Bye bye Evolution Stickers: Hello Reason

[Starboy]

Quote by: Aaron Spicka Isn't evolution a theory? Has it found to be undisputalbe fact on the origin of man? What the hec do these stickers have to do with church and state? Nothing about the disclaimer had anything to do with church rather that no one truely knows where we are from. It seems as tho anything that has been discussed in the argument of creation vs. evolution and is tipped to favor or side with creation is shot down. :eek:

All scientific theories are just theories. They are the best explanations to date of what has been observed around us. However if you are going to teach science then you teach the best of the theories to date and in biology that is evolution. It is evolution without a doubt. There is no competing theory that even comes close to the ability of the theory of evolution to explain the actual evolution that is observed. Funny thing about all that, for some reason these parents are not outraged that their kids are being taught Newtonian Mechanics instead of General Relativity. The horror of it, or could it be that this entire debacle is just another attempt by Christians to force a Christian view of reality on science?

Starboy

[gallo]

Quote by: Aaron Spicka Isn't evolution a theory?

Yes. It is a scientific theory. Other theories are the theory of gravity, the germ theory of disease, the heliocentric theory. There are also theories about light, time, and space. And there are theories about why the tectonic plates that comprise the surface of the earth are moving. I hope you do understand that gravity is a fact, poor hygene can cause disease, the earth does orbit the sun, light isn't clearly understood (as both a wave and a particle), space is anyone's guess - we know it exists but we can't explain what it is, and that there is no doubt as to the continents moving on the surface of the earth. That's all theory.

In science, a theory doesn't indicate conjecture, speculation, or guess work. A theory is as good as it gets. It is based on observation, hypothesis, prediction and testing that uses previous knowledge and the laws of science.

Quote by: Aaron Spicka Has it found to be undisputalbe fact on the origin of man?

There is no other rational explanation. All other explanations boil down to mythology or wild speculation.

Quote by: Aaron Spicka What the hec do these stickers have to do with church and state?

The stickers are an effort to allow the introduction of creationism into science as an alternative theory.

Quote by: Aaron Spicka Nothing about the disclaimer had anything to do with church rather that no one truely knows where we are from.

I'm glad to hear that you admit that you don't know where you came from. I was afraid that you were going to try to feed me some line about a garden and a serpent and that you are dirt.

Quote by: Aaron Spicka It seems as tho anything that has been discussed in the argument of creation vs. evolution and is tipped to favor or side with creation is shot down. :eek:

Of course it is. There is no evidence for creationism while there are libraries full of evidence for evolution. If I am wrong, then please persent some evidence.

[Prometheus]

Isn't evolution a theory?

[rant]
Holy bloody hell! When will people stop saying this! I say we summarily ban the next person making this point. I have heard this exact quote a million times and want to tear my eyes out every time I read it! Good grief - go look up the word "theory," and maybe read about the *theory* of gravity, or the atomic *theory* or better yet, the solar-centric *theory*.

[/rant]

[FIFI]

The only reason creationism still remains is because people bury their head in the sand.

[Prometheus]

Quote by: FIFI The only reason creationism still remains is because people bury their head in the sand.

That, and too lazy to criticize what they are taught in sunday-school.

[JTsteelblu]

Quote by: Prometheus Oh no - this must be part of a vast liberal conspiracy to keep our children from learing about god! The liberals are evil and hate god, so they force our children to learn anti-jesus stuff that is only a theory. This is what the bible said would happen at the end of the world. Watch out all you evil monkey-decendants, jesus is coming to burn you.

So if Jesus was so upset about this, then why didn't he place the stickers there himself? If he had I doubt anyone would have felt the urge to remove them from fear of retribution. In fact, why didn't he just change the books to read the way he wants them to read? Maybe he should consider spelling out why there should be no seperation of church and state himself in front of congress...a personal apperence would do the trick, eh? But he doesn't, hasn't, and I don't hear any plans for such a visit. Seems if he were "coming back to burn me" over my not wanting to dump 1000s of years of research and science in lieu of a religious theory, he'd make the same trip to straighten it out for the entire world at once! Jesus (the man, not the religious icon) taught forgiveness and tolerence...you might wanna try some for your own life (I mean after all, you wouldn't wanna end up burning with all of us anti-christ liberal types would you?). None of what you say here points to any kind of tolerence on your part. As far as Jesus burning me, since I believe in the man historicly, but not as someone any more connected to God than I am, I say bring him on...I got lighter fluid and matches...I'll burn him right back! I always am amazed at you Jesus freaks...you want me to "see the light", but it's always because if I don't I'll burn, or die, or something at least that awful. Why would I want to place trust in someone that is that out to get me? It would be like worshipping Saddam! No Thank you, and leave my children's spiritual upbringing to me...all you'll ever do for them is scare the holy crap out of them. And according to you, isn't that Jesus' job?
JT

[Pooeypants]

Prometheus was being sarcastic by the way.

[Samildanach]

They really need to hurry up that abiogenesis research and put an end to the ID idea.

[Agent007]

If evolution is simply a theory, then why are some members trying to convert others to believe it. I believe that evolution has indeed evolved into a certain religion; it is obviously an antithesis of religions that uphold creationist thought. Besides, many are keeping faith in the principle of evolution, just as others are keeping faith in the principles of Jesus' teachings or Buddha's teachings. Moreover, I have written before in other threads that the probability of evolution actually occuring is extremely slim, and I still support what I have written. If evolution did occur, then all life would eventually be wiped out; surely, many members' rationalist minds should be able to reach this conclusion.

[gallo]

Quote by: Samildanach They really need to hurry up that abiogenesis research and put an end to the ID idea.

Well, progress happens when it happens. However, science has recently produced two examples of progress along those lines.

First, a common laboratory microbe has been genetically altered to use 21 amino acids in the formation of proteins. There is actually no good reason why life uses 20 amino acids and only 20 of all the possible amino acids - all life with no exceptions. In this case, there is one that now uses 21 amino acids. It still reproduces as it did before. I have no idea how this was accomplished or how the genetic code was made to encode an additional amino acid. I don't even recall where I read that - in some science news blurb in some journal or science magazine I suppose. Still, there are implications for abiogenesis.

By the way, the fact that all living things use only 20, the same 20 in every case, amino acids out of the many other possibilities is a pretty good argument for common descent. There is no good reason why a creator should have done it that way since the alleged creator made all of those other amino acids available. The above mentioned experiment offers the answer that there is no good reason why only the same 20.

There have also been 2 cases in which viruses have been artificially constructed in the lab. One is relatively harmless and was introduced to a host. It works and is indistinguishable from the real thing on every level. The second virus was poliomyelitis, which is indistinguishable from the real thing on the molecular level but of course, was not tested on a live subject. In each of these cases, the process was begun with only the necessary chemicals - phosphates, sugars, and bases - and the organism (??) was assembled according to the known sequence of the real virus. It would be possible, in principle to reconstruct the genome of some more complex organism by these methods. In practice, the overwhelming size of the genomes of more complex organisms make that not possible. However, this is a step towards a workable gene therapy whereby an artificial virus can be used to introduce an altered gene to replace one that doesn't function in an individual.

Anyway, I just thought those research events would be of interest in this discussion.

[Pooeypants]

Quote by: Agent007 If evolution is simply a theory, then why are some members trying to convert others to believe it. I believe that evolution has indeed evolved into a certain religion; it is obviously an antithesis of religions that uphold creationist thought. Besides, many are keeping faith in the principle of evolution, just as others are keeping faith in the principles of Jesus' teachings or Buddha's teachings. Moreover, I have written before in other threads that the probability of evolution actually occuring is extremely slim, and I still support what I have written. If evolution did occur, then all life would eventually be wiped out; surely, many members' rationalist minds should be able to reach this conclusion.

I think you've got the logic inverted. If evolution didn't occur, all life would go extinct. I mean, if one environment variable changed, a species which wouldn't be able to adapt to it by evolution would just perish; not the other way round.

[gallo]

Quote by: Agent007 If evolution is simply a theory, then why are some members trying to convert others to believe it.

I hadn't noticed that anyone was trying to convert anyone - except the creationists who constantly threaten some kind of eternal fire for all who disagree with them. To convert someone into "believing" in a scientific theory would be silly. In science, one presents the evidence, and the theories that explain the evidence and how they were tested. Of course, in science, a body of knowledge that is called a theory is as good as it gets. Theories aren't proven and don't grow up to be facts or laws.

Quote by: Agent007 I believe that evolution has indeed evolved into a certain religion; it is obviously an antithesis of religions that uphold creationist thought.

Nah. That's silly. Do you have any basis for that belief? What I believe and my religion aren't the same as and don't have anything to do with religion, mine or anyone else's. I don't know any evolutionary biologist who worships alleles or meets to pray to the genome. Evolutionary theory isn't the antithesis of creationism. Science follows the evidence to the conclusions. If there is a problem, it is with the creationists who prefer to accept mythology as factual and reject reality when it conflicts with what they "believe." And what a creationist believes is not based on any evidence or facts, but rather on mythology that cannot be tested or falsified.

Quote by: Agent007 Besides, many are keeping faith in the principle of evolution, just as others are keeping faith in the principles of Jesus' teachings or Buddha's teachings.

You don't seem to have a very good grasp on science. There is nothing that prevents a Christian from being an evolutionary scientist. There is nothing that prevents a Buddhist or a Jew from being an evolutionary scientist. Only a narrow, weak faith in ones religion (a lack of faith in God) would prevent that. In fact, a well known evolutionary biologist, author of texts and popular books makes no secret of the fact that he is a Christian.

Quote by: Agent007 Moreover, I have written before in other threads that the probability of evolution actually occuring is extremely slim, and I still support what I have written.

No it's not. The probability of evolution actually occurring is 1. There is no doubt that evolution occurs. To state otherwise demonstrates extreme ignorance and a willingness to remain so. I asked before and you didn't answer, so I'll ask again. How did you determine the probability for evolution? I'll give you some examples:

There are several strains of fruit flies used in laboratories. They are all derived from a single population that was domesticated in California. They have speciated several times such that they are no longer able to interbreed with the original population, and most cannot interbreed with each other.

In the 1850s a worm was first found to infest apples in the Ohio valley. Apples are not native to North America and thus had no natural pests when introduced. The pest turned out to be a new species of hawthorn maggot fly. Since the life cycle of the particular maggot fly depends on when the host plants set fruit, and since the plants set fruit at times that are weeks apart, the two kinds of maggot fly are reproductively isolated and they cannot interbreed. The same thing has happened with cherries and pears that have their own species of maggot flies, all derived from the native hawthorn maggot fly.

By accident, polar bears and brown bears where mixed in a zoo. They produced fertile offspring in spite of the fact that they have significant physiological differences in addition to fur. Genetic analysis has determines that even though the DNA of the brown bears and the polar bears can be distinguished, the DNA of the brown bears of the ABC islands cannot be distinguished from that of polar bears. Still, the ABC island brown bears look like any other brown bear.

Quote by: Agent007 If evolution did occur, then all life would eventually be wiped out; surely, many members' rationalist minds should be able to reach this conclusion.

As was pointed out, if evolution didn't occur, life would be wiped out.

When you consider the millions of species of organisms that populate the earth one must conclude that it would have been impossible to fit all of them onto a big boat. There just isn't room. Thus, creationists who have realized how silly the story of Noah is in light of this, have invented "kinds," so that the ark only had to carry a few thousand "kinds." Then, in only a few years after the mythological flood, the few thousand "kinds" evolved into the millions of species. So the 2 cat "kind" evolved into the 36 species of cat, the 2 dog "kind" evolved into the 28 species of dog, the two bat "kind" evolved into the 850+ species of bat. And then there is the 850,000 species of beetle, 1.5 million species of insect, and so on. To solve the problem of room on the ark, creationists now claim evolution at rates that make evolutionary biologists dizzy.

But you think that most leading creationists are wrong - evolution is improbable and all life died after the flood.

[Trotsky]

Science is about models that best explain what is observed.

[Starboy]

Quote by: gallo You don't seem to have a very good grasp on science. There is nothing that prevents a Christian from being an evolutionary scientist. There is nothing that prevents a Buddhist or a Jew from being an evolutionary scientist. Only a narrow, weak faith in ones religion (a lack of faith in God) would prevent that. In fact, a well known evolutionary biologist, author of texts and popular books makes no secret of the fact that he is a Christian.

Certainly to be a good scientist it is a big advantage to be honest. To accept the facts as they lay. Certainly one could partition off one side of their life from another part. In science they are honest but in religion they are not. It seems to me that it would be a whole lot easier if one were just honest in general.

Starboy

[Starboy]

Quote by: Trotsky Science is about models that best explain what is observed.

Or better yet, science is an honest as possible attempt by man to explore and explain reality.

Starboy

[Lou Minotti]

Or better yet, science is an honest as possible attempt by man to explore and explain reality.

Or realistically, science can be used for both good and eveil to push a given agenda.

[Starboy]

Quote by: Lou Minotti Or realistically, science can be used for both good and eveil to push a given agenda.

Certainly I agree, give man a shovel and there is nothing stopping them from hitting someone with it. Can't do much about that. Doesn't have much to with science per se, it is mostly a problem of mankind. But hey, who knows, perhaps someday science will discover and explain enough about mankind so that we could keep men from looking at tools as weapons. My bet is that such knowledge will not matter. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make'm drink.

Starboy