In Pure Spirit

For open minds

The truth behind the mighty and powerful Jibbers Crabst

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Jibbers Crabst is the holy lobster. Jibbers Crabst is the power that brought life to the universe; including and especially bombardier beetles and banana spiders.

This is the conclusion of high priest Matt Inman, Mr Oats, of The Oatmeal. The cartoonist got to the not-keynote for the first every BAHFest West at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco.

What’s BAHFest? It is the Festival of Bad Ad Hoc Hypotheses, that’s a form of hypotheses I’m fond of here at IPS, and deals with logically explained but clearly wrong evolutionary theory. High prest Matt Inman is a master.

Special shoutout goes to the sign language supplier who stands just behind Inman. She’s given some howlers to translate into ASL and does amazingly well. She wins the audience around.

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Do you doubt the lobster wisdom of Jibbers Crabst? What alternative evolutionary theory would you suggest?

Highlights of the Bill Nye & Ken Ham evolution debate

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This blog is about the open mind. You will find many articles here exploring religious faith and you will find science. Part of accepting an open mind is to push back against extremism.

This post acts as growing summary and observation page for debate between “science guy” Bill Nye and young Earth activist Ken Ham. The debate, which was actually two pre-prepared scripts, took place in Creation Museum in Kentucky.

Do you have any favourite comments, quotes or observations from the debate? Leave them in the comments below and they may be promoted to the main blog post.

Bill Nye 1

Bill Nye 2

Ken Ham, founder of the creationist ministry Answers in Genesis;

I challenge the evolutionists to admit the belief aspects of their particular worldview.

Bill Nye;

Your assertion that there is some difference between the natural laws that I observe today and the natural laws of 4,000 years ago is extraordinary and unsettling.

Ken Ham;

The battle is really about authority. It’s about who is the authority, man or God

Bill Nye 3

Who won the Creation vs Evolution debate?

The paper Christian Today has a poll that ran for the event. At the time of this update that poll has 13,784 votes and says that Bll Nye won the debate. In fact, on the Christian Today site some 92% of respondants said that Bill Nye came away top.

poll-1

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Do you want to watch the whole debate? Here’s a YouTube of the 2+ hour event that Answers have made available.

The science: this is how trees survive the winter

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There are some awfully cute trees in this video from Minute Earth. Cute trees and some handy knowledge about different types of trees. Watching this animation might make you think about a similar program from Minute Physics that talks about the difference between evolution and natural selection. Trees evolved to survive in the winter.

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Are you surprised at how adaptable trees are or how fragile they are at times?

What’s your top tips for any would-be gardeners trying to grow a tree in their garden? What keeps them safe?

Do you know the difference between evolution and natural selection?

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This episode of Minute Physics takes a fun and easy tour through the differences between natural selection and evolution. Not all evolution is due to natural selection.

The video also makes the point that whether you believe in evolution or not – it happens. You might believe that natural selection isn’t the only influence on human evolution, though.

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Does this make sense to you? Or is this video wrong – is evolution a nonsense made up by the godless and confused?

Chinese boy with glowing eyes can see in the dark

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This news footage for the UK but from China appears to show a young boy with very strange eyes. It’s not just that they are blue (like a Westerner, says the reporter) but that they seem to reflect light back like cat eyes. The boy has amazed the medical community because it appears as if he can see in the dark.

Take a look at the video below and let us know what you think. Is this real? A mutation? Evolution?

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This would not be the first time someone with superhero-like powers being “found” so we should be cautious of this video. Don’t you think?

Can he really see in the dark?

Mutant calf born in Utah

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This calf was born in a diary farm in northern Utah. She suffers from a birth defect but is apparently healthy. I do worry that she’ll struggle to graze given the condition of her mouth though.

The farmer who posted the video of the mutant cow to YouTube admits they’ve not seen anything like it – and hasn’t even heard of anything like it.

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Have you seen anything like this before?

Can you speculate on the defect/mutation that this little calf suffers from?

Evolution versus National Weath

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Tony Piro has put together an interesting chart.

Across the bottom of the chart it shows the nation’s wealth in the form of Gross Domestic Product. In other words; how rich the people in the country are. Norweigns come out as the richest and Romanians as the poorest.

The vertical access is the percentage of people who believe in evolution. The lowest percentage are the Turks; of all the countries mapped the Turks are most likely to believe that man appeared on Earth via some other mechanism other than evolution. The Icelanders are most likely to believe in evolution.

Putting the two together shows that the poorest people are less likely to believe in evolution. Ask yourself why and speculate.

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Of course, you may have noticed that one country in particular stands out from the curve. Did you spot the USA – rich but not willing to put much conviction into scientific theory. Why do you think that is?

Via Calamities of Nature.

“Should Evolution be taught in school?” Miss USA contestants try to answer

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When I was shown this video it came with only one comment. That comment was “Yikes”. I was prepared for a horror story. Actually, I was prepared to deal with USA contestants who had been coached that a pro-evolution stance was a dangerous one if they wanted to win.

Some of these answers, I find, are awful. Surely science is a human right? The United Nations has ruled that access to the internet is a human right. Not teaching evolution in school, I feel, is an aberration. However, you’re not here for my personal views. You’re here to see how Miss USA contestants try to answer the question “Should Evolution be taught in school?”

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What do you think?

Do you think schools in America should teach evolution? Can you imagine schools in the UK not teaching evolution?

Do you think any of these Miss USA contestants did particularly well or particularly or badly?

Charles Darwin’s walking stick

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This photograph shows the walking stick used by Charles Darwin, author of “On the Origin of Species” and father of evolutionary biology. Rather ironically, it’s crafted from whalebone and ivory. The handle is a small skull.

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Is this the sort of walking stick you had in mind when you thought about Charles Darwin? Do you think he thought about endagered species when the cane was crafted?

Photo credit: This Isn’t Happiness.

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