Why can’t Creationists teach an alternative? Are the ‘free thinkers’ - atheists scared of som

Creationism isnt a theory, its a answer and the answer is simply "magic happened".

Science is about understanding what happened...to remove the phrase "then magic happens" and have a point by point understanding....if your saying the answer is the magic then explain in detail how the magic works, replicate the results, or at least come up with a functional theory on how the magic works.

Science isnt about destroying God, its about breaking down God into understanding how he/she/it works..

God...some sort of conscious quantum entanglement, may have a overall predetermined path as a whole, and this may be God, but until we dismiss the whole its magic so dont bother trying to understand philosophy, then the debate will rage on between the two.


How did the wheat grow? either through functioning gardening principles dictated in several books or God magicked them...which answer is more informative and which one is a shortcut to thinking?


Incidently, the people you point out were brilliant, sure...but brilliance does not mean they were also privvy to divine information. it simply means they were able to think quicker than the norm and crossreference things in more creative and unique ways to create new formulas and structures...a genius is anyone else but in mental overdrive (yep, a genius is not some alien species...they think about porn and beer as much as the next chap..they just think about it faster.)

Originally posted by OldThinker

Originally posted by m4ng4n
Still the question arise...

WHO is god? ...

m4ng4n, Sweet 4 wheeler!!!!

Not too concerned with WHO God is in the thread friend...

But more on the freedom of thought...and intellectual integrity....

What are the skeptics afraid of, that's the real question?

OT

The problem is it can undermine the very contract of society itself...
Reason being is both schools of "thought" lead to a cascade of other implications.
Society in general has moved from explaining process thru stories and religion
to explaining things thru verifiable, testable means. "Any" person can take a SCIENTIFIC hypothesis and prove or disprove its merits. However each individuals
relationship with god and scripture is different, so much so that the whole of these individuals beliefs, if applied to things now considered scientific would result in total
chaos. In the end who could lay claim to the truth? However once again with science
everyone has a platform...

Examples of CREATIONISM/ Religion applied to process can be seen throughout history. For example the inquisition, eventually the exact terms of proper belief were IMPOSED
upon entire populations. Next this frame work was used to suppress and cast tyranny over such population. A small deviation from such a belief was considered a threat to power of said belief system and the power that enforced such.

Applied to modern times - religious teaching if taught as fact not belief would undermine the society. Imagine if after some time thru the advancement of creationist beliefs the entire filed of science was deemed a threat??? What if in this time mankind could observe actual genesis itself and video tape a vast discrepancy with the religious version? Would such an event not endanger the viability of possible religious teachings of the future? Finally would people allow such an affront to the god they love and the world they believe in be destroyed in one fell swing?

I cannot prove gods will, but I certainly determine the existence of electricity.

But any one can claim to know gods will and not be proven or disproven

But anyone can prove that the heat in the Sahara desert can be excessive in comparison to other locations, proven by method or experience.

Religion and science are contrary in method - one requires faith and the other requires proof - one requires belief and the other requires disbelief (not in god per say but skepticism).

They are not the same when applied to the physical world.

Originally posted by chiron613
reply to post by tungus

 

Well, for starters, there's algebra. There's also astronomy - not discovered by Muslims, but certainly developed and advanced by them. Why do you think so many stars have Arabic names?

Under Islam, science flourished while Europe wallowed in the Dark Ages.

There is a book called "Why I am not a Muslim" and it talks about Islam and sciences among other things. Page 273:

"There is the persistent myth that Islam encouraged science...Orthodoxy has always been suspicious of 'knowledge for its own sake', and unfettered intellectual inquiry is deemed dangerous to the fate."

"To give Islam credit for Averroes and so many other illustrious thinkers who, passed half their life in prison, in forced hiding, in disgrace, whose books were burned and whose books wittings almost suppressed by theological authority, is as if one were to ascribe to the Inquisition the discoveries of Galileo, and the whole scientific development which it was not able to prevent."

It is true that the Arabs preserved the knowledge of the Greeks, Ancient Egyptians and Hindus but this was done in spite of Islam not because of it. It just wasn't as good as eradicating free thinkers in its time as the Christian Church was, that's all.


[edit on 18-8-2009 by tungus]

reply to post by OldThinker


OK, OT. I'm here cos you invited me to view your thread. Frankly, I'm disappointed that you yet again are appealing to your bias, appealing to the religiosity of pre-1900 scientists in an age when atheism was fairly unheard of and ignoring the real science.

So let's get started.


Stein and Expelled.

Stein is an idiot, simply put. He is an idiot because his debate, his argument is with Darwinism and Darwinian Evolution. Science has moved on from Darwinian evolution, it is completely outdated and redundant. Stein points to when Darwin conjectured that life may have begun by lightning hitting pond scum. This wasn't part of his theory! Darwin saw that species would change and sometime split - he realised that this would lead to the diversity of life on earth. On the Origin of Species was not about the origin of life itself because he had no idea but he did have an idea where *new* species could appear from.

And now we have Abiogenesis, a new science with knew theories showing promise that deal with the emergence of life. And amazingly it wasn't from lightning hitting scum and it wasn't made fully formed in the beginning either. You didn't suddenly have a whole organism that could miraculously fulfil all of MRS GREN like life does today.

Stein is completely lost and has no clue as to modern evolutionary theory.




Einstein, Newton and Darwin.

These men are all long dead. Their theories as they were when first presented - albeit brilliant at the time - are now outdated. We know more about the universe than they did back then, we have more complete theories now than they did. Their theories are the groundwork for much science we have today. The reason their theories wouldn't be accepted in science now is because they were and then they were improved.

In what way did their theories account for a framework of a 'creator'?



Science and Free Thought.

Does science not often start with a debate? No. Science starts with observations. Then there are hypotheses, followed by trialling to establish the veracity of the hypotheses, upon which incorrect hypotheses are either disregarded or modified to better explain the observations. When hypothesis is in complete accordance with the observations, a theory is established.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/671603c7ad28.jpg[/atsimg]

People like you criticise people who recognise scientific theories as close minded because they don't include God. You're wrong. We were open minded when it mattered i.e. when we were thinking up ideas to explain the observations and then we applied critical thinking afterwards to establish which ideas held the most merit as reflected in the trialling.

Open mindedness (ideas/hypotheses) -> Critical thinking (trials) -> Conclusions of reason (theories).

That is the process and that is how we got what we have now, The Theory of Evolution which has universal consensus in the scientific community.


Newton and the Bible.

To be honest, it doesn't matter what Newton's opinions are about the bible, they are irrelevant when it comes to science, especially now that they man has been dead for hundreds of years. As I've explained, quoting scientists from the distant past on their beliefs of God is pointless.

Do you remember the chat we had about the remarkable man, Johannes Kepler? A true scientist set aside faith in order to better understand the heavens. What he discovered was contradictory with the sublime models that he believed God would have made reality with. He believed God revealed himself in geometry so how distraught would Kepler have been when he discovered that the orbits weren't perfect circles but offset ellipses!

The point? I'll say this clearly. Your beliefs about god don't matter because the concept of God and the discussion of god's (non)existence is irrelevant in Science. This couldn't be any simpler because in science we deal with the physical and examinable nature and this plainly isn't what god is if god is at all.

Newton may have been a great scientist and a dedicated student of the bible but you should not forget how people of countless religions have contributed to science for millennia. When science began, it was with the paganism and polytheism of the ancient Mediterranean and ancient Egypt. Huge leaps on the field of optics were made in medieval Islamic mid-east. It wasn't until Christianity took hold in Rome that scientists became largely Christian. And now as the secular world is moving on from Christianity, many modern scientists like Hawkins, Sagan and Dawkins are atheists.

Religion is not relevant to Science

[edit on 18-8-2009 by Welfhard]

reply to post by Welfhard

I do Not Question your Understanding in what you have written!

Can you give me your answer to this please?

Is “Cognisance” Important to Science ?

I believe it is!

Any Species, including Human Primates are only"Biological Robotics", that is controlled (through having Choice only) to some degree, by "Inner" “Cognisance”.

Perhaps The Universe, is that which is being observed or experienced, but at the end of the day, it is “Cognisance” that experiences this!

Is your Hand "Aware" of You ???
Or of for that matter anything else ???

Or are You Aware of Your Hand ???

My point being is, What or Who is The YOU in us All.

ie what is the Component.... The YOU or ME

Is it the “Cognisance” ???

Perhaps One day we will know more about “Cognisance” and when this came into being, or perhaps it has been from the beginning ???

And where “Cognisance” has come From ???

[edit on 18-8-2009 by The Matrix Traveller]

reply to post by The Matrix Traveller


What your talking about is consciousness, which entails awareness, intelligence and a sense of will.

These things are just an emergent property of the mesh of countless cognitive functions that our brains perform. Our minds are no one thing in the same way that society is no one thing, it's like a sum or a net property of many things interacting amongst each other.

reply to post by Welfhard


I understand what you are saying but this only one answer in attempting to explain where and how it has come about..

But What is Consciousness What is it, not what it does or has come from.

Without Consciousness how does a universe exist, if nothing at all knows it exists ??

Any thoughts on these ???

Can a hand know it exists or an Eye or a Brain ???

Many in the Medical Community accept that Consciousness, is Not of the Brain but rather the Brain is a Decoder/Encoder between Consciousness and What is experienced...

But in being fair there are also many who do Not accept this...

But how do we study its contents ??? is it made of energy or something else.

We can study the responses in the brain, but we can't see what is allowing this within the Decoder/Encoder or Brain.

The electrical phenomena and chemical responses are only the workings of the Decoder/Encoder, and Not the Source.

[edit on 18-8-2009 by The Matrix Traveller]

reply to post by The Matrix Traveller

Without Consciousness how does a universe exist, if nothing at all knows it exists ?

A bacterium exists even when it doesn't know this. The material, the atoms that make me up will remain after I die, but right now one of their net properties is something that is aware and intelligent.

But What is Consciousness What is it, not what it does or has come from.

Those are part of what it is. What it is is property of a sum of functions. It's the same kind of thing as mob mentality and the behaviour of swarms. Is a school of sardine the net movements and forms that the group take.

The reasoning that "I think therefore I am." followed by "If I cease to think therefore everything will cease." is a bit silly.

I only have a couple things to say on this topic.

First this quote:

"Atheism is so senseless. When I look at the solar system. I see the earth at the right distance from the sun to receive the proper amounts of heat and light. This did not happen by chance."

There are trillions upon trillions of stars in the universe, anything could happen by chance. Maybe this Creator just looked for a planet that was suitable for us and placed us here. This planet didn't have to be created with us in mind. It could have sprung up like any other planet and was chosen for us.

Second, I'm no Christian, I don't consider myself to be religious but I will not rule out the idea that there is a "Creator." I don't think it would be in the Christian sense, a "jealous" God that you must worship and spend your life following. Why would a God need a bunch of lowly humans worshiping him constantly?

I'd believe in an alien race creating us and placing us here before believing we were created by the Christian God.

[edit on 18-8-2009 by griftin]

[edit on 18-8-2009 by griftin]

reply to post by Welfhard

The reasoning that "I think therefore I am." followed by "If I cease to think therefore everything will cease." is a bit silly.

Not really as it is a matter of relativity.

If your argument is correct it would apply to the dead person but to the Living it would be considered silly Yes/No ???

I do Not know of any component of my Biological Robotics that is Aware of any thing, But I do exist!

So what do we mean or Identify as I ???

The reason I ask these questions as I was declared Brain Dead in August 1973.. The period of time I was meant to be Dead was for more than 30 minutes.

But to me I was very much alive but Not in the Human sense...

I had No thought...

I did not know of the Earth or Universe Directly nor was I aware of Family or friends in this experience.

During this time I saw No human form but existed or was aware of a completely different existence.

When I returned to the experience of the Universe I walked back into the examination room, and the Doctor and others thought they saw a ghost.

After they settled down I was re examined and was found to have blood pressure and of course No pulse.

It was some minutes after the main examination that My heart started to pulse again and blood pressure slowly returned.

There were quite a number of people in my City that experienced the same as I did in the same Month.

Even today there has Not been any explanation by medical staff as to what caused this to happen to the many this happened to at that time!

My point being that I was Conscious of an entirely different World than you are aware of right now.

I understand this is a very very common experience but is also very controversial.

Yes I am indeed aware of the behaviour of the Pineal gland and the release of chemicals But according to the surgeons No damage occurred as a result
of the experience which still has them puzzled today!

If I did explain more about this Universe and what it really is, you would probably right me off as insane... Just to keep your peace of mind. LOL..

Since that Year 19973 I have been involved with R&D around this Phenomena...

[edit on 18-8-2009 by The Matrix Traveller]

[edit on 18-8-2009 by The Matrix Traveller]

Ok,here's a question for creationists :

without reference to the bible prove that god exists.

reply to post by Okiminletsdoit!


First you need to define Your god!

Or Your definition of god

[edit on 18-8-2009 by The Matrix Traveller]

Originally posted by Okiminletsdoit!
Ok,here's a question for creationists :

without reference to the bible prove that god exists.

Good one, doesn't every effect...have a cause?

OT

reply to post by Okiminletsdoit!

1. Cosmological Argument

The term “cosmological” comes from the Greek word “kosmos” which means “world.”



The cosmological argument for God’s existence goes like this: The world could not exist on its own so there must have been a first cause that brought it into being. This first cause is God. Or put another way, the universe could not just exist on its own—someone or something must have made it. This cause of the universe is God.



Three criticisms of the cosmological argument have been offered. First, some say matter is eternal and is not in need of a “first cause.” Second, some say “If everything needs a cause, what caused God?” Third, some say that even if it is true that some being caused our universe to exist, this does not prove the existence of the Christian God. All it shows is that there is some powerful being that created the universe, but this does not necessarily mean that this creator was the God of the Bible.

Source for 3 more arguments, happy research my inquisitive friend!

www.theologicalstudies.org...

reply to post by The Matrix Traveller



Thanks MT for sharing in the u2u, please give me some time...whew!

OT

Originally posted by Okiminletsdoit!
Ok,here's a question for creationists :

without reference to the bible prove that god exists.

You see our (yours and mine) definitions of God or a god, may be much different ???

So it is you who have to define what God or god is, in your terms, or interpretation for anyone to answer you....

reply to post by Okiminletsdoit!


Abit more on cause effect...

2. Teleological Argument

The teleological argument is also known as “the argument from design” (The Greek word “telos” means “purpose” or “design.”). The argument goes like this: The universe evidences great complexity or design; thus, it must have been designed by a great Designer or God.



The argument from design can be likened to a watch. A watch is obviously made by a watchmaker. The world, which is much more complex than a watch, must also have been designed by a great Designer or Divine Watchmaker (God).



In sum, the teleological argument asserts that the universe evidences too much complexity to be the product of random chance. We know that the celestial bodies move with perfect accuracy in their orbits. Our bodies, too, are incredibly complex. According to the teleological argument, there’s just no way all this complexity could “just happen.” God must have created it all.



There have been three responses to the teleological argument. First, some say the teleological argument is guilty of a “weak analogy” because it assumes a significant resemblance between natural objects (ex. rocks, trees) and objects we know have been designed (ex. watches, skyscrapers). Thus, comparing natural objects with objects we know have been created by humans is like comparing apples and oranges. The analogy just doesn’t work. Second, some say that the theories of the big bang and evolution better explain the complexity in the universe. Third, some say that even if the teleological argument is true, it does not prove the existence of the Christian God.

same source www.theologicalstudies.org...

reply to post by Okiminletsdoit!



I don't use scripture much here....just logic....thoughts?

see: www.abovetopsecret.com...

OT

quote]Originally posted by OldThinker

Originally posted by m4ng4n
Still the question arise...

WHO is god? ...

-------------------------------------------------------------------
m4ng4n, Sweet 4 wheeler!!!!

Not too concerned with WHO God is in the thread friend...

But more on the freedom of thought...and intellectual integrity....

What are the skeptics afraid of, that's the real question?

OT

I have the advantage of living in Europe where fourwheelers are road legal!

There´s a saying out there which I came across:

The golden rule - Those who have the gold rule...

I consider myself a skeptic in that matter that I disagree with the Church.
The bible is true to the letter but still I call myself an Atheist in some context, a buddist in others.

My little quest is that I´m questioning the real origins of man and when one starts to dig into our history one finds that few things add up.
The bible for instance is composed by stories and tales, some written down and some from mouth to mouth. All in all the "best" parts are narrowed to fit a purpose.

I´m not jumping on any religious people out there when I refer o the bible, your choice and fine by me!

Take the great deluge? In how many cultures is the story told?
Eeh... All of them? www.crystalinks.com...

What I´m saying is that the church amongst others has taken advantage of peoples faith and suppress them with lies in order to serve their own purpose just as media tells the sheeple lies.

People with new theories always have to adapt their theories to fit the general beliefs at the time they are putting them forward.
Thanks to the internet more and more people can educate themselves and at the time we reach a critical mass of people thinking for themselves I think that´s a time of new revelations or awakenings if you like.

Those who have the gold are very treatened by the free thinkers and I think It´s to late for them to act today as the ball is rolling...

But to some free thinkers it´s not, atleast not yet!

[edit on 18-8-2009 by m4ng4n]

reply to post by Okiminletsdoit!


What about scientific discoveries, in the scriptures BEFORE Science found them? More here: www.abovetopsecret.com...

OT

Well that's enough for now...please let me know what you think, ok?