[Brad McFall] was elected to the House of Representatives.
Not sure if you were joking or not. There is a Representative Mike McFall from Michigan, elected in 2023. Democrat and openly gay.
If you had gotten confused by the last name, that's understandable. I kept hearing talk of some "Brady" guy and the only Brady I could think of was James Brady, Reagan's press secretary who was shot in the head during Hinkley's 1981 assassination attempt and for whom the Brady Bill (Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act) was named.
Since the context of that other Brady guy seemed to be sports, I marveled at Brady's recovery from his head wound, especially considering that the last I had seen him he was still confined to a wheelchair.
Nor are we interested in your family photos of dirt.
I suppose that you also deny that we are mammals. Or vertebrates.
The Creation is what it is, despite your constant denial of it. And its Creator created it as it is, despite your constant denial.
More pearls before you swine. There's a Christian (believer in Divine Creation) who's also a scientist. Refer to Clint's Reptiles of YouTube. You refuse to listen to any atheist. Well, he's not one, though you will also refuse to listen to him too (hence, this is for the benefit of everyone else, since you are irredeemably lost).
The first video of his I watched has him declaring his faith and describing his many contacts with creationists trying to get them to stop with their stupid strawman arguments and instead develop a "Steelman" form of creationism, one that presents actual arguments with a valid basis:
Regarding this latest idiocy of yours, here is another video of Clint's :
It also addresses one of your standard creationist lies of which you remain unrepentant by showing that you cannot evolve out of your clade. That means that mammals remain mammals, placentals remain placentals, primates remain primates, Haplorhini remain Haplorhini, Simiiformes remain Simiiformes, Hominidae remain Hominidae, Homininae remain Homininae, Hominini remain Hominini, and Homo remain Homo.
To put that more directly, Man is Man, but Man is still in all his ancestral clades, therefore Man is still Homo, Hominini, Homininae, Hominidae, Simiiformes, Haplorhini, primate, placental, mammal, and Animalia. We have never evolved out of any of our ancestral clades, nor could we ever do so regardless of however times you repeat that creationist lie.
Or as one comment summarized it:
quote:
"humans aren't monkeys" - creationists "humans are monkeys" - people who understand evolution "humans aren't monkeys, they're apes" - people who start learning evolutionary history "humans are apes and apes are monkeys, so humans are monkeys" - people who understand cladistics
Sadly, it is too late for candle2 to learn anything, but that is no reason for him to hold the rest of us back.
POST SCRIPT
Some of my fellow Intelligent Designers (AKA engineers) who had worked in defense should recognize Clint's term, STEELMAN, though he might not have known about this context (or perhaps he did).
Such terms are used in the incremental design of major projects, especially DoD, as described in the Wikipedia article, Straw Man Proposal (not to be confused with straw man arguments).
The expression was already in use in the United States Department of Defense circa 1975 in their Large Organization Model Building paradigm (LOMB) and was apparently in use with this meaning (initial proposal) in the United States Air Force before that. The succession of names comes from the requirements document for the programming language Ada. In the High Order Language Working Group (HOLWG) the process to define Ada generated requirements documents sporting different names, representing the various stages of development of the Ada language, as described in 1993 by Col William Whitaker in an article ACM SIGPLAN Notices. They are:
STRAWMAN issued in April 1975
WOODENMAN issued in August 1975
TINMAN issued in January 1976
IRONMAN issued in January 1977 (revised in July 1977)
SANDMAN not published but circulated in January 1978
STEELMAN issued in June 1978
PEBBLEMAN issued in July 1978
PEBBLEMAN Revised and issued in January 1979
STONEMAN issued in February 1980
Other references include "The Ada Environment", LTC Rodney A. Edge, Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Washington, DC 20307, Thomas A. Marciniak, M.D., National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD 20205
Software development
In software development, a crude plan or document may serve as the strawman or starting point in the evolution of a project. The strawman is not expected to be the last word; it is refined until a final model or document is obtained that resolves all issues concerning the scope and nature of the project. In this context, a strawman can take the form of an outline, a set of charts, a presentation, or a paper.
The ‘Straw Man’ also fits in neatly with the concept of iterative design, repeating and re-drafting to improve an initial concept or design. If anything is built, often, it may not end up in the final product. It might be that the decision is to not continue at all, in which case, the ‘Straw Man’ approach may have saved a lot of wasted work in the long run. Or, the final approach may be very different from the first model. Either way, the ‘Straw Man’ will have proven its worth by having re-directed the approach before any significant work is undertaken.
As I recall from the DoD's printing of MIL-STD-1815 (AKA "the Green Book" after the green cover emblematic of the language proposal which was code-named "Green"), the metal and non-metal names denoted parallel design tracks, one for the software and the other for the hardware platforms (as I seem to recall from forty years ago). I gave that copy of MIL-STD-1815 to my boss while keeping the Springer-Verlag printing for myself which does not include the design description.
The first video I presented, the one that urges creationists to stop with the stupid strawman arguments and instead formulate an actual valid position, especially caught my attention, because that's what I've been trying for decades to get creationists to do (from My Cre-Ev website):
quote:If you honestly and truly want to fight evolution, then at least do it right! Learn everything you can about evolution and then attack it, not some stupid strawman caricature of it. And do so honestly and truthfully!
By refusing to fight evolution honestly and truthfully, but rather using "creation science" instead, you are constantly shooting yourself in the foot, dooming your cause to failure and your followers to losing their faith.
But do they ever listen? No. Again, Marcus Lycus to his slave who won't ever do anything to try to improve himself:
quote:But you'll never learn, you'll be a eunuch all your life.
They'll never learn. They'll be nothing but stupid creationists all their life. Laughed at and scorned for their stupidity everywhere they go -- except when they slink into the darkness of fellow creationists, all of them fearful of the clear and bright gaze of normals.
And doing immeasurable damage to their religion in the process, not only through their personal examples of dishonesty, but also because their arguments explicitly demand that if they are wrong then so are their religion, the Bible, and God. They explicitly claim that the only alternative to their false claims is atheism. Eg:
quote:John Morris as reported at the 1986 International Conference on Creationism: ("The 1986 International Conference on Creationism" by Robert Schadewald, Creation/Evolution Newsletter, Volume 6, Number 5, September/October 1986, NCSE, pp 8-14.)
"If the earth is more than 10,000 years old then Scripture has no meaning."
John L. Groenlund, What is the Purpose of Creation Ministry, in Institute for Creation Research Back to Genesis Report No. 78, June 1995:
"If evolution is true, then the Bible is not true."
Science does not disprove God, nor does it try to. Rather, it is creationism that disproves God in so many ways including by its own rules.
***Anyone who thinks that a tree dated at 30,000 years old is incased in a mountain over 50,000,000 years old is definitely perverted in their thinking.
What the hell stupid nonsense are you talking about this time? Still spreading baseless creationist lies? Why are you unable to serve your god except with lies? (that should be a clue)
How's 'bout you something that you have never done before and provide us with a LINK?
Which of course you will never do, because even you must realize that you're lying.
Nothing is what rocks dream about.
The same goes for dirt. And you are the one who believes that you literally came from dirt.
So what the hell are you talking about?
Edited by dwise1, : Changed "Neither does dirt." to "The same goes for dirt." to make the meaning more clear
***If you truly want yo see a delusional person, go stare in the mirror. While there, and while staring at yourself say "I am kin to Chimps and warthog. I am no different than them."
Why would you expect him to say such a stupid thing? Why would you expect any thinking person to say such a stupid thing?
The only people who would ever think that anyone would say such a stupid thing would be A STUPID LYING CREATIONIST!
Are we related to chimps and warthogs (and all other mammals for that matter)? Yes, obviously! Are we no different than them? Of course we are different, obviously! What the hell is wrong with you, you STUPID LYING CREATIONIST?
Why are you incapable of any action other than lying?
Also say, I believe, I do believe, that I, my wife, and my kids are proof that a frog actually turned in a man."
That's even more stupid and utterly false! WHY DO YOU INSIST ON INCESSANT LYING?
Nobody says that humans descended from frogs, EXCEPT FOR STUPID LYING CREATIONISTS. Besides, it makes absolutely no sense at all! Evolution clearly teaches that all descendants of frogs will still be frogs!NO SPECIES CAN EVER EVOLVE OUT OF ITS CLADE!.
WHY DO YOU INSIST ON INCESSANT LYING? Were you always a pathological liar, or is it the corrupting influence of your false religion that has driven you to such utter debasement and depravity?
And on top of that, everything you post is utterly stupid. Complete idiocy!
Seriously, your testimony to us is a warning to avoid your false religion completely.If you truly believe that anything you have posted has any merit at all, then it is you who are delusional.
Phat, here is a new video from Clint's Reptiles that dropped today. It's kind of a follow-up to his Evolutionary Biologist Reacts to Creationist Arguments video (see my Message 430), but he reviews a number of creationist videos to comment on what they get wrong (eg, commonly the "we never see dogs giving birth to non-dogs" nonsense, basically claiming that evolution requires us to evolve out of our clade, which evolution tells us is clearly impossible).
He offers this thesis statement at about the 24:50 timemark (my transcription):
quote:This video comes from a channel called Bible Explored and it sounds like somebody asked him to define "evolution". This is honestly a great activity to do if you don't want to simply make strawman arguments all day. That is why it was so important for me to create a STEELMAN of young-earth creationism.
If I can't explain someone else's position so accurately that they could sign off that I had it right, then why would they have any interest in my criticism of their position? I don't even know what it is.
Not to mention the fact that I might end up agreeing with them if I understood their position correctly.
It's another thing to disagree with positions that you assume they hold but that aren't their actual positions.
So if you are debating someone and you want to have any chance of actually persuading them that they are wrong, correctly articulating their position is basically an essential place to start.
I would love it if more creationists would attempt this, but it is also essential to be open to the possibility that you don't have it right. That is unless you just love strawman arguments.
He puts it so much better, but that's what I've been saying to creationists for decades. And we've all seen creationists run for the hills to escape having to define what they mean by "evolution"; ie, the constant and constantly unanswered question of: "What are you talking about?"
Though Clint may be making a bad assumption here with " ... and you want to have any chance of actually persuading them that they are wrong ... ". Maybe they're not interested in convincing us of anything. Maybe they're far more interested in convincing themselves (and only themselves).
As I reposted from a Quora posting reposted once on FaceBook:
Two decades ago I was on a Google "origins" forum where a creationist inadvertently revealed their secret strategy; that was a real epiphany for me. After decisively refuting a claim he made (the old sea-salt claim, as I recall) such that he himself admitted that his claim was false, I asked him why creationists have so little to support their position (well, nothing actually) that they have to resort to such unconvincing false claims, to which he replied (from memory): "You only find them unconvincing because you are not yet convinced."
That means that they don't care about the evidence, they don't care about the truth, and they don't even want to convince us about anything. All they care about is convincing themselves and keeping themselves convinced.
I've posted this before from Quora, but it's been a year so here it is again:
quote:Why do people get angry when I try to share the word of God with them? I only do it because I care about them deeply and don't want them to end up in hell. I feel like some people avoid me because of this. Is there any way to get through to them?
by Doug Robertson, studied at University of Maine Updated Dec 11 2018
The entire process is not what you think it is.
It is specifically designed to be uncomfortable for the other person because it isn't about converting them to your religion. It is about manipulating you so you can't leave yours.
If this tactic was about converting people it would be considered a horrible failure. It recruits almost no one who isn't already willing to join. Bake sales are more effective recruiting tools.
On the other hand, it is extremely effective at creating a deep tribal feeling among its own members.
The rejection they receive is actually more important than the few people they convert. It causes them to feel a level of discomfort around the people they attempt to talk to. These become the "others". These uncomfortable feelings go away when they come back to their congregation, the "Tribe".
If you take a good look at the process it becomes fairly clear. In most cases, the religious person starts out from their own group, who is encouraging and supportive. They are then sent out into the harsh world where people repeatedly reject them. Mainly because they are trained to be so annoying.
These brave witnesses then return from the cruel world to their congregation where they are treated like returning heroes. They are now safe. They bond as they share their experiences of reaching out to the godless people to bring them the truth. They share the otherness they experience.
Once again they will learn that the only place they are accepted is with the people who think as they do. It isn't safe to leave the group. The world is your enemy, but we love you.
This is a pain reward cycle that is a common brainwashing technique. The participants become more and more reliant on the "Tribe" because they know that "others" reject them.
Mix in some ritualized chanting, possibly a bit of monotonous repetition of instructions, add a dash of fear of judgment by an unseen, but all-powerful entity who loves you if you do as you are told and you get a pretty powerful mix.
Sorry, I have absolutely no wish to participate in someone's brainwashing ritual.
That seems to be a better explanation for what creationists are trying to accomplish with their nonsensical false claims. They know they have no hope of convincing us with their lies (especially when we know far more about the subject matter than they do), so they go through that evolution solely for the purpose of convincing themselves that if they keep polishing their turd it will turn shiny.
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