Evolution Debate ...

[no1important]

Yes it is. Moose are not native to Newfoundland. There were 4 pairs introduced about 100 years back. They currently number over a million.

4 pairs is 8 mammels not 2 mammels like Adam and eve. You only need 7 to start with.

The story of Adam and Eve in Genesis is mythical. Even so it fails to present any valid morals, and instead proposes that a) it is acceptable to punish people for the sins of others (original sin) and b) that death is a suitable punishment for disobedience. Adam and Eve's sons must have slept with their own mother. It is an immoral story that we shouldn't suffer upon children until they are old enough to understand it as a religious myth. God is shown to be a bad parent, uncaring. The logic of the story is faulty. The story itself, in the same way as other religious texts formed, is a compilation and redaction of religious myths, and has no consistent single author.

Genesis 7:17 says that the flood lasted forty days, but Genesis 8:3 tells us that it lasted one hundred and fifty days. So which is it?

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth”

Genesis 1 sets forth six days of creation, but Genesis 2 speaks of the "day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

Genesis 1:2-5 asserts that God created light and divided it from darkness on the first day, but Genesis 1:14-19 says that the sun, moon, and stars were not made until the fourth day.

"If God can make plans, think logically or exist, then logic is an arch-power that encompasses God and gives reason for god's existence which appears to refute the idea that God could be the creator of logic. The God as first-cause argument is partially undermined. If there is no logical reason why God exists then it is more likely that there no logical reason why the Universe exists, and that instead of assuming that the organisational force is a 'god', it's simpler and more rational to assume that it is the universe itself. It appears that whether God exists for logical reasons or not a fundamental contradiction occurs. The only answer is that creator-gods cannot possibly exist. Atheism is more logical. This is also true if God is placed "beyond logic". And if it is said that Human logic is incapable of realizing such metaphysical truths, then this also undermines any argument that can be made by one human to another, for the existence of god."

Addressing the Pontifical Academy of Sciences before its meetings on Cosmology and Cosmogony in October 1981, Pope John Paul II reaffirmed the statement of Pope Pius XII that the universe was created "millions of years ago" directly contrary to creationists views.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

It’s not just not knowing, it’s that we also know from evidence that it can’t happen.

Specifically, what are you talking about here? What has happened that we know from evidence can't have happened naturally? And what is the evidence? But be careful to avoid the fallacious argument from irreducible complexity, it's just a special case of the argument from ignorance.

Since many of the things we see are only known to us to be products of intelligence, then it is reasonable to assume there should be an intelligent outside cause.

Begging the question. That's Paley's watchmaker argument; didn't work then, doesn't work now.

Just about every person whom I’ve heard say that it’s not falsifiable have then proceeded to falsify it.

You'll have to explain that one a little better too. It's intrinsically impossible to falsify such a metaphysical claim, the presumed nature of the supernatural always provides multiple outs and ad hoc hypothesizing. Maybe you mean deny rather than falsify?

And no theory of the cause of the universe is testable.

Ah, but it is. You misunderstand the meaning of "testable" in the scientific context. Any useful scientific theory of the cause of the universe will provide an explanation for what we've seen so far, testable predictions of things we haven't yet seen, and at least an implicit means of testing for them. Differing theories will make differing predictions, then we query nature to find out what it says. Experiment and observation are the only legitimate tests of the truth content of an idea.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

Pea

Jerry Fawell is insane, that .

I don’t think he’s insane, but he is certainly a nut

Well, ordinarily he's insane, but he has moments of clarity in which he's merely stupid.

 

[no1important]

"We have been taught lies. Reality is not at all what we perceive it to be. We cannot survive any longer by hanging onto the falsehoods of the past. Reality must be discerned at all costs if we are to be a part of the future. Truth must prevail in all instances, no matter who it hurts or helps, if we are to continue to live upon this earth. At this point, what we want may no longer matter. It is what we must do to ensure our survival that counts. The old way is in the certain process of destruction.

 

[Machjo]

Genesis and world religions...

It's interesting to note that Jews, Christians, Muslims and Baha'is the Book of Genesis. Do others accept it, I don't know, but at least those groups. Yet of all those groups, Muslims and Baha'is don't really give it too much attention sinse they believe the bible has been abrogated and replaced with new books anyway. And as for Jews and Christians, I've never come across a Jew yet which has understood the Book of Genesis to support evolution or original sin. Nor do the Baha'i and Muslim texts support such a literal understanding either. In fact, some of the Baha'i sacred texts even explicitly support evolution, claiming that many prophets had come before Adam! And explicitly giving a symbolic understanding to the Book of genesys, stating clearly that the story of Adam and Eve taken literally is childish. So it would seem that these particular interpretations of the book of Genesis are quite unique to fundamentalist Christians.

 

[Machjo]

An Islamic tradition to share:

"Before all else, god created the mind."

 

[Machjo]

An Islamic tradition to share:

"Before all else, God created the mind."

 

[Jo Canadian]

:laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3: :laughing3:

 

[Said1]

Re: RE: Evolution Debate ...

The church has known this for a long time that "some creatures are not of God."

Uh.... Karla Homolka?

LOL. Pure eeeevvvvviiiiil.

Try arguing this topic with the freekin Evangelicals "I don't need proof I have faith". :evil:

 

[Vanni Fucci]

Heh...nice toon Jo... :thumbleft:

 

[peapod]

Over at spiked science, they have a survey that some of you might find interesting. The survey asks the question of 250 scientists, if you could teach the world one thing about science, what would it be? One I would like to post here, and I will provide the site address.


Darwinian natural selection, and its enormous explanatory power, as the only known explanation of 'design'


The scientific principle that I wish everyone understood is Darwinian natural selection, and its enormous explanatory power, as the only known explanation of 'design'.

The world is divided into things that look designed, like birds and airliners; and things that do not look designed, like rocks and mountains. Things that look designed are divided into those that really are designed, like submarines and tin openers; and those that are not really designed, like sharks and hedgehogs. The diagnostic feature of things that look designed is that they are statistically improbable in the functional direction. They do something useful - for instance, they fly. Darwinian natural selection, although it involves no true design at all, can produce an uncanny simulacrum of true design. An engineer would be hard put to decide whether a bird or a plane was the more aerodynamically elegant.

Not only can natural selection mimic design; it is the only known natural process that can mimic design. And now, here is the most difficult thing that I wish people understood. True design can never be an ultimate explanation for anything, because the designer himself is left unexplained. Designers are statistically improbable things, and trying to explain them as made by prior designers is ultimately futile, because it leads to an infinite regress.

Natural selection escapes the infinite regress, because it starts simple, and works up gradually - step by step - to statistical improbability, and the illusion of design. Engineers and other designers are ultimately made, like all living things, by natural selection.

So distant are many people from understanding this, they seriously believe that the existence of functional improbability is evidence in favour of intelligent design - the greater the improbability, the stronger the evidence. Truly, the precise opposite is the case. I wish that more people understood this.
Richard Dawkins

http://www.spiked-online.com/Sections/science/sciencesurvey/

 

[WarHawk]

Re: RE: Evolution Debate ...

There is no debate about evolution. It's how we got here.

If you are such big proponent of Darwin, why don't you apply his theories socially?

 

[Reverend Blair]

I have been...that's so many of your posts make reference to your pink tutu.

 

[WarHawk]

Your party wouldn't approve.

 

[Reverend Blair]

are you going to head back topwards the topic or are you just trolling?

 

[WarHawk]

I <3 Darwin. I apply his theories socially and if you <3 him too you should as well.

 

[Reverend Blair]

Social darwinism is against the better interests of the species and therefore anti-Dawinian, Trollhawk. If you'd taken the time to actually learn about evolution, you'd understand that by now.

 

[WarHawk]

How does it go against the interests of the species? Darwin wouldn't approve of you misrepresenting his theories.

 

[Reverend Blair]

The basic rule of evolution is that a species will adapt to conditions by reproducing in a way that favours individuals best suited to conditions. Adaptations are random and the environment is not controlled, so a wider gene pool is favoured.

The basic rule of social Darwinism is that you will try to control conditions to favour a certain segment of the species, effectively reducing the gene pool so that only a few inbred gits, such as yourself, can reproduce. Since inbred gits such as yourself are incapable of producing viable offspring, that will lead to the demise of the species. It is inherently anti-Darwinian.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

Re: RE: Evolution Debate ...

Darwin wouldn't approve of you misrepresenting his theories.

That's probably true, but you're the one who's doing it. Darwinism has nothing to say about human societies, that's not its area of application. Social Darwinism is a philosophically bankrupt attempt to justify maltreatment of society's weaker members essentially by blaming the victims.

Nature has no ethics. We do. Or at least most of us do.