45% of Americans believe that God created humans and placed them on the Earth less than 10,000 years ago. It is an astonishing statistic. That's nearly 136 million people in the USA who believe the Earth is ten thousand years old, twice the population of Great Britain. The question of faith has always been a contentious, and interesting one. Causing more wars than anything else in history, religion has certainly been one of the more interesting phenomena that humanity has created for itself. The dominating religion in the Western world is Christianity and it is certainly hard to get away from it. As scientific thinking and theories have improved over the last couple of hundred years there have been those religious fanatics who have chosen to reject reasonable ideas and logical thinking and cling to their spiritual beliefs in the wake of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. What got me thinking about religion and it's conflict with science was a particular branch of Christianity; Creationism. Creationism is the belief that evolution is a myth and that everything was created by an intelligent designer. In this case the designer is God. Strangely it isn't actually the theory of intelligent design that irks me here, I like to think I'm fairly open to new ideas and generally accepting of religious beliefs, even if I do not agree with them. What does bother me is how the creationists present their views, and how they have such a large population completely brainwashed into the belief. The creationist argument is that life and the universe as we understand it is so complex, infinitely so, that for it to have happened by chance is ridiculous. They believe that the Earth and all the life that lives on it has been designed and placed there by a divine creator, a God. Obviously this flies in the face of evolution, the theory with millions of years worth of hard evidence. A common theory put forward by well known creationists is that the banana presents the 'atheist's nightmare'. They say that the banana is perfectly suited for a human hand, is colour coordinated to show how ripe it is, has a bio-degradable wrapper, is good to eat and is perfectly shaped for the human mouth. They say that with all these things taken into account it is so obvious that the banana has been designed for humans to eat and hasn't just occurred by chance. What they fail to mention however, is that the wild banana is quite different. Filled with hard black seeds it is completely inedible. The banana that we know has been genetically modified over thousands of years into it's current form. In fact the designer of the banana is Man himself, hardly proof of a divine creator. They then go on to compare various man made structures to naturally occurring phenomenon. They say that to say a building has no designer is ridiculous, and so therefore it is also ridiculous to say that nature has no designer. What they fail to mention is that everything that is naturally occurring has had millions, or billions of years to evolve and come into being. To say that an eye has naturally evolved does initially seem far fetched, but when it is backed up with billions of years of chance it suddenly doesn't seem so hard to believe. Imagine playing the lottery every day for five billion years. You'd win quite a few times wouldn't you? Well this is how evolution works. Over such massive time frames tiny chances of things happening become almost certain to happen. I would guess that religious believers have difficulty in comprehending the vast amount of time that existed before Man. The problem with religion and creationism is that everything is so centered around our own species when really we've only been around for an astronomical blink of an eye. Even in our own planet's history we are quite insignificant, we've been around for 200,000 years as opposed to the 500 million years that fish have existed for. To say that a God has designed everything just for us seems entirely implausible to me. Of course one could never be 100% sure that there was no God. You could never say that without having absolute knowledge of everything that exists, has existed or will exist. In this regard I am open to the fact that a God may exist, although I do not believe that one does. I think that fabricating beliefs based on an old book and presenting them as fact is wrong, however. Surely science and rational thinking should be the basis on which opinion is formed. The purpose of science is to find evidence and present theories based on it. By turning yourself over to a religion you are able to just explain everything away with 'God did it'. Against such an point of view it becomes difficult to construct an argument. Inevitably they will ask some questions that science does not have an answer for yet, and then they can answer it with 'God did it'. Science does not pretend to have answers for things it does not understand yet, but preset facts based on real evidence and testing. Organised religion and faith are relics from the past, unneeded in today's society. They were used to govern primitive people and give answers to things that people could not understand yet. Essentially ruling people with the fear of going to Hell, religion is no longer needed now that we have organised rules and police forces. By perpetuating the falsehood of creationism and presenting religion as fact these people are slowing the scientific advancement and development of our species. Religious evangelism needs to accept science or cease spreading its lies, for the good of everyone.
Eh, I know what science says. And I know what my Torah says. Is it really that bad if I fancy the idea of Torah more then science? Is it bad to spend more time trying to figure out the literal/symbolic meanings that is rich in the creation story that takes place in my Torah, over science? I mean, Its not like I would argue creationism or any other bullshti Christians have made up to help them. (*)(*)(*)(*), someday they will claim to scientifically prove Jesus LOL
IMO, it is only bad if you are insisting that a literal interpretation of the Torah is science, and I don't see you claiming that any time soon.
The Bible is my science book. every thing in it is absolute truth. you must protect your soul and be careful of what you believe in.
Ultimately we have to have trust and faith in something. I put my faith in the Bible....and its obvious to me now that the Bible is the only truth within this crazy world we live. Other people put their trust and faith in the Scientific process. I see corruption and human failings within the Scientific process. While some sees it as infallible. Its just a matter of what you trust.
I'll trust evidence and reason any day of the week over 2000+ year old creation myths which are trivially false. Science and the scientific process are not "infallible" and I don't know anyone involved in them who claim it is. In fact, the very nature of scientific enquiry demands correction in cases of error. Faith and religion demands obedience in the face of conflicting information. I find it astonishing that people can "trust" something so utterly and demonstrably wrong on so many things.
Are you trying to convert others to what you believe? I thought atheist did not like other people telling them what to believe.
Great opportunity to post this video. Ray Comfort called in to The Atheist Experience. The Banana Man committed 7 fallacies in under 15 minutes. http://blip.tv/file/4943508
And what you basically said is that Science is infallible. I disagree. Science is conducted by corrupt humans. The process is corrupt. It doesn't correct errors at all. But is corrupted by the same human failings that corrupt other "perfect" institutions (government, UN, Unions....) fear, greed, power and ideology. Results oriented science....discovering a cure or an innovation...is rewarded by power, prestige and money. And it is a legit motivator. But Evolution science is rewarded by those things only if you stay within the confines of what is considered acceptable. I remember reading an article of a scientist that was so excited that he had found a "missing link". He was so excited....that he brushed aside any criticisim from any other scientists that found issue with his data or deductions and assumptions. But as long as it fit the mold...it was a chance at being written about in the history books and assured an income to feed his family.
Except for the part where that's the exact opposite of what he said. No errors have ever been corrected through repeated empirical experimentation? And let me guess, you don't have any links? All you remember is that this case completely proves your point and can never be validated by anyone else?
Duh. Earth is a circle. Earth is flat. Earth is the center of the universe. Don't you know that? Science is bollocks! The weird part is that even coming from that type of background I can't always tell if some of these posters are being sincere or doing satire.
You seem to have reading comprehension issues here. I said Science is fallible and involves self correction mechanisms. Religion and faith contains no such mechanisms for investigating the nature of the world. With something I never claimed. That's called a strawman. Yup. And other humans can check what one human says and test whether it is correct using scientific methodologies. Relgion and faith does none of this. Really? Where? Science is the single most successful method of investigating the universe we ever came up with as a species. The computer you are typing on is great evidence of this. Faith does no engineering. Okay this is just ignorance. What do you think science and the scientific method is? Who has ever said that science is "perfect" or even that any of those other things are? Riiiight. So because science works, it's wrong. Great. Nonsense. You don't seem to understand what science is in the first place, and I'll take a bet that you don't understand the ToE either. Funny, did you notice that other SCIENTISTS picked up errors in anothers claims? Not religion? Not faith? But other scientists using science? Nonsense. Any scientist who disproved evolutionary theory and found that creationism was a testable and correct hypothesis about the nature of the universe around us would be rich beyond their wildest dreams. You don't understand science so you criticise from ignorance. Like most religion.
It must be...we are discussing it in the religion forum But evolution science can be a faith....because some people have so much faith and trust in it...that they won't admit that it is prone to be fallible. They will SAY that it is fallible...but that it has mechanisms to correct the errors...which in the end deem it without error and totally trustworthy. Anything totally trustworthy and without error and without human corruption is holy.
You truly do not understand what the scientific method is do you? Science is only science when and because it can be proven wrong.
Don't put words in my mouth, I never said or implied that. Not even close. You truly do not understand what the scientific method is do you? Science is only science when and because it can be proven wrong. I said nothing about evolution being wrong, nothing about evolution at all. It's no wonder you haven't a clue about the scientific method, seeing how badly you warped a single line. It's only disappointing because you have the capacity, obviously not the desire.
I was putting words in your mouth. Get a sense of humor! But I believe evolutionary science fully corrupt. And you don't. That is simply where we stand. I think I understand science better then you do. And you think you understand science better then I do. I think we can disagree. Just like I can agree to disagree with you in our argument regarding God.
Sure, it was "humor." Profound. "We disagree." This is a debate forum, that's rather how it works. And no, based on your own words you obviously do not understand the scientific method, because they do not coincide with the scientific method lol. Sorry, it's not a matter of opinion, it's a fact. Please, do read up about "scientific method." You might appreciate it's value.
Be flippant all you like, but at least try and answer the question. You don't understand evolution or the ToE, or even science and scientific investigation itself. How can you possibly call something that implicitly calls for evidence and will change with new information, faith? Nonsense. Science is the single methodology that has given you the modern world and has proven itself time and time and time again. It works. It works really, really well. It's fallible, because the people doing science are fallible and we don't have all information about everything. If we did know everything, science would STOP. You don't understand what science is in the first place though, so I wouldn't expect someone ignorant of a subject to be able to criticise it. Nonsense. Science is not "totally trustworthy". It's a methodology for investigation with built in error correction mechanisms like replication, repetition and independent observation. You might need something to "trust" like a father figure, but I don't. I just want the evidence and the facts. And the evidence points to, at the very least, a non-interventionist god, if not the lack of one entirely. If evidence popped up tomorrow that there was a god, then science would recognise it. Does your faith allow for dissent? Does it allow for correction? Does it take into account uncomfortable facts? Science is the antithesis of faith.
Let me translate this nonsense: Evolution goes againts my precious bible, so it **MUST** be wrong, and please I REFUSE to look at any of the all the evidence Evolution has to suport it. I would rather believe in a book that was written 2,000 years that has ZERO evidence for it. Gotta love the theist mind set. I just hope these people do not get called for jury duty!
Strawman - neither is science infallible, nor any of the institutions mentioned perfect. Goodness knows how you managed to dream this up.
I agree with your entire post, except perhaps the quoted part. While religion is never necessary - humans obviously get along fine without it - it is also not worthless or a relic of the past. This I can safely say because there are always reasons for particular patterns of behavior and because billions of people exist that exhibit this kind of behavior. Ignoring the issue by saying that religion is not needed and that scientific findings must be accepted that will essentially annihilate certain religious tenets will only help sustain the taboos of mythological faith. The only way to get rid of these taboos and really look at religion for what it is, is to investigate the reasons for why we behave this way; i.e. getting to know ourselves. The I-know-what-you-are-but-what-am-I game can be fun, - we all do it - but it never solves anything. Only research of ourselves and education can do it. The negative part is, though, that researching what makes our minds tick is the toughest field of research. So tough that it's next to impossible. But, still, worth a shot.
