Why do humans have genes for full body hair?

[Dan From Smithville]

If one wants to make the simplified claim that it is all about caliber, I would give him a .30 caliber handgun, yes such beasts exist, and have it match up against a .223 from a full length rifle. With a hot load for the .223 of course. Some "assault rifles", I am no fan of the term either, are engineered for very hot loads. And of course barrel length makes a difference. Some rifles are considered to be " brush guns". They are designed for use in heavy woods. The thirty thirty was one such gun when I was a lad. I am very out of date for what is available today. They tend to have shorter barrels. And fired ammo that with significantly less powder than a 30-06, which was more of an open area rifle. Both have their uses.

I almost bought an AMT that was chambered for the .30 cal M1 round. Glad I didn't, but I was younger and it seemed sort of cool.

Growing up in the Ozarks, I came to favor those "brush guns". I really like the H&R Model 58 that came with a single shot 30-30 barrel and a single shot 20 ga barrel. I don't need that many rounds. If I haven't hit it the first time, 29 more rounds isn't going to do me much good in those woods.

There are lot of factors that effect the stopping power, range and wounding a round can inflict. In a rifle that you can cycle 45 rounds a minute through, you don't have to be that great a shot to really do some harm. For me, it is a toy to have a so called "assault rifle". Wouldn't use it for home protection and there are many better hunting rifles. It does make some men feel more like a man I guess.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

I have more evidence for my beliefs than I need to know what is real. Personal experience always trumps something you got from a college book.

This is not a pro-education, pro-science statement.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

What do you trust more? Something that happened to you or something you read?

This doesn't seem very pro-education when you look at it.

During my education, we spent time in the classes going over the books and time in the lab putting that to practice. It is a false dichotomy of sorts to consider formal education is just about reading a book. Grad school is like an apprenticeship. I didn't spend days out in the field getting the direct, hands on experience without reading books or taking classes to prepare me for it.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

What do you trust more? Something that happened to you or something you read?

I've read about what prison is like. I don't have to experience it to know it isn't a life I would want to participate in. I haven't been thrown out of a plane, but I've read about it. Don't need to experience it. I wasn't on the Titanic with Leonardo DiCaprio either or crafting threads like the one I'm responding to in order to know I wouldn't want to be on a sinking ship.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Oh please. We all know that is not true.

What I accept is based upon evidence. What you accept is due to abusing a holy book. Evidence trumps mere belief.

That is what I see as a sad truth. It is often more like abuse than use.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Why do you think I don't understand that?
Why do you think that I want to make God into a hypothesis of science. That is something that ID might want to do, not me. I just point stuff out. It is anathema in science to say that design in the DNA is or even might be the handiwork of a designer, even though that is what it looks like. I have to first show a designer exists before I can point out that stuff looks like it is designed. I could say that an evidence for a designer is that stuff like DNA looks like it is designed. But I can only use that for my personal faith and those who accept only what science does are not going to see that as evidence.

It isn't really an anathema. There simply is no evidence to say anything about God or any agency in what we study using science. I think that many of the metaphorical terms used to describe DNA lead those unfamiliar with the use as metaphor to assume the metaphor is a recognized fact. Code, translate, transcribe, etc. are used so that we can understand and not to declare they are actual codes or that an agent is transcribing something.

Saying something looks like it is designed is just a declaration without substance unless it can be demonstrated with objective evidence. That is why ID failed. It couldn't demonstrate anything. It just dressed religion up in a lab coat and lead a lot of people astray.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Moving the goalpost, will not advance your case.

PS: the point was scientists. And it's simply not true that the "vast majority" of scientists believe in a "creator god". But not that it matters, because the discussion is about some vague god belief, but rather concerning very specific points about evolution.

That is what happens in all these evolution creation threads. There's a topic, some reasonable discussion and it quickly turns to this.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Another poster here has spent endless time explaining to you that empirical evidence is the only evidence that is actually useful to anybody, and in fact is the only evidence that has provided us with the knowledge of everything we know about the universe, and here you are just repeating this nonsense again.

And this is why you always end up on faith, when it comes right down to it.

It's a way of viewing the Bible that leads to all the attempts to force facts to fit the allegories of the OT as if they were literal events and historical accounts. Some surely are, but many of them are stories to impart wisdom and belief. If creationists could understand that science is just the tool used to understand physical reality and not lecturing on how a person should believe, the response wouldn't seem so riled up.

 

[Subduction Zone]

It's a way of viewing the Bible that leads to all the attempts to force facts to fit the allegories of the OT as if they were literal events and historical accounts. Some surely are, but many of them are stories to impart wisdom and belief. If creationists could understand that science is just the tool used to understand physical reality and not lecturing on how a person should believe, the response wouldn't seem so riled up.

If I only had a dollar for every time that a creationist said "You are trying to disprove God" I could buy Twitter.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

If I only had a dollar for every time that a creationist said "You are trying to disprove God" I could buy Twitter.

Not now after Elon has "fixed" it.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

If I only had a dollar for every time that a creationist said "You are trying to disprove God" I could buy Twitter.

It's funny that only a couple of atheists have ever given me a hard time on here and I didn't care. I can ignore them. Didn't make me want to run out and change my beliefs.

To be honest, I get more ridicule and anger and barely veiled derision from creationists that claim to believe in God as I do. Funny how that works out that way.

The discussions are about science and I never got the impression that atheists cared about my beliefs as long as I was straight with the science. Not posting videos of a physicist pretending to explain genetics to an audience that wouldn't know valid science from a bag of elbows.

 

[Subduction Zone]

It's funny that only a couple of atheists have ever given me a hard time on here and I didn't care. I can ignore them. Didn't make me want to run out and change my beliefs.

To be honest, I get more ridicule and anger and barely veiled derision from creationists that claim to believe in God as I do. Funny how that works out that way.

The discussions are about science and I never got the impression that atheists cared about my beliefs as long as I was straight with the science. Not posting videos of a physicist pretending to explain genetics to an audience that wouldn't know valid science from a bag of elbows.

As long as you don't disagree with me about my true love:

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

100 percent could believe God doesn't exist and 100 percent would be wrong.

Correct.
Humans can be wrong. So when it comes to finding out if a claim is accurate or not, it matters not if any, nor how many, people believe it already.

So why bring it up if there are or aren't people who believe -whatever- when discussing the validity and accuracy of any given claim?

Claims fall and stand on their own merits; how they relate to the evidence of reality.
Regardless if 0 or a bazillion people already believe it or not.

But they don't. There's something in the human psych that understands life isn't accidental...

Yes. It's called pareidolia and / or type 2 cognition errors (the false positive).

The human psych evolved to stay alive. "seeing" agency & purpose in random events and feeling watched in random situations, are survival mechanism to escape lions and alike trying to eat you.

It forms the basis of superstition. Pretty much all animals that are potential preys of predators, have this tendency to engage in such superstition. It's why cats and humans will freak out when hearing an unexpected sound, while a crockodile will just sit there not caring.

Think about it.
Say you are at a library just scrolling through some books in silence.
Suddenly behind you, a heavy book behind you falls from the top shelve and creates a loud "thud" sound when hitting the floor.

You jump up 3m. Your heart is racing. Your breathing is heavy. Upon landing, you took a couple steps forward, running away from the noise. All this happens within the space of 1, max 2 seconds.
Then you look back and notice the book. Still you look further around for another second or 2-3, still breathing heavily with your heart racing.

Now consider that you see the book falling. Now you don't respond like that at all.

Why is this so?
Why do you respond to a book falling behind you in a similar way to a guy standing in front of you threatening you with a super sharp samurai sword?

and the tiny percent of hold outs just confirm that people can be brain washed effectively.

First, that doesn't follow. Pointing out mere disagreement is not evidence of brainwashing.

Secondly, we've already established that it matters not how many, if any, believe something or not, when it comes to the question of accuracy / validity of that something.

This is why we value independent evidence over mere opinion and beliefs.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I have more evidence for my beliefs than I need to know what is real. Personal experience always trumps something you got from a college book.

Then I guess we should all believe in bigfoot, lochness monsters, fairies, leprechauns, demons, lizard people from planet X, poltergeists, time travel, alien abduction, inner thetans,... and just about ALL religions, many of which are mutually exclusive.


Hmmm. Your "method" doesn't seem to lead to unambiguous conclusions. Sounds in fact like a really good way to end up with false beliefs.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Science is constantly changing. What was once fact is now fiction...

It's called learning.

You should try it sometime.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

What do you trust more? Something that happened to you or something you read?

I'll go for unmentioned option 3: something that has independently verifiable evidence.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I would, however, trust my personal observations about exactly what kind of damage each caliber does over something I got from a book. I have had this discussion with someone on here who apparently still thinks a wimpy .223 causes more damage than a 30 caliber bullet simply because it comes out of a so called "assault rifle".

It's very easy to draw false conclusions from your "personal observations".
There could be factors in play that you don't know about.

In this case, perhaps there were conditions at play (whatever they might be) that caused the "wimpy .223" to do more damage then usual. And if you then use that "personal experience" as the standard for the damage a "wimpy .223" causes, then your beliefs will be inaccurate.

Enter science.
This is why one might want to test our conclusions drawn from "personal experience". OR from science for that matter........... Conclusions must be tested for accuracy.

 

[Brian2]

Sure you did:

"God did it" does not explain how God created everything exactly no.

Is that the only thing "explain" can mean, "how"?

I just pointed out to you that you can't even define what spirit is, let alone demonstrate it's existence and therefore you can't describe any of it's attributes, and here you are trying to give it attributes. And you sure are quick to tell us what spirit isn't, but have yet to tell us what a spirit actually is. We don't generally define things by what they aren't.

There are a number of ways to define something. How do you define gravity? What is it? Do you know what it is or define it in other ways?

You get to decide if you believe that God exists.
Appealing to faith means that you've given up on evidence.

We get to decide if you believe that God does not exist. Does that mean that we give up on evidence?
Faith is where we go when the evidence ends. We leap into belief or unbelief.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Is that the only thing "explain" can mean, "how"?

It is usually the best way.

There are a number of ways to define something. How do you define gravity? What is it? Do you know what it is or define it in other ways?

Don't dodge, define.

We get to decide if you believe that God does not exist. Does that mean that we give up on evidence?
Faith is where we go when the evidence ends. We leap into belief or unbelief.

No, faith is not a pathway to the truth. It is the worst way to go. Faith only tends to follow confirmation bias.

 

[Brian2]

Nonsensical.
Faith is what you need to believe something when you have no evidence.

I don't require "faith" to believe that my keys will fall to earth if I drop them instead of shooting into space. Because I have actual evidence that they will.

And calling things "evidence" does not make them evidence.

For data to be evidence, first you need an actual verifiable & falsifiable model. Without such, you can't have any evidence by definition.

Your god claims are unfalsifiable.
Draw the obvious conclusion.

You define evidence that way I guess. Where does it come from, is that the definition from science? It's a good thing that I don't want to make God into a scientific hypothesis.
You must have a lot of faith because there is no evidence that God does not exist.

But it does mean they are useless and indistinguishable from things that are NOT true.

What's the actual difference between an undetectable dragon and a dragon that doesn't exist?

The undetectable dragon may exist.
When it comes to anything like that we can ask if there is any evidence for it's existence. With the Biblical God there is evidence and I guess that is why skeptics are hell bent on wanting to falsify the Bible. And I guess that makes the Bible falsifiable evidence even if it is not something that science can use.

Can you say "circular reasoning"?

My undetectable pet dragon exists.
That's the claim. According to you, that claim is also evidence of the truth of the claim.
So you should accept simply because I claim it to be so and apparently, that's evidence.

Do you think things through before you post?

I don't accept all claims as being true.
I don't think of all the possible answers before I post, I like being surprised.

Only because you have already decided a priori that you are going to dogmatically believe those claims.
I call the claims rubbish, because
1. they are unfalsifiable
and
2. they have no evidence (they can't, being unfalsifiable and all...)

That's all.

I already said that the evidence for the Bible God is the falsifiable Bible. The claims are the evidence.

Nothing I said about unfalsifiable claims, how meaningless such are and how they are indistinguishable from incorrect claims, is "silly".

What is "silly", is to believe such claims with such passion..........

There you go, religion and politics, steer clear.

For crying out loud...............................
So pointing out that a claim is unfalsifiable and has no evidence is "the work of the devil" now?

The further along this conversation goes, the more absurd it becomes.
I've stopped taking you seriously pages ago tbh

I was not saying that saying that the Bible is unfalsifiable evidence is silly. I do think that the attempts to falsify it (thousands of them probably) are silly, especially if it is unfalsifiable.
I imagine that anyone believing those attempts to falsify the Bible actually show that they think that the Bible is falsifiable.
Unfalsifiable but falsifiable.
Unproveable but the burden of proof is on those who make the claim.
A faith is a leap from where the evidence leaves off and into belief and so proof is not even required for a faith. (there is no proof that God does not exist after all).

Yes, such things were tackled by science also and shown to have simple natural causes.
Your head-in-sand-denial notwithstanding.

It's not my fault that your religious dogma has closed your mind firmly to ANY evidence of the contrary. That's all on you.

I have a serious "leading a horse to water..." feeling here.

Are you really saying that science has shown that the universe came into existence naturally or that life came into existence naturally?
Sounds like skeptic misleading rhetoric about science to me.

Those "superstitions of people" were things that they believed their gods told them also.
Just like you believe when the bible says that god said X, you believe it's actually god saying X. In reality, it's a human who's claiming it and wrote it down.

God didn't write your bible right? It was humans, right?
So you are really just believing the words of men who claimed to be speaking for their god.
Just like all the other "superstitions" you were referring to.

I don't care what other people's gods told them, we are talking about the Bible God.
And yes I don't think the Bible is dictation from God but I see the Bible as truth about God and what He has done and said. That sounds like a Mormon thing or even a Baha'i thing or a Muslim thing.
Buddhism is a religion from a man and not a god.
Hinduism seems to be contradicting philosophy of humans also and not from God.
How about the Bible, that is different in nature to all of these.

It actually does.

You could have a belief that a god is needed to make water turn into ice.
But discovering the process of "freezing" shows that you don't need a god for that at all.

If you can show that God was not needed for creation then you might have a point, otherwise no, all these god of the gaps things that skeptics claim have shunted God out mean nothing to the Bible God who created everything.

Nope.

Science for example has explained sea storms and tides. How they occur, how they form and why.
To the point that we can actually also predict when they will occur, what path they'll take etc.

Did that not demonstrate that Poseidon isn't required for tides and storms to manifest?

It probably does actually show that Poseidon isn't required for those things, unless Poseidon is a creator God. We are talking about the creator Bible God however and the one who can work through natural processes if He wants to.