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Christians can't afford to oppose evolution [says evangelical-biologist]
Chicago Tribune ^ | 27 November 2005 | Richard Colling

Posted on 11/28/2005 3:40:35 AM PST by PatrickHenry

The fuel driving this science education debate is easy to understand. Scientists are suspicious that Christians are trying to insert religious beliefs into science.

They recognize that science must be free, not subject to religious veto. On the other hand, many Christians fear that science is bent on removing God from the picture altogether, beginning in the science classroom--a direction unacceptable to them.

They recognize that when scientists make definitive pronouncements regarding ultimate causes, the legitimate boundaries of science have been exceeded. For these Christians, intelligent design seems to provide protection against a perceived assault from science.

But does it really lend protection? Or does it supply yet another reason to question Christian credibility?

The science education debate need not be so contentious. If the intelligent design movement was truly about keeping the legitimate plausibility of a creator in the scientific picture, the case would seem quite strong.

Unfortunately, despite claims to the contrary, the Dover version of intelligent design has a different objective: opposition to evolution. And that opposition is becoming an increasing liability for Christians.

The reason for this liability is simple: While a growing array of fossils shows evolution occurring over several billion years, information arising from a variety of other scientific fields is confirming and extending the evolutionary record in thoroughly compelling ways.

The conclusions are crystal clear: Earth is very old. All life is connected. Evolution is a physical and biological reality.

In spite of this information, many Christians remain skeptical, seemingly mired in a naive religious bog that sees evolution as merely a personal opinion, massive scientific ruse or atheistic philosophy.

(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: crevolist; evofreaks; goddooditamen; heretic; idiocy; ignoranceisstrength; mythology; scienceeducation; yecignoranceonparade
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To: VadeRetro
Let's also agree that your faith goes in sermons where it belongs and science goes in science classes where IT belongs.

Evolution anit science it is hog wash. It is a crock of bull so idiots can do what ever they want with no fear of God, or so they think. Science, no. Crap, yes.

301 posted on 11/28/2005 4:32:58 PM PST by john_baldacci_is_a_commie
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To: Coyoteman
Having never heard of baraminology, I looked it up.

In creation biology, Baraminology is the effort to classify created kinds. The term was devised in 1990 by Kurt P. Wise, based on Marsh's 1941 coinage of the term "baramin" from the Hebrew words bara (create) and min (kind) to represent the different kinds described in the Bible. (Source Wikipedia)

In his book Fundamental Biology (self-published, 1941) Marsh described himself as a "fundamentalist scientst". He argued that modern human races are degenerate forms of first created man and warned that the living world is the scene of a cosmic struggle between the Creator and Satan. Marsh claimed that Satan is a "master geneticist" and speculated that almagamation and hybridization are his ways of destroying the original harmony and perfection among living things. Marsh viewed the black skin of Negroes as one the "abnormalities" engineered in this diabolical way. (Lustig et al, 2004, p. 92) (Also from Wikipedia)

302 posted on 11/28/2005 4:36:18 PM PST by Liberal Classic (No better friend, no worse enemy. Semper Fi.)
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To: RogueIsland

303 posted on 11/28/2005 4:47:37 PM PST by qam1 (There's been a huge party. All plates and the bottles are empty, all that's left is the bill to pay)
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To: Coyoteman

"These changes in humans probably followed pre-programmed trajectories through biological character space, the specific course of which may have been largely effected by founder effect and genetic drift in small populations following Babel."

That's quite a string of neologisms. I doubt you could actually recite them out loud without taking two deep breaths.

What the hell is a biological character space? Are the DIers speed reading linear algera and turning it into Theo/Biology.

Bring back Eric Von Daniken. At least he was a funny lunatic.


304 posted on 11/28/2005 4:49:05 PM PST by beaver fever
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To: john_baldacci_is_a_commie
Evolution anit science it is hog wash. It is a crock of bull so idiots can do what ever they want with no fear of God, or so they think. Science, no. Crap, yes.

You've already said your Bronze Age texts trump any other lines of evidence. That doesn't leave you in any position to say what science is, OK? I won't tell you what religion is.

305 posted on 11/28/2005 4:52:48 PM PST by VadeRetro (Liberalism is a cancer on society. Creationism is a cancer on conservatism.)
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To: Matchett-PI
Good, you have studied about metaphysics. I'm happy for you. Do you now realize that it does not necessarily have anything to do with the supernatural?
306 posted on 11/28/2005 5:21:36 PM PST by curiosity
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To: beaver fever
Read the post a little more carefully. That is from a link that was sent to me in a previous post, so I researched the link, had a major attack of laughter, and posted it for all to enjoy.

It is certainly not something I would support. I am following the evidence, and that currently points to evolution.

307 posted on 11/28/2005 5:23:03 PM PST by Coyoteman (I love the sound of beta decay in the morning!)
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To: geopyg

I liked your joke.


308 posted on 11/28/2005 5:30:29 PM PST by Just mythoughts
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To: Coyoteman
Read Kant's Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals where he was the first to set out categories of judgment (analytic and synthetic) along with their epistemological restrictions, (Contingent Knowledge vs Knowledge based on the examination of first principles).

He also posited a third category: of synthetic a priori judgments that still dog philosophy to this day.

We are actually on the same page. IDers make the assertion that EVOs stand on A Priori claims but claims base on observation can never be A Priori
309 posted on 11/28/2005 5:35:35 PM PST by beaver fever
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To: beaver fever
Read Kant's Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals

Sorry, I avoided that kind of book for 14 years of college. I choose not to start now. Maybe when I retire and slowly grow senile.

I also avoided all Sociology, Economics, and Philosophy (except for a Logic course), and numerous other touchy-feely subjects, along with Faulkner and Hemingway.

Did get a bit of grounding in the sciences though--Astronomy through Zoology, and quite a bit in between.

310 posted on 11/28/2005 5:44:12 PM PST by Coyoteman (I love the sound of beta decay in the morning!)
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To: JCEccles
"Grossly misstating the ID position is vital to defeating it, because the neodarwinists cannot defeat ID on physical, mathematical, and statistical grounds. Dishonest and desperate neodarwinists have fashioned a strawman, sold it to the public as the genuine article, and bashed it to smithereens."

No one would bother smashing ID, it was formed in pieces. Pieces of scientific sounding neologisms and phony PhD's pile high. It isn't a scientific study. It is a mere hypothesis. There are no discoveries at the Discovery Institute and there are no experiments in ID. It isn't science it is a wishful thinking dressed as a hypothesis.

Keep your faith and stop trying to pass it off as a science.

311 posted on 11/28/2005 5:46:37 PM PST by muir_redwoods (Free Sirhan Sirhan, after all, the bastard who killed Mary Jo Kopechne is walking around free)
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To: Coyoteman

Whatever you do, avoid Hegel like the plague, even WHEN you're old and senile. If you're not there yet, you will be as his writing kills your brain cells.


312 posted on 11/28/2005 5:47:36 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is a grandeur in this view of life...")
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To: CarolinaGuitarman
avoid Hegel like the plague, even WHEN you're old and senile. If you're not there yet, you will be as his writing kills your brain cells.

I did, and do.

I like Steinbeck and Heinlein best. Whole civilizations have come and gone without reaching such heights.

313 posted on 11/28/2005 5:52:19 PM PST by Coyoteman (I love the sound of beta decay in the morning!)
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To: qam1

It saddens me that the ongoing battle between the Left and Right....is diminished in importance by rhetoric.


314 posted on 11/28/2005 5:53:19 PM PST by Halgr (Once a Marine, always a Marine - Semper Fi)
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To: mdmathis6
Convoluted by whose standard...yours?

By the standards of anyone who is interested in reasonable debate rather than semantic sophistry.

Can science produce a moral standard or a virtue

No, and this has no bearing on the fact that evolution is not a religion.
315 posted on 11/28/2005 6:23:00 PM PST by Dimensio (http://angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif <-- required reading before you use your next apostrophe!)
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To: Theophilus
You believe that evolution has been observed, just as some believe they observe Mary weeping.

Really? What observations used as evidence for evolution are akin to a rusty-coloured substance running down the side of a statue's nose, with no apparent origin in the eyes?
316 posted on 11/28/2005 6:24:27 PM PST by Dimensio (http://angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif <-- required reading before you use your next apostrophe!)
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To: Coyoteman

Try Mark Twain.


317 posted on 11/28/2005 6:42:12 PM PST by Gumlegs
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To: CarolinaGuitarman

"The story of his *conversion* was a lie spun a woman named Lady Hope who claimed to have been at his deathbed. She never met him. So much for the honesty of creationists."

Then shall we base our opinion on the integrity of evolutionists on the Piltdown Man episode?


318 posted on 11/28/2005 7:27:57 PM PST by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: metmom
"Then shall we base our opinion on the integrity of evolutionists on the Piltdown Man episode?"

No, because that was exposed as a fraud long long ago, by evolutionists. It was never fully accepted, and has not been a part of the science for over 50 years. Why would an example of a hoax uncovered by evolutionists throw any bad light on their integrity?
319 posted on 11/28/2005 7:44:25 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is a grandeur in this view of life...")
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To: metmom

It should be added also that the Lady Hope story still gets circulated by creationists LONG after it has been exposed as nonsense.


320 posted on 11/28/2005 7:45:26 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is a grandeur in this view of life...")
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