You're welcome.

Re: You're welcome.

I'll offer this to the thread as I don't want to get into the religious debate:

I recently listened to a show about biological science on the radio. The researcher that was inteviewed made a really good point:

The way we are taught in school, think about how our bodies function, etc, we constantly say things like "the brain is our most important organ", "the human brain is x amount of lbs", "humans HAVE a brain that is more powerful than that of a rabbit", etc.

The point she made was that we don't HAVE a brain, we ARE a brain. I AM a brain, but I HAVE a body attached to it.

The brain is who we are and it's very powerful, but we must remember that whatever we experience of the world around us is just signals reaching us from our sensory organs.

If someone has received a convincing piece of input (perceived or factual) about a revelation of God or whatever, it's going to seem as convicing to them as gravity seems to me when I drop a hammer on my foot. Whether the input is coming from real signals from real sensory organs, from a book, or whether it's just imagined doesn't matter to the perceiver once he is convinced.

I learned to accept this a long time ago.

I'm just thankful every day that I get to live in a country that allows me to feel the way I wish to about these issues - and I can post about it on the web without fear - or I can freely choose not to.

I can only imagine the feeling of powerlessness one must experience if one is forced to either believe or pretend to.
 
Re: You're welcome.

Helge Dr. Bentsen said:
The God Delusion: Richard Dawkins: 9780618918249: Amazon.com: Books
The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution: Amazon.co.uk: Richard Dawkins: Books
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I've read some of Dawkins material and seen him in interviews. He is all about selling books and making a name for himself, and that primary motive shows loud and clear in the way that he writes, and what he says.

I don't like to get into these sorts of debates, because they often go in circles. Nobody is going to change their worldview because of somebody's post on the internet. As has been discussed, wackos, nutjobs, people seeking to support their own agenda etc have frequently mis-used the Bible and Christianity, doing some really stupid stuff - essentially creating a "smear" campaign from within - and that isn't going to change anytime soon. The same can be said for Muslims and other religious groups.

Filtering out these sorts of cases from our radar can leave us finding some pretty reasonable Christians, some Muslims that DON'T want "death to America", etc. TJ's points seem pretty reasonable IMHO.

The religious groups who are anti-science are IMHO part of that fringe group too.
 
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Spenser Hamilton said:
View attachment 5016
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Funny quote, but keep in mind, scientific research is based on theory, and reducing it to true/false isn't accurate. The ones that aren't yet "fact" keep the "theory" preface, and they are continually modified as new discoveries are made. Some theories are arguably very close to fact, others are essentially our "best guess".
 
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Jeff Babcock said:
Funny quote, but keep in mind, scientific research is based on theory, and reducing it to true/false isn't accurate. The ones that aren't yet "fact" keep the "theory" preface, and they are continually modified as new discoveries are made. Some theories are arguably very close to fact, others are essentially our "best guess".
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It is a fun, cheeky picture to pull out when the science.v.religion debates start ;)

I found out early on that I can seperate Christianity and Christians. I don't like or agree with Christianity, but I've found that most Christians are good people. I often see people on both sides of the debate trying to demonise the other side, an I think it's foolish. We're all here together.
 
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Bennett Prescott said:
I thought this was a well thought through and produced explanation of why evolution, uh, just is:

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Interesting video Bennett....

A long time ago I came to the conclusion it was Man's massive ego at work that fabricated religions because it provided the answers to those 3 big questions that Man just "must" have the answers to :
Where did we come from?
What is our purpose here?
What happens after we die.

How we still buy into those stories from 1000s of years ago and twist them into excuses to murder each other today and everyday boggles my mind.
I would certainly love to "know" the answers to those questions, but I am content with the fact I don't know and don't have a "belief"...a "guess", Maybe.

Funny thing - it was just yesterday that I had my finger on the fader for the Dalai Lama's microphone in my theater. His message was about trying to achieve our own individual inner peace through compassion for others. If it was delivered as religion, I didn't hear it as religion, but it does seem to make sense as a target behavior for Man's evolution.
 
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Gary Green said:
Interesting video Bennett....

A long time ago I came to the conclusion it was Man's massive ego at work that fabricated religions because it provided the answers to those 3 big questions that Man just "must" have the answers to :
Where did we come from?
What is our purpose here?
What happens after we die.

How we still buy into those stories from 1000s of years ago and twist them into excuses to murder each other today and everyday boggles my mind.
I would certainly love to "know" the answers to those questions, but I am content with the fact I don't know and don't have a "belief"...a "guess", Maybe.

Funny thing - it was just yesterday that I had my finger on the fader for the Dalai Lama's microphone in my theater. His message was about trying to achieve our own individual inner peace through compassion for others. If it was delivered as religion, I didn't hear it as religion, but it does seem to make sense as a target behavior for Man's evolution.
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+1, IMHO this is what religion is all about. Forcing ones interpretation of an old book into showing that something that we can more or less show happened one way must have happened another filthies both ones religion and ones mind, IMHO. The incredible thing about the universe is how many unlikely things can be true about it, and the vast and inconceivable affects of small changes over endless time.
 
Re: You're welcome.

Spenser Hamilton said:
It is a fun, cheeky picture to pull out when the science.v.religion debates start ;)

I found out early on that I can seperate Christianity and Christians. I don't like or agree with Christianity, but I've found that most Christians are good people. I often see people on both sides of the debate trying to demonise the other side, an I think it's foolish. We're all here together.
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Gary Green said:
How we still buy into those stories from 1000s of years ago and twist them into excuses to murder each other today and everyday boggles my mind.
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Having done some academic work in this area many years ago, one thing I found particularly interesting is how people can come to some pretty strong opinions about religious issues without having done a great deal of "real" investigation into the issues at hand. A large part of the population base their opinions on a collection of random news stories, conversations, a few people they know, etc, etc... just a collection of random stuff. Of course this is true on issues outside of religion as well.

When you actually look at religious texts like the Bible and see what is said, you quickly discover that many of the greatest concerns and opposition is in reaction to things that the original text does not say or promote at all (for example, it is pretty clear about not killing people). In fact, what it shows is how lousy of a job most people do of accurately representing that which they believe in. As the public tend to base their opinion more on the actions of these people rather than the goals of the original texts, it is easy to come to a very low opinion of a particular religious group depending on who happens to be in your sphere of contact and their observed behavior.
 
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Re: You're welcome.

For "algorisms", I like his blaming Obama's (first) debate performance on the altitude in Denver. :-)

I actually saw him say that on TV.
=========

But politicians prosper from saying what they think their audience wants to hear.

Our founders were wise to keep church and state separate. I like the "occupy" theme to keep business and state separate too.

JR
 
Tim Padrick said:
Why do theists assume that God did not create creatures that would evolve?
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Two degrees of the term "evolve" - 1) Adaptation, and 2) Change from one species to another. Very few challenge the first, it can and has been well documented. Theists reject the second one (and thus the theory of evolution) because there is no documentation of the second. Hybrids yes, but not adaptation so much that the species changed.

The "millions and billions" of years seems like a cop-out for "we don't have the data points to support our theory, but the theory has to be right!".

We won't have all the data points until we can step outside time. Until then, we need to critically see how well various theories square with the data we do have, with the fewest points that have to be left to faith. Everyone has faith in something, whether evolution or creationism or aliens or the Bible or something else.

It's hard to objectively think if the assumption that the evolution theory (for example) is proven fact. It's not, it's one theory among many with plenty of questions.
 
Re: You're welcome.

Caleb Dick said:
Two degrees of the term "evolve" - 1) Adaptation, and 2) Change from one species to another. Very few challenge the first, it can and has been well documented. Theists reject the second one (and thus the theory of evolution) because there is no documentation of the second. Hybrids yes, but not adaptation so much that the species changed.

The "millions and billions" of years seems like a cop-out for "we don't have the data points to support our theory, but the theory has to be right!".

We won't have all the data points until we can step outside time. Until then, we need to critically see how well various theories square with the data we do have, with the fewest points that have to be left to faith. Everyone has faith in something, whether evolution or creationism or aliens or the Bible or something else.

It's hard to objectively think if the assumption that the evolution theory (for example) is proven fact. It's not, it's one theory among many with plenty of questions.
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Evolution is BOTH a theory AND a fact.

Not only that, but claiming that evolution is on the same plane as "other theories" (I read creationism) is not an accurate way to portray the scientific process.

There is no requirement that you "believe", or have faith in, in evolution. Evolution has an almost insurmountable amount of evidence and repeatable scientific tests which support it.

Simply put, we, not being scientists familiar with evolutionary science, are not qualified to make a determination as to the validity of evolution vs creationism. One is supported by a huge sea of scientific evidence, the other is not.



Saying that evolution is just a theory is WOEFULLY ignorant. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_as_fact_and_theory
 
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Theory:

1
: the analysis of a set of facts in their relation to one another
2
: abstract thought : speculation
3
: the general or abstract principles of a body of fact, a science, or an art <music theory>
4
a : a belief, policy, or procedure proposed or followed as the basis of action <her method is based on the theory that all children want to learn>
b : an ideal or hypothetical set of facts, principles, or circumstances —often used in the phrase in theory <in theory, we have always advocated freedom for all>
5
: a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena <the wave theory of light>
6
a : a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation
b : an unproved assumption : conjecture
c : a body of theorems presenting a concise systematic view of a subject <theory of equations>
See theory defined for English-language learners »
See theory defined for kids »

This from Webster's Dictionary. The scientific term is listed first...
 
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