SCI/TECH: The Battle Over Evolution

Tenpin,

Maybe you should read that article you posted a bit more carefully:

Mr. Flew still does not accept any revealed religion, including Christianity. He has simply become a "theist," or, as he says, a "deist," believing that God created the world but no longer has a personal relationship with it. Nevertheless, as philosopher Angus Menuge says, for "one of the 20th century's most famous atheist philosophers" to become a theist is "huge news in philosophy.

Mr. Menuge, the author of Agents Under Fire, which applies Intelligent Design to the field of philosophy, points out that C.S. Lewis too started as a theist and ended as a Christian. "Flew is a truly remarkable man with a mind as clear and severe as sunlight, and we can hope that although he says he is only a theist, God is continuing his alien work and drawing him to faith." —•

The bias seeps through the entire article. Mr.Flew is a 'philosopher', not an Evolutionary Biologist, or did you miss that part aswell? Philosophy majors in the west focus on Western philosophy revolved around ituitive reasoning, not blind faith.

Deep

.
NewsFlash TenPin,

Truth is not political or religious,
If the past is a fixed quantity it is simply the events that happened.

Intelligent design is just code for creationism. [I suppose you could say aliens guided evolutionary developments, but most advocates of ID don't realize that would be included] In any event there is no tangible evidence to that effect.

Theories based on evidence = science
Theories with zero evidence = speculation, fantasy
.

If God is omnipresent and all knowing, then perhaps in His application of change in the fourth dimention, which is time, He has chosen evolution as His catalyst for change. If He is as smart as Christians say He is then perhaps the creation of the world was a magical event, and the science of that magic is what has become known as evolution by the more intelligent of our spices.

To not believe in evolution is to not believe in change, which is as omnipresent as God Himself. God is change, is evolution and is creation, because to change mud into pottery is also a creation. To evolve men out of lesser beings is also a creation of the same sort.

The contemporary argument about evolution vs creationism is just the bland old argument between the left and the right in American politics. The topic is rarely innovative on either side and only deepens my convictions that we have devolved from apes!

This goes way beyond the question of the origin of mankind, it's a battle for a way of life, a Jihad so to speak:

Science seems to want to objectivate and "materialise" everything, while the ID'ers wants to put everything in their religious context.

Faith is not only a matter of believing in one or more Gods, but above all, accepting the valuesystem and ethics, such as the ten commands, that come with it.

What Creationists and ID blame science for, is that science instead of God behind the steering wheel, with their objective materialism, brings new ideas and technology in this world, WITHOUT assigning ethical values to them, wich in their eyes has led to much deteriotion of values in modern soceity

While I don't believe in a God, I do recognize that many problems in our "free" western soceity are caused by being a consumerist mentality "Right to choose" without getting thaught responsible choices.

Now a book such as the bible teaches about choices and also kids learn about choices in school, but since the quality of public schools in many places going down the drain, no wonder many kids grow up for no good, private $chools and pre-schools seems to be way for people who can afford it to give their kids a good sense of ethics, or much simpler, go to to church and have a divine hand guide you....

So ID et al seems determined to want to bring back values to soceity, even if their is a change that they MIGHT be wrong about their supporting stories such intelligent design or Noahs Ark....

I even doubt that all ID supporters actually believe in their theory, but some rather see it as a tool to try force their valuesystem upon soceity..


[edit on 1-2-2005 by Countermeasures]

I find it hilarious that a so called modern leading country of the world has the same teachings in schools as the least modern and backward and fundamentalist countries in the world. Looks like the US has more in common with these gun toting head scarf wearing religious nuts than they realise !

well said.
even though our forefathers were religious,many were also brilliant scientists. example:benjamin franklin
state and church should remain seperate...if public schools wish NOT to teach creationism then what is the problem? if you don't want your children to learn of theories like evolution,then send them to parochial school.

Originally posted by Asia Minor
True, but we can't replace one flaw with another. Evolution is not true. The Negro is said to be the spawn of us. But we have found bones of MODERN MEN over 300 million years old. We were created. If we evolved, then what stopped apes from evolving? It is a flawed education to teach us that mishap. I stand by them only for a chance at the truth being taught.

this is absolute crap. anything is possible, just not probable, you cant disguard evolution from this. microscopic evolution is proven, its just the matter if outer species evolution is real. i can clearly see you have no knowledge in this area, so why comment so certain?
*But we have found bones of MODERN MEN over 300 million years old* This, truly does make me laugh, for starters, mammals have only been around for 150million years and they where small rodents let alone man... man has only been around for about 6-3million years, this is commonly accepted in science, but if you want to be a true creationist, you should of claim that man is only 6,000 years old and carbon dating is inaccurate.
*If we evolved, then what stopped apes from evolving*
apes are evolution. do genetical mutations occur in apes DNA? yes this is a biological principle. and also evolution

please.

Intelligent design and evolution aren't mutually exclusive. So I am going into my Junior year as a biology major at MIT- so those of you that are going to question my credientials, don't. I wish I had a dollar for everytime I heard one of my professors say, "And then something happened, but we don't know what." There's still a lot of gaps in our knowledge, but nothing that we have denies Creationism/Intelligent design. Albeit, it does depend on how literal you want to take the Bible, but from my own expereince, the more I've learned the more I can't shake the idea of a Creator. What's more, adpatation just adds to the intelligence of said Creator, because honestly, it's just bloody brilliant! So my thought is, teach it until it's proven wrong.

Thats the problem. You will never be able to prove there is a god or not. It is not science and has no place in a science classroom. It's all about pushing a religous political agenda. It like this: Child speaking "How did that happen mommy". Mother replies "It's what god wanted hunney". Thats it. I think we have answers to all the questions right there except one. But, i won't mention it because i don't want it to start a religous debate.

btw, there is no missing link. and to whoever said there are 300 mil year old human fossils, the oldest genis homo fossils found are +- 2.5 mil years old. That would be the homo hablis found by Louis and Mary Leakey I believe in 1960 at the Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. Thats what i got from my text book. Evolution and prehistory, The human challenge, seventh edition. by Haviland, Walwrath, Prins, McBride.

Originally posted by saturnine_sweet
Perhaps it is because the further science digs into the origins of matter, the more intelligent design seems the inevitable conclusion, thus it is once again being taught. Not as a matter of religion, but of good science. Do some research, and you will find that among the leaders in quantum physics and fields related to origins of matter and the universe, their opinions are largely split as to how it all began. Eventually, this has to begin filtering down. Biologists still fervently believe in evolution, but those looking deeper are beginning to have their doubts. Maybe there is some hope for intelligence after all.

Before I address any other points, allow me to please wipe quantum theory from this thread as it is entirely irrelevant and also because the term "intelligent design" is being thrown around on this thread like confetti by people who have obviously no clue what it actually means.

SS, by "leaders in quantum physics", who exactly do you mean? Feynman? Stephen Hawking? Charles Schrodinger? David Bohm? Niels Bohr? Norwood Hanson? Edwin Burtt? Walter Stace? Edgar Cayce? Karl Popper? Thomas Kunn? Any of the bazillions of quantum physicists who agree on absolutely nothing but seem to make perfect sense regardless?

Let me equate quantum theories to eastern philosophy for a moment. "Leading quantum theories" (if any could be described as "leading") which point to intelligent design are contrived of other "leading quantum theories" such as superposition, reductionism, and "inductive logic as the only kind of logic". They point to theories such as non-linear time and zero point space. Just unprovable theories built on unprovable theories.

Now, if you were to refer to a quantum theorist or physicist as believing in intelligent design, you'll probably find that they describe the universe as self-creating and constantly recreating and both and neither all at the same time. In a sense, they are saying the most logically true thing they can think of: that the universe is the universe. (Sort of like how God said "I am that I am" or something to that effect) Existence was created by existence was created by creation was created by creation. Doesn't make any sense to me either.

The point is that intelligent design points to a non-Judeo-Christian God, a god which is truley not human, a god which can't be described or related to, a god which IS everything and ISN'T anything... basically something which can not be understood or labeled and should simply be left alone.

Quantum theory is basically the western version of Eastern Philosophy which is based in (and directly violates) science. It's good that we could clear that up.

Creation vs. evolution? Can't both be right? Can't God have created evolution? Why are creationists trying to use the logic of science to disprove the logic of science?
Look, you read the creation story and say god made it all in seven days. I read it and say that god made evolution to be the creator of all things in what could have best been described by people who were still thousands of years off from discovering science as "seven days". Let me give you some references.

Gen 1:1, NISB, "... God created the heavens and the earth, 2 the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face... 3 Then God said 'Let there be light'; and there was light... 5 God called the light Day and the darkness he called Night..."

Ok, so God created Day in order to create Day on the first Day. Doesn't make too much sense, but if you're God, I guess you don't have to make sense. Second day Gen 1:6 "... God said, 'Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters and let it separate the waters from the waters.' 7 So God made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome... 8 God called the dome Sky." Great, completely redefines astronomy, heat, chemistry and weight as we know them... but then again He is God.

I'm not saying that God couldn't have done those things, I'm just saying, why would there be light with no sky? How could there be Night with no one having been around to have invented a calendar? This explanation is typical of those who think the Earth is the center of the universe and that when it is night, the entire universe is dark and when it is day, the sun comes up everywhere (never mind only on our flat planet). Do creationists think that Earth is flat? What constitutes Day, in this matter? Is it according to whether it is sunny or not? Is it according to man's first calendar? The Hebrew calendar? The new and improved western calendar? Metric time or standard? If there were only some explanation... but unfortunately the people at the time had know way of knowing that the Earth was round, or that light was hella fast or that the earth went around the sun, not the other way around...

Let's continue Gen 1:14 "... and God said, 'Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night; and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, 15 and let them be lights in the dome to give light upon the earth' ... God made the two great lights--the greater to rule the day, the lesser to rule the night ... the Fourth Day". Oh yes! FINALLY, some definition of Day and Night exists... on the Fourth Day. So were we to consider the first Three Days to have been non-days? Even you creationists have to agree that there is SOME figurative language in the Bible.

Here's where I see evolution hidden in between the lines of the creation story: Gen 1:20 "...'Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth' ... 20 so God created the great sea monsters (I love that and just had to throw it in)... the Fifth Day... 24 'Let the Earth be full of creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things...'... God made... everything that creeps upon the ground." Then God made us to be masters of everything on earth. You see, to me, except for the fact that these all happen on separate ambiguous "Days", this sounds a lot like evolution. God made the things of the sea first, then made "creeping" things on the earth after. Kind of like how scientists think that life "creeped" out of the sea. "Sea monsters"? Sounds like dinosaurs to me. But they could be monsters if it'll keep the creationists happy. Excepting Nessie (for you cryptozoologists), they are all dead.

I also want to mention that Earth aside, intelligent design seems to have worked out exactly the way that chaotic design has. Heavenly bodies came first, then the earth slowly formed, then simple life started in the water and gave way to more complex life on land where humans eventually evolved (which would about bring us up to speed in both intelligent and chaotic design).

Let me explain, in simple terms, the basics of evolution. (In most cases) A male and a female of a certain species mate and give genetic material to their offspring. The offspring has genetic resemblance to their parents. (I'm sorry, if you're both white and your wife gives birth to a black baby, she's cheating on you). Undeniably, certain people are smarter than others and certain people are more physically fit than others. Those that are of better physical fitness and higher intelligence have a tendency to survive more often and longer than their inferiors. This survival tendency is called "natural selection" or "survival of the fittest". If, for example all orange foxes have to eat green foxes and all green foxes have to eat bugs, then the only green foxes that would survive would be the ones that were good at hiding, good at running, or good at making themselves a color other than green. If the green fox does not adapt then it dies out and becomes extinct. The white fox has nothing to worry about because nothing eats it... until people realize that their skin makes very expensive coats.

The theory then goes on to presume that inferior specimens of a certain species will be less likely to live to maturity and breeding age, thereby eliminating their genes from the gene pool.

Genetic exchange is a scientific fact. The biggest part of evolution is a scientific fact. The theory resides in the apparent absence of smooth transition from an old species to a newer one. It would take a virtually immortal person to witness and therefore scientifically prove that specific species evolved into other specific species, but this is simply a scientific technicality.

Why is any of this relevant? Well, if modern society were to admit that evolution was false, that there is a guiding hand making everything move and work as it should, then we as a society would also have to admit that science is false. It would, hypothetically, put us back in the stone age.

I want there to be a compromise. God gave us science in order to help us explain the universe and progress as a people. God gave us understanding so that we might be something by which god might compare itself. God set everything in motion so that we could make and wear clothing and hunt and create medicine to heal. If you want, you could say that God heals people... but don't say that God physically lays its hands on a sick person and he/she is healed like magic... that is an insult to human intelligence. Just so we can get along, can you at least say that God set things in motion so that we could create modern medicine over the past 300,000 or whatever years so that little Johnny might actually have a chance at beating cancer whereas the millions of cancer victims before him perished?

Have we really not gotten past the point that anything we don't understand fully has to be the work of god, aliens, or magic? Can't we just say it is what it is and until we can prove why, we won't claim to know? Like it or not, our minds work on a sort of programed logic. It is this logic which allows us to speak. We need it in order to survive and learn. Why is it only applicable selectively? Why do we still need God to fill in the gaps? Can we not just say that God is what it is (just like it said.. "I am that I am") and that the universe it what it is and to try not to mix them up together?
-S

P.S. MA, good show. I totally agree that pushing religion in opposition to science would be a step backwards. Slowly but surely there are compromises being made that make religion make more sense in light of science. Science is also giving up some of its own power, at least in part, by quantum physics. There is a whole area of quantum physics which is devoted to deconstructing the fallacies of modern science.

[edit on 3-5-2005 by ServoHahn]

Originally posted by Asia Minor
The Negro is said to be the spawn of us. But we have found bones of MODERN MEN over 300 million years old. We were created.

If you believe that there are human bones dating to 300 million years (?!), how can you believe in creationism that holds that the earth was created some 4000 years ago?

Personally, I don't see any contradiction between evolution and creation. The argument really exists between dogmatists from both camps.

Some relevant links, but bear in mind scientific data are always, ahem, evolving:

www.newscientist.com...

news.bbc.co.uk...

www.leakeyfoundation.org...

www.leakeyfoundation.org...

www.guinnessworldrecords.com...

www.infoplease.com...

www.jqjacobs.net...

www.warmafrica.com...

www.esimpletech.com...

Links from Urantia Book synthesizing creation and evolution:

www.urantia.org...

www.urantia.org...

www.urantia.org...

www.urantia.org...

www.urantia.org...