The belief is that man was always man and never mutated from another kingdom such as the animal. Abdul-Baha explains this by using the embryo as an example and it’s changes in shape and form, however it is still human.
“For man, from the conception of the embryo until the attainment of maturity, assumes different forms and appearances. His appearance, form, features, and colour change; that is, he passes from form to form and from appearance to appearance. Yet, from the formation of the embryo he belongs to the human species; that is, it is the embryo of a man and not of an animal. But at first this fact is not apparent; only later does it become plain and visible.”
Comparative embryology is an argument for man and other animals having a common ancestor. Human embryos have gill slits and tails like their ancestors, but the ancestor have them in their adult forms as well, whereas in human beings, they are vestigial or adapted for other purposes in man.
It is a serious error to refer to gods in religious debate with skilled thinkers because you will be called out. And you will have no answer.
I have pointed out to multiple apologists that their apologetics are intended for believers and young people unable to evaluate an argument for soundness. It is hoped that they will convince the latter, but the believers need no convincing. They just need reassuring that reason and evidence are on their side, however specious the reasoning or irrelevant the evidence, as we are seeing here repeatedly. The point is, that when presented to people who can competently critique the argument, they have an effect counterproductive to their intended effect. It only ends up being used to show that their thinking isn't sound and their conclusions not to be trusted. For the experienced critical thinker, it is further evidence that theism is an unsound conclusion.
Baha'u'llah has said one of the proofs of the worlds beyond the flesh is that of the dream world and then gives logical rational proof. How many will even consider this?
How long do you think that takes? It's another unsupported claim. Dreaming is evidence that minds dream, not why.
You need to look deeper and not just for evidence to support one side of a story. There is a lot science cannot explain about dreams and NDE's. Knowing how it may work does not mean one knows of the source of the phenomenon associated with it.
Unless you're Bahaullah, in which case it's proof of "worlds beyond", even without an explanation for the source of dreams, right?
How can you test religious beliefs and prove they are false?
False has no meaning with unscientific (unfalsifiable) propositions. They are neither true nor false. They are considered not-even-wrong.
That is not useful because what is considered 'sufficient evidence' is only a matter of personal opinion.
No, it's not, not with skilled critical thinkers. That you think that illustrates that, with all due respect, you are in Dunning-Kruger territory, meaning that you are unable to see the difference between sound conclusions and other ideas. To you, they're all just opinions, none better that another, like preferring chocolate to vanilla or vice versa. What you offer as evidence has been rejected by every secular humanist participating who has expressed an opinion on the matter. That's not a coincidence, and it is not without meaning for anyone able to evaluate what that is evidence of.
What's good enough for you is good enough for none of them. That's evidence of something. To me, anyway.
Recently, on a physics site, somebody commented that if two clocks on the earth showed the same time, and one was accelerated and then returned to earth, they would show the same time again. My understanding was that they would not. Nine people had given a thumbs up to that opinion, and nobody had disagreed. Because I know what these people are capable of knowing, it caused me to seriously question my understanding. I'm still not convinced that they are right (
@Polymath257 ?), but I feel less secure that I was. This is something I suspect you never do, simply because to you, all opinions are jsut guesses, and therefore none has any more weight than any other, even when similar opinions begin to accumulate.
Good luck getting God to DO something.
I know, right? This guy acts as if he doesn't exist.
you have a point about a cell being too complex to just come into being from a brew of organic molecules.
This is an incredulity fallacy with implied special pleading. The first part is, "I just can't believe a cell can organize from ingredients, therefore it didn't." The implied fallacy is that therefore an intelligent designer must exist, also undesigned and also uncreated, and presumably much more complex than a cell. When asked why thy should be judged by different standards - why the cell needs an intelligent designer but not the deity - we get an irrelevant or incoherent comment such as that God exists outside of time (existence implies occurring over a series of consecutive moments, just as thinking and creating do, both implying before and after states).
