I think the idea that Creationists refuse to believe that evolution is at all possible is another in a long line of unfair categorization of a group based on the views of its loudest members. I'm sure there are some creationists that don't refuse that evolution could be possible, it's just that they are not as outspoken as the ones who believe that people who put their faith in evolution are going to hell.

Mr. Moose:
The Catholics and The Jews see it.
Hell, the Jews are the most scientifically understanding of the religions that worship Yahweh.
Why can't the fatty american Christians see it?
Oh.
Yeah.
American.

Go to hell, troll.

Stalington:
the only difference between a scientist and a priest is that a priest is certain...

PWNT

Yes, I'd say that that's actually an accurate representation. And would you rather have someone who's ideas are subject to change, based on evidence? Or someone who will maintain his position despite all contrary evidence, and dismiss any opposing opinions as incorrect, without even having to think about it.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of fools, remember.

That's the difference between scientists and priests. Scientists accept the possibility that they might be incorrect. And were it scientifically proven that God exists, I suspect that would become part of the scientists' doctrine as well.

So, I think the only solutions to this problem, since scientific findings and religious dogma are so often in opposition, are for them to find a way to mesh their theories, for it to be scientifically proven that some religion is correct, or for religion to just ignore science, and get on with its life.

EDIT: This applies only to orthodox religion, of course. Many people can already hold religion and science in their minds, simultaneously, with no contradiction, or at least the faith that any apparent contradiction is merely the result of incomplete understanding.

xitel:
I think the idea that Creationists refuse to believe that evolution is at all possible is another in a long line of unfair categorization of a group based on the views of its loudest members. I'm sure there are some creationists that don't refuse that evolution could be possible, it's just that they are not as outspoken as the ones who believe that people who put their faith in evolution are going to hell.

The creationists most famous for rejecting evolution are the Young Earth Creationists, I believe. Those who think the Earth is somewhere between 4,000 and 10,000 years old. Carbon dating? A lie. Dinosaur bones? Tricks of the devil sent to test their faith.

As a doctor (which i hope I'll one day become) I'll prescribe only those antibiotics that no longer work because of the viruses/bacteria evolving to creationits. If there is no evolution they should be fine :D.

Amnestic:

xitel:
I think the idea that Creationists refuse to believe that evolution is at all possible is another in a long line of unfair categorization of a group based on the views of its loudest members. I'm sure there are some creationists that don't refuse that evolution could be possible, it's just that they are not as outspoken as the ones who believe that people who put their faith in evolution are going to hell.

The creationists most famous for rejecting evolution are the Young Earth Creationists, I believe. Those who think the Earth is somewhere between 4,000 and 10,000 years old. Carbon dating? A lie. Dinosaur bones? Tricks of the devil sent to test their faith.

Right. And as with every conflict, there are other people in each side that disagree with some of the specifics of the majority, but agree enough with the overarching opinion to say that they agree.

Kukul:
As a doctor (which i hope I'll one day become) I'll prescribe only those antibiotics that no longer work because of the viruses/bacteria evolving to creationits. If there is no evolution they should be fine :D.

Except for that pesky Hippocratic Oath thing, that's a great plan.

Dinosaur bones? Tricks of the devil sent to test their faith.

I love this one. It's like saying that God, who has an entire world to chuck together in only six days, stops specifically to put in all sorts of bones and fossilised trilobites and stuff specifically to fuck with the minds of paleontologists.

That's the difference between scientists and priests. Scientists accept the possibility that they might be incorrect. And were it scientifically proven that God exists, I suspect that would become part of the scientists' doctrine as well.

Of course, where God ever scientifically proven to exist, there would be no further point having faith in Him, as faith is only required when things do not exist.

Amnestic:

Kukul:
As a doctor (which i hope I'll one day become) I'll prescribe only those antibiotics that no longer work because of the viruses/bacteria evolving to creationits. If there is no evolution they should be fine :D.

Except for that pesky Hippocratic Oath thing, that's a great plan.

Notice the ":D" symbol at the end of my post. It means I am not serious.
And how the hell am I supposed to know if they are creationists or not?

Theory: God created the universe using what is now known as the "Big Bang Theory". He then created evolution, sat back, and relaxed.

how about everyone just shutup and go outside. In the end all want the same things, better future and a better life. Lets just work on that first, we will work on meaningless things like this late.

GloatingSwine:

Dinosaur bones? Tricks of the devil sent to test their faith.

I love this one. It's like saying that God, who has an entire world to chuck together in only six days, stops specifically to put in all sorts of bones and fossilised trilobites and stuff specifically to fuck with the minds of paleontologists.

The one about how God created a bunch of starlight already in transit just so that we could see stars that were millions of light years away despite the universe being only thousands of years old is better, in my opinion.

-- Alex

Come on this thread is pointless.
Its like arguing with muslim fundamentalists on how to treat women.
Anyone who believes that world is 10.000 years old is either dramatically uneducated or mentaly ill (or manipulated to the point of mental illness)

TomNook:
Stop being militant assholes about either and just go on with life?

NEVER. Seriously, I don't believe there is a god, I find the concept amazingly far fetched. To me Yahweh and Zeus (etc) are just as plausible as each other. So until we find a better solution to the one we have, I would like to use the theory which has the most physical evidence to support i and the largest probability. Who knows, in my lifetime we may find a much better answer which everyone agrees with and we can all go skipping through the fields singing nursery rhymes all day long.
But if instead we say that we are certain one or the other is true (in my opinion especially god, because a belief in said deity rules everything else out and no evidence will sway a hardcore creationist) then we are closing our minds to possibilities.

Graustein:

Amnestic:

Graustein:

SecretTacoNinja:

What did I do?

I think it was the whole "tell them to stop giving a shit because we'll never know"
Apparently we will know eventually. Although the relevence and practical applications of such a discovery continue to elude me.

Why not simply "because we can"? Discovery for the sake of discovery's sake is not necessarily a bad thing.

Nothing wrong with discovery for its own sake, but I can't help but feel like people are too tied up with this instead of doing something that might actually make a difference in our lives. It really does seem like we have better things to do is all.

Exactly, although it would be nice to know, it it probably wouldn't make much difference to our lives.
I really don't think we'll ever know, but I'm almost certain a god didn't do it. But that's just my opinion.

*bangs head against the wall*

God, another one. Why are there stupid topics like these?

You all know about it. The debate about How god created everything or it all started slowly creating itself from a giant explosion.

You do know the difference between faith and science?

If you think that there isn't one, then shut up and realise that you are either too young to understand this topic or at a failure at whatever school you were at.

But in the likely case you don't get it:

The big bang theory has nothing to do with the theory of evolution. You are ignorant.

I am not saying this as an insult, but as a statement of fact. You roll the big bang theory in the same as evolution, which shows that you are ignorant of both.

God created the building blocks for the universe and then guided the evolution of the universe to what it is today.

*bangs head against the wall again*

THIS IS THE PROBLEM! THIS IS NOT A SCIENTIFIC THEORY! THIS IS SHIT YOU MADE UP!

God cannot be either verified or unverified, therefore science does not deal with God unless he can be either.

Do you have a theory that would satisfy both sides and allow this debate to cease or is this a fairly decent one?

Why must both sides be satisfied? Why can't it be simply that one side is right while the other is wrong?

Should we find theories that satisfy both Holocaust deniers and War criminal prosecutors? Should we find theories that satisfy both the KKK and the followers of Martin Luther King?

Think about that before you say stupid shit like this.

Except for that pesky Hippocratic Oath thing, that's a great plan.

Turn on your sarcasm detector.

I disagree with your idea of god creating building blocks and guiding evolution.
That would mean creationism, and creationism is retarded.

There is no reason to be a god and there is no proof that there ever was a god.
Therefor we don't need a god and we're better of figuring out how the universe works without bringing that unrelated sadistic cunt into the picture.

Zixinus:

[snip]
Turn on your sarcasm detector.

Turn off your elitism valve and calm down.

There's no need to go off on the OP because he made a small mistake, which has already been pointed out.
We all understood the question anyway.

You know how it is, you make something, and along the way you edit it and make it better.

God in his infinite wisdom strung something awesome together in a few days, and then had a couple of hours to knock about with it and make it a bit different.

Is my opinion. I believe in God. Just don't follow the rules, I'm not sure why. He made me like this.

Whenever discussions like this pop up, I always hope that at some point we'll hear some hot babe say: "You're in a computer game, Max".

Evolution + Big Bang can easily be put in the same sentence as 'God', as soon as you clear your mind of the Bible/Qu'ran/Torah-version of 'God'.

We just don't know.
And probably never will.
And if we will, we'll just be in a computer game.

Amnestic:
The creationists most famous for rejecting evolution are the Young Earth Creationists, I believe. Those who think the Earth is somewhere between 4,000 and 10,000 years old. Carbon dating? A lie. Dinosaur bones? Tricks of the devil sent to test their faith.

Conclusion: God is basically a scaled-up version of Dr. House.

@Zixinus: Reported.

And to therest of you: 9/10ths of science is a combination of theory, corroboration and guesswork. And while you may all hate religion for your own teen-angst reasons (says the 18 year old Marxist with plans to carpet-bomb Mecca(JOKEJOKEFUCKINGJOKEDON'TBURNDOWNMYHOUSEPLEASE)) the fact of the matter is that religion has helped people. It has held society together as often as it has split it apart, it has provided us with some of the most spectacular works of art on this globe, and it has been of general good use in controling the masses and allowing the progression of society, which in turn is responsible for our beingable to debate this in this manner.

Look, the two of you (Zixinus and Simiski) are both the exact same as the creationist nutters. You both refuse to acknowledge other opinions, you both are rude and abrasive, and youare both fanatics. You're no better than Bible-beltist demagogues who insist the world was created in 6 days- no, in fact, you're worse. Those people have the excuse of ignorance, stupidity, poverty and, in some cases, inbreeding- excuses you LACK.

And Zixius- As far as I'm aware, neither side here has commited any crime. So it's not a fucking trial. So there is no need for one side to be 'wrong' when you can't prove EITHER SIDE TO BE RIGHT OR WRONG.

As for Martin Luther King- a amn who beleived in God. As with nearly all great men. In fact, History's only two noticable atheists were.... Stalin, Lenin and Hitler.

Great company you've got there.

Alex_P:
The one about how God created a bunch of starlight already in transit just so that we could see stars that were millions of light years away despite the universe being only thousands of years old is better, in my opinion.

-- Alex

That one would be better if stars were only interesting to astronomers, but they're generally pretty popular with everyone thanks to poets and romantics.

Fossils are only interesting to a very small number of people, and it's the specificity of the jape that always gets me.

In fact, History's only two noticable atheists were.... Stalin, Lenin and Hitler.

That's three and Hitler was a professed Christian. Couldn't comment about Lenin/Stalin as I don't know nearly enough about them as I perhaps should.

Fondant:
The fact of the matter is that religion has helped people. It has held society together as often as it has split it apart, it has provided us with some of the most spectacular works of art on this globe, and it has been of general good use in controling the masses and allowing the progression of society, which in turn is responsible for our beingable to debate this in this manner.

Ok. Science hasn't?
I agree with you though, for the record; but, it's not like Science hasn't had ad big an impact as religion, if not more.

9/10ths is theory, corroboration, and guesswork? So the LHC is in that last 1/10th.
The way science works is this:
1.Someone asks a question.
2.Lots of people make theories.
3.Many more prove or disprove these theories until.
4.A theory is found that supersedes the others by amount and reliability of evidence.

This evidence can be mathematical or physical. Maths being accepted as a way to back up your theory (as it's just logic), but in the end all theories need proof to be accepted. It isn't just:
1.Pose theory
2.Pose evidence
3.Fact.
When you pose a theory, the Scientific community will try and pick holes in it, and disprove or prove it. And the only way, ultimately, to prove it, is to do an experiment.

So that 1/10th is a very important minority, it seems?

There's a very simple solution to this problem: ID is not science. Anyone saying so should be sterilised to keep them from muddying the gene pool (oh, whoops, I mentioned evolution). It therefore cannot be taught in science classes. It is, however, strongly religious in its overtones. So I have no problem with it being taught in Religion classes (if there are such units at the school, as there were at mine). Both sides are taught, but both are taught in their respective subjects and it is accepted that one is true and one is false...I mean one is science and one is a kooky excuse for why the world is really 6000 years old...I mean one is backed up by mountains of scientific evidence and the other spurns scientific evidence because God is trying to fool us...I'm going to stop trying now.

Why doesn't god let everyone know he exists, if he does?

Because people need faith.
Why?
Because if God was pissing about on Earth going "HI GUYZ I'M TOTALLY REAL!" then no one would be good for "good's" sake, they'd be good so that they didn't get on God's badside. It'd be faux good, fake good.

Or something like that anyway.

Gxas:
Theory: God created the universe using what is now known as the "Big Bang Theory". He then created evolution, sat back, and relaxed.

Actually, I think that that was what Charles Darwin believed. Also, if you read Kenneth Miller's book "Finding Darwin's God" (which I highly recommend) you'll find the idea fleshed out there as well. From a theistic point of view this would be a fine position to take, in my opinion.

Hitler was also a vegetarian. And terrible at backgammon.

Focusing on WHY we are here at the expense of trying to keep ourselves here is whats breaking the world right now in this ones opinion.

Not so much in the sense that we should stop exploring the final frontier or the quasi dimensional m-theory, but in the sense of everyone arguing that there way is better. Once everyone realizes that God is merely a metaphor for the human inability to affect the world in a meaningful way past what is "accepted" and that most if not all religions boil down to the "Don't kill, don't steal, don't be an asshole" prime directives is when the aforementioned argument is solved.

Amnestic:

Why doesn't god let everyone know he exists, if he does?

Because people need faith.
Why?
Because if God was pissing about on Earth going "HI GUYZ I'M TOTALLY REAL!" then no one would be good for "good's" sake, they'd be good so that they didn't get on God's badside. It'd be faux good, fake good.

Or something like that anyway.

That's not why people do it now? For fear of being struck down or going to hell?

Actually, that makes it worse. It's an imaginary threat. At least if God was real then people wouldn't fight so much.

Danny Ocean:

Amnestic:

Why doesn't god let everyone know he exists, if he does?

Because people need faith.
Why?
Because if God was pissing about on Earth going "HI GUYZ I'M TOTALLY REAL!" then no one would be good for "good's" sake, they'd be good so that they didn't get on God's badside. It'd be faux good, fake good.

Or something like that anyway.

That's not why people do it now? For fear of being struck down or going to hell?

Actually, that makes it worse. It's an imaginary threat. At least if God was real then people wouldn't fight so much.

Ah, but that'd be a restriction and an imposition on the free will he wants to give us, apparently. Either way, the explanation I gave is the one I know, there may be others but I couldn't say. My philosophy classes seem so terribly far away now, even though it's been less than half a year ;/ It's kinda sad how much I've forgotten already.

I do remember one thing: 75% of the time the answer to a philosophy question would be
A) God
B) Jesus or
C) Kant

Eventually you can just run them together as Godjesuskant and get a solid B for most questions ;D