Think of how many times we have said, “It sure is cold this winter. Global warming nothing — it isn’t happening here!” Sometimes it would seem our blood is ready to freeze in our veins. So we crank up the heat in the house and head for the auto store to get extra antifreeze for the car. We throw extra blankets on the bed and snuggle in with a good issue of Think & Believe for comfort! Bears hibernate in their dens and other animals put on thicker fur coats, but what...
Read MoreOut of the Mouth of Babes
Most linguists agree that children are born as universalists; meaning that they have the potential to speak any language. It is obvious that speech patterns become more ordered and sophisticated as a child grows. However, for spoken language to develop, the links between the phases of development must be exact and complete before the next phase can be achieved. For example, if a child is interrupted in one stage of development by trauma or lack of stimulation, it is...
Read MoreThe Marine Iguana
Marine iguanas are found only on the Galápagos Islands located in the Pacific Ocean near Ecuador, South America. They are the only lizards that are able to live and feed in the sea. Marine iguanas are vegetarians. They feed on seaweed and algae which they find on rocks, in tidal pools, or in the sea. The adult males can grow to over 5 feet long and the females up to almost 4 feet. On land, marine iguanas are rather clumsy lizards, but in the water they are powerful,...
Read MoreThe Nature of Instinct
Suppose a group of scientists were walking along the beach, and they ran across a message written in the sand. Suppose, in addition, these same scientists praised the grains of sand for their ability to organize themselves in this way. Obviously, we would say they were crazy. Yet, the same scientists can say that the unique design of animals, including their instinctive behavior, somehow came about by random processes and, ironically, most of society accepts it. In...
Read MoreBee Dances and Communication
Years ago, I saw a very interesting Moody Science film featuring the Dance of the Bees. Research first analyzed by Martin Lindauer 60 years ago showed that bees actually communicate by doing a type of energetic and vibrating waggle dance. This communicates the direction and the distance to a food source to other bees. (I wondered if they could actually talk but were just having fun doing some kind of charades at a bee party.) More recently, the Sept. 27, 2010, New York...
Read MoreGod’s Created Creatures Communicate
Not only does God communicate through His creation and to mankind, we also see that many of His creatures are also able to communicate in unique and interesting ways. Consider the following examples: Ants have always been known for being masters of communication. Mary Jo and I confirmed that while watching ants in a huge ant farm in a natural history museum. One ant was carrying a very large load when it stumbled crossing a narrow “log bridge.” It continued to grasp its...
Read MoreSanctity of Life
I was asked recently to do a talk for Master Plan Ministries at Mesa State College (www.master-plan-ministries.org/msc/). The staff had heard my presentation on The Miracle of Life, Part 1, and felt it would be a good talk to present to their Christian college club Tuesday Night Live (TNL). This talk takes a look at the male reproduction system (a very conservative approach – no offensive graphics or terms) and why conception could never have even taken place unless...
Read MoreHurrah for Ants!
Many of us are familiar with the children’s counting song, “The ants go marching one by one…” Scientists have now discovered that at least some species of ants do appear to be counting their steps when they go marching out in search of food. After training some desert ants to look for food in a specific location, scientists investigated how the ants could consistently locate the same source of food with seeming ease. It is known that ants will leave scent markers to guide...
Read MoreSpontaneous Generation
For a long time people thought that living things came from non-living things … mud turned into frogs, old rags turned into rats, and rotten meat turned into white worms. In the late 17th century, a man named Francesco Redi did an experiment to see if meat did turn into worms. He put meat into two jars, one covered with fine gauze and the other left open. Redi observed that flies crawled all over the uncovered meat laying eggs, which later turned to fly larvae (white worms...
Read MorePolar Bear Warmth
Even a polar bear has to keep warm. Part of its heat is produced in the daylight by the sun shining on its fur. The fur consists of clear, hollow hairs which are very similar in design to fiber optics. Sunlight penetrates these fibers and the warmth from the sun is transferred directly into the body. The hollow hair also provides a dead air space for insulation, thus helping the polar bear stay warm longer. Is it fair to say that since fiber optics are highly designed, so...
Read MoreHow Blind is the Watchmaker? – Book Review
When I started reading How Blind Is the Watchmaker, by Neil Broom, I was strangely reminded of a cartoon. Although I can’t remember the source, it illustrates the all-too-frequent practice of modern science. Words like “meaning,” and “purpose,” are covered up because they go against the prevailing notions of materialism – that we exist in a vast, meaningless, cosmic machine that is driven completely by chance. Ironically, to fabricate their story, scientists can’t escape...
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