Audio-Video Podcast 6 — The Ad Hominem Fallacy

You can download the MP3 version of the podcast here.

The ad hominem fallacy seems to be the most common. It is attacking the person instead of the topic. This is very easy to do, especially when someone throws down and indicates that they are not interested in rational discourse, they simply want to negate whatever you have to say with a distraction of insulting you instead of dealing with the discussion at hand.

Edit: He kept at it. Some people do not learn.

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Just How Many Habitable Planets — Really?

Still more press problems that get evolutionists excited, thinking they have a smoking gun to blow away all of creation science. They get going with a "take that!" attitude when they get (yet again) misleading information from the press based in incomplete information from scientists. But if they bothered to do a bit more reading (and thinking), these fans of evolutionism might be a bit slower to be full of glee and have their joy turn into embarrassment. Again.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

One absurd estimate for "habitable" planets in the universe reached forty billion. This "science" is based on luck and odds, not observations. It is also based on evolutionary presuppositions and assumptions. Remember, the press wants to make money on sensational claims, such as saying a planet is very much like Earth if we lived on a molten blob. The scientific community does not help much, since they want to make money and give sensational information themselves. One thing to always remember is that terms need to be defined. In this case, what does "habitable" really mean?

News media ran with a suggestion that one in five stars has a habitable planet, but they didn’t read the fine print.

Here’s how it came out in the mainstream media:

• “One in five suns has habitable world: Astronomers have estimated how many of the 100 billion stars in our galaxy hosts a potentially habitable planet.” (BBC News)
• “One in Five Stars has Earth-Sized Planet in Habitable Zone: Scientists from University of California, Berkeley, and University of Hawaii, Manoa,have statistically determined that twenty percent of Sun-like stars in our galaxy have Earth-sized planets that could host life.” (NASA Astrobiology magazine)
• “How Common Are Habitable Planets? One in Five Sun-Like Stars May HaveEarth-Size, Potentially Habitable Planets.” (Science Daily)

At least Science Daily’s headline was worded slightly less conclusively.  PNAS just issued a correction to the paper on which the claim was based.  That correction points out the huge error bars in making such estimates:

You can read about the errors and important factors they did not tell you if you fire your jets over to "Cosmic Lottery: How Many Habitable Planets?"

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Dinosaur Soft Tissue Explanation Fantasy

Darwin's Cheerleaders are having a laugh at creationists' expense because they believe that a valid "explanation" for the soft tissue in dinosaur fossils has been found. Here we go again (sigh). Someone thinks there is a wonderful proof of evolution, and runs screaming down the street without examining the evidence.

Image * After (modified)

Carelessness gets scientists into trouble, and fundamentalist evolutionists get arrogant with incomplete, careless "findings" and pronouncements. In this example of the apparently never-ending parade of preposterous presentations, scientists are making excuses giving explanations for the soft tissues and red blood cells found in dinosaur fossils. Their bias showed early on, because they "knew" that no soft tissues could last for "millions of years", so they did not look for it. (This is reminiscent of the "junk DNA" fiasco, because evolutionary scientists assumed that because they could not find a use for some DNA, it must be leftover evolutionary junk, and were humiliated later.) Creationists are more content to examine the evidence. So, what's up with the "explanation"?

The discoverer of soft tissue in dinosaur bone now has a new explanation for its preservation – but does it really answer the obvious question?

According to Live Science, Mary Schweitzer’s “controversial T. rex soft tissue find” has been “finally explained.”  The answer is: iron.  The iron in hemoglobin acts like a formaldehyde, preserving the delicate proteins and stretchy blood vessels.  But does it really preserve it for up to 145 million years?

A press release from North Carolina State describes the hypothesis coming from theory and from experiment.  In theory, iron atoms must be guarded against in cells because of their reactive potential.  After death, though, reactive iron becomes a guardian of preservation, because it forms cross-links with proteins, preventing them from decay.  (This process also makes soft tissue hard to detect, Schweitzer says.)  The experimental part involved soaking recently-killed ostrich bone in water and in blood.  The water-soaked bone decayed into a goopy mess in less than a week.  Because of iron in hemoglobin, the blood-soaked soft tissues remained “recognizable” for two years at room temperature, retaining their basic structure.

The press release is tentative, saying iron “may be the key” to preservation, “may play a role” in preserving ancient tissues, and, in Schweitzer’s words, “may be both the mechanism for preservation and the reason why we’ve had problems finding and analyzing proteins that are preserved.”

The article does not deny the authenticity of the soft tissue, but only tries to offer an explanation for the unexpected preservation.

You can read about the "explanation", its flaws and how the evidence inadvertently supports the Noachian Flood at "Dinosaur Soft Tissue 'Explained'".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

How on Earth Did Life Originate?

NASA/NSSDC

For life to supposedly evolve, it first had to originate in the first place. And it had to start very simply. From rocks. But the more we learn about life, the more we realize that simple cells are not so simple. Even the parts of individual cells are amazingly complex.

Going all the way down to the level of DNA, amino acids, sugars and so on, the right things have to be in the right place at the right time. The odds against life originating by chance are nil. Atheists, agnostics and evolutionists are admitting that life could not arise by chance. Some are going into mysticism (such as pantheism and the "Gaia hypothesis"), or pushing the problem out into space. But that does not solve the problem of the origin of life. The complexity of life and the impossibility of it forming by chance are strong evidences for the best possible answer: the Creator.

How did life begin? The origin of life is a vexing problem for those who insist that life arose through purely natural processes. The naturalistic origin of life is also known as abiogenesis or sometimes chemical evolution.

Some evolutionists try to claim that the origin of life is not a part of evolution. However, probably every evolutionary biology textbook has a section on the origin of life in the chapters on evolution. The University of California, Berkeley, has the origin of life included in their ‘Evolution 101’ course, in a section titled “From Soup to Cells—the Origin of Life”. High-profile defenders of ‘all-things-evolutionary’, such as P.Z. Myers and Nick Matzke, agree that the origin of life is part of evolution, as does Richard Dawkins.

A well-known evolutionist of the past, G.A. Kerkut, did make a distinction between the General Theory of Evolution (GTE), which included the origin of life, and the Special Theory of Evolution (STE) that only dealt with the diversification of life (the supposed topic of Darwin’s 1859 book).

It is only recently that some defenders of evolution have tried to divorce the origin of life from consideration. It’s probably because the hope of finding an answer is rapidly fading, as one scientific discovery after another of sophisticated machinery in even the simplest living cells makes the problem of a naturalistic origin ever more difficult.

To finish reading, go to "Origin of life — An explanation of what is needed for abiogenesis".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Still Monkeying Around with Alleged Human Fossils

People have the illusion that scientists are dispassionate and are willing to accept the evidence. Tampering? Fabrication? Sloppy science? Outright fraud? No way! At least, they have learned their lessons from the past.

That'll be the day.

Prestige and money make scientists just as avaricious as us regular folks. People leave comments at The Question Evolution Project proclaiming the virtues of science (apparently their religion is Scientism) and spewing anti-creationist vitriol, seemingly unaware that the scientific community is not full of beings that are above the rest of us in intellect an morality.

For example, yet again, sensationalistic reporting from incomplete evidence regarding our alleged evolutionary ancestors is an embarrassment. Of course, biblical creationists do not have to deal with faking it to get money and applause; we just have to tell it like it really is. Evolutionists do have a good propaganda machine, though. And yes, "evolutionist" is a real word.

An international team of paleoanthropologists reported discovering the earliest human fossils found outside Africa at a dig in the country of Georgia. The team told Science that one specimen, "skull 5," is so different from other humans that it significantly widens the range of variation within ancient mankind. The Guardian wrote that among the human remains in Dmanisi researchers found a "spectacular fossilised skull of an ancient human ancestor," but there is actually more proof against this claim.

The team found clearly human skeleton parts, along with five skulls or partial skulls. Even though skull 5 has several key features resembling an ape, not a human, the Science study authors wrote, "Skull 5 is probably associated with the postcranial [bones located below the head] elements of an adult individual with nearly modern human body proportions."

The only definitive support for this connection is the statement that the skull and human bones "probably" match—and nothing more. This means they may not actually belong together. And the seven observations below indicate this might be another case of evolutionist experts mistakenly associating ape fossils for those of humans. Skull 5 does not ID as a human for the following reasons:

Just a "heads up", you can cogitate on the rest of "New 'Human' Fossil Borders on Fraud".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Shenanigans In Spreading Evolution

In the past, we have seen how the Evo Sith are willing to resort to fraud and lie to students in order to promote evolution. It is no surprise that they are willing to deceive the general public as well. We are given information that is inaccurate, incomplete, sensationalistic — sometimes even promoting information that disproves evolution as evidence for evolution!

Loading up to spread evolutionary propaganda
Image credit: Library of Congress

It is like getting unexpected and unwanted bonus dung with your purchase.



Shenanigans from evolutionists, I tell you! Unlike evolutionary spin, dung is actually useful.

In this 4-part audio series (about 29 minutes each) on Real Science Radio, Bob Enyart and Fred Williams interview Walter ReMine about some of the illusions presented by evolutionists when they attempt to convince us that evolution is a fact. They also spend time on cladistics and Haldane's Dilemma.

Each page has written information as well as the audio. Links to the shows are below the picture. The streaming or download links are near the top, like so (click for more bigness):

Click for Part 1

Ditto for Part 2

Likewise for Part 3

Same for Part 4

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Audio-Video Podcast 5 — Don't Fear the Fallacy

The MP3 version of the podcast can be downloaded here.

As promised (threatened?), I'm beginning the series on logical fallacies with an introduction and an overview. There is no need for people to be intimidated by an aggressive evolutionist and/or atheist who wants to destroy your faith. Just learn a bit about logical fallacies and you can realize when you're being taken for a ride. 

In an online discussion, a friend made this comment to me: "There is a perfectly logical explanation for the skeptics' double standard and blindness. They have not only their own heart's rebellion, but a powerful blinding force from outside. Our job is to pray they be released to find life and joy."

Also includes another edition of the "Atheopath Follies". Plus a bonus video below about how to do an argument!

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Salamanders Have "Living Fossil" Status

So often, evolutionary science is a game of words. Remember the new golden rule, that whoever makes the definitions makes the rules. In this case, it's the term "living fossils". This is generally applied when a plant or animal is found alive and well, but had been declared extinct for "millions of years". The term "living fossil" is a bit of a loaded term, implying that evolution is true despite a bit of a glitch.

They also want the best of both worlds. Evolution is a "fact", sometimes called a law as if it was a kind of inexorable force. So when these "living fossils" are discovered virtually unchanged, people will say something like, "It didn't evolve because it didn't have to". What fallacy is that, No True Evolution, or special pleading?

stock.xchng / Fire Salamander / gc85

Salamanders are a bit different in the "living fossil" realm, since they have not been declared extinct while in hiding and then relocated. Still, the propaganda positively progresses past the point of perspicuity.

You’ve heard of ‘living fossils’? These are usually announced (often with much media fanfare) when something known only from the fossil record, long presumed extinct for millions of years, is unexpectedly found living somewhere. Examples of such living fossils include the coelacanth fish, the Wollemi pine tree (see Missing? or misinterpreted?), and the ‘Gladiator’ insect.

But the latest animal to be pronounced a living fossil is one that has been familiar to generations of people for as long as anyone can remember; namely, the salamander.

So how can something long known to be living, suddenly be dubbed a ‘living fossil’?

Salamanders have always been salamanders.

You can finish reading the rest at "Salamanders are ‘living fossils’!"

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Why So Surprised?

This site is a resource offering more resources. The articles come from different authors (and I even write a few myself), and there are links from the excerpts to the full articles. From there, seekers can browse those sites for additional information. Also, there are many links to creation science sites so people can continue to search and learn.

You can use that material to see how evolutionists are constantly being confronted with observations that do not comport with their naturalistic presuppositions and worldview. Instead of realizing that Occam's Razor applies (restated, the simplest explanation is probably the best one) and that God is the Creator, they bulk up their speculations with further speculations and end up with a complicated jumble in which they put their faith. And the discoveries that support Genesis just keep rolling in.

The history of the world and its life could hardly be more different between the Bible’s account and that of modern evolutionary naturalism.  Some recent scientific reports fit with a designed, recent creation, and do not fit with evolution.

According to Genesis, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”  The world and its life was created in six normal days not that long ago (thousands, not billions of years).  Each animal and plant reproduces after its kind.  The original perfect world was cursed due to sin.  A global Flood destroyed the air-breathing animals, except for survivors on Noah’s ark.  The descendents of Noah dispersed around the globe rapidly after God’s judgment on the Tower of Babel.  Evolutionists mock at these accounts, but will have trouble with some recent findings that are puzzling for their world view, but not for Biblical creation.  The findings involve negative evidence against evolution, and positive evidence for creation.  It’s not that secularists are unable to come up with rationalizations, but findings should fit, rather than surprise, one’s worldview.  In science, the fewer “auxiliary hypotheses” needed to force a finding into one’s web of belief, the better. 

Some of these items are listed at "Findings That Comport With Genesis".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Distant Galaxies — Because Scientists Said So!

Many years ago, I was given a twelve-inch vinyl record album from the "Talespinners for Children" series called "Moon Voyage". I had never heard of the "Talespinners" series before, and never obtained any of their other material. "Moon Voyage" was actually quite good, playing like a kind of historical radio drama and giving stargazing history. If I had a record player, I would consider buying it again.

Perhaps we should start up a company called "Talespinners for Evolution"? There's money in evolutionary stories, you know. And they tell so many of them.

For example, astronomers decided that due to the red shift, a certain galaxy must be the oldest one in existence. They conveniently forget "horizon problem", and ignore other items, such as the brightness of stars in the galaxy, the fact that galaxies exist so far away fouls up the cosmology on the age of the universe, its appearance and other details. By arbitrarily assigning certain values to their observations and cherry picking data, these astronomers can call that galaxy "the oldest" and drive the press into a frenzy. Then, people who bow at the altar of Scientism will joyfully trumpet this latest "proof" of an old universe — all based on lack of science and critical thinking.

An international team recently announced discovery of a new record for the most distant galaxy and claimed they were viewing this galaxy at "an epoch only 700 million years after the Big Bang."¹ However, the leap from a distant light measurement to millions of years and a Big Bang history came tightly packaged with scientific-sounding but unsupported statements that attempt to explain this galaxy's secrets.

Led by Steven Finkelstein, the team scanned several dozen candidate galaxies, looking for one that would provide the tell-tale spectrum confirming great distance. They found only one, which they've given the sterile designation "z8_GND_5296" and labeled as the most distant galaxy. Its starlight is redshifted at z = 7.51 according to the report in the October 24th issue of Nature—the prior record holder was a galaxy measured at z = 7.21.¹ Higher numbers designate further shifting of light spectra toward the red, an effect very likely caused by an expanding universe.

You can read more about the unscientific waltzing around unpleasant facts at "Secrets from the Most Distant Galaxy".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

MORE 1986 Refutation of Evolutionary Geology

In a previous post, Doctors Steve Austin and John Morris referenced a technical paper that they had published. After almost thirty years, the material is still relevant.

Pike's Peak from Garden of the Gods / Library of Congress / PD

Problems in uniformitarian geology discussed have not been satisfactorily explained. Instead, the Genesis Flood model explains what is plainly observed than evolutionary dogma.

In last month’s edition of Acts & Facts, I mentioned studies that Dr. Steve Austin and I presented in a technical paper demonstrating that the deformations in sedimentary strata at two sites better fit with the biblical Flood than with evolution’s long ages of deposition. We featured the first project site, the Split Mountain Formation in southern California, in that issue. Now we will examine geological evidence from the second site, the Ute Pass Fault in Colorado.

Location and General Features

The Rocky Mountains of Colorado were formed by “large reverse” faults, with some having over 20,000 feet of vertical slip. A reverse fault generally places older rocks on top of or adjacent to younger rocks. The very abrupt Front Range is caused by the Ute Pass Fault, a prominent north-trending reverse fault more than 40 miles in length. On the western side of the fault are the upthrown Pikes Peak granite and associated Precambrian metamorphic rocks (pre-Flood rocks), showing all sedimentary strata (Flood rocks) removed by erosion. On the eastern side of the Ute Pass Fault are flat-lying strata thousands of feet thick that are typical of the plains in eastern Colorado.

You can get the rest of the hard science at "Ute Pass Fault: Sand Injectites and Rapid Deformation Fit the Flood".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Trophy Hunting, Animal Rights and Evolutionary Thinking

Modified from Noah's Prayer of Thanks After Leaving the Ark, by Dominico Morelli

Today's article has an unusual genesis. Someone on Facebook posted comments about "hardcore huntress" Melissa Bachman's trophy hunting activities. This person is against trophy hunting, and referred to it as "murder". I am not a hunter, and detest killing animals for sport. But the person who was posting the comments insists that sport hunting is murder.

Is it immoral? That can be debated, because God gave man dominion over the earth (Genesis 1.28), but we also are given responsible stewardship. I am not going to enter into an argument about whether or not sport hunting violates stewardship principles, but the Bible makes it clear that eating animals for food is acceptable — you cannot use the Bible to insist that everyone has a vegetarian diet. So, if you kill it and grill it, good for you.

But to say that killing animals is murder? This is a result of not only "thinking" with emotions (and personal preferences), but the influence of evolutionary thinking. After all, we have people wanting human rights for chimps and for vegetables. Darwin's failed "tree of life" has every living thing evolving from a common ancestor, and evolution is crammed down our throats everywhere we turn. So it should not be surprising that people elevate the status of animals to that of humans. What I found sick and detestable is that some of these animal lovers wanted Melissa Bachman killed! Of what value do they give human life?

Courtesy of Answers In Genesis

Aside from fundamentally flawed evolutionary science philosophies, what is wrong with giving animals status according to God's Word? Some more of the passage cited in the picture above makes this plain:

But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.  (Genesis 9.4-6, ESV)

You don't like trophy hunting? Maybe you don't like any kind of hunting. Fine. Obviously, you have a right to express your preference. But you cannot call it murder, because that is a term for the unlawful killing of humans (Exodus 20.13). And we are made in God's image, not them.

— Cowboy Bob Sorensen

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Audio Download — Real Science Radio Discussion

"Greetings to the brightest audience in the country." I'm the QED Guy! Let me explain this audio.

A few weeks ago, I was privileged to return to the airwaves from Bob Enyart Live. The first time, it was indeed live. This time, it was recorded. Looks like I was promoted, too. "Real Science Radio" has science discussions, and there are often interviews with real scientists. Guess my material on logical fallacies was worthwhile. Or he mixed up the recordings and played it on the wrong day.

This discussion on logical fallacies, atheists and evolutionists was the final prompt for me to begin making the Piltdown Superman podcasts. (I hesitated to get fully into the logical fallacies series because I did not know when this show would be aired and posted.) Some of the items discussed on this show will be dealt with on the podcast, since Bob and I discussed several things in just a few minutes.

One problem with logical fallacies is that several can be combined or used in sequence. They blend, overlap and are even known by different names. The one using the fallacies may think he or she is offering a devastating argument, but is actually just looking silly (except to friends with a similar mindset).

Early in the discussion, Bob Enyart brought up a comment from someone who was banned from The Question Evolution Project Facebook Page. First, there was grousing about being banned. Then he went into circumstantial ad hominem (I don't know anything about astronomy because I read creationist material), and the remark also contained a genetic fallacy. Perhaps the "it's a pity" remark was a plea for sympathy, but I am only guessing on that part.

I made an odd comment that is unlikely to make sense outside of Colorado. Bob Enyart is a strong supporter of the Personhood Amendment. Referring to "Question Evolution Day", I said, "It's my person", instead of the more common, "It's my baby". From this point, I'll let the material speak for itself. You can listen online or download here.

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Audio-Video Podcast 4 — Emotions and Rational Thought

Since people today "think" more with their emotions than with their minds, they tend to be easy prey for those who want to manipulate and control them. Biblical creationists (and Christians in general) need to watch for trickery. More importantly, we need to be careful not to go beyond motivation and into manipulation. Also includes another edition of the Atheopath Follies.

The MP3 version of the podcast can be downloaded here.

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

"Pieces of Light" by Julie Cave — Book Review

by Cowboy Bob Sorensen

Pieces of Light by Julie Cave is the conclusion of the Dinah Harris trilogy. Although it can be read as a "stand alone" book, I recommend reading the first two books, Deadly Disclosures and The Shadowed Mind to fully understand the characters and situations.

I am not going to give out too much information and spoil the story for you. Like the second book, Pieces of Light does not follow a formula to seem like a rehash of the previous books. In fact, it opens with the killer writing his thoughts in a journal while in prison. Then we are taken back to how it started.

Someone hates Christians and Christianity, saying that we're all hypocrites because of what happened to him — he was the victim of abuse by a church-going man that people thought was wonderful. His response when he was older was to bomb churches. But he did not want total devastation, he wanted to "make a statement".

This book does not deal directly with evolution, but we see some of the fruits of evolutionary thinking. In this case, the despair inherent in evolutionary beliefs such as atheism and secular humanism. When we are given the message that the universe and life itself happened by chance, life evolved through time, chance, natural selection and mutations, we are all just rearranged pond scum, there is no God, no final judgment, no Heaven, no Hell, when you die, you're worm food — no wonder people are depressed. Julie Cave did research on this book as well, which adds to the depth and believability.

Like the other books, there are concurrent story lines with other characters — including betrayal, forgiveness and redemption. Also, Dinah Harris is a recovering alcoholic as well as a relatively new Christian. She has to decide if she is going to stay true to her faith and convictions. Other story lines that began in Deadly Disclosures continue, and some are resolved.

As I stated before, I am reluctant to read Christian fiction because there is a tendency for the writers to make their characters shallow, with unrealistic happy piety. These characters are believable, and Dinah Harris has her struggles as well as victories. Not everything ends up in a pretty package with a nice bow on top where everyone receives the gift of salvation. But the gospel message is very clear, and we're left with hope that some of these people will come around.

I recommend Pieces of Light, and the entire trilogy for that matter. It is available at several retailers as softcover or e-book, including Answers In Genesis. For that matter, you can buy all three paperbacks in a boxed set. No, I do not get anything at all for doing these reviews or linking to sellers.
— Cowboy Bob Sorensen

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Comics for Evolution Propaganda

Comics have a connotation for being entertainment for people of lower intellects. It may be true in some instances, but comics have become very sophisticated in their storylines and artwork. They are also used to make statements, just as television, movies and other entertainment media are used for social, political and religious commentary. Comics were used for propaganda purposes, and were famous for that in World War II and onward.

They can be used for good purposes:

This was a gift to me from Kirk Hastings, author of What Is Truth?

And they can be used for not such good purposes, such as promoting leftist political agendas like global warming and evolutionism. NASA is doing just this.

A federally-funded NASA website about astrobiology has just launched an evolutionary comic strip.  Is this an appropriate use of taxpayer funds?

“The Abominable Snow Aliens of Europa” was announced by NASA’s Astrobiology Magazine on November 4.  This was not the first attempt at the comic-book genre (see category “Astrobio Comics” on the site), but promises to be an ongoing series.  The intent is to add some colorful adventure to topics like alien life and global warming.

Our new comic strip, “The Abominable Snow Aliens of Europa,” imagines what aliens from Europa might look like, and also shows what might happen if such creatures developed a space program and other advanced technology. Will “Europe-ans” visit Earth as part of a Cold War space race of their own, similar to our Apollo missions to the Moon? Would they, perhaps, quest to better understand [sic] their solar system, like with our many missions to Mars? Or do they have other motivations that are entirely alien to our own?

Since their nondiscovery precludes any knowledge of what they think, this is purely an exercise in imagination at best, and indoctrination at worst.  The writers and illustrators will slip in their own beliefs on these topics and channel them through imaginary beings to young people.  Some JPL scientists will enter the world of the comic strip to confront the aliens in this imagination-fest.

You can read the rest at "NASA Astrobiologists Draw Comics on the Job".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Don't Leaf Me This Way

For some of us, autumn stirs mixed feelings. Falling leaves, falling temperatures, cold rains and so forth remind us to prepare for the upcoming winter. They can get slippery after a rain, so watch your step. And those leaves keep on falling, getting into the rain gutters and on the lawn. People rake them up and put them in piles. Some cities allow them to be raked to the street to be picked up, and some clowns use half the street for their personal dumping ground, but I digress. Other people are able to burn the leaves, depending on where they live and whether doing so is a fire risk. Many people appreciate the fall foliage, often driving for many miles on a "color tour".

Image courtesy of antpkr / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Why do the leaves come down? Why can't the doggone trees just hold onto the things, anyway? It would be less work for us, yes? Actually, there is a purpose to trees dropping their leaves. And a science, all the way down into a sequential gene code! It's all the intricate product of the master Designer.

In Autumn, deciduous trees don’t lose their leaves — they loose them.

It is the final step in a highly ordered and carefully controlled process initiated in preparation for a resting period (winter) in above-ground portions of the tree.

‘Leaves are designed to be disposable.’—Dr Kim Coder, University of Georgia.

The pre-fabricated ‘AZ’

The place where the leaf separates (abscises) from the tree is typically located at the base of the leaf stalk (petiole). It is called the abscission zone (AZ). The AZ is no random fracture point but is actually built-in, “pre-positioned” during leaf formation. As a publication from the University of Georgia (USA) puts it: “Leaves are designed to be disposable.” (Emphasis added.)

Retrieving valuable resources from the leaf

With the post-summer hint of coolness in the air, before the onset of wintry weather, trees initiate a “senescence sequence”² to systematically retrieve the re-usable resources from the leaves. As this process begins, and the green chlorophyll pigment and other parts of the light-harvesting (photosynthetic) complex are dismantled, the leaf changes colour.

You can drop in and finish reading "Autumn leaves don’t Fall (by accident)".

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!

Creationists In Space

NASA

From some of the comments I have seen, there are anti-creationists who really would like to see creationists in space. All of us. Now. So we can stop troubling evolutionists with the facts and real science.

One of the most amazing examples of atheistic bigotry and ignorance was in a comment, paraphrasing: "When you're miles above the Earth, you don't want your fate in the hands of someone that believes in fairy tales like the Bible". Not only did this guy display massive ignorance of creationist beliefs and capabilities, but seemed willingly ignorant of the fact that there are many creationist scientists.

Back to my original point, creationists have indeed been in space. To cite my article and supporting links on "Atheists Can't Protest Everything":

There are followers of Jesus who have been on space missions. What I think will be the biggest irritant of all [to atheists who protest things] is the fact that Bibles were taken on NASA missions to the moon, and many astronauts were people of great faith. Although they were on microfilm, Edgar Mitchell had the written Word of God with him on the moon. Also, the Lord's Supper was observed on the lunar surface. Dave Scott left a Bible on the Rover on the Apollo 15 mission, and the astronauts did a brief but touching ceremony for astronauts and cosmonauts who had died . Guess if atheists want to protest, they can do it all they want. But if they want that Bible removed, they'll have to go and get it. Not that they'll get popular support, capice?

NASA / Click for larger image

One creationist astronaut in particular, Colonel James Irwin, was a biblical creationist who spent time encouraging creation science and urging people to stand up for the truth. Note the science stuff he did, too.

James Benson Irwin (March 17, 1930–August 8, 1991), an American astronaut and scientist, was lunar module pilot for Apollo 15 on the fourth human lunar landing and was the eighth person to walk on the moon.

From childhood, Irwin dreamed of going to the moon. After receiving a B.S. in naval science from the United States Naval Academy and a M.S. in aeronautical engineering from the University of Michigan, Irwin graduated from the Air Force Experimental Test Pilot School and the Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School. In preparation for becoming an astronaut, he studied geology, astronomy, and spacecraft design, as well as lunar geology. Though a skeptic during his educational years, after extensive research, Irwin became convinced creation was true and Darwinism false.

Apollo 15

Irwin realized his boyhood goal as part of the 1971 Apollo 15 flight. Called “exploration at its greatest,” the mission targeted the moon’s Hadley-Apennine region, an area noted for its high mountains and deep valleys. After reaching orbit, the lunar module, Falcon, separated from the command module,Endeavour, and transported the researchers to the moon’s surface. Irwin’s tasks were more science-based than those of previous expeditions, and he spent more time on the moon than astronauts in earlier missions. Between July 26 and August 7, Irwin logged over 295 hours as the Falcon pilot. He also spent over 18 hours of extravehicular activity on the moon’s surface, with a total lunar stay of over 66 hours.

You can read the rest of the article if you blast off over to "Colonel James Irwin: Creationist Astronaut". I did mention that they left a Bible on the moon, yes?

Looking for a comment area?
You can start your own conversation by using the buttons below!