Accoring to Aubrea Wagner, the 17 year old winner of the Christian World View essay contest in which students were asked to write an essay on the following theme:
Write a letter to Charles Darwin explaining why you believe biblical creationism is more plausible and reasonable than Darwin's theory of evolution.
Aubrea's essay is here in PDF form. The web site with other essays, the rules of the contest, and additional information is here.
I invite you to review this essay and comment on its veracity and validity.
Hat tip: Scott Lohman
Life Science
Politics
Comments
Saw the essay. She doesn't seem to understand what a theory is, and note that one of her sources is Behe.
She talks about insulin, and blood clotting, and basically says "it's complicated, so there's no way it could have evolved." But she doesn't look like she's delved very deeply into the biochemistry of wither. I wouldn't expect a 2th-grader to do too much of that, though. However, I would have hoped she understood that many genetic diseases (juvenile-onset diabetes included) may not kill you until after you reproduce, at which point, evoltionarily speaking, nothing matters.
Then there's the "micro- but no macro" meme, and the no transitional fossils one, (Tiiktalik, anyone?) the usual stuff. Pretty bog-standard, really.
Posted by: Jesse | March 13, 2010 2:00 PM
I'm not sure the "incredible creator effortlessly spoke the entire universe into existence". The bible says nothing about whether it was easy or hard. I think personally that he needed a sitz bath and some divine Preparation H afterward.
Posted by: george.w | March 13, 2010 2:08 PM
"Mr. Darwin, I sincerely hope you will join me in
worshiping the amazing Creator."
Aubrea, I think it's a little late for that.
More seriously, Jesse basically nailed it. She uses standard creationist arguments from standard creationist sources and comes to the creationist answer. A few token mined quotes are toss in for the appearance of both objectivity and to bolster her argument.
Posted by: History Punk | March 13, 2010 2:12 PM
Nearly every sentence in the essay is flawed. Every conclusion is either based on "I don't see how, so goddidit" or the conclusion is ass backwards. The conclusion based on Type I diabetes screams out for a genetic flaw, but she hides from it.
I would give this paper a D-. Its not an F because of the proper use of syntax and semantics and she knows how to site references properly.
Posted by: NewEnglandBob | March 13, 2010 2:14 PM
This is one of those modern theologians that show that science and religion are compatible and Richard Dawkins is wrong, right?
Posted by: Deen | March 13, 2010 3:01 PM
That's just sad. The poor kid doesn't stand a chance. Seems like child abuse to me.
Posted by: Janice in Toronto | March 13, 2010 9:27 PM
Poor kid; her parents are making her the butt of all jokes.
Posted by: MadScientist | March 14, 2010 2:50 AM
I couldn't get past the fifth page, the stupid hurt too much. I hope it's not contagious! This girl doesn't even have a basic junior high school understanding of science or the scientific method! If this is the best they could put forth. I REALLY don't want to read the others!
Posted by: gwen | March 14, 2010 6:25 AM
I read the whole thing hoping to see some actual evidence for creationism. Of course there was none of that, just poor understanding, fumbling efforts to "poke holes", quote mining, and use of noncredible sources to make the same piss-poor arguments that have been thoroughly debunked many many times before.
This kid could get an "A" for composition though. The level of skill using appropriate grammar is as good as you can expect from any highschool student. Even so, the content deserves an "F", a poor argument that doesn't follow the title and contains no supporting evidence.
I am interested in that whole "blood clotting" irreducible complexity comment. I honestly haven't heard that one before. Guess its time to hit the talkorigins site again.
Posted by: DJ | March 14, 2010 8:59 AM
Re: bloodclotting
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB200_2.html
There it is, another creationist claim debunked with actual references to actual primary literature sources. Imagine that
Posted by: DJ | March 14, 2010 9:05 AM
All this essay demonstrates is that the church is deliberately misguiding their own children to create the next generation of sheep.
BTW cosmology does not say the universe came from nothing, that meme is just highly effective religious propoganda. Science says we can trace it's evolution back 13.7 billion years to the event horizon of a singularity. That event horizion is still with us and defines the boundry of the visible universe.
Posted by: Alan | March 14, 2010 9:14 AM
What's really sad about this is that, had she actually paid attention to her sources, she might have seen that Darwin actually had a more meaningful and complex relationship with his God than she does. He actually had to think about that relationship, and what the world he saw meant about it, and he was able to do so.
Posted by: psweet | March 14, 2010 9:37 AM
I may be wrong, but I was under the impression that it took a bit of time for things to fossilize. How long ago did this supposed great flood take place?
Creationist should stick to pure faith for their argument. Any scientific claims tend to just make them look uneducated.
Posted by: William Paysinger | March 14, 2010 4:59 PM
Creobots of all ages are cretins. :P
Posted by: Katharine | March 15, 2010 12:43 PM