Why is uniformitarianim still taught?

There are several threads I'd like to follow up with you. For one, I share Subbie's sentiment that you are, unlike most creationists we have encountered, open and honest about where your bias lies, as is Kurt Wise (no relation, of which I'm quite certain having done the genealogy of my family; "Wise" is a problematic "English" name, because there are so many different German surnames (and other nationalities as well) which got translated to "Wise" after their arrival on our shores)) -- Answers in Genesis used to have an interview with Kurt Wise, but I don't know whether it's still up; Kurt Wise also had a reputation for having refuted several creationist claims due to his insistence on truthfulness, yet the last I had heard of him, which was a number of years ago, he had fallen in with the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) crowd, who are not in the least known for being at all honest.So to keep this somewhat focused, I'll pick this particular statement of yours: First, please let me point out that the demographics of the scientific community does follow the demographics of the general population, in which the vast majority is some form of theistic. Admittedly, atheists and agnostics are slightly more represented in the scientific community, but that still leaves us with most scientists being theists. That directly contradicts your implication that that they are atheists who "[rule] out God a priori."Second, I would like to point you to a thread that I had started: EvC Forum: So Just How is ID's Supernatural-based Science Supposed to Work? (SUM. MESSAGES ONLY) (sorry, but I have not yet learned how to get a link to a specific post) (try So Just How is ID's Supernatural-based Science Supposed to Work? (SUM. MESSAGES ONLY) - AdminMod). Specifically in the "intelligent design" (ID) agenda, they want to completely reform science to include "God" in the equation. My basic question was just how the frak this ID approach was supposed to work. IOW, if the "God of the Gaps" theology of ID were to be truly applied to the working of science, then just how could it possibly work?OK, let's get you fully grounded here. There's purely theoretical, "pie in the sky" stuff (a theme song of the only 15-minute atheist programming decades ago, "there'll be pie in the sky when you die ... that's a lie", as opposed to on-going countless hours of Christian radio programming), and then there's the nitty-gritty completely-practical "but does it even WORK?! stuff.OK, so do please join that thread and supply an answer to the question of just exactly and precisely how the answer-nothing response of "God-did-it" would work in science. I am completely serious here! Just how exactly would "goddidit" fit into science and still make it work?Let me tell you a bit about myself. Circa 1970, the "Jesus Freak" movement began, in which the hippies of the 60's started "turning on to Jesus" -- "Jesus Freak" was their own term for themselves. There were some "Jesus Freaks" in my high school friend's family -- and they also sucked in my friend's mother. I learned a lot about Christian fundamentalism as a "fellow traveller", during which I could never see that as a viable option. Circa 1970, I was exposed to two creationist claims: that living fresh-water clams were falsely carbon-dated as being thousands of years old and that a NASA computer revealed that Joshua's "Long Day" actually happened. I rejected both claims out-of-hand. A full decade later, circa 1981, an ICR road-show arrived at our local university, but my military duty schedule precluded my attendance. However, I was interested to learn that creationists were still around. So I started to investigate their claims. And what I learned in very short order was that they were lying through their teeth. Let me be very straight about this. When I thought that creationists might actually have something going for them, I was honestly looking for their actual evidence for their claims. From the very off-set, I found that they were lying through their teeth.That was in 1981. Ever since that time, I've been looking for a truthful creationist source. Do you know what I've found? Absolutely, frakin', nothing! In three decades! Longer than you've even been alive, from what I've gathered.OK, in the mid-80's at a local mall, a creationist was running a fossil shop. And he organized some "creation/evolution" "debates"at that mall. Yes, I participated. One thing I learned was that most creationists had no idea what the official "creationist" party line was. But there was another thing. One young creationist came up and announced that that he had some "recent scientific findings that would blow the evolutionists away." What he actually had was Setterfield's old stale and fully refuted "decay of the speed of light" claim. Immediately, half the room (the "evolutionist" half) burst into uncontrollable laughter, and then that half of the audience immediately tried to explain to the poor fool what exactly was wrong with his claim. The poor kid was totally blown away with that reaction ... I have no idea where he is at present because of that encounter.Here's the thing, Jason. Creationists are professional liars. I'm sorry, but that's just the plain truth about it. Sure, their followers may sincerely believe that "creation science" is true and zealously spread those lies without knowing the truth. And in some cases even the professionals who create those claims did so out of pure incompetence and self-delusion. Or some professionals whose MO is almost purely one of gathering others' claims and presenting them (such as seemed to be Hovind's MO) are in the same boat as the clueless followers. But we have also encountered cases of deliberate deception, such as Walter Brown's rattlesnake-protein claim.But the real damage that "creation science" does is far worse. It teaches its followers that its claims must be true or else their religion is false and God doesn't exist. And because its claims are false and contrary-to-fact, "creation science" accomplishes something that noone else has ever been able to accomplish. Science does not try to disprove God, nor could it ever do that. There is no possible scientific test or argument that could disprove the possibility of God's existence. But "creation science" has created such a test: if the world is as we find it to be, then God does not exist. Many Christians have lost their faith because of that "creation science" teaching. Hovind would quote a Christian home-schooling video that "75% of all children raised in Christian homes who attend public schools will reject the Christian faith by their first year of college."; rather than schools being hostile towards religion as he was implying, I think that the real reason is that the kids learn the truth and then apply "creation science's" lesson to reject their faith.We've seen many former creationists. One was Glenn R. Morton who used to write creationist articles; he also ghost-wrote the creationist section of Josh McDowell's "Evidence that Demands a Verdict." Everything he knew about geology he had learned from "creation science", but when he went to work as a field geologist, he found himself day-after-day, all day long, staring at rock-solid evidence that he had been taught did not exist and could not exist if Scripture were to have any meaning. Several creationist geologists he had hired suffered crises of faith, while he ended up being driven to the verge of atheism by creationism. His website is at No webpage found at provided URL: http://home.entouch.net/dmd/ and at No webpage found at provided URL: http://home.entouch.net/dmd/person.htm he offers "Personal Stories of the Creation/Evolution Struggle", including his own. You need to read those.Are you at all familar with the Matthew 7:20 test? Ever since 1981, I have studied "creation science". And everything I've seen presented by "creation science" has been a lie. So since creationists tell us that Christianity must relie on lies and deception, then why would anyone ever want to believe in such a system? You may think that "creation science" is a wonder salve, in reality it's pure spiritual poison.Edited by AdminModulous, : added alt link for thread for d's benefit.Edited by dwise1, : cleaned up ending