Discoveries about the Divine fine-tuning of planet Earth for human life continue to pour in and continue to amaze. Take something so mundane as twilight; everyone experiences it twice a day, at each sunrise and sunset. True they are beautiful sights, often spectacularly beautiful, sometimes literally painting the sky in a blaze of golds, reds, pinks, and other vibrant colors. Interestingly, some of the least scenic places on Earth, such as the steps of Central Russia, are home to some of the most spectacular displays of this atmospheric artistry, thereby giving it the name “the Land of the Firebird.”

True this overture to each day and night adds beauty to human life and has served as a source of inspiration to numerous poets, painters, composers, and romantics of every stripe, but is it really important? If twilight vanished tomorrow, would it really change anything? After all we could live without it, couldn’t we? If you think so, think again.

The October issue of Astronomy, in the “Strange Universe” section carried a story entitled “The Real Twilight Zone,” which inspired this Blog. The author points out that the Earth is the only planet in the Solar System that has twilight. Mars almost has a little, but its thin atmosphere and lack of water vapor fail to produce a palate of colors or a long duration of low light, which gradually trickles off. The other planets and planet size satellites either have no atmosphere, going from bright sun light to pitch dark immediately, or they have dense gaseous atmospheres, absorbing and diffusing the sun’s light before it reaches any great depth. The same appears to be true of the 200-plus planets that have been discovered outside of this solar system. Not one of them is a good candidate for producing twilight.

“Okay,” you say. “Not many planets, perhaps no others, have any twilight, so what?” Stop to consider this: we could not exist on this planet without twilight.

Evening Twilight starts when the sun touches the horizon and lasts until it has fallen 18 degrees below the horizon. The length of time this takes depends on one’s location on the globe and the time of year. It is shortest at the equator and longest at the poles. As the sun falls lower on the horizon, its light progressively passes through more and more of the atmosphere. The gases, water vapor, and dust in the atmosphere change the spectrum of the light as the sun moves lower. This produces a gradient effect on the light that reaches the Earth’s surface. This gradient is critical because it triggers certain biochemical cascades in different organisms. Some biochemical processes are only triggered in certain organisms by light of a particular wavelength, and that wavelength is only in sufficient intensity when the sunlight is coming into the earth’s atmosphere at a certain angle. This light plays a role in many types of animal behavior, from the singing of some birds to the feeding habits of many fish. However, this is another story, which is far too complex to go into here.

There are two other major phenomena, which are currently known and there are probably more. First, the thermal equilibrium of the atmosphere is strongly influenced by twilight. It helps moderate the shift in temperature between day and night. On Mars temperatures can easily swing 200 degrees Fahrenheit from day to night, but on Earth it is rarely more than 40 degrees. This narrow temperature range reduces the intensity of storms, is essential in maintenance of the water cycle, and damps down wind velocities. On Jupiter it is not unusual to see sustained wind speeds of 1,000 miles per hour. Imagine something like that on Earth!

The second major phenomenon is the maintenance of the Oxygen (O2)/Carbon Dioxide (CO2) balance of the atmosphere. While plants take in CO2 and produce O2 during the day, the process is reversed at night, when O2 is taken in and CO2 is given off. In order to maintain the balance needed for higher life forms over geologic time, the additional input of twilight to the photosynthetic process is essential. Without it, O2 levels would slowly decline.

So the next time you see a beautiful sunrise or sunset, take in a deep breath, and remember that it was put there for you.

By:  Lawrence Vescera, Ph.D.

Darwinian evolution rests on two pillars: Natural Selection and Random Mutation. Random genetic mutations are supposed to provide new biological traits from which natural selection culls out those which are not useful for the organism and preserves the ones that are. This process is believed adequate to have produced all the world’s biological diversity.

Because Darwinists believe that evolution is a purposeless process, they believe that it should be riddled with useless, unnecessary products. The human appendix and the panda’s thumb are the two organs, which are most commonly cited as examples of the undirectedness of this process of random mutation. It is argued that the appendix has no known function with the possible exception of enabling children to obtain an immediate attention from parents by complaining of a pain in the side. The panda’s thumb however has recently fallen out of favor as an example of evolution’s randomness due to studies showing that it is actually a finely tuned adaptation, assisting the efficient stripping of bark from bamboo, it’s main food source thereby allowing the panda can get to the inner soft tissue more efficiently (But that is another story).

However, the most powerful evidence for the randomness of the evolutionary process was “Junk DNA.” Junk DNA’s are portions of DNA molecules that were believed to serve no useful purpose. They appeared to be inactive, not coding for the manufacture of proteins, which is the primary function of DNA. It was believed that junk DNA composed about 98% of all human DNA. The fact that so much DNA appeared to do nothing led to the conclusion that junk DNA represented the results of random natural processes mutating the DNA and producing unusable, nonsensical stretches of nucleotide code.

The New Discovery

In June of this year the Encode Project (Encyclopedia of DNA Elements) published a group of 29 papers produced by hundreds of scientists working in 11 different countries that have completely overturned the view of “Junk DNA” as useless. This work is still in its early stages but to sum it up briefly: the scientists found that over 50% of all human DNA actually codes for RNA’s which do not go on to produce proteins but seem to be involved in other regulatory functions. These functions include keeping chromosomes from unraveling and controlling cell division.

But the most surprising, indeed shocking, contention of all is that most of these RNA’s seems to be standing by in the event that the body is suddenly exposed to an environmental change. In that event, they are immediately available to produce an adaptation to enable the organism to meet this challenge. This raises an enormously difficult question for the Darwinian paradigm: how could these standby RNA’s be maintained throughout numerous generations, possibly even thousands of generations, until they are needed? With no utility to the current generation they should be quickly selected out of the population but they are not.

Why This is Important

If evolution is an undirected process, as Darwinists claim, it should produce nonsensical and useless outcomes on a prodigious basis as was once believed to be the case. It has been estimated that in humans, about 10,000 harmful or useless mutations should accompany every useful one. Junk DNA was thought to be “smoking gun” evidence for this random process. As it is turning out there is probably no such thing as “Junk DNA.” This is powerful evidence for the observation that evolution is not the result of a random natural process but is rather the result of purposeful design and that purposeful design requires a designer. This designer is, of course, God.

Sources:

1. “Intricate Toiling Found in Nooks of DNA Once Believed to Stand Idle” Washington Post, June 2, 2007, p. A1.

2. http://www.genome.gov/ , The Encode Project.

By: Lawrence Vescera, Ph.D.

The words “Stem Cells” are probably the second most misused term in the current media lexicon, exceeded only by “Evolution”. The word is commonly misused in four ways simultaneously. Not an easy task but when the media is committed to advancing an agenda regardless of the facts, no amount of semantic misuse limits their imagination.

Please allow me to explain. As you have no doubt noticed during the last decade the media has been full of stories critical of those “opposed to stem cell research”. Such people are usually depicted as ignorant, pro-life, Luddites, opposed to scientific progress. Their mindless opposition, according to the media, is resulting in masses of suffering victims who would otherwise be cured if only these backward Christian, Conservatives would end their resistance to scientific progress.

What is the truth? Here are some facts.

A stem cell is a cell that has the ability to differentiate itself into different types of cells. A stem cell can turn into a liver, kidney, brain, hair, skin, bone or any other type of cell. Consequently it is believed that stem cells hold great promises for repairing damaged or diseased tissue. Imagine how wonderful it would be if a victim of liver cancer could be given an injection of stem cells that would go into the body and regenerate a new liver.

There are two main categories of stem cells: Embryonic Stem Cells and Adult Stem Cells. Embryonic stem cells are found in the placenta, placental blood and in embryos. Adult Stem Cells are found in other tissue mainly bone marrow, muscle and the brain. Stem cells are usually obtained from organ donors, fertility clinics and volunteers.

If you have been following the reporting on the subject you may be under the impression that stem cell research in the United States is currently not quite legal but some scientists, brave enough to defy the “zealots” on the Christian right have persisted in the face of persecution nonetheless.

Here are some facts. To begin with, there are no legal barriers to stem cell research carried out within HHS guidelines, absolutely none – none as in zero – despite the media misrepresentation. There are no limits on funding stem cell research with one exception and it is this one exception that the media is using as the source of its disinformation campaign. This one exception is using federal funds to harvest new lines of embryonic stem cells taken from human fetuses. This is the one and only exception. This one exception has come as the result of pro-life groups’ opposition to destroying more human embryos in order to extract their stem cells.

Here are a few other facts the media regularly fails to mention. If you want to harvest new lines of human embryonic stem cells there is absolutely nothing stopping you from doing it, as long as the funds used are not federal funds. So any foreign country, any university, any private company, any state, local government or private individual is completely free to do such research as long as they pay for it. As a matter of fact, several states including California have made funds available for this purpose.

Right now federal funds can be used to do research on all lines of adult human stem cells and all animal stem cells. Additionally in the United States there are currently over sixty lines of existing human embryonic stem cells available for research plus foreign line and privately owned lines for which federal funds can be used. On top of this, to show how truly bogus this entire issue is, new lines of Human Embryonic Stem Cells can be harvested from the placenta and placental blood of new births, making it completely unnecessary to use human embryos as a source for new lines of embryonic stem cells.

However, despite these facts, little money is going into establishing new lines of human embryonic stem cells. The reason for this is simple economics. Investors do not want to throw money away. It was widely believe on theoretical grounds that embryonic stem cells, being more plastic then adult cells, would be more likely to produce viable therapies. However so far this has not proven to be the case as there are currently 60 therapeutic uses of adult stem cells and 0 therapeutic uses of embryonic stem cells. The reasons for this are not entirely clear but seem to be related to genetic level complexities.

One of the reasons for the big push for federal funding of new lines from human fetal tissue seems to be to get funding for projects that would not be funded on economic or scientific grounds. This is being done by portraying denied federal funding as martyrs of “pro-life loonies” rather than people who are trying to pursue, what may very well be, a scientific blind alley.

Why the media distortions?

It is no secret that the media has an extremely strong liberal bias. They want to get their candidates elected and advance their ideological agenda and they are succeeding in this area. Polls have shown that their misrepresentation of this issue has created a very negative impression in the minds of many. The pro-life community is frequently believed to be indifferent to the suffering of disease victims. Additionally the media has succeeded to a large degree in portraying anyone who is concerned about the “slippery slope” of this type of research for any reason as “anti-science.”

By: Lawrence Vescera, Ph.D.

“We do not think with our brains but we cannot think without them.” Mortimer Adler

New research not only supports this shocking claim by the greatest philosopher of the Twentieth Century, but actually goes beyond it to show that this may even be an understatement: indeed consciousness may not depend on your brain.

You have probably read of curiosities such as the well-publicized case of Phineas Gage a railroad worker who had a 3’ by 1.25” iron tamping rod accidentally shot through his brain. He recovered from the accident with little effect and no memory loss even after suffering the destruction of one frontal brain lobe and damage to the other. Okay, you say, amazing but he only lost his frontal lobes. He still had a lot of his brain left so I’m not convinced that it is possible to think without your brain.

How about more extreme cases? Scientific American in an article titled “Strange But True” May 2007 reports on a surgery known as a hemispherectomy, in which half of the brain, one entire hemisphere is removed. These surgeries are most commonly performed on patients who are in neurologically desperate situations such as massive tumors or extremely frequent uncontrollable seizures.

In a study of 111 children who underwent the surgery because of uncontrollable seizures 86% are now either seizure free or greatly improved. But even more surprisingly most suffered no memory loss or personality change. Another study of these patients found that they often improved academically. One even went on to become his state’s Chess Champion. However the outcomes are mixed, the younger the patient the better the recovery usually is. Most often there will be a substantial or total loss of arm movement and vision on the side of the body opposite the lost hemisphere. Language loss, if any, is often recovered regardless of which hemisphere is removed. Okay, you say that is even more amazing but these people still had half of their brains left.

The July 20, 2007 issue of Nature contains an article titled “The Man With a Hole in His Brain.” This is the story of a man named Lionel Feuilet, a French civil servant who was recently discovered to have about 80% of his entire brain missing. The discovery was made during a routine CT scan conducted on him following his complaint of weakness in his left leg. His brain tissue had been slowly replaced through the expansion of his cerebral ventricles by spinal fluid in a process of slow hydocephalicization. His doctors were very surprised that he was behaviorally normal, holding down a fairly mentally demanding job and raising a family.

Wow! You say 80% of the brain gone but still functioning normally - I’m surprised. It really is shocking that this is possible, but perhaps the remaining 20% is still doing everything.

Okay, then how about this one. Science magazine reported in “Is Your Brain Really Necessary” Vol. 210, December 12, 1980 a similar case. However, in this instance the person in question had received a First Class Honors degree in Mathematics from Sheffield University. After complaining of headaches he was given a CT scan. His doctors were shocked when the scan revealed that 95% of his brain, was missing, having been replaced by water. It was estimated that he only had about 1 millimeter of brain tissue left on the outer edge of his cranial cavity, barely enough to be detected in the scan. In effect his brain was literally missing. The article also discussed the fact that other such cases are out there but go undetected because the persons involved have no symptoms.

In all likelihood the mathematician from Sheffield is not the most extreme case in the world. It is very probable that there are a few people walking around right now completely oblivious to the fact that substantially more then 95% of their brain is missing and in effect have no brain.

Why This Is Important

One of the central claims of materialism is that the soul does not exist and that consciousness and all of the processes associated with thought and intellect are merely the result of biochemical activity in the brain. Destroy the brain and you destroy the conscious part of you. This argument is held to disprove the possible of life after death.

While it is true that damage to the brain (in some cases even minor damage) can have catastrophic and tragic consequences, the existence of the anomalies discussed above show examples of people with normal levels of cognitive function, who, for all practical purposes have no brain. This is very strong evidence against the materialist claim that consciousness is nothing but natural biochemical reactions. While it seems evident that the brain has a major role in cognitive functioning there is clearly more to consciousness than physiochemical processes.

During clinical death 80% of the blind report being able to see. That is correct; your eyes are not deceiving you. This holds true even for people who are born blind and have never experienced vision. This is the stunning finding of research done by Dr. Kenneth Ring, Professor of Psychology at the University of Connecticut and his co-researcher Sharon Cooper. Dr. Ring co-founder of the International Association for Near Death Studies has been researching near death experiences (NDE) for over 20 years and is a well-known author in the field.

NDE has become the acronym for that set of phenomena that people all over the world report during periods of clinical death. By now many people have heard about these phenomena that occur when people die and are resuscitated. During the period when they are considered dead about one third undergo an NDE. The NDE’s usually have several common elements. These include the experience of leaving one’s body and viewing oneself, the people and environment in the immediate surroundings. Many also report traveling through a tunnel and coming out on the other end in the presence of a Being of Light, frequently identified as Jesus Christ. They often report going through a review of their lives. The most important impression that these people are left with is a feeling of intense, total love that they experience from the Being of Light. Those who experience an NDE almost universally report not wanting to leave this love to return to Earth. Most people who undergo an NDE report that the experience transforms their lives and leaves them more focused on the truly important things such as loving and serving others and appreciating what they have, especially their families.

Interestingly, when the blind have NDE’s they report exactly the same phenomena. They see both this world and the next. When people who are born blind recover their sight through a natural process, such as a medical procedure, they report an initial period of disorientation because it takes their minds sometime to learn how to interpret the new visual input. This is exactly what the blind report during an NDE. Those who were blind from birth report having difficulty relating to what they are seeing, whereas those who lost sight later in life immediately recognize the return of vision.

This research is reported among other sources in the Summer 1997 issue of “The Anomalist”. Given the rather amazing result the authors try to come up with a naturalistic explanation for this phenomenon. They are able to eliminate certain explanations such as fantasy by independently verifying details through corroborating evidence. For example those who died in surgery were asked to describe the surgery room, the hospital and other environmental factors, which a blind person could not know, were there. This sometimes included such observations as relatives in the waiting room that they had no way of knowing were there at the time. Dr. Ring and his co-researcher Sharon Cooper were also able to eliminate a host of other natural explanations for why the blind can see at death, such as dream based explanations, sensory-cueing, skin based sight and a host of others.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT!

Ring and Cooper searched thoroughly for a naturalistic explanation for their findings. This is not surprising because they are scientists and scientists in most cases argue that the proper focus of science is the realm of the natural. Many and possibly most scientists would argue further that there is no supernatural realm. However, it is not clear what the conclusion of Ring and Cooper is in this case. Their determination as to what is the cause of sight in the blind near death seems to be somewhat muddled. This is not surprising because of the clearly supernatural implications of this research.

How can the blind possibly see at death? They were blind before and they are blind after the NDE, yet during the death period some can describe what only a sighted person can perceive. They cannot see these things with their eyes, so how do the blind transcend their blindness near death?

The answer is obvious but hard to swallow for many. This is clear evidence for the existence of a transcendental part of the human being. It points to the existence of a Soul or Spirit. Vision can be impaired in the physical body with blindness resulting, but when the Soul is separated from the body this impediment is removed because the Soul does not depend on the physical body for vision. Therefore during death sight is possible but leaves again upon resuscitation.

Multiple Coding in Animal Genes

Imagine being hired to write three different books.
The first one a mystery novel, the second a history of
World War II and the third a French cookbook. A lot of
work to be sure but you decide that you are up to the
task. However there is one catch – all three books
must be contained within the exact same text. The only
difference being that the novel will begin with the
first letter of the first word, the history will begin
with the second letter of the first word and the
cookbook will begin with the third letter of the first
word.

And of course all the words must be spelled exactly
correctly and all punctuation must be in the proper
place because even one error will result in an error
in all three books. So if the first word in the first
sentence of the mystery novel is “Help” the first word
of the history must begin with “elp” and the cookbook
must begin with “lp”.

Try to write even one short sentence in this fashion.
“Impossible” you say. Yes, for a human mind it is far
too complex a task. It is even a task far too complex
for the most advanced super computers. The information
density of a system that encodes three different
readings in one text simultaneously is truly
mind-boggling. For these reasons and others
geneticists had never bothered to examine the DNA in
eukaryotic cells to see if they were performing this
task until now.

To their astonishment researchers at Pennsylvania
State University, U. C. San Diego and Vrije University
in the Netherlands have discovered this process in
four different species including humans. The process
labeled Duel-Coding or Alternate Reading Frames is
taking place in at least 40 of the genes in your cells
right now.

Why This Is Important

Let the article published in May of 2007 in
“Computational Biology” speak for itself: “Duel Coding
Is Virtually Impossible by Chance.” (The capitals are
not mine) The researchers using new techniques of
statistical analysis further concluded: “Here we show
that although duel-coding is nearly impossible by
chance, a number of human transcripts contain
overlapping coding regions.” and ” Maintainance of
duel-coding is evolutionary costly and there occurance
by chance is statistically improbable.” When the
authors use the word “improbable” here they really
mean as they stated earlier that the chances are so
small statistically of the phenomena occurring by
chance that in reality is not going to happen.

So if this duel-coding is “Impossible by Chance” how
does it come into being? The fact that these
scientists had the courage to publish this result is
shocking in itself. They may have put their jobs and
careers in jeapordy already. So it should be no
surprise that the authors do not deal with the obvious
design implications of their work. But there are only
two possible explanations for any natural phenomena
either it comes about as the result of a meaningless,
purposeless process (as materialism demands) or it
comes about as the result of a purposeful design. The
design inference here is very strong.

Source:
Wen-Yu Chung, Samir Wadhawan, Radek Szklarczyk, Sergei
Pond and Anton Nekrutenko, “A First Look at ARFome:
Duel-Coding Genes in Mammalian Genomes”, Public
Library of Science: Computational Biology, May 18,
2007, Vol 3, No 5.