Evolution and Religion

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by loseyourname Of course you can follow the teachings of Christ and believe he is the son of the one true God without being religious. Did I ever say otherwise?

You did not, but I am trying to hit on something inherent within the human psyche that is a powerful tool for control, whether by the State, or 500 years ago by the Church.

[ckBejug]

Ohh Mousey here we go again, right? It is certain in my mind that you will never see the other side of this argument because you are always adamant that you are right, no matter how much proof is presented that shows otherwise. You will never even slightly give in to the whole idea of evolution, not because your mind is not bright enough to comprehend the whole thing, believe me I know by now that it is, but because you want to see the whole damn thing replicated in some kind of cut and dry repeatable experiment in a lab or even out there in nature, and that's not going to happen!

Some thoughts on evolution... The FACTS are the fossils, patterns of organic diversity, and DNA. The THEORY of evolution is what explains them. Just as the retrograde motion of the planets, Venus’ phases, and variations in planetary brightness are among the facts the THEORY that Earth revolves around the sun explains. Or do you not believe that either?

About evolution and God... Give me a break with all this WHY did things turn out the way they did questioning, obviously that's not what evolution is the explanation for. Evolution tells us how life came to be where it is, but it does not say why. You can go ahead and have a belief in God and still agree with the theory of evolution because evolution doesn't disprove the idea that God created the world and the life in it. Evolution ony contradicts the literal interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis, and how many of you are actually reading that as an exact historical account anyway??

Evolution cannot say exactly why common descent chose the paths that it did. But, the fact of the matter is there ARE distinct paths, and the theory of evolution is how we explain them. Macroevolution is studied within comparative biochemical and genetic studies, comparative developmental biology, patterns of biogeography, comparative morphology and anatomy and studies of the fossil record. If you know where to look and look with an open mind you'll see that there is tons of proof out there and believe me even if you can come up with a million arguments about anything I say, you wont be able to argue against the solid proof. Unless of course you just say well God created all that exactly that way, it was all his doing, the tiniest randomest most miniscule similarities we find are all results of Gods hand creating everything and scientists are just wasting their time trying to figure out the delicate intricacies of how life works and how it came to be what it is because, well, God did it. If you're just going to sit there and demand that that's the truth, you're never going to actually listen to what others have to say and maybe even start to understand the truth that is in the theory of evolution. There are too many similarities between species, almost exact portions of DNA, new discoveries are made every single day. So what is your explanation, God put it there? it's too easy to say that, isn't it?

There is even evidence that over 15 different species of humans have existed over time, and that during the period of 3 to 1 million years ago almost 10 different species of humans existed at the same time. The evidence for evolution is stacking up to the point that to doubt the overwhelming mountain of proof is really to be dumb and insist on turning a blind eye to the whole damn thing.

Since we're such a fan of quoting around here... read this, it's an OBSERVED proof of evolution. And YES, it's evolution because the moths did not simply ADAPT to their surroundings, their genetic make-up changed, and they became different species, unable to interbreed. How do you explain that away as easily as you seem to do everything else, mousey??

The English moth, Biston betularia, is a frequently cited example of observed evolution. In this moth there are two color morphs, light and dark. H. B. D. Kettlewell found that dark moths constituted less than 2% of the population prior to 1848. The frequency of the dark morph increased in the years following. By 1898, the 95% of the moths in Manchester and other highly industrialized areas were of the dark type. Their frequency was less in rural areas. The moth population changed from mostly light colored moths to mostly dark colored moths. The moths' color was primarily determined by a single gene. [gene: a hereditary unit] So, the change in frequency of dark colored moths represented a change in the gene pool. [gene pool: the set all of genes in a population] This change was, by definition, evolution, and thus the moth started out as one species and evolved into two distinct species with different genes, unable to interbreed.

That's all..... Of course there's more, but my hands hurt from typing and I don't think it's necessary to say any much more since I know we're all pretty bull-headed around here and basically our arguments all just come full-circle and we end up each of us saying our own thing and pretty much getting nowhere....

[Anonymouse]

Originally posted by ckBejug Ohh Mousey here we go again, right? It is certain in my mind that you will never see the other side of this argument because you are always adamant that you are right, no matter how much proof is presented that shows otherwise. You will never even slightly give in to the whole idea of evolution, not because your mind is not bright enough to comprehend the whole thing, believe me I know by now that it is, but because you want to see the whole damn thing replicated in some kind of cut and dry repeatable experiment in a lab or even out there in nature, and that's not going to happen!

Some thoughts on evolution... The FACTS are the fossils, patterns of organic diversity, and DNA. The THEORY of evolution is what explains them. Just as the retrograde motion of the planets, Venus’ phases, and variations in planetary brightness are among the facts the THEORY that Earth revolves around the sun explains. Or do you not believe that either?

About evolution and God... Give me a break with all this WHY did things turn out the way they did questioning, obviously that's not what evolution is the explanation for. Evolution tells us how life came to be where it is, but it does not say why. You can go ahead and have a belief in God and still agree with the theory of evolution because evolution doesn't disprove the idea that God created the world and the life in it. Evolution ony contradicts the literal interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis, and how many of you are actually reading that as an exact historical account anyway??

Evolution cannot say exactly why common descent chose the paths that it did. But, the fact of the matter is there ARE distinct paths, and the theory of evolution is how we explain them. Macroevolution is studied within comparative biochemical and genetic studies, comparative developmental biology, patterns of biogeography, comparative morphology and anatomy and studies of the fossil record. If you know where to look and look with an open mind you'll see that there is tons of proof out there and believe me even if you can come up with a million arguments about anything I say, you wont be able to argue against the solid proof. Unless of course you just say well God created all that exactly that way, it was all his doing, the tiniest randomest most miniscule similarities we find are all results of Gods hand creating everything and scientists are just wasting their time trying to figure out the delicate intricacies of how life works and how it came to be what it is because, well, God did it. If you're just going to sit there and demand that that's the truth, you're never going to actually listen to what others have to say and maybe even start to understand the truth that is in the theory of evolution. There are too many similarities between species, almost exact portions of DNA, new discoveries are made every single day. So what is your explanation, God put it there? it's too easy to say that, isn't it?

There is even evidence that over 15 different species of humans have existed over time, and that during the period of 3 to 1 million years ago almost 10 different species of humans existed at the same time. The evidence for evolution is stacking up to the point that to doubt the overwhelming mountain of proof is really to be dumb and insist on turning a blind eye to the whole damn thing.

Since we're such a fan of quoting around here... read this, it's an OBSERVED proof of evolution. And YES, it's evolution because the moths did not simply ADAPT to their surroundings, their genetic make-up changed, and they became different species, unable to interbreed. How do you explain that away as easily as you seem to do everything else, mousey??

That's all..... Of course there's more, but my hands hurt from typing and I don't think it's necessary to say any much more since I know we're all pretty bull-headed around here and basically our arguments all just come full-circle and we end up each of us saying our own thing and pretty much getting nowhere....

There is a good argument against the moth that is so often touted as evidence of Darwinian evolution.

http://www2.gasou.edu/facstaff/etmcmull/MOTH.htm

http://www.apologeticspress.org/inthenews/2003/itn-03-36.htm

[Anonymouse]

In the introduction to the 1971 edition of Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species, L. Harrison Matthews summed up the obvious when he wrote:

Some experiments are said to demonstrate evolution in action; those on industrial melanism in moths are a well-known example…. The peppered moth experiments beautifully demonstrate natural selection or survival of the fittest. But they do not show evolution in progress. For however the population may alter in their content of light, intermediate or dark forms, all the moths remain from beginning to end Biston betularia (Darwin, p. xi).

[sleuth]

guys if you belive that we evolve from phatogenic bacteria so you are nothing more than can of worms...it's easy arvest to deny the fact of divine intelligenc that controls evrything and univers,that controls us and frys your little kiwi brain...truth is inside you...but some maggots just can't handle the truth...

[ckBejug]

Originally posted by Anonymouse There is a good argument against the moth that is so often touted as evidence of Darwinian evolution.

http://www2.gasou.edu/facstaff/etmcmull/MOTH.htm

http://www.apologeticspress.org/inth.../itn-03-36.htm

Want to know what the problem is with those websites and the New Scientist article mentioned within?? While I can't say whether or not these early scientists did in fact glue the moth to the tree and/or make up the reason their color changed, the FACT of the matter is the color DID change, the species DID change and the light colored moth and dark colored moth, once part of the same species, now became incapable of breeding with eachother. Breeding cannot occur between two different species. I am not asking why this happened. I'm sure in an effort to present the data to the world, or whoever was interested, these scientists, like everyone else in the world trying to convince someone that their point of view is correct, made up some reason for it. That's not the reason, fine, whatever. But, whatever the reason, the FACT remains that the species changed, it was ONE it became TWO, so no matter how much you can disprove the REASON it happened, you can't very well tell me it didn't happen, now can you? As for the girl mentioned on the webpage who said that 'Biology said so' when prodded about evolution, she repeated, regurgitated what she had learned in Biology class to her professor, well it's not the fault of the scientific community that some people just repeat what they read without digesting it and understanding it first. After all, unless you can explain something, you haven't understood it at all.

[sleuth]

....and the univers goes on with laughter ....Evolution_ Perpetual Revalution :PPP

[Aphrodit3]

The problem here isn’t the lack of evidence for evolution or the fossil record. In fact, there is more evidence supporting evolution than creation. Anon, after five pages of nitpicking, you still haven’t given us an alternative. If you’re so adamant on creationism then give something a bit more believable than biblical fairytales.

You can watch the process of natural selection in a petri dish of bacteria. High doses of antibiotics are introduced to a petri dish containing colonies of bacteria. The antibiotics then kill off most of the colonies except a few with resistance to the antibiotic. These live to reproduce. The next generation of bacteria will carry this resistance gene and be unaffected by the antibiotics. Blah blah blah…you get the idea. You can even see the evolution of drug resistance in HIV. Over time, the percent of resistant viruses to a drug called 3TC increased to 100%.

You can see anatomical homologies in mammalian limbs that support the theory of common ancestry. There are embryonic homologies such as the presence of pharyngeal pouches in vertebrate embryos that develop for different functions in each species. We share more than 90% of our genetic makeup with apes. The amino acid sequence of human hemoglobin has a total of 146 amino acids in its chain. There are only 8 amino acids that are different in a Rhesus monkey when compared to a human. Don’t even bother arguing with the fossil record. Thousands of scientists have come and gone, found physical evidence to link gaps in the transitions of the fossil record. I doubt you can undo all their work. Go read some science magazines. I’ll lend you some of mine if you’d like.

Please don’t get me wrong. My beliefs aren’t extreme on either side. I do support evolution but there is that question of “why” that I think can be answered by God. Going back to what Flames and Loser said, I definitely think that evolution and creationism coexist.

[Anonymouse]

After groundbreaking research, and more than a century since Darwin, I don't see any reason to accept evolution. Whether it is citing the moth as an example, or the antibiotics and genes resisting. All these examples forget one basic thing, these are examples of microevolution which I have not denied. You are only stating the obvious. The point is not to dispute whether microevolution happens, but whether it means anything at all?

First bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics becuase of the differential survival of mutant forms possessing the advantage of resistence. Second the melanism in moths changes. If we take these examples as the best observational evidence of natural selection we can draw the following conclusion.

There is no reason to doubt that certain circumstances can compel bacteria to resist antibiotics, or dark colored moths to light colored ones. In these given circumstances the population that are susceptible to drugs and the light colored moths may decline as long as the circumstances prevail. Furthermore, none of these "proofs" provide persuasive reason to believe that natural selection can produce new species, new organs, and other major changes, or even minor ones, that are permanent. The problem with what bejug is saying as "species" is essentially the problem of evolution, its semantics. Even the most staunch creationists will agree that microevolution occures. These are all such examples. That the melanism in moths which bejug raises shows natural selection, it also shows it as a conservative process. It induces some relatively trivial variation within the species boundary but which also conserves the original genetic blue print so population frequencies can shift in the other direction when conditions change again. This is nothing more than adaptation. Such a process does not produce permanent, and irreversible change that is required to produce a wholly new species, let alone a new phyla.

The problem arises from one term "evolution" that is used to designation ( as in the case for moths ) processes that may have little or nothing in common. A shift in the number of dark and light moths in a population is called "evolution", and so is the creative process that produced the cell, the multicellular organism, the eye, the mind. The implication of the semantics is that evolution is fundamentally a single process, and most evolutionists, whether consciously or unconsciously will exploit this as a substitute for scientific evidence. Even seperating "evolution" into "micro" and "macro" implies that all the creative processes involved in life comprise single phenomenon. The vocabulary inherent in darwinism limits our comprehension of the difficulties by misleadingly covering them with a blanket term "evolution" and from this vagueness evolutionary theory becomes a tautology. This is why bejug asked me if I deny these changes, since now for her, the definition has changed.

And what "alternative" is it that you seek? If evolution is something that relies on more faith than a bible thumper has in Jesus, or Agent Mulder in UFOs, then surely it must have stood up to scrutiny and evidnece, but it lacks everything science is supposed to uphold, and has transformed into a tautology, since it is nothing more than a philosophical assumption that we evolved, not an empirical one. The other alternative, is there is a purpose and intelligence that has guided all living things on this planet and is responsible for their creation, and indeed this is what the fossil record shows, species randomly appearing out of nowhere only to disappear without a trace.

Any scientific theory or hypothesis must be proved first possible, then probable, then certain. To be a possible theory, it must be reconcilable with many facts , to be a probable theory, it must be reconcilable with many more to be a certain and proven theory ( we have already established that evolution is not mathematically probable as I showed above by the work of Murray Eden of MIT ), it must be reconcilable with all the facts. Whenever it is irreconcilable with any fact, it should be rejected, as it cantbe a true theory. Every true theory passes through these three stages of possibility, probability, and certainty. A theory is not science until it is certainly true, and so becomes knowledge. evolution is in a desperate struggle to show that it may possibly be a true theory or hypothesis. Yet some who are ready to admit that they are "scientists" claim evolution a proven theory. It is clear, to me at least anyway, that this theory cannot withstand scrutiny, therefore must be rejected.

[sleuth]

I would like to point out that I don't think there is, first of all, a real contrast between religion and science in the sense of one being faith and the other being reason. I think both can be reasonable. And it's interesting that in science, one often refers to the best explanation, and the best explanation then often involves postulating the existence of something you would never observe or ever could observe.
They both have an element of trust needed to belive that either are correct or incorrect.

reconciliation religion and evolution will solve this conflict.

reconsiliation is only solution...