Difference between revisions of "Atheism and historical revisionism"

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(Denial of Creation)
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For more information please see: [[Evolution as a secular origins myth]]
 
For more information please see: [[Evolution as a secular origins myth]]
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==Richard Dawkins Lost a Debate to a Rabbi and then Claimed the Debate Never Took Place==
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[[Image:2402173645 c8e6168fe7.jpg|alt=Richard Dawkins|thumbnail|200px|right|Richard Dawkins,
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<br />
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<small>(photo by Shane Pope, Title: Richard Dawkins, obtained from [http://flickr.com/photos/shanepope/2402173645/ Flickr, see license agreement)</small>] ]]
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''See also:'' [[Richard Dawkins and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach]] and [[Atheism and Debate]] and [[Atheism and cowardice]]
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As briefly noted earlier Richard Dawkins had a debate with Rabbi [[Shmuley Boteach]]. Rabbi Shmuley Boteach was named the London Times Preacher of the Year 2000 and is the author of 20 books.<ref>http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2008/05/Richard-Dawkins-Shameful-Attack.aspx</ref>
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Recently Rabbi Shmuley Boteach wrote:
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{{cquote|...Dawkins attacked me on his website and denied that he and I had ever debated. My office quickly posted the full footage of a two hour debate which took place on October 23, 1996, a debate which Dawkins actually lost after a vote taken by the students as to which side, science or religion, caused more students to change their minds. In my article on the subject responding to his attack I was extremely respectful of Dr. Dawkins and was therefore shocked to receive a letter in return in which he accused me of speaking like Hitler. Had the noted scientist lost his mind? Hitler? Was this for real?<ref>http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2008/05/Richard-Dawkins-Shameful-Attack.aspx</ref>}}
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[[WorldNetDaily]] offers the following quotes of Rabbi Boteach about debate and the initial denial by Dawkins that the debate never took place:
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{{cquote|That is a particularly bold untruth. Our debate, which took place at St. Catherine's College, Oxford on Oct. 23, 1996, attracted hundreds of students and featured, on the atheist side, Prof. Dawkins and chemistry Prof. Peter Atkins, and on the religion side, me and Prof. Keith Ward, Oxford's Regius Professor of Divinity. Student president Josh Wine was in the chair," the rabbi explained.
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"In a vote at the end of the debate as to how many students had changed their minds after hearing the arguments, Dawkin's side was defeated and religion prevailed, which might account for his selective memory," he wrote.<ref>http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=61565</ref>}}
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[[File:Shmuley Boteach.jpg|thumbnail|150px|right|Shmuley Boteach
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<br />
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<small>(see [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:RebShmuley.jpg license agreement])</small> ]]
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Rabbi Boteach reported at Beliefnet:
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{{cquote|I also gave Dr. Dawkins the opportunity to even score by accepting a further debate, at the time and place of his choosing (within reason, of course), to which he has yet to respond.<ref>http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2008/05/Richard-Dawkins-Shameful-Attack.aspx</ref>}}
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A video of the debate that Dawkins lost to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is available at Rabbi Schely Boteach's website.
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A supporter of the [[Question evolution campaign]] wrote:
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{{cquote|We don't believe a word Richard Dawkins says and for good reason. For example, he claimed to have never debated Rabbi Schmuley Boteach, but then he had to admit a debate took place as it was videotaped. According to the student audience, the rabbi won the debate as he convinced more students of the validity of his position concerning the existence of God.
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Furthermore, an angry and embarrassed Dawkins then claimed the rabbi shrieked like Adolf Hitler. Now tell me, how do you forget a debate with a rabbi who supposedly shrieks like Adolf Hitler? Obviously, Dawkins exposed himself for the clown and fraud he is.<ref>[http://questionevolution.blogspot.com/2012/07/richard-dawkins-and-rabbi-shmuley.html Richard Dawkins and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach debate ]</ref>}}
  
 
==References==  
 
==References==  

Revision as of 02:21, November 22, 2015

Voroshilov, Molotov, Stalin, with Nikolai Yezhov.jpg
Nikolai Yezhov walking with Joseph Stalin in the top photo taken in the mid 1930s. Subsequent to his execution in 1940, Yezhov was edited out of the photo by Soviet Union censors.[1]

Theodore Beale wrote about secular leftists:

Regardless of whether it is...Richard Dawkins, PZ Myers, or the vast and corpulent mass of feminists, the Left has an observable tendency to shun debate. They assert many different reasons for doing so, but the truth is always revealed by their seemingly contradictory willingness to debate the incompetent and the overmatched....

One of the things that has been interesting to observe over time is the way that the heated attacks on me, both in public and via email, have all but disappeared even though my overall readership has never been larger. Why is this? My theory is this is because most of my critics, be they atheists, feminists, evolutionists, or free traders, have learned they simply cannot win in a direct confrontation. They can't openly criticize my ideas because they have learned, much to their surprise, that they cannot adequately defend their own.

As Aristotle pointed out more than two thousand years ago, even at the rhetorical level, the side more closely approximates the truth will tend to win out, because it is easier to argue when your arguments are based on truth rather than falsehood. Events will always ultimately prove the arguments of the global warmers, the godless, the female supremacists, the socialists, the Keynesians, and the monetarists to be false because their ideas are false. This is why a good memory is one of the most lethal weapons against them and why it is so easy to win debates against them, as given enough time, they are going to contradict themselves.

Why? Because they have no choice. Being false, their positions have to be dynamic, which means they can never hope for any significant degree of consistency. This is why ex post facto revision and double-talk are the hallmarks of the Left, and is why the first thing Leftists do when they are in a position of power is to erase history and attempt to silence any voices capable of calling attention to their fictions and contradictions.[2]

Soviet Union and historical revisionism

In terms of academic and popular history, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) often engaged in historical revisionism via their control of political/ideological public discourse (media, education, etc.) and via the monitoring of citizens via the KGB.[3]

During and subsequent to the rule of Nikita Khrushchev (1956–64), there was competition between the pro-Stalinists and anti-Stalinists in terms of how Soviet history was portrayed.[4]

Richard Dawkins, atheist atrocities, and historical revisionism

See also: Richard Dawkins, atheist atrocities, and historical revisionism

Dinesh D'Souza took Richard Dawkins to task for engaging in historical revisionism when it comes to the atrocities of atheist regimes and declared Dawkins "reveals a complete ignorance of history".VIDEO

In a recent interview D'Souza declared:

Richard Dawkins argues that at least the atheist regimes didn't kill people in the name of atheism. Isn't it time for this biologist to get out of the lab and read a little history? Marxism and Communism were atheist ideologies. Stalin and Mao weren't dictators who happened to be atheist; atheism was part of their official doctrine.

It was no accident, as the Marxists liked to say, that they shut down the churches and persecuted the clergy...[5]

See also:

Dinesh D'Souza stated in another interview:

As one writer put it, “Leaders such as Stalin and Mao persecuted religious groups, not in a bid to expand atheism, but as a way of focusing people’s hatred on those groups to consolidate their own power.” Of course I agree that murderous regimes, whether Christian or atheist, are generally seeking to strengthen their position. But if Christian regimes are held responsible for their crimes committed in the name of Christianity, then atheist regimes should be held accountable for their crimes committed in the name of atheism. And who can deny that Stalin and Mao, not to mention Pol Pot and a host of others, all committed atrocities in the name of a Communist ideology that was explicitly atheistic? Who can dispute that they did their bloody deeds by claiming to be establishing a “new man” and a religion-free utopia? These were mass murders performed with atheism as a central part of their ideological inspiration, they were not mass murders done by people who simply happened to be atheist.[6]

Karl Marx said "[Religion] is the opium of the people". Marx also stated: "Communism begins from the outset (Owen) with atheism; but atheism is at first far from being communism; indeed, that atheism is still mostly an abstraction."[7]

Vladimir Lenin similarly wrote regarding atheism and communism: "A Marxist must be a materialist, i. e., an enemy of religion, but a dialectical materialist, i. e., one who treats the struggle against religion not in an abstract way, not on the basis of remote, purely theoretical, never varying preaching, but in a concrete way, on the basis of the class struggle which is going on in practice and is educating the masses more and better than anything else could."[8]

In 1955, Chinese communist leader Zhou Enlai declared, "We Communists are atheists".[9] In 2015, the Communist Party of China reaffirmed that members of their party must be atheists.[10]

Atheists and the denial that Jesus existed

Christ on the Cross by Jacques Louis David.

See also: Historicity of Jesus and Atheists and historical illiteracy

Despite their being an abundance of historical evidence for Jesus Christ living in the first century, many atheists embarrassingly claim the Jesus never existed (see: Historicity of Jesus).

In an article entitled Scholarly opinions on the Jesus Myth, Christopher Price wrote concerning individuals who insist that Jesus Christ was merely a mythical figure:

I have often been asked why more academics do not take the time to respond to the Jesus Myth theory. After looking into this question, I discovered that most historians and New Testament scholars relevant to the topic have concluded that Jesus Mythers are beyond reason and therefore decide that they have better things to do with their time.[11]

Atheists and selective use of academic consensus

See also: Atheist hypocrisy

An irony of atheists asserting that Jesus never existed is that atheists often appeal to the academic consensus when it comes to pseudoscience such evolution. And secular leftists often appeal to the academic consensus when engaging in global warming alarmism.

John Lennox's discussion with New Atheist Richard Dawkins about the historicity of Christ

John Lennox pointed out to New Atheist Richard Dawkins that Dawkins claimed in his book The God Delusion that Jesus may have never existed and that Dawkins errantly claimed that ancient historians have some disagreement on whether Jesus existed or not. After some additional discussion with Dawkins, Dawkins conceded that Jesus existed and said, "I take that back. Jesus existed".[12]

Evolutionary pseudoscience and historical revisionism

Since World War II a majority of the most prominent and vocal defenders of the evolutionary position which employs methodological naturalism have been atheists and agnostics (see also: Causes of evolutionary belief)[13]

The creation vs. evolution issue is a matter which deals with historical science and not experimental science.[14]

The atheist Ernst Mayr was a Harvard biologist and served as director of Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology from 1961 to 1970.[15][16] Mayr was a prominent evolutionist and was referred to as "the Darwin of the 20th century". [17]

Mayr wrote:

Evolutionary biology, in contrast with physics and chemistry, is a historical science—the evolutionist attempts to explain events and processes that have already taken place.

Laws and experiments are inappropriate techniques for the explication of such events and processes. Instead one constructs a historical narrative, consisting of a tentative reconstruction of the particular scenario that led to the events one is trying to explain.[18]

human evolution
Nebraska man was made famous by Henry Osborn of the American Museum of Natural History. Nebraska man turned out to be nothing more than a single pig-like tooth.

Evolution, fraud and speculation posing as fact

Evolution is a pseudoscience that engages in historical revisionism and speculation posing as historical fact (see: Evolution and Cases of Fraud, Hoaxes and Speculation and Atheism and deception and Evolution and just so stories).

A notable case of a scientists using fraudulent material to promote the theory of evolution was the work of German scientist and atheist Ernst Haeckel. Noted evolutionist and Stephen Gould, who held a agnostic worldview[19] and promoted the notion of non-overlapping magesteria, wrote the following regarding Ernst Haeckel's work in a March 2000 issue of Natural History:

"Haeckel’s forceful, eminently comprehensible, if not always accurate, books appeared in all major languages and surely exerted more influence than the works of any other scientist, including Darwin…in convincing people throughout the world about the validity of evolution... Haeckel had exaggerated the similarities [between embryos of different species] by idealizations and omissions. He also, in some cases — in a procedure that can only be called fraudulent — simply copied the same figure over and over again.…Haeckel’s drawings never fooled expert embryologists, who recognized his fudgings right from the start. Haeckel’s drawings, despite their noted inaccuracies, entered into the most impenetrable and permanent of all quasi-scientific literatures: standard student textbooks of biology... Once ensconced in textbooks, misinformation becomes cocooned and effectively permanent, because…textbooks copy from previous texts.... [W]e do, I think, have the right to be both astonished and ashamed by the century of mindless recycling that has led to the persistence of these drawings in a large number, if not a majority, of modern textbooks!"[20]

An irony of history is that the March 9, 1907 edition of the NY Times refers to Ernst Haeckel as the "celebrated Darwinian and founder of the Association for the Propagation of Ethical Atheism."[21]

Stephen Gould continues by quoting Michael Richardson of the St. George’s Hospital Medical School in London, who stated: "I know of at least fifty recent biology texts which use the drawings uncritically".[20]

Paleoanthropology, speculation and intellectual dishonesty

A rendering of "Piltdown Man", already entrenched in scientific literature in 1922.

Paleoanthropology is an interdisciplinary branch of anthropology that concerns itself with the origins of early humans and it examines and evaluates items such as fossils and artifacts.[22] Dr. David Pilbeam is a paleoanthropologist who received his Ph.D. at Yale University and Dr. Pilbeam is presently Professor of Social Sciences at Harvard University and Curator of Paleontology at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. In addition, Dr. Pilbeam served as an advisor for the Kenya government regarding the creation of an international institute for the study of human origins.[23]

Dr. Pilbeam wrote a review of Richard Leakey's book Origins in the journal American Scientist:

...perhaps generations of students of human evolution, including myself, have been flailing about in the dark; that our data base is too sparse, too slippery, for it to be able to mold our theories. Rather the theories are more statements about us and ideology than about the past. Paleoanthropology reveals more about how humans view themselves than it does about how humans came about. But that is heresy.[24]

Dr. Pilbeam wrote the following regarding the theory of evolution and paleoanthropology:

I am also aware of the fact that, at least in my own subject of paleoanthropology, "theory" - heavily influenced by implicit ideas almost always dominates "data". ....Ideas that are totally unrelated to actual fossils have dominated theory building, which in turn strongly influence the way fossils are interpreted.[24]
The Canadian anthropologist Paul Gosselin points out that evolution is a secular origins myth.[25] See: Evolution as a secular origins myth

Evolutionist and Harvard professor Richard Lewontin wrote in 1995 that "Despite the excited and optimistic claims that have been made by some paleontologists, no fossil hominid species can be established as our direct ancestor...."[26] In the September 2005 issue of National Geographic, Joel Achenbach asserted that human evolution is a "fact" but he also candidly admitted that the field of paleoanthropology "has again become a rather glorious mess."[27][28] In the same National Geographic article Harvard paleoanthropologist Dan Lieberman states, "We're not doing a very good job of being honest about what we don't know...".[28]

Concerning pictures of the supposed ancestors of man featured in science journals and the news media Boyce Rensberger wrote in the journal Science the following regarding their highly speculative nature:

Unfortunately, the vast majority of artist's conceptions are based more on imagination than on evidence. But a handful of expert natural-history artists begin with the fossil bones of a hominid and work from there…. Much of the reconstruction, however, is guesswork. Bones say nothing about the fleshy parts of the nose, lips, or ears. Artists must create something between an ape and a human being; the older the specimen is said to be, the more apelike they make it.... Hairiness is a matter of pure conjecture.[29][30]

Creation scientists concur with Dr. Pilbeam regarding the speculative nature of the field of paleoanthropology and assert there is no compelling evidence in the field of paleoanthropology for the various theories of human evolution.[31]

Evolution and just so stories

The Question evolution! campaign by Creation Ministries International is a worldwide campaign which poses 15 questions that evolutionists cannot satisfactorily answer.[32] The 15 questions posed to evolutionists can be found HERE

The Question evolution! campaign poses 15 questions for evolutionists.[33]

Question 12 is:

Why is evolutionary ‘just-so’ story-telling tolerated? Evolutionists often use flexible story-telling to ‘explain’ observations contrary to evolutionary theory. NAS (USA) member Dr Philip Skell wrote, “Darwinian explanations for such things are often too supple: Natural selection makes humans self-centered and aggressive—except when it makes them altruistic and peaceable. Or natural selection produces virile men who eagerly spread their seed—except when it prefers men who are faithful protectors and providers. When an explanation is so supple that it can explain any behavior, it is difficult to test it experimentally, much less use it as a catalyst for scientific discovery.”[34]

For more information please see:

Denial of Creation

See also: Evolution as a secular origins myth and Suppression of alternatives to evolution and Atheism and the suppression of science

The evolutionist and immunologist Dr. Scott Todd, wrote: "Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such an hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic".[35]

Creation Ministries International declares:

Underpinning this abandonment of faith in God is the widespread acceptance of evolutionary thinking — that everything made itself by natural processes; that God is not necessary. There is ‘design’, such people will admit, but no Designer is necessary. The designed thing designed itself! This thinking, where the plain-as-day evidence for God’s existence (Rom. 1:19–20) is explained away, leads naturally to atheism (belief in no God) and secular humanism (man can chart his own course without God). Such thinking abounds in universities and governments today).[36]

The evolutionist and immunologist Dr. Scott Todd, an immunologist at Kansas State University, perfectly epitomized the irrational evolutionary denial of the evidence for creation in his correspondence to the science journal Nature. Dr. Scott wrote: "Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such an hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic".[37]

Although he is not a creationist, the atheist philosopher John Gray admitted in 2008 in The Guardian:

A great deal of modern thought consists of secular myths - hollowed-out religious narratives translated into pseudo-science. Dennett's notion that new communications technologies will fundamentally alter the way human beings think is just such a myth.[38]

For more information please see: Evolution as a secular origins myth

Richard Dawkins Lost a Debate to a Rabbi and then Claimed the Debate Never Took Place

Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins,

(photo by Shane Pope, Title: Richard Dawkins, obtained from Flickr, see license agreement)

See also: Richard Dawkins and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and Atheism and Debate and Atheism and cowardice

As briefly noted earlier Richard Dawkins had a debate with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. Rabbi Shmuley Boteach was named the London Times Preacher of the Year 2000 and is the author of 20 books.[39]

Recently Rabbi Shmuley Boteach wrote:

...Dawkins attacked me on his website and denied that he and I had ever debated. My office quickly posted the full footage of a two hour debate which took place on October 23, 1996, a debate which Dawkins actually lost after a vote taken by the students as to which side, science or religion, caused more students to change their minds. In my article on the subject responding to his attack I was extremely respectful of Dr. Dawkins and was therefore shocked to receive a letter in return in which he accused me of speaking like Hitler. Had the noted scientist lost his mind? Hitler? Was this for real?[40]

WorldNetDaily offers the following quotes of Rabbi Boteach about debate and the initial denial by Dawkins that the debate never took place:

That is a particularly bold untruth. Our debate, which took place at St. Catherine's College, Oxford on Oct. 23, 1996, attracted hundreds of students and featured, on the atheist side, Prof. Dawkins and chemistry Prof. Peter Atkins, and on the religion side, me and Prof. Keith Ward, Oxford's Regius Professor of Divinity. Student president Josh Wine was in the chair," the rabbi explained.

"In a vote at the end of the debate as to how many students had changed their minds after hearing the arguments, Dawkin's side was defeated and religion prevailed, which might account for his selective memory," he wrote.[41]

Shmuley Boteach

(see license agreement)

Rabbi Boteach reported at Beliefnet:

I also gave Dr. Dawkins the opportunity to even score by accepting a further debate, at the time and place of his choosing (within reason, of course), to which he has yet to respond.[42]

A video of the debate that Dawkins lost to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is available at Rabbi Schely Boteach's website.

A supporter of the Question evolution campaign wrote:

We don't believe a word Richard Dawkins says and for good reason. For example, he claimed to have never debated Rabbi Schmuley Boteach, but then he had to admit a debate took place as it was videotaped. According to the student audience, the rabbi won the debate as he convinced more students of the validity of his position concerning the existence of God.

Furthermore, an angry and embarrassed Dawkins then claimed the rabbi shrieked like Adolf Hitler. Now tell me, how do you forget a debate with a rabbi who supposedly shrieks like Adolf Hitler? Obviously, Dawkins exposed himself for the clown and fraud he is.[43]

References

  1. [http://www.newseum.org/berlinwall/commissar_vanishes/vanishes.htm The Commissar Vanishes
  2. The distaste for debate, Theodore Beale
  3. Klaus Mehnert, Stalin Versus Marx: the Stalinist historical doctrine (Translation of Weltrevolution durch Weltgeschichte) Port Washington NY: Kennikat Press 1972 (1952), on the illegitimate use of history in the 1934–1952 period
  4. Roger D. Markwick, Rewriting history in Soviet Russia : the politics of revisionist historiography, 1956–1974 New York ; Basingstoke : Palgrave, 2001, on legitimate Soviet Historiography particularly in the post 1956 period.
  5. http://insidecatholic.com/Joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1053&Itemid=48
  6. http://www.churchinhistory.org/pages/atheism/805-answering-atheists-regarding-war.htm
  7. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/comm.htm
  8. http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1909/may/13.htm
  9. Noebel, David, The Battle for Truth, Harvest House, 2001.
  10. China's Communist Party Bans Believers, Doubles Down On Atheism
  11. [http://www.bede.org.uk/price1.htm Scholarly opinions on the Jesus Myth by Christopher Price
  12. Richard Dawkins admits Jesus existed
  13. Evolution is not operational science
  14. http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/bios/mayr.html
  15. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/06/2/l_062_01.html
  16. http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/daily/2005/02/04-mayr.html
  17. Ernst Mayr, Darwin’s Influence on Modern Thought, Lecture 1999, ScientificAmerican .com, 2009.
  18. http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/2007/03/20/a-review-of-the-dawkins-delusion-by-alister-mcgrath/
  19. 20.0 20.1 "Another Evolution Fraud Exposed" - Creationism.org, INVESTIGATING GENESIS SERIES.
  20. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C03EFDD123EE033A2575AC0A9659C946697D6CF
  21. Encyclopedia Britannica (online): Paleoanthropology
  22. Answers in Genesis, Those Fossils Are A Problem
  23. 24.0 24.1 Sean Pitman, M.D., Thoughts on Evolution From Scientists and Other Intellectuals
  24. Myths of Origin and the Theory of Evolution
  25. Brad Harrub, Ph.D., Bert Thompson, Ph.D., and Eric Lyons, M.Min., Human Evolution and the “Record of the Rocks”
  26. Brad Harrub, Ph.D., The “Glorious Mess” of Human Origins
  27. 28.0 28.1 National Geographic (online edition), Joel Achenbach, PALEOANTHROPOLOGY, Out of Africa, Are we looking for bones in all the right places?
  28. Frank Sherwin, M.A., "Human Evolution" An Update
  29. Bert Thompson, P.H.D. and Brad Harrub, P.H.D., 15 Answers to John Rennie and Scientific American's Nonsense
  30. Question evolution! campaign by Creation Ministries International
  31. 15 questions for evolutionists
  32. 15 questions for evolutionists
  33. http://creation.com/a-designer-is-unscientificeven-if-all-the-evidence-supports-one
  34. http://creation.com/images/pdfs/cabook/chapter1.pdf
  35. http://creation.com/a-designer-is-unscientificeven-if-all-the-evidence-supports-one
  36. The atheist delusion, John Gray, The Guardian, Friday 14 March 2008
  37. http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2008/05/Richard-Dawkins-Shameful-Attack.aspx
  38. http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2008/05/Richard-Dawkins-Shameful-Attack.aspx
  39. http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=61565
  40. http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2008/05/Richard-Dawkins-Shameful-Attack.aspx
  41. Richard Dawkins and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach debate