OT: Evolution

To evolve, grow, progress. Isn't that just a natural cycle of life? Arn't we constantly trying to move beyond or go to a greater level than we are now? Isn't that just a natural instint?

Life without evoling is stagnet, regressive, passive, boring.

So here's my thought. The problem most people have with the mechanics of evolution is there is no spirtual influence or power behind this process. It's eather one or the other, creation by a god or just some mechnical process that happens by chance.

What about the fusion of both? We live in a world completly controled by the laws of physcics (please excuse my spelling), we are able to get a satilite to Mars because there are certian laws in the universe that are absolute.

Science has a good argument about the nature of these laws of physicis that we take advantage of everyday. And the scientific community throughout the world stands behind the "concept" of evolution. You know, the guys who figure out how to enable you to drive to work...

But, and a big but , as a believer in a "power" inherent in the universe, I would say there is a "force", a causal law of life that enables this cycle of creation of new planets throught the universe, an essence that is as much a part of who we are as what is most visable to us.

I have my own beliefs through my own real world exerence with it which i'm not going to use this forum to expouse on. Just a thought, there can be evolution with a spirtual force behind it.

Didn't we solve the mysteries of the universe here before, once and for all?

Evolution is the mechanism, not of the magic of it all. And it's a fact: the gene pool evolves over time.

Yea look at Nicks icon and thats what he used to look like :p

How could we have possibly solved the mysteries of the universe here when science for the most part doesn't yet have a clue as to what goes on in our own galaxy much less an endless universe.I think scientific community is way too serious about themselves. They are constantly changing their position on supposed absolutes based on the stream of new data relavent to current technology that seems to flow daily.

You have put it beautifully. You just misunderstand what science is. Changing our outlook on the universe when we get a better understanding of it's workings is precisely what the scientific method is about. Jeremy, you referred to the "absolute" laws of the universe--you're a bit mistaken, too. Science is built on a foundation of ever-changing observation and analysis. The "laws" of nature are only immutable insofar as counter-evidence is undiscovered. Over human history, scientists have constantly altered, modified, or even thrown out entire theories based on emerging data.

Just look at one branch of physics: the search for the fundamental units of matter. First came the concept of the four elements, then the postulation of the atom. Then the atom's structure itself was discovered, and over time from Plato to Bohr to Heisenberg to today's physicists, the entire story has been one of constant evolution.

mixandburn, you hit the nail right on the head when you noted that technology is what allows us to deepen our understanding of physics. We could have not discovered quarks without the aid of particle accelerators. We will not discover what lies beneath the ice of Europa without as-of-yet nonexistent technology. The human struggle to comprehend reality is aided by our most powerful tool, our inventions--both physical, as in the case of the Hubble telescope; or representational, as in the case of Newton's calculus.

The error enters into it when people think that what we have discovered in our brief time here are the unchanging Laws of Nature. Virtually all of science undergoes a constant refinement and modification. It's what makes it powerful--anyone with evidence and a repeatable experiment can change how we see the universe. Just because we have two robots on Mars doesn't mean we understand everything about spaceflight. Remember, we've also lost other robots, spacecraft, and human astronauts.

If a person doesn't understand the scientific method, it's easy to shoot it down because "it's always wrong." It's especially easy to say that when one has been brought up with a background of religious belief in an unchanging, infinite, omnipotent diety. However, science's greatest strength is it's ability to change in order to better describe our universe based on the new data gathered, century after century, by an uncountable number of people.

Thank you for bringing so much humor into my day.

As Steven Wright said - Its a fact: I played a blank CD at full volume and it drove the mime downstairs insane.

stars

yea stuff like this article cracks me up cause they first really don't know 'not conclusive' and they throw in the 100 million year concept which is also conclusive and also has been disproven as much with science more so than proven and then use the word 'created' in the same article. I guess this is what your saying, j. its like a hybrid philosophy of creation and evolution. I do agree that there are elements of things evolving in our world, but just think that Darwin was waaaayyy off, and that as far as animals, humans, and plants go... we'll we have been the same makeup since we were created some 6,000 years ago. I just read recently that scientists and not neccissarly christian ones came up with a new way to date the earth by the earths layer formation, and previously they thought it was millions of years old due to the millions of layers... untill they found a mamouth skeliton that was embedded in what they would have said was tens of thousands of years of layers. In other words a massive flood or mudslide created these layers and when they studied how many sections of layers there were they came up with thousands of years old instead of millions.
As far as growing and progressing, I watch high school students every day and can tell you that we are mentally and cognitavily no farther along than any other time period. Maybe the food we eat and sleeping patterns along with hours of entertainment are making us stupider. Reverse evolution?
Anyway the absolutes I know are that the 'force' behind all the laws of science and physics and things evolving is knowable and has even more to offer our lives. Like Switchfoot sings, 'we were ment to live for so much more, have we lost ourselves, somewhere we live inside, somewhere we live inside.'
my2

taken from http://www.whitehouse.org/news/2002/031302.asp

The absolutes i'm talking about are forces like "Gravity", "Electricity", movements of the stars, asteroids ciculating around us. The ability to calculate the path of a planet like Mars ,launch a satilite, the math it took to enable that to happen, these are absolutes, you can't deny them.

Jeremy,
The fusion of both is now commonly refered to as "intelligent design." There are those that are trying to bridge the gap between polar stances of science and religeon by asking the question - Are they exclusive of each other? can they Co-exist? AS in most debates those on the ends are screaming "hell no". While there are those in the scientific commnity and the Theological community saying... .Yes. Could God create the earth as Fully Mature and old? Yes.. Could God have created it and allowed natural selection and evolution to happen by design? Sure. As in most debates one has to decide how to explain the issues on the other side. If there are no uncaused events.. Who started it? If there is evolution, who was there to witness it? Who knows what things really looked like?
Once again we have polarized each other in our quest for who is right. Both sides are intollerant and unable to reslove the issues. That is sad.
As for me. I have closely studied the fossell record and have a few friends in the scientific community - One spoke at UC Berkeley the other day on this matter. I think the matter is inconclusive at best. We tend to follow the road map or outline of the presenter. If you are an evolutionist.. a teacher somewhere told you about it (for most people that beleive). Are you a creationist? Chances are your sunday school teacher probably told you about it (again, for most who beleive). Very few have actually done indepth study.
Bottom line for me is that I figure both systems of belief rely upon faith in an unseen sorce. No one was there to see the full process of evolution and there are quite a few holes in the system. On the other hand.. no one has seen God either. Im sure that if God is there that He could create what ever he wants however he wants and when he want. If He couldn't he wouldnt be God.
Frankly, I think this is a ****ing contest for each side. I find very few people that actually want to sit down in a room and look at all the cards on the table and form conclusions. Its mostly.. I believe what I want to believe -

peace,

Jeff

TLiX is right. The universe was created by God 5000 years ago. Dinosaurs walked with the Anasazis in present-day Utah. Red shift proves nothing. The background radiation doesn't exist. Carbon dating that proves crops were first farmed 13,000 years ago is a lie.

Jeff, the fact that there are people who believe one or the other does not mean that "intelligent" design is the compromise. Nor are both points of view equally valid, because one is based on evidence and the other is mythology.

Faith in religion is one thing. Faith in objective evidence is totally different. It so happens that we don't have all the evidence, but "intelligent" design (a.k.a. creationism) is not the automatic alternative. Only creationists are believing what they want to believe. People who believe that evolution is real - and it is - don't *want* to believe anything, nor are they automatically non-religious.

They're farther along mentally than homo erectus was about 1.7 million years ago. Their brains are about twice as big.

Is the fact of the day - brain volume is related to intelligence?

For me, scientific evidence shows conclusively that the Earth is over 4.4 billion years old - not 5000 years. Less conclusive, therefore open to modification is evolution as a theory of life's origins.

Darwin, by the way, only concluded that new species may come into existance as a result of natural selection which would be defined by environmental needs with respect to survival.

Experiments to test this theory have been done but it occurs to me that experiments such as these are in the control of the experimentors. Wouldn't they be defined as the intelligent designers? This causes me to have brain cramps.

The fairly recent discovery of dinosaurs forced evolutionists into a corner just as it did those who literaly interpret the Bible.

Neither is complete enough to stand up to scientific scrutiny. Both seem to suffer from close minded tunnel vision which soon breaks down into name calling. Kind of like you would expect from someone who never evolved from the third grade.

What does this have to do with the DA7?

Jeremy, are you trying to hijack my resident antagonist position? It had been awfully quiet around here.

Here is just a few of the many, many reasons why science leans toward a young (5-6 thousand) year old earth.
Mind you scientific evidence, absolutes!


EVIDENCE FROM THE STARS

1 - Star clusters. One type of galaxy in outer space is the star cluster. There are many of them; and, within each one, are billions of stars. Some of these clusters are moving so rapidly, that it would be impossible for them to remain together if the universe were very old.—p. 11.

2 - Large stars. Some stars are so large, and radiate energy so rapidly, that they could not have contained enough hydrogen to radiate at such fast rates for long ages, because their initial mass would have had to be too immense.—p. 11.

3 - High-energy stars. Four types of stars radiate energy too rapidly to have existed longer than 50,000 to 300,000 years.—pp. 11-12.

4 - Binary stars. Most stars in the disk of galaxies are binary stars (two stars revolving about one another); yet, frequently, one is classified as very old and the other very young. This cannot be.—p. 12.

5 - Hydrogen in the universe. Hydrogen cannot be made by converting other elements into it; therefore, if the universe were as old as the theory requires, there would now be very little hydrogen in the universe.—p. 12.

6 - Age of the universe. A sizeable amount of information on this is given in Origin of the Solar System.—p. 12.

EVIDENCE FROM OUR SOLAR SYSTEM

1 - Solar collapse. Our sun is gradually shrinking at a steady rate. It is occurring fast enough that, as little as 50,000 years ago, the sun would have been so large that our oceans would boil. In far less time in the past (25,000 years or so), all life on earth would have ceased to exist.—p. 12.

2 - Solar neutrinos. The sun is emitting hardly any neutrinos. This, coupled with the fact that the sun is shrinking, points to a recently created sun.—p. 12.

3 - Comets. Comets circle the sun and are assumed to be as old as our solar system. Since they are continually disintegrating, and a number are known to have broken up, evidently all of them self-destruct within a relatively short time period. It is estimated that the comets cannot be over 10,000 years old.—pp. 12-13.

4 - Comet water. Comets are primarily composed of water. So many small comets strike the earth that, if our planet were billions of years old, our oceans would be filled several times over with water.—p. 13.

5 - Solar wind. The sun's radiation blows very small particles in space outward. All particles smaller than a certain size should, millions of years ago, have been blown out of the solar system. Yet these micro-particles are abundant and still orbiting the sun. Therefore our solar system is quite young.—p. 13.

6 - Solar drag. Small and medium rocks circling the sun are gradually drawn by gravity into the sun. Careful analysis reveals that most would have been gone within 10,000 years, and all within 50,000 years. There is no known source of rock or particle replenishment.—pp. 13-14.

EVIDENCE FROM THE OTHER PLANETS

1 - Temperature and erosion on Venus. High surface temperatures on Venus (900 degree F [482 degree C]), combined with other of its surface features, support a young age for Venus. If the planet were 4 billion years old, as taught by the theory, its dense atmosphere should long ago have worn away all the craters.—p. 14.

2 - Erosion and water on Mars. Only a few thousand years of the type of harsh dust storm weather occurring on Mars should have seriously eroded its many craters and volcanoes. Long-term erosion should also have obliterated the strong color differences on the surface. The small amount of water on Mars should long ago have been split apart into hydrogen and oxygen by solar ultraviolet rays. The hydrogen should have escaped and the oxygen should be in the atmosphere, but this is not so.—p. 14.

3 - Composition of Saturn's rings. Trillions of particles in Saturn's rings are mainly solid ammonia. Because of its high vapor pressure, it could not survive long without vaporizing into outer space.—p. 14.

4 - Bombardment of Saturn's rings. Meteroids bombarding Saturn's rings would have destroyed them in far less than 20,000 years.—p. 14.

5 - More ring problems. Rings found on Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune indicate that they too have a very young age.—p. 14.

6 - Jupiter's moons. One of Jupiter's largest moons, Io, ejects large amounts of material through volcanoes. Although quite small, it has the most active volcanoes we know of, and must be quite youthful.—pp. 14-15.

EVIDENCE FROM OUR OWN MOON

1 - Moon dust. Ultraviolet light changes moon rocks into dust. It had long been predicted that a thick layer of dust (20-60 miles [32-96.5 km], caused by ultraviolet radiation on the moon's 4-billion-year-old surface, must cover the moon's surface. But scientists were astonished to learn that there is not over 2-3 inches [5.08-7.62 cm] of dust—just the amount expected if the moon were only a few thousand years old.—pp. 15, 17.

2 - Lunar soil. The dirt on the moon's surface does not show the amount of soil mixing it should have, if the moon were very old.—p. 17. 3 - Lunar isotopes. Short-term radioactive isotopes (uranium 236 and thorium 230) have been found in the collected moon rocks. These isotopes do not last long and rather quickly turn into lead. If the moon were even 50,000 years old, these short-life radioisotopes would long since have decayed into lead. The moon cannot be older than several thousand years.—p. 17.

4 - Lunar radioactive heat. Moon rocks have relatively high radioactivity, indicating a young moon, because of the large amount of heat generated.—p. 17.

5 - Lunar gases. Small amounts of several inert gases have been found on the moon. At today's intensity of solar wind, the amount of inert gases found on the moon would reach their full amount in less than 10,000 years—and no longer.—p. 17.

6 - Lunar phenomena. Transient lunar activity data (moonquakes, lava flows, gas emissions, etc.) reveals the moon is still remarkably active, showing it is quite young.—p. 17.

7 - Lunar recession. The moon is already far too close to the earth. It is now know that, due to tidal friction, it is gradually moving farther away from us. Based on the rate of recession, the moon cannot be very old. If it were even 20,000 to 30,000 years old, it would at some earlier time have been so close—it would have fallen into our planet!—p. 17.

EVIDENCE FROM EARTH'S ATMOSPHERE

1 - Atmospheric helium. Our helium comes from three sources: Radioactive decay of either uranium or thorium produces helium. Helium spewed out by the sun, is pulled in by earth's gravity. Helium is also produced in the upper atmosphere. All of that helium is accumulating, since helium is not able to reach escape velocity and go into outer space. But the amount of helium we have is too small if our world has existed for long ages. Based on all three helium producers, earth's atmospheric age cannot be over 10,000 years.—pp. 17-18.

2 - Carbon 14 disintegration. The present worldwide buildup of radiocarbon in the atmosphere would have produced all the world's radiocarbon in only several thousand years. Based on this, earth's age is estimated at 8,000 years.—p. 18.

EVIDENCE FROM METEORITES

1 - Meteor dust. Micrometeors, composed of iron, nickel, and silicate compounds that are continually entering our atmosphere, adds 25 tons [22.7 mt] to the earth daily. Based on the amount here, earth's age should be in the thousands, not millions of years. Regarding nickel content, the amount in the oceans could have been carried there from land in 9,000 years (or half that time, if nickel had already been there).—pp. 18-19.

2 - Meteor craters. Meteor craters are never found in the rock strata! Yet they would be found there, if millions of years were required to lay down that sedimentary strata. Meteor craters always lie close to or on the earth's surface. Thus, all the meteors which have struck the earth—have hit it within the last few thousand years.—p. 19.

3 - Meteor rocks. When meteors strike the earth, they are called meteorites. Supposedly, this has happened for millions of years, yet the meteorites are only found at, or close to, the earth's surface. None are ever found in the deeper sedimentary strata. Therefore, the earth is young and the strata was quickly laid down not too long ago.—p. 19.

4 - Tektites. Tektites are a special type of glassy meteorite. They are especially found in large areas, called strewn fields. Each shower lies on the surface or in the topmost layers of soil; they are never found in the sedimentary fossil-bearing strata. If the earth were billions of years old, they should be found in all the strata. They never show more than a few thousand years of weathering. Carbon-14 tests show them to be no older than 6,500 years.—pp. 19, 21

But the Bible refers to dinosaurs so it fits right in.

There's nothing closed-minded about what Darwin said at all. The only people who say that don't understand anything about evolutionary biology.

Of course we're talking about things that nobody will ever be able to nail down 100%! This is hundreds of millions of years of history!

But it is a fact that evolution occurs. It isn't a proven fact that it's all that occurs, but it's a cold hard fact that species evolve. Again, that doesn't explain the magic involved in between all the evolving. But it also doesn't automatically mean that the corollary is that a god created everything.

TLiX, I didn't make it through your whole list, but I can tell you the problem with anything on it that indicates the universe is 5,000 rather than about 15 billion years old: it's BULL****!

By the way, why on earth would you say that dinosaurs forced evolutionists into a corner?

Listen, maybe there is a god who created evolution. We'll never know. But we do know that evolution explains a lot even if it doesn't explain everything.

We do know the approximate age of the universe, though. And I'm not putting down TLiX' religion by saying that. It has nothing to do with it.

***

There may be exceptions that prevent it from being a 1:1 tie-in, but of course it's related.

I hate to be so blunt, but people who (really) believe the earth is 5000 years old, only because a book (document) (written around 3000 years ago before they understood the history of this planet, a story so to say to give people some explaination of the world they lived in) has some kind of strange mental block. A phycosis derived from a deeply ingrained concept that has been drilled into their brains.

You can still be deeply spirtual, relise there is alot more to who we are than science can explain, and still think evolution is the most reasonable explaination of how we got here. I have no problem with the idea of the life humans evolved from were apes.

I mean look at Nick, he's smart, an respected person in the audio community, gives reviews in EQ mag in chit, but if you meet him in person, he smells like a zoo. He's a f-ing Gurrala!! Yes, that's his actual pic!

Needless to say he has alot of evolving to do, especially when it comes to reviews of Digital to Analog converters.

Hold on. I was planning on going through this entire post of yours, and finding independent data to back up my claims, when I came upon this site. It appears that your list, as I and others had no doubt suspected, is lifted straight from the Creation-Evolution Encyclopedia, an anti-science creationist webpage completely filled with inaccuracies, misquotes, and references to science which is outdated and considered inaccurate itself by many modern scientists! Have you ever heard the phrase, "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing?" It points to the fact that if you understand only a little of something, you can be easily misled as to its details. Sam, you honestly know very little about the scientific method, and very little indeed about rigorous experimentation. This makes you dangerous, because you will believe anyone who comes along with realistic-sounding facts and you will repeat them to others as if you had done your own homework. Well, let me tell you. I was prepared to do my homework and point out your many factual inaccuracies, but I no longer wish to waste my time. I simply want to tell you that God can exist in our universe, a universe which is more than ten billion years old, and for you to think that His existence is in any way threatened by the hard work of the many scientists throughout history is pitifully depressing. Would God be so flimsy that He could not stand up to scrutiny?

You need to open your mind to the facts. God can exist, and science can be right. Darwin's evolution is over a hundred years old, yet those who know nothing about science use him as a strawman. His is not the last word in evolution, only the first. Did you know that Darwin's theory of evolution is wrong? It's wrong because there is no place in it for a species' conscious manipulation of its environment. That's why the theory of evolution is, like all other branches of science, currently undergoing an evolutionary process itself. Darwin had a brilliant idea, and now we're refining it. We live, we learn.

Please open your heart to the possibility that God is stronger than you think. Learn some science. Go to a scientist, and ask them to explain carbon dating to you. Ask them to explain it over and over, until you understand. Until then, you're just repeating half-truths which you hear others say, without yourself evaluating their veracity independently.

I apologize for my tone, but I don't want anyone reading your posts to be convinced by fallacious arguments. I want them, as I want you, to seek out those things which they do not understand, in the hopes that their minds and hearts will grow with knowledge and understanding. Call it tough love.

I can dig what you're saying jeremy, but there are so many people who insist on "my way or the highway." :rolleyes:

I'm not a "my way or the highway" type person. I really am open to what is true and real. For a while I looked at the possibility that God created the universe some 5-6 thousand years ago and made it to begin with 'aged' or to look millions of years old from the start. But after study I truly believe that many of these are correct. I met a guy that worked all the way at the top for NASA in there science department. The guy literaly tested at genious level and figured out some things for NASA that non of the top scientist could figure out. He is also noted as discovering that the speed of light has been slowing down since the beggining of time and is on a slop so that in x amount of years the speed of light will be significantly slower. He said NASA dosn't put a lot of this stuff out there and in high school textbooks cause it would just freak people out to know that the universe can't last forever. He also said that the dust on the moon theory, false methods in carbon copy dating, and the graph that expains the speed of light all show a younger earth. If the earth were millions of years old the speed of light would have stopped all ready, unless somebody reset it Either way all of us are listening to science that we didn't do and test so... Either christians are trying to prove something and are looking for it or secular scientists are trying to prove something else and are expecing and looking for specifics as well. I just think as one looks at how much our earth is changing and what its going through I don't think its realistic to say that it has been in process for millions of years. It logicaly dosn't make sense. If real scientists and even non-religious ones are starting to believe in a 'young' earth, wouldn't it make sense that it is a good possibility.
All this information is in waaayyy more than just the creation-evolution ency. its all over the place textbooks and all

another good carbon dating article
carbon dating
there are ton more like this in scientific journals as well

All true except for the part about EQ mag. I've never written for them, in fact they were "the enemy" when I was editor of Recording magazine!

TLiX, you really need to read up on Einstein and his famous equation E=MC2 (energy = mass x the speed of light squared).

Maybe you missed the equation by the famous physicist Paul Davies and a team of scientists (and not a Christian ones either) c = ?[a + ekt(b + dt)] In this equation c is the curve that the rate of decay that the speed of light is on. The report was given in the journal 'Nature' and the evidence points to that since the speed of light has been slowing down since the creation of the earth that if you follow this formula backwards the age of the universe would be a little less that 6,000 years old. It also explains issues that have come up in the dating methods of the earth and led to the famous book Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth
Larry Vardiman, Andrew A. Snelling, Eugene F. Chaffin that is highly regarded in the scientific world.
These guys are building on what Einstein discovered, and also Einstein wrote some interesting things on the existance of God as well.
yeap

About as much as your incessant Har-Bal evangelism.

What frustrates me is the argument that stupidity and reality are both equal and it's just a matter of which you choose to believe. That's probably more ridiculous than the but-he's-not-even-Christian "science" these people are so desperate to believe in.

The problem with Tlix is he truely believes in the bible, and it can't possibly be wrong, because if it's story is not true, then there's no going to heaven, there's no christian god and that would suck.

So you have to try and rewrite reality to fit into this tunnel vision view. And that's why people like me stand in awe at people like that.

But ultimatly it doesn't matter what a persons view of lifwe is, as long as that person is not in a postion of power and makes judgements that effects millions on this christian fairytale.

And the great thing is that it dosn't even matter what others think or say about what I know is true. I would love others to see the light as I see it and the relationship with this Creator of the universe is really the best part about it, (and I do have a passion for this, and helping others), but it dosn't discourage me when others see it as narrow mindedness. It actually is quite the opposite, it takes a real grand perspective of life, spirituality and people to believe it. Also the wonderful thing about it all is that science, philosophy, and the human spirit do not need to prove Christianity, Christianity proves these things in itself. If one reads the Bible with an open mind and seeks to understand these things it becomes revieled.
You know what is interesting is that people that know me and have a relationship with me, just about all of the ones that didn't believe in Christianity now prayed to recieve Jesus in there hearts as there personal savior. Even my wifes brother who graduated from Brown and is a very smart cat, people I work with, my friends parents, I can't even tell you people that practiced other religions, or atheists and I'm talking about Dozens of people. Now why are people following me on this? It's not cause I'm so great and they all want to be like me, but that I am pointing them toward somthing that is real and can't be ignored as somthing we all need. Now I'm realistic to think that many on this board will say well thats great for TLix and his friends but he is still wrong... and that is a legitimate feeling but everyone still has to seriously look at Jesus and Christianity and make a decision for themselves. I guess all I challenge people to do is to open-mindedly look at it, and I am pretty confident in that 100% of the people that have become Christians along with me have not regretted it and have thanked me for opening them up to it. Its not a crutch for life its the missing peice in our lives. I don't know how else to say it, but its real. It just makes science and physicology and all these other things make sense...
anyone else besides jeremy and nick and zum have thoughts?
sam

"And the great thing is that it dosn't even matter what others think or say about what I know is true. I would love others to see the light as I see it and the relationship with this Creator of the universe is really the best part about it, (and I do have a passion for this, and helping others), but it dosn't discourage me when others see it as narrow mindedness. It actually is quite the opposite, it takes a real grand perspective of life, spirituality and people to believe it. Also the wonderful thing about it all is that science, philosophy, and the human spirit do not need to prove Christianity, Christianity proves these things in itself. If one reads the Bible with an open mind and seeks to understand these things it becomes revieled.
You know what is interesting is that people that know me and have a relationship with me, just about all of the ones that didn't believe in Christianity now prayed to recieve Jesus in there hearts as there personal savior. Even my wifes brother who graduated from Brown and is a very smart cat, people I work with, my friends parents, I can't even tell you people that practiced other religions, or atheists and I'm talking about Dozens of people. Now why are people following me on this? It's not cause I'm so great and they all want to be like me, but that I am pointing them toward somthing that is real and can't be ignored as somthing we all need. Now I'm realistic to think that many on this board will say well thats great for TLix and his friends but he is still wrong... and that is a legitimate feeling but everyone still has to seriously look at Jesus and Christianity ........"

Jeeeezzzzzuuuuussssssss :rolleyes:

I'm sure they do, but they're too mature to express them.

You're confusing two things: Christianity and pure unadulterated bull****.

"About as much as your incessant Har-Bal evangelism."

Testy now aren't we?

I own Har-Bal, I don't own a bible.

One of them is the Truth.

Firstly, please read this speech Einsten himself made. Creationists and those with anti-science agendas always try to claim that because Einstein believed in a god, somehow the Christian worldview is validated. That is completely wrong, and is a disservice to Einstein's amazing legacy. See for yourself his words: Secondly, since you seem to be so fond of anecdotal evidence (which typically has little scientific value), consider an article by Glenn R. Morton entitled Why I Left Young-Earth Creationism Here is a brief summary in his words:

Only those whose faith is untenable disregard ages of advancement and prefer to cling to limiting and limited beliefs. One must be aware that mysteries are meant to be explored, not ignored.

33 posts and you guys still don't have this evolution crap figured out? What's a matter with you?

Tlix, I grew up in this country, have been exposed to the teachings of chritianity my entire life, I've heard it all a gallizion times before.

And it makes abosolutly no sense to me. One of the last things my father said to me before he died was " When something like Christianity makes no sense, you read as much about it as you can". He had a library of over 4000 books, hundreds on Christianty and other world religions.

He knew the history of that religion like the back of his hand. And if you read about how christinaity came about, you well see it's based on primitive achient cultures , myths, ledgends, storys, (fairytales).

They just didn't have the knowlage we have today.

But I won't say that what your experencing isn't real, to you. And it is the framework for alot of people to live their lives. Everyone has a sprirtual nature. But if something is true,real,then it can't fly in the face of known data. There should be no reason it should.

The particular religion I practice does not contradict known scientific fact. And I to am having a spirtual experence, everyday. My particular belief lends itself to personal responsibility, karma (which translates into "action"). No god brings misery or happieness into my life, like the bible says, you reap what you sow.

So I am a very religous person, but in a different way. I practice to improve and strengthen myself. To move beyond where i'm at now, to evolve. It's not easy, to keep it up.

So I have a religous belief, and evolution makes perfect sense to me. Like some have said, we don't have all the pieces to the puzzel, but there is an enormus amout of data suggesting the earth is millions of years old. To ignore that, twist the facts, is proff that that particular belief system is false. BUT, you can still believe in it, have a spirtual experence with it.

Bzzt. You're out for practicing Secular Humanism. Burn that man at the stake. He's a witch.

What you're advocating is what some fundamentalist Christians call a moral relativist, Jeremy (and it's intended as an insult - not a good thing at all). They say you're wrong to make it up yourself. Jesus laid down the law, said that he's the "one way," and everything else is going to send you straight to hell before you pass Go. That applies to people who follow every other religion and have a different point of view from the one they know to be 100% right. After all, either Jesus is the one way or he's not, and since they believe he is, you're not with the program.

It's not just fundamentalist Christians who are extreme, by the way. Every religion attempts to do the same thing when it's taken literally.

The claim that Jesus laid it down as one way is the biggest load of crap of all.
Just another lie that began years ago by those in or seeking power over the masses.
I have little time for cults of any size (up to and including the church of rome) and I'm saddened and sickened by the lies and distortion of truth that these self proclaimed "authorities" spread while claiming they alone have the only valid interpretations of ancient sacred text.
I do however love reading the teachings of Jesus, as well as those of other enlightened beings.
Too bad Palagius lost the vote in France. That bastard Augustine really contributed to screwing up humanity in general.

I'm also looking forward to purchasing a master word clock in the near future. You know. For the DA7.

Zen...
Barry

Hopi, what does master word clocks have to do with this forum? This is about evolution!!! and jesus... No really, my point in starting this thread was that there seems to be 2 extremes of viewpoints on this topic. All I'm saying is that not all religions are at odds with evolution.

As a matter of fact, in eastern teachings they have benn talking about "major world systems" and "other lifetimes and planets", "beginingless time" , and this is a teaching over 3000 years old.


Hopi, I have an aardsyncII for sale.

If Hopi isn't interested, what are you asking for it, Jeremy?

And did you get a Big Ben? Is that why you're selling it?

"They just didn't have the knowlage we have today."

Yhea, but they could spell :p

Jeremy,
Sorry for the misunderstanding. I thought this thread had morphed into a discussion concerning the true meaning of the Word clock of God.
BTW, the oral history of the Hopi tribe extends 40,000 years back in time. so I'm thinking it's probably only white male patriarch figures that were created (most likely in Texas) 6000 years ago.
I'll email you off line about the aardsync II.

Marc

I think that most here misunderstand Christians. I'm sure that a lot of it is related to the self-righteous way in which many of them communicate; they can be easily dismissed. Maybe my perspective will be new to you?--

As a Christian, I lean toward an older version of earth; I don't believe that it is inconsistent with the Bible. I'm not alone in this.

When it comes to the origin of life, I believe most people confuse micro and macro evolution - evolution within a species vs. evolving into another species. I have yet to meet another Christian that denies the reality of change within a species. In addition, I have met some that think evolution is the mechanism that God used to bring us man. However, proving microevolution (which really no longer needs to be proved) does not prove macroevolution.

Evolution, as a mechanism for for the origin of life would have to be miraculous. Especially since some of its hingepoint mechanisms are really paradoxical. Consider, for just a couple of examples, the jump from asexual reproduction to sexual reproduction and the dilemma of punctuated equilibrium. Both of these concepts defy common sense - and are hardly ever discussed - even among evolutionists. How come?

Now, if you are willing to accept the miraculous event that is evolution, why would you not consider that there's a force behind it? And maybe that force did reaveal Itself?

Maybe this was the point of the original poster?

Most Christians aren't like what I described at all, just the right-wing evangelical ones who are holding too much sway over our country. And I for one said right at the beginning that evolution has nothing to do with the magic of it all; it's a totally amoral process. Common sense would say that we wouldn't be here in the first place, so it means nothing to say that you could predict any of this (paradoxes about having to be here to predict it aside).

As to the famous "no inter-species evolution" argument, well, it's groundless. The odds that we didn't diverge from apes (about 7 million years ago) are extremely small, considering how similar our genetics are.

Again, I see the force (or forces) you're talking about as an integral part of it all, not something outside it or driving it.

It was all explained by quantim phisicks about 100,000 years ago - didn't you get the memo?

Everything you want/expect to se will be revealed by looking at it.

I hope to prove that apes evolved from us.
Until one builds a fast food chain or automatic weapon I'll remain convinced they're above us on the ladder.

Your insistence that it is an amoral process is what makes it hard to swallow. It is WAY too incredible.

As far as man from ape, I could maybe buy that - if you could get me to ape. I'll give you amino acids in a primordial soup. I'll give you single celled organisms. But multi-celled organisms? Complex multi-celled organisms? The evolution or organs? All lower life forms are the way to go as far as reproduction is concerned.

Its been said that the beauty of evolution (often referred to as science) is that it is changeable - it'll go with the flow of our latest discoveries. Isn't that just another way of saying we don't know?

Christianity actually does the same thing - well maybe not for fundamentalists (and I'm an ex-fundamentalist). Believe it or not, we view the world in a completely different way than we did just 30 years ago. Much of it is due to scientific discovery.

George Carlin...

Also watch this video...

http://www.fox.com/tradingspouses/video.htm

D@mn I knew someone was going to bring up this video thing...
see and that is one psyco that represents the exact opposite of what Christianity is all about. And the 10 commandments are not expected of Christians anymore and not at all a part of going to heaven or hell. The whole thing is very simple. We all have a choice to believe and know Jesus Christ who is the 'force' behind the creation of the earth and universe. If you choose to have that relationship, you spend the after life with him, and if you don't choose it then after life is spent not with him. Its just like if I had a party and invited everyone on this board to come, some would choose yes and come and others wouldn't. It has nothing to do with following any rules and punishment and all that. I guess how I feel about this quote is that yes some religions have convinced people of this but not true Christianity. And as far as psyco spouse goes, that does not look like ANY Christians I know and I spend every day relating to Christians and know hundereds of them.
Justin I'm even a bit disapointed that you went there..
What I and others have been posting for Christianity has nothing to do with your response here.

I agree with this as well and would even venture to say that as science progress continues, it opens the door for a stronger faith in the one that studies this. Every science, psychology, math, education cource that I have taken in college has helped to me understand what I believe and solidify my personal view of the world and God.
yea, yea Sam thats great for you buddy, what ever you need to believe to get you through the day... sure keep convincing yourself :rolleyes:

What's so moral about some species or individuals surviving and others not, animals eating each other, and all the other cruelties of nature?

And therefore all the world's Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, atheists, agnostics, and so on will spend the afterlife in hell.

You're telling me that you can't look around you, your ability to have relationships with people, etc, and you don't recognize anything incredible happening? Then, I guess you're right. The world sucks. How can there be a god?

Do you even recognize the term 'moral?' I'm not implying anything about you personally. A "might makes right" world goes against the compassionate side of our human nature. How can you look at the world like this? And if you don't, how come?

Even if you were actually arguing with something I said instead of something you've constructed that has absolutely nothing to do with any of my opinions about anything, the idea that evolution is amoral - and it clearly is - has nothing to do with whether or not there's a god.

More importantly, you don't have to be theistic to appreciate the wonder of it all. I often complain about the arrogance of religion (some religion, not all religion of course), and that idea is a big part of it. Why would you think that one has to believe in God to have ethics, morals, successful relationships with other human beings, and generally feel the world is worth contributing to?

Well, this was all you gave me. Of course I don't think that anyone really views the world like that(for the most part), but it is the natural conclusion if you follow any form of natural selection.

I'm often confused by the foundational beliefs of humanists, atheists, agnostics, etc. They seem inconsistent to me - I never hear anything about the evolution of morality, love, spirituality, etc., or even any explanation beyond the fact that humans are merely other animals. I resist this because I see more to it. So of course, don't let me put you into a box, and give me a clue to THE TRUTH as you see it.

I don't think that you have to believe in God to be moral - Its just seems more logical. It is easier to believe there is a design (intelligent of course) and something higher than myself than it is to think that everything is the result of random mutations - Faith in something rather than faith in nothing.

As I said early on in this thread, evolution explains the process but not the magic in between all that.

When I say that nature - and evolution is a part of nature - is amoral, I mean that there's nothing sentimental about any of it. One species survives its environment because it's better adapted, another doesn't. The food chain and how animal populations keep themselves under control is amoral.

And we are "just animals" in one sense. I've posted this many times before, but my cousin Koko the gorilla has an IQ of 90! Another angle is that we also have a beast within, and that's what causes us to go to war with each other.

The difference between us and animals is that we have a choice to control that.

Plus there's the small matter of us "not living by bread alone"...

Yes, it is easier. If everyone was like you, no progress would be made because it's way easier to just let your traditions do the thinking for you and never investigate anything. If you take the time to learn some genetics, learn some astrophysics, and learn some biology then all the things which are too hard for you to understand now will begin to make sense.

A person can go through life relying on "common sense" and "intuition" and "feelings" and be perfectly happy and productive. If you learn any quantum physics or relativity, for example, you will learn quite fast that human intuition has absolutely nothing to do with what goes on at the atommic or galactic scales. To learn advanced topics such as those, one needs to rely on mathematical and physical evidence, and not on what "feels right." You cannot disprove the scientific advances which I'm referring to. They make almost all electronic products possible. They make most fundamental research possible. If you think that evolution and abiogenesis aren't simple and easy to understand it's because they're not--they take some critical thought and analysis. That doesn't make them wrong.

Einstein said "There are two ways to live your life: One is as though nothing is a miracle, the other is as though everything is a miracle."

He also said (in his book "My views on Religion") that there are basically 3 types of religion: The primitive religion (based on idolatry and icon warship), Moral religion (2/3rds of the world religion based on morals and ethics... ie Christianity, Buddhism etc.), and then there is "cosmic religion"... which few people understand and it is their duty to educate the rest of us.

He also said that he was proud to be a Jew, but in his opinion Judaism was more of a tradition than a religion.

Anyway... he was a pretty smart guy and I think he understood that science and evolution and the big bang didn't negate the notion of a cosmic order or Energy Gestalt or if you prefer ..."God".

Just thought I'd share.

AK

Hello Mr Audiorigami - I'm glad we're in agreement... but who's talking about disproving science? I'm talking about fulfilling it and finding purpose behind it - if it's there. Is it your position that complexity proves something? I think that the exact opposite case can be made. It's funny that while studying physics and math I've come to conclusions that are completely opposite of yours.

Please tell me where I'm missing the boat. Oh, and you can use big terms.

Andrew K - I would agree. Nick - you'd probably be surprised by how much I agree with you. That magic is a tough thing to explain... Thanks for a non-condescending post.

However, I'm stuck on this - evolution is just a theory - as far as people on this board are willing to defend it. Most want to proclaim it as the truth, and then snicker at the uneducated misled sheep that dare to question it. It makes me wonder who really knows what pill they are swallowing.

You actually agree with Andrew - he's the one who wrote that. But I agree too.

Anyway, I'm one of the people - perhaps the only one - who says that evolution isn't just a theory. Of course there are some mysteries that we'll never be able to prove conclusively. But there are parts of evolution that you'd have to go way out there to dispute. The essence of is, again, that the gene pool evolves over time. That means species evolve. Even TLiX agrees with that.

Now, there's no video of apes splitting into four branches about seven million years ago, one of which became modern man. But if you look at the genetics and the bones that have been discovered, etc. etc. etc., it's pretty apparent that we were made by the same company.

That part of it isn't 100% conclusive, just very, very unlikely not to be true.

***

I forget who it was who questioned whether brain size really means an animal is more intelligent. Well, neanderthal man's brain was actually a little larger than ours.

I hear you. In fact, it sounds reasonable. But dang - that would be using my common sense and intuition to come to that conclusion.

But the origin of life? You buy spontaneous generation?

Believe me, I've got issues to deal with when it comes to origins and my faith; being a Christian doesn't make everything just work out peachy as one may think. I don't expect anyone to have everything figured out. What I would like, however, is a plausible explanation for the origin of life, and why evolution is the ticket. I'd rather someone tell me that they didn't know, than to just state it's a fact one more time.

What is it we're in agreement about, I can't tell from what you said above. In any case:

"...fulfilling it and finding purpose behind it - if it's there." What are you talking about here? I can't tell if you mean science, or the universe. If you mean science, it is fulfilled by performing scientific research. You mentioned above that evolution is sometimes called a science by some--perhaps you and I disagree on precisely what science is. Allow Wikipedia to elucidate:

"According to empiricism, scientific theories are objective, empirically testable, and predictive — they predict empirical results that can be checked and possibly contradicted."

Evolution is A) objective by definition, B) empirically testable (fossil and genetic records indicate speciation), C) predictive, as for example evolutionary theory predicts that 1. between two related species, transitional forms will be found (and have been, e.g. horses, humans) and 2. that isolation and thus variation of selective pressures will cause speciation (which was shown in experiments at UC Davis wherein fruit flies, separated and allowed to procreate in differing environments, would not interbreed upon reintroduction [which is one definition of species]).

My point is that the purpose of science is to make testable, verifiable, repeatable observations viz. the scientific method.

If you were talking about fulfilling the universe, and finding its purpose, well, that's very open to personal interpretation, and is not what I'm arguing. Having a purpose a priori implies design, which I do not concede exists.

Secondly, "is it your position that complexity proves anything"--not in and of itself, no. Complexity exists. Our debate is about the origin of complexity, and I believe you and I do differ there at the moment. What I don't think you accept is that complexity can arise from simplicity. For you, complexity indicates design. I refute this. Much work has been done in the field of dynamical systems theory, partly including the work of Stephen Wolfram as explained in his book "A New Kind of Science." He, and others, have shown that complexity can arise from simple conditions and simple rules. A discussion of the particulars is beyond the scope of this post, but I advise you to look into the subject. It really blew my mind when I first began studying it. I can talk more about this subject, if you wish--it's really fascinating, and I do believe it would help further your understanding of evolution.

Everybody dies...
~Hed PE

We're in agreement that it's easier to believe in a designer than not. Sometimes the simple solution is the right one.

My response was to your assertion that I would like to go through life relying on my traditions and intuition. For some reason, you want to believe that I don't believe (or want to believe) in the laws of the universe - and I know that they can be complex when you get down to the quantum and go up to the galactic level. You also implied that I haven't done any investigating.

But let's limit the discussion - the whole universe is a big topic. How about the origin of life (still big)? For some reason, that is what I think of when evolution is brought up, and that is what this post was (kind of) about.

I agree that a discussion of genetic algorithms is beyond posting to an audio forum. However, you don't have to convince me that complexity can arise from simplicity. Where we will disagree (I think) is how complex.

The only question is how life started. There are several plausible scientific theories that don't require God.

Which doesn't mean anything, other than that it supports my leaning toward the idea that the universe and life weren't created by a being outside it all. To me it makes more sense that it all just kind of is, and that everything including "god" (a vague word that means different things to different people) is all interconnected.

Consideren en primer lugar traducir esto. En segundo lugar: el hecho de que siendo una materia de carne y hueso (no transistores o chip) pensamos, caminamos sentimos y amamos...y odiamos tanta perfección no puede ser una casualidad. Seríamos millones de casualidades dentro de un solo cuerpo. Considerad también que el sol se oculta en la noche para que durmamos y nos apagamos como un electrodoméstico para dormir. SI ESTO ES UNA CASUALIDAD, ENTONCES QUÉ INTELIGENTE ES LA CASUALIDAD. Sólo considerando el infinito espacio (vaya paradoja¡) me doy cuenta de que DIOS EXISTE

Babel Fish Translation Help

En español:
Por otra parte, qué parecer la perfección pueden apenas ser el resultado de centenares de millones de años de la evolución muda.

Nick,

I am not picking on you because you are a smart guy and frankly you do use your brain (smaller than a Neandertal but what is a little brain capacity among species).

Evolution is simply a theory. What this means is that it is NOT a proven fact, then it would be a LAW. Before it can become a law, it must stand up to scientific scrutiny. If it can't, then it is just a theory, nothing more.

There is no reason to think that it is natural to evolve. In fact the opposite is true. Without intervention, everything moves toward entropy. For me, this is an indication that evolution is not a normal outcome of just nature.

For me, there is not enough evidence to make a decision. Considering the current level of knowledge of the laws of physics, I think anyone who is able to form a solid conclusion simply does not have a grip on reality.

Part B - Darwin observed that the reason for evolutionary changes were simply survival. He concluded that there is not a reason for spontanious evolution. So again, I am stymied by the "theory" that man evolved from the same ancestor as apes. Given that apes have survived nicely throughout the ages, what would be the reason for the change.

For example, if a butterfly has yellow wings and birds like to eat yellow wing butterflies, then the very few who would accidently have blue wings would survive (theoretically). You would find no yellow winged butterflies (in regions where predators live). So far, the theory of evolution has yet to make that explaination for man.

I have not checked on my facts but I seem to recall that the chimpanze has a couple more chomosomes than a man. In fact, I believe that a dog has 78 pairs while a human has 46 pairs. A gorilla has 48 pairs. How does the 'Theory of Evolution' account for this actual measurable scientific fact that flies in the face of logic.

I am not asking to be a smart ass, I am asking because I am curious.

String theory has evolved over the years because there is a problem with quantum physics theory. It just doesn't work out in some situations. Just a few short years ago, Bohr's theory of the atom was accepted scientific fact. A proton was the most basic of all elements, not doubt about it. It has not quite worked out like that. A look at a chart of elementary particles is dazzling and even today it has holes to fill in.

Open your mind to ask the questions and search for the answers even if they make you a little uncomfortable.

I would prefer to sit back and read your magazine - wait, that's right, I don't have a copy.

Zrocks, parts of it are theory, but there are parts of it that are groundless to disbelieve. That's not closed-minded, nor do I have an agenda (I'd get up and brush my teeth tomorrow even if it turned out that TLiX' ridiculous idea about the earth being 5000 years old turned out to be true), nor does any of this make me the least bit uncomfortable. It's just fact.

There are certainly details missing - such as your butterflies - and we're talking about hundreds of millions of years of history, so of course there are missing gaps. We've found 3-1/2 million-year-old Australopithicus bones (Lucy in 1972, and others), and on and on. They were not quite the same as modern man, but they were much more than apes. Facts, not me deciding to believe ****.

That to me is faulty logic. It may not be faulty, of course, but A doesn't necessarily lead to B. To me it's more likely that the will to survive overwhelms entropy. That's true of plants, snails, and all living things. So the second law of thermodynamics isn't violated by evolution, since it takes more energy to change than to stay the same, and that disordered energy is given off and it contributes to the entropy of the universe.

I just read up on this a few days ago. Stephen Hawkins.

Edit: the will to survive is one part of it. The gene pool changing over time is another part of evolution that has nothing to do with will, it just happens. Random mutations; animals that mutate to their advantage out-survive ones that have mutated otherwise.

And I know nothing about the number of chromosomes; I know far less about string theory, which definitely is theory.

Well it all boils down to a few choices. What you choose is up to you.
Choice 1 The earth was created in 6 days by a god (And he is male)
Every living thing was put together in 6 days. You are here to repent for your sins, the one’s you created before you were even born, because the first one of you disobeyed the god, by eating an apple....

Choice 2 The earth was formed over millions of years, like the one’s we are observing throughout the universe today thanks to the Hubble Telescope, I mean science has proven these planets take millions of years to form, we have pictures! And there are billions and billions of planets like ours in an infinite universe.

Choise3 You don’t give a s-hit, wonder what my problem is, think it’s all by chance, one life, that’s it , it’s over. I’d like to think that this life is it. But it just makes to much sense to me that this isn’t just the only lifetime. I mean, why is there so much inequality with people throughout the world? Why are some people born into very good life situations, and other born into poverty, with some affliction, retarded, the list goes on and on.

Why do bad things happen to good people, and why do evil people live on? If there is an almighty god, who is absolute and powerful, what kind of god would let this happen? I was just watching the coverage of the tornado in Illinois, and the people killed. If there is a god, as described in the Christian bible, and those , or at least some of those killed were true believers, why would he have them suffer such a terrible death? Can you image being asleep at 2 am and you awaken to this terrible sound, and you and your house is sucked into the air? Your ripped apart by flying 4x4s and plywood, and your kids? What bad could a kid do to deserve to die like that at 4 years old like this? So, explain to me just how almighty your god is, how powerful he is, tell me about his love for ALL people. Convince me the earth was created , and all life, in 6 days.

Great observation Jeremy and great Questions too...
Might seem simple but that seems to cover it all.

Jeff

Jeremy - your oversimplification of Creationism is ridiculous.

Your other points, however, are well taken. These are questions that go through my mind on a daily basis - and I have a world-view that includes God. And you know what? I don't have an answer for you - at least one that you'll be happy with. I'm not happy with what I've come up with, and even that changes to some degree over time.

I believe that you are probably irritated by Christians that oversell their faith. They are excited about the answers that it provides in their lives personally, and choose not to go into detail about EVERYTHING when they proclaim it. Of course, as with all people, there are even some that don't think beyond their immediate surroundings.

With all of that said, there are explanations that are debated even within the Christian community. Tragic world events can be/are compatible with Christianity. Most of these conclude with you thinking - "Hmmm, there are some aspects of God that I don't necessarily find attractive." And of course, that is proof that there is no God (right?).

Let me give you more. As you study the old testament, you'll find the history of Israel. You'll see instances where God commands his chosen people to decimate other nations - including women and children. It seems God actively contributed to the spreading of tragedy - sometimes to people that we would see as innocent. For you animal lovers - God imposed a way for his chosen people to pay for their sins - and that involved the primitive slaying and burning of an innocent animal.

So yes, there are aspects of God's personality that I don't like or even understand personally (where's the lightning bolt?), and they seem incompatible with the love that He's infamous for. But, as with everything, there is more to it that you find when you believe and seek further. Would you think that something much bigger and even more complex (Audiorigami should appreciate this) than our universe would be fully comprehendable?

Now that we've established that we all are missing some answers, does our opinion affect the truth? Earlier in this discussion was a reference to relative truth - but that's an oxymoron. You've gotta give that up. If there is something true that exists, shouldn't you acknowledge it, whether you like it or not? If there is something that might be foundationally true, shouldn't you give it a chance? Especially since the alternative seems even more ridiculous (my conclusion)? I know that this is a very unpleasant way to sell something, and to a degree I'm selling Chrisitanity.

So, instead of pointing to where the answers don't lie, consider pointing to where they might. Don't load up your guns with a buttload of questions that you know someone isn't going to answer so you can feel good when you walk away not having understood anything new. And you'll remain unchanged, convinced of your intellectual superiority.

Zrocks - of course your points are well taken. Let me give you my take on it; this is an effort to make sure I am current. Most of my understanding of evolution comes from college 12 years ago. I'm wondering if there are any new takes on it.

Major evolutionary changes must occur in immediate big steps - meaning there must have been an ape that gave birth to a human being, and the explanation would be due to a random mutation. This human of course would reproduce with another ape and give birth to another human, and thus, this new species would take off given its ability to survive. Am I missing something?

dorkus

I think you would have to ask an evolutionists for an answer. Just as you would have to ask a creationist for an explaination of the details of that theory.

We are, in fact, more genetically related to other species (I believe it is an earthworm but I will have to check the facts) that apes. In other words, a mutation in an earthworm's DNA is more likely to be the stepping stone to man that an ape mutation. Gotta be really hard for the poor mother earthworm to give birth to a baby.

There is so little known at this point, that it is silly to squash one hairbrained theory for another just because one involves something you don't like.

I could be wrong but intelligent design does not involve a god, just a foreign intervention (presumably intelligent) of life on earth to account for existing gaps in evolutional theory. Gaps that do not seem to follow what would be considered normal origin of species according to Darwin.

Closer to a snail? I think not.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3042781.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4014351.stm

Like I said, I could be wrong.

I did read the articles. Interesting how every time a pertified monkey is dug up, it is the new missing link.

Personally, I think there is more to learn. I will do my best to cut away fake science and rely on real science.

zrocks: I think you're using the term "theory" incorrectly. Wikipedia says:

Note that evolution is considered a "theory" because of the evidence in its favor, quite the contrary of the way you use the word, namely, to imply lack of evidence.

You are also slightly mistaken as to the mechanisms of natural selection. One species does not give birth to another in one amazing, ludicrous step. What happens is that through environmental pressures, offspring with certain, slight, changes from its parents succeed and breed, and those without the change do not multiply as fruitfully. These slight changes happen generation after generation, and in the case of speciation it may take many thousands (or tens of thousands) of generations for an organism to differ substantially from its progenitors. Predation doesn't play as important a role as procreation.

All organisms in the wild can be said to compete for limited resources--food, shelter, mates. Limitation and competition go hand in hand with evolution by natural selection. Those with capable offspring reproduce more successfully, and replace or displace those without advantages. It's really quite simple.

Dorkus:

The last 20 years have seen amazing progress with regard to complexity, simply because even on your home computer you can model experiments which would have taken a supercomputer in the early 80's. I'd love to talk complexity, since it's truly an eye-opening topic. Take a look at Stephen Wolfram\'s website for his book, "A New Kind of Science." (Nick, I think you'd really dig it, too.) Wolfram is the author of the Mathematica computer program, and a genius who earned a Ph.D. at age 19. The entire book is available for free, online, with software you can download to demonstrate his discoveries.

To summarize some of his findings: the repeated application of simple rules to simple starting conditions can generate mind-boggling complexity. I look forward to hearing your impressions; it is truly exciting new research.

We can't really conceive of how long 3-1/2 million years is, which is when Lucy (the famous australopithicus skeleton dug up in 1972) lived. That's a very long time for small changes to evolve; at 15 years per generation (which is probably longer than they were at that time) you'd get about 233,333 generations.

It's not just survival of the fittest that affects evolution. There are random mutations in genes, and a biologist can tell you how many times that happens per thousand. At least for gorillas and people (Koko picked potential mates from pictures, in fact she called an ugly one "bad toilet!"), some individuals are sexier than others; other animals have simpler way of deciding who gets laid and who doesn't.

And there are other factors.

Also, I've posted before that this is ongoing. Some animals will survive global warming, for example, and that will alter the gene pool.

Here we go. This is the link I wanted:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9136200/

It's *far* more likely that Darwin was on the right track than that he wasn't.

Let's not forget that if a genetic trait is not expressed, or that it doesn't somehow aid in reproductive success, it is useless evolutionarily speaking. This means that if there is a small change, it better have a significant superior trait in order for it to become commonplace. I would call that a big change.

These changes must come in clumps. What good is the larger brain size unless you also get the larger skull, interconnecting nerves, increased blood flow, etc, that come with it? I would call that one amazing ludicrous step. There must have been a point at which an animal that we call ape gave birth to an animal that we call man (primitive or whatever). Even more incredibly, this man had to mate and his offspring had to carry and express his genetic traits.

Evolution is filled with these ludicrous steps. Consider, for example, the evolution of an eye. You have to have an eyeless animal give birth to an animal with a functional eye(s) to make any evolutionary sense. -The supporting skeletal structure and muscles, the lens, the retina, the optic nerve, the connection to the brain, etc. - the list is endless. Miss one of those parts and you just have an ugly blob on the face of an organism that no other organism is going to want to reproduce with. (I know, I know, they can't see it - but you get the point). When you consider the incalculable odds (easily statistically impossible), I'd say we've got a miracle.

Nick, I'd love to hear your several plausible theories of how life started. Aliens? So far I've seen evolution and something involving a higher power. I believe most choose evolution for the simple reason that they don't want to acknowledge a higher power. But isn't evolution just too incredible left alone? At least give me that you see my point.

Audio,

Thanks for the link, I will check it out when I can give it the proper amount of time.

I do not think I have misused the term 'theory' at all.

There are many varied theories about quantum physics, string theory, even the Holy Grail - the Theory Of Everything (TOE), which unites all known forces into a single equation.

Evolution is considered a theory because it has yet to explain the method used to get from point a to point b in a repeatable demonstration. For this reason, I doubt that it will ever pass muster to become scientific law but so far it goes like this:

You have a group of apes, then something happens to alter their genes and they become humans. It took a long time.

I believe that is what I said. Except that I would say that a capable offspring is one that has less of a chance of becoming a meal - in the context of your example.

I was rather jocular with my earthworm comment. You are correct that it does take time. However, apes and humans do not share the same number of chromosomes (apes have 48 - we have 46) so I am at a loss to explain the method that caused the change. The evolution argument would be much stronger if they could make that connection.

If monkeys and man are so very similiar, why are pig heart valves used for transplant instead of monkey heart valves?

You are also correct in that this is a very complex field of study. Natural Selection is Darwin's theory as to the origin of Species but it lacks proper depth to be the theory of the origin of man. Much as Bohr's model of the atom is good enough for High School chemistry but lacks the proper complexity for College Physics.

I am very sorry Nick. As much as I respect your opinions, a source of MSNBC isn't going to cut it with me. Not that I matter at all - and I won't speak for anyone else but for me......... no.

Nice to have an intelligent exchange as opposed to the other new thread.

What?!

Acknowledge?!

I've said over and over that whether or not there's a higher power has absolutely nothing to do with evolution, in my opinion. Andrew said the same thing from a Christian point of view.

We're talking about the origin of species and how we evolved. You have to be positively kooky to believe that we aren't closely related to apes! Go read about Koko and her friends, for heaven's sake! They're just like we are, only slightly simpler.

MSNBC is a news organization. It's not Faux News, and that story isn't about research they conducted. I don't know the answer to those questions about genetics, but I do know they're irrelevant.

As a matter of fact I do believe in a higher power of sorts. I don't believe in it the same way you do, that's all, and I certainly don't believe that it snapped its fingers and *poof* there everything was. I also believe in a spiritual connection between everything, in fact I don't see how one can deny that in one sense we're all part of the same thing. To me it makes more sense that the higher power is an integral part of everything, not something standing outside it.

And it couldn't care less who's religious, whether you chant or pray, or anything else; that stuff is all for people to feel secure - which is perfectly valid up to the "and you're not" point. Unfortunately that point is a very short step for a lot of people.

The universe didn't get here all at once; it took about 15 billion years to get here, and it hasn't stopped expanding at a breakneck speed yet. Nobody will ever know what started it, and we'll only be able to theorize about how life began here.

Or maybe we'll be able to create life out of primordial crap one day and prove how it happened. Who knows.

George Bush only has 48 chromosomes, yet 51 percent of the population think he's human. :p :p

Sorry... but this thread was just too high quality for this forum.... there... now I've lowered it back to DA7 status.

On a serious note, there are those who believe that evolution is not a slow process.. but one that happens in spurts... think about cross-breeding and whatnot....

Some say the saline content in our tears closely matches the ph of what the oceans were when we lived in the water.

Some say our appendixs was used back when we needed to digest our food.

Some say our coccyx is a vestige of our ancestors that lived in the trees.

Some say that in the first few weeks after conception, that we are practically indistinguishable from many other animals at the same stage of conception.

And finally, we all evolved from a single celled organism.... where do you think you came from... mitosis is a beautiful thing.

AK

Hmm... I'm missing something here. You believe in a higher power, but that power is either incapable or chooses not to involve itself in the formation of man? Is your higher power an entity, or is it some kind of cosmic energy that we all posess and can tap into, or is it just undefined? What is it about (macro)evolution that you find so compelling that you are an evangelist for it?

Audiorigami - I've been waiting for you to jump on Nick for relying on his common sense and intuition regarding the similarity between humans and apes. What's up?

Not exactly correct. It would be more correct to say that at one point, an ape gave birth to an ape with different DNA. That ape had offspring which carried its modified genes. Then, after many, many generations, with exactly these small steps along the way, one could call the offspring a different species. I see your point, and must agree that any genetic change which impairs the ability to produce offspring will in effect end the line of the host organism. I think you may not grasp the gradual change involved. It didn't go Ape>Human. It went Ape1(for a long, long time)>Ape2(which is only slightly different, and for a long, long time)>Ape3(slightly different)...repeat,repeat,repeat...>Ape"N". At any step, you could choose to compare an ape and the "original," Ape 1, and think "wow, they're so different." With humans, there is literally fossil evidence--you can see the progression from ape ancestor to modern human. You're just disregarding the immense time required, and the gradual nature of change.

The eye has been used as an example for years by those who wish to ignore the evidence showing that evolution occurs. It has been disproven time and time again. Please see this webpage, which addresses a typical related misquotation of Darwin's own writing, and watch this video from a PBS special which talks about experiments in modeling the evolution of the eye. This site, written by a Stanford researcher , describes in detail the structures of the eye and the various forms of light-detecting organs in the world today.

Your argument is a bit flawed. You assume that all the structures peripheral (no pun intended) to the eye itself must be there for the eye to work. You're incorrect. Those structures simply are there in human eyes. Consider the following:

The planet Earth is bathed in radiation from the sun. Much of this radiation reflects quite predictably from objects on Earth (specifically within the part of the spectrum called "visible light.") The first optic organs were most likely single cells which could only detect light or dark (there are still organisms with these organs). The ability to detect movement would have been next (this would involve only simple optic cells, and furthermore, would have given a great advantage to organisms who could detect predators). The formation of the lens would have occured next, beginning with a simple layer of enzyme to aid in focusing. We're still at a relatively simple stage in development. Next would come things like distance detection (which would require a more specialized lens) and color detection. The structures around these primitive eyes would have been equally primitive, but as detection of optical phenomena became more and more helpful to organisms, the structures supporting those eyes would also have evolved to become more robust.

As an aside, consider the flaws inherent in the human eye. Blood vessels run across its surface, making it delicate, and the location of the optic nerve within the eye itself causes a "blind spot." Haven't you ever done the optical trick with two dots which shows you quite clearly where your blind spot is? My point is that if the human eye was designed, it could have been designed better.

Here's one for you. If you look at a plot of sensitivity of the human eye to different colors, the human eye has the strongest sensitivity to a green-yellow color at a particular wavelength. If you then look at a spectral plot of the luminance of the sun, there is exactly the same spike at that wavelength. The sun gives off visible radiation most strongly in the yellow-green region, and because our eyes evolved on this planet, the human eye shows greatest sensitivity to that color exactly.

Don't believe me? Buy two laser pens of exactly the same wattage--one red, one green. Despite the fact that they use the same batteries and draw the same power, the green one will appear "brighter." This is a direct result of the evolution of the eye on our planet.

And many choose the higher power out of a lack of understanding. Evolution occurs. You cannot dispute this. Bacteria develop resistance to medications, case in point. Where we can debate, however, is how life started. I admit, I am certainly no expert in organic chemistry, but there is evidence for the formation of replicating chains of amino acids from raw molecules. There is, however, no such evidence of aliens depositing a fully-functional cell on Earth. I choose to believe that which has been supported by evidence. That doesn't mean the theory of alien-depositing is disproven, it just means it's less likely than abiogenesis.

Similarly, I don't think anything "disproves" the possibility of a "higher power." But I will not ignore evidence that suggests that evolution explains the origin of species. If another sentient being "caused" the beginning of our universe, I'd love to have a beer with them and talk.

Where did I say that?

Who's to say "that power" didn't create evolution?

AK

Sorry Andrew - that was for Nick - the post above yours.

Audiorigami - hoo boy you spent some time. I'm not going to be able to go through that until tomorrow.

Until then...

Oh and Andrew I agree that the higher power could've used evolution. Thats kinda my point.

That was the point of my original post was you can still be very spiritual, and not practice a religion that is at odds with science. The problem here is that Christianity has sunk it’s roots deeply into the depths of the human psyche. It took me a number of years to free myself from the psychological impact it had on me, as a kid growing up in this Christian culture, trying to make sense of it.

The reason the story of Adam and Eve , original sin etc. comes into the discussion is it’s part of the Christian world view, and the their explanation of life’s origin. You may call it an over simplification but it’s the basic story right? Earth created in 6 days, Adam and Eve etc.

There are extreme view points on both sides, I find mine to be the middle ground. Nick views are very similar to mine except he hasn’t found or experienced a practice that taps into this spiritual realm. It is quite an amazing thing and as real as any other human experence. Without it I would not be where I am now.

I don’t practice to make myself more feel comfortable, but to elevate my condition of life, get over the problems that keep me from being where I want to be, and yes to try and make sense of this life, world.

I would think there are other civilizations on other plants out there throughout an endless universe, that evolution is an expression of the energy, power of the universe itself. I think we as a species are now able to come to terms with real concepts of how and why this is happening other than making up fairytale like stories with personifications of “gods”, that fly in the face of reality.

Well, I don't believe in a being that created the universe. To me it makes more sense that it just happened; you can't even say that there was a time when the potential existed, because time began with the Big Bang and there was no time before that!

Why everything is the way it is despite the staggering odds against that is always going to be a mystery. God snapping his fingers is one explanation, but to me that seems too simplistic.

***
Jeremy, what I meant is that I don't believe the rituals of religion - not praying, meditating, and doing good deeds, but wearing silly round hats, putting your lights on a timer on Friday night, eating wafers, etc. - no god who's concerned with the universe is going to care whether I do any of that. He's more likely to be concerned with what I contribute to the world and with the connections I make with the people around me, I think.

Well at least Kansas sees it my way...
see here

an 'intelegent' choice :p

"Intelegent" is wryte.

Amazing how dumb people are.

Yet we depend on them for growing our food, so I guess we can't ignore them.

wouldn't it be 'right'?
or is there a pun I'm missing?

It's the spelling: intelligent.

And I'm sorry, I shouldn't insult people. This is just very frustrating. Notice that the dummies - oops, sorry - who voted for this crap are all Republican.

“The 6-4 vote was a victory for "intelligent design" advocates who helped draft the standards. Intelligent design holds that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by a higher power”.

This is exactly what I’m talking about, this is the essence of the debate. Another words, there is an energy that exists in the universe that puts into motion all this that happens. Stars being born (a reminder.. We have pictures?) And super Novas. I understand and appreciate the yearning for a connection beyond the material world. I remember praying to a model human skull as a kid, my mom walking by seeing me and laughing.

But even as a kid, I knew I needed a connection with the source. The energy and power of the universe, and one day it came into my life, or I was introduced to it. Been using it ever since, and after over 35 years, continues to amaze me in how it changes me as a person. This is a real spiritual energy. And as long as it’s something that is positive, can’t see how it would offend anyone, even a creator of the universe.

Intelligent design is creationism in wolf's clothing. Saying that because the universe is so complex it must have been created by a higher power is on the surface a religious argument - which itself is inappropriate in public school - but mainly a power grab by right-wing turds.

That's what this is really all about. You might think that this is just opening kids' minds to other possibilities, but what it's really doing is letting these horrible people frame a very, very unintelligent debate on their own moronic terms.

Keep religion out of public schools. This is insane we are going back to the dark ages. Believe what you want but don't teach it to my kids. I f you want to teach your kids religion teach them at home. Government and religion do not belong together.....................Hello use your brains !! Next you be burning books, forcing children to believe in your God.

Does this make sense?

Just as you think that Intelligent design is inappropriate, "it just happened" is of little learning value. Why is that a better option?

While I agree with you, fundamentalist religious teachings have no place in public school, you seem to be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. ID may be a foot in the door for creationist but I fear the closed mindedness of those who thoughtlessly reject ID hamper progress.

ID is the bath water. There's no scientific facts that support it. It is not a theory, it's a belief. Now, I don't see any reason not to teach kids about the different belief systems in the world so long as it's presented in that way. Just don't call it a theory. That's what sunday school is for.

You totally miss the point. Totally.

I'm saying we don't have the *slightest idea* whether anything started the process. All we know is that it did start, and everyone who's not a religious kook has a pretty good general idea of how the process works. If it's not quite right, it's a very good working model that explains a lot of it.

We understand a lot about the composition of the early universe a fraction of a second after the Big Bang, how it clumped together, that it was probably hot rather than cold, and so on. We also have plausible theories about how life started in ponds, although unless we're able to duplicate that - which may happen - it's all just educated guessing. A lot of this is just surmising, of course, but the point is that the guessing is educated.

To me it's hopelessly naive and defeatist just to end the discussion by saying that since it's all too complicated to understand, God created it. Sure that's a possibility, but it's only one of any number of possibilities. It's mythology, not science. Now, it happens to be mythology that was invented a few thousand years ago, that had a profound effect on our history, but it's still a very difficult argument that the automatic alternative to evolution is that a god created evolution.

And once again, what is God? TLiX pictures being whose primary interest is that he be worshipped by man. Jeremy and I see forces of the universe. I presume everyone else sees something else again. Some people are atheistic.

Listen, I want to emphasize what I wrote above about ID: you have to look beneath the surface of what's going on here, or you're liable to turn this around and assume that these are simply two equally valid ideas and people like me are closed-minded about alternative viewpoints.

Well, there's nothing wrong with discussing anything. What's wrong is the political agenda behind this crap! It's not just wrong, it's positively sinister to indoctrinate kids in such an underhanded way!

Do not let these creeps fool you: they are closed-minded ****s who want to impose their values on this country. This is nothing but a cynical power grab. They are framing the debate in a very limited way, and they want to force kids to have their discussion.

And the sad thing is how that obscures all the incredible teachings in all the world's great religions, and more specifically all the great values that are in Christianity. As a matter of fact, conservatism is totally the opposite of that as an ideology!

And Dover county sees it the other way. The school board has been replaced by Democrats , who support the teaching of ID only in comparative religion class, where it belongs, and not in science class, where it doesn't.

The thing that I hate about these discussion forums is that they move so quickly; I can never keep up. Don't any of you have jobs?

Audiorigami - where do you come up with this stuff? Are you just a master Googler? I admit you've won my respect - above that of my college anthropology professor. Believe it or not, I was not aware of Darwin's quotation regarding the evolution of the eye. Now, regarding Nilsson and Pelger's calculations, they show that the evolution of a camera eye could occur with their defined parameters within a half million years. That's it. A linear pathway such as this over a 500,000 year span could only occur with some divine hand-holding. Sure, multiply by X, it'll increase your already miniscule odds, but it doesn't change the fact that the line is straight as an arrow. The huge amount of beneficial random mutations is just that - huge.

In addition, all of these articles focus only on the eye - which ignores my point. My problem isn't simply (well, not very simple) the evolution of an organ, but the evolution of that organ and it's support system - and that they must occur at the same time. Also, as far as our eyes having to exist in their current form - I get the point. But if not in this form, then another one that is equivalent. It is the form that makes it incredible and worth studying. However, I'll give it a bit more plausability in my mind.

You seem to have this stuff readily available. Maybe you could steer me towards a source to deal with the most unbelievable of evolutionary steps?--
1. The formation of the first cell - I've read lots on this - but nothing good so far
2. The jump from single-celled organisms to multi-celled organisms
3. The jump from asexual to sexual reproduction
4. The evolution of the cardiovascular and nervous systems
5. And related to 4, the evolution of the spine / spinal cord


Jeremy - I'm with you brother. The only difference is that I've named my entity.


Now Nick, your insulting style towards TLIX is most of the reason I jumped into this debate. Also, your lack of patience for other points of view makes you easy to dismiss. Of course you had to hear this from another one of those judgemental Christian dudes, and that'll make it easy for you to dismiss me.

Your insistence that other points of view are mythology is just closing the debate. What are you afraid of? It seems that you intentionally simplify and then dismiss them. And then you yell - pretty soon you're going to have to go all CAPS. Its just a point of view. Notice, I didn't say an equal point of view, or (gasp) even a greater point of view. Do you not give ID a chance because your intuition tells you that it's just too incredible? Political agenda? Do think people believe this stuff because it will somehow advance them politically?

One last point for thought - evolution is a faith. Think about it - depending upon which side of the aisle you are on, you are scrambling to defend it - not truly question it - to the point of determining plausability inside of statistically impossible odds. Very few of us have been on both sides of the aisle. Those that are most closed-minded are those with the most to lose as far as their world-view is concerned. Isn't science about objectively seeking the truth?

I'm insulting to TLiX because his ideas - not his, the ones he's been fed - are frustratingly ludicrous. You're right that I don't have much patience for points of view like that; you're wrong that I don't have patience for all points of view that are different from my own. It's only the ones that are obviously wrong that I dismiss offhand.

And I and others have already explained why you're simply wrong to say that evolution is only a different faith. Just because there are two sides to a discussion doesn't mean both are equally valid. And in this case they're not. You can go convince 3 billion people that my ass is green, but that doesn't make it so, nor does it make that point of view worthy of respect.

Note that I'm not putting down anyone's religious beliefs, nor am I putting down people who believe God created evolution; all I've done is say why I believe that "God" (again, a word that means different things to different people) is an integral part of it all rather than a being who created it. I could be wrong, of course, in which case my life wouldn't change at all - this is just my opinion.

And I've dismissed the idea that the earth is 6000 years ago for one simple reason: it's horse****. I know it, you know it, and I dare say that somewhere not very deep down TLiX knows it.

As to those poor chumps in Kansas, yes, they are indeed being manipulated for political gain. I'm sorry for you if you don't see that, because it would mean you're very gullible. One of the members of that school board said that they're the laughing stock of the nation (she was one of the four out of ten with some sense). She was right.

I'm glad to see that you reject the idea of relative truth.

I missed your explanation proving evolution. Sure I've heard you state that it's true, but that's it.

I also missed where you showed that evolution is not a faith. Yes, there is observable evidence that can be interpreted as backing up evolution; there are also observable evolutionary events that occur now. There is, however, disagreement that these events are evidence that evolution is the source of life's origins.

I'd disagree when you say that you're not putting down anyone's religious beliefs; you most certainly are.

If it's a religious belief that the earth is 6000 years old, then I guess you're right, because that's just silly.

And I certainly don't reject the idea of relative truth in the fundamentalist Christian sense, dorkus, in fact I reject the idea of there being only one correct religion and all the others being wrong! What's more, everyone makes it all up as they go along - even fundamentalist Christians. We're all moral relativists.

There are many religious orientations, and one is absolutely not more "correct" than the others; it's all a matter of which one makes the most sense for your life - if any of them do.

We're talking about how man got here (I think), and you can be as religious or spiritual as you want and still believe in evolution.

And dorkus, for your benefit: the gene pool changes over time. That means species evolve.

Irrefutable proof that even TLiX agrees with.

But you're just being nasty, and I'm getting tired of you.

Evolution is a fact, Dork! Regardless of what or who put the enertia in place. Hopefully you'll evolve someday. Perhaps an opposable thumb!

Now who's being nasty?

As far as relative truth, would you agree that if there are two contrary belief systems, one or both of them is wrong? Don't get me wrong, I'm not arrogant enough to say which is absolutely true. As we've seen, even within Christianity, there are differing viewpoints. However, my world has been rocked enough in my life that I won't take an absolutist stand on anything, really. There's TLIX's view of creation as opposed to mine as opposed to yours as opposed to etc. Of course this sounds like a cop-out, and in many ways it is, but for such an absolutely huge topic my mind is open to ANYTHING. I used to believe like TLIX, and there are valid observations that even Stephen Hawking doesn't have answers for. So for now, I take it in and am digesting it with the other information that is out there.

With all of this said, life happened somehow. I think there is value in seeking, and being open to all possibilities - divine or not. Maybe someday we'll be able to put our finger on it better than we can now. Some believe that they've got it figured out now, they're just missing details - thus faith. TLIX has a version he stands on, you have a version that you stand on. I think you've got me wrong - I'm just trying to knock over those that are standing - and you stand up the tallest - and thus you've kind of become my biggest target.

I also agree with your point about moral relativism, though I try to resist it. I'm still stuck on the concept of right and wrong.

I also agree that my previous post was nasty - sorry.

Can anyone from either side of this debate answer these questions?
What existed prior to the big bang and how did that come to exist in the first place?
Exactly how did god come into existence?( And please no "in the beginning was the word". I want to know what was before the beginning)

I'm just curious. None of it changes my mission.

And I apologize for getting frustrated, dorkus. I agree with pretty much everything in your last post.

Would I agree that one or both of two contrary belief systems is wrong? Usually, but sometimes it depends on the belief - just as not all courtroom questions have yes/no answers.

Since we're talking about the origin of species, then there are both absolutes and matters of interpretation. Either we split off from apes or we didn't, and that was either about 7 million years ago or it wasn't. Either we evolved into what we are now or we just appeared this way. And so on.

What's not absolute is how it's all driven. Darwin explains a lot of what *happens*, but of course he can't explain why it happens or why anything bothers to exist in the first place. That's what a lot of religion attempts to explain, but none of us will ever really know why...which is where your open mind comes into play.

Stephen Hawkins doesn't have the answers to questions we're unlikely to ever be able to answer, but he sure knows how to pose the questions more clearly than you or I.

Hopi, Stephen Hawkins is good at explaining the thinking about that question. He believes that while time began with the Big Bang about 15 billion years ago, time also doesn't really have a boundary, and it only points in the thermodynamic direction in which we experience it in one sense.

You have to read him to sort of understand it, though, because a) I only get the surface of it, and b) I can't explain what I do understand in a post here - it's too complicated.

The logical questions - What did the universe look like before the Big Bang and How long was it in that state of zero mass - make no sense. There was no time before time began!

Well Nick, now I feel a group hug coming on...

To TLIX: I know we've been talking about you while you're in the room, and I feel kind of bad about that. I want to encourage you to speak up (if you want) because I don't want to presume to have you all summed up. I've taken a look at the website you posted, and I think that there are some valid points to consider... and I'm considering. If you're interested in where my opinion and yours diverges, you may want to read a book called The Source by John Clayton. Here's a link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1582291...=books&v=glance It nicely fits a fundamentalist Christian viewpoint with an older world perspective. I buy a good amount of it.

Still waiting on Audiorigami to get me some more material...

what about da-voo, and destiny. I didn't read the last two pages but it occurs to me if you don't know what i'm talking about than it must be false. Evolution does not take into account rational thought. look at an animal and tell me they decide between things other than fight or flight. Evolution is for simple minds who battle their contradictions and don't understand themselves. evolution is there for anybody who can't stand alone.

Which reminds me: what about unintelligent design?

maberi

I think you meant Stephen Hawking there Nick Copernicus.You might be a little more believable if you at least get the suckers name right.

where is the symbol of man. Where does spontaneous events end up? can one survive a ruthless world where animals dictate and minds disinagrate. Is it really an evolution and are we really as slow as our bodies?

Hawking. Sorry.

Sorry about the wait dorkus.

We're really getting into "the ****" now.

1. There are no sure answers, but here are some
possibilities which have empirical evidence backing them up--more than I can say for ID, which has made no predictions, nor has it produced any evidence in favor of its cause:

Often-repeated experiments show prebiotic molecules formed from ancient-Earth-like conditions

Prebiotic molecules found in outer space

Keep in mind that "cells" are not the only life forms. Viruses do not technically have cells.

2. Jellyfish are technically colonies of single cells. Interesting, no? Here's a link which gives various reasons why
single-celled organisms may have evolved into multicellular organisms.

3. That is actually an awesome question. It turns out that sexual reproduction, because it creates many more novel combinations of genes, is superior to asexual reproduction, and as such would have occurred through natural selection (and has succeeded spendidly, much to our enjoyment).

I am way too tired to go on about number 4. Hopefully this'll give you food for thought--which is really my goal. I'm not anti-anything. I just feel that given time, and facts, anyone can learn the truth about the natural miracle of life.

Thanks for the info. You're like an encyclopedic service that I can call on, and then not have to do any work myself. OK, now for my initial observations:

1. The beauty of ID is that it doesn't have to make predictions or produce evidence! I'm mostly kidding, but I acknowledge the aspect of it that includes built-in answers for creation. This does not mean that a creationist viewpoint cannot be forever tweaked by new discoveries; it should in fact be supported by them. It also does not mean that they are not true.

As far as Miller's experiment - I really thought that maybe there was new work on this. There are countless resources that enumerate the flaws of it - are there not newer experiments that attempt to do prove the same thing with more accurate conditions? If I recall, I think he created an environment that was highly unlikely for early earth.

But maybe the original cells came from space? That could be - but of course that begs the question " Where did they come from?" Still, I was unaware of that.

2. Hoo Boy, that was some fun readin'! However, that was by far the one that causes me to consider what I once thought was absolutely ludicrous. I'm considering. The concept is still way incredible.

3. This one has nothing to do with evolution. We need a mechanism for this change. The author wrote this in a manner that implies we evolve with a purpose and a direction (that would be divine). We can't forget that the mechanism of evolution is random genetic mutation, and we've already established that that's an amoral process.

Let me know where I'm missing the boat.

Evolution, Shmevolution. I believe in Beechwood Aging...

Oxford's Richard Dawkins is a great reference ("The Ancestor's Tale"). Interesting enough, Einstein, Carl Sagan and Dawkins were all atheists. No offense to anyone in particular but these individuals posessed much greater minds than any of the pseudo-scientists on this board. Don't fear the science. Your God won't hate you for understanding the truth.

DIDDO SCIENCE IS AFTER THE FACT

Here's another way of looking at the unanswerable question, dorkus - or at least the one I say is unanswerable and most religious people think they've answered once and for all:

Does evolution have a goal, i.e. is man or is life the goal?

If so, then you'd expect life to be a natural state development all over the universe, even if it's at various stages. Chances are small that there aren't other planets somewhere in some galaxies with mild enough conditions for life.

Why would you say that, Rider?

Some of science is after the fact and some of it predicts things. Einstein predicted gravitational lenses, for example, and they weren't actually observed for a long time after that. We haven't seen a black hole yet (or the light ring around its event horizon), but we know they almost certainly exist and what they're like.

I think the fact that those people were atheists is kind of irrelevant, by the way. Pythagorus, Mozart, and Michelangelo weren't, and they weren't half-wits.

The system is crude. the evolution of man is slow. space is the fact that we have not evolved yet.evolution is behind man and the burial is out of our hands. We have little time to hand the baton off. we can not keep track of ourselves. the great people are runners who don't understand their mission. but they understand time is not on their side so the crazy people push the expeirience of what they know but they don't know why. they can only initiate and know that they're different. The hand down is slow and what we know has to be recovered. This is our condition.

I’m not sure why that’s the unanswerable question. Maybe I’m not getting your point. Isn’t the unanswerable question – “Why?”

Evolution without intervention is goal-less. More life would mean more miracles, and I believe that there might be life of all different kinds somewhere out there. Unfortunately, there’s a good chance we may never find it.

It seems to me, and this might be too philisophical, but if evolution is the natural order, and if it doesn’t have divine intervention, then there must be some universal law that science is missing so far. Life seems like it can’t be held back – at least in our world. It seems to explode everywhere. And it shouldn’t.

Could this be true everywhere and in all different, even hostile environments? Could we just think our mild conditions are ideal for life, because that’s the only life we see?

There must be something more at work here.

yes, but the answer to your question is why not? evolution has a goal but it's after the fact. Did you look in the mirror before your born and say "here i go again "or do you say," I can't remeber **** before 5". Mabey one does but I think it"s more like parents prepared. As far as miricles look at the plauge. look at Fatima. Look at the catholic book of miracles. It's actually far and between. Half barely made less than 600 years ago. There was a great deliverence back than, where a peasant became a land owner and owner became worker, the playing field was leveled. This is probably an a miracle but would be classified as a reason to revolt; which they did. check out Carl Young: A man and his symbols. This guy did not act the way he wrote.

OK, enough of this.

You guys want to know the real answer to all this confusion, I wasn't going to but I'll tell you first hand what I know. Truth is, the universe is teaming with life. Thousands upon thousands of species co-exist together in perfect harmony with one another. The problem is and was, mankind. So somewhere in our far distant past, it was determined by the high councel of elders that we had too much propensity toward violence, destroying our environment and basically were guilty of being crude self absorbed warring brutes with no apparent hope for assimilation into the universal way. So, rather than condeming us to a complete anniliation of the human race, it was determined our poor species would be banished to a far distant planet in a very far away galaxy called earth. Guy's, the naked truth is; that this unfortunatly, is actually a prison planet we live on and the reason there are so many ufo sightings without any apparent contact; is because they are in fact,the gaurdians that for millinioms have patrolled this planet. Ever making sure we do not break too far beyond our bonds lest we become a threat to the celestial community. If we do,without further warning it will be the end of everything. Our planet and everything on it will be utterly destroyed in an instant. However,there are some who may find redemption if they confess their short comings and accept the higher order of life the rest of the universe observes and enjoys. Only then can they be transformed in their minds and become one with our distant brothers and sisters and someday be redeemed once again from this cursed place of isolation. The end.........
A parody by Mixandburn

Calling William Shatner....

"However,there are some who may find redemption" Cut the religious crap. It has nothing to do with evolution. Jesus was just fine till Constantine ****ed it up.

Amen to that.

"Why not" is only sidestepping the question, Rider. And how do you know that the goal is after the fact? I tend to think you're right, but I don't think that's something we'll ever be able to know.

The reason I say that's the question is that if there's a goal, it implies that there's something with a goal in mind. That's why I see the gods as part of the process, and they're stuck in the same thermodynamic "dimension" of time that everything else is.

Actually, the idea that we have free will agrees with that too. God has to abide by Heisenberg's uncertainty principle.

Ok, fine...

I think all this C--p about evolution is really many issues, first and formost about our soverigninty. If we believe that god didn't creat us then it is an easy jump to disolving that whole concept. Second. in essance it dosn't matter, were here, whatever the reason. Third, they all could be right (within the quantium theroy that all time is happening right now, at the same time). Fourth, I'm kinda parcial to the theroy that planet X (Nibereu) sucked all the water and life off of Mars and deposited about ten percent more people down here on earth. Just before the meteor hit in the gulf and destroied 90% of them. ;-)

Your point 1: So what are you saying? It's not an easy jump to explain a lot of what we're talking about, because you need a decent background in several scientific sub-specialties to even understand the theories we have so far.

Point 2: I've already said that it doesn't matter to me, but I find the discussion interesting.

Point 3: Can you explain that? I've never heard that theory. Two particles can be in different places at the same time in one sense, but it's hard to fathom what that could have to do with the dimensions in which we exist. Space is a totally different concept on those scales.

Point 4: Actually, there is something to the theory that comets deposited certain building blocks we need here.

mogandus,
I couldn't agree more..

J

There is intelligence on this Forum. Were our 10,000 year old ancestors also smart? Of course they were. They discovered fire. Oh...I'm sorry...there's no such thing as evolution.

Nick, that sounds funny to say that there has to be a knowledge of anything to explain or understand what any of the contributers have said so far. My point is that we always get caught up in the distraction, not the true or important points of what the government is selling us. Like draft cards, why burn them? they were the third contract/commitmentment. Burning the drivers licence would have been equally as absurd, but burning the social security card would have rasized a lot more awairness than a draft card. It would have also put more pressure on our government.

We are here discussing wether schools should and or could explain more views than are currently available in public schools and how that effects us and our future, but no one is looking down that road very far and extrapolating where this very discussion could lead, if it gets addopted as a common belief. Chicken or egg matters not which one came first does it? But canceling out the basic constitutional premmis that god created man and man created government gets canceled out if the wrong conclusion is drawn. Then where does that leave us?

The other points I'll tackel later after the gig.

I see what you're saying.

Well, if you'd seen what I wrote about Kansas in the previous page, you'd see that I said exactly the same thing. I agree with you that this is all about politics. It's still an interesting subjec, though.

I never got a draft card, thank goodness, but I did have to register. My birthday was about in the middle of the lottery - 165 or so.

But no way would I have gone to fight in Vietnam, burned draft card or no draft card.

Nick – so what I think you’re saying is that you see a goal? Please define “the gods.”

this whole argument is sort of like,
analog vs. digital..

You crack me up. Thanks. :p

Glad you liked that, Z.

dorkus, I don't mean anything I haven't said before by "the gods." And I tend to believe that Rider is right about there not being a predetermined goal for it all, that it only looks like everything was planned from the vantage point of our being here. Yes, that's a big difference from the idea of God creating everything or creating the process that led to us (and is leading to whatever's next). I'm not saying I know that, just that it's the way I lean.

However, that's only talking about how everything got here. It says nothing about what actually is here, and I've already said what "spiritual" forces exist in my opinion. And I don't pretend that's any more "right" than what anyone else believes.

I am the true God. Worship me for I come to you evolved from the first cell made possible by the Creator...Haliburton. Bow down before me.

Geez Nick I did skip through the 4 pages a bit and sorry I didn't catch your observation. I to find this topic interesting and question why it is an issue. My only conclusion is that it is a deversion to turn us into the 5 metro areas that Nixon planned for in the seventies.

Point 3. As a psyc major I often woundered why mutipal personalities would pop out with differant thoughts about where they were in time and physicial space, like the differant faces of Eve, or the many other muitipal personality stories out there. It became almost a quest to find out why they were feeling they were in differant times and sometimes places, not all but enough to see somewhat of a pattern. A few years back, I started hearing about quantium theriory that gives a space to contemplate that very concept, that life can, could and maybe even exisists in differant spaces of time and space at the same time. Like quarks and electrodes, I think, that can be observed in two places at once, on thier path to the same place, if that makes any sence. That has given way to a theroy that 'all' time exists at the same time, therefore the future and past are mutable and the only thing that is stable is the present and that can not be changed till it gets to the past or hasn't come to the present.

Point 4. There are many stories in sandscrit or summerian that depict a major disaster, let alone the bible, but there, a huge planit gets in our way, or actually we get in thier way and the outcome is devastating and leaves us with a moon that has no common gravity because of the bombardment of the many chuncks of earth that got squeezed out from the field that the planit had in its approach twards earth/us.

In that approach there is a theroy that this planit came close enough to mars to suck life and moisture off Mars and pull it out into space and deposit it here on earth, we do have a whole lot of water here compared to the other rocks out there able to support life. The comit theroy also comes into play and gives a good example of what and how that can be done with the tail and modern observations of gravititional pulls.

My unmusicial drive is to be more fluient in my passion of astrological anthropoligy. The explanation of time throught the astrological seasions, (which goes backwards to our precieved seasion of Aquarious) and the differances of the solar clock (why we are told that Crist was born on christmass and it was in the spring).Many old places we dig up have monuments to the passing of the four seasons here in the tempred zone marked by the equnox and solstices. If those days do not line up with the current sceduals, there must be some sort of shifting as we expand through our universe. And I think that is just as exciting as getting the best signal to noise possable.

Every 2 thousand years we go into a differant seasion, much like the 28 day cycle but it happens as we go through space so it appears backweards to us observing. As if we can see the 11 thousand year cycle.

must see... hilarious

http://movies.lionhead.com/movie/1168

In the summerian clay tablets there is a story about this man and his sister who did a jump in our evolution. The interesting thing is that what they said about the process is being confermed by science today. Our science confirmes that we have a pool of eight differant cromazones corrasponding to eight differant primates that somewhat look like the primate that looks like the ethnic group. I can't remember the eight primates, but the list seemed reasonable... As I recall. The twist in this theroy is that to make these eight differant variables work, does not mean that the cromozone that would be associated with the ethnic group will not nessarilly be the same one that will show up, actually, it is rather rare that it does.

Where, why and how we got here? it could be anything from anywhere, really. I don't care what it is "God" or evolution. To me it is the same, created by and evolving to. I'm fine with what has been going on for thousands of years in the form of a belief in a ultamate creator with a history of lesser gods. I'm not interested in taking the concept of god, God or GOD out of our basic rights.

I also like that this thred is 4 pages, nice work Jeremy.

Very nice.

Nick, I agree. Anybody who says they know is a horses ass. A pompess ass. A jack ass! I hate puritans but their the only ones that can make a sentence. At best, they're the coma in my sentence. No man should be judged. Inspiration should be the the one thing that sets us free. All we have is our stories.

Christanity has had humanity by the balls for centuries, it's finally starting to be exposed for what it is. IMHO, B ull****, a lie, a falsehood, a trick, pysological mind control that has been very potent on the weak minded.

It's time we freed ourselves from this plight on humanity , to be human beings without some priest telling you your a sinner, and jesus died for your so called sins. It's B U L L S H I T, PERIOD!!!!!!!

So is creationism and ID. If you actually buy into this, you really need to take a vacation from yourself, like in "What about Bob?". The story of the bible is a story, (as in fairytale). You might as well add the tooth fairy, Santa, and the wicked witch of the west into your portfolio of personal reality.

Tell a kid born with birth defects , aids, limbs missing that there is a god that loves you, created you in His image, and made to to suffer a lifetime where others are born into favorable circumstances, good looking, money, great edcuation, where is the "we are all born inocent" come into this?

The fact is you don't have an awnser, how long can you continue to defend an illusion? There are many caught in the "Matrix" of a false reality, live to the illusion, and liveout their lives in the matrix of a lie someone else created for you.

A-F*****G-MEN!

So Jeremy,

God has you all hot and bothered, clearly. How do you feel about Satan and the devil? Is that all b.s. too? Is Evil part of the fairyland you are describing?

You have a lot of crap figured out, clearly.

Precisely.

I agree with a lot of what you say, Jeremy, but there are also a lot of very profound teachings in every one of the world's great religions. It's only the ridiculous interpretations of Christianity that have perverted its real messages. And extremism is ludicrous regardless of the religion.

On the other hand I've already said that I'm not a great fan of religion right now. All I see it doing is dividing people and making them vote for Bush.

So you hate Muslims as much as you hate Christians? Funny how hate has entered the brain of those who wanted to outlaw hate crimes.

Do you think Bush has a great Muslim following? Or is it Christianity that you hate/fear?

Would you have more respect for Christian fundamentalism if they kidnapped innocent people and cut off their heads while video taping the act?

I was not aware that religions depended on a fan base.

Speaking of evolution, did you read where the Pope 's representative declared ID and Creationism is B as in B and S as in S. It is time for you and the Pope to kiss and make up. He is going to send a priest right over.

Why would you get that I hate Christians from anything I wrote? What I hate is that there appears to be a 1:1 correlation between the number of times a person goes to church or synagogue and his or her (mostly his) likelihood of having voted for Bush.

And I did read this:

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2005/11/18/D8DV0FEO0.html

My comment was that Coyne is smarter than his boss.

No I was trying to get this topic fired up and go for a record 5 pages.

Well I'd lump "satin" in with all the other myths Christianity has as it's framework. I agree Nick there are words of wisdom in the bible, but the basic story, praying to a man hanging on a cross, bleeding, suffering, and being told that YOU are responsible for this, is a lie. Being told the earth was created in 6 days is a lie, the Adam and eve chapter, a lie, ID a lie, just calling it for what it is.

I'm not knocking peoples spirituality, just the belief system of some and the control it's having over our society, and president. In the hands of men in power, it becomes dangerous.

Satan is a good metaphor.

But you know I agree with what you're saying. It's despicable the way Karl Rove masterminded the use of religion to manipulate people into voting for these horrible people.

It must suck to view everything through politically-colored glasses. If you cannot recognize the legitimacy of an opposing viewpoint, then you will forever fail to convince anyone of yours. Repeating the same mantras over and over again just affiirms your closed-mindedness. This goes for most here.

Jeremy, this discussion has focused mostly on science, but now you've brought up history. How do you explain Jesus from a historical perspective? And please, don't worry about being politically correct. (It's funny that bashing Christianity is politically correct, huh?)

Nick, I'm with Zrocks. I'm not sure you realize how you come across.

How dare you accuse me of hating Christians! How dare you.

But I guess I should take a deep breath and realize that your naivety only proves my point.

I agree with Nick that it's a little scary how "religion" is so often associated with "republican/conservative". Not surprising, but still scary.

I really don't like to see religion in the political arena, period, as long as we have the right to worship as we choose and not offend anyone else in so doing...

Exactly. My sole objection is to the attempt to have other peoples' archaic values imposed on me. Otherwise what the hell do I care what someone believes? Knock yourself out if you want to believe the Earth is 6000 years old. I have no respect for the belief itself, but I respect anyone's right to believe whatever they want.

I'm not making up that comment about going to church or synagogue and voting for Bush, by the way. For example (this article is now in the LA Times archives and I'm not going to pay to access it, but the abstract makes the point):

Bush Made Inroads Among Jewish Voters, Study Shows
Those who attended weekly religious services were split between the president and Kerry.
[HOME EDITION]



Los Angeles Times - Los Angeles, Calif.
Author: Ronald Brownstein
Date: Apr 12, 2005
Start Page: A.19
Section: Main News; Part A; National Desk
Text Word Count: 560



Abstract (Document Summary)



The initial Edison/Mitofsky National Election Pool exit poll had found that Jews preferred the Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, over [Bush] by 74% to 25%. The Los Angeles Times exit poll had found an almost identical 74% to 26% split among Jews.

By comparison, young Jewish women preferred Kerry by a ratio of more than 7 to 1, the survey found. Kerry's best group was Jewish women over 60, who backed him over Bush 10 to 1, the study calculated.

According to [Mark Mellman]'s surveys, Jews who attended religious services weekly split their votes evenly between Bush and Kerry, while Kerry amassed big leads among those who attended less often.

My naivety proves what point? I don't know you except for what you say and how you say it. Archaic values? By whose definition? And do I have to keep repeating myself? - - I, and many others like me, don't believe the world is 6,000 years old.

Hating Christians? Hmmm that's a little strong... More like they are unworthy of your intellect.

It goes two ways here - I have to work hard to not put you in a box and take what you say at face value... but you keep coming up with the same predictable stuff. In addition, you are at ease summing up those of us that believe in God. Maybe it's my turn to play offended...

Fieryjack - I'm on the other side of the fence, and I'm in agreement with you.

What's wrong with hating Christians? It's a made-up religion. Hardly organic. I am an admirer and follower of the real Christ. I give no attention or money to any Church. I can't stand pious, superficial religions zealots. Screw you all! Besides, this thread is about evolution, not the pros and cons of religion. It just doesn't matter. Being fair, honest, truthful(when necessary)and kind is enough. Who gives a rat's ass where we come from or where we're going. It's the time between that counts.

I agree with you, Anaconda - it doesn't matter how we got here. As I said, I'd still get up and do the same things tomorrow if it turned out that we're all the product of a booger from Mars.

dorkus, my answers my be predictable, yet you seem to misunderstand them. Nobody said all Christians believe the earth is 6000 years old. And nobody said that all religion is politically motivated. But it's surely being abused by a lot of right-wing scumbags to get votes.

So are the shyte value debates about gay marriage and intelligent design. That is all a big political smokescreen, whether or not you see it. And when I say you're naive, that's what I'm talking about: you think that I hate Christians because I point out what's equally obvious to a lot of Christians! There are many levels of sophistication to all religions, and the people who go for that bull**** are not sophisticated.

And you and zrocks really need to learn how to have a discussion without calling me a bigot. If that's how I come off to you, perhaps you need to think about why you'd rather just throw that out than deal with what I'm saying.

I don't hate Christians, people are people reguardless of what they believe. I only bring up the bible because of creationism, which is at odds with science, yet we see science working for us everyday and take advantage of it.

I like that this thred is so long and all, and that it got some views out of some normally quiet posters. It is interesting to see the post desolve into arguments and sway away for the topic - I know I'm guilty of that, sometimes, but no one is asking why it is an issue. We all have free will and the right to think anyway we want, without reprocussions.

Is there a possibility that these two schools of thought will ever come together? It does in quantum but that does not allow for us to be petty about who's right or wrong and who we serve by alligening up to one side or the other.

Every culture has a story of the beginning and all of those stories hint to a time before. But how can we rectyfy 6,000 and 60,000,000 years old?

It is probably just me but somehow you come across as having more outrage against fundamentalists Christians vs fundamentalists Muslims.

In a poll conducted by the local pollsters, people who pleasured themselves with their left hand preferred Kerry 7 to 1 while right handed Jewish women of Ukarainan descent only preferred Kerry 3 to 1. How could he lose?

It's just shocking how you're totally incapable of grasping the least bit of subtlety, such as a wry comment with some truth in it that's obviously not intended to be taken literally.

And your implication that I'm more outraged by the Christian right than I am by terrorism is just moronic.

Oh, I also see that an important part of that article is missing from the abstract. He also said that it was the same with Christians: the more you go to church, the more likely you are to have voted for Bush.

To spell this out for zrocks: yes, there are also a lot of regular church-goers who voted for Kerry. But is it really necessary to explain that before I can make what's obviously a slightly tongue-in-cheek comment?

Sorry Nick, I don't believe I used the word terrorism in my post. This fact, of course, disqualifies my comment from being "moronic".

If I might make another observation. I am under the impression that you feel that only you are granted the power to be non literal.

By the way, I do not in any way think you are a bigot. In fact I kind of admire your ability to think and express sound ideas.

One day you will see that I am absolutely correct in my thinking that an open mind does not hate. If it does, then it will limit free thought.

So, can I use the DA7 as a control surface for protools?

Not unless we either find the missing link or God gets back to parting seas and human sacrifices.

Nick- nobody said all Christians believe the earth is 6000 years old? There's been two posts since you made that claim that refer to this. I wonder why most people here still want to categorize all Christians as fundamentalist TV evangelists? Creationism is not at odds with science; no one seems to want to hear it... let alone combat it with anything other than preconceived notions and insults.

I'm not consumed by hate, I'm angry at what's going on in this country, zrocks. And no, you didn't mention terrorism, but you said I think Islamic fundamentalism is the same as Christian fundamentalism. Somehow it ****es me off to be accused of putting beheadings, collapsing stone walls on gays, etc. on equal footing with anything that goes on in this country.

dorkus, I've said over and over again that I don't equate all Christianity with TV evangelism. If you read any of my posts in this thread - something I wouldn't expect anyone to do - you'll see me saying over and over that there are many levels of sophistication about religion. I also said that a lot of Christian people agree with me - for example my mom, who despite her German Jewish ancestry was confirmed Church of England as a child.

Western society has a Judeo-Christian heritage, and it's a little older and more profound than most American-style TV evangelism.

And why would I believe that all Christians think the earth is 6000 years old?! Most people in this country are Christian, and very few of them believe that.

...Aaaaanyway.

So I watched 2001:A Space Oddysey again last night. Sheeit, I forgot what a mind**** the first (and last) ten minutes are. I'm smack in the middle of a Kubrick Netflix-fest.

It goes Dr. Strangelove, 2001, Full Metal Jacket.

If you watch those three movies in order, it's quite a look at the latter half of the 20th century. Elegant, frightening, mad.

Disclaimer: the above has nothing to do with evolution, except for the prehistoric apes in the beginning of 2001, which actually made me think--the use of tools was such a huge step in human history. I'd have to say that fire was the more important discovery, although discovery may be a misleading term. I prefer "taming." Yes, the taming of fire. That was pretty big. Then I guess language deserves a nod. Yup, tools, fire, language. What a combo.

So, where does The Shining fit into the filmfest? Hmm...WELP sorry to derail folks, go on talking about...well...whatever it was.

Would you have more respect for Christian fundamentalism if they kidnapped innocent people and cut off their heads while video taping the act?

Absent of videotape technology, doesn't this sound strikingly similar to techniques employed by those benevolent Christians during the Spanish Inquisition?

One would hope that a certain amount of evolution has taken place since those barbaric days.

Since the 15th century? In most First World countries, in some ways, yes.

But we still have wars, there's still crime, lots of countries routinely violate human rights exactly like they did...I think the world is pretty much the same except for isolated pockets.

And I'm fortunate to live in one of them.

Do you feel an obligation to your fellow humans to try to help them evolve?

I can't say that's the first thing on my mind, no. How does one go about doing that?

Apreciado Nick: Todo caos tendiendo a un order implica en sí un ordenamiento lógico. Allí hay inteligencia. Le digo humildemente: he visto las respuestas de Dios a algunos de mis requerimientos.Me ha hecho desaparecer y aparecer cosas cuando con grande fe se lo he pedido entre esas cosas tre casos de cáncer. Créalo Dios es real. Haga esta prueba en el día en que lea esto: Arrodíllese en su cuarto y pídale le dé señales de su existencia y le dice que le seguirá si se responde con certeza.¡Hoy le aseguro que se quedará sorprendido!

Do or don't you believe in what the bible says, and still call yourself a christian? Does not the bible say the earth is about 6000 years old? So if you don't believe that, then how can you believe anything else it says?

Neather me or Nick hate peole who choose to put there faith in a particular belief system, just the influence it's having on the leaders of this country who are making desisions based at least partly on this belief system.

Bien, estoy alegre él conseguí librado de su cáncer.

Hey, it's just like Christian extremists say about homosexuals - "We don't hate the sinner, we just hate the sin"

Could someone please point me to this passage? I've never seen it. Just curious.

I believe it has to do with tracing the number of generations back to Adam.

This page explains how the ~6000 year number is found. Please note that people regularly live past 100 years of age (with Noah living to 600 years of age), and there are numerous estimates which range over fifty years or more.

I report, you decide.

Got it. So it's not actually anywhere other than on some chart some guys put together out of what they think they've extrapolated from the text.
:rolleyes:

Uh-huh... I can't resist anymore...

Seth born when Adam is 130
Enosh born when Seth is 105
Kenan born when Enosh is 90
Mahalalel born when Kenan is 70
Jared born when Mahalalel is 65
Enoch born when Jared is 162
Methuselah born when Enoch is 65
Lamech born when Methuselah is 187
Noah born when Lamech is 182

What? And with no viagra??? And how old were the 'moms' - 11, 12, 13?

And Noah is 600+?

This is silly. I'm not buying into any of this.

Do or don't you believe in what the bible says, and still call yourself a christian? Does not the bible say the earth is about 6000 years old? So if you don't believe that, then how can you believe anything else it says?

This is an excellent point and one which has troubled me for years. If just one element of Christian doctrine or belief is so obviously either logically or scientifically flawed, how can one possibly just accept everything else as gospel?

Another such point is the imprisonment and near excecution of Galileo for advocating Copernican theory (the earth revolving around the sun and not vice versa, as early Christian dogma decreed). This genius was nearly murdered by the Catholic church for his understanding of what ultimately came to be commonly accepted science. This is just one example of religious zealots twisting reality into what often becomes a sad and needless demise for the innocent and others with too much common sense to blindly follow the pack.

Not wanting to be argumentative except when foiling bad science, isn't Adam, flood, Moses, etc. before JC? Muslims also consider that part of the Bible sacred, as do Jews.

So did God actually write the bible by his own hand? If he did, I wouldn't bitch about it. If he didn't, then it was written by humans.

A lot of stuff in the Bible was carried on through oral tradition.... there's lots of room for embellishment and such with that. Also, I don't think the Bible was originally written in English... another area for interpretation. And finally, people used allegories and symbolism to tell their stories.... I believe a lot of it is not to be taken literally... especially over thousands of years of revisions and whatnot.

"First there was darkeness.... then there was light...." ... much easier to say that than to tell people thousands of years ago about the Big Bang.

Just my opinion... well... actually .... many peoples opinion.


AK

I don't mean to target Christianity exclusively. These should only be taken as examples. All religions have their dark sides or so it seems.

What concerns me is the fact that there is so much pro-Christianity right now in the American culture and it appears to be having great effect on our daily lives through politics, education, etc. Understanding that these forces have at times been of a negative nature and detrimental to society would be a good thing to know, I believe.

The Nazis proclaimed themselves to be Christians. Many members of the Klan profess to being Christians. We all know about the Crusades. We realize how religions of all factions have been used as a tool to control the masses of the less fortunate. We see the problems within the preisthood today. We see multi-million dollar settlements being made to satisfy law suits against the Catholic church. Why wasn't this money used previously to help the needy instead of hoarded? Why were not the art treasures of the Vatican used to help the needy instead of being hoarded? Why were underhanded and shady deals made between the Catholic church and Italian government in association with the mob in the '70s and then swept under the rug when money was lost and leaders turned up murdered? This just goes on and on.

You can point to the terrorist cells in the Middle East and say that they are not really associated with the true Muslim culture but these acts are all said to be done in the name of religion. This is much like Nazi Germany embracing Christianity in the 1930's.

As for the origin and spreading of early biblical stories; I'm not surprised that each individual culture adpoted and accepted many of them over time and through translation or interpretation wound up with similar tales about their own evolution. The same could be said about urban legends today.

I believe the original bible was written in Hebrew and the New Testament in Greek. I could be wrong.

What Andrew says shows the difference between someone who is able to get the real meaning of Christianity (or any of the world's great religions for that matter) and someone who isn't even able to scratch surface of it. If you only see the words and accept them literally at the expense of what your (God-given) five senses are telling you, then of course you're going to be stuck in the 1st century AD.

***
Buttrumpet, people have always abused religion. I forget the name of the serial killer they just caught - the family man - but he said he considered himself a Christian. Obviously, what the Nazis did and what he did are 100% the opposite of what the religion advocates. And while Karl Rove isn't a Nazi or serial killer even from my anti-war perspective, his shrewd manipulation of unsophisticated people with a vote was also quite ironic.

The point is that none of that is even remotely related to spirituality or the teachings in the religion. It's simply sanctimonious nonsense, thrown up so that anyone who calls it what it is appears to be against religion - as you saw happening to me here, which is frustrating and infuriating.

Are you concerned about fanatic Islam?

Which concerns you more?

Amen to that Nick. You have to wonder how Jesus would feel about today's thieving televangelists and the modern day Christians telling the rest of the world they are going to hell.

Which concerns me more? That depends. If I'm a doctor in an abortion clinic I guess I'm just as worried (if not more) about being murdered by religious Christian zealots than Islam extremists. I think any faction of extreme religion is dangerous and that's my point.

Wikipedia

We should all be concerned about fanaticism of any sort. Fanatics refuse to acknowledge points of view outside of their own beliefs, and unfortunately there are fanatics of most every religion. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that fanaticism in any form is a danger to democracy.

Who should concern us more? Depends on what is a more likely threat to you. I fear religious influence in public policy, e.g. sex education, evolution vs. creationism, so I am more concerned by evangelical Christian fanatics in that case. I also desire stability, free expression, and safety for families and children in Iraq, so in that case fanatical Islam concerns me more.

Although, I must say, having met fanatical Transcendental Meditation practitioners, they really don't concern me very much at all.

And why would you even want ask that ridiculous, loaded question, zrocks? Do you really think it makes an intelligent point to accuse people of preferring harsh Islamic law to right-wing Christians in this country?

The fanatic.

AK

Not that I was asked, but I'm equally concerned over both as they are two sides of the same coin.
Currently the "Islamic" fundamentalists would seem to be the greater physical threat (though families of murdered doctors that worked at some clinics in the US. and the families of murdered civilians overseas may wish to debate that) while IMO the "Christian" fundamentalists pose a greater threat to our freedoms and the constitution.
As difficult as the lunatic terrorist situation is to deal with at least it's a wolf in wolf's clothing. The "Religious Right" is a much more subtle and insidious sickness and may prove harder to deal with in the long run.

Fanaticism is not quantifiable. Neither should concern you more or less. This is not competitive teams sports or, for that matter, entertainment. It all comes down to individual actions and accountability, none of which concerns the true fanatic. Because, in the fanatic's mind, the end always justifies the means. Take for example the Christian extremist Eric Rudolph - he did not see conceptually that killing and maiming people was inherently evil. His actions, in his mind, were heroic. No different than the Islamic fundamentalists that would behead an American for being an American. That extreme tunnel-vision is the danger - and it doesn't exist in a vacuum. The conservative right's willingness to exploit the more extreme elements of Christian fanaticism (and the Republican party's willingness to whore itself out to the conservative right) is far more worrisome and is equally as pressing an issue, as the lunatic fringe of Islam fundamentalism.

wow.... very well put Glenn. I couldn't have said it better myself.

AK

I'll take a stab at it - the question really is - Do you take the creation account of the bible literally, and assume that there are no missing spaces? My answer is no, and here is a brief explanation why - -

There are many references in the Bible to God being outside of this dimension (I can get them for you if you'd like). Of course, if he exists, this would have to be true - you can't see him. What do we mean by this dimension? Well, traditionally, we mean four dimensions - the three that we can see, and time. So God is without form as we know it, and he isn't bound by time.

This notion should not be new to the scientists here. If you get into quantum physics, you will learn that there needs to be another 7 dimensions just for matter to exist. What's one more dimension? Also, the notion that time is not fixed is relatively new.

So there is a problem when communicating with man about things outside of our world, especially since we cannot even comprehend the existence of matter. Also, consider the original audience; they were even less sophisticated. The account in Genesis makes perfect sense when viewed in this light. A God who is timeless creates things instantly, or over millions of years - what's the difference? You can view the beginning and the end at the same time (well, there is no time, but you know what I mean).

You may find it interesting that the order of the days (time periods) is exactly what we find in science. From the big bang to the creation of organisms in the correct order. In fact, it was Christians that first came up with the idea that time had a beginning - but of course, they didn't come up with it.

And consider the big bang - a singularity (an infinitely small point) exploding into our universe. Let there be light is right.

Another question - When you refer to the Republican party whoring out to the religious right, what actions are you referring to specifically?

Stephen Hawking's no-boundary condition of time - which is what you're describing - doesn't eliminate the thermodynamic direction of time in which we live.

Exactly!

Those who might be consumed by hate can't answer the question.



Good example. If the solution of Islamic fundamentalism is to concede, subjugate, view their side and ask ourselves what did we do to deserve his rath, why not do the same for the home grown fanatic.

BTW, I was working the night of the Olympic bombing. I was in the Olympic Village. It was a very unnerving few hours.

dude!

Do you have a New Teastment quote attributed to JC to back that up?

zrocks, you aren't in JM + the HA are you? If so we've probably met through Bill B.

Anyway, the reason I took exception to your question the first time is that I think you're implying people here only get upset at the religious right in this country, when they should be getting upset at the outrages commited by Muslim extremists (which are much worse). Am I off-base? I for one am not consumed by hatred, by the way, or at least last time I checked I wasn't.

The thermodynamic direction of time has to do with entropy, which is the second law of thermodynamics: things move from order to disorder, not the other way around. If you knock over a cup, the coffee falls out - the coffee doesn't go into the cup like a movie run backwards.

On the other hand, if you're trying to imagine what the pre-universe was like, time is different: it has no border. Yes there was a big bang 15 billion years ago, but before that it "just was" - in fact there was no time "before that."

That's what Stephen Hawking says, and as I posted a couple of weeks ago, you have to read him if you want to try and understand it any better than that. I read his paragraphs over and over, and I still have a hard time grasping a lot of it.

I misspoke. The point was that the Judeo - Christian view was unique.

Nick - regarding time without border - that's in "Brief History of Time"? I'm going to have to pull that out. My understanding is that time and space are inseparably linked (the principle of equivalence). Thus you cannot describe time before the big bang.

This is not limited to just fanatics. Any person who is devoted to their religion puts a limit on their point of view. This is why organized religion promotes division among people. As the world gets smaller through technology and population growth, eventually (maybe in 100 years, maybe in 1000) everyone will have to adhere to the same worldview, and it ain't gonna be Christianity, Muslim, Judaism or any of today's religions (unless one dominates through genocide, and we know that ain't happening). You may be reading this with a bit of confusion if you know that a large part of my living comes from producing Christian music. The fact is, I'm not a religious person myself. I get paid to produce good music and I happen to live in a very Catholic town.

I am not implying, I am observing. Hopi has it right. But the first order of business is to stop the violence and terror. When the religious right strap schrapnel filled bombs to their bodies to kill innocent people, it is time for immediate action. Rudolph spent several years in hillbilly country - squealing like a pig - and was finally caught. Fundamentalists who hide in foreign countries for protection are going to be tougher to catch.

Now you are back to the topic. Doesn't entropy contradict evolution?

This idea and the concept of infinity hurt my brain. One of the arms of string theory predicts a complete universe exists within a Planck's distance. When this universe collapses, it falls into that distance and the other expands out in a big bang.

So far the maesurements taken have shown that the present expansion is increasing rather than slowing. This gives rise to the speculation that there must be undiscovered forces repeling the larger object's gravity attraction. I wonder if it isn't similiar to the weak and strong forces seen at the atomic level.

Why would time have to flow in only one direction? In almost every case, there is always a counter to a known. Electron, positron - and the neutral neutron. 3 quarks, in fact 3 family of quarks. As long as time exists, then it follows that it could have 3 states (directions as it were) forward, backward and neutral.

I don't know what any of that is. I am just a dumb redneck from the Bible belt who moved to Minnesota to marry my High School sweetheart.

Who cares what Hawikings says, if it is wrong? Who cares if Ianstien was wrong about E=Mc Sq.

Is there a smaller than one beat per second? How about one beat per year?

If there was nothing before the big bang, what banged? Nothing? How did we know that then?

An aquantance of mines dad invented the carbon dating system we now use. Many argue that time effects the dating and the arguments about leaving a dead duck on the beach affecting the dating is an argument that can and should be looked into further, but it does give us an idea of what we look at with it.

A wall in or at the lake in Pereu (tittycocka) sp., (but you knew that, right?), has a carbon date of 22,000 years, is it wrong, could be, does it matter, maybe, does it give us an indication of where we came from, no. Does it help in figuring out where and why we are here, maybe. Did Ienstein realize that when the ballon was dropping that it also got taller, no, did that effect the outcome of his famous equasion, yes because he thought it only got longer.

I am a fanatic about music and consider myself as an audio biggot. I only want to do it my way and don't care if someone else does it any other way it could be done. Is that wrong, bad or OK? Fine, well what about other beliefs? Should I be punnished for not moving from what I believe is the right way to do it? I haven't killed anyone over my beliefs, maybe effected thier lives with my fanatic beliefs and came up with a good sounding recording, did that justify the means? The lead singer is crying in the corner and the guitar player is thinking of quiting because he dosn't understand the process. Who cares, they walk out with what they need to go on thier merry way with a great recording and a nightmare recollection of a recording session. If there metal is strong and it tested good under fire will it be a good experiance?

We are still cought up in the symptoms of a war to controll all of humanity, but no one is looking at the problem because we naturly drift to the emotional issues that make up the real problem, diversity and controll. Without diversity we have sheep willing to follow the leader, or a leader. That is controll.... Should we bring up a bunch of fanatic kids that have been breed to destroy the Islamic population? Should we pay our tax to the Islamic groups only to be killed later? The dead sea scrools mention Mohamid so they were around then, just with a differant slant on the whole creation thing and they took over the holy places in thier neck of the woods while they morfed into thier holy places, I'm talking Meca here. It was a cristian holy place before it turned black.

I know I ramboling, but this thread is long and a little off corse. anyone who believes there is a beginning is more than a little off course, in my book. I will only accept that there is a start to the story and that is not the beginning.

What if you looked at it this way:
Were humans designed to fly around in airplanes? On any given day human beings can fall out of the sky from an altitude of 40,000 feet. Tell that to somebody 100 years ago. We can get in a car and zip around with zero effort, and potentially smash into something at a speed of 70 miles an hour. We have ten thousand man made satellites orbiting the earth, most of which is garbage. There are countless man made radio signals emitting from our atmosphere. Mankind has the potential of eliminating himself and virtually all life on the planet with nuclear weapons. We are already doing it slowly with pollution and greenhouse gases. In 100 years, oil will be gone, which took nature tens of millions of years to produce. All of these things seem entropic to me.

Buttrumpet, is this really a fact? If it is a guess, I would guess the opposite: that there is LESS Christianity right now (at least in the U.S.). I could be wrong, though.

While it is interesting to see how Christianity (especially the Catholic church) has tracked alongside politics during the last several centuries, it isn't really fair to imply that "Christianity" as a belief is somehow responsible for the bad behavior of all of these people. People are still responsible for their own behavior as individuals, whether or not they subscribe to a particular religion or ideology. Just because you call yourself a great guitarist or an environmentalist doesn't make it so. It still comes down to how you behave--there are BAD Christians as there are bad muslims and bad democrats. So you cannot assign blame to an ideology or religion, I'm afraid.

zrocks, I sprained my ankle. Your answer: "9/11." Our government is developing "usable" nuclear weapons against all logic. "9/11." The FCC sucks. "9/11."The religious right is using sanctimony to justify imposing their values on other people and take away their rights. "9/11; and furthmore, you're filled with hatred."

No. It takes more energy to produce things than they end up with, so the extra energy dissipates and contributes to the entropy of the universe.

Dorkus, I believe it's in "A Brief History of Time," and I know it's in "The Illustrated Theory of Everything."

JM + HA = Jack Mack and the Heart Attack. They were playing at the Olympics in Atlanta when the bomb went off.

As much as I believe science has the most reasonable explaination of the nature of the "physical" universe, I don't buy into the big bang theory.

I was in the village at the time. After the swimming events, we would go to the pool and jump off the diving boards and swim around. Across the street was the chow hall. I had friends in the press building - overlooked the park area. Couldn't get in or out of the village for several hours. Big guys with guns. We were hoping to meet up and catch some tunes but it was not to be that night.


Another book would be 'Quantum' by Jim Al-Khalili.

Then how do you explain the background radiation that we can see is left over from it, Jeremy? Every time you turn on a TV with no tuner, some of the snow you see is left over from the Big Bang.

Do you have a better theory, or is it just that you don't like the idea?

Nick, I sprained my ankle. Your answer: "Bush is responsible" Our government is developing "usable" nuclear weapons against all logic. "Bush is responsible" The FCC sucks. "Bush is responsible" The religious right is using sanctimony to justify imposing their values on other people and take away their rights. "Bush is responsible; and furthmore, you're filled with hatred."

For the record, government topics are a whole other thread. I thought this was creationism vs scienceism.

I believe religion played a huge part in the last election and continues through all levels of politics. Just look at the recent appointments to the Supreme Court. These people were obviously put in place to overturn Roe vs Wade and to lay a conservative foundation for many years to come. If this faction of people was shrinking, how do you account for all of this? There are televangelists building 50,000 seat arenas for the sole purpose of herding followers in and shaking them down for their money. Only professional sports teams had this kind of clout in the past. Do you know how much money it takes to build an arena? If these groups were not growing in numbers how would this be possible?

I personally don't care what religion you ascribe to but I do object to the ridiculous notion of religious whackos proposing to replace my child's science class with religious voodoo, no matter what type of religion it is. I myself was a teacher years ago and I can tell you that fellow teachers in the scientific community are appalled and insulted over the seemingly never-ending assault which threatens their livelihood and their integrity. If you want your own personal religion taught to your child then send them to religious schools.

You completely missed my point concerning religion. I was simply pointing out how religion, of any type, can be sometimes used in a counter-productive manner. To simply enter any religion with blind faith is asking for trouble. I never implied that Christianity was the root of evil. I only pointed to a few circumstances where it was used in a harmful way whether intentional or not.

As a matter of fact Bush IS responsible for every one of those problems but my ankle!

But why don't you get what I'm saying if I don't spell it out like Dick and Jane?

You're trying to say that people shouldn't complain about the religious right, since what they're doing pales in comparison to the violence perpetrated by Muslim fundamentalists. My point is that just because what they do is worse, it doesn't make the religious right any better.

Or are you saying that bad is bad whether it's Christian or Muslim or anything else? If so, I agree with that. But what the **** does that have to do with being consumed with hate?

I am sure Time or somebody like that has done a survey on religion/Christianity to see how prevalent it is now versus say, the fifties. My guess is still that Christianity is less popular today, based on how many empty churches I see.

I must say, I think it's a stretch to suggest that a "Faction" of people put Supreme Court members in place with the sole intention of overturning Roe Vs. Wade. Frankly, I don't think most people care about Roe Vs. Wade as much as the political gliteratti would have you believe.

So true. Politics as sports feeds on itself - there are now umpteen national cable "news" channels, all of which are broadcasting 24 hours a day, screaming louder from the fringe to grab our attention. Sadly, the distinctive lines between politics and news media are not blurred - they have simply disappeared. There seems to be far more objectivity now amongst the voting public than amongst the so-called journalists. Hence, Bush's precipitous fall in approval ratings. I think the public is finally wising up and not drinking from the media Kool Aide.

It's not a stretch *at all*, Fiery, in fact it's a shrinkage! Do you know why Bush's personal ****ing lawyer withdrew herself? Because the religious right wanted an anti-abortion right-wing creep and they didn't know she was conserative enough! The fact that she was Bush's personal lawyer and totally unqualified didn't bother them at all.

And do you remember the Million Women March a year ago last Spring? That was huge. Abortion rights are *very* important to a lot of people in this country. It's a highly contentious issue.

I agree that it is a highly contentious issue; but with all due respect, I don't believe our country considers it the MOST important issue, that's all. And I don't believe a Supreme Court member has been appointed by a faction at all.....

I believe you are mistaken. Quantum Mechanics does not predict additional dimensions; those dimensions are a creation of string theorists attempting to resolve mathematical inconsistencies in QM. A singularity is defined as a point having infinite space-time curvature. The term often is used to mean any point which is undefined or fails to exist as part of a continuous manifold, and is not necessarily infinitesimal.

Your understanding of entropy is flawed as well. Evolution is in no way in conflict with the second law of thermodynamics. The Second Law states that the entropy of a closed system must increase (in fact, the direction of the "arrow of time" itself is typically defined by determining in which direction entropy increases). The Earth, and its species, do not constitute a closed system. Allow me to illustrate with a familiar metaphor:

A watchmaker takes raw metal and glass and creates a device of magnificent complexity and usefulness. Has this violated the Second Law? No, because the watchmaker and his creation are not a closed system. The discarded shards of metal, chipped glass, and the contents of his garbage are all a part of the same system, and were also "created" during his work. His body radiated heat, and he drank water and ate a Slim-Jim, pausing occasionally to take a leak or tend to his mistress.

Do you see how evolution through natural selection takes a small part of a huge system and creates magnificently complex species and interactions? Remember, our planet is bathed in radiation from many sources, most notably the Sun, which is probably more deserving of praise as a creator of life than any God humans have dreamt up.

What are closed and open systems, Audiorigami?

Fiery, you personally may not find it that important, but I think if you follow the news you'll see that there is a very focused campaign to rid America of abortion rights. The entire reason for appointing Alito is his stance on abortion.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/10/31/scotus.bush/

For example. Read some of the politicians' comments, and observe how Bush protests too much.

Is this a record thread?

Audiorigami,

I like your analogy. However, the part of the ID is played by the watchmaker. Without the intervention of the watchmaker, it is highly unlikely that the watch would have evolved.

This does not prove or disprove anything. I think the origin of a species is infinently easier than the origin of the universe.

You are correct about the dimensions being mathmatical necessities for string theory.

The idea of time not being fixed is what made Einstein come up with the theory of relativity. For time to vary (and it does) the speed of light has to be constant. Astronauts have measured time differences due to velocity resulting from the orbiting of the Earth. In other words, a watch on the ISS runs slower than a watch on Earth.

The idea of time being relative to the observer is something else.

We're talking about time itself not having a boundary. The way we picture it is that for a long time there was nothing, and then one day there was a big bang after which there was everything. And from here, that's what happened: about 15 billion years ago the universe started expanding.

But there was no "before" that. It's not a boundary, in other words.

And the harder you think about it, the more impossible it becomes to fathom.

Exactly what I hoped you'd say. My question is this: if you consider a watch so complex as to require a designer, what do you think about the complexity level of the designer itself? ID fails as a scientific theory because it is fundamentally flawed. Creationists (and IDers are creationists--a rose, by any other name, would still smell as sweet) hiding behind the complexity argument will claim that the myriad species on Earth are too complex to have evolved through natural selection due to environmental pressure and competition, yet will not balk at the concept of a being so complex it is omniscient, omnipresent, and atemporal.

The designer you claim to support is too complex to exist, by your logic, without being designed itself--and who did that, if I may ask?

No one is arguing against the apparent dilation of time and length viz. the Lorentz contractions. The notion of travel at extremely high velocities is a complete mindbender. Check out this amazing demonstration showing how length contraction due to relativistic speeds of travel is actually imperceptible to outside observers! (That is one of the many brilliant explorations of physics on this page, which I advise you to stay the hell away from if you have any work to do, as it will literally make time dilate in the space localized to your desk.)

Lastly, Nick, closed and open are classifications denoting different types of systems. A closed system is wholly self-contained, with no effects propagated to sources outside the system, and no interference coming from outside it either. This is usually only a metaphorical tool, as the only real closed system I'm aware of is our entire universe itself taken as a whole. An open system, on the other hand, is influenced by events and actions outside the system. It's convenient to consider many systems closed for practical purposes, because, for example, the gravitational force exerted by Jupiter on my mixing board is negligible (although full moons seem to cause fader lockup :p ). In the context of the 2nd Law, entropy (the measure of disorder, or unrecoverable energy) is said to always increase in a closed system. In any small part of that closed system, however, taken as a small sample, entropy may in fact increase due to outside effects.

That's a great point!

Audiorigami,

Whoa big fella. I am certainly not a Creationist. I view the two concepts as very different. ID could simply be a little grey man from Mars boinking a Gorilla (no offense Nick).

I am willing to consider anything reasonable that fits with what I can observe or measure. Creation is out.
ID maybe but hard to prove.
Evolution, lots of good science but too many holes to be considered anywhere near complete.

I am working on a new theory called IDvolution.

Tell me some key tenets of Intelligent Design without once referring to evolution. Let's hear some verifiable scientific predictions. It's my opinion that ID merely states the obvious, just as you have. Namely, that the theory of evolution through natural selection is an incomplete explanation of the origin of life or of current species. That is not a hypothesis in any scientific sense of the word--it is merely stating a truism, since no one claims that evolution is complete or explains everything--so again, tell me what constructive claims ID makes in order to attempt to interpret speciation or biogenesis without referring to a creator (because that would make you a creationist) or to evolution (because it does not assert to explain it all). I really am curious, because I have had this conversation with many people, and haven't heard a single one.

Audiorigami - then you tell us who the watchmaker is. Is our universe a closed system? It seems that you're creating a logical pretzel trying to reconcile complexity and entropy. At some point the laws of our universe have to kick in.

Answering a question by asking a question is just avoiding it. The answer to who designed the designer is "We don't know." Would you expect that we could comprehend it?

You're right about that link - I have to go back to it right now.

I'm not sure whether entropy is part of your logical pretzel, but I have to repeat that entropy is *not* at all at odds with evolution. The energy it takes to create something - and that doesn't necessarily mean a being is putting out the energy - is dissipated as heat, and that increases the entropy of the universe.

If that's what you mean, it's not at all a logical pretzel.

There is no logical pretzel. There may be an inductive Saltine somewhere, but I haven't tasted it.

Seriously though, educate yourself on entropy via this link. It is heavy on the math, which is a good thing--we are discussing deeply examined theories of science, and looking at science without understanding the underlying mathematics is like reading the back page of a set of Cliff's notes and expecting to fathom War and Peace.

Secondly, I make no claims about a watchmaker existing at all with respect to the universe. That was a metaphor chosen only to show that in a localized space, and ignoring outside influences, it can often appear that complexity is increasing. I was trying to point out that, in the watchmaker analogy, you can't consider the watch without considering the disorder created by the watchmaker during his work. This is to say, the belief that evolution somehow runs afoul of the 2nd Law is sorely mistaken. The article linked above will explain in concrete terms what my metaphor sought to reveal through analogy.

I purposely chose the watchmaker analogy because I am aware that that is how creationists and IDers view the dawn of life. I thought it appropriate.

In my view, there is evidence to suggest that life can be formed from non-life, that complexity can arise from simplicity, and that humans evolved from earlier forms of life. There is, however, no evidence indicating the existence of a creator or designer that does not simply point out the gaps in current theory.

These missing links are empty spaces remaining to be filled--and empty space explains nothing.

What shall we use to fill the empty spaces, where waves of hunger roar?

Didn't Steely Dan do an album called Pretzel Logic? Maybe they hold the key to our universe.

STOP THE HELL OUT

??????????????????

Ok, I well officaly annoynouce in my misspelling ways, THAT THIS IS THE LONGEST THREAD EVER IN THE HISTORY OF DA7.COM. And it's an honor for me, your humble dung beatle loving his jeremyness ways, to have actually started this thread. This thread should be published so others in our world could learn from our collective knowlage.

To be perfectly honest, in the end, science won out. The somewhat unbelieveable argument of the christian view died out in the face a stark REALITY. Not to say there is no spirtual entity in our lives and in the universe, but it can't be at odds with visual, measurable realities that can be proven as fact. Fact is fact, right???

Actually, I think the fact that this is a long thread means the kooks won out by having framed the debate on their terms.

I find the subject really interesting, of course, so that's not 100% true. But as I keep saying: we're living in the land where ignorance is bliss.

Actually no. I agree with Nick that Ignorance is bliss. I just have a differenc view of what is ignorance in this thread.

Let me start out by saying you, Jeremy, are not accurately stating the depth of the belief when you limit it to Christian. It is not solely a Christian belief. In fact, considering the Judeo-Christian-Muslamic-Hinduvian-Buddist population (not to mention some Native American - North and South beliefs), you are quite the minority.

Personally, I would be happy if both sides of the great debate would admit shortcomings in their respective theories and begin to work together to find the facts. If not, then everyone will remain blissful.

It's not a matter of there being two sides. There are people who recognize the gaps in their information (mostly due to the lack of bones found from the era about 3 million years ago) - i.e. those of us who believe that evolution is a pretty good description of what has happened over hundreds of millions of years - and those who are struggling to reconcile their religious views with what we know to be reality.

It's not a two-sided debate. You might find two sides about specifics of evolution, such as why such-and-such a species developed a certain way. But creationists who think people who believe the facts of evolution are just being stubborn or placing too much belief in science are aggressively ignorant. This is not a matter of "middle ground" between two equal points of view, since they're only contradictory if you insist on taking the Bible literally instead of symbolically.

In other words, zrocks, you are defending ignorance. There's a lot we don't know, but that doesn't discount what we do know beyond any shadow of a doubt. I've said many times that you may be right that God designed evolution, but that has nothing to do with the fact that it exists, nor does it create another "side" to the debate. That's why I say the discussion has been framed by religious right kooks who want to make it 2-sided issue.

zrocks and others: ID was invented by creationists in order to create a "debate" where none existed. Within the scientific academic works, there is NO debate that evolution occurs, or that it is responsible for what we see today. The "debate" was manufactured in order to appeal to peoples' sense of fairness. Where there is no debate, one can create one by saying "Well, let's look at both sides of the argument and let the reader decide!" Well, simply put, there is no other side apart from raw creationism. ID is a political tool meant to reduce the influence of science by fabricating a "debate" where none exists.

Read the so-called "Wedge Document" , written by the Discovery Institute, one of the premier ID think-tanks in the US. It spells out their goals in plain view for all to see.

The fabricated debate is a clever tool for giving disproportionate face time to a small group of fanatics. Think about it, this can be done about anything: We all love the DA7. But what if one or two people believe that digital mixing boards cause cancer? Of course, this is a ludicrous belief, but by claiming that "both sides of the debate" need to be heard, this small group creates a controversy where there was none before. Putting ID on the same ground as evolution is completely ridiculous. They are entirely separate disciplines, and furthermore ID has, to date, made no predictions or hypotheses, nor has a single shred of evidence popped up supporting its cause. Attempting to frame this as a "debate" is just a trick, an attempt to fool people into thinking they are being fair when in fact they are falling for a ruse.

What are you some sort of creationist?

This is what I believe also. So where do we differ? Other than the fact that I have more tolerance for a differing view. An ignorant view in your opinion but I prefer to not get into name calling. I am much too sensitive for that.

I don't personally happen to believe that, as you well know. But I would never call someone who does believe it ignorant.

Moreover that's not what Intelligent Design people say. They say that since there's no smoking gun evidence for every evolutionary link that occurred over hundreds of thousands of years, evolution is wrong; species were designed by God, who *poof* made them appear on their own one day.

And of course anyone who knows there's absolutely no reason to believe that is accused of being intolerant and unwilling to find middle ground between two equally valid points of view.

Or the 6000-year-old earth nonsense, which one might say has been proven wrong. That's especially ignorant.

What Audiorigami says, in other words.

Crap, this went too far in the last couple days for me to catch up. Since everyone wants to conclude this thread, I'll just chime in and go back to hiding.

Yes, evolution exists - undeniably. The level at which it exists should've been what this thread centered on.

Each belief system has holes - Being a Chrisitian does NOT answer all the questions that a Christian may have for himself. He needs to search using all available tools - including science. A Christian does one thing that a naturalist doesn't however - admit his faith.

Does a naturalist have faith? If he stands on any fundamental unproven belief he does. Taking a position without all of the facts is faith. I'd argue that everyone here has a faith.

Just like Nick, if you show me without a doubt that evolution was the process used to bring us here typing on our computers, I would still get up and put my pants on in the morning. Evolution is not incompatible my faith. God is capable of creating in this manner.

Why don't I believe in evolution on a major scale? Because it is lacking something - A MECHANISM. Someone spell it out for me without hiding behind "Anything is possible with tons of time." No one has made a case for spontaneous generation and punctuated equilibrium (well, Audiorigami gave it a decent stab). These holes ARE the theory. I'm open to it - just give me a reasonable mechanism.

Why did we talk about the big bang and the origins of the universe when this topic was about evolution? Are they related? Kind of. Why did we talk about spiritual stuff? I guess that's kind of related to. Was this necessarily a discussion about evolution, or was it really about whether or not there is a God? Were you here to defend your faith?

Well, if you read Germee's first post, that was the context in which he started the thread.

Dorkus, about the mechanism: it seems to me that some things simply do what they do without anything controlling them. Why do plants move toward the light, for example? That's behavior or sorts, but they obviously don't have a brain. And how do marine animals like jellyfish that lack a brain know what to do with themselves?There's no CPU that controls them. They just have basic behaviors.

And I think a lot of the universe is like that.

Its funny (to me) that you can look at something and see it 180 degrees out of phase from the way I see it. I think a lot of the universe is like that as well. The evolution(?) of instinct and such just adds to the complexity and beauty of what we see. If evolution is true, then it is an amazing and (almost) perfect tool. It seems to have purpose and direction built into it, but of course it can't. Animals NEED instinct; plants NEED light. It's incredible that they would develop these right when they were needed. Almost like they were designed.

Why is that 180 degrees out of phase with what I said?

Maybe if the two of you re-align yourselves with the planets you will be in phase....

Well, then maybe not. I was making a case for intelligent design, creationism, whatever you call it.

You made the case for everything being a wonder, which of course it is. There isn't really a "case" for ID or Creationism whatever I call it, because it's simply a belief, just as my belief that it's not what happened is only a belief. None of us will ever know whether or not a higher being created the universe.

But we do know that evolution is occuring.

The End

Nick, my friend on Da7.com, what are you saying????
Just because you can't find a brain on those animals does not mean they don't have one. All it means is that you or your friends can't find it. There is a lot of information latly that says that the path to the brain stores a lot of information that 'we' previously thought was a function of the brain. That tech. is already used in computers.

What would you call the macinism that allows the plant to seek out the sun? If the plant is hooked up to elictrodes it gives off impulses if its buddy gets trashed or branches pulled off or just bad vibed. Does the jellyfish only live by the polarity of its atmosphire?

This is a great topic and very interesting to see how we fit in to it. Does anyone here know of the 'Sepher Yezirah'? It explains how the jewish faith believes the big bang happened and what that being did to effect that change. And of course how the language was compiled and its numeroligy.

I think there are many here on this rock, at this time, who understand how we got here and why. My feeling is that it is not to make money or to be natural the way we have been taught (most of us believe that a 7 11 on the corner is a natural thing and being to far from one is a problem).
Personally, I don't think that decaying teeth is natural, the mummys don't have bad teeth, just our generation and our parents believing what the government has beem saying to us about what to eat. Is living under a power line natural? The government dosn't think so, they say 350 yards from them is safe but they let buildings go up in those areas just the same. I still maintain that we are being duped into thinking the way most of us think so we can be good slaves.

No one has mentioned that the scientific couminity has not debated this subjict for many years because they think that they have the answers already in the chromonazonal evidance of the 8 differant varities of all living humanoids.

Until more evidance pops out, I'll stick with the stories I have found about it and allow all other views to coexist with mine. I'm thinking we all need to get out of the box more.

What about a sperm cell? Does it have a brain that me and my friends can't find? It swims like mad up the tube in search of that egg. Is that muscle memory? Does it have a soul?

Yes, those are rhetorical questions.

And by the way, Gurmi is always thought of as the champion misspeller around here, but I think it's high time you got some recognition too.

So what your saying yng is your still on the fence waiting to see what happens? Are you not a contradiction, because if you aren't, you is. You sound like a science guy to me

Jeremy, fact is fact only if you agree with the premise, therefore logic is a mis-match of wits and wills. This statement is probably inacurrate?

The fact that you admit it is only a belief is good enough for me. Maybe we're in alignment then.

Well, me and MY friends aren't out there looking for sperm brains. They would be too small to find anyway. It might be possible, however, to engage a nanoagent or a nanobot to find a sperm brain, but we might never know....BTW, is it possible for robots to have a soul?

That's an interesting question, Fiery. According to Ray Kurzweil, the answer is yes. My instinct is no, but I think I might change my mind if we were closer to being able to create a robot that even approaches the complexity of a living being.

And you could see a sperm cell's brain with nothing more complicated than a regular optical microscope if it had one. Trust me, they don't have brains. I came up with that as reductio ad absurdum for Key, who knows beyond a doubt that I'm a dreaded inside-the-box thinker for not understanding that jellyfish so obviously have a different kind of brain.

...What's a soul?

That's not rhetorical--really, what is it? Define it. Anyone. I bet we'll all have different definitions, and I'd love to hear them.

Just to throw it out there, I may as well say that I think the concept of the soul is superstition, and is unnecessary because the mind, housed in the brain, is all that I am. My memories are there, I make my decisions there, and I imagine things there. Where's my soul?

It's another example, in my opinion, of humans thinking they're the super-special chosen ones. Do animals have a soul? Plants? Microbes?

I understand the desire to be a part of something infinite, everlasting, and undying. We are--and I call that thing consciousness, not soul. What do you all think?

I don't know if it's everlasting - I doubt it, actually - but to me it's that spark you see in everyone, the life force that's larger than just our bodies - even though that's where it's housed. Animals have it too, just less of it (and some animals have more than others).

If you see someone really powerful like Miles Davis (if there's anyone else like that), you know in an instant that it's not superstition at all. But we all have some of that.

Plants and microbes, well, I don't think they have a soul in the same sense. But I could be wrong. Consciousness is something else.

Consciousness is an instinctive movement(unconcieces behavior).Instinct is a Learned unknowen, (Loren Isely(Star Thrower). Therfore Small animals have a brain that tells them how to avoid danger, how ever small it is. Was Emerson a fool or a pure simpleton?

Well here's the deal, science can only explaij the phenominal world, what we can see, observe, measure. Religion attempts to step beyond that to go to a deeper level of what life really is.

becuse without a doubt, there is a deeper level to our live other than sight, hearing , taste , touch , smell, our consinous that intergrates these sensory imputs, and on a deeper level, uncounsisouness. (How's that for spelling, f -it.)

In eastern thought, it goes deeper than un uncounsious level, to the Alya onsiness, were karma is sytored, another wise our actions, both good and bad, like a bank account of credtis and debits.

Then below that is the essence of univeral life, with we all are apart of. The deepest level of life. Pure, energy.

The question is, how do we tap into this energy that we posses? I believe I have encountered what that is, do to extreme good fortune.

There is no god in control of my life, I am, and I am responsible for my circumstances due to my past action, karma. It only makes perfect sense. Our lives are energy, which originated form the universe itself. I'd love to share with you what I have found to be what that energy to be. But i'm not going to use this forum to "push" my religous beliefs. Anyhoo, peace, we all need some.

you sound like budda. nothing wrong with that. I agree, you make your own luck, but I wouldn't call it karma, just good fortune.

I'm not trying to be a smart alec here and would be the first to admit my knowledge of evolution is probably the least of all the others on this forum but since we're talking so much about it I have a couple of perplexing issues. At least to me.
If we supposedly came from one certain line of apes, why are there so many variations in people? Like blacks, whites, yellow, brown etc. and all with distinct features to go with their ethnic background. Also, what about midgets and or dwarfs. What; did they come from chimps? There is a whole race of smaller people with again very distinct and simular features. I mean a plum tree can have several types of plums on the same same tree but they have to be grafted in on purpose by the farmer, they just don't appear differently on the same tree naturally. If you look at nature, any fruit tree has been bearing the same fruit for ever as far as we know. Grass has always been grass and a fig has always been a fig. It hasn't mutated into an orange. Why is it only people and animals are the only thing on the planet that supposedly has mutated into completly different species? I mean, mud didn't used to be silver or gold, right? Water didn't used to be sulfuric acid? I mean to me, in some respects the idea of evolution is as rediculous as some of you smarter guys among us claim the idea of God is. As far as the big bang goes, what, was there just one big huge dirt clod lodged somewhere in space that one day blew up and ended up creating all the planets and the whole universe? and by the way, there was no time before that, it just was, and it didn't come from anywhere, it just was and there was no space for it to blow into it just did? Talk about far fetched easy to explain because we have no better idea's and far be it for us to consider there is some encredible master genious behind all this. All science is reduced to precise mathematics and not just random chance. All nature operates on a beautiful balance of harmony with itself that at the bottom of it is a very complex string of mathematicl formulas. To me, to accept that all we see and all the complexities and beauty of life not only here but in the whole universe is by some random chance cooked up by some random ingredients in an ancient primordial soup is the fairy tail and the hard nut to swallow. We tend to see and judge this life from a very shallow viewpoint from a very small field of vision based on this very small speck of dirt in the universe within our limited span of years and blather on and on about how much we think we know. I don't believe any of us know much of anything and suspect the reality of all this is much much bigger than we in our finite minds can imagine.

So evolution and the primordial soup is the fairy tale, and not the earth being created in 6 days? A god placing all life and every possible creature in that time? Adam and Eve, biting into an appple condeming the entire human race to original sin, Jesus being sent here and killed, and you are responsible for that, that's not the fairy tale?

Mixandburn, you have a lot of misconceptions about the theories in there. All life has evolved and continues to evolve, including plants and other species of animals.

Humans migrated to different areas of the globe from our origins as great apes in Africa. We look different due to genetics!

As to the Big Bang, no, there wasn't a clump of dirt that suddenly exploded. You can't even say something "was" there, because there was no "was" before about 15 billion years ago!

But the Big Bang did happen - the universe started enlarging very rapidly, first to the size of a baseball, etc. etc. etc. It's still expanding, of course, and there is no "other side" where there's no space - space itself is curved.

Nobody knows why it started, whether a previous universe collapsed the way black holes do and started again, whether there are other universes, and so on. We do know that the details have to be exactly the way they are for us to be here, which defies the odds.

By the way, small stars that burn themselves out collapse into black holes that become a single point with no size, so the idea of "nothing" with incredible mass isn't only the pre-universe. Nobody has seen one (or its event horizon) directly, but there's evidence that they exist.

Mixandburn, plants do evolve! Here\'s a very brief rundown, and here is a more detailed look at a few different plants.

It's interesting that you ask about apples. What we refer to as "natural selection" is a process involving environmental pressure--competition for limited resources, mates, etc. Human activity has also applied selective pressure to species of plants and animals, and the apple is a great example. For over two thousand years, people have harvested apples, and have affected the shape, flavor, and size of apples themselves by selecting which apple seeds to plant and cultivate. Today's apples--juicy, very sweet, and huge--are very different from the apples people grew a thousand years ago, which historical evidence indicates were much smaller and more tart.

Let's say you plant two apple trees--one on either side of a hill. The apples from those two trees will be a little different, because the immediate environments of the two trees are different. Now, let's say you pick the apple you like better, and then plant two seeds from that apple--again, one on either side of the hill. Again, you wait a few years and pick the "better" apple, and again you plant the seeds. After many generations, if you compare the apple you have with an original specimen, they may be quite different, because you influenced which apple trees reproduced.

If you look at the DNA from both a black man and an asian woman, they will both be similar. All humans are the same species, regardless of their external morphology--it's just that in the tens of thousands (probably more) of years that people have lived on earth, different people were exposed to different environmental pressures depending on where they lived. Hence, for example, Norweigans are quite pale (there is little direct sunlight in Norway for much of the year), and natives of the Andes have vascular and respiratory systems capable of dealing with life at very high altitudes.

Mud doesn't really undergo selective pressure, because it doesn't consume anything, doesn't reproduce, and isn't alive. Hence, mud doesn't really undergo selection or evolution.

While I understand and agree with much of your post, I'd like you to clarify this a bit further. Remember, changes have to be genetic. Is it your position that darker skinned people were less capable of surviving in this environment, so their genes kind of died off in this region? I'm confused as to which mechanism created this. (And I'm not trying to make a point).

DNA trails have been tracked around the globe, beginning in southern Africa, migrating through southern Asia across the oceans into Australia and then back into western Asia where they split into all directions including Europe, what is now Russia, Mongolia, the Far East, etc. The Mongolians of what would now be Siberia, crossed the Bering Straits into what is now Alaska with their Reindeer/Caribou (the staple of their diet, shelter, clothing). From there they migrated south. Eskimo and American Indian DNA is very similar to Mongolian. Therefore North and South America are some of the last places to be inhabited.

Lighter pigmented people are found as you move further from the equator since they are exposed to less direct sunlight and the body needs to absorb certain nutrients from the sun such as vitamin D. Just as lighter skinned people exposed to sunlight develop higher levels of pigment to protect them from over-exposure, so have those people closer to the equator.

And this information is passed genetically?

It appears so.

Dorkus, evolution isn't only survival of the fittest - there are other kinds of selection. Someone who looks like Angelina Jolie has an easier time getting laid than someone who looks like Eleanore Roosevelt.

You also have to consider the time it took to reach Buttrumpet's distribution plan.

(I'm just reading about this, so it's right in front of me.)

Our origins in Africa as great apes: 7 million BC.

South-central Asia: by 1 million BC.

Europe: by 500,000 BC.

Australia: 40,000 BC.

Northeastern Europe (Siberia, etc.): by 20,000 BC.

Alaska into Canada: by 12,000 BC.

North America: by 11,000 BC.

South America (present Argentina): by 10,000 BC.

Greenland: by 2,000 BC.

Polynesia (including Hawaii): by 500 AD.


So it's not like this happens overnight.

Reproduction-wise, Angelina Jolie is much more fit than Eleanor Roosevelt.

What this boils down to is the bible is a crock of ****. It's a lie based fairy tale that needs to be exposed for what it is. There is no supreme being that has a
"plan" for your life, wake up. It's a load of horse crap.

ok so your left wondering , well if that's not the truth, then what is? All I can say is open your mind, to the world, to life. Compassion is not the exclusive right of any religion. Compassion is the nature of the universe. It's why we are here. Love and compassion, is not the right of any religion, it's just why we are here and also why we suffer.

Jeremy;
To say compassion is the way of the universe is to contradict your thoughts on God and religion. At least this last post you made. If we are indeed nothing more than the by product of some primordial soup than we are nothing more than brute animals and act and react on nothing more than brute animal instinct. Too act in compassion and mercy, justice and equality indicates we are more than just animals. It would lead to a conclusion we are moral ethical beings. The part of humans that separate us from the animal kingdom. Where did that come from? I already know the old standby "it comes from thousands of years of evolutionary communal coexsistant" answer, but if all we are, and all we have become is merely by chance, where did the sense of right and wrong come from? To this day animals don't get that. One would think if evolution was just like it is preported to be, at least some other animals would have evolved beyond instinct by now and would be operating on a level on par with man. Like on the movie planet of the apes or something.Yes apes do have communities and a sort of family cast system but still they are driven by instinct and not moral values. Thats why chimps are so dangerous as pets. You may think they are your best friend and raise them from the time they are small babies but its a known fact when they grow up they have the potential at any time to turn on you and kill you. Would that chimp know any better and be tried in a court of law? No. Because it is a wild animal driven by instinct and not loyalty or friendship or values or consience. It doesn't understand such things.According to the evolutionary line of thinking, the universe and all that is within is driven by nothing but chance. It was all one big fluke that came out of nowhere and our lives, our families, our values, our hopes, our dreams, our accomplishments all mean nothing. So why care about anything? Why be loyal to your spouse or your kids or other loved oned? Why have loved ones? Why not kill, steal, cheat, extort and do whatever it takes to grab all we can because it all means nothing anyway right? Be a renegade, shirk responsibility, screw the law, screw my community, my neighbor and my country. Afterall, its just me against the world. Nothing else matters. No right. No wrong. A world where everything is relative and subjective to my will and desire? No thank you. That is not any kind of life to lead in my opinion. Life without hope? What a miserable existence. I do not ascribe to the thoughts of the religious zealots out there and by the way neither did Jesus according to history and the bible. Neither do I subscribe to the thoughts or idea's of secular humanists zealots. I don't believe the earth was made six thousand years ago. Why would a master builder who has all time on his side have to short cut such a big plan as earth inhabited by humans that would some day come to know and understand who he is? Proverbs chapter 8 talks about this by the way. I do however believe there is a loving creator we call God for lack of a better name, by which we all were fearfully and wonderfully made. I do believe there is an open invitation to whoever would take it, to know this creator called God that by the way has nothing to do with the religious right wing affiliation. I do believe that mankind posseses a spirit within him or her that goes on after we leave these bodies. I have personally witnessed, experienced and have had first hand interaction with supernatural events that defie the natural progression of things. The evidence of what I have experienced is far more compelling to me than the opinions of those who have not a clue to the reality of God.so I guess the scientifically evolved community of secular humanists can go on all day about the rediculous notion of an intelligent being that placed man on this planet for a purpose beyond their grasps to understand. They can dig in the dirt till doomsday to find old bones and create their own "our way or the highway, we're right your wrong" religion called evolution that excludes any possibility of a devine creator of it all. They can find corrolations between this tree and that bush to bolster their case against God. Still, to this day I would challenge one of them to prove God does not exist. They cannot. My belief in God as creator is big enough to include not only this ancient earth but all the processes that have occured whatever they may be that has got us here to this point in time and my belief system will as well take me beyond this place when I leave this body. Others may do what they will, as for me and my house we will serve this creator of all things. I choose to live my life filled with the faith hope and love that relationship affords. I have come to understand this God encompasses all things; seen and unseen and not just the imaginations of some religious people groups scattered across the land. Like Glenn said early on in this thread "evolution smevolution", I could care less. The fact is, we're all here, now, and moving through fast. Make the best of it. Whatever that might be.

I have nothing against your beliefs, m&b, but your idea of what makes humans different from animals is simply wrong.

What about the gorilla who rescued the baby who fell into her cage, for example? And haven't you seen how dogs have emotions just like ours? Of couse they're much simpler, but they're no less good or bad than we are.

It seems to me that most people (well, maybe not Jeremy) believe that human beings have "spirituality." How come? Probably because of reasons similar to mixandburn's rant. The idea of a morally relativistic society is abhorrent to most of us.

But most of us shy away from defining our spirituality. How come? Is it because we think it sounds goofy?

It kind of leaves us Christians hanging in the wind. We're attempting to define something that is ultimately undefinable, and it's really easy to say it's a crock without offering any alternatives. You may think that spiritual issues can't be defined, so what's the point? But then you can carry on about your "own" version of sprituality without, again, defining it. And somehow this makes it superior. If you believe in some kind of greater truth, please share it with us.

How about this - If there is a human spiritual truth, isn't it universal? Why would you want to keep it secret?

To those that don't believe in spirituality, how do you answer mixandburn?

I for one have already answered how I feel about that. Yes, despite all the competition and apparent separation when you zoom in, there's a universal connection between everyone and everything, and that's what "God" is for me: an inherent "force."

Every religion has a different way of interpreting that - which is why I find the "and you're not" aspect of religion so ludicrous (e.g. you won't share the afterlife with me if you have a different orientation).

Another way of putting this: I don't believe in a creator outside the universe, I believe in a universe that's constantly creating itself. It's an organism that we're all part of, in other words.

And just because I'm not religious and don't believe there's anyone listening when you pray, that doesn't mean I think my viewpoint is superior to anyone else's.

Dorkus, eather you can't read or havn't read any of my posts.

M&B, I don't agree. I think animals do have a consience (especially my dog!). There are many, many examples in which this loyalty and compassion is documented. Remember the elephant that saved the Tsunami survivors, or the turtle that took the baby hippo in?

http://www.rhsager.com/photos/uncategorized/hippo_turtle.jpg

I think what is even more astounding is the utter lack of respect and compassion we have given animals.

As I posted earlier, I completely agree with that (what Fiery says).

What does that really mean, dorkus? We all agree on lots of basic things - it's not cool to kill people, etc. etc. etc. - but ultimately we all make up our own values as we go along. Yes, morals are fluid, they're ultimately individual, and they have to do with the likelihood of getting caught. Look at how many different viewpoints there are among just the Christians on this board!

If you only look at what the words mean, the term "moral relativist" is a description of what we all are - Christian or not, whether or not you or even TLiX admit it. However, the term is loaded in a repulsive, offensive way to mean "anyone who's not Christian is probably immoral. Jesus says 'one way' and that's the only way." That just plain sucks, in fact it's morally reprehensible and has been at the root of countless evil throughout history.

That's why we have a legal system, warts and all: there is no "universal standard" of behavior.

Have you ever heard, say, a Jewish person talk about moral relativists?

In response to M&B: as others have already said, a continuum exists with regard to the mental abilities of animals. A great example is Koko, the gorilla who was taught sign language. She exhibits traits of love, affection, jealousy, desire, happiness--in short, most of the spectrum of emotions that humans feel. Coincidentally, I took sign language classes from a deaf man who got the chance to "talk" to Koko once. He said that it was completely uncanny to be able to converse with an ape, and that her grammar and skill reminded him of a deaf child. Weird!

How many of you have pet dogs which seem to exhibit happiness, shyness, or embarassment? I have a pet parrot, and damned if he doesn't show emotions in his own little way.

Remember the episode of "The Simpsons" where Homer is mistaken for a sasquatch? His captors eventually release him, saying that what they thought was an intelligent beast was really just a below-average human. That's sort of what we're trying to define here: when does a smart beast become an intelligent being? Humans are obviously the latter, and it's my belief that our use of language is what separates us. Incidentally, dogs, parrots, whales, and apes all communicate through what can be called proto-language, but so far no other species has managed to do what we have done with it.

It's our language which makes us special, because it allows us to communicate complex as well as simple concepts to others. With this ability to communicate comes what I believe to be the foundation for replacing religious ethical standards, namely, the ability to recognize all other beings as independent and self-deterministic.

What this means is that because I recognize that other people have their own viewpoints, I know that it is completely unethical for me to force my views on them, or force my desires on them, or for me to limit their ability to live their lives the best way they see fit. That is the foundation of my ethical framework: do unto others as I would have them do unto me. I will not limit the freedoms of others, or infringe on the rights of others, because I would not want my rights limited or revoked.

From this single axiom come many corollaries. Help those in need. Be just. Avoid excess.

I disagree with your claim that a lack of adherence to traditionally religious values causes chaos and self-righteousness. In fact, I would contend that the type of religious belief you support causes self-righteousness, because one who follows those principles did not have to come to any conclusions on their own, and is not taught to respect the soverignty of every individual. Instead, they rely on the inherent "rightness" of their beliefs, and trust that "The Lord will judge."

I find that too fatalistic. In a universe with no intrinsic ethical framework, it's up to us to respect others, help others, and learn about others.

It goes back to nature versus nurture. I believe that we all the capacity and are meant to be sensitive, loving, compassionate human beings.

It would be an interesting experiment to see what would happen if you played "Bambi" to 500 four year olds from all over the world (except maybe Johnnie Rotten's kids, if he has any) and poll the emotional reaction.

My guess is that when Bambi's mother dies, the predominant feeling would be sadness and compassion. I don't believe such a response would necessarily come from how the children were raised, but is innate.

Great post, Audiorigami. You reach the same conclusions I do without getting mad.

"In fact, I would contend that the type of religious belief you support causes self-righteousness, because one who follows those principles did not have to come to any conclusions on their own, and is not taught to respect the soverignty of every individual. Instead, they rely on the inherent "rightness" of their beliefs, and trust that "The Lord will judge."

I believe that you would be hard pressed to find any of the above behavior taught in the New Testament anywhere. Jesus never taught that nor did he display that. That type of behavior never fits into "love the lord your God with all your heart and your Neighbor as yourself." Part of the challenge is that most people never see "true biblical behavior". What most people experience is the wacked extreme and that is too bad.

As you state that they "trust in the RIGHTNESS" of their beleifs" I'd say everyone is guilty of that here on both sides of the discussion. If no one thought they in themsleves were right, there would be no discussion - and what fun is that?

Merry Christmas... I mean have a good day!

just trying to get the discussion over 300!

J

** bump **

is this helping?

Nick and AO - Thanks for the revealing posts. I guess that you guys have more or less communicated your views before - but they seemed nebulous to an absolutist truth seeker such as myself. It seems that many (most?) on this forum ascribe to your type of world-view (and yes, Jeremy, you too - your last post ****ed me off - thus the unnecessary slight).

AO - Your point is well taken. Of course you don't have to be Christian to be moral. And - being a Christian doesn't make you moral. However, society needs to define some base morality in which to function as Nick points out.

In regards to self-righteousness, maybe it would help you to see it from a Christian insider's view - - I hear you! Self-righteousness is annoying to see in anyone. I think that younger, effusive Christians sometimes proclaim judgment on people or beliefs based upon (limited?) Biblical principles. Turn or burn messages can stir up a conversation. As you get older, you realize how little you know, and then you truly don't judge.

I can also see where a Christian's reliance on God as the ultimate judge is annoying when you don't believe in him. What can I say? Most Christians' quest for truth is a commitment to accepting that truth whether they like it or not. The concept of judgment is not really something that Christians look forward to. However, God may not be the hard ass that he's been sold as -- or he may be harder! The point is - a Christian believes in God and you don't - and that is about it. We don't know how God's going to judge, thus we shouldn't take it upon ourselves to do it. Any self-righteousness that you've experienced from Christians is unchristian-like.

While studying the history of the Christian Church (not necessarily the Catholic Church), I'm often struck by misperceived (from my viewpoint) world-views that were once commonly held. Similarly, some of those probably exist today, so we keep on searching and refining. Christians are still trying to figure things out, just like everyone else. We just do it with a fundamental belief that God exists and has revealed (some of) himself.

One more note on self-righteousness - - Many Christians are some of the most guilt-ridden people in existence. I'm kind of one of them. You even have to be concerned with your thoughts! Guilt-ridden people in general are prone to projecting. This could, of course, come across as judgmentalism. Guilt-ridden people, however, don't generally think of themselves as superior to others.

Regarding AO's point about an individual coming to conclusions on his own - I believe this to be a human problem. You have people from all walks of life that don't come up with individual, well-thought-out value systems. I know all types of shallow people.

You know, our entire Western society has a Judeo-Christian heritage. There are something like 240 million Christians in the U.S. Within Christianity there are many denominations. Some people are much more religious than others.

It's not like I'm going to sit here and say that all Christians are right-wing fundamentalists, they all think they're right and everyone else is wrong, they all think mankind is 6000 years old, or any other such ridiculous thing. My disagreements are very specific and don't apply to the entire religion!

I thought that went without saying.

My post wasn't written just to you. I detect an annoyance with Christianity from many on this board - and it's perceived self righteousness seems to be highest on the list.

Part of it seems to be that the self-righteous of all sides are the loudest. Just look at American politics--the "liberal left" and the "conservative right" are the only ones we hear about on the news--where is the outspoken voice of the "moderate middle"?

Most people have characteristics of both, but the moderates aren't the ones screaming. As Zum would say, the ones drinking the Kool-Aid (both flavors) are the loudest in America right now, but that doesn't make either one the majority.

I agree. However, I will concede that I've seen a large amount of newer, usually younger Christians express their new-found belief with little sensitivity, and often with little sense. I see it as kind of a pattern.

Nick - I've been thinking about this while at work, and I developed a theory - Christianity is about Jesus, and it proclaims he is the way. Thus, I think that you do have a disagreement that applies to the whole religion. Am I right?

Nevermind - I just noticed that you already addressed this.

I don't believe in a messiah, and I'm not Christian. But that doesn't mean I have a disagreement with it, just that I have a different orientation - a distinction that many Christian fundamentalists simply can't accept.

The spirit of what Christ taught - not the stuff in the Bible that's clearly a reflection of the social mores of the day, but the basic values- I agree with entirely.

Jesus, if he did actually exist, was a warm compassionate person. But to proclaim that you are the son of god puts him in the "certified" catagory. But then again, as my dad said, it may not have been what he said but what someone said about him, that becamse lore and passed on thru generations.

This all comes back to evolution, which is at odds with the bible. Jesus did NOT write the bible, OK? it was written hundreds of years later after his death, by some lawyers. A human being wrote the bible, not a god.

Christianity is under the gun these days because of the distructive impact it's having on our culture, hense Geroge Bush, which was put into office to f-up this country by the christians. And their moronic world view. Face it, you've been brain washed. Hopefully in this lifetime you'll realize there is spirtuality without the bible.

To what?

To God.
Jeremy, your understanding of history is purely made up. There's not a single secular historian that would agree with your interpretation.

Right on. Greatness + Time = Myth.

Jesus may have had some great points, but they've been modified through the many translations and retellings through the ages. Have you ever played telephone? Yeah, same thing, except this wasn't ten hyperactive kindergardeners, it was several thousand self-serving adults, many of whom spoke different languages and were ready and willing to accept patently impossible things due to the inescapable ignorance of their times and a desire to instill meaning into their chaotic, frightening world.

See, now you've really confused me. There are a few unanswered questions:

I thought I could talk to God anytime I wanted to by praying. What is "the way to God" for Jews and other religions then?

Or is more than half the planet ill-informed and doomed to eternal Hell?

What makes Christians the only ones who have the correct "way to God"?

I'm really curious about this. I would venture to say all religious beliefs are as made up as Jeremy's, only someone else made them up a long time ago. If you could clarify this for me...

Actually; the canon we have today, or better known as the bible; was assembled by the early church fathers known as the council of elders, in about 90 A.D. . Further, before any one of the books of the bible were added to this canon, they had to pass very rigid standard as to authenticity. As a result, many early writings were excluded because of questionable backgrounds. So, the bible contrary to popular opinion has not been revised and rewritten in any way. We do have different translations today such as the King James, the NIV, the Word, etc., but every one of them is done very carefully by leading language scholars and always directly from the most ancient texts or scrolls available. This attention to detail has been observed so rigidly that translators of old were known to wash themselves everytime before writing the name of God as His name was considered too Holy to simply transcribe without a cleansing. So where this telephone idea comes in I do not know, other than it is not based in fact but rather opinion.

Another one:

Greatness + no science at the time = mythology

Did you see the 2100-year-old Mayan painting they found (it was in yesterday's LA Times)? It showed their myth about creation: a god bleeding or something like that. They still tell the same story in Guatemala today.

Is that any different from Western mythology?

Your questions are great, but I'm almost afraid to answer them because of the crap I'm gonna get. Here goes...
Yes, anyone can pray to God. The "way to God" means many things, but the bottom line is Jesus is the way to be reconciled to God and spend eternity with him (heaven).

Can't really say - God is the one who judges. Some literalists would say yes.

Well, Christianity is all about Jesus, and Jesus claimed to be the way to God, and many (including me) believe it.

Your curiosity and skepticism are all warranted. On the surface, I would be inclined to agree with you. Essentially you are asking me, "What does it take to be a Christian, and why would I want to do that?" The answer would involve a conversation that is beyond an internet forum. Let me give you a few basic beliefs that most if not all Christians have; maybe that'll clarify things a little:

1. There is a God.
2. He created us.
3. He is perfect, and we are not.
4. Sin, our imperfection, carries the penalty of death.
5. God has this bizarre exchange that he's willing to make - it's called atonement. Essentially, a prescribed sacrafice can erase sin. Prior to Jesus, the Israelites sacraficed animals.
6. Jesus came as the atonement to everyone that would accept him as such. He had to die to accomplish this.
7. He rose from the dead and still lives.

Accepting Christ is simple and hard. It is merely acknowledging that you believe in him as your Saviour (the atonement thing).

OK, now let me have it.

Can you erase murder?

I see where this is going. The answer is yes.

Number 5 is the one that I really get hung up on. That one could conceivably live his life as a worthless slug and by accepting Jesus be welcomed into the kingdom of heaven. But perhaps a scientist who invents a drug that eases the suffering of millions of people and donates all his spare income to humanitarian causes is doomed to burn in hell because he didn't believe in Jesus. One would hope that God in his infinite wisdom and perfection would be a bit more broad minded than that.

AO - I'm a little surprised - you are not prone to speaking up without backing it up. Your description can't hold water.

Interesting. It could partially explain why the human race guts each other with such ease. I'm sure escape clauses like this exist in many, if not all religions. And I guess they trump "Thou shalt not kill".

I hear you. Again I will say - Christianity is a quest for truth, and some of that truth you may not like, and of course, some of it you will not understand.

Consider this - God has a nature and a set of laws that he adheres to just because of who he is. These will dictate what he does, not necessarily common sense as we see it. Perfection is a standard that we can't relate to.

And again - God is the judge.

Actually, this conundrum is addressed in the bible. I think people usually kill without fully considering the consequences.

Dorkus, I see your points and personally won't hold your feet over the fire for your beliefs. That, to me, is exactly the problem. While not a "practicing" Christian, my faith is strongly defined, my connection to God unquestionable. And when a group of people (in this conversation, hardcore Christians) attempt to shake my faith by imposing their will or political/social influence, I cannot help but feel the same resentment that you feel when your faith is questioned. The difference is that regardless of my socio-political/religious affiliation, I am very willing to let you believe whatever you like regarding evolution, the role of Christ in eternal life, what church you'd like to attend, how you pray, what you eat, what you wear... Very unfortunately for the vast majority of Christians, the political alliance that was formed between the power wielding extreme right and the Republican party has backfired - instead of promoting the right wing radical agenda, it has put it under close scrutiny and found it both lacking and its hyprocracy exposed. For many, I imagine, it has reduced the very private and personal act of worship and prayer to a very public political stance (ie, you are either for or against abortion, you are either for or against prayer in school). My point is that this doesn't serve anyone - as expressed by Dorkus (who's point of view, while not shared, I truly respect) who felt the need to state that he was about to be ridiculed.

In a perfect world, we chose to determine what works for us - not was is determined by a religious/political agenda. We explore and learn from each other, our lives enriched by our interactions with those who think differently than us. Our children are taught to embrace and accept the fundamental differences between people, and to celebrate those differences.

If you believe that Christ is the way, that's truly great. If you cannot recognize that you are being manipulated by a political party, bent on gaining power by attempting to instill fear into the thinking Christian community, then thats a shame. But I still respect your right to feel and worship as you wish.

Well put, Glenn.

Dorkus, where my rhetorical question is going is that I'm very much against capital punishment. Yet who are the most fervent supporters of executions? Right-wing Christians.

The out Arnold Blackeggs used before giving the go-ahead to execute Stanley Tookie Williams was "he obviously isn't repentant." That to me is so confused as to be beyond ludicrous.

But anyway: no, you can't atone anyone back to life. You can see the error of your ways and feel bad for what you've done, but many actions are irreversible.

And I've repeatedly stated my objection to the idea in any religion that the only way is my way. That to me is an obviously fatal flaw. Anyone who believes they're right and nobody else is - regardless of whether it's what the Bible or any book or any person says - is a first-class idiot.

Re: atoning - by the way, that's a perfect example of what I mean about the spirit of what Christ taught. The idea that regardless of what you've done in the past, you're here and you have to look forward…that's great. And since you can't just let it all go with a snap of the finger, the ritual of letting it go (whether it's confession or whatever) is probably a good idea.

It's when you take all that literally and then take the next short step that it's a big problem.

I figured that a Christian would at least know the source of his ideas, Dorkus, just as any scientist must study Plato, Euclid, Leonardo, Newton, Huygens, Faraday, Einstein, and become aware of the interrelatedness of their ideas. If you believe that the bible you read in church today is a direct translation of God's words, you're sorely uninformed:

Here\'s one thorough examination of the history of Christianity.

And here\'s one on the Bible itself.

As Glenn, Nick, and others are saying, all people are free to pursue their own beliefs. My point is that if you truly believe in God then you should seek out all knowledge with the hope of becoming closer to it instead of doubting any evidence which you fear.

If the bible is erroneous, and false, that doesn't make you a bad person--it just means that, like I've been saying all along, everyone deals with the unknown in different ways. You should explore it, and enjoy it, instead of feeling persecuted.

edit: and Nick, I read about that Maya image as well...amazing. In their mythology, a great god impaled his penis, and let its blood flow out, thus creating the world. "Let there be light" is a bit more PG-13, don't you think?

Hi Glenn. I'm having a hard time telling if your points are directed at me, or at the Christian community as a whole.

I entered this conversation in an attempt to shed real light on some issues, to balance out the loudest and more fluent in the group. My agenda has been apolitical - - I wanted to stay focused on what I see to be flaws in mainstream thinking regarding evolution, and present the creationist side in a less wacky way. Perhaps we could understand each other better and gain some respect for each other.

However, it never fails - the conversation somehow turns to "Sure, I respect what you believe, you can believe whatever BS you want, but what about that friggin' extreme right? They're manipulating you, and they want to manipulate me." etc, etc. There is a deep rooted (resentment / hatred / irritation / etc) with "the Right." But I guess I should expect this, it is the favorite topic on this forum (I've been lurking here for years).

I'm not even sure where I sit in the 'middle to extreme right" spectrum. I don't believe that I'm unduly influenced by politicians or TV evangelists. I have beliefs on issues, and many of them are connected to my Christian view of the world. I think that they would have to be discussed one by one. And you know what? I'm really clueless. I'm not sure which issues are the ones that affect or bug you the most.

I hope no one thinks that I'm slamming them for their belief. I'm trying to be transparent in the hopes that others will be too. I recognize that what is gospel to one is silly to another. We all have some unfounded beliefs - and maybe they should be questioned. Really, I'm not offended when people (legitimately) question my faith. If I can't stand up to some questions, then what good is it?

And Nick, yes I saw where you were going - more OT. It's funny that I'm somewhat the spokesman for Right Wing Christians now. As far as capital punishment, if you want my opinion, I vascillate. As far as Tookie, I think that the anti-capital-punishment crowd chose the wrong figure. Despite overwhelming evidence, he maintained his innocence. So he obviously wasn't repentant.

And Nick, I agree that the part where I'm right and you're wrong sucks. However if something is true, it is true. This means Muslims could be right, and I could be wrong. Or you could be right and I could be wrong. Or may nobody is right. Or...

Two opposing viewpoints cannot both be right. At least in this universe

Nick, I'm dense. What's the next short step?

These posts are coming too fast and I have to get home.

OK AO, that's more like it. I'll look up your sources later. FYI, I'm pretty hip in regards to the origin of the Bible.

And if I remember, your previous post was in regard to the New Testament, right? The Old and New Testaments are handled differently.

My comments are directed to both yourself individually and, yes, the Christian community as a whole (which, incidentally, I am a part of). I am hardly an authority on either the spiritual or secular world, but I think you might have misunderstood my intent. I actually was supporting your individual point of view, while trying to explain the reason why many individuals here (and in real life) resent, question or even abhor the public Christian image today.

Understood and appreciated. Again, my post served to acknowledge exactly that - we all agree that communication on a message board can fail to take into account the nuance of one-to-one communication.

Your words, not mine. I don't think your beliefs are bulls*it, nor did I state them to somehow get a jab at you. Unless you are Rove's first cousin, or an ultra-conservative right winger, you shouldn't be offended by my post. If I struck a nerve, that might just mean something...

The deeply routed resentment/irritation was not created in a vacuum, and you know this. The vast majority of people in this country who define themselves as Christians are as fed up with the extreme right as are the right's traditional antagonists, the left. Again, you need to be able to seperate the difference between personal, emotional spirituality and right wing party politics to get my drift. BTW, that you lurked here for years and decided to "come out of the closet" still doesn't mean that you are right or, for that matter, wrong.

I consider myself relatively clueless as well - I think you misinterpreted my post as a personal assault, which it is not at all. Nothing you have posted bugs me at all.

Well put. FWIW, I should tell you that I am currently producing a very well known CCM artist, and I regularly produce both secular (gee I hate that word) and Christian artists - which certainly doesn't make me an authority on anything, but I am willing to share my observations.

That's the fundamentalist Christian view I find so offensive: Christ says the only way is through me, so if you believe in him then you have to believe that all other ways are wrong. Well, that's hopelessly shallow.

Two viewpoints absolutely CAN be right if they're just that: viewpoints! They're orientations, or ways of looking at the same reality everyone else sees. As I've posted way too many times, faith is just that: faith - meaning you *decide* to believe in something beyond what your five senses tell you. You're either raised with a religion or you pick the one that makes the most sense to you. If you were born in Africa you'd believe a whole other set of things, and so on. It's not like you spoke to God on the phone.

You can't possibly "seek the truth" (whatever that means) by accepting an obvious man-made lie as your basic premise.

Christ is the one way *for you.* Even on this board, he's clearly not the way for everybody, and if we're going to hell it's not for not being Christian.

"The next short step" is "it doesn't matter what I do, since I can always atone and everything will be fine again."

"I just read recently that scientists and not neccissarly christian ones came up with a new way to date the earth by the earths layer formation, and previously they thought it was millions of years old due to the millions of layers... untill they found a mamouth skeliton that was embedded in what they would have said was tens of thousands of years of layers".

OH MY GOD....You can´t be serious???

(I´ve got a master in geophysics by the way....)

Who fu cking cares whether he maintained his innocence. What kind of a standard is that? He said I did lots of ****, but not that. Maybe he's telling the truth? The point is that it's wrong to put people to death. It's barbaric and doesn't belong in civilized society.

The only difference with Williams is that since he wrote those Pulitzer-nominated books, it was less impersonal when he was executed. He's certainly not a hero, and of course he can't be let out of jail. There's no "right" figure to protest. Capital punishment is wrong every time.

Whoever it was is very serious, and he has lots of company in this country!

It's shocking, isn't it.

Actually, I just read that the last wooly mammoths became extinct at the end of the last ice age, which was about that long ago.

But there were elephant-family creatures millions of years ago.

Well, Im from Norway and I´ve never met anyone here who believe that the earth was formed approx. 10000 years ago. Is this a US phenomena? The bible was edited in year 300-something. It didnt fall from the hand of God one day. The bible is man-made and thats why its not correct. Believe in God, not the bible.....Or better; Try to read some books written by authors that actually know what they are talking/writing about, instead of crappy articles on the internet. Just a thought...

Wow, wow, wow - I see you guys are still evolving?!? I believe that Jeremy has met his goal a long time (many replies) ago. Just in case you didn't know

Immprod ... I always loved Terie Rypdal, as does my friend Krispen http://krispenhartung.com/

A word on capital punishment, barbary aside; the fact that hundreds of convicts have walked off death row after years of imprisonment due to new evidence discovered should be enough to silence the blood lust in this country. And yet, it doesn't. Why not?

Because this world is ran by wrong species.

Christianity has had a hugh impact on the human race. It's roots go deep. And for some it's all they have experenced.
And the concept of god comes from the bible. If there is an all knowing , all loving god that creats us in his image, then why are some set to experence extreme suffering, and others enjoy life to the fullest?

Would you please explain that to me? The usual awnser is "well I don't know gods plan, he does what he does for reasons we can't understand".

Oh yeah? Humm, you're a fool dude, to believe that, it's simply foolish. our technological advancement, digital audio is based on scientific realities that you can't deny.

Your Mac doesn't work because a god is controling it. We have harnessed the natural forces of nature, laws of physics, everyday, and no how and why they work. I may say at times my computer works in mysterous ways, but the fact is we created it. It functions do to natural laws .

Now the christan explaination of the world is at odds with the science you work with everday. Science has proven that the earth is millions of years old, but your bible says otherwise. So how can you use something that is explainable, created by science you condem as false, and still work in your DAW?

Good to know, Kecinzer! Terje Rypdal is good stuff! I´ll check out your link. Ever heard Jan Garbarek by the way? So called "Mountain jazz"...Very good!

AO - actually good links. Initially, the first one annoyed me because of the obvious political agenda of the guy. However, I've spent a little time with it - some points are decent, some are lame. I plan to spend more time on it later. Until then...

I certainly don't plan on becoming the spokesman for the pro-death penalty crowd. As I've said, I go back and forth on this issue. For now, I'm content to allow a victim's family decide a murderer's fate. I guess I'm more sympathetic to their desires than anyone else's. I realize that this view might make me pro-death penalty in most cases. As far as clemency in any case, repentance has always been a factor. And I agree, the issue is death penalty or no death penalty - not is Tookie good or bad.

Nick, I GET YOUR POINT regarding absolute truth. I realize that all we have (now) is viewpoints. I'm merely stating basic logic: p does not equal -p. If I could prove something one way or another, I would do it. I think that I'm the only one on this board that acknowledges his viewpoint has faith built into it.

In regards to your next short step, of course I agree. In Christianity, we call that repentance.

Jeremy, I agree that the DAW is a modern miracle. I'm just not sure how it's existence proves anything. Please show me where I proclaim science as false.

Glenn - thanks for the clarification. It seems to me that you identify more with the anti-right wing crowd than the right wing crowd. Am I right? How come? Why choose one side to define yourself? I'm sure that you will probably object to this characterization - - but you delivered an empassioned explanation for one side and not the other.

I'm not sure anyone will identify with one side or another completely. Nick would be easily categorized as a liberal left loony from someone on the other side (Sorry to use you for that). I'm sure many here have already put me in the "right wing" box. I think that the labels are pointless; the issues need to be dealt with one by one. When people here refer to "the religious right wing extremists" I really have no idea what to think. It's such a loaded term - it shows a preconceived mindset that allows no room for discussion.

So, how does everyone here feel about abortion?

My positions are liberal and generally on the left, but by no standard are they looney. Looney positions are not based on reality.

I'm not saying there's no debating anything I believe, but it's certainly not crazy.

Love the discussion on religion but since it has zero to do with evolution, I gotta remain neutral.

However, I want to quote the best line I have seen.

I laughed so hard I blew milk out my nose.

No worries. FWIW, I consider myself a moderate centrist, not defined by Fox News, MSNBC, Rush Limbaugh or Al Franken. I would say I am comfortably between Nick and Zumbido - I'd agree with about 80% of what both logically represent without the extreme fringe elements or the political baiting.

Without hijacking this thread too much (but, to answer your question), I am empassioned negatively against the extreme right because of their somewhat successful attempt to co-opt the Republican party - and the Republicans, in their desperation to win the election, allowing this extreme point of view to be represented as mainstream. And the right wing media falling all over themselves to represent this agenda as pro American. I don't need to go down the laundry list of blunders, lies and near-crimes by the Bush administration - we are all well aware of them. And I'd say quite honestly that if the Democrats were in office and allowed fringe elements of the radical left to co-opt the Democratic party, my rhetoric would be equally as irate. However, in my estimation, the conservative right is far more of a threat to vast majority of free thinking, Constitution loving, moderate and average citizens at this point in history. Does that mean I dislike Christians? Hardly, how could I. Again, I stand by your side and defend your right to your beliefs, however they might differ from mine. If you see my distain for hypocrisy, ineptitude, dishonesty, perversion of morality as somehow impuning only one side, well, perhaps that is the direction that the smell is coming from...

There's a scary thought. Let aunt Thelma decide who lives and who dies. Once again, how can you (or anyone) be pro-death when we know for a fact that hundreds of convicted felons have been released (some decades later) when new evidence ,forensic or otherwise has finally proved them innocent? If hundreds have walked imagine how many innocents have died.

And also, everyone should realize the inhumane methods by which criminals are executed. They don't get a general anesthesia and die, they are made to suffer excruciating pain before their lives are taken from them, whether it's by the electric chair or lethal injection. What the hell is that? Blood lust, baby. Now what would Jesus say about that?

Thanx for the tip - I'll email Santa I have a few Jan's earlier albums.

Okay zrocks, you're on, and I hope the milk hurt your nose on the way out. What have I said that you'd call looney or even eccentric?

I'm quite serious.

I've avoided entering this discussion but here's an attempt to bring it back on topic

On religious fundamentalism:
Is there any possibility that the three great world religions emanating from the middle east that alude to a single god are all 'fingers pointing to the same moon'?

The Taoists of ancient China (pre Old Testament & original sin, so forgive them) noted that there is a way - the Tao (call it God's way if you will) - which is immeasurable & indescribable. "The Tao that can be described is not the true Tao". The holy books of Western religion seem to share the same Intent, even though Interpretation differs & creates widely varying Implementations of social & personal policy. To err is human & we all know that even modern biographies contain errors, so could it be that the old & new testaments & the Koran are just human attempts - by bibliographers and editors - at addressing the same unaddressable concept?

I can't help but feel that fundamentalism comes more from the internal wiring (& crossed wires?) of the individual reader of these great works rather than the works themselves, all of which profer peace & tolerance. The source of fundamentalism is fear & fear is the greatest threat to the World as it makes seemingly balanced people act irrationally - irrespective of their creed. Is not therefore the fear-monger the real enemy?

On religion vs. Science
Without the rise of rationalism, we would have no science, no DA7 & no Internet to hold this discussion. Rationalism does not have all the answers - e.g. what existed before the Big Bang? but at least the religion of science allows questions - i.e. what happened before the Big Bang?. Conversely, fundamentalist religions have only all the answers, which seems bizarre, until one considers the socio-political environments within which they were written - as theocratic law, they had to be complete systems of governance.

Some religions (or philosophies) encourage logical debate, which seems a less neurotic approach than fire & brimstone evangelism. However, if one believes that rationalism is the dawning of the age of the Antichrist, then logic & psychology are collective psychosis (or possession) which must be avoided. Strange then that most of the great scientific minds have been highly spiritual, if not devoutly religious people. Indeed, did not Einstein withhold findings for fear that they would undermine others faith as they had challenged his own?

On evolution vs. creation
Entropy will get us all in the end but there seems to be a complexifying force in nature that the rationalists cannot explain. Entropy seems to overcome this counter-force at the point of death, so there would seem to be at least some kind of life force, if not a more general force.

What is its source? Certainly not entropy, so evolution is driven by something else. Is this drive for complexity - for creation - the creator at work? The Tao? Maybe the World created in the '7 days' included the creative life force to evolve the model? OK, it's not specifically mentioned in the Bible but neither is the Aardvark

On solutions
Spirituality is personal - religion is about compliance to group norms. The Christian church made all personal enlightenment or direct knowledge (Gnosis) a heresy - was this so that the failing Roman Empire had an alternative means of power?

Our modern world is one where each person's reason & intuition must combine to find personal answers - we each have to choose our personal path or Tao. Those who cannot face the thought of ego death will choose a belief system with an afterlife or reincarnation. Those who need an external representation of the life force or who can't face it alone, will create their own 'superior being' of some kind. Those who can shed attachment to their egos & realise that we are indeed nothing, will reach enlightenment & escape the torment of the wheel or Samsara & this mortal life...or will they?

I wish you all a peaceful Christmas & a successful 2006!

Best

Keith..

Keith - Very nice. Now if we can pin down some of the answers...

Nick - my point was that you would probably be labeled that. It makes it easy to sum you up and and then not necessarily take you at your word. The labels are devisive on both sides - not that I'm some kind of girlie-man that can't handle being called names. It's the name-caller that is inhibiting his own ability to understand and communicate - which is only hurting himself.

Glenn - what would be the one issue that really sticks it to you regarding the Religious Right? And, just for the hell of it, how about the left? I'm trying to educate myself here.

Dan, I know you WANT me to speak for the pro-death penalty bunch, but I just can't do it.

Keith: Pretty interesting sum-up of the thread so far, and I'd like to help out by pointing out one error with regard to the Second Law of Thermodynamics. As I have pointed out before, this is an often misunderstood concept and is in no way in contradiction of evolution, natural selection, or the human experience.

Furthermore, the concept of self-organization is just coming into its stride. Beginning with Chaos Theory, and now with research in topics like Emergent Systems (including work by one of my favorites, Stephen Wolfram ), it is becoming clear that organization and complexity are not the rare events we believe them to be--in fact, they're nearly inevitable given time and variety.

These advances in our understanding of complex phenomena were simply not possible before the computer made simple the process of carrying out several million iterations of a mathematical formula, for example.

One point I'd like to make is that change and progress will continue to happen--my problem is specifically with social structures which restrict seeking answers, or which deny evidence thus far discovered in the name of preserving the correctness of their beliefs.

Well, if you ask me or Audiorigami, then the answer is no. It's not necessarily even driven! Evolution happens by accident! Hard to accept, but then the time scales are too huge for us to comprehend.

Creation is another story. We don't know what if anything caused the Big Bang. One thought that occurs to me is that nothingness can't exist without somethingness, so it had to happen.

No I don't, but I'd be thrilled if you to spoke against it.

Since we have so many links offered here for reference in regard to the subject matter of this thread, I thought these might be interesting as well for a little counterpoint.
http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/irreducible-complexity.htm

http://www.allaboutscience.org/dna-double-helix.htm

Yeah, speaking of evolution and the death penility, it's only revenge. You deserve to die because you killed someone I love. I want retrobution! It's easy from the outside looking in to say the death penility is wrong, but if your mom, dad, sister, brother, son, daughter, lover was brutaly murdered by someone and the hurt you felt, you wouldn't want that person to pay in the same way for his/her crime?

Anyhoo, that's a totally different thread. From what I have seen and read on this thread, creationism and the bible being exposed for what it is, has maybe opened a few eyes to the brainwashing effect christianity has had on our culture, that it's basicly a falsehood, a non truth that has miguided millions of potentialy beautiful lives into a twisted coctail of delusion. I's simply non sence. B

But sinse some have been raised in this culture and taught it all their lives, they beleve it. Even if a god decendedfrom the heavens and said to them, "I'm the real god, your teaching is false", they wouldn't or couldn't accept it.

Revenge is shallow. I, 13 states in the U.S., and all of Europe disagree with you.

Yeah, Jeremy, I'd want them dead. But unfortunately there's no way to enforce that standard without also killing wrongly accused victoms. We know this as fact. How you can ignore that fact is beyond me. If you went to jail because a couple of phony eye witnesses accused you of murder you'd sing a different tune.

Ah - irreducible complexity. That's the term I've been searching for.

First, take a look at the about us page from both of mixandburn's links.

They are not a scientific organization--they are a religious conversion tool.

Second, their claims have already been addressed by my links throughout this thread. They also pull the dirty trick of quoting scientists, including Darwin, out of context in order to make them appear to be doubting their own work. One good example is the quote on the eye, about which I posted an entire quotation of Darwin's earlier. They do exactly what the link I posted accused of.

Third, that article has no author listed, and is written in a style so cleverly contrived as to give the appearance of objectivity. It is absolutely not objective, but attempts to use the Bible as scientific evidence disproving Big Bang theory as well as Evolution.

Here's an example of their scientific rigor:

The notion of Irreducible Complexity is a study in the misapplication of logic. A typical claim goes: Such and such mechanism is a perfect working machine. For it to function, all its parts must have been generated at once, already functioning, or else the machine wouldn't work at all. Take a car's engine for example--without spark plugs, it wouldn't do anything, so it couldn't have evolved from separate parts.

This completely ignores the fact that simpler systems exist, and have been documented. In the case of the eye, simple light detecting cells gave way to mucous-covered motion detecting cells. Then the mucous led to a fixed lens, and after millions of years we got the magnificent mechanism of moden human vision. Creationists would have you believe that evolution says some creature existed with a lens, occular musculature, and a retina but no iris, then suddenly--bam, an iris "mutated" out of nothing and here we are.

Creationists prey on the uneducated and attempt to supplant the desire for knowledge with a faith in Jesus Christ.

This does not mean that belief in Christ is erroneous. It's just that belief in his teachings cannot replace empirical, repeatable, testable evidence.

I'm still waiting for the evidence of so-called Intelligent Design. So far all I've seen is evidence of the need for further research in evolution--which I don't deny, and in fact encourage.

Intelligent design was created as a front for Christian fundamentalist creationism, and I'm glad mixandburn is proving this through his links.

Maybe someone's moniker should be changed to "mixandburninhell" for all the non-believers. Now wouldn't that be a lovely holiday greeting for all? Happy Festivus!

I would argue that light detecting cells aren't so simple, and each step from there (many of them) toward the camera eye would not be very simple as well. Of course, this linear path toward a more complex and more useful development could have gone another direction, maybe one even more amazing. But then it would've been all the more miraculous.

The use of biased internet sources goes two ways. Being biased, however does not necessarily mean that they only spew crap. It just means you have to be more careful and skeptical.

Is there anyone that argues against ID being some form of creationism? I thought that was a given.

Thanks for the reply AO.

First off, just because scientific information does not come directly from some scientific website, whatever that might be, does not necessarily or automatically negate that informations validity or credibility. Also, what scientific website would list this information anyway? That would certainly seem to undermine the years of hard work and research being at stake if any information would come to light that may contradict the long standing ( 150-200 yrs.) of evolutionary thought. I can imagine just like in Christianity, ones whole belief system could be tied up in this issue. Far be it there could be a chance of that crumbling down based on opposing relevent information.Darwinism has some very interesting challenges to its doctrine whether they will be acknowledged here on this forum or not. In the spirit of an open mind would it be fair to say technology has come a long way since his ideas first came to light? Is it possible some of Darwins conclusions may have been incorrect because of a lack of that technology? Did you not say something like science is always changing based on new information. Are not some, if not most of the changes in scientific thought due to ever improving technology that reveals flaws in an older system of thought? You claim the information I linked to is invalid because it happens to come off a website that has a Christian perspective? I think it brings up interesting thought provoking logical alternatives to a possibly outdated incomplete theory.
Further, your introduction of the last post you made sure smaks of a good old political smear campain tactic. Would you agree?
I could just as easily discredit your own sources a few posts up.
http://www.straightdope.com/faq/officialfaq.html
http://www.bidstrup.com/Resume.doc

You surprise me AO, especially since you chastised Dorkus for apparently not knowing his sources. Are these the kind of places you regularly resource information from? Really,what credentials does Scott Bidstrup have in regard to his preported vast knowledge of Christianity and the bible?

Who is Cecil Adams? Apparently the smartest man on earth according to that web page. Not very convincing.

Hows a bought leaving the smear campain tactics out and see what we come up with?
I wouldn't pretend to know as much about science as you seem to know, but I'm not a complete idiot either.

It's not the least bit outdated! And if it were complete, there would be no need for the entire field of Evolutionary Biology! The reason you don't see any logical alternatives is that there simply aren't any. If you want to say that God created evolution, then good on yer, mate. But to deny that Darwin got it 100% right is simply ignorant or stubborn. Sorry if that sounds "closed-minded," but if you think about what he said, there's simply no other conclusion (other than "Duh, God created it and that's the end of the story.").

Do you even know what Darwin says? Think about a strawberry, which needs birds to eat its fruit and poop out its seeds to spread them around so it survives. But it doesn't want them to do that before they're ready, so it starts off green and bitter to discourage the birds. Then when it's ripe, it attracts them by being bright red and succulent.

Before Darwin, people would look at the strawberry and say God created it (a.k.a. intelligently designed it). But Darwin showed that the stawberries that were red and/or tasty too early or green and/or bitter too late weren't the ones that survived. And that's how natural selection works. Stawberries don't know they're doing what they're doing, of course, but there are no other theories to indicate that anything else is what's going on because Darwin's theory is absolutely corrrect.

If you apply the same concept to animals, then you see that Darwin's ideas are just the same. Animals are more complicated, but then the time scales are way, way longer. (Great apes were 6 or 7 million years ago, modern humans have been around for about 50,000 years.)

That's why Europeans who have been taught about how evolution works are in disbelief that so many Americans can be so dumb! And that's why anyone who says evolution isn't real is just way, way out there.

We know much more than we knew in Darwin's time, but everything we've learned since - genetics, mainly - has only lent more proof to what he said. It certainly hasn't made it outdated.

Do you even know what Darwin says? Think about a strawberry, which needs birds to eat its fruit and poop out its seeds to spread them around so it survives. But it doesn't want them to do that before they're ready, so it starts off green and bitter to discourage the birds. Then when it's ripe, it attracts them by being bright red and succulent.

Before Darwin, people would look at the strawberry and say God created it (a.k.a. intelligently designed it). But Darwin showed that the stawberries that were red and/or tasty too early or green and/or bitter too late weren't the ones that survived. And that's how natural selection works. Stawberries don't know they're doing what they're doing, of course, but there are no other theories to indicate that anything else is what's going on because Darwin's theory is absolutely corrrect.

I see. So, the strawberry then, depends on birds eating it at just the right time who then spread seeds over the countryside via fecal matter. I understand and believe this. IMO where the logic of this breaks down is found in the thousands of years of evolution and natural selection. At what point did strawberries start turning red at all if the primary purpose of the red color is to attract birds who aid in the advancment of their species. Strawberries only come on the vine once a year. If they did not grow up and turn red, be sweet and juicy from the git go, birds never would have eaten them and the word strawberry would not be in our vocabulary because they wouldn't exist following that line of reasoning. Strawberries couldn't have evolved in that way. They were created that way from the start. I will agree we can have many varieties based on breeding different varieties but a strawberry was always a strawberry. Just like an ape was always an ape and a human was always a human. As Ao pointed out earlier and I agree with, different environmental impacts on a species can produce physical changes or adaptive changes over time if you will, my belief however, is that still the baseline species remains the same. An example would be me. I used to be lean, muscular and vibrant. Now I'm overweight,lethargic and basically feeling worn out. Why? Time and environmental impacts has affected the size and shape of my body but deep inside I'm still that same guy.

By the way;

How do you do that quote thing all you guys do? I could use a little direction on this as evidently I havn't evolved far enough to have figured this out yet on my own. :p

Quote thing?

This is the old "there's no inter-species evolution" argument, and it's not based on facts but on the wish to believe certain mythology. Doesn't it seem a little farfetched if you really think about it? Species just appear by the hand of God, and then they begin to evolve?

A geneticist will laugh at you for advancing that idea.

Click on the quotation marks above the post.

Far fetched relative to what Nick? Our current understanding of things? If you or I could go back in time as little as 150 years and share with society what is common knowledge now in regard to our advances in knowledge and more importantly our understanding of how to apply this knowledge, we would have been the laughing stalk of the scientific community then. A man on the moon? Rovers on Mars? Deep space probes splashing down on a distant planets moon? The possibility of cloning? A hybrid, environmentally friendly automobile that can transport people safely and comfortably over hundreds of miles? A computer that does what? Nonsense! Not possible! Lunatic! A brick short of a full load. We would have been outcasts of society for promoting those concepts without proof to back it up. Yet, here we are today.
All the ingredients were already here on the earth to do all those things. We just didn't know or understand the applications. Knowledge and understanding are like that. You don't get it, until you get it. I'm sure in the next 150 years there will be advancments that would astound and confound us today.
Funny how the simple solution to some of todays advancements were the impossible hurdles of yesterdays progress. I'll say again what I posted early on in this thread. I don't think we really have a clue how big, how complex or how miraculous this whole thing is. Mans established religions aside and all the preconceived idea's that accompany that paradigm, I am convinced there is an encredibly advanced genious designer behind all of this for reasons we may not fully comprehend yet. Shouldn't the scientific community with their passion for discovering the truth about things maintain an open mind toward the possibility of this yet scientifically unsubstantiated concept? Isn't that by definition what a scientist does?

And there will be things 150 years from now that we can't imagine today - assuming we don't blow ourselves up first.

But does that mean Pythagorus was wrong? Or Einstein?

Or Darwin?

Of course not. And of course there are lots of things we don't have a clue about. That doesn't mean that any of the infinite number of false propositions is true.

A man on the moon? Rovers on Mars? Deep space probes splashing down on a distant planets moon? The possibility of cloning? A hybrid, environmentally friendly automobile that can transport people safely and comfortably over hundreds of miles? A computer that does "Nonsense! Not possible! Lunatic! A brick short of a full load. We would have been outcasts of society for promoting those concepts without proof to back it up. Yet, here we are today.
All the ingredients were already here on the earth to do all those things. We just didn't know or understand the applications. (Knowledge and understanding are like that). You don't get it, until you get it. I'm sure in the next 150 years there will be advancments that would astound and confound us today.

This just so totally explains the bible doesn't it? And it's concept of creationism. It's what they were able to concieve back then, of what and who we are and how we got here. I'd say in 150 years from now there well be fewer and fewer practicing christians, as we evole as a species, we'll grow bwyong the myth and fairytale culture that has had control of our society for hundreds of years, and mankind as a whole for thousands.

I had a friend in high school named Bwyong.

Darwin only came up with the idea. That was over a hundred years ago. Since then, his ideas have been refined and no counter-evidence has been seen except the God-of-the-gaps.

mixandburn, I apologize for what you call a smear campaign, but if you look a couple of pages back you'll see the Wedge Document, written by the Discovery Institute, and they basically invented the concept of ID in order to legitimize creationism and get Christianity into places it doesn't belong. Again, I apologize if my tone indicated that Christianity was at fault. It's not, only anyone who claims ID is science. It is not.

Also, here's an on-topic update:

ID Loses in Pennsylvania Court: Cannot Be Taught In Biology Class

I told myself I was going to stay out of this debate, but I have one thing to say.

Being here in Hawaii, I am surrounded by absolute, non-debatable evidence that these islands have been forming here very slowly for millions of years. You can see layers and layers of lava built up over millions of years everywhere you look. You can go to the Big Island and WATCH the process in action, for pete's sake.

Even a child can see the process with their own eyes and understand. How anybody can actually believe that the Earth is just a few thousand years old while faced with such overwhelming evidence that it is not is so out of whack, it makes me question the very sanity of anyone who blindly believes in ID or creationism.

No amount of "faith" is strong enough to make me ignore what I can see with my own 2 eyes.

I didn't answer this:

But they *did* evolve in that way. There are always going to be genetic variations - they occur on their own, and a biologist can tell you how many times per thousand. From what I've read, there's just one gene that controls color.

This is the problem right here: people who discount evolution don't know anything about it. No offense - I mean that as a general statement.

***

Mark, people will go to extremes to convince themselves that what they're seeing is what they need to believe. There was an article in the NY Times a couple of months ago about two groups of people visiting the Grand Canyon. One was looking at the wonder of how it was formed over millions of years. The other was seeing how it was formed recently. Both were looking at the same rocks!

But in all fairness, I know of only one person on this site who believes that nonsense. The line is that it's been proven over and over "by non-Christian scientists" (that's always part of it) that the earth is 6000 years old, dating to the time of Adam.

Someone pointed out that they figured this out by geneology - i.e. using the science of genetics! - to determine when Adam was around.

Nick, that's not a valid comparitive example. The erosion that created the Grand Canyon is an extremely slow process that is not visible to the naked eye - thus is open to interpretation.

Here, you see the new land being formed right in front of your eyes. You can watch the lava snaking over older, cooled lava from previous eruptions. You look at it, then look up at the side of the mountain and see the very same processes created the entire 10,000' mountain rising above you. And the 20,000' more of mountain below you as it extends down to the ocean floor. And the other 18 islands and atolls that make up the Hawaiian Archipelago.

It's happening now, today, right in front of you. Only one interpretation is possible - this has been going on here for millions of years. No speculation or illogical leaps of faith are required - only eyesight and common sense.

Not unless you believe that potassium-argon dating is invalid!

But I take your point about actually being able to see it.

mY gOD, WHAT HAVE i DONE....EEERRRKKK,this thread has turned into a M O N S T E R!!!! i'm sure i'll be going straight to hell for this one, right Tlix? How dare I question God, and the Bible, and creationism!!!! I must be killed, that's all there is to it.

No you dont get out of it that easy Jeremy... You have to read it every day like the rest of us.
Besides look at it this way... If there is no God and you die, No big deal, you are worm food and you have passed from this life into nothingness and you are but a memory in the hearts of those who loved you. And hopefully you have helped the evolutionary process at least somewhat n your time here. Well, I guess there are those among us who actually roll the process back a little, but I'm sure that is not true of you. and Hell... well it was just a figment of someones sick imagination in their efforts to control people. So, eat, drink and be Merry...

After All it is Christmas time.


Jeff

"well it was just a figment of someones sick imagination in their efforts to control people. So, eat, drink and be Merry..."
Jeff, there are other world views, religions, other than christianity. I'd look to the east. To Buddhism. It has a much deeper explaination of who we are, where we came from and where we are going.

Of course there are thousands of different forms of Buddhism throughout the world, but the common thread is life is eternal, this is just but one life time, we create our own destiny thru our actions (karma). Your life continues on beyond this world.

So your right I don't believe in a christian god that created the world in 6 days. Or the whole fairy tale of a son of god who died for our sins.
Believe it or not, there is spirtuality beyond christinaty.

re'lig'ion (r?-l?j2ún) n. Abbr. rel., relig.
1.a. Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe. b. A personal or institutionalized system grounded in such belief and worship.
2. The life or condition of a person in a religious order.
3. People killing people over who has the best imaginary friend.

Jeremy,

If all our Christian beliefs are simply fairy tales, folklore or traditions, can they still have any value in this world?

You've pointed out all the negatives associated with religion (i.e. the centuries of wars, the repressed, the bigotry, whatever; please don't go thru again since you have done so ad nauseum), yet you never really concede that religion or Christianity has played a valuable role in our society. Has it?

Is this a fairy tale that should just be wiped from the planet so we can start over? Should Christmas be scrapped and we all celebrate the Winter Solstice?

If this is really a piece of concocted fiction, does it have any value whatsoever in our families and communities?

I think the answer is both. Not the tongue-in-cheek part, but we owe a lot of good and bad to religion.

Works of fiction have a very special place in human life.

Look at Aesop, Shakespeare, Virgil, or Dr. Seuss.

They teach and inspire us. Although grounded in history, the Bible is also inspirational and contains many great lessons.

I wouldn't be the person I am without having read Kurt Vonnegut, for example.

Jeremy, maybe I'm misunderstanding you but the one thing that hasn't felt right since the beginning of this thread is the notion that Christianity is a fairy tale but Eastern religion is truth. It's just another belief system, your belief system. If you believe that a good frog comes back as a horse and we get reborn based on our deeds now and then, that's great. Buddhism may be a far less restrictive or less fear-based than Christianity but it's certainly not any less or more of a fairy tale than any other religion. It's just the one you subscribe to.

Nope, my religion and yours can't both be right, and since I know I'm right therefore you must be wrong.

Can you sing "Archipelago"? You know, without music....

No, I'm just saying Eastern thought is deeper and makes more sense than christianity. For example, the founder of Buddhism , over 3000 years ago talks about major world systems. Time without beggining.

It makes more sense to me that the inequality in this world, the suffereing some endure for a lifetime and others enjoy life to it's fullest, cannot be the actions of a supreme being. Why would he make some suffer for no reason and others live happy fullfilling lives? Would you explain that to me?


BTW, I havn't mentioned the wars ect that have been fought in the name of christ, and the millions murdered.

Unfortunately there is as little evidence for reincarnation as there is for the existence of a Christian heaven.

As far as priorities go, though, I'd have to support Eastern dogmas such as Buddhism and Zen. They stress the oneness of human experience and desire to eliminate suffering and achieve enlightenment above all else, while Christianity seems to stress the importance of the acceptance of Jesus above all else.

Like I said there are thousands of forms of Buddhism practiced around the world today, and they are all different.

One critical difference is buddhism teaches that you are responsible for your life situation, where as in christianity, your life is controled by a god outside yourself. He has a plan for you only he understands. It's like you hear all the time after natural disasters, people saying, "why would god do this?" Why did god let 9-11 happen, the all knowing all loving, all powerful god he's supposed to be.

I mention this because it all comes back to the debate between creationism verses evolution.

Your right, there is no way to prove that life is eternal, that you have lived countless previous lifetimes, and well live countless more. We all have to find our own awnser.

Watching my dad die and what he went thru for a week has made me realize I have to make the most of the time I have. To try to change as much of my negitive karma as I can while i'm alive, to contribute to this earth in some way so I can meet death peacefully when that time comes, which maybe a week from now. Who knows.

Thanks AO,

We're good on that issue. First I would like to say I truely value the information offered in this thread on both sides of this controversy very much. It has caused me to investigate this issue deeper than ever before. It would appear though, because of the core perspectives perhaps on both sides of this issue there will be no resolve of this issue.
It appears, in the scientific community, when a theory is proposed, there must be evidence to support that theory. Evidence of a natural origin. It appears any suggestion of the possibility of a solution coming from a supernatural origin is quickly discarded and labled " ignorant assumption". Am I correct in this line of thought? It appears the thought of a supernatural influence in or over a natural occurence is not acceptable to the scientific mind because everything must have a natural origin. If my conclusions are correct, it leads me to some interesting paradoxes. To illustrate what perplexes me about this lets use the topic at hand. Darwins theory of evolution. The scientific community actually still calls it a theory because they will admit there are flaws, gaps, unknowns still to be solved by science. Given enough time though, these unknowns will certainly be unraveled and explained by natural means and Darwins theory will become fact and undisputable in every aspect. All the ducks will line up in a nice little row.
Faith based people say it is possible Darwins theory does not have everything correct because of things like irreducible complexity, DNA double helix, the eye, the heart etc. and are quickly labled by the scientific community as operating under ignorant assumption because their conclusions do not necessarily come from natural origins. Or, from the natural scientists way or method of research and or criteria for accepting said research. Truth is, the scientific community doesn't really know how to fill these gaps either and I would suggest as a result are guilty of the same thing they accuse creationist of. That is operating under ignorant assumption themselves, filling these gaps with their own conjecture or nothing at all beleiving that in the end result, their faith in natural science will ultimately lead them to the truth. Of all the people on the planet scientist are the ones that claim they never jump to conclusions, always keep an open mind, and are willing to investigate any possibilities that would ultimately lead to truth. However, based on what I have discovered in regard to natural science thinkers, that is not true. They only seem to be willing to investigate or accept idea's that come from natural origins. It would seem any other opinions that do not line up with and or agree with their dogmas are quickly discarded and labled ignorant. If I am not correct in this assessment I apologize because I am truly not trying to be antagonistic. If I am correct though with this assessment, it becomes pitiful to me because it would in my way of thinking put this segment of society in the same little nicely packed box so many dogmatic religions fit into. We're right, your wrong, its our way or no way. Thinking they have all the answers or soon will and wondering how the rest of the world lives in their fairytail existence.If this conclusion I have is true, it is sad because in the end putting a limit on possibilities on what may exist, will also limit ones ability for discovery of what could exist.
I am also wondering at what point Darwins theory of evolution became the litmus test everything else on the planet has to line up with. Particularly since it still hasn't been completely proven to be absolute fact.Has this popular theory along with secular humanism become the established fact and federal religion by which all other concepts are judged because certain fanatical people groups have lobbied it into law and school books over the last many years? As I said earlier, as technology increases we are discovering more and more things that cast a shadow of doubt on the absolute validity of this doctrine of evolution. Of course the challenges to these long held beliefs are quickly refuted by the natural scientist as not possible even though they can't seem to explain the solutions either. So, how and why does this qualify them to be right and everyone else wrong? Particularly in light of the fact they themselves admit there are gaps, holes, unknowns in their theory.
Faith based people look at life through a little different lens. They see, admire, respect and enjoy nature just as evolutionists do. They just attribute it all to a devine creator who had purposes we may not fully understand as of yet. They believe life has a purpose that transends this earthly existence. Man since the beginning of time has lived and died by convictions that were judged to be foolishness by others. Every person has a set of values they live by. A code of convictions that guide their actions. Every individual believes they have truth. That truth they possess is what they live by and in many instances are willing to die by. Whether good or bad. Hence opinions,selfishness, bickering, fighting,wars, murder. Or peace, love, harmony, giving, sharing.
I say all this to say that although I disagree with the conclusions of natural scientists, I think I now understand a little better where they are coming from. That understanding further helps me to respect their position in regard to their thoughts on evolution and how they arrive at their opinions of faith based people. It is my conviction and desire to honor equally all human beings whether I agree with them or not. So understand I am not at odds with anyone here. Some of us just obviously hold different world views.
In conclusion, its my opinion there can be no resolve to this debate because of the different perspectives on the origins of life we hold and because these perspectives are not just sporadic ideas we toy with but rather seem to have become part of the fabric of who we are. Thus affecting to a great degree what we believe to be true about life itself. To deny that, would to a great degree denying who we have become as a result of our convictions.
Further, on the topic of Christianity, it is becoming clear to me that many on this forum have opinions about Christianity and Christians that are completely false. I can only conclude these opinions are based on "ignorant assumption" Being a Christian is much more than going to church, giving them your money, belonging to the republican party, my way or the highway, etc.
However, many complaints I hear on this forum about christians I agree with and am ashamed so many apparent well meaning people,misrepresent something of such a high value to me. What I hear on this board in regard to complaints about christians in many cases does not represent true christianity. I will not go to the mat over doctrine or will I fight over theology. I am willing however,to converse with those who may be interested about what little I may or may not know of what it means to be a man of God and how that affects ones world view.

mixandburn, I made it 2/3 of the way through before getting frustrated by the lack of paragraphs. What you say is thoughtful but hard to read!

Anway, I think you're starting with one incorrect assumption: this is an argument between creationists and evolutionists, with both sides wearing the same armor and riding the same horses only one side is black and the other is white.

It's not like that. What we have is a group of people who understand that Darwin is 100% right, and another group of people who are wrong. In addition to some faulty arguments, the latter group assumes that the fact that there are lots of unanswered questions means Darwin is wrong and therefore creationism is right. He isn't wrong, and the answers to those questions will only refine what he says - just as Einstein doesn't mean Pythagorus is wrong.

And it's also not correct to say that people who know Darwin is right have a closed mind, or even that they don't believe in spirituality. I believe that my ass is pink; if someone says it's green and I say they're nuts, does that make me closed-minded?

And God said, "Let there be lava".

She needed something to put in the light.

LOL

Sorry Nick,

I know for someone like yourself who's career to a degree, has depended on the ability to place thoughts correctly on paper using english puncuation properly, this must be paticularly frustrating. The art of proper english and all the rules of how to apply that was never my strong suit in school. It seemed no matter how hard I tried ,I could only manage bone head english. So I do apologize for your frustration in this.
I hope this has not blurred the meaning of what I wrote too much for you.
Please allow me to clarify.

Nick wrote:
" I think you're starting with one incorrect assumption: this is an argument between creationists and evolutionists, with both sides wearing the same armor and riding the same horses only one side is black and the other is white."

I understand we are in some respects coming from entirely different view points but I would hope the example you gave would allegorize the fact that we are ultimately brothers on this planet and as such on the same team. (the armor)
As such, riding the same horses in the same direction indicating a common goal which hopefully would be truth.
Only one side is black and one side is white. As I stated, we obviously have different perspectives but I certainly don't think one is good, the other evil. At least not in the respect you expect.

Nick wrote:
"What we have is a group of people who understand that Darwin is 100% right, and another group of people who are wrong. In addition to some faulty arguments, the latter group assumes that the fact that there are lots of unanswered questions means Darwin is wrong and therefore creationism is right. He isn't wrong, and the answers to those questions will only refine what he says - just as Einstein doesn't mean Pythagorus is wrong."

I Posted:
"Truth is, the scientific community doesn't really know how to fill these gaps either and I would suggest as a result are guilty of the same thing they accuse creationist of. That is operating under ignorant assumption themselves, filling these gaps with their own conjecture or nothing at all beleiving that in the end result, their faith in natural science will ultimately lead them to the truth"

See full post for full context:

"If I am correct though with this assessment, it becomes pitiful to me because it would in my way of thinking put this segment of society in the same little nicely packed box so many dogmatic religions fit into. We're right, your wrong, its our way or no way. Thinking they have all the answers or soon will and wondering how the rest of the world lives in their fairytail existence."

By the way I don't think Pythagorus was necessarily wrong either. Rather just an incomplete picture of a good theory that concluded with incorrect applications.

Nick wrote:

"And it's also not correct to say that people who know Darwin is right have a closed mind, or even that they don't believe in spirituality. I believe that my ass is pink; if someone says it's green and I say they're nuts, does that make me closed-minded?"

Based on your paragraph above this one, it would appear that would be the case. If I am wrong in this assessment help me understand where you and others are not closed minded to this issue. People who understands Darwin is 100% right doesn't sound like it gives room for much discussion.
In fairness to you Nick, you have been quite gracious in your attitude toward the overall teachings of scripture and their application to ones lives in the purest sense of their meaning,but have made it very clear what your opinion of religion is and I would mostly agree with you on the latter point. Beyond that, you indicate you have a sense of spirituality that exists in some form or another. At the bottom of all this though, Is there room in your belief system for the possibility that a supernatural intelligent force could have possibly had anything to do with creation? Or in your opinion would the only possible explanation have to come through natural causes?

I think we all form our biases based on our current limited understanding of things and I think to some degree those biases become barriers to greater understanding. If we listen to a song and only focus or concentrate on the guitar part for example, we may well miss all the other intricacies of the music that really makes the song what it was meant to be.
Until we become as innocent children and gaze with wonderment into the unknown abyss, hearts pounding in our chests filled with expectation, I fear we shall miss the vast unexplored regions of truth that patiently await our discovery.

Ok, maybe a little over the top but still, kind of true.

I'm not complaining about your grammar, just about the mile-long block of text! It's hard to read.

Okay, now back to read what you're saying.

My belief is that the supernatural intelligent force is more a part of creation. At a certain point the universe took on a life of its own.

That's just my feeling, though, not the kind of thing I shout about.

When I say that Darwin is 100% right, that doesn't mean I believe he answers every question. It's just that what he's describing actually happens with 100% certainty. It's very hard to fathom how anyone could question that seriously.

Why do we as humans have to label the beauty of the universe as "SUPER NATURAL?" WTF is super natural, something that's naturaly super?? Isn't looking at the photos of deep space, the formation of planets, star clusters, super novas, black holes, all that amazing stuff happening all around us, why not call that super natural also?

No, what it is is our tiny minds trying to grasp the nature of our lives in a way we can understand, hense the idea of a creator, and he happens to be a male..."kind of makes you wonder huh?"

The nature of the universe you might as well call "super natural". Life is hugh, beyond our ability to grasp. Like the ice burg anaology, what we percieve is what's visable above the water, what we can't see is what's below.

The idea of a god who has a plan for your life and is taking care of you "in his mysterious way", is an attempt of some to find an awnser to this mystery. To me and many others it looks foolish, even childish.

But, I respect and understand the need to find an awnser, to find that connection to where you come from, it's deep, and as much of a desire as any other.

No.....a she male.

I'm curious as to why you feel the need to make that distinction.

You really all should watch the christmas lights. That video is sic.

Which distinction, dorkus? Between a creator standing outside everything making it all happen and a force or series of forces that are an integral part of everything and aren't pulling the strings?

If so, I don't feel a need at all, that's just how I believe it is. And I was really just answering the question.

But the distinction is probably one of the things that separates me from people who are religious.

Evolution.......
http://news.aol.com/topnews/articles?id=n20051222140709990015&cid=911

If there was any true intelligence in the Universe, this thread would end!

It has to reach 666 posts first.

IMHO the "distinction" is a primary dogma of Christianity. One side being the Creator the other being called 'free will'.

Sorry to be off the topic of evolution but Mr. Batzdorf's agreement with me was a great Christmas present.

(The Nirvana sutra states " People have been suffering sinse uncountable aeons ago. The bones each individual leaves behind in an aeon pile up as high as Mount Vilula in Rajagriha, and the milk he sucks is equal to the water of the four oceans. The blood one sheds surpasses the quanity of water in the four oceans, and so do the tears he sheds in grief over the death of parents, brothers and sisters, wives, children and relatives. And though one used all the plants and trees growing in the earth to make four-inch tallies to count them, one could not count all the parents one has had in the past existences of life.)

This is not the only time around.

And what separates this load of buffalo pasture pies from any other?

Read any post that Jeremy makes after 12 midnight at your own risk...

That seems so arbitary, Glenn.

Why 12 midnight?

:p

You.