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Where does everyone stand in regards to...

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  • #81
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Nflytrap @ Dec. 28 2004,4:24)]Just my 0.0003

Where, then, does your sense of "evil" come from?

I agree with Wes on his paragraph. If there was no evil, mankind would have no need for God.



Edit: Another thing, you can't "prove" something happened-at least not to 100% certainty. Here's a little analogy to the way I look at it

Suppose you've got a barrel of apples. The person who gave them to you tell you they are all good apples. But how do you know? How can you find out?

Reach in and grab an apple...Sure enough...it is a nice looking apple...but you only pulled one apple.

Grab a few more-they are all good...but you still have only a few apples.

Suppose you pull 10 dozen good apples(and not one rotten apple)....which is a lot-but you can't be sure that they are all good. And you can't be sure that the next one you pull would be either good or rotten. The next one you pull could be a mango for all you know.













The only way to know would be to tip the barrel and remove all the apples

Now...in the real world(in this case science) is that possible?
In relation to faith and creationism, it would be the same as someone saying that there is a barrel full of apples but not even showing you the barrel or letting you touch the apples.
 
  • #82
I can't speak for Creationism(whatever the heck that is).

But the barrel is there-the apples are there, and you are free to pick them out. But you can't use your body, your soul, or your mind to do so.
 
  • #83
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Wesley @ Dec. 28 2004,11:16)]Oh by the way, there are millions of people that are praying for the people of Bosnia, and everywhere else that there are lost and injured people, especially during this time of crisis.  We do care, it's just that so many of us have no way to be able to get over there and help.  That's what the Salvation army, Samaritin's Purse(they're based here in Boone, cool huh?), etc are for.  I'll be and have been praying for those countries, and you.
They do help us, but the Salavation army do very little. Not near enough.
If God was so wonderful, he would help us.
You should go to Bosnia and see for yourself.
I know what the business is, all these people say: We are here to help them!! But they do very little.
All they do is keep peace, nothing else.
If God existed, he would send us help.
If he existed, he would restore Bosnia to the popular and beatiful country it once was.
 
  • #84
Hey Dino,
I think you are very much mistaken to say the Salvation army don't do much. Most of mankind's problems like Bosnia, our country etc are pretty much self inflicted.
How do you expect God to help you when all you can do is stick your finger up at him?
 
  • #85
Gee, turn my back for a day and 7 pages go by! Hi Wesley!

For more interesting and related debates, below are the links to the hot ones we had earlier in the year:

http://www.petflytrap.com/cgi-bin....+christ



http://www.petflytrap.com/cgi-bin....+christ

I just skimmed through the past 7 pages and was pretty impressed with Seedjar had to say.

Just so ya know, I was raised Jewish and had my Bar Mitzvah at age 13. By 15 I was an atheist. In college I met a bunch of Christians, belonging to a fellowship group called InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. And these folks, independently od one another debated with me and paryed for me and befriended me. Nearly 30 years later, we're still emailing!

I have a scientific, analytical mind. I wanted proof. I didn't get anything that couldn't be refuted or rationalized away. There was, and this was more after the fact, a lot of evidence to illustrate God's existence and that He provided us with His Son, Jesus, the Messiah. Why? No matter what translation you use or editing errors, the message has always been the same and it is clear:

God created. The Bible doesn't describe how He did it, but it is clear that God did the creating. Part of that creation was humanity. Humanity, when given a few guidelines and consequences, disobeyed. The consequences is death - eternal death. But God is compassionate. He provided a solution and the way to NOT face the consequences of our respective sin. Before Jesus arrived on the scene, some people understood that God was asking us to put their faith / confidence in Him (Abraham, David, Moses, The Prophets etc...). But God had a plan. He was taking eternal redemption to all of humanity. For this, He took His only Son, who is perfect, and sent Him to die on the cross. For those people who put their faith in Him and turned their lives around, they wouldn't have to face eternal death. For those who reject it, the consequences were same as before. Before and after Jesus the consequences and requirements were the same. Faith = eternal life. Rejection = eternal death. Forget the proofs. You won't get them You won't be satisfied.

BTW, we all have faith / confidence that when we type our messages, it will be posted and others will read them. that is just one illustration of how we put our trust in something.


Later, Jim
 
  • #86
[b said:
Quote[/b] ] To take either the bible or the theory of evolution as unquestionably true makes a person a fool, im not saying that you cant believe in only one or the other
In my mind there is proof AGAINST creationism.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]And it would be swell if we had pure, real facts, but really the closest thing that we have to a fact is that all facts depend on faith in consistency
Why are we arguing about this? ok... no "proof" is pure, real facts but neither is the bible (which is even worse) so the fact that we have no "pure, real facts" is irrelevant. We have what we have and that's it. We can't get "pure, real facts" so why even bother?
I don't get it.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]If he loves people so much, why did he let us suffer so much?
whoa whoa whoa! slow down... everyone (not just you) is turning this into a science vs. religion debate. I have PLENTY to say about religion itself but last time I checked this was about science and creationism (which only exists because of religion.. but that's not the point).
 
  • #87
Dino you should make another thread, you're comments are out of context.
 
  • #88
Like I said before, Most people who don't believe evolution I've come across didn't even understand evolution or the evidence for it... let's first understand what we're talking about...
here's a short version of the overwhelming evidence for evolution (and against creationism):
1. Fossil record- You find smaller and older (by radiocarbon dating, etc you determine that they're older) deeper in the ground than newer and bigger (of course you find small organisms throughout the fossil record since they didn't go extinct) organisms, you find them in order (dinosaurs come first, then Archaeopteryx, then birds.
First you find hyracotherium, then orohippus, then epihippus, then mesohippus, then dinohippus, and then equus (horses) You will never find horse bones among t-rex bones or human bones among trilobite fossils,
etc.
2. Biogeographical data- Clustering pattern among what darwing called "closely allied" species- similar creatures sharing roughly the same body plan- They are found around the same region (or we can account how they got there)For example, you won't find polar bears in antarctica or penguins in the arctic, and you also find that even in different places with the same weather there will be different organisms. Instead of beavers or rabbits or hares in south america, you find kapybaras (sp?) and others.... you get my drift.
 
  • #89
3. My favorite... structures.
Vestigial structures/behaviors (did I make up the behaviors part?)- organs/muscles/etc that are useless now OR that they don't serve a purpuse that others with that structure use it for (again... I'm not very articulate :p... that's not a good definition...I'll explain later) many Fish, shrimp, salamanders, etc. that live in caves have black things that used to be eyes and are now completely useless. whale pelvises, snake pelvises, beetle wings, aerector pili (sp?) which are the muscles that give us goosebumps and raise our hairs, the muscles that allow us to wiggle our ears, reflexes like the grasping reflex in babies (both feet and hands... other apes use it to cling to their hairy mom.), the swimming reflex in babies (their throat closes up and they instinctibly know how to swim), etc.
and
homologous and analogous structures- homologous structures are our arms and whale flippers. They both have 5 digits, a radius and ulna, every single bone that we have, they have. Once again, beetle wings (even though useless, they're still wings), etc.
Analogous structures are structures that serve the same goal but do it differently (what a horrible definition... but I can't be searching EVERYTHING now can I?) for example wings. Birds have wings, bats have wings, and insects have wings. You will never find a bat with wings like a bird or wings like an insect (before you say that that's how we group them, you will never find a bat with beaks or more than 4 legs or feathers or lungs like a bird's... etc. They either come together or they don't come at all)
 
  • #90
4. embryology- embryos usually have a couple of stages where they look like what they evolved from. Now... your religious textbooks will say that it was proved wrong, but they're not giving you the whole story.... I don't really know how to explain it so I will let someone else explain it for me. so anyway, if you look at how embryos develop, you will see that most (if not all) vertebrates (even tailess ones like humans) have tails at some time (sometimes human babies are born with tails. Usually there are no vertebrae but sometimes they have 3 or 5 extra vertebrae in the tail... I have pictures by the way :p) We also have gill slits (not gills), dolphins have front leg buds, Many species of snakes and legless lizards (such as the "slow worm") initially develop limb buds in their embryonic development, only to reabsorb them before hatching, etc etc etc...
 
  • #91
We KNOW mutations are possible, we KNOW there IS such a thing as good mutations, we KNOW natural selection is taking place, we can SEE and measure the changes of natural selection, we have even made whole new subspecies (dogs are a good example... I searched and found out that they're not a new species but subspecies). So we KNOW "microevolution" exists. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how after a few thousand years, mutations build up and ta-da! you have a new species. Do you question if we can see and measure evolution in action?
Actually, William R. Rice and George W. salt (lol... rice and salt) "have recorded a speciation event, or very nearly so, in their extended experiments on fruit flies. From a small stock of mated females they eventually produced two distinct fly populations adapted to different habitat conditions which the researchers judged 'incipient species'" (national geographic magazine quote)
Peter and Rosemary Grant have done their research in the wild (galapagos) and have seen how the beak changes in the finches over time.
 
  • #92
DNA is also used... it is what all living things have in common. All living things have some sort of DNA (RNA is some viruses). DNA is used for taxonomic purposes since most fossils don't contain DNA anymore.

It is common sense that if a species (from generation to generation) mutates enough one of the mutations might be benefitial to the species, or even make it differ so much from the other members of that specie that it be called a whole new species... this process over a long period of time is evolution. It isn't like this is something that used to happen and doesnt happen anymore.. it still happens, is still happening, and always will happen.
 
  • #93
I have a different 2 cents on this kind of thing.. I am Christian, but I think most Christians' belief that evolution never occurred and that the earth is only 4,000 years old is foolish. Nowhere in the Bible does it directly discount evolution. Nowhere does it directly say that all life forms were created at the same time. Dinosaurs and humans did NOT live at the same time, no matter how some people choose to interpret the Bible. The Creation-in-7-days thing to me is not false, but I see it as a metaphor. Evolution is not an anti-Christ view. Why is it so hard to grasp the concept of God, yes, creating everything, but over millions of years, and causing evolution to occur by His hand? Why is this so hard to believe? The earth IS millions of years old and life DID start out simple, gradually evolving. I believe it is entirely possible that God MADE these things happen. Why is that such a hard concept to grasp, people? Evolution occurred and it occurred by His will. No, there isn't anything in science that proves evolution, but there's nothing in science that proves the universe being created and everything coexisiting instantly in 7 days, either. It's a metaphor. The truth, but still a metaphor. God created the universe and all organisms, but OVER TIME. I've heard many devout Christians saying that evolution, which they call "The changing of one life form into another," is "impossible". Hel-LO!! Evolution is not the changing of one organism into another, it's the changing OF a life form over time in reaction to climate changes, global warming, etc. Velociraptors did not change FROM velociraptors TO birds, they gradually adapted to their changing environment and survival needs and EVOLVED into what they look like today. They're the same species, just transformed, evolved. If God is capable of creating this whole universe, there's no reason He's not capable of making evolution happen. Even WE make evolution happen sometimes. WE made wolves evolve into Rottweilers, pit bulls, Pomeranians, Dobermans, Yorkshire terriers, etc. It's the same thing. Evolution is that simple. WE are evolving as we speak. Hundreds of years ago, in the early colonial times, people had larger mouths, broader jaws. Gradually our mouths and jaws are getting smaller due to all the soft food we eat today. It's EVOLUTION. We're changing due to lifestyle changes. For some reason we're also taller than we used to be. 5'8'' used to be TALL for a man. It's EVOLUTION.
 
  • #94
I think human evolution has either halted completly or is slowing to a stop.
 
  • #95
Well, I didn't say FORWARD evolution, now did I?
 
  • #96
well, that's great... but...
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]The earth IS millions of years old and life DID start out simple, gradually evolving.
so if god made us in his own image then is god a single cell? how does adam and eve fit with evolution?
 
  • #98
Alpha, when the hell did I say He didn't create Adam and Eve in His image? I didn't discount that. But that still doesn't disprove that He didn't also make evolution occur.

AE, what I meant by "Well, I didn't say FORWARD evolution, now did I?" was that I never said we were evolving in a GOOD way. Just evolving. Smaller mouths and jaws only makes us more incapable of munching buffalo wings during the Super Bowl and getting taller only makes lightning hit us more.
 
  • #99
well... if you believe in evolution then how can you believe adam and eve existed?
confused.gif
 
  • #100
You misunderstood, regardless if you said it was "forward" evolution or not, when i said we have stopped, or slowed down evolutionary wise, i mean it in general.
 
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