Tag: Darwin

The Origin of Species, Ray Comfort, and profound ignorance


Ah, dishonesty!

The day has come.  We in the atheist and scientific communities have been waiting for it with mild amusement or annoyance.  And to our surprise it came a day early.  We almost missed it as a result.  But I didn’t.

For those of you who were not aware, Ray Comfort, from Living Waters and Way of the Master has recently been talking about passing out free copies of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species.  This pivotal book has been all the rage since it was first published in 1859, and it’s impact on science, religion, and culture cannot be denied.  This is a book that must be read by a person if they are to consider themselves a well-rounded, educated, and informed person in today’s culture.  One should at very least be familiar with what Darwin’s essential argument is, what evidence exists to back it up, and what science says about evolution today.

For that, here’s a few good places to start and to keep an eye on:

Why Evolution is True (WEIT)

PBS

Berkeley

But Ray Comfort is not a fan of evolution.  He rejects it and supports intelligent design, so why is Ray Comfort giving away this special 150th Anniversary Edition, precisely?

Well, first a bit about Ray Comfort.  He and his former Growing Pains star Kirk Cameron have been doing ministry about Jesus for some time now.  You may remember the debate that Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron had with my friend Brian Sapient and the Rational Response Squad.  If you have not seen this debate, I’ll supply a link here.

It was this debate where the infamous crocoduck came from.  This has supplied many chuckles and full belly-laughs from sciency people ever since.  (I want a shirt with the crocoduck on it, btw, so I’ll accept gifts of this sort).

This is an image created by Ray Comfort to try and make the point that transitional fossils do not exist, and that if they did this is the type of thing one would expect to find.  The ignorance contained here is astounding.  I don’t even feel compelled to respond, because it has been done elsewhere with many more lulz attached.

But this is not the full act that these clowns have.  If you have not heard their routine, it is amusing.  Here’s an example that includes some rebuttal:

Now, the banana aside (which Ray Comfort admitted was a bad argument), this is utter tripe.  It is clear that Comfort, Cameron, and the others that are on board with this nonsense do not accept the overwhelming evidence for evolution, so why are they giving away copies of The Origin of Species? Well, it has a lot to do with the 50 page introduction that Ray Comfort includes in this ‘special’ edition.

Well, putting aside some obvious problems with the introduction, this is obviously an attempt to appear as if the creationist loons, like Comfort, have actually considered the evidence and are just coming up with another interpretation.  They simply see the evidence lacking, having studied the subject, and are confident to actually give people copies of this book.

But the fact is that evolution is not derived from the Origin like gospel.  It is derived from Darwin’s arguments, evidence, and observations and then is confirmed by all of the work in biology since.  That is, a hundred and fifty years of research, testing, DNA evidence, fossils, and other information  supports what Darwin wrote and expands on it in ways Darwin could not have predicted because he did not know about DNA or genetics, let alone the thousands of fossils we have uncovered that speak unequivocally for evolution by natural selection.

So, the deal was Comfort and his cronies were to hand out copies of the book all over the country, on college campuses, on November 19th, 2009.  The atheist and science blogosphere was all a-twitter about it and has been anticipating this.  Various responses, reactions, and condemnations have surfaced in various places with varying degrees of tone.  And so what happened when I got to my daily business today, one day before the planned give-away? That’s right folks, Comfort has tried to minimize the planned reactions by science enthusiasts and atheists by jumping the gun and doing it early.

But I managed to get out of the house and find a couple of friendly gentlemen who were passing out the books today anyway.  They were having some conversations with students, proselytizing the Christian message similar to Ray Comfort’s, and I took a copy and talked with them about my concerns for a little while.   And what did I find? Ignorance.

In my conversation with these two gentlemen, I found that not only were these two men ignorant of science, it’s methods, and the evidence for evolution, they displayed no interest in learning about science.  One of them actually said that he was not interested in science.  But he did say that he was interested in the truth.  And while he didn’t understand the basics of rational thinking, epistemology, or even what natural selection was, he maintained that he was interested in the truth.

And what is the truth? Jesus is the truth.  This was not merely claimed as a belief, but as knowledge, knowledge that was not doubted even a little.

…

Frustrating.  How can a person claim to be interested in the truth and not have any interest in the scientific method–the best method for determining how the world works–and have not even surface understanding of epistemology? his is an indefensible position.  It is irrational, illogical, and not worthy of the respect that some faitheists and moderate religionists say that these beliefs deserve. Their certainty in their beliefs is staggering considering they are not interested in evidence.  What’s worse is that they accused me of being absolutely certain that god does not exist and that evolution is true.  When I told them that neither was true and that I accept evolution only because of the overwhelming evidence for it.

I am a skeptic.  These people, Comfort included, are so removed from skepticism that they will not admit that they might be wrong.  They cannot even see that they don’t actually have evidence, only personal interpretations of experiences which people of other religions claim with equal authority.  I cannot respect Ray Comfort’s beliefs, his certainty, or the certainty of those who believe such absurd things.  And for them to try and pull a stunt like this,by trying to look like they are educated in the science behind evolution when they are not, is dishonest at very least.

“All you need is eyes that can see and a brain that works” is what Ray Comfort says quite often.  But it is clear, from all I have seen of his work, that he might have poor vision and a brain that works only just enough to sound like he’s saying something sensible to people who don’t see through his idiocy.

I’m glad I have a copy of this fine book to put on my shelf, but from what I have already seen, there is nothing in the introduction that is worth keeping.

Intelligent design and special pleading


venn

All too often I hear from people that there is proof of god everywhere.  The trees and the birds, our hands and our feet, the flesh-eating bacteria and the natural disasters that destroy cities.  OK, those lasts two are not generally used to argue in favor of a loving god, but they are pretty complex, aren’t they?

And that’s the key here: complexity.  How could all of these things with their complex parts, elaborate interactions with the rest of nature, and our intricate brains that can think about it all just get here by chance? They could not have done it on their own, right? So there must have been some intelligence, some designer, to give the world it’s complexity.

It is unfortunate that there is such a deficiency of understanding of science and of critical thinking in our culture.  Science education may be partially to blame, but we must be willing to take the responsibility for ourselves as well.  And as a result of this there is a severe lack of understanding of the theory of natural selection (as well as the other evolutionary pressures) and thus a misunderstanding of the fact of evolution as they intersect with these questions of complexity.

There are great resources for learning about these things online, and so any person can go and find out what scientists say about evolution.  The key here is to understand that the process does not claim chaos or complete randomness.  The question about evolution is not a false dichotomy between an intelligent designer or random chance.  There are many believers in various gods that accept the fact of evolution (Ken Miller and Francis Collins being two prominent examples).  Natural selection is a definite process, is not random, and is well supported by physical evidence.

The major component of randomness in evolution is the mutation of genes.  But most of these mutations have no effect at all, and only sometimes do they have a harmful or helpful effect.  It takes environmental factors, lots of time, and other factors to make a mutation effect the population at large.  And it is the process of natural selection that does the actual work, not the random mutation.

But my point here is not to explain natural selection or to spell out the evidence for evolution.  That is the responsibility of each person to do on their own in conjunction with schools and museums.  Start with the link above, a trip to the museum, or even a recent biology textbook (and not one produced by the Discovery Institute such as Of Pandas and People, as they have been shown to be untrustworthy during the Kitzmiller case).

And so what about this claim that complexity requires intelligent design?  Well, even if we didn’t have a good scientific answer to the claim (which we do), there is another problem with it that can be shown without knowing anything about evolution.

Here is the argument as I have seen it:

  • The world (universe) is full of complex things
  • complex things need designers
  • therefore, a designer of the world (universe) exists.

Ray Comfort is known for arguing that if you see a painting we know there is a painter,  if their is a building there is a builder, etc.  It is certainly true that things we create have designers, and they certainly are intelligent.  But the analogy does not carry through to all things because not all things are constructed in a factory.  Other things reproduce biologically and are put together by very complex natural processes that we, admittedly, don’t fully understand.  And as far as universes go, I’ve never seen one made, so while I can go to the car factory, I can’t go to the universe factory.

But more importantly is the assumption that all things need intelligent designers to exist simply because they are complex.  We know that simple things can become complex through natural selection, but even if we don’t know this we can ask if all things that are complex need a designer, then wouldn’t the designer itself, being a complex thing, need its own designer?

In short, what created god?

Now, the common reply is to state that god is eternal and has always existed.  This is special pleading.  What that means is that the point is making a special exception of the rules for illegitimate reasons.  The question here is whether a god exists, and so in deciding this issue one cannot take as given a special exception for the thing that is in question.  One cannot simply define god into existence by saying that it is not subject to the rule that all complex things need a creator.  If one did, the results would be somewhat silly.

intelligent-design-posterThe bottom line for intelligent design, and whatever people are trying to disguise creationism as these days, is that there is no evidence to support it.  Despite Michael Behe’s best attempts, there is no irreducibly complex thing that cannot be explained without the need of an intelligent designer. Natural selection is sufficient to explain complexity in our biological world.

And further, even if it could be shown that an intelligent designer would be necessary, this would still be a far cry from associating this intelligence with any particular god.  An intelligent designer would not imply that it had anything to do with any theology or mythology (as if there were a difference) of any religion.  A Christian does not win any points for his beliefs even if intelligent design were true.  Because if it were true, the Moslem, Jew, Hindu, etc would step up and claim that it is their god that is the intelligent designer.

Luckily for us, that is not an issue because the proposal of an intelligent designer does not stand up to scrutiny.  The irony, perhaps, is that intelligent design needs people of lesser intelligence, or at least understanding, to propose it.

If complexity needs a creator, so does the complex creator.  God is nothing but a pseudo-answer to a non-problem when it comes to the complexities of the world and how to explain them.

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Related: Counter to the Kalam Cosmological Argument.  A favorite of William Lane Craig, Christian apologist.