Friday, April 17, 2009

Some SDA Anti-Science

2009 is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the 150th anniversary of the publication of "On the Origin of Species". The occasion is being marked by a year long celebration of science and reason around the world. It is also being used as an opportunity for promoting creationism.

Apparently the SDA church is planning a Sabbath for special emphasis on creation in October. Not much detail at this point, but it looks like they will be consciously avoiding uncomfortable details like facts and evidence.
"This isn't to enter into a debate on evolution versus creation, but to emphasize God as our creator"
I'll have to see if the local church gets involved with this. It might be worth checking out. I'm probably to timid to actually say anything though, but somebody should. In promoting their anti-scientific agenda they distort reality to an astonishing degree. "
The major influence of Darwin's work was to separate God from the world"
Spoken like someone who has little concept of evolution. I think that Darwin's work has had a major influence on modern medicine and agriculture, but it seems that those things are not significant.

In another example (scroll down) we see Adventist again misunderstanding or misrepresenting evolution.
"Evolutionism is not a physical science where you ... observe data and you come up with a hypothesis to explain what you have observed."
There is an extensive list of examples to
contradict this statement. Tiktaalik is just one. There are probably better ones I'm not aware of as a non-biologist. Just another instance of people changing definitions around fit their beliefs.

5 comments:

Amicus said...

I can hardly wait to ask Jesus about Tiktaalik when I get to heaven...or if I go to the other place, perhaps the Big Guy Downstairs can teach me about it instead???

Tiktaalik rocks! I loved Shubin's story of its discovery.

tkh said...

Regarding the larger theme of Adventism, here's a link to a controversial book review published by Spectrum magazine about Number's book on EGW. It's pretty short, but fun.

Amicus said...

Blunt force trauma to the head = not cool.

Blunt force trauma to the head with disfigurement = really not cool.

Blunt force trauma to the head with disfigurement and "visions" = an SDA prophet (i.e. "Oh shit!")

Reverted said...

Jeff, you should read Why Evolution Is True.

Because I said so.

And, because you'll burn in hell if you don't.

Seriously.

You've now read it on the internet, so it must be true.

perpetualstudent said...

Speaking of Tiktaalik, you should read Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin.