Pirate quote, arghhhhh

Sir William Schwenck Gilbert: "[a]nd isn't you life extremely flat whit nothing whatever to grumble at!"

Sir W.S. Gilbert: image from Encyclopedia Britannica

Well said Sir Gilbert. A life without grumbling would be boring indeed. W.S. Gilbert is the Gilbert of Gilbert and Sullivan who produced the musicals The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado.

Beauty in creation.

Update: Paul points out a major flaw in my and David's argument for why suffering exists: the Fall. You can read all about it at Creation Ministries, a wonderful source of factual information. I haven't and I won't subject my brain to that torture.

Religious people often cite the beauty of nature as evidence of god. Butterflies and flowers come to mind. What about this, this and this? Warning, contains disturbing images. The second example is discussed by David Attenborough as follows:

My response is that when Creationists talk about God creating every individual species as a separate act, they always instance hummingbirds, or orchids, sunflowers and beautiful things. But I tend to think instead of a parasitic worm that is boring through the eye of a boy sitting on the bank of a river in West Africa, [a worm] that's going to make him blind. And [I ask them], 'Are you telling me that the God you believe in, who you also say is an all-merciful God, who cares for each one of us individually, are you saying that God created this worm that can live in no other way than in an innocent child's eyeball? Because that doesn't seem to me to coincide with a God who's full of mercy'.

For me is the most compelling argument against the existence of god of the bible.

Quoting a famous guy

Mark Twain: "Such is the human race. Often it does seem such a pity that Noah . . . didn't miss the boat."

Thanks Wikipedia

While the story of Noah's Ark, and the great flood are obviously a fairy tales, the quote is a great one. We can know that the idea of a global flood is a myth is from geological evidence.

Mark Twain is obviously famous for writing The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The former is rather light-hearted, but the latter addresses some important contemporaneous themes, most importantly racism, which was rife in the southerns US states. From a  religious perspective,  Twain could be be described as a deist, at least that is what I can gather from Wikipedia.

Today's quote and a little more

“Many people would sooner die than think. In fact, they do”

The quote in my journal is from Bertrand Russell, although I prefer this one; “[t]he trouble with the world is stupid people are cocksure and the intelligent are doubtful.” This is so true and is exemplified by my previous post. The statement is written authoritatively, yet is in several instances well off the mark. Although I am jumping the gun there is an elegant example of the cocksureness of Ponatahi School’s taken from point nine:

Update: The February 2011 National Geographic stated that the archaeopteryx, whose well developed feathers causes a problem for dino to bird dating, was probably such a good flier, that it probably could take off from the ground. Well done National Geographic! We hope that the corrections flow down to the texbooks, but this may be hoping too much

Firstly, there is a clear misunderstanding of how science works. Science is a work in progress, and as Russell said, the intelligent are doubtful. Scientists are usually tentative in presenting their results and others are often quick to scrutinise new or unusual results. Furthermore, taking something from National Geographic as scientific consensus is unwise. When an idea is proposed in science is remains a testable hypothesis and tends to stay out of text books until it has very strong evidence to support it. Therefore, suggesting that text books should be changed based on presumably a single study is not generally going to happen. Sorry Ponatahi but you are hoping probably too much.

Note: I make no comment on the validity of the findings of the original study from which Nat Geo got their information because I have read neither the Nat Geo nor the original paper/s.  I am suggeting rather that one must always be careful of scientific ‘facts’ published in popular press.

Blow by blow: part 1

As a follow-up to my earlier post about two schools in New Zealand that teach creationism and reject evolution I have decided to do a section-by-section critique of the statement published on Ponatahi Christian School’s website. The reason why I am doing this is twofold: (1) I am appalled that teachers paid by the government (i.e. my tax money) can teach this in New Zealand and (2) because their statement about creation/evolution contains several inaccuracies and internal contradictions. The fact that it contains inaccuracies that border on deceit is in my mind a serious concern for the “[t]hou shall not bear false witness against thy neighbor” commandment, but that is really a side in issue and doesn’t concern me. Many of the inaccuracies have been discussed thoroughly by several people, most notably Richard Dawkins in The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution and Jerry Coyne in Why Evolution Is True. I have read the former and found it compelling and well written in a way that can be understood easily by the lay person. If read with an open mind, I would say that you would be hard pressed to not accept the theory (said: fact) of evolution. Unfortunately it is the ‘open-mind’ part that appears to be missing from the statement published by Ponatahi Christian School. Their view, as stated by them, is first and foremost the word of god. Thus, if evidence contradicts the word of god, it must be wrong. The introduction to their statement about creation/evolution testifies to this:

It is important that children and adults are clear that there is one universal truth. There can only be one truthful explanation for origins which means that all other explanations are wrong. Truth is truth. Biblical truth, scientific truth, mathematical truth, and historical truth are in harmony. Truth can never contradict truth. We do not have to be afraid of history or science if rightly understood. True science is our friend, it is the manifestation of God’s wisdom. Design demands a Designer. Creation demands a Creator, and it is not feasible that a Creator would not communicate to us who He is. We are privileged to have the great Creator’s communication to us in our homes and school: The Holy Word of God; the Bible. In this we can learn about the Creator, our relationship to the Creator, and how that relationship can be enhanced. We can also learn things which science is too limited to teach us.

Note: head nod to PZ Myers for comic sans quoting.

The claim that there is one universal truth is an odd one. Logically there is no way to explain a single universal truth. Of course they mean is that god is universal truth, but applied to the universe in a general sense is a logical fallacy; everybody knows the only universal truth is 47. Joking aside, this claim is the justification to reject anything that contradicts the bible. Therefore, we know from the get go that there is no critical thinking applied to the creation/evolution statement. The motivation is anti-science because they start with a ‘fact’ and try to prove it. Here is where there is a contradiction: “it is not feasible that a Creator would not communicate to us who He is.” Absolutely, yet there are no recorded moments in time where it can be said, without a shadow of a doubt, god did that, or that IS god. They provide no evidence of god yet use god as a reason to reject evidence. The ridiculousness is glaringly obvious.

 That “[t]here can only be one truthful explanation for origins which means that all other explanations are wrong” is correct. And indeed truth is truth. Scientific truth, mathematical truth, and historical truth are in harmony. Biblical ‘truth’ is the odd one out.  The bible contains several instances that are absolutely not in harmony with science and/or historical truth. Coming back from the dead, turning water into wine, walking on water, the global flood and the six day creation are inconsistent with scientific observations of geology, biology and physics. This is not harmonious. Indeed, history also contradicts the bible. The book of Matthew recounts the Massacre of the Innocents whereby Herod ordered the slaughter of young males after hearing of the forthcoming birth of Jesus. However, it turns out that the only place this event was ‘recorded’ is the book of Matthew. Matthew was not present at the time of Jesus’ birth and so he did not observe this event. It was not recorded in any contemporary texts suggesting that Matthew was mistaken. While these are only a few examples they demonstrate a point: the lack of harmony.

Overall the introduction holds science in contempt: the closing remark that science is limited with the qualifier ‘too’ which tantalizingly alludes to weakness or inferiority. This suggestion of limitation is expanded in sections two and three but I will save comment on that for another time. All in all not a great start from Ponatahi but it might get better.If you have any thoughts, comments or criticisms of my critique post them below and I will respond accordingly.

I remembered

Today's quote comes from the great Albert Einstein.

 Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former

Albert is unquestionably one of the greatest minds to have ever lived and almost certainly who ever will live. His contributions to humanity are virtually unmatched. He was an archetypal genius most famous for developing the theory of relativity.

I knew they were here

I have met young earth creationists in New Zealand, but they have seemed to be few and far between. New Zealand is a secular society and religious people tend to be moderate, bar the kooks on Queen Street on Friday and Saturday nights. Evolution is the principle that ties all of biology together. Insert Dobzshansky's famous quote here. Thus, it should be taught in biology, and as such it is in New Zealand.

The science curriculum is grouped into several strands linking to the major areas of science. Biology is called "the living world" strand under which the following descriptions is provided:

The living world strand is about living things and how they interact with each other and the environment. Students develop an understanding of the diversity of life and life processes, of where and how life has evolved, of evolution as the link between life processes and ecology, and of the impact of humans on all forms of life. As a result, they are able to make more informed decisions about significant biological issues. The emphasis is on the biology of New Zealand, including the sustainability of New Zealand’s unique fauna and flora and distinctive ecosystems

Furthermore, from level 1--8 (ages 11 to 18) students are taught evolution as evidenced by the achievements and aims of the living world strand. We should expect then that all students who attend state school in New Zealand are exposed to, and taught the basic principles of evolutionary biology.

It turns out that this is not true. Two recent posts (here and here) by Allison Campbell from Wiakato University highlighted two examples of state funded school discarding evolution from their teaching in favour of creationism. The two schools in question are Westminster Christian School and Ponatahi Christian School. Westminster has a pdf of their prospectus that outlines how they have replaced the word 'evolution' with 'creation' and also have a special course called Creation Studies where they seem to go through the days of creation presumably in a literal sense and brainwashing the kids. Ponatahi, on the other hand, has an entire section on their website dedicated to evolution/creation.

I have very little to say on this other than I find these two examples really disgraceful. It makes a mockery of science and how it should be presented to students. The creationist/ID lot love claiming that presenting the "alternative" ideas and letting kids decide for themselves is exactly in the spirit of science. However, when you imply that accepting evolution you are essentially rejecting god and resigning yourself to an eternity of torture. This is mental child abuse and should be stamped out. What I find worse is that these are state funded schools and they are blatantly misteaching those kids. My taxes pay for that and I don;t think it is OK.