Another update on Josh Brecheen.

It has been good to see the mostly positive reaction to the ill-conceived comments of Oklahoma State SEN Josh Brecheen. If this man is looking to make a name for himself, he certainly is. He put an editorial in the local paper from his senate district, The Durant Daily Democrat. In addition to the uproar over several things wrong with attempting to try to have creation taught in public schools, the comments in the newspapers website have been lambasting him for his outrageous views in other subjects as well.

Being a native son of Oklahoma, it pains me when I see this sort of pubic display of foolishness. But even more so when it is done by our government officials.

Here are a couple a links to learn more about this issue and this man. 

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/12/when_did_oklahoma_start_electi.php

http://www.durantdemocrat.com/view/full_story/10775841/article-Reader-says-Breechen-badly-misunderstands-evolution-and-science-?

http://www.durantdemocrat.com/view/full_story/10776295/article-Brecheen-says-the-religion-of-evolution-is-plagued-with-falsehoods?

Letter from Oklahoma Senator Josh Brecheen concerning evolution and creation.

One of the bills I will file this year may be dismissed as inferior by “intellectuals” so I wanted to devote particular time in discussing it’s merits. It doesn’t address state waste, economic development, workers comp reform or lawsuit reform (although I have filed bills concerning each) but it is nonetheless worthy of consideration. It is an attempt to bring parity to subject matter taught in our public schools, paid for by the taxpayers and driven by a religious ideology. I’m talking about the religion of evolution. Yes, it is a religion. The religion of evolution requires as much faith as the belief in a loving God, when all the facts are considered (mainly the statistical impossibility of key factors). Gasp! Someone reading this just fell out of their enlightened seat!!! “It’s not a religion as it’s agreed upon by the entire scientific community,” some are saying at this very moment. Are you sure? Let’s explore the facts.

As a high school and university student forced to learn about evolution I was never told there were credible scientists who harbor significant skepticism toward Darwinian Theory. I easily recall a full semester at SOSU where my English 1 professor forced us to write almost every paper over the “facts” of evolution. That professor had a deep appreciation for me by semester end due to our many respectful debates as I chose to not be blindly led. I specifically remember asking how in 4,000 years of recorded history how we have yet to see the ongoing evidence of evolution (i.e. a monkey jumping out of a tree and putting on a business suit).

Following a 2001 PBS television series, which stressed the “fact” of evolution, approximately 100 physicists, anthropologists, biologists, zoologists, organic chemists, geologists, astrophysicists and other scientists organized a rebuttal. So much disagreement arose from this one sided TV depiction that this group produced a 151 page rebuttal stating how the program, “failed to present accurately and fairly the scientific problems with the Darwinian evolution”. These weren’t narrow minded fundamentalists, backwoods professors or rabid religious radicals; these were respected world class scientists like Nobel nominee Henry Schafer, the third most cited chemist in the world and Fred Figworth, professor of cellular and molecular physiology at Yale Graduate School.

Ideologues teaching evolution as undisputed fact are not teaching truth. Renowned scientists now asserting that evolution is laden with errors are being ignored. That’s where we should have problems with state dollars only depicting one side of a multifaceted issue. Using your tax dollars to teach the unknown, without disclosing the entire scientific findings is incomplete and unacceptable. For years liberals have decried how they want to give students both sides of an argument so they can decide for themselves, however when it comes to evolution vs. creation in the classroom, the rules somehow change. Their beliefs shift, may I say... evolve to suit their ideology.

We must discuss the most recognizable icons of the evolution religion. Darwin sketched for The Origin of Species a visual to explain his hypothesis that all living creatures evolved from a common ancestor. The tree of life scenario, engrained upon most of our memories, depicts gue transitioning into a hunched over monkey which then turns into a business suit.

Darwin himself knew the biggest problem with his visual (cornerstone concept of his hypothesis) was the fossil record itself. He acknowledged major groups of animals, he coined “divisions” (now called phyla) appear suddenly in the fossil record. The whole basis for evolution is gradual differences and changes to be confirmed by modified fossils (phyla cross-over). Even Christians believe in biological change from species to species (adaption) over time. The taxonomic hierarchy which includes species, genus, family, order and class must be visualized for understanding separation from phyla and species classifications. As an OSU Animal Science graduate I readily admit the adaption of animal species from interbreeding such as Santa Gertrudis cattle, a “weenie” dog or even a fruit fly. Even the difference among lions, tigers and cougars could be attributed to species adaption and interbreeding if one so decried. Additionally, human differences seen notable in ethnicity proves that change among species is real but this is NOT evolution, its adaption. Changes with the classification of species is DRAMATICALLY different then changes among Phyla. Phyla changes would be if an insect, with its skeleton located on the outside of soft tissue (arthropods), transformed into a mammal, with its skeleton at the core of soft tissue (chordates). Phyla changes must be verified for Darwin’s common ancestor hypothesis to be accurate.

The rapid appearance of today’s known phylum-level differences, at about 540 million years ago, debunks the tree of life (common ancestor) scenario. This biological big bang of fully developed animal phyla is called the Cambrian explosion. The Cambrian explosion’s phyla fossils and the phyla of today are basically one in the same. These phyla fossils of that era are fully developed, not in a transitional form. In fact we don’t have a transitional form fossil crossing phyla classification after hundreds of years of research looking at sediment beds spawning the ages. There are certainly plenty of good sedimentary rocks from before the Cambrian era to have preserved ancestors if there are any. As for pre-Cambrian fossils being too tiny or soft for secured preservation there are microfossils of bacteria in rocks dating back beyond three billion years. Absolutely ZERO phyla evidence supporting Darwin’s hypothesis has been discovered after millions of fossil discoveries. Darwin’s cornerstone hypothesis where invertebrate’s transition into vertebrates is majorly lacking and so is Darwin’s “theory”.

I will be introducing legislation this session to ensure our school children have all the facts.

This discussion is to be continued in next week’s column..

Josh Brecheen

I have not changed any of the spelling or grammar from the source article.

http://durantdemocrat.com/pages/full_story/push?content_instance=10717736&need_to_add=true&id=10717736#cb_post_comment_10717736

Chapter Eleven; CONGRATULATIONS CHARLES DARWIN part forty

2009 was the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin birth and also the 150th anniversary of the publishing of On The Origins of Species In 1859. In The United Kingdom the Royal Mint has issued a commemorative two pound coin with the struck pose of Darwin on the right facing across from a portrayal of chimpanzee. On the front of the coin is, of course, the portrait of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. The coin is issued in a limited edition and you may be able to order on from the website listed below. xxxvii

I also have a Darwin 2009 t-shirt that I wore the last time I saw Richard Dawkins at Queens College in Charlotte, North Carolina on October 14, 2009. I got the t-shirt when I first saw Dawkins at The University of Oklahoma in Norman, OK on March 6, 2009. It has been good to see so many positive commemorations of the publication of Darwin's pivotal work. I have yet to get the ￡2 coin from the UK or the ￡10 pound note. I would like to get them both and have them mounted in a display case. But I digress.

However, when I last saw Dawkins, he mentioned something about the commemoration of the 150th year of On the Origins of Species that intelligent design or creationist Ray Comfort was publishing. This seemed rather odd to me. Ray Comfort has printed the keystone work of Darwin. A person that in almost every thing I have seem him produce is in polar opposition to this work of Darwin and evolution. Not to mention the scientific method as well.

The book has a nice cover on it and has a beautiful picture of Darwin on it. It says it is a 150th anniversary issue of the book and at the bottom it says with a special introduction by Ray Comfort. I find this odd but I have not yet read Mr. Comfort's text so I will not comment on that. But what I will say is that Comfort has took ever opportunity he possible can to try to make evolution seem less than factual. The ID advocate has failed in every example he has tried. I am not sure if Comfort is actually convince by these stories he is telling or that he doesn't understand the basic concepts of the science involved in the continual support of the Theory of Evolution or if he really is mentally sick and needs medication, what ever the reason it has clouded his ability to reason and process factual information. It is strange that the person that is one of the most opposed to the ideas and concepts of Darwin's natural selection would spend the money and time to publish the book, according to his website, word for word with only an addition to the beginning of the book.

Adding his comment to the beginning of the book may be to keep Comfort from actually reading the work Darwin put out 150 years ago. I have a feeling there are not going to be many reference such as “refer to page such and such for an example”. But I may be wrong about that. It seems a diluted mind never goes to waste. When the launch date for the book was set on April 22, 2010, I went to Washington University to try to get my hands on the free book. I figured I should be able to have one just as much as the other people around there. But after several contacts in the biological sciences I found out that the book had been distributed the day before, ahead of the announced date for the distribution to occur. Seems that Ray Comfort was willing to add his words to Darwin’s work but was not willing to keep his word to the public as to when the books would be passed out.
xxxvii http://www.royalmint.com/store/BritishBase/D09E.aspx

Coming Next Time;

MORALITY AND MANKIND part forty-one

Chapter Five; HOW DOES THIS GOD THING WORK? part fourteen

It is typical for many Christians to use common key verses from the Bible to support their view of the world. Many verses are heard regularly in their church. Some key verses are repeated to enhance the adherence of those that follow the denomination. Depending on the focus of the church, different verses are emphasized. My experience has shown that many adherents do not read their Bible or study their religion, more than the hour per week they are in the church building. They do not realize, step by step, their defense is shored up by their lack of knowledge in the faith they adhere to and their failure to investigate their own religion and dogma. In a way, this is useful. If an adherent is presented factual information about the Bible or other religious books, (s)he may be more likely to come out of that faith and into the rational world. [I wouldn't hold my breath on that , though.] When I was a child and looked at older people, I thought they must be smart. The older people around me seemed smart. The truth is most older people just get older and rarely gain in intelligence. Quite the opposite happens to be honest. Seniors begin to view knowledge with contempt and suspicion. This is how most older people in the church behave. They view the youth with contempt, unless they adhere to preconceived views. This is one of the main motivations for getting the Hell scared out of children and having them convert at a young age. If you can get the kids to believe the impossible then they will have a better chance to believe the total package of dogma that goes along with it.
Most followers would not even know what book in the Bible verses were from or the context they are written in. I contend that facing a believer on their home turf is not for every skeptic. Not that I am advocating that , but, we do live in a nation and world full of adherents. In my experience, all non-believers I have met or heard study the Bible and know the Bible better than most devout adherents. Not only is it a difficult task to take on, it is much harder than one would think. It would seem, the adherents would be hell bent to tell non-believers all about the advantages of their belief. Many of the beliefs that I have accepted, would not let a person stand down from one that was asking about the lessons of the others faith. It was a requirement of my religion.
It is easy enough to use god for any answer that you don't have an solution for. But, as a god is made, the answer to questions become increasingly more complex. You can rely upon scared text, but the support the text has in itself need to have evidence to prove it’s sacred text or it is only self affirming. If it is self affirming, then it relies upon a closed system of faith.
I have been face to face with pastors that told me I am free to visit their church , but not to disrupt their class, because I wouldn't accept their text. They either didn't know their own religion well enough or didn't trust that their adherents, [income source], could not defend what they believe.

The sign of the cross of The First Baptist Church of Moore was destroyed from a category five tornado that hit Moore, OK, on May 3, 2000. Many homes, businesses, and lives were destroyed from the massive winds that swept through the southern and eastern part of The Oklahoma City metro area. Prayers were offered by survivors in the resulting news coverage that resulted. Many people thanked God for saving their life even though the homes were destroyed. Not a single believer in God, on the news coverage, said that God should have stopped the tornado or put it in an area that wouldn't have caused so much destruction. This metal sign became a symbol of that particular disaster.

In the ancient times and even up into the Enlightenment, people often used God as the answer for what they didn't understand about the natural world. The “hand of God” was often assigned to such phenomena as storms, earthquakes, plagues, sickness, volcanic eruptions and other natural occurrences. As man discovered more about the world we live in and the Universe around us, he learned that a giant turtle doesn't hold the Earth. He learned that the Sun doesn't rotate around the Earth. He learned that a great god out at sea does not cause the tides to surge forth on the shores.
We have learned that the stars are not placed upon crystal spheres in the sky. On and on, at the time “God” was given as an explanation, rather than cause and effect. The universe grew, God shrank, and God became more ambiguous.
As man found answers to some of these questions, the power of God as the answer, lost merit, even stories based in “sacred” writings. As man discovers more about the natural world, believers are forced to make God even more abstract and unknowable than their predecessors. Some adherents to the young Earth concept, say, the naturally occurring phenomenon, like fossils, erosion, corrosion spectrometry, glacial movements, plate tectonics and other natural time indicators, are placed in a state that indicates a “false” long history. Furthermore, the methods used to determine the ages are either misinterpreted or bias toward old ages.
Some intelligent design answers , to fossil placement, are that God put them in place. Another is that the processes used to determine the ages is inconclusive or wrong. I have heard both. It is interesting that they will use one or the other, depending on what the particular ID supporter is talking about. It is amazing that experimentation and the scientific method must hold up to scrutiny and testing, by other scientist in the field, to be accepted. However, with ID there is no such method to verify concepts. Almost no original research is done in the ID community. It is speculated that they read the work of researchers, searching for holes or ways to support their point of view of a short age Earth.
On March 26, 2009 , I went to a Evolution vs. Creationism debate in Yukon, Oklahoma with Dr. Charles Jackson, Creation Truth and Abbie Smith, Researcher at Oklahoma University, HIV research.
Miss Smith asked Dr. Jackson if he had first hand or original research. After several stammering and stops, he admitted that he didn't. Miss Smith confirmed, she does first hand research , with her results checked by other scientists, for validity. This shows direct contrast of actual science versus the ID supporters.
I admit , that people who study ID know the scientific terminology and jargon. This certainly helps to sound more reasonable to a layman adherent. I have reviewed Michael Behe's books and find them quite impressive. He is very detailed in his presentation of inconceivable ideas. However, when addressing the scientific community, the weakness in their arguments is evident. To be honest, it is not much different than a pastor using the Bible to develop a sermon. All a pastor needs to do to improve his sermon, is to add a few key verses, i.e. “ No weapon formed against us will proper” or “If God is for us who can be against us”. He need not bother to follow any theology or internal logic. He can yell or speak loudly, and for good measure, provide an alter call.
Even with a god that is all powerful , all knowing and all loving, there must be mechanisms in place for the actions of that god to manifest themselves in reality. Doing something in an immaterial world has no effect in the natural world without a means to use natural reason to bring it into being. After all, the immaterial world doesn't exist. I would say that our imagination is more real than the things of the supernatural world. At least the things I imagine can to some degree become real. There are ways to to do that. However, to do this feat from the immaterial world, I need an amazing device; I call it The Supernatural to Natural Matter Transfer Device. [All the cool gods are getting them. Check your local supernatural electronics store.] What most adherents want to say is, my imaginary friend can do anything he or she wants, and it will become real in our world. If this isn't an example of a person suffering from a delusion, I don't know what is. It is like a small child. “ I want it. I want it. I want it.” It is a temper tantrum of supernatural proportions.
Maybe a device similar to a Supernatural to Natural Matter Transference Device [patent pending] is what these gods use to make their miracles. Instead of walking on water, as we would see in the real world, this god is walking on a bridge, that we cannot see. It was built with the SNMTD [now available at Radio Shack] and then disassembled the same way. Making up stories about reality is fun. You don't have to bother with reality at all, just like with religion. As it is supernatural, who needs to see it. There is no need to prove form or function or adhere to the Laws of Nature. Cause and effect is so silly a notion that one need not even address it. If something doesn't make sense, make up something else to be more confusing and inexplicable.
Still, for a person of faith, there must come a point when the view of the world comes in contrast with the alleged nature of a god. I would say that when addressing the physical existence of a divine, most believers have to admit they’ve not seen such a thing. At best, they will say they have felt “His” presence or provide some other ethereal explanation that seems totally understandable. But, if someone were to say the same of other gods, they would assume that person had been standing too close to the paint mixer. Not only would they admit it, but they would go so far as to say they don't need proof; they have faith. “And faith is all I need to know God is real.” Many very devout adherents have said this.

I have to admit, a statement like that is good enough for an almost non-fiction God.

Chapter Two: ASSURANCE OF SALVATION? part four

To this statement, [Assurance of Salvation] I can already hear the devout and the faithful saying that I must not have been truly saved or filled with the spirit. First, one cannot say that according their own belief system. They cannot know my sincerity and willingness to know more of God. Also, I was one of the most devout and on fire believers that one would come across. But it will be said, never the less.
One of the main reasons that I went through the process of covering my background was to answer what many believers say to me, “If you only really experienced the Power of God you would know He is real. Just open up your heart and let God speak to you.”
During this time of my more profound adherence, I wouldn't have thought the ideas of science and faith were in conflict. I did start to see some incompatible ideas with the literal translation of the Bible verses and science. But the idea was more one of understanding the Bible. I used to actually think that all the answers of The Universe could be found in the Bible. It was just a matter of study to find them compatible with science.
For instance, I knew that the Earth was not six thousand years old. But, I found a verse in II Peter 3:8 that said, “Nevertheless, do not let this one fact escape you, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day.” With this verse I was able to either literally expand the “six” day creation of the Earth or add an indefinite period of time, even billions of years. So, still there was not a conflict with science and faith. But there started to be some things like the idea of water to wine. I knew there had to be an actual reason for these miracle. Even God had to obey the law of nature that he established.
We are not talking about a movie or comic book, but the physical Universe. Every miracle had to have a physical reason, even the “five fish and three loaves of bread.” To me, the only way this “fish story” was true was if fish were really much bigger than the story would lead us to believe. Let's say, for instance, five full sized tuna fish. That would have been a lot of food to spread among the people. Then feeding 5,000 plus people would have been easy. I was one of those that accepted the miracles of Christ, but didn't know how He did them, yet.
There was a reasonable answer; I just had to find it. I really didn't accept the idea of ghosts or other ideas like that. Angels were a tolerable idea to me, but not one that I felt that comfortable with. To me the main objects of religion were the God team of the trinity and Satan in his disguises. Maybe a few more spirits were out there, now and then.
Why on Earth would I not want to know God? If there was a god it just made the most complete sense to me to learn all I could about him. This is the heart of the matter, isn't it? If there is a God, one would have to be delusional not to believe in it. I would whole-heartedly agree. Plus, the more you knew Him, the better you could serve His purpose. One would have to be insane, not wanting to follow God. The truth of the matter is, each person has his or her own reasons for the level of enthusiasm they follow or don't follow a god. Many feel their level of commitment is just enough to live a good and productive life in society. “Go along, to get along” would be that perspective. Each person has their own reasons how, where and why they follow the religion that they believe.
While this is testimonial, I can say with much certainty that there were few that were on fire for God the way I was. There is little that any follower of Jesus can say to me, that I have not read or studied concerning faith and dogma of the Christian faith. With my level of study, I am sure I could have been ordained as a pastor in some churches. This was never the path I sought, though.