Welcome to all of the new subscribers!
This is the “When I get a round tooit” Creation/Evolution newsletter from Ian Juby and the traveling Creation Science Museum of Canada.
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In this newsletter:
1) Still yet on the road again…
2) Reader comment on snake venom: “Isn’t that evolution?”
3) Entire debate is on line!
4) It’s a bird? It’s a plane! It’s Super Bacteria!
5) Life from a comet?
6) Random picks from the mailbag – kind mail, hate mail, inquisitive mail….
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1) On the road again…
Hey everyone, it’s been a rather intense pace, speaking all over Alberta, home for a day, went to a wedding in Ohio, home for a day, then went to Nova Scotia for a research/vacation trip.
Coming up: October 25 – November 30ish, EAST COAST TOUR! Yup, I’ll be bringing numerous displays from my traveling museum to New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and yes, even Newfoundland. Email me or phone 877-532-9160 to book a talk for your church, school, homeschool group or creation group.
(Dates are approximate) October 25-November 15, New Brunswick/Nova Scotia. November 15 thru 30th, Newfoundland.
If you think you may be interested, here is a short promotional video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYNXaxPP8yc
Or you can email or call and request a FREE DVD for your Pastor or group.
Upcoming talks:
September 12: Eglise Chretienne de l’Ouest, Pierrefonds, Quebec, 3pm “The dinosaurs and the flood”
September 13: Assemblee Chretienne de la Grace, Victoriaville, Quebec 7 pm, “The dinosaurs and the flood” (en francais)
September 18-23: Creation Evidence Expo, Indianapolis, speaking on the Paluxy tracks and showing one of the largest collections of fossil human footprints on display (http://www.creationevidenceexpo.org/)
September 27: Kemptville Pentecostal Tabernacle, Kemptville, Ontario, morning service “The complete creation”
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2)Reader comment on snake venom: “Isn’t that evolution?
 Figure 1 – copperhead snake venom, as seen via an electron microscope  Figure 2 – venom from a copperhead after living in biosphere Images courtesy of Creation Evidence Museum |
If you recall in the last newsletter, I reported on some research carried out in the hyperbaric biosphere at Creation Evidence Museum, in Glen Rose, Texas. Copperhead snakes were placed in this chamber which simulates a hypothetical pre-flood world, and their venom was radically altered (photos right).
One astute reader (Tara from Washington) wrote in, asking
It’s an excellent question, so I thought I’d address it.
When is a snake not a snake?
Of course, the copperhead snakes were still copperhead snakes. And because the venom was altered in response to its environment, some evolutionists would call this “adaptation.” Actually, it’s the opposite of evolution: it would appear that the snake was designed to live in the conditions presented in the biosphere. However, at present they live in conditions different than those in the biosphere, and one of the consequences is that their venom becomes disorderly, and toxic.
For the record, no one has actually injected themselves with the “new” venom out of the biosphere, so we can’t really say it’s no longer toxic, but I’m sure one of my very astute readers would be willing to volunteer for this experiment….? (it’s okay, thassa joke) At any rate, the venom may very well be non-toxic now.
The point is this: The snake is not adapting, the snake’s venom-producing system has broken down and become dysfunctional in our present conditions.
This is the opposite of adaptation. All the equipment to produce the proteins was already there, but some of it worked while some of it didn’t. In this case, apparently it all worked the way it was supposed to under these conditions. This has nothing to do with evolution, or even adaptation (which is really just a sneaky word for evolution).
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3) It’s a Bird? It’s a Plane! It’s Super bacteria!
Speaking of “adaptation”…
Many evolutionists claim that bacterial resistance to antibiotics is adaptation (read: evolution). We have these “super bugs” now running around which are unaffected by modern antibiotics, and so it is claimed that these bacteria have “evolved” a resistance to our drugs.
In short, no, they haven’t evolved.
What do a bunch of frozen dead guys have to do with it?
The doomed Franklin expedition to the Canadian high arctic was launched from England in 1845. Sir John Franklin led the expedition, which was sent in hopes of finding passage through the Arctic.
All 129 men died. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin%27s_lost_expedition)
 Picture taken on Beechey Island in 2004 by Dr. Russell A. Potter, courtesy wikipedia.org |
The dead were buried in various places in the arctic, as the expedition traveled around, trying to survive. Some of those graves were on Beechey Island (photo right).
In the 1980’s, some of the corpses were exhumed, and bacteria from the intestines were reanimated (awakened from their frozen sleep) and studied at the University of Alberta:
| “Scientists at the University of Alberta have revived bacteria from members of the historic Franklin expedition who mysteriously perished in the Arctic nearly 150 years ago. Not only are the six strains of bacteria almost certainly the oldest ever revived, says medical microbiologist Dr. Kinga Kowalewska-Grochowska, three of them also happen to be resistant to antibiotics. In this case, the antibiotics clindamycin and cefoxitin, both of which developed more than a century after the men died, were among those used.”
– Ed Struzik, Ancient bacteria revived, Sunday Herald, September 16, 1990, A1. “Well-preserved bodies of members of the Franklin expedition, frozen in the Canadian Arctic in 1845, contain bacteria resistant to antibiotics. Because the first antibiotics were developed in the early 1940s, these resistant bacteria could not have evolved in response to antibiotics. Contamination has been eliminated as a possibility.” |
These bacteria were resistant to modern antibiotics!
Antibiotics had not been invented until over 100 years after these men had died! So obviously these antibiotic bacteria already existed before antibiotics were invented.
What has happened is that we have killed off the bacteria which are affected by antibiotics, and the ones that were resistant have survived, and in some cases, those are the only remaining bacteria. Not only is this not evolution, it is the opposite of evolution: It represents a loss of information, a loss of variation within the bacteria, because we killed off a bunch of them. Evolution requires a gain in variation and information.
Natural selection at your service
This is natural selection, which by the way, was a creationist idea, hijacked by Darwin and claimed to be the process by which evolution occurred. But natural selection has nothing to do with evolution – it only acts on what we already have! It selects from what we have. It may explain the survival of the fittest, but it does not explain the arrival of the fittest.
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4) Debate is on line!
Here it is, the entire, pre-recorded debate for internet radio with Dr. David Koerner or Northern Arizona University. Brock Lee, the host of sagadiiradio.com assembled the debate for the program, and the entire debate is available for download on line:
Session 1: Introductions, opening arguments and rebuttals on planetary formation
http://www.sagadiiradio.com/sr-2009-7-24.mp3
Session 2: Opening arguments and rebuttals on Geologic column
http://www.sagadiiradio.com/sr-2009-7-31.mp3
Session 3: Opening arguments and rebuttals on radiodating methods, closing arguments:
http://www.sagadiiradio.com/sr-2009-8-7.mp3
Post-debate commentary:
http://www.sagadiiradio.com/sr-2009-8-14.mp3
I won’t make much comment, as I think the debate will speak for itself. Other than the fact that Koerner started off by claiming that Creationists’ use ad-hominem attacks, and then proceeded into a continuous barrage of ad-hominem attacks! It was too funny actually. Enjoy!
All the debate files and each episode of sagadiiradio.com is available on the podcasts page:
http://www.sagadiiradio.com/podcasts.htm
(the podcasts are in chronological order)
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5) Life from a comet?
 NASA depiction of the “Stardust” spacecraft
Courtesy NASA/JPL |
Another reader wrote in, asking for commentary on the recent announcement of “life’s buildling blocks” found in a comet:
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=852142
The gist of the article regards samples from the stardust project, a man-made satellite which flew through, and collected samples from the tail of a comet. Well wouldn’t you know it, but the samples contained an amino acid called glycine, which is one of the building blocks of life!
Fascinating to be sure – but proof that life on earth came from outer space? Hardly!
Where’d it come from?
First of all, where do we find glycine in the universe? Earth. This is why the report was delayed so long – the scientists wanted to be sure it wasn’t contamination. Fair enough. So in analysing the glycine, they examined its carbon 12/13 ratio, and concluded that it came from outer space.
This is a huge assumption in and of itself, as it does not (and cannot) take into account the possibility that C12/13 ratios can be produced here on earth that match the ratio they measured.
For a fun read, check out Dr. Walter T. Brown’s explanation of the origin of comets
http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebook/Comets.html
And the origin of Asteroids and Meteorites:
http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebook/Asteroids.html
In short, the glycine may, in fact, be very good evidence that the comet came from earth.
How much did you say…?
Furthermore, please notice the language in the article:
Wait a minute – the article starts off by stating that the glycine was found in trace amounts. In other words, there was barely any! Then suddenly, ‘barely any’ translated into “life in the universe may be common.” Oh really?
Secondly, this can hardly be called life! Glycine is only one of dozens of amino acids, of which a minimum of 20 are needed for life! So they found trace amounts of one of the twenty required amino acids, and suddenly, life came to earth from comets?
This is not unlike finding a bolt in the tail of a comet, and concluding that cars were delivered to earth by comets – and no, that analogy is not that much of a stretch. Some might argue that cars do not reproduce, and therefore the analogy doesn’t apply. Actually, amino acids don’t reproduce, neither do proteins (which are made up of amino acids) and those are all needed to form a living cell, which can be called life. And the complexity of a living cell is infinitely more complex than a car, which cannot reproduce.
Interestingly, living bacteria have been found in a freshly landed meteorite! So why such a hubub over a mere amino acid when we have actually found living bacteria in meteorites? (see endnote #67 in Walt Brown’s excellent book, “In the Beginning,” the entire book being available on line at http://creationscience.com )
This probably has more to do with obtaining funding than science – though in no way do I wish to discount this discovery.
This discovery, while fascinating and important, has nothing to do with the origin of life in outer space. In fact, it’s all good evidence that comets, meteorites and asteroids came from earth.
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6) Random picks from the mailbag – kind mail, hate mail, inquisitive mail….
Here’s some samplings of kind mail, hate mail, and random comments from random people. As always, it all puts a smile on my face.
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There is no talking to religious nuts like yourself. Here is a prediction……YOU WILL NEVER BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY BY ANYONE WHO THINKS RATIONALLY AND DOESN’T BELIEVE FAIRY TALES. Amazing how delusional the mind is. Stop poisoning children’s minds you sick *&%$.
IJ: This was in response to my pointing out his believing in the adult fairy tale of a frog turning into a prince (evolution). Notice he didn’t deny this?
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“Let me just try and understand your loving “god”. So god creates the universe, creates earth, throws down a couple humans then after a while doesn’t like what he sees, so he KILLS everyone, women, children, ya know, KILLS EVERYONE, then later on after he’s been sitting around watching people die from things like a simple *$@%&# tooth ache, he decides that the BEST way to let people know that there is a god is to send his only son to the &#*$&@$ desert where people are unbelievably uneducated and stupid, so that he can be sacrificed!!! Hmm, yep, rational thought and common sense tells me that this is a very very smart and loving god! Oh wait, no….that actually sounded like something that was made up a long long long time ago by people who didn’t know why we’re here. I think if there is a god, he will understand when I stand before him and say, gee god, you really didn’t give me enough evidence to ever believe in any of the ridiculous stories of the bible. So what is more noble, believing the unbelievably ridiculous bible just in case there is a god, or just because you’re scared of death, or not believing because there is ZERO proof of a god? THANK YOU, HAVE A NICE DAY!”
IJ: This will be the inspiration for a couple of future notes in my newsletters, “Lessons from the robots” which I think will nicely explain the Creator’s perspective in a way that we feeble human beings can understand. You’ll please notice that his arguments have absolutely nothing to do with whether or not there is a God. It is merely his lame excuses for hating God.
But as for not enough evidence that there is a God, I think it’s pretty obvious that Paul was quite correct in Romans when he wrote: “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.” (Romans 1:20, KJV) I may be sympathetic to this person, but he has no excuse for his willing ignorance for which he will give an account for on judgment day.
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Hey Ian,
Just wanted to drop you a quick line. You probably got my video invite. I just wanted to say thanks. Both your site in general and your 7 day Creation email primer were great resources that I used as a basis for some of my information in my 2 week Creation/Evolution series I taught at church. I’m loading the whole thing on Youtube now and currently have the first week finished. God bless and keep sharing the Good news!
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hey, just emailing to say good work on the debate, and thank you for talking about the tidal thing. i was wondering what the conditions would need to be like in order to reduce the friction enough to reduce the size of the tidal bulge enough to significantly(and quickly) reduce the amount of energy put into the moons orbital path. i thought about how “fast” they said the continents were moving apart and how it is likely, according to them, that it would be a while before the tidal friction thing was low enough to create a smaller tidal bulge. thank you also for being factual. i did not like how the person you were arguing against did not refute the cases you had scientifically, he seemed to just say, oh look, someone else did something similar and they were wrong, so he’s wrong. that bothered me… i really think philosophy classes aught to be required for high school. i learned about the formats of arguments and all the common mistakes that people, including myself, often over look. Good luck with everything and God bless.
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