50.........

Woj, you are a machine! :1orglaugh

It is not 'statistically impossible'. Impossible means that there is a proven mathematical state that it can't happen, ie: probability of 0%.

You yourself stated that the probability was on the order of 1 in 16 billion. That's pretty fucking far from 'impossible'. As an example, on our own planet alone, within a single lab, a single lab tech can culture millions of bacteria per generation, easily trillions within the lifetime of that one, single lab tech. In that case, a 1 in 16 billion possibility of a specific mutation should show up many times within that tech's lifetime of work experience. It wouldn't be common, of course. It'd be exceedingly rare. But, chances are, it'd happen.

Now, expand that possibility to our entire planet. Our solar system. Our star cluster. Our galaxy. Our UNIVERSE.

1 in 16 billion, in that much space? A trifle. That completely discounts the possibility of multiple universes, or multiple iterations in the case of a steady-state expansion/collapsing universe. Given the paeninfinite nature of our universe (as we understand it), all things may well be possible.

Including the possibility that some dude in the sky with a long beard created the whole thing, although I'd put the odds at THAT as considerably longer than 1 to 16 billion. :1orglaugh

I hope you realize that you just used and example of "intelligent design" to discredit "intelligent design" :1orglaugh

You missing the point completely. I am not arguing which is right or wrong. The fact is both are theories.

1. Darwinism is based on the assumption that the enviroment was created randomly
2. Creationism is based on the assumption that the enviroment was NOT created randomly.


The problem in this thread and in most conversations about the topic people missrepresent Creationism as biblism and while they are close they are not the same thing. Creationism does not define "intelligent designer" as GOD, it just defines the existants of an "intelligent designer".

Read issac asimov he has written more than a dozen creation stories. God has been a child playing hide and seek, a suicidal infinite being trying to figuire out how to die,and even the Galatic computer system which assended to a higher level of being (27th dimensional space) after aborbing every living being in previous colapsing existance.

Creationism does not require to you worship God as the supreme being it just represents the flip side of the coin of darwinism.

1:16 billion (which was the low end ) was for all space. Remember that all the elements in the periodic table were produced from a single proto mass(big bang theory).

BAhahahahahahahha.. oh man.. thats the funniest thing i've seen all week. What a dolt. You rock sac.

Properly read, the Bible is the most potent force for atheism ever conceived.
-- Isaac Asimov (attributed: source unknown)

To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today.
--Isaac Asimov, "On Religiosity," Free Inquiry

When people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the earth was 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.
-- Isaac Asimov, "The Relativity of Wrong" (1989)

Creationists make it sound as though a "theory" is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night.
-- Isaac Asimov (attributed: source unknown)

Imagine the people who believe such things and who are not ashamed to ignore, totally, all the patient findings of thinking minds through all the centures since the Bible was written. And it is these ignorant people, the most uneducated, the most unimaginative, the most unthinking among us, who would make themselves the guides and leaders of us all; who would force their feeble and childish beliefs on us; who would invade our schools and libraries and homes. I personally resent it bitterly.
-- Isaac Asimov, Canadian Atheists Newsletter, 1994

One would suppose that the battle for religious liberty was won in the United States two hundred years ago. However, in the time since, and right now, powerful voices are always raised in favor of bigotry and thought control. It is useful, then, to have a compendium of the thoughts of great men and women of all faiths (and of none) on the subject, to convince us that we men and woman of freedom are not and never have been alone.
-- Isaac Asimov, from Albert J. Menendez and Edd Doerr, The Great Quotations on Religious Freedom

[I]f I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul.
-- Isaac Asimov, I. Asimov: A Memoir

To rebel against a powerful political, economic, religious, or social establishment is very dangerous and very few people do it, except, perhaps, as part of a mob. To rebel against the "scientific" establishment, however, is the easiest thing in the world, and anyone can do it and feel enormously brave, without risking as much as a hangnail. Thus, the vast majority, who believe in astrology and think that the planets have nothing better to do than form a code that will tell them whether tomorrow is a good day to close a business deal or not, become all the more excited and enthusiastic about the bilge when a group of astronomers denounces it.
-- Isaac Asimov (attributed: source unknown)

I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I'm a creature of emotion as well as of reason. Emotionally I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time.
-- Isaac Asimov, in "Free Inquiry", Spring 1982, vol.2 no.2, p. 9

Humanity has the stars in its future, and that future is too important to be lost under the burden of juvenile folly and ignorant superstition.
-- Isaac Asimov (attributed: source unknown)

Although the time of death is approaching me, I am not afraid of dying and going to Hell or (what would be considerably worse) going to the popularized version of Heaven. I expect death to be nothingness and, for removing me from all possible fears of death, I am thankful to atheism.
--Isaac Asimov, "On Religiosity," Free Inquiry ??

When I die I won't go to heaven or hell, there will just be nothingness.
-- Isaac Asimov, interviewed in Bill Moyers' television series "A World of Ideas"

So nasty. That poor woman.

anywho graphic x, yes evolution is a FACT. What is a theory however is the exact mechanics... for example punctuated equilibrium - that there are brief periods of rapid evolution follwed by periods of stasis.. that kind of thing. That evolution has occurred is 110% fact... what is still being discussed and discovered is new ways the mechanics can work.

The absolute funniest thing will be when creationist/ID believers get bird flu and refuse to die and believe in it because it couldn't have evolved to spread easily from human to human. :thumbsup

While the Creationists will argue that humans could not possibly have evolved due to the sheer improbability of it, they will have you believe that some invisible, all-powerful being simply snapped his/her finger's and presto we were here.

Okay, over-simplified but even if you believe in creationism (or intelligent design) you likely do believe that science, generally, is real and is right in most things.

You should then agree with the principle that when given two possible explanations, the easier - or more logical - of the two must be right. (A scientific theory, but a proven one).

Depends on who you ask, but which do you think is the more logical?

Here's a good article by Asimov:

The "Threat" of Creationism
published in Science and Creationism (1984).
by Isaac Asimov

There are no complete facts in science. Induction is not logically valid, and thus it is logically impossible to formally prove any natural law.

However, evolution is without a doubt by far the strongest theory dealing with the development of life.

Again
Creationism DOES NOT EQUAL Biblism

Creationism is based on math or probability not on the bible.

Darwinism is based on the assumption that the enviroment in which evolution exists were created randomly. Whatever that probability is it is NOT 100%. Creationism is the remaining probability.

Darwinism is not a fact it is a theory, until the underlying assumption is proven to be true.

Scientific evidence (what a true scientist would call observed events) said that gravity was NOT a constant, That the smallest particle of Matter was electron. Scientific advancement was hindered in both cases because people took on faith that those assumptions were true, when in fact they were false.

Without quarks we would never have found anti-matter
How many scientific advancements are currently being lost because blind faith that Darwin's assumptions must be true.

? The argument of belittlement.

Creationists frequently stress the fact that evolution is "only a theory," giving the impression that a theory is an idle guess. A scientist, one gathers, arising one morning with nothing particular to do, decided that perhaps the moon is made of Roquefort cheese and instantly advances the Roquefort-cheese theory.

A theory (as the word is used by scientists) is a detailed description of some facet of the universe's workings that is based on long observation and, where possible, experiment. It is the result of careful reasoning from these observations and experiments that has survived the critical study of scientists generally.

For example, we have the description of the cellular nature of living organisms (the "cell theory"); of objects attracting each other according to fixed rule (the "theory of gravitation"); of energy behaving in discrete bits (the "quantum theory"); of light traveling through a vacuum at a fixed measurable velocity (the "theory of relativity"), and so on.

All are theories; all are firmly founded; all are accepted as valid descriptions of this or that aspect of the universe. They are neither guesses nor speculations. And no theory is better founded, more closely examined, more critically argued and more thoroughly accepted, than the theory of evolution. If it is "only" a theory, that is all it has to be.

Creationism, on the other hand, is not a theory. There is no evidence, in the scientific sense, that supports it. Creationism, or at least the particular variety accepted by many Americans, is an expression of early Middle Eastern legend. It is fairly described as "only a myth."

-Asimov

Creationism is idiocy, if only for the simple reason that it tries to "explain" a situation by invoking an intrinsically unexplainable cause, and intrinsically unexplainable causes are not only unscientific but also anti-scientific.

Evolution is the ONLY scientific theory in this field at this moment. Creationism, taken as a scientific theory, leads only to infinite regression. (Q: what caused life? A: a guiding intelligence. Q: intelligence requires life, so what caused that life? etc.)

The word theory does not mean unproven. Here, I looked it up for you:

"Theory: A set of statements or principles devised to explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make predictions about natural phenomena."

Where does that definition say unproven?

The "process" of evolution is not only proven, but used in laboratories on a regular basis.

You are correct.

Every culture has myths about creation.

It is not just a Christian thing. The Hindu belief is very interesting. An endless cycle of big bangs, and eventual universe colapses.

BB says that overwhelmingly the initial elements produced were hydrogen and other exotic forms of plasma and "high energy" materials. As things expanded and cool and this early hydrogen started to coalesce into stars, conditions were more ripe to lead to the creation of heavy elements as a result of stellar fusion.

It's pretty unlikely that all the carbon in the universe today is purely from the big bang. Far more has been cultured in the bellies of dying suns than anything else... so yes, everything in our universe sourced from that protomass, but it's not like everything "sprang out fully formed from Jupiter's leg". It took some time for things to expand, cool, and set the stage for this mid-life phase which allowed for things like carbon and iron and so forth.

Who knows. Perhaps the physical characteristics required to support our level of life are only transient, local phenomena around this little snippet of our spiral arm, again at a high probability against.

gideongallery is spot on. :thumbsup

Mircroevolution and natural selection for all intents and purposes clearly exist, yet they're not at odds with Creationism because evolution does not concern itself with how the universe originated. One doesn't have to believe in creationism to acknowledge this. I'm not a bible thumper, but I can accept that there are current limitations to our understanding of the universe. Even if we accept the big bang with all its statistical improbabilities and the improbabilities thereafter which extrapolate that life has further evolved from simple organisms into complex species, at the end of the day, it still doesn't answer why or how the process got started or why the materials for it exist to begin with.

So, it's possible and perfectly legitimate for somebody to believe in both Evolution Theory and Creationism, or one, or neither. This doesn't automatically mean that the person is uneducated. It is funny though seeing those on their high horse thinking they have a monopoly on knowledge of the universe, lol. The stats support what I'm saying:

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/ar...24100409990019
"Those who believe in evolution, whether guided by God or not, overwhelmingly think it is possible to believe in both God and evolution ? 90 percent say this."

Evolution -> theory with evidence to support it
Creationism -> belief that accounts for those things which evolution does not explain.

These can run concurrent.

lmao, talk about spin.

big bang theory is so much less "absurd" right?

"there was nothing. this nothing 'exploded' and turned into everything. this is more plausible than someone creating everything. because we say so."

And along with that.. some believers in creationism have it that when God created the universe, he also created it's history.. so the things that supposedly happened millions of years ago didn't actually happen, but were a part of the creation like 200,000 years ago..
He created the fossils, and all other things that show of pre-creation existence..

But then, they would have to believe that if they are true believers or their belief system would be fedexed to Hell in a hand bag..

Actually the Big Bang was proven back in 1996. It was celebrated as the "scientific holy grail"

A satellite actually took a photo of the radiation left over from the Big Bang its called Cosmic microwave background radiation

It was on the front page of every newspaper in the world for exactly one day, and then everyone forgot about it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_...ound_radiation

And one more thing...particles at the sub-atomic level pop in and out of existance all the time, for no apparent reson. So if our universe was once smaller than a sub-atomic particle...

one more time biblism is a subset of creationism.

Biblism does not equal creationism.

let me use an example (of a similar logical fallacy)

Jeffrey Dahmer was a cannibal

Jeffrey Dahmer had blonde hair

Therefore all people with blonde hair are cannibals

This thread HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH CREATIONISM. All I'm asking is... why is Evolution JUST A THEORY instead of a 'law' or an established fact. All things evolved and are continuing to evolve, right?

thanks for driving this discussion back home. well for my :2 cents: worth, I think the theory of "apes evolving to man" has developed and became more complexed and has taken a different direction.

Forget about the creation stuff and just read the bits about "THEORY" again:


A theory (as the word is used by scientists) is a detailed description of some facet of the universe's workings that is based on long observation and, where possible, experiment. It is the result of careful reasoning from these observations and experiments that has survived the critical study of scientists generally.

For example, we have the description of the cellular nature of living organisms (the "cell theory"); of objects attracting each other according to fixed rule (the "theory of gravitation"); of energy behaving in discrete bits (the "quantum theory"); of light traveling through a vacuum at a fixed measurable velocity (the "theory of relativity"), and so on.

All are theories; all are firmly founded; all are accepted as valid descriptions of this or that aspect of the universe. They are neither guesses nor speculations. And no theory is better founded, more closely examined, more critically argued and more thoroughly accepted, than the theory of evolution. If it is "only" a theory, that is all it has to be.

-Asimov

simple answer (grade 9 science class)
Because the underlying assumptions of of the theory have not been proven or disproven (the enviroment that evolution exists was created by absolutely random events).

Laws have their underlying assumptions proven

The laws of physics that specify that Gravity is a constant force is a law because some on successfully proved that if you removed the air resistance a feather would fall at the same speed as a buckshot. Before that time the "theory" of gravity said that force of gravity was varied depending on the mass of the object. This "theory" was put in place to explain observed event of a heavy object (cannon ball) hitting the ground before the lighter object (feather).


For evolution to become a law like the law of constant gravity you must prove that the originally proto mass that was the universe popped into existance via random event even though such an act violates the laws of thermodynamics (conservation of mass and energy).

The problem with not teaching creationism is people stop realizing the difference between "theories", observed events and true "facts". If we blindly believe anything (creationism or darwinism) we close our minds to posibilities and is the greatest detriment to scientific research that can exist.

Remember that every theory including all of those that were wrong was founded in observed events ("facts").

The smallest particle of matter was theorized to be an electron because it was the smallest particle we observed until a cyclatron smashed electrons into quarks. (allowing up to propose and prove the existance of particle with the quark structure of an electron but the opposite polarity --- positrons). Had someone not questioned the assumption we would never have known about anti-matter.

I liked it better when Aristotle described that logical fallacy :winkwink:

What IS biblism?

If evolution is fucking true, then why the hell does the monkey in our zoo still a monkey and he is over 100 years of age.

Why does it matter where we came from to make evolution law? I really don't understand what evolution has to do with the big bang theory.

With your logic, I can't be sure I even exsist. Becasue my underlying assumption is that I came from either a) the big bang b) was created by something. Neither of which can be proven.

:1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh

Your answer is indeed one suitable for ninth grade. It completely fails to take into account the findings of twentieth century philosophy of science, such as the rather important (at least for this discussion) refutation of the whole concept of verification by Karl Popper. It is a simple fact that laws of nature are, by logical definition, theories which can never be fully proven.

As for not teaching creationism, that is not a problem at all. Creationism is a non-scientific belief, not a scientific theory. As a scientific theory, it would be laughably weak, since it is essentially untestable and derived solely from mythology rather than any form of empiric data.

Creationism, bluntly put, is a really, really bad theory, which is completely unscientific and extremely weak. Evolution, on the other hand, is a really, really strong theory. Suggesting that the two be taught alongside eachother shows a blatant ignorance of the very nature of science.

Even the Vatican says that evolution is compatible with their beliefs.

http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,...w=wn_tophead_5

Associated Press
12:00 PM Nov. 04, 2005 PT
VATICAN CITY - A Vatican cardinal said Thursday the faithful should listen to what secular modern science has to offer, warning that religion risks turning into "fundamentalism" if it ignores scientific reason.
Cardinal Paul Poupard, who heads the Pontifical Council for Culture, made the comments at a news conference on a Vatican project to help end the "mutual prejudice" between religion and science that has long bedeviled the Roman Catholic Church and is part of the evolution debate in the United States.

Creationism, bluntly put, is a really, really bad theory, which is completely unscientific and extremely weak. Evolution, on the other hand, is a really, really strong theory. Suggesting that the two be taught alongside eachother shows a blatant ignorance of the very nature of science.

That isn't where all the elements come from according to the big bang theory. Not at all.

The different elements are byproducts of nuclear fusion, lower mass stars producing lighter elements, bigger stars with more mass producing heavier elements, etc.

You exist weather you were created by God or random events.

aliens created life through evolution

Google 'Coccyx'

Google 'machiavelli'

Exactly, And I evolve wether I was created by God or random events. Correct? Do you see what I'm getting at? Since you completely skipped over the point I made.

you are completely misrepresenting Karl Popper said

"Logically, no number of positive outcomes at the level of experimental testing can confirm a scientific theory, but a single genuine counter-instance is logically decisive: it shows the theory, from which the implication is derived, to be false."


Basic scientific method, take your theory, establish a counter theory (the opposite in it's entirety not just in part) prove the counter theory to be false by proving the underlying assumption is wrong. That only way to make a theory into a law.

That was exactly what was done when we established the LAW of constant gravitational force (G).

Creationism (again not biblism) does not specify who did the creating, for example aliens seeding the primordial ooze with a culture which would prosper and EVOLVE (like modern day scientist do with bacterial cultures in a lab) is a valid creationism theory which is 100% compatible with every single piece of empirical data that you use to prove that Darwinism is true.

As for teaching creationism in schools you just proved my point. You don't understand the difference between a law and a theory. Your arguing that your theory should be promoted to the level of a law (because it a "really really strong theory"), without the necessary falsification of it opposite theorem is because the school blindly refuses to teach any alternative theory.
You don't understand the necessity of the counter theory in a scientific proof.

I never said you evolved i said you exist. Your argument is that you can't prove your existance (the implied statement is nothing is provable) based on my logic. You don't understand the necessity of a counter theory.

congrats on 1k

Karl Popper? As in the lead singer of the Blues Traveler? LOL j/k

and dollars were made to be placed in his pockets :1orglaugh

okay here's your evolution proof.
http://www.ahajokes.com/cartoon/evolution.jpg

My argument had nothing to do with whether one can prove their existence. Did you even read my posts? That was an exclamation about the logic you used. Let me break it down for you so there is no way to dodge my questions anymore. With this being the third time I am asking you. Please try to answer my question.


What you are saying here is basically. "Evolution cannot become a law, because it is based off the big bang theory, which cannot be proven". Correct? Please let me know if I've misunderstood you here.

So with that(again), My question(s) is. Why does it matter where we came from to make evolution law? What does evolution have to do with the big bang theory?


And for the record, the comment about whether I could prove I exist, was ripping on this comment of yours
With your logic, anyone who believed the big bang theory could not be proven to exist as the underlying assumption of their creation could not be proven. :pimp

Old thread alert.

The portion of Evolutionary Theory which states living things came into existence from a big bang, then formed complex cells, and then turned into species that turn into new species is a theory by proxy, because it hasn't been directly demonstrated or observed. It's supported by limited understanding of pre-existing conditions on the earth, limited historical physical evidence (such as fossil records), and by observing limited and often unpredictable examples of micro evolution in viruses, bacteria, and germs. The theory of evolution is an aggregate of all of this. To say this is the equivalent to a Law such as the Law of Gravity is an overstatement. Gravity is a singular observable physical fact that doesn't rely on history or the complex nature and development of living things.

In actual fact - if the universe were slightly different (thats the content of the local big bang) - we wouldnt be here.

It is only because of the way it turned out - that we are here.

And indeed - the universe itself can not exist in a stable manner under any other condition than this one. And even this isnt totally stable.

Relax - sit back - and exand with it.