News & Notes

DINOSAUR HEART FOUND. It is not common for a dinosaur to be found with any soft organs intact. Bones are much more easily preserved as fossils than soft tissue. The result of that fact has been that almost nothing has been known of what the internal organs of dinosaurs were like. A little over a year ago a specimen was found in Italy with a liver and stomach still visible in the body. Now a dinosaur has been found in South Dakota with a heart preserved well enough to be able to determine its structure with X-rays. The animal is called Thescelosaurus which was a relatively small (800 pounds), plant-eating dinosaur.

X-rays of the heart show two ventricles and a single aorta with some evidence of two auricles-all typical of a four chamber heart. Such a heart would suggest a high metabolic rate which is a basic requirement for an animal to be warm blooded. There are several points that need to be made here. First of all, this issue is not biblically connected. The Bible does not describe dinosaurs, nor does it take a position on how they connect to modern animals. That is not its purpose and it does not get into this issue. In fact it is very likely that there is no connection between the dinosaurs and modern animals. The whole picture has to be considered in this subject. It does not appear that dinosaurs stopped growing at sexual maturity, typical of reptiles. The egg-laying techniques are typically reptilian. Some dinosaurs had bird-like skeletons. Growing rings are seen in dinosaur teeth suggesting hibernation typical of reptiles. Our suggestion is that this group of animals lived for the specific purpose of filling an ecological niche critical to the production of resources God knew man would need. Fitting them into an evolutionary or creationist model is probably an exercise in futility. We would suggest that learning about them is another fascinating look at the wisdom of God and His designs for a functional earth. (Reference originally from wire release by The Washington Post of a story by Guy Gugliotta pril 21, 2000.)

HOT ORIGIN OF CREATION SUPPORTED. The evidence that the universe had a beginning and has not always existed took another step forward recently as evidence was found that the creation was infinitely hot at its origin producing heavier elements. This is significant because those who attempt to suggest that there was no beginning to the cosmos maintain that matter cycles from one existent state to another in a never ending loop. Whether the mechanism is said to be parallel universes or some quasistatal existence, such a viewpoint would deny an instantaneous origin to the cosmos.

If the universe had a hot beginning, then heavier elements would exist. If it had a colder beginning or was oscillating in some way, all that would have been present at the beginning would have been protons, neutrons, and electrons which would produce simple hydrogen. In the Astrophysical Journal, 527 (1999) pages 757-777, is a report that recent studies of blue compact galaxies which are the least massive of all galaxies and thought to be direct remnants of the original creation process. The studies show that these galaxies are made up of 24.6% helium. The only way that there could be that much helium in these galaxies would be if the cosmos began in an infinitely hot beginning. This is a major blow to those who have tried to maintain that the cosmos is eternal. "In the Beginning God created the heaven and the Earth" gains credibility with every new discovery made.

FLOOD EVIDENCE. Smithsonian, April, 2000, page 18, carried a story titled "Evidence for a Flood" that reported on studies that have appeared in numerous journals and which we have mentioned previously in this one. The article reports that a new theory has been proposed in a book titled Noah's Flood (Simon and Schuster) concerning flooding of ancient ocean basins. In this case, the theory is that the Black Sea was dry at the time and the Mediterranean flowed through a series of geological events into the basin with a "volume 200 times that of Niagara Falls." The authors are geologists at Columbia University (William Ryan and Walter Pitman), and they make an excellent argument geologically for the event they describe. Whether this event can be related to the flood described in the Bible may never be answered, but the point is that events of this nature do happen. It is true that this would be a flood of the region and not a global flood, but that is more of a theological issue than a scientific one.

HUMAN EGG SALE BASED ON EVOLUTION. One undeniable fact that most evolutionists will admit to is that some pretty horrible things have been done based on evolutionary assumptions. Atheists will be quick to point out that the same charge can be laid to religion. and that too is undeniable. The difference is that those who murder, steal, and oppress people in the name of Christianity do so in diametric opposition to the Bible. There are specific commands in the Bible that oppose murder, stealing, prejudice, etc.

A recent example of this is the sale of human eggs on a Web site operated by Ron Harris. When you go to the site you can see pictures of eight models who are willing to sell their eggs to infertile couples or couples who want to have perfect babies. The cost rangers from $14,000 to $150,000. The literature provided says "Darwin's Natural Selection at its very best." The idea is that if you use the egg of a beautiful model, your kids will be beautiful. Harris says "Every organism is evolving to its most perfect trait. Finding traits that repair your genetic flaws is what we are all about." Sperm is also available from brilliant, good-looking males.

The first thing that needs to be pointed out is that this is terrible science. There is a difference between genotypes and phenotypes. Phenotypes are what you see physically. Genotypes are the genetic material that leads to what you see. A beautiful woman may have genes for children that will be severely handicapped and very unintelligent. A brilliant man may carry genes for severe mental retardation. What you see is definitely not what you get in this business. More important is the fact that the mentality that would buy into this scam is one of physical obsession and has no regard for the spiritual. As long as we buy into scientific materialism, this kind of ploy will continue to be pushed at mankind.

In a related issue, there is now a business going on in which fetal body parts are being sold. In 1993, Bill Clinton lifted the ban on federal funding for fetal-tissue experiments and part of that law allows "reasonable payments associated with the transportation, implantation, processing, preservation, quality control, or storage of human fetal tissue." What "reasonable payments" means is not explained. It should be obvious where this will lead. (For more information see Christianity Today, March 6, 2000, pages 58-61.)

DOES GOD EXIST? CONSULTANT ON LINE. Over the years we had had the joy and learning experience of working with some men who have incredible abilities and knowledge far beyond ours. One of these great apologetic contributors is Hill Roberts of Huntsville, AL, Hill has worked with us many times and we have run articles by Hill in this journal from time to time. He and his wife do lectureships like ours and have a team that does teacher-training programs similar to what we do. We are thrilled with the success that Hill and his team are having.

Hill has a website at that has marvelous materials and great educational games. We encourage our readers to take a look at this excellent resource.

FCC RULING REVERSED. We have reported in the past that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was adopting a ruling that would not allow religious programming on non-commercial stations which the FCC considered to not be educational. When this story first broke, most of us were reminded of the Urban Myth that has been around for over 30 years that Madalyn O'Hair was getting the FCC to remove all religious programming from TV. That story continues to circulate even though Madalyn is dead, and it never had any validity. This ruling however, could have had serious consequences. The FCC commissioners have voted four to one not to adopt this rule. For now at least, the FCC does not have any rules or policies that negatively impact religious programming. -Source: Christianity Today, March 6, 2000, page 22.

PHONE PSYCHIC COMES CLEAN. One of my major irritations on TV is the constant high profile ads for psychic hotlines. The gullible public is sold a bill of goods about what phone psychics can do. In Reader's Digest , December, 1999, is an article titled "My Life as a Phone Psychic" by Debbie Nathan. If you want to find out how the phone psychics work, we would encourage you to read this article. It has been said that, if you do not believe in anything, you will believe everything. The push to reject God in our society has resulted in people buying into all kinds of frauds, and the psychic business is one of the most destructive and exploitive. This article is a good source.

WATER FROM SPACE. The source of the water that is on the earth has been a subject of much debate over the years. Recent studies of a meteor named Monahans that hit the earth in 1998 has raised the discussion another notch. This meteorite has halite in it and halite is a salt mineral usually produced from liquid water. In the halite were small bubbles of water-hundreds of them. There have been individual molecules of water seen in interstellar material in the past, but this find is unique. The questions about this latest find involve themselves with where did it come from, and was the water that it contains part of a larger environment ? The dating of the meteorite shows it to be of an age that is comparable to the age of the solar system. Water may have been created at the dawn of the creation of the solar system-a fact implied in Genesis 1:2. -Reference: Newsweek, September 6, 1999, page 63. 

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