..a modern movie of a very well respected and incredible series of books...


Did you? I heard that OPINION...but no proof of anything anywhere in this thread, including all of my own posts...


You're right, I am more open to the idea of a higher power than I let on in this particular thread. But it made for productive conversation (at least for me, I think for others too...). And I'll never say that atheism is as pigheaded as religious fanatisism, for the simple reason that religious fanatics hurt more people with their beliefs than they help (taking old folks money on TV, discriminating badly, bombing towers, etc...)...most atheist's don't hurt anyone (except maybe themselves, if there turns out to be a god), they just don't take that 'leap of faith,' for better or worse.


And to reiterate what I REALLY wanted to get across in this thread:

Don't teach the theory of intelligent design in a science class in public school. You all know it doesn't belong there, it's NOT a scientific theory by any stretch of the term.

 

I understand exactly where you are coming from, but let me try and break it down with a few main premises and one (hopefully sound!) conclusion.

Premise 1: Atheists believe that religion is stupid because it focuses on something that cant be definitely proven

Premise 2: Atheists believe that there is no "god" in any form whatsoever.

Premise 3: There is no absolute proof that there is no such as god in any form.

Conclusion: Atheism is caught in a circular fallacious argument. While they lambast "blind beliefs", they embrace their own blindness in approaching the inconsistencies of a "godless" science.

Quick side note: my brother in law has a PhD in astrophysics from Berkeley. He said that a majority of the top minds in his field believe that there is some sort of force that cant be explained, and that many of the atheists have shifted to the middle-ground of agnosticism.

 

Nope, not at all.

 

And this is where it gets murky. What is evolution? It is a theory. That's it. Sure, whales have a bone that could have been legs at some point, and we share 90 some-odd percent of the same genetic make-up as monkeys... neither abslutely proves that macro-evolution is anything beyond a theory.

Creative design, in and of itself, has many different levels. I am more in the camp of the theory brought up by MV that God created the universe, complete with atoms and every other brilliant aspect of the universe, and left the scenery to change in a natural progression. Did he physically plant the tree in my backyard? Of course not, but he did create the conditions that make life possible.

Still, I will not personally concede my views on macro-evolution. As I said, I view it as a theory just I view my own "faith" of creation as another.

 

Y'all just cement how fervently apathetic I am. No matter what my religious preference, how does it change whether this is or isn't a god. No, I really mean it. Thanks. I used to feel a little guilty for not caring, now I realize it's what I MUST do. Unless I become a scientist or unless I become best friends with Gabriel, I'm just buring calories everytime I speculate on this issue.

Personally, I think athiests are too intellectual and make my head hurt.

vs.

I'm somewhere in between and living humbly.

Oh, and no ****, this is the tatt on my left shoulder:

 

I've heard this many times, too. The more and more scientists look into the vast complexity of humans, plants, and other organisms, evolution (creation of species from dirt and water) cannot be explained scientifically. The evolution of existing species can, on the other hand.

 

Dub, your first premise is simply not true. And your second premise is what I've been telling you is *** backwards. You can't prove something doesn't exist; but it can be very very likely that it doesn't if there is absolutly no proof that it does exist. It's not circular logic at all. And the stereotypical religious statement that 'evolution is a theory', give me a break. Gravity is a theory too. But both of these have been observed. The exact evidense you site for macro-evolution (similarities in genetic make up, 'left over' bones in some animals, etc...) don't PROVE evolution completely, but it DOES mean that evolution has infinitly more evidense for it than intelligent design does.

There is no murk, intelligent design is a religious theory (like the theory that Christ rose from the grave...) that has one account (the bible) as 'evidense'. Evolution is a scientific theory that has evidense for it that is not hearsay, it's actually observation from many many different people and places. Intelligent design being taught in science classrooms in public schools is rediculously out of place...like I said, if you like that religious theory have it taught in a religious theory class as an elective.



If you ask those astrophysisits what type of thing they believe in, I'm almost positive they'll all come back with the same general belief as you (that there could have been a creator that just started things and let them run).


We're really stuck having to agree to disagree on this though...there's no way you can convince me that intelligent design is as scientifically legitimate as evolution (because based on the very nature of science it is not a legitamate theory); and there's no way I can convince you to lose faith in what you believe.

 

...you see different science than I do then. 90% of my courses were bio related, and all of my profs (even the religious ones) have taught that it is VERY VERY possible that the molecules of life can be synthesized in an environment very similar to what the earth was like at the approximate time life arose. If you learn some organic chem and some biochem, you'll see that our basic building blocks are far simpler than you think.

And by the way, evolution is NOT the creation of life from nothing. Evolution is the change over time of life forms. Two very different and distinct things you're lumping together there.

 

The start of this thread was about Intelligent Design being taught in school (at least that is the controversy at the heart of it). It has evolved into something else altogether. Currently the thread will go 'round and 'round forever because the theists will keep saying 'you can't prove there is not a god so there is a god' and the atheists will keep saying 'you can't prove there is a god so there is no god'. The ID question on the other hand can actually be addressed. This is a debate about science classes. ID does not use the scientific method to find and test verifiable scientific facts. It is not science therefore does not belong in a science class. Arguing whether there is a god with a theist is like arguing with the 'I know you are but what am I' argument of a fourth-grader, it is unwinnable.

With regards to the SFGate article in the first post; anyone who believes in ID has a right to be irked, I read it and it does slam it rather than objectively report it. I slam it to but I am not a reporter and it is bad journalism to call one side of a controversy 'idiots'. Of course it is SFGate not the NYTimes.

 

By the way MVWRX, your comment on gravity reminded me of an Onion story on the Theory of Intelligent Falling being taught alongside the Theory of Gravity. I thought it was a hoot. http://www.theonion.com/content/node/39512

 

Iconoclast,

Not sure what your real handle is (!) but welcome to the politics forum.

 

Yeah, I saw that too...sort of where I was going with all that...


And thanks for clarifying the point I had set out to make, ID doesn't belong in science class.

 

You have brought up some extremely valid points in this discussion, but I cry bullsh!t on this one.

Scientists have been trying to emulate the pre-mosaic (or whatever time period that is called) period of Earth, and have done so with virtually no success. Those that had partial success had either skewed their findings or did something that couldnt have possibly happened back then, essentially rendering their findings useless.

Any professor telling you otherwise would be grilled by the sharper minds in their respective fields.

 

Not total BS, but it is the least validated point I've brought up in terms of scientific evidense. Theoretically though, it's pretty sound.

To be honest, Helladumb did a good job of throwing me off course with the whole 'beginning of life' thing because that has little if anything to do with evolution.

 

The why do we teach evolution in schools? In the case of macro-evolution, facts are lined up to create an artificial conclusion. Under the truest rigors of the scientific method, evolution does not stand up.

From the web:

The scientific method has four steps

1. Observation and description of a phenomenon or group of phenomena.

2. Formulation of an hypothesis to explain the phenomena. In physics, the hypothesis often takes the form of a causal mechanism or a mathematical relation.

3. Use of the hypothesis to predict the existence of other phenomena, or to predict quantitatively the results of new observations.

4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments.



There is not irrefutable evidence for the theory of evolution. If there were, it would not be called a theory. And according to the fourth aspect of the scientific method, experimental tests are necessary in the creation (for lack of a better word) of "sound science".