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Scary Times: More Americans Are Finally Coming Around To Accepting the Science of Evolution

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More Americans are coming to accept Charles Darwin’s “dangerous idea” of evolution, according to thirty years’ worth of national surveys.

Researchers have found that public acceptance of biological evolution has increased substantially in the last decade alone, following twenty years of relative stagnancy.

Between 1985 and 2010, roughly 40 percent of surveyed adults in the US agreed that “human beings, as we know them today, developed from earlier species of animals”. Taking into account the small number of fence-sitters, this suggests much of the nation was evenly divided on the theory.

By 2016, that percentage had, at last, become a majority, reaching 54 percent. . .

In 2019, researchers found 83 percent of liberal Democrats accepted evolution, whereas only 34 percent of conservative Republicans felt the same. (Read more from “Scary Times: More Americans Are Finally Coming Around To Accepting the Science of Evolution” HERE)

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Scientists Determine That the Earth’s Core Is Four-Times Younger Than Previously Thought; Evolutionary Timeline Impossible

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By BGR. In a new paper published in the American Physical Society’s Physical Review Letters, researchers explain that, after experimenting with recreating the conditions of the core for years, they believe Earth’s core is quite a bit younger than previously thought. They now say that the core is likely somewhere between 1 billion and 1.3 billion years old. . .

Based on all the data they have at this point, the researchers are placing their estimate on the extreme lower end of the spectrum (1 billion to 1.3 billion years), whereas past estimates have suggested the core may be as old as over 4 billion years. Understanding the forces that formed our planet and are allowing us to maintain an existence here are obviously very important and could help us to better grasp how life could be possible on other worlds. (Read more from “Scientists Determine That the Earth’s Core Is Four-Times Younger Than Previously Thought; Evolutionary Timeline Impossible” HERE)

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National Science Foundations Dramatically Revise Age of Earth’s Core

By UT News. By creating conditions akin to the center of the Earth inside a laboratory chamber, researchers have improved the estimate of the age of our planet’s solid inner core, putting it at 1 billion to 1.3 billion years old. . .

The Earth’s core is made mostly of iron, with the inner core being solid and the outer core being liquid. The effectiveness of the iron in transferring heat through conduction — known as thermal conductivity — is key to determining a number of other attributes about the core, including when the inner core formed. . .

The National Science Foundation and the National Natural Science Foundation of China supported the research. (Read more from “National Science Foundations Dramatically Revise Age of Earth’s Core” HERE)

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The Mathematical Impossibility of Evolution

By Institute for Creation Research. [C]onsider a very simple putative organism composed of only 200 integrated and functioning parts, and the problem of deriving that organism by [evolution]. The system presumably must have started with only one part and then gradually built itself up over many generations into its 200-part organization. The developing organism, at each successive stage, must itself be integrated and functioning in its environment in order to survive until the next stage. Each successive stage, of course, becomes statistically less likely than the preceding one, since it is far easier for a complex system to break down than to build itself up. A four-component integrated system can more easily “mutate” (that is, somehow suddenly change) into a three-component system (or even a four-component non-functioning system) than into a five-component integrated system. If, at any step in the chain, the system mutates “downward,” then it is either destroyed altogether or else moves backward, in an evolutionary sense.

Therefore, the successful production of a 200-component functioning organism requires, at least, 200 successive, successful such “mutations,” each of which is highly unlikely. Even evolutionists recognize that true mutations are very rare, and beneficial mutations are extremely rare—not more than one out of a thousand mutations are beneficial, at the very most.

But let us give the evolutionist the benefit of every consideration. Assume that, at each mutational step, there is equally as much chance for it to be good as bad. Thus, the probability for the success of each mutation is assumed to be one out of two, or one-half. Elementary statistical theory shows that the probability of 200 successive mutations being successful is then ½ to the 200th power, or one chance out of 10 to the 60th power. The number 10 to the 60th power, if written out, would be “one” followed by sixty “zeros.” In other words, the chance that a 200-component organism could be formed by mutation and natural selection is less than one chance out of a trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion! Lest anyone think that a 200-part system is unreasonably complex, it should be noted that even a one-celled plant or animal may have millions of molecular “parts.” (Read more from “The Mathematical Impossibility of Evolution” HERE)

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Evolution’s Time Problem

By Answers In Genesis. How do many scientists arrive at the age of 4½ billion years? They rely on radiometric dating, though the story is a bit more complicated than it sounds. Some rocks contain trace amounts of radioactive atoms. Those radioactive atoms decay into stable atoms over time. By knowing the decay rate and measuring the amount of both kinds of atoms in a rock, scientists can compute the amount of time it took to produce the stable atoms.

Some assumptions are involved, however. Were some of the stable atoms present in the rock to begin with? Did some of either type of atom leave or enter the rock during the time being measured for decay? To make matters worse, measuring the age of a rock by different kinds of radioactive atoms (such as uranium or rubidium) often yields very different ages. There are many examples of such discordant ages. . .

Today many scientists continue to believe in a 4½-billion-year-old earth, which evolution requires. They will continue to choose to believe that age, even though solid scientific reasons are available to doubt those dates. (Read more from “Evolution’s Time Problem” HERE)

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Evolutionists Face Another Massive Problem: DNA Discovered in Dino Bones

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A microscopic look at dinosaur cartilage from roughly 75 million years ago has turned up a cluster of exquisitely-preserved cells, and they just might contain something rather familiar.

Dusting off the skulls of two juvenile duck-billed dinosaurs (Hypacrosaurus stebingeri), shelved after their discovery in the 1980s, researchers noticed a bunch of tiny circular structures at the back – some linked together, others standing apart, all of them frozen in time.

Looking closer, several of these circles contained a dark material reminiscent of a nucleus, and others held tangled coils resembling chromosomes. . .

The half-life of this precious organic information has been calculated at about 521 years, so even under the best conditions, scientists predict it would only take about 5.3 millions years before the strands were completely unreadable.

Duck-billed dinosaurs were alive in Montana roughly 75 million years ago, which is 15 times longer than that; if their DNA is still around today, it would be astonishing. (Read more from “Evolutionists Face Another Massive Problem: DNA Discovered in Dino Bones” HERE)

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Evolutionists in Shock: Dinosaur Embryos Discovered to Be No Different From Modern Reptiles

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Fossilized dinosaur eggs discovered in 1976 have finally revealed their inner secrets for this first time — thanks to a cutting-edge new technology called synchrotron scanning.

In a new study, researchers scanned two Massospondylus carinatus dinosaur embryos first found in 1976 in South Africa’s Golden Gate Highlands National Park. They used synchrotron scanning, which is a kind of 3D X-ray scan. . .

In modern reptiles and birds, “the pattern in which bones start ossifying is quite similar.” In these creatures, the skull bones start to harden at the tip of the snout. The upper and back part of the skull, also known as the “braincase,” is the last piece of the puzzle to ossify, along with some jaw bones.

The findings indicate that these prehistoric herbivores were already using an embryo-development strategy common to modern crocodiles, chickens, turtles, and lizards. (Read more from “Evolutionists in Shock: Dinosaur Embryos Discovered to Be No Different From Modern Reptiles” HERE)

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WATCH: Yale Professor Turns Against Darwinism, Warns Darwinians ‘Will Destroy You If You Challenge’ the Theory

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David Gelernter, prominent writer and Yale University professor, believes it’s high time for people to drop Charles Darwin’s outdated theory of evolution. . .

Gelernter, who has been a proponent of Darwinism since childhood, argued that the longstanding theory of evolution simply doesn’t give a thorough enough explanation of, perhaps, the most important component of modern science: the actual origin of species. . .

He pointed out that the concept of intelligent design is not necessarily his favorite theory, but insists that it is an “absolutely serious argument,” pointing out that the theory is the very “first, and obviously most intuitive that comes to mind.” . . .

“I have to distinguish between the way I’ve been treated personally, which has been a very courteous and collegial way by my colleagues at Yale, they’re nice guys and I like them, they’re my friends,” he said in June remarks. “On the other hand, when I look at their intellectual behavior, what they publish, and, much more important, what they tell their students, Darwinism has indeed passed beyond a scientific argument.” . . .

“[I haven’t seen anything] approaching free speech on this topic,” Gelernter admitted. “It’s a bitter rejection, not just — a sort of bitter, fundamental, angry, outraged, violent rejection, which comes nowhere near scientific of intellectual discussion. I’ve seen that happen again and again. ‘I’m a Darwinist, don’t you say a word against it, or, I don’t wanna hear it, period.'”

(Read more from “Yale Professor Turns Against Darwinism, Warns Darwinians ‘Will Destroy You If You Challenge’ the Theory” HERE)

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1000+ Top Scientists Challenge the Massive Fraud of Evolution

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With Darwin Day, February 12, approaching, it’s good to report that the “Scientific Dissent from Darwinism” list currently tops a thousand names of PhD scientists who publicly declare their skepticism in the face of absolutist claims for evolutionary theory. The key word there is “publicly.”

February 12 is Charles Darwin’s birthday…The Dissent statement represents a splash of cold water on the great man. It reads, “We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged.” The signers hold professorships or doctorates from Cambridge, Oxford, Harvard, Berkeley, MIT, UCLA, the University of Pennsylvania, and many other prominent institutions. . .

The nonexistence of scientific skepticism was only natural since, as Darwin lobbyist Eugenie Scott would say in 2009, “There are no weaknesses in the theory of evolution.” See here for the “The Top Ten Scientific Problems with Biological and Chemical Evolution.”

What’s significant about the Dissent from Darwinism list is not so much the names and the institutions listed there but what they tell you about the many Darwin skeptics in the science world who wouldn’t dare sign. Scientists know the career costs that would come from publicly challenging evolutionary theory. Discovery Institute and its sister research lab, Biologic Institute, have welcomed refugees who were chased out of top spots in the research world. Douglas Axe, Günter Bechly, and Richard Sternberg are well known to Evolution News readers. Check out the Free Science website for other stories. . .

The signers of the Dissent list have all risked their careers or reputations in signing. Such is the power of groupthink. The scientific mainstream will punish you if they can, and the media is wedded to its narrative that “the scientists” are all in agreement and only “poets,” “lawyers,” and other “daft rubes” doubt Darwinian theory. In fact, I’m currently seeking to place an awesome manuscript by a scientist at an Ivy League university with the guts to give his reasons for rejecting Darwinism. The problem is that, as yet, nobody has the guts to publish it. (Read more from “1000+ Top Scientists Challenge the Massive Fraud of Evolution” HERE)

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Evolutionists Confounded Again: Snakes Unchanged for 100,000,000 Years

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Snakes are muscle-noodles that have been biting and thriving for at least 140 million years. And while they’ve gone from squirming alongside dinosaurs to living alongside humans on every continent besides Antartica, one thing has essentially remained the same: the snakes themselves. This seemingly time-resistant state of homeostasis is underscored by the recent discovery of ancient snakes preserved in Late Cretaceous amber.

An international team announced Wednesday in the journal Science Advances that they discovered two snakes trapped within the golden fossilized resin — one of which is considered the oldest known fossilized baby snake. This unique and very tiny snake hatchling, the Xiaophis myanmarensis, has anatomy comparable to living snakes despite its estimated 99 million years of age. With 97 vertebrae and rib bones, it’s most similar to the modern-day Asian Pipe snake, a smooth and glossy invertebrate that boasts a powerful jaw.

The snake’s anatomy is evidence that its general body shape has been conserved for a very long time, study co-author and University of Alberta professor Michael Caldwell, Ph.D. explains to Inverse. . .

These fossilized snakes were found in the Southeast nation of Myanmar; but when they were alive and slithering, their home existed within Laurasia, one of the two mega-continents that emerged when Pangea split. The scientists were able to pinpoint the snake’s ancient origins through the use of uranium-lead dating, which revealed that the amber that encased both snakes is around 99 million-years-old.

The amber itself is novel because of its ability to serve as a spyglass into the past. Encapsulated within it are fragments of the insects and plants that lived alongside the snakes, making it a mini time-capsule of the Mesozoic era. (Read more from “Evolutionists Confounded Again: Snakes Unchanged for 100,000,000 Years” HERE)

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Gasp! Is Science Leaning Toward Creation of Man?

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Say what? Human beings didn’t develop randomly out of primordial ooze? Rising spectacularly against the odds to create order from chaos like nothing else? Well, no. Much like science has blown the myth that a developing child is merely a blob of cells – something our troglodytic ancestors shockingly accepted – a current study published in the journal Human Evolution is shaking the foundations of evolutionist presumptions.

PhysOrg reports results indicate that “… nine out of 10 species on Earth today, including humans, came into being 100,000 to 200,000 years ago.” . . .

“In the past,” according to PJMedia, “researchers studied DNA in the nucleus of cells, which differs markedly from one species to another. But the new study analyzed a gene sequence found in mitochondrial DNA. (Mitochondria, the powerhouses of cells, produce about 90 percent of a cell’s chemical energy.) Although mitochondrial DNA is similar across all humans and animals, it also contains tiny bits that are different enough to distinguish between species. This difference allows researchers to estimate the approximate age of a species.”

And it’s the age that’s telling. So either the majority of life began nearly 200,000 years ago, or it re-emerged after a population bust. Cataclysmic event? Creation? Whatever the explanation, 200,000 years is not a long enough period of time to account for the random mutation evolutionists have speculated upon to gird their attempt to play God, substituting science for scripture.

Lead scientist David Thaler admits, “This conclusion is very surprising, and I fought against it as hard as I could.” Why? Well, because the findings clearly indicate evolutionist theory is just that: a best guess, perhaps a biased one put forth by those who do not want to admit the logic behind the theory of intelligent design. (Read more from “Gasp! Is Science Leaning Toward Creation of Man?” HERE)

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Scientists: Frogs “Millions of Years Old” Found in Amber … but Look Like Modern Frogs

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More than a third of the 7,000-odd living species of frogs and toads are found in rain forests around the world. But the fossil record for amphibians from these kinds of wet, tropical environments has been almost nonexistent, leaving paleontologists with few clues to their early evolution.

Now, lumps of amber dating back to the Cretaceous period have revealed a set of four tiny tropical frogs that lived alongside the dinosaurs, making them the oldest frog fossils of their kind. . .

The 99-million-year-old frogs come from the same amber deposits in northern Myanmar that have produced many exquisite fossils, including a dinosaur tail, a couple of baby birds, intact bird wings, and countless insects. Bits of bamboo, velvet worms, and aquatic spiders also found in this amber suggest that the Cretaceous environment was a rain forest, since similar species are commonly found in wet tropical forests today. . .

CT scans revealed much more about the three-dimensional structure and internal anatomy of the fossils, including evidence that Electrorana was similar to modern frogs in many ways. The animal appears to be an ancient member of one of the oldest lineages of living frogs, represented by modern species such as fire-bellied toads and midwife toads. (Read more from “Scientists: Frogs “Millions of Years Old” Found in Amber … but Look Like Modern Frogs” HERE)

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Texas Committee: High Schoolers Can’t Handle Evidence Against Darwinism

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On Thursday, I testified in Austin, Texas about the latest skirmish over how evolution is taught in Texas public high schools. I want it taught, warts and all. Darwinists want it taught as airbrushed and unquestionable dogma.

The state school board meeting was called to consider initial steps to streamline the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS). Streamlining is fine, in principle. The problem is that some of the proposed changes to the evolution section water down four passages that call on students to learn about, analyze and evaluate some of the growing evidential challenges to modern evolutionary theory.

So, for instance, what are we to make of the sudden appearance of new species and fundamentally new body plans in the fossil record? Neo-Darwinism says these animal forms evolved very gradually as part of the evolutionary tree of life, but the pattern in the geological column paints a different picture. Shouldn’t biology students be able to exercise their critical thinking skills by wrestling with this conundrum? The majority on the biology committee weren’t keen on that idea. They struck the sudden appearance language from the TEKS and argued that high school students aren’t mature enough to hear about it and ask intelligent questions. Not “developmentally appropriate,” the committee report said.

And, besides, said Karyn Ard, the chair of the biology curriculum review committee, there’s not enough time to cover it during the school year. There’s too much other material they have to cover. Ditto the growing mystery surrounding the origin of the first life.

Since I substitute taught in the Austin Independent School District for a year before I started graduate school, I could sympathize with Ard when she emphasized the wide disparity in student ability and the challenge teachers face to cover all the assigned material adequately. At the same time, the very real effect of the committee’s streamlining is to get rid of just those areas that best expose kids to the growing evidential challenges facing evolution, while leaving behind all kinds of pro-Darwinian propaganda woven into the fabric of the leading high school biology textbooks.

Covering for Darwin

Significantly, the pro-Darwin Texas Freedom Network (TFN) has had it in for these four hot-button passages ever since the passages made their way into the TEKS a few years ago. So it’s no surprise that TFN is celebrating the proposed deletions.

Ard told the board that the biology committee’s motives were focused squarely on streamlining, that she wasn’t even aware of the TFN until recently, and that their proposed deletions were not in any way politically motivated. My first reaction was: Really? The committee just happened to water down precisely the four passages the pro-Darwin TFN named as public enemy number 1, and the committee includes a vocal Darwin defender, Ron Wetherington, but somehow it was never the committee’s intent to put a giant thumb on the scale for Darwin?

Wetherington himself testified a bit later and made it abundantly obvious that he’s had it in for these four passages since they first made it into the TEKS. Some able cross-examination from conservative state school board member Marty Rowley (Amarillo) further underscored this fact.

In all fairness, Ard may indeed have been largely unaware of what was at stake, or at least had little interest in or knowledge about the origins controversy and was merely happy not to have to cover it during a biology course jam packed with other material. She insisted that when Wetherington debated evolution with molecular biologist Ray Bohlin and Baylor University chemistry professor Charles Garner during their curriculum revision meetings, she and several of the other committee members were at sea, unable to follow the discussion.

OK, but that brings me to the second thought I had on hearing Ard’s plea of non-political motives: Intent is secondary. The primary issue is effect. And the effect of watering down these four sections of the TEKS would be to give biology teachers who want to teach the scientific controversy over modern evolutionary theory less cover than they have now.

And here’s why that’s a problem. The national Darwin lobby is in the habit of targeting and persecuting teachers and professors who dare call into question Darwinian dogma. The Discovery Institute, where I now work, has come to the aid of many teachers and professors who have been targeted by militant Darwinists intent on suppressing the evidence against modern evolutionary theory. That pattern of attack and suppression is why Texas biology teachers with the courage to teach the controversy can use all the cover that the state board of education and the TEKS can give them.

More hearings are set for early next year, and a final meeting and decision in April. It’s in Texas’ best interest that at least eight members of the board (a majority) find the clarity and courage to do the right thing by voting to preserve these key passages in the current standards, standards that free biology teachers to safely teach students to critically scrutinize evolutionary theory, warts and all. (For more from the author of “Texas Committee: High Schoolers Can’t Handle Evidence Against Darwinism” please click HERE)

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