A Peace Plan for the Evolution/Creation Wars

Excellent essay. I have yearned for a view that matched my own on so many points. I hope many people will find the logic and reason in this description.

All these world-views are incomplete even though every subsequent world-view is more complete than the previous. As a byproduct, all these theologies are incomplete.
Therefore, one can look speculatively at possible future worldviews and theologies.

Suppose we found alien life. What if knew for sure that the universe is in fact full of life, on other planets. Things become considerably brighter, because the same vast forces that destroy life are also constantly making and remaking life; comets seed primordial oceans with amino acids, lightning strikes produce prions, prions become cells, meteor strikes eject rocks containing prions or bacteria that can withstand space and seed other planets. Theology becomes a vast cycle of death and rebirth.

Suppose we not only found alien life, but we also became space-faring, and moved to live in space permanently, as opposed to on-a-planet or around-a-sun. Suppose other alien civilizations have done the exact same. No vast cosmic forces could ever do that life any harm, and we'd be fully immersed in them, as opposed to at-the-receiving-end. I leave it to you to imagine what that theology might be.

-----
Aquarius

A possible present-day epiphany would be different too. Planets do not follow the same orbits for ever; orbits decay or converge. The sun is not forever. Comets zap about and hit planets. Supernovas explode. The galaxy will eventually collide with Andromeda. It is scary stuff, and life is not guaranteed a place under the heavens but for brief seconds on a geological scale. If god exists then god is not pro-life (to put it mildly), and quite chaotic. True God has nowhere to hide anymore, in neither order nor disorder. There is no God.

Let's now move to a Newtonian worldview epiphany. The world is a ball orbiting the sun, along with other balls. They have done so forever, and will do so forever. Everything is not only deterministic and predetermined according to certain laws of nature, but also predictable and unchanging for eternity.
There are other suns in the universe, but things are not much different over there. The universe is emotionless, hollow, and there is no free will in it.
The miracle-man is still surrounded by forces that permeate the whole creation, but those are binding and grinding dark satanic mills, that underlay everything. His god, as revealed to him, is Urizen(Reason) and he denies that god, defining true God by what Urizen is not. If Urizen is order, then God must be chaos. This is, however, dualistic, and God is one. Therefore, if the answer to the question 'what is Buddha?' is 'What is not Buddha?' (nothing), then theology is a matter of awakening that nature, that must be present, somewhere and everywhere.

That's a bit like putting the cart before the horse.

God and theology spring from personal epiphany-like experiences. The shape God takes depends on those experiences. Those experiences depend on one's worldview and place in the world, which is shaped by knowledge of the world. Knowledge of the world is science.

Let's take a standard ancient worldview. The world is flat and probably infinite. Above it is a dome with specks of light, some speck of light stand still, other specks of light move about. They are of no concern or relevance, except to show the wonders and mysteries of God's creation.
Suppose now, that the ancient soon-to-be-miracle-man sits in a forest and has an epiphany. He is now one with the world, sees and feels forces at work that permeate the whole creation _as he knows it_. Wherever he goes, whatever he does, those forces will be there for him and with him. Animals bring him berries, lead him to springs of water, wolves avoid him, raging elephants stop dead in their tracks before him.
This is a naturalistic, genesis-like epiphany.
The miracle-men then emerges from the forest and rejoins society to share and announce God's love, and miracles surround him as long as he can stay in this state of mind, that is, as long as he views other people as God's children, a little higher than animals, but essentially the same.
Whenever other people do not comply with this view, he can not perform miracles - no miracle will happen where there's demonstrated free and conscious will. The miracle-man is now set for failure, if he decides to enforce the 'children of god, all bearing god's essence, divine' view. This is a shift, for he miracle-man, from 'be' to 'should be'. 'Should be' implies a choice, rather than some universal truth about things. A choice implies free will.
He looses it all.

test

As for what Aphrodite might think of this little 'battle,' ...She doesn't *like* battles. This is not the way She teaches.

What She teaches about human evolution runs more to the application than the theory. She might say, 'This is not a time to bore Me with details, never mind be not paying attention to what's important and end up on daytime TV screaming at each other about 'rules.' :)

*Poly* theism. Remember? :)

Heh. Is this thread still open?

Not sure *just* what you're on about, there, 'Congratulations,' but, I'm certainly not going to be the one to bore the Paphian Goddess with evolutionary biochemisry...

See, we have this little concept, here, in polytheism. Keeps us out of certain kinds of trouble. We like to call it...

Polytheism.

Which is to say you don't look to paeans to the Foam-Borne One, probably most *particularly* Pindar, to try to justify some perfect unitary written authority when you want to say your own DNA can't possibly work.

That would be muddling things. :)

Possibly it could lead to getting *very ugly* about muddling things.

Like who the guardian of Rhodes was, by some report, for instance, wouldn't want to see anyone basing foreign or environmental policy on being attached to wrong ideas about *that,* would we?

This is one problem with you 'book religion' types... Not only do you think your *own* God is a perfect written authority, depending on blind faith in whatever one comprehends when they read... You think the same of everyone, and everything else.

The very *world* becomes a rival religion in some kind of battle for your soul's eternal binary choice of fate.

The world's made how it's made. We may sing poetry about it, love ourselves, our Gods, each other, we may date the very *atoms* of our past and build wonders and horrors from the knowledge as we may.

Reality is not a rival religion. Not of any religion you know what to do with, anyway.

As noted by Bob Berman in the December issue of Astronomy Magazine, the current human race would fit into a volume of a sugar cube weighing 500 million tons if you removed the space amongst the neutrons, electrons, protons and all the other sub-atomic particles in said humans.

As also noted by Dr. Berman, life in all its forms is simply and basically then about energy/gravity and the perception of this energy/gravity. Would the stochastic process of throwing sub-atomic particles in a mix of motion and energy result in life as we know it? Statistically, yes it would!!!! Would such a mix occur on another planet of one of the 6 x 10E22 stars out there? Probably, but planets rotating about other stars were hard to detect until recently and the visual restrictions and the "slow" speed of light limits our knowledge of these potential other worlds.

So do we need a creating god or is it simply all about the Big Bang and the "Gib Gnab" recycling for infinity??

Mr. Hirschfield,

You are being intellectually dishonest by ignoring the fanaticism of the so called "scientific community", who don't view Darwin's evolution as a theory or a belief. Their claim is that it is indeed a fact. What denomination of evolution am I referring to? The random processes of molecules to man religion - the one species leads to another religion - the Atheists' mythology. For Darwin's theory on the origins of life on Earth, the evidence is not there. Besides the illogical premises of random natural processes leading to first lower than gradually much higher life forms by gaining DNA; which Darwin himself acknowledged as such, the evidence does not support Darwin's theory and it is not the best "scientific" explanation for the origins of life. Where are all the transitional fossils? Millions of dinosaur bones, "FACTUALLY" from 365 million years ago are being found all over the world. But not one "incontrovertible" transitional skeleton or fossil is found from any period of time. A good theory is self propelling; it doesn't need a political platform or laws protecting it from competing theories in a classroom. But this is certainly the case with today's "evolutionists", as "factually" illustrated in Ben Stein's "Expelled" movie.

There is more than one theory of evolution Mr. Hirschfield. There is the scientific one based on the variations "observed" within a species or kind. There is also the religious version, that feels compelled to indoctrinate us all with the random processes; life comes from non-life; intelligence comes from non-intelligence; life forms gain DNA with mutations; dissent is delusion; matter of fact evolutionism.

If you are honestly interested in a "rational scientific" discussion on this topic Mr. Hirschfield, be sure to clarify which version of evolution you're referring to. From what I've read so far, the evidence tells me you're about on par with Al Gore in the science realm.

Edbyronadams wrote:
"Go insult someone else, you self important twit."

Aah, name calling - the last refuge of a losing argument.

how do software specialists enlist the species : )?

1. check whether there is a database.
2. check which software produced the database.
3. check what are the datas, the structure and how it was saved.
4. check whether they may be reconstructed.
5. prepare the software to read properly from the data structure.
6. if there is not a database, take a cup of coffee and put a circle of flowers around your neck.
7. pessimist is "pass this case, i am eastern, not western"

Pamsm Author Profile Page:

Edbyronadams writes, re my (partial) statement -
...the chemical development of self-replicating RNA strands:

"Since nothing like this has ever been demonstrated in an experimental setup, it remains in the realm of fantasy, not science..."

This is not entirely true.

Please educate yourself if you want to talk. I've done my part - I've read your bible and gone to church and Sunday school

_________________________________

First, not a Christian, so your assumptions are wholly incorrect. Second, your article's great revelation after a long "just so" story was the spontaneous polymerization of 40 bases of a RNA chain. That is light years away from your previous phrase that included "self replicating". Self replicating would have some facsimile of life. Beside that a little chemical polymerization
is trivial.

Go insult someone else, you self important twit.

CCNL writes:
"National Geographic this month has an excellent review of Darwin and post-Darwin scientists and their studies."

The Smithsonian Magazine also has a good piece on Darwin.

Edbyronadams writes, re my (partial) statement -
...the chemical development of self-replicating RNA strands:

"Since nothing like this has ever been demonstrated in an experimental setup, it remains in the realm of fantasy, not science..."

This is not entirely true. I posted a link for you above. Obviously, you didn't bother to follow it and read. Here it is again:

http://discovermagazine.com/2008/feb/did-life-evolve-in-ice/article_view?b_start:int=0&-C=

Please educate yourself if you want to talk. I've done my part - I've read your bible and gone to church and Sunday school. I've even read some of your creationist books and Web sites. Now you do your part. There can't be any true dialog if one party is abysmally ignorant of the other party's entire premise.

CCNL, Peg&Place,

see You two tomorrow. did You hear about the Green Object in the Sky that shall pass the nearest to EArth in the end of February, announced by Chinese Astronomers?

he had left the temple into ruins, he had left the body into lack of power and lack of health. he had to put on and put in. he had heard from the body, from the temple, the body produced by the ancestors and inherited from the ancestors. do You agree with me at this subject, RAbbi?

Brad Hirschfield, how many years did it take to Cross Your Fingers under Your Beard mindfully? if You dont put on Your bread for so long a time, shall Your bread drop? this sounds like the words in the audibility of St Francisco Assisi, doesnt it?

Daniel DAy Lewis, how are You? how is the Oscar? does the host care the rose? sure!

CornBread_R21 did. OK.

"The bark of the hibiscus contains strong fibers. They can be obtained by letting the stripped bark sit in the sea in order to let the organic material rot away. In Polynesia these fibers (fau, pūrau) are used for making grass skirts. They have also been known to be used to make wigs.

Hibiscus, especially white hibiscus, is considered to have medicinal properties in the Indian traditional system of medicine, Ayurveda. Roots make various concoctions believed to cure various ailments."

hibiscus? rosemallow? silybummarianum? chrysanthemum?

"Hibiscus, especially white hibiscus, is considered to have medicinal properties in the Indian traditional system of medicine, Ayurveda. Roots make various concoctions believed to cure various ailments.

The hibiscus flower is traditionally worn by Hawaiian women. A single flower is tucked behind the ear. Which ear is used indicates the wearer's availability for marriage."

who did say "ALOHA"?

"In Pindar's ode, the island was said to be born of the union of Helios the sun god and the nymph Rhode, and the cities were named for their three sons. The rhoda is a pink hibiscus native to the island. Diodorus Siculus added that Actis, one of the sons of Helios and Rhode travelled to Egypt where he built the city of Heliopolis and he taught the Egyptians the science of astrology. [6]

In the 1st century AD, the Emperor Tiberius spent a brief term of exile on Rhodes, and Saint Paul brought Christianity to the island. Rhodes reached her zenith in the third century, and was then by common consent the most civilized and beautiful city in Hellas."

was Aphrodite the Queen of Rhodes? was She a Rhodit? was She "hap rhodit"? the happy one? the magic one? the tailor one?

DArwin had two feet on a turtle, Aphrodite had one of her two feet on a turtle, the left one. Peg&Place, how are You? what is fidelity of DAniel Day Lewis in the environment?

CCNL, how do You do in Denmark? are You still in Denmark? what is fidelity of a woman in the environment?

CCNL? please you say what fidelity is in the environment.

"Zeytuni" is "olive-y"

1. a public foundation cannot be hostile.
2. it is not a public foundation of immigration
3. a public immigration foundation cannot ask a grand woman out of country
4. "grandmother with olive" is a reference.
5. fidelity is a matter of truth, faith and public benefit.
6. this is the basic truth and settlement of United States of America.

this is the survival of the "fiddest", the most fidel one. what is fidelity in environment?

National Geographic this month has an excellent review of Darwin and post-Darwin scientists and their studies.

Pamsm wrote:
"the chemical development of self-replicating RNA strands."

Since nothing like this has ever been demonstrated in an experimental setup, it remains in the realm of fantasy, not science but don't let me get in the way of your faith based beliefs.

As noted by Bob Berman in the December issue of Astronomy Magazine, the current human race would fit into a volume of a sugar cube weighing 500 million tons if you removed the space amongst the neutrons, electrons, protons and all the other sub-atomic particles. As also noted by Dr. Berman, life in all its forms is simply and basically then about energy/gravity and the perception of this energy/gravity. Would the stochastic process of throwing sub-atomic particles in a mix of motion and energy result in life as we know it? Statistically, yes it would!!!! Would such a mix occur on another planet of one of the 6 x 10E22 stars out there? Probably, but planets rotating about other stars were hard to detect until recently and the visual restrictions and the "slow" speed of light limits our knowledge of these potential other worlds.

So do we need a creating god or is it simply all about the Big Bang and the "Gib Gnab" recycling for infinity??

Pamsm, Thank You for you patient, illuminating posts. I enjoy and learn much from every one of them.

Genesis is myth as are "creation" theories.

EdByronAdams says:
"Pamsm, I don't know how often abiogenisis is taught. I got it twice in high school biology. First we learned that abiogenisis was a false theory that Pasteur debunked. Then we learned that it was a correct theory on the beginnings of life. Go figure. I guess Louis Pasteur just didn't put his swan necked flasks in just the right spot."

If you don't realize that you're talking about two completely different things here - spontaneous generation of complete organisms (in this case, flies from rotting meat) vs. the chemical development of self-replicating RNA strands - then I'm not going to waste my time trying to explain it to you.

JimMF writes:
"Let's have a discussion Pam. Don't just refer me to the countless books that contain the same speculation I'm complaining about.

What part of the eye evolution tale am I wrong about?"

Sorry to be so long in answering - I've been too busy to check back.

Jim, if you'd try to learn something about evolution, you'd know that it isn't just "speculation" and that you're wrong about nearly all of the eye evolution.

The way that we know how eyes and hearts evolved is that examples of every stage still exist today in various animals.

When there is something to be sensed, something will evolve to sense it. Eyes happened early and often (they were evolved at least 40 separate times). The Sun is such a potent source of energy for the Earth, that it would have been much more miraculous if *nothing* had evolved a way to sense the photons that it sends our way all day.

There are single-celled animals that have eyespots. Euglena is one of them. Its eyespot, called a “stigma”, is located at its anterior end, and allows it to sense light and dark. It doesn’t have actual vision – it can’t distinguish shapes – but it can move toward light to aid in photosynthesis. That’s how it begins. Each improvement is of such a great advantage, that evolution of eyes is moved along more rapidly than that of many other traits.

Eyes in multicellular animals are at the ends of nerves. You do know that nerve endings are common in bodies, right? And that in animals with brains, all nerves lead there? All it took was for a nerve to become sensitive to light instead of touch to start the evolutionary ball rolling. The opsins that convert photons into an electrical signal are, as mentioned above, proteins that evolved first in bacteria.

It’s the same with hearts. The mammalian heart didn’t just spring from nowhere.

Circulatory systems are a requirement of body size. The smallest creatures only need osmosis to get nutrients, but as bodies get larger, some sort of circulation is needed. Some get it by living in moving streams, but larger animals require some sort of substance like blood to carry nutrients to cells, and something to pump it. Most arthropods have an open-ended muscular tube that squeezes their hemolymph slowly through their interstitial spaces. And here’s the beauty part: The genes that code for this very simple insect and crustacean “heart”, are the very same ones that begin the development of the heart in the mammalian embryo.

Heart development can be followed from this primitive structure right up to the most complicated 4-chambered mammalian heart, with examples still extant of every stage along the way. Arthropod, sea cucumber (also possessing a notochord – precursor of the spine), fish, amphibian, reptile, birds and mammals. It follows precisely the path that you would expect, given evolutionary history.

spidermean2wrote:
"What are the factors of natural selection? Height? Weight? Larger brains?"

____________________________________________

Numbers of genome copies determines success in the game of evolution. Insects are the most successful terrestrial order since 95% of the animal biomass is made up of them. As far as humans go, if you wanted to make a snapshot judgment now, you would have to say that Muslims and Mormons are the most successful since they haven't given up on reproduction. Does that represent bigger brains?

There is a lengthy treatment of this issue on Richarddawkins.net that you all may find interesting (wapo blocked the url...maybe because it was too long).

aloha

You all may find the discussion of this issue here interesting.

http://www.richarddawkins.net/article,3574,Jerry-Coynes-Seeing-and-Believing-with-responses,Jerry-Coyne-Lawrence-Krauss-Daniel-Dennett-Sam-Harris-Steven-Pinker

Aloha

I often hear the phrase "natural selection" as if these people understand what they are talking about.

Does natural selection tell us who's going to live longer between an elephant and an ant. What I mean is who would still exist 1 million years from now? What are the factors of natural selection? Height? Weight? Larger brains?

You guys should know what you are talking about so you won't be branded as fools.

In every society, justice is a nice frill, but stability is essential. And nothing is more necessary for stability than a poorly educated, ignorant and easily exploited underclass. This is why teaching creationism and intelligent design to children, the younger the better, is so necessary.

Mr. Hirschfield is correct in his argument against the use of "belief" in both contexts (faith or evolutionary biology). I do not believe in evolution. My understanding of evolution has nothing to do with belief. Evolution is a fact based on a theoretical framework that makes testable predictions which are falsifiable. Current theory (in the scientific sense, not the 'it's only a theory' vernacular of the public) explains not only what we see in the nature of living systems, but what we should expect to find. If it fails to do that, then evolutionary theory needs to be modified or tossed. At this point, the theory is strongly supported.

Rabbi Hirschfield notes that "...those who support the theory of evolution are prepared to dump it for something better at any moment. In fact, scientific breakthroughs occur when past theories are disproved more than when they are confirmed." That's true...

...but, of course, that doesn't mean what many people take from it. Isaac Asimov discussed this (http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm) in an insightful essay. "[W]hen people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the earth was [perfectly] spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together."

A "theory" in scientific terms is not equivalent to a "guess" or "supposition". It ties together a lot of different observations, makes predictions about what the result of new observations should be, and has passed a large number of tests checking those predictions. (It's still called the "germ theory of disease", for example.)

Relativity is one of our best-tested theories. But engineers still overwhelmingly use Newtonian physics, because in the world humans inhabit, where nothing moves anywhere close to the speed of light, Newton's laws are usually more than "good enough". (Not always - the GPS system would fail within hours if Relativity weren't taken into account - but the majority of the time.)

Newton was wrong - but not completely wrong. Mostly, he was only right within a particular range of sizes and speeds. Current evolutionary theory may turn out one day to be similarly incomplete - but things like common descent, adaptation, genetic drift, and so forth will still be entirely true. There's just too much evidence backing them up. (E.g., see http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/)

Edbyronadams:

I would extend your "flat earth" analogy even further. Believing in microevolution and not believing in macroevolution is like saying "well, I can accept the concepts of addition and subtration, but I refuse to believe in multiplication and division".

Thank you, Rabbi. You're right that there's no reason to get dogmatic, even when talking about dogmatism. Great piece.

"Rather than fighting against each other to determine which side is Right, we should find ways to learn from each other..." In case you haven't been paying attention for the last 8 years, when a democratic nation is brimming with morons, there are consequences. If I encounter a flat-earther, should I ignore which one of us is Right, and instead find a way to "learn" from the fool?

"And to those ideologues whose vision of either science or religion is so narrow as to assume that no such learning is possible, we should say a pox on both your houses!" That's an empty threat. Half of the electorate accepts ancient mythology over scientific understanding. There already is a pox on all our houses.

krankyman,

"Off to the ovens???" Hardly. But what's to respect about lack of knowledge?

It's obvious that all these issues sell big time and that's what the news need. Evolutionists vs creationists is obviously a good matchup nowadays. Excellent mass media material and a rather recent one too, still to be exploited.

It's clear that all journalism benefits from all this. Which probably means they are very involved in the fact of knowingly feeding a false dichotomy to the public.
Like a manual on how to start a circus. Pick a topic which polarizes people and throw it to the masses. Not sure it's always as harmless as evolutionists vs creationists.

harveyh5 Author Profile Page:

JimMF,

One thing for you though. Don't jump to conclusions. I didn't claim to be fully intelligent, but instead only stated those with no concept of evolution are semi-intelligent.
==========================================
So its "off to the ovens" with those that don't agree with you.

That's what I like, open discussion in a attitude of mutual respect.

Back to one of Rabbi Hirschfield's main points, he is absolutely correct that there is a language barrier when words like "faith" and "belief" are used as if they have the same meaning in religions and in science. They do not. But the common usage of these words is so powerful, that it is difficult to see a remedy. Despite decades of science education in the schools, has there been any movement on this issue? I'm not yet convinced that there has been.

JimMF,

One thing for you though. Don't jump to conclusions. I didn't claim to be fully intelligent, but instead only stated those with no concept of evolution are semi-intelligent. There is hope though. To approximate a quote attributed to Muhammad Ali, "If I'm not any smarter at 31 then I was when I was 21, then I've wasted 10 years of my life."

Paganplace,

Appreciate the excellent reply to JimMF!

JIMMF wrote: "There is no justification to support the belief by evolutionists that mutations can be so innovative as to spontaneously create something like a photosensitive cell."

Evolutionists do not believe mutations alone innovate. Where did you get such a silly idea?

An animal is not blind and then through a mutation can see. There is no evidence to show such a thing ever happens in evolution. If this is what you are basing your doubts on then you have not learned anything about evolution. First read up on evolution, learn what it is. Arguing from ignorance is not a good way to argue.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/change/grand/

"It's not about Gods. It's about your books."

Not my books. I'm not sure what point you are trying to make. Would you explain? My point was that all assertions of supernatural existence are equal regarding their possibility, their lack of evidence, and their unlikelihood of being factually accurate. No religion's definition of what constitutes a god should be taken as a default, whether or not the religion uses a book as an authority.

Paganplace wrote"

"Wouldn't base my faith on arguments from ignorance. Not very helpful"

______________________________

Couldn't agree more.

Rabbi Hirschfield states: "Believing in evolution simply means that one trusts the scientific method to provide answers about the mechanics of the physical universe."

The good rabbi uses the word "believe" in the comparison of the scientific methods used in modern biology and religious faith/dogma. I do not go around "believing" that humans can construct a vehicle that can fly through the atmosphere or orbit the earth. I KNOW that these machines exist. The same could be said about the idea of transplanting a set of lungs and heart from a dead human being to a living one and saving a life. I do not have to have faith that these incredible feats of technology can occur, they do.

Evolution is a theory that seeks to EXPLAIN the natural world by means of investigation, experimentation and cooperation. The "belief" description of evolution, or secularism for that matter, is nothing more than an attempt to put science and religion on a more even debating platform. You cannot compare apples to oranges in that argument.

Hirshfeld titles his article: "A Peace Plan for the Evolution/Creation Wars"

What we need to clarify here is this notion of a war. If it is a war, the side attacking is the creationists. The side continually on the defensive is science. When you are attacked by those who use belief as a rationale, with God as the end of the argument, with a closed mind as proof, and your weapon of choice to defend yourself is truth and reason, you don't have a chance.

Science did not choose this war. Science understands that scientific method and reason always bring forth truth. Belief is poison in science, leading to bias and poorly done experiments and scientists not following the results to where they lead. Science has won this war of course. You only need to look at our medically advanced technological society and ask how much of it can be attributed to religion. But like a soldier who is defeated but cannot accept the fact, religious fanatics continue to attack what they cannot accept. Like racists who must live in a multiracial America they should simply go off and live alone and stop making fools of themselves.

If I may:

"Here is a question for you who is fully intelligent versus semi-intelligent.

"Explain how random mutations could create something such as a heart."

It's *preachers* who claim evolution is about isolated cases of randomness.

Evolutionary theory and science aren't actually based on any such notion.

But preachers claim it is, anyway.

That's not intelligence.

That's redirecting a *little* bit of intelligence toward something else.

One further point JIMMF - the article I refer to in my last posting directly tackles your posturing relating to the evolution of a photosensitive cell (at least several times at different points in the history of the earth)
I look forward to your careful critique of the specific facts and inferences contained within this work.
Unfortunately i am 99.99999995% sure that you will not bother to read nor consider this work. Unfortunately you are not looking for an open debate - just a platform from which to proselytise.

HARVEYH5:

I understand the "concept of evolution" very well.

Here is a question for you who is fully intelligent versus semi-intelligent.

Explain how random mutations could create something such as a heart.

The biggest problem in this "conflict" is that those who believe in creationism don't have a clue to what evolution is. My advice to those is to find a good encyclopedia article about evolution and read it. Think too though about how a complex human being evolves from the union of an egg and sperm, an automobile is built from various basic components, or a sky scraper is constructed from the ground up. Anyone who can't understand the concept of evolution is only semi-intelligent.

I mean, yaknow what really burns my biscuit? How much time it took to convince Christians your air freshener sprays and Freon weren't such a great idea, now you're basing your whole Creation story on the ozone layer.

Feh. :)

" Carstonio
""If a god or gods exist that had no hand in creating the universe, wouldn't they be classified as exotic forms of life and not god(s)?""

"Not according to polytheistic religions past and present."

Well, speaking as a member of the latter with some study of the *former,* the difference here is all about how book religions arrogate authority to controllable *books.*

Somehow we missed the memo, perhaps, on how seeing how something actually works somehow is in conflict with sacredness.

It's not about Gods. It's about your books.

Stromatolytes, btw, Edby. You don't need the whole atmosphere to have shielding if you're a molecule of some stuff, under some other stuff.

Wouldn't base my faith on arguments from ignorance. Not very helpful.

"If a god or gods exist that had no hand in creating the universe, wouldn't they be classified as exotic forms of life and not god(s)?"

Not according to polytheistic religions past and present.

Like next to a rock? :)

Pamsm, I don't know how often abiogenisis is taught. I got it twice in high school biology. First we learned that abiogenisis was a false theory that Pasteur debunked. Then we learned that it was a correct theory on the beginnings of life. Go figure. I guess Louis Pasteur just didn't put his swan necked flasks in just the right spot.

See, what's kind of my thing here, watching atheists and monotheists argue, is just this:

If we don't share a common ancestor with chimps and bonoboes, we're *certainly* really good at faking it.

Maybe we ought to see what we'd like to do with that, rather than think arguing'll help. :)

PAMSM:

Let's have a discussion Pam. Don't just refer me to the countless books that contain the same speculation I'm complaining about.

What part of the eye evolution tale am I wrong about?

"What you need to understand is that science is about open thought and not brainwashing."

My criticism of the monopolizing evolutionary faith is based on scientific facts and evidence.

What we have are the passionate faihtful that really believe that evolution of the eye started with a random mutation creating a photosensitive cell.

Sorry about the double post - I was told that the first one was rejected, so I tried with the hyperlink removed. Surprise! They both showed up.

JIMMF,
You've submitted this exact same diatribe on other threads and had it blown out of the water, yet you keep repeating it endlessly.

Who do you think you're impressing?

You clearly don't have the least notion of what evolutionary theory is about, or how evolution works. Why don't you educate yourself and then come back? There are some excellent books available. I'd start with Carl Zimmer's Evolution: The Triumph of an Idea.

JIMMF,
You've submitted this exact same diatribe on other threads and had it blown out of the water, yet you keep repeating it endlessly.

Who do you think you're impressing?

You clearly don't have the least notion of what evolutionary theory is about, or how evolution works. Why don't you educate yourself and then come back? There are some excellent books available. I'd start with this one for a general overview:
http://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Triumph-Idea-Carl-Zimmer/dp/0061138401/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233609351&sr=1-1

"It is amazing that, with all the indoctrination going on, there are people intelligent and independent enough to conclude that the evolution explanation is completely inadequate to explain the complexity of life."

I'm always amazed that the only people talking about "indoctrination" at universities are the deeply religious, whose job it is to weekly chant refrains about God and use other clearly indoctrinational methods of brainwashing. What you need to understand is that science is about open thought and not brainwashing. If it were we would all be learning about Aristotle's science and only learning from books, never conducting an experiment, never going into the field or lab, never writing a paper questing an old or new theory, never questioning what is in the book. Its interesting when you consider that the only institution that ever stiffled scientific thought and new ideas or papers being published was the church.

If you really are trying to say a dogmatic 2500 year old book-fed ideology should replace free thinking scientifically defined truth and the freedom to challenge dogma, well, your world is very small and has no place explaining the unknown when thought is actively discouraged.

Edbyronadams said:
" I do have one problem with biology curriculum attached to evolution. That is that the idea of abiogenisis is taught quite often alongside that of natural selection."

Do you have some documentation for this? How often is "quite often"?

I find this difficult to believe, as abiogenesis is not yet settled science. It is the subject of much research, and a great deal of intriguing material is emerging, but it's not ready to be taught as "fact", and somehow I think it would be big news if it were being taught anywhere below college level.

I know there are universities that teach the research and the various theories, but that's about it.

Here's a promising one, if you're interested:

http://discovermagazine.com/2008/feb/did-life-evolve-in-ice/article_view?b_start:int=0&-C=

"That's because it's possible for gods to exist that had no role in creating the universe."

Is that possible? If a god or gods exist that had no hand in creating the universe, wouldn't they be classified as exotic forms of life and not god(s)?

Scientific inquiry is being harmed by Evolutionists that think the story of Evolution should be exempt from criticism because it is the "best possible explanation".

How can a so-called "theory" that uses an enormous amount of baseless speculation be the "best possible explanation"?

The amount of wild speculation and over-simplification to buttress the story of evolution is causing the DUMBING DOWN of science students.
Evolutionists take evidence for microevolution and, without adequate justification, extrapolate that to macroevolution with the creation of organs in existing organisms.

The "Great Creator" relied upon by evolutionists for amazing biological innovation is RANDOM MUTATIONS. Evolutionists have tremendous faith in RANDOM MUTATIONS when there is no justification for such faith.

For example, the evolutionists speculate that the evolution of the eye started with a random mutation creating a photosensitive cell capable of sensing light.

In the religion of Evolution, it is blasphemy to question whether the "Great Creator", RANDOM MUTATIONS, is capable of such amazing innovations. The high priests will tell tall tales and never cast doubt in the "Great Creator".

The problem with the eye tale is that it is not based on science but pure speculation without scientific basis. Mutations have been observed through common and scientific activities for the history of mankind. There is no justification to support the belief by evolutionists that mutations can be so innovative as to spontaneously create something like a photosensitive cell.

Of course, we, the sinners, cannot stop there with our criticism of the eye tale. The photosensitive cell alone is useless. It's like me installing a security camera outside my house and not wiring it, not connecting the monitor, and not personally monitoring the images on the monitor to interpret danger.

The organism must have the "wiring" and the process center to interpret and convert those signals from the photosensitive cell into useful information.

For evolutionists, all that is needed is an over-simplified explanation that leaves out essential information. They can send off that student who is now an indoctrinated evolutionist that is passionate but ignorant.

THIS HARMFUL RELIGION HAS A MONOPOLY IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITIES.

The eye evolution tale, along with countless other tales, is adequate for teachers to tell mind-numb students because any speculative answer, no matter how bad it is, is acceptable as long as it supports the evolutionary faith. HENCE, WE HAVE THE END OF CRITICAL THINKING AND THE DUMBING DOWN OF STUDENTS.

It is amazing that, with all the indoctrination going on, there are people intelligent and independent enough to conclude that the evolution explanation is completely inadequate to explain the complexity of life.

"Much progress is being made so I expect that our grandchildren will be learning about abiogenesis in 8th grade science class and believers will have one less thing to point to as evidence for a God."

While you make good points about abiogenesis, the concept doesn't automatically rule out a single god or many gods. That's because it's possible for gods to exist that had no role in creating the universe. Ascribing the origin of life to an intelligent creator is not a hypothesis at all. It makes too many assumptive leaps, and it's a one-size-fits-all explanation that is really no explanation.

edbyronadams wrote: "The real question is whether anyone has demonstrated a self replicating collection of chemicals yet, which they haven't. [...] I haven't any problem with people delving into the question but it is in no way supported enough by evidence to find a place in primary education now."

I agree its not ready for primary education, yet, but science is actively being done to investigate how life could have arose with the goal of creating primitive life in the lab. See:
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/1493/title/RNA_world_gets_support_as_prelife_scenario

Its pretty clear no cell living today just "arose" spontaniously, but even bacteria today have had over 3 billion years to evolve. The question is how could it have started in a primitive state. RNA seems a good candidate and serious science is working on this question and many results exist such as how lipid bilayers could spontaniously form.

The science is real, the evidence points to life having originated here and not elsewhere. Much progress is being made so I expect that our grandchildren will be learning about abiogenesis in 8th grade science class and believers will have one less thing to point to as evidence for a God.

I just hope I live to see the day, not because of its huge scientific significance but to see how the faithful react. Will they attack it like they have attacked evolution? Will they pull their kids out of science class when the "creating life" experiment is going to happen? If you google "abiogenesis" you will find 9 out of 10 articles are attacking the idea in favor of a creationist theory. That gives me a clue but also points out that many believers do not want to know the truth, instead they want to define the truth.

"He failed to provide a mechanism in the early atmosphere that would trap and shield these macromolecules from the concomitant destructive forces of the high energy inputs that created them."

Like a rock?

A leaf is still a leaf, no matter how closely you look in wonder.

The stars are still the stars, no matter how widely you look in wonder.

To think that that wonder is so cheap or illusory that it could be broken by our most earnest and intensive attempts to understand, does no service to either faith, nor reason.

It's our vanity, that.

The world ain't that fragile.
And neither are Gods that fragile.

Neither's faith.
Neither's spirit.

Only some structures built on words upon words are that fragile. Even when we most want to think they are.

bevjims1 wrote:
"The real question is how it got organized into a living cell."

The real question is whether anyone has demonstrated a self replicating collection of chemicals yet, which they haven't. The hoary old Miller experiment is usually the cited source of support for abiogenisis but he included a trap for the higher molecules spontaneously created. He failed to provide a mechanism in the early atmosphere that would trap and shield these macromolecules from the concomitant destructive forces of the high energy inputs that created them. It is pure speculation, not science. I haven't any problem with people delving into the question but it is in no way supported enough by evidence to find a place in primary education now.

"It makes no claims about the meaning or purpose of that process and represents no necessary threat to faith in God or in the eternal truth of a revealed scripture, if that happens to be one's belief."

Thanks to Hirschfield for emphasizing that. My one quibble with his column is over the idea of an "eternal truth." I see no evidence that truths have any existence outside the human mind, but that's merely a matter of scientific principle. More important is the danger of believing in absolutes regarding eternal truth. Absolutism of any kind is dangerous, and it's most dangerous when the absolutist is convinced that he or she is on the site of eternal good. I should emphasize that this does not describe most religious people, but just the vocal minority of extremists.

The true "non-believers" are those who deny science. Denying evolution is like denying the earth is round instead of being flat like the predecessors of these "non-believers" swore.

If the Abrahamic religions really believed in peace and harmony as they hypocritically profess, it would be easy for them just to accept evolution as the process in which a creator created things - creationism and evolutions in harmony. But, NO, their job is to be pig-headed based on cherry-picking ancient scriptures, to judge others and to deny science in the name of their small and shallow god. It gives them their self-righteous might and control over people.

When I tell my students in Mexico that there are theocracies in the US that mandate teaching creationism and abstinence instead of evolution and sex education, they are incredulous. It's incredulous to me, too.

edbyronadams wrote: "While natural selection is fundamental to understanding biology as a whole, the theory of abiogenisis is so wildly speculative that it does not deserve a place in science curriculum."

Well, its not so wildly speculative. While science has not proven abiogenesis or the method of life's origins a lot has been done to determine that life is from earth. Many of the components of a living cell can be created naturally in an environment lacking oxygen, which geologists tell us was the case in the early earth. The cellular plasm is very close to seawater in electrolyte balance, something that should be unnecessary for land dwelling creatures which must actually eat salt to maintain a balance of electrolyte that matches the ocean's. Science has documented the rise in oxygen in earth's atmosphere indicating life generated oxygen, which was not present on the early earth. So life did arise here, or close by and came here on say a meteor. And the question of how is being scientifically studied actively. Bilipid layered cell walls can be created out of chemicals easily. Many amino acids can also be easily created as can nucleotides. The real question is how it got organized into a living cell. Today's cells are very complex and could not have arisen spontaniously, leading scientists to consider cells much simpler that used to exist but evolved to become more complex. Now, if cells required something that does not exist on earth, or is composed of something not found on the early earth, that would be very interesting and might make science consider other external sources. But right now a lot is being studied and a lot is known. That part of the science book will continue to grow and I can imagine my grandchildren will create life in 8th grade science class and laugh at those who thought it impossible, just as we laugh at those who thought flight was impossible.

Thank you, Rabbi Hirschfield for some rational discussion of the issue. As a rational supporter of Darwinism, I do have one problem with biology curriculum attached to evolution. That is that the idea of abiogenisis is taught quite often alongside that of natural selection. While natural selection is fundamental to understanding biology as a whole, the theory of abiogenisis is so wildly speculative that it does not deserve a place in science curriculum.

They are two different matters and tying them together does a disservice to both. Life is change and a religious belief in unchanging forms merits no place in science. At the same time, believing that living organisms spontaneously arose from non-living materials hasn't enough experimental or observation evidence to merit its inclusion in science curriculum.