Worland to allow evolution teaching

That is ALL they care about though, is their bible, and they will use it to bash science in any way shape or form they can.

If it cannot use the bible, it is irrelavant, it had BETTER use the bible or it's the devils work.

Shoot, one creationist already told me that if God came down from on high and told her that their bible was not meant to be taken literally, she would NOT believe that it was god telling her and would continue to take it literally.

What can you say against such mindsets?

Science is science, religion is religion, there is a difference, and they want to try and convince people that there isn't. Science is not religion, it CANNOT use god as a causation, creationism is NOT science, it is religion, and SHOULD NOT be taught in a science class.

When science uses god as a causation, then it becomes religion, ID being a PRIME example of such silliness.

Hi. With everything that's been said, I don't know about anybody else but the prospect of death brings me back to my senses.

We live in a time of relative peace and prosperity (at least here in the U.S.) and so we forget our own mortality. The high-fillutant philosophical discussions about the origin of life do not seem to matter much when death stares you in the face.

God wants us to have faith in Him. In some sense, the theory of evolution requires us to have some sort of faith because you'd have to make huge extrapolations to compensate for the incomplete fossil records.

The bottomline is that a life lived with a lack of faith in science will do no more than be labelled ignorant and a kook but a life lived with a lack of faith in God has some damning eternal consequences. I'm not saying that we should only believe in God because of fear (in my opinion, God is worthy of praise for many other wonderful reasons) but this is one pragmatic way of looking at things.

Let me know what you think. Best Regards.

The bottomline is that a life lived with a lack of faith in science will do no more than be labelled ignorant and a kook but a life lived with a lack of faith in God has some damning eternal consequences.

I don't see any conflict between the two. It's not necessary to be "ignorant" or a "kook" in order to have religious faith.

And it's a lot easier to have "faith" in science when the evidence is staring us in the face. The very computer upon which I type this message works on priniciples of physics that were discovered only in the last century of so. Every visit to the doctor demonstrates to us the discoveries of biology and chemistry.

Having taken courses in all of these, plus anatomy, physiology, and genetics, I've seen the evidence and in many cases done the lab work to confirm it. No faith required - my opinion on evolution is reasonably well-informed and based on hard evidence. As I said earlier, as a scientific theory, evolution is subject to future refinement, but it doesn't take much "faith" to believe that the current understanding of evolution is the best explanation we have for the origin of life on Earth.

Natural selection can be observed - we see it when bacteria develop drug resistance. Relationships among types of animals can be observed - see any course on comparitive anatomy. The best theory (by far) that accounts for all of this evidence is evolution. (And there is of course lot's more I'm not getting into.)

Now you may very well say that "people are not bacteria" or some such to dismiss the natural selection. You may counter comparitive anatomy by saying "Well, God made it that way". The problem with that position is that no observations, experiments, or facts can then change your mind, because you always have an "ex cathedra" hole card.

And my original point is that, if you take position, you will be labeled "ignorant" and a "kook". If you're OK with that, hey, it's your call. But it's not necessary, and does not help you gain credibility with those who do not share your faith.

In fact, I would argue that it's harder to spread the Christian faith when you espouse a world view that is based on rejecting common sense evidence. So understanding science and it's relationship to religion can actually help you be a better Christian, by making you better able to spread the word.

Hi. I guess you missed a lot of my points on my previous posts on this thread.

I have a Biology degree, too. I don't really need much convincing about accepting scientific truths. But I still say, based on what I've seen, the hard evidence you are referring to still requires a huge leap because you have to make huge extrapolations to go from what's observed in the fossil record to explaining how life actually came about. Although evolution via natural selection is our best scientific theory to account for how humans came to be, it's still too early and presumptive to say that all it needs is refinement to become rock solid.

Many people actually think that there's enough and plentiful evidence in the fossil record of slow, gradual, and continuous transformation resulting in diversity and complexity, which is what the theory of evolution claims. What we actually see are periods of short brief bursts of change followed by very long periods of almost no change at all. In my opinion, even with billions of years, there simply isn't enough time for all the evolution to occur from a bacteria to a very complex human being.

There's an external and universal TRUTH out there. I believe the Bible is truth. God is very clear on most things but chose to confound us when it comes to the account of his mechanism of creation (It could very well have been through evolution, I don't know). I guess, this is where He says we must have faith.

HB

OK, let me tell you what I think.

Let's keep this straight from the get go.

I am not a Christian, was born and raised a Roman Catholic, but am no longer.

What I actually am is unimportant.

The fact remains, that science is science, and when religious people ignore or misrepresent scientific evidence, it does NOT help their religion, They are indeed thought of as kooks and ignorant.

Death is not something that I am afraid of, I am not sure why everyone else is so afraid of it.

It just happens, it is the way of life, you live, do the best you can to make the world a better place then you found it, have children that will hopefully do the same thing. You grow old and die. That's life. That's the way it is.

Why be so afraid of something that you can't stop.

When you are born, you are condemned to die.

I have NO idea what god wants, I have no idea if god even exists, in the meantime, I will do the best I can to make this world a better place and treat my fellow man in the way that I expect or would want to be treated. Unless of course they are arrogant SOB's then I will pound them senseless if I can...;)

Anyway, I have no idea what god wants, does he want worship, somehow I have always doubted that, does he want me to pray and ask for his help, I doubt it, he probably has better things to do, does he love me, probably, if I am his creation, yes, he probably does. Does this mean that I should set my life's course in bringing more and more people into my church in order to worship him the way I do, NO, I don't think so.

You want a personal relationship with god? Great, have at it, but don't expect your relationship to be like mine.

What am I saying?

I am saying this, just because you have found your answers, does NOT necassarily mean they are everyones answers.

Just because you are a christian, does NOT mean that everyone else has to be a christian as well. And Don't alsways believe unquestionably when someone says that if you do not believe like they do, you will go to hell or whatever punishment their religion has thought up.

Science is science, religion is religion.

If fighting science somehow gives you comfort, then go ahead, but expect to be called arrogant, clueless, and ignorant. Because when the evidence is ignored, you are CHOOSING ignorance, when your mind is at a closeminded level where ALL evidence will be ignored or misrepresented, then YOU are the one with the problem, not the rest of us.

Anyway, most of this post was not directed AT you, so please don't think that I am saying this to you personally, but it is aimed at those that believe that because they have their answer that it HAS to be everyone elses as well.

Have a great day, time to go find some fun stuff at garage sales, there's a LOT of them this weekend!!

Anyway, most of this post was not directed AT you, so please don't think that I am saying this to you personally, but it is aimed at those that believe that because they have their answer that it HAS to be everyone elses as well.
Oh good, because the last thing I want to do is force my beliefs on others. The most I'd like to do is to inject a little different way of looking at things.
The one thing I would really wish here for Free Republic is to be able to discuss relevant issues without getting personal, defensive, accusatory, and smug. What I find to be almost always true is that the opposing sides of any controversial argument seem to mischaracterize the other in a big way. If one gets a little bit passionate about arguing for his side, he gets called names, belittled, and told to mind his own business. Passion, many times, is wrongfully perceived as intolerance. Anyway, this is just something I've noticed to be true here and everywhere else.

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