Sunspots 982

 

Things I have spotted that may be of interest to others:

Gizmodo reports on a study that found that all of the largest US cities are sinking.

Kenneth Schenck discusses politics and Christianity.

Gizmodo reports that the new pope (and the previous one) has warned about possible dangers from artificial intelligence.

Equus, and other sources, report that horses are especially able to move fast because of a gene peculiar to horses and their relatives.

Gizmodo on whether Pope Leo XIV is an environmentalist (and on whether Francis was).

CNN reports on the melting of polar ice and its dire consequences.

NPR reports that the Centers for Disease Control is no longer warning the medical community about disease threats.

Sunspots 926

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*:

Computing: Gizmodo reports that the US Marshals have been hacked.

Gizmodo also reports that there's a printer that prints chocolate constructions.

Gizmodo also reports that Chuck-E-Cheese is still using floppy disks to run its game machines!

Finances: (or something) A Conversation writer argues that buses are the cure for urban transportation woes.

(and humor) NPR posts about tooth fairy inflation.

Health: (and ethics) A woman is to be arrested for refusing to be effectively treated for tuberculosis.

The Conversation discusses in-family aggressive behavior -- in other words, bullying a sibling. It is actually more common than "regular" bullying.

Politics: A Yahoo! commentator takes on Marjorie Taylor Greene's suggestion that the US split into two countries.

A Conversation article tells us that the caste system is, unfortunately, alive and well in the US.

(and computing) Gizmodo reports on lots of Twitter bots, backing former President Trump, and attacking various non-Trumpists.

Science: Gizmodo reports on the development of really white paint (which really cuts down on the amount of heat absorbed from sunlight.)

USA Today reports that Japan has hundreds of tiny islands that it didn't know were there.

Gizmodo reports that some humans were riding domesticated horses about 5000 BC.

(and ethics) NPR reports on discussions of whether to alter human genes.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

Sunspots 867

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*: 

The Arts: Listverse tells us about 10 literary locations that you can actually visit, in the UK.

Computing: Gizmodo reports that Gettr, a social network that claims not to censor user's posts, is deeply connected to Facebook and Google.

Environment:  Gizmodo has posted a slide show of the 9 worst invading species in the US, including one plant.

Finances: ABC News reports that the 10 richest men in the world doubled their worth during the pandemic, while the rest of us mostly lost worth.

History: NPR reports that authorities may have finally discovered the name of the person who turned in Anne Frank and her sister and parents to the Nazis. For more on Anne Frank, go here.

Humor:  (or something) Lego has released a build-it-yourself globe that can spin, according to Gizmodo.

Politics: According to NPR, the Supreme Court justices aren't getting along very well, and there was a time in the past when they got along even more poorly.

Science: Gizmodo reports on analysis of horse bones from the Middle Ages, that indicates that war horses from that time were smaller than modern horses.

SciTechDaily reports that a huge fish nesting area (60 million nests, from one species, estimated) has been found near Antarctica.

The graphic used in these posts is from NASA, hence, it is free to use like this.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

What did the animals on Noah's Ark look like?

An article published by Answers in Genesis complains about illustrations of the animals on Noah's Ark, often found in children's books, and elsewhere. (It complains about other things, but I'll try to stick to a discussion of what the animals on the ark looked like.)

Here is a quotation from the article:

Zebras, Clydesdales, and donkeys are all part of the horse kind and came to look like they do today since the Flood as part of the one horse kind. Species and the biblical kind are not necessarily the same things. The original horse kind likely had features resembling each of these. They diversified into what we have today through natural selection in the wild and artificial selection for man’s benefit. The same is true with the cat kind. Domestic cats, lions, bobcats, tigers, and so on, are all varieties in the one cat kind that have developed through variation since the Flood. It is better to draw generic representatives of each kind ...

Let's re-state that section of the article. The author, speaking for Answers in Genesis (AiG), claims that the animals on the Ark did not look a lot like the animals of today. Why is that claim made? The main reasons are that AiG believes that there was a world-wide flood, about 2348 BC, and that all land animals descended from creatures that were rescued on the Ark. AiG also believes that there would not have been room for each species of animal (and food needed to keep them alive) on that vessel, so that there were, instead, founders of each kind, which, since the Flood, diversified rapidly into the multitude of species that live on earth now. (Apparently this sort of belief has not been around for very long in AiG circles, but it is strongly held now.) In other words, the quotation says, there were no tigers or lions, etc., on the Ark, just a pair of cat family ancestors - generic representatives. So how did approximately 40 living species of cats come about? (And some additional extinct ones -- AiG belief is that extinct animals became extinct after the Flood.) AiG's answer is that there was rapid evolution (although they seldom use that word) after the Flood, and that all of these, living and extinct, are descendants of the pair of cat ancestors that were on the Ark. AiG thinks that distinguishing features didn't arise until after the animals came off of the ark -- the cat ancestors probably didn't have stripes, a mane, spots, cheetah-like speed, the ability to climb trees, and other features now found in one or a few species of the cat family, but not the entire family.

Another AiG source says this: "Recent studies estimate the total number of living and extinct kinds of land animals and flying creatures to be about 1,500. With our “worst-case” scenario approach to calculating the number of animals on the Ark, this would mean that Noah cared for approximately 7,000 animals." [pairs or sevens of each kind]

That seems like a lot, but according to my calculations, there are over 31,000 species of animals alive on earth today, to say nothing of extinct ones. That would mean that each of the kinds on the Ark would, on average, have diversified into about 20 species each, all within less than 4600 years.

That's preposterous, of course. Such rapid and extensive speciation, in vertebrates, has not been observed. Biologists generally believe that new species can't develop unless isolated from others in the same line in some way, either by being geographically separated, by mating at different times, or other behavioral differences, or by hybrid sterility. Cave art does not seem to indicate that early humans saw animals that were substantially different than those we see today. Although the Bible does not describe vertebrate animals in any detail, the behavior described (lions as predators, for example) does not suggest that lions, in Bible times, were much, if any, different from those that live today. Samson and David had interactions with lions. Jacob's blessing on his son Judah includes this: Genesis 49:9 "Judah is a lion’s cub. From the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down, he crouched as a lion, as a lioness. Who will rouse him up?" Jacob died in about 2000 BC. Samson lived at about 100 years before David, who lived at about 1000 BC. (For my post, indicating all the mentions of lions in the Bible, see here.) As I indicated, the Bible does not describe animals definitively, but it sounds like, by the time of Jacob, as well as Samson and David, lions were like those alive today. If they hyperevolved somehow, from an ancestral cat type, this would have happened in less than 400 years, using AiG's timeline.

It seems to me that it makes a lot more sense to suppose that the Flood was not world-wide, and that cats, and other animals, diverged over a much longer period of time.

For an expanded discussion of these ideas, see my post here.

It seems to me that it's OK to put lions, tigers, bears, donkeys, giraffes, etc., in illustrations of Noah's Ark. We don't really know if there was a world-wide Flood, and the proposal that children's Bible story art be based on unproven, even false, ideas is dangerous.

Sidelight 1: By the time of Zechariah, about 500 BC, horses, mules and donkeys must have diverged, although, even today, they haven't completely diverged, as mules are the offspring of a donkey-horse mating. According to AiG, that divergence took place after the ark. According to all sorts of other evidence, it took place over a much longer time.

Zechariah 14:15 "So will be the plague of the horse, of the mule, of the camel, and of the donkey, and of all the animals that will be in those camps, as that plague." The Masoretic Text uses three different names for the members of the horse family named in this verse, indicating that there were three different animals, all horse-like. (The King James uses "ass" instead of donkey.) The use of these words goes back way before Zachariah -- for example, Pharaoh's army included horse-drawn chariots.

Sidelight 2: The author of the quotation at the beginning of this post, and AiG, should be commended for at least one thing. The author says that artists often portray Adam and Eve as white, or white, blue-eyed blondes, and states that this is most likely not the way that they really looked.

Thanks for reading.

*Added November 6, 2023: The article from AiG also includes this complaint (and over a dozen others): "Not including dinosaurs and pterodactyls (e.g., dragons) on the Ark"

Sunspots 721

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Computing: PC Magazine tells us about some ways to use Google Calendar that you probably don't know about. (Anyone with a Google account and an internet connection can use Google Calendar.)

Gizmodo reports on the sophistication of various methods of phishing. Scary.

Your Android device may have anti-virus software that is not as good as it should be.

Gizmodo reports that t he CEO of AT&T apparently got a robocall while he was giving a presentation.

Education: (and Finance, and Politics) The Associated Press reports that some Republican state legislators, and governors, have suddenly become supporters of public schools.

Humor: (or something) Listverse tells us 10 interesting things about horses.


Politics: S. E. Cupp examines the field of Democratic candidates for President. She concludes that only Oprah Winfrey (who isn't running) can beat the President.

Catherine Rampell discusses socialism, and analyzes the President's warnings about it.

Science: There is no Nobel Prize in mathematics, but Gizmodo reports that a woman has won the equivalent Abel prize, and discusses her contributions.


The graphic used in these posts is from NASA, hence, I believe, it is public domain.
Thanks for looking!

Sunspots 698

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Christianity Today reports that many US Christians hold heretical beliefs about the gravity of sin, the importance of worshiping with others, and the nature of the Holy Spirit.


Finance: (or something) Scientific American reports that there are now a million electrically powered autos in the US.

Food: Listverse on the origins of 10 common foods (including bagels, ice cream cones, and others.)

Health: Scientific American on doctors being slow to use new technology. (The article says that thermometers were resisted for a long time!)

History: About the life of Ella Mae Wiggins, a textile worker who became a leader in the struggle for better pay and conditions for textile workers, but who was shot to death in 1929, by textile mill security employees.

Politics: FiveThirtyEight has a solid analysis of how the Supreme Court responds to resistance to its actions from Congress and/or the President, based on the history of such situations.

Science: Scientific American tells us the function of a horse's tail. Really.


The graphic used in these posts is from NASA, hence, I believe, it is public domain.
Thanks for looking!

Young-earth creationism and the kinds of animals

Genesis 1:20 God said, “Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth in the open expanse of sky.” 1:21 God created the large sea creatures, and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarmed, after their kind, and every winged bird after its kind. God saw that it was good. 1:22 God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 1:23 There was evening and there was morning, a fifth day.
1:24 God said, “Let the earth produce living creatures after their kind, livestock, creeping things, and animals of the earth after their kind”; and it was so. 1:25 God made the animals of the earth after their kind, and the livestock after their kind, and everything that creeps on the ground after its kind. God saw that it was good. 

7:1 Yahweh said to Noah, “Come with all of your household into the ship, for I have seen your righteousness before me in this generation. 7:2 You shall take seven pairs of every clean animal with you, the male and his female. Of the animals that are not clean, take two, the male and his female. 7:3 Also of the birds of the sky, seven and seven, male and female, to keep seed alive on the surface of all the earth. 7:4 In seven days, I will cause it to rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights. Every living thing that I have made, I will destroy from the surface of the ground.”
7:5 Noah did everything that Yahweh commanded him. (World English Bible, public domain.)

Young-earth creationists, of which Answers in Genesis is the most prominent organization, believe that there was a world-wide flood, occurring about 2348 BC, and that the land animals, including land-based birds, have all descended from the animals that Noah and his family had in the ark with them.

Saving all of the animals causes what seems to be an insurmountable problem for young-earth creationists. How did all of these creatures fit on the ark, and how was it possible to feed them? The answer, from Answers in Genesis, is that there were about 137 kinds of animals, and all of the types we have today descended from them. (This doesn't include insects -- at least some young-earth creationists believe that they weren't taken on the ark. Another estimate from Answers in Genesis is that there were about 1500 kinds of animals on the ark. I'm not clear on why the difference, although the larger estimate is said to have included "flying creatures." Perhaps the lower estimate doesn't include them.) It is doubtful that the Genesis word usually translated "kind" corresponds to any of the categories used by today's taxonomists. Young-earth creationists do not claim that it does.

How many species of animals are there now?
This source, citing an authoritative textbook, says that there are currently 5,416 species of mammals on earth. (This presumably includes water-living mammals, which, according to young-earth creationists, were mostly or entirely not found on the ark. The Answers in Genesis belief is that extinct animals from ancient times, such as the saber-toothed tiger, would have descended from animals on the ark, too.)

This source indicates that, until recently, it was thought that there were 9,000-10,000 species of birds, but that this number is an underestimate, and that there are perhaps twice that many. This source indicates that there are about 7,000 species of amphibians. This source indicates that there are about 10,793 species of reptiles. (This research article proposes that there were 11 kinds of turtle on the ark, which have given rise to 313 living species, and 3 kinds of alligator/crocodile, giving rise to 25 current species.) Using 9,000 as the number of species of birds, and 4,800 as the number of species of land mammals, there are about 31,500 species of birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles now on earth. There have been some extinctions within recorded history -- dodos, moas, the marsupial tiger, dinosaurs -- yes, Answers in Genesis proposes that dinosaur kinds were on the ark -- and others, which would add to the number of species that must be accounted for. Young-earth creationists believe that no more than about 1,500 kinds of animals became 31,500, or more, species, within the last 4,366 years. That means that, on average, each of those 1,500 kinds evolved into 21 species over that period, and that number is probably an underestimate. That's an astounding claim!

Here's a brief statement of the Answers in Genesis position, with a diagram of part of the "cat kind." The diagram indicates that the cat kind of animals, on the ark, evolved into lions, house cats, jaguars and cheetahs. (And, presumably, servals, ocelots, leopards, tigers, including saber tooth tigers, and more.)

R. Joel Duff has written about these beliefs of young-earth creationists, and finds them wanting, for a number of reasons. Some of my criticisms, listed below, are derived from his article:

1) Answers in Genesis, which rejects evolutionary mechanisms for the origin of large groups of organisms, over long periods of time, wants us to believe that evolutionary mechanisms are responsible for an astounding unfolding of many species, over a few thousand years. Answers in Genesis does not say "evolutionary mechanisms" much, or at all, but they are really relying on natural selection for the unfolding of species from ancestral kinds.
2) One criticism of main-stream evolutionary thought, by young-earth creationists, is that some fossil links are missing. But there are no known fossils, from the last 4,366 years, of any of the proposed species explosions after the Ark landed. Furthermore, cave art doesn't show such transitional forms. They are missing!
3) The Bible seems to describe lions, and other animals of Bible times, as if they looked and acted as they do today. Samson encountered a lion in about 1,100 BC, so the cat kind, according to Answers in Genesis, would have diversified to about what it is today in a mere 1,300 years or so. Is that possible? If it is, why haven't animals continued to expand the number of species up until the present day, or why did evolution stop at lions, 3,000 or so years ago, and not continue cat diversification?
4) There is no observational evidence from ancient literature for this explosive diversification.
5) Duff points out that scientific reasoning persuaded Answers in Genesis that there was not room in the Ark for all of the species we now have. The idea of rapid speciation after the flood is a new idea, not one that ancient Biblical scholars got from the text of Genesis. It has come about mostly, or entirely, because of the realization, by young-earth creationists, that it would have been impossible for Noah's family to house, feed, and clean up after 30,000 or so animal species within the dimensions of the Ark. In other words, young-earth creationists, who often accuse Christians of other persuasions about origins, that they are putting science ahead of a plain reading of the Bible, are in fact doing exactly that. See here.
6) This is a matter of culture and esthetics, I guess, rather than a logical objection, but what would Answers in Genesis have us do with all the Bible story picture books that show giraffes, zebras, lions, tigers and other animals, either with Adam and Eve in Eden, or on the Ark with Noah? Do they want us to replace these with pictures of their own inventions, the ancestors of the kinds? (Added June 8, 2022: The answer is "yes." see here for an AiG statement on this subject.)
7) Are we to believe that the names Adam gave to the animals would shortly be outdated, because of rapid evolutionary processes? (In most of the Old Testament, including Genesis, the names of people were chosen carefully, and matched the person's perceived character. Adam may have done that in naming the animals.)
8) Dogs have been artificially selected for thousands of years, but they are still dogs. Why, then, should we believe that natural selection would bring about an explosion of many species from an ancestral dog kind, in a few thousand years?
9) If hyperevolution was responsible for turning 137, 1500, or some other relatively small number of species (or kinds) into over 30,000 after the Ark landed, wouldn't it also have been responsible for rapid diversification before the Flood? If that had happened, wouldn't it have multiplied the kinds considerably?

Thanks for reading. For a chart showing many of the strengths and weaknesses of several views of origins held by Christians, see here. (All views of origins have weaknesses -- young-earth creationism isn't the only one that does!) For "What's wrong with young-earth creationism?" see here. For evidence that at least one of the important Bible scholars of the past, St. Augustine, did not necessarily believe that the earth is only a few thousand years old, see here.

Addendum, September 5, 2018: the Naturalis Historia blog discusses the idea that dinosaurs and humans lived at the same time, and points out several problems with that idea. 

October 26, 2018: I recently saw a post on the Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham debate, held in 2014, on the Gospel and Evolution blog. The reaction to the debate is of considerable interest, but this statement is especially pertinent to the subject of the post you are reading: "Ken Ham didn’t seem to have a problem at all with a 1,000 or so 'kinds' undergoing speciation since his alleged global flood 4,000 years ago to become the millions of species alive on the earth today, not to mention the billions that have lived and become extinct."

Thanks for reading.

Added November 30, 2018: A post by Naturalist Historia (R. Joel Duff's blog) discusses the adoption of evolutionary mechanisms in the explanations given by Answers in Genesis. 

Added December 31, 2018: David Heddle, of "He Lives" also writes about the problem that the large number of species raises for Mr. Ham and his followers. 

Added January 18, 2019: Naturalis Historia discusses horses, and related species, and examines what the Bible says about horses, and concludes that it's not possible for all horse types (including extinct ones) to have come from a single pair. 

Added March 5, 2019: R. Joel Duff has analyzed articles by adherents of Answers in Genesis, and, again, finds the hyper-evolution thesis to be spectacularly unbelievable. (In fact, Duff quotes one AiG author, who states that ordinary evolutionary processes could not have been responsible for the amazing number of bird species of the finch kind, if they all descended from one kind, after the Flood.) Here's one of Duff's articles. It has links to an AiG related publication.

July 18, 2019. This blog post was edited somewhat, including the addition of criticism 9.

August 20, 2019. See this post for more on the subject.

May 19, 2020. For more on proposed rapid speciation, from AiG and other Young-Earth Creationists, see here.

May 26, 2020. An article, published in Answers Research Journal, an organ of Answers in Genesis, and authored by important YEC scientists, says this: "In short, the YEC model proposes significant amounts of morphological change in a window of time that, by comparison with evolution, is extremely short."

July 18, 2022: Todd C. Wood, a young-earth creationist with solid science credentials, reacts to some who are calling Ken Ham, head of Answers in Genesis, an evolutionist. He is sometimes called that because of his belief in hyperevolution.

Sunspots 675

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Benjamin L. Corey gives some good advice about coming through life's trials with a softer, not harder, heart.

A Christianity Today writer tells us about true hospitality.

Relevant says that the record of the US on taking refugees is shameful and unChristian. (We've taken 11 refugees from Syria in 2017. No refugee, out of thousands previously admitted, has perpetrated a terrorist act in the US.)

Christianity Today reports on a Pew Research poll, examining what people mean when they say that they believe in God.

Politics: Mick Mulvaney, director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has acted again to protect financial institutions from scrutiny, rather than protecting consumers from being ripped off. Sigh.

For the first time ever, the Chaplain of the US House of Representatives has been fired, according to NBC and other outlets.

Science: Gizmodo and Scientific American discuss the Environmental Protection Agency's declaration that burning wood is Carbon neutral.

New Scientist reports that the ability to grow human brain tissue in labs raises lots of ethical issues.

New Scientist also reports that horses can remember whether you smiled or frowned at them the last time they saw you.

Thanks for looking!

Image source (public domain)

Sunspots 629

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Christianity Today points out, with some examples, that spreading conspiracy theories and other fake news is, well, sin.


Education: Listverse discusses the origins of 10 widely used school supplies (such as backpacks and pencils).

Finance: (or something) Wired comments on the possible changes to the Federal Aviation Administration.

Health: Science reports that a new antibiotic, which may make it impossible for bacteria to develop resistance, has been produced. In tests, it seems to be very effective.



Politics: Scientific American fact-checks President Trump's speech on the Paris climate change accord.

Scientific American says that torture is not effective in extracting information.

Science: The Conversation says that killing coyotes does not make sheep and cattle safer, and explains why.

Scientific American reports on a long-term study of the social lives of wild horses.



Image source (public domain)

Sunspots 588

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: A Relevant columnist discusses her experiences with online dating.
 
Benjamin L. Corey re-examines Romans 8:28, the verse that seems to be saying that all things work together for our good.

Relevant tells us that being in the center of God's will isn't always safe.

Literature: Listverse notes 10 important works written while the author was in prison. (Not included: Revelation, and Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail.")


Politics: Relevant points out that "Jesus Never Worried About Politics."

Science: Listverse on ten animal species that show real intelligence.
 
Listverse also has an article on ten of the most important crop plants, that had their genomes changed significantly by ancient humans.


Wired reports that horse racers are using DNA testing in developing successful race horses.

Wired reports that there are underwater heat waves, and they are devastating to marine life.

DarkSiteFinder is designed to show us how well we can, or can't, see the stars at night, because of light pollution. It has a link to an detailed map.


Sports: Wired tells us that athletes in most Olympic events are helped by various equipment enhancements, and, actually, are cyborgs, rather than pure humans.


Image source (public domain)