The atheists monopoly of true morality....

reply to post by PerfectAnomoly


Cause-effect relationship: The idea that there is an effect and therefore the scientific method can be applied to verify the cause. If you apply the limiting case then, of this reasoning - we have something arising from nothing. This is the currently understood case for quarks flashing in and out of existence for instance.

reply to post by Grimpachi


The understanding of science is relative to science.

Everything is relative, short of having 100% knowledge of everything in the universe. For instance, for how long did science believe that the atom was indivisible?

Therefore, science too is a circular argument. It is a theism based on a foundation of other people's ignorance, if you will.

Rather, I choose to believe both science and in the existence of God and not feel that the two are necessarily mutually exclusive.

I found a thread that discusses creation from a scientific perspective here: (why should I re-invent the wheel).

Originally posted by edmc^2
Warning to Evolutionists:

The Video that you're about to see might cause you to change your way of thinking. So if you're not up to it may I suggest to move on and be close minded.

But of course I would rather want you to watch the program and decide for yourself if indeed Life was Created or in your case evolved.

Enjoy - and let me know what you think and if you're able to answer the Qs asked in the Vid (as a mature and knowledgeable homosapian).

To Creation beleivers - enjoy and be in awe of the wonders of Creation!

"For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse."-- Rom 1:20 (NASB)

www.youtube.com...


tc

I forgot to provide the link for the quote in my previous post.

Here it is:

post by edmc^2

reply to post by sensibleSenseless


To answer your question regarding the video you posted..... I would like to quote Atzil321... another member of ATS....

"I could only manage 8 minutes of the video sorry. All I see is christian fundamentalists trying to use science to confirm their belief that god created the universe ect. The basic argument they use is 'everything is so amazing and complex it has to have been designed by a creator'... Their shameless cherry picking of scientific knowledge to justify their world view falls flat on its face once you realize the core belief of their religion is that the universe itself is only 4000 years old.

Yes everything we observe and have learned about the universe through science is amazing, but scientific method has taught us the universe we observe is at least 14.5 billion years old not 4000 years, thats a hell of a long time for things to evolve into all the wonder we see around us today 'independent of any creator'.

These days you can dress any old argument up to look modern and exciting 'especially if your audience is gullible and poorly educated' thats all I see here."

What he said^^

PA

reply to post by sensibleSenseless


This particular clip has been discussed and debunked before...

It really does say nothing beyond "Look how amazing and complicated everything is, it must have been designed/created"... and then goes on to propose spurious statistical data based on random leaps of faith and pre-determined conclusions...

When it comes to statistics I agree with David Brent...

"Statistics are like a lampost to a drunken man, more for support than illumination".

PA

reply to post by PerfectAnomoly


You do know that a lot of scientific "knowledge" is based on statistics. Take the efficacy of many pharmaceutical products. The double blind tests that are done are often gathering statistical evidence of the invented medications' effectiveness.

That being said, I do have my differences with what was discussed in the video. For instance, I believe that it isn't random changes that cause evolution, but changes that are a feedback mechanism from the organisms that change.

What I see a lot of people who try to debunk the idea that there is a God, is that they cling to the belief that extreme orders of intelligence can occur from random origins. So, perhaps we are destined to agree to disagree.

As to your idea that the universe is only 4000 years old, according to scripture - it really depends on who you talk to.

Threads that discuss a lot of what we are debating here today exist all over the place. And there are many views on the understanding of scripture.

The creationist view as a view of what scripture was saying was something that my research on scripture has debunked. Here is the post I made in another one of these threads discussing scripture:

Originally posted by sensibleSenseless

Sorry if I am repeating others' views. Haven't had time to view the entire thread. You might count me as another vote for what I am about to say.

I believe that the reason for the books of creation is to explain the concept of "God" to people of the time, and that it is a story that purposely circumvented the theory of evolution so as to demonstrate the concept in terms that people of the time could understand. It was not, IMHO, a book written to expose the chronological order of events of the time.

I'm not sure how many people believe that the bible disproves the theory of evolution. Creationist theories may be popular, but I don't count the fact that it is popular as meaning that it is right.

Take a comparison of the first two chapters of the bible:

(BTW: the word "day" is translated from the original word "Yom", which means time period - so I am going to use the word time period in running my comparison).

First Chapter:
=============

God made the first vegetation on the planet on the second day/time period.

God made sea creatures and birds on the fourth day/time period.

On the fifth day/time period, God made the animals and human beings.

The second chapter:
==================

This time period - according to the second chapter - occurred as God was creating the earth.

God made man prior to making wild bushes and wild plants. (Just the wild ones).

God made man and then created the wild animals and all the birds of heaven - to give man a companion.

One note:
=========

Clearly, according to the second chapter all the birds were made to give man a companion. Yet, the first chapter puts the event of bird making prior to the arrival of man.

Another note:
============

The first chapter says God created heaven and earth in the beginning. Then it goes on to say there was a divine wind blowing over the waters.

Now, the actual act of creating heaven occurred on the second day and the earth was a formless void (until it was created on the third day). So, the previous paragraph wasn't necessarily meant to be a chronologically ordered description.

The earth was created on the third day. So, an earth day is not necessarily implied in the days described earlier.

On the fourth day (according to the first chapter) - is when God set the two lights in the sky - one to govern the day and the other to govern the night and to indicate the passing of days, and to divide light from darkness.

Yet, the same idea appears on the first day - he created light and separated it from darkness, calling the light "day" and the darkness "night". (in chapter 1).

Additionally, we now know the earth is round and this is how "our" days and nights are caused. So, it would likely be that the human day and night would have been created after the earth had been created.

Yet, the first chapter describes evening and morning for every single day... evenings and mornings occur because the earth is spinning on its axis... and that too only if you were located at one point on earth would you have a 24 hour day - the northern most point on the north pole only sees a 6 month day and a 6 month night. (Same thing in Finland).

Conclusions:
===========

What does this all mean? Can't say.

It does say in the second chapter that God fashioned man from the soil of the ground - but it would be true if you summarize evolution as well.

So, I can't say that it disproves evolution, neither can I say it proves it.

So you see: Those who hold a creationist view of scripture aren't holding a valid argument IMHO.

reply to post by sensibleSenseless


This concept you have originated of people attempting to debunk your god?

I see people asking for tangible evidence of your god. This is quite the opposite of debunking.

The problem lies in perspective. You translate a belief into a fact then require people to prove your "fact" wrong.
In essence we have the root cause of immutable belief versus mutable scientific theory raising its ugly head once more.

reply to post by Noncompatible


It's hard for me to understand your post. There seems to be many assumptions that you wish to have people attach to incompletely expressed ideas. Your first two sentences are hard to decipher as they do not point at the material to which they refer.

There is no experimental proof for the existence of God, except from observation. God is not a material to be tested. Therefore, for the in-existent to be tested is impossible. The existence of a higher intelligence is therefore discerned from what we have been able to "see" - in a manner of speaking.

If you were to take the biblical description of God, though, there is proof of God's existence. For instance, God has been qualified in multiple locations in scripture: "God is love", "God is spirit". These, therefore, indicate that a material existence is not being expounded upon, rather that they are qualities that emanate from human beings. These qualities are the corner stones for effective leadership of groups of people, if you will. And the bible is a book of wisdom that applies to leaders and the most efficient means to generate collective outcomes that work.

"The problem lies in perspective. You translate a belief into a fact then require people to prove your "fact" wrong." The idea that the atom is indivisible - was this a "fact" or belief? (Hint: It was considered science at one point in time.)

It is a belief, and this is agreed. As for a "fact": every observer has to decide for him/herself what "fact" is. Even science doesn't require the use of force to observe experiments and their outcomes. Science is after all relative - and part of that relativity relates to the observer.