MrT

Well Mr T, you've brought up a couple of points that are used by creationists to "prove" that they're right, Darwin refuting evolution on his deathbed and inaccurate carbon dating results.

Let's looks at Darwin first.

1) Can anyone prove or disprove that he did say that? A lot of people say he didn't.

2) He was brought up in a culture that is more religious than it is today, he trained for the clergy, he was in fact vicar (or whatever name is used for whatever religion he was).

3) Because of his religious background he was loathe to publish his findings on evolution and did so reluctantly because some young whipper-snapper had the same idea and sent him an outline of a paper that he was preparing which basically stated everything that Darwin thought himself.

4) Taking his religious background into account I'm wouldn't be surprised if he did try to refute evolution on his deathbed. Let's face it, he was only a few minutes/hours away from finding out if there was a god or not so, taking his religious background into account, I'm not surprised he went for the "hedging his bets" option.

5) Even if he did say it, that proves nothing.

Carbon Dating.

There are several reasons for inaccurate carbon dating results. One of the principal reasons was the fact that the person/people who developed the technique got their sums wrong initially and it was too late to change it by the time anyone noticed. All carbon dating is subject to the same offset due to this initial error.

Sample contamination is also a big problem with carbon dating. Nevertheless carbon dating is a useful tool with known error bars. No one can say for sure how old something is using carbon dating but they can tell you with high degrees of certainty how young/old it isn't.

Anyway, carbon dating is only useful for a few thousand years in the past and on organic matter. Using radium/lead ratios in crystals scientists have proven (within the limits of modern science) that some rocks are about 3.8 BILLION years old, that's 3,800,000,000 years. Compare that to the 10,000 years or so that creationism teaches and I'm afraid that (imo anyway) there is no way that science can be that wrong. Even if someone throws in the differing rates of radioactive decay theory there would have to be a HUGE change in radioactivity levels in the past 10,000 years to throw up results like that and such a change, unless for some bizarre reason it happened in jumps, would be easily measurable today.

Then add in all the other geological evidence, deposition rates of sediments, rates of mountain building and erosion, tectonic plate movement etc and you're left with, as far as I can see, 3 possible explanations.

1) God created the earth 10,000 years ago but decided to put in a lot of evidence that it was a lot older.

2) The universe was on some sort of fast-forward, like a gigantic VCR, until 10,000 years ago and for some reason god has hit play.

3) Creationism is wrong.

While 1) and 2) are possible I think they are so unlikely that the only reasonable conclusion to reach is 3).

If the heavens and the earth and all the creatures on it were created in 7 days 10,000 years ago then the definition of day is different to the one that we currently use or the original texts have been transcribed and/or translated wrongly. To err is human after all.

Excellent answer Captain C!

Isn't the problem that some US schools teach creationism instead of evolution in science subjects, not teaching it alongside evolution in a seperate theology based subject like RE which we get over here.

I believe Creationism has been banned in most US schools except for those that are Christian schools. I think this is just as bad as not allowing other subjects to be taught alongside.

Heh. I prefer to trust things like, "carbon dating" and science over the words of a book written hundreds of years after the death of the alleged, "son of god" who historically came from a family of theives.

Carbon dating is well known to be completely wrong a lot of the time. There is far too much physical evidence on the planet that lines up with the Bible to completely discount it's content. Many scientists use it as a guide for their research.

have you not seen the bit in the borat film where the christian guy is going on about he 'is what he is' and didn't evolve from monkeys? seriously though, while i agree that teaching the creation parts of the bible as literal truth doesn't deem 'all scientists' liars it's still at odds with evolution. i don't claim to be that familiar with the bible, but as far as i recall, it claims that god personally created adam and eve; they were the first humans and we're directly descended from them. people who know anything about evolution know we evolved from monkeys or apes or whatever. thus, people who take the bible's account of creation literaly, think the theory of evolution is telling porkies. theres a reason these american fundamentalist types banned teaching darwin's theories in schools and at least one person was indeed prosecuted for doing it (ok this was in the 1920s but origin of the species was published in 1859 or thereabouts).

also, i dunno many 'natural philosophers' but Darwin had huge problems reconciling his discoveries with his (previous) religious beliefs. admittedly, the fact he risked being accused of blasphemy and whatnot could hardly have eased his state of mind. minor point anyway, whether he felt good about it or not doesn't change the fact his theory is at odds with the adam and eve myth.

also, no offence but i think you're analogies are pish. i see what you're saying (i think it's rubbish, but then most likely so do you; unless you're a christian fundamentalist you're just putting this forward for arguments sake) but you could just say 'he's god, he can make the world look however old he wants too, cos he's a supremely powered being/ wizard.' i don't see how it compares to playing a video game. if you were half an hour into a save then it's irrelevant whether you've being sitting their for 30mins or not... definitely not quite the same as faking the difference between 6 days and a few billion years. if you tried to fake you were 100 hours played into a game without saving then maybe but it'd be easy to tell: if you're lying dead in a pile of your own shit you did it one go, if not you loaded a save... waste of time to type this bit... o_O

Didn't darwin become a Christian and say all his theories were a load of bollocks before he died?

The reason I started this thread was the worrying trend of US government on insisting that they teach kids that god created the heavens and earth and all things in it in 6 days as actual fact, this now appears to be creeping into the curriculum of UK schools.

This of course renders the thinking of Darwin and all discoveries by scientists before and after his amazing revelations as lies....I don't think so.

And another point, can any believers out there (thats if your keen to pop your head above the battlements) explain how someone was able to write the books of Genesis 'in chronological detail' when there was no fucker there...??

Have they not always tought this in UK schools seeing as this is considered to be a Christian country?

I'm going to make a guess here and say...

"Thou can't believe in what thou has't never seen with thou's own een"?

Do you believe in wind?

The Xcerts rocked but the crowd sucked. I've never seen such a dull crowd before and the talking during the bands set was driving me nuts! Great gig though!

'Need Me' by The Squirrels - a classic!

Bros - Chocolate Girl

Can I have two?

I remember waking up on the couch in the smoking lounge (usually after a deadloss gig or fudgenight) several times not quite knowing how I got there. My head would be pounding from cheap champagne and I would have to make my way down the stairs without touching the bannister for fear of injury or death. After fishing through various unidentified items in the kitchen sink, I would eventually find a mug to make a cup of tea to set me up for the challenge of crossing the pit of death in the bathroom floor.

Whatever happened to Knuklz?

I know it's a long shot but what are the chances of me putting an add in the fanzine?

Nick T

Well I'm just about to take delivery of my nice shiney new 1200W monitors..........so there!

Anyone interested in having their live gigs recorded by a studio engineer from LA? It's a great way to get a realistic sounding demo! This service will be available in Aberdeen in the next few months.

If you want more info then you can contact me at: nick@tayloredsound.co.uk

Maybe I could play bass for you! I don't know how to but I'm sure I could wing it. I already know half the songs.

Is it too late for an add? If not then I would like one.