Creationism Vs. Evolution: The Debate Is Live Tonight online at 7pm- http://www.npr.org

[alexey]

and your Godlessness is not the same to you?

I do not define my identity by my beliefs.  Frankly i dont even know if i have an identity.  I am a brain. I think identity is an illusion and holding it is a bad idea... as demonstrated by people who hold their faith against evidence. 

 

(not talking about identity as cultural heritage or relationships here, those are great)

[grego]

Joking.

I know.

I can't resist the opportunity to remind folks that there are many kinds of people in the world.

I always hated generalizations

I do not define my identity by my beliefs. Frankly i dont even know if i have an identity. I am a brain. I think identity is an illusion and holding it is a bad idea... as demonstrated by people who hold their faith against evidence.

(not talking about identity as cultural heritage or relationships here)

I actually kinda get what your saying. But you're more than just a brain. I can at least go as far as the whole snowflake individual thingy......

You may not be "spiritual", but you can believe in purpose, no?

[nonniey]

What about believing in both? Is that allowed?

[alexey]

I actually kinda get what your saying. But you're more than just a brain. I can at least go as far as the whole snowflake individual thingy......

You may not be "spiritual", but you can believe in purpose, no?

Yes I am "more than just a brain" in that I have emergent properties...

 

It's cool that you mentioned snow flakes and the wiki article has them on the front page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence

 

I can believe in purpose, but not the pre-determined kind. 

[Mad Mike]

I wish Nye would admit to the possibility of a grand creator. Not to support intelligent design but to say that a great and all powerful god may have used evolution as is widely understood to do his work by simply setting the stage and letting nature take it's course.

 

To me, the greater power would be to drop a pebble into a pond (the big bang) and have it evolve over billions of years leading to the creation of our solar system, earth and eventually us than a god who had to manually create each thing.

[Corcaigh]

What about believing in both? Is that allowed?

 

The majority of Christians, Catholics and most Protestants believe both. And most scientists, including atheists, would accept that you can't prove one way or another whether a supreme being created the Universe and the mechanism of evolution along with it.

 

However, this debate was supposed to be about Ken Hamm's worldview of Young Earth Creationism that the Earth is 4500 years old and evolution of species is false.

[grego]

Yes I am "more than just a brain" in that I have emergent properties...

It's cool that you mentioned snow flakes and the wiki article has them on the front page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence

I can believe in purpose, but not the pre-determined kind.

I'm with you on no pre-determination

[Springfield]

What about believing in both? Is that allowed?

I think intelligent design and evolution can be congruent but creationism, specifically young earth creationism, is incompatible with evolution.

Evolution doesn't claim that people, plants, animals were just put here by god (creationism). In fact it claims the exact opposite. Young earth creationism takes that a step further and claims all sorts of wacky things like man lived along side dinosaurs, the earth is only 10,000 years old, etc.

Intelligent design could be congruent because it claims that evolution has in fact happened but it was guided by god's hand. I think intelligent design is the closest that a Christian can get to evolution.

[Corcaigh]

I think intelligent design and evolution can be congruent but creationism, specifically young earth creationism, is incompatible with evolution.

 

 

Intelligent design is not congruent with evolution. It only exists because the creationists were told they could never get religion in science class in public education, so they renamed creationism to intelligent design. Read the Dover trial if you are under any misunderstanding on this. Intelligent design is no more scientific than astrology.

[Ellis]

I'm sure this debate will settle everything and we'll never have to discuss this topic again.

Thank Go-- err, I mean.... hmmmm...

[Corcaigh]

And before this goes any further ...

 

[Mad Mike]

I also wish Nye had hammered home the opportunity presented in the question about believing every part of the bible as literal. Ham opened the door when he admitted that not all parts of the bible are to be taken literally and humans have to interpret what they are.

 

My question to him and to any creationist is "if you were god, trying to explain the origins to the universe and of man, to people of those times who did not have the scientific understanding to grasp such things as the big bang or evolution, what might that explanation sound like?

 

Because if you start with the premise of a higher intelligence like an adult trying to explain a complex thing to a child, the description as written in Genesis makes a lot more sense.

[Mad Mike]

Intelligent design is not congruent with evolution. It only exists because the creationists were told they could never get religion in science class in public education, so they renamed creationism to intelligent design. Read the Dover trial if you are under any misunderstanding on this. Intelligent design is no more scientific than astrology.

 

I agree. I can respect the loose concept that maybe the universe as we know it was created by god in the way science tells us it happened. But when they start trying to come up with alternate explanations for what we know, the concept has jumped off the tracks of reality IMO.

[Springfield]

Intelligent design is not congruent with evolution. It only exists because the creationists were told they could never get religion in science class in public education, so they renamed creationism to intelligent design. Read the Dover trial if you are under any misunderstanding on this. Intelligent design is no more scientific than astrology.

Fair enough.

I was trying to be nice to the people who believe in intelligent design/creationism. Only because I can't prove that they are wrong. They can't prove that they are right either so we just end in a stale mate. Therefore I do the good Christian thing and try to be nice about it.

I still remember the conversations I've had on ES about this subject...

"Evolution is just a THEORY!"

"Yeah..."

"That means it isn't proven fact!"

"No..."

"It is only a theory! It isn't true'"

"You're wrong."

[Zguy28]

I also wish Nye had hammered home the opportunity presented in the question about believing every part of the bible as literal. Ham opened the door when he admitted that not all parts of the bible are to be taken literally and humans have to interpret what they are.

My question to him and to any creationist is "if you were god, trying to explain the origins to the universe and of man, to people of those times who did not have the scientific understanding to grasp such things as the big bang or evolution, what might that explanation sound like?

Because if you start with the premise of a higher intelligence like an adult trying to explain a complex thing to a child, the description as written in Genesis makes a lot more sense.

this is kind of what Old Earth Creationists believe such as myself. The "days" are not 24 hours. Doesn't mean I take the bible any less seriously. I also take seriously the suffering in this world that the millions of dollars wasted on his silly museum could be used to relieve, isn't relieved. What a tragedy.

[alexey]

imho you are setting yourself up for failure whenever you try to explain any part of reality using god.

 

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Neil_deGrasse_Tyson

 

Does it mean, if you don’t understand something, and the community of physicists don’t understand it, that means God did it? Is that how you want to play this game? Because if it is, here’s a list of things in the past that the physicists at the time didn’t understand [and now we do understand] [...]. If that’s how you want to invoke your evidence for God, then God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that’s getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time moves on - so just be ready for that to happen, if that’s how you want to come at the problem.

[Destino]

There are people who believe that the holocaust was justified and Hitler was right. There are people think that white man was the first to inhabit this country. It doesn't effect their ability to live purposeful lives.

It doesn't make them right.

That is a amazingly bad comparison. Wow.

[Springfield]

That is a amazingly bad comparison. Wow.

Personally, I thought it was as least as good as your grammar.

[Destino]

I just want to add that not all Christians view evolution is incompatible with their faith or believe in the young earth stuff.

[Unforgiven]

this is kind of what Old Earth Creationists believe such as myself. The "days" are not 24 hours. Doesn't mean I take the bible any less seriously. I also take seriously the suffering in this world that the millions of dollars wasted on his silly museum could be used to relieve, isn't relieved. What a tragedy.

 

When you say the "days" aren't 24-hours, do you mean that a day literally lasted longer or that the story itself if simply an allegory used to explain a complex story to a people with little scientific advancement? (Not to say people of the Bible era were stupid, just that they lived in a time before a lot of discoveries were made)

[Destino]

Personally, I thought it was as least as good as your grammar.

I wouldn't have defended that ridiculous comparison either. Good choice.

[Springfield]

I wouldn't have defended that ridiculous comparison either. Good choice.

You can't tell me you take young earth creationists more seriously than holocaust deniers.

The point was to be so far in left field with the comparison because those folks are whacked out.

[Zguy28]

When you say the "days" aren't 24-hours, do you mean that a day literally lasted longer or that the story itself if simply an allegory used to explain a complex story to a people with little scientific advancement? (Not to say people of the Bible era were stupid, just that they lived in a time before a lot of discoveries were made)

The "days" of the creation story. Hebrew word Yom doesn't mean 24 hour period of time always. It can, and sometimes does, but sometimes doesn't. Hebrew only has roughly 3000 or so words vs. 100,000 or so in English. I don't believe it is allegory either though, just that "days" (English word) are not literally one week. I do believe in things like ancient hominids, but also an historical Adam.

[Zguy28]

You can't tell me you take young earth creationists more seriously than holocaust deniers.

The point was to be so far in left field with the comparison because those folks are whacked out.

The difference is that holocaust deniers have video evidence and deny it. Young earthers have the ancient equivalent to video evidence and believe. You are the one who denies it. Obviously you see it the opposite way and it is what it is.

[Destino]

You can't tell me you take young earth creationists more seriously than holocaust deniers.

The point was to be so far in left field with the comparison because those folks are whacked out.

 

My initial reaction to the young earth creationist view is certainly to consider it pretty nutty.  I don't say this simply because of the obvious scientific evidence but also because it seems like such a meaningless issue on which to expend so much energy.  Salvation does not hinge upon the age of the planet and Jesus did not gather his followers and declare "The earth is exactly xxxx old.  Seriously people, exactly xxxx old, don't let anyone tell you different."  If it was important enough to draw a line in the sand and turn people away from the church over it I think Jesus would have at least mentioned it.