Stupid Creationist Arguments 5: Crocoduck

With Ray Comfort releasing a version of Darwin’s Origin of Species with a 50 page propaganda introductions I decided to talk about this dumb asses dumb ass arguments starting with the Crocoduck.

Its basically the argument “why don’t we find fossils that are half ‘this’ and half ‘that’?” where said “this” and “that” are usually modern species that are often unrelated to each other (well not really, more distantly related). For example: The crocoduck (imaged above), half cat half dog, half man half monkey (half ape half man doesn’t count because humans are apes).
It’s ignorance of evolution that is on an astonishing but not surprising scale. Even many creationists world cringe at hearing such an argument knowing how stupid it is.

Transitional fossils will not look like a cross between two currently existing species.
Populations change over time, species change over time. Millions of years ago, our ancestors did not look like modern humans. The same goes for the vast majority of species.

Of course there are some exceptions. Like Tiktaalic

But of course finding what they want will not convince them, they will either move the goal post or just ignore it entirely.

Stupid Creationist Arguments 4: Not So Irreducible Complexity

The irreducible complexity argument was developed by Michael Behe and first used in his book Darwin’s Black Box.
The argument is that some biological systems are so complex that they can not have evolved though mutation and natural selection; it you remove one peace, it brakes, it no longer functions. Creationists often use the analogy of a mouse trap; remove one part and it doesn’t work. A mouse trap is surprisingly a good analogy, take out the catch and the hold down bar and you you have strong paper clip or if your defending evolution is Dover, a tie clip. Hell if you remove the spring and the hammer you have a paper weight.

One of the most popular examples of irreducible complexity is the eye. It is so popular because of a quote from The Origin of Species that would seem to say that the eye could not have evolved.

To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible degree

However this is a quote mine. Darwin continued with:

Yet reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a perfect and complex eye to one very imperfect and simple, each grade being useful to its possessor, can be shown to exist; if further, the eye does vary ever so slightly, and the variations be inherited, which is certainly the case; and if any variation or modification in the organ be ever useful to an animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, though insuperable by our imagination, can hardly be considered real. How a nerve comes to be sensitive to light, hardly concerns us more than how life itself first originated; but I may remark that several facts make me suspect that any sensitive nerve may be rendered sensitive to light, and likewise to those coarser vibrations of the air which produce sound

Then the fact that we have a pretty good understanding of the evolution of the eye makes the claim even more disingenuous.

Another popular example of irreducible complexity is the bacterial flagella. On the surface its would seem like a good example, it certainly looks designed however it is not. Remove a few parts and you get a type III secretory system: a type III secretory system is sort of like a tiny molecular syringe that injects toxins into other cells.

And last example in this post: wings. Its seems like a legitimate point; “whats the use of half a wing?” But with a little bit of imagination and some research you’ll find that half a wing has benefits.
The most obvious benefit is gliding. Being able to glide would increase the distance an animal can jump and it would be especially beneficial to animals who live in trees. Being able to glide would make it easier to escape from predators and easier to capture pray.

Before any one decides to try and stump me with some example of irreducible complexity, use a little imagination and do some research. If you don’t I’ll use some imagination and some research to show you that you are wrong.

Links & Sources
Irreducible Complexity
Idea Center – Irreducible Complexity: The Challenge to the Darwinian Evolutionary Explanations of many Biochemical Structures
Talk Origins – Irreducible Complexity and Michael Behe
The Mousetrap Analogy or Trapped by Design

Eye
Evolution – Library – Evolution of the Eye
Science Daily – Evolution of the eye

Bacterial Flagella
Evolution of the Bacterial Flagella
The Flagellum Unspun The Collapse of “Irreducible Complexity”
Type III protein secretion systems in bacterial pathogens of animals and plants.

Wings
Darwin Watch.com – The Irreducible Complexity of Wings Refutes Evolution
Vertebrate Flight Exhibit – The Evolution Of Flight (a.k.a. How To Wing It)
Talk Origins – Index to Creationist Claims – What use is half a wing?
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<-Part 3

Cuss-O-Meter: Fuck Yeah!

Created by OnePlusYou – Free Dating Site

36.2%! Fuck yeah!

Stupid Creationist Arguments 3: The Fine Tuned Argument

The argument is self explanatory. The universe, the earth, blah has been fine tuned fro life. Some take the argument further and say the universe, the earth, blah has been fine tuned for human life.

I’ll start with the universe: The majority of the universe is empty space. The vast majority of the matter in the universe is in galaxy’s with millions of light-years between them, the vast majority or all of the galaxy’s are in large clusters with hundreds of millions to billions of light-years between them. Galaxy’s them selfs are wispy things with most of the baryonic matter in nebula, stars and black holes.
Most of the “stuff” in the universe isn’t baryonic matter (the matter we are made of). Most of the “stuff” in the universe is dark energy (about 73%) and dark matter (about 23%). Baryonic matter only make up about 4% of the matter and energy in the universe and most of that is interstellar and intergalactic gas (about 0.4%).[1][2]
Then there is space itself. Beyond the protection of the earths magnetic field you have cosmic rays coming at you from all directions, coming from stars, gamma ray bursts and the sun. Cosmic rays can damage DNA.[3] If your hit by a solar flare, your dead.
Space is cold, very cold too cold for life. Beyond the inner solar system the only places that could have life are are moons of gas giants large enough to have an atmosphere and close enough to the planet so that the gravitational title forces to heat the moon enough to have a liquid ocean. And too close to the sun its too hot for life.
As for other stellar systems: We don’t know how common planets are, we have found other planets but nothing earth like because we are unable to find planets the size of earth, we can only find planets that are large enough for their gravity to cause their star to wobble so we don’t know how many earth like planets are out there. However we do know from our own solar system that planet formation is quite chaotic. Venus rotates very slowly in the opposite direction from the rest of the planets in the solar system, Uranus is on its side and the earth is the only planet with a single large moon. The best explanations for these are planetary collisions.[4][5]

Sometimes used with the “universe is fine tuned” argument or could be used as a rebuttal to the points above: the claim that the Earth is fine tuned fro life. Of course it isn’t.
The best they have is “the earth is in the perfect place for life to exist. A little bit too close and the earth would be too hot a little bit to far and the earth would be too cold.” But that claim ignores one huge fact, the earths orbit is elliptical, the earth does get closer and further from the sun. Further more the habitable zone of the Sun is estimated to be between .95 and 1.37 AU (and AU is the average distance between the earth and Sun) so the Earths orbit is not fine tuned.[6]
While it can seem that the earth is fine tuned to life or even us, its not. Life is very adaptable, there are animals living deep in the ocean, animals can live an mountains at reliantly high altitudes there are even worms living in glacial ice.[7] Live is very adaptable. The earth is not adapted to life, life is adapted to it.
Life on earth lives on a thin layer of crust, the vast majority of the earth is uninhabitable. Its far too hat in the mantle, its far too hot in the core, it is only the crust where life can live.[8]

Now to the idea that the universe is fine tuned for human life: We only live on 1/3^rd of one planet. We can’t live in the oceans, we can’t live in space. And much of that land is difficult to survive on. We have thin skin, we cool our selfs through sweat, we lack the fur and body fat needed to protect us from the cold. It is our large brains and opposable thumbs that have allowed us to survive. It is our intelligence that allows us to survive in the desert, we had to learn how to survive in the desert despite our cooling system that causes humans to loose water much faster than other animals. We had to kill other animals to get they’re skin and fur to protect us from the cold of colder environments. It is the development of farming that made us the dominant species.
Its not that the earth is fine tuned to us its that we have the intelligence to learn how to survive and are adaptable enough to survive. But we are not the most adaptable things on this planet. Smaller simpler organisms are far more adaptable than we are. Single celled organisms can adapts and thrive in environment that are very hostile to us. [9]
If the universe is fine tuned for life, its not fine tuned for us.

Then there is their best argument: “If gravity was a tiny bit stronger or weaker or if the electromagnetic interaction was a little bit stronger or weaker blah, blah, blah”
This argument has two problems. The first one is that the assumption that if the the strength of the fundamental interactions were different life could not form, that assumption is baseless. If you change them enough then yes, stars would never form, etc but the claim that changing them slightly makes life impossible is baseless, there is no evidence to support it. Second: Fred Adams of the University of Michigan Ann Arbor tested the assumption using a computer simulation. He found that if the fine-structure (alpha) and gravitational were off by as much as a hundred fold stars would still form.[10] In fact it is conceivable that if the strength of the fundamental interactions were different life may be more probable.
© 2009 all rights reserved

Sources
1. Imagine the Universe – Dark Matter
2. NASA Home- News and Topics – Universe
3. Wise Geek – What are the Health Effects of Cosmic Rays on the Human Body?
4. Ask an Astrophysicist – Retrograde rotation of Venus
5. Universe Today – Formation of the Moon
6. Stars and Habitable Planets
7. Ice Worms and Their Habitats on North Cascade Glaciers
8. Structure of the Earth
9. Eukaryotes in extreme environments
10. New Scientist – Is our universe fine-tuned for life?

<-Part 2 | Part 4->

Stupid Creationist Arguments 2: Cosmological Argument

Everything that comes into existence has a cause, the universe came into existence thus it had a cause and that cause was God.

The Cosmological Argument starts out with a decent premiss and then plunges head first into stupidity.

“Everything that comes into existence has a cause” this makes sense and fits with our observations (except maybe on the quantum scale) but beyond this point, it fails.
“The universe came into existence” this is where that argument starts to fail. The closest we have to evidence that the universe had a beginning is the big bang but as I’ve said in part 1 we don’t know what was before the big bang. The universe could have existed in some form before the big bang, the big bang (and thus the universe) could have came out of another universe or some combination of the two. We don’t know.
“and that cause was God” This is where the argument goes from a fail to an epic fail. Even if the universe had a beginning, that does not mean what cause the universe was some deity. It is much more plausible the the universe would have came out of another universe though some natural process.

To get out of the two fatal problems of the cosmological argument creationists claim that infinity is impossible, there needs to be a first cause because with out a first cause you get an infinite regress and infinity is impossible.
Of course infinity is not impossible. When asked why its impossible they will probably say something like “you can’t have an infinite number of points between two points”. This argument is bullshit because INFINITY IS NOT A NUMBER infinity is a mathematical consent. Of course you can’t have an infinite number of points between two
points but outside the two points it goes on infinitely, forever.

Links and Information
Wikipedia – Cosmological Argument
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – Cosmological Argument
All About Philosophy – Cosmological Argument

© 2009 all rights reserved

<-Part 1 | Part 3->

Stupid Creationist Arguments 1: Something From Nothing Or Is It?

“You can’t get something from nothing”

“A common creationist argument. It is based on the assumption that the big bang theory states that before the big bang there was literally nothing. Of course the big bang theory says nothing about what was before the big bang. The big bang theory is not a theory of the origin of the universe.
The truth is we don’t know what was before the big bang. Information from before the big bang has been lost, with out information we don’t have anything to base hypotheses on.

“In the beginning there was nothing and it exploded.”
This variant of the argument goes beyond “something from nothing” it is a full on straw man.
Firstly: The term “big bang” was coined by Fred Hoyle an astronomer who rejected the idea of the big bang in favor of the steady state theory. He coined the term “big bang” as a derisive term and it stuck.
Secondly: The big bang was not an explosion, it was an expansion of space time. Space time itself rapidly expanded.

Links and information.
Universe 101
Time line of The Big Bang
Frequently Asked Questions in Cosmology
Sir Fred Hoyle (1915-2001)
Wikipedia – Big Bang
Wikipedia – Time line of the Big Bang
© 2009 All rights reserved

Part 2->

Obamas Mens Only Basketball Game

Recently Obama has been criticized for hosting an all-male basketball game. I’m not going to comment on that. I’m going to point out what he should have said in response.

I’d bet good money that if he had said something along the line of “I’m a man and sometime I want to get away from women and be with other men. Do guy things. You woman understand. Don’t you sometimes want to get away from us and be with other woman?” it would have killed the controversy.
© 2009 All rights reserved

Things I find stupid, objectionable, offensive and just plain wrong on the bible. Exodus 16-20

Exodus 16:2-3

2 And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness:
3 And the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger.

Hmm, strange statements for people who have been freed from slavery.

Exodus 16:8

8 And Moses said, This shall be, when the LORD shall give you in the evening flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full; for that the LORD heareth your murmurings which ye murmur against him: and what are we? your murmurings are not against us, but against the LORD.

“Your not complaining about me, your complaining about GOD! Heretics!”

Exodus 16:11-12

11 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,
12 I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel: speak unto them, saying, At even ye shall eat flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled with bread; and ye shall know that I am the LORD your God.

You would think that a god would be smart enough to know that if you take people out of civilization and make walk them across a desert they would need food and complain when they didn’t have enough food.

Exodus 16:14-15

14 And when the dew that lay was gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there lay a small round thing, as small as the hoar frost on the ground.
15 And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the LORD hath given you to eat.

Yahweh has the power to make bread out of nothing. Why Couldn’t he have done that in the first place? If they had enough food in the first place they would not have complained and not had a need to complain.

Exodus 16:2-4

2 Wherefore the people did chide with Moses, and said, Give us water that we may drink. And Moses said unto them, Why chide ye with me? wherefore do ye tempt the LORD?
3 And the people thirsted there for water; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?
4 And Moses cried unto the LORD, saying, What shall I do unto this people? they be almost ready to stone me.

Yahweh has the Israelites walk across the desert, humans need water, humans can loose allot of watter through sweat (which is how the body cools itself). And god didn’t give them some source of water? Is God that stupid?
“Why chide ye with me? wherefore do ye tempt the LORD?” Complaining about not having something that you literally need to survive would “tempt the LORD”?
“they be almost ready to stone me.” Yahweh let it get that bad. A powerful being that can make something out of nothing and made the human body not only had the Israelites walk through the desert with out an adequate supply of water, he let it get that bad. What the fuck?

Exodus 17:6

Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel.

Making water with magic.

Exodus 17:7

And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among us, or not?

Apparently God is easily tempted.

Exodus 17:10-12

10 So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek: and Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill.
11 And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed: and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed.
12 But Moses hands were heavy; and they took a stone, and put it under him, and he sat thereon; and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.

And when Moses held his magic staff in the air the Israelites were winning.

Exodus 17:13-16

13 And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
14 And the LORD said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven.
15 And Moses built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovahnissi:
16 For he said, Because the LORD hath sworn that the LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.

Okay so some group led by some one called Amalek and the Israelites were at war. It does not say who started it so for the moment I’ll give the Israelites the benefit of the doubt. The Israelites won. Okay. But then God had “war with Amalek from generation to generation” What the fuck? Seriously, what the fuck?

Exodus 18:5

And Jethro, Moses’ father in law, came with his sons and his wife unto Moses into the wilderness, where he encamped at the mount of God:

Um… In Exodus 2:18-21 it says Moses father in law is Reuel.

Exodus 18:11

Now I know that the LORD is greater than all gods: for in the thing wherein they dealt proudly he was above them.

Gods? As in polytheism? As in more than one god? As in not monotheism?

Exodus 18:12

And Jethro, Moses’ father in law, took a burnt offering and sacrifices for God: and Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread with Moses’ father in law before God.

Burnt offerings, sacrifices. Why would a god need these?

Exodus 19:5

Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine:

Yahweh treasures the Israelites over all other in the world? Think about that for a moment.

Exodus 19:12-13

12 And thou shalt set bounds unto the people round about, saying, Take heed to yourselves, that ye go not up into the mount, or touch the border of it: whosoever toucheth the mount shall be surely put to death:
13 There shall not an hand touch it, but he shall surely be stoned, or shot through; whether it be beast or man, it shall not live: when the trumpet soundeth long, they shall come up to the mount.

Any one, human or animal who touches Mount Sinai is to be stoned to death? Why? What was really up there?

Exodus 19:15

And he said unto the people, Be ready against the third day: come not at your wives.

“This is our club house! No girls allowed!”

Exodus 19:21

And the LORD said unto Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break through unto the LORD to gaze, and many of them perish.

“Do not let them go through the gate for they will see me and die!”

And next the Ten Commandments

Exodus 20:3

Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

“Before me” as in “I’m the top god, you can have some beneath me but not before me”. Of course not all the translations agree with each other of whether its “before me” or something else. 9 English translation say “before me”, 2 say “besides me” , 3 say “in place of me” (which still doesn’t say monotheism, it only says “I’m alpha god”), the New Living Translation says “but me” and the Message says “only me”. Most translations agree that the bible say not to worship other gods before Yahweh but it doesn’t exclude worshiping other god beneath Yahweh which fits the clear polytheism of the early books of the bible.

Exodus 20:4

Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

That goes way beyond idles of other gods, it in fact implies that any image of anything is a violation of this commandment.

Exodus 20:5-6

5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

“visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation” In other words punishing the children, grand children and great grand children of any those who worship an idle. Yeah that a real just god you have.
“of them that hate me 6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.” Okay not “keeping his commandments” is hating Yahweh and keeping his commandments is loving him? Does Yahweh know what love and hate even mean?
“the LORD thy God am a jealous God” Why would a god me jealous? Especially if he is supposed to be the only god?
There are people who believe that our laws (US) are based on biblical laws, 4-6 show that is not true in any way shape or form. We have freedom of religion, a person may worship what ever they want in the many they want (so long as they do not harm others). We would not have such a freedom if our laws were based on biblical laws.

Exodus 20:7

Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.

Why would a god care how we use its name? Especially if its the only god.

Exodus 20:8-10

8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:

While the concept of a day of rest is a good idea forbidding any work on that day is crazy. Some time you have to do shit even if its a day of rest. People do not always have a choice.

Exodus 20:11

For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it

So, the whole 6 day creation is not a metaphor? Thats how it happened?

Exodus 20:12

Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.

What if your parents abuse and or neglect you? Do you still have to honor them?

Exodus 20:17

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.

Living in a capitalist country and being semi-capitalist my self I can see that coveting actually helps the economy (of course so long as you don’t spend your self into debt).
Notice how woman are put in with slaves house and livestock.

Exodus 20:19

And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die.

Yep Yahwehs voice kills people. WAIT! Didn’t Adam, Eve, Cain, Able, Noah, Abraham, Jacob/Israel talk to Yahweh and hear his voice? And moses heard Yahwehs voice and he is still alive.

Exodus 20:24

An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee.

Again Yahweh wants people to kill animals and throw them on fires as sacrifices to him.

© 2009 All rights reserved

Order From Disorder

A common creationist argument is that order can not come from disorder, in fact this idea goes beyond creationist, many people assume this. But it is utterly false.
If you take a disorderly system (I mean completely disorderly, random) the different possible outcomes will have different stabilities (some outcomes will be more stable than others), on average the more stable outcomes will out last the less stable outcomes. So even in a random system there will be order, in fact that order would come out of the randomness of the system.

This isn’t just hypothetical, we’ve seen it. Things on the quondam scale are disorderly, two particles collide, there are 5 possible outcomes, which one happens is (as far as we can tell) is random. Yet when you move to a larger scale, things go from a random disorderly system to an orderly deterministic system. In evolution random mutations cause the variation between generations however natural selection acts on these random mutations. Those mutations that increase a creatures chances of survival and reproduction build up in the population while mutations that decrease a creatures chances of survival and reproduction are weeded out.

Order from disorder is not only possible it is the norm.

Note: This too is an old unpublished post.
© 2009 All rights reserved

My Ten Suggestions

The Lord, the Lord Lone Wolf has given unto you these fifteen…”
[drops one of the tablets]
“Oy… Ten! Ten Suggestions!”

The Christan, Jews and Muslims have their ten commandments so I give my ten suggestions.

1. Do not kill.
2. Do not rape.
3. Do not steal.
4. Do not commit adultery.
5. Do not do to others what you do not want then to do to you and do to others what you want others to do to you unless they don’t want you to do “that” to them.
Notice how I start with those?
6. Keep, defined and protect the freedom of speech and expression even when you disagree with what others say.
7. Criticism is good, do not be fearful of it.
8. Keep things in perspective.
9. Think critically.
10. When in an argument or debate; do not use lies, fallacious and/or descriptive arguments.

And the five that was dropped:
11. How important of a belief is to you has no bearing on the factuality of that belief.
12. Keep your religion out of government.
13. No one has to respect your beliefs or the beliefs of others, they only have to respect your/their right to those beliefs
14. Religious, political and philosophical beliefs are no excuse for oppression and murder.
15. Make your own 10 suggestions.
© 2009 All rights reserved