an unborn embryo/baby is a living, human being. Do nonliving beings hiccup, suck their thumbs, or respond to touch, pain, cold, sound, and light? Of course not. Yet unborn babies do all of these things (see “Fetal Development,” 2003). They have a beating heart and a working brain. They are, beyond any doubt, living, human beings! Only the cold, callous heart would think otherwise. [For information on life beginning at conception, see Major, 1995.]
Although she recanted her views about abortion several years ago, relatively few people know that “Jane Roe,” the pseudonym that Norma McCorvey assumed as the lead plaintiff in the infamous Roe v. Wade case, no longer supports abortion. After over 20 years of supporting the pro-abortion platform, McCorvey suddenly began opposing abortion and has been for several years now. Why did this pro-abortion poster child become pro-life? What led to her change in thinking? Why does she now adamantly oppose the slaughtering of innocent unborn babies? According to McCorvey, the “straw that broke the camel’s back” came while she was working in an abortion clinic and was instructed to enter a room where aborted fetuses were kept. Her assignment was to count the body parts of an infant that had just been aborted—to make sure the doctor had retrieved the entire baby from the mother’s womb. McCorvey, who had previously worked in at least three other abortion clinics, stated, “I went back to the parts room, and I looked at this tiny little infant, and I freaked” (as quoted in McGrew, 2002, emp. added). “Jane Roe,” the woman who symbolized a woman’s right to have an abortion (i.e., Roe v. Wade), was forced to look upon the body parts of an aborted “fetus” and became convinced that it was a human being. Why? Because it looked like a human being. Unborn babies look like humans beings because they are human beings!
When Samuel Armas was a 21-week unborn baby, USA Today photojournalist Michael Clancy snapped what arguably would become the most famous pre-natal photograph ever. On August 19, 1999, Dr. Joseph Bruner, of Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee, performed spina bifida surgery on Samuel while he was in utero. During the surgery, Samuel, who was only about half way through the normal gestation period, was pictured with his tiny hand resting on one of the doctor’s fingers. Samuel was born 15 weeks later. When Samuel’s surgery was first reported more than 10 years ago, many eyes were opened to the preciousness and humanity of early unborn children (for more information, see Miller, 2009). More recently, however, another baby, who further testifies to the humanity of unborn children, captured the headlines. Her name: Amillia Sonja Taylor. She was born on October 24, 2006 in south Florida. What makes Amillia so special? Doctors believe she “spent less time in the womb than any other surviving infant” (“Florida Baby...,” 2007). Amillia’s mother, Sonja, carried Amillia for less than 22 weeks. At delivery, she was only 9½ inches long and weighed less than a can of soda. But, she was a living human being. Four months later, Amillia weighed 4½ pounds, was 15½ inches long, and was almost ready to go home for the very first time (“Doctors Extend...”). Two years later, she was a healthy toddler (“Amillia...”).
Amillia did not turn into a human 15 to 18 weeks later—when most babies are delivered—she was a human at 22 weeks, had been human since she was conceived, and deserved rights like any other human. She was not lifeless matter—a mere blob of tissue. She was not a plant. She was not an animal. She was a living, growing human being. Millions of “Samuel Armases” and “Amillia Taylors” have been brutally mutilated on the holy grail of a “woman’s right to choose.” How can anyone look at pictures of an unborn child such as Samuel Armas, or a 10-ounce baby such as Amillia Taylor, and come to the conclusion that at 22 weeks old they are not human beings?
Consider some things that science has discovered about unborn babies in the first trimester of a mother’s pregnancy.
Day 22—heart begins to beat with the child’s own blood, often a different type than the mother’s
Week 5—eyes, legs, hands begin to develop
Week 6—brain waves detectable; mouth, lips present; fingernails forming
Week 7—eyelids, toes form; nose distinct, baby kicking and swimming
Week 8—every organ in place; bones begin to replace cartilage, fingerprints begin to form
Weeks 9 and 10—teeth begin to form, fingernails develop; baby can turn head, frown
Week 11—baby can grasp objects placed in hand; all organ systems functioning; the baby has fingerprints, a skeletal structure, nerves, and circulation
Week 12—the baby has all of the parts necessary to experience pain, including the nerves, spinal cord and thalamus (“Diary of an Unborn Baby,” n.d.).
In addition to the support that common sense and science give for the living humanity of unborn children, Scripture is equally clear on the subject. Seven hundred years before Christ, the prophet Isaiah said of himself: “Before I was born the Lord called me; from my birth he has made mention of my name” (49:1, emp. added). Similarly, several years later, the prophet Jeremiah spoke of how the Lord knew of him in utero: “Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying: ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations’” (Jeremiah 1:5, emp. added). The Creator of life has testified through inspiration that He views pre-born infants as living, human beings—real people whom He calls, sanctifies, and ordains. Had the mothers of Isaiah and Jeremiah aborted them, they would have been unlawfully taking the lives of precious children.
God made this equally clear in the Law of Moses. In fact, he specifically addressed the life and value of an unborn child in Exodus 21:22-23. He informed Moses: “If men fight, and hurt a woman with child, so that she gives birth prematurely, yet no harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman’s husband imposes on him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. But if any harm follows, then you shall give life for life.” Notice how God equates the life of all humans—both the unborn and the already born: “life for life,” He said. If God did not view a “premature” baby as a living human being, then one could not take “life for life.” Rather, it would be more like “a living human for a blob of matter.” But unborn children are not merely blobs of tissue; they are lovely, living, human beings (cf. Miller, 2004).
When the angel Gabriel informed Mary about the pregnancy of her cousin, Elizabeth, the angel of God said that she had “conceived” (Luke 1:36). Conceived what? What was inside of Elizabeth? A mass of meaningless matter? A non-living non-human? An animal evolving into a person? What had Elizabeth conceived? Gabriel informed Mary that Elizabeth had “conceived a son.” What’s more, when Mary went to visit Elizabeth prior to the births of John the Baptizer and Jesus, Luke, the physician, called the unborn baby in Elizabeth’s womb a “babe,” and even noted that he “leaped in her womb” (Luke 1:41,44). Luke used this term (Greek brephos) at least four other times. Twice he used it in reference to Jesus lying in a manger after His birth (Luke 2:12,16), once when referring to young infants whose parents had sought the Lord’s blessings (Luke 18:15), and once in reference to the babies that Pharaoh had exposed in ancient Egypt (Acts 7:19; cf. Exodus 1:22).
In each of these cases, brephos refers to children, to boys and girls, to sons and daughters—to living human beings whom the psalmist said are fearfully and wonderfully made, formed, and woven by Almighty God (139:13-16). Man should be careful tampering with Jehovah’s creation whom He fashions in His image!

AMERICA, ABORTION, AND THE ABSURD


Mommas Can Murder, But Daddies Can’t?

Few things enrage a community more than finding out that a pregnant woman has been murdered. Towns struck with such an atrocity often rise up and declare that justice must be served: “Violators should be charged with two counts of murder, not just one.” In recent times, men committing such heinous crimes have been charged with double murder. From Missouri to California, from Ohio to Utah, prosecutors have been pushing for maximum penalties by charging men, who allegedly have killed their pregnant wives (or girlfriends), with two counts of murder. Just last year, a California man was convicted of murdering both a mother and her unborn baby after he brutally stabbed the mother (and child) repeatedly with scissors (Ertelt, 2009).
It is encouraging to know that our judicial system has seen fit to prosecute those who murder unborn babies, and to make the guilty pay the highest penalties allowed. In these situations, our judicial system has treated the unborn baby as he/she really is—a human being. “A person guilty of murdering an unborn child is guilty of murdering a person.” This is what we are being told over and over again by those who seek to charge men, who take the lives of a woman and her unborn baby, with double murder.
But wait a minute! How can an unborn child be considered a human being in one situation (when a man takes the life of a woman and her baby), but then, when a pregnant woman wants to take the life of her unborn child, the baby becomes an “appendage” of the mother’s body? “The baby is not a human being, just an extra lump of tissue that the mother can discard at will.” If the father intentionally kicks a baby while in the mother’s womb, killing the child, he likely will be sentenced to prison, or possibly to death (and rightly so—Genesis 9:6). On the other hand, if a mother goes to an abortion clinic and pays a doctor to insert an instrument into her uterus literally to pull and shred the baby into pieces, snapping the spinal cord, and crushing the skull, she has done nothing illegal.
How, in the name of common sense, can our courts rule that when a woman takes the life of her own child, “it is a choice,” but when someone else takes that life, “it is murder”? Such reasoning makes no sense. Abortion-rights activists, at least, are consistent in this regard. As Heather Boonstra, senior public policy associate at the Alan Guttmacher Institute, stated: “The law cannot hold both that a pregnant woman is two persons and at the same time allow her to have an abortion” (as quoted in Simon, 2001).

Inhumane to Kill Dogs, but not Humans?

In August 2007, many people, including myself, were disappointed to learn that a well-known professional football player (Michael Vick) plead guilty to sponsoring, financing, and participating in the brutal sport of dog fighting. Vick even admitted that he was partly responsible for hanging and drowning a number of dogs that did not perform well in certain “test” fights (see United States v. Michael Vick). For his crimes, Vick was sentenced to 23 months behind bars, most of which were served in a federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas.
I certainly believe that Vick’s actions (i.e., the drowning of dogs, etc.) can be described as appalling and somewhat sadistic. What’s more, he knowingly participated in a sport which has been outlawed in every state in America. He deserved some kind of punishment for his actions. But, we must recognize that Vick’s acts were done against animals. Though dogs may be “man’s best friend” (and I happen to love dogs), they still are just animals—not humans. They are every bit as much an animal as cows, crows, chickens, deer, monkeys, horses, and pigs.
How absurd, inconsistent, and immoral is the United States’ judicial system when a person must serve nearly two years in prison for fighting, hanging, and drowning animals, yet,
if a woman slaughters a 22-week-old unborn human, she supposedly is blameless. The fact that doctors in the United States can legally rip unborn babies to pieces, chop them up with knife-like devices, or puncture their skulls with a pair of scissors before sucking out their brains, is atrocious. Are we to believe that Vick’s actions against dogs were “inhumane,” but what happens to approximately one million innocent, unborn babies every year in America is not? What could be more inhumane than willfully, selfishly, arrogantly, and brutally taking the life of a human—one of God’s image-bearers (Genesis 1:26-27; 9:6)? Baby murderers freely walk the streets of America every day, but dog fighters are jailed for inhumane acts—against animals? How absurd!

Overpopulation Problem?
Don’t Pollute the Planet with Babies?

More than 3,500 years ago, Pharaoh observed that the children of Israel were growing and multiplying so rapidly that he became fearful of problems such a large number of slaves might cause. Exodus chapter one makes clear that Pharaoh gave two separate execution orders upon Israel’s newborn sons because of what he perceived as an overpopulation problem. Sadly, such “reasoning” is still used today.
In 2006, evolutionary environmentalist Dr. Eric Pianka was named the Distinguished Texas Scientist of the Year. At his award ceremony in Beaumont, Texas, attendee Forrest Mims reported how Pianka
began laying out his concerns about how human overpopulation is ruining the Earth. He presented a doomsday scenario in which he claimed that the sharp increase in human population since the beginning of the industrial age is devastating the planet. He warned that quick steps must be taken to restore the planet before it’s too late. Professor Pianka said the Earth as we know it will not survive without drastic measures. Then, and without presenting any data to justify this number, he asserted that the only feasible solution to saving the Earth is to reduce the population to 10 percent of the present number.... His favorite candidate for eliminating 90 percent of the world’s population is airborne Ebola (Ebola Reston), because it is both highly lethal and it kills in days, instead of years (Mims; cf. Butt, 2008).
Most people find Dr. Pianka’s suggestions insane. Who in his right mind would propose spreading airborne Ebola around the planet for the purpose of reducing the world’s population? Ridiculous? Before dismissing Texas’ 2006 “Distinguished Scientist” as a raving lunatic, consider a more palatable form of population reduction.
In 1977, Paul and Anne Ehrlich and John Holdren (who currently serves as President Obama’s “science czar”) penned a book titled: Ecoscience: Population, Resources, and Environment. In the book, Holdren and the Ehrlichs assert that “there exists ample authority under which population growth could be regulated.... [U]nder the United States Constitution, effective population-control programs could be enacted” (p. 1280). What kind of “population-control programs” exactly? They specifically noted: “compulsory population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abortion,” which “could be sustained under the existing constitution if the population crisis became sufficiently severe to endanger society” (p. 1280, emp. added). Is there really much difference between the Pharaoh of Exodus one and President Obama’s science czar (cf. Matthew 5:21-22; 15:18)?
The United Kingdom’s Daily Mail ran a story a few years back about a woman (Toni Vernelli) who “terminated her pregnancy in the firm belief she was helping save the planet” (as quoted in Courtenay-Smith and Turner, 2007, emp. added). According to Vernelli, “Having children is selfish.... Every person who is born uses more food, more water, more land, more fossil fuels, more trees and produces more rubbish, more pollution, more greenhouse gases, and adds to the problem of over-population” (2007). Vernelli indicated her desire to “save the planet—not produce a new life which would only add to the problem.” She went on to describe procreation as “something negative” and claimed that there were many others with similar planet-saving ideas. The Daily Mail concurred, saying, “Toni is far from alone” (2007).
Thirty-one-year-old Sarah Irving was in complete agreement with Vernelli. “[A] baby,” she said, “would pollute the planet.... [N]ever having a child was the most environmentally friendly thing I could do” (2007, emp. added). Sarah and her fiancĂ© Mark Hudson told the Daily Mail, “In short, we do everything we can to reduce our carbon footprint. But all this would be undone if we had a child.... It would be morally wrong for me to add to climate change and the destruction of Earth” (emp. added). In the minds of environmentalists and atheists, including Freedom from Religion’s President Dan Barker, murdering unborn children can be considered “progress” and a “blessing” (see Barker, 1992, p. 135; see also Barker and Rankin, 2006), while bringing children into the world may be “negative” and “morally wrong.”

CONCLUSION

Some 2,700 years ago, the prophet Isaiah warned of those “who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter...who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight” (5:20-21). Sadly, Isaiah’s description of the ungodly fits America to a tee. In this country, we call unbridled lust “love,” we describe immodest apparel as “stylish,” we refer to homosexuals as being “gay,” and baby murderers we call “pro-choice”—protectors of “women’s rights.” (Whatever happened to children’s rights?)
What will become of those who “call evil good, and good evil”? What is God’s reaction to those who “rejoice in iniquity” rather than truth (1 Corinthians 13:6)? Isaiah spoke of God’s judgments and punishment:
Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble, and the flame consumes the chaff, so their root will be as rottenness, and their blossom will ascend like dust; because they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel. Therefore the anger of the Lord is aroused against His people; He has stretched out His hand against them and stricken them, and the hills trembled. Their carcasses were as refuse in the midst of the streets (5:24-25).
According to the psalmist, “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God” (9:17).
Both the Bible and history teach us that God does not tolerate wicked, bloodthirsty nations forever. He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah with fire from heaven. He raised a mighty army to punish the wicked inhabitants of Canaan (Deuteronomy 9:4; 18:9-12). He sent “angels of destruction” upon Egypt, and gave them “over to the plague, and destroyed all the firstborn” (Psalm 78:49,51). What will be America’s fate? If our “Christian” country’s murderous methods do not cease, what can we expect? We can expect that God will severely judge our nation in this life, while individually rendering “each one according to his deeds” in the afterlife (Romans 2:5-10). In the meantime, may our longsuffering Savior grant Christians the courage to “take up the whole armor of God” and “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might” (Ephesians 6:13,10).

REFERENCES

“Abortion Methods” (2010), http://www.lifesitenews.com/abortiontypes/.
“Amillia Turns Two” (2008), http://growingyourbaby.blogspot.com/2008/10/amillia-taylor-turns-2.html.
Barker, Dan (1992), Losing Faith in Faith: From Preacher to Atheist (Madison, WI: Freedom From Religion Foundation).
Barker, Dan and John Rankin (2006), “Evolution and Intelligent Design: What are the Issues?” http://www.ffrf.org/about/bybarker/ID_Debate.mp3.
Butt, Kyle (2008), “The Bitter Fruits of Atheism [Part 1],” Reason & Revelation, 28[7]:49-55, July, http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/3740.
Butt, Kyle (2009), “Is God Immoral for Killing Innocent Children?” Reason & Revelation, 29[12]:89-95, December.
Courtenay-Smith, Natasha and Morag Turner (2007), “Meet the Women Who Won’t Have Babies—Because They’re Not Eco Friendly,” Daily Mail, November 21, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=495495&in_page_id=1879.
“Diary of an Unborn Baby” (no date), National Right to Life Foundation, http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/facts/fetusdevelopment.html.
“Doctors Extend Hospital Stay of Tiniest Premature Baby” (2007), Associated Press, February 20, http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,252878,00.html.
Ehrlich, Paul, Anne Ehrlich, and John Holdren (1977), Ecoscience: Population, Resources, and Environment (San Francisco, CA: W.H. Freeman and Company), http://www.scribd.com/doc/22480029/Ecoscience-Population-Resources-Environment-1649-Pgs-John-holdren.
Ertelt, Steven (2009), “California Man Convicted Killing Both Pregnant Girlfriend and Unborn Child,” http://www.lifenews.com/state4210.html.
“Facts on Induced Abortions in the United Sates” (2008), Alan Guttmacher Institute, http://www.agi-usa.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.pdf.
“Fetal Development: From Conception to Birth” (2003), National Right to Life, http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/facts/fetaldevelopment.html.
“Florida Baby Delivered at 21 Weeks Won’t Go Home as Planned” (2007), Associated Press, February 20, http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2007-02-20-tiny-baby_x.htm.
“Gianna Jessen” (2006), http://www.abortionfacts.com/survivors/giannajessen.asp.
Gould, Stephen Jay (2000), “Abscheulich! (Atrocious),” Natural History, 109[2]:42-50, March.
Jackson, Wayne (no date), “The ‘Link’ Between Evolution and Abortion,” Christian Courier, http://www.christiancourier.com/articles/958-the-link-between-evolution-and-abortion.
Lyons, Eric and Bert Thompson (2002), “In the ‘Image and Likeness of God’ [Parts I/II],” Reason & Revelation, March/April, 22:17-23,25-31.
Major, Trevor (1995), “The Value of Early Human Life,” Reason & Revelation, 15[2]:9-15, February, http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/259.
McGrew, Jannel (2002), “‘Jane Roe’ Tells Story of Change at Fundraiser,” Prattville Progress, May 1.
Miller, Dave (2004), “Abortion and Exodus 21,” http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/2598.
Miller, J. Maxwell (1972), “In the ‘Image’ and ‘Likeness’ of God,” Journal of Biblical Literature, September, 91:289-304.
Miller, Joshua Rhett (2009), “Ten Years Later, Boy’s ‘Hand of Hope’ Continues to Spark Debate,” Fox News, May 6, http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,519181,00.html.
Mims, Forrest (2006), “Dealing with Doctor Doom,” The Citizen Scientist, http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_2006/2006-04-07/feature1p/index.html.
“Saddleback Presidential Candidates Forum” (2008), August 16, http://www.clipsandcomment.com/2008/08/17/full-transcript-saddleback-presidential-forum-sen-barack-obama-john-mccain-moderated-by-rick-warren/.
Simon, Stephanie (2001), “Debate Grows on Whether Fetuses Should Have Special Legal Status,” Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 6A, June 17, http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1683&dat=20010617&id=G8AaAAAAIBAJ&sjid=XjAEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6739,6695111.
United States v. Michael Vick (2007), 3:07CR274, http://sports.espn.go.com/photo/2007/0824/vicksummary.pdf.
“Women” (2009), The White House, http://www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/women.


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Thursday, August 30, 2012

Great refutation of Bill Nye's comments

Bill Nye: The (Pseudo-)Science Guy

by  Jeff Miller, Ph.D.

Many of us who are scientists grew up watching “Bill Nye the Science Guy,” and learned to love science in the process. Sadly, Bill Nye came out recently with a video that indicates he is vehemently opposed to parents who teach children that evolutionary theory is false. In a YouTube video posted by BigThink.com, Nye said:
wikipedia.org (Ed Schipul) 2012 CC-by-sa-2.0
Denial of evolution is unique to the United States…. People still move to the United States, and that’s largely because of the intellectual capital we have—the general understanding of science. When you have a portion of the population that doesn’t believe in that, it holds everybody back. Really. Evolution is the fundamental idea in all of life science. In all of biology. It’s like, it’s very much analogous to trying to do geology without believing in tectonic plates. You’re just not going to get the right answer. Your whole world is just going to be a mystery instead of an exciting place…. Once in awhile I get people that really, or, that claim, they don’t believe in evolution. And my response, generally, is, “Why not? Really. Why not?” Your world just becomes fantastically complicated when you don’t believe in evolution. Here are these ancient dinosaur bones or fossils. Here is radioactivity. Here are distant stars that are just like our star but that are at a different point in their life cyle. The idea of deep time, of this billions of years, explains so much of the world around us. If you try to ignore that, your world view just becomes crazy. Just untenable. It’s self-inconsistent. And I say to the grown-ups: If you want to deny evolution and live in your, in your, uh, world that’s completely inconsistent with everything we observe in the Universe, that’s fine. But don’t make your kids do it. Because we need them. We need scientifically literate voters and tax payers for the future…. We need engineers that can build stuff—solve problems…. In another couple centuries, that world view, I’m sure, will be, just won’t exist. There’s no evidence for it (Fowler and Rodd, 2012).
Such comments, though not surprising, certainly are unfortunate, since so many young people have long hung on Bill Nye’s every word about science.
Several points are worthy of mentioning in response to Mr. Nye. It is true that widespread denial of evolution seems to be somewhat unique to the United States (see Miller, 2012), although there are other contenders (cf. Le Page, 2008). It is also true that many people clamor to get into the United States and that the United States has been the leader in the technological revolution over the last century. What’s unfortunate is that Nye totally ignores the fact that America has become the superpower that we are in science and in every other field—while largely not believing in evolution. America has historically been Christian and pro-Bible (and thus, anti-evolution), and in truth, it is due to that stance that America has flourished. Becoming more pro-evolution would actually move us in the opposite direction from the direction that has made us great in the first place. Believing in evolution will actually “hold America back”—while believing in Creation has not.
Nye believes that dinosaur fossils, radioactivity, distant stars, and deep time prove evolution and disprove Creation. As you know, we address such matters on a regular basis (e.g., Lyons and Butt, 2008; DeYoung, 2005; Lyons, 2011; Miller, 2010) and have shown that the scientific evidence supports the Creation model rather than the Evolutionary model. The Creation model can offer reasonable explanations, in keeping with the scientific evidence, for the existence of matter, energy, life, the laws of science, design, beauty, religious intuition, morality, “anomalies” in the geologic column, and many other things, while the Evolutionary model falls far short. It is the Evolutionary model that is “completely inconsistent” with much of what we observe in the Universe. In truth, it is the Evolutionary model that is holding back the progress of science. If evolutionary scientists would stop spending time and money in pursuit of unscientific notions (like trying to figure out how abiogenesis could happen, even though science has already disproven that idea time and again; or how something material could come from nothing or exist forever, even though science has already disproven those ideas time and again; or trying to find “missing link” fossils that prove that we came from ape-like creatures, when over 130 years of exploration into the geologic column has not helped in that pursuit), and begin interpreting the scientific evidence in light of the Creation model, much more progress could be made.
Evolutionary theory spawned the false concept of vestigial organs. That idea would have all but stopped scientific research on those organs, since according to evolutionary theory, those organs are now useless or nearly so. Now we are realizing that those organs are not vestigial, but important, and we are reaping the effects of evolutionists’ lack of emphasis on those organs for over a century. Little research has been done on many of those organs in the past century due to the vestigial argument. On the other hand, when scientists have turned their attention towards the created order for scientific inspiration—as creationists do since we understand that the Chief Engineer designed it—they are discovering that the Universe is replete with fully functional, amazing designs worthy of mimicking. The Creation model is hardly a hinderance to scientific progress. Contrary to Nye’s charge to parents—we encourage parents to continue to advocate the creationist mindset! The fruit of that pursuit has been the emergence of the most advanced and prosperous country in the history of mankind (cf. Skousen, 2009). Teach your kids the truth! “We need scientifically literate voters and tax payers for the future. We need engineers that can build stuff—solve problems.”
In a CBS interview after the release of the video, Nye talked about his passion concerning evolutionary theory.
I feel passionate about it for the betterment of the United States, the United States economy, and our future. What makes the United States great—the reason people want to live in the United States, move here still—is because of our ability to innovate. This goes back to Ben Franklin and Thomas Alva Edison and George Washington Carver, let alone landing on the moon—Neil Armstrong. All these people believed in science (“Bill Nye on Creationism Critique…,” 2012).
While we disagree that the “reason people want to live in the United States” is solely our ability to innovate, we certainly agree that the freedom and encouragement to engage in innovative endeavors in this country is a significant perk in coming here. However, Nye has failed to realize that the freedom to innovate in this country stems from the fundamental belief held by the Founders of this country—that men have been “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,” including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These unalienable Rights, according to the Founders, were derived from the God of the Bible, in which, the Founders, en masse, believed (see Miller, 2008b). Belief in the Bible has resulted in fewer evolutionists in America—since Darwinian evolution and the biblical account of Creation cannot be harmonized (see Thompson, 2000). And yet, again, America is still greater than, perhaps, any other country in the history of the world.
Ironically, Nye mentions Franklin, Carver, and Armstrong among the great scientists of history. Franklin, though less religious than many of the Founders, was still a strong proponent of biblical morality in America and believed in the God of the Bible. Carver was a well-known Creation scientist, and Armstrong was among this country’s pioneering astronauts who even read from the Bible from space during television broadcasts (see Miller, 2008a). Nye failed to mention the fact that many great scientists from history have made significant contributions to the field of science, even though they were firm believers in God and Creation. Johannes Kepler, the father of modern astronomy and modern optics, was a firm Bible believer. Robert Boyle, the father of chemistry, was a Bible believer. Samuel F.B. Morse, who invented Morse Code, was a believer. Wernher Von Braun, the father of the space program at NASA, was a strong believer in God and creation, as well as Louis Pasteur, the father of biology, Lord Kelvin, the father of thermodynamics, Sir Isaac Newton, the father of modern physics, and Faraday, the father of electromagnetism. Dozens of other well-known scientists from history could be cited (see Morris, 1990).
Although numbers ultimately mean nothing in regard to truth, creationists can certainly come up with an impressive list of qualified scientists living today who have examined the scientific evidence and concluded that the evolutionary model falls short in explaining our existence. Creation Ministries International posted a list of some 187 scientists alive today (or recently deceased) who believe in the biblical account of creation (“Creation Scientists…,” 2010). The scientists who are listed all possess a doctorate in a science-related field. Over 90 different scientific fields are represented in the list, including several types of engineers, chemists, geneticists, physicists, and biologists. Astronomers and astrophysicists; geologists and geophysicists; physicians and surgeons; micro-, molecular, and neurobiologists; paleontologists and zoologists are represented, and the list goes on. Jerry Bergman amassed a list of more than 3,000 individuals. Most have a Ph.D. in science, and many more could be added, according to Bergman.
On my list I have well over 3,000 names including Nobel Prize winners, but, unfortunately, a large number of persons that could be added to the public list, including many college professors, did not want their name listed because of real concerns over possible retaliation or harm to their careers (2006).
For over 30 years, we at Apologetics Press have conducted numerous seminars and published hundreds of articles by qualified, credentialed scientists who speak out in support of the biblical account of creation as well—scientists with graduate degrees in geology, astrophysics, microbiology, neurobiology, cell biology, biochemistry, aerospace engineering, nuclear engineering, and biomechanical engineering. Creationists can certainly speak with credibility in scientific matters—and we can show with confidence that the scientific evidence does not support Bill Nye and his evolutionary theory.
Concerning a recent NASA conference he attended, Nye noted how extraordinary it is that anybody in the world could attend that conference in a sense, since it was broadcast all around the world using technology that did not exist in the past, but now does, thanks to science. “That’s a result of science. That’s not a result of thinking the Earth is some extraordinarily short number of years old” (“Bill Nye on Creationism…,” 2012). It is true that our technology is a result of science, and in a sense, it is not necessarily all due to “thinking the Earth is some extraordinarily short number of years old,” since not all technological breakthroughs or hang-ups are necessarily the result of one’s belief on the age of the Earth. However, technology is also not a result of thinking the Earth is some extraordinarily long number of years old either. One’s belief about how old the Earth is does not necessarily directly affect the findings of science. Even prominent evolutionists recognize that one does not need to believe in Darwinian evolution in order to be a scientist. Richard Dawkins of Oxford University said, “a student of, say, nerve cells, might decide that he is not aided by thinking about evolution. The nerve specialist agrees that his nerve cells are the products of evolution, but he does not need to use this fact in his research…. That is a defensible position…. A physicist certainly doesn’t need Darwinism in order to do physics” (1996, p. 283, emp. added). A person’s stance on evolutionary theory may not directly affect his scientific findings, but it certainly can indirectly affect his findings through God’s Providence—as has been manifested throughout the history of this country and the blessings that Almighty God has bestowed upon us through scientific advancement. When God is happy with the decisions of a country, the country is blessed with prosperity and advancement (Psalm 33:12). So, Bill Nye and people like him are a hindrance to scientific progress. Why? (1) Because his views foster the acceptance of false information and hinder the free exchange of ideas; and (2) Because his unbiblical view of the origin of the Universe will ultimately lead to the drying up of the fountain of God’s providential scientific blessings in this country. May God help us to boldly fight this war for the soul of America.

REFERENCES

Bergman, Jerry (2006), “Darwin Skeptics,” http://www.rae.org/darwinskeptics.html.
“Bill Nye on Creationism Critique: I’m Not Attacking Religion” (2012), CBS News, August 28, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505270_162-57501492/bill-nye-on-creationism-critique-im-not-attacking-religion/.
“Creation Scientists and Other Specialists of Interest” (2010), Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/creation-scientists.
Dawkins, Richard (1996), The Blind Watchmaker (New York: W.W. Norton).
DeYoung, Don (2005), Thousands...Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).
Fowler, Jonathan and Elizabeth Rodd (2012), “Bill Nye: Creationism is Not Appropriate for Children,” BigThink.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHbYJfwFgOU.
Le Page, Michael (2008), “Evolution Myths: It Doesn’t Matter if People Don’t Grasp Evolution,” New Scientist, 198[2652]:31, April 19.
Lyons, Eric (2011), “Common Sense, Miracles, and the Apparent Age of the Earth,” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=4082.
Lyons, Eric and Kyle Butt (2008), The Dinosaur Delusion (Montgomery: AL: Apologetics Press).
Miller, Dave (2008a), “American Astronauts: From Belief to Unbelief,” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=12&article=2490.
Miller, Dave (2008b), The Silencing of God (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).
Miller, Jeff (2010), “Inevitable—Given Enough Time?” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=12&article=3729.
Miller, Jeff (2012), “Literal Creationists Holding Their Ground in the Polls,” Reason & Revelation, 32[9]:94-95, September (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).
Morris, Henry M. (1990), Men of Science Men of God: Great Scientists Who Believed in the Bible (El Cajon, CA: Master Books), third printing.
Skousen, W. Cleon (2009), The 5000 Year Leap: A Miracle That Changed the World (Malta, ID: National Center for Constitutional Studies), 17th printing.
Thompson, Bert (2000), Creation Compromises (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), second edition, http://www.apologeticspress.org/pdfs/e-books_pdf/cre_comp.pdf.

Bill Nye: Not Appropriate for Children


Just some things to think about

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Lets Squash Some Bugs 3, The True Nature of Evidence

     In the debate between Mr. Butt and Mr. Scott, Mr. Scott continually asked for the evidence for the existence of God.  This was his primary reason for rejecting the evidence that was presented to him and the audience from Mr. Butt.  He asked repeatedly "Where's the evidence?".  I believe that Mr. Scott is unaware of the true nature of evidence.  It is not what many, including Mr. Scott seem to think.  The following is an article that I published a few years ago on Facebook.  It explains what the true nature of evidence is and what is really involved when anyone comes to that evidence.
     What is the place of scientific evidence in the origins debate?  Do things like DNA, fossils, rock layers, the age of the earth really show that the earth is billions of years old and that evolution has occurred, or do they support the creation account as described in Genesis.  Why is it that 2 PhD scientists can work side by side on the same piece of evidence and come up with 2 totally different explanations of the evidence?
     Many people like to think that an unbiased investigation of the evidence in the absolute standard by which the origins debate can be settled.  We often hear the evolutionist say "The evidence is conclusive, evolution is a fact".  If this were true then, would it not be the case that all would accept this fact?  Yet when we look at the vast gulf that exists within the two camps, it becomes obvious that something else is in play.
     Again, some people think that all that is needed is the evidence.  However, such a view does not stand up to careful scrutiny.  Others take the opposite approach.  They believe that scientific evidence is utterly irrelevant to the debate.  The issue being more a matter of faith than reason.  However, this is overly simplistic and, just as the opposite, will not stand up to careful scrutiny.
     Before we begin to address the issue at hand, I wish to include a couple of the most compelling scientific arguments for Biblical creation.  The first has to do with Information Science.  This is a relatively new field in science.  Yet it is one of the most compelling.  In this technological age, we are inundated with all sorts of information.  But few people stop to consider what information really is and where it comes from.  We can define information scientifically as a coded message containing an expected action and intent.  Under this definition, the words on the screen qualify as information.  That is to cay they are encoded, the words represent ideas.  The expected action is that you, the reader, will read and act upon the words.  The intended purpose is that you will become better in your understanding of the issue (that is, if I can explain it!).
     The DNA molecule is a long molecule found within living cells and resembles a twisted ladder.  The rungs of the ladder form a pattern of base pair triplets that represent amino acid sequences or the building blocks of protein.  DNA contains the instructions to build the organism.  So different organisms have different DNA patterns.  DNA qualifies under the definition of information.  1) It contains an encoded message, the base pair triplets that represent amino acids.  2) It has an expected action, the formation of proteins.  3) It has an intended purpose, life.  This being the case, DNA contains information.  Whenever we find any kind of information there are certain rules that apply, these are called theorems.  For our discussion we will look at two.  1) "There is no known law of nature, no known process and no know sequence of events that can cause information to originate by itself in matter", (Theorem #28 in DR. Werner Gitts book In the Beginning Was Information, Green Forest, AR:Master Books, 2006, p. 207).  2) "When its progress along the chain of transmission events is traced backwards, every piece of information leads to a mental source, the mind of the sender ( Theorem #15, Gitt, In the Beginning Was Information, p. 107).  The first tells us that matter does not spontaneously generate information.  The second tells us that only a mental source can generate new information.  To underline this concept, consider the response given by Richard Dawkins when asked to give an example of new information being generated by chance.  His response was silence.
     In one sense, these theorems are hardly profound; we that for granted that when we read a book it has an author.  No one reading this would conclude that it was generated by a sequence of typos that gradually accumulated over time.  We take for granted that a mind (no matter how small) is ultimately responsible for the information that it contains.  The theorems of information science confirm this.
     With this new science, it would seem that the gradualist Darwinian scenario is crushed.  These theorems tell us that life cannot have come about as it is stated by the evolutionists.  The information in DNA cannot have come about by mutations and selection because the laws of information science tell us that all information comes from a mind.  This goes against the Neo-Darwinian synthesis of origins.  The laws of information science would seem to confirm the creation account as given in Genesis.
     Although the above example is a very good argument, it does not actually prove Biblical creation, nor does it utterly refute evolution.  The reason being is, when faced with this kind of evidence, those who do not accept the Biblical account of creation invoke (unknowingly) what is called a "rescuing device".  That is, they invent a story to explain away apparently contrary evidence.  A great example of this comets.
     Evolutionary astronomers believe that the solar system is billions of years old, yet they see comets within it.  They can see that comets disintegrate quite rapidly and based on this they compute that they can last only 100,000 years or so.  This would indicate the the universe is rather young.  How do the resolve this dilemma?  There must be a source that generates new comets to replace the old ones.  So they have proposed the Oort cloud (named after its inventor Jan Oort).  This cloud is an enormous hypothetical sphere of icy masses that surround our solar system.  It is supposedly far beyond the most distant planets, beyond the range of our most powerful telescopes.  They also suppose that on occasion, objects in the Oort cloud are dislodged from their distant orbit and thrown into the inner solar system to become brand new comets.  Since these new comets continually replace the old ones, the solar system could be billions of years old.  It is important to indicate here that no one has ever seen the Oort cloud.  It is supposedly much to far away to detect the small objects within it.  Currently there is no observational evidence of any kind for the cloud.  This is a rescuing device that "saves" the evolutionists view from evidence that would otherwise seem to refute it.  Is this acceptable?  Can "rescuing devices be used?
     The answer to the question might surprise you.  It is NO.  A rescuing device is not necessarily wrong.  In fact we all use these devices, even the Biblical creationist.  The distant starlight problem is a great example the the Biblical creationist also use these devices.  This argument states that the universe must be billions of years old since it takes light millions of years to reach the earth from distant galaxies.  This would seem to be irrefutable evidence that the universe is in fact billions of years old.  How does the Biblical creationist answer this contrary evidence.  A rescuing device.  There have been several models proposed to explain this problem, yet they have yet to be conclusive.  So in order to retain our position, we issue a rescuing device of our own.  We introduce the words of Scripture in order to save our belief.  Is this arbitrary?  Are we, just like the evolutionist being unreasonable?  The answer is no, both sides have a reason to believe what they believe.  It is called a world view.
     We all have a way of thinking about the world, this is commonly called a world view.  Our world view contains our most strongly held convictions about how the world works, how it came to be, the nature of reality, and nature of truth and how we should live.  Most people today have not given much thought to their own world view.  In fact many do not even realize that they have one.  Such people tend to think that all knowledge is acquired by an unbiased observation of the evidence.  This is called "Empiricism" and it is itself a world view.  We cannot help but to have some beliefs about how the world works, how we obtain knowledge and how we should live.  Even if we believe that we have no such beliefs, this is a belief itself.  There is no escaping it.  It is inevitable to have one.  The thing is a rational world view in not.
     A world view is like mental glasses.  It effects the way that we look at the world.  A person wearing red glasses sees everything as being red.  A person wearing evolution glasses sees evolution everywhere.  The world is not really re everywhere, but the glasses do effect our perception of the world and the conclusions that we draw.  The evolutionists sees the world differently then does the Biblical creationist.  We have the exact same facts, but what we make of those facts is colored by our world view.  Thus, we interpret the same evidence differently.  This is why the two PhD scientists can come to two totally different conclusion about the exact same evidence.  This point cannot be overstated.  Much of the frustration that exists in the evolution-creation debate is due to this fact.  The evolutionist and the creationist must interpret the same data differently due to their different world views.
     Many people do not want to accept the fact that all evidence must be interpreted in light of prior beliefs, a faith commitment of some kind.  Again, many have the assumption that evidence should be approached in a neutral and unbiased fashion.  That is without any previous beliefs.  This is impossible to do since this view is itself a belief and not based on any empirical evidence.  It is a belief about how we should look at the evidence.  In order for our observation of evidence to be meaningful, we first have to assume that our senses are reliable.  If our senses are not reliable then any observation is flawed and we cannot empirically test our senses because we have to use the very thing that we are testing.  Since this is the case it does us no good to observe the evidence if we did not believe that our observation were real and reliable.  We cannot avoid wearing mental glasses, having a world view.  The item of importance here is that we need to make sure that we have the correct glasses.  An incorrect pair will draw incorrect conclusions, a correct pair will prevent us from drawing the wrong conclusion and can improve our understanding about the universe.
     A magician saws a woman in half.  Your senses tell you that you saw this happen.  But the conclusion that you draw from it is not based on what you have seen.  You draw your conclusion that it is a trick because you world view prevents you from drawing the wrong conclusion, that the woman was actually cut in half.  Our world view restrains us and guides us in the interpretation of the evidence.  This is true in every aspect of life from origins to our view of the Bible.  Our world view tells us what to make of the evidence.  We all interpret the facts in light of our world view.  Any evidence that seems to challenge our world view can always be explained by invoking a "rescuing device".  Many of the debates and comments about origins (from both sides) are not effective because the opposing sided do not understand the nature of world views, evidence and rescuing devices.  This is the fundamental reason why the parties always leave the debate wondering what is wrong with the other side.  They call the Biblical creationist unreasonable even stupid, yet the same can be said about the Biblical creationist (which should never happen).
     Evidence by itself will never settle the debate, and being such it would appear that there is no rational resolution to the issue.  After all, no matter how compelling the evidence to either side may be,the opponent will always interpret that  evidence in light of their world view.  This being the case, is there any way to rationally resolve this issue?

Friday, April 20, 2012

Let'e Squash Some Bugs Part 2, The Butt, Scott Debate

As we continue to examine the things mentioned in the debate, I wish to this time focus on Mr. Scott's comments on the arguments put forth by Mr. Butt.  Mr. Butt presented the arguments from the cosmological, teleological, moral, free will, and a little of the transcendent.  Mr. Butt presented them in a simplistic and general manner I believe due to the time constraints of the debate.  In Mr. Scott's opening statements, he called those arguments simply philosophical and had no meaning.  He kept demanding for evidence.  He simply rejected them as being philosophical in nature and unreasonable.  Here we find another problem with Mr. Scott's view of the issues.  The question of the existence of God is just that, a philosophical question.  It can only be answered in a philosophical manner.

     The Christian faith as defined by Biblical revelation  teaches a number of things which are not restricted to the realm of man's temporal experience as Mr. Scott would have it. It teaches things about an invisible God, His triune nature, the orgin of the universe, the regularity of the created order, angels, miracles, the afterlife, etc.  These are the types of claims which I believe Mr. Scott most often find objections to.
     The objection is that such claims are about transcendent matters, things that go beyond our everyday to day human experience.  The triune Creator exists beyond the temporal order, the after life is not part of our ordinary observations in this world.  Those such as Mr. Scott are accustomed to thinking that people can only know things based upon, and pertaining to, the "here and now".  Since he thinks this way (those who have seen the debate will notice this fact), then the claims of Christianity about the transcendent are an intellectual reproach.

     Those who are not Christians will often assume that the natural world is all there is, in which case nobody can know things about the "super natural" (hence the reason Mr. Scott makes the statement that science never asks why and that the why is irrelevant).  In philosophical circle, discussions and debates about questions like these fall within the area of study known as "metaphysics."  As you might expect, this division of philosophical investigation is usually the hotbed of controversy between conflicting schools of thought.  More recently, the entire enterprise of metaphysics has itself become a hotbed of controversy.
      Over the last 2 centuries a mindset has developed which is hostile toward any philosophical claim which is metaphysical in character.  It is clear that antipathy to the the Christian faith has been the primary and motivating factor in such attacks.  Nevertheless, such criticism has been generalized into a pervasive antagonism toward any claims which are "metaphysical".  This attitude has been one of the crucial ingredients which have molded culture and history over the last 2 hundred years.  It has altered common views regarding man and ethics, it has generated a radical reformation of religious beliefs, and it has significantly affected perspectives ranging from politics to pedagogy  Consequently a very large number of the skeptical questions or challenges directed at the Christian faith are either rooted in, or colored by, this negative spirit with regard to metaphysics.

     Before we can elaborate on Mr. Scott's problem with his statements and the arguments that he presented, it would be helpful to understand better what is meant by "metaphysics".  This is just a technical word that is rarely used outside of the academic circles, it is not even a part of the Christian vocabulary.  Nevertheless, the conception of metaphysics and the reaction to it which can be found will definitely touch and have an impact on the life of the Christian either in terms of the attacks of the faith in which he or she must answer, or even in terms of the way in which they portray the faith in everyday life.
     It is often said that metaphysics is the study of being or studies being, that is, questions about existence.  It asks, what is it to exist?  And, what sorts of things exist?  Thus the meta-physician is interested to know to know about fundamental distinctions (the essential nature of things that exist) and important similarities (the essential nature of the members of these classes).  He seeks the ultimate causes or explanations for the existence and nature of things.  He wants to understand the limits of possible reality, the modes of existing, and the interrelations of existing things.
     It should be obvious, if only in an elementary way, that Christianity propounds a number of definite metaphysical claims.  But we need to understand that Mr. Scott also holds to a philosophical meta-physic himself (even though he would deny this).  It would be profitable to pause and reflect upon an insightful comment by a recent writer in this area.  W.H. Walsh has written, "It must be allowed that the reaction against (meta-physics) has been so violent indeed as to suggest that the issues involved in the controversy must be something more than academic.).  He would be correct.  The issues are indeed more than academic.  They are a matter of life and death-eternal life and death.  Jesus said, "And this is life eternal, that they may know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent." (John 17:3).  However, if the unbeliever can stand on the claim that such a God cannot be known because nothing transcending the physical (nothing :metaphysical") can be known, then the issue of eternal destiny is not raised.  Accordingly, men may think and do as they please, without distracting questions about their nature and destiny.
     The fact is that one cannot avoid metaphysical commitments (no matter how much Mr. Scott tries to "sweep them under the carpet").  The very denial of the possibility of knowledge transcending experience is in itself a metaphysical judgement.  Mr. Scott demands evidence.  I believe that when stating this he is not being forth right with the audience.  When he says evidence in reality he means something that can be placed in the test tube and examined through the avenue of science and experience.  This is why he denies the evidence given in the debate.  Again, this is a meta-physical assumption on his part, that all legitimate knowledge is gained by the scientific method.  Mr. Scott deals with philosophy at every turn in the debate, yet denies that it is relevant to the question.  Friedrich Nietzsche had something to say along these lines when he stated:
     "What provokes one to look at all philosophers half suspiciously, half mockingly, is that they all pose as if they had discovered and reached their real opinions through self-development of a cold, pure, divinely unconcerned dialectic while at bottom it is an assumption, a hunch, indeed a kind of "inspiration"-most often a desire of the heart that has been filtered and made absract-that they defend with reasons they have sought after the fact.  They are all advocates and willy spokesmen to their prejudices which they "baptize" "truths".

     Mr. Scott's arguments can be set up as thus;
     1) There cannot be a non-empirical  source of knowledge or information about reality, and
     2) It is illegitimate to draw inferences from what is experienced by the senses to what must lie outside of          experiences.

     When we listen to the comments made by Mr. Scot in the debate, we can see that the above reflects accurately his meta-physic.  In short, we can only know as factually significant what we cn experience directly with our senses-which nullifies the meaningfulness of meta-physical claims and the possibility of metaphysical knowledge.
      We can begin our response by considering #2 in the above. We should first ask why it is that we should not reason from what is known in sense experience to something lying beyond sensation.  After all, is not this exactly what the empirical scientists do on a day to day bases.  They continually reason from the seen to the unseen, (subatomic particles, computing gravitational forces, warning against the effect of radiation simply on the basis of its effect, prescribing medicine for an unseen infection on the basis of an observed fever, etc.).  It certainly appears capricious for Mr. Scott to prohibit Mr. Butt from doing what is allowed to the scientist!!  Such an inconsistency betrays a mind that has been made up in advance against certain kinds of conclusions about reality.  This is exactly what Mr. Scott was arguing in connection with the teleological argument.  He dismisses it since he cannot seen God.
     Moreover, it is important to notice in #2 above that it is not really relevant to making the case against the Christian meta physic.  Christianity does not view its claims as unguided or arbitrary attempts to reason from the seen to the unseen world-unwarranted projections from nature to what lies beyond.. In the firstplace, the Christan claims that God created this world to reflect His glory and to be a constant testimony to Him and His character (Romans 1:18-20).  God also created man in His own image, determined the way in which man would think and learn about the world, and coordinated man's mind and the objective world so that man would unavoidably know the supernatural creator through the conduit of the created realm.  God intended and made it unavoidable that man would learn about the Creator from the world around him.  This amount to saying that the natural world is not in itself random and without a clue as to its ultimate maning, leaving man to arbitrary speculation.
     Moreover, given the intellectually corrupting effects of man's fall into sin and rebellion against God, man's mind has not been left to know God based on the basis of man's own unaided experience and interpretation of the world.  God has undertaken to make Himself known to man by means of verbal revelation, using words chosen by God which are exactly appropriate for the mind of man that was created by God to come to the correct conclusions about his Creator, Judge, and Redeemer.
     The Christan meta-physic is not the result of a self-sufficient exploration of, and argument from man's unaided and brute emperiical experience, to a god lying beyond and behind experience,  Rather it affirms, on the basis of Scripture's declaration, that our meta-physical tenets rest on the self-revelation of the transcendent Creator.  The Christan meta-physic does not work from man to God, but from God to man (2 Peter 1:21).
      Therefore this anti meta-physical claim by Mr. Scott begs the main question.  If God as portrayed in the Scriptures does indeed exist, then there is no reason to preclude the possibility that man who lives in the realm of nature can gain knowledge of the supernatural.  God creator and controls all things, according to the Biblical account (Gen.1&2; Heb. 1:3).  Given that perspective, God could certainly bring it about that man learns the truth about Him through both the created order and a set of divinely inspired messages.  When Mr. Scott contends that nothing in man's temporal, limited,natural experience can provide knowledge of the supernatural, he is simply taking a roundabout way of saying that the Biblical account of a God who makes Himself known in the created order and Scripture is mistaken.
     This begging the question is sometimes veiled from the unbeliever by there tendency to recast the nature of the Christian meta-physic as man centered and rooted initially in human, empirical experience.  However, the very point in contention between the two meta-physics comes down to the claim that Christan teaching is rooted in God's self-disclosure of the truth as found in the world around us and in the written word.  There is not reason to think the the Christan would be intellectually required to build upon the foundation of human sense experience, unless someone were presupposing in advance that all knowledge must ultimately derive from empirical procedure.  But this is the very question at hand.  Mr. Scott is not supporting his reason for rejecting The Christian meta-physic, it is simply a rewording of that rejection itself.
   
     We are brought then to #1 in the above, the first and foundational step in Mr. Scott's meta-physic.  What are we to make of the assertion "all significan knowledge about the objective world is empirical in nature"?  The most obvious and philosophically significant reply would be that is the preceding statement were true, then, on the basis of that claim, we could never know that it were true.  Why?  Simply because that statement in question is not itself known as the result of empirical testing and experience.  Therefore, according to its own strict standards, the statement could not amount to significant knowledge about the objective world.  It simply reflect the subjective (perhaps meaningless) bias of the one who pronounces it.  Hence, Mr. Scott not only has his own preconceived conclusions, but it turns out that he cannot live according to them (Romans 2:1).  On the basis of his own assumptions he refutes himself.

     The very question of the existence of God is a meta-physical question.  Contrary to the assertions of Mr. Scott, it is a philosophical question and must be answered in that matter.  We have not had time in this post to cover the true nature of evidence, will come later so be on the look out.  The basis of this post is to show the error in the thoughts of Mr. Scott.  He has a meta-physic.  He has a philosophy.  He has a world view.  The question then becomes which is true, his or the Christian?  I contend that it is the Christian meta-physic since it and it alone can stand up to careful scrutiny.  All others have some sort of inconsistency within them.  That includes atheism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Mormonism, etc... 
    
    





 

 

Saturday, March 24, 2012

Arguments against the Teleological Argument

 We have looked at the teleological argument for the existence of God (if you have not read them, please take a few minutes and familiarize yourself with them).  Of course those who are against the faith have their arguments that try to demolish the argument.  Please find here the most common of them and my answers to them.



1) Some of the defenses of the premises use unprovable assumptions.
    A) For example, we cannot prove that if the earth were closer to the sun that a
         negative effect would transpire and life on earth would not be possible.
    B) Remember what we are trying to do with our arguments.  We can never prove
         anything 100 %. 
        1) You cannot prove 100% that you exist.  There is only one way to do this.
             You must exit your body and observe yourself in a state of existence.  This we
             cannot do.  It is physically impossible.  What is the answer then. Can we
             come to any type of conclusion about our own existence.  Yes we can.
             We need to remember three things, 1) What is the evidence? 2) What
             is the plausibility of you existing? 3) We must use our own reasoning
             and common sense.
            a) Is there any evidence that you exist.  Well, you are reading this.
                You are thinking about the things written.  Have someone punch
                in the arm, go ahead.  Did you feel any pain?  Someone once said,
                “I think, therefore I am.”  These two areas are evidence that you exist.
                1) You are capable of thinking.
                2) You can feel things that are physical in nature.
            b) Based on these two (there are others that can be added, just trying
                to keep it simple) what is more plausible?  That you do in fact exist,
                or that you do not exist.  Based on the evidence, it is more plausible
                that you do exist.  In fact, the plausibility of your existence is so
                overwhelming, it is reasonable to conclude it is a fact.
            c) Besides, common sense tells us that we do.
        2) This is the same with this objection.  No, we can not prove 100% that the
            defenses are fact.  But the plausibility of them being fact is so overwhelming
            that it is reasonable to conclude that they are fact.

2) The Anthropic Principle
    A) The Anthropic principle is this, the universe is tailor-made for habitation, and that
         both the laws of physics and the initial conditions obligingly arranged themselves in
         such a way that living organisms are subsequently assured of existence.
    B) Well, DAH!  Of course they are.  We are here.  The only difference is we know the
         Tailor who made it so. 
    C) This is really not a strong argument.  In fact, realizing the obvious implications of the
         scientific evidence for the Anthropic principle, many evolutionary scientists have
         rebelled at even the mere mention of it in the halls of science.




3) God of the Gaps
    A) It is often stated something like this, “ Just because we do not know how something
         came about does not mean we can or should insert God as the cause.”
    B) This is an argument from ignorance.  The Design argument is based on our everyday
         design inference.  When we see something that looks designed, that is what we infer.
    C) We use the design inference on a daily bases.  Even scientists, whether they want to
         admit it or not, use it on a daily basis in their everyday work.  A doctor and a
         mechanic diagnose the same way.  They each look within the machine to identify
         what has gone wrong.  The mechanic looks at the engine to see if one of the parts
         has malfunctioned or if something has entered in to disrupt the machines inner
         workings.  They make the inference to design since the all the parts have to be
         working properly in order for the machine to function as it should.  The doctor in
         essence does the exact same thing. They look at the inner parts to see what is not
         functioning properly.  They to make the same inference to design since all the
         parts of the system have to be working properly in order for the system to work.
         By identifying the problem, they then can correct it.
    D) All the argument does is show that some intelligent being has designed the
         system.  We do not know what that intelligent being is.  It could have been aliens
         for all we know.  This is a possible explanation.  (Although I personally do not
         believe that aliens exist.)  Do not get caught up in this trap.  They are making
         assumptions that the argument is not asserting.

4) Darwin has shown that variations and natural selection can account for the
     appearance of design.
    A) We will deal with this more readily when we refute the evolutionary theory.
    B) This rebuttal is primarily focused at the biochemical design argument.
    C) If it can be shown that mutations and natural selection can produce the complex
         systems such as the blood clotting cascade, then their argument stands.  Yet, as
         of today, none have been put forward.  Perhaps we can understand why
         detailed models are missing from the evolutionists by asking what a real
         scientific investigation of mousetrap evolution would be like.  They would first
         have to think of a precursor to the modern mousetrap, one that was simpler. 
         Suppose they started with a wooden platform?  No, that will not catch mice.
         Suppose they started with a modern mousetrap that has a shortened holding
         bar?  No, if the bar is too short it would not reach the catch, and the trap would
         spring uselessly while they were holding it.  Suppose they started with a smaller
         trap?  No, that would not explain the complexity.  Suppose the parts developed
         individually for other functions-such as a popsicle stick for the platform, a clock
         spring for the trap spring, and so on- and then accidentally got together?  No, their
         previous functions would leave them unfit for trapping mice, and they still have
         to explain how they gradually developed into a mousetrap.  If they cannot explain
         the mousetrap, which is simple compared to the systems of the body, it is easy
         to see why there are no attempts to give an evolutionary explanation.
   
       
    D) A pertinent question to ask now is, “How do we know things?”  Without getting
         into the discipline of epistemology, there are really only two ways that we know
         things.  1) Through personal experience and 2) By authority.
        1) If you make the positive knowledge statement that the walls in your house
            are green, how exactly do you know that?  It is through personal experience.
            You know the walls in your house are green because you live there and saw
              that they are green.  Similarly you know what a bird is, how gravity works
            (in an everyday sense), And how to get to the nearest shopping mall, all by
            direct experience.
        2) If you make the positive knowledge statement that the earth revolves around
            the sun, how exactly do you know this?  It is by authority.  That is, you rely
            on some source on information, believing it to be reliable, when you have no
            experience of your own.  Anyone who has attended school believes that the
            earth goes around the sun, even though only a few have the knowledge of how
            to detect this. 
    E) Scientists are people too, so we can ask how they know what they know.  They are
         like everyone else, they rely upon personal experience and, or authority.
        1) No one has personal experience in the evolution of complex biochemical
            systems.  It does not happen in the lab.  In fact, there is an ongoing
            experiment that is testing the validity of the mutation, natural selection theory.
            They use a bacteria that the generations come and go at a rapid pace.  They
            have gone through about 40,000 generations.  As of yet, there have been no
            noticeable changes in the bacteria.  Therefore they cannot say that the reason
            that they know it has happened this way is through personal experience.
        2) It is also not based on authority.  There is no publication in scientific
            literature- prestigious journal, specialty journals, or books- that describes
            how evolution of any real, complex, biochemical system either did occur or
            even might have occurred.  There are assertions that such evolution occurred,
            but absolutely none are supported by pertinent experiments or calculations.
        3) Since no one knows biochemical evolution by direct experience, and since
            there is no authority on which to base claims of knowledge, it can be said that
            the assertions of biochemical evolution is merely bluster.       

5) Design is not science
    A) This rebuttal goes something like this, “ Since we do not have access to the designer,
         we have no way to falsify the concept.”
    B) This is hypocritical on their part.  A great example of science and design is the SETI
         (stands for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence)
         project.  This project was stated in the early 60's, but did not really get started until
         Carl Sagan founded the Planetary Society.  It was a vehicle to advance the SETI
         program.  Simply, the program uses radio telescopes to search the skies for
         intelligent life.  Basically, millions of dollars (some of which were tax payers
         dollars) were pumped into a project to detect codes or messages from outer space
         that would indicate intelligence.  Those involved in the project recognized that
         mathematical patterns, codes, languages, algorithms, and various other
         “fundamental laws” would be accepted as evidence that some type of intelligence
         did exist.  The premise that can be surmised from the SETI program is that
         Intelligence could be recognized and distinguished from non-intelligence, natural
         explanations; the required criteria for this recognition being some type of code,
         mathematical sequence, physical patterns, etc.  Such codes have been found in
         biochemical systems.
    C) The two are basically the same.  They are both looking for design in nature.  The
         SETI scientists are looking for things that do not occur naturally.  If they were to
         come across something such as that, then they would immediately infer design.
         It would be on the front page of every newspaper that intelligent life exists
         elsewhere in the universe.  No one would begin to question the statement even
         though we could not test the being that designed the signal or whatever.  The same
         is true for the biochemical design we see in the body.  We see something that looks
         designed.  Just as with the SETI people, we naturally infer design.  No, we cannot
         test the designer, but just as with SETI, we do not have to for it to be science.  We
         are justified to infer the design concept.

5) Just trying to get religion into the schools
    A) This is a bad assumption on their part.
    B) It has nothing to do with religion. 
    C) Who the intelligent designer is, is not what the argument is showing.  Of course
         the next logical step would be to say that it is God.  But that is apart from this
         argument.
    D) This, I believe, is just an attempt to curtail the discussion from what it is about
         in order not to deal with the argument.  It would be kind of like putting a band aid
         on a severed limb.  It just will not help the situation. 

6) Does not prove a creator
    A) This is true, but the argument does have value.
    B) We need to recognize the fact that the teleological argument does not prove
         an infinite, Necessary being who created the universe out of nothing.  The
         Cosmological argument is intended to accomplish this.  However, when combined
         with the cosmological argument the teleological argument does show that the
         infinite cause of all finite being is an intelligent one, which is evidenced by the
         extremely complex design manifested in the universe. 

7) The perfection problem
    A) Stated as such, “It does not prove the existence of God.”
        1) The fact that the world is full of chaos indicates that there was no designer
            and that it is best explained by natural phenomena.
        2) The fact that mankind is plagued with disease, sickness, suffering indicates
             that an intelligent being could not and would not design something so sloppy.
    B) This is usually a rebuttal against the God of the Bible.
    C) This is faulty on their part, since we are not arguing for the God of the Bible using
         this argument.  The only thing that the argument is stating is that there is design
         in the universe that requires an intelligent being. 
    D) It is also faulty since we do not know at this point what the intelligent being had
         in mind at the start.  Could it not have purposely designed it in such a way as to have
         the chaos, disease, and suffering as a part of its original plan?  Possibly.  (We will
         examine this further when we discuss the issue of evil, pain, and suffering.)  Also
         what makes mankind’s definition of perfection the “rule of law”?  Just because
         mankind does not see it as perfection does not of necessity mean it is imperfect.
           There are many buildings that I would say are really not very appealing to the eye.
         Of course the designer of the building would disagree with my view of what he has
         designed.  Who is correct? 

8) Multi universe theory
    A) The multiverse theory is the hypothetical set of multiple universes that together
         comprise all of reality.
            1) It is argued that if this theory is correct then the design argument fails.
        2) With the increase in number of universes, the probability of one having
               the exact chemistry (for lack of a better word) for life to come into existence
            becomes greater and greater. 
        3) Not only does it become more probably, it becomes plausible.
    B) The major problem with this theory is the fact that we have absolutely NO
         Empirical evidence to even suggest such.  This theory laughs in the face of all
         science.  Science is not based on wishes.  It is based on evidence. 
    C) Since this theory has none, it should not even be considered.

Conclusion
    The teleological argument, as such, is a highly plausible but not absolutely certain argument for intelligent design manifested in the world.  Chance is possible though not plausible.  The teleological evidence favors the unity of this cause since this world is really a universe, not a multi universe.  This is especially evident in view of the anthropic principle which reveals that the world, life, and humankind were anticipated from the very moment of the origin of the material universe.
    The teleological argument as such does not demand that this cause be absolutely perfect.  Nor does it explain the presence of evil and disorder in the world.  The teleological argument is dependent on the cosmological and moral argument to establish these other aspects of the theistic God.
    It is really a casual argument from effect to cause, only it argues from the intelligent nature of the effect to an intelligent cause.  This point is important.  For if the principle of causality cannot be supported, the admittedly one cannot insist that there must be a cause or ground of the design in the world.  Design might just be there without a cause.  Only if there is a purpose for everything can it follow that the world must have a purposer.  The teleological argument depends on the cosmological argument in the important sense that it borrows from it the principle of causality.  As can be readily seen from every form of the design argument, the underlying assumption is that there needs to be a cause for the order in the world.  Deny this and the argument fails, for the alleged design would merely be gratuitous.