(June 6, 2013 at 9:05 am)ideologue08 Wrote: Yes. If someone told you to renounce your atheism or you'll be executed, would you die for your beliefs?
I don't know. It would probably depend on the circumstances. I cannot renounce atheism in the sense that I could have renounced a religion or deity-- not only is there no deity to turn away from, there is no penalty from that non-deity for doing so. Also, I would have to adopt a particular faith or belief on demand, and I'm not even sure if I could put on a good enough show to convince the person making the threat.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
-Stephen Jay Gould
