(December 5, 2015 at 5:39 pm)AAA Wrote:(December 5, 2015 at 5:37 pm)TheRocketSurgeon Wrote: That depends on what you mean by "religious beliefs". If your religious beliefs prevent you from doing impartial science, as in the Discovery Institute and Answers In Genesis crew, then you're not a scientist at all. But yes, as I said, many scientists are also Christians, including my Beloved.
I agree that Answers in Genesis put their religious beliefs ahead of science, but I think the Discovery Institute is more impartial. Steven Meyer is one of the most rational people that I have heard, and I think you should watch some of his debates (if you haven't already) and see if you find flaws in the argument.
Seriously? Or is this more sarcasm?
The Discovery Institute (renamed from the Creation Institute) has openly admitted their bias, and that they are willing to lie to promote Biblical literalism. They most infamously do this via "quote mining", where they misrepresent something a scientist said by taking it out of context in order to make it appear the scientist is saying something they would never have said, as a way of making it sound like there's a controversy over the fact of evolution.
They formerly had what is now known as "the Wedge Document" on their main website, openly admitting their purpose and intentions, including the propaganda campaign about "Intelligent Design" in place of Creationism, which in 1998 (when they wrote it) had already lost court cases concerning religion in schools. This document was taken down later, but which the National Center for Science Education was kind enough to preserve for posterity:
http://ncse.com/creationism/general/wedge-document
I have spent the past 20 years disembowling their misrepresentations and outright lies. In fact, I credit their BS with helping me attain my BSc in biology/chemistry, since I mad a hobby of debunking those things online after they came to our college with a "presentation" that challenged one of our biology professors to a public debate-- I looked up the disingenuous tactics they use, and came up with a strategy to help our professor overcome the public speaking tricks, with which he was unfamiliar. The most prevalent was what I call "the Machine-Gun Tactic", but which others have dubbed "the Gish Gallop": they will fire off, say, ninteen questions in rapid sequence, and ignore that the first 19 were answered when the scientist says, "I don't know the answer" on the 20th question, and they'll go "AHA! You don't know!!" I countered by hooking up a database to the Berkeley website that contains most zoological and biochemical information known at the time (this was 2001), and printing off the question before the guy could even finish his bit, handing the paper to the professor on stage. For this, I spent my entire senior year being called "that evolution guy" by people who were in the audience, when they saw me on campus.

A Christian told me: if you were saved you cant lose your salvation. you're sealed with the Holy Ghost
I replied: Can I refuse? Because I find the entire concept of vicarious blood sacrifice atonement to be morally abhorrent, the concept of holding flawed creatures permanently accountable for social misbehaviors and thought crimes to be morally abhorrent, and the concept of calling something "free" when it comes with the strings of subjugation and obedience perhaps the most morally abhorrent of all... and that's without even going into the history of justifying genocide, slavery, rape, misogyny, religious intolerance, and suppression of free speech which has been attributed by your own scriptures to your deity. I want a refund. I would burn happily rather than serve the monster you profess to love.
I replied: Can I refuse? Because I find the entire concept of vicarious blood sacrifice atonement to be morally abhorrent, the concept of holding flawed creatures permanently accountable for social misbehaviors and thought crimes to be morally abhorrent, and the concept of calling something "free" when it comes with the strings of subjugation and obedience perhaps the most morally abhorrent of all... and that's without even going into the history of justifying genocide, slavery, rape, misogyny, religious intolerance, and suppression of free speech which has been attributed by your own scriptures to your deity. I want a refund. I would burn happily rather than serve the monster you profess to love.