Chuck Missler is a Heart Breaker
Back in my younger days, I used to read a Christian publication put out by a guy named Chuck Missler. I don’t recall the name now, but it was kind of a small Christian version of Reader’s Digest with a Cloak and Dagger twist. For example, on one page you might read an inspirational story about a woman honoring god through the gift of bake sales, and on another, you might read about how the UN is building up its military presence in the US in an effort to let the antichrist take over American discos, or something like that.
Basically, he claimed to have “sources”, and these “sources” (if you make your fingers into quote marks when you say “sources”, it sounds cooler) were always leaking things that no one could possibly believe, but which sounded kinda plausible because they involved missiles and weird looking guys from foreign countries. Like this guy:
In looking around youtube after the famous Kirk Cameron Banana Incident of Ought-Seven (which actually happened yesterday, and wasn’t really an incident), I found this chestnut. Please, enjoy yourself. We’ll resume our pleasantries afterwards.
Before I get to the heart of my argument, let me say one thing: the fact that the blond woman is standing in what looks like a court room has totally sold me on Jesus. That, and for being a crazy middle-aged woman, she’s not bad. I wonder if she’s single….
I digress. My point is this: even after I stopped being a believer, I still held Chuck Missler in relatively high esteem. The guy is highly intelligent and tends to make good points. But this video demonstrates that to be false. Chuck Missler has broken my heart. He is a complete fraud of an intellectual.
Because I’m already bored, I’ll quickly list the problems with the video:
- Just because the crazy old man in the bad suit at the beginning says that theories of life are fairytales doesn’t make them so.
- Science holds that life can arise spontaneously, but that there are probably limited conditions in which it can do so.
- Peanut butter is not an ideal climate for the spontaneous creation of life. But jelly is! That’s a little known scientific fact.
- Science doesn’t state that the first signs of life that appear are multi-cellular organisms that should be readily visible to the naked eye. Rather, the foundations of life arise out of atomic and sub-atomic patterns that over time might barely be able to replicate themselves. For all we know, the creation of peanut butter might actually be creating the atomic building blocks of life and that by eating a PB&J, we’re essentially performing an abortion. A creamy, crunchy, good-for-you abortion.
Technically speaking, it’s entirely possible that the building blocks of life could be popping up all over the place but are being eradicated too quickly to take hold.
It is complete and utter bloody nonsense to suggest that evolutionary theory contends that we should find well-defined, highly evolved life when we pop open a can of peanut butter. That Chuck Missler would even suggest that this is the case makes him look like the worst kind of idiot. He should know better. Any 9th-grade drop-out with even basic reading comprehension could tell you that this is not what evolution is about.
Seriously. Nuts to Chuck Missler. He should be ashamed of himself. He’s smart enough to know what a bloody straw man argument is.
(For a funny spin on this, watch Pasta Sauce: The Creationist’s Nightmare
What burns me up is not the false arguments, which are silly, but the implication that “science” (however they define it) should stop trying to explain things. That seems to be what they’re implying. In fact, they seem to be offended that science should be allowed to try to explain anything. I’m American, and that doesn’t sit well in my freedom-loving breast.
Comment by David Peterson — 7 May, 2007 @ 09:03
wow 2007, i wonder if anyone will read this.
First off, that video is the only video I?ve seen that people have anything to say about when you try to argue against Chuck Missler, so at least try to waste your time “setting us strait” on something longer than a minute.
Secondly, he’s clearly not implying that, if evolution is true, we should find full grown peanut butter bugs in ?Skippy? across the US, This was clearly your own implication from the time elapse mold affect the video maker threw in for theatrics. Plus, the video is short, vague and people looking for a fight intentionally miss the point.
I also don?t know why you take such offence to the creationist?s argument. What do you care how people outside your circles and by all rights outside your sphere of influence live? And more so what argument they listen to? If they believe everything they hear from anyone, no matter how what credentials or background they err. But if they’re being taught decent moral values by logical, coherent argument of provable text that commands them to love their neighbor as themselves and esteem others (you fall into the category of others) better than themselves, the real question is, what do you care? I’m in no way implying that that’s how every Christian acts, but I am saying that’s the standard we should be holding ourselves to.
Basically it comes down to this, you have no reason to want to debunk his argument (accept for a personal grudge) and no formidable argument of your own. This video is an easy target so you use water cooler talk, some jargon and minimal research to shoot spitballs at a steamroller. I?m not calling you stupid or implying that you lack intelligence, but you?re sucker punching a punching bag, sir.
Comment by jordan — 11 April, 2009 @ 22:43
Jordan,
False modesty does little for argumentation, sir. And chuck missler is hardly a steam roller.
If the author does not have reason to debunk missler’s far-fetched science fiction stories of demons and creation, then missler has no reason to debunk the theory of evolution. Are you suggesting that we should just leave creationists alone because they’re teaching people how to be good? If so, then please tell them to stop wasting untold amounts of money and time trying to get creation ’science’ in schools. As long as creationists continue to lash out at scientists, scientists will have no other recourse aside from lashing back.
And come on, do you honestly believe that morals and religion go hand in hand? It’s hard to see the morality in islamic suicide bombers, pedophile priests, repressed homosexual evangelicals, or your own arrogant response above.
and finally, i don’t think anyone speaks out against missler because…no one knows who he is or what he says, and very few that do actually care about what he has to say. and please enlighten me: if missler is not implying that we should be finding life in jars of peanutbutter, than what is he implying? i guess i just miss the point too.
but hey, i’m not calling you stupid, or implying hat you lack intelligence or anything. sir. and please oblige my own personal grudge and study up on the history of christianity. and take a biology course or two.
Comment by john — 20 April, 2009 @ 13:51
I’m with Jordan, I think that it’s all to easy to make fun of a short MPEG you’ve found of someone that you once respected. If you were seriously trying to do anything other than put “something funny” (quote marks because it’s funnier) on the web then you’d have done some more research on the subject.
I’m going to hazard a guess that you’ve the kind of person who doesn’t want to research to subject, your mind is made up and you totally believe that evolution is the answer to how we came to be on the earth - right?
If that’s the case then your willingness to accept half truths has turned you into an ignorant fool.
Christians that have researched this love science (not to be confused with science fiction) because it actually backs up the creation view. Evolution I’m sorry to inform you has been based on guesses which result is science fiction.
If you can be bother to look into the subject further I urge you to read the information on the following sites.
http://www.answersingenesis.org
http://www.evolutionisstupid.com
http://www.darwinconspiracy.com
You seem pretty intelligent to me, just a little mis-informed and mis-guided. Maybe you’re looking in the right places for the wrong things?
All the best H
Comment by Hevs79 — 14 July, 2009 @ 01:52
Whatever!!! Chuck Missler is a genius! Half of you probably didn’t graduate high school. Do your homework
Comment by John Doe — 31 October, 2009 @ 19:08
God have blessed Dr. Chuck Missler with great insights of the Word of God.
Whatever you are hurting inside. May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with you…
Comment by Malaysia — 26 November, 2009 @ 08:39
my friend…Chuck is mocking the theory of evolution.You’re right, the posibility of life arising out of a peanut butter jar is absurd..as is evolution. You show me an example of transitional humans in our fossil records..PLEASE..I want to believe you guys.
Comment by bill sanders — 28 November, 2009 @ 19:08
Hey Bill-
Thanks for the comment. The point of my post isn’t whether evolution is true or not, it’s that Chuck Missler knew he was lying about what the theory of evolution posits. What’s more, the biological theory of evolution has nothing to say about the origins of life itself; evolution is how life changes. Even the Creation Museum itself supports a basic theory of evolution in explaining how the present abundance of life could arise from the small number of animals that were supposedly on the ark.
So what we have here is a two-fold misrepresentation by Chuck Missler: first, that “Evolution” has anything to say about the foundations of life, and second, that biogenisis suggests life can arise spontaneously from peanut butter.
On to your claim: I’m not an expert on fossils by any means, but I want to point out simply that your argument is a logical fallacy called “argumentum ad ignorantiam.” Even if your statement about absent fossils were true, a perceived lack of fossils does not disprove evolutionary theory anymore than the lack of contemporary sources (let alone contemporary hostile sources) for Christ disprove his existence.
Comment by jake — 28 November, 2009 @ 19:28
I am absolutely astonished that anyone wants to argue between creationism and evolution. It certainly distracts from the really complicated things like loving mercy and walking humbly (Micah 6:8) or loving each other (John 15:17).
Psalm 119:73 proves that this theory of sexual reproduction is rubbish (”Your hands made me and formed me”), nothing about eggs and sperm there. I also know that any scriptural text that does not support an argument is obviously “quoted out of context”. No wonder the world has difficulty believing the Good News when those who call themselves after Christ cannot love their friends let alone their enemies.
Comment by Rihari — 1 April, 2010 @ 04:45