Posted on 11/29/2011 12:32:30 PM PST by SeekAndFind
For the last several months there has been a flurry of discussion—mostly online, of course—about the impossibility of a literal Adam & Eve (see, e.g., here and here and here). This ruling-out has been accomplished recently by the Human Genome Project, which indicates that anatomically modern humans emerged from primate ancestors about 100,000 years ago, from a population of something like 10,000. In short, science has confirmed what many of us already knew: there was not a literal first couple. So what else can we learn from this story?
Plenty, it turns out. Peter Enns, a biblical scholar who blogs at Patheos, has been following the discussion with some care. Lately he has done us all a great favor: written a series of posts pointing out recurring mistakes made by many of those doing the discussing. Many of these mistakes are rhetorically effective but collapse upon even modest inspection.
But not all of them.
On Friday, he listed one held mostly by the pro-science crowd: “Evidence for and against evolution is open to all and can be assessed by anyone.”
Enns declares that this is not so. “The years of training and experience required of those who work in fields that touch on evolution rules out of bounds the views of those who lack such training,” he writes.
This is true but it misses the point. The open-access-to-science cliché, usually trundled out by those who wish to contrast the transparency of science with the supposed obfuscation of religion, carries some truth.
Science actually is transparent in a way that religion is not. That’s because, in science land, there is nothing but to follow the evidence. It’s out on the table, after all, able and willing to be poked and prodded and analyzed and figured out and held up and turned around and looked at from new angles. Also, what counts as evidence in science is pretty well-defined. And if you do become an evolution expert, you actually will see that 99% of all scientists back evolution for a reason: the evidence demands it.
This is the great generosity of science, and its great strength: It is actually all right there, ready to be seen and understood. It is relievedly explicit. It takes effort, sure, just as Enns suggests; it’s not easy to become a professional research biologist. But the reason biologists agree on evolution is because it’s a relatively simple matter to be objective about fossils and genes. Unlike the objects of religion—the divine and humanity’s relation to it—the objects of science give themselves up for abstraction and analysis without a fight.
Therefore Richard Dawkins (for example) is right when he says, as he has on many occasions, that the evidence for evolution is there to be inspected by anyone. It is sitting out there on the table, waiting patiently for most of humanity to catch up to it, waiting to tell us it’s time to bid the historical Adam & Eve a final, if fond, farewell.
When a creationist asks an evolutionist a question they can't answer it's called appealing to "the God of the gaps."
When an evolutionist asks a creationist the same sort of question,it's called "defending science."
"Logical fallacies for me and none for thee" is the cry of the evos on this board.
Well, hold on there...what if one of the mice crossbred with a ferret that had elenty-one chromosomes, or a passing archaeopteryx that had umpteen? And they did it on Juneteenth?
Umpteen is a prime number, you know. ;-)
Well said.
It’s both. Jesus referred to them as real people.
That’s good enough for me.
Besides, what’s your proof from Scripture for stating that they were NOT distinct individuals, created by God as the first man and woman?
Well, consider the similarities.
We are constantly told that AGW is true because it's science and so many scientists believe it. Ditto for evolution.
We are told anyone who questions AGW is anti-science and has an agenda to harm science. Ditto for evolution.
We are told anyone calling themselves a scientist who doesn't believe in AGW isn't a real scientist, no matter what their credentials. Ditto for evolution.
Scientists who wish to be seen as moral philosophers use AGW to justify reworking the moral underpinnings of society. Ditto for evolution.
AGW is founded on models that don't make any sense but are appealed to as fact, even though they violate common sense, i.e., "If you have 10,000 molecules in an air space and five of them are CO2 the temperature will run off the chart but if there are only three CO2 molecules it's all good." Ditto for evolution, specifically the idea that systems of astonishing complexity came about by random chance in defiance of near-infinite odds against.
If the facts change, the "fact" of AGW doesn't change. Ditto for evolution.
There you go.
The huge disconnect is picking and choosing which miracles to believe based on preference.
Why are you willing to sacrifice science on the altar of faith when it comes to the virgin birth and faith on the altar of science when it comes to Genesis and the creation account?
The God who can make a baby virgin born can create the universe and all that is in it in a heartbeat, if He wanted. On what basis do you say He didn't when He tells us that He spoke it into existence.
Actually, God created light before plants.
The sun is listed as being created after the plants, but since light existed, it’s not an issue.
Plants need light, not specifically the sun.
They had it.
A theistic evolutionist without insults is like a lawyer without a briefcase or a mechanic without a socket set.
LOL!!!
How about just *an evolutionist*? There's precious little difference between a theistic evolutionist and an atheistic evolutionist in the insult department.
Why just the similarities?
Why just the similarities?
No doubt. Now, please identify any one drug or medical procedure that has depended on evolution. I'll be charitable and allow any applied science application from any discipline.
Because Adam and Eve are our ancestors.
Actually, it is an issue if someone is saying that Genesis describes evolutionary cosmology and biology. If the evolutionary timeline is true, the Sun was a billion or more years old before the first microbe evolved on Earth. Ergo, plants before a Sun conflicts with evolution.
True! That said, the theisticevos are supposed to be God’s kids and should be acting as such.
Every new drug tested in model species utilizes these model species based upon their evolutionary relation to the human species. That is why data on non-human primates is more valuable than data in rodents - because of the evolutionary similarity of our DNA and the resulting proteins.
Enzymes are designed for industrial uses utilizing an error prone PCR method that introduces variation - and a selection criteria that eliminates non optimal variations. Gee, randomly created variation and a selection criteria - where did they think of THAT from?
Science is of use in application, as well as in explaining and predicting data.
Creationism is of no use in application or predicting data.
Creationism is useless.
You asked why people had a certain opinion. The similarities are the reason for the opinion existing, ergo, I discussed the similarities.
For example, if Person A said, "My friend Bob looks just like Justin Bieber" and Person B said it was odd they would think that, Person A is not going to clarify the idea by discussing contrasts between Bob and Bieber. Only similarities will explain why the opinion exists.
But if it was an allegory, they’re fictional characters. And in addition to that, if evolution is how we came about there was no Adam and Eve.
The global flood is the key to the veracity of the biblical account of history. The interpretation of the evidence through the lens of a global flood obviates the need for "billions of years".
What would we expect to see if there was a global flood?
Well, something like millions of dead things buried in sedimentary rock layers laid down by water all over the earth? Yeah, probably.
So you concluded they were the same by finding all the similarities, and not looking for any differences.
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