Is Evolution a science or a faith?

[Esquilax]

Fly... I don't know enough about insects to say anything.

Hey Harris, do you see this? Pocaracas came upon a subject in which he had limited knowledge, and instead of pretending he knew everything about it and spouting of an increasingly strident series of easily debunked falsehoods, he just admitted he didn't know enough to comment, and moved on.

That's what normal people do, when they don't know a thing. Isn't that so much more honest than just making shit up and expecting everyone else to deal with it?

[Harris]

If Atheism is not a FAITH at all or say LACK of FAITH in God then how your mind adopted the concept that God does not exist. Funny isn’t it?

We get the concept of god not existing from the claim you make that god exists. Its a default position to the claim, you claim god exists, we say we don't believe your claim. Why is this so hard to understand?

No, I am not only saying God exist. I am giving logical evidence from science and nature. You are concentrating only on the mechanism but not the agency, which has produced this mechanism, and running it. Perhaps, because you cannot perceive that agency with your direct senses. It is just as if you are saying electronic circuitry inside Sony TV is more important than Akio Morita. Well it is explaining how the circuitry works but it is not if I ask you the question, how that circuitry does comes into existence in first place. At this stage, everybody got speechless.

[Fidel_Castronaut]

We get the concept of god not existing from the claim you make that god exists. Its a default position to the claim, you claim god exists, we say we don't believe your claim. Why is this so hard to understand?

No, I am not only saying God exist. I am giving logical evidence from science and nature. You are concentrating only on the mechanism but not the agency, which has produced this mechanism, and running it. Perhaps, because you cannot perceive that agency with your direct senses. It is just as if you are saying electronic circuitry inside Sony TV is more important than Akio Morita. Well it is explaining how the circuitry works but it is not if I ask you the question, how that circuitry does comes into existence in first place. At this stage, everybody got speechless.

Is that because you'd shot them?

In all seriousness, though, saying that you've given "logical evidence from science and nature" is rather hilarious don't you think?

To all the lurkers out there, if you can go back through this dude's thread(s) and posts and see where he's used even a glimmer of "logical evidence from science and nature", please join and let us know so we can go and read it. Because I can't remember seeing any.

[bennyboy]

We get the concept of god not existing from the claim you make that god exists. Its a default position to the claim, you claim god exists, we say we don't believe your claim. Why is this so hard to understand?

It is just as if you are saying electronic circuitry inside Sony TV is more important than Akio Morita. Well it is explaining how the circuitry works but it is not if I ask you the question, how that circuitry does comes into existence in first place.

I like that way of putting it.

[Bibliofagus]

Fossil record is incomplete not because Palaeontologists have not collected sufficient amount of fossil but because fossil record lacks fossils of transitional animals. Out of millions of records, not a single fossil has been declared to be a transitional animal.

That's because a transitional fossil is a misnomer, they are all what you claim a transitional fossil is (are?).

You've seen paintings by Van Gough?


They are made up of thousands of tiny brush strokes each like a tiny mutation of the canvas, brush stroke upon brush stroke until the canvas is a completed painting. At what point do the accumulated brush strokes become transitional from blank canvas to the completed painting?

And I'd like to add:

Given mutations, millions of years and billions and billions of creatures, you'd need a mechanism that actually actively prevents evolution from happening. Like a reset-button. What is it?

[The Grand Nudger]

First, if 4 percent difference between ape and human genes that means 3 billion base pairs of DNA in every cell that represents 120,000,000 entries in the DNA code that are different. In our DNA instruction book, that’s equivalent to about 12 million words—a seemingly small percentage that has a tremendous impact.

Of course, humans are very different from other apes. We didn't need genetics to tell us that, but genetics does help us quantify "how different" we are. That little bit makes a big difference, and I doubt that anyone would tell you otherwise.

Second, if 96 percent similarity of our genes with chimps make them our ancestor then we also share about 50% of our DNA12 with bananas but that does not make us half bananas. Or do you think otherwise.

You didn't understand the contents of that link at all. What are you having trouble with, I'll see if I can make it simpler for you? You asked for something very specific, it's been given to you, and it has nothing to do with percentages. Can you explain to me, in your own words, what that link was describing? For bonus points...as you took my suggestion to click on the individual links, right......could you describe the relationship that those genes have with regards to human beings and other hominids, specifically chimpanzees? You don't have to accept the evidence you've been given....I'd just like to see that you at least understand it in the broad strokes.

Here are some other animals who have similar genes if compared to human genes.

Cat: 90%
Cow: 80%
Mouse: 75% (do we have anything resembling to mouse?)
Fruit Fly: 60%

Yes, we have alot in common with mice, because we share an ancestor. That's one of the reasons that they're so useful for testing. Notice the dropoff in fruit flies - that's when we leave the territory of mammalia. We share an ancestor with them as well, but it's much further back - at the level of animalia. Similar to a banana, which you mentioned a minute ago - in even lesser amounts, and even further back in time - at the level of eukaryota. These are simply points of biological convergence - that become apparent as we reel the tape backwards; points which have left their "indelible stamp" - which we can actually measure and quantify with genetics.

None of this makes us "half banana" or "half mouse" because mice and bananas have also been undergoing evolution. It connects us through an lca - not directly to surviving and extant populations. In that same manner, we aren't "mostly chimps" so much that both chimps and ourselves are still "mostly" our lca. Understand?

[popeyespappy]

Understand?

Ha!

[Lemonvariable72]

Okay Harris, If evolution is false like you claim then please explain the results of this article. http://cdn.viewmixed.com/wp-content/uplo...2169-8.jpg

I am not a representative of Christianity. If a Muslim did something similar then for me between him and an atheist there was no difference.

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This whole ludicrous attempt to lump science as faith can be summed up by:

1. I'm going flying in a commercial jet later today. I have faith that it will fly and I will not die.

2. I'm going to jump off a tower later today. I have faith that I can fly by flapping my arms and I will not die.



If you think these two "faiths" are the same, then you really shouldn't be allowed out in public, even if your preacher tells you that with faith you can achieve anything.

These two faiths cannot be the same if we are not talking about a crazy person.

In the first case you asses the probability of a crash which is minimal. So you have sense of more comfort than anxiety. Therefore, although there is always a chance of a crash but because the probability shows plane crashes are rare therefore, you have faith in flying safely and willingly you take that small risk for your flying.

In the second case if you are not a crazy person then you will never jump based on the reasoning that I gave for your first case.

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So has Harris left the house? Off somewhere quote mining for future use? Ah well.

Don't get upset. I love you all.

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He is your brother in FAITH

Thanks for the complement.

What does he know of biology and science?
Oh, very little!!
Your insistence on this author is then the fallacy called "Argument from (or appeal to) authority".

You do not need to be a scientist like Stephen Hawking to assess the following quote to be true of false.
“Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing.”
Page 227
The Grand Design
By Stephen W. Hawking

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I'm noting you seem to think it's either evolution or god. This is a false dichotomy. Evolution is a fact. It has nothing to do with the existence or non existence of god. Most Christians have no issue with evolution, in fact the Catholic Church, which I came from, endorses it. It was not evolution which caused me to become an atheist, or to leave the church.

You have noted correctly, I am indeed taking evolution as god. I cannot see it otherwise in the context of Atheism. If Natural Selection, which is blind, unguided, and mindless process that is able to create nature out from nothing where not a single thing is no less than a miracle then for me Natural Selection is nothing more than an alternate to god.

The difference between my God and Natural selection is that my God is Intelligent whereas Natural Selection is blind, mindless, and Unguided. As being a conscious person, I can’t take unguided, blind, and mindless Absurd as FAITH or even as Science. Sorry.

Evolution is a fact. It is observable, testable, verifiable.

Please give evidence instead of giving an abstract talk.

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Both proponents for evolution and intelligent design use science to back up their faith in their own theories. Frankly, the people behind Ancient Aliens have more substance than what is passed as evolution these days.

Science is incapable to prove or disprove the existence of God. All my argument against evolution is only to show that that the concept behind evolution is not logical. Intelligent design use science to assess the logic for the existence of God. Intelligent design cannot show existence of God by using science only.

I just realized now that I posted the wrong link. I think that makes it even funnier.

[Harris]

(Today 03:56)Harris Wrote: If abiogenesis is not the base of evolution, then how you justify the evolution in the first place.


We don't know. And that's it.

Very interestng, there is no foundation yet there is a big theory with so may intricate details. More interestengly everyone seems to be happy with this theory without even knowing this theory at its root level.

Seriously. We don't know how life originated; it could have arisen by natural means, or a god of some stripe could have done it, or some other thing. We know it's at least theoretically possible that it could happen naturally, but that's where the science stops. But we know that things evolve. .

I am pleased to see the writing above because it contains the word god. The concept of God is naturaly embossed over our conscious. You can take it serious or not but you can negate it only by denying your own conscious person.

Quote: In other words, how life originated in first place if it is not spontaneous. Theory of evolution only leads us to believe in the spontaneous emergence of life by not giving appropriate explanation about the birth of first cell of life.

You know what? Gravity doesn't give an explanation about the birth of the first cell either, does that mean gravity leads us to believe in spontaneous emergence too? Evolution and the origins of life are entirely different ideas, evolution doesn't address abiogenesis in the same way cheese doesn't have anything to say about gold: they are not connected. .

I agree that gravity doesn’t give an explanation about the birth of the first cell. But the trouble here is that no one is believing that gravity has produced life. All what you are saying is evolution and natural selection responsible for the life on earth. Therefore, your example does not fit in here.

Abiogenesis and evolution are not separate things, they are deeply interconnected with each other. Tell me if there was no first cell then would evolution (in which you believe) ever happened and do you think you and me were corresponding with each other here? Further, what makes you believe that life started from the first living cell. Maybe life has started in absolutely different way.

[Natachan]

Evolution is variation in allele frequency with traits being passed to subsequent generations via hereditary. That's it. That's all it is. Abiogenesis is a chemical process involving the transfer of early carbon compounds into organic molecules that resulted in life these are separate studies involving separate and different areas of expertise.

Further neither of these fields has anything to do with the possible existence or no existence of god. Most people who accept evolution believe in god, and most people who believe in god accept evolution.