Update: As I explain below in a comment of 2 November 2007 to this post (with some minor corrections):
"... as I have mentioned in subsequent posts on my two blogs, CreationEvolutionDesign and TheShroudofTurin, I am now concentrating my blog posts on writing two books: "Problems of Evolution" and "The Shroud of Turin: Burial Sheet of Jesus?" While I still may write an "Evolution Quote Book," it is now on the backburner. ... My "Problems of Evolution" book will refer to points made by my quotes but not usually as quotes."
To those who have sent me messages and a comment, I hope to respond to you via CED eventually. I feel I should explain why I may not be able to post to this blog, or respond to questions or comments, as regularly as previously.
Even though I had retired in late 2001, completed a biology degree in 2004, and shut down my Yahoo list CED in 2005, I still found I was busier than ever, writing my book, "Problems of Evolution" and posting to this blog.
I have since ~1998 regarded it as a high priority to keep up with science news articles and save ones that I find interesting or think might be of future use, to my hard disk (if anyone wants an old article relating to creation/ evolution/ design, I probably have a copy of it). I had recently set up Pluck RSS reader which is much more efficient than clicking on each news site, but the problem is that I now have ~40 science RSS feeds (currently I have ~1,075 science articles to read and I had cleared it only last weekend!), as well as other topics.
But, it gets worse! Since a little over a week ago, I now have only nights to blog, as I have been working full-time each day, six days a week, writing a book (a different one) which will be a selection of ~1,000 quotes (or ~350 pages whichever comes first) from the ~10,000 quotes I have online.
I had been thinking of taking a detour from writing my book "Problems of Evolution" because I found I needed to refer to my quotes, but most of them are unclassified and I had forgotten many of them!
I had long thought of publishing a book of my quotes (since at over 6 megabytes of text files it is probably the world's largest collection of personally verified creation / evolution quotes), but had been put off by the prohibitive cost of paying the copyright owner of each quote for permission to use it. Although I wondered how any quote book could ever be published, and there are lots of them and none of them that I had read (including the late Henry Morris', "That Their Words May Be Used Against Them") had mentioned anything about obtaining permission.
I had been praying about this, and then a few weeks ago (after I had entered preliminary discussions with a publisher about publishing my quotes), I read the following in a secondhand book of Australian quotations:
"In a book composed entirely of quotations, the question of copyright, and its ill- defined antithesis, fair dealing, is complex. We have endeavoured to contact the authors or copyright owners in all cases where we are quoting a complete work, or so large a portion of a work that we believed such action to be necessary." (Murray-Smith, S., ed., "The Dictionary of Australian Quotations," [1984], Heinemann: Richmond Vic., Australia, Revised, 1987, p.iii).
I took this as an answer to prayer, that even in Australia (which has a stricter copyright law than the USA, where I would be publishing my quote book), for books that are "composed entirely of quotations," under Australia's "fair dealing" (analogous to the USA's "fair use") provisions of copyright law, there is no need to ask the copyright owners for permission, unless "so large a portion of a work" is quoted that I "believed such action to be necessary."
I plan to either publish the quote book through a regular publisher, or self-publish it (e.g. through iUniverse). I have a tentative `catchy' title for it, but don't want to say publicly what it is. Each quote will have a unique serial number, so I will probably include a CD or DVD of the quotes with no, or minimal, hyperlinked headings and serial number (otherwise the book could be too easily pirated), which will add to its usefulness as the quotes can then be copied and pasted from a browser.
Even at a rate of ~20 quotes a day (it is surprising how long it takes, but there is a fair bit of setting up and tidying up, although I expect to pick up speed) working through ~10,000 quotes, it will take me over a year to finish it! Now that the book is rapidly taking shape (it is ~250 quotes and ~90 pages long and the previously isolated quotes seem to gain power by being classified), I think it will be a very worthwhile ~1 year (even though it seems I am a quarter there after only a little over a week, I still need to go through all ~10,000 quotes to select the best ~1,000 quotes) detour!
I would be interested in no obligation feedback, either through comments to this post, or a private email (which I reserve the right to publish here anonymously) on those who would buy such a book of ~1,000 evolution quotes, mostly by evolutionists, at ~US$20 to $25. Hostile evolutionist feedback will be regarded as an encouragement! :-)
Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"
"We know that among all animals there is great variation. In any large family no two are quite alike, and it was natural to assume that the fittest would be more likely to survive, and form a fitter variety. But it is now known that most of such varieties as are due to changing conditions of climate, nutrition, or to the physical condition of the mother at the time of the early development, and variations which Darwin thought would be inherited are not inherited at all." (Broom, R., "Finding the Missing Link," [1950], Greenwood Press: Westport CT, Second edition, 1951, Reprinted, 1975, p.98)
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4 comments:
I hope your readers put these quotes to use in a well defined and structured way and merely to be spiteful, for each quote though you state may be used against evolutionists in some ways can indeed be interepreted oppositely (such as the one posted on your review).
Anonymous
Thanks for your comment.
However, as I have mentioned in subsequent posts on my two blogs, CreationEvolutionDesign and TheShroudofTurin, I am now concentrating my blog posts on writing two books: "Problems of Evolution" and "The Shroud of Turin: Burial Sheet of Jesus?." While I still may write an Evolution Quote Book, it is now on the backburner. I will add a note to this effect on this post above.
My "Problems of Evolution" book will refer to points made by my quotes but not usually as quotes.
>I hope your readers put these quotes to use in a well defined and structured way and merely to be spiteful,
In my 11 years (1994-2005) experience debating evolutionists, being "spiteful" overwhelmingly is from the evolutionist side, as can be seen by just reading my old Yahoo CreationEvolutionDesign group's archives (and indeed in my experience the archives of all Creation/Evolution discussion groups).
However, anything good can be used wrongly. My intention is that my quotes be used in the Christian spirit of "speaking the truth in love" ( Ephesians 4:15).
>for each quote though you state may be used against evolutionists in some ways can indeed be interepreted oppositely (such as the one posted on your review).
No doubt every quote "can indeed be interepreted oppositely." In fact that was Darwin's point in his Origin of Species that "A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question":
"This Abstract, which I now publish, must necessarily be imperfect. I cannot here give references and authorities for my several statements; and I must trust to the reader reposing some confidence in my accuracy. No doubt errors will have crept in, though I hope I have always been cautious in trusting to good authorities alone. I can here give only the general conclusions at which I have arrived, with a few facts in illustration, but which, I hope, in most cases will suffice. No one can feel more sensible than I do of the necessity of hereafter publishing in detail all the facts, with references, on which my conclusions have been grounded; and I hope in a future work to do this. For I am well aware that scarcely a single point is discussed in this volume on which facts cannot be adduced, often apparently leading to conclusions directly opposite to those at which I have arrived. A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question; and this is here impossible." (Darwin, C.R., "The Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection," John Murray: London, Sixth Edition, 1872, pp.1-2)
But evolutionists ever since Darwin have attempted to suppress "the facts and arguments on" the other side "of each question", i.e. the creationist/IDist side, even denying that there is another side.
My "Evolution Quote Book" was, and my "Problems of Evolution" book will be, an attempt to provide some of that missing fairness and balance.
Stephen E. Jones
My question for you is
If you are a realy Evolutinist.. please explain to me how did life come from dead matter?
Anonymous
Thanks for your comment.
>If you are a realy Evolutinist..
I am NOT an evolutionist. As the heading of my blog says:
"I am an Australian Christian OLD-EARTH CREATIONIST/IDist biologist who accepts universal common ancestry (but NOT EVOLUTION)".
>please explain to me how did life come from dead matter?
GREAT question! There is NO adequate FULLY NATURALISTIC explanation of how live arose spontaneously from dead matter.
But if supernatural intervention by God was necessary to ORIGINATE life, then FULLY NATURALISTIC evolution collapses.
Because then God could have intervened at other strategic points in the history of life, as Progressive Creation maintains:
"Progressive creationism accepts much of the scientific picture of the development of the universe, assuming that for the most part it developed according to natural laws. However, especially with regard to life on earth, PCS HOLD THAT GOD INTERVENED SUPERNATURALLY AT STRATEGIC POINTS ALONG THE WAY. On their view, CREATION was not a single six-day event but OCCURRED IN STAGES over millions of years. ... The PC view tends to overlap with other views, particularly with old-earth creationism." (Pennock, R.T., "Tower of Babel: The Evidence Against the New Creationism," MIT Press: Cambridge MA, 1999, pp.26- 27).
Stephen E. Jones
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