HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: mls@panix.com (Michael Siemon)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Future evolution of Creationism
Summary: prediction
Keywords: future
Date: 9 Jan 93 02:15:24 GMT
Organization: Panix Public Access Internet & Unix, NYC

In article <8JAN199313510696@juliet.caltech.edu> waynebro@juliet.caltech.edu (Broughton, Wayne Jeremy) writes:

>Be a bit bolder: do you really think Christian fundamentalism will succeed
>in dominating the US government?  The impression I get is that Pat Robertson
>and co. are considered more of a burden on the Republicans than a help.

Things are a bit tricky here.  The "Christian" right-wing was rejected in
this (national) election, without their conceding the point -- they will
need to get increasingly dismal results from their increasingly strident
campaigns over the next few cycles before the lesson will generally sink
in [nor, I should note, will THEY then agree with the consensus, any more
than I as a left-liberal Democrat concede that the "problem" of my party
in recent years was people like me :-)]

As you note, the more worrisome political arena is local, with school
boards and municipal councils and (to a somewhat lesser extent) state
legislatures.  Here, the political struggle is just beginning, as most
people are not accustomed to LOOKING there for serious dangers.

>But even if they succeed in some aims such as re-introducing school
>prayer, legislating various aspects of their morality, etc. (which is all
>kind of irrelevant to this thread anyway), I think the precedents of the
>Arkansas and Louisiana cases make it unlikely that they will be able to
>succeed in legislating Creationism into the classroom.

What they CAN succeed (hell! *have* succeeded) in doing is to excise
science from the science classroom.  The resultant vacuum will be filled
by whatever gets there first.  Despite this last 30 years (since I was
in high school) being perhaps the greatest age of biology in history, I
think from overview of textbooks and curricula that the castration of
critical intelligence by religious dogma has never succeeded so well.

Symbolic victories against *forcing* the idiotic nonsense of Creationism
on students are very cold comfort when the graduates are totally without
background -- save what their own individual curiosity might impel them
to learn -- to resist the specious drivel that will assault them from
their "spiritual" leaders.

The "prediction" of my summary is that the USA is in zero danger of
fundie theocracy -- that movement just died, and further activity is
of the nature of a decapitated chicken.  However, I am less sanguine
of the future of science (or *any* form of critical inquiry) in our
schools.  Everyone is currently so hot on the idea that schooling is
a way of making a fortune, that truth is of no concern at all, at all.
-- 
Michael L. Siemon	"We honour founders of these starving cities
mls@panix.com		 Whose honour is the image of our sorrow ...
			 They built by rivers and at night the water
			 Running past the windows comforted their sorrow."
From: jsanders@phys.ksu.edu (Justin M. Sanders)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Evolution implied by the Bible
Date: 12 Jan 1993 05:37:20 GMT
Organization: Department of Physics, Kansas State University, Manhattan KS, USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: bohr.phys.ksu.edu

In article <1993Jan11.220331.1654@nsisrv.gsfc.nasa.gov> jgacker@news.gsfc.nasa.gov (James G. Acker) writes:
>Lionel Tun (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk) wrote:
>: rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter) writes:
>
>: >Does it say anything about Mary?  Do creationists accept immaculate
>: >conception? 
>
>Lionel answers:
>
>: Of course.
[deletions]

>	I have a distinct feeling that the Bible-quoting inerrant
>Fundamentalists of southern Baptist heritage would actually bristle at
>the suggestion that creationism and a strongly Catholic doctrine like
>the immaculate conception go hand-in-hand.

If you've ever watched the "John Ankerberg Show", you will see that
at least some creationists would have spewed their coffee all over
the screen upon reading Lionel's ex-cathedra remark.

--
Justin M. Sanders    "...a beautiful theory, killed by a nasty,
Dept. of Physics                  ugly little fact."
Kansas State Univ.                         -- T.H. Huxley
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: vanweer@ecf.toronto.edu (VANWEERDENBURG NICHOLAS JOHN)
Subject: Re: Evolution implied by the Bible
Organization: University of Toronto, Engineering Computing Facility
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 00:17:44 GMT

In article <1993Jan5.002839.1093@smds.com> rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter) writes:
>In article <1993Jan04.000557.19737@jcnpc.cmhnet.org> mam@jcnpc.cmhnet.org (Mike A. McAngus) writes:
>
>>If Man was created only thousands of years ago, and we are all
>>descended from common stock... why is there such a wide variety
>>in our genetic pool today?
>
>>Do you believe that the ancestors of people as diverse as South
>>American forest pygmies, Zulus, Europeans and Japanese were the
>>same as yours only a few thousand years ago?...
>
>>If you do admit this much evolution can take place in such a short
>>time (hundreds of generations) then what objections can you take
>>against the extension of the idea to the theory of Darwinian
>>evolution as it stands today?
>
>Actually the matter is quite simple.  We know that Adam and Eve were
>created perfect.  We also know that they acquired this burden of
>original sin which has been inherited down through the generations.
>Originally Adam and Eve shared all of the original sin.  As the
>population increased the burden of original sin was split among more
>and more people, i.e. the individuals in the later generations have
>a smaller individual share of original sin.  Since degeneration in
>the racial stock [e.g. mutation] is proportional to the amount of
>original sin present, the amount of "evolution", i.e. loss of genetic
>perfection at any particular time is proportional to 1/P where P is
>the current population.
>
>Currently the population is quite high, ergo the rate of change is
>quite low.  The evolutionist error is to extrapolate backwards on
>the assumption that the current rate of change is a constant.  By
>using this assumption the "molecular clock" indicates an origin of
>hundreds of thousands of years ago for the human species.  However,
>as we have seen, the "molecular" clock ran much faster near the
>origin.  For relativity fans, the problem is that evolutionists are
>using tau time when they should be using t time.
>
>Now you know.
>-- 
>Richard Harter: SMDS Inc.  Net address: rh@smds.com Phone: 508-369-7398 
>US Mail: SMDS Inc., PO Box 555, Concord MA 01742.    Fax: 508-369-8272
>In the fields of Hell where the grass grows high
>Are the graves of dreams allowed to die.

I almost believe that this is a humorous post, but I can't really tell.
Does this mean I'm almost perfect?  Since I only have 1/( 2 500 000 000 )th
of the original sin in me?

By the way, how do know this?  Do you have reasons for your strange fantasy,
or is it simply that since it makes the world pink and rosy for you it
must be right.
From: justinf@cco.caltech.edu (Justin Fang)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Imperfect state of academic thought-control/censorship
Followup-To: talk.origins
Date: 10 Jan 1993 23:36:41 GMT
Organization: none whatsoever
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: macintosh19.cco.caltech.edu

In article <198@fedfil.UUCP>, news@fedfil.UUCP (news) wrote: 
> Justin Fang laments: 
> > Ah, Ted has a list for acquiring pseudoscientific Velikovskian propaganda.
> > Read it, and laugh at its stupidity, or cry at the lamentable state of
> > science education that allows people to think this. 
> That's right, Fang.  The best efforts of American academia cannot eliminate
> thought or scholarship from this world.  
 
You mean the best efforts of American academia cannot eliminate YOUR
thoughts and scholarship (and those of the people you agree with) from the
world, which of course it can't. (Whether or not this would be a good thing
seems to the topic under discussion... :) )

> Want something fun to read (other than catastrophism, which is obviously a
> bit too heavy for you)?

Heavy? Oh no, I find that catastrophism makes fairly good humorous light
reading. Sort of like looking at a Rube Goldberg machine... so much effort
(tossing planets around in a sort of cosmic pool game, changing the laws of
physics, etc.) just to explain a few ancient myths and some incorrect
calculations.

>  Something really good about American academia, I
> mean something which makes DeSouza's and Allan Bloom's best efforts seem
> pale in comparison?  Try "ABANDONED: THE BETRAYAL OF THE AMERICAN MIDDLE
> CLASS SINCE WORLD WAR II", by William J. Quirk and R. Randall Bridwell.

Why do I get the feeling that this book is not at all complimentary to
American academia? Still, I'll take a look at it if I ever come across it.
(If nothing else, I'd like to see how anyone could be more critical than
Bloom...)

> -- 
> Ted Holden
> HTE

Justin Fang (justinf@cco.caltech.edu)

                               This space intentionally left blank.
From: rh@smds.com (Richard Harter)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Evolution implied by the Bible
Date: 7 Jan 93 23:30:55 GMT
Reply-To: rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter)
Organization: Software Maintenance & Development Systems, Inc.

In article <C0GAzK.oF@panix.com> mls@panix.com (Michael Siemon) writes:
>In article <watson.726339134@space.sce.carleton.ca> watson@sce.carleton.ca
>(Stephen Watson) writes:

>>Sorry, Richard, but you need to start using smilies.  Creationists
>>descend so often into self-parody that it gets difficult to tell the
>>spoofs from the genuine item.

>Competence of expression and rigor of thought are sufficient to
>distinguish Richard's essays from "the genuine item."

Aw shucks, blush, blush.

Clearly, if I am to take my place among the great talk.origins psychoceramics,
I shall have to study the masters and learn from them.  How is this for
a curriculum:

Turgidity:  Taught by Bob Bales, offered irregularly several times a year.

Bizarre incoherence:  Taught by guest lecturer Antti.  A required course
for advanced degrees in psychoceramics.

Incoherent bizarreness:  Taught by guest lecturer Kalki.  This course
replaces Freshman Disorientation.  The requirement for this course is
waived for people with permanent brain damage due to over enthusiastic 
use of recreational chemicals.

One Liners:  Required course taught by Lionel Tun, with frequent lectures
by Antti and Kalki.  Requirements:  Irrelevancy I and II.

Metatheory 101:  This course reviews a wide variety of standard psychoceramic
world models.  Professor Holden teaches Velikovsky, Talbott, Rose, and the
Holden number.  Professor Kalki teaches Krishna Conciousness.

"I am not a Liar" seminar series:  This is a round table seminar series
featuring Holden, Bales, and Merritt.

Decorum and Taste:  Practical tips from Ted "horse shit" Holden.

Theory of Creation Science:  Not available.


-- 
Richard Harter: SMDS Inc.  Net address: rh@smds.com Phone: 508-369-7398 
US Mail: SMDS Inc., PO Box 555, Concord MA 01742.    Fax: 508-369-8272
In the fields of Hell where the grass grows high
Are the graves of dreams allowed to die.
From: lmh@iago.caltech.edu (Henling, Lawrence M.)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Evolution implied by the Bible
Date: 4 Jan 1993 13:10 PDT
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: iago.caltech.edu
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    

In article <1993Jan04.000557.19737@jcnpc.cmhnet.org>, mam@jcnpc.cmhnet.org (Mike A. McAngus) writes...
>[ Article crossposted from alt.atheism,talk.religion.misc ]
>[ Author was Martin Dougiamas ]
>[ Posted on Sun, 3 Jan 1993 07:57:20 GMT ]
> 
>Christians among you: explain this.
> 
>If Man was created only thousands of years ago, and we are all

 Try not to confuse 'Christians' with 'Creationists' (those who believe
the bible to be literally true).
 Likewise 'Evolutionists' may be geologists or whatever rather than 
biologists.

larry henling lmh@shakes.caltech.edu
From: m23364@mwunix (James Meritt)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Sagan's <Super Greenhouse>/  Three Strikes
Date: 12 Jan 93 13:40:10 GMT
Organization: MITRE Corporation, McLean VA

In article <199@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
}We've all seen the Magellan pictures by now.  They show a planet (Venus)
}the entire surface of which appears to consist of recent lava flows,
}i.e. a new planet.  

You have an odd concept of "recent" and "new".  It is "recent" and "new" using
geologic times, not human times.  Place a number on it and even you may notice
the difference.  Bet you think that glaciers dash around...
From: huston@access.digex.com (Herb Huston)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: _Eoraptor_, very early dinosaur, announced
Date: 9 Jan 1993 17:24:51 GMT
Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: access.digex.com

In article <1993Jan8.204751.13272@anasazi.com> scott@misty.UUCP (Scott Gibson) writes:
}In article <1ifks8INNja@mirror.digex.com> huston@access.digex.com (Herb Huston) writes:
}>The _Washington Post_ for today (January 6, 1993) had a front-page story
}>on a news conference at the National Geographic Society yesterday at which
}>the discovery of _Eoraptor_ (Dawn Plunderer) was announced.  Since I don't
}>have the newspaper in front of me right now, I'll omit details except to
}>note that there was pointer to an article in _Nature_ by Serano et al. for
}>this coming Thursday (January 7, 1993).

Correction:  The principal author is Sereno, not Serano.  Sorry about that.

}There is an X-ray photograph of a composite fossil of the skull of
}Eoraptor in January's issue of National Geographic.  The skull is
}shown in comparison with a human hand, and is about the size of the
}palm.

The newspaper story described _Eoraptor_ as being about the size of a goose.
There was a line drawing of the beast in full pursuit of prey.

-- Herb Huston
-- huston@access.digex.com
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Subject: Re: Biology majors pleez!
Reply-To: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 18:10:51 GMT

In article <1993Jan11.100725.10864@panix.com>, arandia@panix.com (Joel Arandia)
writes:
> 
> Hi!  Are there biologists who believe in Creationism?  Is evolution a
>necessary part of Biology?
> 
> Mr. Curious

   Yes and Yes (wierd, ain't it?).  There are biologists who believe in creation
science but they tend to do things like rewire genes or assay
biochemicals instead of doing theoretical work.  The theory of evolution is
central to biology.  I'm currently colaborating with a zoologist in work
an mitochondrial DNA and the theory of evoluion looms eveywhere.  We're
trying to find characteristics of a creature NOT influenced by natural selection
so we can get objective measure of evolutionary distance...
...and it turns out to be very tricky.

Dan
Danwell@IASTATE.EDU
From: news@fedfil.UUCP (news)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Imperfect state of academic thought-control/censorship
Date: 10 Jan 93 13:35:01 GMT
Organization: HTE

Justin Fang laments:

> Ah, Ted has a list for acquiring pseudoscientific Velikovskian propaganda.
> Read it, and laugh at its stupidity, or cry at the lamentable state of
> science education that allows people to think this.

That's right, Fang.  The best efforts of American academia cannot eliminate
thought or scholarship from this world.  

......................................................................

Want something fun to read (other than catastrophism, which is obviously a
bit too heavy for you)?  Something really good about American academia, I
mean something which makes DeSouza's and Allan Bloom's best efforts seem
pale in comparison?  Try "ABANDONED: THE BETRAYAL OF THE AMERICAN MIDDLE
CLASS SINCE WORLD WAR II", by William J. Quirk and R. Randall Bridwell.




-- 
Ted Holden
HTE

Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: cust_ts@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Tero Sand)
Subject: Re: Biology majors pleez!
Organization: University of Helsinki
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 15:26:13 GMT

In article <1993Jan11.100725.10864@panix.com> arandia@panix.com (Joel Arandia) writes:
>
>Hi!  Are there biologists who believe in Creationism?  Is evolution a necessary
>part of Biology?
>
>Mr. Curious

There's a Finn (who starred here for a while) who claims to be one, but
based on his knowledge, nobody except him believes he is a biologist.

The only more implausible thing I can imagine is a young-earth
geologist.

	Tero Sand
-- 
	EMail: cust_ts@cc.helsinki.fi   or   custts@cc.helsinki.fi
   "I feel most ministers who claim they've heard God's voice are eating
too much pizza before they go to bed at night, and it's really an 
intestinal disorder, not a revelation." - Reverend Jerry Falwell
From: doi@tartarus.uwa.edu.au (Daniel Kuan Li Oi)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Protocells,self-replicating proteins
Date: 4 Jan 1993 08:50:54 GMT
Organization: The University of Western Australia
NNTP-Posting-Host: tartarus.uwa.edu.au

arandia@panix.com (Joel Arandia) writes:

>I read something about a Sidney Fox who did experiments on amino acids in 
>the late '70s.  He found that amino acids do not link randomly but in 
>specific sequences.  These polymers, when added to water, become 
>self-replicating proteins.  Supposedly, they can be considered alive.
>I was wondering if anyone had the recipe lying around.  I was thinking that
>these things might make good pets.

>joel d. arandia
>ps-actually, I just want the recipe to satisfy my own curiousity.  Can I make
>life in my bathtub?

	Quoting from a Sci Am article in Feb 1991 :

Beginning in the late 1950s, Sidney W. Fox, who is now at Southern
Illinois University, performed experiments that provided even more
support for this view [that life began when a class of compounds were
able to copy themselves and occasionally make 'mistakes']. By repeatedly
heating amino acids and disolving them in water, he induced them to
coagulate into tiny spheres composed of short protein strands.
Fox argued then-and continues to do so-that these "proteinoids"
represented the first cells, but his work has fallen out of favour among
many scientists. Once proteinoids are formed "that's it," says Gerald F.
Joyce of the Reasearch Institute of Scripps Clinic. "They can't
reproduce or evolve." Even so, various other researchers, notably Cyril
A. Ponnamperuma of the University of Maryland at College Park, have
picked up where Fox left off, trying to develop proteins which can
assemble themselves and reproduce without assistance from nucleic acids.

[page 102 bottom RH corner]

	It seems that abiogenesis has still a long way to go to exlain
the first formation of life. The conclusion of a committee of the
National Academy of Sciences that recently (as of Feb 1991) reviewed
origin of life research : much more research is needed.

					Daniel Oi
					University of Western Australia

Disclaimer: I'm only a 1st year(not for long). What's your excuse? :-)

Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: mls@panix.com (Michael Siemon)
Subject: Re: Evolution implied by the Bible
Summary: probably a Gaussian distribution
Organization: Panix Public Access Internet & Unix, NYC
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 21:10:00 GMT

In article <1993Jan12.114559@IASTATE.EDU> kv07@IASTATE.EDU
(Warren Vonroeschlaub) writes:

>  I have a feeling it is considerably older than that.  Old enough that the
>first written account was in Greek instead of Latin (when did Latin become the
>universal language?  800?)

1453? :-)  Your question is odd.  It should be rephrased as to when Greek
ceased being the fundamental theological language *in the West* --
and that was fairly early (by Constantine's time, though Greek was well-
understood there for another century or so [e.g. by Augustine, though he
is already exceptional among the Westerners in this.])

I don't know when the earliest appearance of the I.C. notion appears --
it would not surprise me to see it from about the time of Chalcedon
(say, mid 5th century C.E.)

>> I would expect that it would be 
>> extremely rare among other Christians (although is it possible that 
>> some high Church of England types might accept it?).
>
>  I don't think so.  Officially the Anglican Church doesn't even recognize
>the same saints.  (Some bishops have even been quoted as not believing in
>the virgin birth, so I don't think they come _that_ high).  Wonderful
>church I belong to, no? :-)

Well, *I* think so :-)

Actually "high church" Anglicans come in all heights, and some AngloCatholics
may well believe in the Immaculate Conception and Assumption -- nothing pro-
hibits this, and Marian devotion is not uncommon.  What Anglicans reject is
the papal claims to authoirty to pronounce such things as dogma.  We would,
I think, even take issue in the specific cases if we accepted papal claims
to authority, in that such dogmatic infallibility is *supposed* to rest on
claims which derive from traditions that *are* universal -- quod semper et
quod ubique.
-- 
Michael L. Siemon	"We honour founders of these starving cities
mls@panix.com		 Whose honour is the image of our sorrow ...
			 They built by rivers and at night the water
			 Running past the windows comforted their sorrow."
From: philjohn@garnet.berkeley.edu (Phillip Johnson)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Gould versus Johnson
Date: 12 Jan 1993 23:20:58 GMT
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
NNTP-Posting-Host: garnet.berkeley.edu
Summary: Reply to Brinkman


Matt Brinkman interprets my statement that "it is possible to
debate metaphysical differences in a fair-minded and mutually
respectful manner" to mean that it is out of bounds to question
whether Darwinism and theism are logically compatible.   On the
contrary, the point is not to abandon the debate, or insist that
one side may not argue its case.  The point is to conduct the
debate so that it leads to greater understanding.

The question whether "theistic Darwinists" are overlooking a
logical difficulty was put on the table long ago, and I can
hardly be forbidden to address it.  After all, Richard Dawkins
insists that Darwinism supports atheism, and David Hull argued to
the same effect in his review of Darwin on Trial in Nature. 
Gould tried to have it both ways.  He insisted that he regards
science and "religion" as separate realms "of equal dignity and
limited contact," but gives science (and hence naturalism)
exclusive title to "factual reality."  God, in this metaphysical
system, is outside of factual reality.  That's exactly where He
belongs, if you are a metaphysical naturalist, but to pretend
that such a classification leaves God with any meaningful
"reality" is to play with illusions.

Whether "evolution -> atheism" is a canard or not depends upon
the definition one gives to "evolution."  My views on the
relationship of Darwinism to theism are fully explained in my
article "Creator or Blind Watchmaker?" in the current (January,
1993) issue of First Things.  Briefly, theism is not inconsistent
with any empirical findings of evolutionary biology.  It IS
inconsistent with the philosophy of scientific naturalism, which
undergirds the more expansive claims of Dawkins' Blind Watchmaker
thesis.  Attempts to combine naturalism and theism are common in
the Christian academic world, but in my opinion these merely
paper over the logical difficulty by using terms like "evolution"
vaguely.  For understandable reasons my opinion is being disputed
in some sectors of the Christian academic world, and I understand
that Professor Howard Van Till of Calvin College will be replying
to my article in an issue of First Things later this year.

First Things is a monthly journal of religion and public life,
edited in New York by Richard John Neuhaus.  If any are
interested in subscribing, the annual rate (10 issues) in $24. 
Address for subscriptions: Dept. FT, P.O. Box 3000, Danville, NJ
07384-9847.

-- 
Phillip E. Johnson
  School of Law, University of California, Berkeley CA 94720

Newsgroups: talk.origins