Nelson’s talk was a not so thinly veiled swipe at evolution and modern science. He didn’t say the E word but he didn’t need to. His audience knew exactly what he was talking about.

He describes many of the amazing features of the human body that creationists like to harp on about (eyes, heart, immune system etc) as evidence of a divine creator. (He chooses not to mention that many animals also possess very similar features).

He then says:

“Anyone who studies the workings of the human body has surely seen god moving in his majesty and power...”

Having the audience right where he wants them he can now start mocking.

“some people erroneously think that these marvelous physical attributes happened by chance or resulted from a big bang somewhere… (most audience members chuckle, some audience members inwardly groan). Ask yourself, could an explosion in a printing shop produce a dictionary.”

Its amazing the courage these geriatrics get when they are protected both by a pulpit and a gullible audience that will blindly swallow anything they say.

How did he get through medical school though? I can understand/excuse this drivel from someone not schooled in the natural sciences. But he has had extensive physics, biology, chemistry training. At a minimum he should understand the dangers of mixing science with theology. This has got to be political.

And how would he explain a person in a persistent vegetative state? Broken spirit?

Can't Resist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> How did he get through medical school though? I
> can understand/excuse this drivel from someone not
> schooled in the natural sciences. But he has had
> extensive physics, biology, chemistry training. At
> a minimum he should understand the dangers of
> mixing science with theology. This has got to be
> political.

Back in 1998 when I first read about the DNA lineages of Native Americans I was put in touch with Scott Woodward at BYU (who was a world leading scientist who could put me straight). At one time Scott and I considered the idea of speaking to an apostle about the DNA research. I thought Nelson was the obvious choice as he was a quack. Woodward ruled him out immediately. He had been advised by other scientists that Nelson was the wrong apostle to speak to. His mind is closed. And since he is an apostle he can't be wrong.

Thats truly disappointing. It's pretty clear that truth, in the Mormon paradigm, can't be circumscribed into one great whole.... Maybe that's "hole".

Did you ever speak to one of the 12 about the DNA issue?

Jesus Smith Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Did you ever speak to one of the 12 about the DNA
> issue?

Nope. I didn't stick around long enough and I was too far away. I am pretty sure that Woodward has. I know that he spoke to Hinckley and the upshot of that was that he got moved off campus.

I asked my contacts in the biology/chemistry depts at BYU about why Woodward got a pink-slip. They all refused to discuss it, as if it is a taboo topic.

Jesus Smith Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I asked my contacts in the biology/chemistry depts
> at BYU about why Woodward got a pink-slip.

I assume a pink slip is your notice (to vacate your office).

I also have a contact in the biology department and that person told me Woodward was mighty ticked off about losing his position and the whole department knew about it. Being removed from a professorial appointment at a university is a big deal.

in the UK it is a p45!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/02/2012 10:34AM by bignevermo.

Evangelical Creationist votes for Mitt?

It's not like it's official church doctrine, quite the opposite.

Maybe the LD$, Inc. strategy (if there is one) is to keep conflict alive among the members, so that more of them will eventually conclude that there is no clear answer to this kind of question. So........they'd better keep following the Profit.

And the nifty side effect: tithing $$ keeps rolling in.

I don't understand what this serves the church. I realize that scriptures such as 2 Ne 2:22, Moses 3:8 & D&C 77:6 are all proponents of a young earth and against evolution, but the official stance in the past 50 or more years has been a shrug of the shoulders on the matter.

Why is he bringing back the fight now?

Is this solidifying the base against science so that they can get TBMs to ignore DNA evidence?

Nelson surely didn't disagree with evolution at one point in his biology studies. Evolutionary biology is integral for a lot of medical treatments--antibiotics (especially combating drug resistance), etc.

Nelson should read this basic "biology 101" presentation, from Berkeley educators.

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/medicine_01

Like Lulu I think it is as close as they can come to saying "Vote for Mitt, he's as right-wing religious conservative as an southern evangelical". The obvious benefit for the church is having a Mormon in the white house. Imagine all the Mormon royalty called to the cabinet...

Jesus Smith Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> Nelson surely didn't disagree with evolution at
> one point in his biology studies. Evolutionary
> biology is integral for a lot of medical
> treatments--antibiotics (especially combating drug
> resistance), etc.

I must confess that while I passed biology 101 at university with distinction, I didn't fully accept evolution until well into my first postdoc in England. You don't need to believe evolution to pass a biology test.

I am also puzzled why they let talks like this get through. They continue to pick on scientists. It seems they are just saying things that the audience wants to hear. There must be several apostles now who don't have a problem with evolution and most of the BYU biology faculty just accept it. Maybe they didn't think he was mocking evolution because he didn't say the word.

Thanks for telling us that, Simon. I guess I can see what you mean. You don't have to accept or even understand evolution to pass biology.

When I was an undergrad in physics, I had serious cog-diss on the subject of earth age and evolution. I desperately looked for ways to reconcile the scriptures and evidence, and even attempted for a short time to be open minded about creationist arguments on the exponential time-decay of the permeability and permittivity constants that are integral to many dating methods. However, the rest of the evidence--the layering of geo-strata, the progression of the species in that strata, and so forth--were overwhelming.

For a couple of years, I decided I wouldn't resolve it and that even if the scriptures were wrong, it didn't mean the whole gospel was wrong. Except...nagging at my mind is the concept that the atonement is directly tied to the fall, which is directly in conflict with evolutionary evidence. It eventually got bad enough in my mind that by the final year of my MS in molecular biology, I started "losing the spirit" of many things in the church. I hovered there, still reluctantly active, for about a decade.

"I am also puzzled why they let talks like this get through. They continue to pick on scientists. It seems they are just saying things that the audience wants to hear. There must be several apostles now who don't have a problem with evolution and most of the BYU biology faculty just accept it. Maybe they didn't think he was mocking evolution because he didn't say the word."


A mesmerizing speaker (assuming he is such) can enervate his audience and basically hold them in thrall - demonstrating that a spoonful of charisma makes the nonsense go down, especially with a non-critical/non-attentive audience. They are, after all, "blessed" to be in the presence of a mormon apostle.

And, the ready PR antidote of "he was speaking as a man" is available if needed.

"Hey! Smart people in the audience! This church is for fools! Wake up! Go outside and throw a frisbee around while I keep these chumps distracted with idiotic folksy false analogies!" I don't know if he was using that many exclamation points, but that's the way the spirit spoke to me.

My husband's been joking that the analogy of the printing press blowing up is just a subtle way of throwing historic references in the face of the uninformed. Like they all sit around before conference and dare each other/make bets about slipping in little tidbits from their damning history.

I'm seeing the printing press quote all over facebook. I always regret saying anything on there, so I'm trying to let it go.

Part of what's frustrating about it to me is that Nelson didn't propose any other version of the creation story. Does he think that God threw his apron on, lined up his ingredients and used his mixing bowls and Kitchenaid? I'll be the first to admit that I'm not very educated on the Big Bang Theory or evolution in general, but why the hell couldn't that be the method He used?

(If "He" exists.)

How come Elohim & Jehova get to run around naked (in the temple), but A & E have to wear aprons?

The LDS Church is so limited in its worldview because it is the creation of a few small minded men: JS, BY, etc. The modern gerontocrats know precious little about the real world, and are cut off from Heaven.

They have no integrity and are only interested in expanding their little corporation at all costs. Nelson knows that evolution is a proven scientific fact. Without it, all our antibiotics would become useless as bacteria evolve resistance. BYU biology professors when I was there knew that you cannot be a biologist and a creationist, because understanding evolution is as critical to biology as understanding electricity is to computer engineers.

I thought Mormonism explicitly rejected the idea that God designed the human body. According to Mormonism, the human body is just like God's own body, and he got it from his parents just like we received it from God.

Is anyone reviewing these talks ahead of time to make sure that they don't contradict basic Mormon beliefs?

(Thank you for that, Simon!) Rather than argue the particulars, which would be a huge mistake and his audience would not follow anyway, he chose to poison the well. Attack evolution and science and you attack the DNA evidence against the Book of Mormon without bringing it up.

Good point. So they are prepared to say that god just randomly stuck non-Semitic DNA in the cells of Native Americans for the hell of it? No cause and effect? Back to a pre-Newtonian understanding of the world. Bottom line is that they don't want educated people in the church... Too risky.

robertb Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Attack evolution and science and
> you attack the DNA evidence against the Book of
> Mormon without bringing it up.

Interesting take.

Everyone knows it was a talking snake in a tree!

Isn't it marvelous? Isn't it wonderful?

Actually, a rather large percentage of the american people claim not to accept evolution (40+ percent?) which means they are either apathetic, or have the obstinate ignorance of a 2 year old. In Nelson's case, it is apparently the latter.

When I was a TBM in college, learning about evolution was easy. I viewed it like anything I was there to learn. My job was to memorize the material and pass the test. That's what I did. All personal questions were put on the shelf. My science teacher also made it clear she wasn't there to debate, but to teach.

It was an extremely busy time in my life. I had 3 kids, a business, and was going to school full time. I didn't have time to sit around and think about the universe. At the time I didn't care. I just needed to get through school, whatever that took.

What's funny is that he actually passed medical school.

But I guess this is similar to those guys who become doctors and endorse crappy skin care products. As long as the $$$/status is there (as it is in Mormonism), just say whatever the hell it takes to sell the product.

Unfortunately a lot of cognitive dissonance can be tolerated by some in medical school. I've witnessed this exhibited by some of my colleagues during and even after graduation from medical school. They don't have an issue with antibiotic resistance with bacteria because there is a convenient distinction between so called "microevolution" and "macroevolution." Since a bacteria that develops a new characteristic (say resistance to an antibiotic) is still the same "species" of bacteria, no real evolution has occurred because that's not macroevolution.

What makes this even more complicated is the fact that species is not a very meaningful term (which is why I placed it in quotes) when talking about bacteria which reproduce in an asexual manner. A more technical definition of species is a population of organisms that not only can interbreed but will interbreed. These kinds of distinctions are crucial to a good understanding of these topics but creationists toss them around, many times, to an audience who nod their heads and say, "that makes sense."

Bottom line is that there isn't a lot of evolutionary principles taught in medical school. I was fortunate and was enrolled in a dual degree program and studied genetics at the same time.

Partial transcription of Nelson's talk in this thread:
http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,461545

I did a search and came up with a talk dated 1987/88:

"Through the ages, some without scriptural understanding have tried to explain our existence by pretentious words such as ex nihilo (out of nothing). Others have deduced that, because of certain similarities between different forms of life, there has been a natural selection of the species, or organic evolution from one form to another. Many of these people have concluded that the universe began as a “big bang” that eventually resulted in the creation of our planet and life upon it.

To me, such theories are unbelievable! Could an explosion in a printing shop produce a dictionary? It is unthinkable! Even if it could be argued to be within a remote realm of possibility, such a dictionary could certainly not heal its own torn pages or renew its own worn corners or reproduce its own subsequent editions!

We are children of God, created by him and formed in his image. Recently I studied the scriptures to find how many times they testify of the divine creation of man. Looking up references that referred to create, form (or their derivatives), with either man, men, male, or female in the same verse, I found that there are at least fifty-five verses of scripture that attest to our divine creation. I have selected one to represent all the verses that convey the same conclusion:

“The Gods took counsel among themselves and said: Let us go down and form man in our image, after our likeness. …

“So the Gods went down to organize man in their own image, in the image of the Gods to form they him, male and female to form they them.” (Abr. 4:26, 27.)

I believe all of those scriptures that pertain to the creation of man. But the decision to believe is a spiritual one, not made solely by an understanding of things physical, for we read that “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” (1 Cor. 2:14.)

It is incumbent upon each informed and spiritually attuned person to help overcome such foolishness of men who would deny divine creation or think that man simply evolved. By the Spirit, we perceive the truer and more believable wisdom of God.

With great conviction, I add my testimony to that of my fellow Apostle Paul, who said, “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?

“If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.” (1 Cor. 3:16, 17.)

The Lord said that “the spirit and the body are the soul of man.” (D&C 88:15.) Therefore, each one of us is a dual being—a biological (physical) entity, and an intellectual (spiritual) entity. In the beginning, man, the intellectual entity, was with God. Our intelligence “was not created or made,” nor can it be. (See D&C 93:29.)

That spirit, joined with a physical body of such remarkable qualities, becomes a living soul of supernal worth. The psalmist so expressed this thought:

“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou has ordained;

“What is man, that thou art mindful of him? …

“For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.” (Ps. 8:3-5.)

Why were we created? Why are we here? Why are we upon the earth?

God has made it plain over and over again that the world was made for mankind. We are here to work out our divine destiny, according to an eternal plan that was presented to us in the great council of heaven. Our bodies have been created to accommodate our spirits, to allow us to experience the challenges of mortality and continue our eternal progression.
Taken from a talk delivered at Brigham Young University on 29 March 1987
Russell M. Nelson, “The Magnificence of Man,” Ensign, Jan. 1988, 64"
----------------------------------------------------------------

The scary thing is that this guy was once a doctor and a pretty good one at that. I wounder if someone could sit down and explain things to him.

"Hey Russ...how that you have finished your cream of wheat, let me tell you about a really neat idea. You know how some people can select certain animals and plants and then cross breed them to create new and better strains? Well guess what!!! That happens in nature also all by itself! Ain't that sumthing?!!?

imo evolution-ism has little grounds to debunk creationism. It answers nothing, just gives those that don't believe in a divine being a little bit to think upon while those with a belief in such have a little more.

Simon in Oz Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> >
> Having the audience right where he wants them he
> can now start mocking.
>
> “some people erroneously think that these
> marvelous physical attributes happened by chance
> or resulted from a big bang somewhere… (most
> audience members chuckle, some audience members
> inwardly groan).

I hate it when these guys act like they are in a some secret that the rest of the world is not privy to. (Hint, hint, chuckle, chuckle.) Monson pulled this "wink, wink" stunt a conference or two ago when referenced the Beatles' "All You Need is Love" in a deroogatory manner.

The irony is that those doing the chuckling are the ones who are really being duped by the GAs bullshit.

M.P.

I always get a chuckle when I remember the following story from a BYU grad who was a good TBM young man at the time :)

http://packham.n4m.org/whylft.htm

"I enjoyed my four years at BYU, being surrounded by devout fellow- students and being taught by devout and educated teachers. One professor of geology was also a member of our ward. I was just learning about the age of the earth as most geologists taught it. I asked him one Sunday at church how he reconciled the teachings of his science with the teachings of the church (which said that the earth was created about 6000 years ago). He replied that he had two compartments in his brain: one for geology and one for the gospel. They were entirely separate, and he did not let the one influence the other. This bothered me, but I didn't think more about it."

Good thing for this young man's contributions to building up the kingdom and the tithes and making Mormon babies that he didn't let himself think about this professor's comment ;) If only he had been born under correlation then he might be sitting in a chair today at home searching online for the conference talks so he can bask in the well-correlated spirit he felt this weekend ;)

I remember when Monson came to speak at BYU for a fireside when I was there. Early in his talk he started mocking people who believed in Evolution, just as an aside. I got up and walked out.

My point is that they're all like that.

Yikes. I would not want a surgeon who didn't believe in basic accepted scientific theories working on me.

What other scientific theories does this guy think is hooey? And how would that conflict in the OR?