Sidewalker

Well done, I think a History forum was conspicuously absent, I'm sure it will be a popular category.

Also looking forward to that being where all the Trump posts belong :)

Your contentions here are based on a contrived presumption that the theory of evolution in some way contradicts Christian faith, it doesn't.

What you are contending requires a direct refutation of the most general principles of most of our physical and biological sciences. As a unifying theory of biology, evolution holds true. Its mechanisms are by no means completely understood and it does not in any way eliminate the mystery of life, question the existence of God, or bring into doubt any of the basic tenets of Christianity.

But it is absolutely central to science.

The theory of evolution is the great unifying principle of biology, as powerful a model to biology as Newton's model was to physics. The conceptual framework of the theory of evolution makes sense of a profoundly wide range of scientific facts and it does it in a magnificent and comprehensive way. It provides a principle of unity, a framework by which science can attempt to explain, to unify, and to order, a vast amount of disparate data into a consistent whole providing tremendous coherence and clarity. To deny evolution you must bring into question the entire interwoven fabric of scientific research.

Flat out denial of the theory of Evolution requires the concomitant denial of an astounding range of scientific disciplines, not just the disciplines of geology, paleontology, archeology, radiometric dating, genetics, and zoology but also such fundamental disciplines as physics, astronomy, astrophysics, chemistry, biochemistry, geophysics, biology, botany, microbiology, and meteorology, and many others. Because of the interrelated aspect of the sciences you can't really propose that the theory evolution is false without being fundamentally anti-scientific. You can contend that the theory of evolution is incomplete, nobody claims it is complete. If you could in fact, deny the theory of evolution, it would, in effect, unravel the world of science.

And I just don't see why anyone would want to do that. I simply do not see evolution challenging any of the basic tenets of Christianity; unfortunately, I can't say the same thing about your contention here. In order to support the belief that evolution is false, you accordingly have to postulate a deceptive God don't you?

You would need to propose a God who would create Man with a rational mind, a sense of wonder, and seeking intellect, while creating a universe with the false appearance of tremendous age with the overwhelming evidence of "evolution" occuring in creation as a trick or something. This concept of a deceptive God is very hard to accept, it strikes me as a much greater challenge to Christianity than any damage the concept of evolution could ever hope to do.

you are describing the change of an animal. I am arguing that Abiogenesis is impossible. it is logically impossible for something not alive to become alive 

For the life of me I will never understand this conflict between evolution and Christianity. I think it is simply contrived and ridiculous. It is very much like the grief Copernicus got for his discovery, he was attacked "as if" the theory that the sun and planets revolved around the earth were a tenet of the Christian faith, but it wasn't.

A Christian faith that is threatened by the theory of evolution is certainly a very weak faith. I would like to propose another way for Christians to look at the theory of Evolution.

First, lets recognize that the "mechanism" Darwin proposed is a tautology. Survival of the fittest really says that in hindsight, the survivors survived...ok...no great shakes there.

But what was Darwin's real accomplishment?

At a point in time when Science was at it's peak of materialistic and deterministic hubris, Darwin applied the scientific method to the history life, and here is what he found.

1) That life was contingent. Contingent upon the rest of creation, its growth and development was a mysterious interplay between nature and nurture, between the individual and the environment, between the part and the whole. He proclaimed all of life to be a unity and stated that in time and space we are all interconnected to each other and to everything else.

2) That life was probabilistic, and consequently, it was not deterministic. Darwinian evolution has no predictive quality, life is open ended, filled with infinite possibility, and its history shows endless variety.

3) That all of life is one life. He demonstrated that all life is interconnected, all of life is related to each other and to the rest of the world. In time, he demonstrated that all life had descended (ascended would have been a better word) from one initial instance of life. He did not explain away the mystery of life, to date, science has not even touched upon the mystery of life. 
4) That life is transcendent,

Darwin, by applying the scientific method, rigorously and in a comprehensive way, to life, determined that life was contingent, probabilistic, and it constitutes a unity. He put science to Genesis, in no way contradicting it in word or in spirit. He correlated the facts of science to the overriding image provided by theology.

This was at the peak of Science's deterministic and materialistic arrogance, and in one fell swoop he turned science around, he changed the direction of Science's journey so to speak. Somewhere along the line, the prodigal son of Science had diverged and gone astray and now, with centuries of new knowledge and experiences under it's belt, it had turned back around and begun a journey down a path that would some day intersect and converge with the original path.

I just don't understand what all the contrived conflict is about. Please don't give me that he provided design without a designer. First of all, he didn't, second of all we are talking about a transcendent God, objective proofs are not possible and in fact, are considered to be a form of idolatry, in that they focus on the concept of God rather than the experience of God. There are no objective proofs of the existence of God and there can't be, so this does not hold up as an argument against the concept of evolution.

Rather than just blindly follow Kent Hovind’s anti-science rants, can you explain what the real problem with this theory is?

Interesting, a new member telling old members how the forum works, and a racist appealing to "diversity", that's not something you see everyday.

Oh wait, yes it is, in fact it's two of the basic principle taught in the Klan's "How to disrupt on-line discussion boards 101" class.

It’s not hard to see that science has built a self-sustaining system, a mathematical tissue of concepts, its gone way beyond interpretation of observations to become a tower of abstraction that is completely detached from the reality it was meant to interpret.
 
It is easy to get carried away, taking our symbols for reality instead of as mere tools of description.  Are we uncovering a preexisting order, converging on the way the universe really is, or is it all just a human construction, just a fitting of the data into a carefully crafted mental framework? When are we doing physics? When are we just conjuring with numbers? 
 
It is becoming harder and harder to tell how much of the order is truly woven into the world and how much is imposed by the brain’s hunger for pattern.  We build these systems to represent the world, and then we are left to wonder what they mean. 

This isn’t a question that physics can answer with our present knowledge or without some form of qualification.

Thanks for clearing that up for me.

IwantRooseveltagain, are you trying to say that people who believed Trump when he said Putin is your friend and the American people are your enemy are stupid?

I mean, cmon, that's like saying people who abandon democracy for a Russian backed Autocrat because he hugged a flag aren't patriots.  You don't think that's stupid do you?

I suppose you think people who can be controlled by conspiracy theories  aren't critical thinkers, or maybe that racists aren't good people.  

Maybe you just don't understand alternative facts. 

According to the Standard Model of Cosmology, the Universe is temporally and spatially finite, and it is expanding. 

The question becomes, what is it expanding into?

In another thread, on a far away board, much like this one, angry Evangelical Colorblinds (ECs) finally proved that Green does not exist. Here is a report by someone that was actually there...

For centuries it has been said that Green was both blue and yellow, and yet, it was neither blue nor yellow.

The Evangelical Colorblinds (ECs) pointed out the obvious contradictions in this paradoxical statement, it was proven that something can not be both and yet neither at the same time, and Green was shown to be illogical and irrational.     

Those who believed in Green pointed out that people everywhere, in all times, always, have reported having experienced the color Green.

The ECs explained that those people lived in a pre-scientific age, which is equal to unscientific of course, and therefore Mankind must in fact have always been wrong and that Mankind has just always been delusional, simply wishing that there was a color Green.

It was shown that what is referred to as Green by pre/unscientific man is merely a particular wavelength of light within the visible spectrum of the electromagnetic field, and that in fact, the color Green had therefore been explained away by science. It was determined that Green has no objective existence.

It was pointed out by the people that believed in Green that they do in fact experience the color Green themselves.

These people were told that the burden of proof was on them, that no one can prove the existence of Green, and it had already been proven that Green had no objective reality anyway. The EC's then explained that these people were also delusional, anti-scientific, illogical and irrational; they mocked them, called them names, and proclaimed them stupid.

The believers said that Green was the color of photosynthesis, that photosynthesis transforms light into life, and that the air we breathe is nourishing because of this process. It was said that no color chart is complete without Green.

The ECs proclaimed that Green was the color of envy and the color of money and so it was a function of greed. The ECs went on to show that most of the wars of mankind were fought by people wearing Green uniforms, so that Green has obviously been the cause of mayhem and murder for centuries, and it was shown that all of the terrorists of 911 had Green cards and so in our day, Green was nothing but the cause of terror and destruction also. It was stated that if men would simply accept science and renounce Green, the world would be a better place and we would have peace on earth.

I became frustrated by this thread and wanted a break from the discord and so I went to look at the Color Forum to read other threads to see what the believers had to say among themselves, I wanted to see people pronouncing the glory of Green in all its shades and hues.

But all I found were posts by the Forests mocking the Hunters and the Hunters mocking the Forests. People were telling the Azures and Turquoises that they had allowed the one true Green to become polluted by adopting the royal blues of the Romans and Greeks, and the sky blues of the Native Americans into their Green. People were telling the Emeralds and the Jades that they had allowed an eastern yellow to pervert and pollute the one true Green. The Pales were attacking the Darks, calling everyone neo-darks, and the Darks were attacking the Pales, saying they were Greenless. Ranging from patronizing to blatant anti-Olivism, it seemed everybody was picking on the Olives, some even said the Olives had killed Green. Teals were fighting with Chartreuses, there was a Seventh Day Avocadoists telling everyone that the world was coming to an end in capital letters, and some nutcase offering people a free toaster if they would accept Limeism and tithe. Everyone was proclaiming that their Green was the one true Green, and that all other Greens were false Greens.

I realized that nobody was really discussing Green; they all just seemed to be waiting for their turn to talk and then speaking about themselves, and I just didn't see the point of it all.

I realized that over half of the people in the world had developed their color charts on the basis of the color chart of the ancient Olives and so I think they must have been on to something. I also knew that the ancient Olives had believed that one should not even utter the word Green so as not to turn Green into an object and forget that the word Green was referential to a relationship. I was beginning to understand why the Olives tried not to use the word Green and so I decided that I would never again say the word Green as long as I lived, and having so resolved, I turned off my computer and went for a walk in the woods.

After a while I just didn't think about it anymore, I didn't try to put words to it, I just felt the grass under my feet and looked out at the plants and trees, the vastness of the blue sky filled me with a sense of awe and wonder, and the yellow sun warmed me. I breathed the fresh air and I was surrounded by an abundance of life, and I realized that it didn't matter what anyone had to say about the color Green, for I beheld that the quality of Green is within me.

I experienced something real and genuine that day. I don't exactly know how to express it with out saying the word, all I can say is that what I experienced that day was both blue and yellow, and yet, it was neither blue nor yellow.

Before another of TWS1405's threads descend into emotive outbursts and name calling , lets look at the underlying issue scientifically. Again and again, peer reviewed scientific studies have identified the root cause of racism to be:

Penis Envy

In fact, there is a linear relationship between the degree of racist attitude and smallness of naughty parts, and by applying the Stanford Racism Equivalency Test to the number and type of TWS1405 posts,  we find that TWS1405's racial attitudes result from deep feelings of inadequacy associated with the fact that his tiny member looks like a button.

Discuss.

This thread seems to have gone off the rails, away from facts and scientific analysis into emotive outbursts and name calling, lets bring it back rational analysis and look at the science .

Science has studied racism extensively and determined what the root cause is: 

Penis Envy

Scientifically speaking, studies have shown that racists have very small naughty parts, TWS1405's probably looks like a button.

Although the science of brain cell communication is well-understood, the complexity of thought processes is not well-defined. However, exploring the brain may help in understanding the bigger picture.
The brain is primarily composed of neurons, which are cells that generate electrical impulses for communication. It is estimated that the human brain has close to 100 billion neurons.
Neurons release brain chemicals, known as neurotransmitters, which generate these electrical signals in neighboring neurons. The electrical signals propagate like a wave to thousands of neurons, which leads to thought formation.

On a material level, Consciousness represents a supervenient structure that bears properties that its subvenient parts do not exhibit.  Consciousness is not coextensive with brain, it exists independently of material brain as a higher order structure that cannot be decomposed into its parts and their relationships, so it is an ontologically novel entity. It exists independently of the physical materials and properties of its parts and yet, exerts causal influence on events in the world, exerting a causal influence that its constituent components, in sum, cannot exert.  Consequently, it has an ontological status apart from its material components, and it logically follows that it is itself a causal agent as well as an entity that is acted upon by external causes.

Consciousness has causal influence due to its content, not solely because of the physical aspects of its neural correlates. A continuous conscious state includes desires or intentions, it includes the ability to envision a future state and establish a strategy for attaining that state. That makes it more than a purely physical state, it is a conscious state with reference to a future possibility, and no such reference is part of any purely physical state.  The self has the ability to exert the force of consciousness to some effect in the material world; such conscious states can have causal effect to bring about further states for the sake of values and purposes.  Intents, values, and purposes are not reducible to a purely physical state unless one attributes consciousness to the constituent matter itself; consequently they exist as properties of a consciousness which clearly entails a distinct ontological existence apart from its constituent material components.

In  J.J.C Smart’s “Sensations and Brain Processes”, he explores the relationship between the mind and body, specifically delving into the shortcomings of the theory of Dualism. In the work of Paul Churchland, Dualism distinguishes the mind from the body, categorizing consciousness as unable to be investigated by empirical science.

People who oppose dualism usually use a convenient definition of Dualism that suits their purposes, while this allows folks like Smart and Churchland to feel they have made their case, in the end, Dualists don’t believe in the Dualism that they don’t believe in either.
 
Within this school of thought are a variety of sub-theories such Substance Dualism, Popular Dualism, and Property Dualism. Smart however, asserts that “there are no philosophical arguments which compel us to be dualists”. 

Yeah, metaphysics is like that, there are no philosophical arguments that compel against Dualism either.  While the Dualism conclusion in not logically coercive, it does provide an intellectually satisfying way of making sense of the experiential reality of human consciousness.
In other words, Smart fails to see the logical reasoning behind Dualism, and instead proposes his Identity Theory of the Mind. Under this school of thought, while there is a slight distinction between mental states and brain processes, there are no non-physical properties. Although the physical properties may be vague or difficult to comprehend, they are still all physical properties.

Simply asserting that there are no non-physical properties isn’t an argument.

In his attack on Churchland’s notion of Dualism, Smart states: “[the idea] that everything should be explicable in terms of physics except the occurrence of sensations seems to me to be frankly unbelievable” .  Smart does not see why sensations should be granted such scientific leniency. His Identity Theory of Mind highlights the failure of Dualists to explain why sensations are not subjected to the same logical scientific expectations.

Smart and Churchland both reject Dualism, I’m not sure how refuting Churchland translates into a refutation of Dualism. 

However, Smart does spend considerable time grappling with the notion of sensations. He uses the example of pain to ultimately highlight the nuances between a mental state and a brain process. An ache is a “report of a brain process”, but it is not the same as the sensation of feeling pain . Thus, his thesis does not state that a sensation can be directly translated into a brain process, but does explain that the two are inextricably correlated. Sensations and mental states can exist, just as by-products of specific brain processes.

The interaction problem is a supposed problem for Dualism, the view of the mind that humans have two parts, an immaterial mind and the body
 
As you said, it’s a “supposed” problem, and it’s always struck me as a “contrived” matter of semantics with no logical basis.
 
I will state it as it follows:
 
1-The mind and body are two separate substances, and have no shared properties
 
It’s typically represented in this way, which is actually a self-refuting statement more about semantics than philosophy.  To start with the premise that mind and body exist as two “substances” obfuscates the issue at best, and in fact, it contends that they share the property of “existing as a substance”. 
 
2-two substances need one shared property to interact
 
The argument just dogmatically states that something we know to occur is metaphysically impossible, which isn’t an argument, it has no logical basis, .  The experiential fact of the matter is that mind and body do interact, the fact that we don’t understand how that occurs certainly doesn’t mean that it is impossible. 
 
3-the mind and body cannot interact
 
However, the mind and body do clearly act. Whether you are a materialistic, Idealist or whatever, you most likely belief that your thoughts cause your actions. You need to drop either one or two. 
 
Two can be supported by the fact it has wide confirmation: a hammer and a nail have the property of being physical, and ideas that interact with each other have the property of being ideas. 
 
Two is widely “asserted”, but it always appears to be presupposed without being established logically, that does not constitute “confirmation”. The attempt to deny the self-evident experiential reality of the interaction between mind and body, and the associated fact that mentally, we are causal agents, is a very extraordinary claim and extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The unfounded and completely faith-based belief that the observed facts of the matter are metaphysically impossible doesn’t constitute extraordinary evidence by any stretch of the imagination.