unforum

[ariock]

Theology, Science and Other Stuff You Don't Want to Read.

[ashground]

There's a fine line between discussion and flamebait. This crosses that line. And yet, I feel there are a few things that need to be put straight.

[Tarrsk]

ariock, I agree with your points, but I must echo ashground's sentiment: please tone down the harsh language a bit. We're all friends here, regardless of our points of view.

That said, I'm glad you linked TalkOrigins. It's a fantastic site, and goes into a real of depth regarding current scientific evidence in favor of evolution, while also providing links to responses from the other side so that the reader can make his or her own informed decisions. Best of all, the writers almost always provide external citations to actual research backing up their assertions.

The "response to creationism" page you linked to is only the tip of the TalkOrigins iceberg. Here's some other relevant pages:

Just what is evolution, anyway?
Five common misconceptions about evolution
Introduction to the biology of evolution
Observed instances of speciation

These articles are excellent reading regardless of which side you espouse; I highly recommend them for *anyone* interested in this debate.

[urthstripe]

I'm Catholic Christian and I don't have a problem in "believing" in Evolution. I believe that evolution is true and that God used it to create us. I don't believe in the whole Deist thought that God set everything to motion and left it alone. I think that Evolution is a tool that God used/uses to make the world. Is that so hard?

[DreamOfTheRood]

Why is this in the Haunted Apiary section?

[WhiteGulls]

Because religion is centered around the fact that we're all from some sort of a hive mind and hives are what bees live in, and because bees live in hive, and there's a hive mind, it's haunted, and an apiary, so it belongs in the haunted apiary section of course.

Also, I think the discussion started in this section, so why not finish it off where it started, ne? =P

[ariock]

EDIT: Post was redundant. You don't really care what it says, you KNOW what it says, so respond to that.

[Kronus]

Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert) wrote a book called God's Debris. In it he has an interesting analogy in responce to evolution. What if you were a distant race of aliens, and you came to Earth in hopes of finding fossils of extinct species? But the only things that you found were dishes and silverware. Well, you'd imagine that the spoon evolved from the knife, and the fork from the spoon (the spork would be a cross-breed, I'd imagine). Plates grew walls, in order hold life sustaining liquids, and eventually, cups would reign supreme. You might now be saying, "but dishes and silverware was never alive." but neither were fossils.

I believe, as humans, we search for order. We search for reason and meaning. More importantly, we interpret our surroundings. We want to make sense of it all. Most people however, are comfortable letting the thinking be done by others. We relay on the Bible, or Darwin to tell us how it is, because, let's face it no one's original (that was a joke, by the way).

I myself actually tend to agree with Ariock more, simply because I believe in cause and effect, everything happens because of every previous event, leaving nothing up to chance or being random. But that's just it, a BELIEF! I think that only if we were everywhere at all times, and knew everything, essentially the entirety of everything, would we KNOW the truth. But when you don't know even one aspect of the universe there is what you would perceive to be variables, the unknown. So, we try to solve for the unknown, without really knowing where to start.

P.S. I voted for the thread to stay, because it is off-topic from the other one, has at least somewhat to do with ILB, and because I believe in free-speech.

[DreamOfTheRood]

[ariock]

Oh fer cryin out loud....

[thebruce]

well ariock, like I just posted in the other thread, I'll get to answering later today... it's 2:50am here right now and I'm going to bed...

I skimmed over (very) quickly the posts here, and so far it still seems that I'm mainly alone (at least, no one else has really spoken up), but I'll get to the details when I reply... and honestly, I'll try to cover anything. If I miss any points you feel are important, don't hesitate to repeat them

Why am I so confident? Because I know in my heart and mind what is true, and I know there are clear explanations for everything, whether I know them yet, or they have yet to be discovered. But until something comes along that can convince me my beliefs are incorrect, that won't change... so, I'll answer as much as I can, and if I don't know an answer, it'll give me reason to research an answer...

but right now, it's sleepy time...

[IcyMidnight]

Wow, this is a very interesting thread! It is however verging on the edge of a flameware. Lets try to tilt it a little more toward complete civility. I'm sorry Ariok, but your post up there did sound a little " " even if it was unintended. The limitations of communication with only written monotone words I'm afraid.

It is very interesting to see the seeminly polar opposite views presented by thebruce and Ariok. I would say that I sit somewhere in between.

One point I would like to clarify for you Ariok (that's right thebruce I'm kinda siding with you on this one! ) is the whole TV thing. It's not that people think that God is sitting up in heaven saying "Crap! Johnny's about to turn on his TV, gotta get them electrons primed!". They/we just believe that God set up a system where electons work a certain way that we've observed and harnessed to created a TV. Obviously you call the TV repair guy to fix it, you just believe that the system of laws it relies on to function was set up by God. And now thebruce this goes for you too! People of my persuation believe that evolution could exist and be used by God to create us.

A small example (if I remember bio 100 correctly). Science suggests (as I mentioned before) that we came about when just the right amounts of energy and luck forced chemicals lying around on the ground/in the muck to form simple chemical bonds, which in turn formed more complex chemicals, and eventually cell like organisms. These joined up and specialized and formed more complex multicellualar organisms ... etc ... and voila humans. Evolution.

If you look at it from a more simplistic, less educated point of view (like if you lived a couple thousand years ago...) that may sound like magic. It's not really. If you wanted it to put it a different way, humans were created and formed from the dust (with a little adjusting of the chace from God perhaps?). Hmm..?

Of course I am no biologist or theologean, but things like that lead me to believe that perhaps both parties are at least a little bit right?

(P.S. Dont forget the smilin' )

It's like when you set up a computer system. You design it so that you can add input to change/affect things as you need them, but you really want the system to function on it's own.

And please gentlemen continue your discussion. Even if you don't, I at least find it very interesting!

[krystyn]

Rood, dude. Being list mommy means that you also have to bake us cookies, get us extra blankets for naps, clean our rooms, and wipe our noses when they're runny.

I see no goobery noses in the vicinity, and I assure you that there is a team of us waiting with big ol' hankies of locky doom in case there is a need. Danke.

[Centipede]

[Phaedra]