Poll: Do you support evolution?

[Silk_Sk]

I'd answer the poll with "Yes, I believe in evolution: Go Science" except that seems to preclude that I am not a creationist, which I am. I just don't see evolution and creation (or indeed, religion and science as a whole) as being in conflict with one another.

Why does no one consider that god created evolution? Say he did throw the whole universe together in seven days. How long it took him doesn't matter. God is a being outside of time with unlimited power. 20,000 years ago (or whatever ridiculous age the extreme zealots claim the earth is) God created everyting, but he designed it to be a couple bazillion years old when he did, with all evolutionary paths intact. It's like Game of Thrones. Just because the story started a few years ago from it's current point doesn't mean that whole world is only a few years old. Centuries of history take place before we come to the point when the story starts. Why can't creation be like that? See? Both parties are satisfied.

Actually no, they're unsatisfied because they can't accept that being right doesn't have to mean the other party is wrong.

 

[frizzlebyte]

What I find particularly frustrating is that, IIRC, it is more controversial now than when Darwin first published. At the time, most Christian either didn't care, or found it interesting to some degree. It didn't threaten their worldview, it wasn't something they had to hush up.

But then the Monkey Trial happened in Texas, and it became something that many Christians felt they had to oppose, because it somehow became part of their religion, for no good reason that I can see.

Actually they were opposed to it, very much so, it is simply that it was not taught in the public schools and so they didn't feel they were being forced to teach what was, in their view, a lie to their children.

And the Scopes trial was in Tennessee, not Texas.

As for my part, yes I support and accept evolution, based on a preponderance of both documented and readily observable evidence. I also believe that religion and science can, and should, exist together.

I heavily subscribe to the idea that, even if something seems random to us, it might not be to an outside observer, based on the idea that if one knew or could calculate the position and movement of every atom in the universe, one could, in effect, predict the movements of said atoms, precluding the idea that events are random. So for our own purposes evolution (and by extension pretty much every other thing that happens in the universe) is random, but may not be, in fact, random, but also not guided by said outside observer.

Just for the record, I am Christian.

 

[omega 616]

I don't think you need belief in evolution, I think belief is what you have when you have no evidence to support something. I say evolution is a thing, like aging is a thing ... it just is and to deny it is a refusal of evidence.

I would say that since evolution and belief is usually only brought up when religion is uttered, it should be in that section.

It is a very flammable subject.

 

[Lightknight]

Believe it or not, it's basically proven with the exception of being able to show something evolve in real time. Hence why it's a theory ...like gravity, and the earth orbiting the sun, yes, they are theories. For some reason many seem to think a theory means a hypothesis, it's not.

That's untrue. We have viruses evolving in real time, and someone has pointed out a rather interesting thing about certain mosquitoes that changed so far when they moved underground that they can't even interbreed anymore.

Well, Snotnarok also said that gravity and the Earth orbiting the sun were theories too, soo...

 

[MasterOfHisOwnDomain]

When the Chinese et al. look at the things us westerners tie ourselves in knots over, they must feel very content indeed.

The Chinese that still feel that rubbing a rhinoceros horn over your genitals cures erectile dysfunction? or having shark fin soup relieves cancer? That same, sane race of people? Westerns are probably the least religious or superstitious people on the planet.

 

[masticina]

You wanna know the real kicker in these debates?


Evolution isn't the theory, which is something that BOTH sides seem to forget.
When people say 'the theory of evolution', it's actually just a nickname for 'the theory of evolution through natural selection'.



Evolution is not a theory, not even under the scientific definition of theory. Evolution is a phenomenon, and natural selection is the (scientific)theory to explain why/how evolution happens.


((same for gravity ladies and gents, gravity is no theory, 'general relativity', 'quantum gravitation' or the earlier newtonian 'universal gravitation' are the theories))

Thank you that was very useful, yes we need to use the right words. Some words mean different things in different situations.

 

[Olas]

I'm a catholic, the Catholic church has never denied evolution, we fully embrace it along with nearly all branches of Christianity and Judaism. Only the most extreme religious groups I would think still refuse to believe in evolution.

And I find this "Team God" and "Team Science" thing pretty offensive.

The Catholic church does not embrace it scientifically. It embraces evolutionary creation which they have
slowly arrived to since Darwin's The Origin of Species was published in 1859. This has nothing to do with evolutionary science what so ever. You do not introduce untestable things as gods in to science and say you are on the same side. Science does not work like that.

No shit, which is probably why the Catholic church doesn't call itself a scientific institution. But the fact remains that it's never flat out denied the theory of evolution even back when it was first proposed.

Believe it or not it's possible for some of us to hold scientific beliefs and religious beliefs and understand the difference between them.

 

[Meatspinner]

Shouldn't this thread be in the "Religion and Politics" forums?

Westerns are probably the least superstitious people on the planet.

By which measurement?

 

[gamernerdtg2]

I believe that the things we create can evolve. Art, technology and so on can evolve. But it's a shame how scientists who believe in intelligent design are being taken out of the picture. I couldn't believe that Bill the science guy and Lavar Burton (who I grew up watching reading rainbow with) passed off creationism as meaningless, antiquated fallacy.

I find that modern science is boring. The museum of Natural History is without wonder now because we can somehow explain everything. I don't want to know everything, and I certainly don't want to be able to explain everything. I want to socialize with people who have studied things that I haven't studied, and see where our knowledge connects.

I blame the extreme conservative people. They have no idea who they are representing - they represent themselves and call that God. It's ridiculous. So many people have been turned off by this extreme stance that we now have the opposite extreme - angry atheists who are just as bad.

This jaded desire to explain everything has crept into art and also video game design. Everyone wants things to be explained down to the minute detail, otherwise it's drivel. I'm not into it.

So I vote for Creationism b/c I really don't want to know everything that there is to know. I want to be kept informed, I want to continue learning, but I also want to be blown away when I learn something new. I don't want to be like Darwin who said quote: "A scientific man ought to have no wishes, no affections - a mere heart of stone".

I can not get down with that. It's called lying to yourself. What are we doing when we take our affections out of the equation entirely?

Voting for a position on any basis other than truth is lying to yourself. Not once did I see facts to back up your position, only the desire to not know everything.

But science says that voting for a position on any other basis than empirical evidence is lying to yourself. Sometimes the truth and the empirical evidence don't agree.

 

[80sboy]

Go team Science? Since when did it become about picking sides?

I believe in evolution because it's a theory that's been around for almost 2 centuries now and makes sense. There's also a lot of shit I don't believe that scientist think now because the idea hasn't been put through the ringing as much as evolution has in debating and arguing and research. String Theory for one.

Question? What difference is there in a scientist telling us what we should think, compared to a priest telling us what we should thing? If we decide not to be critical about it...since when did become about science vs religion? It's true that they both bud heads a lot, but I find that stupid, it's no different than centuries ago when people would wage war to prove their gods were the real ones.

Science is about critical study to draw conclusion, it's not some stupid tag team in Westlmania taking on religion.

Ugh!

>>

 

[Yopaz]

Not only do I believe in evolution, I actually have a decent understanding of it unlike the majority of those I have seen on this site. I'll admit that I don't know enough to say I am confident enough to teach what I know, but I know enough to recognize the bullshit some people think is how it works. Yeah, I am talking about those who say that evolution is all a product of random mutation.

 

[Akytalusia]

no opinion, but i'm not leaving the internet. i will continue to observe.

 

[cikame]

I trust the theory of evolution, even though i don't think science will ever have all the answers, it's like CSI trying to find the evidence for a crime which happened billions of years ago, never going to happen.

As creators of religion we created what a god or several gods did, there's no harm in believing in a spiritual entity, just don't believe what others tell you about said invisible, evidenceless entities, make up your own mind.

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

I am more about the atheist undercurrent within science.
I totally agree that there is a very thick, black line between faith and empirical evidence. We can't ask the scientific community to "believe", nor can we ask the religious community to neglect faith and be empirical in all things.

Fair enough, as you say, we entirely agree on this point. But I don't think a sense of wonder and mystery is limited to either side, which is sort of what I felt you were implying. I am an atheist, for example, who spent all of my schooling years in a catholic school where the vast majority of christians I came across didn't have anywhere near the respect and wonder I do for existence, because they weren't intrigued by the universe like I am and I think you'll find a fair number of atheists on this thread alone who share that sense things. Like just about every other interest that people take, it's got nothing to do with theism, certain individuals are just attracted to certain concepts and ideas.

 

[Idlemessiah]

As somebody who went to university to study archaeology, I think I'd have a pretty hard time supporting creationism, what with all the glaring scientific facts and hard evidence.

 

[Agow95]

The only people who say evolution is still up for debate are creationists who are largely unaware of the vast evidence there is for evolution.

 

[Quaxar]

It is somewhat comical that evolution is considered a theory still. It's a bit like calling gravity a theory.

And cue the explanations of what a scientific theory is.

Well, there are principles, there are forces, there are processes and then there are theories that make up those things. I'd say evolution is every bit as much an observable process as gravity is an observable force. Example, I am being pulled into my seat by a force known as gravity and I, despite being a man, have two nipples exactly where women do despite mine not having any particular purpose thanks to the trait not being maladaptive enough to have evolved away.

I see, that's what you meant. Well, you had that written in a quite confusing way.

But yes, that's exactly my point. The equation assumes a constant speed of light and yet we have math to account for variances of the "constant". I was using what I felt to be a more than adequate example.

No, we don't have variances of the constant. We have the constant c, which is the speed of light in a perfect vacuum (299,792,458 m/s) and we have varying lightspeed values in different mediums due to interactions (like <url=http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/1999/02.18/light.html>just under 50km/h), which are not c.

<youtube=w_DenvIA9gQ>