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Forums - General - The fight over Darwin - Teaching evolution in schools

bazmeistergen on 19 September 2009
appolose said:
ManusJustus said:

appolose said:

Most of the stuff in the Bible is miraculous; I don't find the concept too far a stretch of the imagination.

Consider my earlier post:

If the story of Noah's Flood was true, there would be evidence for a global flood and it would make sense that one man could build a boat and put two of every animal in it, and that somehow fresh or salt water fish could survive such an event and be saved from whatever composition the flood water had.  I'm assuming since the flood came with rain that it was mostly fresh water so all sea life would have died.

This is miraculous, as there is a lot of magical things going on.  However, if I told you that I have a pet dinosaur that I found in a cave that goes to the bottom of the Earth, that would be equally miraculous and you would easily denounce my story.  Whats the difference between the two stories, how can you logically deduce that my story is false and the story of Noah is true?  The difference is that one story is older and a lot more people told you it was true.  If the story was switched, and I told you that I built a boat and put every animal on it and the Bible had a story about a dinosaur living in a cave that goes to the center of the Earth, you would switch which story you believed in.

Concerning Noah's Flood, it makes much more logical sense to say that it was a myth just like countless other myths going around at that time.


By absurd, I mean that hundreds of other things are needed to explain the idea (refer to the biologist's quote) in order to keep it internally consistent.  Most of the Bible's stories are not in need of that (you just have to decide whether or not God actually exists).  As for the flood, I do think that there is global-wide evidence for it (but let's not get into that), and also recognize that I don't know what sealife was like some 4000 years ago and that I do not know what type of water covered the Earth (perhaps it wasn't homogeneous).

In any event, absurdity does not disprove anything, anyways.

 

Absurdity does tend to suggest that something is not true when there is a wider, evidenced and more holistic interpretation available.

I wonder why one would choose that particular explanation of creation. There are far older creation stories than the one's found in the Bible. The absurdity of Genesis when faced with a more reasonable, evidenced explanation means it is NOT as true as an actual scientific explanation. How big would an ark have to be to fit on the millions of species of land-based creatures? How did these animals get food? Why didn't some the animals eat each other? Why did god choose to wipe out many sinless animals? Why did birds get away with it? How come we find fossils dated as older than a few thousand years?

Your biologist quote is very nice, but the logic behind the materialistic view presented does not have to be accepted a priori for it to be more sensible. There are many things materialism cannot explain, but to jump into senseless mysticism is farcical. Leaving the questions unanswered and open is a far more radical and dangerous position than simple dogmatic belief. The other thing about the quote is that it seems to forget about the good things science has produced, including longer and healthier life, time-saving devices, energy-creating gizmos and so on.

I don't understand literal interpretations of the bible. It makes god much simpler and a bit stupid. A god that created the infinite beauty of the universe with all its cascading changes through time would be far more magnificent than the idiot redneck view of god of genesis.

 



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Khuutra on 19 September 2009
bazmeistergen said:

Absurdity does tend to suggest that something is not true when there is a wider, evidenced and more holistic interpretation available.

I wonder why one would choose that particular explanation of creation. There are far older creation stories than the one's found in the Bible. The absurdity of Genesis when faced with a more reasonable, evidenced explanation means it is NOT as true as an actual scientific explanation. How big would an ark have to be to fit on the millions of species of land-based creatures? How did these animals get food? Why didn't some the animals eat each other? Why did god choose to wipe out many sinless animals? Why did birds get away with it? How come we find fossils dated as older than a few thousand years?

Your biologist quote is very nice, but the logic behind the materialistic view presented does not have to be accepted a priori for it to be more sensible. There are many things materialism cannot explain, but to jump into senseless mysticism is farcical. Leaving the questions unanswered and open is a far more radical and dangerous position than simple dogmatic belief. The other thing about the quote is that it seems to forget about the good things science has produced, including longer and healthier life, time-saving devices, energy-creating gizmos and so on.

I don't understand literal interpretations of the bible. It makes god much simpler and a bit stupid. A god that created the infinite beauty of the universe with all its cascading changes through time would be far more magnificent than the idiot redneck view of god of genesis.

Hey now, the God of Genesis was not an idiot redneck.

He was, however, a slave-owner who was terrified of the potential of his own creation and tossed Adam and Eve out of the garden so that they could not be like God and the rest of the gods (because Genesis refers to a Heavenly pantheon that is like God, if you remember).



appolose on 19 September 2009
The_vagabond7 said:
Appolose believes the "answers in genesis" approach of "if the bible and reality contradict each other, side with the bible". It is impossible to reason with that kind of mentality because there is absolutely zero room for anything that doesn't agree with the bible. And if you show concrete evidence to the contrary, the evidence is mistaken not the bible. If the bible says that the entire planet was covered in water, and somehow trees survived for 150 days submerged, somehow fresh and saltwater fish were just fine, somehow every single parasite was being contained in every animal, and none of the animals died and 2 of each animal (whatever "each animal" means) managed to create our entire biosphere over the entire planet in 4000 years, and that entire biosphere came from mount arrarat with bears and bison and every other kind of life crossing the ocean to arrive in north america in significant enough numbers to start a working ecosystem, and all of the fossils of countless extinct species laid in the ground prior are either from the devil or god (who can say?) then it must be so. No matter how insane or absurd, or contradictory to the reality we see, it must be so.

There is no arguing with that kind of sense. If somebody believes that they are receiving revelations in their head that cannot be explained verbally or even questioned (which every religion around the globe purports to have) then it is a kind of mentality that cannot be argued with. You're wasting you're time. I only wasted my time this time because I was drunk. Had I been sober I would've known better to even bother.


In response to this, I would just assert that no position on reality can be proven, anyways.  You're all in the same boat as me.



Okami

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ManusJustus on 19 September 2009
appolose said:

No position on reality can be proven.

There are better explanations for reality.  Obvioulsy, saying it rains because of condensation is a better explanation than saying it rains because Zeus is pleased that farmers sacrificed a lamb.



appolose on 19 September 2009
Rath said:
appolose said:
Rath said:
appolose said:
Rath said:
 

The fossil record would be considered historical evidence, yes?  In that notion, yes, I would naturally agree that the fossil record exists.  What does not, however is any hypothesis I come up with that includes it.  That is the unobservable part

Evolutionary theory does not predict that more advanced organisms are found in newer layers; rather, it is observed that they are (no contesting there from me).  The theory does say that they are desendents of the lower life forms, and that is the untestability.

This is the same case of the first two; there are things we find in the fossil record, yes, but those things are not the evolutionary theory.  Rather, the explanation of them is.

No, evolution does predict which fossils will be found in which layers and where. These predictions are made before the fossils are found and the fossils are used to confirm the hypothesis. That is testability. Evolution has passed this particular test many times.

The theory of evolution was derived form the general observations of the fossil record.  It wasn't conceived of first, then tested by fossils.  The predictions you refer to are more specific cases of who-evolved-into-who, such as the evolutionary path of horses.  I'm talking about the idea that all life forms are of common descent.

However observations of the fossil record that occurred after the theory of evolution have since proven it. You don't have to make a baseless prediction then find all the evidence. Having an observation, making a prediction, then making another observation to confirm or invalidate the hypothesis is the way science works.

I disagree; random mutation is a proposed mechanism of evolutionary theory.  Disproving it would not disprove the explanation of the fossil record.

Wrong, the modern theory of evolution relies on genetic mutation. You are saying it would not disprove the fact of evolution, this is why it is a fact. Science only requires the explanation to be able to be falsified - not the observation itself.

The theory in question is the theory of common descent of all life forms on Earth. This is the theory made from our observations of the fossil record.  Genetic mutation is not apart of it, as disproving it does not disprove the idea that all life forms of common descent.  Random mutation merely attempts to answer how that could be.  Take natural selection for example; if that were proved wrong, then the theory of punctuated equilibrium could easily take it's place.

You clearly don't know what a scientific fact is.

By continuing to work out why they contradict, I suppose that would imply that it is believed one set of of observations must be false, which would contradict the basic principles of science (which is, it is assumed that, given enough observation, repetition etc, the theory is true).  As for God not being falsifiable; while that may be true, it is irrelevant as science must conclude it anyways.

So you're saying that if something violates the laws of logic then we must assume god exists? That would require further study of logic then. Science can never come to the conclusion god exists by the very nature of science, science makes observations, tries to explain them and then tries to prove those explanations wrong. If you cannot complete that last and very important step it stops being science.

 

Logic trumps science (indeed, logic is essential to science).  In the event that science comes to two conflictory observations, in order to nto violate science's own assumptions about empiricism, then it must follow the logical outcome.

Wait, you're saying that if logic is broken science must follow logic? That still makes no sense.

Sorry I didn't reply earlier. Didn't realise your reply was still in the post, just not bolded. I honestly don't think you understand the basics of how the scientific method works at all if you believe that evolution (and all other sciences of historical events) are not science yet the supernatural could be.

Sorry about that, I don't know why all of it wasn't bolded.

@vagabond. I've realised this =P


Probably not going to post any more because somebody who is completely unwilling to even acknowledge that there is the slightest possibilty that they are wrong is not really worth arguing against.

We haven't even brought the Bible into our discussion yet.  This argument has nothing to do with my presupposed belief in the Bible, so there should be no problem of me being "unwilling to even acknowledge that there is the slightest possibilty that [I am] wrong".

If you still aren't going to argue, tell me now and I won't respond to your latest argument.

Although, I must ask how you got the implication of broken logic from what I said.



Okami

To lavish praise upon this title, the assumption of a common plateau between player and game must be made.  I won't open my unworthy mouth.

Christian (+50).  Arminian(+20). AG adherent(+20). YEC(+20). Pre-tribulation Pre-milleniumist (+10).  Republican (+15) Capitalist (+15).  Pro-Nintendo (+5).  Misc. stances (+30).  TOTAL SCORE: 195
  http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=43870 <---- Fun theology quiz
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appolose on 19 September 2009
bazmeistergen said:
appolose said:
ManusJustus said:

appolose said:

Most of the stuff in the Bible is miraculous; I don't find the concept too far a stretch of the imagination.

Consider my earlier post:

If the story of Noah's Flood was true, there would be evidence for a global flood and it would make sense that one man could build a boat and put two of every animal in it, and that somehow fresh or salt water fish could survive such an event and be saved from whatever composition the flood water had.  I'm assuming since the flood came with rain that it was mostly fresh water so all sea life would have died.

This is miraculous, as there is a lot of magical things going on.  However, if I told you that I have a pet dinosaur that I found in a cave that goes to the bottom of the Earth, that would be equally miraculous and you would easily denounce my story.  Whats the difference between the two stories, how can you logically deduce that my story is false and the story of Noah is true?  The difference is that one story is older and a lot more people told you it was true.  If the story was switched, and I told you that I built a boat and put every animal on it and the Bible had a story about a dinosaur living in a cave that goes to the center of the Earth, you would switch which story you believed in.

Concerning Noah's Flood, it makes much more logical sense to say that it was a myth just like countless other myths going around at that time.


By absurd, I mean that hundreds of other things are needed to explain the idea (refer to the biologist's quote) in order to keep it internally consistent.  Most of the Bible's stories are not in need of that (you just have to decide whether or not God actually exists).  As for the flood, I do think that there is global-wide evidence for it (but let's not get into that), and also recognize that I don't know what sealife was like some 4000 years ago and that I do not know what type of water covered the Earth (perhaps it wasn't homogeneous).

In any event, absurdity does not disprove anything, anyways.

 

Absurdity does tend to suggest that something is not true when there is a wider, evidenced and more holistic interpretation available.

I wonder why one would choose that particular explanation of creation. There are far older creation stories than the one's found in the Bible. The absurdity of Genesis when faced with a more reasonable, evidenced explanation means it is NOT as true as an actual scientific explanation. How big would an ark have to be to fit on the millions of species of land-based creatures? How did these animals get food? Why didn't some the animals eat each other? Why did god choose to wipe out many sinless animals? Why did birds get away with it? How come we find fossils dated as older than a few thousand years?

Your biologist quote is very nice, but the logic behind the materialistic view presented does not have to be accepted a priori for it to be more sensible. There are many things materialism cannot explain, but to jump into senseless mysticism is farcical. Leaving the questions unanswered and open is a far more radical and dangerous position than simple dogmatic belief. The other thing about the quote is that it seems to forget about the good things science has produced, including longer and healthier life, time-saving devices, energy-creating gizmos and so on.

I don't understand literal interpretations of the bible. It makes god much simpler and a bit stupid. A god that created the infinite beauty of the universe with all its cascading changes through time would be far more magnificent than the idiot redneck view of god of genesis.

 


If you've seen The Matrix, you'll understand where I'm coming from more when I say that nothing can be proving, and the complexity of whatever is supposed about reality therefore has no bearing on whether or not it is more likely to be true.

Pardon the short response; I'm trying to summarize myself a bit more quickly and just avoid another long debate.



Okami

To lavish praise upon this title, the assumption of a common plateau between player and game must be made.  I won't open my unworthy mouth.

Christian (+50).  Arminian(+20). AG adherent(+20). YEC(+20). Pre-tribulation Pre-milleniumist (+10).  Republican (+15) Capitalist (+15).  Pro-Nintendo (+5).  Misc. stances (+30).  TOTAL SCORE: 195
  http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=43870 <---- Fun theology quiz
appolose on 19 September 2009
ManusJustus said:
appolose said:

No position on reality can be proven.

There are better explanations for reality.  Obvioulsy, saying it rains because of condensation is a better explanation than saying it rains because Zeus is pleased that farmers sacrificed a lamb.


Not at all; if you cannot prove a single thing about reality, you can't decide which assumption about it is more likely to be true.  Anything that you could use to lend credit to your assumption would be based off of other assumptions as well.



Okami

To lavish praise upon this title, the assumption of a common plateau between player and game must be made.  I won't open my unworthy mouth.

Christian (+50).  Arminian(+20). AG adherent(+20). YEC(+20). Pre-tribulation Pre-milleniumist (+10).  Republican (+15) Capitalist (+15).  Pro-Nintendo (+5).  Misc. stances (+30).  TOTAL SCORE: 195
  http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=43870 <---- Fun theology quiz
appolose on 19 September 2009
The_vagabond7 said:
Appolose believes the "answers in genesis" approach of "if the bible and reality contradict each other, side with the bible". It is impossible to reason with that kind of mentality because there is absolutely zero room for anything that doesn't agree with the bible. And if you show concrete evidence to the contrary, the evidence is mistaken not the bible. If the bible says that the entire planet was covered in water, and somehow trees survived for 150 days submerged, somehow fresh and saltwater fish were just fine, somehow every single parasite was being contained in every animal, and none of the animals died and 2 of each animal (whatever "each animal" means) managed to create our entire biosphere over the entire planet in 4000 years, and that entire biosphere came from mount arrarat with bears and bison and every other kind of life crossing the ocean to arrive in north america in significant enough numbers to start a working ecosystem, and all of the fossils of countless extinct species laid in the ground prior are either from the devil or god (who can say?) then it must be so. No matter how insane or absurd, or contradictory to the reality we see, it must be so.

There is no arguing with that kind of sense. If somebody believes that they are receiving revelations in their head that cannot be explained verbally or even questioned (which every religion around the globe purports to have) then it is a kind of mentality that cannot be argued with. You're wasting you're time. I only wasted my time this time because I was drunk. Had I been sober I would've known better to even bother.

That hurts, Vagabond



Okami

To lavish praise upon this title, the assumption of a common plateau between player and game must be made.  I won't open my unworthy mouth.

Christian (+50).  Arminian(+20). AG adherent(+20). YEC(+20). Pre-tribulation Pre-milleniumist (+10).  Republican (+15) Capitalist (+15).  Pro-Nintendo (+5).  Misc. stances (+30).  TOTAL SCORE: 195
  http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=43870 <---- Fun theology quiz
Khuutra on 19 September 2009
appolose said:
ManusJustus said:
appolose said:

No position on reality can be proven.

There are better explanations for reality.  Obvioulsy, saying it rains because of condensation is a better explanation than saying it rains because Zeus is pleased that farmers sacrificed a lamb.

Not at all; if you cannot prove a single thing about reality, you can't decide which assumption about it is more likely to be true.  Anything that you could use to lend credit to your assumption would be based off of other assumptions as well.

Okay

If we follow historical precedence, you're about to find a tautological proof of God

Does it stand to reason that, in fact, you are reasoning?



Rath on 19 September 2009

No I'm not going to argue because while I am willing to acknowledge that the theory of evolution, or indeed anything that I believe in, is not absolute you are not willing to acknowledge this. As such arguing in favour of anything that contradicts the literal interpretation of genesis that you have against you is pointless.

Also the only way for two observations to be irreconcilably contradictory is if the laws of logic are broken. Otherwise it merely means that are currently established theories are flawed and should be modified or discarded.