Evolution

Well, some people really can be called pigs because they are much more closer to them in behaviour
Actually, to tell you the truth, Chimps are by far our closest relatives in the animal kingdom. The reason why we use pigs and mice in research is that, indeed, they do share some of the key genetic elements as us humans, but the more important reason is because of cruelty to animals. Since we eat pigs, they don't consider it any less humane to do research with them. "Chimponauts" as they called them were the first "Americans" to go into space, and since then, research on Chimpanzees has been widely blasted by animal rights activists as being very inhumane, because of their likeness to us. I've read a lot about this, and I've done a lot of research. Basically, they do everything like us: they love and hate, have families, care for the young, respect the old, they have social hierarchies, grieve for the dead and even wage war. They are the only known species that has been observed to systematically destroy members of their own kind (warring groups of Chimps have been observed in Tanzania). This is far too similar for me to be coincidence.

Something that struck me as being a bit odd: how can it be "common sense" that a theory will be automatically proven wrong after a while? The ones I listed were an obvious example of wrong medieval thinking, but I can't think of any that have been completely proven wrong and changed the way we look at our universe...

By the way, I really enjoy this thread I just hope I'm not enraging anyone or provoking fights with the claims/arguments I'm making! It's purely a friendly discussion!!

I don't understand the question: you listed the common examples - the obvious ones. I'm saying I agree with those, and that those are examples of how major world views can be commonly held and proven wrong.

People thought the Earth was flat. They thought the Sun was God. They thought the Earth was much smaller than it was. If I do some research I will find others - but I'd rather not have to.

As for the Chimps: yeah, they're pretty intelligent, arn't they? I think that is all built into them. However, the fact remains that if you stick a bunch of Apes on a planet by themselves and come back 1,000 years later, they'll still be eating bugs off of each other's backs and squeeling - they won't have made houses and cars and other things like that.

I beg to differ, and I have a perfect example of it. There was a test done in Africa with a small group of monkeys living together in the wild. Scientists would feed the monkeys rice, but all they would do is toss it out to them(these monkeys lived on the beach) and the grains of rice would get mixed with the sand and the monkeys wouldn't be able to eat it(they couldn't see it). But there was one monkey, a female, that learned after only a few days what to do. It picked up a big handful of the sand/rice mixture and dumped it in the shallow water. The sand would sink, and the rice would rise. Pretty cleaver.

As for them building houses and cars, of course not. The only reason that humans have invented houses and cars is because it became a neccisity. People needed a place to stay, and a more reliable, faster mode of transportation. What is a monkey going to need with a car? As for houses though. I have seen documentaries of chimps building huts out of the bases of trees using a mud mixture.

If you want cars, your gonna have to wait alot longer than 1,000 years.

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The rice thing is hardly what I'm talking about - I'm not saying Monkeys have no ability to solve any problems whatsoever - but they cannot reason they way we do. Not even close. They survive on instincts - we do as well, but we also survive with our Wits - we make things easier on ourselves all the time.

Monkeys simply do not do that. Nothing does other than man. That's the point I was trying to make.

Chris - those points i made, somewhere in there i said i'm just going off your own points, not necessarily saying you have no basis and that I don't respect your own beliefs in the validity of your own points. i wanted to stress that i am not picking on you or seeking to debunk any of you beliefs and/or prove you wrong. I'm just following tangents based off what people said in this thread, and both you and Zephyrus made more comments ... so i had lots of responses.

ok, now:

1. Chris: " The reason that one isn't open to interpretation is because I just don't think it is - it's clearer than the others. It was a matter of opinion. I thought that much was obvious... "

It wasn't obvious. You said you didn't think it was open to interpretation and didn't say why. So now I know it's cause you think it's clearer. I still think though that "clearer" is relative and that based off my "translation" theories that a concrete and immutable understanding of the bible at all in its entirety or any one chapter (genesis included) is impossible unless God tells us himself.

2. Chris: "When I'm talking about not being able to believe it about millions of other species, I'm talking about this planet - I don't think there have been millions of mutated humans here on Earth that have died out - if you believe in Darwin's theories or most theories of evolution, that goes with it. Doesn't seem too likely to me. "

again, why? it's the likeliness factor i don't get. i ean, why is it unlikely? we don't know what god did or chose to do prior to our existence and he may have indeed had some practice shots. then again, he might not have. i'm not arguing for or against it, i'm just arguing it's as likely as anything else. it may seem extraordinary and unlikely to the christian from faith beliefs, but a belief in god is just as extraordinary to the non-believer.

3. Chris: "I understand that not everyone "blocks out" God because of their own sins, but I think plenty do. Some don't like the idea of someone more powerful and more in control than they are - they think a God means they have no control. Things like this can be concious or subconcious, and I think most Non-Christians have something similar to that going on. "

whoah, that's a real heavy generalization. that's why i had something to say on the topic earlier. but you're sticking to your guns, and that's your prerogative. feeling you have no control is not a natural conclusion to avoid responsibility for sin. to wish to avoid that responsibility you have to BELIEVE in sin. the only way to believe in sin is to believe in the bible and in god. how is that possible if you don't believe in god?

4. Chris: "It has always been human nature to jump to conclusions on scientific matters"

i would argue this against both science and religion. it is also human nature to jump to conclusions on religious matters. those conclusions are based on "fact" statements/lessons (and relative interpretations) from texts. the same goes for science. yet theories can be disproven, and, i believe, so can many of the theories that come from people (televangelists, pastors within churches, parents teaching their children) who draw ways of living (parallel to ways of science) from these texts. it is ALL relative. neither science nor religion will ever have it completely right until they both get all the data from the big boss man (or beings) himself.

so, to chris, i'd say: just because things can be disproven does not mean the whole thing (science) or most of it is bunk.

and to zephyrus: just because things have remained "true" and seem to "work" when tested again and again does not mean the whole thing (science) should be the rubric by which the world goes.

basically, i take both religion and science with a grain of salt.

5. zephyrus: "Sorry Miriam, have to disagree there. Math is invented based on observations of the universe around us. If you say it's not fact, can I therefore conclude that 1+1 is not equal to 2 because it is just fabricated to suit our needs? As far as light goes, it is hard to understand (which doesn't mean that it's inexplicable by mathematics). What it is basically is the wave/particle duality, because based on observations light sometimes behaves as waves (i.e. electromagnetic radiation) and sometimes as particles (i.e. matter). I can't really explain more without going into quantum physics... "

actually, who's to say that 1+1 does not equal 1? to better understand anything i think deconstruction is necessary. to see the whole picture you need to get out of the frame. that is all i am arguing here. what bests works for us now in this frame of reference might indeed wholly support that 1+1 is 2, and i would agree that it suits us in the living of our lives and the rules our currently civilization is based on. but what if at some point we evolve to beings that don't even need numbers? or where all knowledge makes sense on some other level or in some other way where 1+1 = 1 and nothing is separate and all things are equal?

i would phrase that for how things are now, you have stated it exactly: these things work "because it is just fabricated to suit our needs? " math is indeed invented. man created it. he created symbols to represent ideas that represent how the world works. man created the single line that represents a single object. perhaps that is why he trusts it more than he trusts religion - HE made it, not some voice in the sky. this may be why he depends upon the scientific domain rather than the spiritual. he is breaking it, as others have said here, into small parts that he can understand. the world may very well exist in such a way that small packets are not necessary and there is a larger scope (rather than numbers/formulae) to understand it in. i'm not saying it DOES. i think so. but i'm not so confident as to tell the world it must believe me.

as for quantum physics... dear friend, is spent an entire YEAR studying all and every facet of light. quantum physics included. i now know things that i will never be able to shake ... terribly useless but interesting information (for me . anyway, i know how light works. at the basic level, i still believe it's all theory. to have the notion that light even behaves as a "wave" or as "matter" is invented in itself. i'm not saying it's untrue or not right or implausible. i'm just saying it's invented. which it is. cause only man invented that idea or those terms to couch it in.

more zephyrus: "Einstein's Theory of Relativity has been tested to such a huge extent (with no major flaws or violations of the universe being found) that it is considered to be more an axiom or fact(something that is assumed automatically without requiring proof) rather than a theory. And it works very well countless times in explaining what goes on on the atomic level, which can't otherwise be explained. "

"which can't otherwise be explained" - that's the clincher here. who's to say that in 20 years or 100 someone isn't gonna find another way to explain it that also works and doesn't seem to fail the requisite examinations? will it disprove Einstein? or will there just be multiple ways to see it? and the other point - man seeks a way to explain things and therefore makes up rules to fit that. that's what that phrase also implies.

6. ok, zephyrus quoted me talking about the universe: ". thmilin: "But we don't know the size of the universe nor our size in terms of it. Science can yap all it wants but if there are multiple universes around us then we've got a limited knowledge base. science is only trying to make sense of what it knows in it's limited space range (earth/any universes/galaxies we know of) and cannot presume that at any given time it's found it all. say we're a house in a fenced-in yard. scientists are sniffing all over the yard and may think they've got it all figured out but there's still a little gate that leads out to the street, and the neighborhood, and the next street, and ... etc."

Sorry once again, scientists actually do know the size of the observable universe, and every possible calculation shows that our universe is expanding at an increasing rate. We are not even a grain of sand in the desert of the universe, we're even less significant. "

your statement does not disprove mine. i said that scientists are sniffing in a YARD. and that science is only making sense of what it KNOWS. i did not say that scientists don't know (or think they know) the size of the OBSERVABLE universe. I'm saying there is an inherent flaw in determining the relation of things from the house (earth) to the yard (the observable universe) when there is an UNknowable universe beyond it. there is ALWAYS going to be something more that scientists haven't found, don't know, and for however much they find out, they won't know something else.

as for calculations that the universe is expanding, that's the knowable universe. what about the universe out there scientists haven't encountered yet? it's concentric circles and we don't know how far those rings go.

also, i made that statement in relation to YOUR comment:

quote Zephyrus: "But what they sometimes fail to realise is the actual size of the universe, and by this alone, every random event has a small probability of happening, which in a universe of this size can become significant. "

where it seems you're arguing that the size of the universe is rather constrained, at least enough to make some probability and it's happening "significant" where in this argument you've just posted that :" We are not even a grain of sand in the desert of the universe, we're even less significant. "

which i agree with, by the way, but this seems to contradict what you said before. which was what i was responding to before anyway. tell me if i'm wrong, but i'm making that link, between US being significant and random events/their probability being significant because you were speaking of random events in relation to humanoid races having just "happened" upon this planet and the likelyhood, which Chris thought was unlikely.

ok, my hands are tired ...

Chris, what I was saying doesn't actually contradict what you were saying... The theories we currently have are as good as our guess gets. Perhaps sometime in the future, someone will figure out something that works better than what we have now (well at least I hope so), but untill then, these theories work the best. Put it this way, I'm open to anything and everything new!

Chris: "As for the Chimps: yeah, they're pretty intelligent, arn't they? I think that is all built into them. However, the fact remains that if you stick a bunch of Apes on a planet by themselves and come back 1,000 years later, they'll still be eating bugs off of each other's backs and squeeling - they won't have made houses and cars and other things like that."

What you say is true. But hell, we didn't evolve in 1000 years either! It tooks us, say, four and a bit million years to make a car...
And of course, if you stuck apes anywhere they would continue to be apes, because that's the way they have adapted to suit their ecological niche. We didn't evolve from them, we both evolved from a common ancestor...but if you stuck anything on a planet and came back after a few million years, then there would definitely be some change.

Chris: "...but they cannot reason they way we do. Not even close. They survive on instincts - we do as well, but we also survive with our Wits - we make things easier on ourselves all the time.

Monkeys simply do not do that. Nothing does other than man. That's the point I was trying to make."

My friend, let me ask you exactly what makes us human, and what separates us from the Chimps? Our ability to reason? They can solve math problems, use language, plan for the future...for heaven's sake, they can plan things ahead!! To be able to solve a problem, does it not require that they visualise it, think of a solution and then put it into practice?? They do all these things, perhaps (I admit) not nearly as much as humans, but the characteristics are still there.
You might argue that it is the soul that separates us from them...the ability to repent for your sins? Well, I have read many stories about Chimps intentionally or unintentionally inflicting harm on other chimps or people, and then later on feeling sorry for it and trying to make up...my question is where exactly do we draw the line?

thmilin: "...man created it. he created symbols to represent ideas that represent how the world works"

I couldn't have put it better myself! That is exactly what we do with math, and exactly what we do with science. We create symbols to represent what we see, and then we test these symbols against reality to see if they work...when someone proves that the symbols are wrong, they go and invent new ones...that's hitting the nail right on the head

Quoting myslef (no, I'm not being egocentric ) "But what they sometimes fail to realise is the actual size of the universe, and by this alone, every random event has a small probability of happening, which in a universe of this size can become significant. "

What I was trying to say with this is that in terms of probabilities, since we are here, then the probability of a random event happening like us must be more than zero. Therefore, even if it's someting like one part in 10^10,000,000, it still has a chance of manifesting itself in this ever expanding universe. The other quote where I said that we were smaller than a grain of sand in the desert, i was commenting on our significance in the grand scale of things.

Miriam:

1 - Glad it's obvious now.

2 - Why? Because it doesn't seem likely to me. Why do you think it does? There's nothing to argue about here - just my opinion. Some things feel right, and others do not - and seeing as how there is no fact either way, I'm going with my gut.

3 - It could be dead-on accurate. We'll never know. However look at it from my standpoint: I believe it is NATURAL and CORRECT to believe in God, therefore anyone who does not must have something that's blocking them in one way or another.

The four most popular atheists of all time were all very screwed up in their childhood, BTW. I'm willing to elaborate a bit.

4 - Yes, people jump to conclusions in both. No argument there.

Yup, it just means we should be skeptical of these things and not take them as Gospel (no pun intended).


Zeph: I understand your point - obviously I can't say for sure what Apes would do after, say, a million years instead of 1,000. I still think they'd be apes, however.

What's the difference between us and them? Well: who are there more of? Who has dominated the planet? Apes have intelligence, but in a very different way from us. They don't lie awake at night wondering about God, and they can't reason out complex equations the way we can.

Chris: "What's the difference between us and them? Well: who are there more of? Who has dominated the planet? Apes have intelligence, but in a very different way from us. They don't lie awake at night wondering about God, and they can't reason out complex equations the way we can."

Actually, I agree with you (in contrast to my previous posts ) Obviously, we are superior to the Chimps in a hell of a lot of ways, their existence depends on us right now. The point which struck me was how much similar to us they are, how our destructive nature exists in them, as well as our capacity for love and forgiveness. I simply find this fascinating, and it was after reading a book about this that I started becoming interested in evolution and their similarity to us (the book dealt with a scientist, how he taught sign language to a chimp, how the chimp community started to communicate between themselves using this new sign language, and how it was passed on to one of the offspring without any intervention on behalf of humans - simply fascinating! )

I've also thought about a lot of the points in this thread (shows what I do with my spare time ), and I've managed to figure out where I stand. My belief is that God does exist, in some form or other, that he did create Man, and that the tool he used to do this was evolution...if you think about it, it's not too impossible!

Not impossible at all - not what I believe in, but not ridiculous or insane or anything. A reasonable conclusion.

And yes, the things animals do is amazing at times. They have some reason - but I still believe there is an invisible line somewhere that animals will never cross.

I can tell you exactly what that invisible line is. It is the ability to imagine. I know animals can dream and solve problems which use brain power and thinking, but human beings are the only creatures on earth that can actually imagine. Think out step by step what somethig will do, chimps can do that. But chimps can not visualize what the results of there actions will be. The only animal that can do that, is a person.

I do see people as animals though. I think they are just animals who have a better advantage of the other animals. Were king of the jungle!

LOL - interesting way to put it. But yeah, I think you're right. I used to say it was the ability to reason - which is only half right. They can reason things out a bit, but not in the same way.

King of the Jungle...LOL.

Chris, I've got to ask you as part of this discussion...I know a lot of the arguments that evolutionists use to prove their point, and a lot of the attacks that some of the creationists make upon them...but surprisingly enough, when I think about it, I haven't heard almost any arguments that prove the other side's point of view, it's almost as if by attacking and refuting evolutionist's arguments, then it is assumed that by default the other side is correct!

So, are there any arguments that specifically support the case of the creationists?

You'll need to be more specific: are you looking for a list of reasons why I believe in God?

No, not really. I have realised from your threads the reasons why you believe in God, and of course I can respect that. What I was referring to specifically is that, in this thread, you have come up with a lot of arguments in reply to mine about evolution, the creation of the world etc. They were all contradictions and rebbutals, but I haven't seen any specifically that supported the opposite case (i.e. for the creation of Man/the world as in Genesis, the age of the universe...these kind of things).

Belief in creationism is different - the reason we don't have loads of supposed scientific evidence in our favor is because we know that it won't prove anything: because the bias is there on both sides, and always will be.

Evolutionists, however, like to harp (not generalizing here) on things like "Evolution is Scientific" - implying that people believe in Religion because they were taught to, and anyone who looks at the supposed "facts" and reasons it out will come out supporting Evolution. This isn't the case, of course.

As you can see, the mentality is different. As such, evolutionists seem to try a lot of different scientific experiments to "prove" their beliefs, when I just don't see it happening on either side.

I also believe, from a purely religious standpoint, that since everyone OUGHT to (IE: I believe it is natural, the way we were created) believe in God, that perhaps they're searching for proof for their beliefs with more vigor because they're afraid of being wrong.

That's going to sound insulting, but it's not. It goes back to my earlier belief that if God is real and the way he is portrayed in The Bible, then he has created us TO believe in him, and that anyone who doesn't will have certain irregularities present: such as a chronic desire to prove their case against Him.

Hope that explains it a bit. Not trying to be rude - and I have my problems like everyone else. I just think they stem from human nature, rather than denial of God.

I agree with you that we ought to believe. But not specifically in God (as you can see from the fact that there are hundreds of religions around the world). The fact is that it is our human nature to believe in something larger, more potent than us (speaking of course in general terms) in order to compensate for our own flawed nature. That's what it comes down to, I think.

Speaking about evolutionists in general, they find it hard to accept everything in the Bible at face value, so they try to find some additional answers. Of course, pure, hard-line evolutionists eventually hit a wall beyond which they cannot go further with science. They start thinking about the creation of the universe, the Big Bang, and of course, it doesn't explain everything. Theoretically, the smallest definable amount of time is 1*10^(-43) seconds which is known as Planck time. Beyond that, time becomes irrelevant, as does asking the question "What happened before the Big Bang?" On the other hand, saying that God created the universe eventually leads to the question "What/who created God?" and the answer is that no-one created him, that he was always there. Of course, that argument is a bit hard to accept, and I think both sides are at a loss to explain what really created the universe and how/why.

Evolutionists don't just think up scientific experiments and bend the data to suit their needs/arguments. What they do try to do is figure out and explain what they observe (i.e. fossils of hominid ancestors etc). The main finding is of course that what they observe seems to contradict everything that religion teaches us. They are presented with two alternatives: blind faith in something they have never seen, or the other concrete, more real and more substantial alternative.

But what it seems like is that Creationists spend more time harping on the beliefs of evolutionists, trying to prove to them how ridiculous these beliefs are, whereas they don't come up with any alternatives of their own...

If your willing to except that God was always there, I don't think you should try to dismiss that the particles that started the big bang could of just always been there.

I couldn't agree with you more. It happens every single time this type of arguement comes up.

As for when time started, I don't think it ever did. I think time and space were just always there and will always be there. I know that sounds weird but its hard to explain.

Just a funny question, when the clock was first invented, how did the inventors know what time to set it to? I know there were sundials, but sundials don't have minutes and seconds....

There's a very simple reason for us "harping" on those things - I thought I had explained it, but I'll give it another go.

Most of us believe that neither side can prove things with experiments that way - they're biased and it's in the person's interest (finanically as well, sometimes!) to "discover" these new things.

As such, I (can't speak for everyone of course) believe that both sides trying to do so is probably going to produce tripe, which is why you probably won't see many Christians trying to prove God's existence with experiments. So, why don't we? Like I said: we don't believe it can be proven that way. We also debunk the evolutionist's experiments for this same reason.

So basically, we're not CLAIMING to have all the answers or concrete proof - but we're telling others that they don't. This doesn't seem unreasonable to me at all.

The whole thing about time is pretty confusing when you think about it...but I know for sure that the smallest possible definable instant (after the big bang) was 1*10^(-43) seconds. Space and time were in fact not always there, they were created with the massive explosion of matter and energy that happened with the Bang. In fact, the theory goes that space, time, matter, everything, was compressed in on infinitely dense point, and then it all exploded . As the explosion went outward, space increased (and is still increasing) and time came into being...that's basically what the theory says.

As one scientist put it, "First there was nothing. Then it exploded."

They measured the time by the sun and the stars...don't think seconds appeared untill much more recently, when equipment to measure time got more sophisticated...actually, how they determined that the day is specifically 24 hours long I have no idea...perhaps had something to do with a circle...any ideas anyone???

Why didn't they go with 100 hours instead? Or even better, one hour? pretty confusing, ah?!