It appears that in Alabama, belief in evolution is now a disqualifying factor for candidates for public office. Alabama gubernatorial candidate Bradley Byrne is being attacked in the ad below for once saying that evolution “best explains the origin of life.”
Byrne is also being challenged for saying that the Bible is “only partially true.” If you recall, a majority of Republicans running for President last election stated that they did not believe in evolution. For a prior column, click here.
Byrne is notably running against the “ten commandments judge” Roy Moore.
For his part, Byrne quickly promised that he wants creationism and not evolution taught in Alabama schools: “As a Christian and as a public servant, I have never wavered honey baked ham in my belief that this world and everything in it is a masterpiece created by the hands of God,” he said. “As a member of the Alabama Board of Education, the record clearly shows that I fought to ensure the teaching of creationism in our school text books. Those who attack me have distorted, twisted and misrepresented my comments and are spewing utter lies to the people of this state.”
He further assured voters that he believes “every single word” of the Bible to be true.
At least in our politics, we certainly seem to be disproving Darwinistic theories of the survival of the fittest.
He is not alone. There is increasing intolerance for religious figures (here), scientists (here), and others who profess belief in evolution or a non-literal reading of the Bible.
For the full story, click here
They are species which have characteristics of dinosaurs and birds that appeared in the time when dinosaurs were thought to have evolved into birds – just as was predicted by the theory of evolution. That’s not an opinion, that’s a fact that supports evolution. A search of the PubMed database on ‘evolution’ turns up 265,705 scientific papers – compared to 0 scientific papers which don’t support evolution (papers on intelligent design don’t count until they can come up with a falsifyable hypothesis). We call it the theory of evolution because it has been subject to an enormous amount of testing over the years and it has survived. Just like Newton’s theory of gravitation (better, in fact, since Einstein landed some serious blows on Newton’s theory). When we call something a ‘theory’ in science that is the strongest statement that we can make – we’re saying that something is unquestionably true to the extent of our ability to verify it (and with the discovery of DNA, our ability to understand and verify the mechanisms of evolution is very impressive). In a scientific sense evolution has been proven to be correct. If you disagree, then find a chimera or spouting your ignorant, unscientific garbage.
Slart: Your list is just a list of extinct species scientist merely claim are transformational specimens.
There is no proof that they are. It’s only opinion.
I shoulda knowed hit was a Ph.D. psychological trap…
FFLEO,
You’re welcome. While I explained it’s significance to me, I’ll let it’s meaning be a sort of Rorschach test for everyone else… Thanks for giving your interpretation.
Whoops, I wuz a’ typin’ when you writ.
Slartibartfast,
Even though I do not have an avatar, I expect people who use them to explain them when first displayed. Therefore, what does that image represent or signify?
To me it looks like a male Peacock lookin at hisself in those carnival sideshow fun house distortion mirrors.
Thank you very much for your non-maffmatikal explaneashion…
Buddha,
Thanks. It comes from using Newton’s method to find the roots of the characteristic equation for the model of chloride concentration in two coupled nephrons that I used in my thesis. I like to think of it as ‘my’ fractal.
Hey, nice icon there Slarti. It matches your fractious, er, fractal nature. 😉
Tootie,
If the people choose idiots for leaders knowing that they are idiots that’s one thing, but if the people choose leaders and they are unaware that the leaders are denying the science underlying pretty much all modern medical research (you know, like modern drugs and cancer research…) that’s quite another.
You said:
No one makes a leap of faith to believe that birds evolved from dinosaurs – we make a leap of faith to believe in the scientific method and the method tells us that pedopenna (168-140 Ma), anchiornis (155 Ma), archaeopteryx (150-145 Ma), Confuciusornis (120 Ma), eoalulavis (115 Ma) and Ichthyornis (93.5 Ma-75Ma) are all transitional forms between dinosaurs and birds. If you want to live like the Amish that’s fine, but if you utilize the technology that results from science while rejecting the scientific facts that you don’t like you’re nothing more than a hypocrite.