Creation "Science"

I think this is an important question, although I'd frame it more broadly and direct it to the particular brand of atheistic scientism preached by Dawkins, Dennett et al., and especially scientists like Steven Wienberg physicist, who are adamant that the universe is meaningless. Weinberg writes: "I believe that what we have found so far --an impersonal universe which is not particularly directed towards human beings--is what we are going to continue to find. And that when we find the ultimate laws of nature they will have a chilling, cold, impersonal quality about them." He could be right, but then again he could be wrong. Apparently, these dudes can go on with life in the face of these bleak predictions, because they're so fascinated by science it's all the meaning they need. But what do normal people do?

In his book Breaking The Spell, atheist Daniel Dennett tries to explain why religion developed. He documents exhaustively the major psychological and social functions religious belief performs for us, but seems puzzled at the response of his readers. After showing them that their faith is "nothing but" an evolutionary survival mechanism, why don't they give it up? He doesn't seem to realize that he's answered his own question in page after page of evidence. What will take its place in performing those functions? Of course, a true scientist might reply: "I just find the facts. If the facts are inconsistent with a meaningful universe, too bad. Get over it!" But for people trying to make their way in life, and societies trying to promote order and morale, what will take the place of religion, spirituality, or God? Existentialism is a bit sophisticated for mass consumption, and science doesn't cut it either for most of us.

 

You're probably right, but I said it in the context of speaking to evolutionists.


I forget who said it but it was said; that even if there wasn't a God we'd have to make him up. It's funny but if you look at all the societies of man, a belief in God is pretty much universal. I really wonder if man did get here by evolution, why would he make up a God, it just seems like a pretty complex concept for something that just crawled out of the primordial soup, so to speak.

 

My point was that Christians can believe both evolution and God. That is the point you so eloquently made for me.

Once again, evolution does not mean speciation. They mean two different things. You are objecting to the idea of speciation- it is hard to discuss something when the entire argument is based on a faulty premise. There is evidence of evolution all around us. Natural red hair is an example- the genotype frequency is becoming more rare than in past generations. This is evolution. Generation 1- 20% genotype for red hair, generation 100-5% genotype for red hair. Evolution- change in genotype (inherited traits) frequency. When one objects to evolution based on a false understanding of what evolution is, it is impossible to have a meaningful conversation.

"Evolution is a change in the gene pool of a population over time. A gene is a hereditary unit that can be passed on unaltered for many generations. The gene pool is the set of all genes in a species or population."
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-intro-to-biology.html

Why does evolution remove the Divine? I find the Divine is everywhere, in others, in trees, in a rock. Why would believing in the geologic processes remove the Divine from a rock? It seems like your argument is that anything not directly created by God CANNOT be divine. The Divine is in everything; having a scientific explanation about an origin does not remove it.

Peace and love

 

I'm not sure why you posted this. This is from the viewpoint of someone who does not strictly read the Bible. If you reread my post, I am referring to those who strictly read the Bible, who believe that every word in the Bible is absolute truth and literal. These folks are the ones who believe the Earth was created in 7 days. There are many more who will say that the Bible cannot be read as a history book (youir point) but I was not referring to them.

Peace and love

 

It looks like the only fallacy you tried to find was circularity. You're groping around in the dark, here. But my argument wasn't circular anyway, which I will now demonstrate.

What are you talking about? The conclusion is that there is no justified reason to believe in miracles like special creation. That miracles don't have the form of universal laws is a premise, not a conclusion. This is simply a reiteration of the definition of a miracle. That's not circular reasoning. Second, I can define miracle any way I want. It's a definition, so you're forced to accept it. Besides, whether we understand God's will or not is irrelevant. There are universal laws that we haven't discovered yet and so don't understand. They're still universal laws, though. If God is free, then his actions are not determined. So, acts of God are not universal laws because universal laws are determined.

Appeals to authority aside, Einstein wasn't talking about God, traditionally conceived. He was talking aboout universal laws, not a free agent.

So, is God free, or isn't he? You can't have it both ways. This "self-limiting" business just seems to be tricky sophistry. If God is limitted in any way, then that entity, whatever it is, isn't worthy of the name God.

No, you know damn well what I mean. So, stop trying to brush this off with little jokes.

Doesn't matter. The argument is transcendental. The mere possibility of God being able to create anything is enough. What God actually creates has no bearing on the argument.

Mine, which you have to accept for the sake of argument. That's just how a definition works. We have to agree on the meanings of certain terms before we can even begin to argue. You probably know this, and this is your way of trying to sneak out of the debate.

And here's the plug for creationism, with a little stab at Darwin, to boot. This foolish and tiresome wedge strategy is all the creationists have to go on.

 

Please my friend, take some courses in logic or review the ones you’ve taken.

When you say: “Miracles, then, obviously”, you are making a conclusion from what has gone before and the only thing that has gone before to prove this statement is your definition of Miracle and that makes your argument circular.

I’ll to try simplify:

Your argument takes the form of: if A and x,y,x…..then B.

A) Is: Special creation is an instance of a miracle. (A miracle is an act of God; not a universal, natural law.)
xyz) I skip over for the sake of brevity
B) Miracles, then, obviously do not have the form of a universal law.

This makes your argument circular and thus makes your argument fallacious. You then go on from there to try and make other conclusions from an already fallacious argument.

Also I’m quite sure you don’t mean this: Mine, which you have to accept for the sake of argument. That's just how a definition works. We have to agree on the meanings of certain terms before we can even begin to argue. You probably know this, and this is your way of trying to sneak out of the debate.

Because then I will start an argument with this as a definition:
Creation is by definition always true and then conclude that Creation, then, obviously must be true! I’m quite sure you’re going to object to this argument and you would be correct to do so.

 

Hi hippie_chick666,
Sorry, I tend to get in more trouble when I just try to talk to people about these things off the top of my head.

I’ll try to explain myself a little better. What you say is true, there are people who say they have a strict interpretation of the Bible and they believe exactly what you say (that the days where 24 hours) but there are others who also would say they have a strict interpretation of the Bible who believe like what I was saying (that the days spoken of were time periods of indeterminate lengths). Just trying to let you know that strict interpretation isn’t one size fits all.

As for what you say about evolution, the Bible does not talk about evolution nor does it use the scientific language that came some two thousand years or more later. What it does talk about is kinds, and it seems what a kind is has to do with the hereditary boundaries that can’t be mated across. A good example of this would be horses and donkeys. Horses have 64 chromosomes and donkeys have 62 chromosomes. The two can be mated and the offspring are mules that have 63 chromosomes and tend for the most part to be infertile. In the rare occasions where mules do have offspring it will have either 62 or 64 chromosomes not 63, so it seems that the Bible kind is of this nature and that horses and donkeys are different kinds. Whereas dogs appear to be of the same kind, although in some cases they would appear to be a different kind such as a Chihuahua and a German Shepherd. They do not have a hereditary boundary and can mate without problems of infertility. So to me what you say about there being evidence of evolution all around us and natural red hair being an example, I see those things as only an example of the natural genetic diversity found in all the Biblical kinds and not evidence that having red hair makes a person a kind of genetic throw back.

Peace and Love and Sharing Man, Sharing!

 

Well, you are finally beginning to understand that evolution IS genetic diversity! Evolution as fact means the difference in inherited traits. Evolution as theory means a process which created diversity of life.

And yes, different animals have different amount of chromosomes. Here is a reply to this: Chromosome counts are poor indications of similarity; they can vary widely within a single genus or even a single species. The plant genus Clarkia, for example, has species with chromosome counts of n = 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 14, 17, 18, and 26 (Lewis 1993). Chromosome counts in the house mouse species (Mus domesticus) range from 2n = 22 to 40 (Nachman et al. 1994).

Chromosomes can split or join with little effect on the genes themselves. One human chromosome, for example, is very similar to two chimpanzee chromosomes laid end to end; it likely formed from the joining of two chromosomes (Yunis and Prakash 1982). Because the genes can still align, a change in chromosome number does not prevent reproduction. Chromosome counts can also change through polyploidy, where the entire genome is duplicated. Polyploidy, in fact, is a common mechanism of speciation in plants.

Here is a link to this site: http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB141.html

I hope this clarifies your question about chromosomes.

Peace and love

 

I had no question about chromosomes.
Maybe it’s evolution I don’t understand.
Are you saying that evolution means that man did not evolve from the apes?
Are you saying that all life started with all the different kinds already established and that there is no evolving from one kind to other?

Because when I gave the example of dogs I said that among dogs there was tremendous genetic variety but whether they are tall or short, big or little, brown ,white, black or spotted, they are still dogs and always have been dogs and will still be dogs, if there are dogs a million years from now. There is nothing in a dog’s tremendous genetic variety that will allow you to produce a cat or a horse or a bird or an elephant or a butterfly. No matter how selective a breeding process you go though it will always be a dog.

With all your talk about chimpanzees do you really think that if someone mated with a chimpanzee they would have a child? If offspring did occur, do you think that such offspring would be fertile? No, because of what I said, there seems to be a hereditary boundary between differing Biblical kinds that will not allow this. These hereditary boundaries would seem to be a rather large gap to span for evolution to have taken place.

 

I think the following sites on speciation may help to answer your question. David Haig's explanation addresses allopatric, parapatric and synpatric speciation.
http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/tutorials/Speciation3.asp
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/VC1fEvidenceSpeciation.shtml

 

No, man did not evolve from apes. Evolutionary biologists do not believe this happened, either. There was a common ancestor that both apes and man shared, which did not look like a man or an ape, more than likely. There is very little fossil record during this time period due to erosion, which can produce time gaps. This explains why there are no dinosaur fossils in Indiana b/c the Mesozoic rocks have eroded, leaving much older rock exposed.

Anywho, the process of speciation begins w/ variation among populations. Ring species are a good example of speciation in progress. Certain populations can interbreed while others cannot. Slowly, the differences in genetics create a new species. Sometimes this can happen quickly.

No, one generation of a species will never produce a member of another species. This, again, is not evolution. Evolution does not occur at the organism level; it occurs during populations and higher. Let's say 1 species has 4 alleles (AaBb) and they both affect a trait. However, only AABB or aabb survive. All other variations cannot reproduce. After many, many generations, there will be 2 species instead of one. Perhaps AABB may have only pink flowers while aabb have white. There is very little difference between them (only flower color) but they cannot interbreed. It is many of these little steps that over billions of years that has created the world as we know it.

Peace and love

 

whoa; that is such a mindfuck. put it in the Mindfuck section!!! Now i'm all paranoid.... <.< >.>

 

Sorry about that XBloodyNailPolish,

It's just an old philosophic argument, I thought everyone had heard of, but I was using it just to show that there can be other explanations for the fossil record than that of evolution, so that those who believe evolution would take a look around and see that world is filled with the other possibilities.