evsoul

iTrader: (1)

no because the difference is no one created the creator.. but in the science world there's no legit explanation that can cover how the very very first thing came to existence. Say heat pressure, some of this and some of that..

in Christianity we would love to know how God has always been but it's really not important to our belief. In science you have the pursuit of knowledge. Without the information to explain how the very first thing got there then science is flawed.

I will admit it's only fair to understand how an atheist could think the idea of a creator is a radical concept, but honestly i think it makes more sense. How did we get here if not from something more powerful than what we understand as logic?

Superglue WRX

There's nothing radical about the idea of a god. That's as old as man himself.

Some people would like to read a book and accept all the answers, just because. Some people would prefer to be shown something more convincing before accepting any answers.

The reason we have the things we have today is because people continued to question and look for answers like challenging the idea of a flat earth, the laws of motion, flight, medicine, etc.

evsoul

iTrader: (1)

No I get it.. but there's a lot of people who think the very concept of a God is "retarded" as my buddy likes to say. That's more so what I was trying to address with that statement.

Generic

iTrader: (2)

First of all, my sources are not Atheist, they are scientific.

Second of all, the problem isn't that your source was biased (even though it was), it was the fact that Dr. H was WRONG. He used non-factual data, skewed numbers, ignored proper scientific method and then turned around and said he proved his theory (using said flawed data). That isn't bias, its ludicrous.

Again you are skirting the real issue. I answered the 4 questions Medic proposed, and then asked a few of my own. Neither you nor Medic has addressed those questions head-on with reliable sources. My answers were not from biased sources, they were from scientific sources based on observable, peer(and non-peer)-reviewed data.

Instead you go off on a topic that is tangent to the main discussion.

Generic

iTrader: (2)

Hrrm... After searching "Flavius Josephus on Jesus", one gets this:

Accepted? By who? Creationists? Jewish apologists (after all, Josephus was a self-proclaimed Jewish apologist himself)?

Just give me one, ONE reliable, confirmed source on all your claims of "facts" that disprove evolution. Please.

woocabin

iTrader: (13)

Bible taught in schools in Texas is fine as long as its not preached.

all agreed.

end thread. =]

evsoul

iTrader: (1)

Darwin admitted that fossils of the transitional links between species would have to be found in order to prove his theory of evolution but these transitional links have never been found.

what evolutionists show us are different species, we never see the in between stages of the species..

on Origins:
matter can create energy and energy can create matter.
but where did the original energy come from to create matter thus the big bang. I want an explanation for this before I care to continue any of that debate. I've never ever had a believer in evolution/big bang answer that for me.

everyday scientific facts change, yet the Bible stays the same other than translations to better understand it.

And why don't we ever see any civilizations dating back more than 10,000 years ago? Where are all the structures? If evolution is true, and such "slow progress" then wouldn't it make sense to see some kind of structure/civilization remains from more than 10,000 years ago? It's not like we could have evolved enough in 5-6k years that we would have no signs of civilization then poof now we do. we got the great pyramids about 4500 years ago (roughly) but what signs of civilization do we have that date back much further than those?

and don't tell me "technology, and developments" because in evolution we would see the small steps of progression in DNA and with that, we'd see the small steps of progression within civilizations.

correct me on any of that if you can, id love to hear your side.
and for the record can we please keep it friendly? we are dividing by zero by having this conversation on the interwebs so let's respect each other, we all have our beliefs. if anyone feels that i am attacking them then tell me and i'll look back on my posts. i think calling people morons is a bit excessive considering that person didn't show much to back up why "i am a moron" other than statement through opinion with no "scientific fact" to back it up.

Jin

if we do find a "missing link" there will be another "missing link" from that link to the other so its a paradox. perhaps we'll have an answer in the future.

scientists are trying hard to find that answer, we've come so far to have nations put their resources together to find this answer, LHC? the big bang theory tries to explain what is causing the expansion, not where everything came from.

i forgot what it was called but there has been another science where it looks into fractions of seconds. though it maybe just a blink of a eye, a lot can happen within that short period of time like the big bang. however, once we try to look beyond zeptosecond(?) our common model to understand it completely falls apart, meaning we dont have the knowledge to understand it yet.

thats a horrible example as i've said it before. the evolution of theories in science is the beauty of it. are you saying we shouldnt be trying to understand the world? only believe in what is being told to us by a "book"?

caveman? pre-historic tools, then transition to more advanced tools, etc, etc. the history we know of is only known because it was described back then; language and writing had to be invented first.


i totally agree, people have different views but this is just for entertainment

i'm all for religion to some degree (trying to be a good person), i just dont like people who take the words literally...the metaphor should be more important. i just believe logic and reasoning should come before superstition.
like ghosts, people dont believe in it until they see it. i havnt seen one but i've had friends tell me that they have, so i really dont know what to say. however, this is certain: growing up in korea, i've heard of korean, chinese and japanese ghost stories and later western ghost stories. they all have similarities, for example, "Death"; the guy that comes to pick you up when you die. they look different and have different names depending on the culture, yet they have the same role. this only seems to explain the psychological similarities with all humans awhile trying to explain that with their own cultural perspective. with that logic, i dont see how bible could be the ONLY answer trying to explain the unexplainable.

just by probability alone, there must be another life form, perhaps intelligent being somewhere in the universe. we'll never see it or hear from it thanks to the speed of light barrier. will aliens conflict with bible or will it have no effect?

on evolution vs intelligent design, what usefulness does ID have other than trying to make the connection between the bible and the real world?

evsoul

iTrader: (1)

wasn't really meant to be a valid argument, but more so part of where I come from. I was raised Christian, completely denounced all faith in it because of a very bad time I was going through. Then found myself stronger than ever in the faith. And no matter what happened that "book" said the samething to me as before it didn't change. One thing I can't argue to anyone and no one can tell me different are the things that have happened to me. When I told God to eff off, he told me "i don't think so". I hated the idea for a minute, then told him "You've got one last shot with me to make me believe you aren't some fairytale" and that night I had a dream that hit me so incredibly hard, and I can remember every single detail from the dream better than I can remember what I did yesterday. That's one of those things that make me think "there's nothing anyone can say to change my mind".

But how do you convince someone that it's worth believing in based on a dream you can't show them? heh, that's part of it all I guess.


Honestly I am iffy on that subject

that says to me it could literally be a chariot of fire, or it could be that a chariot was their only way of describing a vehicle back then.. so say a "UFO" came down and thrusters would that not be how they would have described it? that's what some people think.
personally I believe it being about an actual chariot of fire, but who knows. it's rather minuscule when it comes to having faith in God. I don't feel those questions affect my belief or relationship with Him.

Jin

i have no problem with religious people as long as they dont come to me and say "earth is 6000 years old". i grew up going to church every friday and sunday, volunteer to help elderly and so on. i learned that it is good to help people, learn what is good and bad, jesus was a good model on how a person should be. i didnt take his miracles and other feats literally, i just knew that was a good person and the moral of the story was good. now to define what is good and wrong, i just go by the law of physics, "for every action, there is a reaction"
basically meaning i should treat people the way i would want to be treated, and if someone disrespects me, i have the right to respond.

i know people that goes to north korea every year or two as volunteers, traveling with their own money to help the poor. i greatly respect that and it is the bible that motivated them to do so.

however, there is also the negative side of the religion, which is the side i dont like. for example, can you imagine a president getting elected that is an atheist or muslim? i dont think so, solely because of his belief and solely because his belief isnt accepted by the majority of the voters. and you cant deny that there are people out there that takes advantage of people's religious beliefs. thats why i said logic and reasoning should come before superstition.

and as for your dream, its like trying to believe in ghosts...typical person wouldnt believe in it unless they experience it for themself. your dream just could have been a manifestation of what you were going through or it could be god's message, no matter, what is important is that it made you into a better person and help you get through life.

evsoul

iTrader: (1)

Well without the resurrection of Christ then the concept of the moral is meaningless.
Why be a good person if there's no reason to? If we were all an accident then who cares.The reason his good deeds and moral have actual value is because it came from him as a God. It was an extraordinary occurrence.

Well being that it's a democracy the majority of the voters should have the right to vote with who they connect with most. I wouldn't vote for an atheist for the sole reasoning of my not supporting many of their beliefs, and I want to know I support my president as much as humanly possible. And belief being a big deal to me, I couldn't vote for someone that does believe in God.

And with my dream thing, I've never to this day had a dream i still remember every single detail of beginning till end except that one. Which is why the impact for me was significant. But like your point says, it's like convincing someone of a Ghost without them having seen them.

Overbear

Ok, after spending 2 ****ing days building a post, my word file crashed! so, I am going to do this in a condensed version.

Evolution, macro and micro.

First we have to understand what evolution is. To put it in its most simple terms, evolution is change in the genetic material of a population of organisms from one generation to the next. This change is small in most cases, and very large in a few cases.

Micro evolution: Microevolution is the occurrence of small-scale changes in allele frequencies in a population, over a few generations, also known as change below the species level. We can see examples of this in our day to day life, A prime example would be dogs. Lets look at Black labs, and golden labs(Canis lupis familiaris labrador) as our test subject. The only real difference between the two, is fur/coat color and density. As we trace the roots back, we find they come from the same blood line, therefor the small changes have happened inside its own population.

Macro Evolution: Macroevolution is a scale of analysis of evolution in separated gene pools. This means we see species changes, not just small changes in the same species. Let us use another example, in this case we will take Ursidae (bear) and Canidae (coyotes, dogs, foxes, jackals, and wolves). As we look back in the tree we can see both come from Class Mammalia, Order Carnivora, and interestingly enough hold a common ancestor. About 38 million years ago, the bear and dog lines separated into two distinct groups. The bear group began to walk on the soles of their feet while the dog group (called "canids" which includes modern day dogs, wolves and foxes) continued to walk on their toes. As bears evolved into omnivores, which means they began to include plant material in their diet, their gut became longer. Since plants take longer to digest than meat, plant eating animals need longer guts than carnivores. The bears teeth also changed over time. Canids tear their food when they eat, and have typical carnivorous teeth - small pointed front teeth and pointed molars. But bears crush and grind their food and therefore have short front teeth and rounded molars.

Now even in this day we are starting to see examples of macro evolution at work. One of the biggest examples is again in our friends the Ursidae, and for this we look to the cold north of the world. Here a species known as Ursus maritimus, the polar bear (who happens to share a past with brown bears) is in danger. However mother nature has a ace up her sleeve. Members of the Ursidae family are very quick to adapt, and we are seeing this now in a hybrid bear, a breeding of Ursus maritimus, and his long distant cousin Ursus arctos (the brown bear). This new bear has the black skin and adaptive clear coat of the polar bear, but a lighter shade of black, one that does not absorb as much heat. They are finding the pawpads are starting to become thicker to deal with non ice life, and most of all, the diet is changing from the polar bears strict meat diet, to one more omnivore. Is this a new species...no, not yet, but in our lifetime, or perhaps the next generation, we are going to see a whole new species join us on earth.

And that, my bible thumping friends, is absolute, un-questionable, PROOF evolution, not creationism, exists.

Generic

iTrader: (2)

I already answered this. You cannot argue this point one moment and then not accept the likewise argument to who created the Creator? Science is looking for the answer to it's regression problem. Creationist are satisfied with flawed logic and willful ignorance.
Ill grant you that the fundamentals have not changed, but there have been thousands of revisions with thousands of translation discrepancies. I'll say it again (I have already answered this one as well): Science changes because people don't just accept things on 'faith'. Science questions when things don't make sense or when there is a major breakthrough in human understanding. Of course the Bible has radically changed, that would defeat the purpose.

We do. As Jin already pointed out, we have extensive fossil records of the Homo genus of our species. Up until around 10,000 years ago, Homo sapiens were a hunter-gatherer society. They did not have permanent settlements. Permanent dwellings and large scale agriculture started around that time, which is why we sometimes find those today. Furs, lean-tos and transitory huts made of ferns and such don't exactly stand the test of time.

Evolution of an organism, and the 'evolution' of a society can occur on vastly different time scales. I believe you view on what exactly Evolution mean is very convoluted as you keep comparing it to things that don't exactly share the same realm. It absolutely was 'technology and develepoements'. We DO see small steps in progression within civilization. A really condensed version would look like the following:
hunter-gather (subsistence living) -> seasonal migration to fertile agricultural regions (still non-permanent dwellings, not always in the exact same spot season to season) -> permanent dwellings and the Agricultural revolution (also referred to as the Neolithic Revolution) around 10k years ago. Simple irrigation, year-round planting, more than just subsistence living.

Anatomically modern humans first appear in the fossil record in Africa about 195,000 years ago. It took a very long time to get to the Neolithic Revolution. What I am trying to prove with statement is that we were the same organism then as we are now. No biological evolution has taken place (aside from some small, phenotypical differences) since then. Your comparison with the evolution of DNA and the evolution of society breaks down there.

I too agree that calling people morons is not only rude, but also untrue. There are plenty of very intelligent people that also happen to be religious. To me, this doesn't make them any more founded in the beliefs, but that is my opinion, and the opinion of science. I didn't say it because I don't believe it to be true. I don't think you are a moron and having this conversation degrade into name calling would be counterproductive.

Overbear

That has to be the single most asinine thing I have ever seen posted on the net. How sad is that?

So you are trying to say, that morals are only valid because some imaginary person was nailed up on a plank of wood, died, then did the zombie thing 3 days later? That people can't have morals/ethics without that? you sir, need serious mental help.

Generic

iTrader: (2)

You know, I don't usually take any offense at all with religion, but that statement about how someone can not have morals unless they believe in the Judeo-Christian God is not only complete false, it's really insulting.

I happen to be a fantastic person, thanks. I have a loving family, I love my girlfriend dearly. I volunteer, I am kind, I am giving, I help others whenever I can and I am rewarded with a great group of friends and a comfortable life. I know right from wrong because I was raised to think of other people. I was not raised religious in any fashion, even though both my parents were. You talk about not calling people names, that it is counter-productive and then you say something like that? Are you joking? Hypocrisy at it's best. How dare you propose otherwise.

That, right there, is one of the things I find very, very wrong with what Religion espouses. While I disagree with your beliefs and am ready to defend my own, I would never propose you are less of a person for having those beliefs. It's really sad that the same cannot be said about me, according to you.