In U.S., 46% Hold Creationist View of Human Origins

[Lost Wanderer]

Originally Posted by edwest2

God does not need science and God does not need to observe the laws of physics.

Of course He doesn't but that won't stop the grand majority of angry nerds who'll probably just hate God for not granting their fantasy wishes.

You're making yourself into a strawman for the atheists to chew on.

[Lost Wanderer]

Originally Posted by exnihilo

Real life is not the banalities of everyday living. Real life is your mind with its awesome powers to imagine. Real life is knowing the Eternal God. God has His reasons for making the world as He did. The best thing to do is simply accept that.

No. Real life is what the laws of physics say it is. If they say what comes up must come down, incanting Wingardium Leviosa isn't going to change that.

And please, the "God has His reasons" excuse? Spare me. I've seen more people become anti-theists because of that. I'm sure many of the ones lurking here are already loading up your quote as a means to evangelize the gamers.

Basically you're saying God wanted to torment people with this banal reality by removing all that was mystical from the world at some point in history.

Yeah. Brilliant. Might make a fine novel if it didn't make our Faith look more ridiculous and logically inconsistent for own apologists to handle.

Originally Posted by exnihilo

I dont think Aristotle or Pythagoras wrote about those things but I have to admit I'm not familiar with either man's entire body of work. Based on your objection modern science is just as worthless because some people in our culture also write fictional books. Just because a culture has fantasy, myth or just plain wacky elements does not mean some people in that culture are not very scientific in the modern sense.

Whoa, whoa, WHOA! Slow down there! Are you serious? There's a HUGE difference between modern storytellers and those in ancient times. Ancient storytellers actually believed in their tales.

We don't. J.K. Rowling certainly didn't believe Hogwarts was real.

[grannymh]

Originally Posted by Lost Wanderer

It's not because God is incapable. Quite the opposite. It's the way WE will interpret such miracles. And frankly, the literal take on the OT doesn't paint a theologically flattering picture of Him. He's essentially no different from all the other "Appease me and I shall do this and that" type of deity. Like I said, it reduces Him into just another participant in the Ancient War of the Gods.

Christ barely, if ever, exhibited this type of behavior.

I do not mean to be disrespectful, but Catholics need to study the first three chapters of Genesis and then check the Catholic doctrines on the relationship between God and the real person Adam. Actually, I prefer learning Catholic doctrines first. That makes reading the first three chapters, not all 50 chapters of Genesis, a piece of cake.

Speaking of the Ancient War between the god of Evil and the god of Good, that was put to rest at the get-go.

Speaking of the 46% --
I believe in one God Who is Creator of all as in Genesis 1:1. But I do not consider myself a Creationist.

And the poll takers did not call me for my position.

[grannymh]

Originally Posted by Lost Wanderer

No. Real life is what the laws of physics say it is. If they say what comes up must come down, incanting Wingardium Leviosa isn't going to change that.

Whoa, whoa, WHOA! Slow down there! Are you serious?

My physics course dates to the 1950's. And I am not in the mood to update it. Currently, I find biology way more useful especially the study of the 21st century evolution model pertaining to decomposing anatomies.

[Lost Wanderer]

Originally Posted by grannymh

I do not mean to be disrespectful, but Catholics need to study the first three chapters of Genesis and then check the Catholic doctrines on the relationship between God and the real person Adam. Actually, I prefer learning Catholic doctrines first. That makes reading the first three chapters, not all 50 chapters of Genesis, a piece of cake.

I'm not here to debate about the existence of the first human being. That doesn't exactly deny evolution as it's popularly understood. Adam's existence isn't so much as fantastically impossible compared to a true-blue, literal interpretation of all Genesis.

I've read those chapters ever since I was kid. I've also read many other creation accounts of other popular mythologies from Greece to China. I'm not dismissing Adam if we're talking about the first human. My focus is on the ridiculous assertions that somewhere, in the distance past, our world resembled something that you could set a DnD campaign in.

Originally Posted by grannymh

Speaking of the Ancient War between the god of Evil and the god of Good, that was put to rest at the get-go.

I don't know if you really understood what I was talking about. Even within their own ancient religion, it's not unusual for pagan gods and their worshipers to have rivalries. Greek mythology is one good example. Egyptian mythology too (look at what happened to Set).

The fact is, anyone who reads most of the Pentateuch depicts God in a sadly similar fashion. He is pitted against both Greek and Egyptian gods and shown to be triumphant. This is in direct contrast to Christ, who'd sooner drive away money changers out of his own religion's temple than use his powers against a Roman one.

[gcharles]

Please describe whether you're talking about speciation evolution or adaptive evolution.

[Lost Wanderer]

Originally Posted by grannymh

Whoa, whoa, WHOA! Slow down there! Are you serious?

My physics course dates to the 1950's. And I am not in the mood to update it. Currently, I find biology way more useful especially the study of the 21st century evolution model pertaining to decomposing anatomies.

Well, I don't know what you're trying to argue (if you're even trying to argue) but I don't really care which subject is more fascinating.

If anything, hearing scientific explanations about why my fantasies are never gonna happen just provokes me to further my disdain for the entire discipline. (Yet ironically, here I am doing what a lot of people would deem as defending it.)

[vz71]

Originally Posted by Farsight001

It's not hard to explain how a different species came about. Let me rephrase. There is a line, it's just vague and blurry. Obviously, a cow and a lizard are different species. A wolf and a dog are different species.

Wolves and dogs are able to be mated.

Originally Posted by Farsight001

But the more similar two creatures get, such as a golden retriever and a Labrador retriever, the more difficult it is to see the line because evolution flows like a river. It's not a set of stairs. The point I was trying to make is that it flows, which is why a wolf does not pop out a dauchsund. Over thousands of years and thousands of generations, tiny changes add up and eventually you see the difference. For short lives species such as bacterias, it could take a matter of months instead of thousands of years. (it depends on an organism's age of reproductive maturity)

I see.
With a definition so fluid, I guess it would be impossible to prove false.
Especially if one decides that they will adhere to it no matter what they have to say anything really means.

But then again, with a definition so fluid, the theory becomes meaningless.

[vz71]

Originally Posted by Farsight001

All I can say is that you very very clearly do not understand the quotes you are citing.

I only have the words to go by.
Perhaps you have something else?

[vz71]

Originally Posted by vz71

Really?
Please send links to this research.

Originally Posted by Farsight001

I don't know why you would need links. It's been in the news for decades. I'll look for links in the next few days. I've got homework and unpacking that takes priority. If someone else doesn't provide (though I think someone will), keep on me about it because I randomly lose interest in a topic at times.

Your inability to back what you claim is noted.

[vz71]

Originally Posted by Farsight001

Once again, you should really do at the very least a google search for this evidence before you blindly and ignorantly claim there is none. The library near me literally has a room full of papers from studies and experiments about this.

You really shouldn't be calling people out for lack of backing when you are guilty of the same...

Remember this?

I don't know why you would need links. It's been in the news for decades. I'll look for links in the next few days. I've got homework and unpacking that takes priority. If someone else doesn't provide (though I think someone will), keep on me about it because I randomly lose interest in a topic at times.

[St Francis]

Originally Posted by Farsight001

Once again, you should really do at the very least a google search for this evidence before you blindly and ignorantly claim there is none. The library near me literally has a room full of papers from studies and experiments about this.

If you are going to assert something, you need to provide the links.

No one said we need millions of years. We need thousands of generations. You ask these rhetorical questions assuming there is no answer for them, when there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for each of them. Yes, once a change occurs, it tends to get passed on. If the possessor of the change dies before it reproduces, then it does not pass on its trait, obviously. But if the new trait increases survivability or capacity to reproduce, then it has an increased chance to be passed on. Sometimes it doesn't get passed on, but more often it does, and that's all that's needed.

But "dog" is not a species, so this is completely irrelevant and expresses nothing more than a complete and utter ignorance as to what evolution actually is.

Grey wolf would be the species, of which dog is (two) subspecies, afaict. Which makes sense, because dogs and wolves can interbreed and produce offspring which is also capable of reproduction.

Altho there have undoubtedly been thousands of generations of dogs, they are still able to mate with wolves and produce viable offspring: they are still the same species. No macro-evolution has occurred; we started with one species, and we still have only one species.

An interesting sentiment considering, first, that the Church is not authoritative on matters of science, but rather only faith and morals, and two, the church pretty much says that scientists know what they're talking about, so, in reality, your refusal to trust scientists is, by extension, a refusal to to trust what the Church has to say.

The Church says to trust scientists prudently--the Church does not say to trust scientists blindly. So, if we see problems with what scientists are telling us, we have every right not to trust them. Even the Church has not come out and said, Yep, the scientists are right about evolution, believe them. The Church only says that it seems like a viable area of study, unlike things like abc or IVF.

[lynnvinc]

Originally Posted by Lost Wanderer

I more or less agree (even though I'm probably less appreciative of the actual structure of our universe than you ).

I read the creation account and see a style of storytelling that's not much different from those of the ancient Norse, Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, Japanese, Indians or any other mythological culture.

Still to say that God went from that and then suddenly gave us the world that's the less funny version of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. is indeed a mockery of His glory and power.

From my perspective, I have to doubt that our world was ever as awesome as it is in mythological accounts (Biblical or otherwise). People who insist that it are actually saying that God has a lot to answer for every poor nerd whose daydreams are often dashed by the scientific principles that govern our reality.

Actually from a strictly scientific, materialist view point, you are correct. It is very sad to think that even if we mitigate climate change at this point (which is a gigantic IF), then within a billion years the sun will become so hot on its way to self destruction that it will cause runaway warming and total death to all life on earth. It is also very sad to think the universe is expanding and winding down thru entropy, and that long after life on earth dies, even the atoms will disintegrate and break down -- death and dissolution.

Which is why I'm so glad I'm a firm believer in God, Heaven, and the spiritual dimension, which is (at least) analytically separate from the material universe. We don't know much about it, only what Jesus and the prophets have told, and maybe from our own mystical glimpses. But I believe the man who calmed the sea, walked on water, raised the dead, and came back to be with us after his own death (and the simple, sincere peasants who related these stories) even more than I believe the scientists.

I'm thinking Heaven is the opposite of this dying universe. But with St. Therese, who loved God so much that she couldn't stand the idea of disappointing Him, I would pretend to be extraordinarily awed and thrilled when I get to Heaven, even if it isn't quite as grand as I think.

[lynnvinc]

Originally Posted by Nec5

If you're telling your students that, please stop teaching. We have enough people being brainwashed by progressives in education at all levels. Your original approach was at least open minded directing students to think for themselves.

And your assertion that you only turn to experts on any matter is laughable at best. One of the hallmarks of progressive thought is the so called tyranny of the experts in which normal thinking adults cannot make decisions without complete reliance on "authorities". Experts are to be used, but it is foolish to rely exclusively on them, for they are just as flawed as the rest of us.

Rejecting evolution a sin?

Rejecting evolution may well be a sin, if it is correct and the creation stories false. However, there is always a possibility that science is wrong. It is a self-correcting, advancing endeavor, and some things scientists were telling us decades ago have now been replaced with better theories.

I'm glad that the Catholic Church accepts evolution. I perhaps would not have converted if it did not. I cannot live in lies.

Now if science were ever to find out that evolution is totally untrue and in fact God did a presto-chango thing turning dirt suddenly into man, and making woman out of Adam's rib, then I'd have to go along with that. I do believe in miracles -- in fact I believe all is miracle; some miracles have scientific explanations, and some do not....yet.

I do not blindly accept all science. I check some of it out at bit, some very thoroughly, but most I just accept what the experts say -- there is just not enough time to check out everything, every pill the doc prescribes, etc. and get a Ph.D. in every field.

I am well aware that some science is corrupt, like when scientists at the Formaldehyde Institute did false science to show that formaldehyde is not harmful to the health -- they ended up in prison for that.

It's good to check out everything, try everything, as St. Paul says.

[buffalo]

Originally Posted by lynnvinc

Rejecting evolution may well be a sin, if it is correct and the creation stories false. However, there is always a possibility that science is wrong. It is a self-correcting, advancing endeavor, and some things scientists were telling us decades ago have now been replaced with better theories.

I'm glad that the Catholic Church accepts evolution. I perhaps would not have converted if it did not. I cannot live in lies.

Now if science were ever to find out that evolution is totally untrue and in fact God did a presto-chango thing turning dirt suddenly into man, and making woman out of Adam's rib, then I'd have to go along with that. I do believe in miracles -- in fact I believe all is miracle; some miracles have scientific explanations, and some do not....yet.

I do not blindly accept all science. I check some of it out at bit, some very thoroughly, but most I just accept what the experts say -- there is just not enough time to check out everything, every pill the doc prescribes, etc. and get a Ph.D. in every field.

I am well aware that some science is corrupt, like when scientists at the Formaldehyde Institute did false science to show that formaldehyde is not harmful to the health -- they ended up in prison for that.

It's good to check out everything, try everything, as St. Paul says.

Peruse this site, in particular the supporting resources page. Your eyes will be opened.