creationism/intelligent design vs. evolution

[Andarvi]

so im watching that show 30 days on FX with morgan spurlock and this weeks episode is dealing with an atheist living a month with some holy rollers. in one of their bible studies they bring up the discussion of creationism/intelligent design vs. evolution, one that ive heard a million times, but still baffles me how people can be so RETARDED in today's day and age.

how the fuck can you argue that evolution is a false "theory?" what is wrong with people. this one guy actually had the audacity to state that humans and dinosaurs LIVED TOGETHER 60 million years ago and that there is still "no proof" that man evolved from primate.

amazing.

[JoOeetheplatypuS]

When people let their faith dictate their science you get the crazy chimera known as Intelligent Design.

[Melisande]

http://www.inkycircus.com/photos/unc...ized/fsm_1.jpg

[Lordwafik]

The big reason that there's a big hoo haa over evolution, is it's still a theory. Often referred to as evolution theory.

True, there's evidence to support this theory, lots of evidence, but untill a creature evolves within our lifetime (and if people dont press B), you most likely wont win the people who are against the theory over.

Also just curious, are you in the lines of thought that Natural selection and Adaptation are evolution?

[JoOeetheplatypuS]

Gravity is a theory too.

[Lockecole]

They both take a phenomenal amount of faith to believe both are true. I really don't see the difference. You either believe one or the other, but to say there's a surmounting amount of facts supporting either, is just being biased to the side you chose to have more faith in.

[JoOeetheplatypuS]

They both take a phenomenal amount of faith to believe both are true. I really don't see the difference. You either believe one or the other, but to say there's a surmounting amount of facts supporting either, is just being biased to the side you chose to have more faith in.

No. One was created through observation of the natural world, inferences about based on historical records, and scientific thought. I can think through evolution and make very few assumptions. One was created by trying to fit previously held beliefs without an observational basis into a scientific world instead of thinking from the ground up.

[Andarvi]

The big reason that there's a big hoo haa over evolution, is it's still a theory. Often referred to as evolution theory.

True, there's evidence to support this theory, lots of evidence, but untill a creature evolves within our lifetime (and if people dont press B), you most likely wont win the people who are against the theory over.

Also just curious, are you in the lines of thought that Natural selection and Adaptation are evolution?

im pre-med at an ivy league university and have taken several bio classes, i know the difference between natural selection, adaptation, and evolution.

also, there are several animals in the natural world that have recently evolved that we can observe. whether they have done so fully within the few hundred years of humans even dreaming what evolution may be is up for question (tho i wouldnt doubt it), however there are many instances where animals living in close proximity exude almost identical physical characterstics. in this situation, diverged by allopatric speciation.

[Gafgarionn]

You just haven't come across an intelligent design argument that's actually intelligent (funny how that works). While I don't neccessarily agree with intelligent design, they actually have valid scientific evidence; none of the real arguments are rooted in faith. Read Darwin's Black Box by Michael Behe. There are also a few debates out there you can download between Behe and various evolution proponents. Interesting stuff

Edited so science nerds don't jump on me for using the wrong terminology

[Melisande]

Well honestly if you want evidence of evolution look at bacteria. With the discovery of penicilin we were able to finnally cure/prevent alot of diseases, but now there are new strains which are resistant to the drugs we use. It's the reason why you usually have to take mutltiple antibiotics when dealing with anything serious, and why you have to be constant with treatment and cant allow the bacteria to grow resistant, meaning the ones who survived bred and passed on their resistance to their offspring, ie natural selection. Sure it isn't the transformation of Velociraptor into Archaeopteryx but it is evidence that these processes exist and overtime will lead to new variations.


And are you kidding, the entire premise of Intelligent Design is rooted in blind faith. For "Intelligent" Design to work there has to be an intelligent designer, ie the Christian God.

[BRP]

I fail to see how people can't compremise and just say God, with his almighty knowledge, could easily create the the complex system that is evolution, and Adam and Eve are just stories with morals that God wants to communicate to people.

I won't ever deny the possibility of a Intelligent Designers, secretly I hope there is one, but the Bible simply isn't 100% true no matter how much you are completely in the belief.

[Gafgarionn]

Oh, and it's also important to note the difference between macro and micro evolution. Micro, of course, is evolution on a small scale. It's easy to observe microevolution taking place within a species. Macroevolution, on the other hand, is supposed to account for the creation of a new species. Intelligent designists don't think it can, though.

[Andarvi]

well personally i dont believe in a god with "almighty knowledge" and all that, but thats another story. either way, while a compromise would be lovely, there never will be one, considering evolution challenges the very foundation religion sits on.

[JoOeetheplatypuS]

well personally i dont believe in a god with "almighty knowledge" and all that, but thats another story. either way, while a compromise would be lovely, there never will be one, considering evolution challenges the very foundation religion sits on.

...this isnt merely political. We're looking for the true mechanism for species creation here.

[Gafgarionn]

Well honestly if you want evidence of evolution look at bacteria. With the discovery of penicilin we were able to finnally cure/prevent alot of diseases, but now there are new strains which are resistant to the drugs we use. It's the reason why you usually have to take mutltiple antibiotics when dealing with anything serious, and why you have to be constant with treatment and cant allow the bacteria to grow resistant, meaning the ones who survived bred and passed on their resistance to their offspring, ie natural selection. Sure it isn't the transformation of Velociraptor into Archaeopteryx but it is evidence that these processes exist and overtime will lead to new variations.


And are you kidding, the entire premise of Intelligent Design is rooted in blind faith. For "Intelligent" Design to work there has to be an intelligent designer, ie the Christian God.

That's why I disagree with intelligent design for the most part. Most of their arguments rest in trying to explain why macroevolution isn't credible.

As for the penicillin thing, that's just a very elementary example of microevolution at work. Natural selection is a process that does exist, but due to a little something called irreducible complexity it makes macroevolution very unlikely. Very unlikely meaning.... impossible.

Oh, and don't take my posts to mean I believe in intelligent design or anything. I just think most people are uninformed and don't realize that intelligent design is a topic worthy of scientific debate. As a result, most people tend to associate faithful or religious people as illogical and unintelligent. Not always true.

Oh, and why is my font so goddamn big?

[Bwelch]

Creationism and evolution just seems to linear to me. Consciousness and reality seems more the right path to take. Perhaps were still missing the larger scope of what, who we are and where are we.

[Andarvi]

irreducible complexity has many holes in it. in humans alone there are many genetic defects that do not inhibit the regions of the body that are abnormal.

[Melisande]

The reason people associate faithful people with being illogical and unitelligent is because faith is entirely unrational. Faith is believing something without any credible evidence backing it up. Just because you want something to be true doesn't mean it is.

And the irreducible complexity has many holes in it as the poster above me just said. How do you explain vestigal structures or the random curve balls nature seems to throw in the genetic mix?

[Andarvi]

Creationism and evolution just seems to linear to me. Consciousness and reality seems more the right path to take and perhaps were still missing the larger scope of what, who we are and where are we.

the human mind in its current state cannot comprehend the universe and everything in it. for example, people that argue to me that there is no other life PERIOD in the universe. i tell them that in our galaxy alone there are 100,000,000,000 (one hundred billion) stars. there are believed to 10,000,000,000 (ten billion) galaxies in our ever expanding universe. suppose that each of those stars had but one planet orbiting them (some will have more, some less). thats an incredible amount of possible environments where some type of life exists (to me, does exist, and is surely more intelligent than us). i understand the conditions that existed that allowed life to arise on our planet are very unique, but still.

anyways, back on track, i donno what the heck you mean by reality being a path for anything. vague much?

[Remembrance]

They both take a phenomenal amount of faith to believe both are true. I really don't see the difference. You either believe one or the other, but to say there's a surmounting amount of facts supporting either, is just being biased to the side you chose to have more faith in.

Pretty much~

Now im no 'holy roller' or anything, but I'd like to believe that the world we live in today was spun with abit more conscious intent. Everything works just a little bit too nicely together for me to believe otherwise.

On one hand, you have a divine whatever, that spun this shithole we call the universe together. The concept of infinity is hard to grasp, along with an omnipotent being, so I can agree, this is hard to believe. This gives you a start, as to where things began, albiet unfounded by science.

On the other hand, you have something visible to us. We can experience adaptation and natural selection with our own eyes, right now. However it certainly does leave the question of where did the conditions allowing for the expansion of the universe come from? Something had to have created the conditions.

Either path requires immense ammounts of faith, and the beginning of both theories are 100% unbased in science. Both events were totally unobservable, so you cannot base either in science.

Personally (maybe nobody cares) I favor a clockwork theory. Whatever divine being kind of wound everything up, to let it play out on its own. I do not believe at all in divine intervention in this day and age, or 'miracles' and what have you.

Anyways, flame on heh