Biologist Kenneth Miller states that "Intelligent Design is winning"

[PennitentMan]

The art of deception has been used in warfare since ancient times. The deceiver, in this case, is a real being. Jesus talks about him. But then science enters the picture and it says, we have evidence, you can't argue against evidence.

Catholics have evidence. Evidence that cannot be argued against either. It can be disbelieved but not effectively argued against.

I could ask you to produce said evidence. If that evidence is based on faith and beliefs, then the word “evidence” is used incorrectly.

Intelligent design (the non-political concept) makes sense. As Michael Behe wrote: Getting design without a designer is a neat trick. I agree. Pope Benedict rejects the idea that we are just random mistakes. I would add that we are called slightly more complicated snowflakes by biologists. We're just ambulatory bags of chemicals that assembled themselves. We are controlled by our genes who decide what we do, with the occasional input by ourselves.

In the end, God is the victor. In the meantime, we have to guard ourselves against science so called which is partly blind and seeks to integrate itself into the current materialist-reductionist worldview so that all human beings can be happy campers regardless of what are referred to as 'mythical' beliefs. That is what the Church objects to: not science, but mechanistic explanations for man that cannot completely answer the question of his true origin.

Science says that we don’t know yet. It doesn’t state that man cannot know. New things are being discovered but of course, it needs to be subjected to trials, experiments, debunking efforts by peers, etc.
See, science seals in proven evidence and fact, but it also big enough to admit that some things we do not know yet. Not to say that we won’t find out at some point. Religion is when people claim to know something that they can’t possibly know. That’s the difference.
I can understand how the church would object to that and why religion and science can never truly co-exist…science will always require proof and evidence and that’s something that religion does not have…they deal in faith and science can’t accept that.

The argument stating that “ID is true because it makes sense” is not really able to stand up in a scientific milieu, is it?

[AnotherFriend33]

Originally Posted by PureGrace

This is a lie.

We have ample evidence for evolution. If God made it look like evolution had occurred when it really hadn't, you would be required to concede that God is a deceiver or a trickster. I don't think you think God is deceitful, now, do you?

http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=328876

Originally Posted by AnotherFriend33

On the Book of Genesis, we find the Original Sin. There were two trees there, one of them was the Tree of the Knowledge/Science of Good and Evil. That was a long time ago, wasn't it?

If my car breaks down, I may find car mechanics a beneficial science. Same thing I would say when I open the fridge or bake a pizza. But, that is today.

Today we seem not to be able to survive in the wild, today we depend more and more on science day by day. You call the ones you love on their mobiles, and those who live far send you their digital pictures and videos over the Internet.

Who would dare to stand against science when we all depend on it so much?

And yet, this is the same science that dropped the atomic bomb over a Catholic community in Nagasaki. This is the same science that practice abortions all over the world, the same science that brings "Good" brings "Evil" too.

God teaches about Wisdom, not about science. They are two different things.

When a son asks a bread from his father, would his father give him a stone instead?

Obviously, Adam and Eve thought they would be given wisdom, but they were cheated by the snake. They received science instead.

Take a look at our recent modern history, now that science has developed so fast, and you will see how hard is the bread we try to chew.

Take a look at the dark ages, where science was restricted, and you will find a justification for the inquisition. They tried to stop what we are living now.

Science today claims everything started with a big explosion, therefore chaos.
Science today also claims that intelligent life is the result of an evolution, therefore order.
This is "Order ab Chaos", Order out of Chaos, a philosophy better known as masonry.
This is not coming from God, open your eyes, there is no need to try to reconcile science with the words of God because what you know as science is "a hard stone to chew", you are being cheated again.

[reggieM]

Originally Posted by iKnighty

Care to mention any of these 'random' factors?

Sure. The randomness of environmental factors like temperature, rainfall, volcanic activity, wind, erosion and many other aspects that affect natural selection. Random mutations and random environmental conditions give us a process that is essentially random.

It doesn't matter if some environmental factors may be random, natural selection isn't. I can still can claim that Evolution, as a whole, is not random. Only mutations, the spread of which is controlled, are random.

As I pointed out, the conditions that cause selection are random also. If the environment, for example, does not change (and that is not predictable), then natural selection is limited by that random factor.

There is no such thing. I was merely pointing out Miller's beliefs, not that of the whole scientific community.

I was looking also for a definition of theistic evolution. How do you define it?

In what way does Evolution replace the need for a religion? I'm not seeing anyone use Evolution in that way.

I think we can see this very strikingly in the case of Richard Dawkins and several of the prominent atheistic-evolutionists who argue against the existence of God by "proofs" of evolutionary theory. The idea is that mankind is not subject to God's laws but only to evolutionary processes (since we are the product of blind, unintelligent forces of mutation and natural selection).

Evolution is really one of the most popular substitutes for God that there is today in our culture.

[reggieM]

Originally Posted by PureGrace

We have ample evidence for evolution. If God made it look like evolution had occurred when it really hadn't, you would be required to concede that God is a deceiver or a trickster. I don't think you think God is deceitful, now, do you?

If God made it look like nature was designed by his intelligence for a purpose, but it really was created by blind, unintelligent natural forces -- then God would look like a deceiver or a trickster.

According to evolutionist, Richard Dawkins, nature gives the overwhelming appearance of having been designed for a purpose. Why did God make it seem that way?

[reggieM]

Originally Posted by AnotherFriend33

If my car breaks down, I may find car mechanics a beneficial science. Same thing I would say when I open the fridge or bake a pizza. But, that is today.

Science is a tool that can be used for good or evil. There are many who use science for evil today -- to try to justify atheism or to do sinful deeds to others.

And yet, this is the same science that dropped the atomic bomb over a Catholic community in Nagasaki. This is the same science that practice abortions all over the world, the same science that brings "Good" brings "Evil" too.

Very good points.

Take a look at the dark ages, where science was restricted, and you will find a justification for the inquisition. They tried to stop what we are living now.

Interesting. You're probably right about that. They saw the worship of reason taking away from the glory of God and tried to stop it with the methods they knew at the time.

Science today claims everything started with a big explosion, therefore chaos.
Science today also claims that intelligent life is the result of an evolution, therefore order.
This is "Order ab Chaos", Order out of Chaos, a philosophy better known as masonry.

It's the revolutionary spirit of Marxism also, in many ways.

This is not coming from God, open your eyes, there is no need to try to reconcile science with the words of God because what you know as science is "a hard stone to chew", you are being cheated again.

There is no sense in trying to reconcile materialistic-nihilism, atheism and existentialism with God. Some try to reconcile Darwinism but it's built on a false philosophical structure.

[iKnighty]

Originally Posted by reggieM

Sure. The randomness of environmental factors like temperature, rainfall, volcanic activity, wind, erosion and many other aspects that affect natural selection. Random mutations and random environmental conditions give us a process that is essentially random.

But Natural Selection itself operates on the fact that the most suitable animal to live in a certain environment will live and thrive in that environment. That may depend on chance but it always gives out the same result, the most able to live in that certain environment will thrive in it.
I'm sorry but in what way do you mean 'random'? Because I think I'm using in a different way...

Originally Posted by reggieM

I was looking also for a definition of theistic evolution. How do you define it?

I define it as Evolution that in someway was influenced or instigated by a deity.

[reggieM]

Originally Posted by iKnighty

But Natural Selection itself operates on the fact that the most suitable animal to live in a certain environment will live and thrive in that environment. That may depend on chance but it always gives out the same result, the most able to live in that certain environment will thrive in it.

Natural selection is limited and modified by chance events. This is the problem we were talking about at the beginning. Evolutionists claim that the diversity in nature and the complexity of organisms and all of the variety and beauty and purpose in nature was caused by chance. Natural selection is an unintelligent process. It does not think ahead about what to create. If the environment randomly causes events, then natural selection will either act on an organism or not act, or it could go quickly or slowly. In the end, it's a random, accidental process. There is no purpose behind it. God is not guiding or directing it, but all the success it has and every thing that is created comes from mutations and then the natural selection of the fittest. Some scientists now see this as impossible and false.

I define it as Evolution that in someway was influenced or instigated by a deity.

If this is the case, then I would think that Mr. Miller would provide some scientific explanation for what the influence is and how the influence shaped nature.

[iKnighty]

Originally Posted by reggieM

Natural selection is limited and modified by chance events. This is the problem we were talking about at the beginning. Evolutionists claim that the diversity in nature and the complexity of organisms and all of the variety and beauty and purpose in nature was caused by chance. Natural selection is an unintelligent process. It does not think ahead about what to create. If the environment randomly causes events, then natural selection will either act on an organism or not act, or it could go quickly or slowly. In the end, it's a random, accidental process. There is no purpose behind it. God is not guiding or directing it, but all the success it has and every thing that is created comes from mutations and then the natural selection of the fittest. Some scientists now see this as impossible and false.

Beauty is subjective.
Isn't it wonderful that a natural process could accidentally bring about something as complex as us? Nature is beautiful.
Hmm, maybe it is random, but I'll try to think more on the matter. Thanks for all that .