Tennessee’s Anti-Science Bill Becomes Law

[finder]

Granting this to be the case, I hope you realize that the Biblical creation story provides as little useful information about the beginning of life as abiogenesis. God spit, breath and dirt is hardly a scientific formula we can replicate or investigate. So in truth theists and non-believers both have no good idea as to how life began. We both just have a story that is less than satisfying. I'm willing to bet, though, that science manages to explain in detail how life began long before theists can.

On the subject of Tennessee bills, it seems they're on a roll...and it's a roll in a troubling direction.

Back-alley bills make Tennessee tremble | The Tennessean | tennessean.com

True, but the bible isn't a scientific journal nor was it intended to be so it doesn't have the burden of unfolding the details as a journal would. That said, even if science one day could explain every intricate detail it still would have no bearing on whether or not God was the cause.

The article was written with its own biases obviously. For one, the U.N. is a world governmental agency and one need not invoke a "conspiracy" to understand it, like all governmental bodies seek to increase the need for its existence. If waitresses and waiters are taxed why not strippers? If someone else besides the shooters had a gun at Columbine less people would have died. These are not "extreme & fruity" positions, they just don't agree with the liberal view of government always is the first and best answer. That said though I do tend to agree that "creationism" as it has been asserted should not be mandatory in science classes. I think we do agree on that and that is where I distance myself from the creation movement. I don't think science can ever have anything to do with God because it demeans God. God is so far above the limited understanding of science. But Tennessee has the right govern itself the way it sees fit.

[Thanatos]

You're wrong, Adam, according to scripture was part of the creation.

So according to evolution every living thing including us owes our existence to this...



that evolved from nobody knows what? Sorry, too much faith for me. That aspect of evolution to me has not been explicitly proven.

That picture is a bad example. You should have picked a prokaryote or a prion or something. A eukaryote is a eukaryote. The difference between you and yeast is just organization and teamwork. Molecularly, there's no big difference between you and brewer's yeast.

"The answer is stunning: We are so similar to yeast, in some of our genes, that human DNA can be substituted for the equivalent yeast gene—and it works just as well."

Yeast Researchers Get a Head Start

But how do cells learn to cooperate and form something larger? How do they learn to communicate and coordinate? Put them in a situation where they die if they don't! Brewing up multicellularity was surprisingly easy.

Researchers evolve a multicellular yeast in the lab in 2 months

[Jack]

...the bible isn't a scientific journal nor was it intended to be so it doesn't have the burden of unfolding the details as a journal would.

If someone is searching for real answers to real natural events and willing to disregard any bias in doing so, the fact that the Bible doesn't offer a realistic explanation for the origin of life would lead them to discard it as a viable source of knowledge and move on to more valid explanations. In fact you've just provided a good reason that the Biblical creation story isn't science and doesn't belong in a classroom where science is being taught.

[finder]

That picture is a bad example. You should have picked a prokaryote or a prion or something...

I got the image from here...Everyone’s Ancestor Somewhat Sophisticated » Chromographics Institute

The caption under it sums up the article nicely...

The last universal common ancestor, rather than a primitive blob of chemicals, likely was more complex, even having so-called organelles or miniature organs.
CREDIT: David Huntley | Shutterstock

So we do have much to learn.

[finder]

If someone is searching for real answers to real natural events and willing to disregard any bias in doing so, the fact that the Bible doesn't offer a realistic explanation for the origin of life would lead them to discard it as a viable source of knowledge and move on to more valid explanations. In fact you've just provided a good reason that the Biblical creation story isn't science and doesn't belong in a classroom where science is being taught.

If there was only the natural I would agree with you completely. But your statement assumes the only knowledge worth having is physical knowledge which just isn't true. We have the spiritual as well i.e. one who is truthful is of a good spiritual nature and one is of an evil nature who practices deception. You've heard of "the spirit of brotherly love?" Well these are the attributes that sentient beings capable of self awareness posses and they are very much a part of reality as anything materialistic. God just isn't depended in anyway to a carnal reality. So yes, I do make the case that creation doesn't belong in the science room. But that isn't for Washington to decide or at least it shouldn't be. If Tennessee wants it to be considered an alternative to evolution so be it. I wouldn't want Washington dictating what I believe, that's where I'm coming from.

[Thanatos]

I got the image from here...Everyone’s Ancestor Somewhat Sophisticated » Chromographics Institute

The caption under it sums up the article nicely...



So we do have much to learn.

Were this real life, I'd back away slowly and stop trying.

The picture shows a cell with a full set of organelles. The article is about a common method of ATP storage which is kind of like an organelle. You cannot know much about an article by looking at the pictures and the headlines. People will put up random pretty pictures and interesting headlines to make otherwise dull information more interesting to the people who only read headlines and look at pictures. Journalists will also do that for other, more nefarious reasons.

The source you chose... oh my pirates. Why? It's copied from Livescience. Even the image is being leeched off of Livescience. The guy who did the copying is clearly not adding anything and seems to be going on about energy shifts and other crazy stuff elsewhere on the site.

[Jack]

But your statement assumes the only knowledge worth having is physical knowledge which just isn't true.

Natural science isn't "the only knowledge worth having", it's the only knowledge for which we have physical evidence.

We have the spiritual as well...

You believe we do but you can't provide any physical evidence to validate that contention.

This disagreement isn't so much between atheists and theists as it is between those who accept the detectable physical universe as reality and those who accept the product of their imaginations as reality. The supernatural is an untestable contention and therefore cannot be validated as real, the spiritual is an untestable contention and therefore cannot be validated as real, the idea that gods exist is an untestable contention and therefore cannot be validated as real. On the other hand the physical universe functions regardless of human belief. Gravity works for those who don't understand it, evolution occurs among species who can't grasp the notion. Nature does not require belief.

Well these are the attributes that sentient beings capable of self awareness posses and they are very much a part of reality as anything materialistic.

They are materialistic. The mental processes that produce emotions and thoughts are quickly becoming known to neuroscience. Every day we understand more about the brain and how it produces what we once believed was ethereal.

God just isn't depended in anyway to a carnal reality.

Another claim with no substantiation, only a belief that it is so.

So yes, I do make the case that creation doesn't belong in the science room. But that isn't for Washington to decide or at least it shouldn't be. If Tennessee wants it to be considered an alternative to evolution so be it. I wouldn't want Washington dictating what I believe, that's where I'm coming from.

And I don't want scientifically uneducated Christian politicians defining science.

[finder]

Natural science isn't "the only knowledge worth having", it's the only knowledge for which we have physical evidence.

The supernatural is an untestable contention and therefore cannot be validated as real, the spiritual is an untestable contention and therefore cannot be validated as real, the idea that gods exist is an untestable contention and therefore cannot be validated as real. On the other hand the physical universe functions regardless of human belief. Gravity works for those who don't understand it, evolution occurs among species who can't grasp the notion. Nature does not require belief.

You believe we do but you can't provide any physical evidence to validate that contention.

And you don't believe it? I think you do and just don't realize it. If you believe truth stands whether we exist, know it, believe it or not, it stands on its own merit, then you believe in the spiritual because that is what spirituality is. The all encompassing truth. What you said about nature carrying on despite our mental attitudes ....that is spiritual. And you just verified its existence with your physical brain.

They are materialistic. The mental processes that produce emotions and thoughts are quickly becoming known to neuroscience. Every day we understand more about the brain and how it produces what we once believed was ethereal.

True, but that says nothing about the existence or nonexistence of God. It goes back to that all encompassing truth.

Another claim with no substantiation, only a belief that it is so.

And that doesn't make it untrue for there is nothing in natural science that substantiates the notion that God doesn't exist. There is only what we know in part and what we don't know at all in science, period.

And I don't want scientifically uneducated Christian politicians defining science.

Nor do I. However scientifically educated Christian politicians I don't have a problem with.

[Jack]

If you believe truth stands whether we exist, know it, believe it or not, it stands on its own merit, then you believe in the spiritual because that is what spirituality is.

You and I are operating from different definitions, then. When I refer to the spiritual in this context I'm speaking of the belief in spirits and souls and the those beliefs stemming from a belief in the spirit world.

True, but that says nothing about the existence or nonexistence of God.

It strongly suggests that all our perceptions are outputs of the brain, including emotions and beliefs. The existence or nonexistence of any god is a matter of belief. Believers themselves eschew physical evidence to establish the existence of their gods, contending that faith is of greater value. Our physical reality provides no irrefutable evidence of gods or a particular god.

And that doesn't make it untrue for there is nothing in natural science that substantiates the notion that God doesn't exist.

Science is concerned with evidence. Claims with no physical evidence to substantiate them cannot be examined by science. There's no field of science that's dedicated to disproving claims that lack evidence.

There is only what we know in part and what we don't know at all in science, period.

True, and lacking physical evidence (beyond the brain's capability to form beliefs from imagination) the question of the existence of gods is still one of the things we just don't know.

However scientifically educated Christian politicians I don't have a problem with.

It doesn't appear there are very many of those in Tennessee.

[Peter]

Were this real life, I'd back away slowly and stop trying.

That's good advice. I need to stop engaging creationist ideas as if they have any merit. It gives them an air of legitimacy they'll never have if they're simply ignored. It's so fun though!