Errors in the Creation book

by crownboy 13 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  crownboy

  Hi there, and happy New Year to all!

  Recently, there have been great debates between people on this forum on the whole "evolution vs. creation" matter. While I'm not an expert on evolution, I do understand it to an extent, and while it may not be a perfect answer, it's a bilion times better than the literal explanation given in the bible for the origin of life (which I have so far not seen evidence for). Since I was very young when the Creation book came out, I never really read it, so I gave it an overview a few days ago (given how the Society can botch basic Christain theology, I was interested in how much better/worse they would do in science).

  In my view, at some times they seemed ignorant of evolution (like when they didn't realize that when the peppered moth changed colors that was evolution. They seemed to think evolution would predict it to turn into a cow or something), and though they said they were being unbiased, using terms like "blind chance" to describe evolution clearly showed their predujice. My favourite part was when they implied that the theory of evolution ORIGINATED WITH THE DEVIL!. That's right, old Beelzebub got to Darwin! They also seem unaware that you can reconcile belief in evolution with belief in God and even the bible. They also said that the carbon 14 dating system used by scientist is so inaccurate, that they can be millions of years off. However, for the carbon 14 dating to be that much off would have required earth's conditions to be very unhospitable to humans, i.e. Adam& Eve could not have lived here 6,000 years ago. They did, however, quote from many sources, so I would like to know:
  1. Are any of the quotes taken out of context? (something the society has done before). 2. If the quotes are real, how credible are the sources?

  They made a big deal about the lack of "transitional fossils", which is probably my biggest gripe with evolution, but they also said later in the book that the bible is "historically accurate" and the "perfect word of God"(or words to that effect), so apparently their scrutiny only goes one way . Any other comments about the Creation book for those who have read it?

  Go therefore and baptize the people in the name of the father and of the son... what the hell, we just need to bring up the yearbook numbers!
• 

  sleepy

  If your talking of the "How did life get here by evolution or creation" book , then you're talking of mis-quotation city Arizona.
  Look through some of the web cites at the bottom of the page.
  I know Janh has a list of some.
• 

  Fredhall

  Crowngirl,

  There are some errors in the Creation book. But the POINT is clear. And that is, are ancestors did not come from apes.
• 

  Skeptic

  Fredhall,
  

  There are some errors in the Creation book. But the POINT is clear. And that is, are ancestors did not come from apes.

  The evolution theory tells us that we did not come from apes either.

  When creationists know so little about evolution that they make that blunder, they have no right criticizing it.

  Richard
• 

  Fredhall

  Skeptic or Dick,

  The Evolutionists knows so little about Creation.
• 

  RunningMan

  Yep, there are some really nasty, intentional misquotations
  in that book and in others:

  The Quote:
  "Fossil hunter Donald Johanson acknowledged: 'No one can be sure just what any extinct hominid looked like.'" - Creation p 89

  What it really said:
  "No one can be sure what any extinct hominid looked like with its skin and hair on. Sizes here are to scale, with afarensis about two feet shorter than the average human being." - Donald C. Johanson and Maitland A. Edey, Lucy - the Beginnings of Humankind, New York: Warner Books, Inc, 1981, p. 286
  
  The Quote:
  "At this point a reader may begin to understand Dawkins comment in the preface to his book: 'This book should be read almost as though it were science fiction.'" - Creation p39

  What it really said:
  "This book should be read almost as though it were science fiction. It is designed to appeal to the imagination. But it is not science fiction: it is science. Cliché or not, 'stranger than fiction' expresses exactly how I feel about the truth." - Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, 1976, p. 9

  The Quote:
  "Zoologist Richard Lewontin said that organisms 'appear to have been carefully and artfully designed.' He views them as 'the chief evidence of a Supreme Designer.'" - Creation p 143

  What it really said:
  "The manifest fit between organisms and their environment is a major outcome of evolution.... Life forms are more than simply multiple and diverse, however. Organisms fit remarkably well into the external world in which they live. They have morphologies, physiologies and behaviors that appear to have been carefully and artfully designed to enable each organism to appropriate the world around it for its own life. It was the marvelous fit of organisms to the environment, much more than the great diversity of forms, that was the chief evidence of a Supreme Designer. Darwin realized that if a naturalistic theory of evolution was to be successful, it would have to explain the apparent perfection of organisms and not simply their variation." -Richard C. Lewontin, "Adaptation", Scientific American, vol. 239, September 1978, p. 213

  The Quote:
  "Carl Sagan, in his book Cosmos, candidly acknowledged 'The fossil evidence could be consistent with the idea of a great designer.'" - Reasoning from the Scriptures, 1985, p124

  What it really said:
  "The fossil evidence sould be consistent with the idea of a great designer; perhaps some species are destroyed when the Designer becomes dissatisfied with them, and new experiments are attempted on an imperfect design. But this notion is a little disconcerting. Each plant and animal is exquisitly made; should not a supremely competent Designer have been able to make the intended variety from the start? The fossil record implies trial and error, an inability to anticipate the future, features inconsistent with an efficient Great Designer (although not with a designer of a more remote and indirect temperment)." - Cosmos, p29
• 

  Carlo

  Fredhall

  "are ancestors did not come from apes."

  That is not the POINT. This is the point:
• 

  Fredhall

  Carlo or Homo Erectus,

  A least the creationist have one thing right, that is man did not come from apes.
• 

  Simon

  Fred, can you explain the evasive comment in the Creation book about non-ape fossils which says that they were "a branch of the human family that died out"

  I don't think they meant for this level of truth to get in there!
• 

  AlanF

  Crownboy, for a discussion of about 100 examples of misrepresentations, misquotes and misunderstandings in the 1985 Creation book, go here: http://www.geocities.com/osarsif/index2.htm and read the article "The WTS View of Creation and Evolution".

  The level of stupidity and deceitfulness displayed by the writers of the Creation book is nothing short of astounding. There are many cases where they're actually quoting young-earth creationists who are supporting their YEC ideas. A goodly number of quotes are from a paranormalist named Francis Hitching, who was promoting his otherworldly ideas against both creation and evolution. The Society tells the reader, in the Creation book and other books, that Hitching is an "evolutionist" and a "scientist".

  AlanF