Note: LucasForums Archive Project
The content here was reconstructed by scraping the Wayback Machine in an effort to restore some of what was lost when LF went down. The LucasForums Archive Project claims no ownership over the content or assets that were archived on archive.org.

This project is meant for research purposes only.

Evolution - and how we know it's right

Page: 3 of 4
 Samuel Dravis
04-12-2006, 11:06 PM
#101
Catholics just don't seem to have the same hang ups about that... or perhaps they've just outgrown it. (I must confess that I don't know enough about Catholicism to know why it's different... )I found a short writeup on that...


As from the first, God speaks to his Church through the Bible and through sacred Tradition. To make sure we understand him, he guides the Church’s teaching authority—the magisterium—so it always interprets the Bible and Tradition accurately. This is the gift of infallibility.

Like the three legs on a stool, the Bible, Tradition, and the magisterium are all necessary for the stability of the Church and to guarantee sound doctrine.

Sacred Tradition (CCC 75–83)
Sacred Tradition should not be confused with mere traditions of men, which are more commonly called customs or disciplines. Jesus sometimes condemned customs or disciplines, but only if they were contrary to God’s commands (Mark 7:8). He never condemned sacred Tradition, and he didn’t even condemn all human tradition.

Sacred Tradition and the Bible are not different or competing revelations. They are two ways that the Church hands on the gospel. Apostolic teachings such as the Trinity, infant baptism, the inerrancy of the Bible, purgatory, and Mary’s perpetual virginity have been most clearly taught through Tradition, although they are also implicitly present in (and not contrary to) the Bible. The Bible itself tells us to hold fast to Tradition, whether it comes to us in written or oral form (2 Thess. 2:15, 1 Cor. 11:2).

Sacred Tradition should not be confused with customs and disciplines, such as the rosary, priestly celibacy, and not eating meat on Fridays in Lent. These are good and helpful things, but they are not doctrines. Sacred Tradition preserves doctrines first taught by Jesus to the apostles and later passed down to us through the apostles’ successors, the bishops.

Scripture (CCC 101–141)
Scripture, by which we mean the Old and New Testaments, was inspired by God (2 Tim. 3:16). The Holy Spirit guided the biblical authors to write what he wanted them to write. Since God is the principal author of the Bible, and since God is truth itself (John 14:6) and cannot teach anything untrue, the Bible is free from all error in everything it asserts to be true.

Some Christians claim, "The Bible is all I need," but this notion is not taught in the Bible itself. In fact, the Bible teaches the contrary idea (2 Pet. 1:20–21, 3:15–16). The "Bible alone" theory was not believed by anyone in the early Church.

It is new, having arisen only in the 1500s during the Protestant Reformation. The theory is a "tradition of men" that nullifies the Word of God, distorts the true role of the Bible, and undermines the authority of the Church Jesus established (Mark 7:1–8).

Although popular with many "Bible Christian" churches, the "Bible alone" theory simply does not work in practice. Historical experience disproves it. Each year we see additional splintering among "Bible-believing" religions.

Today there are tens of thousands of competing denominations, each insisting its interpretation of the Bible is the correct one. The resulting divisions have caused untold confusion among millions of sincere but misled Christians.

Just open up the Yellow Pages of your telephone book and see how many different denominations are listed, each claiming to go by the "Bible alone," but no two of them agreeing on exactly what the Bible means.

We know this for sure: The Holy Spirit cannot be the author of this confusion (1 Cor. 14:33). God cannot lead people to contradictory beliefs because his truth is one. The conclusion? The "Bible alone" theory must be false.

The Magisterium (CCC 85–87, 888–892)
Together the pope and the bishops form the teaching authority of the Church, which is called the magisterium (from the Latin for "teacher"). The magisterium, guided and protected from error by the Holy Spirit, gives us certainty in matters of doctrine. The Church is the custodian of the Bible and faithfully and accurately proclaims its message, a task which God has empowered it to do.

Keep in mind that the Church came before the New Testament, not the New Testament before the Church. Divinely-inspired members of the Church wrote the books of the New Testament, just as divinely-inspired writers had written the Old Testament, and the Church is guided by the Holy Spirit to guard and interpret the entire Bible, both Old and New Testaments.

Such an official interpreter is absolutely necessary if we are to understand the Bible properly. (We all know what the Constitution says, but we still need a Supreme Court to interpret what it means.)

The magisterium is infallible when it teaches officially because Jesus promised to send the Holy Spirit to guide the apostles and their successors "into all truth" (John 16:12–13).
 ET Warrior
04-12-2006, 11:41 PM
#102
Nice job ignoring the question. You just cling to that argument if it makes you feel better.I retract my earlier statement. Religion is flexible like a sheet of rock. Sure, eventually some change happens, but it takes a really long time, lots of pressure, and sometimes extreme heat.

I challenge you to show me a religion that is designed to accept, and even PROMOTES constant change.
 Joe©
04-13-2006, 11:38 AM
#103
I would prefer if you answered my "challange" (whatever) first. But since I don't think you are planning on answering it anyway I will move on...

I retract my earlier statement. Religion is flexible like a sheet of rock. Sure, eventually some change happens, but it takes a really long time, lots of pressure, and sometimes extreme heat.

I challenge you to show me a religion that is designed to accept, and even PROMOTES constant change.

Take The Episcopal Church? They have recently changed their stance on (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) people in their clergy. Many Protestant churches have also changed their stance on birth control (not abortion) The catholic church (as stated above) has changed their view to evolution.

What kind of change are you looking for? I don't think any church would ever change its view on some issues (murder theft ect.) And BTW, all these the changes are rather recent, within the last 30-40 years.

::EDIT:: This topic is fun, it needs its own thread :p
 toms
04-13-2006, 11:45 AM
#104
No, in order to date something to that age you simply need to know the rate of decay in certain radioactive elements. Uranium-235, for example, decays into Lead-207. Uranium-235 has a half-life of 704 million years, so any rock that contains an even distribution of those two elements is likely to be approximately 704 million years old.

Which is similar to many early methods of telling time: like the water clocks. All you need to know is the rate at which the water flows out of the jar and you can estimate reliably and repeatably how long it will take for a certain amount of water to flow out. Infact its similar to almost every measuring method we have that makes our world possible.

-

So, the catholic pope doesn't thin evolution is incompatible with god. 9/10 coe/protestant clegry believe in evolution. Is it only the evangelical fringe that is left saying "i just don't believe it - no matter what proof you show me"?

-

One thing that struck me reading a few recent posts about religion is that Christianity has "evolved" in a almost identical way to life!

Originally there was just one christian faith, but over time it has split and split again. At each split the new "species" resembled their ancestor, but modified their beliefs slightly based on their environment and how it affected them. Certain "species" prospered and gained more followers, others became too specialised and became extinct. Some "species" competed with each other over resources (followers) and killed each other off.

Now, rather than one simple christian religion we have 100s of different "species" off christianity - many of which have diverged so much that they are totally incompatible with each other's beliefs - and you would hardly imagine that they could have come from the same common ancestor. :)
 Samuel Dravis
04-13-2006, 2:16 PM
#105
Which is similar to many early methods of telling time: like the water clocks. All you need to know is the rate at which the water flows out of the jar and you can estimate reliably and repeatably how long it will take for a certain amount of water to flow out. Infact its similar to almost every measuring method we have that makes our world possible. The only inacurracy that these have, actually, is that it's hard to know for sure if the element was made at the same time the rock formed; you'd have to know how much element was present in the rock at the beginning to really accurately measure the age. Something that is perhaps better for showing that such ages are possible is starlight and background radiation of the universe that the WMAP satellite measures. It's pretty clear that either things actually are that far away (and thus we can figure their minimum age by how far away they are), or someone's playing a rather big joke on us. There's no way we can know 'for sure,' so it's better to assume that it really is the truth - to do otherwise would be to deny science. Yeah, you can do it, but it doesn't get you very far.
 ET Warrior
04-13-2006, 4:39 PM
#106
If you can find Zircon crystals then it's a very straightforward process of determining their age, because Zircon crystals from with absolutely no lead, only Uranium. There are some matters that can complicate it, but it is known if they happened.
 Samuel Dravis
04-14-2006, 12:49 PM
#107
If you can find Zircon crystals then it's a very straightforward process of determining their age, because Zircon crystals from with absolutely no lead, only Uranium. There are some matters that can complicate it, but it is known if they happened.That's cool; does it work by having a melting point lower than the surrounding rock?
 ET Warrior
05-03-2006, 12:18 PM
#108
So I just finished reading a book called "Finding Darwin's God" by Kenneth Miller.

I strongly recommend this book to anyone, but in particular to those who feel that evolution is incompatible with their religion. The first half of the book is devoted to showing exactly why and how evolution happened, and then debunks the myths of creationism and intelligent design. The second half of the book is devoted to explaining why it is that Western religions should be excited about evolution. (Kenneth Miller is a devout Christian).

It is extremely well written, and amazingly informative.
 toms
05-03-2006, 1:10 PM
#109
I for one have never thought that evolution and christianity (or any religion) are incompatible... and i don't think darwin or the catholic church or the churchof england thinks so either.

Its only the fundamentalist branches of various religions that claim they are incompatible.

A god who created the wonderous system that is evolution is much more impressive than a childish god who created te world in seven days in his playpen.
 Samuel Dravis
05-03-2006, 5:42 PM
#110
A god who created the wonderous system that is evolution is much more impressive than a childish god who created te world in seven days in his playpen.I don't think doing it either way makes God 'more impressive' as both ways are equally easy to infinite power. I think the question that should be asked the proponents of ID is this: do you trust God to tell you the truth? Faking the evidence is exactly what God is accused of by those who hold to ID/Young Earth creationism/etc, and I don't understand how they can truly have faith without the absolute trust that comes from knowing that he will not lie to you. My opinion is that God does not lie. If he did, what reason would you have to believe him on anything else? You'd be stuck with Pascal's Wager, and that has severe problems with an omniscient god.

@ET: I'll have to see about that book. :)
 SkinWalker
05-04-2006, 10:25 AM
#111
ET, I thought at first the book title you were recommending was one that I also had read, but then I looked closer and realized it was Miller's book. The one I read moved me to write a review and post it on my blog: Dawkins' God: Genes, Memes and the Meaning of Life. (http://hotcupofjoe.blogspot.com/2006/04/review-dawkins-god-genes-memes-and.html)

Its only the fundamentalist branches of various religions that claim they are incompatible. Actually, there are a number of prominent atheists that say the same thing. I happen to agree with them for the moment. Dawkins is quoted by McGrath (in the book review I linked to above) as holding the contention that the universe is either Darwinian, Lamarckian, or the result of God. Since the last two fail as explanations, the answer must be Darwinian or something we haven't thought of yet. Dawkins asserts on more than one occasion (The Blind Watchmaker, The Root of All Evil?, etc) that religion and science are not compatible. The main reason is, much in science directly discredits much in religion (Noachian flood myth, doctrine of miracles, etc.)

As a Catholic, Kenneth Miller, is a dissenting voice in science on this subject, so it will be interesting to read his book and see if it can change my mind from the arguments of Dawkins, Gould, Sagan, Daniel Dennet, and Sam Harris.
 ShadowTemplar
05-04-2006, 8:33 PM
#112
Just because it isn't testable, doesn't mean it isn't there.

Straw man. Nobody said that. What we did say is that if it's not testable, it's not science - and never will be. Your private metaphysical speculations are your own to have - they are none of my business, and frankly I don't really give a damn about them.

That's not to say that we could not have a theological debate in some other thread, but I would think that Kurgan would be a better bet for a debate partner.

Also, you are leaving out of this "debate" a very large majority of the world's population with that statement.

You have misunderstood the purpose of this thread. None of the participants from the reality-based community are interested in a 'debate,' since there are no real points to debate (that's not to say that there aren't interesting debates over the details and mechanisms of evolution. Such debates - controversies even - certainly exist, but they are rather beyond the scope of a forum thread).

That's because in the creation theory,

There is no 'creation theory'. Not a single one. Nada. Zip. In point of fact, there's not even a hypotesis.

Of course, if you do know a 'creation hypothesis,' I'd be happy to hear it. I hereby submit a concise explaination (http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives/2006/01/luskin_humans_d.html#comment-74973) of the scientific method written by Lenny Flank.

If you (or anyone else for that matter) can come up with a model or description that could pass muster in all the five steps Flank outlines, I'll buy you a bottle of whiskey. It'd be a first.

To me, this thread doesn't seem like a debate.

That's because it's not.

It seems more like an excuse to tell each other how great the evolution theory is.

Not quite true. It was intended as a place where people of intellectual integrity and with a genuine curiosity could ask questions and recieve answers or pointers vis-a-vis the ToE without having to wear an asbestos suit.


Originally Posted by TK-8252
Alright, but, it must be fair to say then that even though you can't test that the sun is made of cheese, doesn't mean it's not made of cheese.
That's different. Because that's disprovable. There just... aren't enough cows.

One could imagine the sun having always been, and hence needing no cows - after all, there is very little decomposition in an anoxic environment. And we will likely never know 'for sure' in the creationist sense of the term, since it is massively unlikely that any probe will ever survive to within touching distance of the surface of the sun.

Besides, since the sun doesn't really have a rigid surface, one could always imagine that the probe just didn't go deep enough, and if one were to use standard creationist 'reasoning', one could speculate that if it had just gone a mite deeper into the very dense 'atmosphere', it would have hit a solid surface of cheese.

And this is what's fundamentally wrong with the kind of 'reasoning' that creationists routinely employ: There is - in principle - no way to prove a negative. I cannot prove that I didn't kill somebody. That's why it's up to the prosecution to prove that I did, if they want to put me behind bars (at least in civilised countries).

Point is, creation isn't really disprovable.

And that is the fundamental weakness. The lack of possible falsification renders creation utterly useless as a model of anything.

Many people have a hard time of seeing how that's the case, but it's really astonishingly simple:

Take two statments (A and B)

A IMPLIES B
IF AND ONLY IF
~B IMPLIES ~A

Thus, if there is not even in principle any observation B that is required for A to be true, then A implies absolutely nothing. No inferences can then be drawn from A, and A is a superflous statement, to be cut out in keeping with the principle of parsimony.

And you must remember that there is some basis for creation. It's not just something people believe out of spite.

But as you have kindly just pointed out yourself, there can be no possible evidence for creation, since - by your own words - creation implies nothing.

If there's anything we've learned throughout history, it's that being in the majority doesn't make you right.
That might be true in some cases, but not always. Besides, that wasn't really my point. I wasn't saying being in the majority makes me right, I was saying that if you're looking for debating opponets who don't believe in creation or evolution. Well... that's a rather small opposition.

We're not looking for 'debate opponents'. We're looking for people with genuine intellectual integrity and curiosity, that we may answer their questions about the ToE or tell them where to find people who can answer their questions.
 Mike Windu
05-05-2006, 12:45 AM
#113
Holy Jesus. Shadow for diety. :p That was an amusing post.

On a more related topic... doesn't cheese melt...? Or is this a new form of cheese that has heat resistant properties? In the former case, would the sun's rays be melted cheese flying at us? :p
 TK-8252
05-05-2006, 12:50 AM
#114
On a more related topic... doesn't cheese melt...? Or is this a new form of cheese that has heat resistant properties? In the former case, would the sun's rays be melted cheese flying at us? :p

Don't question God's cheese-creating abilities. If God wants to create non-melting cheese, He can.

JUST DON'T QUESTION!


see, it works :)
 Samuel Dravis
05-05-2006, 1:54 AM
#115
Don't question God's cheese-creating abilities. If God wants to create non-melting cheese, He can.

JUST DON'T QUESTION!


see, it works :)MY GOD (pun unintentional) IT DOES!

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/1985/burningcheese4cw.png)

:p
 ShadowTemplar
05-05-2006, 1:09 PM
#116
Holy Jesus. Shadow for diety. :p That was an amusing post.

You mean like I actually made sense? Man, I need to cut back on the creationist-bashing when I can make sensible posts on the subject at 3 in the morning...

Originally Posted by TK-8252
Hey, who is this so-called "intelligent designer" anyway?

I've seen supporters of the "theory" asked that many times, and yet they can't exactly answer that question...
Depends on what religion. If it's Chritianity it's simply the God of the bible. What more do you need? Or are you really just asking where he came from? Becuase he's always been. I think in any theory of existance you have to have something that's always been there.

As Lenny so often says: Give a fundie enough rope, and he'll inevitably hang himself on the First Amendment.

In order to be considered, "ID" needs to be able to come up with some evidence that there is an intelligent designer.
Ususally, it's paired up with the idea of Irreducible Complexity, which makes it harder to dismiss. Even then, many of the supposedly irreducibly complex organisms that the ID/IC supporters have chosen turn out not really to be IC. Then they move to the next 'IC' bit of life. It's clearly not going to stop them to show that they are wrong in any given situation, and it's impossible to show that they are wrong in all situations.

Woah, woah, woah, wait a sec. The reality-based people here don't need to prove the non-existence of IC. It's the fundies who need to prove the existence of IC.
 Samuel Dravis
05-05-2006, 5:35 PM
#117
Woah, woah, woah, wait a sec. The reality-based people here don't need to prove the non-existence of IC. It's the fundies who need to prove the existence of IC.Oh, I agree with you about that. I was just pointing out that nothing we can do can convince someone who really believes IC/ID, because they can literally take anything and say it was created, regardless of whether that worldview makes any scientific sense. It may make religious sense, but that doesn't mean it should be taken as a model for a science class to use when one with more predictive power (and one that happens to be falsifiable) is available.
 Sigundr
05-05-2006, 7:52 PM
#118
i haven't read all the thread, it will take to long, but please, tell me why you think that evolution is the right thought action. i would like to know.
 TK-8252
05-05-2006, 8:32 PM
#119
i haven't read all the thread, it will take to long, but please, tell me why you think that evolution is the right thought action. i would like to know.

Sorry, but you're gonna have to read the thread. That's like, rule number one with good debating...
 Samuel Dravis
05-05-2006, 9:51 PM
#120
Sorry, but you're gonna have to read the thread. That's like, rule number one with good debating...You can cut a newbie some slack once in a while. :)

i haven't read all the thread, it will take to long, but please, tell me why you think that evolution is the right thought action. i would like to know.Basically we came up with these (I'm assuming you are some type of Christian; most of the people that have issues with or question evolution are):

* It doesn't conflict with religion in the sense that it denies it; some of the things it has shown true have forced the reevaluation of doctrine or scripture, but it has never been used as a proof for the nonexistence of God by a rational scientist (that proof cannot exist). It simply ignores god, whether he's there or not. It doesn't matter to evolutionary theory because god is a random being - there is no ability to predict his actions and thus he cannot be taken into account. There is no reason for religion and evolution to be exclusive. This has been shown by several major religions (CoE, Catholicism) accepting that evolution can be true. Christianity's god did not give people rational minds for no reason, nor did he restrict their use in the intellectual persuits. It stands to reason (heh) that he meant for people to use that which he had given them. Aquinas argued that you could see god in all things, and indeed you can - the more you know, the greater the impressiveness, you might say. Good stewardship of the cognitive prowess and all that.

* It's a good model. It is scientifically valid and it has predictive powers that have been shown to be correct in all cases in which it can be applied meaningfully. It's been used in evolutionary programs to create better bot AI for players to fight in games (I think that Quake III did this, not sure though) and it worked. It's as valid as any other science, and you don't go about picking and choosing what sections of biology, physics, chemistry etc you want to believe - it doesn't matter whether you think it's true or not. It's there, and it has a lot of evidence to support it.

* And the last thing I already posted here about why ID fails religiously (it denies that god is completely good in defining him as a being capable of lying - an act fundamentally against his nature. This is also taken care of by Aquinas, if you're interested in that type of thing):

I think the question that should be asked the proponents of ID is this: do you trust God to tell you the truth? Faking the evidence is exactly what God is accused of by those who hold to ID/Young Earth creationism/etc, and I don't understand how they can truly have faith without the absolute trust that comes from knowing that he will not lie to you. My opinion is that God does not lie. If he did, what reason would you have to believe him on anything else? You'd be stuck with Pascal's Wager, and that has severe problems with an omniscient god.
 ET Warrior
05-06-2006, 3:17 AM
#121
i haven't read all the thread, it will take to long, but please, tell me why you think that evolution is the right thought action. i would like to know.Well, like TK said, if you really wanted the answer to that you should've just read the thread...it's been answered...

But if you want to even quicker version than Samuel Dravis proposed, we believe in evolution because evolution is right. As near as we can tell, from all the tests, and all the observations, and all the evidence: evolution happened, is happening, and will continue to happen. There is no argument against it that holds up to scrutiny and testing. It's what makes sense, and it's what we can see.
 toms
05-08-2006, 8:19 AM
#122
And every new scientific discovery, genetic discovery, archeological discovery, geographic discovery etc.. re-enforces the theory of evolution.

If anything was likely to disprove evolution it was the recent opening up of genetics and our ability to understand them - but instead it confirmed everything we had previously thought.
 Ray Jones
05-17-2006, 11:03 AM
#123
...
One of them recently remarked to me that it is blasphemous, in his opinion, for creationists to continually assert that the Earth cannot be as old as science has discovered or that God cannot set into motion, over 13 billion years ago, the process that produced the evolutionary mechanism that science has discovered. "How dare they," my friend exclaims quite loudly, "pretend to know what God's limitations are and attempt to limit His ability to create!"
...
How very well said. I am wondering about this since I know there is something like religion. ;
 toms
06-15-2006, 11:17 AM
#124
Another discovery showing the way eveolution works in greater detail. These seem to be coming pretty fast right now, with lots of major breakthroughs in filling in the blanks about how evolution works.

Butterfly effect: New species hatches in lab

The creation of a new species, something that scientific orthodoxy says should take thousands of years of genetic isolation has been achieved in the lab in just three months.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1797814,00.html)

When was the last major breakthrough that challenged evolution, or supported ID?
 SkinWalker
06-15-2006, 11:41 AM
#125
For those interested, here's a link to one of the tables from the Nature article: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v441/n7095/fig_tab/nature04738_F2.html)

Here's the Editor's Summary (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v441/n7095/edsumm/e060615-12.html) in Nature, but the article itself requires subscription, so I'll offer a couple of quotes from Mavarez et al (2006):

The butterfly species Heliconius heurippa is known to have an intermediate morphology and a hybrid genome (Salazar et al 2005), and we have recreated its intermediate wing colour and pattern through laboratory crosses between H. melpomene, H. cydno and their F1 hybrids. We then used mate preference experiments to show that the phenotype of H. heurippa reproductively isolates it from both parental species. There is strong assortative mating between all three species, and in H. heurippa the wing pattern and colour elements derived from H. melpomene and H. cydno are both critical for mate recognition by males.

Our study provides the first experimental demonstration of a hybrid trait generating reproductive isolation between animal species, and the first example of a hybrid trait causing pre-mating isolation through assortative mating.

References

Mavarez, J. et al (2006). Speciation by hybridization in Heliconius butterflies. Nature, 441, 868-871.

Salazar, C. A. et al. (2005). Hybrid incompatibility is consistent with a hybrid origin of Heliconius heurippa Hewitson from its close relatives, Heliconius cydno Doubleday and Heliconius melpomene Linnaeus. J. Evol. Biol. 18, 247–256

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v441/n7095/images/nature04738-f3.2.jpg)
 The Source
06-15-2006, 8:54 PM
#126
I am entering into this conversation late in the game.

I will start with: I am a Catholic (Christian). In order to answer the main question presented, there has to be a balance between science and religion. My aunt is a solidified Born Again Christian, and we have these legnthly discussions about Science vrs. History vrs. Theology vrs. Religion. Unfortunately, she is an extrodinary fundamentalist.

I believe that Genusis is the story of evolution, which science can only support through testing hypothesis. God created the universe. After mankind reached a level of consciousness, they discovered the hidiousness of sin and pain. Instead of looking at 'God created the Earth in six days, and then he rested on the seventh.', I believe God created the Earth in a much longer period of time.

My Definition of Adam and Eve:
Adam and Eve symbolize the first two humanbeings who acheived full conscienceness. They represent the moment when mankind went from a nieve state into a more knowledgeable being. (Apple symbolizes the knowledge they acheived.) However, humanity had to evolve into this more knowledgable state. God, through his patience and wisdom, allowed humanity to progress from a primitive anemo-acids (sp?) into Adam and Eve. Through our study of science, we are learning the fundamentals of how mankind went from a one celled organism into a complex biological being.

My 'Let there Be Light' Definition:
When God said, "Let There Be Light", this symbolizes the beginning of creationism and evolution. The light represents what science calls the 'Big Bang'. Before the universe existed, there was absolutly nothing. God in his infinite wisdom and patience, pushed together these unknown elements to give birth to the galaxy. Sience will only give us a glimpse of his process. I do believe that there are certain things that even God will prevent mankind from finding out. However, mankind will eventually findout significant processes, but we will never truely understand the unknown (Supernatural) process.

Bringing It All Together:
God -> Created evolution through his wisdom and patience. The supernatural process.

Mankind -> Creates a scientific/biological understanding of what he has done.

Science -> Is a testing of theories and hypothesis, which our curious species needs inorder to find cures for health issues. Without science involved, we will not be able to find ansers to the questions 'What If" or "How".

Evolution -> Is the process that God pushed forward, which caused biological changes to occur. These biological changes allowed our species to adapt to our environment. Sience will only help us understand what biological changes he allowed to occur. At the end, this will only benifit mankind.

Science vrs. Religion Conundrum:
Science put up a restraining order on religion, and religion put up a restraining order on science. This will prevent mankind from excepting our Lord the Father and from growing as a human species. Why? This is a topic for another thread and time.
 Point Man
06-21-2006, 9:23 PM
#127
I have to wonder why the limit was placed on not discussing origin of the universe. That is where the real question is. Even though some of the older evidence for evolution is questionable at best and dishonest at worst, to dispute that species adapt to changing conditions is to deny reality. However, no theory of evolution can answer the question of where matter came from. To say that atoms somehow organized themselves into complex molecules in violation of the Law of Entropy takes at least as much faith as saying God created the universe.
 Dagobahn Eagle
06-21-2006, 9:39 PM
#128
However, no theory of evolution can answer the question of where matter came from.Nor is that, with all due respect, the "job" of the theory of evolution. Its task is to explain how the existing organism developed into what they are today.

To say that atoms somehow organized themselves into complex molecules in violation of the Law of Entropy takes at least as much faith as saying God created the universe.Perhaps so (except the enthropy part - the law of enthropy does not disprove evolution, contrary to popular belief). But again, that's... What, abio-genesis (?), not evolution.

Oh, and welcome aboard!
 Point Man
06-21-2006, 11:27 PM
#129
Nor is that, with all due respect, the "job" of the theory of evolution. Its task is to explain how the existing organism developed into what they are today.
Maybe so. Let's skip forward and postulate matter always existed (a statement of faith, not of science). How then do we get from atoms to complex molecules to cells to organisms? In my entire time as a microbiology major at college, I never found any empirical evidence to support that path. It just plain violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

the law of enthropy does not disprove evolution, contrary to popular belief).
It sure makes a compelling argument, though. Are you willing to say that the Law of Entropy applies now, but it did not apply billions of years ago?

Oh, and welcome aboard!
Thanks! I take it as my duty to help people think about what they choose to believe. I put my faith in Creation. Others may put their faith in evoluton, but I hope to make them realize their belief system takes just as much faith as mine.
 Dagobahn Eagle
06-21-2006, 11:33 PM
#130
www.talkorigins.org/FAQ):
Question: Doesn't evolution violate the second law of thermodynamics? After all, order cannot come from disorder.
Answer: Evolution does not violate the second law of thermodynamics. Order emerges from disorder all the time. Snowflakes form, trees grow, and embryos develop, etc. [...]

The thermodynamics argument is a common one, but it's nothing more than a myth.
 Point Man
06-22-2006, 1:03 AM
#131
www.talkorigins.org/FAQ):


The thermodynamics argument is a common one, but it's nothing more than a myth.
Formation of snowflakes does not violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics because they form in an open system and the snowflakes are disordered. They do not conglomerate into snowmen; they remain individual snowflakes. Check Question #4 (http://www.holysmoke.org/thermo.htm)

Tree growth and embryonic development do not violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics because the organism expends energy.

How did random atoms acquire the energy to form molecules, complex molecules, complex organic molecules, cells, tissues, and then organisms? And please don't say it was lightning striking a primordial soup in a reducing atmosphere. I did not buy it as a college freshman, and I do not buy it now.
 ShadowTemplar
06-22-2006, 6:27 AM
#132
I have to wonder why the limit was placed on not discussing origin of the universe.

Because that has jack squat to do with the subject of the thread, which is biological evolution. You want to discuss cosmology? Fine with me. Start another thread. You want to discuss chemical abiogenesis? Fine with me. In another thread.

Limiting the discussion solely to biological evolution is simply a matter of limiting the subject of a single thread to something almost manageable, so that questions in one area don't get lost in replies to questions about another area.

And, contrary to what you imply, the distinction actually made is not an arbitrary one. We know that life exists. How it came about is immaterial to the ToE. We know that the Earth existed well before life arose. How the Earth came to be is immaterial to the question of how life arose (OK, not quite - it can shed some interesting light on the question).

So the distinction is quite well grounded in the different questions posed by those different phases. Not to mention the fact that ToE is primarily biological and biochemical, while chemical abiogenesis is primarily chemical, and cosmology is an astrophysical dicipline. It would be mightily unreasonable to expect the same commenters to cover such a wide range of fields.

Even though some of the older evidence for evolution is questionable at best and dishonest at worst,

Dishonest? Which parts? Questionable-but-not-dishonest? Which parts?

However, no theory of evolution can answer the question of where matter came from.

That being because ToE does not attempt to explain that. ToE explains what happened on this planet after the first life was formed. The formation of said life - much less the formation of the planet - is irrelevant.

To say that atoms somehow organized themselves into complex molecules in violation of the Law of Entropy

Pray tell, what does 2LoT actually say?

[Answer (http://members.aol.com/darrwin/thermo.htm)])

There is one subtle error in the essay.

I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to find it.

Next, pray tell, do chemists and biochemists who routinely synthezise complex molecules violate 2LoT in their daily work?

Oh, and while we're on the subject of thermodynamics, what do the other three laws of thermodynamics say?

For a more thorough understanding of how 2LoT (and Newtonian dynamics) work, you could visit the Museum of Unworkable Devices (http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/museum/unwork.htm#top).

Let's skip forward and postulate matter always existed (a statement of faith, not of science).

First of all, it's not necessary to postulate that matter has 'always' existed. Secondly, the formation of matter is hardly an issue of faith. Astrophysics have the timeline pretty much pat down (although I am personaly in no position to evaluate the soundness of their arguments), and as we speak, investigation into the nature of matter itself is underway at the Centre for European Nuclear Research near Geneva, Switzerland.

How then do we get from atoms to complex molecules

Sorry, you'll need to find both a chemist, and another thread if you want an answer to that question. This link (http://www.chem.duke.edu/~jds/cruise_chem/Exobiology/PBearth.html) provides part of the answer, but, AFAIK, the whole story has yet to be determined.

to cells

Again, the picture is, AFAIK, incomplete, but RNA has been formed using common chemicals. Lipids - the stuff that makes up our cell membranes - spontaneously forms into closed membranes - that's the trick that makes soap work. And you can probably find more information if you ask a biochemist.

to organisms?

Once you have a living cell, you have an organism. If you mean multicellular organism, part of the story can be found here (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bv.fcgi?db=Books&rid=cell.section.61).

In my entire time as a microbiology major at college, I never found any empirical evidence to support that path.

Argument from personal incredulity.

It just plain violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

I reiterate my questions:

Pray tell, what does 2LoT actually say?

Next, pray tell, do chemists and biochemists who routinely synthezise complex molecules violate 2LoT in their daily work?

Oh, and while we're on the subject of thermodynamics, what do the other three laws of thermodynamics say?

It sure makes a compelling argument, though. Are you willing to say that the Law of Entropy applies now, but it did not apply billions of years ago?

I reiterate my questions from above:

Pray tell, what does 2LoT actually say?

Next, pray tell, do chemists and biochemists who routinely synthezise complex molecules violate 2LoT in their daily work?

Oh, and while we're on the subject of thermodynamics, what do the other three laws of thermodynamics say?

Formation of snowflakes does not violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics because they form in an open system

Well, so does life... - or, rather, it forms in a closed, but not isolated system, which is rather more to the point.

and the snowflakes are disordered.

Pray tell, what relevance does 'disorder' have w.r.t. thermodynamics?

They do not conglomerate into snowmen; they remain individual snowflakes.

But they're still just fruitflies. Sorry, cheap shot, but I couldn't resist...

The point here is not that the snowflakes don't form into snowmen. The point is that the snowflakes have lower enthropy than the water vapour from which they are formed. This is compensated for by the fact that during their formation, they have released energy to their surroundings, thus increasing the enthropy of the rest of the world. Which brings us to your reference:

A forming snowflake is an open system. There is mass transfer across the boundary.

More to the point, there's an energy transfer. You can easily design an experimental setup in which the freezing water is a closed system - but it won't freeze unless there's an energy transfer.

If snowflake formation causes a reduction in the entropy of the snowflake, then, by the second law, the entropy change of the surroundings must increase.

That's precisely the point. Now, try to apply this to biological systems.

What about the order of the snowflake? A snowflake indeed appears to have a high degree of order, but remember, we are talking about ordered energy. Ordered energy is energy that is available to do work.

Feh. Now he's confusing enthropy and free energy. A snowflake as a lower enthropy than gaseous water. Inasmuch as enthropy translates to disorder (an analogy, by the way, that is far from perfect), the snowflake could be said to have a higher degree of order. Why the author feels compelled to bring up the free energy of the snowflake is something I fail to understand.

Once a snowflake forms, it doesn't do any work,

Well, technically no bodies do any work. Forces do work. But, contrary to the statement by your source, falling snowflakes do indeed apply forces to their environment, and those forces do indeed do work. Further, if you collect an abundance of snowflakes in a basket, and pour them over a treadmill, you will see that snowflakes can indeed contain free energy...

And, frankly, I fail to see any sense in the rest of the article.

Tree growth and embryonic development do not violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics because the organism expends energy.

You're confusing energy and free energy.

How did random atoms acquire the [free] energy to form molecules, complex molecules, complex organic molecules, cells, tissues, and then organisms?

Same place they do today: Old man Sol. Not to mention the fact that in an anoxic environment, it will be energetically favorable for Hydrogen and Nitrogen - two of the most common compounds in the universe - to form Methane - a compound that contains more free energy than CO2 and water.

And please don't say it was lightning striking a primordial soup in a reducing atmosphere. I did not buy it as a college freshman, and I do not buy it now.

Howsabout volcanic outgassing then?
 toms
07-01-2006, 9:33 PM
#133
http://www.framestore-cfc.com/commercials/guinness_noitulove/amv_gune339_050_qt.mov)
seems to explain it quite well. ;) But you might have to play it backwards.
 Dagobahn Eagle
08-17-2006, 8:56 AM
#134
God, am I good!

I managed, throught extra-ordinary patience and superb coping skills, to suffer my way through this speech rant by Dr. Kent Hovind (note that he is not a doctor in the field of biology).
2 1/2 hours of Creationist propaganda! (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5240112600444883198&q=evolution) Or, in other words, 2 1/2 hours of idiocy. Although, of course, he goes from evolution to conspiracy theories about communism, the NWO, and NRA-style gun-teasing pretty soon:rolleyes:. "If you think Timothy McVeigh was behind blowing up the Oklahoma City Building, you're really duped".

Fair enough that he realizes that the "anti-terrorist" measures like the PATRIOT ACT are dangerous, but come on...

Either way, it's official: I've got patience with morons:D! But holy ****, watching through it wasn't easy. They should introduce it as a torture tool at Guantanamo.

In reply to post above (which was not moronic):
Formation of snowflakes does not violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics because they form in an open system and the snowflakes are disordered.Snow flakes are certainly orderly.

Vapour that snow flakes come from:
http://www.ghgonline.org/images/clouds2.jpg)

Snow flake:
http://www.photoshopsupport.com/photoshop-blog/05/12/ib/holiday-cards-snow-flake.jpg)
It looks very orderly to me. Geometric and symmetric both.

They do not conglomerate into snowmen; they remain individual snowflakes.Of course not. But the disorder of the vapour leads to the order of the snow-flake.
 toms
08-17-2006, 10:23 AM
#135
Good grief.. i think i'd rather sit through 2 1/2 hours of NWO wrestling...
..what is he a doctor of?
 Samuel Dravis
08-17-2006, 10:31 AM
#136
He has a bachelor's in religious education from an unaccredited university (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midwestern_Baptist_College), and his master's and doctorate are from a diploma mill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Bible_University). Not really hard to understand why his dissertation is held under lock and key. Probably it's gibberish.
 Dagobahn Eagle
08-17-2006, 11:04 AM
#137
 Nedak
09-10-2006, 3:06 PM
#138
What I was saying was that the vast majority of world populace does not believe in evolution.

I disagree. I think that a vast majority of the world doesn’t even know what Evolution is, and/or are not willing to open their minds to learn, and to try and comprehend Evolution. Most who don't believe in Evolution are narrow minded, and unwilling to learn outside of their Christian, Catholic, and other beliefs.
 Totenkopf
10-18-2006, 3:55 PM
#139
han sala:
I disagree. I think that a vast majority of the world doesn’t even know what Evolution is, and/or are not willing to open their minds to learn, and to try and comprehend Evolution. Most who don't believe in Evolution are narrow minded, and unwilling to learn outside of their Christian, Catholic, and other beliefs.
-------------------------------------------------------

I take it that you're indicting individuals here, not necessarily belief systems? BWIM that surely you're not implying that all Catholics, for instance, reject ToE out of hand? Last I heard, at least one of the 20thC popes stated that ToE and belief in God were not in fact mutually exclusive.

But the fact also remains that until the fabled missing link between man and ape is found, ToE is going to be a hard sell as anything other than a theory to most people. The inconvenient fact is that many people try to replace the concept of God with evolution as the explanation of where we came from all along. Niether idea is mutually exclusive. I daresay that if hardcore evoultionists didn't try to seperate God from evolution, they might be more widely accepted by most people.
 SkinWalker
10-19-2006, 12:52 AM
#140
But the fact also remains that until the fabled missing link between man and ape is found, ToE is going to be a hard sell as anything other than a theory to most people.

That "fact" only remains in the minds of the undereducated. The link between man and ape is genetic and the genetic distances between humans and other apes (man *is* an ape) is very much known. If you were referring to the fallacious notion that the ancestor of Homo sapiens is an "ape," and the "missing link" you're referring to is between them, I feel compelled to point out that man and apes evolved from a common species. The "missing links" are many and also well known. How many australopithecines are necessary before the morphological trends from earlier species are clear enough for people to accept?

Moreover, "anything other than a theory" is yet another fallacy that I've addressed at least once in this thread. Theories can contain laws, facts and tested hypotheses. Each of which are present in the "theory of evolution." Evolution is a fact. It really happened.

The inconvenient fact is that many people try to replace the concept of God with evolution as the explanation of where we came from all along. Niether idea is mutually exclusive. I daresay that if hardcore evoultionists didn't try to seperate God from evolution, they might be more widely accepted by most people.

God simply isn't a factor. If there is a god, it would be a truly incompetent one that couldn't have set into motion the creation of the universe using the laws of physics that are measurable and observable. Evolution doesn't take into consideration a god simply because a god is a supernatural/magical concept and thus not testable. It is therefore, discarded as a hypothesis as god doesn't matter. There's no replacement, it simply has no place in a scientific perspective, so why bother with it? Science cannot be pinned down to a single religious cult, it operates independently. Otherwise there would be as many different scientific methods as there were worldviews, religions and cults -each with a different god to interject into their explanations of how the world works.
 Totenkopf
10-19-2006, 3:00 AM
#141
Perhaps I should have said as anything other than an unsubstantiated theory. You don't have to try to sell me, so to speak, on the concept of evoultion. I accept that it is the best theory we have for how life as developed on this planet. Where people like you (no, I'm not actually channeling Ross Perot here) have a problem is that you state things as fact that you don't really know are fact. We don't really know if there's a god or not, but absence of proof is not proof of absence. Maybe God is real and maybe he's just a collective myth. What you're saying isn't only that we can't factor a supernatural, untestable variable into the equation, but that that variable doesn't even exist. Basically, what you CAN say is that you think life DEVELOPED along these lines (ie evolution), but that you don't know what is the ultimate source of the material from whence it arose. That is more logical than simply saying something doesn't exist because you can't measure it.
 SkinWalker
10-19-2006, 8:40 AM
#142
Where people like you (no, I'm not actually channeling Ross Perot here) have a problem is that you state things as fact that you don't really know are fact.

Please quote me on which "facts" I've misrepresented as so. I'll be happy to revise my position on them should I be wrong.
 Totenkopf
10-19-2006, 9:09 AM
#143
Quite simply, you claim to KNOW that God doesn't exist, but then admit in another thread that you can't actually test that hypothesis. So, if you can't really test whether god exists or not, you can't prove he doesn't. That's the only place I'm faulting you. Besides, if you KNOW God doesn't really exist, you'd be an atheist and not an "agnostic-atheist".
 SkinWalker
10-19-2006, 9:31 AM
#144
Perhaps you could quote the passage and include the post # where I stated I know god doesn't exist so I can correct this blatant oversight.
 Totenkopf
10-19-2006, 5:35 PM
#145
In all fairness, I didn't quote you. However, also in the interest of fair play I'll admit that I was reduced to inferring your position from having read through many of your posts. After having reread many of your posts and reading others I hadn't yet seen, I don't think it's unfair to conclude from your often dismissive comments about religion as little other than superstitition and it's believers as delusional, that you think the nonexistence of God (or any god for that matter) is in actuality a fact. I do agree in part with some of your comments regarding the nature of threads like this one that if one is going to argue vs evolution, they shouldn't just resort to the knee jerk position that God created the universe and therefore evolution is merely bs.

While that shot in one of the threads about you being a monkeyboy could be taken as a kind of cheap shot, I think you're well aware that he was coyly attacking your belief in evoultion. Still, colorful potshots like that, so long as someone doesn't start reducing themselves to actually cursing you or deriding your intellect repeatedly, kind of make the threads a little more interesting to read and a little less dry to have to digest.

BTW, I've also read your caveats about your position on god (ie He doesn't really exist unless He's willing to prove it to me personally..dead relative, stop the earth rotating and so on). But you'll have to pardon me (or not, I s'pose) if they don't ring a little hollow. Kind of like saying you respect blank (women, blacks, anything really) but then talk trash about them right after uttering the first part of the statement. Still, having said that, you come across as more of a hardcore missouri style agnostic (ie show me or begone) than an athiest. In spite of your citing a thelogian to somehow validate your position on agnostic atheism, his quote doesn't change the meaning of the words and they do conflict. B/c what you're really saying isn't that you don't believe in God, just you don't believe YET. That's basically an agnostic.
 Ray Jones
10-20-2006, 7:09 AM
#146
I do agree in part with some of your comments regarding the nature of threads like this one that if one is going to argue vs evolution, they shouldn't just resort to the knee jerk position that God created the universe and therefore evolution is merely bs.I fail to see why there seems to be a lack of people supporting the idea that God created evolution.

I mean, they claim him to be potent enough to create the world and life and literally *everything*, including the possibiliy of building jet engines, spaceships, a-bombs, the act of murder and child molesting. These are all things which are all perfectly fine and considered as kind of "made by God", why the heck should it be impossible that he also created evolution to ensure that life exists in it's rich variety it does and he doesn't has to do a thing about it.

Maybe he created other worlds before, and got sick of having to do it all on it's own for every lifeform. With evolution he just needed to say "manky slime go here" and "teenie weenie poopy loopy smally pally cell pop up there" and ka-poof! -- fishes, bees, trees, eggs, beavers, humans and french canadians all over the place in no time at all. It's a huge difference if you write a program using assembler or a high level language, so to say, but in the end both codes end up as the same binary gibberish which appears to be the only thing average processors are willingly to work with. Hey, possible that the Bible is not up to date to the version of our universe, someone should go and download the actual one.
 Jae Onasi
10-20-2006, 6:23 PM
#147
I fail to see why there seems to be a lack of people supporting the idea that God created evolution.


I don't object to this at all--I actually have some difficulty with the science of the very literal creationists.

I think it's entirely possible He guided it all along in a manner consistent with evolution. The only difference is that when you get down to the point of the creation of the very first life form, I can't believe that it happened by chance. It's so astronomically small that I find it takes more faith to believe in pure chance than God putting it together.
 Samuel Dravis
10-20-2006, 8:56 PM
#148
I think it's entirely possible He guided it all along in a manner consistent with evolution.With that sort of mindset, there is no material difference whether a god exists to drive evolution or not. I think quite a lot of people would find that acceptable.

The only difference is that when you get down to the point of the creation of the very first life form, I can't believe that it happened by chance. It's so astronomically small that I find it takes more faith to believe in pure chance than God putting it together.Under such incredibly long, absolutely massive timescales it becomes a little more credible. Still, as you did with evolution, you can say that god started it (i.e., abiogenesis, which is not evolution per se). And what would be the difference? None, save the way you percieve it.

I'm curious, at what point would you say, "This IS what god did, it couldn't happen otherwise?" Is there such a point for you?
 Ray Jones
10-23-2006, 7:58 AM
#149
The only difference is that when you get down to the point of the creation of the very first life form, I can't believe that it happened by chance. It's so astronomically small that I find it takes more faith to believe in pure chance than God putting it together.
Well, I cannot deny that possibility. But I think that, according to my understanding of things, the chances that a being put up life per fingersnap is 1 against uncountable "by chance events" in the chaotic system "planet Earth". So the chance is way more bigger for random creation of life. To me this is not faith, it's math. Again, who knows how God did it?

I really doubt life was simply put together. I don't think there was a single first "lifeform". I like the idea that the basics of life "died" a hundred billion deaths before there finally was anything looking real life-ish. And even then, it didn't survive, reproduce, whatever. Life started as what it still is, one big cluster of tons of chemical reactions (or in the case of cells, not that big).

Also, I found one question to be quite interesting: Is God a lifeform, too?

If so, how can God, as form of life, create life itself? Did he create his own existance as lifeform? I would find that hard to believe and logical quite impossible.

And if he's not a lifeform (this appears to me the only valid possbility in case he literally *created* life), then why impersonate him as "human" (or vice versa, humans after his image), because he is not even "life"? That seems somewhat contradicitve.

However, what I know is, that one lifeform can provide the environment for another to exist. One example for this is something humans call a zoo. A bigger and more complex, more random version of this would be a wildpark. (I do not deny non-lifeforms to be able to do so too ;))

So, regardless of God being a lifeform or not, he might just have created anything needed for life to occur; a huuuuuuuge universe (read: a very large, progressive and even more complex wildpark), large enough, to have a massive amount of random events, so that in the end life could (or even must) happen by chance.

In essence, God could have created nothing but the universe (or caused the universe to happen) and with that caused life to happen by chance. Even more, in this case, it'd be interpretable true to say, God is life, God is all around, God created whatever, .. you get the point.
 SkinWalker
10-23-2006, 11:56 AM
#150
I can't believe that it happened by chance. It's so astronomically small that I find it takes more faith to believe in pure chance than God putting it together.

Not if you have an understanding of probability and apply this to some really big numbers. How many "chances" did the universe have? How many Little Fizzles were there before the Big Bang banged? How many stars orbiting how many galactic centers have how many planets with the right conditions.

We assume that because ours is the planet with life that we were meant to be alive. The failed attempts at life in the universe could be on the order of 10 to the 23 zeros. Or it could be 5. The situation is like the lotto winner: an "astronomically small" chance of winning, but for the winner it seems like "fate." Bollucks. Someone had to win. The same could be true with the universe and we should use n=1 when deciding the probability that life could emerge from a universe.
Page: 3 of 4