Why Creationism Should Never be Taught in Science Class

originally posted by: Ghost147

originally posted by: hudsonhawk69

originally posted by: BuzzyWigs
a reply to: hudsonhawk69

However evolution isn't exactly science either is it. Neither should be taught in schools!

That statement ^^ is ridiculous.
But, I bet you're just trolling and trying to be funny....right?

Actually no... Evolution is based on as many unfounded assumptions as creationism is...

Could you point out a specific unfounded assumption that the Theory of Evolution makes? I'd like to discuss it with you if you wouldn't mind?

How does evolution overstep bio-incompatibility? The point where mothers abort their fetuses because they aren't compatible anymore, or where even if the offspring survives (say from an immune-compromised mother) how would they ever find a compatible mate?

And don't give me that gradualism bit. When a mutation causes bio-incompatibility, the individual organism with the mutation is no longer viable. For example, there are about 100 histo-compatibility genes on chromosome 6 in humans (yeah, only 100). You don't need gradual successive genetic changes to get to incompatibility. It is single step, single mutation stuff. An incompatible mutant cannot spread its mutation into the gene pool. It is end of line. So how does such a speciating mutation, which arises in individuals, get spread?

originally posted by: notmyrealname
a reply to: chr0naut

Please kindly do not confuse the Law of Conservation of Energy with any theories as you are not comparing the two in a proper manner. You can talk all you want about the theory and it is still only a theory.

But the observations seem to disagree with the 'law' and if the 'law' does not apply in some circumstances, it weakens the claim to being a law.

Why is it a law and not a theory? Only because someone said that there were no observed exceptions. Except we now have an apparent exception.

There are gaps in our vision, we can define the blind spot by measurement and trial. We can also ignore it, thinking that we haven't missed anything so far.

Personally, mysteries and blind spots hold a fascination. I choose to try and solve or resolve them if I can. If I can't they hold all the more allure.

originally posted by: Ghost147

originally posted by: hudsonhawk69

originally posted by: BuzzyWigs
a reply to: hudsonhawk69

However evolution isn't exactly science either is it. Neither should be taught in schools!

That statement ^^ is ridiculous.
But, I bet you're just trolling and trying to be funny....right?

Actually no... Evolution is based on as many unfounded assumptions as creationism is...

Could you point out a specific unfounded assumption that the Theory of Evolution makes? I'd like to discuss it with you if you wouldn't mind?

1. Abiogenesis. I understand there is a difference between evolution and abiogenesis, but evolution, from the non-deistic/non-theistic perspective that you would argue relies on abiogenesis.

2. The addition of information onto DNA.

3. Macro-evolution

You keep saying evolution as a natural phenomenon is fact. Micro-evolution is fact... Not macro-evolution. Please be more specific. Evolution producing new species is not a factual natural phenomenon.

4. Multi-verse and fine tuning of the universe for life on Earth.

Once again, I understand that this is not part of the theory of evolution, but it is still an assumption that non-deistic/non-theistic evolution must rely on.

originally posted by: randyvs

Looks like one hell of a train wreck to me.

Thats because you dont understand evolution, as proven by your using the phrase coincidences. Evolution is not a series of coincidences. Evolution is a species ability to adapt to new climate and evironments. Mutations happen all the time,in all species. Some good some bad. If a mutation works for a species, that mutation will be passed throughout the species through breeding. That species will have evolved to be mkre adaptable to it current situation.

You can't use the word faith and evolution in the same sentence. You don't need faith to believe in evolution, there is mountains of evidence supporting it. Calling it coincidences willfully ignores the simplicity and beauty of how it works.

In some sense, I get why people on both sides care so much about this. On the other hand, I really don't. What in the flying hell does your personal view or belief about the way in which the universe was created and/or exists and how life as we see it came to be actually affect you, whatsoever? Does your job entail a knowledge of genetics in order to understand diseases?

All I care about is the WHO and WHY. The HOW hardly matters to me. I believe in intelligent design, but hey, biblical creationism could be true... The only thing is, it doesn't freaking matter to me. The method in which God created all things does not affect my salvation. My faith and submission to Jesus Christ does.

Why do you care if they teach creationism in school? I get your arguments. You don't feel like it is science--I don't disagree with you. If it's so overwhelmingly the proven, realistic answer, then people will see that and accept it, regardless of whatever else they're taught. I could see how you might disagree with that statement, that they're somehow being "brainwashed" to accept something like creationism as legitimate and true. I lean toward a view that you cannot fix stupid. I think you can educate and increase intelligence, but only to an extent. I come from the nature and nuturer view... But fixing stupid only goes so far.

After all, it doesn't seem that atheism and accepting scientific theories like evolution has done much to eliminate stupidity and ignorance. I see plenty of idiotic arguments and statements from people who accept evolution and deny the existence of god, just as I see dumb statements from creationists. There's stupidity everywhere. Hell, even some educated people are still stupid. I've known plenty of dumb people who work hard and memorize information but still lack great ability to think critically and produce common sense, and I've known plenty of genius people who grasp concepts easily, think very critically, and retain above average intelligence without putting much effort into their studies!

I think if anything, teaching both evolution and creationism would be beneficial. You might say: there's no unified creationist view, so how can it be taught? And you think that all view evolution and other scientific views identically... I don't agree with that. There isn't and shouldn't be a unanimous consensus.
Teaching both COULD help people develop critical thinking. Critical thinking has the most potential, IMO, to fix stupid. Memorizing scientific theories that have ZERO impact on the vast majority of people's lives (through their careers especially) does not work. They could teach both, and AGHAST, smart, critical thinking children will analyze both to decide which is more legitimate! Perhaps the teachers could probe the question: what is the difference between these two views, and the students could think critically to examine how one theory relies on proof or this or that.
Or do you not trust the children to think critically and realize the difference on their own? If properly, thoroughly taught evolution, how could they not, seeing as you say it is so overwhelmingly the correct answer.

At the end of the day, there are still GENIUS creationists and GENIUS atheists, and GENIUS everything in between and everything else. By genius, I mean people not only with high IQs, but who also can think critically exceptionally well.
Critical thinking is what matters. Not "skepticism."

Atheism and belief in scientific theories like evolution have not eliminated igorance nor caused critical thinking ability. Most atheists I come across still often lack the critical thinking ability to recognize the effect that their diction has on their arguments, how it creates a strawman easily slain (using words like 'magic' to describe God, or referring to him as a 'sociopathic, mass murderer,' or 'invisible man in the sky'). They lack the critical thinking ability to investigate the outrageous Christ Myth proposition that Christ is just a copy of other gods; or the critical thinking to realize the consistently of the Bible compared to other ancient texts, or their claim that Jesus Christ was never a historical figure because of lack of contemporary writings, despite the fact that we have virtually zero writings of antiquity that are originals and that all the ones we have are copies of copies of copies dating far past their original's supposed creation (with biblical writings having the smallest gap between writings we have and their originals). They lack the critical thinking to possibly consider the importance of taking the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, in its context instead of relying on a 21st century, drastically different viewpoint, or the ability to realize that our translations don't always grasp the originals intention for a word's meaning ("faith" as it is intended to mean in Scripture versus the definition today of "Believing without evidence"). They often lack the critical thinking ability to consider that morals were very different before the rise of Christianity, and claim from their post-Christian 21st century that man does not need religion to have morals and that the world would be better off had Christianity never existed.

They lack the critical thinking to raise an eyebrow at the idea of an infinite multiverse. Or abiogenesis.

I'm ranting, so my apologies. But these are some of the things that evolution-accepting atheists have yet to overcome--suggesting that their beliefs have not increased their intelligence and critical thinking ability, nor have they eliminated ignorance. But hey, as I've said, creationism and various other religious views have not done so either--I just happen to be picking on atheism.

My point simply is: we need critical thinking, not memorization/brain washing... It is important to teach the truth, absolutely! But we need critical thinking much, much more.

a reply to: Achilles92x

Excellent, absolutely excellent. I have nothing to add to your post.
I couldn't agree more

You said everything that can be said in a discussion like this.

originally posted by: Megatronus

originally posted by: randyvs

Looks like one hell of a train wreck to me.

You can't use the word faith and evolution in the same sentence. You don't need faith to believe in evolution, there os mountains of evidence supporting it. Calling it coincidences willfully ignores the simplicity and beauty of how it works.

you can certainly use faith and evolution in the same sentence! Just because there's evidence for something doesn't mean no faith is involved. Accepting evolution requires faith in its gaps. Or faith that "in time, science will be able to explain that gap." With science in general, faith is involved if one makes the claim that science will be able to explain 'this' or 'all things we currently do not understand.' You have zero evidence with such a claim. For all we know, we could, with science, only grasp 0.001% of all things that we could know. I'll be generous instead and say we know 1%. Knowing that little and continuing to know each little minuscule, negligible addition bit by bit does not qualify as evidence that we will eventually understand and explain the unknown.

I have a question, a legitimate one:
So let's assume abiogenesis. You've got this one (or did multiple microscopic organisms result from abiogenesis?) microscopic organism resulting from inanimate matter. What drove it and allowed it to reproduce?
Let's assume it does reproduce, this organism successfully mutated to better fit its environment? It didn't ever fail, and consequentially die off? It really got that lucky? If we're dealing with one, or even several unicellular, microscopic organisms, they seriously were capable of and managed to successfully mutate before dying off? Did this primordial soup just keep #ting out organisms and one finally got lucky over and over again, thousands of times, without dying off? This sounds like a lot of probability.
And this organism, though microscopic, eventually spread out far enough to have a different environment in which to adapt to, allowing for different species to develop? Or did multiple organisms arise from the primordial soup, all of which were lucky enough thousands of times to adapt better to their enviroment, but who adapted differently, causing different species to arise?
I'm just imagining this from the start. Not only, to me, does the probability of inorganic matter becoming organic seem astronomically impossible, but also that it just had the drive to replicate, and the odds of these replications successfully adapting to the environment before dying off, not just once, but over and over again. And then, they became so spread out that different species developed. The only natural predator for the original life was the environment. And either these microscopic organisms spread out enough to develop into different species, or multiple species arose in the primordial ooze. Either way, they all did so without dying off.

Or were all properly and perfectly adapted to their environment in the primordial ooze? Then why the drive to replicate? Mutations just errors in the replication that somehow managed to produce better surviving organisms without dying off first.

Maybe I have a huge misconception about this... So I legitimately ask that someone point it out respectfully if this is the case. From my limited, partially forgotten education on the matter, this is what im picturing, however.

originally posted by: Aedaeum
a reply to: Achilles92x

Excellent, absolutely excellent. I have nothing to add to your post.
I couldn't agree more

You said everything that can be said in a discussion like this.

Thank you! I greatly appreciate that.

originally posted by: Achilles92x

originally posted by: Megatronus

originally posted by: randyvs

Looks like one hell of a train wreck to me.

You can't use the word faith and evolution in the same sentence. You don't need faith to believe in evolution, there os mountains of evidence supporting it. Calling it coincidences willfully ignores the simplicity and beauty of how it works.

you can certainly use faith and evolution in the same sentence! Just because there's evidence for something doesn't mean no faith is involved. Accepting evolution requires faith in its gaps. Or faith that "in time, science will be able to explain that gap." With science in general, faith is involved if one makes the claim that science will be able to explain 'this' or 'all things we currently do not understand.' You have zero evidence with such a claim. For all we know, we could, with science, only grasp 0.001% of all things that we could know. I'll be generous instead and say we know 1%. Knowing that little and continuing to know each little minuscule, negligible addition bit by bit does not qualify as evidence that we will eventually understand and explain the unknown.

I have a question, a legitimate one:
So let's assume abiogenesis. You've got this one (or did multiple microscopic organisms result from abiogenesis?) microscopic organism resulting from inanimate matter. What drove it and allowed it to reproduce?
Let's assume it does reproduce, this organism successfully mutated to better fit its environment? It didn't ever fail, and consequentially die off? It really got that lucky? If we're dealing with one, or even several unicellular, microscopic organisms, they seriously were capable of and managed to successfully mutate before dying off? Did this primordial soup just keep #ting out organisms and one finally got lucky over and over again, thousands of times, without dying off? This sounds like a lot of probability.
And this organism, though microscopic, eventually spread out far enough to have a different environment in which to adapt to, allowing for different species to develop? Or did multiple organisms arise from the primordial soup, all of which were lucky enough thousands of times to adapt better to their enviroment, but who adapted differently, causing different species to arise?
I'm just imagining this from the start. Not only, to me, does the probability of inorganic matter becoming organic seem astronomically impossible, but also that it just had the drive to replicate, and the odds of these replications successfully adapting to the environment before dying off, not just once, but over and over again. And then, they became so spread out that different species developed. The only natural predator for the original life was the environment. And either these microscopic organisms spread out enough to develop into different species, or multiple species arose in the primordial ooze. Either way, they all did so without dying off.

Or were all properly and perfectly adapted to their environment in the primordial ooze? Then why the drive to replicate? Mutations just errors in the replication that somehow managed to produce better surviving organisms without dying off first.

Maybe I have a huge misconception about this... So I legitimately ask that someone point it out respectfully if this is the case. From my limited, partially forgotten education on the matter, this is what im picturing, however.

No you only need faith when there is no evidence. Once evidence has been collected faith is no longer required.

originally posted by: Megatronus

originally posted by: Achilles92x

originally posted by: Megatronus

originally posted by: randyvs

Looks like one hell of a train wreck to me.

You can't use the word faith and evolution in the same sentence. You don't need faith to believe in evolution, there os mountains of evidence supporting it. Calling it coincidences willfully ignores the simplicity and beauty of how it works.

you can certainly use faith and evolution in the same sentence! Just because there's evidence for something doesn't mean no faith is involved. Accepting evolution requires faith in its gaps. Or faith that "in time, science will be able to explain that gap." With science in general, faith is involved if one makes the claim that science will be able to explain 'this' or 'all things we currently do not understand.' You have zero evidence with such a claim. For all we know, we could, with science, only grasp 0.001% of all things that we could know. I'll be generous instead and say we know 1%. Knowing that little and continuing to know each little minuscule, negligible addition bit by bit does not qualify as evidence that we will eventually understand and explain the unknown.

I have a question, a legitimate one:
So let's assume abiogenesis. You've got this one (or did multiple microscopic organisms result from abiogenesis?) microscopic organism resulting from inanimate matter. What drove it and allowed it to reproduce?
Let's assume it does reproduce, this organism successfully mutated to better fit its environment? It didn't ever fail, and consequentially die off? It really got that lucky? If we're dealing with one, or even several unicellular, microscopic organisms, they seriously were capable of and managed to successfully mutate before dying off? Did this primordial soup just keep #ting out organisms and one finally got lucky over and over again, thousands of times, without dying off? This sounds like a lot of probability.
And this organism, though microscopic, eventually spread out far enough to have a different environment in which to adapt to, allowing for different species to develop? Or did multiple organisms arise from the primordial soup, all of which were lucky enough thousands of times to adapt better to their enviroment, but who adapted differently, causing different species to arise?
I'm just imagining this from the start. Not only, to me, does the probability of inorganic matter becoming organic seem astronomically impossible, but also that it just had the drive to replicate, and the odds of these replications successfully adapting to the environment before dying off, not just once, but over and over again. And then, they became so spread out that different species developed. The only natural predator for the original life was the environment. And either these microscopic organisms spread out enough to develop into different species, or multiple species arose in the primordial ooze. Either way, they all did so without dying off.

Or were all properly and perfectly adapted to their environment in the primordial ooze? Then why the drive to replicate? Mutations just errors in the replication that somehow managed to produce better surviving organisms without dying off first.

Maybe I have a huge misconception about this... So I legitimately ask that someone point it out respectfully if this is the case. From my limited, partially forgotten education on the matter, this is what im picturing, however.

No you only need faith when there is no evidence. Once evidence has been collected faith is no longer required.

That's some serious opinion right there. I disagree. The crazy thing about evidence is... It can be used and spun in different ways! Evidence can be used for confirmation bias! Evidence can be interpreted as cause and effect, when in reality it may simply be correlation! What's the overarching theme here? Belief. Belief has an effect on everything. Evidence is altered by human perspective.

I understand that the scientific method helps to avoid this issue. That testability hopes to eliminate perspective of evidence. But it certainly does not entirely. The same testable evidence can often be used to support contradicting views.

You seriously think that having evidence for some of a view eliminates the need for any form of faith to fill in the gaps? You know, the gaps that remain unknown, or the inconsistencies? Does partial evidence suddenly equate to full evidence?

I think a huge issue here is your negative connotation of the word "faith," which is something all atheists seem to share. I would know, I used to be a really, really big one.
I actually hate the idea of faith as "belief without evidence."
I don't have any belief without evidence!
I have personal, logical, and other evidence of God. Many other believers have the same. You may not like the evidence, you may not agree with what the evidence truly suggests, but it is evidence, nonetheless, and no less real than your evidence.

The word faith as used in the Bible leans more toward a definition similar to a profound trust. That is the FAITH in God that I have.

And I would argue, you have a trust that the inconsistencies, outrageous underlying assumptions, and gaps in evolution and other scientific theories can be explained some day, and that they do not eliminate the truth of those theories.

Seeing as this is a conspiracy website... Have you, personally, ever done some or all of the vital research and experiments needed to support evolution as a scientific theory? I'm going to guess a whopping no, so, ultimately, you put faith (in this case, possibly 'belief without evidence') in people you do not know, who may or may not have actually performed the experiments, who may be driven by agendas and affected by their own biases and beliefs, who may have entirely fabricated portions of their work.

Sound impossible? Seem too far fetched to assume? I think a very good example of where MANY people would raise an eyebrow is medical research and pharmaceuticals. THAT is some serious agenda driven research right there, that picks and chooses its evidence, that picks and chooses what it will study and research, solely for its own benefit and prosperity. It will ignore avenues and evidence in favor of other things, providing that the other things allow the agenda to thrive.

originally posted by: hudsonhawk69
a reply to: Krazysh0t

I can see where your coming from... However evolution isn't exactly science either is it. Neither should be taught in schools!

Um... Yes it IS science. It is the very definition of science.

a reply to: Ghost147

but the study of the effects of religion on society is not a scientific field.

Yes, it is.
It is social science. Like Anthropology.

a reply to: chr0naut

Well I have nothing, personally, against the God of the gaps argument. It isn't a logically unsound argument and god may very well exist within the gaps of our scientific knowledge. I just see the idea of using the absence of conflicting evidence as a means of belief is rather contrived.

originally posted by: chr0naut

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: Bone75

I didn't make this thread in response to any particular news stories right now. I'm just discussing how the debate is flawed to begin with.

Just because it may not be currently taught, doesn't mean that people aren't trying to change that. Plus it IS being taught as science in some private schools, and that is part of my point. It isn't science, even if you have every legal right to call it that as you teach it.

How would one teach it as science?

Ya got me, but apparently they are doing it in certain schools, and they aren't just private, religious schools either.

originally posted by: chr0naut

originally posted by: Krazysh0t
a reply to: theantediluvian

I didn't notice it, but I did now. Lol

That poster is wrong. He is framing the argument like a debate actually exists. The only people who believe a debate even exists are the Creationists who have created the debate out of thin air. Like I said in the OP, you can't call it science if you can't even present a unified idea of what it says among all its proponents. After all, how can you teach a standardized version of it for all parties then?

So, you're taking part in a debate that doesn't exist?

Sorry, I'm confused?

Because it isn't a debate. It's an attempt at educating someone.

originally posted by: Achilles92x


That's some serious opinion right there. I disagree. The crazy thing about evidence is... It can be used and spun in different ways! Evidence can be used for confirmation bias! Evidence can be interpreted as cause and effect, when in reality it may simply be correlation! What's the overarching theme here? Belief. Belief has an effect on everything. Evidence is altered by human perspective.

I understand that the scientific method helps to avoid this issue. That testability hopes to eliminate perspective of evidence. But it certainly does not entirely. The same testable evidence can often be used to support contradicting views.

You seriously think that having evidence for some of a view eliminates the need for any form of faith to fill in the gaps? You know, the gaps that remain unknown, or the inconsistencies? Does partial evidence suddenly equate to full evidence?

I think a huge issue here is your negative connotation of the word "faith," which is something all atheists seem to share. I would know, I used to be a really, really big one.
I actually hate the idea of faith as "belief without evidence."
I don't have any belief without evidence!
I have personal, logical, and other evidence of God. Many other believers have the same. You may not like the evidence, you may not agree with what the evidence truly suggests, but it is evidence, nonetheless, and no less real than your evidence.

The word faith as used in the Bible leans more toward a definition similar to a profound trust. That is the FAITH in God that I have.

And I would argue, you have a trust that the inconsistencies, outrageous underlying assumptions, and gaps in evolution and other scientific theories can be explained some day, and that they do not eliminate the truth of those theories.

Seeing as this is a conspiracy website... Have you, personally, ever done some or all of the vital research and experiments needed to support evolution as a scientific theory? I'm going to guess a whopping no, so, ultimately, you put faith (in this case, possibly 'belief without evidence') in people you do not know, who may or may not have actually performed the experiments, who may be driven by agendas and affected by their own biases and beliefs, who may have entirely fabricated portions of their work.

Sound impossible? Seem too far fetched to assume? I think a very good example of where MANY people would raise an eyebrow is medical research and pharmaceuticals. THAT is some serious agenda driven research right there, that picks and chooses its evidence, that picks and chooses what it will study and research, solely for its own benefit and prosperity. It will ignore avenues and evidence in favor of other things, providing that the other things allow the agenda to thrive.

I will start with abiogenesis which really has nothing to do with evolution. It's a completely different kettle of fish. That is also just a hypothesis. That does require a cetain amount of faith to believe as it's not backed up by the evidence yet. Notice I said yet, there are currently plenty of experiments ongoing testing this hypothesis. I don't see any experiments tying to prove the biblical account mainly because 'God did it' is not testable or repeatable.

When I used the term evidence I was referring to it in terms of the theory of evolution. The theory of evolution has mounds of evidence to support it and I believe there is not a shred of evidence tha disputes it. So she it comes to Evolution, a theory with such a wide base of supporting evidence, faith is not needed to believe

I have personal, logical, and other evidence of God. Many other believers have the same. You may not like the evidence, you may not agree with what the evidence truly suggests, but it is evidence, nonetheless, and no less real than your evidence. 

This not evidence, That is opinion. Evidence can be tested and repeated. What you stated of evidence is your opinion and personal experience, nothing more.

I'm not here to rain on your parade and tell you god isn't real. I wouldn't, there is no evidence for or against his existence. So, the jury is out on that as far as I'm concerned. All Im saying is Evolution has enough evidence it requires no faith and that personal experience and opinion is not evidence of anything.

The First Amendment (Amendment I) to the United States Constitution prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering with the right to peaceably assemble or prohibiting ...

They put that in there (religion mention) because this argument has been going and going and going on forever.

If we defined Evolution as a completely natural and random process, then at this point, Evolution looks more like a myth than Creationism. Evolution has two problems to overcome, and that is the Transitional Fossil Problem, and now what I'd call the Dispersion Problem. Quite frankly, at this point, genetic manipulation(which is Creationism in spirit) is as good a theory as any, and explains away both of these problems.

a reply to: Barcs

Finally, someone makes sense. I agree 100%. Its just hard to explain most to christians(espicially the conspiracy kind). Thry will simply say you are brainwashed by satanism..while not acknowledging their religion is just as false.

originally posted by: ffx6554
If we defined Evolution as a completely natural and random process, then at this point, Evolution looks more like a myth than Creationism. Evolution has two problems to overcome, and that is the Transitional Fossil Problem, and now what I'd call the Dispersion Problem. Quite frankly, at this point, genetic manipulation(which is Creationism in spirit) is as good a theory as any, and explains away both of these problems.

Your problems with Evolution are that it is incomplete? That isn't exactly a valid reason to disbelieve a scientific theory...