The Origin of Complex Life Forms and Their Purpose

[DavidFirth]

Yes it has, hence the reason that evolution is both fact and scientific theory.

And by the way, why couldn't the god you worship have designed evolution?

And I have to wonder why you don't hold yourself and your religion to the same standards you hold science to. Where's all the empirical evidence for your beliefs?

I do not. I hold fast to the word of God. In order to sway me you will have to prove the word is wrong and you cannot do that.

The word of God is established spiritually and empirically. Macro-evolution is established empirically only.

The word of God says men did not evolve from apes, God created men in His image. I cannot believe the Bible and ape-to-men. Ape to men sounds silly to me, anyway. Apes are nothing like us.

 

[metis]

You can read Christian Creation sites and you can read non-Christian sites. Believe them or don't believe them.

I read more than you could probably ever imagine on this, and I neither believe nor disbelieve in the concept as to whether there's a creator-god or gods.

You can't prove anything empirically either way. You must choose based on faith.

Science uses the "scientific method", which is the polar opposite of basing something on "faith".

Maybe seek out a Christian denomination that teaches you this instead of the dishonesty some have been feeding you. Most mainline Protestants and Catholics take a much more realistic approach that's not based on being blind to science and/or faith.

 

[DavidFirth]

I read more than you could probably ever imagine on this, and I neither believe nor disbelieve in the concept as to whether there's a creator-god or gods.

Science uses the "scientific method", which is the polar opposite of basing something on "faith".

Maybe seek out a Christian denomination that teaches you this instead of the dishonesty some have been feeding you. Most mainline Protestants and Catholics take a much more realistic approach that's not based on being blind to science and/or faith.

Science uses faith in that one must believe in postulates. The postulates for macro-evolution are wrong, I believe. If the postulates are wrong, then the science is wrong.

 

[DavidFirth]

Thanks for making my point for me.

You don't get the point. The word of God is inviolate. You can't prove it wrong. You can try but you can never ever do it.

 

[sayak83]

I do not. I hold fast to the word of God. In order to sway me you will have to prove the word is wrong and you cannot do that.

The word of God is established spiritually and empirically. Macro-evolution is established empirically only.

The word of God says men did not evolve from apes, God created men in His image. I cannot believe the Bible and ape-to-men. Ape to men sounds silly to me, anyway. Apes are nothing like us.

Then you should abandon Christianity, as evolution is certainly true and so is the evolution of man from ape. Do you want to waste your life blind to reality and following a false religion?

 

[metis]

Wrong. What would the priest in your wife's church say? I believe based on spiritual and empirical evidence.

See above.

Back in the early 1960's, the first time I learned that one could be both a Christian and accept the basic ToE was from a Catholic priest, as I was raised up in a fundamentalist Protestant church that taught against it.

The CC accepts science, including the basic ToE as long as it is understood that God was behind it all, but it's obvious that your denomination teaches having a blind faith and a dishonest approach to science as my old church did.

 

[metis]

Science uses faith in that one must believe in postulates. The postulates for macro-evolution are wrong, I believe. If the postulates are wrong, then the science is wrong.

That doesn't even make the slightest amount of sense. Evidence is not some sort of "postulates" that somehow we all blindly follow. That's theism, DF-- not science.

 

[DavidFirth]

Then you should abandon Christianity, as evolution is certainly true and so is the evolution of man from ape. Do you want to waste your life blind to reality and following a false religion?

I say no to both. Neither has been proven nor can either be proven.

 

[DavidFirth]

See above.

Back in the early 1960's, the first time I learned that one could be both a Christian and accept the basic ToE was from a Catholic priest, as I was raised up in a fundamentalist Protestant church that taught against it.

The CC accepts science, including the basic ToE as long as it is understood that God was behind it all, but it's obvious that your denomination teaches having a blind faith and a dishonest approach to science as my old church did.

My faith isn't blind, that's what evolutionists like to say but it isn't true.

 

[DavidFirth]

That doesn't even make the slightest amount of sense. Evidence is not some sort of "postulates" that somehow we all blindly follow. That's theism, DF-- not science.

Postulate 1: the Big Bang is true
Postulate 2: All macro-evolution began with a single celled organism and progressed from there (or a variant thereof)
Postulate 3: Men evolved from ape like beings

None of those postulates can be proven but they are all assumed to be true.

Postulate 4: Current dating methods are absoltutely reliable
Postulate 5: The universe was not created 10,000 years ago and it is not possible that a God could have done it, else we'd know

I could go on but I won't.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I do not. I hold fast to the word of God. In order to sway me you will have to prove the word is wrong and you cannot do that.

So, pretty much what I said. You're just going to believe what you want.

The word of God is established spiritually and empirically. Macro-evolution is established empirically only.

What does "spiritual" mean and how can I view that evidence?

The word of God says men did not evolve from apes, God created men in His image.

Do you claim to know what god looks like?

I cannot believe the Bible and ape-to-men. Ape to men sounds silly to me, anyway.

And there it is. YOu cannot believe it because an old book says something different.

Apes are nothing like us.

We actually share many things in common with apes (aside from the massive amounts of DNA we share with them), and given that we are also apes.
Behavioral Similarities between Humans, Chimps and Apes - Science in Our World: Certainty & Controversy
Genetics | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program
similarities between apes and humans – Apis Communication Science
Differences and similarities between human and chimpanzee neural progenitors during cerebral cortex development | eLife
Humans and apes are genetically very similar



What's silly is declaring that "apes are nothing like us" when the evidence clearly indicates that we have much in common with them and share a common ancestor. But we already know that you have to stick with what the Bible says, no matter what. Honestly I don't know how anybody can look at an ape and not see that they look like us. Have you ever seen one up close?


I also wonder how you explain all of these fossils:
Fossils | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program

 

[sayak83]

I say no to both. Neither has been proven nor can either be proven.

But I have spiritual proof from Brahman that evolution is true along with scientific empirical evidence as well as scriptural evidence from Upanishads. Thus my truth claims is stronger than yours.

 

[SkepticThinker]

You don't get the point. The word of God is inviolate. You can't prove it wrong. You can try but you can never ever do it.

You've made my point again.

It's not my burden of proof to demonstrate that your claims are wrong. It's your burden of proof to demonstrate that they are right.

Science doesn't just declare that it's right until somebody proves it wrong, like you want to do. That's the big difference here.

 

[DavidFirth]

So, pretty much what I said. You're just going to believe what you want.


What does "spiritual" mean and how can I view that evidence?


Do you claim to know what god looks like?



And there it is. YOu cannot believe it because an old book says something different.



We actually share many things in common with apes (aside from the massive amounts of DNA we share with them), and given that we are also apes.
Behavioral Similarities between Humans, Chimps and Apes - Science in Our World: Certainty & Controversy
Genetics | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program
similarities between apes and humans – Apis Communication Science
Differences and similarities between human and chimpanzee neural progenitors during cerebral cortex development | eLife
Humans and apes are genetically very similar



What's silly is declaring that "apes are nothing like us" when the evidence clearly indicates that we have much in common with them and share a common ancestor. But we already know that you have to stick with what the Bible says, no matter what. Honestly I don't know how anybody can look at an ape and not see that they look like us. Have you ever seen one up close?


I also wonder how you explain all of these fossils:
Fossils | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program

They're just fossils. They don't prove anything and neither do you and neither does any scientist. You believe them based on your faith in what they say. Nothing more except a rendition of evidence that can and has been rendered differently.

 

[DavidFirth]

You've made my point again.

It's not my burden of proof to demonstrate that your claims are wrong. It's your burden of proof to demonstrate that they are right.

Science doesn't just declare that it's right until somebody proves it wrong, like you want to do. That's the big difference here.

Science cannot prove your theories are inviolate.

 

[SkepticThinker]

They're just fossils. They don't prove anything and neither do you and neither does any scientist. You believe them based on your faith in what they say. Nothing more except a rendition of evidence that can and has been rendered differently.

No, I accept them based on the evidence, some of which I presented to you. No faith is required whatsoever. I don't think faith is a virtue, as some do. Anything can be believed on faith, and therefore I don't see it as any kind of path to truth or knowledge.

Your answer that "they're just fossils" neither addresses the question nor really says anything at all.

 

[sayak83]

Postulate 1: the Big Bang is true
Postulate 2: All macro-evolution began with a single celled organism and progressed from there (or a variant thereof)
Postulate 3: Men evolved from ape like beings

None of those postulates can be proven but they are all assumed to be true.

Postulate 4: Current dating methods are absoltutely reliable
Postulate 5: The universe was not created 10,000 years ago and it is not possible that a God could have done it, else we'd know

I could go on but I won't.

All the above are not postulates but are conclusions from observational evidence and predictive success of scientific theories based on such evidence. For example the successful prediction of cosmic radiation, element abundance, radiation temperature distribution, anisotropy data and neutrino background coupled with observed red shift of galaxies makes Big Bang an evidence based scientific conclusion and not a postulate.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Science cannot prove your theories are inviolate.

Could you try addressing the content of the post for once.

You cannot prove that your god beliefs are inviolate. You cannot even demonstrate their veracity.

 

[sayak83]

They're just fossils. They don't prove anything and neither do you and neither does any scientist. You believe them based on your faith in what they say. Nothing more except a rendition of evidence that can and has been rendered differently.

False. Evolutionary theorists predicted transitional skeletons between fish and reptiles, reptiles and birds, reptiles and mammals, apes and humans would be found. The discovery of such skeletons vindicated evolution. Creationists predicted nothing, in fact early on, they gleefully proclaimed the absence of such skeletons as evidence for creationism. Thus their discovery provides evidence against creationism and for evolution. Simple logic. Desperate after the fact denials and hand wavings changes nothing.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

In another thread, a poster said the following.

"I didn’t start believing in the existence of God because some religion said so. What made me a believer was my study of science. The more I learned about how the universe works, specially life forms, the more I realized how incredibly connected and complex everything is. There is so much intelligence, so much creativity and so much purpose behind everything that I couldn’t believe it happened without someone designing it.
That's the base of it. I could develop this subject but there is so much material I would rather do it on a separate post."

I am setting my beliefs and knowledge aside for a moment to solicit thoughts on why it would require intelligence and creativity to create complex beings and to understand what purpose is behind this, and why this would be more plausible to an individual than evolution through natural selection.

This thread was not created as a call-out. The poster offered to expound on this, and I asked her if she would be kind enough to participate in this thread and share her thoughts. I welcome anyone else's thoughts on this as well.


ETA: I neglected to include the fact that the poster mentioned above claims to be well studied on the theory of evolution.

Likewise, I was brought up atheist, but became increasingly skeptical of it as I studied the science further. We can debate subjective appearances all day long, something can appear superficially to be designed or natural, and both these appearances can be fallacies- that's a wash

But there are more objective measures; the math, the information systems, the algorithms involved in operating not only life, but the physics and chemistry that so specifically supports it in the first place.

The mathematical problems with natural selection are clearly borne out in other lines of evidence; a fossil record which failed to satisfy the predictions of smooth gradual transitions, but increasingly validates the opposite prediction; well defined jumps, gaps, sudden appearances, with vast periods of stasis involving very limited adaptation. It is also corroborated in direct experimentation, with bacteria, fruit flies etc which remain so no matter the evolutionary pressure applied

From every scientific angle, we see that adaptation functions in life, just as it does in any reasonably sophisticated product design you can think of- as a logical function of that design, not a design mechanism. And so it necessarily operates within strict predetermined limitations.

Darwinism made a lot of sense 150 years ago, so did classical physics, we need a better explanation in light of the the evidence since then