So your an Athiest

[AAA]

Well it isn't easy to try to have a discussion on what there was before the universe that we can observe. You seem to think that an intelligent designer is illogical. I have a hypothetical scenario: if we one day created a computer simulation program that had conscious beings, and these beings started to realize that the space that they live in only works if the parameters to make the computer program work at very specific values. They then learn of their own complexity and begin to examine the digital code that makes up themselves. Is it irrational for them to conclude that they are living in a space that was designed?

This scenario is not so hypothetical. It is exactly the situation we are in.

Yes it is, it's very, very hypothetical - just because we happen to exist in a Goldilocks case of coincidental situations which are favorable to life does not in any way imply design. We are centered where we are around 1 of probably trillions or more stars in this universe, therefore the law of averages is not only favorable for relatively small number of variables to occur all at once - it mandates that this happens! If such conditions never developed here, then we would not be having this conversation, but interesting life (whether or not it speaks or writes) would certainly be on some other planet. Give any planet with such conditions enough time, and high intelligence will develop eventually.

Here's an example of how the statistics play out, which you can do yourself with the help of only 1,024 friends. I'm sure you've been in bigger crowds than this, even if you didn't know anybody, and if that many or more all flip a coin 10 times, it's guaranteed you will see somebody win that many consecutive times!

People have done the calculations. And the fact is that it is not likely that our planet would exist. Yes there are billions of galaxies with billions of stars, but the variables for a life sustaining planet must be set at very specific values (gravity, nuclear forces, cosmological constant). The fact that the laws of the universe must be a certain way for life show that either it just happened to be right the first time, or we are just one of many universes. Also your coin example is under exaggerating the issue.

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Ok, I want to say again that I study biology and I think the evidence disagrees. I did not bring the old book into this, you did. I agree that observations should guide our belief. I also want to make sure that you realize that within the scientific community there is virtually never a consensus between what they think the evidence points to. Your story about the eye is just a story. The facts: organisms can sense light. We have organs that sense light. Your interpretation: one must have become the other over many generations. You have been taught in your biology class about the slight changes that occur, and they tell you that these changes can lead to entire new genetic information. Evolution operates by changing existing DNA. It has no good mechanism of adding new genetic information. The design of the human body is amazing. If there was an engineer alive today capable of designing something that efficient, they would be the most successful engineer of all time. The appendix still serves functions. It has functions in cultivating bacteria for your intestine to aid in digestion. It also may have immune functions. Life is not poorly designed. The simplest cell is more efficient and complex than anything mankind has done.

I do sincerely hope you aren't a surgeon who I may need to rely on some day, for your grasp of the difference between fiction and reality!

I would slap and run too if I didn't understand the opponent's argument.

[Mr.wizard]

Sorry that I made those assumptions, but the point is that I don't believe there was ever just nothing.

The reason it isn't an argument from ignorance is because I do understand it, and it simply doesn't work. You can't just keep calling me ignorant if the science that I am telling you is true. If you have some hidden knowledge about the theory of evolution and how it leads to new genetic information then please share it. If you don't know the mechanism for increasing genetic complexity, then you are arguing from ignorance.

Evolution works and  it is real one  only needs to look into the field of medicine.

Well no it doesn't. I'm sure your thinking about antibiotic resistance developing in bacteria. Antibiotic resistance is often hijacked as an example of evolution, but it actually is not creating new genetic information. What happens is a small percent of bacteria contain a segment of pre-existing DNA called plasmids. These segments of DNA code for proteins that destroy the antibiotic molecules. Bacteria can then transfer this segment of DNA between each other and thus they gain this ability to survive. But it is not the creation of new information, it is just a brilliant design to keep populations of bacteria alive.

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If your saying you understand evolution and it doesn't work, proves you don't understand it.

Ok then please inform me. You are right to doubt some random guy on the internet, but then maybe look up Steven Meyer or another doubter of evolution. These are professionals. Also it isn't fair for me to go off on all the science behind why it doesn't work when you've already said that you don't like biology. However, if you keep telling me that I do not understand the theory, I will give my reasons and it will be up to you to decide if you agree with them.
[/quote]


Well first I never said I didn't like biology I don't where you got that from. Second it doesn't matter who is presenting the information, it matters what can be proven. Evolution is proven, its real, its a fact, I don't have to appeal to authority on this one, we know that life evolves.

[AAA]

Evolution works and  it is real one  only needs to look into the field of medicine.

Well no it doesn't. I'm sure your thinking about antibiotic resistance developing in bacteria. Antibiotic resistance is often hijacked as an example of evolution, but it actually is not creating new genetic information. What happens is a small percent of bacteria contain a segment of pre-existing DNA called plasmids. These segments of DNA code for proteins that destroy the antibiotic molecules. Bacteria can then transfer this segment of DNA between each other and thus they gain this ability to survive. But it is not the creation of new information, it is just a brilliant design to keep populations of bacteria alive.

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If your saying you understand evolution and it doesn't work, proves you don't understand it.

Ok then please inform me. You are right to doubt some random guy on the internet, but then maybe look up Steven Meyer or another doubter of evolution. These are professionals. Also it isn't fair for me to go off on all the science behind why it doesn't work when you've already said that you don't like biology. However, if you keep telling me that I do not understand the theory, I will give my reasons and it will be up to you to decide if you agree with them.

Well first I never said I didn't like biology I don't where you got that from. Second it doesn't matter who is presenting the information, it matters what can be proven. Evolution is proven, its real, its a fact, I don't have to appeal to authority on this one, we know that life evolves.
[/quote]



Sorry, maybe it was someone else who said they didn't like biology. But yes I agree that it matters what can be proven. You asserting that evolution is a proven fact doesn't make it true. You do have to appeal to authority. Otherwise you are just doing circular reasoning. We know that organisms change across generations, but they do not increase in complexity.

[Mr.wizard]

I am just done, I can't go through another one of these.

[God of Mr. Hanky]

The facts: organisms can sense light. We have organs that sense light.

Your interpretation: one must have become the other over many generations.

If you are going to butcher my statements so mercilessly as that (which, btw, is the mark of the truly desperate), then I'm not even going to address what you hand back to me - go read it again!

You have been taught in your biology class about the slight changes that occur, and they tell you that these changes can lead to entire new genetic information. Evolution operates by changing existing DNA. It has no good mechanism of adding new genetic information.

That line of bullshit is in dire need of empirical evidence regarding both its accuracy and relevance!

The design of the human body is amazing. If there was an engineer alive today capable of designing something that efficient, they would be the most successful engineer of all time. The appendix still serves functions. It has functions in cultivating bacteria for your intestine to aid in digestion. It also may have immune functions. Life is not poorly designed. 

Just keep on telling yourself that enough times, and maybe sooner or later you'll believe it yourself. You can't really believe it now, otherwise you wouldn't need the affirmation of coming here to say it.

The simplest cell is more efficient and complex than anything mankind has done.

So fucking what? "Mankind", which is no word used by scientists since the Christians no longer controlled them, doesn't claim to be a designer of life forms which evolved over billions of years - therefore, ZERO points again for your creator gabble. We are very, very complex life forms, but complex <> flawless. I'll bet you skipped out on your mathematical logic lessons.

The cones of your retinas are not perfectly designed for efficiency, even if you see 20/20 because they face backward. It took further evolutionary development to form an end run around this defect.

We are designing life right now, and if demand supports it, science will eventually rival the complexity of human perceptions and thought, and probably with fewer defects. To actually imitate life as it exists today would be very difficult, not because it's so awesome and flawless, but for the very good reason that life was never engineered in the top-down fashion which is required of short-lived human engineers. Be honest about this, if you are capable of doing so: just why in fuck do you really think your god would sit back and watch everything that ever crawled out of the dirt blunder and waste so much time over the past 4 billion years, bandaid-patching one defect at a time and changing so slowly that between adjoining generations they are barely noticeable at all, when he actually had a plan? No, Genius, plans do not work that way. Go ahead and chalk that up to "mysterious ways", but if your god did that than he's an asshat.

[Nay_Sayer]

It drove me to eat babies and sin a whole bunch until I let FSM take the wheel. Now with the one true religion with me I focus my efforts on laughing at your weak christian god.

[AAA]

If you are going to butcher my statements so mercilessly as that (which, btw, is the mark of the truly desperate), then I'm not even going to address what you hand back to me - go read it again!
 

You have been taught in your biology class about the slight changes that occur, and they tell you that these changes can lead to entire new genetic information. Evolution operates by changing existing DNA. It has no good mechanism of adding new genetic information. The design of the human body is amazing. If there was an engineer alive today capable of designing something that efficient, they would be the most successful engineer of all time. The appendix still serves functions. It has functions in cultivating bacteria for your intestine to aid in digestion. It also may have immune functions. Life is not poorly designed. The simplest cell is more efficient and complex than anything mankind has done.

Just keep on telling yourself that enough times, and maybe sooner or later you'll believe it yourself. You can't really believe it now, otherwise you wouldn't need the affirmation of coming here to say it.

We are designing life right now, and if demand supports it, science will eventually rival the complexity of human perceptions and thought, and probably with fewer defects. To actually imitate life as it exists today would be very difficult, not because it's so awesome and flawless, but for the very good reason that life was never engineered in the top-down fashion which is required of short-lived human engineers. Be honest about this, if you are capable of doing so: just why in fuck do you really think your god would sit back and watch everything that ever crawled out of the dirt blunder and waste so much time over the past 4 billion years, bandaid-patching one defect at a time and changing so slowly that between adjoining generations they are barely noticeable at all, when he actually had a plan? No, Genius, plans do not work that way. Go ahead and chalk that up to "mysterious ways", but if your god did that than he's an asshat.

It is a good design. From the DNA to the actual anatomy, all the parts work together well. We are modifying organisms, but we aren't designing it. We aren't even designing our new DNA, we are just taking DNA from one organism and putting it into another. Also I think the evidence is more consistent with a top down design for life. Our genome is slowly being crippled by mutations from generation to generation, we are not becoming better. We are becoming a more disease stricken species. I do not think he sat by and watched for billions of years. I think that it was made good at the beginning and is slowly getting worse. So your whole condescending statement about his crappy plan is just putting words in my mouth.

[dyresand]

Evolution works and  it is real one  only needs to look into the field of medicine.

Well no it doesn't. I'm sure your thinking about antibiotic resistance developing in bacteria. Antibiotic resistance is often hijacked as an example of evolution, but it actually is not creating new genetic information. What happens is a small percent of bacteria contain a segment of pre-existing DNA called plasmids. These segments of DNA code for proteins that destroy the antibiotic molecules. Bacteria can then transfer this segment of DNA between each other and thus they gain this ability to survive. But it is not the creation of new information, it is just a brilliant design to keep populations of bacteria alive.

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If your saying you understand evolution and it doesn't work, proves you don't understand it.

Ok then please inform me. You are right to doubt some random guy on the internet, but then maybe look up Steven Meyer or another doubter of evolution. These are professionals. Also it isn't fair for me to go off on all the science behind why it doesn't work when you've already said that you don't like biology. However, if you keep telling me that I do not understand the theory, I will give my reasons and it will be up to you to decide if you agree with them.

Well first I never said I didn't like biology I don't where you got that from. Second it doesn't matter who is presenting the information, it matters what can be proven. Evolution is proven, its real, its a fact, I don't have to appeal to authority on this one, we know that life evolves.
[/quote]


To give a better a example instead of broad one 
But over all medicine and  evolution go hand in hand. 

https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/evo...-medicine/

One only needs to look up evolution and XYZ bacteria/virus/etc

[God of Mr. Hanky]

[quote pid='1132718' dateline='1449295939']
It is a good design. From the DNA to the actual anatomy, all the parts work together well.

[/quote]
Wow, it actually works, and ain't that just amaz'n? I mean, what if it didn't actually work? The answer to that is simple: we would not be here discussing it!

Life as we know it works because it's adequate. It's not a poor design, but it's not a flawless one either - it's no design at all, the evidence has been evaluated, CASE CLOSED! If you want your idea to the contrary to be taken seriously, then you will need to present actual evidence, not the wishful, argumentative blather which you've been spewing all day.

[Fidel_Castronaut]

I've always been an atheist. I've never believed in a deity or been convinced by the arguments
For them.

I don't believe in evolution. Evolution is a fact and the ToE seeks to explain it (and does a pretty good job of it too). Completely irrelevant to atheism, though.

And that's that, really.

Pandaemonium, Great answer, back on track. Just curious, were you raised an atheist, were your parents. Have you ever researched about God, for a lack of better words. ( I know atheists can't look into something that does not exist, but humor me)

In wasn't raised an atheist to be fair, my Parents never told me what to believe. They taught me how to think and question things. Both are atheists but I never once had a discussion about it with them when I was young.

And no, I've never felt the need nor the care to do so. Many people have tried to convince me to believe in their gods, and to date none of their claims or evidences have met my minimum criteria for believing. I come from a country where people are apathetic to religion and religious belief systems, too. So the prevalence of religion in public life is so little as to be almost non-existent.