Ideas for questions

[Charla]

Society causes major changes in any given individual's environment far faster than any significant genetic changes can react. Therefore, the effects of society on the genome represent a very powerful and very chaotic influence, which over time completely overpowers any reliable, long-term influences such as those that would normally constitute natural selection.

Other species have no society, and as such are still subject to long-term genetic selection, notwithstanding human interference. As such, other species will continue to evolve as long as people stay out of the way long enough.

[Fuuko]

"Entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity" otherwise known as "Occam's razor".

But so many things in the world we live in are being multiplied beyond necessity that, while saying they should not be is very true, it doesn't matter if they should or should not, they will anyways.

The gist of Occam's razor is that the simplest explanation is generally the truth.

Occam's Razor does not really work to favor a side because when you take out all of the theological themes and take out the theories of the actual mechanism of evolution both ideas are equally simple.

The theological theory makes two basic assumptions. 1. The method was a programed result. 2. Something had to create the program.

The atheist theory also makes two basic assumptions. 1. The method was random chance. 2. Nothing exists that could have, or did, interfered with the random events.

Both theories are equally logical, so you can't not say one is a "better" theory than the other.

[Khamsin]

Well, random events seems simpler than creating an elaborate program and planning for everything to turn out a certain way, no matter how you look at it.

If I flip a coin, will it land on heads because that's just how it turned out with all the various influences on it as it hurtled through the air, or is it because I calculated beforehand the exact velocity and angle I needed to fling it at, with the right amount of pressure just off-center to generate the appropriate initial angular velocity and acceleration and taking into consideration the air pressure and wind vectors so that this perfectly weighted and balanced coin I engineered will land on heads?

Now, I don't necessarily agree with either of the two possibilities you mentioned, because I don't believe its entirely random. I think, rather, everything stopped being random the moment self-awareness entered the picture.

Think about how your day goes. Is everything you do random chance? Am I randomly at work, randomly typing letters on this computer someone randomly invented by accident and randomly replying to this topic in one grand coincidence? No. I'm aware of myself and my surroundings, and I do things with a purpose. Same goes for anything else in the world, even plants whose roots and stems grow a particular way to gain access to the most resources (water, sunlight, etc).

It is far fetched to believe everything just fell into place in a perfect way all by coincidence. It is not far fetched to believe all the organisms that respond to the environment worked their way to where they are today with purpose and direction. Not the direction of one being that carefully planned everything to unfold in this exact fashion right from the start, but rather the direction of each individual organism responsible for its own survival. Of course, that doesn't necessarily discount said being from not planning anything from the start, and just letting things unfold as they may. But that's neither here nor there.

[Charla]

I think I can safely say that this has become a more intelligent and reasonable debate than the one the OP was planning on going to.

[Mysterio]

The idiots are just a side-effect for the overall fall of human society.

I blame Rap music.