Evolution: “Overwhelming and Compelling”

I can’t believe we’re still having this “debate” in 21st century USA. We’ve become the laughing stock of other advanced nations. :(

That comment was meant for Realist.

Jerry – A. The fossil record shows that mammals are relative latecomers to the Earth, and that they descended from earlier animals with different forms of procreation (egg-laying reptiles, etc.). B. 99.99% of all species that have ever lived on Earth are extinct. Some species will survive climate changes (or other environmental factors) relatively intact, some will die out completely, and some will evolve over time into different species. This is how evolution works.

As long as everyone agrees that Jesus spoke English, the evolution argument means absolutely nothing.

The religious right was the last to be dragged onboard “the world is round” bandwagon. They’ll get it someday.

If we evolved from monkeys, then why are there still monkeys??
If I am wrong for believing in God, oh well. If the atheists are wrong, well, Hell.

Here’s what I don’t understand about this whole debate. Why would you want Creationism taught in a SCIENCE classroom? What’s scientific about it? There’s nothing wrong with religion (necessarily), and as that excerpt points out, many scientists and proponents of evolution are deeply religious. But religion and science are still discrete issues and belong in separate classrooms. If you MUST give your child the counterpoint, then teach them at home or send them to private school. Religion has no place in public education. There wouldn’t be time to teach them all!

According to creationism, the bible indicates that the earth is only 6000 years old. I suppose we having mass halucinations of those million year old dinosaur bones in our museums.

God created the heavens & the earth … and man … Period …

Human evolution impossible?
First off, we know the process is occuring in mankind…
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Debate over. Humanity mutates. Thus, Humanity evolves.
All part of the Creator’s plan. :-)

No one has ever said that humans evolved from monkeys. Boy, this one’s getting old… Go grab and read a science text then maybe you won’t sound quite so ignorant when trying to argue your side.

The next BIG Bang event to happen will be Christ returning. As a Doctor anyone who can look at the human body with its DNA and the complex being that we are and think this happened by chance and not design skipped thier Bio classes. We find a fossil of a fish with legs on this same website they are showing you pictures of conjoined twins skeletons so in 100 years will people think we all had two heads. One fossil makles a nice museum peice 1000 makes an argument.

Evolution??? Evolution is a THEORY.
You are welcome to your theory. So are those that believe, or in other words, have a theory that God created man.
Common sense rules out evolution.
Natural selection would dictate that only a few select species would survive.
Why don’t pigs fly or talk. Why just monkies able to “evolve”.
Why science has observed is ADAPTATION.
There is zero evidence, or observation oof one species becoming a more acompletely new advanced species.

Evolution’s fine. Just don’t tell me that the “Big Bang” started by itself. If so, where did the materials come from?

I’m sure you have the same disdain for evolution when your doctor gets you healthy with practices and medication based on biology and yes belief in evolution. Confortable then right?

No one can fathom the possibility that maybe the scientific community and the those who are religious are correct? If God can make the universe can’t he oversee evolution too?

As a dog owner, I can tell you that my dog is very intelligent but did not evolve from any cells of a creature that man did. Evolution is fine but only after stating that all was created and allowed to evolve by the Creator and not chance. Man’s mind should show people how man is nowhere near related to animals.

To Reason:
Because, unfortunately, fools and fanatics of both sides confuse the fools and fanatics of the other sides as the authority of that other side…
…instead of realizing that the ones bein’ loud, hot and bothered, are just the overgrown simian howler monkeys of mankind.
I’m realigious. I’m a Christian (Baptist), even… but, my beliefs in no way inhibit science. Indeed, I think the Creator intends for us to use our brains; that’s why life was given the ability to evolve them.
Now, if the idiots will just stop howling, maybe we can get some serious science accomplished.
Like, health and healing of mankind. Somatic genetic engineering and cloning: medicines of the future that should be medicines of the now.
Also like: bringing the green earth back to health… we ARE supposed to be taking care of the place. THAT is ALSO in Genesis. (not that the Fundamentalists are willing to acknowledge that).
Or, solving poverty. Not that the Fundamentalists are willing to acknowledge THAT either. *sigh* Clinton and Carter: hope they actually salvage some of the true believing thinkers, from the howling dynamite monkeys of doom and gloom.

Why does religion always have to slow down the advancement of science???
Because without religion,there would be only manipulation and lies left to debate. Just use your common sense.

The heck with evolution, I believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster……

I’d recommend that all the posters here who are confused about evolution and the overwhelming scientific evidence supporting it sign up for an introductory anthropology or evolutionary biology course at their local college or university – that should help answer your questions.

Upon reading the “religious” responses left on this blog, it is UP-SETTLING obvious that we have a LONG way to go before we can rid the world of the plague that is religion. Quite sad, but profoundly true.

For those who don’t believe that Dog, Apes or Man have nothing geneticly in common need to take a long look at the skeletal struture. Wow… and 2 eyes, mouths, noses, ears, front legs (arms) back legs all in the general areas. And breasts? Girls, are you glad that God got the placement of breasts in Cows out of his system before he created man/women.

People, people, come on! The earth is flat. Period. End of story.
Signed,
The Church, circa not that long ago

God put dinosaurs, etc. on earth so that they would all die, decompose, and over eons turn into coal and crude oil so that man could burn them up, trash the environment, cause global warming and live happily ever after. Also, in the Bible, 2 Peter 3:8, is found “But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” – in other words, the time spans relating to the creation as set forth in the Bible are figurative. It probably didn’t happen in one day or even a thousand, but billions. There is room within creationism for science.

If you ask me, it takes a lot more faith to believe in evolution than creation. The Bible isn’t a science textbook, but when it touches on matters of science it is remarkably accurate. Isaiah 40:22 says “There is one who is dwelling above the circle of the earth,”… this was written a long time before “enlightened” man thought the world was flat. People want to believe in evolution, so they aren’t accountable to anyone.

I love it when people just post a few words from the Bible, “in the beginning…” That blogger is so dumb, as he/she just keeps repeating the same sentence that other sheep have uttered.
It’s funny how, when it comes to, for example, some nutjob saying that they got abducted by aliens, Christians say, “well how do we know? Show us some evidence that aliens did this?” But when you ask them about Genesis, or how they know that Jesus is supposedly the son of God, they say, “oh i just believe it on faith.” So they REQUIRE evidence for things they don’t want to believe in (including evolution) but they DON’T REQUIRE proof for things they want to follow blindly.
Sounds to me like they are VERY scared that there is nothing after death. They prefer to believe stupid stories about “Samson” who had long hair, and then cut it and he lost all his power. Sounds like he’s one of the X-Men or the Fantastic Four! Those are fairy tales, and these people are cowards for not admitting that the bible is just another book full of stories. Christians are trying to give answers because they fear the silence that might come after death. So they create a religion to make them feel better.

It is nice to refer to the “overwhelming proof” of evolution, but note the quote from the above article “It describes in detail the discovery of Tiktaalik, the four-legged fish fossil from the Canadian Arctic that appears to be the missing link between primitive fish and animals that walked up onto land.” Notice it says appears to be the missing link. They still haven’t found them. The “theory” of Creation has been around since… well… Creation!

All of you bashing religion and the faith of good people are the real problem with America.
You want your teory of evolution taught in our schools bit will allow no mention of God.
You trying to do just what you accuse religion of doing—being closed minded.

I suggest that people actually read this report that Ned has pointed out to us, from the most prestigious scientific organization in the country. It gives a good overview of the science of evolution and answers all of the scientific questions people are discussing here. Then we can talk.

I evolved from a Gumby figure. Or was it pokey? Dang…now I’m feeling just plain monk. Remember, God is a comedian who is playing to an audience that is afraid to laugh.

Give it up people, we were created by the Great Spahgetti Monster!

MICRO evolution has happened and continues to happen. Repeatable and falsifiable. No problem. MACRO evolution: i.e. a dog becoming a cat, has NEVER happened. There is NOTHING in the fossil record that shows anything like that. NO transitional forms. NOTHING!!!! Thus the RELIGION of evolution should not be taught as scientific fact but as a theory. Now how about teaching children to actually observe, think, and do REAL science, not pseudo-science.
Anytime that you come to a conclusion based on assumptions,,,,well, you know what happens. Macroevolution; requires a complete change of genetic code, not a loss of code as happens with mutation. Macroevolution; requires many thousands of transitional forms, none exist. Macroevolution; the belief that one species can and has become another species without the slightest bit of concrete evidence. YOU DECIDE, who will you run to?

To those denying evolution within humans, ever wonder why you have a tail bone but no tail? Or an appendix?

I have no issue with those that embrace religion and believe in God. Good for you. I have great issue with religous fanatics that believe only THEIR religion is correct, only THEIR people chosen, only THEIR beliefs blessed.

The argument is far more basic then most are stating here. Being one that was never subjected to organized religion, I come from an unbiased point of view. I find the basic issue with religion and the people that follow religion is that they can not except the fact that when they close their eyes for the last time, most likely there will be nothing…it will be the end. This is basic human weakness and religion helps feed that weakness and therefore helps people justify their tiny existence. The facts are plan…..you can quote books, articles and whatever you want. All species evolved from lower species over billons of years (that’s right “billions”). That is the very concept that as human beings we have difficulty conceiving within our own minds…we can hardly think past a few years, let a lone billions of years. This is also the weakness that has been preyed upon by organized religion for is own political and financial benefit. People will continue to live in the self imposed fantasy because they are too weak to do otherwise. The lies portrayed by religious people, such as, standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon and telling their followers that it was created by the “Great Flood” is not only pathetic but dangerous. If anyone questions the importance of separation of Church and State, they should just reference countries such as Iraq or Iran…

“If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.”
–Charles Darwin, Origin of Species

To all the creationists who posted, which God are we talking about? Every religion has a different God/s and every religion says their God/s created life. So which is it?

One Question, if evolution is true, then there would have had to be a BIG BANG right? so where did that little ball that blew up come from, Can someone tell me that.

No no, I got it. We have to combine evolution and faith. We evolved from monkeys…and God made us in hid image…so God must be a monkey. Problem solved, now can’t we all just get along? :)

So, we don’t know where the ball that made the Big Bang, so that means that you have to have faith to believe in evolution, doesn’t that make it a religion?

But yet they cant say how eyes “evolved”

Where are all the fossils of creatures that evolved? There should be millions of them but in reality there are none? Also how does one create life out of non-life?

Wow, this column really set everyone off. All I have to say is that carbon dating is about as accurate as a shotgun from a hundred yards. That is probably why the evolutionist scientists use it because they can make anything “millions” of years old. Remember the moon landing? If the earth and the moon were millions of years old there should have been tens of feet of dust instead of a few inches. I do not deny the process of evolution that is evident in so many creatures, but without a first mover there is no beginning. The big bang just doesn’t cut it. The universe is just too complex to believe that two things bumped into each other and then everything came into existence. I place my faith in the One who has the power to speak this world into existence. Someday all truths will be realized, but unfortunately it will be too late for ye of little faith. I shutter to think what it must be like to go through life with no faith. Such a hopeless and meaningless existence. Well when you get tired of that way of life there is always room for one more believer. God bless you all. Believer or not.
-Proud little Bible thumper

In the end this is not a rational argument. It is the collision of facts vs. established beliefs, which people hold dear more than facts. The fact is
that the Bible is not supported with scientific facts, while scientific theories are.
The danger is that religious adherents feel so threatened, due to their ignorance of basic scientific knowledge, that they will resort to any means, lying, aggression, and even violence, to maintain their chosen belief system — behaviors that are not at all condoned by any kind of religious teaching.
In fact, these so-called fundamental Christians are not really Christians or religious at all. They are part of a neurotic tribe that aspires to force their beliefs on others, that is what really is going on. For them life is all about indoctrination and feeling secure in a community of like-minded. They crave having simple answers, and not having to use their God-given power of critical thinking to learn more about themselves, how they really behave in contrast to what religion teaches, and what deeper message about sincerity lies in their faith. In short, they should try directing their energies into their own religious practice and take responsibility for their deceitful actions.

I am not saying i don’t believe in micro evolution. That is a real thing. I am trying to figure out where evolutionists say the material for life came from.

Evolutionists are correct.
We are a cosmic accident that advanced enough to know how we advanced. Therefore, we are most likely alone in the universe and the chances of similar advanced lifeforms are practically impossible.
Why can’t they accept this?

Amazing the ignorance of basic scientific principles displayed by the creationists here – from asserting that the big bang was “two things [that] bumped into each other” to conflating the big bang with evolution. No wonder religious nuts fear science – they barely understand it at all, and it’s the nature of ignorant men to fear what they can’t comprehend.

I read some of the posts stating that those that believed in God were fools.
Well this is America and you have the right to post your comment no matter how stupid it is.
Thousands of dollars and hours spent year in and year out to try and figure out where we came from….anyone ever just look at the world? Just Nature? Where did that come from? Do people think this was a magic trick? Poof and here is a world.
If you want to come from Monkeys, so be it, I did not. If you do not believe that God is the Creator of Heaven & Earth, then think that way but do not put the ones down that do believe.
I am not a preacher and I have no right to preach to you about God , and you have no right to tell me and others we are wrong either.
I will die believing in God, and if….if I am wrong, so be it, my life is just ended. But on the other hand, if you do not believe and when you die and you end up standing before God,how will you explain putting him down?, how do you want to be roasted and that is forever, not just a few hours. Is it really worth the chance to you?? The ACLU will be there in hell, they have taken God out of our Country and we cannot wonder why times are so bad. People are not regilious nuts because they believe in God, I do not nor people I know walk around with a Bible in hand, we are out working everyday and are not imposing on your rights. These Left wing Churches, yes they make the statement true about a few bad apples..
This is not Planet of the apes..I know where life came from, it Came from God, wise up.

Why can’t everyone admit that both the evolution side and the Creation side have holes in them that can only be filled by Faith. Why not choose the faith that might lead you to eternal life, rather than the one that just has this life and nothing else, if we are just a accident, than our lives mean nothing, so take a chance and have faith in a God.

How come Religious kooks always want everybody to give God credit for their “successes” but want us to blame ourselves for our failures? Lame!

if people think we evolved from “monkeys” they would be wrong-
we are actually a divergence from a split of Chimpanzee-
The chimpanzee is 99.9% genetically the same as human beings. One school of thought believes that even after the split of chimpanzee and man, we perhaps hybridized for awhile, then finally split for good.
To watch nature and not believe in evolution is absolutely absurd. Animal life proves to us daily that evolution exists. Birds and fish are but one excellent example- read the Origin of the Species before you decide that evolution does not exist. I went to church before I decided that creationism was likely very UNLIKELY.

Science is a great endeavor..I don’t think there is an animal that has evolved into a scientist..yet..I have seen a documentary where monkey’s have devised a tool..for eating..and some know how to find a hot spot in winter..the differance if Darwin was too expand his thoughts more..//are the Creation of Freedom..where science really might play a very little part..God has played a more great part..the science cult..and the religion of God seem to excist like stream-lined parts of a formula..the best a man can do is just step back and watch the two go by.

Dave. I agree. People have the right to be wrong.

I live in denmark, and I really enjoy to relive this discution… My Parents used to tell me how they had an never ending fight with there parents about it.
see.. we came up with a GREAT solution.. we now have both sciens and religious classes in school.
In sciens we look at sciens and in religion we look at all kinds of religions.
And then we let people make there own mind.
And we respect there desicion.
P.S. Denmark is in europe (just in case).
(sorry about my bad english)

I am a Catholic who does not believe in the literal interpretation of the creation story. There are millions more like me who beleive in evolution, but also that God was the intelligent being that put it all into motion. I hate the way the media always portarys this as an either/or debate all the time.

If any naysayer has brains enough to read “Science, Evolution and Creationism” , he would gain an understanding of that which he presently has none of, and also realize he doesn’t have to abandon his religious faith by accepting the reality of evolution. If he can’t do that, or does and still clings to his ignorance, there’s no sense wasting time in further discussion with him.

I just watched ABC’s evening broadcast about the National Academy of Science’s report on Evolution, Science Education, and creationism. Kudos for airing the report, but the report emphasizes just how poor our national science education program is. ABC reported on national TV that humans are descendants of apes. In fact, apes and humans are descendants of a common ancestor. No wonder the public is confused!

Half the fossil record is MISSING from the Grand Canyon. It was there for the Cambrian Period, then it must have climbed into a time machine because it skipped the next 100 million years (there being no fossils for that time). Then about 250 million years ago the Grand Canyon must have climbed into that time machine again because there are no fossils in the Grand Canyon from then till now. It is much more scientific to see the fossil record as being laid down by shifting currents durring Noah’s Flood.

I love how athletes, celebrities, etc…who get on TV after a great game or winning award always “want to thank god for all the help, abilties, blah blah blah’ but after a BAD game or not winning an award, etc..NEVER BLAME god for not performing well, etc….Do some people think god only does good things but never bad?

The funny thing about this argument is the arguers. You have two sides who passionatly defend their position. Both sides make valid points on their behalf. The evolutionist says we evolved . . . The creationist says there is a grand design . . . Why can’t the two exsist? Instead of calling people kooks or anti-God, try to see the validity on both sides. Creationist, if God has given us the intellect that we have maybe there is some truth to the evolution arguement. Did God really give us this intelligence for nothing? No, He wants us to understand His creation, which does require some sceintific exploration. Evolutionsist, if we have shared a common ancestor with a monkey where is it? Does it not take faith to believe this “theory” as well. Just because scientist say it exsisted doesnt mean it has. Whatever side you believe, I think in this day and age maybe its a bit of both. Afterall most things in life work that way. I will rue the day when we get a definitive answer to this question, but sadly even then there will be doubters . . .

Genesis 1 was written by religious scholars to explain a very difficult question. There was no science to base their answer on. they only knew that god created everything somehow.So Genesis 1 was their best answer to a very complex idea.

As usual things are expected to fit the timeline defined by humans. So really, what is the significance between evolution and creation? Not everything is point A only. Some things still require more steps than one. Some are still debating which came first; the chicken or the egg? Is the chicken a mutation of another creature’s egg or did the chicken mutate an unusual egg? Ashes to Ashes and Dust to Dust. The master plan comes from somewhere.

Whatever happened to reporting all sides of a story? A Former reporter for the chicago Tribune, a former Atheist,was drawn to this very subject. Some, he also found a majority of Scientists who had a very opposite conclusion. If you were to really peport on a story as it were true, you would not use cleregy who actually themselves do not believe in God. You need to contact Lee Stroebel, and the scientists that he had used in his investigation, or maybe try to discredit these people. Just like these so called scientists who also call homosexuality normal behavior. Are there any homosexual societies that had lasted since 1900? Also, there is nothing in this article about the Dover PA decision. in the Judge’s ruling, he called himself a scientist, and somehow creationism is a religion. Religion is catholic, Baptist, buddism, Huduism, Islam, and Atheism not the Bible, and Creationism, The Seperatrion of Church and state was to keep thias country from having a state church, the dutch have with the Lutherans, and England had with the church of England . So, this stupid Judge does not even understand the constitution

Regarding the story pitting Evolutionism against Creationism, I notice that your online version was much more accurate than your on-air story which misrepresented several facts:
1. Most scientist do not believe that the earth is “hundreds of millions” of years old. The accepted number is more like 4.5 billion years.
2. You assume that all evangelicals subscribe to young earth creationism, which is not true.
3. You presented author Michael Denton for the young earth/evangelical side of the argument, and he is neither.
4. For the on-air piece, you completely ignore the Intelligent Design proponents.
5. For the on-air piece, you represented the NCSE spokesman as some sort of unbiased scientist, rather than an Evolution activist (which the NCSE clearly is).
6. For the on-air piece, you deliberately omit the fact that the NAS “report” is not a “new” finding, but rather an updated report.
I could go on. When I was told you were going to cover this issue tonight, I had vague hopes that you would cover it fairly and accurately. I was very disappointed.

There is a theory of gravity… does applying the word “theory” to the mathmatics that (perfectly) describe all observed gravity make gravity less real?
Please, let us be adults here. Either there is a Creator who made the universe or some universal principle of nature… but either way, after the Big Bang there is NO evidence of a divine creator taking matters into His divine hand!
Chaos theory (random events in the quantum universe cause particles of proto-matter to pop into existence all over the universe) adequately explains how the universe comes into being. It does not confirm OR deny the existence of God. In short, unless God decides to DO something, there is no reason to believe He exists.
To date, he has done nothing. He never stopped genocides, murders, wars, famines, infantacides or patricides. He never stopped tigers from eating lambs or one culture from conquering and exslaving other cultures.
He never stopped slavery, he never stopped the systematic abuse of women (usually most cruel in religious societies, by the way!) and he never left any intelligent proof that he exists.
All evidence for a God grows out of cave-man supersitition. Later, good people, trying to make better societies, formulated myths and legends to explain the universe, and in doing so, created the idea of “God”.
Thus, in the beginning, Man made God in his own image… not the other way around.
In China, God looks Chinese. In Africa, God looks African. And of course, in white, northern European societies, depictions of God tend to be blue-eyes and blond haired. Trace ANY religion back and it becomes a bunch of tribal beliefs based on naturism.
Anyway… “Evolution” should be thought of as a backwards map. It shows where species came from, along genomes in DNA, along maternal DNA in mitochondria, in gross anatomy (Felines, Bovines, Canines, Equines all evolved from quadraped mammals, etc.) and in chemical processes in the differing species. Every bit of evidence, including our own blood cells, prove that we all evolved from descendants from Africa, who in turn, descended from a now-exticnt species of primate related to Chimpanzees about 4-5 million years ago in eastern Africa.
All else is distortions and outright lies, motivated by political gain and personal ego.
Frankly, if there is a God, He had utterly failed to provide mankind with accurate, consistent instruction and even a modicum of protection from the ravages of (Chaotic) nature!
Yet I still, instinctively believe in God. Why? Maybe because humans like to believe we are not alone, all responsible for the things we do. We like to believe in Santa, and God is the ultimate Santa!
It would be very scary to accept that the cruelty of the world is our fault… so we would rather believe in a devil.
There is but ONE sign of intelligent life in the universe, and we are it.
Wake up, fellow beings, and quit dreaming!
John
Intelligent Being

Evolution is a theory. It takes faith to believe it just as it takes faith to believe in intelligent design. We do not have sufficient evidence that either one is completely disprovable or provable.
I think these “scientists” have failed to remember that even Darwin himself called evolution a “theory”. Since when did it become “fact”?

What are the odds of a monkey typing on a typewriter could write the complete works of Shakespeare? What would be the odds of that? 1 out of a “google” of zeros? And living matter is more complex than books!! And we are supposed to believe in those odds, versus a God who has told us he created all these things? What really is the harder to believe? I do believe things change, but I’ll never believe species change to different species. I will always believe that there was an Adam and Eve, and there was no death before the Fall of Adam, and the entire history of earth life since the Fall of Adam and Eve has been approx 6000 years..so far. We will find one day that is the truth. I’m all for science finding truth. But in that search, we have to go through a lot of silly myths that simply are not true.

To be fair… shouldn’t we consider everything about God to be a Theory?
Every society that has legends and myths and perhaps writing has evolved a form of animism that becomes a tribal religion. Over thousands of years, the babylonian mystical beliefs were inherited by the ancestors of modern religions. So Abraham blieved things about demons and angels that were part of the babylonian tradition. Of course, stories about Abraham and his offspring are the basis of the three major “revealed” religions of the world.
So isn’t all that history really the cause of
1) a Jewish theory of God,
2) a Christian theory of God and
3) a Moslem theory of God?
Let’s face it… all belief comes from superstition!
Where is the proof for the Theory of God?
John

I would really suggest that the creationists here attempt to study both sides of the issue before spreading lies in a chatroom. Many of the claims made here by creationists are just embarrassing to honest christians. I doubt many of them even read their own side’s material (creationist material that is). They just hear bible-friendly slogans and repeat them over and over witout really understanding any of the definitions or evidence invoked.
In the US about half of self-described christians are literal creationists. So its not as bad as it might be but it’s still pretty bad.
Just do yourself a favor and spend some time on the subject, with an open mind, exploring both sides. Regardless of your ultimate conclusion it’s an interesting subject and worth looking into.

Bull that is it.

The fact of evolution is indisputable. How life on earth started is still up for debate, but we’re getting closer to the answer. Perhaps life originated on Mars, and a meteor impact spread it to earth; perhaps space travelers emptied their septic systems here billions of years ago. For certain, a white bearded, benevolent deity had nothing to do with it. Belief in god is a trait of the weak-minded. For those who believe, tell god to say hello to santa and the easter bunny for dave in your prayers.

To Rosemary, humans haven’t been able to cure the common cold because it is a virus with many different strains. It has mutated many times over the course of its existance. So when you find a way to cure every last strain AND keep it from mutating again, we’ll listen to you.

99.9999999999% of the scientists on the planet accept evolution.
But a bunch of mall-shopping, fast-food-eating fundamentalists who spend just about zero time in rigorous academic pursuit of…anything… are going to tell them that they are wrong.
This is truly devolution.

Thanks Eric…I would like to add that there is no economic incentive for drug companies to CURE common colds as they make far more $$ selling products that treat its symptoms….

And the Great Flying Spaghetti Monster is just as viable of a candidate for the creation of the universe…and man

I’m a Christian and I believe in BOTH. If you’re too ignorant to understand that much of the Bible is metaphorical, then you’re just not worth talking to and your “faith” is both shallow and weak. God hates ignorance.

Thoimas, only one side of the story is supported by evidence!! The other side (ID/creationism lacks supporting evidence completely. That’s why!

EddieNHope
A circle IS flat! These contributions show exactly why religious beliefs have absolutely no place in public schools. Belief systems based on whatever dated revelations do not belong in discussions on topics that are presented and verified by logical thinking, the scientific process and observable and testable information.

MAN SAYS
“We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of it’s consrtucts… for we cannot allow a divine foot in the door” – Richard Lewontin, biologist
GOD SAYS
“The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God. – Psalm 14:1a

I am a supporter of science, and I believe that the theory of a God creating life and the theory of evolution can co-exist. The study of DNA is the study of life. So who makes the DNA? Where does it come from? And even though I believe in a God, I also think that religions are man-made and are therefore full of crap. Religion was invented by men wanting to manipulate people. I’ll admit I follow a particular religion, though I don’t belong to any church. Am I going to stand here and say that my religion is correct and all the others are wrong? NO!!! I’d rather say that my religion is also likely full of crap. But for some reason, I cling to it anyway, just like a child clings to their favorite warm and fuzzy blanket. Maybe I am weak. Maybe I need help. I have studied and pondered the reason for our existence for my entire life, but I still don’t have the answers. But neither does anyone else I know. Maybe this is how it is supposed to be.

What’s really troubling is how ignorant the creationists are. Many of them still believe the earth is 6,000 years old, despite the overwhelming evidence against that and none for it except in that little book of theirs. How can anyone expect them to understand evolution? It’s a waste of time.

Organized religion and organized government are both products of men for the purpose of controlling the masses. One uses the threat of eternal death and the other uses the threat of immediated punishment for disobeying. Say, the church did that for a while too didn’t it?

I am a scientist with an advanced degree and several patents. I believe that God created the Earth approximately 5,768 years ago; Why not believe the Jewish calendar? The flood of Noah explains the fossil record. There is no distinction between science and God. Science is the discovery of God’s creation.

The debate here is mistated. I grew up in a religious home, and studied dinosaurs and evolution of species in school. I have never considered my studies to be a contradiction of my faith. Where the “Evolutionists” become screwballs isn’t when they say evolution happened. It is when they say it happened through ACCIDENTAL mutation. There are not odds large enough to explain how a land/water based creature can accidentally mutate wings. It is impossible, just as the accidental or spontaneous printing of Gone With The Wind would be utterly impossible. Something intelligent obviously and logically had to direct the shaping of a wing to include the Bernoulli principle of air lift, not to mention hollow bones and other requirements. To suggest that arms or legs, or webbing of a gliding squirrel, could somehow respond to environmental factors into a wing, is nothing short of Mental. It is not a matter of Odds. It is flat out impossible. You have to admit the existence of intelligence somewhere guiding all of this along. What the nature of the intelligence is, and whether it is a single all powerful God over all creation — that could be an interesting debate and argument. But to say we are just an accidental outgrowth of amino acids a zillion years ago is to refuse to you use your god-given brain.

I believe in evolution- to a degree. But to say life evolved out of a protein in some water that was hit by lightning is a big stretch of my imagination. If an evolutionist is “smart” enough to believe that garbage, then he must have come from a monkey. There are other questions regarding irreducable complexity and the fact no GENUS of species has any proof of evolving into another GENUS of species. In other words, not only is there no “missing link” for humans, there is no missing link for any other genus either- as in dogs and fish, cats and reptiles, etc.

Having read through all of these postings, I must say, am truly bothered by the attitude displayed here towards people of faith. There is absolutely no need to call other people names or make fun of opposing viewpoints. It shows not only an extreme amount of hatred and intolerance, but does nothing to get the opposing side to listen carefully to the arguments you are making. Stop trying to put people down who view things differently than you do. Believe what you believe—-live and die by it—-but do not think because others believe something completely different than you do, that it somehow makes you a more intelligent, better person. It is not only arrogance personified, but betrays a fear that the other side could perhaps be correct after all. If you are correct, the other side will eventually know it—as will you, in the end, should they be correct. It is this bullying of one another in the public square and refusal to have a reasoned and thoughtful debate without resorting to personal insults that makes this topic so volatile. Please remember that, everyone has a right to their opinion in this nation–no matter what you may think of it—and it is our willingness to allow for open, public debate and differences that makes this nation so unique. To resort to ‘Neanderthal’ tactics when a creationist refuses to swallow what you may believe is fact, only shows that you have not yet ‘evolved’ to the place where you should be admitted into such public forums. The Christians have a right to demand that you provide absolute proof of what you want to teach to their children—especially if you want to contradict what they are teaching them at home. And, according to our Constitution, they also STILL would have the right to reject your ‘proof’ once you provide it, if it goes contrary to their own religious beliefs. The Universe and all it contains is a wonderous thing. Surely it is large enough to hold all our theories and beliefs within it, until the end, when we are all faced with the Truth. In the meantime, let us, as reasoned creatures at least attempt to respect one another for the marvellous beings we are–regardless of how we came to be…..

Well if you don’t believe in evolution, try selective breeding. That seems to be a very proactive way to make rather rapid improvments and divergences in just about everything we see these days. How many different kinds of dogs can you imagine were around 5000 years ago? And not all changes are for the better in humans either. We now have the means to keep defective breeders alive long enough to pass plenty of bad genes along with some of the good ones they may also have. I do not advocate forced selective breeding of humans, but we certainly practice a lot of voluntary selective breeding on our own. Whether that is to maintain a certain culture, or etnicity or whatever reason we use to select our breeding partners, it seems to be working to keep us more apart with lots of differences rather that making all the same. Viva la difference.

C’mon people. Whether biological evolution occurs and whether God exists are two entirely different subjects with nothing to do with each other. This blog entry was about the scientific evidence for evolution, which is indeed compelling. So why are people talking about God? Anyone here who thinks denying God will somehow help the scientific case for evolution is obviously not a scientist, and neither is anyone who thinks they have to disprove evolution in order to believe in God.

Evolution is not totally random. If it were we would not be here. The process of natural selection prevents most mutations from becoming predominate unless that change leads to a better survival rate. Lots of experiments fade out when stronger, more agressive, and more plentiful evolution entries either drive them to oblivion or eat them.

Whenever people tell me they don’t believe in evolution, I ask them whether they believe in gravity – it’s “just a theory,” too, after all. Sometimes the best way to kill a dumb idea (creationism) is with humor. Anyone who thinks humans aren’t related to apes has obviously never spent any time around children…or driven on the Washington DC Beltway…

There are two “toms” posting on this board who have different passwords. I am NOT the “tom” who made the dumb comment about how “there should be millions of fossils, but in reality there are none.” I am the other “tom”. Of course there are fossils – billions of them. Please don’t confuse me with this guy. I’ll leave this board now, so as not to be confused with him.

It was good that we either were given or evolved a means to live here on our planet with all its poisonous gases and weather extremes. I find that we exist at all is itself a wonderment that boggles the mind. Just when we actually became humans may be a question of timing, but mankind had better still evolving or we won’t be around to think about it much longer.

swandarox | Jan 3, 2008 9:20:22 PM … your post: “…I believe in evolution- to a degree. But to say life evolved out of a protein in some water that was hit by lightning is a big stretch of my imagination…”
I believe in the Bible – to some degree, but to say woman was born out of some man’s rib is a big stretch for me.

There are many different questions being “debated” in this thread, all under the guise of “evolution”. Let’s break this discussion down a bit…
Q: Is evolution a fact?
A: Yes, provided the question is referring to micro-evolution (mutations within a species). This is indisputable and needs to be taught in schools. However, it gets a bit more interesting when people try to apply this status to macro-evolution (one species transitioning into another), since it is not possible to confirm. Those who want to believe this transition occurs will see the fossil record as supporting their position. Those who do not believe this transition has ever occurred will look at the same fossil record and see that it supports their position. One can wave his hands and say that macro-evolution is just a series of micro-evolutions but he shouldn’t be surprised when thinking people don’t believe him. Teaching this aspect as fact in schools is what a lot of people disagree with.

I would like to say that I agree with Joann in the previous post. Respect for others and their views is one of the characteristics of a learned individual.
I would also like to comment on what I perceive to be a major difference between science and religion. Religion appears to be an answer in search of an audience to inform. Religions all proclaim to speak a Truth. The basis for this truth might be debated (but not here). This truth is fundamental in that it deals with who we are and where we come from and where we are going.
Science on the other hand is a process of discovery and re evaluation. the Answer is not known but only deduced. I suspect that any scientist who subscribes to the theory of evolution would happily admit that it could be wrong. Science is a process that changes its mind often based on new evidence. This new evidence is then assimilated and the answer is then re evaluated.
Based on this perspective intelligent design is not science as it already has an answer that it is attempting to justify. Neither is it the other side of the argument from evolution as a scientific theory. Scientific inquiry isn’t trying to prove a truth, it is trying to find out what it is.

“Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”
-Albert Einstein-
I still dont’t believe in evolution.
Go God!

On, and PLEASE, EVERYONE, learn the facts here: EVOLUTION IS A FACT. It is NOT a theory. It is not a hypothesis. It is not open for discussion. WHY Evolution happens is where the theories come from: Natural Selection (Darwin), sudden mutation, environmental pressure and adaptation, or a combination of all of them with other factors not yet discovered. The only thing is a theory must be provable and supported by evidence. It’s not THE answer, but a possible contributor to the answer. All of the theories (Except Intelligent Design) are fully supported by the evidence and NOT disprovable by that evidence. Intelligence Design has been disproven and is therefore not considered a valid theory in support of the fact of evolution and because of that, belongs in a science class about as much as astrology, tarot card and tea leaf reading. It is, however, an excellent example of how a person’s religious bias can subvert
sound scientific research. (The original researcher failed to take the evidence to it’s logical conclusion, stopping at several key point and not going any further because to do so would have undermined his hypothesis in the first place.) Stop talking about evolution as a theory. It isn’t. That’s the point of the announcement.

First of all, there is a difference between a “theory” in the general sense and a scientific “theory” A “theory” in the general sense is equal to what is called a hypothesis in science. A scientific theory is a proven hypothesis.
The huge amounts of evidence collected in the last 150 or so years leads to the conclusion that evolution is true. Like
the Theory of Gravity, Stress Theory (used to keep bridges from falling) or Aerodynamic Theory. This has NOTHING to do with God’s existence. If anyone tells you the Theory of Evolution disproves God, they don’t know what they are talking about. Believing evolution is true does not mean you have no one to be accountable to. That’s total nonsense. Macro evolution is the same as micro-evolution. You will never see a duck turn into a cat. Thats not how Macro-evolution works. Natural Selection is NOT completely random, so probabilities are essentially meaningless. The environment in which a mutation occurs determines whether a mutation is beneficial or deleterious. Mutations aren’t automatically bad.
There are NO respected, intelligent scientists who think the Earth is less than 10,000 years old.
Your faith should be strong enough to honestly consider the Modern Theory of Evolution (MET)

The Second Law of Thermodynamics requires a thermodynamic mechanism to explain the increase in entropy, which evolution requires. The generalized mechanism of mutation and natural selection is too general. It is like postulating a vehicle mechanism to explain all the types of mechanisms used in transportation. The problem with this mechanism is that it fails to explain the details of the processes. Real engines require details explaining the processes. So too, Darwinian theory fails to address the billions upon billions upon billions of processes required for the development of life. Unfortunately the propagandizing of science is occurring by proponents of evolution. Insidiously, they are crying that Neo-Darwinian theory be given a free ride. It is time to stand up against the propagandizing of science and force these hucksters to explain the details of the processes.

We will never truly know how the universe was created (meaning from the beginning). The elements that came together to create this ‘big bang’; where did those elements come from (the gases and other elements that created that big bang)? If we evolved then why don’t new humans form today from monkeys, or whatever? If we evolved from monkeys or whatever then why are there still monkeys or whatever (I guess only certain types evolved and their whole DNA code changed? Some folks who have a near death experience talk about seeing a white light? I think they just see white (in their eyes) because the mind (their brain) is dying (in the process of dying) behind their eyes; and if doctors revive them that information is recorded in their brain while it was still active. It is hard to believe in a God who allows all this death and destruction on our planet. This word ‘freewill’ is an escape clause Christians use to justify all this death and destruction. If evolution was so real then every planet would spawn life (no matter the climate it was in). As they say ‘life finds a way’ but it reality it doesn’t. There isn’t any life on any other planet we have around us (but if evolution was true to form there would be no matter what). We should have humans (animals or plants) on the planets closer to the sun who could live with all the heat (evolution) and humans who could live on planets with no heat – also because of evolution. Evolution requires so many things to be ‘just right’ for life to spawn it makes perfect sense to me that our planet is the only planet in the whole universe with life. I could see that. How was this God formed? Did this God have parents or is this God just a collection of highly evolved energy? Maybe this God is some alien from another planet who is thousands of years more advanced than we are? This God figured dropped by and stayed a few years – gave us some rules and we created this bible from that information? Maybe everything on this planet was transplanted from another world that was dying to save their race? Maybe we are just a lab experiment from some advance race playing with us let pets? So many theorys – it is all a guessing game filled with ideas and imagination. No matter what if this God does exists, from the bible, they we are all in big trouble some day. It is hard to believe in evolution or hard to believe in a God. I could believe in both. Evolution created the universe and created life. This God (we worship) is some advance race (thousands of years more advanced than we are). This being created life on this planet like a lab, because they were dying off. So many possible choices and I just hope we find out someday what really happened. I don’t beleive in life after death, but I can still hope.

Wow. Im shocked. Im a deist and searching Christian and I could be wrong but I feel like some people, given the chance, would like to go all “natural selection” on me and kill me for getting in the way of evolution.
Apparently Im a brainless moron for believing in God and questioning evolution. Thanks guys. Way to live that tolerance youre always talking about.

Thank God [metaphorically speaking, of course] I live in Australia, where the original article wouldn’t raise as many hackles — and most of the resultant angry “criticisms” of it would be met with bemused tolerance.
As a relevant old saying used to go, “Anyone for tennis?”

Answer to Question #1 There is no overwhelming evidence proving evolution false. Not even minor evidence. Gaps in knowledge don’t count.
Answer to Question #2 There is no evidence proving creation true. Has anyone found the Ark? No. Is the Earth only 6,000years old? Nope.
To Eric:
Evolution has no problem with the Law of Thermodynamics. That’s creationist nonsense.
Do you know whats really special about the Tiktaal fossil? It was predicted to
have existed BEFORE it was found. Its location was also predicted. Correctly.
They didn’t find this fossil by accident. Its existence was predicted using Modern Evolutionary Theory. Not the scientifically vacuous Intelligent Design hypothesis. The prediction was made and…hey! There it was.

EricJ, I happen to work in the field of engineering thermodynamics and I can tell you there is a problem with evolution related to the Second Law. Without a detailed mechanism controlling the processes, you are left in probability fantasy land. The coupled nature of biologic systems makes the development of new systems too improbable. Evolution requires a multitude of very precise mutations, which makes the mutations impossible given the allowed time. The biologic systems are coupled on the macro, semi-macro and nano levels (a multitude of levels really). The evolutionary mechanism is really shown to be no mechanism at all for it fails to explain the details of the billions upon billions of processes required for life. I say billions upon billions but this number does not really capture the number of processes required for all lifeforms over all time.
The problem with biology today is that evolution is assumed to be true, and so answers outside the evolutionary framework are disallowed. As an engineer, I can tell you that designing a robot to mimic humans is impossible given the enormous technological complexity of life. Even the very “simple” things such as balance and communication are difficult to design. The notion of reproduction of engineered systems (like life) is completely outside our capability. Biologists loose the realization of the technological marvel of these systems given that they just modify living things. They don’t have to design the molecular and macro details required to make systems found in life. The indoctrination in evolution is so widespread that few are able to challenge it without fear of loosing their jobs.

If a first cause is required for the development of humanity, life, and the universe and that first cause is God, then who built God? The Big Guy must have had an Intelligent Designer, too, if we are consistent and follow the religious argument into the void.

All this talk from creationists/zealots about evolution being only a “Theory” and therefore not worthy of being taught in science class is very interesting. By that line of irrational “reasoning” the “Theory” of gravity is also not worthy of being taught in physics class and the Pythagoran “theorem” (singular)should be banished from geometry class. Creationists, to avoid being abject hypocrits, kindly expand your focus to reject ALL theory from sciense classes.
I also find it interesting that many, though not the majority, of evolutionists/athiests reject the bible outright. Jericho DOES exist, and the walls DID collapse suddenly. Whether that was from an earthquake (as some scientists believe) or from a religious rock band tooting horns as bible literalists believe is an open question. BUT there are many, many other biblical passages which have been proven to be at least allegorically true, with scientific evidence to back it up.

If Noah had an ark the size of the Nimitz he could not fit all the animals of the world on it, and could you just see lions and tigers living next to chickens peacefully.This argument against evolution makes the USA look silly and backward.

I don’t understand why many people believe science is the enemy of religion. Science and religion strive to meet the same end,to explain that which cannot be explained. Ultimately the goal should be the same, the pursuit of truth. If evolution is true, does that automatically mean that God did not plan it that way? How does anyone know that is not part of the Divine Plan? Whether it took six days or six million years to create, the fact that we exist at all is truly remarkable. There is enough imperical evidence to substanciate the theory of evolution. Although there are some questions that cannot be completely explained by evolution, the Faihful need’nt feel as though God is being diminshed in anyway. You can still believe that God created the earth AND believe in evolution. If anything it illustates how magnificent His creation really is. By the way, Charles Darwin was a devout Christian and theology student at Cambridge University. Darwin believed in God and felt that evolution was a means to demonstrate His magnificence. The Big Bang Theory was the brain child of MSGR. Georges Lemaitre, a Roman Catholic Priest. This is a man who dedicated his life to God yet was the author of one of the most widely accepted scientific theories of all time. Science is not the enemy of God. Ignorance is the enemy of everyone. The pursuit of truth is most important, it even says so in the Bible. Science may one day prove God’s existance or may prove that he never existed at all. That is a frightening thought for many. The fact is, neither science or religion has the answers for everything and that is precisely why we need to continue to ask questions and explore new avenues of thought.

It’s amazing that in polls over 90% of the people in this country believe in God yet if you mention God having anything to do with creating this world than there is this huge upheaval.

As many of the comments posted here make clear, many people reject the idea of evolution without bothering to understand the simple and compelling reasoning involved or to review and understand the readily observable consequences of ongoing evolution.
This is one piece of evidence that much of our populace is brainwashed and/or intellectually lazy. And sadly dangerous.

WOW.
WOW. WOW. WOW.
all this discussion and such little progress.
if there is a god, and we were made in his image,
it would seem that it is a stubborn god indeed.
and here’s something more to discuss…
it would also seem that all religions have an
evolutionary aspect to them. they start out from
humble beginnings with only a few followers, and
then, either evolving into large complex organizations
or dieing out… we no longer throw people into volcanoes
in order to insure good crops. we look back at that
and think about how stupid it was to think that the
actions of a few human deaths could change the weather.
how will the future look at what we are believing in right now?
will we be judged as we judge those who firmly believed
that human sacrifice was a good idea? i hope so.

*headkeyboard*
*headkeyboard*
*headkeyboard*
I can’t believe I actually read this thread from beginning to end. It was painful. That’s what I get for having a screwed-up circadian rhythm and nothing else to do at 3am, lol.
Ok, here’s the thing. Evolution? ***NOT A BELIEF.*** YOU DON’T GET TO CHOOSE WHETHER TO BELIEVE IN IT OR NOT because whether or not you do, it is happening right under our noses. It’s a *scientific* THEORY, which means that it is a hypothesis that was tried and tested throughout the ages and has LOADS of evidence backing it up, as opposed to *some random person’s* theory that may or may not have evidence. You could say that a scientific theory is some random person’s theory which has been supported overwhelmingly by experiments, evidence from the natural world, etc.
SCIENTIFIC THEORIES aren’t just random ramblings scientists pull out of their ###. Get that straight before you ramble on that “Evolution is just a theory, blah blah.” Gravity was a Theory too, until centuries and centuries of experiments turned it into Law. Many scientists over the years tried to disprove the Law of Gravity or propose alternate theories, but it stood the test of time. Right now, many scientists are doing the same for Evolution, and it is holding up. Evolution has holes, yes, but evidence is plugging up these holes fast. Intelligent Design has so many more holes, and scientists have “driven a mack truck through it,” so to say.
The reason why schools won’t allow ID in the classrooms is because it is bad science that stemmed from religious beliefs. Even if it didn’t stem from religious beliefs, it would still not pass muster because of the lack of *scientific* evidence. That’s all. And no, the Bible is not *scientific* evidence.
Anyway, here’s my 2c on this whole debate: God created evolution. There’s no reason the two can’t get along, as extremists on both sides claim. The Theory of Evolution just describes that life changes (and has changed over billions of years) through several mechanisms (natural selection, mutation, etc). It does not say who set this process into motion or what is the purpose of life.
Putting it in simpler terms, science describes what happened (diversity of life), when it happened (depends on who you ask, but it started around 3.5 Ga and is continuing presently), and how it happened (microevolution, macroevolution, natural selection, etc), and religion describes who set things into motion (the Creator, God, FSM, IPU, Allah, Odin, Giant Eagle, Pan Gu, etc), and why (to glorify God, because God was bored, because there was a great war in heaven etc). Totally different spheres, people. Both science and religion have a claim to where, religion saying we came from Nothing, from a tortoise and a snake, from dismembered body parts of a giant, etc and science saying we came from outer space, from a life soup in the ocean, etc.
As I said, I believe a God created evolution. You are free to believe the FSM created evolution, or that Izanami and Izanagi did, or [insert favorite deity here] did. Just don’t force it down my throat, and those of other people.

Why are the religious so defensive about science making a few claims here and there? If your god is the ultimate being then why should it be threatened by a few mere humans that believe they share a common ancestry with another species? Is your god really that pathetically weak that you have to run to its defense every time someone in the scientific community makes a claim that could shatter your illusion of its existence? Your god has nothing to worry about and instead of worrying about what everyone else in the world is doing and saying maybe you all should be more concerned with your lack of faith in your all powerful god. If your god wants the answers to all these questions found, then don’t you think that it would provide those answers in no uncertain truths because it is said that God (in the western christian sense) is not a god of confusion. So instead of listening to those knuckleheads from Liberty University or anyone else for that matter just pray that the answers will be revealed and when they are there will be no doubt on any side from any person. So basically, shut up, pray to your god, and stay out of the way and let the rest of do what we will do.

I am an Evolutionist, and I also believe God created everything. I see no conflict in this because nowhere in the ‘Creation Story’ of Genesis is a “Day” defined as 24 hours. Who can say that the first “Day” of creation was exactly 24 hours or a million “years” long? …And the same for each subsequent day in the six days of creation. Who can say that the creation of man (Adam) was not achieved by God through an evolutionary process that spanned who-knows-how-long?

JT – I completely agree with you that “Science should not try to wipe out religious beliefs. That is not its purpose.” And religious education is also important, whether at home, in churches, or even in some classrooms. But NOT in science classes. Religion is not science. Science is not religion. Both are valuable. The ONLY conflict we have is when people claim that there is more scientific evidence for biblical creation than for biological evolution. As the NAS review that this blog points us to shows so well, such a claim is completely and obviously wrong.

a note to all religious people;
you guard your beliefs like an alcoholic guards their bottle.
read a book or two about atheism or agnosticism. i dare you.
you may just ingest a form of comfort that’s better than what you were fed as a child.
science isn’t afraid of a little contradictory evidence (empirical evidence not subjective evidence). in fact they appreciate it. that is what makes it such a great method of exploration/explanation. it doesn’t rely on dogma. this may be why you feel so threatened by it. a logical way of thinking makes sense and you don’t want lose your main source of comfort to it. you just don’t realize that there’s a huge deal of comfort to be gained by seeing the world as it really is, clearly and truthfully. sure, there might be a god. but the odds are pretty slim and when you don’t actually know something you have to truthfully admit you don’t actually know it (go ahead. make some more stuff up to explain things). otherwise you’re denying the real truth. sort of like an alcoholic guards their bottle of comfort… just do us all a favor and don’t give your kids anything to drink that may cripple them (and the rest of us) in the future. not allowing them a choice is very similar to child abuse and just seems like a very irresponsible thing to do. they should be told about their options in a truthful non-biased way. and the best way for you to do that is to read a book or two about atheism or agnosticism. i dare you.

“is god willing to prevent evil but not able,
then he is not omnipotent.
is he able but not willing,
then he is malevolent.
is god both able and willing,
then whence cometh evil?
is he neither able nor willing,
then why call him god?”
epicurus
341-271 bce (before christian era)
interesting thoughts from 2,300 years ago eh?
even more interesting are the lengths that the
church has gone to over the millennia to suppress
this kind of thinking. for example, there was a
period of time in england that blasphemy and
atheism was punishable by death…
any thoughts on this?
here’s another one:
“there is
in every village a torch:
the schoolteacher
and an extinguisher:
the priest.”
victor hugo
1802-1885
kinda makes you think doesn’t it…
don’t worry, it’s ok to think.
i find that thinking takes my mind
off stuff.

If God wants everyone to believe, why doesn’t he just show up as a, I don’t know, a big face in the sky and command everyone to believe while demonstrating some grand omnipotent gesture or sign. If he did that every once in a while I’m sure there would be more believers but I’ll bet it doesn’t happen soon.

Most people arguing for creation or against evolution via these comments are utterly and demonstrably ignorant of the science.
Evolution has several hundred fossils of “missing links” or transitional species. Evolution is a science because it’s made thousands of predictions, all of which have been experimentally or observationally confirmed (proven).
One such theory was that the jump from fish to amphibian SHOULD have occurred about 360 million years ago. And it would have occurred where a water of that period met land. And evidence (fossils) would be found in a place that would be conducive to the process of fossilization AND one such place was Nunavut in Canada, on Ellesmere Island.
So scientists dug there and found it.
You see, science made a prediction, and the remains (the fossil) was found precisely where evolution predicted it.
Evolution doesn’t say that we came from monkeys, it says that we share a common “ancestor” and that ancestor has long since died off.
There are no holes in evolution. Each time we make new discoveries, and find further proof, the ID people have to change their arguments.
Creationist don’t have a provable theory. Their argument is consistently “OH YEAH, WELL WHERE DID THIS COME FROM” which is not proof for their own argument.
That’s why creationism isn’t a science. It makes NO predictions.
Creationists, find me a human fossil from the Jurassic era, or a dog skeleton from the devionian or a bird or vertebrate land animal from the pre-carboniforous(sp).
All, and I repeat ALL the evolutionary experiments have been repeatedly performed under peer-review conditions to confirmative success for about 100 years. Every molecular biology study supports evolution (and there have literally been thousands).

It says in Leviticus (sp?) that it is an abomination for a man to sleep with his sister. If Adam and Eve were the first two people, who were their kids procreating with?

Well, the “discussion” has run its course…
“Because your mind is too arrogant to understand that you can’t understand, doesn’t make your position valid that God does not exist.”
That sounds really profound, but it is the height of silliness…
You do realize that this sort of sophistry works for BOTH sides?
-
Because your mind is too arrogant to understand that you can’t understand, doesn’t make your position valid that EVOLUTION does not exist.
-
This isn’t a discussion, its a merry go ’round for those who think their beliefs trump facts. Sounds positively Dark Age.
I expect the Magical thinkers will be storming the universities with their torches & pitchforks any day now.

The issue is not whether a species evolves. It does within it own species. However, the scientific community pushes evolution without that limitation. That is irresponsible science. They claim that there must be a missing link. Sounds like a non-factual faith. :)
So contain your disbelief in God to explaining how the universe came into existence. The answer “the Big Bang” doesn’t cut it.

ID can make predictions. Here is one that I will put forward. One day when science advances, we will discover that the robustness of life is programmed into lifeforms. Random mutation and natural selection are not the direct cause of the micro-changes we see in life. It is the programming we see in life that changes the lifeforms due to the environment. This whole framework of natural descent will be shown to be a fraud.
I should point out that not all ID proponents think alike. Some do believe in natural descent.
I think Brian’s comment about using belief in Creationism as tool in deciding who to hire is bigoted and without merit.
I should point out that many Creationists and ID proponents do work in the sciences at very prominent institutions. So we are not against science! We favor science and fight back against those who use propaganda to silence legitimate scientific discussion. The theory of evolution has some major areas where the science does not support it. One major area is the supposed mechanism of evolution, which can be argued to be no mechanism at all.

If creation myths are to be discussed at schools (NOT in the Science classroom, it doesnt belong there), why dont we discuss Aboriginal Dreatime, Inuit Raven creation myths etc. etc. What is so special about the judeo-christian viewpoint ?? Its just one of many, and all are equally valid from a religious point of view.

Billy – you are like most IDers: all rhetoric and NO rigourous, sophisticated, testable scientific predictions. Saying that there is no mechanistic data for the evolutionary process is not laughable – just sad. Read the NAS report before you speak.

hey einstein-
i’m thinking you have me confused with percy… (the comment right before mine)
i’m on your side.
“i don’t see any god up here”
-yuri gagarin (speaking from orbit)
see?

da, comrade… 8-)

Impossible Eric. There is no way to test something like that because there is no way we can predict what the environment or what conditions will be put upon living organisms in the future, near or distant. The only possibility is to see what has come before us and the adaptations that have been made up until based on what we know about the past. So, since we cannot possibly predict the future there is no way to test for any possible limitations.

Eric – you have such a simplistic idea of what science and testable hypotheses really are. If I strip the mumbo jumbo away from your statements there is nothing left. The second law of thermodynamics cant be understood by just reading wikipedia – that moldy old creationist argument has been refuted time and again – the evolving earth is neither a closed system nor at equilibrium – unlike a creationists mind.
IDers are soooo good at misunderstanding science, but again this is more sad than laughable.

Why do you say that all religion has caused so many problems. you just classified all religions as the ones in the middle east that like to kill each other, you know that is not what they all are, so why did you say it.

Wow, it’s going to take a long time to digest all this. Folks need to read the book “More Light and Less Heat” to help them calm down and discuss this issue. The majority of what I’ve scanned so far adds nothing to the debate. So I challenge all to consider defining their terms so at least we’re all talking about the same thing. Like, what is science? Some wrongly equate science with naturalism – no God allowed. Sorry, but I don’t think my God flunked biology. And then they want to interchange the General Theory of Evolution (molecules to man) with mutation and adaptation. The latter has been observed. The former has not. No indisputable instance of new information being generated by mutation and adaptation exists. That is necessary but not sufficient for GTE. And how this discussion diverted into the merits of various religions just emphasizes the inability to stay on target.

It seems that a lot of you exhibit an example of how the human brain could have stopped somewhere along the evolutionary path in your belief of ‘evolution’…Which Darwin did not believe himself — read the book. Better yet, read Schulte’s book — Origins…Science or Fantasy? — It will guide you through Darwins’ rantings. But, please explain how we went from monkey brain to the incredibly undescribably complex brain function of say — just speech. (Which yes only humans fully can do.) Where are the missing links? And, ‘ug’ does not count for an in-between language. Find one and write back. They do not exist because God is the most complex scientist which none can not finitely test, but only study.
There is no evolution, just variation of various ‘kinds.’ That four legged fish is still — yes a fish. You can deny God but he is still with you.

This is the ‘dark ages’ when scientists deny that biology, archeology, physics, biology and geology are intertwined with their engineer. You let your PERSONAL belief – athiesm – become intwined in these sciences. Where was that missing link by the way? I noticed you didn’t address that?

This has nothing to do with religion or science. It has to do with control and man wanting to be God and not admitting that there is a God that is greater then them. Anyways, the killers of Columbine used evolution to explain why they killed their fellow students. No wonder we have so many self esteem problems when we teach our kids that they came from pond scum. What do they have to live for?

To be honest, I only read a small number of comments so my point may have been made already. If indeed we were made by survival of the fittest, if we got here by millions of years of death, disease, bloodshed, and violence, then why do we try to stop that process? I mean, how arrogant are we to say that we should try to slow down and stop the very process that gave us everything we know? I say let’s shut down all hospitals and let survival of the fittest reign again so that those that survive will be better. Let’s let loose all the sociopaths, all the child rapists, all those that are in prison. How dare us to attempt to deny evolution from moving on. We’ve earned the right to do anything we want because we’ve survived thus far. Survival of the fittest. That way, we continue the process. That way we don’t anger the next generation from being arrogant enough to put ourselves and our laws, which don’t really mean anything anyway because evolution uses no laws, no rules, no regulations. Let’s just go around and kill as many people as we can because that would weed out the weak. Those that survive will be better off than those that died. Let’s go back to our roots and make the world a better place by survival of the fittest. I hope my point is clear.

It never ceases to amaze me how egocentric the USA is – doyou not realise that the whole world is laughing at you over this? that the whole world will be way ahead of you in scientific developments in a few years because of this? When are you going to wake up and start thinking?

Haha.
Science is not formed by public debate. Taking part in public debates gives creationism a gravitas it doesn’t deserve.
Creationism knows it isnt science which is why it tries to woo public opinion with stunts such as debates.
Where are the testable, falsifiable, predictions of creationism?

You are right, Maxify55. It is a preposterous assertion; it also has utterly nothing to do with the theory of evolution, though it is commonly used to “refute” the possibility of abiogenesis and has been refuted countless times. The argument you cite was originally presented by 18th. century preacher William Paley, who used a watch as his example of a created item that couldn’t have arisen by chance. The problem is that watch springs and computer chips aren’t the same as atoms and molecules that are capable of interacting and organizing themselves on their own through electro-chemical reactions. Simple systems of units governed by a handful of simple rules – like atoms and molecules – are capable of producing very complex systems all on their own. Evolved systems (e.g.; biological systems) do NOT happen by sheer random chance, though chance does play a part. Natural SELECTION works upon such systems, causing them to accumulate certain spontaneous, “random” changes (inherited traits), that are conducive to the system’s survival of the selection process. Over time these advantageous traits accumulate in the system, leading to its complexity and making it appear for all the world that it was “designed.” This is why natural selection is also often referred to as “cumulative selection.”

There is not common link between us and Apes.The so called “Missing Link” doesn’t exist.What these evolutionists are doing is pushing their atheist beliefs on us by trying to debunl creativity and Jesus and anything Christian so they can feel good about changing morals to fit their immoral lifestlyes. Many gay groups donate money to these science losers to help them turn “evil” around as a good thing and “good” as a bad thing.Lies,Lies,Lies!

Evolutionists like to try to wiggle out of the probability problem concerning evolution because it dooms the theory. The heart of the Second Law of Thermodynamics concerns probability. Processes tend to go in one direction. For example, the air molecules will tend to disperse out of a balloon once the opening of the balloon is let go. This is because the most probable state is for the molecules to leave the balloon through the opening. Now it is technically possible for the balloon to blow up bigger by air molecules from the outside traveling into the balloon at a greater rate than those entering. But, we know this will never happen because the probability is just too small. This would violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The same can be said about the development proposed by Neo-Darwinian evolution. There is a gigantic number of possible states for a given genome. The problem for evolution is that life is highly coupled. The systems are extremely intricate and detailed. New systems, for example eyes, require a large number of mutations. The systems need something to encourage selection, or else no advancement is possible. Without the functioning system, there is no increased fitness. Selection will not happen.

KB6, it’s the same reason that makes it possible for crystals to grow, or steam to condense. Local changes that seem to violate the second law are allowed, because it only applies to thermally ISOLATED systems. Creationists tend to deal in scientific half-thruths.

I appreciate everyone’s comments. And there are some great minds working in the above blogs. OK, religion should not be taught in a science class, but the theory of Intelligent Design is an argument against the theory of Absolute Evolution (Big Bang, No God). These things are debatable. Many parents do not want their children to hear only one side of the story in school, and this happens when schools are prohibited from teaching religions. God gave mankind a will to choose – that is His gift – a free will. Some people choose not to believe in Him. But those who do, should not be insulted or censored. He can’t be explained in terms of science or analysis by human minds. What science has revealed so far about evolution is fascinating, but for some reason, there are anti-spiritual people who make use these theories negatively to destroy the beliefs of others. Peace.

David,
You are throwing up smoke screens, like you find all over the web! Yes, when the temperature goes below 32F it freezes with 100% probability. This is nothing like life, where you have not only complexity of form but also complexity of function. Freezing confines the number of micro-states of water into positions consistent with the molecular structure, but this in no way comes close to the nanomachines that compose life. Comparing the thermodynamic process of freezing with the development of life is dishonest. Life consists of specific components that need to be assembled in very specific and detailed processes. Life reproducing is not a problem because you have all the DNA instructions, logic, and nanomachines working together, utilizing the energy, to assemble it — enabling entropy to decrease. The problem is the supposed advancement due to evolution. You don’t have the thermodynamic mechanism, instructions, templates, nanomachines, etc that very precisely use energy enabling the processes to occur. Pointing out simple mechanisms found in nature, like freezing, in no way explains the enormously complex mechanisms required to build life. It is like a child jumping in the air, noticing the increase in height and saying that he can jump to the moon!

The Second Law of Thermodynamics also applies to open systems. You may have energy flowing into a system, but without a mechanism to utilize the energy, you will not see a localized decrease in entropy. Now, I should point out some simple mechanisms found in nature that can exploit the energy. The water cycle is one example. Another is geothermal geysers. But the function found in natural mechanisms are always limited in scope because of Nature’s limited ability to constrain boundary conditions. Again, this goes to the heart of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, because it is related to probability. Once you have more than a few required constraints imposed on a natural system, the probability of these systems being found in nature are very remote! So this is why we don’t see airplanes being constructed naturally in the environment. The probability of constraining all the boundary conditions required in the construction of the airplane are just too remote. These boundary conditions are time dependent, have geometrical constraints, and are relevant to a multitude of properties found in physics.
From an engineering thermodynamic perspective, life is extremely more complex than a simple airplane. The number of boundary conditions required to build the systems are immense. Super computers like brains are no small chore to build. Digestive systems, reproduction systems, pumps, cooling systems, sensors, thermodynamic cycles, chemical plants, energy plants, self repair, nanomachines etc etc are impossible for even us to build today — as a system comparable to life. The number of specified boundary conditions required for the development of the systems is just to large to be explained by nature.
Biologists act as if the systems are independent. They believe that simple mutations can consecutively bring about controlled advancement. But they fail to see the coupled nature of the systems. This requires more controlled boundary conditions. Very specific mutations are required and not just one or a few. An eye without connection to the brain is useless. The brain has to be developed enough to use it. Even in thinking about the simplest system, the number of mutations required are large. A new cell that is optically responsive to light is no small detail! How many genes are required for a new optically sensitive cell? How about all the nerve cells that communicate with the brain? How about the mutations required by the brain? Useless structure consumes energy, so life tends to discard it. So you don’t have forever to wait after one “positive” mutation has occurred.
The Second Law does apply to open systems and does present problems for the Darwinists. Nature does not constrain every boundary condition useful in the construction of life. The number and nature of the constrained boundary conditions is so large and complicated that the probability of seeing these events are as remote as the air flowing into the balloon blowing it up naturally!
A problem often found in biology today, is the treatment of their imagination as if it were an experiment. If they can imagine how a system can evolve then this is proof that it did evolve! Having a good imagination is useful in science, but to confuse it for experimental evidence is very unscientific!

I had a great laugh at Pope Pious Penguin XI response on the 4th. Some people were claiming that ID is not testable. I presented a theory that could be tested. If ID is correct, as proposed by those of the ID camp who do not believe in the natural descent paradigm, then limits should be seen in evolutionary development. Pope Pious said that it could not be testable because we do not know the future environments that living things will see. Hummm. Seems to me that the same can be said for those unknown environments of long ago! So really evolution cannot be tested! Laugh!
Well, my theory can be tested because we the experimenters will impose the environment and see how the population X changes. From an ID perspective (at least one flavor of it), the robustness of life is programmed into life to enable living systems to survive during changes to environments. If this is true, we should observe changes occurring as the environment changes, and be able to trace it to mechanisms and advanced systems found within the lifeforms. For example, there could be genetic switches that are turned on or off for certain conditions of the environment. The population will change as the programmed mutations or adaptable genetic designs are triggered. This is definitely a testable theory! And it could show that evolution is a misguided theory that actually points to Design! Wouldn’t evolutionists just love this. Laugh.

Eric: “I forgot to say that the limits of evolution would be based on the programming and mechanisms within the lifeform. Beyond the ability of the mechanism, evolution will cease to occur.”
Another half-truth. It’s true that once epigenetic effects are exhausted, further change is slow, because it depends on actual genetic change, which happens much more slowly. You’re just too impatient!

W. Marc Connolly
The common ancestor is believed to be moropithecus or australopithecus. pithecus means ape.

Eric – Re: “Biologists act as if the systems are independent. They believe that simple mutations can consecutively bring about controlled advancement.”
Where in heavens name do you come up with such claptrap? THERE IS NO CONTROL.

Re: “Common sense rules out evolution”
This is the definition of “kook”.

Let me read that one back to you Dom…
“Creationist speculation DEMANDS that we believe in the hypothesis that the Earth and mammals are relative latecomers the Universe, and that they were created within a week of each other in essentially the same form as we see them today by a supernatural all-powerful Abrahamic sky-god.
There exists no proof that the Earth, any mammal or any other animal has ever been created by a supernatural all-powerful Abrahamic sky-god.
An example of the problem Creationists commonly have is distinguishing between hypothesis and theory.”
Evolution has plenty of supporting evidence…museums and libraries full of evidence, if you’ll only take the time to stop listening for awhile to others telling you what to think, and do some scientific self-discovery on your own.
Visit a museum of natural history and give the sorts of creatures that existed during the Cambrian explosion some critical analytical thought. Visit a library and read about ancient civilizations. Visit a University and and talk to some real paleontologists, geologists and anthropologists.
For it is ignorance which is fear my friend — knowledge is the light!
Cheers,
Brando

Dom
The proof is in your DNA

Dom, I didn’t rephrase another person’s post, I rephrased YOUR post. Clearly demonstrating the utter absurdity of your position, in my opinion.
The evidence is yours for the seeking, no one can decide to break the shackles of dogmatic ignorance other than for themselves.
Cheers!
Brando

Brando
That post was from Percy, not Dom. I think that you saw Dom’s name leading the next post (mine).

[Replying to Brandon Nichols | Jan 9, 2008 6:05:53 AM & Jan 9, 2008 9:39:39 AM]
Brandon,
first let me clarify that it was not me who commented on re-phrasing another’s post, it was Percy [Jan 9, 2008 8:48:38 AM].
Secondly, permit me to point out that in your attempt to summarise my views you actually substantially misrepresent them.
1. As a Biblical Creationist I do not speculate as to the origins of the universe, the earth and the creatures inhabiting the earth. I trust in God who has made himself known to me in his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently I believe the Biblical account of origins because I acknowledge the Holy Bible, as the word of God, is utterly reliable. Thus I do not speculate about origins but rely upon God’s own testimony.
It is Evolutionists who base their views upon speculative ideas.
2. I do not demand you believe the Biblical account; I realise that if you are not born again and alive to God then you cannot believe it.
But this is not to say that Evolutionary ideas masquerading as science should not be challenged. It is important to stand up for the truth so that people are not misled.
3. I do not claim mammals were created by “a supernatural all-powerful Abrahamic sky-god”, but that they were created by the one, true, eternal God. This is the God of Abraham, and the God who revealed himself in Jesus Christ, whose day Abraham rejoiced to see.
4. I do not propose that there exists proof that the earth and its inhabitants have been created by God. You merely present a straw man argument.
The Biblical account teaches that the creative work of the Creator is inscrutable and that man cannot understand it. I do not suggest that science may prove that God’s creative work happened, but that it may show that the empirical data is consistent with the Biblical account.
And I suggest that if a theory, such as that of common ancestry of all living things, has no scientific basis it should be pointed out that it is not scientifically established.
Further to those four misrepresentations, you go on to assert Evolution has plenty of supporting evidence. In which case you should have no trouble citing one single piece of evidence showing one kind of organism evolved into another completely different kind. May I please ask you to do so in order to support your assertion?
And in your response to this request, in order for you to be self-consistent (as you seem to disdain the idea of, as you put it, “others telling you what to think”, perhaps you ought not to rely on what others tell you, but only upon what you yourself may establish to be true.
And perhaps you might reflect on why you believe what you do about the date of the Cambrian explosion. Have you adopted your opinion from what others have told you about it, or have you personally scientifically established the age you believe it to be?
As for ancient civilisations, you veer off into another field here. But as you mention it, did you know that the Biblical record of ancient civilisations also accords with all the facts?
Lastly you mention fear and ignorance, but I am not afraid of science, I think science is wonderful. What I do not think is wonderful is the shameful pseudoscience of Evolutionary theory.
You seem to feel you have knowledge. But between your speculative philosophy and the word of God, I ascribe knowledge and light to God rather than to you. Perhaps you feel that is preposterously stupid of me, but you will simply have to excuse me for not sharing with you your opinion of yourself. I suggest Naturalistic dogma has gotten the better of you.
However, if you wish to attempt to argue your views are based on empirically established evidence, then all you need to do is to present the evidence.

Brando
The “better than thou” group are looking for proof in the old testament of their protestant bible. They do not seem to understand that there are other beliefs that contradict their beliefs as well as science. They will NEVER acknowledge that they could be wrong. What I have been attempting to relate to them is that they should not be imposing their faith on others who are of many other faiths. Such imposition is what they do in places like Iran. We have a constitution to protect us from this. As to the other academics contributing to this column, I implore you to attempt the same.

Steven
Sorry but I have to disagree with your opinion on 3 key points.
1. Re: “If you require a person of belief to accept the possibility that there is more than one god, the evolutionist would then be required to believe that the existance of a god is possible”.
I AM a Darwinist but I am NOT an athiest – I consider myself an agnostic because I can not condone ANY religion that tells me that I will be damned if I don’t believe their way. (They are correct – everyone else is wrong) I follow the teaching of Christ so you can consider me a christian, just not your brand of christian.
2. Re: “It should be noted that in the Biblical perspective, there are not multiple views or multiple gods.”
Your religion (and belief as well) is monotheistic. Monothesism is NOT a universal practice, some people do believe on more than one god to this day. A loving god will not condemn them to hell for just their ignorance any more than he would you and they have every bit as much right to believe that way if they want to. That, my friend, is guaranteed by the constitution. And that in turn guarantees GOVERNMENTAL imposition of any one PARTICULAR faith. And PUBLIC schools are GOVERNMENTAL institutions. You may consider an Iranians zealots, I count ALL that try to impose their religion on others zealots. Show me how you are different.
3. Re: “With the coming of Jesus, the Jewish religion splits with Christianity about a Messiah, but not about who is God.”
With the coming of Muhammad, Jesus was demoted to Phrophet. Their version of the bible is not the same as yours. Their beliefs are greatly different than yours. Who are you to say that their rendition of “gods word” is false and at the same time say yours is true?
In Summary:
You believe what you want to, that IS your freedom in this country NOW. If the fanatics in this country get their way you will not have that freedom (and remember that the winning bible version may well not be yours). Fanaticism is flawed regardless of the subject. That is why I am a Darwinist – in science we can question and change the way we look at the world, we can think for ourselves, use free will et. al. – in organized faiths we are locked in by threat of damnation and the vilification by the zealots.

Hi Ed.
You lean on science which has its place, but you also lean on faith. You expect to wake-up tomorrow after you sleep. You can argue that your body is programmed to do so, therefore, its not faith. However, one day you won’t awake, yet the night before you had faith that you would. Did the first organism sleep or did this develop with evolution? You can’t possibly ever know the answer. So would I be wrong in stating that the 1st organism didn’t sleep anymore than if you said that it did? How could we argue either point considering it is beyond our current ability to prove either way?
Still disbelievers dismiss God without the ability to prove either way. It is easy to have faith if one chooses. I would submit that it is easier to have faith than the contrary. I don’t have to establish criterion for my feelings.
Why is it so hard to have faith that there is a God? Because you can’t touch him or see him? Missouri’s state motto would be an appropriate motto for many.

I see you are back in the conversation Brandon. Your tone of discussion has turned sour and pompous. I am sorry to see that.
It is probably futile, but I will ask again. What is the beginning of the universe; the moments before your big bang?

Ned
In the article you mention “The report is careful not to discredit religion; it describes science and faith as different ways of arriving at truth.”
I did download it but it appears to be more of a pamphlet and does not offer much in a technical sense. Did I download the wrong thing?

Percy
The Big Bang hypothesis is not part of evolution theory and no one knows the answer to the question that you are asking. But there is another hypothesis or two that attempt to explain what happened before the big bang. One is String Theory and another is called either Ribbon or Plane Theory (not sure which). There are a few more but I dont remember what they are. That is in the realm of physics and alternate dimensions and well beyond my understanding. The word “Theory” used when these are reported on should actually be “hypothesis”. Personally I dont buy into it – they are all hypothetical experiments in math – just an FYI for you.

Eric – Re: “Biologists act as if the systems are independent. They believe that simple mutations can consecutively bring about controlled advancement.”
ED – Where in heavens name do you come up with such claptrap? THERE IS NO CONTROL.
What I mean is that not any set of mutations serve to advance the lifeform. You need a multitude of very specific mutations within a population. Also, you need to explain how all these mutations coalesce into one offspring, when the individual mutations don’t add fitness. When I use the word “control”, I mean that you need very specific mutations, because the probability of the random mutations is just too small. This relates to thermodynamics where you need mechanisms that harness energy to allow nonspontaneous processes. In other words, you need something more than just mutation and natural selection to bring about the advancement.

Many parents do not want their children to hear only one side of the story in school, and this happens when schools are prohibited from teaching religions.
********
And that is why you have the freedom to teach those lessons in your home or at your church.
But if you want the “Christian Truth” of Creationism to be taught in public schools as the truth, then you must be willing to have all other’s beliefs taught as truth too. How do you feel about that?
Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, etc, all have the truth about Creationism written in their books. So it is OK with you that the school teaches that evolution and all religious Creation stories are true?
You can’t have it both ways. Either the scientifically proven Evolution only, or all faith’s theories, plus evolution, taught as the truth. Because like it or not, Christianity doesn’t have a lock-down on the truth. Your Creation theory has no more merit than any other’s written in their holy book.
Is that what you want? It amazes me that Christians would want Creationism taught in the classroom as truth, because it means that all religious beliefs will be taught as truth. Since this country has no official religion, and people like you are free to whorship any religion you want, that also means that all Creation stories must be taught as truth.
Is the faith your kids hold strong enough for that? And is that what you really want? I would think that Christians would be loudest people shouting about seperation, just so they can teach their children that their way, and only their way, is the truth.

Eric
I understand now but the word you should be using is stimulus. And yes I am aware of ID, have videos etc. I have no objection to the concept of design but disagree the “too complex” logic as it is simply not logical to me – I see nothing about the design of life as being “too complex” unless the assuption is made that evolution does not occur. Then it becomes too complex to understand. Complexity like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.

C in Texas wrote: “Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, etc, all have the truth about Creationism written in their books. So it is OK with you that the school teaches that evolution and all religious Creation stories are true? You can’t have it both ways”
C what you profess is that evolution is proven and, therefore, is the only option to be taught. That is indoctrination don’t you think? I don’t except your faith on this issue. Shouldn’t I have a say on you pushing your faith on me?
Ed, the origin of the universe will ultimately help determine if there is a God or not. As you stated, “nobody knows how the universe was created, but there are theories (which you name several).”
Creationism is as viable as any theory you listed, yet you choose to ignore this option?
Brandon, you still won’t address my question. To debate your position requires, no only, you presentation of evidence to support you position, but evidence that disproves mine. So far, you have presented neither.

Eric
Re: “you need to explain how all these mutations coalesce into one offspring, when the individual mutations don’t add fitness.”
Each mutation whether it is a major change or a small change that occurs in an individual will continue to be passed along to all of it’s offspring, beneficial or not. That is why we can inherit a disease or deformity.
If the mutation is detrimental to the point where the animal can not survive LONG ENOUGH TO BREED then the mutation is lost.
Under the right stimulus, such as a drastic change in the environment, that error or deformity (variation) may be beneficial to the descendants and the animals without this mutation may not be able to survive (direct replacement).
Or the mutation may simply become a slight advantage that enables the new variation to have more offspring than the original variation. Conversely it might provide only a slight disadvantage so that the main line continues on and the new species survive only for a short time (geologically) and then go extinct.
Or as you indicate, this mutation may combine with another totally different line of variants and produce offspring that have mutations that can now work together.
This is an over-simplification used as an example of course. For every species there are inumerable variations and the rise of a new species may come about from any combination of these in isolation.
Individual mutations that add fitness are extremely rare and most mutations, taken alone, are harmful. But the time that has passed over the aeons has been ample to allow natural selection over and over again.
The proof that was needed to verify this is within our DNA. HOX genes, PAX genes and Homeobox sequences show our specific relationship to all other forms of life on this planet. This new information also shows that while there has been mostly gradual change, early on, in the precambrian and the cambrian, there were rapid radical mutations of very simple organisms which gave rise to all the known kingdoms.
There is a very good book, written in laymans terms, by Dr. Filler that explains all this called “The Upright Ape”. If you HONESTLY want to see how evolution works and that it is not too complex you should read it. The teaser on his website may be enough for some without having to read the entire book which is in fact half history and half technical.

Percy
You have either misread or not read my other posts. I am agnostic and accept the possibility of creation as a hypothesis. I have to side with athiests on evolution because they are utilizing logic rather than dogma. As far as the creation of the universe goes, however, while I can accept the creation as hypothesis, I actually do not believe that the universe was in fact created by anything – no big bang – no strings.
I simply think that is always has been and always will be and what we see as a big bang is only a very tiny part of the universe since it is infinite. We are like blind men trying to describe an elephant with one touch. There is no possible was that we can see or detect beyond our little ball that we consider to be the universe. Void is an assumption, the fact is it is unknown. The strings or planes are descriptions of alternate dimensions which to me are just more of that infinity. I don’t pretend to understand their math or their logic but I get the drift. This is a very hard concept to grasp, it used to meke me feel sick even to contemplate it.

I believe Percy, regarding sickle cell anemia, is referring to the fact that this mutation is bad and continues to persist. Shouldn’t it be lost to evolution? (Percy, did I state this correct?)
Ignorance is not a choice. It can’t be helped. Once a person sees the ability to move beyond ignorance but chooses not to, it then becomes stupidity. I think this may better apply. However, I would also like to add that just because one person is unwilling to read a given piece of work does not, necessarily, represent stupidity.
I wouldn’t waste my time reading a book on Scientology, because I can already surmise it is gibberish (IMHO).

Steven
That a disease still exists only means that it kills AFTER producing offspring rather than preventing reproduction. For example I have type II Diabetes, I had children way before the diabetes took any effect on me. Therefore, while my children do not have diabetes they do carry the genes that allow it to effect them and their offspring. If I and all other diabetics died before we could produce children then the mutation would go extinct (no more diabetes in my example). In theory, all mutations are “bad” as they are all deviations from the parent. The worst will kill BEFORE a chance of reproduction and will not be carried on genetiocally but those that do not inhibit survival BEFORE procreation will persist. The key words that are being missed are in the timing – BEFORE or AFTER producing offspring. Offspring of the FIRST variant are all that matter in mutation, the parent (FIRST VARIANT) is already formed. The same goes for sickle cell anemia. If the carrier lives long enough to have children then the children will also be carriers. That defines inheritted disease.
Of course not reading a book is not stupidity, to refuse to read that book knowing that doing so would resolve an issue of understanding, however, is to choose ignorance.
I personally choose to learn, albeit I do not know what “Scientology” means. As I have said before, I have read bibles as well as literature on both I.D. and creationism. While they did not change my mind I at least tried to understand other views.
Eric
I read your post but could not make any sense out of it. Sorry.

“A willful neglect or refusal to acquire knowledge which one may acquire and it is his duty to have” – equally correct! NOW – define duty as it applies to your species rather than to yourself and you will have the meaning that most people use in this context.

Ed,
Here is one response:
1) In building machines one must construct the pieces together so the machine will function. A lot of detail must be defined. Bolts have to be placed in specific locations, connecting systems have to be integrated, precise timing must be maintained etc. Life is a machine from an engineering perspective. In order to develop new systems in a lifeform enabling new function, very specific mutations must occur. Certainly the proposed process of evolution is random (at least to a certain extent), but not any mutation will bring about new systems. This is the problem with the theory of evolution. With all the lifeforms ever seen on earth, the number of required mutations is staggering. A simple example shows how this is. If we take a simple 10 piece electronic circuit and take it apart. It would take a significant time if we just randomly soldiered it back together. When you then expand this to hundreds of objects the time is impossible. How about billions of objects. When you examine the number of parts in all lifeforms ever seen, this number is staggering. There is not enough time allowed to make this possible, even with 4.5 Billion years.

3)
Ed – “Auto manufacturers fill tires every day by spontaneously releasing vacuum. Thermodynamics could be used as well if the tires would not melt.”
Yes this is true, but they have the engineered mechanism utilizing energy that enables a nonspontaneous process to be spontaneous. Without the mechanism, you are stuck! Nature has very simple mechanisms with mostly uncontrolled boundary conditions. When we talk about the construction of complex machines, we need other supporting machines and/or intelligence to enable nonspontaneeous processes allowing the building of the machines. You don’t get something for nothing in the world of thermodynamics!

Looking at the countless of “it’s just a theory”, it’s scary to see how many people don’t even know what a scientific theory actually stands for

Steven, Eric:
Fine, but as engineering was my lifetime career ans paleontology my lifetime hobby (retired from former. more involved now in the latter) I can both agree and disagree. I agree about 75% with you on things mechanical, as early engineering pioneers did not take all these things into account such as design space, that’s why early designs are so cumbersome. I can not agree with you on evolution and creation because I STUDY evolution and accept the opinion of peer reviewed acasemics while your answer is the bible said so. In every case specified by a creationist I can refute with logic rather than the word of god. Your answers, while sentient, are not showing any signs of actually wanting to understand the world view, and lend no credibility to your case.
I give up. I’m going to go bang my head against a wall, knock all the sense out of it and become born again. Have a nice day.

Coming a bit late to this thread, but the S allele which carries sickle cell anemia offers protection against the most serious form of malaria. People that carried a single S allele had resistance to malaria, and lived long enough to reproduce. Evolution at its best.

Ed: The S allele is a mutation which produces a hemoglobin variant resistant to the parasite that causes malaria. Inherting an S allele from both parents will likely result in an early death from sickle cell anemia. Inheriting only one S allele does not cause CSA, but does impart a degree of resistance to malaria – one of the major infectious diseases in the world. There is a strong geographic correlation between the occurrence of the S allele and the falciparum form of malaria. People that are heterozygous (genotype AS) for the S allele have the greatest chance for survival in a malarial environment.
This is a perfect example of how evolution works. This isn’t a perfect solution, but it is an effective one that permits continuity within a reproductive population. Reproductive fitness is what “survival of the fittest” refers to, and the S allele helps ensure that in an inhospitable environment.

Ed: I just stumbled across this further tidbit of interesting info on medicine.net : “It is now widely believed that falciparum malaria contributed in no small way to the final fall of the Roman Empire. DNA evidence supports this concept.” All the more reason we should be concerned with global warming. Although the occurrence of Dengue fever in the US has up to now been infrequent, with warmer temperatures, the southern US could be at much greater risk from this disease which is carried by mosquitos and for which there is currently no vaccine. Climate change has a distinct impact on evolution, and usually not for the benefit of those who are currently in residence.

Re: “Climate change has a distinct impact on evolution, and usually not for the benefit of those who are currently in residence.” Agree completely! Now the scary stuff:
“Mass extinction comes every 62 million years, UC physicists discover”:
The San Francisco Chronicle; David Perlman, Chronicle Science Editor; Thursday, March 10, 2005
“…life on Earth has flourished and vanished in cycles of mass extinction every 62 million years…The UC Berkeley researchers are physicists, Muller and Rohde.”
If we accept the last mass extinction was at the KT boundary 65 million years ago, then we are currently 3 million years into a natural extinction cycle. The most likely cause for these cycles is climate change, other factors regulating only the severity. Actually this was proposed many years ago but I believe the cycle proposed then was 26 million years. Interesting!

Ed – “I can not agree with you on evolution and creation because I STUDY evolution and accept the opinion of peer reviewed acasemics while your answer is the bible said so.”
So Ed, I could give you the most reasoned logical arguments to not accept evolution, and you would never believe me because the peer reviewed academics say that evolution is true. I can understand you finding me suspect, given my unknown credentials, but I would hope that people accept evolution based on the scientific validity of the theory rather than the bandwagon of academics. Concerning the Bible: I can address evolution based on science without even mentioning what the Bible says.
I can also address evolution by showing that it is the product of intelligence using the design inference construct developed by Dembski. It is the same process that we use to determine if a signal from space originates from some intelligent being or whether it is from natural causes. It is the same process that we use to decide if a death was natural or the result of murder.
Some try to circumvent the design construct by saying that it is not valid. I find this argument intellectually dishonest. All the time we look for design in nature. While hiking we look for the trail based on whether we see design. This design evidence can be many different forms, such as the footprint of a previous traveler or the formation of rocks stacked to show the trail. In archaeology objects are evaluated all the time to decide if an artifact was designed. Was a rock a cutting tool or was it just some natural object? Or in space we examine formations on planets to decide if they were designed by some unknown intelligent being.
There is a logical systematic way to evaluate design in nature based on Dembski’s design inference construct and Behe’s irreducibly complex construct. But ironically, the critics argue against his ID construct by creating straw men. ID says nothing about the Bible nor God.
Now Creationism does start out from the premise that God exists. There are many forms to creationism, such as the Christian biblical creation story. The typical Creationists in the USA start from a Christian world view and operate from that framework. If a special creation was the cause of our existence than evidence for this should be found in science. This is the scientific aspect used in their studies. They don’t just say God says it so it must be true, but they examine the scientific evidence to see if it does point to a special creation. The Naturalists preclude the possibility that God could exist, so their science is biased against any notion of special creation, even if God does exist and did create life.
Ed – “In every case specified by a creationist I can refute with logic rather than the word of god.”
I am refuting evolution purely based on science. You have yet to address my points! You have a faith in evolution because the academics say evolution is true. Who is more scientific, you or me?
Ed – “Your answers, while sentient, are not showing any signs of actually wanting to understand the world view, and lend no credibility to your case.”
I understand the evolutionary world view and I find it grossly wanting and irrational. I find the bandwagon mentality found within science regarding evolution totally unscientific and disturbing. The distortion of science related to evolution is sickening. The grandiose proclamations made by many evolutionists are total without scientific merit. We do not see evolutionary development of new systems in the lab. It would take too long so it is impossible to see. Yet the certitude of evolutionists is profound — and I use the word profound with sarcasm! There are significant gaps found in the ancestral tree of life. There is not ONE system that can be shown to be the product of evolution. My previous discussions show how this is impossible. What is supposed to be evidence of evolutionary development is the programmed design in life enabling the robustness of life. Without robustness, life could not exist: a simple change in the environment and life would cease to exist. So evolution, as observed today, is based on faith for it is impossible to observe in the lab. The notion that small numbers of mutations can build on themselves is also a faith statement as I already pointed out. The faith in evolution is a different faith compared to the Creationists faith. The Creationist will acknowledge his premise that God does exist and that the Bible is an accurate recording of history. The science part has no faith in it, for the evidence either exists or it does not. The difference is that evolutionists fail to admit their faith statements and proclaim them to be science. The bandwagon of academics then has the gall to proclaim Creation and ID to not be science!
Again I should note that ID is completely different than Creationism. Though I argue from both perspectives, some ID proponents would be highly offended to be compared to Creationists. I just say let the science lead where it will! Evolutionists, where is the beef?

Eric,
“If you look above at my posts you will see why the Second Law does present problems for evolution”
It doesn’t. At all. The second law of thermodynamics ONLY applies to closed systems. To say an organism is a closed system is preposterous.

” I work in engineering and use thermodynamic analysis often!” – Eric
Then you should know the difference between a closed and an open system and not display such ignorance in this regard.

Eric
Re: “The Darwinian mechanism is not very precise , which brings into question whether it really is a thermodynamic mechanism able to explain common descent.”
The Darwinian method while imperfect is functional when combined with Mendel’s Law. It has been used in medical research with great success. That is why it should not be confused with faith. The problem we have with ID is that it requires an original designer, and the problem with that is that we have no way of knowing what that original design actually was. If we could, in fact, see the origin of genetic code it could then be determined. Acepting that the original code was complex without being able to prove it is an act of faith.

Eric
“The Second Law of Thermodynamics applies to Open, Isolated and closed systems.”
That’s funny, because by it’s very definition: The total entropy of any isolated thermodynamic system tends to increase over time, approaching a maximum value.
NOWHERE does it mention it applies to an open system as well. In other words, it doesn’t apply to open systems which means your whole lenghty argument becomes IRRELEVANT.
You just can’t redefine a scientific law untill it suits your needs.
I really wonder if you are honestly mistaken are are deliberatly trying to deceive the audience. After all, the average layman be rather ignorant in thermodynamics and thinks you’re making a valid point.
Second of all, by reading your post, am I wrong to say that you think you need huge mutations in order for a species to evolve? That’s not evolution, that’s Pokémon. Do you think an organism with a massive mutation would even find a mate to pass his genes on?
Since you’re mentioning probability a lot, is your idea of mutation something like an organism with no eyes would suddenly develop a complex eye organ by pure chance? The only ones who are claiming that are creationists on what evolution supposidly says.
Think of an organism with absolutely no vision at all. A small mutation happens which makes a cell or a small area on its skin a bit sensitive to light. It would still be blind, but being able to perceive light from dark is already a massive improvement compared to perceiving nothing at all and it would certainly add to his chance of survival.
And small mutations happen all the time. Some are bad, some are beneficial but the majority are simply neutral. It is the acumulation of these small changes in a population, trough the process of natural selection, that eventually will lead to a new species over time.

I also add the same comment as Ed regarding spelling mistakes :)

From Belgium: Your comments about the Second Law of Thermodynamics show that you don’t know the law. I know there are all kinds of sites where you will find academics denying the fact that the Second Law is problematic for evolution, but these folks are not telling the whole truth! One of the most powerful uses of the Second Law of Thermodynamics is that it predicts the direction of processes.
Clausius statement of Second Law of Thermodynamics:
“It is impossible for any system to operate in such a way that the sole result would be an energy transfer by heat from a cooler to a hotter body.”
Does this apply to an open system? Let us see. If we apply our boundary around our system such that the energy crosses the boundary then yes it is an open system. If we apply our boundary around the energy sources then we have a nonequilibrium system. So we can say that this law applies to both open systems and nonequilibrium systems! I challenge you: what does “sole result” mean?
When I talk about mutations, I am referring to many small mutations like Darwinists propose. The problem with the evolutionary development of new systems is the requirement of many very precise mutations to allow the new function. Without the new function, you don’t have the selection in the populations allowing the adaptation to propagate in the population and coalesce into one genome.
The whole notion of the evolutionary development of the eye is highly speculative! A light sensitive cell serves no purpose if it is not connected to the nerves and has processing capability in the brain. Fantastic fables of evolution are interesting but this in no way represents scientific evidence!

“But this is completely different than designing new systems when the genetic code is not there. ”
Mutations CAN add new information to a genome. Other mutations substract it
“Medical research has not observed the supposed Darwinian mechanism building whole new systems. Not ONE new system has ever been seen developed by Darwinian evolution in the lab! Again Darwinists operate on a faith statement!”
Examples of gene duplication which is likely to add new information: Brown et al. 1998; Zhang et al. 2002
Examples of increased genetic material: 2001; Brown et al. 1998; Hughes and Friedman 2003; Lynch and Conery 2000; Ohta 2003
Examples of novel genetic material: Knox et al. 1996; Park et al. 1996
“This statement is unfounded. Are you telling me that if you found some strange object that you could not tell if it was natural or designed? ”
You seem to have a problem with telling the difference between an object and an organism
“Why then do we spend hundred’s of millions of dollars, if not more, looking for intelligent signals from space.”
Because science want to know more about the universe. Luckely it’s not up to people like you because you simply wouldn’t bother it in the first place.
“If you found the writing in the sand, “I am here” could you not tell it was designed?”
Sure that would be designed. Please show me which part of a body has written “Designed by God” or “Made in Rigel 7″
“We don’t have to know anything about the designer to recognize ID.”
There isn’t any proof ID. It has as much evidence as the hypothesis that says we’ve been created by the wizards on the Discworld

Actually, I just thought of something funny. There is more proof of a crappy designer than an intelligent designer. After all, why would we still have an appendix? Useless in the best case scenario, dangerous.
Or what would he/it/they have been thinking when they made the dolphin. A sea animal that can DROWN :D

Eric
By the way, there are markings on rocks in Nova Scotia that can be read in ancient Ibero-celtic script but are argued that they are natural.
There is the face on mars that only looks like a face with just the right lighting.
No intelligence recognized as required to produce either one. The former may actually be writing but the latter is probably natural. But there are arguements for both. The point is that design is not obvious and in many instances simply is non-existant.

“We don’t have to know anything about the designer to recognize ID.”
Actually, you do. If you don’t know anything at all about this supposed designer (due to the convenient lack of evidence), then YOU CANNOT MAKE PREDICTIONS, and CANNOT BE FALSIFIED. If someone put forward a hypothesis as to the methods, motivations and capabilities of an ‘intelligent designer’, then we could make predictions and potentially falsify that hypothesis. For example, if I say “All life was created by an intelligent designer who wanted to minimize waste”, then you could refute that with an example like the appendix, or with the large chunks of non-transcribed DNA code (“Introns”).
The problem is that ID’ers are attempting to create a theory, then find facts to fit it. That’s not what real science does. ID might have been an acceptable theory (as in accepted for peer review, then shot down and buried for the rest of eternity) if someone had taken a look at the world and said ‘huh, it’s almost like someone who is made life by ‘. But if we take a look at the world, the only real conclusion we could make about the designer is that he/she/it really wanted their results to look like the result of natural evolution.
Of course, then we run full tilt into Occam’s razor…

From Belgium,
I have to go out of town for a week, so I will respond quickly.
I gave you a statement of the Second Law of Thermodynamics and showed that the system was open. Logically, we can then conclude that the Second Law does apply to open systems, counter to your claims! Have you ever heard of an availability balance?
From Belgium – “And if it would be any relevant to an open system, then why does my refrigerator and airco work just fine? … Because that’s what a refrigerator pretty much does.”
Yes, you need a thermodynamic mechanism coupled with an energy supply to be able to explain the entropy decreasing process. This is what is implied by the Clausius statement of the second law. And the limit of the capability and location of entropy decrease is related to the constraints imposed by the thermodynamic mechanism. If the degrees of freedom are too large then the second law takes over and little decrease in entropy is possible. This is related to evolution where the offspring are only as advanced as the parent, which includes the genetic designs within the genome. You are limited by the functional ability of the thermodynamic mechanism. Advancements are limited by the shear improbability of the many precise mutations. Also, the many deteriorative mutations predominate which prevents the advanced new system. Again, we have never seen ONE new system develop by evolution in the lab. Without this evidence evolutionists should be very humble concerning their theory! Gene duplication has not been shown to be advantageous in developing new biologic systems. There is a difference between useful information and potential for increased information.
From Belgium: “Oh wait, so you know the ‘real’ definition of the 2nd law that the evil academics don’t want us to know. It’s all a giant conspiracy you say. Oh how blind I was to not to see the truth!”
No, there are some academics who distort thermodynamics to the point where they deny some basic principles of thermodynamics that are well established. Then people parrot those statements without a real knowledge of what they are talking about. Every step of evolutionary development is resisted by the Second Law. It goes to the nature of the second law where it provides a means for predicting the direction of processes. Probable processes occur while the least probable processes do not.
Ed: One needs to examine the probability of the natural development of the artifact in question, concerning ID. We can use physics to determine the probability. The power of Dembski’s approach is that I could propose that an artifact is designed by examining the relevant physical processes that could possibly explain it. If the probability was below the universal probability bound then we could conclude it was designed. You could counter back, showing some process that I missed and demonstrate that it was significantly greater than the universal probability bound. We would then conclude it was natural. Dembski’s approach forces us to stay within the realm of science by direct analysis. This is why I think many evolutionists want to derail the ID movement, because they would be forced to be rigorous in their scientific approach and forced to use analysis to justify their evolutionary stories. In other words, Darwinists want a free ride!

Eric
“I gave you a statement of the Second Law of Thermodynamics and showed that the system was open. Logically, we can then conclude that the Second Law does apply to open systems, counter to your claims”
For the umpeenth time, the 2nd law Only Applies To Closed Systems.
Just only gave a definition of what an open system is. This somehow would justify it being relevant to the second law… how?!?
“Yes, you need a thermodynamic mechanism coupled with an energy supply to be able to explain the entropy decreasing process.”
Which would make it an open system. Hence, the 2nd law has nothing to do with it anymore
“Every step of evolutionary development is resisted by the Second Law. It goes to the nature of the second law where it provides a means for predicting the direction of processes. Probable processes occur while the least probable processes do not. ”
An organism IS NOT A CLOSED SYSTEM! Or do you happen to live in a unpermeable glass bubble with no heath, food, air or water coming trough? No? Then you interact with your environmentand the 2nd Law becomes IRRELEVANT
“Again, we have never seen ONE new system develop by evolution in the lab.”
That’s gold. I gave nearly 10 examples in the very post you’re replying to. Do you selectively ignore things that are said? Why don’t YOU show some evidence or experiments done by ID
“No, there are some academics who distort thermodynamics to the point where they deny some basic principles of thermodynamics that are well established”
Then open a real science textbook instead of “researching” from a creationist website to see what those basic principles really are. Obviously you don’t even know the difference between an open and closed system

I also wonder if Eric realises that if the 2nd law was relevant to open systems, it would be impossible to synthesise more complex organic molecules. Modern medicine proves him wrong

Eric & From Belgium
I came across an interesting and pertinant article this morning “Missing Evolutionary Link Found By Using Tiny Fungus Crystal – ScienceDaily (Jan. 3, 2008) — The crystal structure of a molecule from a primitive fungus has served as a time machine to show researchers more about the evolution of life from the simple to the complex” :)

From Belgium,
Here is the entropy rate balance for a control volume:
dScv/dt = Sum(Qj/Tj) + Sum(mi*si) – Sum(me*se) + sigma_cv
This equation applies to open systems! So evolutionists are dishonest when they say the Second Law of Thermodynamics does not apply to open systems!
The Second Law of Thermodynamics also is relevant to the direction of processes. When we build machines we are fighting the Second Law by constraining boundary conditions enabling nonspontaneous processes to occur. The advancement of life by evolution is resisted by the Second Law. The thermodynamic mechanism needs to constrain the processes, thus allowing the nonspontaneous process. For reasons I already explained, evolution is unable to constrain the processes enabling the advancement of new systems.

With all these religious nuts that don’t believe in evolution, its no wonder our economy continues to go to crap. We aren’t even innovative enough to get past 2000 year old myths, how are we going to compete with the rest of world which happens to be much more intelligent than we are, or atleast test scores say we are.

Jim,
I do not believe in evolution because I am educated and innovative. Perhaps if we quit teaching evolution as fact in schools we will become more innovative and we will see a renewed surge in entrepreneurs within America. Group think of any kind leads to stale thinking. Neo-Darwinian evolution is grossly short on evidence and jeopardizes science as a whole because it attempts to shutdown real scientific discussion. It also distorts fields of science, such as thermodynamics, in an effort to prop up the theory. The scientific community is in a very sad state today!

From Belgium: “Err no. You can’t have ones cake and eat it too.”
This is exactly what Darwinists are doing. They are trying to avoid the issue of having a viable thermodynamic mechanism. You don’t seem to understand the implications of needing a large number of mutations to bring about new systems. Also, these mutations have to be very precise. It is the grand faith statement of evolution that a stepwise mutational process achieves ever increasing advancement leading to selection. From a functional perspective, we know this is not true.
From Belgium: “Second of all, like any scientific theory it’s perfectly falsifiable”
This is not true in practice. The evolution game is one of finding similarities in function and form and developing the evolutionary tree. You have two lifeforms that have similarities and you conjure up stories to explain how they evolved. Never mind the fact that you don’t have the details showing the common decent. You have to let your imagination flow to fill in the details! But this is not science! And how do you falsify this? You can always say, “But evolution takes sooo long that we can’t expect to have the details!” This statement does not constitute evidence!
From Belgium: “So MRSA just magically poofed into existance in hospitals. Maybe God was punishing the sick.”
Bacteria, like other lifeforms, is able to adapt to its environment. This, rather than suggesting evolution, is an indicator of design. Without the ability to adapt life would cease to exist. This type of engineering design is the hardest to achieve — something that biologists fail to appreciate.
Your statements about God are interesting. As I have observed with other evolutionists, some have an ax to grind with Him. Perhaps this is why they are so bent on proving evolution even to the point of distorting science!
From Belgium: “First of all, it isn’t short on evidence at all. You just choose to ignore it.”
Without being able to show the stepwise mutations leading to other species, it is short on evidence! Showing that life is robust does not prove common decent! We cannot automatically assume that one species developed into another just because life is robust. The development of whole new systems is fundamentally more difficult and complex than the micro adaptations we observe enabling the robustness of preexisting lifeforms.
I have no problem with evolution being taught as a theory but I do think Intelligent Design and Creation should also be taught. The “Overwhelming” evidence of evolution is a grand joke when you examine it in detail! For the sake of science we should be careful not to allow evolution to be the 21st century flat earth theory!

Eric & from Belgium
The college that I graduated from also happened to be a seminary. There was no mention of God or creationism in the science classes. That was kept to the theology classes. I see no reason that the same division could not be used in public schools as long as theology was an elective so that no ones personal concepts would be offended.

From Belgium: “Intelligent Design and Creation can or are already being taught in religion or philosophy. They just don’t have anything to do with science and shouldn’t be taught in science classes.”
First let us address Intelligent Design (ID). There are several different branches related to ID. One that Behe advanced was the irreducible complex biological components and systems. If we can show the existence of these systems, then we can show that Neo-Darwinian evolution cannot account for them. These systems are ones in which the individual components are needed for the larger system to provide function. In other words, without all the individual components, the larger system cannot function and only is a waste of energy for the biological lifeform. Neo-Darwinian evolution cannot explain these systems because the probability of them materializing in a single genome is too small. Selection of the individual subsystems would not occur because they would be an energy drain on the lifeform resulting in a small percentage of the population having the traits. The critics of ID have claimed that there may exist some unknown function related to the subsystems allowing the selection of the mutated organism. But once again this is not evidence until they can explain it in detail and show a probability value that is attainable to explain the development. As is often the case the evolutionists are low on evidence and high on weed — something they need to give them the creativity to come up with some evolutionary fable. I am saying this in good humor, but it does hit the point, that Neo-Darwinists need to show that the probability of the mutations and subsequent development is possible within the allotted time — something that they fail miserably at. Intelligent design does force Neo-Darwinists to be more rigorous in their analysis which is one reason it is so resisted. Neo-Darwinists are so captured by the philosophical side of evolution and the bandwagon mentality within science that they are unwilling to allow the theory to be questioned when glaring evidence brings the whole artifice into question.
Dembski has also expanded upon ID and has developed a systematic approach which identifies design. This approach can be used to identify if a signal from space is natural or intelligently designed. It can also be tested. For example, you could write a program to identify if rock and sand formations are natural or intelligently designed. You could then have one team of people modify a section of a beach or land area and have the other use their program coupled with their smart surveyor to identify the designed sand and rock formations. There would be the possibility of false negatives where the designed objects would look like natural objects, but you would focus in on the designed objects. The potential for false positives may exist if your program failed to identify the important processes related to sand and rock formation, but re-examination (and program improvement) would always be possible to weed out the false positives. Intelligent design is clearly a scientific endeavor. The clamor saying it isn’t a science is driven by the theologians of evolution. ID science can also be applied to living organisms to identify design. So, ID should be taught in science class because it is a scientific discipline.
The critics of ID often say that ID does not have a positive theory. This is partly true for the developers of ID wanted to stick solely with the “natural”. They examined only for intelligence and did not identify the designer. This was done partly out of the desire to please the Naturalists, who would react if God was the designer, since God is outside of our natural world and beyond the limits of science — though God’s fingerprint and intelligence should be identifiable within nature if He does exist and did create the world.
Here I should point out that Creationism is not ID and ID is not Creationism. Creationism does put forth a theory about the origin of life. There is not one group of Creationists but many! Some ID proponents will have nothing to do with Creationists while others do.
Creationism is also a science, though young in development. I mean this in the sense that few dollars have been spent (compared to evolution) to develop the theory and to expand the framework within the other disciplines of science. From my point of view it was jettisoned too quickly when some evidence was found that seemed to contradict the theory in the early days of science when Creationism was the predominate theory.
Many today claim it is not science because the framework requires the existence of God. But this notion is simplistic because if God does exist and he did make the world, then evidence should support this. As evolution is based on a philosophy so creationism has a philosophy. For example, evolutionists hold that all processes are natural and that God does not affect the processes or he does not exist. This is a statement of faith and built into the framework or philosophy of evolution. So there is a philosophical part to both evolution and creationism, which is not based on science. Creationism is scientific in the sense that we examine the evidence based on our philosophical perspective just like evolution does with its philosophical perspective. We examine the fossil record and see the large number of lifeforms that pre-existed and see how they slowly died out, which is consistent with the creationist model. We see the large graveyard of lifeforms existing in various locations of the world and we see this evidence consistent with the flood. We see the fossilized trees protruding through layers supposedly representing hundreds of millions of years and realize that these layers were rapidly deposited. So we use the scientific method to establish our theory just like other branches of science. Creationism is also a science.

“So being an educated fellow who has studied thermodynamics and being an advocate of science, I do get ###### off when I see abuses of science by those who claim to represent science!”
I can’t believe that. If you actually bothered to open a physics textbook you’d see your whole argument is based on a grotesque misinterpretation. Just where did you get your degree again?
“Creationism is also a science.”
That hurts. Creationism simply IGNORES evidence when it doesn’t fit their narrow view. Science relies on falsification. Creationism is anti-science.
But then again, if you’re a creationist (since you’re mentioning the scientifical impossible flood myth), you’re not only disagreeing with biology but with things like physics, cosmology and geology as well.

From Belgium: “I can’t believe that. If you actually bothered to open a physics textbook you’d see your whole argument is based on a grotesque misinterpretation.”
You are the one that stated that the Second Law of Thermodynamics does not apply to open systems! I showed you the equation where it does apply! And you talk about opening physics books when you don’t even understand the physics. Shame on you.
Eric: “Creationism is also a science.”
From Belgium: “That hurts. Creationism simply IGNORES evidence when it doesn’t fit their narrow view. Science relies on falsification. Creationism is anti-science.”
The different scientific communities IGNORE evidence when it doesn’t fit their narrow view based on the evolutionary paradigm. They twist science for their own ends to fit the theory. They also embellish the strength of the theory. The main difference between Creationism and evolution is that a mountain of money has been spent to prop up the theory of evolution. Evolutionists have failed to explain the origin and development of life. They have failed to show how new biologic systems are able to develop through mutation and selection. The information content of humans is amazing. If you unwind the DNA, it will stretch from the earth to the moon. The burden of proof is on Neo-Darwinists to show how a multitude of very specific mutations can possibly occur thus leading to whole new biologic systems. The probability is simply too low to allow it to happen within the supposed available time of 3.5 billion years. And remember, you have to explain the origin of ALL biologic systems as well as the abiogenesis of life! I point these facts out because you seem to think that evolutionists of many disciplines don’t IGNORE the evidence. I am not advocating anyone to ignore the evidence, but I think that much of the evidence can be explained by the Creationists model. What you would say is evidence for evolution, I may say is evidence of Creationism. For example, microevolution is evidence of design. Anyone who works in engineering knows that systems that have to work in a multitude of environments are much harder to design than ones designed to opperate in a single environment. An engineering system that automatically adapts itself for the given environment, whatever it may be, is even more difficult to design! The programmed instructions, templates, and nanomachines coupled with microevolution is the key to the robustness of life. It suggests that life is designed and points to a designer, which may even be God! Just like science in general cannot explain why math consistently supports physics — it is a faith statement built into the philosophy of science — so Creationists accept the possibility of God, which is a faith statement of their philosophy of science. We can use science to show that the world wide flood occurred and that life was created by an intelligent designer. We can use science to examine the age of the earth (some Creationists hold to a young earth while others hold to an old earth). Creationists rely on falsification just like other scientific disciplines.
From Belgium: “…you’re not only disagreeing with biology but with things like physics, cosmology and geology as well.”
The evolutionary paradigm has invaded many disciplines of science. I don’t disagree with physics, cosmology and geology but Creationists see the evidence in a different light. For example, Creationists recognize that energy alone does not allow systems to decrease in entropy while at the same time moving away from local equilibrium. For example, a bolt of lightning could potentially do all kinds of useful work, but it does not because it lacks the thermodynamic mechanism to constrain the work and chemical processes. Cosmology is a field that is in great flux with a multitude of different theories. Geology is grossly entangled in the evolutionary paradigm, but the Creationists paradigm can be applied to it too.
WDJ: “Since once does science includes magic as a possible mechanism?”
There are a multitude of reasons to believe in the existence of God. The very fact that the Laws of Science exist suggest the existence of a Law Giver. The fine tuning of the Universe and specifically our solar system suggest that Design is the cause. The fact that we can even intelligently look at our world and ask why we are here suggests that we were made for a purpose. So the notion of a creating being is not unreasonable, but it is unreasonable to exlude this possibility from science. The logic of some in science is not reasonable: “God is outside of our physical world; scientifically we cannot prove God; therefore, discussions of God are unscientific”. What we can say about God is that we scientifically don’t know whether he exists. So to be consistent scientifically, we should conduct science as an agnostic, not stating one way or the other whether God exists.

“You are the one that stated that the Second Law of Thermodynamics does not apply to open systems! I showed you the equation where it does apply! And you talk about opening physics books when you don’t even understand the physics.”
Am I now? How is posting a (correct) entropy balance equation which indeed applies to an open system makes you jump to conclusion that it applies to the second law, which is about the rate of entropy production due to irreversible transformations in the control volume (sigma_cv) only?
If you actually understood the equation you copied, you would realize that this open system can reduce its entropy, that is, dScv/dt can be negative as long as Sum(me*se) is large enough or Sum(Qj/Tj) is negative. This is one of the reasons why an open system out of equilibrium can show self-organization… such as life.
So you shot yourself in the foot (again) because that equation exactly refutes the traditional creationist argument that the second law of thermodynamics would not allow the development of life.
So when you claim to be an educated person, do you actually mean that you skim creationist websites to copy/paste your strawman arguments? And when you say you work in engineering, that you work in a garage?
“Evolutionists have failed to explain the origin and development of life.”
Why would they? If you knew what you were talking about you would know evolution doesn’t make any claim about the origin of life. About the creation of life itself I’m agnostic in the way that the first life on earth could either have happened trough abiogenesis (what you seem to confuse with evolution) or by an intelligence (it doesn’t seem that science is that far off in doing that themselves anyway). However, life has evolved since has started. That’s as much as a fact as the fact that gravity will make things fall down.
“They have failed to show how new biologic systems are able to develop through mutation and selection”
Appeal to ignorance. The theory of evolution did provide such predictions. Two examples are:
* Genetic information must be transmitted in a molecular way that will be almost exact but permit slight changes. Indeed, since this prediction was made, biologists have discovered the existence of DNA, which has a mutation rate of roughly 10-9 per nucleotide per cell division; this provides just such a mechanism.[24]
* Some DNA sequences are shared by very different organisms. It has been predicted by the theory of evolution that the differences in such DNA sequences between two organisms should roughly resemble both the biological difference between them according to their anatomy and the time that had passed since these two organisms have separated in the course of evolution, as seen in fossil evidence. The rate of accumulating such changes should be low for some sequences, which code for critical RNA or proteins, and high for others – that code for less critical RNA or proteins; but for every specific sequence, the rate of change should be roughly constant through evolution. These results have indeed been found experimentally. Two examples are DNA sequences coding for rRNA which is highly conserved, and DNA sequences coding for fibrinopeptides (amino acid chains which are discarded during the formation of fibrin), which are highly non-conserved.
“but I think that much of the evidence can be explained by the Creationists model.”
Oh but I agree. In fact, you can explain the origin of life by using any of the hundreds creation myths that are in existence. However, it’s something else to actually prove a specific creation myth
“For example, microevolution is evidence of design”
First you deny evolution happening and now you say that evolution is evidence of design. Do you even know what microevolution is?
“We can use science to show that the world wide flood occurred”
Apart from the fact that there isn’t enough water, nor any geological evidence, or that the kinetic energy alone would turned the earth in molten rock, that the world population couldn’t possibly recover that fast, that all plants and fish would have died out, that the ancient Egyptians failed to notice such flood, etc…
“We can use science to examine the age of the earth”
Well, the old-earth creationists anyway
“For example, Creationists recognize that energy alone does not allow systems to decrease in entropy while at the same time moving away from local equilibrium”
Thank you for showing that creationists use natural laws that are different to that of what is used by science. Second, a heat engine is something that does just that.
“The logic of some in science is not reasonable: “God is outside of our physical world; scientifically we cannot prove God; therefore, discussions of God are unscientific”
Since God can’t be seen or observed, nor tested or measured in any way, it’s unnecessary to include God in science. Science relies on empirical evidence. God is not a factor when you’re making calculations for say, building a bridge.
“What we can say about God is that we scientifically don’t know whether he exists.”
Indeed
“So to be consistent scientifically, we should conduct science as an agnostic”
Sure. God may or not may exist. Fine. But that doesn’t change the fact that evolution occurs.

“If you knew what you were talking about you would know evolution doesn’t make any claim about the origin of life.”
A naturalistic evolution requires the origin of life. If it did not, the the question of “God” pops up again!

Eric: “They have failed to show how new biologic systems are able to develop through mutation and selection”
Belgium: “Appeal to ignorance. The theory of evolution did provide such predictions. Two examples are:
* Genetic information must be transmitted in a molecular way that will be almost exact but permit slight changes. Indeed, since this prediction was made, biologists have discovered the existence of DNA, which has a mutation rate of roughly 10-9 per nucleotide per cell division; this provides just such a mechanism.[24]”
*****************************************
Let us not forget that if we unwind the human DNA that it will stretch from the earth to the moon. OK, let us look at the eye.
There is the bulbar conjunctiva which covers and protects the eye. The Cornea holds the anterior chamber. The iris regulates the amount of light allowed into the eye. The lens bends the light. It is biconvex, surface is “smooth and shiny, contains no blood vessels, and is encased in an elastic membrane.” The retina is the far layer of the eye where the light is focused. It is thin, delicate, sensory tissue composed of layers of light-sensitive nerve cells. The retina begins at the ciliary body (not at the front of the eye) and encircles the entire interior portion of the eye. Rods and cones, nerve cells of the retina, convert light first to chemical energy and then to electrical energy. Rods function chiefly in dim light, allowing limited night vision”.
To save space I will not go into all the details but I will ask this one simple question. Where on the genome is all the information allowing this structure to form? Is it one location or is it spread out over a multitude of locations over the genome, which stretches from the earth to the moon? There are the tear ducts, veins, special cells (rods and cones), and brain that has to process the information. And we need to remember that the genome must record the precise shapes of the parts. It is safe to say that there are over 100 parts plus all the information that specifies the shape and location of the parts. The point is that the information is large and at very specific locations. Not any mutations will bring about this system. Now in the crap shoot game of evolution, how does it all come together? Evolutionists only speculate on this and invent stories to explain it. But they have never proved it because they don’t know precisely how it even develops let alone the processes that could possibly explain the evolutionary development! The most important point is that given the length of the genome and the large number of mutations that would require this development the probability is just too small to explain it naturally. The claim that evolution is the mechanism is pure nonsense!

Belgium: “The rate of accumulating such changes should be low for some sequences, which code for critical RNA or proteins, and high for others – that code for less critical RNA or proteins; but for every specific sequence, the rate of change should be roughly constant through evolution.”
How then do you explain the Cambrian explosion? How could such diverse systems be built so rapidly? Again, the probability is just too low!

The fact is, is that many scientists who hold Phds and have won awards in their field of study and research and who also teach in our universities discount evolution and a world that is millions or billions of years old. Some how this fact that their are real scientists out there who don’t believe in the theory of evolution never seems to see the light of day on ABC news or other networks. Why?

I don’t know how anyone can not believe in God, first off, seeing as how animals and insects have designs on them and we’re not so close to the sun that we’re getting burned, etc. Secondly, the bible is extremely accurate. They found some of the Dead Sea Scrolls and they were absolutely spot on..nothing had been edited or added.I know the bible is difficult to read and understand; but it’s like peeling back layers every time and you eventually start to get what is being said. By the way, carbon dating is completely inaccurate; they’re realizing that more and more all the time..the world is only six thousand years old.

Faith…is believing in something that cannot be proven….like evolution….and that Creationism is wrong.
You have your faith…and I have mine in that the Word of God is TRUE!

The 6 24 hour days of Creation is a LIE of man. Even the Bible states (2 Peter 3:8 and Psalm 90:4) that the length of God’s Day is 1000 human years! Since no human was alive until the 6th day of Creation, the Creation Narrative CAN NOT be using human days (since there were no such things as human beings before God created them). The closest approximation of the true calendar ( the Hebrew Calendar) is off by about 7000 years (including the 1st Sabbath Day, which occurred while Adam slept and DID NOT AGE) minus one week. So the earth by Biblical standards is closer to 13,000 years old. Anything less is, in my opinion, unbiblical!

The general viewpoint on the laws of thermodynamics is summarized well by biological thermodynamicist Donald Haynie; as he states: “Any theory claiming to describe how organisms originate and continue to exist by natural causes must be compatible with the first and second laws of thermodynamics.” This is very different, however, from the claim made by many creationists that evolution violates the second law of thermodynamics. In fact, evidence indicates that biological systems and obviously the evolution of those systems conform to the second law.

Mic
While I do strongly agree with you I need to point out in defense of my country that it was founded by europeans who were trying to escape intolerance. The founders were quite adamant that their new country would not be run by a state church as happened to so many countries in Europe.
This is turn gave us a predominance of fanatics, some of which continue to be an impediment to education.

I can’t give a c**p about this theory and junk but if it really matters:
The theory of evolution and the belief in creationism can be related.
The big bang required an infinate amount of energy and, if you believe in god, this energy was provided be god. There, settled. God made the world. Science explains his process.
Science tells us how and when. Religion gives the why.
There shouldn’t be no more debate.
I swear if I see one more person try and argue about this crap using second law of thermodynamics I’m going to….(insert empty threat here)
If you don’t agree. Complain. I’m probably never going to view this site again.

Snax,
Bring it on.
You are a good case in point. Why are you so convinced that the Second Law of Thermodynamics is NOT a good argument against evolution? It is because the “hijackers of Thermodynamics” have convinced you that evolution and abiogenesis are compatible with the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The basis for this belief is not founded on science: it stems from the belief that evolution has happened naturally, so it is assumed that it must not violate the law.
The classical approach to thermodynamics can be applied without reference to an auxiliary device – sometimes called a thermodynamic mechanism. But although engineers use it in this fashion in the design process, the auxiliary device is crucial in deciding if a process can occur. No WORKING device and the process will not happen! I emphasize this because, as engineers all too well know, not any device will work and achieve the desired processes. But the “con artists” of evolution fail to bring out the point that the Second Law is “fighting” all the advances of evolution. Also, they fail to explain clearly that the real issue is the probability, which is the underlying reason that the Second Law of thermodynamics holds.
For example, there is a possibility that the air molecules in the room will all move to one side of the room causing all the people on the side without air to die. But this event is so improbable, that if it did occur we would say that the Second Law of Thermodynamics was violated! The most probable states did not occur.
Also, some mechanism could materialize causing the air to be moved from one side of the room to the other. For example, an air pump and supporting equipment (e.g. air tight divider, air lines, etc.) could cause the air to move from one side to the other if there was energy and all the equipment connected together correctly. But the probability of this mechanism appearing naturally is just too small. Now the evolutionists are proponents of the naturally appearing mechanism to explain Neo-Darwinism. But at what point do we reach absurdity! Effectively any mechanism can be theorized to get around any imposed direction by the Second Law of Thermodynamics leaving the theory meaningless! So to say that the Second Law does not presents problems for evolution is to eliminate the Second Law of Thermodynamics from being a useful theory!
Now there may be some evolutionists that will counter that they do believe the Second Law is in opposition to the development and advancement of life. Some will even cloud this by talking of “climbing mount improbable” without referencing the Second Law as the cause – but this is another point. They will respond that mutations and natural selection are the auxiliary device or thermodynamic mechanism enabling evolution.
But this gets back to my previous post where I discuss the supposed evolutionary development of the eye. The heart of that discussion was that the degrees of freedom of the evolutionary mechanism are too large, proving that the supposed Neo-Darwinian thermodynamic mechanism is not possible. It is like trying to wright your name in the sand with a string as you would a pencil or stick. It just doesn’t work!

Eric
The hindrence to education is fanaticism of any sort. Someone who claims to be a scientist but views the world with the arrogance of a closed mind would be a good example. Someone who lumps everyone who does not agree with his personal views is another.

I notice you don’t say how the second law forbids evolution, just that it does.
Life does not break the second law, hence things can grow and reproduce. Not all of these offspring are genetically identical, so they will differ slightly in their behaviours and abilities. Neither will all survive, so it is to be expected that the genetic make-up of a population will change over time (evolution). Any differences between behaviours or abilities that increase/decrease an individual’s chances of survival would be expected to be over/under represented in the next generation (natural selection).
All that is required for evolution is reproduction, with inheritance, and variation, and differential survival. None of those things break the second law of thermodynamics, nor can they.
The second law say that the entropy of the complete system must increase. It does, the entropy of the Sun increases by a vast amount every second, and some of the energy released while it’s doing this shines on the Earth and drives 99% of natural processes on it. The other 1% derives its energy directly from geological processes, which also doesn’t break the second law as the entropy of them and the Earth they took their energy from also increased in the process.
Arguing against evolution by saying lightning conductors don’t build houses is like arguing against Genesis by pointing out that breathing on dirt doesn’t either. It’s called a strawman argument and implies that the speaker has no real evidence for their view, hence is compelled to invent some.

David B.
Well said. I agree except for the example of the refrigerator which uses the same principle as air conditioners.
You do point out the real function of refrigeration in “gasses can flow from low pressures to high (pumps)” albeit we call them compressors in my field. Cold is a sink rather than a source, the compression of the refrigerant (gas) causes it to give off heat (source) external to the mechanism and the expansion of the gas in larger tubes within the mechanism removes heat (sink) to make and keep the inside cold.
:)

David B.
Point taken.

STB,
“Intellectual frauds”? It is ironic that you make this claim when the truth of the matter is quiet the opposite! You are the one posting the “same old” propaganda that is paraded around as if it is science. My postings are original and I do have a higher degree in engineering. I work at a very prominent organization and I do work with thermodynamics often. Your posts look like the same old cut and paste arguments presented by the propagandists of evolution. The Second Law of Thermodynamics has everything to do with the direction of processes. Energy itself does not produce localized decreases of entropy by itself. There needs to be a thermodynamic mechanism to utilize the energy! For example, without the refrigerator you will not get the localized decrease of entropy such that the localized control volume is moving away from equilibrium producing the cold storage box. The constraints imposed by the thermodynamic mechanism enable the decrease in entropy. Energy (even solar energy) will not produce the decrease in entropy moving away from equilibrium by itself. Now there are some natural thermodynamic mechanisms but the systems are very limited because nature does not have the ability to precisely constrain the boundary conditions. Without the precise constraints you can’t produce systems with both complexity of form and function.
The watch maker argument is a very powerful argument for design, especially when you look at life. Life operates at a number of levels: molecular, nano, micro, and macro. If you knew anything about engineering, you would know the difficulty of designing these machines. Reproduction, nervous systems, digestive systems, hearts, eyes, brains etc are all crafted from the molecular to the macro levels. The information to build itself is stored in the genome. Every single process, billions upon billions of them, are all programmed into the genome. The chemical reaction vs the inert object argument is a smoke screen which is laughable at best! When you look at all the processes required to get life, our simple designed systems have more probability of appearing in nature than does human life. Our designed systems are like toys compared to mammals and higher lifeforms. So think for yourself and don’t let the propagandists think for you!
Concerning the third point: I do get energized when I see such blatantly erroneous ideas trumpeted as truth. For example, saying that solar energy is enough in and of itself to produce life is shamefully ignorant. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see this. A car will go up the hill (an entropy decreasing process) if it is functional, has energy as well as an operator. Take away the engine and you can have all the gasoline you want but you won’t get up the hill.
Now I am sure someone will say they could use the gasoline to blow the car up the hill. Even then you would have to constrain the fuel to allow the explosion, ignite it, and even then you wouldn’t get very far. Your explosive device would be a thermodynamic mechanism, though of limited capability. Most probably you would burn up the car with little movement up the hill. So yes, I do wonder why supposedly educated people can’t comprehend these points. I have to say it is willful ignorance! They are so programmed to believe evolution that they are unable to think rationally!
The bacterial resistance to vaccines suggests design rather than evolution. The robustness of life is built into it or else the lifeforms would just die out! Having engineered machines required to work in multiple environments, these systems are much harder to design. Life having the ability to modify itself, though limited by the programming in the lifeform, suggests a very sophisticated design!

David B.,
“Life does not break the second law, hence things can grow and reproduce.”
You are correct here. Once the machine is built it can do the things it was designed to do. The problem for evolution is when you try to explain the advancement, beyond what is programmed into the lifeform. As I pointed out before, if you unwind human DNA, it will stretch from the earth to the moon. There is an amazing amount of information programmed into the DNA. Every step in the development of eyes, stomach, heart, brain etc has to be recorded precisely! I say again, EVERY step needs to be recorded as well as WHEN the step needs to be made. This whole process is highly coupled which means that changes to the design are hard to make! You can look at the functionality of the body and see the interconnections. To explain the development through the evolutionary process, you must explain how the multitude of very precise mutations are able to occur. We are talking about hundreds or even thousands of very precise mutations along the genome that stretches from the earth to the moon. When you look at this probability, you quickly see there is not enough time for all the mutations to occur even for some very simple systems. Thousands of mutations must occur at very precise points along the genome. This is what dooms evolution.
From a thermodynamic perspective, the thermodynamic mechanism determines what processes are allowed and defines limits on the ways entropy is decreased. The highly ordered and precise states along the genome leading to advancement and growth are resisted because of the shear improbability of the mutations, just like the air molecules all moving to one side of the room are resisted.

Of course houses neither grow nor reproduce, hence your analogy is not applicable. Another example of a strawman argument.
All that is required for evolution to occur is growth, reproduction, variation and selection. So which of these breaks the second law?
If natural selection is impossible under the laws of thermodynamics, why isn’t artificial selection?
As to the information content of human DNA, it is the product of billions of generations upon billions of individuals, giving rise to more than enough material to allow the necessary changes. To insist that they must occur in a particular sequence, or together, is to artificially constrain the problem to arrive at the answer you want. Which is also a form of strawman argument.
The reason that bodies like the NAS support evolution is because it works as an explanation.

David B.
You make an excellent argument but Eric’s view of evolution is creation oriented (ID). This argument is largely a semantics issue. Evolution, by definition is how amd why life changes (evolves), not about it’s origin (creation). These are two distinct and very different arguments. When these concepts are lumped together there are no facts only hypothesis vs belief. It’s a loser for both sides as the origin of life can not be proven without repeating the process.

All,
Thanks for the response.
David B.: “Of course houses neither grow nor reproduce, hence your analogy is not applicable. Another example of a strawman argument.”
My first point was that energy alone does not build machines or houses as you claim it does simply by using energy from the sun. Even with open systems, the Second Law of Thermodynamics requires a thermodynamic mechanism to explain entropy decreasing systems moving away from equilibrium.
My second point was that the probability of simple structures (like houses) forming by chance is much more likely than complex lifeforms arising from simpler lifeforms. The number of very specific mutations required of evolution is large to explain the development of new systems. The Lifeforms tends to eliminate useless structure because it wastes energy. The DNA also tends to repair itself.
Naturalists must also explain the development of life from inanimate elements, if naturalistic evolution is true. You must explain how life started in the first place. So discussions about inanimate matter are relevant to the origin of life as well.

David B.:
“As to the information content of human DNA, it is the product of billions of generations upon billions of individuals, giving rise to more than enough material to allow the necessary changes.”
Well, you need to do the math to show that it is true. Even if you inflate the number of the population to get to a probability closer to what you want, you run into problems. Each of your “isolated” populations take more time to transfer their genetic material to the next “isolated” population – assuming the populations are semi-isolated. How long does it take for the genetic advancements to coalesce into one genome? Essentially, there is a limit where the larger population does not help you from a probabilistic perspective.
David B.:
“To insist that they must occur in a particular sequence, or together, is to artificially constrain the problem to arrive at the answer you want. Which is also a form of strawman argument.”
First, I should clarify my point. In the reproduction process, specifically embryonic development, the processes are very specific. If this was not the case, the lifeforms would not function! So living systems are highly coupled, which means that changes are hard to achieve that don’t adversely affect other systems. My illustration of pick-up sticks is apropos. When the sticks are highly coupled and intertwined, it is hard to pull one stick out without moving the others. Another illustration is instructive. In a automobile assembly line, all the assembly processes need to be cared out in a very precise fashion. For example, the manager can’t change the type of engine without major changes in the assembly process. All the bolts holding the engine must connect at precise locations. The size of the engine can’t be too large or major design changes are needed for the body and chassis. Also, all the programming of the robotic arms needs to be modified to make sure the precise operations are carried out.
I bring up all these points because life has to re-manufacture itself in the reproduction process. The processes are highly specific and precise. The DNA holds all the instructions, information, and templates for this process. It can be argued that most modifications would be problematic in the embryonic developmental stages. How could evolutionary development proceed for systems highly coupled with a multitude of other systems? This question needs to be answered by Neo-Darwinists to explain how evolution is even possible.
Now to further explain why your statement above is wrong, I need to address my second point: a large number of very precise mutations are required to allow the advancement of new systems. This statement can be arrived at by examining the multitude of subcomponents of the system and interrelationships between the many other systems. Quickly you realize that added function is needed to ensure selection, but the many specific mutations required to ensure the development are just too improbable. This is the catch 22 for evolution!
Again you say the following:
“To insist that they must occur in a particular sequence, or together, is to artificially constrain the problem to arrive at the answer you want.”
No, you are the one constraining the problem in a fashion that you want to get the answer you want! The burden of proof is on Neo-Darwinists to show that simple one or two mutational processes can build anything. Again, little advancement will provide little pressure to drive evolution. The rates of advancement will be too slow! Also, you must explain how the mutations coalesce into a single genome. And to say that the order of mutations is unimportant is another faith statement. Again, the burden of proof is on Neo-Darwinists to show how this is true! Again, we have never seen evolution occur in the lab where whole new systems are built. It is the grandest faith statement to state that evolution is “overwhelming and compelling”! In fact, it is downright dishonest and dangerous for science!

David B.:
“Fortunately, evolution has such a mechanism. It’s called ‘life’.”
Well, this is like saying that a machine in a general sense is a thermodynamic mechanism. A guy says I need a pump and the engineer says here is a machine. Another guy says, “I need an airplane.” The engineer says here is a machine. And finally, another guy comes along and asks for a computer. The engineer says, “Here is a machine.”
But our customers are interested in the specifics of the machine. They have specific processes that they want to achieve! If the machine doesn’t constrain energy, mechanical dynamics, electrodynamic forces, fluid flow, heat transfer, and a host of other processes in very precise fashion, then the notion of the machine being a thermodynamic mechanism is meaningless. We cannot talk about a machine without giving the specifics about how processes are constrained enabling very specific results.
The problem with the statement that “life is the thermodynamic mechanism” is that it does not explain the host of very specific processes required for the progressive development of biological systems. The billions upon billions of processes required of evolution need to be shown to be within a probability band such that all lifeforms can be accounted within 3-4.5 billion years.

“Naturalists must also explain the development of life from inanimate elements, if naturalistic evolution is true. You must explain how life started in the first place.”
“I find it interesting how Neo-Darwinists distance themselves from life’s origin! The thermodynamic argument is powerful concerning this topic, but I digress. Naturalists are in a real pickle if they cannot show how life originated, naturally! It brings into question their original assumptions about science: namely, only naturalistic processes can occur and account for life.”
No they don’t. You’re again redefining terms to things you want them to be. Evolution doesn’t deal with the origin of life. You’re mixing that up with abiogenesis.
“Let me throw another rock in the glass towers of evolution.”
If by rock you mean false analogies then that tower will stand just fine

Eric
Before you label someone you might want to ask first what that person’s position actually is.
I’m a Darwinist, not a neo-darwinist. I don’t like the terms Micro and Macro as they confuse issues. They, in fact, do not exist. After reading and rereading Darwin’s works I have concluded that he had made some false assumptions based on a lack of evidence and available technology, but his basic hypoyhesis for the origin of species holds true and has been witnessed in nature. Darwin also suggested the theory that we now call P.E. within the text of “Origin of Species”. He also talked about embryology which has now evolved into evo-devo. He is often misquoted, assigned Lamarkian quips and slandered as being godless. He was in fact a brilliant christian with keen observation and a logical mind and I do and will continue to act as his defender.

WDJ
“No they don’t. You’re again redefining terms to things you want them to be. Evolution doesn’t deal with the origin of life. You’re mixing that up with abiogenesis.”
If naturalistic causes can’t explain the origin of life, then the possibility exists that life is a product of an intelligent designer – a nonnatural explanation. If this is true, it brings into question the assumption that only natural explanations are possible for science.
WDJ – “If by rock you mean false analogies then that tower will stand just fine”
Is this a faith statement or is it based on science!

Quietman: “Before you label someone you might want to ask first what that person’s position actually is.”
So do you believe in genetic inheritance?
Quietman: “I don’t like the terms Micro and Macro as they confuse issues. They, in fact, do not exist.”
This statement is based on faith rather than science! I have already shown how this is problematic.
Quietman: “Darwin also suggested the theory that we now call P.E. within the text of ‘Origin of Species’.”
P.E. is even more problematic from a thermodynamic perspective! What is the mechanism that can explain the rapid jumps in development? Again, you must have a great faith in evolution!
Quietman: “He was in fact a brilliant christian with keen observation and a logical mind and I do and will continue to act as his defender.”
So do you consider yourself a Christian? What branch?

By the way Eric, don’t you find it hypocrytical that on one side you keep repeating your thermodynamics argument yet on the other hand you also bring up the flood myth a couple of times, something that would defy quite a lot of physics

“You are the one posting the “same old” propaganda that is paraded around as if it is science.”
Strangely enough, this propaganda you speak of is universally accepted by leading scientists across all fields of science. Scientists who are a hell of a lot smarter than either of us. So there must be some sort of secret Darwinist conspiracy that I’m not aware of.
“My postings are original and I do have a higher degree in engineering. I work at a very prominent organization and I do work with thermodynamics often.”
Original my foot.
“Energy itself does not produce localized decreases of entropy by itself. There needs to be a thermodynamic mechanism to utilize the energy!”
They’re called chemical reactions. Any freshman engineering major would have to learn that chemical reactions occur spontaneously, or when energy is supplied from the surroundings
IE the sun.
“If you knew anything about engineering, you would know the difficulty of designing these machines. Reproduction, nervous systems, digestive systems, hearts, eyes, brains etc are all crafted from the molecular to the macro levels. The information to build itself is stored in the genome. Every single process, billions upon billions of them, are all programmed into the genome…..etc”
After tutoring engineering students for the past couple of years, and helping a friend in a design competition, I know enough of engineering. Biological systems are massively more complex than our mechanical machines, billions in fact by your own word. It may take a very precise DNA sequence to produce a human being, but it also means that there are an infinite number of permutations of DNA sequences to produce life in general. Going back to the watchmaker B.S, a watch can be a simple sundial, watch glass, a modern digital, or any arbitrary method used to keep track of time.
“I do get energized when I see such blatantly erroneous ideas trumpeted as truth. For example, saying that solar energy is enough in and of itself to produce life is shamefully ignorant.”
As shameful and ignorant as disregarding solar energy’s contribution in the first place, and acknowledging it when someone brings it up.
“The robustness of life is built into it or else the lifeforms would just die out! Having engineered machines required to work in multiple environments, these systems are much harder to design. Life having the ability to modify itself, though limited by the programming in the lifeform, suggests a very sophisticated design!”
So basically what you’re saying, that a method of physical/chemical assault against a life form that had worked so wonderfully well to the point of near eradication, is now no longer effective because in the past 50 years some sky pixie extended its noodley appendage granting it immunity from not only a single kind of vaccine, but multiple ones that have been specifically made to target such bacterium?
You have to be high in order flaunt your supposed higher credentials in Engineering in order to appear intellectually credible while at the same time disregard in biology, bio-chem, and organic chemistry to the point of giving them labels as members of some grand conspiracy.

Eric:
“Energy itself does not produce localized decreases of entropy by itself. There needs to be a thermodynamic mechanism to utilize the energy!”
Hotshot: “I guess you have never experienced a hurricane or tornado?”
Yes, I already explained that there are some natural mechanisms such as hurricanes and tornadoes, but these mechanisms are very limited in their ability. For example, hurricanes don’t assemble cars in a factory, even though they have enough energy to do this. Hurricanes and tornadoes destroy things and when they do construct things, such as a two by four through your front door, it is not considered beneficial. This is the point when I talk about the precise use of energy. This is all related to the direction of processes in thermodynamics.
The thermodynamic ID construct that I referred to has to take into account the natural thermodynamic mechanisms.

STB: “Strangely enough, this propaganda you speak of is universally accepted by leading scientists across all fields of science. Scientists who are a hell of a lot smarter than either of us. So there must be some sort of secret Darwinist conspiracy that I’m not aware of.”
Certainly, many biologists and other scientists are convinced by evolution and do not believe that there is any conspiracy! Many in the sciences do NOT believe in evolution. But there is a bandwagon mentality within science today which grossly exaggerates the evidence for evolution. Dissenting opinions are squelched. People are even fired for daring to question the grand faith of evolution.
True scientists however always look at the evidence. No new useful biological-systems have been observed to develop due to evolution in the lab. No clear links show that the “evolutionary tree” is solid scientifically. In fact, a lot of speculation is trumpeted as scientific evidence. The supposed transitional fossils do not show any clear transitions. They could easily be explained as some other species that died out long ago.
Now if this was acknowledged by the scientific community and some humility was demonstrated, then maybe myself and others within the sciences who are critics of evolution would not say there is a conspiracy. But given the gross exaggeration of the evidence for evolution, and the religious fervor of the “protectors of science”, I find the notion of a conspiracy credible. Specifically, notice how you state that evolution is “universally accepted by leading scientists across all fields of science.” If 40% of college grads don’t believe evolution, what percent of those in fields related to science don’t believe in evolution? My guess is that at least 10% don’t!

STB: “They’re called chemical reactions. Any freshman engineering major would have to learn that chemical reactions occur spontaneously, or when energy is supplied from the surroundings
IE the sun.”
Laugh, so any process can occur? So why do chemical plants require heat exchangers, boilers, evaporators, condensers, pumps etc. If only energy is needed you should be able to put the base chemicals in a pile and let the sun shine on it! But we all know that this does not happen because you need the thermodynamic mechanism to constrain and allow the desired processes!

If should also add that while the sun provides energy in the form of heath, light itself is also a very potent catalyst for reactions. It’s not a coincidence that some products have to be stored in opaque or dark brown bottles

WDJ: “If you had a basic understanding of organic chemistry processing you’d know that by itself, creating a more complex molecule isn’t that really hard.”
Around equilibrium there are a number of simpler molecular structures that can form based on molecular dynamics, but as quickly as they form they can be destroyed! The more complex the molecule the more improbable is the formation. There is a big difference in observing the formation of simple amino acids found in Miller’s experiment and the complex functioning nanomachines found in life. The nanomachines require very detailed and precise applications of energy to allow their formation. These processes are in opposition to the natural direction of the processes.
Once again, energy by itself is not enough to account for the formation of life and the supposed evolutionary development form single cells to advanced lifeforms. In fact, these arguments are laughable when you look at them in detail!

i can’t believe it, and i don’t get it, you guys still discussing about this crap!!!!there are some friends from the states, and they just came over to germany to visit me last weekend and they couldn’t believe it how confortable it is, to be over here.like the daily life and all the stuff people care about over here. it’s not like this crap you discussing about, it’s just all about, how could it be more confortable for me and other people to live together.Guys, just stop to be concerned about stupid stuff like evolution or creation and the possibility of each.noone has a answer you are just discussing possibilitys!!by the way, happy birthday, 5 years Iraq!!5 years and you didn’t change anything!!a perfect example for what happens if you americans concerned about something!

It would seem that before evolution can be taught in public school, the parents first need to be taught what their vocabulary actually means. The definitions of words like “hypothesis”, “theory”, “law” and even “fact” are incredibly twisted in these comments. It would seem that education has failed miserably for the current generation.

David B.
“Just applying energy can turn simple commonly occurring chemicals into amino and nucleic acids, as shown be numerous Miller-Urey experiments. An energetic and inconstant environment, will also cause them to combine, separate and recombine innumerable times.”
The Miller-Urey experiments did have a thermodynamic mechanism – one allowing simple chemical reactions. But it is dishonest to say that it is an easy process to go from these simple amino acids to living bacteria or other cellular life forms. In fact, the odds of it is astronomically small. So being an educated fellow, why are you so willing to twist the scientific data presenting it as an easy process? This is where the mainline scientists (many of them) lose credibility! If you cannot be honest about the odds of the first cell forming, how can we beleive what you say?

David B: “Complex molecules are not only found in laboratory experiments (of the M-U type) but have even been detected in space.”
Just applying energy to an open system does not mean that entropy will decrease. In fact, the vast majority of energy just dissipates. There are three types of processes where the entropy decreases naturally: 1) A natural mechanism occurs allowing a decrease in entropy. These mechanisms are limited in ability because nature has limited control over the boundary conditions. Some examples are the following: a)the water cycle; b) volcanoes; c) waterfalls; d) wind blowing sand in the desert; e) lightning; f) and ocean currents. 2) Around equilibrium there are processes that can be entropy decreasing. This is related to the probability of the molecular collisions and the resulting probability distribution. These are typically insignificant for the degree of entropy decrease is related to the distribution. For example, it is possible that a large molecule form out of air, but as the molecule grows the probability favors the destruction of the macromolecule. Even in space, there can be a probability distribution developed to define the molecular structures resulting over, say, an astroid. The local molecules around the astroid will tend to cling to the surface resulting in macromolecules. Still even in this environment there is an expected probability distribution over the surface dependent on such factors as the collision rate of molecules, collision rate of high energy particles, electical surface charge, and density and composition of molecules around the astroid. Typically, these result in useless macromolecules. 3) There are also a combination of both 1) and 2) where natural mechanisms interplay with the processes close to equilibrium. Here I use the words “close to equilibrium” but it can include “far from equilibrium” processes. These would include Benard convection, bifurcation processes, Belousov-Zhabotinskii reactions, and dissipative dynamical systems.
When you examine the “design space” of natural entropy decreasing processes, it is very limited. This is so because the natural boundary conditions are very limited.

Just like the church imprisoned Galileo. The church ridiculed Darwin. The nice thing is that science works. We can find cures for diseases, both mental and physical, and the lovely god that likes genocide isn’t real.

It seems that we can take a page from Shakespeare in regards to this argument. There is no right or wrong, but thinking makes it so. Stop trying to be right all the time. Stop trying to show how everyone is wrong. Religious folks quote the bible as proof because they believe their god wrote it. Good for you lads, and I mean that, truly i do, go ahead and believe that, it’s your right and as a free loving individual, I support you and your beliefs. This being said, I would like to say that I do not believe that any “god” wrote a book. I ask you to stop trying to make me believe this. Please. Nothing you can do will convince me at all. Whether or not science got it right or religion, it simply does not matter. I believe in other realities and this should not be a threat to you. People who believe other realities are not out to get you. relax friends and just remember that pride (in regards to being right) is a deadly sin….no?

Funny how terrified the evolutionist are. They accuse creationists/ID of having a flimsy arguements, yet they are the ones constantly changing their arguements. They make up entire scientific models based on virtually nothing. They use something like “tiktaalik,” and ignore the fact that it is a true fish, and say that it is a “missing link” between fish and anphibians, and then claim that it compelling evidence for evolution. Not to mention all the “missing links” in those laughable posters of supposed evolution. You know, the kinds that start off with a monkey, then they show it slowly change, each one a little less monkey-like. By the way, NOT ONE of those monkey-like creatures have been found. I ask any evolutionist, give me one, I repeat, JUST ONE example of an organism gaining new genetic information. It hasn’t happended. And no, natural selection doesn’t count. Why? Because genetic info is LOST, not created in natural selection. You could NEVER breed a poodle back to the original dog it came from.
As for this issue about wheather or not to teach creationism in the schools(Oh no, what are we going to do?), I will say I dont believe this is necessary. Rather, just teach that there is two beliefs about the begining of the earth, then teach real science(observational science). Why is that so dangerous? Or maybe its not that it’s danderous, but that the evolutionist are scared. They are scared because they know it is true science that is backed up by facts.

Evolution teaches us there is only one
religion and we all belong to it. And
that religion is SURVIVAL. And the
principles of this religion is that
which helps us survive, for example,
love, care, nutrition, fitness, science, education, medicine and so on.
To say God created us doesn’t help us
much. It simply pushes the question
further away from us. Because then we must ask who created God.
Being a psychologist, I hope you will understand why I don’t believe in “revealed religion.”
But the Universe is more than inanimate matter. The Universe has intelligence and emotion. How do I know this? I
observe humans. We have intelligence
and emotion, and we are part of the
Universe. So intelligence and
emotion do emerge from the Universe.
Moreover, evolution tells us how
the psychological characteristics of the Universe emerge.

Wow, my post was too long. To continue:
As for me, I believe in God. I’m not perfect, but I work on my imperfections every day. Thanks to God, I have a moral compass and an ideal to aspire to. But I don’t require anyone else to believe. I’ll talk to anyone about it willing to face to face, but I’m not going to force it on you (and no, commenting on a public forum isn’t forcing my views on you, as you can always avert your eyes) because in the USA we have the right to believe, or not believe, as we see fit. I just wish the atheists were as easygoing about it.
I sit next to an atheist at work. He doesn’t believe, I do, we discuss it sometimes, but we get along well regardless. Should be that way everywhere.

@logicwillsetyoufree:
It is precisely the fact that there is no natural explanation on the table to account for the enormous odds against the origin of life that we turn to supernaturalism as a plausible explanation. It is not folly to postulate something outside the natural realm that caused a miracle to occur if the data we have at our disposal tells us that it WAS a miracle for life to exist at all.
Also, if we are talking about God, there is no formal need to explain His presence if we understand Him to be an eternal Being. Now, you could potentially argue that God is not eternal, but even if this is the case and we don’t know where He came from, it doesn’t change the argument at all that a supernatural being of some sort is responsible for the creation of life as we know it.
Back to the article – I’ve read the document before (a person I was chatting with gave it to me a few months ago), and I think it makes a few very compelling arguments, but the arguments don’t justify the extrapolation of evolution to account for all of life by any means. In general, much of the content is based on completely unfounded assumptions and flat out red herrings. Take for example the notion that an understanding of biological ancestry is “absolutely necessary” to understand the nature of the SARS virus. The article itself says in a subsection that scientists who study the virus note the similarities between it and other strains of known viruses, and this shows the common heritage, and hence they know how to treat it because of that ancestry.
Read that closely and think about it. Why does common ancestry come into play here? Couldn’t we just as well say, “Hey, the viruses appear similar to each other, so why don’t we try to adapt treatments we have for these known viruses to work with the SARS virus because it seems to treat similar diseases?” In fact, this is EXACTLY what biologists do when finding cures for new diseases. Notice that we don’t even have a reason to care about whether or not these viruses came from the same common ancestor. All we care about is that the viruses are similar in nature, and hence we can use that information as a basis to form a treatment. In fact, they wouldn’t know the viruses even had the potential to be “related” unless they studied the similarities in structure and effect of the virus to begin with!
So, the notion that biologists MUST understand evolution in order to do their work treating diseases is completely false and misleading. Many of the other arguments made for the power of evolutionary theory in solving problems fall victim to the same kind of extraneous information fallacy.

The reason this debate continues is simple – a total unwillingness on the part of the evolutionary community to make a clear distinction between evolution and Darwinian evolution. There is ample evidence for evolution. There is no evidence that Darwinian evolution plays any significant part in evolution of species and any belief that it does requires a serious level of innumeracy – it is simply too improbable. The evolutionary community has adopted a marketing approach to the issue – emphasise the bits that work, hide the bits that do not work. Hence the current situation where there is a simple, natural non-Darwinian evolutionary mechanism that does explain the “mysteries” of evolution, does give the correct answers to caluculations, does correctly predict the distribution of genes etc and it is totally suppressed by the evolutionary community as being a “competing product”. If you want to get a handle on the issue first ask for a description of Darwinian evolution but insist that it is in terms of tuning of genetic mechanisms, not “variation”. It actually makes more sense that way. Then ask the killer question – where did the novel genetic mechanisms come from? It is this issue that the suppressed evolutionary theory addresses.

“One simple question. How did mammals manage to survive while they waited for the complex design of procreation to “evolve”. Global warming people are saying that mammal species are now dying out because they can’t evolve fast enough to cope with the 1/4 degree increase in temperature, but somehow they managed the other.” Posted by: Jerry Nendel
In response: Your question follows no logic. Evolution happened over millions of years not over a few decades. So the reason mammals can’t keep up and are not able to cope with the 1/4th degree temperature increase is that the increase is happening too fast and the environment is changing too drastically for them to be able to adapt to the changes.

001:026 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
1)Who was god talking to if nothing existed?
001:024 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
2) let the earth bring forth after his kind?… well i guess we all now know that the earth is a male
001:022 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
3) i guess that means that fowl (birds) live in the earth
001:002 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
4) so if the earth was with out form and void (nonexistant) how was darkness upon the face of the deep?… if there was no form then there was no face

There’s no point in debating the subject as no common ground will ever be found. I do believe there is a spiritual power that affects us but it is something that (as of now) the human mind is incapable of understanding. Dare I say that evolution may allow us to understand this in the centuries to come.
Throughout the last 10,000 years people all over the world have worshipped a differing greater power using different methods. The old pagan and Greek beliefs, for example, have gone, overtaken by organised religions such as Christianity and Islam. These religions have been altered and abused by people in power for thousands of years to suit their own aims. I believe in a greater power but I will not be held by one particualr religion which has been altered frequently since it’s inception.

To deny evolution is to clearly proclaim that one lacks education.

i just have to say this but we didnt evolve from monkeys we both (monkeys and humans) evolved from a comon ancestor

Perhaps we should study the real cause and affect issue. Science is funded by donations and grants from the governmen. The same government that is forbidden to recognize religion. Over the last hundred years science has PROVEN whatever their benefactors want them to prove. Science used to say cigarettes were healthy. Granted they were funded by the tobacco companies. You can find just as many scientist that deny global warming as those that support it. The scientific fact is that SCIENTISTS are like prostitutes, they will do or prove anything for money.

For all of you that doubt evolution, next time you are at the doctors, hospital or pharmacy, just ask them for treatment that was NOT derived from evolutionary theory(which includes cell theory, biology and many many other disciplines)
Oh, and by the way, creationism or intelligent design are NOT science. Both ideas are completed rejected by the Scientific Method. They are conclusions that “try” to work towards supporting evidence. That isn’t science.

Are people still stuck on the monkeys. Can evolved and created people forgotten how to read? The ‘theory’ said we evolved fro a common ancestor, the monkeys and apes and humans of today have been around for about the period of geological time. We didnt come from them and them didnt come from us. Common ancestor …..
And who said evalution is not an instrument of God. Mybe such a creator whole notion is to watch things unfold, and so, creation is the initiation of the evolutionary process and the creator sits and watches ‘the experiment’. The way we are ready to kill and maime each other over ideas, should of been reason to restart ‘the experiment’ a long time ago. Mybe when sentiance first thought of the concept of Me Right You Wrong.