evolution is defined as "slow change"
therefore evolution does exist
but it is debatable that Charles Darwin's theory of sential evolution is real
if the game can support both sides of the argument
that should be a good thing

i think god directs evolution its the answer to how and god is the answere to why

Spore = Evolution and Intelligent Design at the same time

Spore does promote the idea of natural selection in a sense, just not on easy mode. (The casual gamer difficulty.) If you evolve your creature well your creature succeeds, if you evolve it poorly nature selects it to die.

I haven't seen anything come out of any major news organization or other such groups that talk of the "controversy" behind the themes in Spore, but it wouldn't surprise me if something popped up in the not too distant future.

internutt:
I'm Christian and I do not personally believe evolution. I think humanity has always been here, we have not changed much over the centuries, we have simply changed technologically. I do however believe in natural selection. Creatures die out and change to adapt to different areas.

Doesn't the very notion that you believe in natural selection contradict your ideal that evolution is untrue? Evolution is nothing more than natural selection and adaptation on a very, very long time scale and involves much more drastic genetic changes.

Woe Is You:
Three words: evolution is a lie.

Also, monkeys don't live several million years. Ergo, evolution is a lie.

Well see, as others have said, we evolved from apes, or should I say ape-like mammals. These evolved from even earlier primate-like creatures who, in turn, evolved from even simpler tree-fairing mammals. These came from simpler earth-bound mammals who only thrived because of the mass extinction events that resulted in over 75% of life on this planet dying off. This cleared the way for mammals to become the dominant species shortly after the Cretaceous period leading into the Tertiary or specifically the Paleocene period. The evidence supporting evolution is everywhere, just because some are unwilling to acknowledge it doesn't change the fact that it's there.

P.S. "Evolution is a lie" is 4 words.
P.P.S. as we all know, the cake is a lie, not evolution.

Woe Is You:
Three words: evolution is a lie.

Also, monkeys don't live several million years. Ergo, evolution is a lie.

I really hope that was sarcasm.

zirnitra:

Ixus Illwrath:

internutt:
I'm Christian and I do not personally believe evolution. I think humanity has always been here, we have not changed much over the centuries, we have simply changed technologically. I do however believe in natural selection. Creatures die out and change to adapt to different areas.

Animals like dogs started out as tamed wolves before adapting to the specific tasks that humans required of them.

Oh come on, what the fuck. Did we just get dropped off by a goddamn space ship after the dinos were long gone? You and your band of creationists should be banned from teaching anyone anything outright and forever.

come on now that's not fair, people should be allowed to belive whatever they wish no matter how deluded, wishful and sometimes just ignorant they seem when faced with an overwhelming amount of evidence against their beliefs. people being taught should be given all sides of the argument.

PS creationist's do not believe that dinosaurs ever were.

No, you're quite wrong. This brand of 'mild' creationism is the backbone from which all the other, more fundamentalist creationists sprout. People should not be able to believe in what they want; especially if their kind of unscientific, uncritical, unreasoning minds engender the kind of sectarian hate and religious bigotry that we see all over the world. Without their secular 'backbone', more fundamental and crazier creationists could not support themselves.

Children should be taught the truth, and the best explanation for the universe right now includes evolution. Would it be moral for us to teach the next generation 1) what we innocently believe to be the truth, including the best physical evidence available to us at present, or 2) watered-down lies concerning stone-age Middle-Eastern fairies?

People do not have the right to believe in anything they want - especially when it leads to the destruction of so many people and poisons the minds of innocent children.

hem dazon 90:
i think god directs evolution its the answer to how and god is the answere to why

Supply corroborating evidence, please.

Ixus Illwrath:
If this game had any respect for real evolution you wouldn't be able to sell back all your body parts and switch from being veggies/meat at a whim.

Strangely enough, don't the Civ games seem to support a creationism standpoint? I always get disappointed in myself trying to make a badass civ and having to pick a religion at some point :(

Not to mention you always start out at 4000BC. That says a whole lot in itself.

4000BC is approximately when the first cities appeared in the Middle-East and India.

Spore is fun..but it won't be for long...

dib_dib_9@hotmail.co.uk:
Spore is fun..but it won't be for long...

I'm trying like mad to get into it, but I just can't. I get to the civilization stage and just throw my arms up in the air and walk away.

mackemsniper:

Ixus Illwrath:
If this game had any respect for real evolution you wouldn't be able to sell back all your body parts and switch from being veggies/meat at a whim.

Strangely enough, don't the Civ games seem to support a creationism standpoint? I always get disappointed in myself trying to make a badass civ and having to pick a religion at some point :(

Not to mention you always start out at 4000BC. That says a whole lot in itself.

4000BC is approximately when the first cities appeared in the Middle-East and India.

I was being more facetious, I was more pointing out how that game doesn't in any real way conflict with a creationist viewpoint. Doesn't make it a bad game, but it's food for thought. I don't remember hearing about militant anyone complaining about how something wasn't properly represented in that game.

Ixus Illwrath:
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/evolutionists_flock_to_darwin

These are the guys in question.

I find it hilarious that, being evolutionists (and therefore most likely atheists) one woman said "I brought my baby to touch the wall to purify her makeup of undesirable inherited traits."
This made me laugh. Did Jesus not cure people by touch (supposedly)? The best part is that it's one part ridiculous logic and half nerd-speak.

Actually, I also got a bit frustrated with the Civ level... did manage to just buy out the last civilization with money after I couldn't convert them to save my life...

I started the space stage before going to bed last night. Initial impressions are that it is very similar to Star Control II, which is one of my all-time favorite games. I really hope it continues like that, because it is an excellent game.

Irony of Ironies... guess what I (the rabid atheist) played my civilization out as? Yup, you guessed it, a theocracy! I was pounding other cities with my religious propaganda and forcing them to believe what I believe!! hehe Personally, I like to think that my little abominations (man I'm horrible at the creature creator) were running around my little world demolishing those other cities because they refused to believe in creationism! ;)

mackemsniper:

zirnitra:

Ixus Illwrath:

internutt:
I'm Christian and I do not personally believe evolution. I think humanity has always been here, we have not changed much over the centuries, we have simply changed technologically. I do however believe in natural selection. Creatures die out and change to adapt to different areas.

Animals like dogs started out as tamed wolves before adapting to the specific tasks that humans required of them.

Oh come on, what the fuck. Did we just get dropped off by a goddamn space ship after the dinos were long gone? You and your band of creationists should be banned from teaching anyone anything outright and forever.

come on now that's not fair, people should be allowed to belive whatever they wish no matter how deluded, wishful and sometimes just ignorant they seem when faced with an overwhelming amount of evidence against their beliefs. people being taught should be given all sides of the argument.

PS creationist's do not believe that dinosaurs ever were.

No, you're quite wrong. This brand of 'mild' creationism is the backbone from which all the other, more fundamentalist creationists sprout. People should not be able to believe in what they want; especially if their kind of unscientific, uncritical, unreasoning minds engender the kind of sectarian hate and religious bigotry that we see all over the world. Without their secular 'backbone', more fundamental and crazier creationists could not support themselves.

Children should be taught the truth, and the best explanation for the universe right now includes evolution. Would it be moral for us to teach the next generation 1) what we innocently believe to be the truth, including the best physical evidence available to us at present, or 2) watered-down lies concerning stone-age Middle-Eastern fairies?

People do not have the right to believe in anything they want - especially when it leads to the destruction of so many people and poisons the minds of innocent children.

Sorry for the double post.

As callous and unfair as mackemsniper's argument is, I'm afraid he makes a valid point. Religions invariably lead to war (unless you are a Buddhist or a Hindu, who seem to be the most neutral partes in any case) and if religion is taught then it will spread. Despite my apprently incorrect beliefs that people can choose what to believe (see the irony) he makes a swaying point.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/6/18/

Actually, Hindus have that whole Caste system thing, which is pretty nasty once you've read up on it... and as far as Buddhists are... it is rare, but there are violent Buddhists too.

Woe Is You:

Liatach:

Woe Is You:
Three words: evolution is a lie.

Also, monkeys don't live several million years. Ergo, evolution is a lie.

Religion relies on faith,
Science relies on rational deduction.

You got it backwards.

Creationism is based upon science, reason and tons of evidence.

Evolution is based on the blind acceptance of superstitions and fairy tales.

(Oh come on, people, don't you read Fundies Say The Darndest Things?)

HaHa no i hadn't but i will.

On a side note, as i mentioned, i am dead keen to play this game though it seems i'm going to have to wait a while, as in until EA wakes up to itself and removes the mass effect style DRM http://fredbenenson.com/blog/2008/09/07/spore-drm-and-disorganized-activism/

Its because in order to have a debate you have to have two valid sides of an issue to debate. Intelligent Design isn't a valid point of view, it is a religious belief not grounded in sound science.

-Gooney

Woe Is You:
Three words: evolution is a lie.

Also, monkeys don't live several million years. Ergo, evolution is a lie.

Ha ha ha ha ha... :D

This guy wins the logic prize.

mrnelsby:

Anyway, if anyone sees any articles about people freaking out about the game, please do post them, I'm really curious if any of the religious types are noticing the media barrage and whether there are responses to it, or attempts to coopt it as part of their argument...

lol have gamers been attacked so much recently that we lie in wait for arguments that depict games?

BTW grammar Nazi's if you start a sentence with a abbreviation eg lol how should it be spelt, lol Lol or LOL.

Oh bloody hell.

I'm Christian and I do not personally believe evolution. I think humanity has always been here, we have not changed much over the centuries, we have simply changed technologically. I do however believe in natural selection. Creatures die out and change to adapt to different areas.

Animals like dogs started out as tamed wolves before adapting to the specific tasks that humans required of them.

Good for Spore. Evolution is a great game mechanic, much like Black and White it is like being God and controlling life from the microscopic level.

That's both an interesting and very hypocritical position to take: how can you believe that animals change and adept yet believe that humans did not evolve?

And don't start saying "microevolution is real but macroevolution is not" because "microevolution" IS "macroevolution". There is no difference. Changes happen slowly and minimally over a humongous amount of time.

Actually no, it goes Hypothisis, Theory, Law like Newton's Law of Gravitation..which are generally accepted as fact.

You do realise that gravitation is a theory too?

The words "theory" and "law" are misleading: "law" tells you what will happen. "Theory" will tell you HOW will it happen and WHY (well, on a physical level anyway).

Also, you are wrong, wrong, wrong, WRONG. This is the scientific method:

1. Observation: Finding pheromone.
2. Hypothesis: Formulation of hypothesis, an attempt to understand and model the pheromone(s) in question.
3. Experiment or observe to either deny or confirm hypothesis. If something happens that does not go along with hypothesis then either change existing hypothesis or make a new one.
4. Theory: Repeat step 2-3 until you get hypothesis that models reality well enough.

More here: http://teacher.pas.rochester.edu/phy_labs/appendixe/appendixe.html

people being taught should be given all sides of the argument.

The argument is closed and settled; it has been settled for nearly a century, if not more. Why not argue that children should be taught that between planets there is ether, not vacuum?

I am being serious here: there is no argument. There has been no argument among academic circles since Darwin. There has been no true argument in the level of law for quite a while now. The only place where there is an argument is within the minds of creationists.

9 words: There(1) are(2) four(3) words(4) in(5) "evolution(6) is(7) a(8) lie(9)." And don't discount 'a' as a word. It is an indefinite article. I'd like to thank my resources for this post: my fingers, for the counting, and a dictionary, for the indefinite article information.

He was being sarcastic, you twit.

http://kotaku.com/5035628/militant-atheists-are-moaning-about-spore

Don't link to a second-hand article, link to the source. The author of the article may as well be lying. He's not, but he may as well be.

The writer definitely distorted what Will Wright said. See my bolded parts: from "might call militant atheists" we get "militant atheists". Those two words mean an enormous difference.

Here is the quote about militant atheists from the actual interview:
http://kotaku.com/5035628/militant-atheists-are-moaning-about-spore

Eurogamer: You describe yourself as an atheist; take the so-called militant atheists like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, who see faith uniformly as a bad, negative and dangerous thing. Do you see it more benignly, even if you don't necessarily believe?

Will Wright: Oh, I definitely see it more benignly. I see a lot of benefit and danger in religion like anything[...] I think our bigger fear was that we didn't want to offend any religious people; but looking at the discussion that unfolded from this thing, what we had was a good sizeable group of players that we might call militant atheists, and the rest of the players seemed very tolerant, including all of the religious players.

And most of the atheists were very tolerant as well. I didn't expect to hit hot buttons on the atheist side as much; I expected it on the religious side. But so far I've had no critical feedback at all from anybody who is religious feeling that we were misrepresenting religion or it was bad to represent religion in the game. It was really the atheists!

The problem wasn't the controlled evolution part: the problem was with the point that a civilization NEEDS religion.

Let me explain why.

Militant atheists see religion, any religion, as a form of mental illness. You believe in something that is not there, so therefore you are insane. You make a judgement influenced by beliefs in something that is not there, therefore your judgement is flawed.

For militant atheists, progression is when people abandon religion, thus abandon what they perceive as insanity and become a person that sees the world clearly. Thus, people will make better decisions, better judgement and understand things better. That's the idea anyway.

What offends militant atheists here, is that in Spore, you NEED a religion for society to function and this is an insult for reasons obvious by now.

Spore wanted to avoid fire from the religious side as much as possible, so they hit over the mark.

Does it make sense now?

Personally, I think "oh shut up and hand me a drink".

then again intelligent design is probably a ploy for churchies to keep "smart" followers with em. after all if you cant beat em join em but mess up the rules so it looks like they join you.

Actually, its not. In the USA, it is specifically forbidden to teach children in school. It's the very first amendment.

If you try to teach creationism as it is, you will not fool anyone and you will be violating federal law by trying to preach religion in public. Note that I use the word "preach" not "teach". Preach means that its held as true, while teach means that it is taught about.

The point of Intelligent Design is to fool people to think that it isn't creationism, no matter how obviously it is. They replace the word "god" with "designer" and "created" with "designed" and so forth. At first appearer, it does not look like creationism but it still is.

It is nothing more then a political trick.

Of course the Dover (or whatever their name was) trial showed how well it worked: not at all.

evolution is defined as "slow change"
therefore evolution does exist

That is a broad definition, not one relating to biology. The biological definition is much more precise and complicated.

Also, your argument is horribly flawed.

but it is debatable that Charles Darwin's theory of sential evolution is real

It's not deletable actually. Well, at least not with people who actually know what evolution is, how it works and you know, capitalise.

I find it hilarious that, being evolutionists (and therefore most likely atheists) one woman said "I brought my baby to touch the wall to purify her makeup of undesirable inherited traits."
This made me laugh. Did Jesus not cure people by touch (supposedly)? The best part is that it's one part ridiculous logic and half nerd-speak.
report

It's the Onion. Look it up.

being evolutionists (and therefore most likely atheists)

Tell me, what are you, eight? You have to be eight to be that retarded.

There is no such thing as an "evolutionist". There is no such word in the English language and the term you are trying to convey does not fucking exist.

The term you are looking for is "biologist".

Biologist tell you that evolution exists, because without it, biology won't make any sense. Biologists will go out their way to fight with creationist, both in public and in court. Biologist believe in evolution to be factual.

Why?

Because evolution is factual as it demonstratable as such. End of discussion.

Furthermore, just because someone believes in evolution it doesn't meant he or she is an atheist: there are plenty of sane Christians, Muslims, etc that believe evolution to be factual.

unless you are a Buddhist or a Hindu, who seem to be the most neutral partes in any case)

Go look up Tibetian and Indian history and find out just how bloody those religions. Just because you haven't heard these religions creating crusades and wars, doesn't mean there aren't any.

Society's beliefs and values act like a skewed pendulum. They sway from conservative to liberal, conservative to liberal, but it leans to being more liberal with every swing.

I believe that every successive generation will be more liberal (assuming the world doesn't befall some calamity like a comet hitting the earth or a zombie plague), as seems to be the historical trend. Attrition. Attrition. Attrition.

So yeah, I believe in evolution and more and more people will believe in it with every passing generation. I cannot completely say that a higher power does not exist because I have at least two nagging questions. "What was there before the Bang? How did nothing come to end at once?"

-------------

This post is an opinion. I do not claim to be an expert, unless otherwise claiming to be an expert in the above post. I am one of thousands posting in a forum that is not known to exist by the other billions of people on this planet.

There you go:

Anti-Spore: Resisting EA's War on Creationism

Fraser.J.A:
There you go:

Anti-Spore: Resisting EA's War on Creationism

How delightfully pathetic.

PhatmasterJ:
What if evolution IS Gods plan? The Bible was written for people who lived 2000+ years ago. Maybe "let there be light" is talking about the big bang? I'll buy that before the "God put fossils in the ground to test our faith" line.

Anyway sounds like its going to be a fun game.

I actually said that to a really fanatical Catholic the other day and he called me the anti Christ. I think your onto something there, mate.

Fraser.J.A:
There you go:

Anti-Spore: Resisting EA's War on Creationism

Do you know if the creator of that website is male or female? Because people keep claiming that the author is stating he is either female or male quite a few times which leads people to believe the site is one big trolling session.

I guess I have never seen any intent on the part of the Bible to be taken as a science book. The amount of time wasted on this fight is staggering. It's just a tempest in a teapot, created by those who need something to make themselves feel righteous.

The really funny thing is, it was my college astronomy professor (Extraterrestrial Life at UT) who proved the existence of God to me. (I had always "believed" but nothing like someone pointing out a simple yet brilliant fact, is there?) Yes, the same dudes proving the age of the universe also are men of faith--perhaps more so because "have you not seen Him in the things He has made?"

Discussion over?

Haha! Those are some excellent finds! I love that Spore threatens that guy's world view.

Back to my own Spore experience, my little race of theocratic space-bible thumpers are now being threatened by another theocracy since I wouldn't pay their non-believer tax. I declined like three times and now they have declared war on me! Love it!

Ooh... wow. Well, between the last time I saw Anti-Spore and the time I posted that link, this happened. Rolled.