[asa] 7 Words You Can't Say in Church WAS ORIGINS: pseudogenes are overwhelming evidence for evolution...?

As a more humorous aside to this very serious issue of the truth not being
allowed in most of the evangelical church, a friend of mine who is also a
recent TE convert and I came up with this to hopefully help break the ice
and get people to start thinking about this.

NASA scientist and former RTB Apologist Dr. Mark Whorton, author of "Peril
in Paradise" will be presenting to the RTB Atlanta Chapter Christmas Party
later this month on "Peril in the Pew: The Evolution of an Evolving
Creationist" and this came out of our preparation for that.

Please let me know what you think. :-)

John

7 Words you can't say in Church:

1. Big Bang

2. Old Earth

3. Death before the Fall

4. Allegorical Genesis

5. Common Descent

6. Darwin

annnnd

7. Sex

-----Original Message-----
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
Behalf Of Dehler, Bernie
Sent: Sunday, November 04, 2007 1:03 AM
To: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: [asa] ORIGINS: pseudogenes are overwhelming evidence for
evolution...?

Hi all-

     I'm new to this group (and ASA), so I hope I'm not bringing up
something already discussed in great detail. If so, maybe you can direct me
to the log.

     In my recent studies on the origins debate, it seems to me that there
is "overwhelming evidence for evolution" via pseudogenes. These are genes
present and functional in lower life forms, yet we have messed-up
(nonfunctional) copies of them. There are supposed to be thousands of
pseudogenes in the human genome. Humans and apes have these messed-up
copies, but not lower life-forms. Since we share the messed-up copies with
apes, we can't say that it is from the fallen human nature, as apes also
have them messed-up while lower lifeforms don't. A prime example is
supposed to be ascorbic acid (vitamin c).

     Hugh Ross, in his book "Who was Adam" explains the technical details
well, and ends up saying there is no "old earth" response (since old earth
is against evolution). no response yet, anyway. Young earther's also don't
seem to have a response to this argument.

     It seems to me that we have to accept this evidence for evolution. just
as we have accepted evidence from Copernicus/Galileo regarding a
heliocentric solar system.

     Question: Is it true there is no serious response from young earthers
or old earthers to the claim that pseudogenes are overwhelming proof for
evolution?

     Then again, there's also the biological evolutionary evidence based on
chromosomes. Humans have one less chromosome than apes, and it can be seen
that the reason why is because two ape-like chromosomes have joined into one
for human. This joint is obvious. Again, any good young earth or old earth
responses?

     Both the pseudogene and chromosome evidence for evolution were cited as
evidence by Dr. Francis Collins in his recent book.

     By the way, I'm on the mailing list for Liberty University. They claim
there is no compelling evolutionary evidence. Check out this quote:

Dr. David DeWitt, Liberty University professor of biology, wants to help
Christians understand the nature of creationism and teach them how to ably
counter mainstream arguments.

His new book, "Unraveling the Origins Controversy," is a crash course in
biblical creationism and examines assumptions on both sides of the origins
debate with clear biblical teachings.

The veteran professor, who is director of Liberty's Center for Creation
Studies, notes that there are new scientific findings in terms of the
earth's foundations almost every day and Christians need to have a framework
for understanding these alleged evolutionary breakthroughs.

Dr. DeWitt, who recently received a large National Institutes of Health
grant to support his Alzheimer's disease research, said, "We live in the
same world and use the same facts as evolutionists. We simply use different
assumptions and reach creation conclusions."

Included in Dr. DeWitt's scientific refutation of evolutionary theory, he
incorporates Scripture throughout his book to support the science of
creationism. He believes the value of his book is that it is written by a
scientist who integrates up-to-the-minute findings with a biblical
worldview.

Asked if there is any argument an evolutionist can make that a creationist
cannot effectively answer, Dr. DeWitt smiled wryly and offered a simple,
"No."

"We have nothing to worry about in defending our beliefs," he confidently
stated.

.Bernie

www.sciligion.org <http://www.sciligion.org/>

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Received on Sun Nov 4 06:11:25 2007