Creationism in schools.

[lurch]

..Did some body say ,," Blow things up"..ooowwwww..i'm all that,,literally or figuritively,,,yea...kaaa booooom! Me American..Me Like Big Boom, Tiney Pieces. ..Pray to Mushroom Cloud God...Spred Freedom and Democracy All Over World with Mushroom Cloud God. Me Create New World Order with Mushroom Cloud God( in keeping with the thread)...Not Scary..just want to re-born you.....MEL

[dennisrwood]

Lurch: still waiting for that proof you promised was readily available. stop redefining your proof and offer something.

[lurch]

... Okay,,I'll give one more opportunity to get it.
...The existance of a God based soley on Faith cannot be proved. The word " Proof" denotes things ,tangible,,subject to Laws and structure. The problem isn't with the word Faith..its with the word Proof.
....Therefore, I do not attempt to " prove" your god. The nature of Faith ,,allows it to be instilled into anything..real or imagined . Allow me..Its unfettered..Faith can be plugged into anything. That Faith is applied to ones God or ones big toe nail is no difference..Just ask the person who has All his faith in his big toe nail.( I speak metaphorically here) He'll defend his faith as passionately as any Christian or Jew or Moslem or....With that freedom,,that unstructured parameter,,applying the word proof to it is ,,at best non sequitor..it doesn't apply.
...Now..with that out of the way,,and I feel for you and your God, but, the original proposition was ,,prove the extistance of God,,not ,,prove the existance of X's or Y's or Z's God. There is a defined God that can be proved in the real sense,,in the realm of this 3- dimensional existance,,in terms of Laws and Structure...That God is..God as an Ideal..a projected by man ideal being. The proof is the projection...as mans needs and requiremets evolved and progressed thru time..so has the projected God. The point of ,,well thats just seeing parts of the overall God...allows for the admitting then..of not knowing the God in totalilty, but at the same time assuming , thru faith,,that God is such and such,,whatever you believe in. Which brings us back to the faith..and that has already been dismissed as not part of proposition or solution.
...Try this...if somebody ( Sheol, in this case), said, Lurch, How do you know there is a God?..I would reply,,Of course there is, I see people praying to him everyday. Do you get the drift?..I am not trying to define a specific God. ..I cannot apolgize for not proving your God. I set out to prove a God that i could prove in terms of a tangible 3-d world. The statues, the paintings, the words,,they are all projections of God by man.That is a provable God in terms of tangible proof...Oh #@&*#..I do apologize..you were referring to the Big Bang and Evolution..well..you refered to a quote by a " Piltdown",,I 'm sorry,,i do NOT recall that name being in any thing I've read , tried to understand, or observed. One voice you reference does not make a winning arguement against the Scientific Method. Where as cures for diseases, technical advances, going to the moon and beyond, seeing all the way back to a couple of billion years after the theorized Big Bang,,and seeing the evidence of muons at the subatomic level..speak volumes about the success of the Scientific method....On a side note,,its always made me laugh ,,when the media types hoot and hollar when something scientifc goes not as planned,,like that Mars probe that got mixed up because of metric Versus inches foul up. Great lambast was made of scientists. Yet,,when fotos of saturns moon Titan's surface came back..hardley a peep. When tsunami's take their grizzly toll,,no lambast of God there.
...Anyway,,proof of the Big Bang...The funny thing is ..that the scientist who orginally argued Against the Big Band,,he being a steady state proponant,,a Fred Hoyle,,if I recall correctly,,named the theory as Big Bang in derision,,and muchto his dismay..it stuck. I digress..Any way..as noted in another post on this thread,,Theorys do not require Proof,,Theorys are made up of observations( many,,many many) that lead the theorists to a conclusion. That conclusion ( theory) is subject to constant testing. If major exceptions arises then the theory goes down the crapper. There are numerous sources of info on the Big Bang theory. Hawkins, Paulie, Thorne,,etc, etc. Suggest a Google and start reading. Perhaps a general intro to Cosmology is in order first. Also,,over the years,,National Geographic Magazine has run made easier articles onthe Big Bang concept and how it has evolved over time...may have to go back 15 or so years to find the articles. There is the articles in Science to look up..well..like I said..the sources are numerous and listed on the internet in some manner..its all there,,if one is interested.
...Evolution...again..have you tried Googleing ? Do you really expect me to submit a term paper to you,,when it would mean sooo much more to you if you did it yourself.?...You never know what you'll find once you start down the path...i mean..youdo understand,,that the answer you request for get people degrees..Perhaps a chatboard that allowed for foot notes would satisfy?..MEL

[dennisrwood]

Lurch: i have read books. but i asked for your proof. and you offered none. i don't need a term paper. you claimed proof and now you dodge. i don't need you to answer, as i know such things for myself. you have answered well enough and i have made my point. thank you. btw, Piltdown was a hoax in England, had many convinced for years that the missing link had been found. another missing link was the tooth of a horse. i have no doubt that somewhere your proof exists. sweep aside the dodging and you may find it?

[lurch]

..I am trying to understand your logic..The proof is in the results. The proof is in the results of the scientific method. Why would I be concerned about hoaxes? They get disproved over time..thanks to the scientific process. The Polio vaccine a hoax?..The computor a Hoax?..The telescopes on Kitt Peak, they're hoaxes..? What are you saying.? I am required to have a fotographic memory before i can talk about things. ? Do you have a point? What books have you read?
..Again..you keep demanding proof of theorys because you believe what is keeping creationism from being taught in schools is its supposed lack of proof..you have it wrong. Creationism is not of the PROCESS that requires proof of the tangible nature.. Scientific Theorys eventually have to pass physical, objective, tangible , repeatable tests inorder to manifest itself in the real world.Creationism,,is therfore a subjective interpertation of words written in a religous book. Allow me to ask you this..How a bout,,a humanities class..that presents all the creation stories of all the tribes, ancient societies,,villages,,you know,,along side with how Rome was created,,the Mayan creation story,,the eskimo version..the Norse version..etc.etc...I believe some Colleges may be offering such courses already..maybe I'm mistaken..maybe not one college in this world is offering such a course..anyway..If colleges are,,then this whole debate is rather a moot exercise..unless..its really not about Creation stories..its really about My religion and How can i get it Taught in public schools....MEL

[Loredoctor]

Actually, there is evidence for creationism, but its not really surprising if you've never heard of it, b/c its never taught in public schools. There's a reason its ridiculed in science too, b/c science relies more on consensus than on the scientific method, at least in regards to how life began. Someone mentioned proof of the big bang, sorry, but w/the scientific method, you must be able to perform tests repeatedly, which I haven't seen any blowing up a piece of matter and creating this universe. Any idea that says the big bang should be taught in science class but not creationism is a little laughable. At least w/evolution we have the fact of micro-evolution, which can be tested. That at least can have a place in science class. But if big bang does, creationism should, which has more evidence.

I don't mean to sound rude but some of your statements are WAY off. Science DOES NOT rely upon consensus. Anyone who thinks so, I'm afraid to say, has obviously never studied science. From day one in every university course they drum into you the element of critical thinking; the reason 100% of journal articles are cut to pieces by other scientists. Witness quantum physics - there is no consensus there. Scientists pull apart theories all the time. If the media want to claim theories as truth, well they are 'welcome', but very few theories make it to becoming Laws (truth).

You discredit the big bang theory based on the inability to support the theories - i.e. 'cannot create a universe in a lab'. Perhaps we should look for signs of the big bang? Background radiation, red shift, the development of heavy particles . . . . FAR more support than any evidence for creationism. Further, most Christians argue for creationism's credibility by pulling down evolution or the big bang. That's weak reasoning.

[I'm Murrin]

Dennisrwood - I have to say I agree with lurch here. You're asking for something he can't provide, on demand, in this medium. He has stated his opinion on the matter, and has mentioned ways you could look at this evidence yourself, and that is enough. This discussion board is no place for enormous essays on recent scientific theory.
But you say you don't want 'term papers'. What do you want? What is 'proof', to you? There is no proof. That is the flaw in your arguments here. There is evidence, but no proof. Religion, on the other hand, has no factually based evidence. You cannot demand 'proof', when 'evidence' is all that can be given.

[Loredoctor]

Welll said, Murrin.

[Sheol]

Over about the past three pages all that has been made clear is that nobody has the answers and some people keep asking for them. I think what some people need to know is that science doesn't have all the right answers just yet, and that is what the other people are failing to communicate to you.

What science is based on is the ability to take facts and build a theory with them. They constantly take theories and modify them or supplant them with new ones that fit better with current scientific knowledge. Because of that sientific knowledge is constantly growing and developing.

Religion is based on faith. Religious explanations for the order of things are not science because they are based primarily on faith and do not subject themselves to be objectively falsified. If religion grew like science, there might be a new god each week, a new way to serve the god might come up every other day, and people would begin to lose faith. It would not be a stable orginazation to be a part of. But it doesn't, it gains new believers every day and grows. Because of that people began to mistake majority belief for credibility, and that causes topics like this.

[Cail]

I think that may be an overly simplistic way of looking at things Sheol. I believe that there is undeniable proof that God exists, which makes faith a very simple thing for me. Just as there are certain scientific things that are very easy to prove. The difference between the two is that some people, for whatever reason, can not or will not open themselves up to see the truth of God. This is in stark contrast to 200-300 years ago when anything could be very easily explained away by God, but science wasn't trusted.

I don't think that science and God are mutually exclusive.

[Worm of Despite]

Well, my take on teaching Creationism in schools: depends on what class. If it’s a theological class, okay. If it's science, then I don't see the point; I mean, why not teach the "stork theory" in place of childbirth? Plus, one has to consider the implications/problems of teaching a specific religious doctrine/set of value judgments in a public school--but that’s perhaps more for the Think Thank than the Close.

Something that struck me as humorous: I was watching the news and this woman said, “I’m a Christian, so I don’t think evolution should be taught in schools.” She said nothing more, nothing less. It’s as if she presupposes evolution is bad--as if word of mouth from other Christians persuaded her. Did she even look into evolution, study it at all? I think it’s quite silly; why does it automatically have to be one or the other? Scientific understanding can still be reached whilst maintaining your belief in God at the same time.

Heck, I don't think science solves everything or is the new "big answer"--far from it. Religion is still best at serving its purpose--nothing has surpassed it for giving sense of place, purpose, fulfillment, etc. My biology professor once put it this way: science is sometimes just the "best lie" humans have constructed to explain whatever it is they don't understand; it's often just an elaborate way of saying "we don't know".

[Sheol]

Lord Foul: What got me to start this topic was a story I saw on the news. It took place in a small town in some small state. The Christions were trying to get science teachers to read some document that said evolution was not the only theory. It was science class they were focusing on. If it was in a history class I probibly wouldn't have started this. So I totaly agree with you, it doesn't belong in sciene class.

[Nathan]

Over here we teach both... Seems like the easiest way to me. You learn creationism as a theory in Religious Education and you learn evolution as a theory in Science. We don't have the big fuss like you do over in the USA.

[Fist and Faith]

Sounds good to me, Nathan!

[dennisrwood]

but public schools must avoid all mentions of religion here. and the argument is silly. we want teachers to stop teaching evolution as if it were fact. science can not explain everything. a theory by definition is not law. but evolution is provoded as fact.

Murrin: Lurch derides my belief, I ask for the proof that he is right. he presents science as the be all. but can not support. yet i am derided for asking that science present it's facts. I am told to just believe, seems like faith.

Sheol: how many years does Chritianity have to be around before you give it credibility? and you laud science for constantly changing, but ask that i believe what they say today. how do i know that it won't change tomorrow? that would seem closer to your 'god a week' quote. what you call growing and developing might be construed as constantly getting it wrong and having to change your beliefs to fit the circumstances.

Foul: it was a sound bite, so i will finish for the woman. "I don't want evolution taught to the exclusion of my faith. As evolution and God have not been proven stop deriding what I believe. I am not uneducated, I allow for the possibility that some aspects may exist, but adaptation might best explain others. So stop being so smug and trying to
get me into buying into your scientific answer of the age. As that answer could well change when yet another scientific answer is proved wrong. Stop trying to sell me a horse tooth as the missing link."

[Worm of Despite]

Foul: it was a sound bite, so i will finish for the woman. "I don't want evolution taught to the exclusion of my faith. As evolution and God have not been proven stop deriding what I believe. I am not uneducated, I allow for the possibility that some aspects may exist, but adaptation might best explain others. So stop being so smug and trying to
get me into buying into your scientific answer of the age. As that answer could well change when yet another scientific answer is proved wrong. Stop trying to sell me a horse tooth as the missing link."

Dennis, is that honestly what the woman said? Unless you saw the exact same woman (it was on the Atlanta news on channel 5) and you have proof that that's exactly what she said, then okay, but until then I'm really going to wonder.

Warning: Foul is now going to ramble! It's a little off topic.

Sorry, but there's some points about evolution I just can't restrain myself from making:

Evolution is not about the origins of life on earth; it is not about the big bang theory, nor the formation of the Sun and Earth. It is not about attempting to prove that the Bible, Qu’ran, or any other holy book is false. It is not about monkeys turning into men, or showing that humans are “merely animals”.

It is about the development of living things over time. Whether or not that conflicts with a particular interpretation of a particular scripture is not a consideration. There is no "conspiracy" amongst scientists to disprove the teachings of any of the thousands of religions how happen to make claims about the processes of life.

Concerning Darwin's Theory of Evolution:

Darwin's Theory of Evolution is not evolution. In the same way, the theory that the Earth orbits the Sun is not the Earth orbiting the Sun; it is a description and explanation of it. The theory of evolution is an explanation of the facts of evolution.

If nobody had ever developed the theory, it would not change that fact that living things evolve over time; evolution happens whether there is a theory or not.

Furthermore, Darwin's theory of evolution may be totally, hopelessly and utterly wrong. Even if it were, and Darwin and every biologist who had contributed to the theory since were incorrect, evolution would still exist and continue. Evolution is totally independent of the theory of evolution. The theory is simply an attempt to explain the observed facts of nature that we call "evolution".

If another theory came along to replace the theory of evolution, it would have to explain the facts at least as well as Darwin's theory has done for the last 150 years. No such replacement has ever been produced.

If there is a debate or controversy within the scientific community about the theory of evolution, creationists see this as evidence that "evolution is in crisis". Nonsense; it is merely that scientists disagree (often bitterly) over details of the theory of evolution. That evolution actually happens is beyond question, but the theory of evolution is--and always should be, like every other scientific theory--probed, tested, and scrutinized. Again, even if the theory were to collapse, that would still not magically disprove evolution or cause species to cease evolving.

[dennisrwood]

Foul: my finishing of the woman's quote was a plot device. i simply put in what i have heard and read from people of faith. and what Darwin says and what people take it to mean are two different things. the argument boils down to this: creationism versus atheism. disagree, but that is where the line is drawn. and the majority of people simply don't want anything taught that excludes God. the majority of believers are tired of intellectuals lording over their beliefs. i will concede any scientific princible. but i believe it comes from God's design. the latest controversy is that evolutionist don't want a statement read that says that evolution is a theory and that there are other theories. why sweat that? if the evolution theory bears out, so be it. but there are other opinions, why shouldn't they be aired?

[Avatar]

Over here we teach both... Seems like the easiest way to me. You learn creationism as a theory in Religious Education and you learn evolution as a theory in Science. We don't have the big fuss like you do over in the USA.

That's about the way that it is over here too.

I think that Foul's point is essentially an important one. Both theories are elaborate ways of saying that we don't really know.

Science constructs reasons for why it might have been, as does religion. Unfortunately, I still think that evolution is a more reasonable explanation given observed evidence.

However, mentioning the fossil evidence, isn't that in direct opposition to creationism? If we take the creation story, it doesn't leave room for any fossil evidence. (Assuming we interpret literally.)

This is just one of those things folks. Proof, of the irrefutable kind, is hard to come by. Evolution just makes more sense to me. But as lurch says, there is no need to stop there. We should all be continually open to the next bit of experience. Our understanding of the world is dynamic, and so too should we be.

Nobody is going to get what they want here, which seems to be irrefutable proof, one way or the other. Anybody who expects this to be provided, should simply stop reading/posting in The Close.

What we're really after is an understanding of why anybody feels a specific way about it, how they came to that feeling, and what it means to them. Not whether or not it can be proved. As I've said often enough, if you believe it, its the same as if it were true. For the person believeing that thing at least.

--Avatar

[Cybrweez]

I don't mean to sound rude but some of your statements are WAY off. Science DOES NOT rely upon consensus. Anyone who thinks so, I'm afraid to say, has obviously never studied science. From day one in every university course they drum into you the element of critical thinking; the reason 100% of journal articles are cut to pieces by other scientists. Witness quantum physics - there is no consensus there. Scientists pull apart theories all the time. If the media want to claim theories as truth, well they are 'welcome', but very few theories make it to becoming Laws (truth).

Loremaster, I said ESPECIALLY in regards to the creation of life. I did not mean in every area of science. I do not believe the law of gravity is a law b/c the majority of scientists believe in it. However, I've spent a good deal of time on message boards about evolution/creation, and many people will argue that macro-evolution is a fact. And, any evidence shown for creation is ridiculed by the evolution community b/c its against evolution, no other reason. That's why you really have to search for that evidence. I remember reading about the famous physicist who came to the belief that creation had more merit than evolution, but didn't tell anyone for years b/c he knew he'd lose his job and credibility in the evolution circles. His research had nothing do to w/losing that credibility, his denial of evolution did.

Further, most Christians argue for creationism's credibility by pulling down evolution or the big bang. That's weak reasoning.

That can happen both ways. And for me, I like to point out the gaps in evolution b/c so many believe its a fact and will ignore the problems. Michael Behe talks about this very same thing.

[Cybrweez]

What do you want? What is 'proof', to you? There is no proof. That is the flaw in your arguments here. There is evidence, but no proof. Religion, on the other hand, has no factually based evidence. You cannot demand 'proof', when 'evidence' is all that can be given.

I thought that was the point of some posts in the Proof of God thread, that there is evidence for God. I think this idea of "factually based evidence" is actually better said, "what I consider factually based evidence". Again, comes down to interpretation.