Coming off the release of yet another children's work of fiction, and before I start on the next, it's time to look at some non-fiction print books that I've owned for a while, read some time ago, and never got around to blogging. These will all be science-based works, mostly about evolution, that have been useful to me, educational and helpful.
It's been a while since I've done battle with the idiot creationists, the main reason being that it's a waste of time. There is no creation science. It does not exist in any way, shape, or form. There is creation religion - blind belief unsupported by any evidence - and it's a waste of time arguing with those who swallow those lies, because there is no amount of fact, or evidence, or science, or truth that you cam set before them that will ever impact in any way upon their brainwashed hive mind. But if you want to take on that hopeless challenge, or evne just be better armed to defend your own scientific views, these are some of the boosk you might find useful to have on your reading list.
The first is Tim Berra's work. At the time he wrote this, he was a professor of zoology at Ohio State university - that is, not some hydrologist or electrical engineer, or some other field entirely unrelated to biology, paleontology, physics, or cosmology like the real scientists are, and the creationists most certainly are not!
Berra's book is simed at open-minded readers (i.e. not creationists!) and laid out in lay-person's terms. It's divided into the following five sections:
- What is Evolution?
- Geologic Time and the Fossil Record
- The Explanatory Power of Evolution
- The Evolution of life and the Rise of Humans
- Science, Religion, Politics, Law, and Education
The book is only some 140 pages long, not counting the extensive appendices and other supporting materials, but it competently covers, and in sufficient detail without being exhaustive or exhausting, enough of the basics about how science works to get you up and running. It explains why evolution is not a theory as expressed in everyday use, but a scientific theory, which is a different thing altogether, and it goes into what evidence supports it, giving many, many examples of evolution at work, and how we know what we know. In short, this is a solid beginning for anyone honestly trying to understand evolution, and I commend it as a worthy read.
