Creation or Evolution?

[GostHacked]

Hurts whose cause? I get tired of being lectured not to upset the fundamentalists by asking what evidence they have for their beliefs. In some ways, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris are right when they say that liberal religionists enable the fundamentalists by attempting to squelch any probing questions about the value of religious belief and religious affiliation.

That was not my point. I know in the other thread about Dawkins/Athiesm give many examples of what you have a beef with. I won't argue with you there at all.

If athiests have a cause (which there does not seem to be) then using evolution to prove no god exists is futile at best, and just as good as the so called evidence to prove god DOES exist. For the simple fact that we know evolution does not deal with that question at all. So indeed, why the hell is is brought up all the time?

[Bonam]

That was not my point. I know in the other thread about Dawkins/Athiesm give many examples of what you have a beef with. I won't argue with you there at all.

If athiests have a cause (which there does not seem to be) then using evolution to prove no god exists is futile at best, and just as good as the so called evidence to prove god DOES exist. For the simple fact that we know evolution does not deal with that question at all. So indeed, why the hell is is brought up all the time?

Because people on both sides of the argument still think of whatever they deem truthful as a "belief system". Evolution, like any other scientific theory, should not be treated as a belief system, but sadly it is perceived this way both by the religious organizations as well as by most "believers" of evolution. Just look at the wording of this poll for one.

Once people think of something as a belief system, rather than an objective theory dealing with specific phenomena and supported with specific evidence, they then inevitably fall into the trap of trying to extend it to support their ideas of the existence or non-existence of the supernatural.

The fact is that there is no fundamental conflict between science and religion. Science deals with the realities of this world, as it can be observed, described, and quantified. Religion deals with the supernatural, a realm that science can by its very definition have no comment on, as it is "outside nature".

Edited June 25, 2009 by Bonam

[eyeball]

Because people on both sides of the argument still think of whatever they deem truthful as a "belief system". Evolution, like any other scientific theory, should not be treated as a belief system, but sadly it is perceived this way both by the religious organizations as well as by most "believers" of evolution. Just look at the wording of this poll for one.

Once people think of something as a belief system, rather than an objective theory dealing with specific phenomena and supported with specific evidence, they then inevitably fall into the trap of trying to extend it to support their ideas of the existence or non-existence of the supernatural.

The fact is that there is no fundamental conflict between science and religion. Science deals with the realities of this world, as it can be observed, described, and quantified. Religion deals with the supernatural, a realm that science can by its very definition have no comment on, as it is "outside nature".

The problem is when religions try to be the final word on the natural world as well. Its just out of its realm when it does often resulting in a fundamental conflict with science and reality that has tangible consequences. Look at the issue of condoms for contraception and disease prevention for example.

Atheism would be better described as skepticism which is more a method or way of looking at the world. While skepticism can take a systematic approach to things its clearly not a belief system in and of itself.

[DFCaper]

As the others have said, god's existence (or not) has nothing to do with evolution.

Just how does evolution prove god is smart? Evolution doesn't say or imply anything about god what-so-ever.

There is no onus to disprove the existence of god - if we had to go proving the non-existence of everything that doesn't exist, we would be here a while! ;-)

How does the quote go? "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."?

So... what makes you believe evolution is controlled by the hand of god? Where is your extraordinary proof?

I thought when the Creation question was asked, this was somewhat a religious question, as I doubt anybody believes in Creationism in this context without it being belief based.

I was just explaining that despite my beliefs, I also believe in science. I also think science and religion do nothing to prove, or disprove one another. No matter what the uneducated believe.

[WIP]

That was not my point. I know in the other thread about Dawkins/Athiesm give many examples of what you have a beef with. I won't argue with you there at all.

If athiests have a cause (which there does not seem to be)

Why did you state that there was an atheist cause in your previous post?

then using evolution to prove no god exists is futile at best, and just as good as the so called evidence to prove god DOES exist. For the simple fact that we know evolution does not deal with that question at all. So indeed, why the hell is is brought up all the time?

Once again, I did not say that evolution proves that God does not exist; what I said was that it takes away one of the commonly used arguments for intelligent design -- the diversity of life on Earth. Evolution provides a natural theory of how animals, plants and micro-organisms diversified and flourished, without the need for mythical explanations.

[WIP]

Because people on both sides of the argument still think of whatever they deem truthful as a "belief system". Evolution, like any other scientific theory, should not be treated as a belief system, but sadly it is perceived this way both by the religious organizations as well as by most "believers" of evolution. Just look at the wording of this poll for one.

You can call all theories "beliefs" for that matter, the distinction between good theories and bad ones is found in how closely they match the results of observations and empirical evidence. On that scale, I would say the Theory of Evolution is superior to the Six Day Creation Myth in the book of Genesis.

The fact is that there is no fundamental conflict between science and religion.

My apologies to all of those who would like N.O.M.A. to actually work, but the fact is that there are conflicts between science and religion that cannot be papered over! Science conflicts with religion by positing a theory of evolution that contradicts religious creation myths, and by attempting to push further into Abiogenesis - the study of how life arose, and by developing cosmological theories that try to uncover the origins of the Universe. All of these scientific inquiries threaten religious dogmas, and that's why the believers in various dogmas take a hostile view of science.

On the other hand, religion is responsible for the problems we have dealing with beginning of life and end of life issues, because of the belief in a supernatural soul, and religion is also the reason for discrimation against homosexuals, because religious dogma that insists that they are choosing to sin, rather than the scientific evidence that they are responding to genetic, hormone or even infectious agents early in life.

Face it, NOMA doesn't work! Either the religiious will have to re-interpret their dogmas to accommodate new scientific understandings, or we keep getting stuck and even regressing, like we did back in the Middle AGes.

Science deals with the realities of this world, as it can be observed, described, and quantified. Religion deals with the supernatural, a realm that science can by its very definition have no comment on, as it is "outside nature".

The supernatural used to be part of the natural world at one time. In the Bible, the wind is a force of God's spirit moving over the land. The supernatural keeps retreating beyond the point of examination because believers want to hold on to these beliefs, and keep moving the definitions of souls, spirits, ghosts etc. out of reach of scientific examination to a point where they are irrelevant for us who do not believe they exist.

[GostHacked]

Why did you state that there was an atheist cause in your previous post?

I guess because some see it that way. You know, with betsy n all

Once again, I did not say that evolution proves that God does not exist; what I said was that it takes away one of the commonly used arguments for intelligent design -- the diversity of life on Earth. Evolution provides a natural theory of how animals, plants and micro-organisms diversified and flourished, without the need for mythical explanations.

agreed, and it seems that some of the new posters get it as well. encouraging.

[Oleg Bach]

Darwin never said once that God does not exist - those that use Darwins observations to justify rebellion against the natural world (GOD) are similar to homo-sexuals who expouse the idea that every great man that ever lived was gay...from Micheal Angelo to Napoleon..it's very unfair - dead men can not defend their reputations...If Darwin was not out to destroy God but to explain God and creation - evolution is timeless as is creation - they are the same thing... Much like the man who opened the door to nuclear physicis was sickened when they took his work and created a bomb- or like Freud who was sickened when the Nazis took his work and re-engineered it to control the mass and enslave them --- If Darwin was alive today he would also be sickend by the small minded jerks that took his life force and used what is truely an unveiled mystery of God to destroy God..wtf/

[DFCaper]

My favorite part about the attitude of posters such as WIP is that they are the people who pushed certain people to push the anti-evolution theory and push Intelligent design. I also bet your the most offended by it. hehehe

I'm sure your better at promoting people towards the Creationism than the anti-God Evolution theory that you believe!!! People like you make me more and more torrent of Creationism, despite my complete disagreement with it. The strong push from Atheist such as yourself is what fueled Intelligent design of the last 10 years. It is certainly growing, thanks to efforts from people such as yourself.

[Oleg Bach]

Eternity and the universe is intelligent and is spectactularly designed...If there was no intelligence we would not be here - in the alternative maybe the fact that we are here and we are not intelligent proves the theory that there is no God - what rational supreme force and intelligence would create such a defect as we?

[DFCaper]

On the other hand, religion is responsible for the problems we have dealing with beginning of life and end of life issues, because of the belief in a supernatural soul, and religion is also the reason for discrimation against homosexuals, because religious dogma that insists that they are choosing to sin, rather than the scientific evidence that they are responding to genetic, hormone or even infectious agents early in life.

Your simplistic views are entertaining to me. I guess all of mankind's weaknesses can be traced to religion. Just because religion has been used as a tool to manipulate people, make s the people abusing there power within a religion wrong. Not having religion. Religions are run by man. therefor, not perfect.

[Oleg Bach]

Your simplistic views are entertaining to me. I guess all of mankind's weaknesses can be traced to religion. Just because religion has been used as a tool to manipulate people, make s the people abusing there power within a religion wrong. Not having religion. Religions are run by man. therefor, not perfect.

Most certainly. Well run and well managed socially benevolent religions are fine. They are a human construct that is one of mans finest creations..but if you take it higher - all the greatest teachers and founders of supposed religions never really wanted to start a religion but only to provide a superiour state of mind for individual human beings..For instance that quantum mechnics generated by the astounding knowledge and logic of Christ... Generated some very powerful and useful men---then - there was an instant decline as religion became secularized...and humanized...sad---- look at the revelations of Mohamid - he learned one thing - If you are a good buisness man and had sex with a wealthy older woman - you could take her money and raise an army and rule by force...which we still see today in modern Talibanism - which they say is pure Islam - and they are right - conversion by the sword has been replaced by conversion by the AK 47.. And for that matter Christian corporatism is now gone international - so we have a conflict between these two cults -- It's gang war fare big time!

[WIP]

Your simplistic views are entertaining to me. I guess all of mankind's weaknesses can be traced to religion. Just because religion has been used as a tool to manipulate people, make s the people abusing there power within a religion wrong. Not having religion. Religions are run by man. therefor, not perfect.

I could go into a lot more detail if the space was available! Hundreds, maybe even thousands of books have been written about the psychology of religious belief and its role in group behaviour, how am I suppose to summarize it into one paragraph without getting accused of being "simplistic?"

My position still stands that religion may be useful for some, but it's based on a faulty method of understanding the world around us. It emanates from the basic human capacity for creating myth that begins in early childhood -- preschool children will use their imaginations to make up stories to answer questions that they do not have enough understanding of -- and myth-making is born. The desire for satisfying answers is often stronger than the desire to determine the accuracy or relevance of those answers. The reason I noticed your post, was the opening comment:

QUOTE (DFCaper @ Jun 25 2009, 12:20 PM) *

I believe evolution that is controlled by the hand of God.

And I responded:

Why? And what is God?

And I didn't get an answer. Personally, I would say that the record of mass extinctions over the ages is evidence against designed evolution, or evolution for a divine purpose. But, I wanted to know why you believe in guided evolution, and I am beginning to wonder if you ever considered the question before. Is it just because of a wish to harmonize religion or science? Or are there valid reasons for believing in guided evolution?

But that is not my objection to the religious worldview. If religious understanding is confined to personal issues of meaning and is not used to apply to others, no harm is done. But, the reason why religion can be a "tool to manipulate people," as you said, is because religious truth cannot be critically examined, and questioning religious doctrine or the religious authorities who claim to understand the dogma is not well tolerated either!

There are a number of areas, besides evolution, where religion collides with developing understanding based on empirical methods. When religious dogma declares that "life is sacred" and uses that dogma to try to prevent terminally ill cancer patients from ending their lives, then religion is harming others.

At the beginning of life, when religious dogma claims "life begins at conception" they are causing harm by interfering with the birth control and abortion decisions of pregnant women, and forcing them into poverty by having children early in their teens - before they have a chance to get a good education, and having more children than they are able to support later in life. A magical doctrine of dualism makes rational determination of when to value new life impossible.

In the last year or so, attempts by gay men and women to achieve full equal rights have been stymied by the religion-motivated conservatives who pull out their bibles as evidence that homosexual behaviour is caused by SIN, rather than accept the evidence that it is a normal biological variant that has been observed in every other mammal studied so far. The 'sin of homosexuality' dogma is responsible for this bizarre case in Connecticut church that produced a Youtube video of a "gay exorcism" of a 16 year old boy. The young man's age is apparently a factor in an investigation for child abuse over the incident. Nevertheless, if it wasn't for the desire to hold on to dogma-based beliefs that 1. sin causes homosexuality and 2. imaginary creatures called demons are blamed for causing the sin in this specific example, this bizarre story wouldn't have happened in the first place!

Also in the news recently, Governor Mark Warner of South Carolina, has become the latest poster boy for how bad things can go wrong when someone is just not cut out for a lifetime of monogamous marriage. Hey, monogamy is not for everybody! If the fear of alimony and child support payments doesn't keep a guy from looking for some action on the side, the threat of hellfire and wallowing in self-pity won't do it either! An excellent article entitled "Red Sex, Blue Sex" by Margaret Talbot, published in the New Yorker, shows evidence that the Christian obsession with sexual purity may be behind the higher numbers of teen pregnancies, STD's, and divorce stats found in the Bible Belt states. Setting goals of unrealistic sexual behaviour leads to worse end results for problems with sexual behaviour, so the high profile Christian celebrity who falls from grace is more representative of his community than what the believers would like to think.

These are just a few of the examples where beliefs that are based on religious doctrine rather than empirical evidence degrade the quality of life for many people, including those who don't share these beliefs! The problems of dealing with religious fundamentalism run a lot deeper than their hostile attitude towards scientists and scientific inquiry

[GostHacked]

[Malaclypse the Younger]

Even the Catholic church doesn't think that God and evolution are at odds with each other. The director of the Vatican observatory firmly holds the belief that God must have directed evolution. It seems silly to be a Christian and think otherwise, I think.

But I'm not a Christian.

[Bonam]

Even the Catholic church doesn't think that God and evolution are at odds with each other. The director of the Vatican observatory firmly holds the belief that God must have directed evolution. It seems silly to be a Christian and think otherwise, I think.

But I'm not a Christian.

God "directing" evolution is just as baseless an assumption as static creation. However, you are right, evolution and religion are not at all at odds with each others. Evolution is a part of science, which seeks to observe, explain, and make predictions about, the natural, physical world. Religion is a set of teachings designed to provide social cohesiveness and a standard of morality for a society, as well as to "explain" the supernatural world.

The two are completely separate fields of human thought, and any balanced individual realizes that mixing them is not productive. For example, I have a friend who is both a devout Catholic and a marine biologist. As a scientist in that field, he is wholly convinced of the validity of the theory of evolution, and yet he also takes seriously the teachings of the bible.

[ToadBrother]

My favorite part about the attitude of posters such as WIP is that they are the people who pushed certain people to push the anti-evolution theory and push Intelligent design. I also bet your the most offended by it. hehehe

I'm sure your better at promoting people towards the Creationism than the anti-God Evolution theory that you believe!!! People like you make me more and more torrent of Creationism, despite my complete disagreement with it. The strong push from Atheist such as yourself is what fueled Intelligent design of the last 10 years. It is certainly growing, thanks to efforts from people such as yourself.

I challenge you to provide one single citation in peer-reviewed or primary literature where evolutionary researchers make claims about the existence of God.