I suppose life goes on... and yet I am still intrigued by all that I absorbed on Saturday (for I must confess, it was quite a lot to absorb).
I have to admit, I laughed out loud when I saw the comment about 'Christians purposefully going onto science journals in search of persecution', because I can imagine some Christians doing just that. It’s kind of similar to democrats who will call into Rush Limbaugh’s show, so that they can say, “Hey, I called into Rush!”. They, of course, are immediately shut up, and when they get off the air (sometimes without choice), their points are ridiculed into oblivion. And yet, still they call. Fascinating.
So, with the ‘scientists at large’ receding back into their comfortable corner, I feel more at ease talking to my normal readers. I feel I can confess the things I have learned with ease.
It is with great solemnity that I confess to having slept little the past couple of days, on the account of the definition of ‘Evolution’. Indeed it is a dreadful thing to hear in ones ears. All of Sunday, while I sat in my little pew at church, my mind was nagging me to get back to the previous debate. Even when I talked to people, it was steadily in the back of my mind. I had my last little obliterated word, and that was fine with me… But maybe there’s something deeper to it all.
Here’s what I mean. I thought of something…rather spontaneously. I was accused of not truly understanding the concept… the definition of Evolution. And honestly - I had a picture in my mind of little monkeys gradually losing hair and becoming, well, intelligent human beings. That, my dear readers, seems laughable.
So, what’s the solution? There’s always some kind of solution, no? I decided to find out what people in general think ‘evolution’ means.
So I posed the following ‘slightly controversial question’ to my endearing customers. “What do you think the definition of Evolution is?” Surprisingly, few of them asked ‘what kind of evolution’. They already KNEW that I was referring to the evolution which brought man, animals, and life’s existence in general about. And, if you fear my customers were offended or defensive, I can assure you they suffered no customer-abuse. One man put it this way, “I never shy away from a controversy.” I echo that.
So free speech reigns, my dear readers. These are directly from the mouths of average Americans, like you and I. Some of the words were penned by the customers themselves. Are you ready?
What is the definition of Evolution?
1. Where’s a good dictionary? There’s not really a definition. It’s a theory. It’s not proven. It’s the theory of evolution. It’s not the law of evolution - like the law of gravity.
2. That’s a good question.
3. That human beings were previously some other form of life. They evolved. Over one million years.
4. I think the definition of evolution is different for every person. Because everyone is constantly evolving into something different than they currently are. It also means- some of us are going backwards and are going forwards. Everyone will see it differently - like everyone’s in their own world, even though we’re co-existing together. For instance, if everyone were given a camera at a bridal party, the pictures taken would show all different angles.
5. You gotta have change somewhere in there… Um the process of like a graduated change to something… where the resulting entity that is changing is distinct from the entity that was at the beginning of the process.
6. Adaptation to accommodate environment.
7. It’s a thing we have scientific proof for. You can scientifically prove evolution.
8. Just life evolves. It gets better. It gets worse. The strongest survive. Darwinism. I don’t buy into the theory that the world is 10,000 years old - just because the Bible says it.
9. It’s a lie. Creation is the way it works. Evolution is alie. There are details - but to think that randomly chemicals can get together and build amoebas and amoebas can get together and build…whatever’s next… It ust doesn’t make sense. It takes more faith to believe in Evolution than Creation, because there are just so many gaps in Evolution. They find a “new” bone in Africa and exclaim, “That proves it!” There’s evidence that carbon dating isn’t really as accurate as they say it is. I think there’s a Creation Museum in Cincinnati Ohio.”
10. I deny to define it.
11. Things change as the environment changes.
12. Change. One word.
13. The process of adapting to one’s surroundings.
14. More towards what we would consider higher life forms.
15. Most people argue that it’s evolution vs. creation. But there are many Creationist-Evolutionists. Evolution is an adaptation - and ability for everything to adapt to it’s surroundings.
16. My definition of evolution is constantly changing.
17. Evolution is really nothing more than creation. Some people put history in it, but it’s really just creation.
18. Man evolved from Primates.
19. Change built upon change.
20. Evolution is the point at which some of us became superior to others.
21. Evolution is a scientists explanation for the existence of the planet.
22. First thing that comes to mind is change, adaption, and survival.
23. The graduation from simple to complex.
24. Animals/Humans evolving over time to best suit their climate and environment.
25. BIG BANG theory. Universe was created by atoms that compressed to a type of compression and then exploded in energy. However, it was engineered by an Intelligent Superior Being.
26. The change in an organization over a long perio dof time due to climatic or geographic changes
27. The theory that life on earth began without supernatural influence.
28. I defer to the dictionary.
29. Refer to #21
30. Stupid. Stupid is, Stupid does. There’s no way in **** that amoeba floated to land, then evolved into an iguana or something… then - into whatever.
Those were the definitions, and while I didn’t press anybody for their beliefs on the issues -- I wanted things as unbiased as possible -- one lady went a little deeper on one side of the spectrum.
I believe…
“I know evolution involves something like change - but it’s gotta be something bigger than that. Like, I believe in God - but could evolution also be possible? I know my job is constantly evolving to something different, and I as a person am constantly evolving (growing, changing) to something different. I’m just trying to figure out if I believe in evolution - like if God may be wants me to evolve to something better.”
Then, for a more precise (albeit difficult to understand) definition, I dug up a piece (yes, copy and paste! Isn’t it divine?) defining Evolution on www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/.
I drew from it, that Evolution (at least macroevolution, the piece clarifies) ‘in fact embraces a plurality of theories and hypotheses. What is vigorously challenged…is macroevolution. Macroevolution is evolution on the "grand scale" resulting in the origin of higher taxa. In evolutionary theory it thus entails common ancestry, descent with modification, speciation, the genealogical relatedness of all life, transformation of species, and large scale functional and structural changes of populations through time, all at or above the species level. Common descent is a general descriptive theory that concerns the genetic origins of living organisms (though not the ultimate origin of life). Because it is so well supported scientifically, common descent is often called the "fact of evolution" by biologists. For these reasons, proponents of special creation are especially hostile to the macroevolutionary foundation of the biological sciences.’
This last definition seemed to be a very long way of saying that, in fact - life started with…something? And then, something made that something into a man.
So, I am intrigued. I am sitting here, thinking, hmm. Right, so they look at a chair, and tell me all about how the chair is made. They tell me how old the chair is, and what kind of wood the chair’s made from, and what has sat on that chair… and yet there still seems to be something missing.
Perhaps this is more of a philosophical question, and yet it still must be asked. I am told to believe all of this… presumably by people far more intelligent than the average person… but it is understandable to wonder… if things are being formed, what is the driving force that is forming things? Sure, the chair is there… the chiseled-out-bones are in the museum… the technical words are splashed boldly against a computer screen. But, is all of that science? After all, science is constantly changing. The definition of science is constantly changing. The world is full of possibilities. I am sure if I were to ask the question ‘why’, (why or what force caused the first atom to be created, and this perfect atmosphere of ours to take shape) I would be told that is not a question I can ask. I’m not allowed to ask that question. Science cannot answer the question of morals. All right, but is ‘why’ a moral, or a philosophical question. Could ‘why’ or ‘what’ behind the forming of this great earth of ‘ours’ be the answer to the age-old debate of ‘evolution vs. creationism’, or as one man put it, ‘creationistic evolution’. Why was the chair formed or made? Did it just come to be, and it’s just waiting to be analyzed and debated over? Or is there something more… logical. Something that science cannot explain. Only logic… man… God can prevail on this one.
You see the turmoil I am in. So I have to tie this all up for now. So here’s the big clincher. My definition of the results that evolution brings…
(These have been implied by various commenters, so I can only assume that it was commented for the benefit of the concept of Evolution.)
Evolution seems to be saying that children do not have the right to choose what they learn in school. Okay. Evolution-grounded-Scientists have the right to decide for parents and children that morals and religion do not apply to America’s children. Right. Children also do not have the right to debate the issue, because the “science that is always changing” is already decided for them.
How am I doing so far?
I conclude, my dear evolutionists - if you happen upon this in a few dusty years, that you are a machine. The idea began, it took root, and then ‘evidence’ supported itself with ‘evidence’. Little discoveries are constantly being made, but who is to say that an objective scientist will conclude the objective result? Are you not all clearly biased - and have you not already said, that although science is changing, you will not see creation (or any other possibility) in a clear light?
My dear unbiased readers, and otherwise controversially drawn passers-by, I wonder if our evolutionists really believe that Creationists purposefully seek them out in pursuit of persecution… that they purposefully pursue the path of martyrdom. If I could, I would tell my dear evolutionists that they flatter themselves. They are not our enemy. They are merely the majority.
I have tried to be objective… and I fear I have come across rather strongly biased. It is funny. One commenter demanded the answer for God - who made Him? - why does He exist? And I demanded of evolutionists the answer for evolution - what possessed it to begin? - why does it continue? Yet one very wise man once put it this way. “We in our little finite minds try to explain the infinite.”
Truly, while some believe Evolution to be mixed intricately with Creation, I ask - why believe God at all if you can only believe Him half way? And why believe in Science, if it leaves you with no purpose to live?
Perhaps when I am old, wizened, and embittered, I will return to my little blog and type to my hearts content about the fallacies of ideals and hope in a Sovereign being, or a design that was Intelligent and Intentional -- but even in the future I believe the controversy will fascinate me, and spur me on to something deeper. Perhaps a deeper…definition. Because, as many of my customers made clear, who knows the answer? Who dares to put themselves above all - ‘superior’ as it was said (even superior to God), and tell us that they know exactly what happened billions of years ago? Hypothesize, by all means. But tell our children there is but one answer?
Never.
12 comments:
Of course creationism has a place in school! The same place that phlogiston theory, flat-earth theory, and the demon-possession theory of disease have - I think students should learn why we know some things to be scientifically true, and they can best learn this by reading how older theories were adopted and later discarded because evidence supported another theory.
That's the crux of the matter - evidence. There's evidence that the world is older than 6,000 years old, evidence for fossil stratification, evidence for humanity's descent from ape-like creatures. In the 1800s, when creationist scientists put creationist theories to the test, they had to keep revising and revising their theory because the evidence didn't support them. That's how theories live and die, and let's face it, scientific creationism died a long time ago.
Think about it. Perhaps there's no evil atheist scientist agenda - it's just scientists insisting that science class teach only what the evidence supports, and, sorry, but creationism isn't it.
Bravo :-) You're starting to think for yourself.
I had considered going through and answering your blogpost point by point but I am not certain you read the responses to your previous blogpost, so it may be nugatory effort.
One thing I will ask you to think about is this. What religion are you? I'm willing to bet its the same as your parents. Children of religious parents don't get a say in what religion they choose. They cannot chose a religion on the basis of which has the nicest church or cathedral, which has the best services or the coolest way to worship etc. Thats because children have no choice in the matter, they're 'brainwashed' (for want of a better word) by their parents. You listen to your parents, they're the authority figures in your life and if they say "Don't run across the road in front of cars" then generally you don't. They exert a similar authority over all other aspects of your life, including your religion and how you worship.
Now, at age 17, is a good time to start to investigate that big old world that exists and start to look for evidence. Not tales from an old book which has and is translated and mistranslated but real life hard facts.
Oh and one more thing to ponder. Evolution is the explanation for how life developed into its current state. Its not the explanation for how life came to be, thats a different branch of science known as abiogenesis. Google that and you'll find plenty of links.
Good luck to you in your journey because what I'm picking up on is that you're starting to question and to think FOR YOURSELF! :-)
I find one thing interesting.
You asked a lot of people what they think evolution is.
But evolution is a technical term. Why didn't you ask a single biologist what evolution is?
I'm one, so let me try:
- Descent with modification;
- changes in the allele frequencies in a population.
(If you don't know what "allele" means, please look it up -- Wikipedia, Google, even in a dictionary.)
It follows from these definitions is that individuals cannot evolve, only populations. It also follows that, say, chairs can't evolve, because they don't reproduce and they don't inherit.
I mentioned all this in my monster comment to your copy-from-Hovind-and-paste job, which you let through. Did you let it through without reading it? If so, why do you have moderation switched on at all? ~:-|
I am sure if I were to ask the question ‘why’, (why or what force caused the first atom to be created, and this perfect atmosphere of ours to take shape) I would be told that is not a question I can ask. I’m not allowed to ask that question. Science cannot answer the question of morals. All right, but is ‘why’ a moral, or a philosophical question.
What?
It's neither a moral nor a philosophical question. It's a scientific question. It's testable.
Even though sometimes the best answer that can be found is the good old "everything is the way it is because it got that way".
However, if you knew a little chemistry and physics admittedly at beginning university level, you'd understand why the existence of atoms is inevitable. Nuclei and electrons attract each other (electrostatics), and because various laws of quantum physics prevent them from being arbitrarily close, the electrons settle into specific (although fuzzy) places around the nucleus.
Our atmosphere is self-made: oxygen is a waste product of photosynthesis. You know what that is, right? Once oxygen was there, the bacteria that became the mitochondria of our ancestors changed from breathing nitrate or sulfate or whatever it was to breathing oxygen, which got them a higher energy yield (as can be calculated with sufficiently advanced chemistry).
There is a lot of knowledge out there of which you seem to never have imagined that it even exists.
Evolution seems to be saying that children do not have the right to choose what they learn in school.
That's a misunderstanding.
Firstly, the definition of science ("if I were wrong, how would I know?") shows that the theory of evolution is science -- not that it's correct; that it's science --, and that creationism is not science -- not that it's wrong; that it's not science. It logically follows that to teach creationism in biology class would simply be a lie.
Which creationism actually? Judeo-Christian? Muslim (similar, but not quite the same)? Hindu (claims that the Earth in general and mankind in particular are several orders of magnitude older than what the evidence says)? Navajo? Any of several hundred others?
That was my point in giving you this link, which I'm now doing for the third time.
Remember: choosing only one of those religious stories would violate the US Constitution.
Secondly, teach in sunday school, or in comparative religion classes in public schools, whatever you want. But in science class, teach science.
Little discoveries are constantly being made, but who is to say that an objective scientist will conclude the objective result? Are you not all clearly biased - and have you not already said, that although science is changing, you will not see creation (or any other possibility) in a clear light?
We are not automatically right. As I told you: science cannot prove.
However, as I also told you, it can disprove. If we were wrong, we could find that out, and someone would get a Nobel Prize for that. Show me a rabbit skeleton in a Silurian rock, and the theory of evolution will be in serious trouble. Show me a dog giving birth to a cat or vice versa (without being a surrogate mother, obviously). Show me. Go ahead, show me...
My dear unbiased readers, and otherwise controversially drawn passers-by, I wonder if our evolutionists really believe that Creationists purposefully seek them out in pursuit of persecution… that they purposefully pursue the path of martyrdom.
A few certainly do. Guillermo Gonzales comes to mind.
And I demanded of evolutionists the answer for evolution - what possessed it to begin? - why does it continue?
That's very simple: it's simply inevitable. Mutation is inevitable -- damage to DNA from UV rays and radioactivity happens all the time, and even without that, mistakes happen all the time when DNA is copied, and even without that, DNA falls apart when stored in water.
Some intelligent design, that! But it's a fact. When molecular biologists want to conserve DNA for a short time, they put it in the freezer; when they want to conserve it for longer, they boil it in nitrogen; when they really want to keep it, they dry it and store it at room temperature.
All living beings spend a large part of their energy on constantly repairing their DNA. If we used a more robust material, we'd need to eat much less, but no, we're stuck with it, "we" being all known life.
Hypothesize, by all means. But tell our children there is but one answer?
Never.
I agree with that.
(Shocker.)
Just don't pretend that all answers are somehow equally valid. Some can be shown to be wrong. Others can be shown to be untestable and thus useless -- they could explain everything and its opposite.
--------------------
Oh, and... carbon-dating is indeed a tricky affair. But because carbon-14 decays so quickly, carbon-dating only works for the last 50,000 years or so. Anything older than that simply doesn't contain measurable amounts of carbon-14 anymore. That's why other methods are used to date such stuff: most often the decay of potassium-40 or uranium-238 in volcanic rock.
I think I gave you this link. Evidently, you haven't read it yet. Please do so. If you don't, you'll never understand what you yourself are talking about.
Ahh... creation versus evolution.. where do I start?
First off, I would argue that creation and evolution are not opposing ideas, but complementary concepts - based on your definition of evolution. The fact that things evolve over time is unrelated to the origin of the planet. However, since many people correlate "evolution" with the big bang, monkeys turning into humans, etc versus a divinely-created universe only 5 digits old, let's proceed with that.
These two concepts cannot be debated. Let's use the two typical definitions: creation = universe was created 10,000 years ago ready to go, evolution = universe came into existence billions of years ago and life formed over time, evolving from simple things to more complex things.
Diving deeper into creation, God created the world "mature". This makes sense. If you're a divine being with the power to create a universe, why would you create one with simple cells, seeds, eggs. Why not create one ready to go? By definition, then, God created a world that had the stuff that takes millions of years to form.
This creates the issue. God created a world fully mature. If scientists existed that day, they would look around and argue that, clearly, science proves that the world is very old.. I mean, look at that tree - it's easily 20 years old. So, we should all believe that the world is 20 years old, even though God is right here telling me He just created it.
In other words, science works within the laws that govern this world. Rightfully so. If not, it wouldn't be science. As such, I don't take umbrage whatsoever at science stating that "given the laws that govern our world, these laws prove that our world is billions of years old". If they said this the very day of creation, how could you argue? How could you use scientific facts to disprove it?
To believe in God and creation is to believe in things that work outside of the laws that govern our physical world. To believe in science is to believe and work with things that work within the laws that govern our physical world. As such, I don't think either one can be used to disprove the other. To believe in God is to believe in things beyond the reach of science. To not believe in God is a personal choice to not believe in anything that can't be proven by science.
... which brings me to my last point. Many unbelievers will state "well, prove that there's a God", thereby suggesting that if we displayed God, people would believe. This is simply not true. God was visible throughout Old Testament times, yet all people didn't automatically believe in Him. Ask yourself this - what could possibly be displayed to an unbelieving scientist to prove the existence of God? I humbly submit that the answer is "nothing". Let's say a being appeared in front of us... 100 feet tall... could make things appear and disappear.. could change the weather... heal sick people.. perform other miracles.. would the scientist's response be "ok, now I believe"? I submit not. I believe the scientist's response - from a scientific perspective - would be "that doesn't prove that that projected image is a supernatural being operating outside the laws of science; rather, it's simply something that we don't understand yet".
So yes.. there's plenty of evidence proving the world is millions of years old as evident in fossil stratification. As a believe, I know that God created that stratification in its current form 10,000 years ago. Neither I nor the scientist can use our belief to PROVE the other incorrect. We can only use our belief to say: my belief in God is a person decision to accept things outside this world; your belief in evolution is a personal decision to NOT accept anything that can't be explained by laws of science.
Given all of this, the issue of what to teach in PUBLIC school is not an easy one. If you live in a country where any one religion can't be forced on anyone, teaching creation could be questioned. If, however, we as a nation decide to accept certain aspects of Christianity as part and parcel of our country, we may come to a different conclusion - but that is not the case in America today. I'd like to argue that the U.S. should make laws to support and enforce Christianity, but the planet doesn't have a good history of countries/nations surviving a single forced religion. Perhaps the current model is the best & most enduring - and the burden of teaching creation & Christianity is the added work of those/us who believe in it.
Humbly submitted,
BLT
Oops, I didn't finish my comment. I explained that mutation is inevitable: as long as there's DNA, there's mutation. I didn't explain why selection is inevitable.
That, however, is extremely simple, too. There's always an environment. Mutations produce a variation in a population; most of that variation doesn't matter, a part produces a disadvantage, and another part produces an advantage. Those with the advantage will have more surviving offspring, so that, over time, the advantage becomes more common in the population. This -- directional selection -- goes on till the adaptation is as good as it can be; then, all mutations that have an effect at all result in disadvantages. This is called stabilizing selection.
But no environment lasts forever. As soon as it changes, directional selection comes back.
That's why evolution has never stopped. It simply cannot stop as long as any environment is not completely stable.
All the way to the middle 20th century, many biologists believed this couldn't be the whole thing. There had to be, for example, a mysterious force that drove evolution to "higher levels" (curiously, "higher" was never defined). But all of these proposals made so far have turned out to 1) be unnecessary to explain the observations, and 2) contradict some of our observations. Therefore they have all fallen by the wayside. Orthogenesis? POOF. Schindewolf's typostrophe theory? POOF. Osborn's aristogenesis? POOF. Depéret's Rule? POOF. Lysenko's communism-influenced idea that organisms of the same species (whatever exactly a species is) treat each other like comrades and don't compete? POOF. They're all gone and of nothing but historical interest anymore*. 60 years ago, you could have found scientists who would have defended one or more of them -- nowadays you won't find a single one. As Huxley has said it (I quoted him in my monster comment), we go wherever the evidence leads, no matter how dear our convictions that the evidence is found to contradict.
* In the case of Lysenko, though, the historical interest is pretty large. Lysenko was Stalin's darling. We're talking about failed agriculture policies, missing harvests and famines here. "Reality is that which does not go away if you stop believing in it."
One commenter demanded the answer for God - who made Him? - why does He exist?
Oh yeah. You don't seem to have got the point of that comment. The Argument from First Cause has a long tradition in religious (not just Christian -- it started with Aristotle!) apologetics: nothing comes from nothing, everything comes from something, and if we follow all those chains of cause and effect back for long enough, we have two choices: either infinite regress ("it's turtles all the way down"); or we arbitrarily choose a starting point, call it God, and declare that God had no cause. Apologists traditionally imply that the first alternative is somehow unsatisfying and therefore settle on the second one.
The "who made God" argument shows how arbitrary and unjustified this choice is. Why stop at that point and not one earlier or one later -- why does the universe need a creator, but God doesn't? Or for that matter why stop at all -- what's really so horrible about infinite regress, except that we Puny Humans™ can't imagine it?
However, all this talk is unnecessary. We know more today than Aristotle did. We have figured out quantum physics and tested it. Lo & behold, it happens all the time that effects happen without having a cause. Everything that can happen can happen, just because it can -- at a probability that can be calculated very precisely. Take an atom of uranium-238, leave it completely alone, and it will decay (actually, its nucleus). It is completely impossible to predict when it will, and that's not just a technical limitation: the nucleus itself doesn't "know" it. But it will decay, with a probability of 50 % in 4.5 billion years. In other words, take any amount of U-238 nuclei and watch them for a year: half of them will decay within that time, but it is completely impossible to tell which ones will decay and which won't.
Accordingly, the theologists have simply dropped the Argument from First Cause. The problem it tried to explain simply doesn't exist.
Excellent. Starting to think for yourself.
But you have asked the man in the street to define evolution, without asking a biologist? Isn't that like asking a brick-layer about rocket fuels? Or a musician about gravitational fields?
Why is it evolution, a technical science like any other, is subject to so much personal opinion?
Even though some of us come across as stridently atheistic, don't forget that ALL we ask is that we don't teach non-science in science class. Have as many religion/bible classes as you want! Scientists aren't asking priests to start teaching evolution instead of or alongside their bible readings!
But in some ways, having a scientist teach 'the controversy' is as ridiculous as having your christian priest teach you that actually Islam is just as valid, and so is Buddhism. A Christian teacher would not be happy about being forced to teach those things, so why should a scientist be forced to teach non science? Admittedly, the analogy is bad, as one is belief vs belief and the other is belief vs fact.
You say children should have a choice in what they learn, or be presented with 'both sides'. Firstly, children already learn one side from their parents, their church, their religious education classes. Secondly, they go to science class to learn about science, not just facts, but the scientific method. Creationism and intelligent design fall down here, as they are NOT scientific concepts. Don't take that all the wrong way - it doesn't actually mean that creationism and ID are WRONG, OR right. It means that they are not disprovable.
Noone can disprove God entirely (although some people have had a damn good crack at it - you SHOULD read Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion" although don't let your parents see you!) God is for a start so nebulously defined by all the different versions of what he is and what he demands that deciding WHAT to disprove is hard enough. There IS always the tiniest possibility that there IS some bearded being who snapped his fingers and everything appeared as it is.
But given that we humans once believed God snapped his fingers and sent down lightning, and that by asking the right questions we discovered that was not true, then why should the process stop? Finding a cause for lightning did not cause god to go away. Why should in fact finding a purely natural, chemical cause for life make god go away? If God is there then he will be found because he's there, nothing to fear. If he's not then we'll be the better off for knowing. Nothing should stop us asking questions, and therefore nothing should stop us asking the RIGHT questions to get REAL answers, therefore the scientific method is of huge importance and SHOULD NOT BE DILUTED in SCIENCE CLASS by teaching that non-science, poor science and pseudo science are acceptable.
BLT you believe in the Western Jeudo christian god. What about all the other gods that people have believed in over thousands of years?
Do you believe in Thor (very big in the Norse countries)? How about Ra, the Egyptian sun god? Apollo the roman sun god? Apocatequil for the aztecs? Allah the muslim god? And so on and so on.
I'd be astonished if you believed in them which must make you an atheist, like me. Only difference is I don't believe in one more god than you.
As a YEC (Young Earth Creationist) can you explain why you believe the earth was created only 10,000 years ago to give the appearance of being billions of years old? what is the point in that? And if thats possible then how do you know its 10,000 years old and actually wasn't created 2 months ago and you were created with the memories you have?
One thing I do agree upon with you is that belief in a god is to believe in the supenatural, in things which have no natural causation. As far as I'm aware there is nothing on this planet or in this universe which has been shown to be supernatural in origin, cause or effect.
If god created everything from nothing then who created god??
However, since many people correlate "evolution" with the big bang
They are all wrong. The Big Bang has zero, zip, zilch, nada to do with evolution. I have explained why.
evolving from simple things to more complex things.
No, evolving in all directions, with individual branches changing direction whenever the environment makes them change direction.
Diving deeper into creation, God created the world "mature". This makes sense. If you're a divine being with the power to create a universe, why would you create one with simple cells, seeds, eggs. Why not create one ready to go? By definition, then, God created a world that had the stuff that takes millions of years to form.
Complete with a fossil record and decay products of radioactive isotopes? What sense does that make?
Ask yourself this - what could possibly be displayed to an unbelieving scientist to prove the existence of God? I humbly submit that the answer is "nothing".
I humbly submit you're wrong. Have you seen the movie Contact? I haven't, but I'm told that near the end of the movie it turns out that there's a message written into the number pi.
Imagine! The very foundations of mathematics meddled with to include a message. That would convince everyone.
As a believe, I know that God created that stratification in its current form 10,000 years ago.
So you are saying God is a liar?
So you are really saying God is a liar?
Interesting.
There are people who believe creationism is blasphemy. I think you can see why. :-)
We can only use our belief to say: my belief in God is a person decision to accept things outside this world; your belief in evolution is a personal decision to NOT accept anything that can't be explained by laws of science.
The other way around. Your belief in Biblical literalism is a personal decision to not accept things that are inside this world -- to simply ignore them. Our use of science is a decision to go where the evidence leads so we may understand reality.
Wait -- I said "your belief in Biblical literalism". Let me submit that there is no such thing.
Why are there two contradictory creation stories in Genesis?
There's Genesis 1:1 to 2:3, which has God (whose name is always spelled out -- the King James version doesn't dare doing that and uses "the LORD God" instead) create first heaven & earth, then sun & moon, then the plants, then the animals, and then God suddenly refers to hisselves in the plural and suggests "Let us make man in our image" (1:26) -- and "male and female he created them" at the same time (1:27).
Then there's Genesis 2:4 onwards, which has God (referred to as Elohim, literally "gods", which is usually translated as "God") creating Earth, heaven, and plants at the beginning, then Adam, then the Garden of Eden (not mentioned or even alluded to in Gen 1:1 -- 2:3), then the animals, and then Eve.
Logically, both cannot be literally true.
(I'm told that somewhere in the psalms there are traces of a third creation story. I've never seen it, though.)
It should come as no surprise that theologists have always preferred an allegorical reading. If at least one of the stories isn't literally true, perhaps they are both true in a deeper way?
For example, the first creation story keeps repeating "And God saw that it was good". Perhaps that's the take-home message? Perhaps that's what the text actually wants to say? And perhaps it even dovetails nicely with what the King James version renders as "have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth" (Gen 1:28) -- the Hebrew verb here translated as "have dominion over" means "rule like a good king". In sum, the world is good, and we should take care of it. That's the interpretation I'm used to.
An Anglican bishop said in the late 19th century: "The Bible is about the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go."
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Fideism is nice, BLT. It just doesn't solve any problems.
Science, on the other hand, helps us understand reality.
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I do, however, agree with your conclusion that the separation of church and state protects not just the state but also the church.
Though, while I am at it, I should -- just FYI -- mention that it's pretty clear why Eve is created from specifically a rib in the second creation story. That's because "life" -- which is what Eve's name means -- was pronounced the same as "rib" in Sumerian: ti. The Sumerians loved puns, and it comes as no surprise that there's a Sumerian creation story where a goddess called "life" is created from a god's rib. The simplest explanation is that the second creation story in Genesis is much older than the Bible, common to the whole region, just with the protagonists occasionally modified or exchanged. After all, the two interwoven Noah stories are not only similar to each other, but also to the Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian one about Ziudsura/Atrahasis/Utnapishtim. Stories mutate and spread... they evolve... :o)
It sounds like you've enjoyed the journey the pharygulites took you on and have been doing a little digging of your own.
Keep digging, trust me, science becomes more interesting the more you know.
Beleive it or not, scientists are not much more intelligent than the average person, they're just passionate about what they study and have dedicated years to learning about it. Who knows in your quest for the answers, it might happen to you.
Keep Digging! theres a beautiful whole world out there for you to discover.
Best of luck.
La... the endless world of knowledge... Can you believe it's been days...weeks... and I'm just now reading all of these delicious comments? I was rather bored with it all, and now I get to read all of this unchallenged bull on my blog. What fun! ;) It's like it all comes back fresh and anew in my face!
I am absorbing what is being said... I'll say that much - even in this late hour on this late date. But... as fascinating as I find it... and the more I understand it... I still believe it's bias on display -- interesting, well-established bias, but nevertheless... bias. Okay, David, so Science is 'not proving, but disproving' and 'mutation is random but selection is adapting to ones environment'. Great. DNA is complicated, and the human body is with error. Right, differnent kinds of species came into existence through gradual changes that adapted the stronger variety of species to its' environmeent. Right, you've all pounded it into me, and for that I am grateful to you. But WHERE did it all start? You're telling me everything that we're seeing today, but you can only SURMISE about fossils - you don't KNOW. Sure it's the 'logical evidence' your peers will approve, but do fossils prove to you the plausibility of evolution? Fossils you never saw alive.
Another thing - right... so Dinosaurs were said to never have existed among men. Why else would there be ancient drawings of dinosaurs - and never are there men shown in existence with the dinosaurs. I'm curious -- who do we think drew the pictures? Did the dinosaurs have special abilities - perhaps they adapted to life without humans, and new INSTINCTIVELY that humans would need them to draw their life stories on ancient cave-man walls.
Okay, so there have been very many beliefs in many many gods over hundreds of years. DUH. Right, so you guys are thinking you're the FIRST to tell me that God has been perverted by people in high places? Of course -- and I find it fascinating that so many of my dear scientific phyrangula people are willing to throw up 'the church' and 'christians' of decades past in my face, like I'm supposed to defend them. Then they turn around and go, 'o, o, darwin, our dear founder of evolution, didn't quite know everything we know today. He was misquoted. He was innocent - INNOCENT I tell you." Right. Who's defending who? (please know I was advantaging your words and taking them greatly out of context -- it was great fun).
Ug, I have to go. I WILL talk more of this in the future.
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