What is the Evidence of Mutations and New Information

[one.opinion]

1 hour ago, shiloh357 said:

However, there are many changes required for a whale to evolve from a land mammal. One of them is to get rid of its pelvis. This would tend to crush the reproductive orifice with propulsive tail movements. But a shrinking pelvis would not be able to support the hind-limbs needed for walking. So the hypothetical transitional form would be unsuited to both land and sea, and hence be extremely vulnerable.

This argument ignores the existence of seals and sea lions.

1 hour ago, shiloh357 said:

The lack of transitional forms in the fossil record was realized by evolutionary whale experts like the late E.J. Slijper: ‘We do not possess a single fossil of the transitional forms between the aforementioned land animals [i.e., carnivores and ungulates] and the whales.’³

Let's do a little history to see how misleading this quote is.

Slijper wrote the book containing this quote in 1962. Now let's look at dates when these hyopthetically-transitional fossils were discovered.

Pakicetus - 1983

Ambulocetus - 1992

Kutchicetus - 2000

Rodhocetus - 1992

Dorudon is an outlier - first fragments discovered in 1845, more complete representatives have been discovered since this time.

So Slijper didn't find Dorudon evidence convincing, but didn't have the opportunity to respond to the others. (Note - Dorudon is a member of the Basilosaurid group that is mentioned in the article you posted.)

1 hour ago, shiloh357 said:

The second in this ‘transitional series’ is the 7-foot (2 m) long Ambulocetus natans (‘walking whale that swims’). Like the secular media and more ‘popular’ science journals, Teaching about Evolution often presents nice neat stories to readers, not the ins and outs of the research methodology, including its limitations. The nice pictures of Ambulocetus natans in these publications are based on artists’ imaginations, and should be compared with the actual bones found! The difference is illustrated well in the article A Whale of a Tale?⁶ This article shows that the critical skeletal elements necessary to establish the transition from non-swimming land mammal to whale are (conveniently) missing (see diagram). Therefore, grand claims about the significance of the fossils cannot be critically evaluated. The evolutionary biologist Annalisa Berta commented on the Ambulocetus fossil:

Since the pelvic girdle is not preserved, there is no direct evidence in Ambulocetus for a connection between the hind limbs and the axial skeleton. This hinders interpretations of locomotion in this animal, since many of the muscles that support and move the hindlimb originate on the pelvis.⁷

Regardless of the particulars of the mechanism locomotion, there is little doubt that Ambulocetus was aquatic although it possessed much of the same anatomical features of terrestrial tetrapods.

1 hour ago, shiloh357 said:

Finally, it is dated more recently (by evolutionary dating methods) than undisputed whales, so is unlikely to be a walking ancestor of whales.

This misrepresentation of evolution is surprising. Evolution is not believed to be a chain of events with entire species morphing from one to the next, but a highly branched web. If we assume for a second that evolution is true and this transition did take place, it would not necessarily include every single representative of Ambulocetus, but a "branch" from the Ambulocetus tree. There is no reason why both organisms could not both exist at the same time.

2 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

This indicates that its authors don’t believe Pakicetus is a good example of an intermediate.

Possibly. Since Pakicetus was much more terrestrial, the source the author is referring to may have decided to simply not use it.

 

2 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

So the evidence shows that it was probably a land mammal, not a transitional form.¹¹

Analysis of the teeth suggest that Pakicetus ate fish. Additionally, the limb bones are denser than expected for a mammals its size, suggesting it spent a lot of time in the water, with the dense limbs allowing it to walk on the bottom of rivers and lakes like the modern hippo. Another really important reason scientists suspect it is transitional is very specific:

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Pakicetus had a dense and thickened auditory bulla, which is a characteristic of all cetaceans. The bulla is the bone of the skull that formed the floor of a cavity that housed the middle ear ossicles (the malleus, incus, and stapes). The thickened part of the auditory bulla was suspended from the skull, allowing it to vibrate in response to sound waves propagating through the skull. Normally, sound waves in air are reflected when they encounter a skull because of the great difference in density between bone and air; however, the density of water is much closer to that of bone. Underwater sound would have entered the skull of Pakicetus and caused its bulla to vibrate. The bulla was in turn connected to the chain of middle ear bones (i.e. malleus, incus, stapes), which transmitted the sound to the organ of hearing. Thus the thickened bulla of Pakicetus is interpreted as a specialization for hearing underwater sound. The sound passage via the external ear of Pakicetus was intact and was similar to that of other mammals.

(https://www.nyit.edu/medicine/pakicetus_spp/)

Basically, it had anatomy for hearing well both on land and in the water. It's debatable whether its descendants became more whale-like, but it certainly is a possibility.

 

[Guest shiloh357]

1 hour ago, one.opinion said:

This argument ignores the existence of seals and sea lions.

The topic of the article is about whales, not seals and sea lions.   So I don't think he is "ignoring" anything.

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Let's do a little history to see how misleading this quote is.

Slijper wrote the book containing this quote in 1962. Now let's look at dates when these hyopthetically-transitional fossils were discovered.

Pakicetus - 1983

Ambulocetus - 1992

Kutchicetus - 2000

Rodhocetus - 1992

Dorudon is an outlier - first fragments discovered in 1845, more complete representatives have been discovered since this time.

So Slijper didn't find Dorudon evidence convincing, but didn't have the opportunity to respond to the others. (Note - Dorudon is a member of the Basilosaurid group that is mentioned in the article you posted.)

 

It goes back to the evolutionary practice of trying to find evidence after the fact.  Declare something to have evolved from something else and THEN go manufacture "evidence" to support it.   Evolution has a long  and storied history of manufacturing "evidence." So, evolutionists are not exactly in a position to accuse anyone of being misleading.

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Regardless of the particulars of the mechanism locomotion, there is little doubt that Ambulocetus was aquatic although it possessed much of the same anatomical features of terrestrial tetrapods.

Even so, that doesn't make it an ancestor to whales.

 

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This misrepresentation of evolution is surprising. Evolution is not believed to be a chain of events with entire species morphing from one to the next, but a highly branched web. If we assume for a second that evolution is true and this transition did take place, it would not necessarily include every single representative of Ambulocetus, but a "branch" from the Ambulocetus tree. There is no reason why both organisms could not both exist at the same time.

And yet, evolutionists cannot provide the volume of transitional fossils that would be in the earth if it were true.  

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Possibly. Since Pakicetus was much more terrestrial, the source the author is referring to may have decided to simply not use it.

 

Analysis of the teeth suggest that Pakicetus ate fish. Additionally, the limb bones are denser than expected for a mammals its size, suggesting it spent a lot of time in the water, with the dense limbs allowing it to walk on the bottom of rivers and lakes like the modern hippo. Another really important reason scientists suspect it is transitional is very specific:

(https://www.nyit.edu/medicine/pakicetus_spp/)

Basically, it had anatomy for hearing well both on land and in the water. It's debatable whether its descendants became more whale-like, but it certainly is a possibility.

 

Again, the evidence for Pakicetus being a ancestor of whales is being interpreted with a whole lot of imagination and speculation.  There is nothing solid about it.  

[one.opinion]

4 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

However, there are many changes required for a whale to evolve from a land mammal. One of them is to get rid of its pelvis. This would tend to crush the reproductive orifice with propulsive tail movements. But a shrinking pelvis would not be able to support the hind-limbs needed for walking. So the hypothetical transitional form would be unsuited to both land and sea, and hence be extremely vulnerable.

 

1 hour ago, one.opinion said:

This argument ignores the existence of seals and sea lions.

 

5 minutes ago, shiloh357 said:

The topic of the article is about whales, not seals and sea lions.   So I don't think he is "ignoring" anything.

I thought you would be able to understand my point. My mistake.

The author claims that a shrinking pelvis "would be unsuited to both land and sea, and hence be extremely vulnerable."

Seals and sea lions have a reduced pelvis, and they are doing just fine. Thus, the argument is inherently invalid.

8 minutes ago, shiloh357 said:

It goes back to the evolutionary practice of trying to find evidence after the fact.  Declare something to have evolved from something else and THEN go manufacture "evidence" to support it.

Actually, it points out a bit of an ethical concern regarding the author. Why do you suppose he used a quote from 1962 before about 80% of the transitional fossil record he attempts to refute was discovered? He couldn't possibly be trying to mislead his readers, could he?

What type of evidence do you think was manufactured?

18 minutes ago, shiloh357 said:

And yet, evolutionists cannot provide the volume of transitional fossils that would be in the earth if it were true.

How many fossils do you think would be present if evolution were true? I suspect what you really mean by this is "paleontologists cannot provide enough transitional fossils to satisfy me." If you ignore the possibility that a fossil with a tail and teeth like a dinosaur, but with wings and feathers like a bird is transitional, there is not a sufficient number of transitional fossils to satisfy you.

 

25 minutes ago, shiloh357 said:

Again, the evidence for Pakicetus being a ancestor of whales is being interpreted with a whole lot of imagination and speculation.  There is nothing solid about it.

I agree, this is somewhat speculative. What is clear is that this is a terrestrial mammal that is surprisingly well-adapted to spending a LOT of time in the water. Whether this particular branch led to the others is unclear. We really need to wait further along in the proposed series before we see things like nostrils moving to the top of the head as in Rodhocetus.

At the most-favorable interpretation of your argument, Pakicetus should be left out of the cetacean transitional series. Good luck refuting the rest with evidence.

[Guest shiloh357]

4 hours ago, one.opinion said:

 

At the most-favorable interpretation of your argument, Pakicetus should be left out of the cetacean transitional series. Good luck refuting the rest with evidence.

I am not the one with the evidence problem.   I am the one who notices the lack of evidence for Evolution in terms of what should be present in the fossil record.   What you have provided thus far, isn't evidence of macro-evolution.   All you have provided really amounts to speculative interpretation and not much more.  

[one.opinion]

1 hour ago, shiloh357 said:

I am the one who notices the lack of evidence for Evolution in terms of what should be present in the fossil record.

Who do you think would know better “what should be present in the fossil record”?

A. Amateurs that do not accept evolution and fight it tooth and nail

B. Experts professionals that study fossils for a living

The answer should be obvious, but I’d really like to see your answer.

[other one]

1 hour ago, one.opinion said:

Who do you think would know better “what should be present in the fossil record”?

A. Amateurs that do not accept evolution and fight it tooth and nail

B. Experts professionals that study fossils for a living

The answer should be obvious, but I’d really like to see your answer.

remember that it was "experts" that designed, built and sank the Titanic killing over a thousand people....   Experts/professionals don't always have the answers....    but many of them have agenda's.    and a professional with an agenda can be dangerous especially if they can't admit that they could be wrong.

[Guest shiloh357]

8 hours ago, one.opinion said:

Who do you think would know better “what should be present in the fossil record”?

A. Amateurs that do not accept evolution and fight it tooth and nail

B. Experts professionals that study fossils for a living

The answer should be obvious, but I’d really like to see your answer.

This speaks to the tyranny of the atheistic scientific community.   People like me utilize something that the experts don't like:  Critical thinking.   It means I don't just accept what I am told, but I actually think about what the "experts" are telling us we are supposed to accept simply because they are the "experts." 

Stephen J. Gould once said that if Christians want to use the Bible as a source of faith, hope and inspiration, that's fine.   But he asserted that the origin of humanity is the sole domain and science and science alone that we should simply accept what scientists tell us about origins/evolution and so on.  

It's the tyranny of, "When the experts speak, the thinking has already been done."  

We are not supposed to ask them about the lack of or quality of their evidence.  We are not supposed ask, "If Evolution is true and took place over millions or billions of years, why aren't there millions of transitional fossils in every rock strata?"   

We are not supposed to ask, "If Evolution is true and the evidence plenteous, why did "the experts"  feel the need to fabricate and lie and manufacture false evidence over the years?  Shouldn't the evidence be sufficient enough that lying wouldn't have been necessary?"  

And if the evolution "science" community  has been willing to lie about the evidence, why do they deserve our trust as "experts?"

We are not supposed to ask, "Why did the notion of Evolution precede the evidence?  Why wasn't the scientific method employed where Evolution is concerned?   Why is desire for Evolution to be true driving the interpretation of the fossil record?  That is the opposite of how science is supposed to operate."

It's similar how the "experts" have been handling the whole "Global warming"  debacle after all of their predictions from 15 years ago, didn't come to pass, but we are just supposed to accept it as "settled science" no questions asked.  In fact, it was such a failure, they had to change the name to "Climate Change."  And any scientist that dared to question the accuracy of and science behind Global Warming was supposed to be punished, even incarcerated if possible.  We aren't supposed to think about it, or question it; we are just supposed accept it because the "experts" say so.  

Critical thinking and the willingness to question the "experts"  is anathema to a tyrannical, leftist atheistic "scientific" community.

I am not easily impressed by "experts."   In fact,"expert" is somewhat of an overused term these days, and it is meant to intimidate the rest of us into silence.  The "experts"  are assigned the mantle of infallibility and are seen as standing above scrutiny and question and critical thinking.

[enoob57]

We now return you back to the science fiction channel of none opinion.... Or perhaps you have an opinion and if it's pro-evolution you may be considered an expert if not well poor thing your just ignorant  
Is it just me or is the obvious just peeking out from the data... join the club of the informed who needs proof?

Edited August 25, 2018 by enoob57

[one.opinion]

4 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

This speaks to the tyranny of the atheistic scientific community.   People like me utilize something that the experts don't like:  Critical thinking.   It means I don't just accept what I am told, but I actually think about what the "experts" are telling us we are supposed to accept simply because they are the "experts." 

 

Critical thinking is valuable and useful. But it does have its limits. Sometimes, there are concepts that are simply not comprehensible through critical thinking alone and training is needed to understand them. Critical thinking is great when you have all the facts assembled before you and you can analyze them and use them to build a bigger picture. What you are claiming is that you know more than the experts, just because your intuition tells you that if evolution were true, then there should be more transitional fossils. I would suggest investigating this question. I did a Google search and here is one of the top links: (http://evolutionfaq.com/faq/why-arent-there-more-transitional-fossils).

5 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

We are not supposed to ask, "If Evolution is true and the evidence plenteous, why did "the experts"  feel the need to fabricate and lie and manufacture false evidence over the years?  Shouldn't the evidence be sufficient enough that lying wouldn't have been necessary?"

Let's follow up with this. You think that hoaxes are rampant in paleontology. We can "critically think" about this question. How many cases can you find of hoaxes? Were they perpetrated by scientists or by people just wanting notoriety? What proportion of fossil finding are fake? I encourage you to investigate and do some critical thinking about this question, it is certainly important to know.

5 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

We are not supposed to ask, "Why did the notion of Evolution precede the evidence?  Why wasn't the scientific method employed where Evolution is concerned?   Why is desire for Evolution to be true driving the interpretation of the fossil record?  That is the opposite of how science is supposed to operate."

Critical thinking also involves metacognition - or thinking about your thinking. Let's look at your first critical thinking question, "Why did the notion of Evolution precede the evidence?" I have repeatedly shown you that Darwin had evidence. What part of critical thinking allows you to keep ignoring facts and stick to the same completely invalid question?

Second question - "Why wasn't the scientific method employed where Evolution is concerned?" There are two avenues for evolution research. One is to use the scientific method to test things that we can observe directly. This happens every day. This is the microevolution that you are perfectly fine with. To me, at least, critical thinking takes what we can directly observe and extrapolate these observations to past events that cannot be observed directly. Here I would like to ask you again what evidence do you have that prevents microevolution from eventually becoming macroevolution. Critical thinking requires facts, after all. Study the fossil record. Study the layering of life forms. Use critical thinking to arrive at conclusions about those different layers and the life forms found in them. Study the use of multiple isotopes in rock samples that independently derive the ages of rock layers. Apply your critical thinking skills unilaterally and not only when it supports the version of history that you want.

5 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

It's similar how the "experts" have been handling the whole "Global warming"  debacle after all of their predictions from 15 years ago, didn't come to pass, but we are just supposed to accept it as "settled science" no questions asked.

Back up your claims. If you champion critical thinking, provide evidence that what you say is verified. Show the 15 year old predictions that haven't come to pass. I can show you evidence of global warming, but I suspect you won't pay any attention to that either if it contradicts your preferred narrative.

5 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

In fact, it was such a failure, they had to change the name to "Climate Change." 

Educate yourself, then apply your critical thinking. Critical thinking requires facts, even those that you may not like. Try Google some time. I'll even give you a link that would take you 15 seconds to find yourself - https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/whats-difference-between-global-warming-and-climate-change. Rather than doing any actual learning, you selectively read only what supports what you already think. Why cloud your mind with facts that may interfere with your opinions?

 

6 hours ago, shiloh357 said:

Critical thinking and the willingness to question the "experts"  is anathema to a tyrannical, leftist atheistic "scientific" community.

I am not easily impressed by "experts."   In fact,"expert" is somewhat of an overused term these days, and it is meant to intimidate the rest of us into silence.  The "experts"  are assigned the mantle of infallibility and are seen as standing above scrutiny and question and critical thinking.

You believe the entitlement generation is leftist, as well, but that's exactly what you are displaying with this post. Everyone should get a gold star for trying. Never mind if some people devote years or even decades of their lives to learning the intricacies of a particular facet of science (evolution or climate science), we should have get a gold star because everyone's opinion is valid, regardless of expertise. I gave you the example of the Seal Team earlier in this thread and it was completely valid. What you are saying is "my critical thinking is better than, or at least the equal to a decade or more of intense study and effort". It is just not so.

[Guest shiloh357]

20 hours ago, one.opinion said:

 

Critical thinking is valuable and useful. But it does have its limits. Sometimes, there are concepts that are simply not comprehensible through critical thinking alone and training is needed to understand them. Critical thinking is great when you have all the facts assembled before you and you can analyze them and use them to build a bigger picture. What you are claiming is that you know more than the experts, just because your intuition tells you that if evolution were true, then there should be more transitional fossils. I would suggest investigating this question. I did a Google search and here is one of the top links: (http://evolutionfaq.com/faq/why-arent-there-more-transitional-fossils).

I am not claiming to know more than the experts.  And it is not intuition. It's simple logic.    What I am saying is that so far, the "experts" don't really have a satisfactory answer to my questions.   I understand why there would be cases where animals die and nothing is left behind as a fossil.   But that is already baked into my question.   Even when we take into account the fact that some animals die without being fossilized, there should still be millions and millions of transitional fossils of at least some ancient creatures over millions and billions of years to draw from.  

I am not saying I know more than the experts;  I am saying that the "experts" are not really being honest about the lack of evidence.

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Let's follow up with this. You think that hoaxes are rampant in paleontology. We can "critically think" about this question. How many cases can you find of hoaxes? Were they perpetrated by scientists or by people just wanting notoriety? What proportion of fossil finding are fake? I encourage you to investigate and do some critical thinking about this question, it is certainly important to know.

I didn't realize there was a number of times that people can lie and deceive before it becomes a problem.  

• But let's start with a zoologist named Ernst Haeckel.   He created an embryo chart to prove that human beings are biologically related to fish, lizards, pigs, rabbits and chickens.  It's wrong and it is known to be wrong, but it is still circulated as true.
• Then there was Piltdown man that was touted for decades as proof by the "experts" that humans came from apes.  It was an embarrassment to the scientific community in England for it be found to be a hoax.
• The real beginning of why Evolution is taught in American schools was the "Nebraska man" tooth.   That turned out to be wrong as well. It was an attempt to prove a theory (again working backwards) and even though it failed, the glaring failure of the "experts" to recognize a pig's tooth doesn't give them a moment' pause about their ability to support Evolution.
• Neanderthal man has turned out to be hoax.  Dr. Reiner Protsch was the one who popularized Neanderthal, but he was forced to great disgrace and embarrassment and the loss of his job in 2005, that he purposely made up the whole thing. 
• Archaeoraptor  is a fraud and was exposed as such in National Geographic, Oct. 2000.

So yeah, there are a lot of frauds that have occurred IN the scientific community because Evolution is presumed true and any evidence that is found is filtered through that presumption and sadly, they will even resort to manufacturing evidence to deceive the public.  It's what happens when atheistic scientists are the gate keepers who get to decide what the public is allowed to see and know about the "evidence."  And these frauds are not just back 100 years ago. They occur quite recently as well and it is not some amateur trying to pull a fast one or get some notoriety.   It is "the experts" who end up getting embarrassed after being discovered to be frauds. 

Again, if the evidence for Evolution were solid, there would not be a reason for degreed scientists  in the evolutionary community make stuff up. So, I have reason to doubt and challenge the experts given their lack of honesty and credibility.  What else has been foisted upon us by "the experts" that we don't yet know is actually a fraud?

 

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Critical thinking also involves metacognition - or thinking about your thinking. Let's look at your first critical thinking question, "Why did the notion of Evolution precede the evidence?" I have repeatedly shown you that Darwin had evidence. What part of critical thinking allows you to keep ignoring facts and stick to the same completely invalid question?

He had "evidence" with respect to microevolution.   He admitted that the fossil record did not support his ideas, but was sure that it would later on.  He did not have the kind of evidence needed to support molecules to man, macroevolution.     It goes back to the foolish idea that since bacterial strains can adapt to resisting new anti-bacterial drugs, and finches beaks can change to adapt over time,  it proves that dinosaurs can evolve into birds.  

 

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Second question - "Why wasn't the scientific method employed where Evolution is concerned?" There are two avenues for evolution research. One is to use the scientific method to test things that we can observe directly. This happens every day. This is the microevolution that you are perfectly fine with. To me, at least, critical thinking takes what we can directly observe and extrapolate these observations to past events that cannot be observed directly. Here I would like to ask you again what evidence do you have that prevents microevolution from eventually becoming macroevolution.

Again, that question has been dealt with.   Adapting to a changing environment is simply a rearrangement of existing genetic information.  It is adapting to the environment.   How would that lead to the introduction of brand new information never before existing, leading to the evolution of a totally different organism?   I think when it comes to evidence, you are the one with the burden.   Anyone who simply thinks about what is being suggested, would ask how finches and moths changing color or developing traits to allow them to exist in a particular environment would lead to a new organism?   How would adapting to a new environment mean that man started off as molecules in a primordial soup?

 

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Critical thinking requires facts, after all. Study the fossil record. Study the layering of life forms. Use critical thinking to arrive at conclusions about those different layers and the life forms found in them. Study the use of multiple isotopes in rock samples that independently derive the ages of rock layers. Apply your critical thinking skills unilaterally and not only when it supports the version of history that you want.

Critical thinking simply breaks down the arguments being made.  I am operating from the facts being presented by the evolutionists and so far, no intellectually satisfying answers can be presented. 

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Back up your claims. If you champion critical thinking, provide evidence that what you say is verified. Show the 15 year old predictions that haven't come to pass. I can show you evidence of global warming, but I suspect you won't pay any attention to that either if it contradicts your preferred narrative.

People tend to forget that back in 2001-2002, we were told that if we did nothing about "global warming" that certain species of animals would be extinct, that the polar ice caps would melt, there would be catastrophic results in ten years, and so on.   A lot of doom and gloom was predicted if we didn't change to prevent global warming.   It was touted as the biggest threat to human survival.   Well, we did nothing it has been more than ten years, and none of the apocalyptic stuff predicted came to pass.

Global warming was touted as settled science by Obama, meaning that it was not to be questioned, but accepted and we were expected to be compliant sheeple and do what we were told.  It was used to con people into buying what the government told them to buy.  Pretty soon we told to buy certain kinds of lightbulbs and toilets and washing machines and everyone was "going green."

 

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Educate yourself, then apply your critical thinking. Critical thinking requires facts, even those that you may not like. Try Google some time. I'll even give you a link that would take you 15 seconds to find yourself - https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/whats-difference-between-global-warming-and-climate-change. Rather than doing any actual learning, you selectively read only what supports what you already think. Why cloud your mind with facts that may interfere with your opinions?

Global warming was touted as man-made.  It isn't.  It was touted as  man-made in order to convince us that we needed to change our lives because we are threat to the environment, when it simply isn't true.   The earth is always changing and fluctuating, warming and cooling, as part of its own self-regulating that God engineered into it.  It is not man-made, it is God-made, but it is being exploited to control the masses.  

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You believe the entitlement generation is leftist, as well, but that's exactly what you are displaying with this post. Everyone should get a gold star for trying. Never mind if some people devote years or even decades of their lives to learning the intricacies of a particular facet of science (evolution or climate science), we should have get a gold star because everyone's opinion is valid, regardless of expertise. I gave you the example of the Seal Team earlier in this thread and it was completely valid. What you are saying is "my critical thinking is better than, or at least the equal to a decade or more of intense study and effort". It is just not so.

No, the problem is that I dare to question the experts, that I dare to think about what they are claiming to be true and asking fair and honest questions.   Somehow, because they are experts and I am not acquiescing to the assumption that they are infallible and paying them the reverence they think they are due, somehow I am the problem.  

This has nothing to do with "entitlement."  That is a ridiculous comparison.   You are simply reflecting the typical Leftist mentality that prefers that we not think, or question or anything, just accept what the "experts" say, "We have done thinking for you, so just shut up, sit down and do what you're told."

It's interesting that you don't accept the word of an all-knowing, infallible God, but you are so quick to trust the word of fallible little men who have a poor track record of honesty.