Posted on 08/01/2005 10:58:13 AM PDT by wallcrawlr
The half-century campaign to eradicate any vestige of religion from public life has run its course. The backlash from a nation fed up with the A.C.L.U. kicking crèches out of municipal Christmas displays has created a new balance. State-supported universities may subsidize the activities of student religious groups. Monuments inscribed with the Ten Commandments are permitted on government grounds. The Federal Government is engaged in a major antipoverty initiative that gives money to churches. Religion is back out of the closet.
But nothing could do more to undermine this most salutary restoration than the new and gratuitous attempts to invade science, and most particularly evolution, with religion. Have we learned nothing? In Kansas, conservative school-board members are attempting to rewrite statewide standards for teaching evolution to make sure that creationism's modern stepchild, intelligent design, infiltrates the curriculum. Similar anti-Darwinian mandates are already in place in Ohio and are being fought over in 20 states. And then, as if to second the evangelical push for this tarted-up version of creationism, out of the blue appears a declaration from Christoph Cardinal Schönborn of Vienna, a man very close to the Pope, asserting that the supposed acceptance of evolution by John Paul II is mistaken. In fact, he says, the Roman Catholic Church rejects "neo-Darwinism" with the declaration that an "unguided evolutionary process--one that falls outside the bounds of divine providence--simply cannot exist."
Cannot? On what scientific evidence? Evolution is one of the most powerful and elegant theories in all of human science and the bedrock of all modern biology. Schönborn's proclamation that it cannot exist unguided--that it is driven by an intelligent designer pushing and pulling and planning and shaping the process along the way--is a perfectly legitimate statement of faith. If he and the Evangelicals just stopped there and asked that intelligent design be included in a religion curriculum, I would support them. The scandal is to teach this as science--to pretend, as does Schönborn, that his statement of faith is a defense of science. "The Catholic Church," he says, "will again defend human reason" against "scientific theories that try to explain away the appearance of design as the result of 'chance and necessity,'" which "are not scientific at all." Well, if you believe that science is reason and that reason begins with recognizing the existence of an immanent providence, then this is science. But, of course, it is not. This is faith disguised as science. Science begins not with first principles but with observation and experimentation.
In this slippery slide from "reason" to science, Schönborn is a direct descendant of the early 17th century Dutch clergyman and astronomer David Fabricius, who could not accept Johannes Kepler's discovery of elliptical planetary orbits. Why? Because the circle is so pure and perfect that reason must reject anything less. "With your ellipse," Fabricius wrote Kepler, "you abolish the circularity and uniformity of the motions, which appears to me increasingly absurd the more profoundly I think about it." No matter that, using Tycho Brahe's most exhaustive astronomical observations in history, Kepler had empirically demonstrated that the planets orbit elliptically.
This conflict between faith and science had mercifully abated over the past four centuries as each grew to permit the other its own independent sphere. What we are witnessing now is a frontier violation by the forces of religion. This new attack claims that because there are gaps in evolution, they therefore must be filled by a divine intelligent designer.
How many times do we have to rerun the Scopes "monkey trial"? There are gaps in science everywhere. Are we to fill them all with divinity? There were gaps in Newton's universe. They were ultimately filled by Einstein's revisions. There are gaps in Einstein's universe, great chasms between it and quantum theory. Perhaps they are filled by God. Perhaps not. But it is certainly not science to merely declare it so.
To teach faith as science is to undermine the very idea of science, which is the acquisition of new knowledge through hypothesis, experimentation and evidence. To teach it as science is to encourage the supercilious caricature of America as a nation in the thrall of religious authority. To teach it as science is to discredit the welcome recent advances in permitting the public expression of religion. Faith can and should be proclaimed from every mountaintop and city square. But it has no place in science class. To impose it on the teaching of evolution is not just to invite ridicule but to earn it.
That may be so, but belief in evolution doesn't cause that attitude. Even given your argument the benefit of every question (and there are many, such as whether it is actually true that you would get more help in one community over another), you would have, at best, correlation. Disbelief in evolution and this "grace" stem from the same thing, but one does not cause the other. And given the fact that many Christians believe, to a greater or lesser degree, in evolution (mostly theistic evolution) and that many evolution-believing people are the nicest people you'd ever want to meet, it is a very loose correlation, at best.
And if you are insulted by the use of Islamic, then you are a poor pathetic, ignorant fool. Regardless of the acts of some of its adherents, it is one of the world's great religions and great civilization. Should I judge Christianity by Jim Jones's group drinking the Kool-Aid? That you don't see the rock-headed ignorance you are spewing and find it to be an insult means that you are just one of those idiotic rubes whose pitiful thoughts and small ideas makes it difficult for well meaning and intelligent people to describe themselves as conservative.
Observation teaches me that inanimate to animate does not occur within observable time. Therefore, to have a mathematical model conclude the same should not be surprising.
Here is one take on the model:
http://www.arn.org/docs/dembski/wd_idtheory.htm
No, I used them to insult you; not Christians in general but you as an individual. Your attitude in response to a serious question made in good faith was pathetic enough, but you your finding an insult in me mentioning Islam shows you are a pathetic little man.
pby, congratulations, you have just correctly identified a circular argument, vis. it's not a myth because it says it's not a myth. You might as wall say Scientific Creationism is true because I say so.
eleni121, Marx? Who brought Marx into this? Oh, I see, you have no answer so you resort to calling me names. Very good argument!
Did you guys stay up all NIGHT yakking????
"Evolution offers no solution to the question how did the first cell come to be. Supporters such as Haeckel recognized this from the beginning. Ask the ordinary high school teacher how he would answer the question where does like come from? It would not come from evolutionary theory."
True enough. I hope you're not insinuating that this is some flaw in evolutionary theory.
I surely agree here!
They were ALWAYS turning to other 'gods' for help.
Sad...
Looking for help where there is none.
When you talk about people it's polite to ping them.
What evidence do you have that God exists?
There's an old book, that contains lots of claims of miracles, and claims made by people of being Gods son. I've seen magic tricks before, how do we know whether or not all of it was mere trickery? How do we know whether it was just all fiction?
There is quite a bit of non Biblical evidence for Jesus. The Koran for example, but it suffers from the same credibility issues as the Bible. There may be some non-religious, Roman evidence that exists. But still, how do we know he wasn't just a first century corrupt revival preacher /slash/ magician, that sleeps with all the farmers daughters?
You also have the emotion of religion that one can imagine is the Holy Spirit filling your heart, and thus "proof" that God is real. I witnessed an entire congregation of several hundred break down in tears one sunday after no sermon whatsoever. It was an amazing experience.
But similar things happen in non-religious things all the time. Everybody's seen a tearjerker movie and felt or seen people get emotionally involved. Tears streaming down their face. The story of Jesus dying on the cross for *your* sins is a pretty emotional story, when retold by a talented preacher.
pby, have you ever witnessed a miracle that could only be explained by God's direct hand? I'm not talking about a very sick person getting well, that happens all the time. I'm not talking about something happening that was improbable, but happened anyway. And I'm not talking about someone, even you, seeing "visions" or something, because the human mind can play awful tricks on you.
I'm talking about a miracle like a clearly dead person coming back to life. Not coming back after a couple of minutes (and claiming to have "seen" God), but after days? And not someone's who's been bitten by a puffer fish, and appears "dead", but is not. And I'm not talking about reading a story about such a thing, but witnessed it yourself, or you have direct evidence such as video of the event? Have you witnessed any genuine Godly miracle?
The bottom line is that I haven't seen any evidence for a God that can't be explained by non-Godly means. The Miracles of Jesus could have just been good magic, or pure fiction. The 12 disciples could have all just been corrupt men in the religion business, like Jim Jones of Koolaid fame and his 1000 followers.
There is no incontrovertible "proof" that your God, or any god exists.
So why do you believe in Him?
Just because it feels good?
Just because you're scared of where you will spend eternity? Or maybe that when you die, the lights just go out, and that's it?
Creationists claim that evolution people are "scared" to have ID taught in schools? Why on earth would that "scare" them? I think the fear of dying for all eternity is a very much scarier prospect, and if evolution and an old earth demonstrates that your religion is false, then it terrifies you immensely.
I agree here!
Or if...
Regarding this interjection, Martin Gardner writes:
"Darwin himself, as a young biologist aboard H.M.S. Beagle, was so thoroughly orthodox that the ship's officers laughed at his propensity for quoting Scripture. Then 'disbelief crept over me at a very slow rate,' he recalled, 'but was at last complete. The rate was so slow that I felt no distress.' The phrase 'by the creator,' in the final sentence of the selection chosen here, did not appear in the first edition of Origin of Species. It was added to the second edition to conciliate angry clerics. Darwin later wrote, 'I have long since regretted that I truckled to public opinion and used the Pentateuchal term of creation, by which I really meant 'appeared' by some wholly unknown process." [stress added] (Gardner, 1984)
The mirror?
Dang!!
Now I'm a minority IN a minority!!
Is there some reason you posted that to me?
I don't know if THIS line is supposed to be sarcasm or not, but the other day one of these C vs E threads had some info about goldfish varieties. The implication was that these separate wildly different types were evolved. Guided by man, of course, but still showing HOW "E" could have worked in the wild.
The point as made that if you started breeding these weird ones to each other, you'd get the original kinda plain carp back again.
So it is with people. When distinct 'races' mate, you get a mixture, and when enough mixing takes place, you get what Adam and Eve where like, long ago.
;^)
As well as a 200 yo one:
James 3
1. Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.
2. We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.
3. When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal.
4. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go.
5. Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.
6. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
7. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man,
8. but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
9. With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God's likeness.
10. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be.
11. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?
12. My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.
13. Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom.
Is this like tradition trumps the Word?
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