Sometimes they have to be included (not push) into History. If you're studing the history of Hebrew culture you're bound to encounter King Solomon and the building of the Jewish temple in Jeruselum. See that is what I'm aiming at. There are certain (not all ) stories or legends that could provide valuable information about the history of a culture.
First of all, there is a difference between Evolution and natural selection. Natural selection is the the impetus for evolution. There are several reasons why evolution makes more sense than creationism. The fossil record. If life was six thousand years old, there would be no fossil record. However, there are some christians that say they don't dispute the scientific idea that the earth is billions of years old. Okay, so some creationists accept that the fossil record is factual, but that it is simply more evidence of gods hand in our creation.
Evolution theorizes that all life descended from a few ancestors and that natural selection seperated those few into many different organisms and species. A basis for this idea is the priniple of homology. Homology says that both humans and dolphins have similar structure in their hands. However, a humans hands are used for one thing(many things actually) and a dolphins flippers are used for something completely different. So, environment effected the hands of two species with the same ancestor group and produced two different end results. Take the dolphins lungs for example, or those of a whale. What kind of god would create a species that lives in the water, but depends on air? That makes no sense, it isn't very intelligent or logical. Instead, evolution provides the answer. The ancestors of whales and dolphins at some point in time lived on land and had to breathe air. Another fact that supports this idea is that whales have hip bones. Why in the hell would a whale have hip bones? For the same reason that humans have tail bones. At some point in their history, whales had ...LEGS! In fact, one of Darwins earliest assumptions was that whales were the descendants of bears. Obviously not modern bears, but that the two had a comon ancestor. The fossil record goes on and on. The absence of a missing link is not proof that humans didn't evolve, rather that is the nature of the fossil record. Land based animals stand a very low chance of being fossilized, about a thousand times less than creatures that live in the ocean. That's because the chance of conditions being just right to create a fossil are much less on teh land than they are in the ocean...or even a river.
Consider the T-Rex: there are about a dozen complete specimens of the t-rex. Now, how many actual animals existed? Millions, I'm sure.
The age of dinosaurs. Let's think about that. There are no fossils of birds. How could that be? Because they did not exist as a species. archaeopteryx is a species of dinosaur. This species had feathers and teeth. There are later specimens of small rapter dinos found in mongolia that actually have fully featherd bodies, and four wings. Two sets of wings? Why would they have four wings, when two are enough for birds to fly? Because these dinosaurs didn't fly. They used their wings to glide as well as to provide them with a method of covering greater distances in one leap when they would chase prey on the ground. No dinosaur ever flew, by the time they started flying, they were birds.
So, the basic point is that life is much more messy than we like to think. If god was behind life, it wouldn't be so messy. There are dead ends in natural selection. Hip bones in whales, etc. Examples like this show how life is trial and error...not perfection in a bottle. That is also why evolution is a science, and creation is not.
You know, all these people who claim that there's evidence for creationism....I'd really like to see this so-called evidence some day. And by evidence, I do NOT mean a quote from the bible, I mean hard scientific evidence.
But no one will ever be able to show this evidence, now will they. Why? Because it doesn't exist. So no one can, in any stretch of their imagination, call it a theory.
If you want to believe in creationism, whatever. But do NOT call it a theory and say that there's evidence to back it up because it isn't one and there is no evidence for it. It is supported simply by faith.
Creationism does not belong in a science class. Keep it to a religion class, maybe history.
Originally posted by Capt_Fantastic
First of all, there is a difference between Evolution and natural selection. Natural selection is the the impetus for evolution. There are several reasons why evolution makes more sense than creationism. The fossil record. If life was six thousand years old, there would be no fossil record. However, there are some christians that say they don't dispute the scientific idea that the earth is billions of years old. Okay, so some creationists accept that the fossil record is factual, but that it is simply more evidence of gods hand in our creation.Evolution theorizes that all life descended from a few ancestors and that natural selection seperated those few into many different organisms and species. A basis for this idea is the priniple of homology. Homology says that both humans and dolphins have similar structure in their hands. However, a humans hands are used for one thing(many things actually) and a dolphins flippers are used for something completely different. So, environment effected the hands of two species with the same ancestor group and produced two different end results. Take the dolphins lungs for example, or those of a whale. What kind of god would create a species that lives in the water, but depends on air? That makes no sense, it isn't very intelligent or logical. Instead, evolution provides the answer. The ancestors of whales and dolphins at some point in time lived on land and had to breathe air. Another fact that supports this idea is that whales have hip bones. Why in the hell would a whale have hip bones? For the same reason that humans have tail bones. At some point in their history, whales had ...LEGS! In fact, one of Darwins earliest assumptions was that whales were the descendants of bears. Obviously not modern bears, but that the two had a comon ancestor. The fossil record goes on and on. The absence of a missing link is not proof that humans didn't evolve, rather that is the nature of the fossil record. Land based animals stand a very low chance of being fossilized, about a thousand times less than creatures that live in the ocean. That's because the chance of conditions being just right to create a fossil are much less on teh land than they are in the ocean...or even a river.
Consider the T-Rex: there are about a dozen complete specimens of the t-rex. Now, how many actual animals existed? Millions, I'm sure.
The age of dinosaurs. Let's think about that. There are no fossils of birds. How could that be? Because they did not exist as a species. archaeopteryx is a species of dinosaur. This species had feathers and teeth. There are later specimens of small rapter dinos found in mongolia that actually have fully featherd bodies, and four wings. Two sets of wings? Why would they have four wings, when two are enough for birds to fly? Because these dinosaurs didn't fly. They used their wings to glide as well as to provide them with a method of covering greater distances in one leap when they would chase prey on the ground. No dinosaur ever flew, by the time they started flying, they were birds.So, the basic point is that life is much more messy than we like to think. If god was behind life, it wouldn't be so messy. There are dead ends in natural selection. Hip bones in whales, etc. Examples like this show how life is trial and error...not perfection in a bottle. That is also why evolution is a science, and creation is not.
Okay, for the dolphin skeletal systems: It makes sense to use one creation as a template, and then simply modify it for your purposes. I know that when drawing, I use a basic form, and then modify that form until I have a unique character that I like. Same deal.
And as far as your argument about the chaos required for lungs in a swimming creature... What about the natural selection you cited as the impetus for evolution? Wouldn't natural selection, running naturally, require this less convienient form to die off, allowing for the "fitter" species to grow larger and better?
How interesting that you bring up fossils... For I feel it important to note that not a single transitional form between two species have ever been found. I can allow your statement about the difficulty of the formation of fossils, but with the numbers required for natural selection to produce the (obviously smaller) number of animals now in existence, shouldn't there be at least a few hundred transitional fossils? I find it very difficult to believe that not a single transitional form ever managed to make a fossil, and only "fully different" forms did.
And even without the fossil record, let's examine the path evolution must take. For an example, I will use bats. Bats would have had to have come from some small, four legged mammal according to evolution. Bat wings are merely skin stretched between the "fingers" of the front legs. However, over this extended period in which the finger bones were lengthening and the skin spreading, there would have been at least one point in which the transitional creature would have been unable to run fast enough to catch prey, and yet still unable to fly. The result: The creatures trying to become bats die off, a la NATURAL SELECTION. How can evolution even be considered for scientific truth if it contradicts even itself?
Would you like for me to continue?
Originally posted by MC Mike
This is really bad in one way, and really good in another.All the jesus freak teachers will be biased, and so will some of the non-believers. And that's just f*cked up.
Personally, I don't believe ANYTHING in creationism in any way, shape, or form, but do think that non-biased teaching of both would be okay. Just make sure they present all the evidence for both.
If no one got the point of my post - Just make sure they present all the evidence for both. - there is no evidence for creationism.
Originally posted by General Kaliero
Okay, for the dolphin skeletal systems: It makes sense to use one creation as a template, and then simply modify it for your purposes. I know that when drawing, I use a basic form, and then modify that form until I have a unique character that I like. Same deal.And as far as your argument about the chaos required for lungs in a swimming creature... What about the natural selection you cited as the impetus for evolution? Wouldn't natural selection, running naturally, require this less convienient form to die off, allowing for the "fitter" species to grow larger and better?
How interesting that you bring up fossils... For I feel it important to note that not a single transitional form between two species have ever been found. I can allow your statement about the difficulty of the formation of fossils, but with the numbers required for natural selection to produce the (obviously smaller) number of animals now in existence, shouldn't there be at least a few hundred transitional fossils? I find it very difficult to believe that not a single transitional form ever managed to make a fossil, and only "fully different" forms did.
And even without the fossil record, let's examine the path evolution must take. For an example, I will use bats. Bats would have had to have come from some small, four legged mammal according to evolution. Bat wings are merely skin stretched between the "fingers" of the front legs. However, over this extended period in which the finger bones were lengthening and the skin spreading, there would have been at least one point in which the transitional creature would have been unable to run fast enough to catch prey, and yet still unable to fly. The result: The creatures trying to become bats die off, a la NATURAL SELECTION. How can evolution even be considered for scientific truth if it contradicts even itself?
Would you like for me to continue?
First of all, do not approach this conversation as though you are making the rules for this discussion. I don't need you to "allow" anything I say. As soon as you are elected speaker of the house, then you can approach people from this perspective.
Secondly, do not expect me to prove the theory of evolution. I am not a scientist, neither are you I would imagine. In fact, one scientist had this to say about proving any theory in science:
"First let me say that I am not a biologist, but a chemist. So I do not have a very detailed answer to your question. I first want to say that scientists have a very special meaning for the word "proof." In fact, it is so difficult to "prove" a scientific theory that I can honestly say that there are NO pieces of scientific knowledge that have actually been "proved." Scientists come up with a theory, and then they test it in as many ways as they can, looking for evidence or information which will either prove the theory to be impossible, or maybe verify some of the theory's predictions, or change the theory a little."
As for a transitional species, there are many found in the dinosaur fossil record. These feathered dinosaurs fossils progress through the fossil record. Starting with feathers only on certain parts of the body, then to the arms and then the arm structure begins to change and then wings appear. In the case of Caudipteryx, there were four: two sets of layered wings. Now, if you're looking for a human skeleton that still has a tail and opposable thumbs on it's feet, I can't help you there. In the quest to find the missing link, DNA seems to be the the biggest factor in proving the relationship between extinct species and modern species.
Fortunately, many of the protosapien species that we've found still hold viable DNA. These extinct species share genetic patterns that more closely resemble modern humans than does the chimp, which is our closest living genetic relation. Now, if god created so many species and just modified their structure because he had found a suitable model, no.1 that kind of illustrates a lack of creativity and no.2 why would the wing structure of a bat be totally different than that of a bird which is toally different than a bug?(structure being shape and functionality in this case.) If this idea that god just got bored and kept reworking the same form, then why wouldn't this apply to all living things?
And, as I mentioned before, why would there be all these dead end aspects to evolution? Why does a whale have a hip bone?
Originally posted by General Kaliero
Wow. I never thought that it swell up to these proportions in a matter of hours.First: Creationism, while it should be taught, should mot be taught in Science class. Like someone said earlier, fairy tales shouldn't be taught in a class that is concerned with provable, scientic truths.
Second: Which is exactly the reason evolution should not be taught in science classes, either. Despite being called a theory, and being taught as fact for many, many years, evolutionism still suffers from the distinct drawback of not having one piece of verifiable proof.
Yes, I just said that. Show me just one piece of evidence that clearly shows evolution as fact. Just one.
Pfft! That is doing exactly the same thing- misidentifying a theory.
Science isn't Maths- when it comes to talking about the past of creation, you can't provide a 'fact' as you define it without a time machine!
But there is plentiful high quality evidence for evolution which is what makes it a workable and acceptable theory- easily meeting scientific standards, and massively over the line to be taugh in science class as the best explanation we have at this point of the development of life on Earth. Like all Science it is, of course, open for future improvement.
This quote from an evolutionist rebuts this silly attempt to try and remove Evolution, even though it is just as well supported as a hell of a lot of other scientific 'facts' we teach in the classroom:
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The phrase "scientific fact" is an oxymoron. So is the phrase "scientific proof." Science, unlike mathematics, does not consist of a collection of airtight proofs. Nor is it a large body of "facts." Science is a method of learning about our universe and how things work. The concept of "proof" does not exist in science, because the essence of science is being always open to new evidence and new explanations, which may call into question tentatively accepted theories.
Religion, on the other hand, does pretend to know certain so-called "truths" with absolute certainty, through faith. Faith, basically, is a determination to remain convinced of some proposition, despite any and all evidence or reasoning that might ever be offered to the contrary. Science is distinguished from religion in that it does not rely upon faith, but rather upon evidence and reason.
While it is not possible to conclusively "prove" a scientific theory, it is possible to disprove them. Just because a particular explanation is accepted upon faith by some or many people does not automatically make it scientifically disproved. However, if an explanation is merely a matter of faith, in that there is no evidence or reasoning to support it, then that idea has no place being taught in [science class].
Into this environment, a decade or so ago, steps Dr Hovind,, a self-described "creation science evangelist" who offers a substantial reward to anyone who "proves" evolution. He states that evolution refers to the origin of time, space, matter, higher elements from hydrogen, stars & planets, life from inanimate matter, kinds (species), and not just gradual changes within species.
Aside from the fact that there is no such thing as a "scientific proof" it seems absolutely unclear to me just what specifically we are being asked to prove. For example, it makes no sense to prove "the origin of time." Someone needs to make a specific statement that might tend to explain whether/how/when? time began. I'm betting several people have taken a crack at making such a statement. I know Steven B. Hawking, for one, has. Which theory is Dr Hovind suggesting is the "evolution" explanation that is to be proven?
If it were possible to "scientifically prove" anything, a contest such as this one would need to be judged by impartial, fair-minded people. Dr Hovind refuses to identify the judges. Presumably they would be hand picked creation science buddies who accept some scriptural explanation on faith. In other words, they are determined to reject any and all possible alternative explanations.
The existence of this unclaimed quarter million dollar standing offer is constantly thrown out as evidence that "evolutionism" is a faith because has not yet been proven. The fact is, though that there is considerable convincing evidence for a variety of theories across the wide range of scientific thought that Hovind calls "evolution." The fact that more is being learned every day about these matters, and that current thinking is constantly revised is proof that such scientific theories are not accepted on faith, but rather provisionally.
The fact that nothing can ever be scientifically proven is not proof that every idea is necessarily accepted on faith. Dr Hovind and those who publicize his unclaimed reward would have us believe that faith means "not knowing for sure but believing anyway." In fact though, what faith is, is "being determined to believe something, despite any and all evidence or reasoning that might ever be offered to the contrary." And it is exactly this kind of stagnation of thought that the founders (of the U.S.) sought to protect us against with the first amendment.
And as an addendum to that from another contributor:
"Actually... it’s perfectly acceptable to ask for evidence, and evidence is available in abundance. There is such a compelling accumulation of observation and reason, in fact, that practically the entire scientific community is united in agreement that evolution is the best explanation that we have so far of the current diversity of species. What we don’t claim to have is proof of the sort that is sometimes available for mathematical puzzles. It is by remaining open to the possibility of a better explanation that we avoid the kind of mental stagnation that defined the Dark Ages (AKA the Age of Faith)...
...Creationists continually taunt, "But where are the transitional forms?" Every time another piece of the puzzle is put into place they want to know where the fossils are that show that the discovered animal was ancestor to any current day species. When another fossil is found that seems to fit directly between the first one and the same current day animal, they again call for "transitional forms." Apparently, somebody’s going to have to find a fossilized pregnant monkey whose fetus is a little girl or boy before some will be satisfied.
This whole problem was brought into bold relief for me a few days ago in reading the thoughts of one such person who is calling for transitional forms. He said that he would not be satisfied that human beings (who all have two eyes) have descended from amoebas (who have none) until archeologists uncover a one eyed creature. This is just a reminder that there will always be some people who can never be convinced. There are even some still who believe the earth is flat."
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Meanwhile, I think Tex is highly naive to think that putting Creationism alongside Evolution in Science class will diminish the credibility of the first- it will only make it not credible in the eyes of those who were not going to find it credible anyway, whereas for others it will gain credibility by being put in a class which deals solely with rationality and NOT blind faith.
"You know, all these people who claim that there's evidence for creationism....I'd really like to see this so-called evidence some day."
The only evidence these creationalists can throw around is that there is also no factual evidence for evolution, and somehow by default, if there is not factual proof of evolution, then creationism must be correct.
Originally posted by BackFire
"You know, all these people who claim that there's evidence for creationism....I'd really like to see this so-called evidence some day."The only evidence these creationalists can throw around is that there is also no factual evidence for evolution, and somehow by default, if there is not factual proof of evolution, then creationism must be correct.
Originally posted by Ushgarak
Hence this old mini-script:Creationist: How was the Universe created?
Scientist: I'm not quite sure.
Creationist: Oh, God must have done it then.
So very true....and I recently got in this argument with someone here.
And GOOD, I'm not the only person who understands that science does NOT prove things (in the sense that most people think of the word prove meaning), but uses substantial amounts of evidence to support a theory. I've explained this numerous times but people just simply don't seem to get it.
Also, I don't think the people who claim that there's little evidence for evolution as a theory really understand the scientific method and how it works -- for a hypothesis to become a theory, they must find a TON of evidence to support it. It's not a case of "that sounds good, let's make it a theory". Yet another thing I've explained many many times but people never seem to understand -- or want to understand.
Originally posted by WindDancer
Sometimes they have to be included (not push) into History. If you're studing the history of Hebrew culture you're bound to encounter King Solomon and the building of the Jewish temple in Jeruselum. See that is what I'm aiming at. There are certain (not all ) stories or legends that could provide valuable information about the history of a culture.