Author of #1 best seller exposes atheism's superstitious creation story

Have evolutionists admitted that their beliefs are based on superstition? In a word, yes, according to Carl Gallups, author of the new “The Magic Man in the Sky.”

He cites selected paragraphs from the atheist website godisimaginary.com, an often-referenced site that states, “Where did the first cell come from? Many believers will argue that God magically created the first living cell. This, of course, is silly. The scientific principle that describes the origin of life is called abiogenesis. In the same way that there is no supernatural being involved in evolution, there is no supernatural being involved in abiogenesis. Both the creation of life and the evolution of species are completely natural processes.”

The article concludes, “There is no ‘supreme being’ in heaven who reached down to create life on Earth or human beings. Nor is that being answering prayers. There is no soul. There is no everlasting life. Science tells us all of these things with complete clarity. God is imaginary.”

READ MORE http://www.wnd.com/2012/06/look-whos-following-superstition-now/

Another epic blow to evolution theory - the mammoths disagree

Giant mammals roamed North America during the Ice Age, but were humans among them? A site in Vero Beach on Florida's East coast contains mammoth, mastodon, giant ground sloth—and human fossils. The problem is that humans were not yet supposed to have been there, according to the standard story told to generations of archaeologists.

When discovered in the early 1900s, researchers insisted that the Vero Beach human remains washed in long after the large mammals fossilized. But new results, like so many other similar reinvestigations of old sites, show they were made at the same time and that humans lived and died in North America long before believed. What took researchers so long to acknowledge that?

The reason why it took so long for the evidence to come to light may be the same reason why fossil evidence of humans and dinosaurs is so scarce.

read more: http://www.icr.org/article/6883/

Report: Men and dinosaurs coexisted

Dinosaurs are often portrayed as having lived in a time before man. However, the available evidence shows that man and dinosaur coexisted.

Legends of dragons are found among most people groups. For example, there are the stories of Bel and the dragon, the Kulta of Australian aborigines, St. George and the dragon, and of course many Chinese legends. Often, the anatomical descriptions given are consistent, even though they come from separate continents and various times. These depictions match what we know from the fossil evidence of certain dinosaurs. Thus, dinosaurs are known directly from their fossils, and indirectly from cave drawings, tapestries, textiles, figurines, carvings, bas reliefs, and many oral and written eyewitness accounts, most of which are quite old.

read more http://www.icr.org/men-dinosaurs/

New evidence for the parting of the Red Sea‏

Atheists have scoffed at the mention of it, modern religionists have denied it’s veracity, and papal pundits refuse to admit that Constantine’s mother selected the wrong sites for The Red Sea Crossing and The REAL Mount Sinai – ground zero for the two most famous events in recorded history. Now, you will see the scientific and archaeological evidence that has been preserved in coral and stone for this generation.

Journey with Michael Rood and an international team of scientists and explorers as they document the most exciting archaeological finds in the history of the human race. You will sail the ancient "Yam Suph" (modern day "Gulf of Aqaba" aka the "Red Sea") where hundreds of Egyptian chariots have been strewn across the sea floor. Robotic submarine cameras will lead you through an underwater battlefield where the coral encrusted remains of Pharaoh's army still litter the ocean floor like an ancient chariot junkyard. This will be the beginning of the greatest adventure of your life. You will never be the same after experiencing The Red Sea Crossing!

Now Available as a Digital Download $10: http://michaelrood.tv/red-sea-crossing-digital-download.html
The Red Sea Crossing - DVD Available Here: http://michaelrood.tv/red-sea.html
LIKE IT ON FACEBOOK! http://www.facebook.com/theredseacrossing

DEVASTATING! Evolution Theory PROVES Intelligent Designer! Pastor Carl Demonstrates

DEVASTATING! Evolution Theory PROVES Intelligent Designer! Pastor Carl Demonstrates

Hear Carl Gallups (narrator) every Friday - 1330 WEBY AM - Gulf Coast Talk Radio

Freedom Friday With Carl Gallups

http://www.carlgallups.com

BREAKING!: New Book Proves the Existence of GOD

EPIC DEBATE - PPSIMMONS Takes on FOUR Atheists

Apart from a few minor flaws the only real mistake made by Mike Shoesmith in his recent debate was that he used too many big words for the panel of atheists to digest.

The video embedded at the bottom of this article is the two-hour long debate recorded by Mr. Shoesmith wherein he forced himself to endure the same old cliche'd one-liners offered by atheists ever since Darwin uttered them upon the death of his young daughter; the ultimate cause of his delusion finally taking hold. With familiar phrases like "look - a bacterium has speciated therefore evolution MUST be true!" Never mind the fact that speciation is predicted by the Bible. How else could a single pair of dogs (wolves probably) turn into the many breeds we see today? When Noah brought them onto the ark he was likely fully aware of the ability of animals to speciate. However the atheist fails to admit that the observations made confirm that speciation is confined to the "kind" or genus. And it was the "kind" that God created. It was the "kind" that was brought on board the ark. And it is these same "kinds" we see running, swimming, hopping, and whatever else they do on the earth to this very day. Bacteria remain bacteria and people remain people. That's real, observable science.

Another issue brought up by Mr. Shoesmith was that of Christianity being an "Existential Paradox". Without a doubt this concept completely confounded the out-of-their-league a-supernaturalists who had comfortably inserted "christians" into a nice tidy little definition. In fact Christianity can be just as much a religion as anything else be it golf or dentistry. So many people are easily talked out of their faith in college or university because it was, for them, nothing more than fire insurance - something their parents or pastor told them was true. When a more sophisticated, nuanced idea emerges from the lips of a professor who knows the multi-syllable words mom and dad could never wrap their feeble minds around, well, the sarcasm-laced religion of atheism takes root and they simply exchange one religion for another.

There are many who live their days in the closed-minded arena of atheistic belief yet never force it on anyone else. And then there are those who live their lives with a religious conviction to eradicate the belief in transcendental realities altogether. The group who took on Mr. Shoesmith were this type of atheist. They invited him to discuss cannibalism as a ruse to debate their religious tenets - cannibalism, naturalism, liberalism, etc. They, as many others, are no different than the Jehovah's Witness or Mormon who walk the streets knocking on doors trying to convince anyone who dares open their door enough for a foot to get in that their religion is the right one. Atheism is a closed-minded delusion excluding all other possibilities than the natural. You will hear, should you listen to the debate embedded at the end of this video, the atheists say several times that nothing exists outside of nature - a clear violation of the converse fallacy of accident. This is the same fallacious argument which would boldly declare that because one has never seen a black swan no black swans could ever possibly exist. This in spite of the mountains of anecdotal evidence which supports the existence of supernatural realities.

The debate quickly shifted to evolution. Mr Shoesmith was quick to point out that he is not a scientist yet the panel offered their typical and predictable evidences anyway. They are, as they always are, bacteria. Yes - the hero of modern evolution. Nylonse, E-coli, my oh my. The problem with this rather limited evidence is the fact that the Bible happily predicted the speciation we observe in biology. They offered another little piece of recent evidence and asked us to look into it while they ignored Mike's recent evidence in favor of Young Earth Creationism; a tactic of plugging one's ears and pretending they don't hear.

The evidence they proposed involves yeast. We found the research out of McGill University here. But we defer to the interpretation from our peers concerning the science of this discovery.

From Brian Morris M.S. of the Institute for Creation Research we see creation scientists way ahead of the pack on these issues - unafraid to look at all of the evidence with clear heads and open minds. Yet the atheists are comfortable ignoring the evidence which extensively refutes the evolution claims at every turn.

There are many scientific explanations for yeast cell replication which do not invoke deep-time mythology. See creation ministries international for a great deal of education on yeast right here. There is no need to credit the creation myth for modern atheism for speciation among bacteria. Once again another atheist hero goes down in flames. See also our many evolution videos at our youtube channel - youtube.com/ppsimmons - for more fuel for the fire engulfing the dying atheist worldview.

Logically speaking, and Mr. Shoesmith's favorite topic, atheism is indefensible based solely on logic itself. Modern naturalistic atheism is a logical wasteland. It is the very embodiment of the perfect example of the converse fallacy of accident. They have never knowingly experienced the supernatural so therefore they argue that it must not exist. This was the most disturbing aspect of the entire debate - that so much time was spent educating the atheists on their own beliefs. Finally it was agreed upon that modern atheism is the denial of acceptance that transcendental realities exist. Christopher Hitchens once said that the reason he debates theists is because the argument which underlies all arguments involves the belief in the existence of supernatural realities and the repudiation of that belief. And we at PPSIMMONS agree - that may have been the smartest thing that man ever said.

To clarify - Mike was asked by an atheist on the panel if a person develops the ability to climb Everest without supplemental oxygen would that person's children have that ability? He answered "why not?". He was laughed at and told he doesn't understand evolution - obvious straw man. Yet if the climber's child received the same training as the climber - then why WOULDN'T he be able to? Was the panel suggesting the climber's child would be too stupid to do it? You see, they were attempting to drag Mike into agreeing with them that evolution is true. They asked him to define evolution and when he didn't give the atheist version of deep time mythology they launched childish ridicule at him per the doctrine of elitism outlined in Mike's book offered as a PPSIMMONS resource.

Get Mike's book today for a real education on what atheism really is, what Christianity really is, and find out now why The Atheists are Wrong and why atheism ruins everything.

Death of an ATHEIST Nation - Destroyed by Liberalism

The Daily Mail is reporting today (Nov 30) that Japan is in danger of heading for extinction after researchers found that more and more of the country’s young people are shunning the idea of marriage and having children.

Japan is, by many estimates, 80 percent atheist and since marriage is a religious ceremony it stands to reason that they would be predominantly liberal on marriage since liberalism is a tenet within the religion of Atheism. The PPSIMMONS resource book written by Mike Shoesmith details the relationship between liberalism and modern Atheism. Titled "The Atheists are Wrong - How Modern Atheism Ruins Everything" Shoesmith goes into uninhibited detail on the connection between so many ills facing the modern world dynamic and the great harm done to an entire generation by removing God from society.

Asked why they remain unmarried, 13.5 per cent of men and 11.6 per cent of women aged between 25 and 34 said they do not know how to be in a relationship, and 11.9 per cent of men and 7.0 per cent of women aged between 18 and 24 gave the same answer, the institute said.

Get the PPSIMMONS resource today and learn the truth behind what is happening to Japan and the rest of the current generation. What are they teaching YOUR children in college and university? Answer: it's every man for himself because you're only an animal. Arm yourselves with knowledge. Do it now. Get it here.

Why "Scientists" Really Should Not be Trusted

Scientists are people - and people have agendas. More often than not these agendas are hidden and are often unknown to the "scientist". These can be very subtle yet they govern all the the person's presuppositions which direct the conclusions made after following the trail of evidence.

The word "science" comes from the Latin word "scientia" which literally means "knowledge". Scientific method is, essentially, using that knowledge to predict outcomes. Yet entire fields of research have sprung up around unproven theories which are being called fields of scientific endeavor yet are based entirely on the presupposition. These fields include but are not limited to "evolutionary biology" which is a total misnomer since it excludes limited adaptation within genuses and completely embraces the theory of macro pan-genus microbe-to-man evolution. This more resembles religion than science.

Scientists have been wrong so many times they have not earned a right to be believed. Doctors used to promote smoking cigarettes in advertisements. They prescribed them for relief of stress. George Washington himself died from the "science" of blood letting - something we now know has no beneficial effect.

Could it be that this generation of Americans is so over weight because of the lies told by the last generations's "scientists"? How soon is too soon to begin drinking Cola? This ad quotes scientific findings in a lab and suggests Cola drinking should begin when they're babies!

The consequences of a Cola-rich diet are now obvious a generation later. Someone once pointed out to me that if you read a Pepsi bottle backwards the message is "The Next Generation isded". Get it? "pepsi" upside down and reversed reads "isded" or IS DEAD! I know - it's a stretch. But the results are in folks - drinking cola (and other garbage) has made the western world obese. Yet where were the "scientists" on this?

This ad promoting the consumption of beer by breast feeding mothers says it is "essential" and promotes it as an "appetizing stimulating tonic". This is probably not the recommended drink in today's climate for mothers but hey - who's judging?

And the list goes on and on. We haven't even touched on the scientific frauds like Piltdown Man, climate gate, etc. One of the greatest scientific atrocities however is still going strong today. It is the teaching as fact that people are evolved from the primordial slime and are nothing more than animals. This is the worst form of child abuse imaginable and society is beginning to reap a harvest. From std's to unwanted pregnancies to breast cancer to youth depression leading to suicide we can offer no better answer than Alexandre Soljenitsyne who famously said "All of this has befallen us because men have forgotten God".

Society has placed the "scientists" on pillars and labelled them gods. In turn the people have been relegated to the status of animals and now we see humanity playing the role. Give us our beer and our sports idols. Give us our steak and our Simpsons and we will live as animals because you say that is what we are. Scientists have convinced an entire generation that they have no transcendental value and nature is the ultimate judge. So we see gangs of youths robbing stores and young people killing themselves because they have no hope - no God to save them. The learned gods with their tenure have talked them out of their faith with high sounding orations from Nietzsche and Watts. And now it is harvest time. The great "Falling away" has happened just as the Bible predicts all thanks to so-called "scientists" who promote their presupposition as fact - a fact which will one day be as ridiculous as blood-letting but not before it kills as many people as possible.

¶Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first...

2 Thessalonians 2:3a

Did Humans Cause Dinosaur Extinctions? - plus video - Dinosaurs - Man - Evolution and The Bible

ICR

Like elephants and a few other animals, rhinoceroses are among the last of the large animals called "megafauna." Rhinos exist in African, Indonesian, Javan, Indian, and Sumatran varieties.¹ They are also among the rarest animals in the wild.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature declared the Western Black Rhino officially extinct this year. The Northern White Rhino, also from Africa, may be on its way out as well, and the last Javan Rhino in Vietnam may be gone for good.²

Poachers are notorious for killing the large animals in order to harvest their highly valued horns, which some believe have medicinal properties, including use as an aphrodisiac. The horn is made of the protein keratin, the primary component of fingernails and hair.

This confirms what researchers generally observe about the extinction of species: The primary cause is interaction with humans. When mankind moves into an area, some of the first animals to face destruction are those that are the most threatening, such as the megafauna. Thus, recent centuries have seen the demise of such giants as Haast's eagle³ and the moa, a giant flightless bird.⁴

"The current extinction crisis is caused primarily by human impacts upon wild populations," according to UK biologist Rosie Woodroffe, who wrote on the declining populations of large carnivores.⁵

Rhinos are not carnivores, but in addition to being valued for their horns, they are large and can be dangerous if they are frightened or challenged. Thus, it stands to reason that if humans primarily cause the current extinctions of megafauna, then they may have caused past extinctions as well.⁶ That could help explain the plethora of legends, found in all cultures, of heroes killing dragons, which were probably dinosaurs in many cases.⁷

Why did the dinosaurs go extinct? One very likely factor—among others, such as climate changes after the Flood—is the same reason the black rhinoceros and so many other megafauna have died out: People moved in and eliminated them.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE WITH REFERENCES

The Ingenious Way That Bacteria Resist Aging - plus video -EVOLUTION - Settled Science - or - A Magic Man In The Mud?

ICR

Bacterial cells are singularly long-lived. They keep dividing for what seems like forever. But because they are made of biochemicals, their DNA and proteins should suffer damage similar to what any other cell endures, including animal cells. What keeps bacterial cell components from wearing down?

Microbiologists have been trying to find out how these single-cell organisms handle chemical damage, which relentlessly accumulates due to friction and uncontrolled chemical reactions. So far, the results have been confusing, but a new analysis appears to have confirmed that bacteria have a remarkably well-engineered damage-reduction program.

University of California, San Diego biologist Lin Chao led a computer analysis of prior experiments.¹ His team's work, published in Current Biology, cited a 2005 study showing that bacteria do age and that the cells do accumulate damage. But a subsequent study clearly showed no evidence of aging in the same bacteria species. Chao's analysis asserts that both are true.

His team proposed that when one bacterium divides into two cells, more of the damaged biochemicals end up in one than the other of the daughter cells. After many generations, a single population of bacteria ends up as a mixture in which cells filled with accumulated damage live side-by-side with "rejuvenated" cells.²

Chao said in a university press release:

So for a single celled organism that has acquired damage that cannot be repaired, which of the two alternatives is better—to split the cellular damage in equal amounts between the two daughters or to give one daughter all of the damage and the other none?²

"We think evolution drove this asymmetry," he said. But he did not explain how. He also said, "Because you have this asymmetry, one daughter by having more damage has aged, while the other daughter gets a rejuvenated start with less damage."²

Of course, the species as a whole will survive longer if each generation could redistribute damaged parts. But allocating so many tiny parts is a horrendous logistical problem.

Since no problem ever solves itself, either an intelligent person continually selects and removes the damaged biochemicals, or an intelligent engineer encoded an internal apparatus that identifies and transports the tiny offending chemicals into one daughter cell and not the other. There is no evidence that engineers live inside bacteria, so the latter option fits best.

While it makes sense that a dividing bacterium would give more damaged biochemicals to one cell than another, it makes no sense that "evolution"—which by definition excludes intelligent causes—could "drive" such a strategy. Strategies always come from strategists and never from nature.

Such an ingenious design could only have come from an ingenious Designer.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

CHRISTIANITY: The Stars are on OUR Side

Youtuber Philhellenes made a video a while back with the title "Atheism: The Stars are on Our Side". We did a refutation video which clearly demonstrated the utter failure of his argument and we were subsequently blocked from his channel for our efforts. Here is our video posted to our sister channel "prosperousindividual". Following the video we will discuss a recent post made by CMI which further exemplifies the glory of God in what the scriptures tell us about the cosmos and specifically stars.

Creation Ministries International has expounded on the greatness of Philhellenes' monumental epic fail.

What does the Bible say about the number of stars? Jeremiah writes: ‘As the host of heaven cannot be numbered, neither the sand of the sea measured: so will I multiply the seed of David my servant’ (Jeremiah 33:22). At that time, when men of learning were convinced that there were only about 3,000 stars, Jeremiah wrote that nobody would be able to count the stars. Let us consider an imaginary dialogue between Jeremiah (J) and a well known astronomer (A) of that day, about 600 years before Christ:

A: Jeremiah, you write about the number of stars as if you knew what you were saying. My colleagues and I have studied astronomy for a long time and daily concern ourselves with the stars. Our researches have made astronomy the most advanced science. Even kings appreciate and respect our findings.

J: You may have discovered many things, but you are mistaken about the number of stars.

A: How do you know that? You have not studied astronomy, not even for a single semester. So do not speak about matters which you do not understand!

J: Yes, of course my studies were in a totally different field. But I still maintain that nobody is able to count the stars, because they total such a large number, similar to the number of grains of sand on the beach.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESA/Harvard-Smithsonian CfA

Messier 81 galaxy

A: We have recently completed a survey of the number of stars in the sky, employing our younger colleagues whose vision is sharp and unimpaired. They did not miss any stars, and their count was 3,000. Revise your biblical text; it has been disproved by our scientific findings.

J: I still maintain that I have written the truth. I am no expert, but I know Him Who created the stars. He has told me and I believe Him.

We are not cosmic outcasts, as the 19^th century atheistic philosopher Nietzsche claimed, neither are we ‘gypsies at the edge of the universe’ as the 20^th century French atheist biologist Jacques Monod maintained. On the contrary, we are beloved by our Father in heaven, through Jesus Christ, if we have accepted His salvation by grace through faith.

Heinz Kaminski, who was for many years director of the Bochum observatory, was once asked what his thoughts were when he first pointed his telescope at the heavens. He replied in part:⁴

.‘Astronomers have reduced man to an atomic nothing; he was continuously dragged out and left to stand alone like a worm at 17,000 million light-years. He is overwhelmed by the enormous stars and vast distances. To himself he appears tiny and insignificant. Clever people have forgotten that this puny human being occupies an important place in the eye of the Creator, as can be read in the Bible. When God had created the earth … he then created man and gave him some crumbs of the greatness of his own Spirit. And these crumbs enable us to grasp something of the logistics of the entire system. If we did not carry this creative spark, we would not have been able to analyze the laws of the universe nor understand their effects.’

The universe in its immensity was especially created for us humans so that we could see and appreciate the glory and the power of God. He is so great that it required no more effort to create ten stars than one, or one thousand, or even 10²⁵. He did not exert Himself, neither did He perspire. His creative words were sufficient: ‘For He spake, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast’ (Psalm 33:9).

SEE HERE FOR ORIGINAL ARTICLE

DNA Study Contradicts Human/Chimp Common Ancestry - plus video -Evolution's DIRTY LITTLE SECRET - of Species, Kinds and The Story

ICR

Evolutionary biologists argue that since human and chimp DNA are nearly identical, both species must have evolved from a common ancestor. However, creation scientists have pointed out that their DNA is, in fact, very dissimilar. The vast majority of each species' DNA sequence is not genes, but instead regulated gene expression. A new report unmistakably confirmed that the regulatory DNA of humans is totally different from that of chimps, revealing no hint of common ancestry.

Biologist John F. McDonald, of the Georgia Institute of Technology's School of Biology, and his team wrote that chimp and human genes are more than "98.5% identical," a commonly quoted statistic.¹ Yet humans don't look or act 98.5 percent identical to chimps. Thus, something other than genes must be involved, and this has been overlooked in evolutionists' efforts to establish chimp-human ancestry. In 2005, molecular biologist and creation scientist Dan Criswell wrote:

However, such sequence similarity was based only on a fraction [less than four percent] of the total genome of man and chimpanzees, and reflects only the physiological similarities of humans and chimpanzees based on their cellular protein content, not the overall genomic content. The homology [similarity] frequently reported for the human/chimpanzee genomes excluded "indels," which are areas with zero sequence homology.²

"Indels" refer to insertions (in-) and deletions (-del) of genetic material, but they are simply DNA sequence differences.

Publishing in the open access journal Mobile DNA, the research team led by McDonald tested the hypothesis that the "substantial INDEL variation that exists between humans and chimpanzees may contribute significantly to the regulatory differences between the species."¹McDonald said in a Georgia Tech press release:

Our findings are generally consistent with the notion that the morphological and behavioral differences between humans and chimpanzees are predominately due to differences in the regulation of genes rather than to differences in the sequence of the genes themselves.³

The team's analysis of indels confirmed exactly what Bible-believing biologists have been saying for years. The indels and other variously named non-gene DNA are not "junk DNA," and they are critical to the formation of each living creature.⁴ Biblical geneticist Jeff Tomkins wrote in 2009:

Most of the DNA sequence across the chromosomal region encompassing a gene is not used for protein coding, but rather for gene regulation, like the instructions in a recipe that specify what to do with the raw ingredients. The genetic information that is functional and regulatory is stored in "non-coding regions [including indels]," which areessential for the proper functioning of all cells, ensuring that the right genes are turned on or off at the right time in concert with other genes.⁵

The argument that chimp-human DNA similarity is evidence of common ancestry is possible only by ignoring the 98 percent of DNA that is different!⁶ It is like arguing that an aspirin pill is identical to a cyanide pill because they are the same shape and color. When do thedifferences enter the conversation?

Regulatory DNA—not just genes—is essential for each kind of organism, is almost entirely useful, and is different in humans than it is in chimps. How could billions of DNA differences have evolved in just four million years? It's impossible.⁷ Humans and chimpanzees were distinctly and uniquely created after all.

Original Article with references.

'Dinosaur Plant' Evolution Stories Conflict - plus video - Dinosaurs - Man - Evolution and The Bible

ICR

Cycads, also called "sago palms," are cone-bearing plants with long leathery shoots that often adorn dinosaur dioramas. Though there are about 11 living cycad genera, which further divide into about 300 species, many more once existed but are now known only from fossils.1

The oldest rock layers that contain cycads are supposedly about 250 million years old. However, in a study published in Science, a group of scientists compared the similarities between cycad DNA sequences and did not find the many DNA differences that should have resulted from a quarter-billion years' worth of mutations and evolution.2

Even after applying evolutionary assumptions to make their molecular clock work, most likely including a very slow mutation rate, the researchers' results showed that almost all of today's cycads "only began diversifying 10 million years ago," the study's lead author, Nathalie Nagalingum, told LiveScience.3

So, did cycads emerge suddenly 250 million years ago, according to the evolutionary age assignment given to their first appearance as fossils, or did they suddenly diversify only 10 million years ago, according to the evolutionary age assignment given to their DNA differences? Is either story even close?

Surely this vast age discrepancy cannot be the fault of fossils or DNA, because they were the same in both studies. Instead, the assumption of vast age produces the confusion.

However, the creation model's young age explains these data with no conflicts. Rocks with dinosaur fossils also contain many fossils of animals and plants—including cycads and Wollemi pines—that are essentially the same as their living counterparts.4 They look so similar to living creatures because they were only deposited thousands of years ago after being swept up in one of a number of catastrophic watery surges associated with the year of Noah's Flood.

According to Scripture, which provides eyewitness accounts that go back to the very beginning, there is no such thing as a dinosaur age—at least, not one without people, cycads, birds, marsupials, and other "modern" creatures.5

The molecular clock-based 10-million-year-old cycad divergence described in Science may actually reflect the rapid diversification into many species of those few genera of cycads that survived the Flood and pioneered the post-Flood world only four thousand or so years ago.

Cycads are living reminders that dinosaurs and modern plants and creatures recently shared living space. And the recent cycad dating mismatch is a reminder that evolutionary dates are all based on broken clocks.

Original article with references.

New Study Shows Enzymes Couldn't Evolve - plus video - 3. THE UNIQUENESS OF MAN and Evolution - An Embarrassing Conundrum (VID 3 in a 7 part series)

ICR

According to evolutionary theory, chemicals must have somehow organized themselves into cellular life, presumably long ago. And that means that enzymes must have formed themselves, too.

But enzymes are highly engineered miniaturized machines. Even intelligent human scientists armed with the most sophisticated technology cannot reproduce their design and manufacture—so, logically, neither can unintelligent chemicals or the laws that govern them. The title of a recent scientific report asserted that a particular enzyme evolved. The study results, however, clearly demonstrate that this enzyme was purposefully created.

The investigators compared the three-dimensional structures of similarly shaped enzymes that are found in different species of bacteria. One enzyme splits water and combines the resulting hydrogen atoms with sulfur in a process that captures chemical energy. The researchers compared it with another class of enzymes that also splits individual water molecules, but then combines the hydrogen with a carbon-based molecule.

The enzyme that manipulates sulfur—called a CS2 (carbon disulfide) hydrolase—is required because its bacteria inhabit sulfurous volcanic waters in Italy. The studies confirmed that the core structure of the CS2 hydrolase, like that of similar enzymes, is critical. The scientists wrote in Nature, "Any change in this area of the protein [enzyme] adversely affected protein activity."1

On one hand, evolution's story requires that, at some point in time, something altered what would become the enzyme core again and again, as each structural piece evolved into place over eons. On the other hand, science shows that altering the enzyme core in the slightest is impossible without making the whole structure useless.

The researchers also found that CS2 hydrolase is distinct from enzymes with an otherwise identical core because it has an additional long, narrow tunnel through which only CS2 can pass. The tunnel "functions as a specificity filter," ensuring that no similar molecule such as carbon dioxide enters.1

The researchers found a clue in the DNA that suggested to them an idea of how the enzyme could have evolved. The DNA that codes for the tunnel portion of the CS2 hydrolase gene is surrounded by unique sequences, indicating that this DNA portion may have been added to the main enzyme's DNA. Perhaps some unknown cellular mechanism "stitched in" this extra bit at just the right place among the bacteria's 1.8 million DNA bases, adding the tunnel portion to a CO2-converting enzyme through "lateral gene transfer" and thereby forming CS2 hydrolase.2,1 If so, could this process properly be called "evolution"?

No—if the gene jumped from another bacterium to this one, it did not evolve because it already existed elsewhere. But in order for a lateral gene transfer to even work, in addition to the enzymes themselves, another mechanism had to already exist that could recognize, accept, and insert the foreign DNA in just the right place. Only then could it retrofit an enzyme in just the right way to enable the bacterium to live on sulfur.

Where's the evidence here for evolutionary innovation? Pre-existing DNA and pre-existing DNA transfer and splicing programs appear to have existed from the beginning.

The authors asserted that CS2 hydrolase "emerged owing to the evolution of a new quaternary [final protein] structure."1 But this ignores the facts that no new DNA actually "emerged," and the proper placement of transferred DNA required just the opposite of evolution—purposeful design.

CS2 hydrolase did not evolve. In fact, experimental science shows that this enzyme functions today only because of its precise and specific arrangement of parts. And like any machine with multiple, interconnected parts, whether biological or man-made, all the correct parts assembled in the correct configuration were needed from the very beginning.3

Original Article with references.

Dinosaurs Ate Rice

ICR

Just what did dinosaurs eat?

One way researchers are finding out is by studying coprolites, or fossilized dinosaur dung. And as it turns out, some dinosaurs ate rice plants. But if flowering plants like rice did not evolve until millions of years after dinosaurs lived—as evolution maintains—how could dinosaurs have eaten them?

Some coprolites contain phytoliths, which are uniquely shaped microscopic crystals manufactured by various plant tissues. Most phytoliths are made of silicon dioxide, the same chemical that comprises sand. Scientists examining these tiny grains can often discern from which plant they came.

For example, in 2005, researchers found phytoliths from grass, palm trees, conifers, and other flowering plants in (probably sauropod) dinosaur coprolites from India.1 "It was very unexpected….We will have to rewrite our understanding of its evolution….We may have to add grass to the dioramas of dinosaurs we see in museums," palaeobotanist Caroline Strömberg told Nature News at the time.2

Recently, Strömberg and two of her co-authors from the 2005 study described coprolite-encased phytoliths that are so similar to those made by certain modern rice plants that those found in dinosaur rocks "can be assigned to the rice tribe, Oryzeae, of grass subfamily Ehrhartoideae."3 They collected these samples from the same Indian rock layers, the Lameta Formation, that contained their 2005 finds.

This find joins others that have shown that rice, grass, palm trees, and conifers from dinosaur rocks were essentially the same as their living counterparts. It's as though millions of years of plant evolution never occurred.

The Lameta formation includes sedimentary layers interbedded with volcanic rock layers. It is huge, covering a large area of India.4 The Flood described in the book of Genesis is the best explanation for this scale of upheaval, showing that the fossils found there resulted from the Flood.

Thus, these coprolites show that rice plants existed before the Flood. Either rice had diversified from an originally created grass that was common to many other grasses, like wheat and bamboo, or God created rice grasses separately from other grass kinds. Studies show that rice grasses do not hybridize with other grasses.5 These dinosaur-eaten phytoliths add weight to the idea that rice was a distinct creation from the beginning.

According to Scripture, God created all the grasses, plants, and grazing mammals, along with any grazing dinosaurs like sauropods, by the sixth day of the creation week. As far as what the fossils have shown, Scripture is right.

Original article with references.

Did Astronomers Find an Evolving Planet?

ICR

A Hawaii-based astronomer announced at an October 19, 2011, NASA meeting the discovery of a young-looking planet forming near the star LkCa 15. "You can actually see the planet forming, as the process is happening right now," Adam Kraus, of the University of Hawaii's Institute of Astronomy, told the Associated Press.1 But how does he know that it is forming?

Though a related university press release didn't show original photographs,2 in the AP report Kraus described what he and colleague Michael Ireland saw through their uniquely equipped telescope: "We see this young star, it has a disc around it that planets are probably forming out of and we see something right in the middle of a gap in the disc."1 Kraus and Ireland's research is scheduled to be published in The Astrophysical Journal.3

According to AP, the planet-like object "is estimated to have started taking shape about 50,000 to 100,000 years ago." But even if that object is a planet, what observations support the theory that it evolved from particles found in the dust disc? The answer is none, because the supposed evolution of planets has not been observed, but assumed. These assumptions were then used as the basis of "scientific models of how planets form."1

Not only was its evolutionary history assumed, but the physics of dust clouds prohibits planet formation. The problem is that such small particles bounce off each other when they collide, instead of sticking together.4 A few years ago, University of California Santa Cruz planetary scientist Erik Asphaug described difficulties modeling the critical early period of dust accumulation that supposedly leads to pre-planets called "planetesimals." He asserted that "dust grains coagulate," then wrote:

However, too great a turbulence disrupts agglomerates faster than they form….Not only must turbulence be low, but the gas must go away before the growing planetesimals spiral in.... Decoupled [separate] solids spiral towards the Sun at an estimated 1 AU [astronomical unit] per 10–1000 years, so there is not much time!5

Thus, even the models of planet development are packed with problems. So why did the AP's report of "scientific models of how planets form" fail to say so? In truth, "the problem of accreting meter-scale planetesimals is far from solved."5 But this is only a problem for planetary evolution—not planetary creation.

These astronomers may not have observed a planet at all. If it is a planet, what is the evidence that it is forming today, or that it formed by natural processes in the past? It might instead simply be in the process of falling apart or breaking down like everything else in the universe. Whichever is the case, these astronomers did not watch any planet forming!

And since a natural formation of planets defies physics, the creation of planets remains the best hypothesis to explain their existence.

Original Article with references.

New Study Can't Explain Blue Stragglers' Youth

ICR

Blue stragglers, according to NASA, "are older stars that acquire a new lease on life when they collide and merge with other stars."¹ But a new study calls into question whether stellar collisions can account for these remarkable stars. And blue stars burn their fuel so quickly that they actually look young.

Since their discovery, evolutionary astronomers have sought a way to explain how these stars can even exist. They burn fuel so fast that they should have burned out billions of years ago. American astronomers Aaron Geller and Robert Mathieu published in Nature a description of their model for how older stars could have acquired a "new lease on life" by siphoning matter from nearby gas giant stars through "mass transfer."²

They investigated stars within a cluster called NGC 188, found in the constellation Cepheus. It contains 21 blue stragglers, 16 of which are binary stars that closely interact with nearby stars. The researchers suspected that the blue stragglers' partners were white dwarfs, which would be small, leftover remnants of larger red stars that the blue ones had drained of fuel. Such dwarfs are too faint for direct observation, but they have sufficient mass to cause their partner stars to wobble.

Of the 16 binaries, 12 had rotational periods right at 1,000 days and were thus called "long-period" blue stragglers. The study authors ran a statistical analysis that showed "the theoretical and observed [mass] distributions are indistinguishable."² In other words, their theory that other stars "fed" these 12 blue stragglers matched well with what they observed.

But did this reconcile the relative youthfulness of these binary blue stars with their assumed billions of years of history? The answer is no. The authors wrote, "Blue straggler stars…should already have evolved into giant stars and stellar remnants,"² and their new observations do not solve this deep-time problem.

Blue stragglers should burn through all their fuel in "a few million years at best."³ But these NGC 188 stars are supposed to be seven billion years old. So, to make them fit that age, these authors maintain that they were not initially blue stars, but instead burned fuel at a normal rate for billions of years. Then suddenly, within the last one million years, all 12 of them began siphoning extra fuel from their binary partners so that they only look young right now.

However, nothing explains the many blue stragglers that are not binary stars and yet exist near and far throughout the universe. Could they have received recent "youthfulness" through collisions with other stars?

In an article summarizing the Geller and Mathieu paper, University of Cambridge astronomer Christopher Tout wrote, "Thus, in this cluster [NGC 188], a collisional origin for blue stragglers is much rarer than expected, and the authors' study casts doubt on whether it occurs at all."⁴ The modeled scenario in which blue stars form by collision did not match observations.

So, isolated blue stars could not have received their young looks from a binary system, since by definition they have no binary from which to siphon fuel. They probably didn't receive their youthful appearance from collisions, either, according to these results. And though the binary blue stragglers may have siphoned fuel from nearby partners, the idea that 12 of 16 only did so recently—after an imagined 7-billion-year wait—defies reasonable odds.

Thus, the best explanation is still the most straightforward one—blue straggler stars look young because they are young.

Original Article with references.

Earth Hit the 7-Billion Mark Too Late

ICR

The world's population will reach seven billion on October 31, 2011, according to the United Nations, and media outlets are heralding the issue of overcrowding on the planet. How long did it take for this many humans to be born?

The evolutionary version of human population growth presents a fantastic scenario to answer that question. In this imaginary long-ages history, the population did not grow at all for millions of years before suddenly taking off only a few thousand years ago. In the July 29, 2011, issue of Science, demographic anthropology expert Jean-Pierre Bocquet-Appel wrote:

After the members of the genus Homo had been living as foragers for at least 2.4 million years, agriculture began to emerge in seven or eight regions across the world, almost simultaneously at the beginning of the Holocene.1

Supposedly, the advent of agriculture enabled population growth at that time. But according to the Bible and historical records, there was never a time when humans weren't engaged in agriculture.

The problem is that in this projected timeline, people ("genus Homo") must have had virtually no population growth "for at least 2.4 million years." Bocquet-Appel wrote, "The world's population on the eve of the emergence of agriculture is estimated to have been 6 million individuals."1 Thus, the first human couple that supposedly evolved from ape-like ancestors would have had only 6 million descendants after 2.4 million years. This requires a population growth rate of about 0.000000009—essentially zero. Virtually no growth for 2.4 million years?

In contrast, the average historically observed growth rate has been at least 0.4 percent, at times spiking to above two percent. Even a "pre-industrial farming population" growth rate of 0.1 percent per year—Bocquet-Appel's number—would have yielded today's seven billion people in only 7,062 years.1 As the late Dr. Henry Morris, founder of the Institute for Creation Research, asked, "How could it be that the planet only now is experiencing a population crisis—why not several hundred thousand years ago, soon after man first appeared on earth?"2

To try and explain this slow growth, Bocquet-Appel stated, "An increase in the birth rate was closely followed in time by an increase in mortality." And the cause of all this death was "infectious diseases" such as "Rotavirus and Coronavirus."1

But this only invokes more unlikely events. How could such diseases maintain a near zero balance of birth and death rates for so long without randomly killing the whole population at some point? And why would these diseases suddenly lose their population-reducing effect after so many supposed eons? Plainly, the infectious disease idea, along with unrealistically slow growth rates, are ad hoc add-ons that prop up long-age thinking.

But the current world population aligns completely with biblical history, with no added stories. Using census records from the last 400 years and a bit of algebra, and assuming a natural logarithmic growth, eight Flood survivors 4,500 years ago produce 7 billion people almost exactly.3 This is powerful evidence that biblical history is accurate, and man-made evolutionary history is not.

Original Article with references.

Mercury's Fading Magnetic Field Fits Creation Model

ICR

Planets, including the earth, generate magnetic fields that encompass the space around them. Observations have shown that, like earth's, the planet Mercury's magnetic field is rapidly breaking down, and NASA's Messenger spacecraft confirmed that again earlier this year.

If the planets in the solar system are billions of years old, why do these magnetic fields still exist?

In 1974 and 1975, the Mariner 10 spacecraft measured Mercury's magnetic field strength with its onboard magnetometer and sent the data to earth. The astronomers analyzing the data at the time found that the average field strength was 4.8 x 1022 gauss cm3, which "is about 1% that of the Earth."1

A decade later, creation physicist D. Russell Humphreys published a magnetic field model based on clues from the Bible. He reasoned that earth and the planets all shared a watery beginning, in accord with Genesis 1 and 2 Peter 3:5.2 He calculated what the magnetic field strength would have been at the creation by using a mass of aligned water molecules equal to the masses of each planet.

Then, he plotted the rate at which the magnetic fields would have diminished over the roughly 6,000 years since. Humphreys wrote, "Electrical resistance in a planet's core will decrease the electrical current causing the magnetic field, just as friction slows down a flywheel."3 The resulting model accurately predicted the magnetic field strengths of Uranus and Neptune, as well as the declining strength of Mercury's field.4

In 2008, Messenger flew past Mercury and captured a magnetic field measurement, and Humphreys compared it with the decaying slope generated by his creation model. Sure enough, Mercury's magnetic field strength had diminished since 1974, right in line with the predicted value of the creation magnetic field model.

If Mercury's magnetic field is supposed to have lasted for many millions of years, then it should be very stable over vast time periods. But as Messenger's data show, researchers can measure its decay within a person's lifetime.

Humphreys wrote, "My predicted 4% decrease in only 33 years would be very hard for evolutionary theories of planetary magnetic fields to explain, but a greater decrease would be even harder on the theories."3 He anticipated more accurate 2011 measurements, which Science published on September 30.

The Science authors wrote that the field strength for Mercury is "~27% lower in magnitude than the centered-dipole estimate implied by the polar Mariner 10 flyby."5 This confirms that Mercury's magnetic field is rapidly diminishing, which in turn confirms that the field must only be thousands of years old—just as the creation model predicts.

Full article from ICR with references.

Ancient Paint Workshop Challenges Human Evolutionary Story

ICR

In 2008, excavations in a South African cave uncovered two red-stained abalone shell bowls along with various tools in what was evidently a workshop where ochre and other ingredients were mixed, most likely for use as paint. Researchers examined the artifacts and have published a study in which they say the artifacts are 100,000 years old. Could they really be that ancient?

According to standard evolutionary dogma, mankind did not start evolving advanced cognitive abilities until about 70,000 years ago. Christopher Henshilwood, lead author of the study that appeared in Science, told Nature News that these artifacts "push back by 20,000 or 30,000 years" the imagined advent of "complex cognition,"1 or the time when humans finally had the brainpower to prepare and use paint.

In 2001, Donald Johanson, the famed discoverer of the fossil primate "Lucy," wrote, "The archaeological picture changed dramatically around 40-50,000 years ago with the appearance of behaviorally modern humans."2 But Henshilwood said that his date for these paint-processing materials "suggests conceptual and probably cognitive abilities which are the equivalent of modern humans" (emphasis added).1

So, did man evolve modern thought capacities 40-50,000, 70,000, or 100,000 years ago? Are any of these numbers trustworthy? Not only does the 100,000-year date assignment conflict with prior evolutionary notions, but also with the straightforward 6,000 or so years of world history recorded in the Bible.

The study authors performed three different dating techniques on the remains.3 Curiously, however, they did not carbon-date any artifacts. Some of the tools included cow, seal, and dog bones, and the abalone shells must still contain protein. All of this material should have datable carbon. Why were they not carbon-dated?

The answer probably has to do with the fact that carbon dating is unreliable for artifacts older than 60,000 or so carbon-years. If any carbon-14 was detected in these remains, then the carbon age would be no more than 60,000 years, and probably far fewer—thousands of years younger than these scientists' target date.

In their Science report, the archaeologists showed dates on a photograph of several vertical feet of cave floor layers. However, one dating method showed an age of 100,000 years for a layer that was dated at only 75,000 years by another method. And there were other inconsistencies, raising suspicion over the reliability of the age assignments.4

And there is more. They labeled the very top eight-or-so-inch-thick layer "hiatus," instead of assigning it an age like the other layers. Then they labeled the next lower layer at about 68,000 years. Why would nine feet of cave sediments accumulate over 32,000 years, then almost no sediment accumulate for 68,000 years?

The idea that man evolved his cognitive abilities has no scientific support, either. Cognitive thoughts are not traits encoded by particular genes, but immaterial traits. Thoughts interact with the material world through the sophisticated architecture of the brain, which requires thousands of precisely interacting genes. Tinkering with brains or brain-developing genes brings disaster, not improvement. Thus, brain biology shows that modern human cognition must have been purposeful and present at the beginning.

The ideas that human cognition evolved and that these cave sediments are 100,000 years old are both underpinned by evolutionary dogma, not historical or scientific research. However, these paint-making tools do show that the earliest human inhabitants of what is today South Africa possessed modern human abilities—which makes sense if they had recently descended from Noah.

Original Article with references.