Re: If you are a resident of Europe…

and: …But now, for real people…

As a naturalized Texan, I’ve often suspected that residents of Europe were somewhat, uh, “unreal” … But in a “good way,” honest!

YEC is a mixed bag. Some YEC’s do start with the Bible and simply ignore any contrary evidence. Some YEC’s come to their beliefs largely through scientific evidence, with the Bible functioning more as a source of hypotheses than as a philosophical base to which science must conform. Of course, the latter routinely are conflated with the former by those who wish to argue against YEC. You will, of course, recognize a parallel to this conflation in what is commonly done to ID.

Not all YEC’s are YUC’s (young universe creationists). There is another variant that allows an old age for the earth, but believes in a young age for life on earth, what might be abbreviated YLEC. It is easy to find oneself arguing against positions that are not actually being held by one’s opponent if one is not careful.

But BarryA is right; this blog is not primarily for discussing YEC. So unless there is a specific connection to the topic at hand, it may be better to address the subject of YEC elsewhere.

YEC overlooks several important facts in trying to establish its validity.

In my opinion, the most egregious violation of science (and of basic Theistic mandates) by YEC is when they require the universal constants (such as the speed of light) to vary, in order to arrive at their numbers for a young universe.
YEC is no better than evolution if they must presuppose that something, that they have absolutely no evidence of, “could have” happened, in order to make the evidence that is available fit their theory.

It makes a theory unfalsifiable when the theory carries more weight to bend evidence than the evidence has weight to falsify it.

And that is exactly what we see with evolution and YEC!

“I know the difference between ID and Creationism, but what is UD’s general opinion about young earth creationism, in that the earth is only a couple ten-thousand years old? More specifically, are the accusations of radioactive dating being inaccurate well-founded?”

Berceuse, young earth creationism (YEC) is an essentially religious approach to origins. ID is a scientific approach. UD is a site for the discussion of ID, not creationism of any stripe, including YEC. UD does not have a “general opinion” about YEC, becuase discussing it is not within the scope of our mission. Although you will see many of our commenters alluding to YEC from time to time, UD does not hold itself out as a forum for such discussions.

Thanks ever so much! (And, Brr!)

GEM of TKI

“Something Changed”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcqFZV8UJMs

The song something changed:

http://video.google.com/videop.....;plindex=3

[QA01.04] Quantum Control of Molecules
Kent R. Wilson (University of California, San Diego)

Quantum control of molecules has recently rapidly moved from a theoretical field involving simple dilute gas phase molecules with the participation of only a few quantum states to experiments involving large molecules in the condensed phase at room temperature. These advances flow in part from the use of new techniques such as multiphoton control, the molecular pi pulse, and adaptive learning control (in which the experiment automatically learns from successive trials to optimize the light field with respect to the experimental goal). Applications of quantum control and its point of view to other fields are now becoming numerous: control of electronic, as well as nuclear, dynamics; automatic testing of theorems; control of large molecules in solution (including proteins); use of quantum control to discover the nature of chemical reactions; optimization of multiphoton microscopy; and quantum control concepts applied to develop a molecular scale pH meter.

please note this fact:

“control of large molecules in solution (including proteins)”

I think they may have actually leap frogged the big researchers:

This is solid proof of principle that this ain’t no fluke.