Re: [asa] A new anti-evolution book

Thanks for posting this link, Burgy. I recommend that everyone read the
article. The book described below has been mailed free to thousands of
scientists in the US and a French version is being distributed in France.
One estimate put the cost of the book at $100 and the free distirbution of
thousands at $1,000,000.

I encountered the writings of Harun Yahya while on leave in Sarajevo three
years ago. Some of his writings were being distributed in Bosnian, and
causing a stir among the scientific community. My paper to the Ulama (the
Association of Muslim Scholars) was in part intended to clarify the meaning
of evolution and its relationship to creation in the face of terrible
misrepresentations on the part of this Turkish propagandists. I saw a slick
video on ID and creationism on Croatian TV which included Yahya as the host.
You can google his web site to get a full picture of his aims and message.

Ronald Numbers at an AAAS meeting several years ago reported that ICR had
been bankrolling Yahya, who was translating ICR stuff into Turkish and
having it distributed free around the country. I wonder if our well-endowned
creationist organizations in this country are helping to fund this present
book project. It would be interesting to find out. But he may be getting a
lot of money from conserative Muslim regimes also. Much of his message is
aimed to convince Muslims that evolution is a danger to their faith and
contrary to Islam. If he succeeds in doing so among traditionalist Muslims,
that would add a further complication to the conflict within Islam between
the modernists and the traditionalists.

I wonder why Yahya chose to distribute it to the hundreds of evolutionary
scientists in the US? Was this a shot across the bow?

Stay tuned,
Bob Schneider

On 7/18/07, Carol or John Burgeson <burgytwo@juno.com> wrote:
>
> The web site
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/17/science/17book.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
>
> has a NYT article on a new book, apparently distributed free of charge
> world wide, espousing a creationist view.
>
> Interesting article. It begins:
>
> "In the United States, opposition to the teaching of evolution in public
> schools has largely been fueled by the religious right, particularly
> Protestant fundamentalism. "Atlas of Creation," by Adnan Oktar of Turkey, is
> turning up, unsolicited, in mailboxes of scientists. The book says that
> creatures today are just like creatures that lived in the fossil past, so
> evolution must be impossible.
>
> Now another voice is entering the debate, in dramatic fashion. It is the
> voice of Adnan Oktar of Turkey, who, under the name Harun Yahya, has
> produced numerous books, videos and DVDs on science and faith, in particular
> what he calls the "deceit" inherent in the theory of evolution. One of his
> books, "Atlas of Creation," is turning up, unsolicited, in mailboxes of
> scientists around the country and members of Congress, and at science
> museums in places like Queens and Bemidji, Minn.
>
> At 11 x 17 inches and 12 pounds, with a bright red cover and almost 800
> glossy pages, most of them lavishly illustrated, "Atlas of Creation" is
> probably the largest and most beautiful creationist challenge yet to
> Darwin's theory, which Mr. Yahya calls a feeble and perverted ideology . .
> . ."
>
>
> Burgy
>
> www.burgy.50megs.com/one.htm
> (Review of ONE WORLD, The Interaction of Science and Theology, by John C.
> Polkinghorne)
>
>
>

To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
Received on Wed Jul 18 15:32:02 2007