Schwarzwald was indulging in a little satire, I believe John - with his point being that we don't need to denounce every piece of stupidity that comes down the pike.
But I guess whether you agree depends on what you're passionate about.
Blessings
Murray
John Walley wrote:
>
> Sorry maybe its just me being hopelessly out of touch and too old for
> this kind of thing but I didn't see any meaning or relevance to that
> video at all. If the woman is supposed to be Eugenie Scott, who is the
> guy? He does look somewhat like Christopher Hitchens though.
>
> I would have never inferred that is was an "affront to science education
> and scientists" but again maybe its just me. Do you have any basis for
> that or are you just deducing that? And how did you even know what a
> codpiece was, I had to look that up. :)
> Although we agree about being "duty-bound" and more proactive in the
> culture wars I am not sure this is the call to duty we answer.
>
> John
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *From:* Schwarzwald <schwarzwald@gmail.com>
> *To:* asa@calvin.edu
> *Sent:* Mon, November 16, 2009 7:58:22 PM
> *Subject:* Re: [asa] What is the Christian reaction to Ray Comfort's use
> of "The Origin of Species"
>
> Heya Mike,
>
> The Christian community, and I should think think any association of
> Christian scientists, is duty-bound to provide an answer to slights like
> these. But I think there's a problem that needs to be addressed, one
> much larger than this latest relatively meager offering by Comfort.
>
> I'm talking, of course, about the music video "Danger! High Voltage!" by
> Electric Six.
>
> This so called "music video" at points takes place in what looks to be a
> Natural History museum, featuring a scantily-clad woman (who bears an
> uncanny likeness to Eugenie Scott) wearing a flashing brasierre, sitting
> on top of a biology artifact (in this case, a stuffed moose), making out
> with an archaeologist wearing a flashing codpiece. I think it's hard to
> ignore the implicit maligning of evolutionary theory invoked in this
> imagery.
>
> If that weren't enough, the song makes use of explicitly religious
> concepts. I quote, with my emphasis added.
>
> "Fire in the disco!
> Fire in the taco bell!
> Fire in the disco!
> /Fire in the gates of hell!/"
>
> I think it's clear that, unless and until the ASA explicitly denounces
> this affront to science education and scientists at large, Christianity
> will suffer in the eyes of intellectuals the world over. As of this
> writing, the youtube video of this (and there are multiple ones) has
> received over two million hits. That's, presumably, over two million
> people who are going to be deeply misled about archaeology, evolutionary
> theory, and Maxwell's equations - the latter of which lends itself to a
> natural security concern, as the American economy depends deeply on
> electricity.
>
> How long will Christians remind silent about this? Where is the ASA on
> this outrage? Where is Ken Miller? Where is the Pope?
>
> On Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 7:11 PM, Nucacids <nucacids@wowway.com
> <mailto:nucacids@wowway.com>> wrote:
>
> Hi Bernie,
>
>
>
> “If this stuff isn’t repudiated by the Christian community, then it
> will serve as a self-mockery of the Christian community in the eyes
> of intellectuals. Dawkins will pick up on it, and Eugenie has also
> been doing battles with Comfort lately, so this will be more fodder
> for her arsenal.”
>
>
>
> True intellectuals do not peddle in stereotypes and
> guilt-by-association. Any “intellectual” trying to extrapolate
> Comfort’s antics to the larger Christian community would be a
> pseudo-intellectual.
>
>
>
> As for Comfort, I never heard of him until his stupid banana
> argument went viral in cyberspace. I even poked fun of it here:
>
>
>
> http://telicthoughts.com/the-orange/
>
>
>
> You might want to consider that Comfort is engaged in a *publicity
> stunt* to draw more attention to himself and you are asking the ASA
> to assist him in these regards. The best thing to do when dealing
> with an attention-seeking publicity hound is to ignore him.
>
>
>
> Besides, if the ASA is supposed to police such antics among people
> who are not members of the ASA, then where do you draw the line?
> Must the ASA comment on every future publicity stunt from any new
> creationist clamoring for attention?
>
>
>
> Mike
>
>
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> *From:* Dehler, Bernie <mailto:bernie.dehler@intel.com>
> *To:* asa <mailto:asa@calvin.edu>
> *Sent:* Sunday, November 15, 2009 9:19 PM
> *Subject:* RE: [asa] What is the Christian reaction to Ray
> Comfort's use of "The Origin of Species"
>
> “They also didn't cite that Collins disagrees with them
> concerning chimpanzees in the Language of God.”
>
>
>
> RE: quoting Collins as pro-ID and then implying he is
> anti-evolution when he is actually pro-evolution.
>
>
>
> This sounds like a trick out of the playbook of the ‘Expelled”
> movie For example, in “expelled” they interview McGrath (on an
> unrelated topic), making/promoting the assumption that McGrath
> is pro-ID and anti-evolution. McGrath actually wrote negative
> comments about ID and is pro-evolution as far as I can tell.
>
>
>
> If this stuff isn’t repudiated by the Christian community, then
> it will serve as a self-mockery of the Christian community in
> the eyes of intellectuals. Dawkins will pick up on it, and
> Eugenie has also been doing battles with Comfort lately, so this
> will be more fodder for her arsenal.
>
>
>
> …Bernie
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *From:* Rich Blinne [mailto:rich.blinne@gmail.com
> <mailto:rich.blinne@gmail.com>]
> *Sent:* Sunday, November 15, 2009 4:40 PM
> *To:* Dehler, Bernie
> *Cc:* asa; Randy Isaac
> *Subject:* Re: [asa] What is the Christian reaction to Ray
> Comfort's use of "The Origin of Species"
>
>
>
> You can see the pdf of it already:
>
>
>
> http://assets.livingwaters.com/pdf/OriginofSpecies.pdf
>
>
>
> Page 10 of the introduction cited Francis Collins from the
> following UK Times article that marked the release of /The
> Language of God/. (Randy, it might be interesting to get Dr.
> Collins' reaction given they also rehash the faux Nazi
> connection on pp. 36-9 which I believe caused a falling out
> between him and Coral Ridge.)
>
>
>
> http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article673663.ece
>
>
>
> They quoted this as follows:
>
>
>
>> To ponder how DNA’s amazing structure could have come together
>> by sheer accident is indeed amazing, and has even led some to
>> consider the possibility of design. Based on his study of DNA,
>> the director of the U.S. National human Genome research
>> Institute concluded there must be a God. Francis Collins, the
>> scientist who led the team that cracked the human genome,
>> believes it provides a rational basis for a Creator:
>>
>
>
> “When you have for the first time in front of you this 3.1
> billion-letter instruction book that conveys all kinds of
> information and all kinds of mystery about humankind, you can’t
> survey that going through page after page without a sense of
> awe. I can’t help but look at those pages and have a vague sense
> that this is giving me a glimpse of God’s mind.”
>
>
>
> After quoting Collins, Comfort says this:
>
>
>
>> DNA is an incredibly detailed language, revealing vast amounts
>> of information encoded in each and every living cell— design
>> which could not have arisen by purely naturalistic means. In
>> every other area of our world, we recognize that information
>> requires intelligence and design requires a designer. with our
>> present-day knowledge of DNA, this presents a formidable
>> challenge to Darwinian evolution.
>>
>
>
>
>
> But somehow strangely -- shall we say by chance? -- they didn't
> quote the following from the Times article a few paragraphs down:
>
>
>
>> “I see God’s hand at work through the mechanism of evolution.
>> If God chose to create human beings in his image and decided
>> that the mechanism of evolution was an elegant way to
>> accomplish that goal, who are we to say that is not the way,”
>> he says.
>>
>
>
> The next section goes onto the next page and attempts to explain
> away the similarities between the chimpanzee and human genomes
> using material from Answers in Genesis. They also didn't cite
> that Collins disagrees with them concerning chimpanzees in the
> /Language of God./
>
>
>
>> A further example of this close relationship stems from
>> examination of the anatomy of human and chimpanzee
>> chromosomes. Chromosomes are the visible manifestation of the
>> DNA genome, apparent in the light microscope at the time that
>> a cell divides. Each chromosome contains hundreds of genes.
>> Figure 5.3 shows a comparison of the chromosomes between a
>> human and a chimpanzee. The human has twenty-three pairs of
>> chromosomes, but the chimpanzee has twenty-four. The
>> difference in the chromosome number appears to be a
>> consequence of two ancestral chromosomes having fused together
>> to generate human chromosome 2. That the human must be a
>> fusion is further suggested by studying the gorilla and
>> orangutan — they each have twenty-four pairs of chromosomes,
>> looking much like the chimp.
>>
>>
>>
>> Recently, with the determination of the complete sequence of
>> the human genome, it has become possible to look at the
>> precise location where this proposed chromosomal fusion must
>> have happened. The sequence at that location — along the long
>> arm of chromosome 2 — is truly remarkable. Without getting
>> into the technical details, let me just say that special
>> sequences occur at the tips of all primate chromosomes. Those
>> sequences generally do not occur elsewhere. But they are found
>> right where evolution would have predicted, in the middle of
>> our fused second chromosome. The fusion that occurred as we
>> evolved from the apes has left its DNA imprint here. It is
>> very difficult to understand this observation without
>> postulating a common ancestor.
>>
>
>
> Collins also showed in Figure 5.1 how similar the inferred DNA
> sequences of mammalian species with what Darwin had in his 1837
> notebook for the tree of life. That would have been interesting
> in an introduction to Origin but again not there.
>
>
>
> Ray Comfort has every right to publish an introduction to a
> public domain work but at least it shouldn't be YEC's "greatest
> hits". It ends with a Gospel presentation. I don't believe it's
> going to be terribly effective and it's the tarnishing of the
> Gospel that I have the greatest concern.
>
>
>
> Rich Blinne
>
> Member ASA
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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