Creationism vs. Evolution

[fogus]

Shunyadragon:

Do you have any evidence or articles on helium migrating into rocks?

Do you have any evidence or articles on nitrogen migrating into diamonds?

Do you have faith in evolution?

[Pooeypants]

Fogus, true science doesn't deal with faith, it deals with facts. If you like to ignore the facts that point to evolution then it is your delusion to keep, we'll keep our feet planted firmly in the real world, thank you.

[shunyadragon]

Shunyadragon:

The questions you are asking now are very technical questions concerning the applied fields of Chemistry. I will answer these as best I can here, but 'Creation Science' advocates need to get a better foundation in the basic sciences and get more support from the applied sciences related to evolution.

Almost all the scientists and academia supporting CS are not experts in the fields related to evolution. There are several Mechanical Engineers, some with good credentials supporting CS, but they are out of their field of specialty.

The CS websites do occasionally site authorities from related fields to evolution, but they most often misquote them and misuse there research. The scientists like Colin Patterson are not happy with this and it is unethical.

You and others who want to challenge science need to get your education in the related fields of science so that you understand what we are talking about.

Some articles from talk.origins address these issues, but you have to more technical stuff in specialty fields to get the research on these topics.

I will look for articles and post them, but the problem is unless you have at least a BS in a related science you will not be able to understand them. Though these are not contravercial topics in science it is simply the regular workhorse science used in mineral and resource industries.

Originally posted by fogus,+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (fogus,)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> Do you have any evidence or articles on helium migrating into rocks? [/b]

The migration of Helium and other gases through rocks is the product of very deep technical Geochemistry and there is a lot of research on it that has nothing to do with evolution. It has more to do with the mining and resource industry. Migration of gases in rocks depend depends on diffusion coefficients, equilibrim constants and conditions of pressure and temperature. The general picture is easy. Gases migrate from regions of high temp and pressure to regions of low temp and pressure, usually upward and concentrate in formations nearer to the surface.

Originally posted by fogus,@ Do you have any evidence or articles on nitrogen migrating into diamonds?

Nitrogen does not migrate in diamonds, it is an impurity substituted for carbon in the matrix.

<!--QuoteBegin-fogus,
Do you have faith in evolution?[/quote]

I have faith in the scientists of the world, scientific method and the academic peer review process that keeps it professional and constantly changing as new knowledge is acquired. All the technology around and in your life comes from the same sciences that support evolution. I do not need faith to accept the results.

The problem still persists of the lack of a basic foundation knowledge in the basic and applied sciences of CS advocates.

[damnrad]

Originally posted by ruiner, you cant help feeling sorry for hovind having all these sites documenting stuff against him, im sure he's a decent chap really

Oh, poor Dr. Dino, with nothing to fall back on other than his theme park: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/01/arts/01D...aa3aa65dc0101ce.
Selling lies to children through amusement-park rides -- appears to me to be child abuse.

[Utah]

I know I'm late to this discussion, but I'll add my two cents in even if it appears we are way off topic.

It is difficult to not see evolution as anything but valid, but I also believe in creationism and I'll tell you why. Really, I care not what others think or believe, but if God truly put us on this earth to make the right choice to return to him then how hard would it be if we had absolutely no history before we existed? If God can create the earth, he sure in hell could create the past so we would have an alternate theory and thus giving us an option to make a choice.

[LogicaLunatic]

Originally posted by ruiner, you cant help feeling sorry for hovind having all these sites documenting stuff against him, im sure he's a decent chap really

I've actually met with the man when he was here in Minnesota. We shot the shit for about 10 minutes before his "lecture" and he is very unpleasant. He got even MORE unpleasant after he found out that I'm an atheist :) He actually is an a-hole.

LogicaLunatic

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by Utah, I know I'm late to this discussion, but I'll add my two cents in even if it appears we are way off topic. It is difficult to not see evolution as anything but valid, but I also believe in creationism and I'll tell you why. Really, I care not what others think or believe, but if God truly put us on this earth to make the right choice to return to him then how hard would it be if we had absolutely no history before we existed? If God can create the earth, he sure in hell could create the past so we would have an alternate theory and thus giving us an option to make a choice.

Darwin and I are Theistic Evolutionists. In other words science is simply investigating and discovering how creation happened. Is this how you believe?

[Indaliceo]

Quite Frankly I don't have enough faith to believe in Evolution, Take for example the computer your typing this on the chances of evolution working is just about the same as finding a working electrical computer with all the software including a copy of windows that actually works well. Impossible I just don't have enough faith, Creation for me. Thank You

[Pooeypants]

Originally posted by Indaliceo, Quite Frankly I don't have enough faith to believe in Evolution,

You don't need faith, the evidence is all there.

Take for example the computer your typing this on the chances of evolution working is just about the same as finding a working electrical computer with all the software including a copy of windows that actually works well. Impossible I just don't have enough faith, Creation for me. Thank You

Well that's quite amazing odds, but that isn't how evolution works.
If you'd rather believe we popped out of thin air thx to the work of your imaginary friend, please do so but remember, it was the science that brought you the computer and the net, working under the same principles which made Evolution a scientific theory.

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by Indaliceo, Quite Frankly I don't have enough faith to believe in Evolution, Take for example the computer your typing this on the chances of evolution working is just about the same as finding a working electrical computer with all the software including a copy of windows that actually works well. Impossible I just don't have enough faith, Creation for me. Thank You

Bad example. The probability may be low or high, but I have had a fine computer for two years with both Chinese and English Windows that works very well and no problems.

The probably of some of the randomized events may be low for evolution, but you have billions of years and more than trillions of events per year to make it work very well. You must realize that evolution is determined by the constrants, processes and laws of the nature and the environment and not random events.

May be it helps to be in China, a country where most of the people believe in science and evolution. Science may work better if you appreciate it.

I believe in God and evolution.

[samsara15]

I'll go with evolution. Which is where most biologists are. When science conflicts with religion, it's time to change or re-think the religion.

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by samsara15, I'll go with evolution.  Which is where most biologists are.   When science conflicts with religion, it's time to change or re-think the religion.

This is very close to a quote by Abul'baha concerning the view towards scince and religion in the Baha'i Faith almost 100 years ago.

'If religious beliefs and opinions are found contrary to the standards of science they are mere superstitions and imaginations; for the antithesis of knowledge is ignorance, and the child of ignorance is superstition.

[samsara15]

fundy, let's hear the nickanmes for people like me. I'm curious as about what you call us!!

All science is theory.

I'm a religious secular. But it's my own religion. If we base it on what we can prove, we'd all believe only in ourselves.

[samsara15]

All the better for the Baha'i faith. Which suffers greatly, in Iran and iraq.

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by ruiner, The problem is of course that the Creationist position has been collapsing ever since Darwin proposed Evolution. As more and more evidence is uncovered the evolutionary patterns become more and more pronounced. The main Creationist arguments against evolution have always been based on the current lack of knowledge in science and they use this lack of knowledge to make out that the Theory of Evolution is some sort of guess. The funny thing is that as soon as this happens the new generation of Biblical literalists will suddenly "find" half a dozen bible verses that show the Bible actually predicted evolution. We will then have them all lining up saying "look the bible is proof of God, how else would it have predicted evolution 2000 years in advance of darwin?"

An interesting fact that is not well known is the current CS movement is relatively young. In 1915 all most all Evangelical Christian Theologians accepted an old universe and some form of theistic evolution.

There is very good evidence that evolution as such is not the real issue. The rapidly changing world of the twentieth century so Christianity in trouble. Chuch attendence was dropping and other religions and phiolosophies were on the rise. To turn things around Evangelical and other fundimentalist looked for causes and evil dragons to slay to bring the faithful back to the pews and the righteous cause back to Christianity.

[fogus]

Fogus, true science doesn't deal with faith, it deals with facts. If you like to ignore the facts that point to evolution then it is your delusion to keep, we'll keep our feet planted firmly in the real world, thank you.

You must have faith in something. If you don’t you will end up not believing anything. If you don’t have faith in scientists that means you don’t trust them, if you don’t trust them, if you don’t trust them you wont trust their work... You will begin to see that true science has everything to do with faith. And as you begin to investigate the evidence you will begin to see that you can put your faith in the words of the bible.

I believe in God and evolution.

What has your god ever done? Since science says miracles cant happen you cant believe in them. Nothing supernatural! All your god can do is exist. He has never healed the sick, raised the dead, made the lame walk, or let the blind see. Do you believe in heaven, hell, sin, forgiveness, morality or predestination?

You don't need faith, the evidence is all there.

Faith is not an expression of belief in something that does not conform with reality. I have faith in the internet for example, because it has always allowed me to post on this page, I have faith that it will continue to do so. There has been no information presented to me to suggest that it will be closed soon. Faith is not directly or necessarily connected to religion.

BTW, the Baha'i faith violates every religion at its core, because all religions are fundamentally exclusive, including Baha'i. Even the Baha'i exclude some people (the exclusivists, like me!)

[fogus]

Also no one has given me an adiquate responce to my initial question:

Can any one give me a documented example of a mutation giving rise to new genetic information which was seen as being benificial to an organism?

I also havent seen any documented science to suggest that my article of heluim defusion rates is wrong.

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by fogus, You must have faith in something.  If you don’t you will end up not believing anything.  If you don’t have faith in scientists that means you don’t trust them, if you don’t trust them, if you don’t trust them you wont trust their work...  You will begin to see that true science has everything to do with faith.  And as you begin to investigate the evidence you will begin to see that you can put your faith in the words of the bible.

Fogus there are two basic meaning of faith in the Bible. A basic understanding of the proper use of the English language. (1) To trust someone or something as reliable. As in faith in the trustworthyness of science and scientists to provide the best understanding of the nature of our physical existenc. (2) Belief in a religion or God. Science is not considered a disipline that requires faith as the belief in a religion or God.

I believe in theistic evolution and I have a God centered faith, but I am also very much aware that Ancient religious texts fail to provide the modern guidance when it comes to science. I would like to know more about what yoou call true science. The sciences that progressed over the ages and gave us our modern technology does not have its roots in Christian doctrine. In fact the advancement of science has been at odds with Christian doctrine through out history. Up until the renaissance the Islamic world lead the way in the sciences. Much of the Greek scientific literature lost to the Christian world was preserved in Islamic libraries and the scientific methods were used to develop many advances in fields like metalurgy, navigation and astronomy.

What has your god ever done?  Since science says miracles cant happen you cant believe in them.  Nothing supernatural!  All your god can do is exist.  He has never healed the sick, raised the dead, made the lame walk, or let the blind see.  Do you believe in heaven, hell, sin, forgiveness, morality or predestination?

Science basically says that miracles are occurances that we cannot explain by our current level of knowledge. Many people believe that the miracles that occur in many religions are just natural occurances that we do not fully understand yet.
You draw quick and judgemental conclusions about what other people believe concerning God. It is better to ask and understand and not shoot from the hip with a shotgun.

Faith is not an expression of belief in something that does not conform with reality.  I have faith in the internet for example, because it has always allowed me to post on this page, I have faith that it will continue to do so.  There has been no information presented to me to suggest that it will be closed soon.  Faith is not directly or necessarily connected to religion.

There are two definitions of faith, they are different and the faith in religion and God is exclusive to beliefs in the intangible spiritual nature of faith. These are basic dictionary definitions of the word in English. I believe that my faith in God conforms very well with reality, because I do not make a different set of rules for the natural and supernatural. What science discovers about the nature of existence is simple the nature of existence how God created it.

BTW, the Baha'i faith violates every religion at its core, because all religions are fundamentally exclusive, including Baha'i.  Even the Baha'i exclude some people (the exclusivists, like me!)

A classic misunderstanding of the Baha'i Faith. You and others may exclude, condemn, disregard, void, or rule out my belief as invalid, but I do not exclude your belief or judge you as you you judge others. All religions are not fundimentally exclusive. You may admit to being that way, but I think it would be best to let others speak for themselves like the Unitarians and Buddhists.

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by shunyadragon,+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (shunyadragon,)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteBegin-fogus, You must have faith in something.  If you don’t you will end up not believing anything.  If you don’t have faith in scientists that means you don’t trust them, if you don’t trust them, if you don’t trust them you wont trust their work...  You will begin to see that true science has everything to do with faith.  And as you begin to investigate the evidence you will begin to see that you can put your faith in the words of the bible.

Fogus there are two basic meanings of faith. A basic understanding of the proper use of the English language. (1) To trust someone or something as reliable. As in faith in the trustworthyness of science and scientists to provide the best understanding of the nature of our physical existenc. (2) Belief in a religion or God. Science is not considered a disipline that requires faith as the belief in a religion or God.

I blieve in theistic evolution and I have a God centered faith, but I am also very much aware that Ancient religious texts fail to provide the modern guidance when it comes to science. I would like to know more about what yoou call true science. The sciences that progressed over the ages and gave us our modern technology does not have its roots in Christian doctrine. In fact the advancement of science has been at odds with Christian doctrine through out history. Up until the renaissance the Islamic world lead the way in the sciences. Much of the Greek scientific literature lost to the Christian world was preserved in Islamic libraries and the scientific methods were used to develop many advances in fields like metalurgy, navigation and astronomy.

I believe in God and evolution.

Science basically says that miracles are occurances that we cannot explain by our current level of knowledge. Many people believe that the miracles that occur in many religions are just natural occurances that we do not fully understand yet.
You draw quick and judgemental conclusions about what other people believe concerning God. It is better to ask and understand and not shoot from the hip with a shotgun.




There are two definitions of faith, they are different and the faith in religion and God is exclusive to beliefs in the intangible spiritual nature of faith. These are basic dictionary definitions of the word in English. I believe that my faith in God conforms very well with reality, because I do not make a different set of rules for the natural and supernatural. What science discovers about the nature of existence is simple the nature of existence how God created it.



A classic misunderstanding of the Baha'i Faith. All religions are not fundimentally exclusive. You may admit to being that way, but I think it would be best to let others speak for themselves like the Unitarians and Buddhists.[/b][/quote]

[shunyadragon]

Originally posted by fogus, Also no one has given me an adiquate responce to my initial question: Can any one give me a documented example of a mutation giving rise to new genetic information which was seen as being benificial to an organism?

My specialty is not genetics, but I can and have presented evidence for the Helium problem, which I will repeat.

I do feel that since the evolution of species takes place over periods of thousands of years or more that it is difficult to see examples of a specie forming to day, but some of the examples given in the past do demonstrate that this is taking place today.

I also havent seen any documented science to suggest that my article of heluim defusion rates is wrong.

I presented that arguement based on the nature of Helium and it is valid. Helium is non-reactive and migrates within the earth depending on the temperature and density of the rock. It is well known and apparently acknowledged by AIG that Helium is a product of the radioactive decay of uranium isotopes. This occurs throughout the earth's interior where there is Uranium. It is very simple science that these gases produced in deeper hotter regions of the earth will migrate upward to cooler regions and accumulate, because the rocks are less permeable. The region where AIG took the measurements is a region where they actually extract Helium for industrial purposes, because it accumulates there from deeper rocks.

These principles are very much a part of the predictive models of mining and extracting gases from the earth. The principles of diffusion coefficients and permeabilities of different rocks at different temperatures is a little complicated, but the basics should not be hard to understand.

(1) Helium is non-reactive gas.
(2) Helium is relatively small so it would be more prown to migrate than other gases.
(2) Gases will migrate from hotter regions of high permiability and accumulate in rocks in cooler regions with lower permeabilities.

Because of this you cannot draw any conclusions on the concentrations of Helium anywhere as to its origin, it cannot be used to measure radioactive decay rates. This is true for any element or chemical that would migrate, because it is non-reactive with other elements or chemicals around it.

Others attacked AIG's methods in sampling and measuring the Helium. Talkorigins gave an adaquate rebutal of the inadaquacy of the scientific methods used in the study and the limited number od samples taken to question the results.

I preferred to simply present basic science to explain that the conclusions cannot be drawn from the evidence. Please respond if you feel the basic science that I propose is in any way in error. I kept the arguement simple so someone with a limited background in science could understand.

I have some interesting challenges for you in my specialty geomorphology and sedimentology.

(I) The sedimentary rock strata of Appalachia occurs in a regular cyclic rythum of sandstone shale and coal repeated over thousands of feet. In each of these cycles there are meandering rivers, streams, oxbows, terraces, deltas, lakes, beaches. In places in these strata we have the casts of trees in forests still standing where they were covered by river delta and beach deposites. There is even evidence of forest fires, tracks and fossils of many amphibians like turtles. These deposites can be seen in similar environments around the world today. How could these deposites possibly be deposited in on huge flood event? The other problem is these rocks are then uplifted thousands of feet above sea level. The strata is then disected by thousands of feet of erosion of river systems. Based on the evidence of boulders, stones and gravel all through the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys, this erosion took place after the rocks were consolidated to stone. You have less than 6000 years to describe this complete series of events to take place. Actually less time, because we have a lot of witnesses in the past 2000 years that little has happened in that time period. AIG basically claims all sedimentary rocks are laid down during and after the flood.

(II) In the Pacific Ocean there are barrier coral reef islands with continuous growths of coral arround an extinct volcano a mile or more thick. There are younger volcanoes with barrier islands in various stages of development showing in detail how this sequence of events took place over millions of years. Even with highly exagerated growth rates for coral that AIG proposes is possible it could not come close to demonstrating barrier coral reef growths one mile thick and the associated extinct volcano.