Posted on 05/12/2006 12:13:47 PM PDT by PatrickHenry
In his op-ed "Evolution's bottom line," published in The New York Times (May 12, 2006), Holden Thorp emphasizes the practical applications of evolution, writing, "creationism has no commercial application. Evolution does," and citing several specific examples.
In places where evolution education is undermined, he argues, it isn't only students who will be the poorer for it: "Will Mom or Dad Scientist want to live somewhere where their children are less likely to learn evolution?" He concludes, "Where science gets done is where wealth gets created, so places that decide to put stickers on their textbooks or change the definition of science have decided, perhaps unknowingly, not to go to the innovation party of the future. Maybe that's fine for the grownups who'd rather stay home, but it seems like a raw deal for the 14-year-old girl in Topeka who might have gone on to find a cure for resistant infections if only she had been taught evolution in high school."
Thorp is chairman of the chemistry department at the University of North Carolina.
Regardless of anyone's view of homosexuality, your specific argument does not represent sound reasoning. It commits the fallacy of "arguing from 'is' to 'ought'," also sometimes called "the naturalistic fallacy". IOW, just because something "is" so (usually in nature) it does not follow that it "ought" to be so, or advocated (usually in human society).
For example, also in accord with "natural selection and survival of the fittest," male lions usually kill all the cubs in a pride when they take it over from another male. There are many other examples of ubiquitous infanticide in nature. Nor is infanticide uncommon in human cultures. None of this, however, morally justifies infanticide.
Evolution has no banned books, no warnings about heresy or blasphemy, no record of burning witches or heretics, no fear of black cats, no public displays of piety or prayer, no holy book supposed to contain "All Truth", no creed to be ritually recited. No mythological beliefs or transsubstantiations.
Evolution is not a religion. The idea of evolution has no priests, pastors, ministers, bishops, warlocks, ayatollahs, imams, mullahs, prophets (or televangelical profits). Evolution has no churches and no temples. No holy books or sacred scriptures. It has no holidays, no feast days, no canonized saints.
Evolution has no history of torturing non-believers, has never started a single war, no condemnations of the ideas of others with disparaging words like infidel or pagan or atheist. Evolution has no record of sex scandals. No demand to tithe to get a passport stamped for entry into heaven.
Evolution receives no tax exemptions. Evolution does not ascribe natural events or disasters as "acts of God".
Evolution has no "thou shalts" or "shalt nots". No dependence on a supernatural deity or pixies; no prayer rituals, no burial rituals, no sacraments. No condemnations to hell nor promises of a heaven.
The above are evidences of religion. The idea of evolution, which is based on observation of the natural world as we see it, does not have any of the attributes of religion.
The Theory of Evolution, the Theory of Gravity, the Germ Theory of Disease are not religion and not religious. These scientific ideas are merely desriptive-they describe how the world around us works (not about how some people might prefer it to work).
Evolution is naturalistic and has no need for belief in an invisible soul or an invisible 'hand' that changes the course of natural events in miraculous, unrepeatable ways. Claims to see "God's hand' invariably turn out to be anecdotal. Evolution has no belief in the occult and no faith in invisible beings, like devils, demons, ghosts, satans, angels, spirits, cherubim, seraphim, pixies, faeries, etc.
The theory of evolution is about what we actually observe. The idea of science is about questioning old myths and superstitions to figure out what actually is valid about the planet we live on.
I wouldn't say the vast majority, but sure, it does occur.
There are also well-dccumented cases of Christians who don't understand/have never completely read the Bible.
Yeah, my wife kind of thinks so. But others don't...
:)
Well then, it's next on the hit list!
Of course. That godless Relativity Theory has led directly to moral and cultural relativism. /sarc
I asked:
"Out of curiousity, tell me the three CONCRETE observations that persuade you that all living things evolved from non-life and/or a strand of rna/dna."
Other than a critiquing of MY most persuasive observations in favor of creationism, I received
...NOTHING, NADA.
As I anticipated.
I love your tagline. And yet you would seem to think the first acorn tree came from an acorn and not the other way around. The basic argument of evolution is what occurs first the cause or effect. Take away the Bible for a minute.
Do things begin with a mature plant that produces seeds or do things begin with seeds that eventually produce a mature plant. I submit it makes common sense to start with a mature plant which produces seeds. Otherwise an effect occurs without a cause. Everything that we see has an origin. Where does the first amoeba come from? It has to have an origin.
Not by definition, but by experimental observation.
In fact, Lamarckists thought that mutations were triggered in a way that would better adapt future generations to the environment.
And there is "theistic" or "guided" evolution, which claims that the beneficial mutations were put there by a hypothetical designer.
Science really is something apart from religion. It is allowed and basically expected to change its story. After all, it is argued from the current preponderance of evidence. It converges over time upon an increasingly accurate description of nature. No religion does this or even claims to.
Perhaps no one has bothered to answer you, because you have appeared to mix up two ideas into one question, and then you want an answer...and when you dont get one, you act as if you have won the argument...well, you have won nothing at all...
What you have managed to do, is demand concrete observations that persuade that living things evolved from non-life...this of course has to do with how did life begin in the first place and it has nothing to do with evolution of that life, once it exists...
How life began in the first place is a completely different area of study from how living things evolve...
I am not qualified to answer your questions...however, I can see that you are mixing up two questions...
1...how did life begin?... 2. does life evolve and what mechanisms are involved?...
If you want good answers to your questions, there are many on this thread who are more than able to answer your questions...but you have asked two different and separate questions...perhaps no one wants to untangle them for you....
"Just look out the window, you dolt! Look out the window! Look out the window!!!!!"
A garbage truck?
What has four wheels and flies, Alex?
God uses the foolish things to confound the world and weak things to confound the mighty. I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. God has made foolish the wisdom of this world. The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. He takes the wise in their own craftiness. The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men. I Cor. 1 and 3.
My ways are not your ways and My thoughts are not your thoughts. For as the heavens are higher than the earth so are my ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. Is. 55.
Then you need to read some history and learn something before you speak:
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1431032/posts
The anti-evolutionists often post this amusing argument: "Hitler accepted evolution. Hitler was a bad man. Therefore, evolution is evil."
It is a nutsy argument on 10 different levels. There is no evidence that Hitler understood anything about biological science; he studied as an art student. He was raised as a Catholic and reasserted his faith many times. He did not persecute Catholics during his regime (he was interested in his power, and eliminated anybody who challenged his power, equally whether they were Lutherans, Jews, Orthodox, or non-believers.)
mlc9852 posts an argument along the lines: Hitler promoted nazism/fascism. Hitler loved his mother and roses. Therefore evolution is demonstrated as evil.
From this "argument", I can equally conclude that my Mom is evil. Not to mention roses. Be very careful what you say in reponse!
Wacky. Almost as wacky as stuff like this:
"He was raised as a Catholic and reasserted his faith many times. He did not persecute Catholics during his regime..."
Hitlers religion was Nazism, not Catholicism, not atheism and not Darwinism.
Just keeping it real.
You need to partake of this too:
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1431032/posts
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