Originally posted by Circle
The evolutionary model as presented by Darwin has flaws and even Darwin himself expressed his doubts about his theory. One which being the
assumption that later turned into DNA and genes being responsible for how we are "made." Turns out that assumption was wrong, and our DNA and genes
lack a lot of information that is made up by our physical environment so therefore genes and DNA only determine about half or less of what we actually
turn out to be.
DNA was not discovered in Darwin's time. Crick discovered the genome in the 1970s whereas Darwin was formutaing his Theory of Evolution in the mid
19th Century.
Re-read what I posted and you will realize I said nothing of DNA in Darwin's time. I said the assumptions that later became the idea that genetics
entirely determine the individual of a species.
However, Darwin recognized that lifeforms react to their environments. He might not have known about DNA but he knew a mechanism existed for
natural selection. Those lifeforms that prospred in their environment (and hence their DNA) were most likly to survive through sexual reproduction.
Unsuccessful lifeforms were less likely to spread their DNA because of lowered survival rates.
What Darwin's theory came to encompass (as I remember being taught it in high school) is that individuals of a species evolve
at random and
that the random mutations that prove favorable are the ones which are most often carried on to the next generation.
What has now been refuted about that assumption is that the entire "natural selection" process is actually not random at all, and our environment
and other factors external to individual cells are constantly causing parts of our DNA to be activated or de-activated, so that the environment is
what determines the active genetics informing our cells.
I see why people can believe in both God and evolution. God could create an evolutionary universe but it goes against the scientific evidence
that the world was created in a week.
Even if the world was created in a week, and even if there were scientific evidence that indicates that, you must realize that it has no more bearing
upon spiritual realizations and coming to know the one true universal "God" than the assumption that the Sun revolves around the Earth. The Church
used to say, of course, that the Sun revolved around the Earth, and they went to enormous and ridiculous efforts, even killing people, to try to force
people to continue believing this despite overwhelming evidence.
Why would the church go to such effort to try to keep people believing that the Earth is the center of the universe?
Because realizing that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and the Sun is the real center of our
solar system of various bodies all revolving
around this Sun, was actually more profound and mystical an insight to people of that age than the mundane assumption that the Earth was the focal
point of God's universe and there was nothing else "out there" to learn about during our physical lives.
Copernicus' discovery filled him with love and appreciation for the complexity and order of the universe, it humbled him to realize that the Earth
is really just
one planet revolving around the Sun, and not the center of anything.
The Church has used all number of psychological tactics over the years and why anyone would not be skeptical of anything ANY traditional Christian
dogma teaches today blows my mind. Governments and religious institutions from all over the world all have the most atrocious track records of lying
to people in order to maintain unfair control over their lives, yet people go on buying anything they say on a day to day basis as if they'd never
heard such blasphemies, even though they are written on just about every page of history.
They don't want you to know how wonderful and mysterious and inspiring and beautiful this universe really is. They don't want you to feel mystified
or empowered or even particularly humbled directly by the natural world. They don't want you to focus your awareness much on the living, conscious
creation around you at all. Instead, they give you books to memorize, passages translated through so many languages and being colored by so many
connotations over thousands of years so as to lose so much of their original meaning, and even be superseded by more accurate modern knowledge. They
want you to focus on all these trivialities, even the ones they know are lies or are wrong, because they want you to argue about them, and argue over
the scripture, and be distracted by these books and challenges of faith and threats of eternal damnation. That's how they "divide and conquer."
The truth is much more wonderful than any fictions, and even the ancients were wrong about many, many things, as we now know. Even the Bible says
somewhere or another (in Revelations if I'm not mistaken) that in the end times, or when this age draws near a close, knowledge will be greatly
increased. The truth will set you free. It really is a wonderful thing. The control institutions will always teach you to look only to THEM for
your understanding. Do you really think the God of the entire universe has given the highest knowledge only to one institution of people and no one
else? Real knowledge is free and for everyone. And it is self-evident and does not need a book to explain it, although for many people spiritual
scriptures of various cultures are very enlightening to the divine mystery surrounding them anyway.
[edit on 7-1-2010 by bsbray11]
