Scott Klusendorf

The Law Is Clear, Life Begins In The Womb (Scott Peterson)

Published by Papa Giorgio

I saw the video [to the right] on Seth Gruber’s Rumble, and I realized I did not have a post here concerning Scott Peterson.

So I wish to fill in the gap with this posting. What follows are some pro-life apologists using Scott Peterson as an example to argue for the life, from conception. Who is Scott Peterson? — for my younger audience.

Who Is Scott Peterson?

In a case that riveted the nation, Scott Peterson was convicted of killing his eight-month pregnant wife, Laci, in 2002. With the help of his mistress, who had not previously known he was married, the FBI was able to collect evidence for the case against him. He was sentenced to death by lethal injection in 2004 for the first-degree murder of his wife and the second-degree murder of their fetus son.

(BIOGRAPHY)

In doing some searching for “stuff” for this post, I came across this blogpost by SECUALR PRO-LIFE… an atheist pro-lifer (yes, THEY EXIST, but they DO – NOT… lol). Here is a portion of that post that mentions Scott Peterson — and brought me to a video I likewise isolated, edited, and posted to my RUMBLE. Both the text and the video discuss what pro-life philosopher, Trent Horn, calls “Golden Retriever Reasoning.”

Enjoy:

Gradualism

This is the argument that pro-life philosopher Trent Horn referred to as Golden Retriever Reasoning. This position essentially states that the unborn don’t have the same value that we do, but they do have some value, just like dogs do. It would be wrong for me to kill my neighbor’s Golden Retriever, not because he’s as valuable as humans but because he belongs to my neighbor. Additionally, you shouldn’t just kill them for a trivial reason, but if circumstances get very tough, then you are justified in killing them.

But as Trent points out in the video, this doesn’t account for why we treat the unborn as no different than infants in some situations (for example, in some states if you kill a wanted unborn child you are charged with murder, not animal cruelty, such as when Scott Peterson killed his pregnant wife and unborn child in California several years ago; he was charged with two counts of murder). In fact, many pro-choice people do treat the unborn as babies if they’re wanted.

We don’t become “more human” by developing further, we just develop more of the traits that humans possess. Similarly, we don’t become “more of a person” by developing further, we just develop the capacity to perform the functions that persons can perform.

So the Gradualist position just doesn’t account for why abortion should be available, especially on demand as we currently have it in the United States now.

(I also add a clip from Seth Gruber)

Much more can be found at my Roe v. Wade post: SCOTUS Overturns Roe/Casey!

SEA TURTLES VS. HUMANS

Bill Maher: Kathy, why do you oppose a women’s right to choose

Kathy Ireland: Bill, when my husband was going to medical school I underwent a transformation.  Because I used to be in favor of abortion.  But I noticed when I was reading through some of his medical teaching books, that according to a law in science known as the law of biogenesis, every living thing reproduces after it own kind.  That means dog produce dogs, cats produce cats, humans produce humans.  If we want to know what something is we simply ask what are its parents. If we know what the parents are, we know what the thing in question is.  And I reasoned from that because human parents can only produce human offspring, unborn human fetuses could be nothing but human beings, because the law of biogenesis rules out every other alternative.  And I concluded therefore that because human fetuses were part of our family, we should not harm them without justification.

Mr. B responds to the claim that “life begins at conception” is only a religious belief.

This is an excerpt from Randy Alcorn’s book (older edition), “Pro-Life Answers to Pro-Choice Arguments Expanded & Updated“

It is uncertain when human life begins; that’s a religious question that cannot be answered by science.

An article printed and distributed by the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL [the original, and still largest pro-choice organization]) describes as anti-choice the position that human life begins at conception. It says the pro-choice position is, Personhood at conception is a religious belief, not a provable biological fact.

Bill O’Reilly of Fox News said on July 3, 2000, “No one knows when human life begins.” He made no distinction between biological life and any other kind of life. Mr. OReilly then went on to ask a guest if “is an embryo in a [petri] dish a human life”? Sen. Hatch’s claim that “an embryo in a petri dish is not a human life”?

1a.  If there is uncertainty about when human life begins, the benefit of the doubt should go to preserving life.

[One of the reasons the Supreme Court allowed the legalization of abortion is that they werent sure of when life began.] Suppose there is uncertainty about when human life begins. If a hunter is uncertain whether a movement in the brush is caused by a person, does his uncertainty lead him to fire or not to fire? If youre driving at night and you think the dark figure ahead on the road may be a child, but it may be just a shadow of a tree, do you drive into it or do you put on the brakes? If we find someone who may be dead or alive, but were not sure, what is the best policy? To assume he is alive and try to save him, or to assume he is dead and walk away?

Shouldn’t we give the benefit of the doubt to life? Otherwise we are saying, This may or may not be a child, therefore it’s all right to destroy it.

1b. Medical Textbooks and scientific reference works constantly agree that human life begins at conception.

Many people have been told that there is no medical or scientific consensus as to when human life begins. This is simply untrue. Among those scientists who have no vested (monetary) in the abortion issue, there is an overwhelming consensus that human life begins at conception. (Conception is the moment when the egg is fertilized by the sperm, bringing into existence the zygote, which is a genetically distinct individual.)

Dr. Bradley M. Pattens textbook, Human Embryology, states:

  • It is the penetration of the ovum by a spermatozoan and the resultant mingling of the nuclear material each brings to the union that constitutes the culmination of the process of fertilization and marks the initiation of a new individual.

Dr. Keith L. Moores text on embryology, referring to the single cell zygote, says:

  • The cell results from fertilization of an oocyte by a sperm and is the beginning of a human being. He also states, Each of us started life as a cell called a zygote.

Doctors J. P. Greenhill and E. A. Friedman, in their work on biology and obstetrics, state:

  • The zygote thus formed represents the beginning of a new life.

Dr. Louis Fridhandler, in the medical textbook Biology of Gestation, refers to fertilization as:

  • that wondrous moment that marks the beginning of life for a new unique individual.

Doctors E. L. Potter and J. M. Craig write in Pathology of the Fetus and the Infant:

  • Every time a sperm cell and ovum unite a new being is created which is alive and will continue to live unless its death is brought about by some specific condition.

Popular scientific reference works reflect this same understanding of when human life begins. Time and Rand McNallys Atlas of the Human Body states:

  • In fusing together, the male and female gametes produce a fertilized single cell, the zygote, which is the start of a new individual.

In an article on pregnancy, the Encyclopedia Britannica says:

  • A new individual is created when the elements of a potent sperm merge with those of a fertile ovum, or egg.

These sources confidently affirm, with no hint of uncertainty that life begins at conception. They state not a theory or hypothesis and certainly not a religious belief every one is a secular source. Their conclusion is squarely based on the scientific and medical facts.

1c. Some of the worlds most prominent scientist and physicians testified to a U. S. Senate committee that human life begins at conception.

In 1981, a United States Senate Judiciary Subcommittee invited experts to testify on the question of when life begins. Al of the quotes from the following experts come directly from the official government record of their testimony.

Dr. Alfred M. Bongioanni, professor of pediatrics and obstetrics at the University of Pennsylvania, stated:

  • I have learned from my earliest medical education that human life begins at the time of conception. I submit that human life is present throughout this entire sequence from conception to adulthood and that any interruption at any point throughout this time constitutes a termination of a human life.

I am no more prepared to say that these early stages [of development in the womb] represent an incomplete human being than I would be to say that the child prior to the dramatic effects of puberty is not a human being. This is human life at every stage.

Dr. Jerome LeJeune, professor of genetics at the University of Descartes in Paris, was the discoverer of the chromosome pattern of Downs syndrome. Dr. LeJeune testified to the Judiciary Subcommittee that:

  • after fertilization has taken place a new human being has come into being. He stated that this is no longer a matter of taste or opinion, and not a metaphysical contention, it is plain experimental evidence. He added, Each individual has a very neat beginning, at conception.

Professor Hymie Gordon, Mayo Clinic:

  • By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception.

Professor Micheline Matthews-Roth, Harvard University Medical School:

  • It is incorrect to say that biological data cannot be decisive. It is scientifically correct to say that an individual human life begins at conception. Our laws, one function of which is to help preserve the lives of our people, should be based on accurate scientific data.

Dr. Watson A. Bowes, University of Colorado Medical School:

  • The beginning of a single human life is from a biological point of view as simple and straightforward matter the beginning is conception. This straightforward biological fact should not be distorted to serve sociological [familial, age, or medical advances], political [pro-choice], or economic goals [cannot finish school].

A prominent physician points out that at these Senate hearings, Pro-abortionists, though invited to do so, failed to produce even a single expert witness who could specifically testify that life begins at any other point other than conception or implantation.

1d. Many other prominent scientists and physicians have likewise affirmed with certainty that human life begins at conception.

Ashley Montague, a geneticist and professor at Harvard and Rutgers, is unsympathetic to the pro-life cause. Nevertheless, he affirms unequivocally, The basic fact is simple: Life begins not at birth, but conception.

Dr. Bernard Nathanson, internationally known obstetrician and gynecologist, was co-founder of what is now the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL [Dr. Nathanson help start the entire pro-choice movement]). He owned and operated what was at the time the largest abortion clinic in the Western hemisphere. He was directly involved in over sixty thousand abortions.

Dr. Nathansons study of developments in the science of fetology and his use of ultrasound to observe the unborn child in the womb led him to the conclusion that he had made a horrible mistake. Resigning from his lucrative position, Nathanson wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine that he was deeply troubled by his increasing certainty that I had in fact presided over 60, 000 deaths.

In his film, The Silent Scream, Dr. Nathanson later stated, Modern technologies have convinced us that beyond question the unborn child is simply another human being, another member of the human community, indistinguishable in every way from us. Dr. Nathanson wrote Aborting America to inform the public of the realities behind the abortion rights movement of which he had been a primary leader. At the time Dr. Nathanson was an atheist. His conclusions were not even remotely religious, but squarely based on the biological facts.

Dr. Lundrum Shettles was for twenty-seven years attending obstetrician-gynecologist at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. Shettles was a pioneer in sperm biology, fertility, and sterility. He is internationally famous for being the discoverer of male- and female- producing sperm. His intrauterine photographs of preborn children appear in over fifty medical textbooks. Dr. Shettles staes:

  • I oppose abortion, I do so, first, because I accept what is biologically manifest that human life commences at the same time of conception and, secondly, because I believe it is wrong to take innocent human life under any circumstances. My position is scientific, pragmatic, and humanitarian.

The official Senate report on Senate Bill 158, the Human Life Bill, summarized the issue this way:

  • Physicians, biologists, and other scientists agree that conception marks the beginning of the life of a humans being a being that is and is a member of the human species. There is overwhelming agreement on this point in countless medical, biological, and scientific writings.

Does It Matter?

In a statement form the The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity, Director of Media and Policy Daniel McConchie said:

  • “Stem cell lines are quickly becoming marketable items. Once some integral human parts can be bought and sold, we run the risk that democratic societies will decide that other weak and defenseless members of the human race in those societies can be utilized for profits as well.”

Jews and Blacks were once said by the courts to be less than human, I wonder if we are headed down that path again?

Democrats Don’t Actually Want To Debate Abortion (Matt Walsh)

Human From Conception – Kathy Ireland

Published by Papa Giorgio

This video is from the late 90’s via POLITICALLY INCORRECT… and is a centerpiece to a great presentation by Scott Klusendorf (“The Case for the Pro-Life Position (Part 1) ~ Winning the Argument“). I looked for this years back but gave up. After some short talk with Larry Elder, I decided to give it another shot… walla, GODTUBE had it (longer file.

She was also (a few years later) was on the HUCKABEE SHOW and explained this again.

Great stuff!

Concepts: “Is Reality Merely a Perception?” (UPDATED)

Published by Papa Giorgio

(As usual you can enlarge the article by clicking on it.) I enjoyed this weeks Concepts by John Van Huizum. While he showed the usual lack of deep study and merely expresses opinion as such, he is right about one thing… reality is perception. In Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1996), the 9th District Appeals Court wrote:

“At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State.”

 I have a feeling that John would agree with the following statement:

“If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own reality…”

More on Johns Relativism (cultural relativism/subjectivism, relativism, pluralism) later.

In Christian apologetics, often times the person doing the perceiving is said to have a pair of colored glasses on:

The right eyeglasses can put the world into clearer focus, and the correct worldview can function in much the same way. When someone looks at the world from the perspective of the wrong worldview, the world won’t make much sense to him. Or what he thinks makes sense will, in fact, be wrong in important respects. Putting on the right conceptual scheme, that is, viewing the world through the correct worldview, can have important repercussions for the rest of the person’s understanding of events and ideas… Raising one’s self-consciousness [awareness] about worldviews is an essential part of intellectual maturity.

Ronald H. Nash, Worldviews in Conflict: Choosing Christianity in a World of Ideas (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992), 17-18, 9.

After this mentioning of “perceptions,” or, really one’s worldview, John starts down his normal rabbit trail of ideas stuck together, his straw-men “set-ups,” and the like. For instance, perceptions are often changed… usually when an unprepared youth of faith goes off to college and finds a university teaming with…

➲ evolutionary psychology (for instance, atheist defender Sam Harris makes the Darwinian psychological statement that “…there’s nothing more natural than rape. Human beings rape, chimpanzees rape, orangutans rape, rape clearly is part of an evolutionary strategy to get your genes into the next generation if you’re a male.”);

ϟ science (often put forward in the classroom as “scientism“);

Ⓐ and militant skepticism.

…they will typically reject their childhood faith, and not set foot into a church till their thirties/forties. It is said that men stop going to church at 18 when their mom stops dragging them, and start back up when their wife drags em’ back (why men hate church).

People first became aware of the problem after hearing the results of a Barna Research Group study that said that between 67% and 94% of Christian students (depending on denomination), within 18 months of graduating high school, are no longer at church. This report was given in 2002 and showed that the largest protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, was losing an average of 88% of their students while in college. (Why Apologetics)

Typically though, later in life the person in question will start reading some scholarly Christian works, or family harkens them to their childhood faith, someone close dies, life hits em’ hard, something happens that draws them back into their faith. Even within someone’s faith there are levels of trust in believing. Professor Stokes points out that such doubt is natural to a person,

Often, however, the cause of our doubt isn’t what you might think. It isn’t necessarily the strength of the arguments that rattles us, but the way they resonate with the unbeliever in each of us (what the Bible calls the “old self”). We hear Tokyo Rose’s voice and she seems to make pretty good sense sometimes. Yet more often than not, if we look closely at the atheist’s arguments, we find that there is little substance. Seeing this can change the argument’s frequency and therefore break its spell. Believers often worry that their doubts signify the rapid approach of full-blown unbelief. But as pastor and author Tim Keller puts it,

Faith without some doubts is like a human body without any antibodies in it. People who blithely go through life too busy or indifferent to ask hard questions about why they believe as they do will find themselves defenseless against either the experience of tragedy or the probing questions of a smart skeptic.

All thoughtful believers—even those whose faith is mature—encounter doubt. Not a single person has had unadulterated faith. In any case, it certainly won’t do to ignore your doubts, and defusing them will only strengthen your faith. To be sure, doubts can be strong enough to become a trial in your life; but like all trials, they’re meant to refine faith, not stifle it.

Mitch Stokes, A Shot of Faith: To the Head (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2012), xvii. (Emphasis added!)

So people are a bit more complicated than space could allow John to state, or that he cares to ponder. I will also agree with him that this conversation has been going on a very long time.* Cicero is a great example, he was born in 106 BC and died in 43 BC, and said the following in response to the skeptics of his day:

But if the structure of the world in all its parts is such that it could not have been better whether in point of utility or beauty, let us consider whether this is the result of chance, or whether on the contrary the parts of the world are in such a condition that they could not possibly have cohered together if they were not controlled by intelligence and by divine providence. If then the products of nature are better than those of art, and if art produces nothing without reason, nature too cannot be deemed to be without reason. When you see a statue or a painting, you recognize the exercise of art; when you observe from a distance the course of a ship, you do not hesitate to assume that its motion is guided by reason and by art; when you look at a sun-dial or a water-clock, you infer that it tells the time by art and not by chance; how then can it be consistent to suppose that the world, which includes both the works of art in question, the craftsmen who made them, and everything else besides, can be devoid of purpose and of reason? Suppose a traveller to carry into Scythia or Britain the orrery recently constructed by our friend Posidonius, which at each revolution reproduces the same motions of the sun, the moon and the five planets that take place in the heavens every twenty-four hours, would any single native doubt that this orrery was the work of a rational being? These thinkers however raise doubts about the world itself from which all things arise and have their being, and debate whether it is the product of chance or necessity of some sort, or of divine reason and intelligence;

Cicero, Nature of the Gods, Translated by H. Rackam, pp. 207-209

So yes, important topics and questions are new to every generation, but these queries have been asked for a very long time, and should continue to be. Believing that mankind will outgrow their “superstitious” faith is merely someone displaying their metaphysical naturalist presuppositions. Now on to another aspect of a statement by John. He said,

❂ “Atheism has been aided by scientific discoveries and rigorous questioning.”

I think this is true if one looks at the situation wrongly. When people do not try on other pairs of glasses, become skeptical of their skepticism, do not use self-refuting propositions (similar to Vincent Bugliosi), or study to see which worldview offers a better explanation, they can become ideologues (religious or secular):

… a “coherent worldview must be able to satisfactorily answer four questions: that of origin, meaning, morality, and destiny.” He says that while every major religion makes exclusive claims about truth, “the Christian faith is unique in its ability to answer all four of these questions.” These questions are the bedrock of any worldview… that holds any weight at least.

Ravi Zacharias, Deliver Us From Evil (Nashville, TN: Word Publishers, 1997), 219–220; taken from the first chapter of my book.

For example, apologist Lee Strobel talks to a philosopher about the evidence that culminated in many atheists rejecting (or wanting to reject) science because of its implications FOR God, or origins [Side note… Einstein introduced the Special Theory of Relativity in 1905, when applied to the universe as a whole in 1915, it became known as the General Theory of Relativity]:

When Albert Einstein developed his general theory of relativity in 1915 and started applying it to the universe as a whole, he was shocked to discover it didn’t allow for a static universe. According to his equations, the universe should either be exploding or imploding. In order to make the universe static, he had to fudge his equations by putting in a facto that would hold the universe steady.

In the 1920’s, the Russian mathematician Alexander Friedman and the Belgium astronomer George Lemaitre were able to develop models based on Einstein’s theory. They predicted the universe was expanding. Of course, this meant that if you went backward in time, the universe would go back to a single origin before which it didn’t exist. Astronomer Fred Hoyle derisively called this the Big Bang — and the name stuck!

Starting in the 1920’s, scientists began to find empirical evidence that supported these purely mathematical models. For instance, in 1929, the American astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered that the light coming to us from distant galaxies appears redder than it should be, and this is a universal feature of galaxies in all parts of the sky. Hubble explained this red shift as being due to the fact that the galaxies are moving away from us. He concluded that the universe is literally flying apart at enormous velocities. Hubble’s astronomical observations were the first empirical confirmation of the predictions by Friedman and Lemaitre.

Then in the 1940’s, George Gamow predicted that if the Big Bang really happened, then the background temperature of the universe should be just a few degrees above absolute zero. He said this would be a relic from a very early stage of the universe. Sure enough, in 1965, two scientists accidentally discovered the universe’s background radiation — and it was only about 3.7 degrees above absolute zero. There’s no explanation for this apart from the fact that it is a vestige of a very early and a very dense state of the universe, which was predicted by the Big Bang model.

The third main piece of the evidence for the Big Bang is the origin of light elements. Heavy elements, like carbon and iron, are synthesized in the interior of stars and then exploded through supernova into space. But the very, very light elements, like deuterium and helium, cannot have been synthesized in the interior of the stars, because you would need an even more powerful furnace to create them. These elements must have been forged in the furnace of the Big Bang itself at temperatures that were billions of degrees. There’s no other explanation.

So predictions about the Big Bang have been consistently verified by the scientific data. Moreover, they have been corroborated by the failure of every attempt to falsify them by alternative models. Unquestionably, the Big Bang model has impressive scientific credentials …. Up to this time, it was taken for granted that the universe as a whole was a static, eternally existing object …. At the time an agnostic, American astronomer Robert Jastrow was forced to concede that although details may differ, “the essential element in the astronomical and Biblical accounts of Genesis is the same; the chain of events leading to man commenced suddenly and sharply, at a definite moment in time, in a flash of light and energy”…. Einstein admitted the idea of the expanding universe “irritates me” (presumably, said one prominent scientist, “because of its theological implications”).

Lee Strobel, The Case for a Creator: A Journalist Investigates Scientific Evidence that Points Towards God (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2004), 105-106, 112.

Here are just two (of the many examples I can provide) of an atheist and an agnostic commenting on the above evidence:

✪ “The essential element in the astronomical and biblical accounts of Genesis is the same; the chain of events leading to man commenced suddenly and sharply, at a definite moment in time, in a flash of light and energy…. The Hubble Law is one of the great discoveries in science; it is one of the main supports of the scientific story of Genesis.” ~ Robert Jastrow: American astronomer and physicist. Founding director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, he is the director of the Mount Wilson Institute and Hale Solar Laboratory. He is also the author of Red Giants and White Dwarfs (1967) and God and the Astronomers (2nd ed., 2000).

✪ “Certainly there was something that set it all off. Certainly, if you are religious, I can’t think of a better theory of the origin of the universe to match with Genesis.” ~ Robert Wilson: is an American astronomer, 1978 Nobel laureate in physics, who with Arno Allan Penzias discovered in 1964 the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB)…. While working on a new type of antenna at Bell Labs in Holmdel Township, New Jersey, they found a source of noise in the atmosphere that they could not explain. After removing all potential sources of noise, including pigeon droppings on the antenna, the noise was finally identified as CMB, which served as important corroboration of the Big Bang theory.

Dr. George Smoot, Particle Physicist, Nobel Prize winner, and team leader from the Lawrence-Berkeley Laboratory, regarding the 1992 observations from COBE (the NASA satellite Cosmic Background Explorer): “It’s like looking at God.”(8)

A somewhat more “sober” assessment of the findings was given by Frederick Burnham, a science-historian. He said, “These findings, now available, make the idea that God created the universe a more respectable hypothesis today than at any time in the last 100 years.”(9)

Dr. Stephen Hawking (Theoretical Physicist) described the big bang ripples observations as “the scientific discovery of the century, if not all time.”(10)

Dr. George Greenstein (Professor of Astronomy at Amherst.): “As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency – or, rather, Agency – must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?”(11)

Sir Arthur Eddington (British Astrophysicist): “The idea of a universal mind or Logos would be, I think, a fairly plausible inference from the present state of scientific theory.”(12)

Dr. Arno Penzias (Nobel Prize winner in physics, co-discoverer of the microwave background radiation from the Big Bang): “Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide exactly the conditions required to permit life, and one which has an underlying (one might say ‘supernatural’) plan.”(13)

Sir Roger Penrose (Physicist, Emeritus Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics at the Mathematical Institute, University of Oxford, and joint developer of the Hawking-Penrose Theorems): “I would say the universe has a purpose. It’s not there just somehow by chance.” (14)

Dr. Robert Jastrow (Founding director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies): “For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”(15)

Dr. Frank Tipler (Professor of Math and Physics at Tulane University): “When I began my career as a cosmologist some twenty years ago, I was a convinced atheist. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be writing a book purporting to show that the central claims of Judeo-Christian theology are in fact true, that these claims are straightforward deductions of the laws of physics as we now understand them. I have been forced into these conclusions by the inexorable logic of my own special branch of physics.”(16). Tipler since has actually converted to Christianity, resulting in his latest book, The Physics Of Christianity.

Dr. Alexander Polyakov (String Theorist, Princeton): “We know that nature is described by the best of all possible mathematics because God created it.”(17)

Dr. Edward Milne (British Astrophysicist, former Rouse Ball Professor of Mathematics, Oxford): “As to the cause of the Universe, in context of expansion, that is left for the reader to insert, but our picture is incomplete without Him [God].”(18)

Dr. Arthur L. Schawlow (Professor of Physics at Stanford University, 1981 Nobel Prize in physics): “It seems to me that when confronted with the marvels of life and the universe, one must ask why and not just how. The only possible answers are religious…. I find a need for God in the universe and in my own life.”(19)

Dr. Wernher von Braun (German-American Pioneer Rocket Scientist) “I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science.”(20)

Dr. Frank Tipler (Professor of Math and Physics at Tulane University): “From the perspective of the latest physical theories, Christianity is not a mere religion, but an experimentally testable science.”(21)

Footnotes for this quote

8) Thomas H. Maugh, II (April 24, 1992). “Relics of Big Bang, Seen for First Time”. Los Angeles Times: pp. Al, A30.

9) The Los Angeles Times, Saturday 2nd May 1992.

10) Smoot, George, Wrinkles in Time, 2007 edition , cover.

11) Greenstein, G. 1988. The Symbiotic Universe. New York: William Morrow, p.27.

12) Heeren, F. 1995. Show Me God. Wheeling, IL, Searchlight Publications, p. 233.

13) Margenau, H and R.A. Varghese, ed. 1992. Cosmos, Bios, and Theos. La Salle, IL, Open Court, p. 83.

14) Penrose, R. 1992. A Brief History of Time (movie). Burbank, CA, Paramount Pictures, Inc.

15) Jastrow, R. 1978. God and the Astronomers. New York, W.W. Norton, p. 116.

16) Tipler, F.J. 1994. The Physics Of Immortality. New York, Doubleday, Preface.

17) Gannes, S. October 13, 1986. Fortune. p. 57

18) Heeren, F. 1995. Show Me God. Wheeling, IL, Searchlight Publications, p. 166-167.

19) Margenau, H. and R. A. Varghese, eds. Cosmos, Bios, Theos: Scientists Reflect on Science, God, and the Origins of the Universe, Life, and Homo Sapiens (Open Court Pub. Co., La Salle, IL, 1992).

20) McIver, T. 1986. Ancient Tales and Space-Age Myths of Creationist Evangelism. The Skeptical Inquirer 10:258-276.

21) McIver, T. 1986. Ancient Tales and Space-Age Myths of Creationist Evangelism. The Skeptical Inquirer 10:258-276.

So, far from atheism being supported by science, the theistic worldview has been exemplified above all other models of interpretation (perceptions) of reality. Mind you this isn’t “proof” how the naturalist wrongly interprets the empirical method (scientific positivism), but it is a probability that exceeds others. (I suggest taking time, about an hour, and listen to this presentation by William Lane Craig on the evidences for theism over other worldviews.) Here John makes one of his signature jumps from one topic to a completely different one. I sometimes feel — shot in the dark again — he does this with the idea that he is saying something “scientific” and that everyone should credit his knowledge in on this particular topic (which is not the case), and then he brings that “trust” into a completely different topic.

Odd, to say the least. At any rate, freedom is something atheism does not account for, determinism is (enjoy the John Cleese video to the right). But that is a subject left for another day.

At this pivot point regarding freedom in one sentence to abortion in the following deserves some attention. Mr. Van Huizum seems to think that those who stand against abortion are doing so because God says. There are many atheists who are pro-life. How do they make their argument then? Science! Oooooh DRAT! Foiled by his own premise. If John had a grave to roll over in, he would. Here, for example, is model Kathy Ireland using the scientific laws to make her point:

Kathy Ireland, many years ago, was on Bill Mahers Politically Incorrectand the discussion that ensued shows the frailty of the liberal/relativistic position:

Bill Maher: Kathy, why do you oppose a women’s right to choose

Kathy Ireland: Bill, when my husband was going to medical school I underwent a transformation. Because I used to be in favor of abortion. But I noticed when I was reading through some of his medical teaching books, that according to a law in science known as the law of biogenesis, every living thing reproduces after it own kind. That means dog produce dogs, cats produce cats, humans produce humans. If we want to know what something is we simply ask what are its parents. If we know what the parents are, we know what the thing in question is. And I reasoned from that because human parents can only produce human offspring, unborn human fetuses could be nothing but human beings, because the law of biogenesis rules out every other alternative. And I concluded therefore that because human fetuses were part of our family, we should not harm them without justification.

Bill Maher: Well Kathy, that’s just your opinion!

In October 2002, Kathy Ireland made a compelling argument against abortion on the Fox News Channel’s Hannity and Colmes political debate show. Alan Colmes described Ireland’s opinions as religious, but Ireland said that her views on abortion do not stem from faith. She asserted that even atheists could realize that abortion is wrong. Kathy told Alan that her belief is founded in science and technology, which she says, “has come a long way since Roe vs. Wade.”

Ireland also defended her values as being pro-women, stating, “We need to support these women who are in crisis pregnancy situations.” She claimed that because scientific evidence proves that abortion is murder, “I have no choice but to defend the most vulnerable among us.”

Here is one the best presentations detailing some of the above by Scott Klusendorf, a guy who’s specialty is the pro-life position in contradistinction to the pro-choice one. [Actually, since one position is “pro-life,” the other one is rightfully the “pro-death” position.] (Audio presentation to the right, 30-minutes.) So John Van Huizum’s statement that the pro-life position is merely based on “God says so” seems to be — either out of ignorance or bias — a straw-man argument of what the other side truly believes. Again, John seems to cheapen these important issues, not giving the other side its proper due.

Right when you think Mr. Huizum is staying on one topic, he switches again in his last paragraph by quoting a verse about taxes, as if this verse has something to do with a letter from Jefferson to the Danbury Baptists. I dissect this position quite a bit in my paper found here, but this quote from a seminary level text that touches on the idea (separating the religious realm from the secular) John expresses:

Such “exclude religion” arguments are wrong because marriage is not a religion! When voters define marriage, they are not establishing a religion. In the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” the word “religion” refers to the church that people attend and support. “Religion” means being a Baptist or Catholic or Presbyterian or Jew. It does not mean being married. These arguments try to make the word “religion” in the Constitution mean something different from what it has always meant.

These arguments also make the logical mistake of failing to distinguish the reasons for a law from the content of the law. There were religious reasons behind many of our laws, but these laws do not “establish” a religion. All major religions have teachings against stealing, but laws against stealing do not “establish a religion.” All religions have laws against murder, but laws against murder do not “establish a religion.” The campaign to abolish slavery in the United States and England was led by many Christians, based on their religious convictions, but laws abolishing slavery do not “establish a religion.” The campaign to end racial discrimination and segregation was led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a Baptist pastor, who preached against racial injustice from the Bible. But laws against discrimination and segregation do not “establish a religion.”

If these “exclude religion” arguments succeed in court, they could soon be applied against evangelicals and Catholics who make “religious” arguments against abortion. Majority votes to protect unborn children could then be invalidated by saying these voters are “establishing a religion.” And, by such reasoning, all the votes of religious citizens for almost any issue could be found invalid by court decree! This would be the direct opposite of the kind of country the Founding Fathers established, and the direct opposite of what they meant by “free exercise” of religion in the First Amendment.

Wayne Grudem, Politics According to the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010), 31.

So you see that — again — John’s understating of theology, culture, philosophy and science is one that is the culmination (I suspect) of a life lived rejecting the other side of the issue as mere opinion… or worse yet, as delusional, without really taking into consideration the best of the opposing views scholarly arguments. All this evidence being shown I suspect that john rejects faith, God, conservative ideals for psychological reasons more than evidential. I will begin to end this critique with a presentation by Dr. Paul C. Vitz, Professor of Psychology at New York University (emeritus?).

Now, I promised to end with more on a quote I used from the 9th District Court that I thought John would agree with. Let’s compare a portion from both statements:

1) “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe and of the mystery of human life…“

2) “…the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own reality…”

Whether you’re an Atheist, Buddhist, Hindu, Christian or Muslim, agnostic, [Democrat, Republican, Libertarian], it doesn’t matter. Your reality is just that… your reality, or opinion, or personal dogma. I want to now complete one of the quotes that I left somewhat edited, not only that, but I want to ask you if you still agree with it after you find out who wrote it.

Ready?

“Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable.”

Mussolini, Diuturna pp. 374-77, quoted in A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist (Ignatius Press; 1999), by Peter Kreeft, p. 18.

______________________________________________________

*As the link points out, intelligent design is not a recent invention of creationists and their response to “lost” court case. Here is more:

Is intelligent design based on the Bible?

No. The idea that human beings can observe signs of intelligent design in nature reaches back to the foundations of both science and civilization. In the Greco-Roman tradition, Plato and Cicero both espoused early versions of intelligent design. In the history of science, most scientists until the latter part of the nineteenth century accepted some form of intelligent design, including Alfred Russel Wallace, the co-discoverer with Charles Darwin of the theory of evolution by natural selection. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, meanwhile, the idea that design can be discerned in nature can be found not only in the Bible but among Jewish philosophers such as Philo and in the writings of the Early Church Fathers. The scientific community largely rejected design in the early twentieth century after neo-Darwinism claimed to be able to explain the emergence of biological complexity through the unintelligent process of natural selection acting on random mutations. In recent decades, however, new research and discoveries in such fields as physics, cosmology, biochemistry, genetics, and paleontology have caused a growing number of scientists and science theorists to question neo-Darwinism and propose intelligent design as the best explanation for the existence of specified complexity throughout the natural world.

This Day Choose Life (*GRAPHIC* Not Intended For All Audiences)

Published by Papa Giorgio

Cecile Richards, Planned Parenthood Director, said she knows of no one surviving an abortion:

…UM…

Death Follows Liberalism

“I think we have deluded ourselves into believing that people don’t know that abortion is killing. So any pretense that abortion is not killing is a signal of our ambivalence, a signal that we cannot say yes, it kills a [baby].”

~ Faye Wattleton, former president of U.S. Planned Parenthood

Below are some GRAPHIC images and videos. Near the bottom is a filmed partial-birth abortion. To be clear, this needs to be seen, but if you are not the person to handle this, then this is not the post for you

Life Follows God

“…that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life so that… your children may live”

~ Deuteronomy 30:19

Conversation Series

The first part of this post is an import from my old blog and is a post about a conversation with a young gal in and area we called the “pit,” the specialty cheese, wine, and meat section of my old employer — Whole Foods. What took place was a glowing example of many years of work by the left-leaning establishment that is often called “higher education,” which has turned out a zombie of non-thought who would rather use the seven words in Dennis Prager’s article. Like, “what about the mentally ill or deformed kids in the womb, shouldn’t the woman have the choice to abort them?” Even at my friends site you will often here a horror story about a child not having health-care and then the label, “[you] Bush doesn’t care about the children.” These are non-statements. There is no critical thinking involved.

When talking about abortion, for instance in our “pit,” I hear some position stated and then I merely respond, “that’s fine, but that doesn’t deal with whether the ‘fetus’ is a life or not.” Then I hear some grand tail about a women’s choice, and I respond, “that’s great, but that doesn’t deal with the issue of whether the ‘fetus’ is a life or not.” That is the question. Then the “you’ll never know what it is like” line comes out, referring to me being a man, ergo, I cannot have as valid an input on the matter, to which I responded/respond with examples of people who do have the personal capability to respond. Like Norma McCorvey, who was “Jane Roe” in Roe v. Wade (1973), she wrote a book that is pictured here (as well as a DVD).

I brought up Gianna Jessen, who was herself a survivor of an abortion, her story (and book) are very compelling, and often, when young university minds are being steeped in feminist philosophies, rarely is there ever time taken to study or reflect on the other side of the issue, as I was told after I asked a this question, “so at 24-years old you have looked at both sides of the issue and all the evidence and arguments and have concluded that you are right and there is no evidence left to compel you,” the response was “yep!”

A great 40-minute video can be found here. This presentation is rational, well thought out, and rarely responded to by the Left. Another personage that I typically bring up is Bernard Nathanson, who,

…as a younger man, he had been strongly pro-choice, and he performed an abortion on a woman who had become pregnant by him. He later gained national attention by then becoming one of the founding members of the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws, now known as NARAL Pro-Choice America. He worked with Betty Friedan and others for the legalization of abortion in the United States. Their efforts essentially succeeded with the Roe v Wade decision. He was also for a time the director of the Center for Reproductive and Sexual Health (CRASH), New York’s largest abortion clinic. Nathanson has written that he was responsible for over 75,000 abortions throughout his pro-choice career.

He likewise wrote a book. Is he someone who would have some valuable input on the matter? Of course, his sex has nothing to do with it… unless you’re sexist. Dr. Nathanson is best known for his “Silent Scream” video (it is very dated), where a baby is shown being aborted via ultrasound images. What the video details is as the abortion procedure gets under way, the baby starts to literally scream, except there is no air to carry the cries of agony and pain. The entire video is linked above, but I will show the poignant part here. CAUTION, this video to the right is GRAPHIC as well, as it is ending a perfectly viable life… unless you are pro-choice, then this is just like any other operation — like removing your appendix, or tonsils.

I doubt the person in conversation with me has done much in the way of reading and contemplating this issue much beyond what she deems to be liberating feminist theory rebuffing the patriarchy. People who are protecting their emotional belief very rarely go out and pick up a book like Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice, by Francis Beckwith. Which is too bad.

(The above Facebook video is via THE FEDERALIST)

I mentioned Kathy Ireland and her appearance on Bill Maher’s show, Politically Incorrect, where she responded to a question (from a discussion a few years back):

Kathy Ireland, many years ago, was on Bill Mahers Politically Incorrect and the discussion that ensued shows the frailty of the liberal/relativistic position:

Bill Maher: Kathy, why do you oppose a women’s right to choose

Kathy Ireland: Bill, when my husband was going to medical school I underwent a transformation. Because I used to be in favor of abortion. But I noticed when I was reading through some of his medical teaching books, that according to a law in science known as the law of biogenesis, every living thing reproduces after it own kind. That means dog produce dogs, cats produce cats, humans produce humans. If we want to know what something is we simply ask what are its parents. If we know what the parents are, we know what the thing in question is. And I reasoned from that because human parents can only produce human offspring, unborn human fetuses could be nothing but human beings, because the law of biogenesis rules out every other alternative. And I concluded therefore that because human fetuses were part of our family, we should not harm them without justification.

Bill Maher: Well Kathy, that’s just your opinion!

In October 2002, Kathy Ireland made a compelling argument against abortion on the Fox News Channel’s Hannity and Colmes political debate show. Alan Colmes described Ireland’s opinions as religious, but Ireland said that her views on abortion do not stem from faith. She asserted that even atheists could realize that abortion is wrong. Kathy told Alan that her belief is founded in science and technology, which she says, “has come a long way since Roe vs. Wade.”

Ireland also defended her values as being pro-women, stating, “We need to support these women who are in crisis pregnancy situations.” She claimed that because scientific evidence proves that abortion is murder, “I have no choice but to defend the most vulnerable among us.”

Here I will again link to Dennis Prager’s article that bears on this whole discussion and hashing it out rationally and responsibly instead of using invectives to rebuff some perceived sexism or racism or some other label.

A lot of progressive liberals do not know what they mandate as legal often times, in our day and age many have to see video to know what Obama fought against banning and Clinton legalized as one of his first actions as President. One woman saw the video without realizing what she saw (this GRAPHIC video will be at the end) and describes her emotions.

1997: Obama opposed bill preventing partial-birth abortion

In 1997, Obama voted in the Illinois Senate against SB 230, a bill designed to prevent partial-birth abortions. In the US Senate, Obama has consistently voted to expand embryonic stem cell research. He has voted against requiring minors who get out-of-state abortions to notify their parents. The National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) gives Obama a 100% score on his pro-choice voting record in the Senate for 2005, 2006, and 2007.

Obama opposed legislation protecting born-alive failed abortions

Obama has consistently refused to support legislation that would define an infant who survives a late-term induced-labor abortion as a human being with the right to live. He insists that no restriction must ever be placed on the right of a mother to decide to abort her child.

On March 30, 2001, Obama was the only Illinois senator who rose to speak against a bill that would have protected babies who survived late term labor-induced abortion. Obama rose to object that if the bill passed, and a nine-month-old fetus survived a late-term labor-induced abortion was deemed to be a person who had a right to live, then the law would “forbid abortions to take place.” Obama further explained the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not allow somebody to kill a child, so if the law deemed a child who survived a late-term labor-induced abortion had a right to live, “then this would be an anti-abortion statute.”

…Within the next year and half, the claims above were bluntly discredited by abortion providers:

  • Ronald Fitzsimmons, the executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, told the New York Times and American Medical News that he “lied through [his] teeth” when he appeared on Nightline because he was afraid that the truth would erode public support for abortion. Disowning his previous statements, he stated that partial-birth abortions are “primarily done on healthy women and healthy fetuses….”
  • Two doctors at a New Jersey abortion clinic spoke with a North Jersey newspaper under condition of anonymity. Both independently stated that their clinic was performing roughly 1,500 partial-birth abortions per year, most of which are elective and not for medical reasons….

(Life News)

Again, here is the video… if you cannot handle a GRAPHIC MEDICAL PROCEDURE ending a HUMAN’s life that most Democrats want to legalize, then do not watch what it means to be a part of the PARTY OF DEATH! The first video is merely a presentation of the procedure in a medical class, the second is the procedure in real life.

The reader may want to familiarize themselves with Planned Parenthood and their founder, Margaret Sanger.

You Do Not Have To Be Religious To Be PRO-LIFE ~ Just Reasonable

Published by Papa Giorgio

VIDEO AUDIO DESCRIPTIONS

In one of my favorite presentations by Scott (his ministry is outstanding: http://www.prolifetraining.com/), arguments touching on scientific laws, philosophy, and common sense allow the pro-life advocate to deal with opponents in clear and concise ways. This isn’t a Bible bashing fest, but a tactic in bringing the whole of the argument for the preciousness of life to the forefront.

Here is the VIDEO Scott Klusendorf references near the end of this presentation. THERE IS A WARNING WITH THIS VIDEO, it is GRAPHIC!

A good presentation as well is the 180 movie. Well worth your time.

HERE ARE PARTS 2 AND 3: