U.S. Court Rejects Creationist School’s Lawsuit Over Bid to Offer Master’s Degree

The should get accredited as a church, not as a college.

Fraud – the earth is flat and the sun revolves around the sun because I have a Masters in Creationism and therefore have credability on science matters!Another 501 Corporation wanting Federal Education money and not concerned with education.

You may not agree with this school’s position, but before you ridicule them, evaluate their science. This school has good evidence for what they present. I thought science was about inquiry. The comments so far reject out of hand without even looking at the science. Have we become so afraid of questions?

Faith is faith, and not provable by science.Science is fact, test and observation based, and faith is irrelevent.It is an oxymoron to say they will: “equip believers with evidence of the Bible’s accuracy and authority through scientific research, educational programs, and media presentations, all conducted within a thoroughly biblical framework.” When you begin with the irrevocable premise that A is true, then you will determine that A is true, regardless of any actual evidence pro or con. the outcome is foretold. These folks cannot approve any evidence that contradicts A being true, so real science has no part in it.

In all honesty, some of these statements represent the most ignorant, uninformed, and biased statements that I have ever read. The last time that I checked evolution is a belief system that is based on philosophical presuppositions. Pure science contradicts much of evolutionary thought.

mccannrj,You are more incorrect than you can possibly imagine. Literally.

In all honesty, mccannrj, you don’t know much about science if you can write that with a straight face. Why in the world can’t ICR take pride in offering a degree in theology (or even in “creationism”) and not corrupt their pure biblical views with secular scientific knowledge. If God can do anything, why bother to verify his action with worldly assertions? The more improbable his actions, the more divine they are.

Bah Humbug, 11319762.You mortally wound your own argument in you second paragraph. No credible scientist would ever say that they deal in absolute facts. What you’ve done is tried to use the “strawman” logical fallacy. While scientists did believe in a geocentric universe, no scientist believes that today. Indeed, look outside and you tell me what the universe would look like if we DID live in a geocentric universe. Yeah, it would look largely the same.The entire point is: science changes its collective minds about things – religion does not. Science can tell us how many atoms fit on the head of a pin – only religion can speculate about how many angles may be copping a squat.The other stuff if your post is political and there’s no doubt that science often bends to the will of politics and it shouldn’t.

One has to be impressed when any Texas board takes a stand for science over creationism. You go, board!

The “skeptics” seem to argue that any lack of understanding of a process (evolution or climate change) means that the entire process does not actually occur. That is completely bogus. The evidence for the occurrence of these processes is multifaceted and quite clear for anyone with an open mind and reasonable brain power. Just because we don’t know every aspect of how they work doesn’t mean that they don’t happen. We don’t know everything about how people learn, but we don’t then conclude that learning doesn’t happen.But pointing out gaps in our understanding is just their cover. Their real goal of the “skeptics” is to deny the existence of a process they don’t like. Reality goes against their preconceptions, so they want to change reality. What they don’t understand is that beliefs don’t dictate reality. Believing in Santa Claus doesn’t make him real. Failing to believe in gravity doesn’t make it disappear. I believe, deep in my heart, that the Chicago Cubs are a great baseball team. But they keep losing, damn them!

Number 14 (11319762) – You are very wrong about the science of global warming. The evidence is all quite solid and convincing to the great majority of scientists. Skepticism has been promoted by a handful of people who are backed by free-market ideologues and the oil and coal concerns. Yes, there are unsolved problems and active debates in climate science. But the debates are about minor details. No one in the climate science community is debating whether or not changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations alter the greenhouse effect, or if the current warming trend is outside of the range of natural variability, or if sea levels have risen over the last century. About those points, there is consensus — and there is consensus that the cause is man-made. This is NOT a faith-driven phenomenon like creationism. There is no religious tenet that mandates a belief in climate change; there is no ideological motivation to accept the facts of climate change. Even a conservative publication like The Economist accepts the facts and is exasperated that Americans are so remiss in taking action.

Goxewu,Hey, I’d pay good money to see any of those things. And when none will ever occur, the explanation will be that these are miracles and take place outside of empirically-provable arenas. But they actually happened – honest. Trust me. I promise. Have faith.

What the judge saidI have read the court’s opinion. The judge made clear that the degree may well have been approved had it been presented for approval as a religious degree. It was denied because the school presented it as a science degree and it didn’t meet the standards for science degrees.Alan ContrerasEugene Oregon

Pittsburghtec:What’s truly amazing is not how “scientists” scoff at magic, but how “believers” just keep regurgitating the one word they’ve been indoctrinated to use since birth: TRUTH. Your “truth” is simply what a handful of people have told you it is. When I ask other believers why their truth is THE truth, they provide answers like “because” or “it’s in the Bible.” By that logic, everything I read in all books should be held as absolute truth (I mean, why does this one book contain the absolute truth and while others do not?). And because all “truth” emanates from one all-knowing and flawless font, should anything happen to said font, your “truth” would be completely different. Indulge me in a brief thought exercise:If time travel were possible, I would pay a visit to King James, tell him I’m an Angel of the Lord (which I’m most certain he’d believe) and explain to him that the Bible as he knows it is false, and that God has provided a new, TRUE testament. I would then hand him a copy of The Silmarillion. Fast forward. Your “truth” would then be that Iluvatar created the World through the Music of the Ainur.Long story short, “believers” believe in a single truth (one that was created and manipulated by men with agendas over the last 2,000 years) and are NOT open to debate. There are also non-believers who may be gullible enough to take whatever scientific or pseudo-scientific nonsense they read in a book as truth. But REAL science indulges debate – that’s part of how it moves FORWARD. One scientist posits a theory and within moments, it seems, others in the scientific community try to prove or disprove that theory. That’s what science is about. Challenging our perceptions, thoughts, ideas and knowledge base in an attempt to move our understanding of the universe FORWARD, not backward, as “believers” would have it.In the meantime, since you stated that the “proof of the truth of the Bible has not changed”, please provide five scientifically-verifiable examples of proof of the “truth” of the Bible, Creationism, that the Earth is only 5,000 years old, etc. (and archaeological discoveries of Biblical locations and proof of the existence of characters like David and Solomon, etc. don’t count -). Oh, and try to do it without resorting to magic.I.Z.

Re #26:* The Wikipedia citation is useless. Wikipedia citations aren’t accepted in freshman comp papers, let alone to stand as evidence in scientific debates (if “the eucharistic miracle” can be dignified with the term). Moreover, this particular Wikipedia article has a warning heading it. Even within entries on Catholic subjects which are by nature less than scientifically skeptical, this particular entry is “B Class,” i.e., the only things lower are “stubs” and “starts.” Less than zero.* The other website gives the term “junk science” a bad name. It offers as evidence only a series of statements about an experiment conducted about 40 years ago and “partly” (whatever that means) about 30 years ago, by two Italian scientists whose credentials are left rather sketchy, in a region rather well-known for “blood hoaxes.” Accompanying the statements are a series of scientific-looking (“-looking” is the point, isn’t it) illustrations with no captions other that “Fig. 1,” “Fig. 2,” etc. The link itself comes from some “adorational” (now there’s a scientific term for you!) society in Lombard, Illinois, a veritable hotbed of scientific research. (And, of course, is “transubstantiation” is fact, then every wafer and every drop of wine used for it in, say, Lombard, Illinois, and not just a couple of samples from Italy four decades ago, should be “scientifically” analyzable as human flesh and human blood.)Note: The Catholic Church has a history of conducting such pseudo-analyses, announcing the results, then quickly packing up, not answering questions about the procedures, and refusing to let non-Catholic scientists try to repeat the experiment on neutral turf. (Sub-note: Ain’t it convenient how such “miracles” as the “Eucharistic Miracle of Lanciano” always seem to occur in places where people are already primed to believe them? How come, one wonders, why didn’t some agnostic cement worker’s bread-and-Ripple lunch in, say, Newfoundland, turn into “living flesh” and “real blood”? Bottom line: There are millions of websites whose URLs, when posted, look to the gullible something like scholarly footnotes. You can find a website purporting to prove just about anything–”hollow Earth,” “Christ was an alien,” “Michael Jackson was the Messiah,” or the “Harry Potter” movies are a communist plot. The proffering of these two websites as proof of anything is–or at least should be–utterly embarrassing to fizmath.

ianderso, Maybe you should take one or two of the offered courses and research that at which you scoff. Do you truly believe that there is no physical proof to show that the Bible is true? Do you truly believe, can you be so egotistical as to think, that you are the only one “smart” enough to see through some hoax? Give you five examples? There is an entire field of study called Apologetics. Ever heard of it? Maybe you should do your homework. By the way, maybe you should also look and see how many “purist” scientists have become believers once they actually started researching. But, I guess you’re “smarter” than all of them No one is going to make a fool of you – you can open your mouth and do that all by yourself.

gowexu,* I cited wikipedia since it was easy to find and well known to most readers. So it seems that the miracles don’t suit your tastes since they happen around believers. The Lanciano miracle happened because the priest lacked faith. You are incorrect in your assertion that non-Catholic scientists are not allowed to examine miracles. The ones who worked on the Shroud of Turin were mostly non-Catholics, as are the doctors who examine alleged cures at Lourdes. If the Lanciano investigations were more recent instead of 40 years ago it would still not matter to you. Admit it, you would find some other objection. * you misunderstand transubstantiation if you insist that every communion wafer should be subject to verification. It is supposed to look like bread except in the rare cases of miracles.* Since you are willing to take time to investigate my links, then look into the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, Portugal. That was witnessed by thousands including many non-believers. It was reported in the secular press. I will quote your favorite source again:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle_of_the_Sun

Re #33:I was always taught by my devout Catholic great aunts that the whole point of “transubstantiation” with the wafers and the wine is literal, not metaphorical, that one IS consuming the flesh and blood of Jesus each time. If it’s only a metaphor each time millions of believing Catholics perform the act, I retract. But then the Church, too, is stuck with, “only a metaphor,” except in dubious, isolated cases where it can haul out a couple of local scientists to do a scientifically totally substandard “analysis” and say a “miracle” has occurred.The Shroud of Turin: Yawn. The sliver of hope on some people’s part that it’s not a medieval product of some sort only moves the approximate date of it back to Jesus’s general time–and even then certainly not to the specific 33 years he was alive. It’s like those remnants of “Noah’s Ark”: those who really want to believe it’s the real thing will believe it’s the real thing. (About holy relics in general: Wasn’t there somebody in the 19c. who went around to Catholic churches and toted up the impossible number of skulls of St. Aloyisius, etc.?)Claiming to have cited Wikipedia page in #26 because “it was easy to find and well known to most readers” is preposterous. a) The second URL cited was totally arcane; why no consideration for being “well known to most readers” there? b) All one has to do go to a website–any website, no matter how obscure–is to copy and paste the URL into the proper browser slot; “easy to find” is bogus. c) That particular Wikipedia entry practically shouted that it was probably a crock. Richard Dawkins would probably love to send people to it. (Did fizmath even look at it?)Lourdes has yet to “cure” an amputee. (Hey, I’ve seen Benny Hinn, right there on TV, lay hands upon people who then throw away their crutches!) Autosuggestion can be a powerful curative. Lots of people have believe lots of things besides Catholic/Christian things that have caused their cancers to go away.The “miracle of Fatima”: Even fizmath’s own source, the Wikipedia page, offers credible natural explanations. If a less earthly cause is desired, how about a UFO? (Again, Lourdes and Fatima occurred in Catholic countries in a time of less skepticism and credulity. What we tend to get these days are not much at all from Europe or America where people are more or less educated, but, instead, visions of the “Virgin” in tree mold in Paraguay, or something.)

gowexu,I was ready to give this a rest except one issue has to be set straight. I did not mean in any sense that transubstantiation is some metaphorical idea. Your aunts were correct. In Catholicism the bread truly becomes flesh and blood. Part of the miracle is that you can’t see it. The event is accepted by faith. I can dig up stories of amputees being cured but it will not matter to you. I’ve cast enough pearls to you already.

Pardon me, I meant National *Library* of Medicine, the one in Bethesda.

Once upon a time, I worked out the geology and configuration of the earth, based on the literal statements in the KJ bible. Get this: the earth is shaped like an off-shore drilling rig, with a transparent dome over the whole platform (because it’s all underwater!), a dome that has gates that open and shut to let in the rain. Seriously, just stitch the statements from Genesis and Psalms, and that’s exactly what you get. What a hoot!!No wonder when people say ‘biblical science,’ I ROTFLOL.

generally_academic,The KJV is itself a translation, from multiple original languages, so taking anything “literally” from it is a misnomer. Be that as it may, the cosmology presented in Genesis matches up quite nicely as a description of the Big Bang and the formation of the known universe. The idea of the original elements, sudden change, periods of development for organic materials, and an evolutionary ladder of carbon based life forms is a surprisingly adept description of the story that physicists tell today about our beginnings. One really should be amazed that an author some 4000+ years ago, with none of the history of discovery that we enjoy today, could tell such a story. Maybe that is really what was divinely inspired in Scripture.

Swish, this is not a thesis defense. I am under no obligation to do anything for you. gowexu, look into the Miracle of Calanda for a case of a healed amputee. It was not at Lourdes. It occured in the 17th century so by your standards it won’t matter.

Re #45:fizmath was under no more of an “obligation to do anything” for me than he/she was to swich. But telling me to go look up a 370-year-old, pre-Enlightenment “miracle” in an especially credulous Catholic country (I did: another Wikipedia page with another warning about bias), was probably a lot easier than producing some independent verification for another dubious “miracle.”I’m still in tears, holding my sides, at “Part of the miracle is that you can’t see it.” Absolute genius!