Evolution... a kids fairytale

reply to post by Nosred


I don't want to argue semantics. Besides, your implication on the inaccuracy of the Bible has no bearing in the discussion. The idea that things exploding and colliding in space created intelligent life on Earth is a farce no mater how accurate or inaccurate the Bible is.

The Universe exploded, cooled, gas clouds collapsed under gravity and created the sun and the planets, a Mars-sized object hit Earth and created the moon, everything was molten magma, but the dirt cooled and turned into intelligent life that built spaceships to explore the Universe.

Somehow your doubts about a book written by this intelligent life that came from nothing seems to negate that intelligent life came from nothing.

reply to post by RealTruthSeeker


LOL. Oh dear.

High Preist of Micro-Biology. As Dawkins has always said, far be it from him to force people to believe in evidence.

PLEASE READ BEFORE YOU CONTINUE TO MISINFORM/MISLEAD USERS REGARDING EVOLUTION

listverse.com...

Note that each point is the misunderstood claim

e.g. "15. Evolution is a theory about the origin of life" - THIS CLAIM WOULD BE INCORRECT AND FALSE.

Here are all the misunderstandings listed:-

15. Evolution is a theory about the origin of life
14. Organisms are always getting better
13. Evolution means that life changed ‘by chance’
12. Natural selection involves organisms ‘trying’ to adapt
11. Natural selection gives organisms what they ‘need.’
10. Evolution is ‘just’ a theory
9. Evolution is a Theory in Crisis
8. Gaps in the Fossil Record Disprove Evolution
7. Evolutionary Theory is Incomplete
6. The Theory is Flawed
5. Evolution is not science because it is not observable
4. Most Biologists have rejected Darwinism
3. Evolution Leads to Immoral Behavior
2. Evolution Supports “Might Makes Right”
1. Teachers Should Teach Both Sides

Again, all of the above are common misconceptions, I hear many of them being spouted by religious preachers or creationists like Ken Hovind and Bananaman.

Top 15 Misconceptions About Evolution

Read information for each point explaining why they are misconceptions.

Originally posted by dbates
reply to post by Nosred

 

I don't want to argue semantics. Besides, your implication on the inaccuracy of the Bible has no bearing in the discussion. The idea that things exploding and colliding in space created intelligent life on Earth is a farce no mater how accurate or inaccurate the Bible is.

I wasn't the one who brought the Bible up in the first place, that was the OP telling me to find a contradiction in it.

The Universe exploded, cooled, gas clouds collapsed under gravity and created the sun and the planets, a Mars-sized object hit Earth and created the moon, everything was molten magma, but the dirt cooled and turned into intelligent life that built spaceships to explore the Universe.

Abiogenesis has about as much to do with evolution as the Bible does. Evolution does not explain how life got here but rather what happened after life was already here. Evolution only explains the diversity of life, not the origin.

Somehow your doubts about a book written by this intelligent life that came from nothing seems to negate that intelligent life came from nothing.

I fail to see what my beliefs on a book put together hundreds of years ago by some dudes in Rome has to do with evolution. Evolution is a scientific fact regardless of the Bible's accuracy and regardless of how life originally formed.

reply to post by Haxsaw


You wrote:

["More side-stepping, evolution requires "faith" to swallow hook line and sinker, full stop. In regards to my "version" well I'm not the one claiming my "beliefs" don't involve "faith" to believe, you are."]

You haven't come around to what my 'faith' is. But please take your time.

Quote: ["Your head must be spinning with all the circles you've done thus far. I'm clearly referring to the fact that when two people have a belief system(one says they came from GOD, another says they came from the accretion disc revolving around the sun) both of which take faith to believe, and one of them admits it takes faith to believe what they believe in while the other refuses to admit that their belief system requires any faith at all and attempts to pass their belief system off as nothing other than complete truth involving no faith whatsoever, then the former is obviously more honest in this particular issue."]

In some ways excellent thoughts, except that you also haven't come around to why 'science' requires 'faith', and that these thoughts are yours, for which I hardly can be held responsible.

And thanks for your concern about my head. It's doing fine.

Quote: ["No, you try to sort out what you believe and go from there."]

I use objective procedure, and won't mind bringing it in. Why will you not demonstrate YOUR method?

Quote: ["I'm talking about believing in evolution in it's entirety, I only mentioned this about 10 times os far."]

The first occasion where I opposed you was actually about the probability-aspect of the 'intelligent design' postulate.

Quote: ["Oh dear, I'm referring to the scientific theory of evolution that tells you earth formed from the accretion disc revolving around the sun. Hang on, what's this now we have a creationist teaching an evolutionist about evolution, madness I say."]

So you are willing to expand the creationist perspective to including physics also. Great news, I'm more at home there.

Quote: ["Well done sir, finally, right there you have the admittance that evolution as a whole requires "FAITH" to swallow. Not much more needs to be said."]

What do you mean "finally"? I haven't said anything about it before. Have you started to carry a dialogue, where you speak for both of us? A bit unconventional, but it could be fun. You say what you say, and what I say. And then I say, what I say also. There will say to speak be three of us.

Quote (on what real science is): ["Nope, I'm going by what your superiors zealously attempt to push down our throats."]

You're right. Let's avoid to define REAL science at all costs. It would give us eggheads unfair advantages, if we actually could introduce real science in this three-person kind-of-dialogue (or that would be tria-logue).

Quote: [" Take it exactly how I've presented it, and that's that evolution as whole requires faith, it is a belief system, and science itself corrects itself, obviously proving that it is often wrong(or right until proven wrong as some scientists have said before)."]

While this isn't precisely what I've said (but I have granted you permission to speak on my behalf also, so that's OK), what YOU have said sofar is, that you don't want to present YOUR 'science', that MY science is a faith/belief-system, that we only speak about evolution, even when we speak about astro-physics and cosmogony, and that my science isn't to be presented just as yours isn't, because it could ruin your science is faithbased (in selected bits, which are representative of all science...did I get that right?) argument.

And that presenting real science is cramming it zealously down peoples' throats.

Quote: ["Well then you've clearly steered in all sorts of wrong directions, I for one am not a christian but do however have faith in an INTELLIGENT UNSEEN FORCE behind all forces, and my initial bid was to present the fact that evolution as a whole requires faith to swallow, and you have admitted that above, intentionally or not, so I don't think you needed or continue to need to present a single thing to me. Thanks anyway."]

My apologies for mistaking you for a christian. What would you like to be addressed as?

Originally posted by dbates

Originally posted by Nosred
I honestly feel like this is the 17th century and I'm trying to convince the village idiot that the Earth isn't the center of the universe.

Every galaxy could make the claim that it is the center of the Universe since all distant objects are moving away from it. It's like we're on the outside of a balloon that's being inflated. All points are moving away from every other point.

Which has nothing to do with the model of a geo-centric universe.

It's all okay now, I found this to give me hope again:





Edit: So I changed my mind. I don't want to convince you that evolution is real anymore. This provides any easy way of telling which people need to be kept out of the gene pool if we don't want the world to turn into a real life version of the movie 'Idiocracy'.

Originally posted by RealTruthSeeker

Originally posted by Nosred
I honestly feel like this is the 17th century and I'm trying to convince the village idiot that the Earth isn't the center of the universe.

Speaking of which, you don't believe the Earth is the center of the universe do you? Because I mean, if you did then you'd be even more laughable.

Can you prove that it's not? Have you ever seen the center of the universe? Have you been to where the universe starts and where it ends? If so, where is your evidence?

edit on 1-8-2011 by RealTruthSeeker because: (no reason given)

edit on 1-8-2011 by RealTruthSeeker because: (no reason given)

It's funny, but you actually sound like the now almost extinct species of reductionist materialist empirical scientists, existing a century ago.

Science HAS changed, and many of the things we take as truth these days are invisible to the naked eye. There are microscopes, telescopes, particle-tracing tanks and whatever.

Some things are too small, others too big etc etc........

Most of the advanced contemporary theories rest on building on formerly acquired knowledge, through the use of objective procedure or if you like the systematic methodology of science/logic. To be generous (without carrying the comparison too far), you could say, that this procedure and methodology are the 'doctrines' of science, considered from a total epistemological perspective. From which perspective a constructive debate can take place, for the philosophically interested.

From HERE where we are positioned now however, science/logic demonstrates a solidity through its 'tools', which has nothing to do with 'faith' or 'belief'. Not least that its basic observations are uniform and communicable. So at the level of observing the observable the 'doctrines' of science/logic have proved themselves more than trustworthy and reliable.

Originally posted by malcr

Originally posted by kalunom
I find it as likely that we evolved from apes as apes devolved from us.

I agree with you. We live under a certain, specific, set of laws (programs) that produce life out of what would otherwise be chaos or, equally likely, nothing at all.

Who wrote the rulebook? No idea, but to say that all this happened by chance is just lazy. And I say lazy because putting your faith in the theories of the much-revered scientists of our time is just that. Lazy.

Putting faith in science where we all (lay persons and scientists) have to make the effort to learn and understand is lazy. Whereas attributing everything to a mythical creature is a sign of effort and deep thought...

It is astonishingly sad that after thousands of years of human advancement there are those who still wish to believe in the myths of our ancestors. Very sad.

Who said anything about belief in myth? Not I. This is an example of the lazy thought of which I spoke. Simply because I made a statement saying that putting your faith in the theories of science is lazy, you immediately assume I hold belief in some "god" somewhere "out there" who created it all.

Some beliefs can be useful; e.g. believing I can achieve a goal before getting there. Most beliefs are not useful, including a belief in a god one has no personal understanding of AND belief in the theories of scientists without any personal verification.

Happy to make you smile, and thanks for making my point clear to those who care to see.

I'm going to post this link since all you might learn something from it.

darryl-cunningham.blogspot.com...

Please read that.

reply to post by samaka


Well.. The nature of the Carbon atom, and the Chlor atom, is to bind easy with other atoms.
Things happens, by itself.

Originally posted by dbates
reply to post by Nosred

 

I don't want to argue semantics. Besides, your implication on the inaccuracy of the Bible has no bearing in the discussion. The idea that things exploding and colliding in space created intelligent life on Earth is a farce no mater how accurate or inaccurate the Bible is.

The Universe exploded, cooled, gas clouds collapsed under gravity and created the sun and the planets, a Mars-sized object hit Earth and created the moon, everything was molten magma, but the dirt cooled and turned into intelligent life that built spaceships to explore the Universe.

Somehow your doubts about a book written by this intelligent life that came from nothing seems to negate that intelligent life came from nothing.

Your arguments would be a lot more effective if you didn't straw-man about 6 scientific theories into one overly simplistic, run-on sentence.

It's interesting how theists constantly bring up the problem of nothing, since no scientist nor atheist ever makes claims about things coming into existence from nothing. Scientists and rational thinkers pose that pre-existing materials come together to create higher complexity (and this is the simple version, if you really want to debate scientific issues or topics I'm always open to a much larger conversation). In fact it's quite the opposite; that the theists are the ones to pose that the universe was created out of nothing, creatio ex nihilo by their deity (who somehow gets to bypass the supposed need for an efficient cause).

Originally posted by Stuffed
Scientists and rational thinkers pose that pre-existing materials come together to create higher complexity

This is violating the second law of thermodynamics. For the rest of the Universe things are progressing from order to disorder. Why is it the opposite here on Earth? Perhaps something is messing with the laws of nature? Could that be some sort of proof of an external influence. If a house got cleaner and cleaner we wouldn't say that it was an accident would we?

Originally posted by Stuffed
the theists are the ones to pose that the universe was created out of nothing, creatio ex nihilo by their deity (who somehow gets to bypass the supposed need for an efficient cause).

Correct, causation is only necessary for things that have a beginning. Of course this is way outside of the simple conversation this thread is based upon. I don't think anyone is this thread is prepared to have an actual honest discussion about an eternal God, which dimension he resides in, and how he is external to time and space.

Originally posted by dbates
This is violating the second law of thermodynamics. For the rest of the Universe things are progressing from order to disorder. Why is it the opposite here on Earth? Perhaps something is messing with the laws of nature? Could that be some sort of proof of an external influence. If a house got cleaner and cleaner we wouldn't say that it was an accident would we?

This is precisely the same thing i corrected you on earlier in this thread. The 2nd law of thermodynamics applies only to perfectly closed systems. The Earth is not a closed system, it receives constant energy in the form of light and heat from the nuclear fusion process inside of our sun. This is also what i was talking about when I mentioned straw manning, if you're going to address the problems in a scientific theory, do so without making it say something it doesn't.

Perhaps I should start a conversation on causality because the word nothing gets thrown around way too often.
e.g. Big Bang from nothing, Life from Nothing, neither of which are accurate critiques on the scientific models addressing them.

reply to post by dbates

Correct, causation is only necessary for things that have a beginning. Of course this is way outside of the simple conversation this thread is based upon. I don't think anyone is this thread is prepared to have an actual honest discussion about an eternal God, which dimension he resides in, and how he is external to time and space.

And of course, you'd be humble enough to accept that an eternal deity is not the only possibility? There could be alternatives.

It could equally be possible that we exist within a computer program (some pose the unfalsifiable hypothesis that we could exist in "test" universe within another verse or even gallaxy - perfectly simulated reality) Good sci-fi, right?

Simulated reality is the proposition that reality could be simulated—perhaps by computer simulation—to a degree indistinguishable from "true" reality. It could contain conscious minds which may or may not be fully aware that they are living inside a simulation.

There has been much debate over this topic, ranging from philosophical discourse to practical applications in computing.SOURCE

In this hypothetical: would it be wise to assume, and commit to the assumption in belief, that because humans make computers, that a character with human characteristics created the universal "computer"? (i.e. an eternal deity)

It seems to me, it is was it is; an assumption. And equally unfalsifiable as the above "simulated reality" hypothesis.

reply to post by dbates


You wrote:

["This is violating the second law of thermodynamics."]

What stage of the process are you referring to. I have the impression, that you are not talking about the same as science does in this context.

Quote: ["For the rest of the Universe things are progressing from order to disorder."]

It's not only pedantry, when I point out, that it progresses from order to 'lack of order', not disorder. 'Chaos' can get some twisted meanings in theist contexts, if used imprecisely.

Quote: ["Why is it the opposite here on Earth?"]

Because self-organizing complexity can create local negative entropy (= create order).

Quote: ["Perhaps something is messing with the laws of nature?"]

Nope, not necessarily. Self-organization is the expected result of cosmic dynamics between asymmetric polarities, because of the accumulated information potential in combination with spatial flexibility.

Quote: [" Correct, causation is only necessary for things that have a beginning."]

That's quite simple too. Causation, as we know it, is only valid inside cosmos. Whatever possibly is 'outside' (trans-cosmic) would not have the same kind of causality (if any at all). The 'agnostic' position thus again.

Quote: ["I don't think anyone is this thread is prepared to have an actual honest discussion about an eternal God, which dimension he resides in, and how he is external to time and space."]

Not until we get some resident high-level professionals, who can speak normalese also.

Originally posted by dbates
This is violating the second law of thermodynamics. For the rest of the Universe things are progressing from order to disorder. Why is it the opposite here on Earth? Perhaps something is messing with the laws of nature? Could that be some sort of proof of an external influence. If a house got cleaner and cleaner we wouldn't say that it was an accident would we?

Here's another Young Earth argument, and when I first heard it I said "What the heck are they talking about??" It's that Evolution violates the second law of thermodynamics. The second law of thermodynamics states that there is no reverse entropy in any isolated system. The available energy in a closed system will stay the same or decrease over time, and the overall entropy of such a system can only increase or stay the same. This is an immutable physical law, and it's true. Young Earth Creationists argue that this means a complex system, like a living organism, cannot form on its own, as that would be a decrease of entropy. Order from disorder, they argue, is physically impossible without divine intervention. This argument is easy to make if you oversimplify the law to the point of ignoring its principal qualification: that it only applies to a closed, isolated system. If you attempt to apply it to any system, such as a plant, animal, or deck of cards, you've just proven that photosynthesis, growth, and unshuffling are impossible too. Organisms are open systems (as was the proverbial primordial goo), since they exchange material and energy with their surroundings, and so the second law of thermodynamics is not relevant to them. Innumerable natural and artificial processes produce order from disorder in open systems using external energy and material.

skeptoid.com...

Originally posted by dbates
Correct, causation is only necessary for things that have a beginning. Of course this is way outside of the simple conversation this thread is based upon. I don't think anyone is this thread is prepared to have an actual honest discussion about an eternal God, which dimension he resides in, and how he is external to time and space.

Evolution has nothing to do with how anything began. Evolutionary theory explains the diversity of life rather than the origin of life itself.

Originally posted by Stuffed
This is precisely the same thing i corrected you on earlier in this thread. The 2nd law of thermodynamics applies only to perfectly closed systems.

Sorry, I missed that at the end of your reply to the OP. Could I state that our solar system was a closed system and the Earth just a part of that? If not I could say our local group, or galaxy, and eventually go on to include the Universe. I think this hits on what the OP was suggesting that even given energy from the sun the probability of order from random chaos is nearly infinity impossible. You could throw a stack of brick out of the back of a moving truck and it would most likely never land in the shape of a pyramid. Things even in closed systems tend to become more disordered. Is there an example of order from chaos outside of the Earth? That would be interesting to talk about.

Originally posted by ExistentialNightmare
There has been much debate over this topic, ranging from philosophical discourse to practical applications in computing.SOURCE

In this hypothetical: would it be wise to assume, and commit to the assumption in belief, that because humans make computers, that a character with human characteristics created the universal "computer"? (i.e. an eternal deity)

It seems to me, it is was it is; an assumption. And equally unfalsifiable as the above "simulated reality" hypothesis.

Oh! Now we're getting interesting. I might have hit on this topic before so forgive me if this is a repeat for you. Let's assume that this Universe is a simulation (Look up the universe as a hologram) and perhaps this is only one of a nearly infinite number of simulated universal possibilities. So given that there are an infinite number of possible things that can happen within this simulated structure.

Now recently I meshed two totally separate concepts into a fun idea. This is all 100% hypothetical of course but fun to imagine none the less. The idea was marrying an infinite number of universes and possibilities with the life-reviews that people have in NDE. You can read that here. I like to play with funny ideas like that more than you know. This sort of fits with the Universe being a simulated experience as you were insinuating. All fun good discussion.

Originally posted by dbates

Originally posted by Stuffed
This is precisely the same thing i corrected you on earlier in this thread. The 2nd law of thermodynamics applies only to perfectly closed systems.

Sorry, I missed that at the end of your reply to the OP. Could I state that our solar system was a closed system and the Earth just a part of that? If not I could say our local group, or galaxy, and eventually go on to include the Universe.

You're getting off topic. The galaxy and universe have nothing to do with evolution. The Earth is not a closed system so your argument of evolution being against the second law of thermodynamics is false.

Oh! Now we're getting interesting. I might have hit on this topic before so forgive me if this is a repeat for you. Let's assume that this Universe is a simulation (Look up the universe as a hologram) and perhaps this is only one of a nearly infinite number of simulated universal possibilities. So given that there are an infinite number of possible things that can happen within this simulated structure.

Now recently I meshed two totally separate concepts into a fun idea. This is all 100% hypothetical of course but fun to imagine none the less. The idea was marrying an infinite number of universes and possibilities with the life-reviews that people have in NDE. You can read that here. I like to play with funny ideas like that more than you know. This sort of fits with the Universe being a simulated experience as you were insinuating. All fun good discussion.

None of this has anything to do with evolution. Evolution is a fact regardless of how the universe started, how Earth was created, or how life got started on Earth.

reply to post by Nosred

Evolution is a fact regardless of how the universe started, how Earth was created, or how life got started on Earth.

Indeed.

In the aforementioned list of common misunderstandings regarding evolution:-

15. Evolution is a theory about the origin of life

I think abiogenesis is a related field of discussion, Richard Dawkins concedes that he is no astro-physicist or astronomer but postulated a fancyful idea that universes (within a multiverse) would work in the same way of evolution; universes "competing" in a way, some not able to form gallaxies before they collapse etc.

Of course, if we were to form a grand unification theory that tied particle theory, quantam physics, gravity, it should also be expected to tie in life abiogenesis, evolution and even consciousness.