NationStates Jolt Archive

Creationism Does Not Even Meet the Standards of Christian Belief

That Creationism is not a science is easy enough to prove and has been more than adequately demonstrated in other threads (please don't offer your "scientific proof" here). What I would like Creationist to address is how they rationalize the religious inconsistencies of Creationism and Christianity. I do not believe Creationism follows its own Christian standards of belief.

Since Creationism claims to be a science it must adhere to the scientific method. It is this method, when applied to Christian belief, which undermines the faith of Creationists. This method is composed of fours steps:

1. Observation and description of a phenomenon.
2. Formulation of a hypothesis to explain the phenomena.
3. Use of the hypothesis to make predictions.
4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments.

If the experiments bear out the hypothesis it may come to be regarded as a theory or law of nature. If the experiments do not bear out the hypothesis, it must be rejected or modified. There is always the possibility that a new observation or a new experiment will come along and conflict with, and overturn, a theory.

Therefore, to be a science Creationists must begin with the understanding that their theory is based upon observable and verifiable data, with the possibility that it could one day be overturned.

However, the basis of Christianity is not verifiable data and proof, but rather, faith. The Bible, both Old and New Testaments, are very clear on the central role of faith. Isaiah commands, “If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all.” This is further reinforced in the New Testament, “The righteous will live by faith” (Romans 1:17).

The Bible is very clear that religious faith takes precedent over the world of men’s ideas. Corinthians’ rejection of the scientific world is unambiguous, “… your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power” (1 Corinthians 2:5).

What is science if not men’s wisdom?

In Hebrews it is written that, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” Not by theories or evidence or factual proofs.

Christianity is not to be proven through pseudo-science or even real science, but must be taken on faith.

Therefore, Creationism, if it truly claims to be a science, is bad religion. If it is a religion, then it is bad science.

I can only assume that Christian Creationists see the religious inconsistency of their argument and have no answer for it.

The creationist theory is not a science, but a faith. The only thing one needs to back this faith, is Genesis. Holding science to a religion is the same thing as holding math to a work of art. Religion will always be a gray area of debate for many, but faith is the one driving force behind any belief. Such as you faith in science, someone whose faith lies in magic could come and question you as well. Who is right doesn't matter in the least bit, as it's their faith that will keep them devout, and it is their choice to what they place their life's focus in.

The title of this thread and the content have nothing to do with one another. The creationist workings are clearly outlined in the first few pages in the Bible, and seeing as how the Bible is what traditionally defines what is Christian and what is not, there is no way that you can say that the creationist theory contradicts Christianity.

The creationist theory is not a science, but a faith. The only thing one needs to back this faith, is Genesis. Holding science to a religion is the same thing as holding math to a work of art. Religion will always be a gray area of debate for many, but faith is the one driving force behind any belief. Such as you faith in science, someone whose faith lies in magic could come and question you as well. Who is right doesn't matter in the least bit, as it's their faith that will keep them devout, and it is their choice to what they place their life's focus in.

The title of this thread and the content have nothing to do with one another. The creationist workings are clearly outlined in the first few pages in the Bible, and seeing as how the Bible is what traditionally defines what is Christian and what is not, there is no way that you can say that the creationist theory contradicts Christianity.

You miss the point that Creationism wishes to be regarded as a SCIENCE. That is the justification for demanding it be taught in schools. Those who advocate Creationism as a science, and set about attempting to prove a divine origin of life using the scientific method, are contradicting your statement about Christianity being based upon faith. By their own standards they are poor Christians. Creationism as a science contradicts faith, and as a religion, is unnecessary.

Creationism has no place, either in the schools or the church.

You miss the point that Creationism wishes to be regarded as a SCIENCE. That is the justification for demanding it be taught in schools. Those who advocate Creationism as a science, and set about attempting to prove a divine origin of life using the scientific method, are contradicting your statement about Christianity being based upon faith. By their own standards they are poor Christians. Creationism as a science contradicts faith, and as a religion, is unnecessary.

Creationism has no place, either in the schools or the church.
Three things:

First of all, Creationism is one theory to explain the creation of our universe. One, of many. It is not a science, it is a theory pulled from science.

Secondly, there is no more "viable and visible" proof for Big Bang or anything else than there is for Creationism. Big Bang requires just as much faith, if not more, as Creationism does. If you'd like, I can post a very strong argument that Atheism is a religion. Furthermore Absence of proof is not proof of absense.

Lastly: Luke 18:27
Jesus replied, "What is impossible with men is possible with God."

You miss the point that Creationism wishes to be regarded as a SCIENCE. That is the justification for demanding it be taught in schools. Those who advocate Creationism as a science, and set about attempting to prove a divine origin of life using the scientific method, are contradicting your statement about Christianity being based upon faith. By their own standards they are poor Christians. Creationism as a science contradicts faith, and as a religion, is unnecessary.

Creationism has no place, either in the schools or the church.

Calling creationism a science is part of the "re-defining" of words to fit an agenda. By saying aspects of a faith are "science" they have a chance of getting those aspects into schools and promoting faith as hard fact.

Note: I'm not saying Christians or any particular group is more guilty of this politically charged redefining any other group - it seems to be happening all over the place. I wish it would stop. Soon language is going to be practically meaningless.

Calling creationism a science is part of the "re-defining" of words to fit an agenda. By saying aspects of a faith are "science" they have a chance of getting those aspects into schools and promoting faith as hard fact.

Note: I'm not saying Christians or any particular group is more guilty of this politically charged redefining any other group - it seems to be happening all over the place. I wish it would stop. Soon language is going to be practically meaningless.


Its all the "theory" thing

they can call creation a theory or divine command a theory because any scientific explination is also called a theory.

unfortunatly a theory isnt a scientific theory

lol, id say language is already pretty useless. Way too subjective

And so a new process of thinking should be closed. Wasn't that the meaning of closed-minded? I think Creationism has helped science in alot of ways in forcing science to come up with more evidence for thier theories. It helped distinguish theory from fact. If what certain scientists said went unchallenged, I wonder where we would be at today. The foundation wouldn't be very strong without the lies and hoaxes uprooted.

And so a new process of thinking should be closed. Wasn't that the meaning of closed-minded? I think Creationism has helped science in alot of ways in forcing science to come up with more evidence for thier theories. It helped distinguish theory from fact. If what certain scientists said went unchallenged, I wonder where we would be at today.


Thats not this issue though

scientists will check scientists. There is no centralized scientific board that makes all the decisions of what is right or wrong. If someone says something they have to be able to back it up and it has to survive scrutiny.

I dont see where you get any idea that scientists just get to say whatever they want and that people in the scientific community will just accept it. I would argue that a certain degree of skepticism is necessary in any scientist.

Besides, even if science didnt check itself, It shouldn't be forced to defend itself against lies. Science has never attacked religon.

If I take a picture of something and say that it is a unicorn, do i have as much right (in an academic sence) to call it a unicorn as someone who researches and study's the picture finds that it has been edited by photoshop and shows signifigant data that it has to say it is not?

If I do, do you want your child being taught that the animal in the picture could be a unicorn?

"4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments. "

ummmm . . . Evolution can not be tested, by independent experimenters or otherwise. You can't preform an experiment regarding evolution.

Evolution is not a theory based on experimentation, but has become a "theory" because it is the only hypothesis which does not involve the supernatural to be accepted by the scientifuc community.

Various parts of Creationism can be proven via repeatable experiments. I.e, natural selection, which forms a key basis to Creationist Theory.

Natural Selection results in the loss of Genetic information, which is a repeatable experiment.

We can't ask God to appear in times Square a Noon tommorow, and create life. Therefore, that aspect of Creationism cannot be proven through experiment.

At the same time, the World's best Scientists cannot create life even though they have millions of dollars of funding, even with all of the different Amino Acids at their disposal. That aspect of evolutionary doctrine cannot be replicated.

At the same time, we have not witnessed evolution in action. We've watched species of a certain kind, as a result of natural selection, diverge, resulting in two similar but distinct species, each with less genetic information than the original.

Both creationists and evolutionists are dogmatic in their beliefs, but both are dictated by their presuppositions. Creationists and evolutionists use the exact same evidence, but simply interpret it in different ways. Creationists presume an existence of God, and then interpret the evidence. Evolutionists presume the inexistence of God, and then interpret the evidence.

Science is continually progressing, and constantly challenging our assumptions. We laugh at Scientists who believed in Abiogenesis 150 years ago. 150 years from now, people will be laughing at the Scientific beliefs of the present day.

I Love you all, and wish you many fluffles :fluffle:

Preferably with your own loves, as I'm already taken ;)

Hehe, if you think about it for long enough, nothing is fact. Science is a house of cards, as is Religion, and both keep having the layers knocked down and rebuild.
In this day and age, I'd say the western world has a pretty tall house of cards for science, and the east builds upon religion. This is just a generalization, but you can derive my meaning. Science tends to keep Europe in order, Religion balances central Asia, science and religion divide America, and religions tear apart the middle east.
I know this is off-topic, but I think if you bear that in mind when comparing religion and science, it's a bad idea to mix them.

"4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments. "

ummmm . . . Evolution can not be tested, by independent experimenters or otherwise. You can't preform an experiment regarding evolution.

1. We can perform experiments on evolution. We can watch bacteria adapt immunities and genetic information from hosts to become a new genus of bacteria.

2. Each time a virus infects a human it evolves the strain to specifically reproduce within the host and those with similar dna structures.

3. Evolution of any other larger and more complex organisms requires either:
a) massive environmental or climate change in which new adaptations are required to survive
b) Huge spans of time (thousands of years) where specific genetic traits become more specialized in an enviromnent

We have not witnessed a massive climate/environmental change in the span of human history that would warrant this and we have not existed as a species long enough to catagorize any complete transition from one species to the next of another animal.

Evolution is not a theory based on experimentation, but has become a "theory" because it is the only hypothesis which does not involve the supernatural to be accepted by the scientifuc community.

No theory is based on experimentation. It is based on observation. Experimentation is a way in which observations are aquired. As you have pointed out, large animal evolution is impossible to run experiments on. Bacteria, amoeba and viruses however are not and in all experiments have shown the adaptive requirements to explain evolution.

Various parts of Creationism can be proven via repeatable experiments. I.e, natural selection, which forms a key basis to Creationist Theory.

No it doesn't. Natural selection is subordinate to God's will in creationist theory.

Natural Selection results in the loss of Genetic information, which is a repeatable experiment.

yes, hence why natural selection is important to species adaptation which is another name for evolution.

We can't ask God to appear in times Square a Noon tommorow, and create life. Therefore, that aspect of Creationism cannot be proven through experiment.

correct. But, we have no evidence that god created life. In fact all the observable evidence points away from god.

At the same time, the World's best Scientists cannot create life even though they have millions of dollars of funding, even with all of the different Amino Acids at their disposal. That aspect of evolutionary doctrine cannot be replicated.

Evolution is not responsable for explaining the origins of life, but for its transitions from one species to the next

At the same time, we have not witnessed evolution in action. We've watched species of a certain kind, as a result of natural selection, diverge, resulting in two similar but distinct species, each with less genetic information than the original.

... what else do you call that?

do you know what evolution really is or are you an ignorant god fearing american who doesnt know their ass from a hole in the ground

Both creationists and evolutionists are dogmatic in their beliefs, but both are dictated by their presuppositions. Creationists and evolutionists use the exact same evidence, but simply interpret it in different ways. Creationists presume an existence of God, and then interpret the evidence. Evolutionists presume the inexistence of God, and then interpret the evidence.

Wrong. Scientists have no presuppositions. Should god reveal himself in times square, the scientific community would have no choice but to then believe.

Science is a accumulation of evidence through observation. The fact that Darwinian evolution is no longer accepted as fact is proof that science isnt dogmatic. It changes as the evidence points to something differant.

Science is continually progressing, and constantly challenging our assumptions. We laugh at Scientists who believed in Abiogenesis 150 years ago. 150 years from now, people will be laughing at the Scientific beliefs of the present day.

150 years ago, most of the belief systems of people were based on religous dogma and science was only starting to be accepted by the establishment as legitimate since it went in the face of established theory.

"4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments. "

ummmm . . . Evolution can not be tested, by independent experimenters or otherwise. You can't preform an experiment regarding evolution.

Sure you can, and it has been done many times. It is only necessary to use very short-lived species in order to accumulate genetic changes over many generations.

Evolution is not a theory based on experimentation, but has become a "theory" because it is the only hypothesis which does not involve the supernatural to be accepted by the scientifuc community.

That's preposterous. A scientific theory has nothing whatsoever to do with supernatural -- either way.

Various parts of Creationism can be proven via repeatable experiments. I.e, natural selection, which forms a key basis to Creationist Theory.
Natural Selection results in the loss of Genetic information, which is a repeatable experiment.

Implying that natural selection is not a part of the scientific theory of evolution? :confused:


We can't ask God to appear in times Square a Noon tommorow, and create life. Therefore, that aspect of Creationism cannot be proven through experiment.

Like most creationists who know less about science than they suppose, you've made the classic mistake of assuming that "proving" something is the key to whether a theory is scientific or not. It's the exact opposite that is critical -- can the theory be disproved? Creationism's basic foundation is inherently non-disprovable, and is therefore non-scientific (no matter how many "facts" can be dredged up to support various components).

At the same time, the World's best Scientists cannot create life even though they have millions of dollars of funding, even with all of the different Amino Acids at their disposal. That aspect of evolutionary doctrine cannot be replicated.

The inability of humans to create life (currently) is by no means any refutation of the scientific theory of evolution.

At the same time, we have not witnessed evolution in action. We've watched species of a certain kind, as a result of natural selection, diverge, resulting in two similar but distinct species, each with less genetic information than the original.

What you describe is in fact exactly what you claim it isn't: evidence of evolution in action. I'm not sure what you think evolution is. It is really just positing that species change over time and that one species can become two if a portion of the population is genetically isolated over a long enough period of time. There are more extensive elaborations based on this theory (such as the specifics of how particular species have evolved via evolution over the history of the planet), but at the core, evolution is really fairly simple. Most Creationists don't really address or have big issues with the concept of evolution itself, but with the expanded theory about how humanity itself has come into being -- because that is the only portion that is truly incompatible with (a literal translation of) the Bible.

Edit: I see before I post that another good response has been posted by Terra - Domina

I love you Terra Domina. But your Evolutionist Dogma makes me sad. It is like arguing against a close minded brick wall.

Fortunately, I am not an American, but I sense you are very prejudiced against them.

In your reference to superbugs, perhaps you should visit your local physician and have them explain them to you.

They are a result of Natural Selection, not Evolution. Evolution according to theory, is a new trait forming as a result of additional genetic information randomly being produced via mutation.

Natural Selection, according to evolutionary theory, culls the maladapted traits, resulting in a loss of genetic information, with the genetic information for the new trait becoming dominant.

Natural Selection IS central to creationist theory, you simply have lack a proper grasp of it.

Back to the superbugs bit, superbugs are actually "superwimps" compared to their progenitors. Common bacteria that have several superbug strains of various resistances, are Klebsiella, Pneumococcus, and Staphylococcus.

Most bacteria produce minute amounts of an enzyme called penicillinase. This allows them to survive encouters with penicillin in their natural environments. Now, because of mutational defect, the gene which controls the production of penicillinase is damaged or eliminated. This causes the bacteria to devote large amounts of it's resources to creating penicillinase.

Now, depending of the degree of defect, some strains can produce enough penicillinase to counteract penicillin in the bloodstream, and others can become completely immune. Resulting in a superbug.

But these superbugs tend to be limited to hospitals. Why, you might ask, is a bacteria that is so obviously superior, not becoming the dominant strain?

Because these bacteria are in fact superwimps. in the sterile environment of a hospital, these bacteria have very little competition.

However, a commonway to treat certain superbugs, is introduce a bacteria that would naturally compete with it, but bears little harm to the host.

These superbugs devote too much energy to producing penicillinase, lacking the regulating gene, that they can't compete in nature with other bacteria, and then die off.

I hope this will clear up any misconceptions that you have about superbugs.
:fluffle:

"Like most creationists who know less about science than they suppose, you've made the classic mistake of assuming that "proving" something is the key to whether a theory is scientific or not. It's the exact opposite that is critical -- can the theory be disproved? Creationism's basic foundation is inherently non-disprovable, and is therefore non-scientific (no matter how many "facts" can be dredged up to support various components)."


I don't believe that I claimed to be proving anything. So much of our existence is based upon pressuposition, it is important for us to realise what those presuppositions are.

Most of the evolutionists and creationists on this forum simply like to insult each, which is very sad. I personally never claimed to know very much about Science, and I sincerely hope that you don't either.

I can't disprove evolution, nor do I care to. I can not disprove Creationism, nor do I care to.

There are simply some arguments which I think are rather silly which give me a good laugh that both sides use, since most of the people on these forums don't even fully comprehend the theories that they are arguing for, and most of them understand even less thatn the theories they are arguing against!

Lot's o' Love. :)

I love you Terra Domina. But your Evolutionist Dogma makes me sad. It is like arguing against a close minded brick wall.

Fortunately, I am not an American, but I sense you are very prejudiced against them.

evolutionist dogma?

if i had to place any dogma on my understanding it would be that i accept what is the best explination for what i see around me. plain and simple.

In your reference to superbugs, perhaps you should visit your local physician and have them explain them to you.

They are a result of Natural Selection, not Evolution. Evolution according to theory, is a new trait forming as a result of additional genetic information randomly being produced via mutation.

Natural Selection, according to evolutionary theory, culls the maladapted traits, resulting in a loss of genetic information, with the genetic information for the new trait becoming dominant.

Natural Selection IS central to creationist theory, you simply have lack a proper grasp of it.

ok... Natural Selection: A creature is better adapted to survive in a certain environment so it does and passes those genes onto the next generation. Those that die off do not pass on any of the failed genetics.

I need you to do 2 things for me, explain how this is NOT the fundamental process of evolution and second how that in any way supports creationist theory.

BTW, mutation is only one way that it is supposed that creatures have evolved. In the majority of cases however it appears as though evolution happen as creatures are able to use traits they already had in new ways to better survive. The Dinosaurs and feathers is a good example of this.

Back to the superbugs bit, superbugs are actually "superwimps" compared to their progenitors. Common bacteria that have several superbug strains of various resistances, are Klebsiella, Pneumococcus, and Staphylococcus.

Most bacteria produce minute amounts of an enzyme called penicillinase. This allows them to survive encouters with penicillin in their natural environments. Now, because of mutational defect, the gene which controls the production of penicillinase is damaged or eliminated. This causes the bacteria to devote large amounts of it's resources to creating penicillinase.

Now, depending of the degree of defect, some strains can produce enough penicillinase to counteract penicillin in the bloodstream, and others can become completely immune. Resulting in a superbug.

But these superbugs tend to be limited to hospitals. Why, you might ask, is a bacteria that is so obviously superior, not becoming the dominant strain?

Because these bacteria are in fact superwimps. in the sterile environment of a hospital, these bacteria have very little competition.

However, a commonway to treat certain superbugs, is introduce a bacteria that would naturally compete with it, but bears little harm to the host.

These superbugs devote too much energy to producing penicillinase, lacking the regulating gene, that they can't compete in nature with other bacteria, and then die off.

I hope this will clear up any misconceptions that you have about superbugs.
:fluffle:


This is exactly what evolution is

if you dont understand that then you need to read a biology text book

you honestly cant use evidence of evolution as proof against it, you look foolish

[QUOTE=The Isthmus]Evolution according to theory, is a new trait forming as a result of additional genetic information randomly being produced via mutation.

No. Evolution is the process of change over time. In biology it is a two part process:

1- the production and redistribution of genetic variation; and
2- natural selection acting on the variations

The production and redistribution of traits is produced by mutation, genetic drift and gene flow (not just mutation as you assert).

Natural Selection, according to evolutionary theory, culls the maladapted traits, resulting in a loss of genetic information, with the genetic information for the new trait becoming dominant.

Yes and no. Natural selection is how species adapt to enviornments. Traits will be "culled" only if they are maladaptive to the given enviornment. In other enviornments were the traits are not maladaptive, they will not be culled. Loss of genetic variation only occurs if there is no survivable niche for the genetic variations. As long as there is a survivable niche, all genetic material is preserved on whole, and where there was one strain/variation/species (depending on what level change one is talking about) before, after natural selection occurs there will be more than one.

The creationists idea that natural selection results in a net loss of genetic material and thus only creates "simpler" organism and therefore disproves evolution is bunk science based on lack of understanding of genetic and evolutionary principles (or perhaps being used as propaganda by those who understand them to convince those who do not).

Let's look at the case of the so-called "superbugs."

First off, no genetic material has been lost. The strains of bacteria which gave rise to the superbugs are not extinct. So all that genetic material still exists. The original strains are better capable of surviving in enviornments where the superbugs are at a disadvantage, whereas the superbugs survive in enviornments where the original strains of bacteria could not. So now we have a greater number of strains of bacteria capable of exploiting a greater number of enviornments. Differentiation and proliferation without loss of genetic material. No simplification has occured. Rather the entire ecosystem has become more complex. And in a very short space of time, as evolution goes.

evolutionist dogma?

if i had to place any dogma on my understanding it would be that i accept what is the best explination for what i see around me. plain and simple.

Very good, at least we both admit that we are dogmatic. It is by admitting the weaknesses of our own arguments that we are better able to understand them.



ok... Natural Selection: A creature is better adapted to survive in a certain environment so it does and passes those genes onto the next generation. Those that die off do not pass on any of the failed genetics.

They also do not pass on any beneficial genetics that they have, those that do not die off continue to pass on their failed genetics. i.e. superbugs

I need you to do 2 things for me, explain how this is NOT the fundamental process of evolution and second how that in any way supports creationist theory.

Ok, to Answer #1, I don't believe that I in anyway said that Natural selction is not a fundamental process of evolutionary theory. I said that it forms a fundamental part of creationist theory.Which leads to #2. To give you a simplified run down of creationist theory. According to Creationist theory, God created different kinds of animals, which through natural slection, differentiated over thousands of years into the species we know today. So you could say that we are actually slowly degenerating, as oposed to slowly evolving.

BTW, mutation is only one way that it is supposed that creatures have evolved. In the majority of cases however it appears as though evolution happen as creatures are able to use traits they already had in new ways to better survive. The Dinosaurs and feathers is a good example of this.

Ummm . . . Mutation IS the way that creatures evolved according to evolutionary theory. Where did these different traits used by these creatures come from? According to evolutionary theory, mutation, which allowed the creatures to use these traits in new ways to survive.

If no genetic information is added or taken away, a new species will not develop. A new subspecies will not even develop.


This is exactly what evolution is.

Nope, no matter how many times you say it, doesn't make it any more true. Read a few books on evolutionary theory before arguing it. I don't want ot be harsh, but I'd rather debate with someone who understands what they are actually trying to support.

if you dont understand that then you need to read a biology text book.

Actually, I own quite a few Biology textbooks, and quite enjoy reading them, though it is surprising how quickly they become out of date.

you honestly cant use evidence of evolution as proof against it, you look foolish

I'm simply re-interpreting the said evidence. I must point out however, that you must understand evolution in order to support it.

I am in no way attacking evolution, evolutionists keep on trying to put words in my mouth, oh well, I love you all :) .

Let's look at the case of the so-called "superbugs."

First off, no genetic material has been lost. The strains of bacteria which gave rise to the superbugs are not extinct. So all that genetic material still exists. The original strains are better capable of surviving in enviornments where the superbugs are at a disadvantage, whereas the superbugs survive in enviornments where the original strains of bacteria could not. So now we have a greater number of strains of bacteria capable of exploiting a greater number of enviornments. Differentiation and proliferation without loss of genetic material. No simplification has occured. Rather the entire ecosystem has become more complex. And in a very short space of time, as evolution goes.

Actually, genetic material has been lost. The regulating gene for Penicilinase. I never claimed that the superbugs went extinct, nor did I claim that the original strains have, quite the opposite in fact. Superbugs exist in most hospitals, and are in an ideal habitat, very little competition. Once they leave their habitat, they can't compete, and die.

Outside of hospitals, the original strain is dominant.

It never ceases to amaze me how quickly a novel idea can mutate back into a stale argument. This thread was not meant to be about evolution. Rather, it was meant to be about Christianity and faith. Atheists, out! Creation "scientists," out! Back to topic!

While I'm not quite sure about the analysis, Ogiek's conclusion seems correct. Creationism is either bad science or bad religion, and probably both. Will no one discuss this point?

Christianity is not to be proven through pseudo-science or even real science, but must be taken on faith.[/B]

Therefore, Creationism, if it truly claims to be a science, is bad religion. If it is a religion, then it is bad science.

You use Creationism and Christianity interchangeably, which invalidates your argument. My original post was simply stating how Neither Evolution nor Creationism adhere to his description of the Scientific method when it comes to clause 4.

Creationism is not a religion. Therefore, your argument does not make sense.

last thing im gonna say

Isthmus: Your understanding of evolution is flawwed. I suggest you research more into what biologists understand the evolutionary process consists of, because you seem to think it is solely mutation which it is not.

Actually, genetic material has been lost. The regulating gene for Penicilinase. I never claimed that the superbugs went extinct, nor did I claim that the original strains have, quite the opposite in fact. Superbugs exist in most hospitals, and are in an ideal habitat, very little competition. Once they leave their habitat, they can't compete, and die.

Outside of hospitals, the original strain is dominant.

If both strains are still extant, then nothing is lost. All original genetic material is still in existance. Furthermore the superbugs didn't "lose" the regulating gene for Penicilinase. They still have the same number of genes. Rather they have different allelles that allow for a greater production of penicillinase (or if you prefer don't inhibit the production, same thing). This is not a defect or genetic weakness. It allows for the superbugs to exist in a habitat where bacteria could not easily exist before - also known as exploiting a new niche. Superbugs may be "wimpy" in some enviornments, but are perfectly suited to the enviornment which they expliot (while regualar bacteria are wimpy in the superbug enviornment - which is why there is no "competition" in the sterile enviornments). An organisms fitness can only be defined in relation to its ability to survive in its given enviornment. Thus superbugs are no more or less fit than regular bacteria. Natural selection has brought about different strains and caused them to be dominate in the enviornment best suited to them. That is what evolution is about.

last thing im gonna say

Isthmus: Your understanding of evolution is flawwed. I suggest you research more into what biologists understand the evolutionary process consists of, because you seem to think it is solely mutation which it is not.

No evolutionary theory is a combination of mutation and natural selection, though there are many biolgists who hold to different varieties of evolution such as microevolution, macroevolution, or a combination of the two. But mutation IS central to evolutionary theory.

No evolutionary theory is a combination of mutation and natural selection, though there are many biolgists who hold to different varieties of evolution such as microevolution, macroevolution, or a combination of the two. But mutation IS central to evolutionary theory.

you are being ignorant

do a google search for "what is evolution" and select the first thing

it has lots of defenitions, those that are about biology deal with natural selection and progress by adaptation. Not much about mutation, since it isnt as important.

If both strains are still extant, then nothing is lost. All original genetic material is still in existance. Furthermore the superbugs didn't "lose" the regulating gene for Penicilinase. They still have the same number of genes. Rather they have different allelles that allow for a greater production of penicillinase (or if you prefer don't inhibit the production, same thing). This is not a defect or genetic weakness. It allows for the superbugs to exist in a habitat where bacteria could not easily exist before - also known as exploiting a new niche. Superbugs may be "wimpy" in some enviornments, but are perfectly suited to the enviornment which they expliot (while regualar bacteria are wimpy in the superbug enviornment - which is why there is no "competition" in the sterile enviornments). An organisms fitness can only be defined in relation to its ability to survive in its given enviornment. Thus superbugs are no more or less fit than regular bacteria. Natural selection has brought about different strains and caused them to be dominate in the enviornment best suited to them. That is what evolution is about.

Sorry, I misused the term gene, I'm using this thread as a distraction from my essay. Due tuesday - Woot!

The superbug strain lost genetic information, the non superbug strainit originated from didn't. One person who posted referred to them as evolution in process. I was simply pointing out that this is natural selection in proces - Evolution and Natural selection are NOT interchangeable. If you take a biology course, your proffesor will not mark kindly if you can not differentiate the two.

According to creationist theory, this "wimpy" superbug will continue to deevolve, becoming a new species. The other two possibilities are extinction (unlikely, it is far too suited to it's habitat), or continuing as is. (Unlikely bacteria have short generation spans, and as Creationist theory would have it, slowy degenerating).

According to evolutionary theory, this superbug will develop some sort of beneficial mutation, and eventually become a new species. Two other possibilities are that it will become extinct (Survival of the Fittest, another tenet to evolutionary theory, like Natural Selection, though many Scientists have been downplaying or downright disputing the "Survival of the Fittest" bit. Or it could proceed on it's own (Unlikely, as Bacteria have short generation span, and will continue to develop mutations, beneficial or not.)

you are being ignorant

do a google search for "what is evolution" and select the first thing

it has lots of defenitions, those that are about biology deal with natural selection and progress by adaptation. Not much about mutation, since it isnt as important.


Then where did the genetic information come from if not through mutation? Please read an up-to-date University Biology textbook!

I agree that Creationism is not a science, but neither is evolution. Science is being able to observe and prove through experiments that something is fact. You can't observe evolution or creation and there as many facts against evolution as there are for it. I think we should drasticlly cut back on the emphasis of evolution in classrooms. You can easily teach about the behaviour and habitats of animals without say they evolved from such and such an animal and that they are 3 million years old. No matter what scientists say, the fact is that science teachers are teaching evolution as fact(its a theory) without pointing out the errors in it.

you are being ignorant

do a google search for "what is evolution" and select the first thing

it has lots of defenitions, those that are about biology deal with natural selection and progress by adaptation. Not much about mutation, since it isnt as important.


Ok, I did so, and what did I find?

"Change of the genes of a population over time, resulting in new species.
www.informatics.jax.org/mgihome/other/glossary.shtml"

By evolutionary theory, Change occurs by mutation! Did the new information just pop out of nowhere, or are you a misinformed creationist?

"The process by which all forms of plant and animal life change slowly over time because of slight variations in the genes that one generation passes down to the next.
www.ornl.gov/TechResources/Human_Genome/publicat/genechoice/glossary.html"

Genes again!

"1. Change in allele frequency in a population over time. This (reductionist) denotation represents the minimum phenomenon which biologists will, when questioned, admit fits the term ``evolution'' and cannot be covered completely under ``adaptation'', ``variation'', or the like. The means by which the allele frequency changes occur are the subjects of a number of theories, such as natural selection and genetic drift. 2. The descent of all living organisms from a common ancestor or a relatively small set of common ancestors. This is the non-reductionist formulation of evolution(1).
www.cs.bham.ac.uk/~rmp/slide_book/node11.html"

Change in Genetic information!

"In biological terms, a change in the genetic composition of a population over time.
dblab8.csie.ncu.edu.tw/Glossary.htm"

Yet Again

"cumulative change in the gene frequencies of a population of organisms occurring in the course of successive generations related by descent, i.e., descent with change.
www.chias.org/www/edu/cse/wdnglo.html"

Again

"A change in the genetic make up of a population over time.
www.jsdnp.org.jm/glossary.html"

Again

"Is a process by which species come to possess genetic adaptations to their environment. Its mechanism is natural selection. It also requires genetic mutations.
www.geog.ouc.bc.ca/physgeog/physgeoglos/e.html"

Again . . .

"A change in the gene pool of a population over time.
berlinadmin.dlr.de/Missions/galileo/sepo/atjup/fp.html"

Again . . .

"A change in allele frequencies in a population of organisms over time.
home.uleth.ca/bio/bio1020/taxonomy.html"

And again. Do I have to explain evolutionists their own theory in order to debate it? :confused:

Christianity is not to be proven through pseudo-science or even real science, but must be taken on faith.

Therefore, Creationism, if it truly claims to be a science, is bad religion. If it is a religion, then it is bad science.

It is assumed by Christians that God created the universe and everything in it. To Christians, this is fact - it is not subject to interpretation, but is indeed openly declared and detailed in the Bible, again believed by Christians to be the Word of God.

I suppose it depends on your definition of science then, ie an issue of semantics. Creationists think of science as whatever proves God's existence, whereas modern Leftists think of science as whatever forwards Marxist objectives. But it's a bit absurd to call Creationism "bad Christianity"; it's actually rather good Christianity, at least in a traditional sense, and I suppose the reason so few people responded is because it's rather obvious you're trying to take the piss.

Sorry, I misused the term gene, I'm using this thread as a distraction from my essay. Due tuesday - Woot!

Actually it probably depends on which superbug bacteria variant and whether a mutation caused the resistance or if the resistance developed through the gradual survival of and reproduction of those bacteria who were less "regulated" in their production of penicillinase. (Which by the way is one of the non-mutative forms of overall genetic change in the theory of evolution- already existing traits being selected and amplified (or in negative cases, deselected and culled) in response to changing enviornment.

Best wishes for your essay by the way.

The superbug strain lost genetic information, the non superbug strainit originated from didn't.

I'm confused by what you mean by "lost?" Are you saying that the superbugs have fewer gene pairs than the strain they developed from? If not, genetic material hasn't been "lost" but changed. You can say that the superbugs "lost" the specific genes which give them ability to regualate penicillinase production, but likewise you can say that the superbugs "gained" the specific genes which give them the ability to freely produce it. Like I said, unless there are fewer (or more) gene pairs, nothing was lost (or gained) - just altered.


One person who posted referred to them as evolution in process. I was simply pointing out that this is natural selection in proces - Evolution and Natural selection are NOT interchangeable. If you take a biology course, your proffesor will not mark kindly if you can not differentiate the two.

How is it NOT evolution? Evolution is the change in genetics -in the frequency of allelles -over time (either through mutation, gene flow, genetic drift, etc). Natural selection is the process by which this is done - in which only organisms that are fit for a certain enviornment will flourish there, and if an organism is more fit for a certain niche than others, the others (and their genes) tend to get pushed out.

Did change happen? Yes. Superbugs are a new genetic sequence. They have gone through stages where they become more and more resisitant (gradual change through time) and they have become dominate in certain enviornments through natural selection (and certainly have caused a shift in the percentage of certain allelles in the overall bacteria population).

If it could be shown that superbugs have always existed in their current genetic form but made up a very insignificant portion of the bacteria population until enviornmental conditions changed so that they could flourish then one could argue that only natural selection had occurred.


According to creationist theory, this "wimpy" superbug will continue to deevolve, becoming a new species. The other two possibilities are extinction (unlikely, it is far too suited to it's habitat), or continuing as is. (Unlikely bacteria have short generation spans, and as Creationist theory would have it, slowy degenerating).

According to evolutionary theory, this superbug will develop some sort of beneficial mutation, and eventually become a new species. Two other possibilities are that it will become extinct (Survival of the Fittest, another tenet to evolutionary theory, like Natural Selection, though many Scientists have been downplaying or downright disputing the "Survival of the Fittest" bit. Or it could proceed on it's own (Unlikely, as Bacteria have short generation span, and will continue to develop mutations, beneficial or not.)

What do you mean by de-evolve? Unless you believe in evolution then you can't mean it to be going to a previous state of evolution (which according to evolutionary theory is impossible). If it is giving rise to a new species how does this de-evolution differ from evolution?

The superbug has ALREADY deveolped a beneficial genetic change (I don't know if it was mutation or gene shift - micororgansim gene exchange is so wonky compared to other organisms. Some material says shift, some says mutation and there are different strains...). The change exploits an enviornment that bacteria were unable to exploit before. As a result, bacteria as a whole can continue to pass on genes at a greater rate than before. The unchanged bacteria continue to pass on full complements of the previous genetic structure in the enviornments that it previously exploited while the superbugs pass the new slightly modified genetic structure (which is still mostly analogous to the unmodified bugs) in an area which before was prohibitive to other bacteria.

You use Creationism and Christianity interchangeably, which invalidates your argument. My original post was simply stating how Neither Evolution nor Creationism adhere to his description of the Scientific method when it comes to clause 4.

Creationism is not a religion. Therefore, your argument does not make sense.


Find me a creationist who is not using the theory to reinforce Christian belief. Creationism is a religion in that it puts forward the Biblical version of creation. It is just a very poor religion, at least by Christian standards.

The ideas of evolution adhere to all steps of the scientific method. Find me a creationist web site that states the creationist belief is just a theory, dependent upon observable data, with a statement that they are willing to accept that this "theory" could be overturned by future (or even current) evidence.

Christianity is not to be proven through pseudo-science or even real science, but must be taken on faith.

Therefore, Creationism, if it truly claims to be a science, is bad religion. If it is a religion, then it is bad science.

It is assumed by Christians that God created the universe and everything in it. To Christians, this is fact - it is not subject to interpretation, but is indeed openly declared and detailed in the Bible, again believed by Christians to be the Word of God.

I suppose it depends on your definition of science then, ie an issue of semantics. Creationists think of science as whatever proves God's existence, whereas modern Leftists think of science as whatever forwards Marxist objectives. But it's a bit absurd to call Creationism "bad Christianity"; it's actually rather good Christianity, at least in a traditional sense, and I suppose the reason so few people responded is because it's rather obvious you're trying to take the piss.

Thank you for stating clearly that by accepted standards of science creationism is a belief, based upon faith, and not a science, based upon the scientific method (the definition of science is not an issue of semantics).

Since Christians already believe the Biblical interpretation of creation any attempt to prove that version, through creationist pseudo-science, is unnecessay, and as I pointed out, actually runs counter to Christian beliefs about faith.

As a Christian your religion calls on you to understand by faith, not by theories or evidence or factual proofs (“By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible”).

Why do you need creationism if you are truly a Christian?

As a religion creationism is bad science; as science it is bad religion.

Best wishes for your essay by the way.


Thank you, it's nice to finally see an evolutionist who enjoys debate, and isn't trying to force their beliefs on someone else (I think :P).

Seeming as how it's way too late for me to respond point by point, let me just say that natural selection does form an essential part of the evolutionary process according to evolutionary theory, but the natural selection cases that have been documented thus far have resulted in no new information being produced (Corrupted genetic information in the case of superbugs, which is essentially "lost").

Creationism has scientific aspects, but is based on a belief in God.
Evolution has scientific aspects, but much of it is faulty, and needs to be reworked, which interestingly enough is what drew me away from Atheism into Christianity. And no, it was some Christian Fundie who offered me a pamphlet, it was a number of contradictions I was finding in my biology textbooks.

Darn, it looks like I'm becoming long winded, but I guess my final point is - to all you creationists and evolutionists out there, don't force your viewpoint on others, and try not to insult each other on the forums either. On this thread alone I have been called ignorant and an American Dumbass. Fortunately I'm not an American, and I feel great sympathy for the American people who must suffer four more years under that hypocrite Bush.

It's fun discussing things like creationism and evolution, as it let's you see the flawed arguments of others, and you get to see other's commentary, which allows you to better clarify your points in the future.

For all you Creationists who aren't civil with evolutionists, you're being hypocritical. We can all be frustrated at times, but resorting to name calling is childish. Besides, didn't Jesus say to love one another?

To you Evolutionists, creationists simply hold differing opinions then you, there's no need to resort to name calling. I'm sure that whatever god/God/non god/ideology/whatever you believe in probably has some bad Karma in store.

Well, I'm off to sleep, and sorry for my rant, it just makes me sad to see both sides bashing the other side without really trying to understand it first!

Too bad we couldn't have some sort of creationist/evolutionist test set up at the beggining of a thread so that only people who have informed grasps of both sides of the issue can debate!

Good Night all, and Many Fluffles! :)

:fluffle:


P.S. And I guess my final point wasn't my final point after all . . . I need to take a break from these forums, I can't stop typing :P

Wow, that last post is so sweet it has given me diabetes.

There are at least four other threads debating the scientific aspects of creationism. This is not one.

This thread is to debate whether or not creationism is good Christianity. Try to focus on that element of creationism.

So far, not one Christian has addressed the central point that creationism runs counter to Christian belief based upon faith.

Why do you need creationism if you are truly a Christian?

As a religion creationism is bad science; as science it is bad religion.
True - but also, as religion, it's bad religion. One of the themes of Hebrews is that we are still in "Day 6" that the process of creating humanity is still underway.

Ok, I did so, and what did I find?

lol, oops... boy that makes me look dumb


And again. Do I have to explain evolutionists their own theory in order to debate it? :confused:

lol

no, you are right, evolution of dna and genetics and what i would call single celled evolution is defenatly based on mutation.

I was, and this is probably my mistake, speaking entirely of complex organisms

Darn, it looks like I'm becoming long winded, but I guess my final point is - to all you creationists and evolutionists out there, don't force your viewpoint on others, and try not to insult each other on the forums either. On this thread alone I have been called ignorant and an American Dumbass. Fortunately I'm not an American, and I feel great sympathy for the American people who must suffer four more years under that hypocrite Bush.

lol

ya, sorry

i was a little bitter earlier

Creationists will go on all night with pseudo-science to support their religious beliefs, but refuse to touch the religious inconsistancies of their "science" with their religion.

First of all, Creationism is one theory to explain the creation of our universe. One, of many. It is not a science, it is a theory pulled from science.

by the definition of a theory, creationism isn't a theory.

a theory should be able to be proven false and should make predictions. creationism can't be proven false (well the 7 day 6000 years ago kind can, but otherwise, it's impossible to prove that this was made by a god or not) and it does not make any predictions.

Secondly, there is no more "viable and visible" proof for Big Bang or anything else than there is for Creationism. Big Bang requires just as much faith, if not more, as Creationism does.

the big bang is a theory based on the empirical evidence. hell, before the universe was discovered to be expanding, it was thought to exist in a steady state. the big bang theory was brought in to explain the expansion. it is a theory, it does make proofs and potentially could be disproven.
and hey, if you want to disprove the big bang, go right ahead. it'll bring you fame, fortune and keep scientists busy for years to come. :)

If you'd like, I can post a very strong argument that Atheism is a religion. Furthermore Absence of proof is not proof of absense.

which is why agnosticism is the way to go. no faith either way. *thumbs up*

There are at least four other threads debating the scientific aspects of creationism. This is not one.

This thread is to debate whether or not creationism is good Christianity. Try to focus on that element of creationism.

So far, not one Christian has addressed the central point that creationism runs counter to Christian belief based upon faith.

This is going to be painful, as I dislike standing up for something I find personally distasteful, but yes, creationism can be good Christianity.

The term Christianity makes it seem as though there it is one religion when in reality there are countless Christian religions. Matters of doctrine are so schismed that members of some Christian religions don't even consider members of other Christian religions to really be Christians.

For a sect of Christianity that demands strict faith in the words of the Bible first and foremost then it can be argued that Creationism might be bad Christianity. But even then it comes down to how the words of the bible are interpreted. Technically it could be argued adherents of Creationism already have faith that God created the world and are just using their "science" to convince non-believers of this fact.

Other strains of Christianity profess that faith simply means having faith in Jesus Christ, crucified and risen from the dead, as one's saviour. Some of these strains are highly evangelical, and strongly emphasize converting non-believers. For such a Christian religion, Creationism would be excellent Christianity.

(Please not that I am not endorsing such a religion and neither do I personally hold the beliefs that I am writing about, rather I am only attempting to analyze these certain Christian religions by what I percieve to be their own terms).

I've already stated that I believe the "science" of Creationism was created to fit an agenda. For years many Christian churches have regarded the theory of evolution to be a force in guiding people away from Christianity. I really do believe that whoever started Creationism did so as a recruiting tactic. Creationism attempts to disprove evolution while giving a population that has largely come to see science in almost religious terms (as something proven rather than the most scientifically reasonable and sound theory that cannot yet be disproven) something seemingly fact-based to hold on to.

On a more personal note, I really do not believe that some of the proponents of Creationism actually believe in it (at least in the terms that Creation Science sets forth). The writing in _some_ Creationist articles suggests a knowledge of geologic, genetic and/or evolutionary principles and are written in a language that distorts these principles without actually refuting them and then claims that the distortions are refutations. If I am correct in this assumption then these people, who supposedly believe in the Christian God, are subverting what they know about His design to an agenda - in effect bearing false witness against God's creation. I can't think of any of the Christian religions where this would be considered good Christianity. So, while I don't think believing in Creationism is necessarily bad Christianity, I do believe the creation of Creationism was bad Christianity.

the big bang is a theory based on the empirical evidence. hell, before the universe was discovered to be expanding, it was thought to exist in a steady state. the big bang theory was brought in to explain the expansion. it is a theory, it does make proofs and potentially could be disproven.
and hey, if you want to disprove the big bang, go right ahead. it'll bring you fame, fortune and keep scientists busy for years to come. :)
*
You're right. There is evidence for the big bang, but for some reason any nimrod who can tell you "The universe is expanding" feels like they earned the right to say the big bang is based on faith. Unless you can tell me the significance of t=10^-34 s , you have no business trying to disprove that theory.
(For the curious thats the farthest back in time we can measure using the Cosmic Microwave Background .0000000000000000000000000000000001 seconds after the bang.)

As for creationism, I think the "Proof denys faith" argument was implicated very nicely in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Ref: Part about the Babble Fish.

This is going to be painful, as I dislike standing up for something I find personally distasteful, but yes, creationism can be good Christianity.

The term Christianity makes it seem as though there it is one religion when in reality there are countless Christian religions. Matters of doctrine are so schismed that members of some Christian religions don't even consider members of other Christian religions to really be Christians.

For a sect of Christianity that demands strict faith in the words of the Bible first and foremost then it can be argued that Creationism might be bad Christianity. But even then it comes down to how the words of the bible are interpreted. Technically it could be argued adherents of Creationism already have faith that God created the world and are just using their "science" to convince non-believers of this fact.

Other strains of Christianity profess that faith simply means having faith in Jesus Christ, crucified and risen from the dead, as one's saviour. Some of these strains are highly evangelical, and strongly emphasize converting non-believers. For such a Christian religion, Creationism would be excellent Christianity.

(Please not that I am not endorsing such a religion and neither do I personally hold the beliefs that I am writing about, rather I am only attempting to analyze these certain Christian religions by what I percieve to be their own terms).

I've already stated that I believe the "science" of Creationism was created to fit an agenda. For years many Christian churches have regarded the theory of evolution to be a force in guiding people away from Christianity. I really do believe that whoever started Creationism did so as a recruiting tactic. Creationism attempts to disprove evolution while giving a population that has largely come to see science in almost religious terms (as something proven rather than the most scientifically reasonable and sound theory that cannot yet be disproven) something seemingly fact-based to hold on to.

On a more personal note, I really do not believe that some of the proponents of Creationism actually believe in it (at least in the terms that Creation Science sets forth). The writing in _some_ Creationist articles suggests a knowledge of geologic, genetic and/or evolutionary principles and are written in a language that distorts these principles without actually refuting them and then claims that the distortions are refutations. If I am correct in this assumption then these people, who supposedly believe in the Christian God, are subverting what they know about His design to an agenda - in effect bearing false witness against God's creation. I can't think of any of the Christian religions where this would be considered good Christianity. So, while I don't think believing in Creationism is necessarily bad Christianity, I do believe the creation of Creationism was bad Christianity.

Don't you think creationism, the search for facts and evidence to prove the Christian faith, runs counter to the idea that this religion, and indeed most religions, is based on the idea that you should believe as a matter of faith, not fact?

Don't you think creationism, the search for facts and evidence to prove the Christian faith, runs counter to the idea that this religion, and indeed most religions, is based on the idea that you should believe as a matter of faith, not fact?

I personally find it very odd and counter-intuitive that a religion that insists its scripture is absolute truth (as most people who believe in Creationism do) would need or want evidence to "prove" the religion. I mean, if one really believes the bible is the absolute truth, searching for proof would be superfluous.

As for running counter to the actual ideas of the religion, however, I don't think it does.

Not all Christians are biblical literalists. In this case, while there must be a belief in God, the there is no religious prohibition against seeking proof of God's design. So there would be no religious inconsistancy with Creationism.
In spite of this fact, the greater percentage of non-literalists are able to reconcile their beliefs with scientific theories (usually by saying God started cosmic and biological evolution and let natural forces which he also created take it from there).

Neither are strict biblical literarists aren't going against their faith by believing in Creationism. A biblical literalists who believes in Creationism already has faith in the exact word of the bible- the "science" of creationism presupposes the idea the God created the world. These people aren't really looking for facts to prove Christianity (at least not to themselves). They are looking for psuedo-facts that will let them foist their beliefs on the rest of the world. Obviously there are branches of Christianity that have no problem with that.

As a side note, very few religions outside of the Abrahamic religions insists that their religious texts are literal truth. Most say the religions are symbolic or metaphysical truth and many of them don't even insist that they have the "one and only" metaphysical truth.

Something I think tends to get overlooked in any sort of discussion like this is the fact that even Evolution is a theory only, and has undergone many modifications since it first made an appearance.

To blindly follow Evolution without an open mind to alternate explanations is exactly the same closed-mindedness that is often attributed to Creationists. In truth, it takes as much faith to believe Evolution as it does to believe in Creation, except that Evolution is the current fashion.

Despite this, any discussion on the relative reliability of Evolution vs. Creation tends to start from the baselin eassumption that Evolution Theory, in its current form, is to be accepted as the standard and it is up to the Creationist to account for every single facet not only of his or her belief, but how it accounts for the observable phenomena around us. If Evolutionists had to work as hard in such a debate as Creationists, indeed the holes in that theory would be well and truly exposed.

As for the point of this thread, Creationism is a Science as far as it is based upon a set of observable phenomena, but are from a different worldview from Evolutionists. An Evolutionist starts from the worldview that science is 100% accurate and reliable (even though they pay lip service to the fact that the Theory of Evolution is still theory, not a Law, they still treat it as being as reliable as the Law of Gravity or Thermodynamics.) A Creationist starts with the worldview that God is the Creator and is omnipotent, and that the creation of the world is accurate as presented in Scripture.

Some Christians try and take the middleground by interpreting the opening chapters of Genesis as a metaphor for the process of Evolution. To me, this is a result of a lack of faith because it's an attempt to modify Scriptural reading to reconcile with Evolutionary science, once again using it, and not the Word of God, as a baseline.

Something I think tends to get overlooked in any sort of discussion like this is the fact that even Evolution is a theory only, and has undergone many modifications since it first made an appearance.

To blindly follow Evolution without an open mind to alternate explanations is exactly the same closed-mindedness that is often attributed to Creationists. In truth, it takes as much faith to believe Evolution as it does to believe in Creation, except that Evolution is the current fashion.

Despite this, any discussion on the relative reliability of Evolution vs. Creation tends to start from the baselin eassumption that Evolution Theory, in its current form, is to be accepted as the standard and it is up to the Creationist to account for every single facet not only of his or her belief, but how it accounts for the observable phenomena around us. If Evolutionists had to work as hard in such a debate as Creationists, indeed the holes in that theory would be well and truly exposed.

As for the point of this thread, Creationism is a Science as far as it is based upon a set of observable phenomena, but are from a different worldview from Evolutionists. An Evolutionist starts from the worldview that science is 100% accurate and reliable (even though they pay lip service to the fact that the Theory of Evolution is still theory, not a Law, they still treat it as being as reliable as the Law of Gravity or Thermodynamics.) A Creationist starts with the worldview that God is the Creator and is omnipotent, and that the creation of the world is accurate as presented in Scripture.

Evolution is as much a fact as gravity. Things fall down. Animals evolve.

The theory of evolution is, like the theory of gravity, not final.

The theories of gravity are changed over time; Newton's equations were replaced by Einstein's theory of relativity, which we know is incomplete and will eventually need to be modified once we figure out how. This doesn't change the FACT of gravity - apples fall down, whether or not they do it by Newton's equations or Einstein's or some other ones.

The theories of evolution are changed over time; Darwin's theory that natural selection is the main driving force is in the process of being replaced by the theory that relies more on punctuated equilibrium. This is probably incomplete - the truth is probably somewhere in between the two, and will include factors such as genetic drift. This doesn't change the FACT of evolution - animals evolve, whether or not natural selection or punctuated equilibrium or something else is the right description of how they do so.

You can, if you want, argue that all science is incomplete, because we can never "prove" anything. But do not single out evolution, it is equally well-proven as any other theory in biology.

Something I think tends to get overlooked in any sort of discussion like this is the fact that even Evolution is a theory only, and has undergone many modifications since it first made an appearance.

To blindly follow Evolution without an open mind to alternate explanations is exactly the same closed-mindedness that is often attributed to Creationists. In truth, it takes as much faith to believe Evolution as it does to believe in Creation, except that Evolution is the current fashion.

Despite this, any discussion on the relative reliability of Evolution vs. Creation tends to start from the baselin eassumption that Evolution Theory, in its current form, is to be accepted as the standard and it is up to the Creationist to account for every single facet not only of his or her belief, but how it accounts for the observable phenomena around us. If Evolutionists had to work as hard in such a debate as Creationists, indeed the holes in that theory would be well and truly exposed.

As for the point of this thread, Creationism is a Science as far as it is based upon a set of observable phenomena, but are from a different worldview from Evolutionists. An Evolutionist starts from the worldview that science is 100% accurate and reliable (even though they pay lip service to the fact that the Theory of Evolution is still theory, not a Law, they still treat it as being as reliable as the Law of Gravity or Thermodynamics.) A Creationist starts with the worldview that God is the Creator and is omnipotent, and that the creation of the world is accurate as presented in Scripture.

Some Christians try and take the middleground by interpreting the opening chapters of Genesis as a metaphor for the process of Evolution. To me, this is a result of a lack of faith because it's an attempt to modify Scriptural reading to reconcile with Evolutionary science, once again using it, and not the Word of God, as a baseline.

There so many false assumptions in this post I don't know where to start. So let me narrow this down to the statements most directly addressed by the point of this thread:

"Creationism is a Science."

To be a science creationists would have to accept that their belief is a theory. They would have to accept that future data could come along and overturn their theory. They would have to constantly subject their theory to experimentation, test, and peer review, updating it and changing it as new facts appear.

Do you know any creationists willing to accept those constraints on their beliefs? Can you name any creationist Christians willing to downgrade their faith to a theory?

"A Creationist starts with the worldview that God is the Creator and is omnipotent, and that the creation of the world is accurate as presented in Scripture."

Yes, indeed. This is precisely why creationism is not a science. They are starting with the assumption that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, not subject to doubt or challenge. This is fine for a religion, but is totally unacceptable for science.

Because Christian creationists believe in a divine origin there is no need for a pseudo-science philosophy to attempt to prove what is believed by faith. To do so is bad religion. And to attempt to interject faith into the scientific method is bad science.

Evolution is as much a fact as gravity. Things fall down. Animals evolve.

The theory of evolution is, like the theory of gravity, not final.
...
You can, if you want, argue that all science is incomplete, because we can never "prove" anything. But do not single out evolution, it is equally well-proven as any other theory in biology.

Er... actually you can't compare the theory of Evolution to the Law of Gravity. Our understanding of the nature of the source of gravity has indeed changed from Newtonian to ensteinian thought, but the Law itself, that gravity causes acceleration at a caluclable rate based upon the mass of the object, distance from it, and the Gravitational constant. It is a Law.

Evolution is a Theory, and if you don't know the difference then I humbly suggest you are in over your head. The fossil record does not, in fact, prove Evolution as currently accepted, and there is a growing movement to raise awareness of this fact.

Evolution is based entirely on interpretations of the fossil record and the fact that it fits neatly under a gioven set of assumptions. The truth is that Evolution is not an observable phenomena, since no human being has been around long enough to document such change, and in fact, it would take hundreds of thousands of years at a minimum to do so.

Science relies heavily on observable data and the ability to replicate, in a laboratory, the phenomena being studied, Evolution is anecdotal at best.

Er... actually you can't compare the theory of Evolution to the Law of Gravity. Our understanding of the nature of the source of gravity has indeed changed from Newtonian to ensteinian thought, but the Law itself, that gravity causes acceleration at a caluclable rate based upon the mass of the object, distance from it, and the Gravitational constant. It is a Law.

Evolution is a Theory, and if you don't know the difference then I humbly suggest you are in over your head. The fossil record does not, in fact, prove Evolution as currently accepted, and there is a growing movement to raise awareness of this fact.

Evolution is based entirely on interpretations of the fossil record and the fact that it fits neatly under a gioven set of assumptions. The truth is that Evolution is not an observable phenomena, since no human being has been around long enough to document such change, and in fact, it would take hundreds of thousands of years at a minimum to do so.

Science relies heavily on observable data and the ability to replicate, in a laboratory, the phenomena being studied, Evolution is anecdotal at best.

How does this relate to the fact that Creationism is bad Christianity? This thread is not about whether or not creationism is bad science (there are at least three other threads arguing that point), but rather is a discussion of creationism as bad Christianity.

There so many false assumptions in this post I don't know where to start. So let me narrow this down to the statements most directly addressed by the point of this thread:

"Creationism is a Science."

To be a science creationists would have to accept that their belief is a theory. They would have to accept that future data could come along and overturn their theory. They would have to constantly subject their theory to experimentation, test, and peer review, updating it and changing it as new facts appear.

If you're going to quote me then by all means do so, but please have the courtesy to keep my remarks in context. What I said was: "Creationism is a Science as far as it is based upon a set of observable phenomena, but are from a different worldview from Evolutionists." And this is true. The fact is, The Scriptures don't paint a terribly detailed picture of precisely how things were done and why, so new information from an equally trustworthy source would certainly be taken into consideration.

Do you know any creationists willing to accept those constraints on their beliefs? Can you name any creationist Christians willing to downgrade their faith to a theory?

I'll concede that very few Christians would be prepared to downgrade Creationism to a theory, if you'll concede that many Evolutionists are equally zealous in their adherence to Darwinism, and who call it a scientific Law even though it is not one. (see below)

"A Creationist starts with the worldview that God is the Creator and is omnipotent, and that the creation of the world is accurate as presented in Scripture."

Yes, indeed. This is precisely why creationism is not a science. They are starting with the assumption that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, not subject to doubt or challenge. This is fine for a religion, but is totally unacceptable for science.

Unfortunately you've made 2 false assumptions here. Firstly, I have not stated that the Bible was inerrant. If you were to look over some of my other posts in different threads I have indicated my belief that the text of the Bible is incomplete and on occasion contains errors of translation and bias. I am aware that not all Christians would agree with me in that assertion, but this is my argument.

Secondly, you are leaving out the fact that while a Creationist starts from a worldview that God is omnipotent and the creator, most scientists who push Evolution tend to start form the assumption that either there is no God to begin with, or that the story in Genesis is pure metaphor. In either case, it's still a baseline worldview.


Because Christian creationists believe in a divine origin there is no need for a pseudo-science philosophy to attempt to prove what is believed by faith. To do so is bad religion. And to attempt to interject faith into the scientific method is bad science.
I'd agree with your starement by adding that Evolution itself seems to have evolved into a religion of sorts. You see, from my point of view, it takes an awful lot more faith to believe that a cloud of random gas and dust could coaslesce into a complete solar system, in open conflict with the law of entropy, and then be able to not only sustain life but to actually spontaneously produce it on at least one world, again, in glaring violation of entropy, all without any divine guidance.

As opposed to a being far more advanced than any of us being able to control and direct it according to His will, and not having to take billions of years to do it.

Remember what Ocham's Razor (sp?) tells us.. All other things being equal, the simplest explanation tends to be true.

How does this relate to the fact that Creationism is bad Christianity? This thread is not about whether or not creationism is bad science (there are at least three other threads arguing that point), but rather is a discussion of creationism as bad Christianity.

My response was to Reasonabilityness. Why aren't you calling him/her out for bringing the issue up in the first place?

My response was to Reasonabilityness. Why aren't you calling him/her out for bringing the issue up in the first place?

Bad Reasonabilityness, bad. Go stand in the virtual corner.

As to your previous post, evolution theory will stand or fall on the basis of the scientific method, so I am not going to get drawn into a defense of that theory. My point is, and has been, that creationism is not a science. I am not arguing that Christianity or any other religion is wrong. Those kinds of arguments are pointless to me.

As I have said many times, to turn Christianity (and come on, let's start calling creationism what it is - Christianity) into a scientific theory would be heretical to most Christians. Therefore, my contention is that creationism, because it is a faith based idea, cannot meet even the bare minimum standards to be considered a scientific theory and therefore should never be taught in school along side other scientific theories.

Bad Reasonabilityness, bad. Go stand in the virtual corner.

As to your previous post, evolution theory will stand or fall on the basis of the scientific method, so I am not going to get drawn into a defense of that theory. My point is, and has been, that creationism is not a science. I am not arguing that Christianity or any other religion is wrong. Those kinds of arguments are pointless to me.

As I have said many times, to turn Christianity (and come on, let's start calling creationism what it is - Christianity) into a scientific theory would be heretical to most Christians. Therefore, my contention is that creationism, because it is a faith based idea, cannot meet even the bare minimum standards to be considered a scientific theory and therefore should never be taught in school along side other scientific theories.

I thought your contention was that Creationism is bad Christianity.

And by the way, Creationism is not unique to Christianity. Islam, Judaism and Hindu all have their own Creationist thought.

I thought your contention was that Creationism is bad Christianity.

And by the way, Creationism is not unique to Christianity. Islam, Judaism and Hindu all have their own Creationist thought.

I have two contentions...I'm very contentious.

And no, the other religions you mentioned make no pretence of trying to cloak their religious beliefs in the mantle of science.

That is my real contention - that to become a science creationism would have to become bad Christianity by giving up the element of faith. But, if it remains a religion, then it is bad science because it is based on faith.

The fact is it can't be both.

I have two contentions...I'm very contentious.

And no, the other religions you mentioned make no pretence of trying to cloak their religious beliefs in the mantle of science.

That is my real contention - that to become a science creationism would have to become bad Christianity by giving up the element of faith. But, if it remains a religion, then it is bad science because it is based on faith.

The fact is it can't be both.

Back in the time of the Exodus the Israelites were commanded to bury their waste outside the camp. They didn't know why since they couldn't know about bacteria and so on, but they complied out of faith.

Later, we learned about bacteria and sewage. Does that make it bad faith because research was done to flesh out the scientific reasoning behind that directive?

The fact is God wants us to learn and study about the universe we live in. That doesn't dismiss faith, it reinforces it. It gives us an example of His power and glory.

A brief explanation of evolutionary theory:

1) There are variations among the traits of living things, in size, shape, etc., all the way down to the molecular level.
2) These traits are influenced by information that is passed down from one generation to the next.
3) Some traits help an individual to survive and produce children; others hurt its chances.
4) So, over time we expect a population to change to become more like the individuals that are best at surviving. (If white fur is helpful, more and more members of the species will be white.)

That's it. Evolution doesn't make any claims about the existance of Gods, or the origin of life (though there's an interesting "RNA World" hypothesis about that), or the morality of "survival of the fittest." Part 1 is obvious; Part 2 we now understand from DNA studies; Part 3 is obvious; Part 4 is the conclusion.

Evolution is a scientific theory because it proposes a specific explanation for why something happens, because it could be proven false (eg. by showing that the universe is too young for it to work), and because it's "fruitful" and leads to other discoveries (like the new field of "sociobiology.") It's a well-established theory because it's supported by geology (the age of the Earth), astronomy (the age of the universe), nuclear physics (age), fossils (extinct species, "transitional" species like Archaeopteryx and Ambulocetus), genetics (genetic similarity between all species even in the "junk" areas), and easy experiments. Biologists demonstrate evolution daily by exposing bacteria to antibiotics; the few that survive produce a new generation that's much more resistant to antibiotics. Farmers have used selective breeding -- unnatural selection -- to radically change wild species; look up pictures of teosinte, the wild ancestor of modern corn. While we can't absolutely prove every aspect of the theory, it's well-supported from multiple directions and is the foundation of modern biology.

A brief explanation of evolutionary theory:


Thank you. Now tell me this. Suppose, just for the sake of argument, that tomorrow a scientist at the University of Maryland found a critical flaw in the process of carbon dating that was so glaring and so severe that it makes any and all results previously attained by means of carbon dating invalid, according to his findings.

Now with this hypothetical scenario in place, how willing do you think the scientific community at large would be to accept and adopt this information? Would they even be willing to condust a follow up to verify the results of this one scientist? Or do you think they'd be more likely to ignore him as a crackpot and continue on as before?

(First off, I suspect you're going to pull out a real study.)

I expect that the lone scientist would be treated as a crackpot and mostly ignored. You're right about that. The reason is that at this point, his evidence doesn't jibe with the large body of evidence supporting carbon dating and other aspects of evolution.

Even ignoring the present weight of the evidence, rejection is normal for new theories; scientists are human too. The scientific method is meant to minimize bias and have scientists police themselves. We've shown that theories that are initially unpopular and against the weight of the evidence -- like the plate-tectonic theory, the heliocentric solar system, and evolution itself -- can eventually become widely accepted by the normal process of scientists debating ideas.

So if you really are confident that evolution is hogwash, don't cry conspiracy, just be patient. Evolution dominates biology textbooks because it's the only theory to earn, repeat, earn, the respect of the mainstream scientific community.

If I were designing a school science curriculum, I would actually include creationism and other pseudoscientific or discredited theories, for the sake of teaching kids about history and the scientific method. If we just tell people "this is how it is; don't question it," we're no better than priests. We want to encourage people to question all ideas, even the ones we're pretty sure about. The problem with allowing creationism into the classroom is that its backers want to include _only_ their version, and not other versions like Buddhist, Shinto, or Scientologist myth, and to present it as equal to mainstream science, and to imply that kids should choose based on faith. Teaching science that way doesn't help kids learn what scientists believe, or how to think rationally, so all it does it hurt students.

-Kris
MIT '03
Coral Zone

Thank you. Now tell me this. Suppose, just for the sake of argument, that tomorrow a scientist at the University of Maryland found a critical flaw in the process of carbon dating that was so glaring and so severe that it makes any and all results previously attained by means of carbon dating invalid, according to his findings.

Now with this hypothetical scenario in place, how willing do you think the scientific community at large would be to accept and adopt this information? Would they even be willing to condust a follow up to verify the results of this one scientist? Or do you think they'd be more likely to ignore him as a crackpot and continue on as before?

Well, the scientific world would be skeptical, considering that Carbon dating has been verified in many ways. They'd look at his experiment, and would try to figure out where there's a flaw in it; they'd expect to find one, since Carbon dating is so well-documented and widely-used. If there's no flaw that could be seen, there would be someone that repeats the experiment again, or do a similar experiment - to verify the conclusions. If the anomaly showed up again and again, verified by different scientists, and could not be explained - then yes, we'd have to come up with a different theory, or modify the existing one.

Thank you. Now tell me this. Suppose, just for the sake of argument, that tomorrow a scientist at the University of Maryland found a critical flaw in the process of carbon dating that was so glaring and so severe that it makes any and all results previously attained by means of carbon dating invalid, according to his findings.

Now with this hypothetical scenario in place, how willing do you think the scientific community at large would be to accept and adopt this information? Would they even be willing to condust a follow up to verify the results of this one scientist? Or do you think they'd be more likely to ignore him as a crackpot and continue on as before?

Let me throw this back at you. Suppose the same scenario, but instead incontrovertible evidence is found for evolution, or even archeological evidence that Jesus was a fraud.

Would Christians give up their faith?

They would not, nor should they. Why? Because faith is not about evidence or proof. Your example about bacteria does not apply because such scientific advancements do not address fundamental questions of God and faith. Those questions are best addressed through devotion and prayer, not scientific theories, archeological digs, or laboratory experiments (I say this as an on-again off-again agnostic).

If your faith can be shaken by worldly evidence then I think most religious people would conclude your faith is not very strong. And if your faith remains in the face of empirical evidence then you can't make a claim that it is a science.

First of all, Creationism is one theory to explain the creation of our universe. One, of many. It is not a science, it is a theory pulled from science.

Creationism is in no way "pulled from science." Science requires use of the scientific method, a method that Creationists refuse to employ. Creationists have a set conclusion, which they will never change. This is not science.

Secondly, there is no more "viable and visible" proof for Big Bang or anything else than there is for Creationism. Big Bang requires just as much faith, if not more, as Creationism does.

There are so many complete misconceptions in this post that I don't know where to begin...

"4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments. "

ummmm . . . Evolution can not be tested, by independent experimenters or otherwise. You can't preform an experiment regarding evolution.

Absolutely and completely false. Why don't you peruse a few scientific journals.

Evolution is not a theory based on experimentation, but has become a "theory" because it is the only hypothesis which does not involve the supernatural to be accepted by the scientifuc community.

THis is an incredibly idiotic statement. Evolution is a theory based on evidence. Science gets evidence and then creates a theory. THe theory changes with any new evidence. It has nothing to do with the supernatural, as the supernatural is outside the realm of science.

[Various parts of Creationism can be proven via repeatable experiments. I.e, natural selection, which forms a key basis to Creationist Theory.

Natural selection is the cornerstone of evolution, darling.

[Natural Selection results in the loss of Genetic information, which is a repeatable experiment.

What do you mean by "loss of genetic information"? If you mean loss of specific genes, you would be right. If you mean loss of total information, you would be completely and totally mistaken. Many mutations actually *increase* the amount of total genetic information in a given organism.

[We can't ask God to appear in times Square a Noon tommorow, and create life. Therefore, that aspect of Creationism cannot be proven through experiment.

Nothing can be proven through experiment. Hypotheses can only be disproven.

[At the same time, the World's best Scientists cannot create life even though they have millions of dollars of funding, even with all of the different Amino Acids at their disposal. That aspect of evolutionary doctrine cannot be replicated.

Evolution != Abiogenesis.

[At the same time, we have not witnessed evolution in action. We've watched species of a certain kind, as a result of natural selection, diverge, resulting in two similar but distinct species, each with less genetic information than the original.

Other than the "less genetic information" fallacy, this is exactly describing evolution. Congratulations.

[Both creationists and evolutionists are dogmatic in their beliefs, but both are dictated by their presuppositions. Creationists and evolutionists use the exact same evidence, but simply interpret it in different ways. Creationists presume an existence of God, and then interpret the evidence. Evolutionists presume the inexistence of God, and then interpret the evidence.

This is incorrect. Creationists start with a conclusion and only pay attention to evidence which they think they can interpret in a way that will support that hypothesis. Any other evidence is assumed to be "of the devil", wrong, or insignificant - no matter how repeatable. Scientists take the evidence and form a theory from it. They then look for further evidence. If the evidence refutes part of the old theory, the theory is changed. Meanwhile, there is no need to "presume the inexistence of God," as the existence or non-existence of God is, by definition, outside the realm of science.

Ok, I did so, and what did I find?

"Change of the genes of a population over time, resulting in new species.
www.informatics.jax.org/mgihome/other/glossary.shtml"

By evolutionary theory, Change occurs by mutation! Did the new information just pop out of nowhere, or are you a misinformed creationist?

"The process by which all forms of plant and animal life change slowly over time because of slight variations in the genes that one generation passes down to the next.
www.ornl.gov/TechResources/Human_Genome/publicat/genechoice/glossary.html"

Genes again!

"1. Change in allele frequency in a population over time. This (reductionist) denotation represents the minimum phenomenon which biologists will, when questioned, admit fits the term ``evolution'' and cannot be covered completely under ``adaptation'', ``variation'', or the like. The means by which the allele frequency changes occur are the subjects of a number of theories, such as natural selection and genetic drift. 2. The descent of all living organisms from a common ancestor or a relatively small set of common ancestors. This is the non-reductionist formulation of evolution(1).
www.cs.bham.ac.uk/~rmp/slide_book/node11.html"

Change in Genetic information!

"In biological terms, a change in the genetic composition of a population over time.
dblab8.csie.ncu.edu.tw/Glossary.htm"

Yet Again

"cumulative change in the gene frequencies of a population of organisms occurring in the course of successive generations related by descent, i.e., descent with change.
www.chias.org/www/edu/cse/wdnglo.html"

Again

"A change in the genetic make up of a population over time.
www.jsdnp.org.jm/glossary.html"

Again

"Is a process by which species come to possess genetic adaptations to their environment. Its mechanism is natural selection. It also requires genetic mutations.
www.geog.ouc.bc.ca/physgeog/physgeoglos/e.html"

Again . . .

"A change in the gene pool of a population over time.
berlinadmin.dlr.de/Missions/galileo/sepo/atjup/fp.html"

Again . . .

"A change in allele frequencies in a population of organisms over time.
home.uleth.ca/bio/bio1020/taxonomy.html"

And again. Do I have to explain evolutionists their own theory in order to debate it? :confused:

And yet you consistently equate "change" to "loss" when the two are not the same thing.

Creationism Does Not Even Meet the Standards of Christian Belief

That Creationism is not a science is easy enough to prove and has been more than adequately demonstrated in other threads (please don't offer your "scientific proof" here). What I would like Creationist to address is how they rationalize the religious inconsistencies of Creationism and Christianity. I do not believe Creationism follows its own Christian standards of belief.

Since Creationism claims to be a science it must adhere to the scientific method. It is this method, when applied to Christian belief, which undermines the faith of Creationists. This method is composed of fours steps:

1. Observation and description of a phenomenon.
2. Formulation of a hypothesis to explain the phenomena.
3. Use of the hypothesis to make predictions.
4. Performance of experimental tests of the predictions by several independent experimenters and properly performed experiments.

If the experiments bear out the hypothesis it may come to be regarded as a theory or law of nature. If the experiments do not bear out the hypothesis, it must be rejected or modified. There is always the possibility that a new observation or a new experiment will come along and conflict with, and overturn, a theory.

Therefore, to be a science Creationists must begin with the understanding that their theory is based upon observable and verifiable data, with the possibility that it could one day be overturned.

However, the basis of Christianity is not verifiable data and proof, but rather, faith. The Bible, both Old and New Testaments, are very clear on the central role of faith. Isaiah commands, “If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all.” This is further reinforced in the New Testament, “The righteous will live by faith” (Romans 1:17).

The Bible is very clear that religious faith takes precedent over the world of men’s ideas. Corinthians’ rejection of the scientific world is unambiguous, “… your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power” (1 Corinthians 2:5).

What is science if not men’s wisdom?

In Hebrews it is written that, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” Not by theories or evidence or factual proofs.

Christianity is not to be proven through pseudo-science or even real science, but must be taken on faith.

Therefore, Creationism, if it truly claims to be a science, is bad religion. If it is a religion, then it is bad science.

That evolution is a science is not in dispute, even by most reputable creationists.

Those of you who believe creationism (i.e. Christianity in a lab coat) is a science can spend your time and effort here bashing evolution if you like, but can you defend your "theory" using the fundamentals of your own religion?

You're right. There is evidence for the big bang, but for some reason any nimrod who can tell you "The universe is expanding" feels like they earned the right to say the big bang is based on faith. Unless you can tell me the significance of t=10^-34 s , you have no business trying to disprove that theory.
(For the curious thats the farthest back in time we can measure using the Cosmic Microwave Background .0000000000000000000000000000000001 seconds after the bang.)

go planck's time!

oh, and to the guy who said that evolution is the only explanation for life that does not invlove the supernatural... what about if life onm earth is aliens fleeing the destruction of their homeworld? what about that?

but then there's no evidence of that either.

go planck's time!

oh, and to the guy who said that evolution is the only explanation for life that does not invlove the supernatural... what about if life onm earth is aliens fleeing the destruction of their homeworld? what about that?

Wow, you got us there, Dakini. Because of course the backbone of the entire evolutionary theory is the little green men from outerspace hypothesis.

I guess I'll just pack up the old science kit and go to church.

As a strong atheist I feel offended to see Atheism be called a religion.
It's plain dumb, sorry...
Religion comes from "re-ligare" (or something like that), which means reunite..body and soul. Guess what, we atheist DO NOT belive in soul, nor God, nor whatever, so stop claiming that Atheism is a religion or I'll get pissed.

(First off, I suspect you're going to pull out a real study.)

I expect that the lone scientist would be treated as a crackpot and mostly ignored. You're right about that. The reason is that at this point, his evidence doesn't jibe with the large body of evidence supporting carbon dating and other aspects of evolution.

Even ignoring the present weight of the evidence, rejection is normal for new theories; scientists are human too. The scientific method is meant to minimize bias and have scientists police themselves. We've shown that theories that are initially unpopular and against the weight of the evidence -- like the plate-tectonic theory, the heliocentric solar system, and evolution itself -- can eventually become widely accepted by the normal process of scientists debating ideas.

So if you really are confident that evolution is hogwash, don't cry conspiracy, just be patient. Evolution dominates biology textbooks because it's the only theory to earn, repeat, earn, the respect of the mainstream scientific community.

If I were designing a school science curriculum, I would actually include creationism and other pseudoscientific or discredited theories, for the sake of teaching kids about history and the scientific method. If we just tell people "this is how it is; don't question it," we're no better than priests. We want to encourage people to question all ideas, even the ones we're pretty sure about. The problem with allowing creationism into the classroom is that its backers want to include _only_ their version, and not other versions like Buddhist, Shinto, or Scientologist myth, and to present it as equal to mainstream science, and to imply that kids should choose based on faith. Teaching science that way doesn't help kids learn what scientists believe, or how to think rationally, so all it does it hurt students.

-Kris
MIT '03
Coral Zone

I appreciate that reply, thank you.

Although I would take exception to the last part about the backers of creationism wanting only their belief presented. I have not found that to be the case. Every argument I have heard for inclusino of creationism into the curriculum is meant to accompany, not replace, evolution.

Let me throw this back at you. Suppose the same scenario, but instead incontrovertible evidence is found for evolution, or even archeological evidence that Jesus was a fraud.

Would Christians give up their faith?

They would not, nor should they. Why? Because faith is not about evidence or proof. Your example about bacteria does not apply because such scientific advancements do not address fundamental questions of God and faith. Those questions are best addressed through devotion and prayer, not scientific theories, archeological digs, or laboratory experiments (I say this as an on-again off-again agnostic).

If your faith can be shaken by worldly evidence then I think most religious people would conclude your faith is not very strong. And if your faith remains in the face of empirical evidence then you can't make a claim that it is a science.

You are absolutely correct, but your answer does seem to imply faith in evolution as well.

As a strong atheist I feel offended to see Atheism be called a religion.
It's plain dumb, sorry...
Religion comes from "re-ligare" (or something like that), which means reunite..body and soul. Guess what, we atheist DO NOT belive in soul, nor God, nor whatever, so stop claiming that Atheism is a religion or I'll get pissed.

Hey Rokolev...

Atheism is a religion... sorry. According to Miriam-Webster online (yes, the contemporary definition of the word is more relevant than the etymology of it)
religion (4):a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith

It takes faith to believe in Atheism just as it takes faith to believe in a particular Theology. In fact, I'd say it takes more, re:Pascal's Wager

Hey Rokolev...

Atheism is a religion... sorry. According to Miriam-Webster online (yes, the contemporary definition of the word is more relevant than the etymology of it)
religion (4):a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith

It takes faith to believe in Atheism just as it takes faith to believe in a particular Theology. In fact, I'd say it takes more, re:Pascal's Wager

Please, hardly anyone has faith these days.

You don't need faith to be athiest or religious. In fact, in most cases both of these stiffle faith with rules an threats of afterlife for one, and a absolute disregard to anything no in the physical world in the other.

You are absolutely correct, but your answer does seem to imply faith in evolution as well.

No. I believe the theory of evolution to be true because of the preponderance of evidence. I believe it in the same way I believe the theory of gravity or the Bernoulli principle, both of which allow me to get on an airplane without having to resort to faith (although I have been on flights where faith would have come in handy). It is the most likely theory I have found to explain the diversity of life on the planet, as well as the most logical model describing the origin of human life.

I think part of the problem lies in the difference between the common usuage of the word theory and the way it is used in science. When you or I say theory we generally mean something uncertain or vague, with a rather low chance of being true. Often in these discussions the word is accompanied by the qualifier "just," as in "it is just a theory."

In science a theory is something used to explain existing facts and to predict new ones. To be a theory in the scientific sense the explanation must meet certain logical, empirical, sociological and historical criteria. The reality is that while we use the term to apply to any idea that might pop into our heads, in science for an idea to reach the state of a theory is a rigorous process.

If I had "faith" in evolution I would not need evidence, but would rely instead on the "substance of things hoped for and the proof of things unseen."

I spend too much time posting crap on these message boards. Time for a break from the General Forum. I leave with a quote from a really bad Sean Connery movie, Zardoz:

Zed: We've all been used and reused...
Friend: ...and abused...
Arthur: ...and amused!

If I had "faith" in evolution I would not need evidence, but would rely instead on the "substance of things hoped for and the proof of things unseen."
You make a very good point, but the faith I refer to is the faith in the various components that join to form what you see as a preponderance of evidence.

Firstly, you're putting your faith into the integrity and competence of the scientists who generate and support the theory. Second, you put faith in the precision and validity of the methods and sub theories used to produce the Theory of Evolution (such as carbon dating, fossil records, etc) Third, your faith is so strong that if a counter-argument is offered, you would probably find it very difficult to let go of your current systems.

I'll use an example. I do not recall the details beyond what I will present here, but if you folks are really interested I can research it for you. I do however give my word that what I do present here is true to the best of my memory.

In a recent dig in central Africa a scientist unearthed the remains of what could be another step in the evolution of man from apes. Taking samples of material from the remains, he sent one to each of the 3 major laboratories in the world that do carbon dating. 2 are in the US, 1 in the UK.

Meanwhile, based upon other archaeolgical data gathered at the site, he hypothesized that the remains dated back approximately 15,000 years.

Eventually the results of the carbon dating tests were returned. One lab confidently dated the remains at 300,000 years. Another gave a date of 13,000 years, and the last gave a date of 35,000 years. The scientist chose to adhere to the value that most closely matched his original hypothesis and announced to the world that indeed he had found another piece of the puzzle of the missing link, and that his find was between 13,000 and 15,000 years old, proven by carbon dating.

I'll use an example. I do not recall the details beyond what I will present here, but if you folks are really interested I can research it for you. I do however give my word that what I do present here is true to the best of my memory.


Please do give details! Who was this? Where'd you get this information? I very much am interested.

Please do give details! Who was this? Where'd you get this information? I very much am interested.

Will do. And feel free to send a telegram if you like.

Eventually the results of the carbon dating tests were returned. One lab confidently dated the remains at 300,000 years.

That quote makes me doubt your claim.

From the talk.origins archive page on carbon dating, I find that
" Any tool will give bad results when misused. Radiocarbon dating has some known limitations. Any measurement which exceeds these limitations will probably be invalid. In particular, radiocarbon dating works to find ages not much older than 50,000 years. Using it to date older items will give bad results. "

From c14dating.com, I find
"the limit of the technique is about 55-60 000 years. Obviously, the limit of the method differs between laboratories dependent upon the extent to which background levels of radioactivity can be reduced. Amongst accelerator laboratories there has been mooted the theoretical possibility of extended range dating to 75 000 yr +, at present this seems difficult to attain because of the problems in accurately differentiating between ions that mimic the mass and charge characteristics of the C14 atom. Beukens (1994) for instance has stated that this means the limit of the range for his Isotrace laboratory is 60 000 yr which is very similar to the conventional range."

Thus, your claim that a "lab confidently dated the remains at 300,000 years" is impossible - carbon dating can't confidently give a result of 300,000 years. At best, it can give 60,000; even 75,000 is "theoretically possible" but too difficult to do.

That quote makes me doubt your claim.

From the talk.origins archive page on carbon dating, I find that
" Any tool will give bad results when misused. Radiocarbon dating has some known limitations. Any measurement which exceeds these limitations will probably be invalid. In particular, radiocarbon dating works to find ages not much older than 50,000 years. Using it to date older items will give bad results. "

From c14dating.com, I find
"the limit of the technique is about 55-60 000 years. Obviously, the limit of the method differs between laboratories dependent upon the extent to which background levels of radioactivity can be reduced. Amongst accelerator laboratories there has been mooted the theoretical possibility of extended range dating to 75 000 yr +, at present this seems difficult to attain because of the problems in accurately differentiating between ions that mimic the mass and charge characteristics of the C14 atom. Beukens (1994) for instance has stated that this means the limit of the range for his Isotrace laboratory is 60 000 yr which is very similar to the conventional range."

Thus, your claim that a "lab confidently dated the remains at 300,000 years" is impossible - carbon dating can't confidently give a result of 300,000 years. At best, it can give 60,000; even 75,000 is "theoretically possible" but too difficult to do.


Agreed carbon dating cant

But things like
uranium-238 dating is good through 100 million

and potassium-40 doesn’t start getting accurate until after the 100 k mark! (good through 4.5 billion or so … but we don’t have a sample older then that to try it on)


so … if they did one of the other dating methods

so … if they did one of the other dating methods

Well, the claim was that Carbon Dating was inaccurate because it gave such-and-such a result. I was showing that that result cannot have been true, and idicated an unreliable analysis. There are definitely other methods for dating older samples - but this claim was about Carbon dating specifically.

"Tree Rings and C-14

The study of climatic changes through tree rings (Dendrochronlogy) started in the 1920s. In simple terms, dendrochronolgists can determine past seasonal climates by looking at the rings of trees. In certain species of trees, a ring will appear wider if the weather has been wet. During a dry season, a ring will be much narrower. A ring is established by the change from spring to winter. During the spring, a tree adds new, large cells to the outer layer. As winter approaches, the cells are smaller in contrast; thus establishing each year that has passed.

[...]

An interesting side point is that they are able to date volcanic explosions by examining its effects in affected rings.

There are no known living trees over 5,000 years old, so how could anyone know about building a tree chronology back to pre-flood times? The answer lies in building a chronology from dead trees onto the live trees. The method for building tree chronology is very simple and extremely sound as well. The key is to find a standing dead tree that had an overlapping life with a living one. By using this method, rings can be compared or visually overlaid (think of two viewgraphs) to add the number of standing dead trees rings to the number of rings of live trees. Another verification is to find the ring damage in both sets of trees resulting from the volcanic activity along with matching rings. Once these dates have been established, more tree ring chronology can be added by comparing fallen dead tree rings to the standing dead tree rings (See Figure on tree rings.)

[...]

Scientists can check how many C-14 per C-12 atoms there were in the atmosphere during every century all the way back through the tree ring chronology by checking the carbon-14 dating wood from these very old trees. Using this method in the Bristlecomb Pine trees, carbon-14 dating has been checked back to over 9000 years ago."

Excerpted from http://www.nazarene-friends.org/booklets/RadiometricDating.htm.

Also from that website - an anecdote suspiciously similar to what you're talking about... but also just an anecdote, unfortunately.

"When I started reading Young Earth literature, I found the arguments against carbon dating very strong. I remember reading a book that told of a Yale study about carbon dating. They quote the study as coming up with three significantly different ages when dating a single sample. It turns out this is true, but very incomplete. Any good report on science will have been based on an beginning to end understanding of a given study. I thought as I read, ‘How can anyone rely on this method? It is obvious that Carbon dating is inaccurate!’ It becomes obvious that the authors were either very dishonest or simply found only enough facts to use to rebut the studies findings. This would be like someone quoting half a Bible verse to suit the needs of their argument when taking the whole verse clearly disproves their position. When I read Stoner’s book a couple of years later I was appalled at the bad research that was put into this study by my Christian brothers. Quoting Stoner again:

‘This acid wash was apparently misunderstood in one young-earth argument which claimed that, "Yale University dated an antler three different times and got three different ages - 5,340 years, 9,310 years, and 10,320 years." We might picture in our minds a very confused scientist until we check the original source where we find that the three dates were:

- the antler when it was contaminated with recently formed limestone - 9,310 years,
- the antler after the limestone had been washed out - 10,320 years,
- and the limestone itself which had been washed out into the acid - 5,340 years.

And so, when we look more closely, this turns out to be a perfectly reasonable set of measurements.’

Limestone contains a great deal of Carbon-14 and needs the acid wash to get the accurate results. It is very easy to come across this kind of ‘take what only half the facts and ignore the rest of a study’ tactics by creationists too many times. "

Anecdotes and counter-anecdotes... bleah.

That quote makes me doubt your claim.

Thus, your claim that a "lab confidently dated the remains at 300,000 years" is impossible - carbon dating can't confidently give a result of 300,000 years. At best, it can give 60,000; even 75,000 is "theoretically possible" but too difficult to do.

So if I remember one of those numbers incorrectly it must mean my whole point is meaningless? Let's toss that one aside then and assume I just recalled it wrong and stay witht he remaining values. DOes a disparity of 20,000 years mean so little?

I'm still looking for that original source, but in the meantime here's something for you guys to keep busy with that I found in the process of my serach:

http://www.cs.unc.edu/~plaisted/ce/dating.html#Carbon

Especially noteworthy a little less than halfway down the page are some quotes from scientists admitting that data that does not support their theories tends to get tossed out.

Okay, an actual source...

Quaternary Research
Volume 61, Issue 2 , March 2004, Pages 204-214
"Radiocarbon calibration beyond 20,000 14C yr B.P. by means of planktonic foraminifera of the Iberian Margin"
By Edouard Bard, Frauke Rostek and Guillemette Ménot-Combes

"Except for ages older than 40,000 14C yr B.P., Greenland's GISP2 and GRIP records yield similar calendars. The 14C and imported calendar ages of the Iberian Margin record are then compared to data — from lacustrine annual varves and from corals and speleothems dated by U–Th — previously used to extend the calibration beyond 20,000 14C yr B.P. The new record follows a smooth pattern between 23,000 and 50,000 cal yr B.P. We find good agreement with the previous data sets between 23,000 and 31,000 cal yr B.P. In the interval between 33,000 and 41,000 cal yr B.P., for which previous records disagree by up to 5000 cal yr, the Iberian Margin record closely follows the polynomial curve that was previously defined by an interpolation of the coral ages and runs between the Lake Suigetsu and the Bahamian speleothem data sets."

Translation - "we made a calendar of a certain phenomenon based on 14C dating and other methods. They agreed with each other and with our predicted curve."

Or, how about

Quaternary International
Volume 61, Issue 1 , November 1999, Pages 27-39
"Paleo-environment and radiocarbon calibration as derived from Late glacial/Early Holocene tree-ring chronologies "
Michael Friedrich, Bernd Kromer, Marco Spurk, Jutta Hofmann and Klaus Felix Kaiser

"We present an overview of the extended Hohenheim oak chronology (HOC) and the dendrochronologically dated Preboreal pine tree-ring chronology (PPC). Both provide an absolute, annual time frame of the Holocene, extending into the Younger Dryas (YD) back to 11,919 BP. Two floating pine and larch chronologies are 14C dated, covering large parts of the Lateglacial. Dendro-ecological parameters, such as ring width and stable isotope variation are used to infer past environmental conditions. 14C analyses on decadal sections provide a high-precision, high-resolution data set for calibration of the radiocarbon time scale. Based on a marked change in ring-width and growth pattern, the YD termination is clearly identified in the German pine chronology. Its absolute age of 11,570 BP appears synchronous, within the errors of the respective chronologies, to related signals in the Greenland ice cores (GRIP, GISP2) and in lacustrine varve sequences. The 14C age of the Laacher-See tephra (LST) is determined from a series of decadal tree-ring samples to 11,063±12 14C BP; the calibrated range is 13,010–13,200 cal BP. The climatic impact of the LST is reflected in the growth pattern of our tree ring chronologies. "

Translation - "for a test of this single sample, three dating methods agreed."

So if I remember one of those numbers incorrectly it must mean my whole point is meaningless? Let's toss that one aside then and assume I just recalled it wrong and stay witht he remaining values. DOes a disparity of 20,000 years mean so little?

I'm still looking for that original source, but in the meantime here's something for you guys to keep busy with that I found in the process of my serach:

http://www.cs.unc.edu/~plaisted/ce/dating.html#Carbon

Especially noteworthy a little less than halfway down the page are some quotes from scientists admitting that data that does not support their theories tends to get tossed out.

Quotes, quotes, quotes... gimme studies! Evidence!

...whoa, and lookie at the source of those quotes...

"Here are some quotes from John Woodmorappe's paper, "Radiometric Geochronology Reappraised," Creation Research Society Quarterly 16(2)102-29, p. 147, September 1979, that indicate that radiometric dates are scattered, and that anomalies are often not reported:"

It's someone publishing a page of quotes in a creation journal? So, he interviews creationists, finds that they say that scientists lie, and claims that as proof?

Looking through the section on "anomalies of radiometric dating," quick paragraph-by-paragraph summary...

Paragraphs 1-4:
There are anomalies in dating that don't seem to be explained but are thrown out and disregarded. I don't know how often they occur, but it's not insignificant. Thus, whatever is making them inaccurate can invalidate the entire dating method.

Next several sections are one-line quotes, not about data, but about conclusions -

"Improved laboratory techniques and improved constants have not reduced the scatter in recent years. Instead, the uncertainty grows as more and more data is accumulated ... " (Waterhouse).
"In general, dates in the `correct ball park' are assumed to be correct and are published, but those in disagreement with other data are seldom published nor are discrepancies fully explained." (Mauger)
" ... the thing to do is get a sequence of dates and throw out those that are vastly anomalous." (Curtis et al)
" ... it is usual to obtain a spectrum of discordant dates and to select the concentration of highest values as the correct age." (Armstrong and Besancon).
"In general, strong discordances can be expected among ages deduced by different methods." (Brown and Miller)

Evidence? Studies? Data? The fact that "a scientist said it" does not mean it is representative of scientists as a whole, or that it's true. A published study in a peer-reviewed scientific journal showing that there are anomalies that cannot be explained away. And, of course, an explanation of why do results often agree despite the supposed inaccuracy.

...anyhow, that's a tangent - we were discussing 14C dating, yes?

It has been verified, among other things, by dendrochronology (tree rings).

His objections to dendrochronology can be summed up by
"Um, I don't understand the method, maybe there are flaws in it? Here's a quote by some random guy who says that one dating attempt was flawed. Conclusion - dendrochronology is invalid!"

Erm, that doesn't quite work. It's used, accepted, has been tested - and he provides no evidence for throwing it out besides speculation.

Although I would take exception to the last part about the backers of creationism wanting only their belief presented. I have not found that to be the case. Every argument I have heard for inclusino of creationism into the curriculum is meant to accompany, not replace, evolution.
I meant that Creationists seem to want to add only their theory to the classroom, rather than adding a wide variety of viewpoints from other religions and placing evolution in its historical context. It would teach kids a lot to look at any of the really controversial theories, and see the debate among scientists, theologians, politicians, the media, and the public. Just putting a sticker in a textbook saying "evolution is just a theory" (as some districts do) singles it out unfairly, as though it weren't mainstream science.

Remember, though, that teaching evolution + creation is a fallback position for Christians. They originally wanted to ban teaching evolution altogether, just as they've traditionally used censorship and violence to silence competing ideas. This is not the behavior of an open and honest belief system.

I suggest Edward Larson's book "Summer For the Gods," a historical look at the Scopes "Monkey Trial." There's also the book/play/movie "Inherit the Wind." "Summer" points out a lot of info omitted or distorted by "Wind," such as the ACLU's involvement and the story of how evolution became the prevailing theory.

It's also interesting to look at eugenics, the pseudoscience of weeding out human "defectives" through selective breeding, invented by Darwin's evil cousin Charles Galton Darwin. America had forced sterilization laws for a while, including a "three-strikes-and-you're-castrated" program for violent criminals. I know some Creationists/Christians look at science and say it leads to immorality, but the consequences of an idea don't make it true or false. (Just because an idea makes you feel good doesn't make it true.) And anyway, evolution says nothing about whether we should do anything, only about what is.

Oh, and to the original post: many Christians seem to consider evolution compatible with their beliefs, so how can it be "bad Christianity?" The religion is whatever its believers say it is.

And from a textbook I have on "Biological Psychology":

"As Descartes was preparing to publish his book, he learned that the Vatican had forced Galileo to renounce his teaching that Earth revolves around the sun, threatening to execute him... Descartes withheld his book from publication... He asserted that humans, at least, had a non-material soul as well as a material body. This notion of dualism spread widely... Biological psychologists reject dualism and insist that all the workings of the mind can also, in theory, be understood as a purely physical process in the material world, specifically in the brain.

A bold statement to bury in a corner of page 19! Even though the facts of modern science can be reconciled with Christianity if you interpret the Bible vaguely enough, the philosophy behind science is a threat to the basic religious worldview of believing things on faith.

Oh, and to the original post: many Christians seem to consider evolution compatible with their beliefs, so how can it be "bad Christianity?" The religion is whatever its believers say it is.

And from a textbook I have on "Biological Psychology":

"As Descartes was preparing to publish his book, he learned that the Vatican had forced Galileo to renounce his teaching that Earth revolves around the sun, threatening to execute him... Descartes withheld his book from publication... He asserted that humans, at least, had a non-material soul as well as a material body. This notion of dualism spread widely... Biological psychologists reject dualism and insist that all the workings of the mind can also, in theory, be understood as a purely physical process in the material world, specifically in the brain.

A bold statement to bury in a corner of page 19! Even though the facts of modern science can be reconciled with Christianity if you interpret the Bible vaguely enough, the philosophy behind science is a threat to the basic religious worldview of believing things on faith.

I don't see how that statement is a threat to a religious worldview (at least one that holds the soul as non-material. The idea that the soul must somehow be equivalent to the mind and give rise to thought process is just a theory that came about when thought itself was still reasoned to be a largely non-material process. It is not Cannon). If a person believes in god and believes that he is a part of all creation or that creation is his handiwork, then all purely physical processes that make up the mind (via sensory input and design) would be processing that which is of god. The soul would be the non-material totality of a person, the essence of a person. Choosing to accept god, a decision which would, as all decisions do, affect the brain pattern in some small way, would then be letting god into one's soul.

Don't you think creationism, the search for facts and evidence to prove the Christian faith, runs counter to the idea that this religion, and indeed most religions, is based on the idea that you should believe as a matter of faith, not fact?

While I will hold to my idea that the particular type of religion itself must dictate whether or not faith and seeking evidence in the physical world aremutually exclusive, after reading the comments of some of backers of creationism, I am now more willing to say that in many cases it is bad faith. Way too much refusal to consider other established scientific facts (like the fact that the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics has other than classical applications) which would refute their refutations of evolution, coupled with the fact that much more of creationism than I had originally thought (never paid more than passing attention before recently) isn't even centered on developing actual new theories (like none of it) so much as finding loopholes (usually just semantic) with the theory of evolution and calling that their 'proof.' So what I am concluding is that the majority of them have no real interest in even seeking outside proof for the existance of their religion. What they are seeking is validation of their religious beliefs from other people. And if you need for someone else to tell you that your religion is correct - well, can't get much less faithful than that.

I agree with your assessment that most proponents of creationism are less interested in turning their religion into science and more concerned with tearing down a theory they believe strikes at the heart of their religious beliefs.

Despite the overwhelming evidence for the validity of the theory of evolution most people still hold onto their traditional religious beliefs.

According to a 2001 Gallup poll on creationism, evolution, and public education:

45% believe that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so

37% believe that human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God guided the process.

12% believe that human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God had no part in this process.

6% answered "no opinion" or "other".

When asked by name whether they believe in or lean more towards the "theory of creationism" or the "theory of evolution", 57% indicated creationism, 33% indicated evolution, and 10% responded "not sure."

OK... Does the BIG bang uply to science? Heck does anything uply to science? no!!!!

Read the BIBLE!

Read the BIBLE!

Yes, by all means, read the Bible. It is a great way to learn science. For instance:

According to the Bible a person can live three days without oxygen.

“Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights” (Jonah 1:17).

Also, the earth is flat.

“And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth” (Revelation 7:1). “And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth” (Isaiah 11:12).

How long did it take Noah to place at least two of each of the more than 50 million animals species on his boat? A single day, meaning an average of 1,157 animals boarded the boat every second.

“In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, and the sons of Noah, and Noah’s wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark; They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort” (Genesis 7:13-14).

How are clouds made? Why the dust from God's feet, of course.

"The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet" (Nahum 1:3).

It is also helpful for guiding one in all manner of daily activities. Consider:

What does Jesus say about a woman’s appearance?

“In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array” (1 Timothy 2:9).

I hope none of you Christian ladies are wearing gold jewelry or braiding your hair.

How about women’s fashions?

“The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 22:5).

Ladies, you aren't wearing jeans, are you?

Are you allowed tatoos?

“Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord” (Leviticus 19:28). “They shall not . . . make any cuttings in their flesh” (Leviticus 21:5).

Have some of you disobeyed your parents? What punishment did God say is mandatory for an unruly child?

"And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die" (Deuteronomy 21:20-21). "For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death" (Mark 7:10). "And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death" (Exodus 21:15). "And he that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death (Exodus 21:17)."

Now are any of you Christian women in school? Shame, shame.

"Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression" (1 Timothy 2:11-14).

So, please, read the Bible and further your education (except for you women).

Read the Bible. It is a great way to learn science. For instance:

According to the Bible a person can live three days without oxygen.

“Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights” (Jonah 1:17).

Also, the earth is flat.

“And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth” (Revelation 7:1). “And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth” (Isaiah 11:12).

How long did it take Noah to place at least two of each of the more than 50 million animals species on his boat? A single day, meaning an average of 1,157 animals boarded the boat every second.

“In the selfsame day entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, and the sons of Noah, and Noah’s wife, and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark; They, and every beast after his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort” (Genesis 7:13-14).

How are clouds made? Why the dust from God's feet, of course.

"The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet" (Nahum 1:3).

It is also helpful for guiding one in all manner of daily activities. Consider:

What does Jesus say about a woman’s appearance?

“In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array” (1 Timothy 2:9).

I hope none of you Christian ladies are wearing gold jewelry or braiding your hair.

How about women’s fashions?

“The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God” (Deuteronomy 22:5).

Ladies, you aren't wearing jeans, are you?

Are you allowed tatoos?

“Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord” (Leviticus 19:28). “They shall not . . . make any cuttings in their flesh” (Leviticus 21:5).

Have some of you disobeyed your parents? What punishment did God say is mandatory for an unruly child?

"And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die" (Deuteronomy 21:20-21). "For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death" (Mark 7:10). "And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death" (Exodus 21:15). "And he that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death (Exodus 21:17)."

Now are any of you Christian women in school? Shame, shame.

"Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression" (1 Timothy 2:11-14).

So, please, read the Bible and further your education (except for you women).

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