Your friendly neighborhood spider v. Darwin.

Don’t Be Frightened! It’s Just a Spider — An Exemplar of Intelligent Design
David Klinghoffer | @d_klinghoffer

Spiders are part of the iconography of Halloween. Don’t be frightened, though. Sure, a Facebook friend advises today that for black widow spiders common in Central Oregon, a squirt of brake cleaner works great, followed, just to be safe, by application of yesterday’s newspaper. Thanks, fine, but for the rest of spiderkind, how about leaving them alone and, instead, appreciating the valuable services they perform? Gobbling mosquitoes, for one thing.

And that’s not all. Take a moment to appreciate the awesome natural design of their webs. A new video from Discovery Institute explains why biomimetic researchers would love to be able to duplicate the strength and flexibility of dragline silk.

There’s much more to admire in these tiny predators than there is to be scared of. Spiders are among the natural wonders described in Billions of Missing Links: A Rational Look at the Mysteries Evolution Can’t Explain, by Discovery Institute Fellow Geoffrey Simmons, MD. Get a copy now!

A clash of Titans. LXII

Security trumps privacy?:Pros and cons.

The late Michael Crichton Vs. settled science

Is There a "Consensus" in Science? Remembering the Late Michael Crichton
Casey Luskin 


Anyone who was awed when they watched Jurassic Park and saw realistic-looking dinosaurs walking around on the big screen for the first time should take a moment to remember Michael Crichton. Crichton, a famous science-fiction author, wrote the books that became the Jurassic Park movie series, as well as many other popular novels. He also had an appreciation for the importance of dissenting views within the scientific community and was a keen observer of how some in the scientific community use rhetoric to quash minority scientific viewpoints. Crichton passed away earlier this month after losing a battle with cancer, so in remembrance of Michael Crichton, I'd like to re-post this quote from a speech he gave that was recently reprinted in the Wall Street Journal:

"I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you're being had.
"Let's be clear: The work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus.

"There is no such thing as consensus science. If it's consensus, it isn't science. If it's science, it isn't consensus. Period. . . .

"I would remind you to notice where the claim of consensus is invoked. Consensus is invoked only in situations where the science is not solid enough. Nobody says the consensus of scientists agrees that E=mc2. Nobody says the consensus is that the sun is 93 million miles away. It would never occur to anyone to speak that way. ."

(Michael Crichton, "'Aliens Cause Global Warming'," reprinted in Wall Street Journal, November 7, 2008.)

Rest in peace, Michael Crichton.

On attempts to reanimate the RNA world scenario.

An Extraterrestrial Spin on the RNA World
Stephen C. Meyer

As  Evolution News has previously noted, a recent article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences  presents an extraterrestrial spin on the standard RNA World origin-of-life proposal. The authors argue that RNA molecules appeared in warm little ponds (WLPs) more than 4.17 billion years ago, transported by “meteorites and interplanetary dust particles…to warm little ponds whose wet–dry cycles promoted rapid polymerization.”

The Abstract states:

Before the origin of simple cellular life, the building blocks of RNA (nucleotides) had to form and polymerize in favorable environments on early Earth. At this time, meteorites and interplanetary dust particles delivered organics such as nucleobases (the characteristic molecules of nucleotides) to warm little ponds whose wet–dry cycles promoted rapid polymerization. We build a comprehensive numerical model for the evolution of nucleobases in warm little ponds leading to the emergence of the first nucleotides and RNA. We couple Earth’s early evolution with complex prebiotic chemistry in these environments. We find that RNA polymers must have emerged very quickly after the deposition of meteorites (less than a few years). Their constituent nucleobases were primarily meteoritic in origin and not from interplanetary dust particles. Ponds appeared as continents rose out of the early global ocean, but this increasing availability of “targets” for meteorites was offset by declining meteorite bombardment rates. Moreover, the rapid losses of nucleobases to pond seepage during wet periods, and to UV photodissociation during dry periods, mean that the synthesis of nucleotides and their polymerization into RNA occurred in just one to a few wet–dry cycles. Under these conditions, RNA polymers likely appeared before 4.17 billion years ago.

RNA World advocates envision a process of pre-biotic natural selection beginning once a primitive RNA replicator — an RNA molecule capable of copying itself — arose on the early Earth. RNA World scenarios also favor the idea that the chemical evolution started with RNA molecules because RNA is capable of storing genetic information (like DNA) and catalyzing some important biochemical reactions (like proteins). The new PNAS model advocates this same basic approach but envisions the RNA molecules forming much earlier than other RNA World models do, in warm little ponds during the period of heavy meteorite bombardment ove 4 billion years ago.

Unfortunately, the PNAS model lacks credibility for most of the same reasons that other RNA World models do. In Signature in the Cell, I describe those several problems in detail. One that leaps to mind is the problem of the instability of RNA molecules and their constituent subunits (especially their nucleobases and sugars) — a fact the authors effectively acknowledge by insisting that these chemical subunits of RNA “must have” polymerized extremely rapidly to avoid dissolution. However, the new model seems even less plausible than other RNA models as an origin-of-life scenario because the frequent impact of meteorites in such an early epoch would have sterilized the surface of the Earth and vaporized the oceans.

Even if whole RNA molecules could polymerize under these conditions, the PNAS model does nothing to explain how the precise sequencing of bases — the genetic information — in the RNA molecule could have arisen. Yet, as I show in Signature in the Cell, we now know that precise RNA nucleotide base sequencing would be a precondition of any self-replicating RNA molecule. I note there that ribozyme engineering experiments have succeeded in producing an RNA molecule capable of copying a small portion of itself but only after the intelligent chemist or the “ribozyme engineer” arranges the RNA bases in very specific sequences — i.e., only after chemists provide the information necessary to achieve even that limited replicase function. Thus, RNA self-replication doesn’t explain the origin of the information necessary to getting natural selection going (let alone life). Instead, RNA self-replication depends upon preexisting unexplained sources of information.

In any case, the PNAS model fails to provide a plausible solution to an even more basic problem: the origin of the constituent subunits of the RNA molecules and the synthesis of the whole RNA molecules under realistic pre-biotic conditions.

The authors acknowledge that the nucleobases (adenine, cytosine, guanine, uracil, and thymine) essential to RNA and DNA could not have been easily produced on the early Earth. Therefore, they speculate that these organic molecules must have originated in outer space and then were transported to Earth via dust particles and meteorites. They explain that, “as to the sources of nucleobases, early Earth’s atmosphere was likely dominated by CO2, N2, SO2, and H2O. In such a weakly reducing atmosphere, Miller–Urey-type reactions are not very efficient at producing organics. One solution is that the nucleobases were delivered by interplanetary dust particles (IDPs) and meteorites.” They further speculate that small amounts of nucleobases (.25 to 515 parts per billion) from these meteorites would have dissolved into the warm little ponds. At the same time, ribose purportedly formed through the formose reaction and quickly combined with the nucleobases and phosphorous to form nucleotides. They then envision nucleotides combining into RNA chains through cycles of the ponds evaporating and then refilling with water. Their rationale: building blocks can only be produced in water, but the nucleotides can only form into long chains through cycles of dehydration. They acknowledge that the entire process had to take place within a few years — a geological instant — otherwise everything would have been eliminated by such forces as UV radiation, hydrolysis, and seepage.

In  Signature in the Cell, I describe several factors that argue strongly against the formation of RNA in any realistic pre-biotic environment given the entire history of the Earth, let alone a few years.

First, nucleobases would have been highly unstable in the Earth’s early environment (even if trace amounts of these RNA subunits were transported from space on meteorites). As I note:

[T]he bases of RNA are unstable at temperatures required by currently popular high-temperature origin-of-life scenarios. The bases are subject to a chemical process known as “deamination,” in which they lose their essential amine groups (NH2). At 100 degrees C, adenine and guanine have chemical half-lives of only about one year; uracil has a half-life of twelve years; and cytosine a half-life of just nineteen days. (p. 302)

Second, the formation of ribose would have been next to impossible, particularly in the presence of the nucleobases:

The presence of the nitrogen-rich chemicals necessary for the production of nucleotide bases prevents the production of ribose sugars. Yet both ribose and the nucleotide bases are needed to build RNA. As Dean Kenyon explains, “The chemical conditions proposed for the prebiotic synthesis of purines and pyrimidines [the bases] are sharply incompatible with those proposed for the synthesis of ribose.” Or as Shapiro concludes: “The evidence that is currently available does not support the availability of ribose on the prebiotic earth, except perhaps for brief periods of time, in low concentration as part of a complex mixture, and under conditions unsuitable for nucleoside synthesis.” (p. 303)

Third, interfering cross reactions would have inhibited the synthesis of RNA molecules and further chemical evolution in a life-friendly direction:

[B]oth the constituent building blocks of RNA and whole RNA molecules would have reacted readily with the other chemicals present in the prebiotic ocean or environment. These “interfering cross-reactions” would have inhibited the assembly of RNA from its constituent monomers and inhibited any movement from RNA molecules toward more complex biochemistry, since the products of these reactions typically produce biologically inert (or irrelevant) substances. (p. 303)

To assess the plausibility of the RNA World scenario, I invite you to  read an excerpt here from Chapter 14 of Signature in the Cell. This excerpt addresses five critical problems facing the RNA World hypothesis, including the implausibility of forming the chemical subunits of RNA and getting them to link together on the early Earth whether in warm little ponds or elsewhere. The excerpt addresses even more significant weaknesses of the — oddly — still popular RNA World. After you read them, you might want to go back and reread the Abstract of the PNAS article. Does the scenario it outlines still seem at all plausible?

How Settled science's gatekeepers are putting the squeeze on free enquiry

Science Philosopher: Science World Beset by “Filters,” “Conformity,” “Hidebound” Thinking
David Klinghoffer | @d_klinghoffer

How often have we heard the stale line about how science adores fresh thinking that topples past idols? Oh sure, we’re told, if there were anything of substance to the theory of intelligent design, some young maverick scientist would just love to make his mark by being the guy who knocked over Darwinism in favor of ID.


This familiar appeal to the myth of professional scientists as free thinkers receives a blow from philosopher of science Adrian Currie, writing for  writing for Aeon. Currie is not someone we’d heard of before, not an ID proponent. He’s not trying to insert himself in the Darwin debate. But man, his frank depiction sure rings a bell:

Nowadays scientists tend to shun the ‘maverick’ label. If you’ve hung out in a lab lately, you’ll notice that scientific researchers are often terrible gossips. Being labelled a ‘maverick’, a ‘crank’ or a ‘little bit crazy’ can be career-killing. The result is what the philosopher Huw Price at the University of Cambridge calls ‘reputation traps’: if an area of study gets a bad smell, a waft of the illegitimate, serious scientists won’t go anywhere near it.

Mavericks such as Newton, Buffon and Darwin operated in a very different time to our own. Theirs was the age of the ‘gentleman scholar’, in which research was pursued by a moneyed class with time to kill. Today, though, modern science encourages conformity. For a start, you need to get a degree to become a scientist of some stripe. You also need to publish, get peer-reviewed, obtain money from a funder, and find a job. These things all mould the young scientist: you aren’t just taught proper pipette technique, but also take on a kind of disciplinary worldview. The process of acculturation is part of what the philosopher and historian Thomas Kuhn called a ‘paradigm’, a set of values, practices and basic concepts that scientists hold in common.

On top of this standardisation, careers in science are now extremely hard to come by. There’s a scarcity of jobs compared with the number of applicants, and very few high-ranking and ‘big impact’ journals. This means that the research decisions that scientists make, particularly early on, are high-risk wagers about what will be fruitful and lead to a decent career. The road to academic stardom (and, for that matter, academic mediocrity) is littered with brilliant, passionate people who simply made bad bets. In such an environment, researchers are bound to be conservative — with the stakes set so high, taking a punt on something outlandish, and that you know is likely to hurt your career, is not a winning move.

Of course, all these filters help to ensure that the science we read about is well-supported and reliable, compared with Darwin’s day. There’s much good in sharing a paradigm; it makes communication easier and helps knowledge accumulate from a common base. But professional training also involves learning how to convince colleagues in your field that your work is legitimate, that it meets their ideas of what the good questions are and what good answers look like. This makes science more productive, but less creative. Enquiries can become hidebound and unadventurous. As a result, truly revolutionary research — the domain of the maverick — is increasingly hard to pursue.

Maybe he didn’t know anyone was listening, or at least anyone who would think to consider this candid admission in the context of the evolution controversy.

And remember, all his talk about “reputation traps,” “filters,” a sensitivity to “career killing” “bad smells,” a system set up to “encourage conformity,” ensuring “conservative,” “hidebound and unadventurous” thinking — all this is true when the maverick science that might be investigated or championed has no philosophical implications to it.

In the case of ID, the implications for your picture of reality are, naturally, enormous. So the institutional conservatism of science is really going to kick in and resist new thinking. As we know it does.

Reconciling the genealogies of Jesus Christ:The Watchtower Society's commentary.

GENEALOGY OF JESUS CHRIST

In the first chapter of Matthew we find the genealogy of Jesus running from Abraham forward. At Luke chapter 3 is a genealogy back to “Adam, son of God.” Jesus’ genealogy is the only one given in the Christian Greek Scriptures. Part of his genealogy appears at 1 Chronicles chapters 1 to 3, running from Adam through Solomon and Zerubbabel. The books of Genesis and Ruth combined give the line from Adam to David.

The latter three lists (Genesis/Ruth, 1 Chronicles, and Luke) agree fully from Adam to Arpachshad, with minor differences as to certain names, such as Kenan, which is “Cainan” at Luke 3:37. The Chronicles and Genesis/Ruth lists agree down to David, while another “Cainan” is found in Luke’s account between Arpachshad and Shelah.—Lu 3:35, 36.

From Solomon to Zerubbabel, the Chronicles record and Matthew agree in the main, Matthew omitting some names. These differences and differences in Luke’s account from David to Jesus will be discussed later.

Under GENEALOGY, we have shown that besides many private family records, the Jews kept public records of genealogies and that the chroniclers, such as Ezra, had access to these when compiling their lists; also, that the public registers existed in the first century evidently up until 70 C.E. The matter of the descent of the Messiah from Abraham, and through David, was of prime importance to them. So we can be confident that both Matthew and Luke consulted these genealogical tables.

Reliability of the Gospel Genealogies. The question arises: Why does Matthew leave out some names that are contained in the listings of the other chroniclers? First of all, to prove one’s genealogy it was not necessary to name every link in the line of descent. For example, Ezra, in proving his priestly lineage, at Ezra 7:1-5, omitted several names contained in the listing of the priestly line at 1 Chronicles 6:1-15. Obviously it was not essential to name all these ancestors to satisfy the Jews as to his priestly lineage. Similarly with Matthew: He doubtless used the public register and copied from it, if not every name, the ones necessary to prove the descent of Jesus from Abraham and David. He also had access to the Hebrew Scriptures, which he could consult alongside the official public records.—Compare Ru 4:12, 18-22 and Mt 1:3-6.

The lists made by both Matthew and Luke were comprised of names publicly recognized by the Jews of that time as authentic. The scribes and Pharisees as well as the Sadducees were bitter enemies of Christianity, and they would have used any possible argument to discredit Jesus, but it is noteworthy that they never challenged these genealogies. If either Matthew’s or Luke’s genealogy of Jesus had been in error, what an opportunity it would have been for these opponents to prove it then and there! For until 70 C.E. they evidently had ready access to the public genealogical registers and the Scriptures.

The same is true regarding the first-century pagan enemies of Christianity, many of whom were, like those Jews, learned men who would readily have pointed to any evidence that these lists of Matthew and Luke were unauthentic and contradictory. But there is no record that the early pagan enemies attacked Christians on this point.

Also, both Matthew and Luke achieved their objective, and that was all they needed to do. To prove that Jesus was descended from Abraham and David, it was not necessary to make a new genealogy. All they had to do was copy from the public tables that the nation fully accepted regarding the lineage of David and of the priesthood and all other matters requiring proof of one’s descent. (See Lu 1:5; 2:3-5; Ro 11:1.) Even if there was an omission in these tables, it did not detract from what these Gospel writers intended and indeed accomplished, namely, presenting legally and publicly recognized proof of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah.

Problems in Matthew’s Genealogy of Jesus. Matthew divides the genealogy from Abraham to Jesus into three sections of 14 generations each. (Mt 1:17) This division may have been made as a memory aid. However, in counting the names we find that they total 41, rather than 42. One suggestion as to how they may be counted is as follows: By taking Abraham to David, 14 names, then using David as the starting name for the second 14, with Josiah as the last; finally, by heading the third series of 14 names with Jeconiah (Jehoiachin) and ending with Jesus. Notice that Matthew repeats the name David as the last of the first 14 names and as the first of the next 14. Then he repeats the expression “the deportation to Babylon,” which he links with Josiah and his sons.—Mt 1:17.

As stated earlier, Matthew may have copied his list exactly from the public register that he used, or he may have purposely left out some links with a view to aiding memory. However, a suggestion as to the omission here of three kings of David’s line between Jehoram and Uzziah (Azariah) is that Jehoram married wicked Athaliah of the house of Ahab, the daughter of Jezebel, thereby bringing this God-condemned strain into the line of the kings of Judah. (1Ki 21:20-26; 2Ki 8:25-27) Naming Jehoram as first in the wicked alliance, Matthew omits the names of the next three kings to the fourth generation, Ahaziah, Jehoash, and Amaziah, the fruits of the alliance.—Compare Mt 1:8 with 1Ch 3:10-12.

Matthew indicates that Zerubbabel is the son of Shealtiel (Mt 1:12), and this coincides with other references. (Ezr 3:2; Ne 12:1; Hag 1:14; Lu 3:27) However, at 1 Chronicles 3:19 Zerubbabel is referred to as the son of Pedaiah. Evidently Zerubbabel was the natural son of Pedaiah and the legal son of Shealtiel by reason of brother-in-law marriage; or possibly, after Zerubbabel’s father Pedaiah died, Zerubbabel was brought up by Shealtiel as his son and therefore became legally recognized as the son of Shealtiel.

A Problem in Luke’s Genealogy of Jesus. Available manuscript copies of Luke list a second “Cainan,” between Arpachshad (Arphaxad) and Shelah. (Lu 3:35, 36; compare Ge 10:24; 11:12; 1Ch 1:18, 24.) Most scholars take this to be a copyist’s error. In the Hebrew Scriptures, “Cainan” is not found in this relative position in the genealogical listings in the Hebrew or the Samaritan texts, nor is it in any of the Targums or versions except the Greek Septuagint. And it does not seem that it was even in the earlier copies of the Septuagint, because Josephus, who usually follows the Septuagint, lists Seles (Shelah) next as the son of Arphaxades (Arpachshad). (Jewish Antiquities, I, 146 [vi, 4]) Early writers Irenaeus, Africanus, Eusebius, and Jerome rejected the second “Cainan” in copies of Luke’s account as an interpolation.—See CAINAN No. 2.

Why do the genealogies of Jesus Christ as given by Matthew and by Luke differ?

The difference in nearly all the names in Luke’s genealogy of Jesus as compared with Matthew’s is quickly resolved in the fact that Luke traced the line through David’s son Nathan, instead of Solomon as did Matthew. (Lu 3:31; Mt 1:6, 7) Luke evidently follows the ancestry of Mary, thus showing Jesus’ natural descent from David, while Matthew shows Jesus’ legal right to the throne of David by descent from Solomon through Joseph, who was legally Jesus’ father. Both Matthew and Luke signify that Joseph was not Jesus’ actual father but only his adoptive father, giving him legal right. Matthew departs from the style used throughout his genealogy when he comes to Jesus, saying: “Jacob became father to Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ.” (Mt 1:16) Notice that he does not say ‘Joseph became father to Jesus’ but that he was “the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born.” Luke is even more pointed when, after showing earlier that Jesus was actually the Son of God by Mary (Lu 1:32-35), he says: “Jesus . . . being the son, as the opinion was, of Joseph, son of Heli.”—Lu 3:23.

Since Jesus was not the natural son of Joseph but was the Son of God, Luke’s genealogy of Jesus would prove that he was, by human birth, a son of David through his natural mother Mary. Regarding the genealogies of Jesus given by Matthew and by Luke, Frederic Louis Godet wrote: “This study of the text in detail leads us in this way to admit—1. That the genealogical register of Luke is that of Heli, the grandfather of Jesus; 2. That, this affiliation of Jesus by Heli being expressly opposed to His affiliation by Joseph, the document which he has preserved for us can be nothing else in his view than the genealogy of Jesus through Mary. But why does not Luke name Mary, and why pass immediately from Jesus to His grandfather? Ancient sentiment did not comport with the mention of the mother as the genealogical link. Among the Greeks a man was the son of his father, not of his mother; and among the Jews the adage was: ‘Genus matris non vocatur genus [“The descendant of the mother is not called (her) descendant”]’ (‘Baba bathra,’ 110, a).”—Commentary on Luke, 1981, p. 129.

Actually each genealogy (Matthew’s table and Luke’s) shows descent from David, through Solomon and through Nathan. (Mt 1:6; Lu 3:31) In examining the lists of Matthew and Luke, we find that after diverging at Solomon and Nathan, they come together again in two persons, Shealtiel and Zerubbabel. This can be explained in the following way: Shealtiel was the son of Jeconiah; perhaps by marriage to the daughter of Neri he became Neri’s son-in-law, thus being called the “son of Neri.” It is possible as well that Neri had no sons, so that Shealtiel was counted as his “son” for that reason also. Zerubbabel, who was likely the actual son of Pedaiah, was legally reckoned as the son of Shealtiel, as stated earlier.—Compare Mt 1:12; Lu 3:27; 1Ch 3:17-19.

Then the accounts indicate that Zerubbabel had two sons, Rhesa and Abiud, the lines diverging again at this point. (These could have been, not actual sons, but descendants, or one, at least, could have been a son-in-law. Compare 1Ch 3:19.) (Lu 3:27; Mt 1:13) Both Matthew’s and Luke’s genealogies of Jesus vary here from that found in 1 Chronicles chapter 3. This may be because a number of names were purposely left out by Matthew and possibly also by Luke. But the fact should be kept in mind that such differences in the genealogical lists of Matthew and Luke are very likely those already present in the genealogical registers then in use and fully accepted by the Jews and were not changes made by Matthew and Luke.

We may conclude, therefore, that the two lists of Matthew and Luke fuse together the two truths, namely, (1) that Jesus was actually the Son of God and the natural heir to the Kingdom by miraculous birth through the virgin girl Mary, of David’s line, and (2) that Jesus was also the legal heir in the male line of descent from David and Solomon through his adoptive father Joseph. (Lu 1:32, 35; Ro 1:1-4) If there was any accusation made by hostile Jews that Jesus’ birth was illegitimate, the fact that Joseph, aware of the circumstances, married Mary and gave her the protection of his good name and royal lineage refutes such slander.

[Chart on page 913, 914]

BIBLE LISTS OF JESUS’ GENEALOGY

Genesis 1 Chronicles Matthew Luke

and Ruth Chaps 1, 2, 3 Chap 1 Chap 3

Adam Adam Adam

Seth Seth Seth

Enosh Enosh Enosh

Kenan Kenan Cainan

Mahalalel Mahalalel Mahalaleel

Jared Jared Jared

Enoch Enoch Enoch

Methuselah Methuselah Methuselah

Lamech Lamech Lamech

Noah Noah Noah

Shem Shem Shem

Arpachshad Arpachshad Arpachshad

Cainan

Shelah Shelah Shelah

Eber Eber Eber

Peleg Peleg Peleg

Reu Reu Reu

Serug Serug Serug

Nahor Nahor Nahor

Terah Terah Terah

Abram Abraham Abraham Abraham

(Abraham)

Isaac Isaac Isaac Isaac

Jacob (Israel) Jacob Jacob Jacob

Judah (and Judah Judah Judah

Tamar) (and Tamar)

Perez Perez Perez Perez

Hezron Hezron Hezron Hezron

Ram Ram Ram Arni (Ram?)

Amminadab Amminadab Amminadab Amminadab

Nahshon Nahshon Nahshon Nahshon

Salmon Salmon (Salma, Salmon (and Salmon

1Ch 2:11) Rahab)

Boaz (and Boaz Boaz (and Boaz

Ruth) Ruth)

Obed Obed Obed Obed

Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse

David David David (and David

Bath-sheba)

Solomon Solomon Nathan ⁠1

Rehoboam Rehoboam Mattatha

Abijah Abijah Menna

Asa Asa Melea

Jehoshaphat Jehoshaphat Eliakim

Jehoram Jehoram Jonam

Ahaziah Joseph

Jehoash

Judas

Symeon

Amaziah Levi

Azariah (Uzziah) Uzziah Matthat

(Azariah)

Jotham Jotham Jorim

Ahaz Ahaz Eliezer

Hezekiah Hezekiah Jesus

Manasseh Manasseh Er

Amon Amon Elmadam

Josiah Josiah Cosam

Jehoiakim Addi

Melchi

Jeconiah Jeconiah Neri

(Jehoiachin)

Shealtiel Shealtiel Shealtiel ⁠3

(Pedaiah) ⁠2

Zerubbabel ⁠4 Zerubbabel Zerubbabel

Rhesa

Abiud Joanan

Joda

Eliakim Josech

Semein

Azor Mattathias

Maath

Zadok Naggai

Esli

Achim Nahum

Amos

Eliud Mattathias

Joseph

Eleazar Jannai

Melchi

Matthan Levi

Matthat

Jacob Heli (father

of Mary)

Joseph Joseph (Heli’s

son-in-law)

Jesus Jesus

(foster son) (Mary’s son)

1 At Nathan, Luke begins reckoning the genealogy through Jesus’ maternal line, while Matthew continues with the paternal line.

2 Zerubbabel evidently was the natural son of Pedaiah and the legal son of Shealtiel by brother-in-law marriage; or he was brought up by Shealtiel after his father Pedaiah’s death and became legally recognized as the son of Shealtiel.—1Ch 3:17-19; Ezr 3:2; Lu 3:27.

3 Shealtiel the son of Jeconiah possibly was the son-in-law of Neri.—1Ch 3:17; Lu 3:27.

4 The lines meet in Shealtiel and Zerubbabel, afterward diverging. This divergence could have been through two different descendants of Zerubbabel, or Rhesa or Abiud could have been a son-in-law.

The next arms race?

For this next trick...

Wikipedia Erases Paleontologist Günter Bechly
David Klinghoffer | @d_klinghoffer

Günter Bechly is a distinguished paleontologist, specializing in fossil dragonflies, exquisitely preserved in amber for tens of millions of years. After revealing his support for the theory of intelligent design, he was pushed out as a curator at the State Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart, Germany. He subsequently joined Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture as a Senior Fellow. Now we learn that our colleague has suffered another act of censorship: he has been erased from Wikipedia, ostensibly for not being “notable” enough.

This is a big deal, and a reminder of a key dynamic in the debate about ID. What the public hears about that debate is often highly misleading. That’s for a number of reasons, including media distortion, dishonest attributions of “creationism” to ID proponents, and a refusal by most professional scientists who oppose ID to respond to the theory on its scientific merits.

The discussion of design evidence is affected as well by an absence of voices that, in a sensible world, would be in the thick of it. Those voices, a ghost chorus, belong to scholars sympathetic to ID who keep out of the controversy because they’re aware they will be punished if they speak up. We know many of them, and keep private channels of communication open. At Evolution News, we have documented a range of instances of censorship and intimidation. Rarely, though, do the censors reveal themselves as clearly as in the case of Wikipedia versus Bechly.

They don’t do so by name. Wikipedia editors typically employ pseudonyms. But  a discussion page records the deliberations of editors and others on the decision to delete Dr. Bechly’s Wiki entry. It makes for a fascinating and revealing read.

Enormously influential in forming opinion, Wikipedia relies on volunteer editors who may have zero experience in the areas that catch their attention. They’re a dedicated group, with, it often seems, huge amounts of free time on their hands to police changes to entries. The sociology is significant here. Do these unpaid editors have jobs? Spouses? Families? If you don’t think that being preoccupied by children or employment, too busy to obsess about Wikipedia, or not being too busy to do so, correlates with a person’s view of reality, you’re fooling yourself.

So when it comes to anything related to ID, Wiki editors have rigid and not altogether surprising biases. They are lightning fast at erasing corrections to pages they care about. Wikipedia’s coverage of ID, which they characterize as “a religious argument for the existence of God,” is hopelessly prejudiced and inaccurate.

So a pseudonymous editor recommended getting rid of Dr. Bechly’s page, and another, after making a show of weighing the case and soliciting opinions from others, agreed to it. In an eerie replay of his experience with the museum, which deleted his webpages, Bechly is now erased.

Prior to disappearing, his Wikipedia entry dispassionately recounted his education, employment, and accomplishments, including an impressive scientific publications list and a variety of species and taxa named for him. It devoted a short paragraph to his “Support for Intelligent Design.” The case for erasing him seems to have been carried by three individuals. If I’m interpreting the discussion’s welter of nerdy abbreviations and other lingo correctly, a person called “Trekker” nominated Bechly for deletion. This editor claims no bias against “creationism.”

Now, it maybe [sic] also appropriate to point out that I was not even aware that this person was some kind of creationist or whatever when I put this article up for deletion. I simply saw it a while ago by looking at someone elses [sic] edit it [sic] and decided to check the sources, which I do regularly, and saw that they were very lacking. I then checked the talkpage which had already brought up the issue of notability. I felt a [sic] AFD [Articles for deletion] was a good idea. That’s that.

Trekker, whose interests include “pro wrestling, literature, science fiction, fantasy and comic book[s],” is pressed by a pro-Bechly contributor, “Sam Tanner.” Trekker then throws a tantrum and exits the discussion — “If you are feel [sic] I’m being combative and condescending towards you that’s because I am.” Tanner replies that Trekker’s combativeness “does suggest that this is more than routine housekeeping.” Really? Do you think so?

Another active participant, “David Eppstein,” is apparently, and to his genuine credit, a real name. It belongs to a computer science professor at UC Irvine. He argues for deletion and maintains that Bechly’s “turn to fringe creationist views does not seem to be notable at all.” At one point Bechly himself enters the discussion, offering “dozens of more secondary sources from the print press, TV and radio” plus “three described new insect orders, more than 160 described species, and insect family Bechlyidae, a genus and 8 species named after me, 2 edited books and numerous book chapters, 1 book in German about me, and a ResearchGate score that is higher than 85% of ResearchGate members.”

Bechly wonders what Eppstein, with his own brief Wikipedia page, itself “semi-protected” from edits, can offer by way of comparison. I have written to Eppstein to ask this question; I am waiting to hear back. Being on the faculty on a University of California campus is no trivial accomplishment. But the system has 21,200 people on its faculty staff. To my eyes, Eppstein does not seem more notable than Bechly. The latter points out that on the atheist side, “intellectual nobodies like Richard Carrier and Matt Dillahunty” enjoy lavish and lengthy Wiki entries. Indeed they do, not skimping on personal details, either. For example, did you know that Carrier (whom I’d never heard of), a self-published author and blogger whose biography runs to 9,000+ words, has “revealed that he is polyamorous”? TMI, Wikipedia.

While much of the encyclopedia is useful, a lot of it is a comedy. Thus, you might wonder if the bio belonging to the editor who ultimately decided Dr. Bechly’s fate is real or a put on. I believe it’s all too real.

The editor, “Jo-Jo Eumerus,” also goes by “Septimus Heap,” after the popular fantasy series for juvenile readers. He is “a currently 23-year old male from Switzerland” who “distinctly prefer[s] to be referred to by the attributes of my avatar on the forums (that is, usually as ‘boy’).” Jo-Jo, or rather “boy” (??), includes a graphic of himself as a wizard, “from a time 500 years ago.” He indicates he has been “diagnosed with Asperger syndrome” and “sometimes [has] problems with society due to this.”

On the Bechly matter, Jo-Jo solemnly rules that “‘notability’ does not necessarily indicate ‘notability’” in Wikipedia’s sense. With a straight face: “Accusations of anti-creationism bias are not germane to the purpose of AfD [Articles for deletion], and we don’t consider the stances of an article subject on a contentious topic in judging notability.”

The most prominent dissenting voice, Sam Tanner, provides ample illustrations of Bechly’s “notability” in any sane, realistic sense of that word, with links to mainstream scientific and popular coverage of his work. That includes discoveries of some pretty horrific insects from 100 or more million years ago.

But once they’ve got you falsely tagged as a “creationist,” none of it matters. One editor pushing for deletion candidly admits:

[D]etermining notability, especially in borderline cases, can definitely be subjective. If it weren’t, discussions like this wouldn’t be necessary.

Well, obviously so. This isn’t a “borderline case,” but clearly, the editors trying to erase Dr. Bechly’s record do not have some sort of knockdown, objective algorithmic case against him. It’s a mad world, a funhouse world, where the notability of a paleontologist of Günter Bechly’s stature is uncontested one day but, following his admission of finding ID persuasive, suddenly and furiously contested, to be ruled upon by a 23-year-old “boy” and 500-year-old wizard called “Jo-Jo.” Such is the alternative reality of Wikipedia.

What’s there to be done? Fight the editors on their own pages? No, that’s a waste of time. We’ve tried. But do share this with friends, as widely as possible, so that perhaps readers will take the online encyclopedia with a pinch of skepticism next time. Also please be sure to share the new documentary Revolutionary in which Dr. Bechly gets to tell a little bit of his own story.

Choosing life has become controversial?

Controversial! HHS to Define Life in Line with Embryology Textbooks
Wesley J. Smith

The Department of Health and Human Services has published a draft strategic plan for 2018-2022 that includes some, shall we say, controversial language. See if you can spot it:

Mission Statement

The mission of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is to enhance the health and well-being of Americans, by providing for effective health and human services and by fostering sound, sustained advances in the sciences underlying medicine, public health, and social services.

Organizational Structure

HHS accomplishes its mission through programs and initiatives that cover a wide spectrum of activities, serving and protecting Americans at every stage of life, beginning at conception…

Whoa. Life “beginning at conception,” or perhaps better stated, at the conclusion of fertilization, is a fact of basic biological science – as embryology textbooks attest.

Still, despite the scientific accuracy, expect the usual suspects to be furious about the proposal. Indeed, that sound you hear is the  yelling already beginning.

The proposed mission statement would also  seem to set the department against assisted suicide:

A core component of the HHS mission is our dedication to serve all Americans from conception to natural death, but especially those individuals and populations facing or at high risk for economic and social well-being challenges, through effective human services. [Emphasis added.]

Good. We can use all the help stopping the death agenda that we can get.

Jehovah's Witnesses in Nazi Germany:a timeline.

Jehovah's Witnesses in the Holocaust: Chronology of Events 1933-1945

1933 - About 25,000 Jehovah's Witnesses are active in Germany. March, first concentration camp, Dachau, established. April 1, all religious literature printed by Jehovah's Witnesses is banned from circulation in Germany. In June, Prussian State Police ban the work and organization of Jehovah's Witnesses. Some Witnesses sentenced to terms in labor and concentration camps. Watch Tower office in Magdeburg raided and closed. August 16, first mention of existence of concentration camps in the Golden Age magazine (now Awake!), published internationally by Jehovah's Witnesses.

1934 - October 7, telegrams of protest sent to Hitler by Jehovah's Witnesses in 50 countries, including Germany.

1935 - April 1, Jehovah's Witnesses banned from all civil service jobs and arrested throughout Germany. Pension and employment benefits confiscated. Marriage to one of Jehovah's Witnesses becomes legal grounds for divorce. Children of Jehovah's Witnesses banned from attending school. Some children taken from parents to be raised in Nazi homes and reform schools.

1936 - Mass arrests of Jehovah's Witnesses. Several thousand are sent to concentration camps and some remain there until 1945. December 12, Jehovah's Witnesses throughout Germany secretly distribute 200,000 copies of the Lucerne Resolution, a protest of Nazi atrocities, in one hour.

1937 - Buchenwald concentration camp established. Here is first known use of the purple triangle as a symbol for camp inmates who are Jehovah's Witnesses. April 22, Gestapo order directs that all of Jehovah's Witnesses released from prison be taken directly to concentration camps. June 20, Jehovah's Witnesses throughout Germany secretly distribute the "Open Letter," which supplies detailed accounts of Nazi atrocities.

1938 - October 2, Watch Tower Society President J. F. Rutherford, speaking over a network of 60 radio stations, denounces Nazi persecution of the Jews. November 9 and 10, Jews experience a nationwide attack in a pogrom called Krystallnacht (night of Broken Glass). About 25,000 Jewish men deported to concentration camps. On November 15, all Jewish children expelled from school.

1939 - September 15, August Dickman, one of Jehovah's Witnesses and the first conscientious objector of the war to be executed, dies by firing squad at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp.

1942 - January 20, Wannasee Conference of Nazi officials formalizes plans for the so-called Final Solution, the extermination of European Jewry.

1945 - May 7, Germany surrenders and the war in Europe ends. The Nuremberg war crimes trials begin in November. September 30, verdicts of the war crimes trials announced in Nuremberg on the same day that Jehovah's Witnesses hold public convention at the Zeppelinwiese, formerly used for Nazi Party rallies.