Religion, who, what and how do you believe/practice

[Zennie 0]

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Which religion would be the oppostite of Satanic-Buddhism? I want to evolve into Cheetos....

The closest I can find are the Islamic-Aztecs, who believe that we will eventually become one with the Almighty Nacho Cheese Dortio.

- Z
"Always be yourself... unless you suck." - Joss Whedon

[pajarito 0]

Really searching for the truth...huh fellas...

[nigel99 144]

Bill - maybe I wasn't clear in what I mean't.

To me alot of what you have described as evolution I attributed to mutation. i.e. if you buy into evolution theory then I guess you can call it micro-evolution and when the fruit fly is made longer/drug resistant etc, but when the fruit fly evolves to be a golden eagle then thats macro-evolution...

As to theories alot of the theories in science that are currently used have got to be supplemented by "fudge factors", and hence acedemics are actively paid and pursue alternative explainations. While it appears to me that people who search for alternative explainations to evolution (a theory that everyone has to admit has its holes) are described as religous wackos (of which many are - but not all).

It is part of my point about the religous devotion to evolution that many people have. Why are non-religous people so eager to defend and argue that a theory is undisputable? Until a theory pass's the criteria to become scientific law I believe that people are free to explore alternatives.

As an example - we as humans engage in bio-engineering, design engineering covering robotics etc, it is POSSIBLE that a higher species CREATED us as a form of design engineering - now that can quickly form the basis of a religion where we do not understand the higher beings and therefore gods are created to explain the higher beings status.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[Nightingale 0]

Evolution is a theory.

It's a theory that fits ALL the evidence we have right now. We can't prove it wrong.

There is no other theory that does that with regards to the origins of modern plant and animal life on this planet.

When another theory that fits all the evidence is proposed, it will most probably be published in a reputable scientific journal, met with doubt, tested again and again, and will be given the same status as evolution... that of a well respected theory.

Scientific hypotheses are, in one way or another, tested against nature -- the "real world" that all scientists conventionally agree is "out there." Only when hypotheses are sufficiently tested and bind together information from relatively diverse areas that previously had not been connected do they properly become theories. Theories embody the highest level of certainty for comprehensive ideas in science. Thus, when someone claims that evolution is "only a theory," it's roughly equivalent to saying that the proposition that the Earth circles the sun rather than vice versa is "only a theory." Evolution is, in fact, a very useful theory.

Paul R. Ehrlich in Human Natures: Genes, Cultures and the Human Prospect, p. 74.

[nigel99 144]

I agree that we can't prove it wrong - however we can't prove it right either.

Secondly while it may fit ALL the evidence we have - it has significant flaws in terms of "missing links" or partially evolved debri that the theory requires. It therefore lacks significant amounts of evidence before it should reach the phase of being un-disputable.

Just because virus's and animals adapt to their environment does not imply that they can morph into entirely new beings. I can't categorically state this as fact but I do not believe that there is a single piece of evidence to support the macro-evolution jumps.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[Nightingale 0]

Science doesn't prove anything. It only disproves. Anyone trying to claim that science = proof doesn't understand science.

The power of the scientific method lies in "disproof" - falsifiability.
Rutherford used the data collected from X-rays passing through materials to disprove Bohr's hypothesis that atoms are single spheres of matter.
Kepler used careful observations of the planets' motion to disprove that they move in a circle around the sun. They move in an ellipse, not a circle
Galelio used a variety of experiments to disprove that heavy objects fall faster than lighter ones.
There are many other famous "disproofs" in science...

When presented with an idea, a hypothesis, ask yourself, "Can this be disproven? Is it faslifiable?"
You will find that experiments and observations do not prove anything to be the truth. The best they can do is support an idea.

When a hypothesis has stood the test of falsifiablity, often many times and in many ways, it takes on the status of a theory. Theories grow from successful hypotheses and usually encompass a grand unifying idea that cements together many observations, experiments and thoughts into a succinct description or process.



http://www.synapses.co.uk/evolve/lec1d.html

[jakee 1,257]

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Just because virus's and animals adapt to their environment does not imply that they can morph into entirely new beings. I can't categorically state this as fact but I do not believe that there is a single piece of evidence to support the macro-evolution jumps.

What do you mean by a macro evolution jump? I'm getting the feeling that you think evolution means individual animals changing into other individual animals. Please tell me I'm wrong.

Basically a lot of evolution IS mutation that occurs during reproduction. If the mutation weakens the offspring then its more likely to die before breeding, if the offspring is stronger as a result the mutation has more chance of being passed on.

It's observable in viruses and bacteria because they reproduce very quickly, one day you've got a 100,000 bacteria and 50 medicine resistant ones, take a few pills and the next day the normal one's have gone and only the resistant ones remain, except now there's 20,000 of the buggers.
Since most animals don't reproduce that quickly evolution is too slow to be observable.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[jakee 1,257]

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Galelio used a variety of experiments to disprove that heavy objects fall faster than lighter ones.

I wish people would word that differently in all the school textbooks and stuff. Whenever I tell whuffo's about tandems having drogues or the reason I'm getting a weight belt all I hear is 'but doesn't everything fall at the same speed?'
No you moron! here's a feather, here's a brick. Knock yourself out.

Sorry, back to subject now.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[Nightingale 0]

objects fall at the same rate in a vacuum. passing through air acts as a force and alters fall rates. my science books were pretty clear on it.

[jakee 1,257]

Well OK, the books aren't really to blame it's just that people always remember the soundbite "objects fall at the same rate" without realising what it actually applies to. Honestly I didn't mind the first 20 times I explained it but after that I began doubting the standards of physics education in this country.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[nigel99 144]

point taken

So in your opinion is it possible for science to disprove creationism aka Genesis?

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[nigel99 144]

Yes the differentiation I am making is between mutation which is accepted fact and undisputable.

I am treating seperately the issue of one lower lifeform evolving into a higher life-form. The absense of partially evolved creatures that gradually go from one state to another is I believe in many cases explained away as a radical transition between life-forms. For example the explaination that scales transitioned to either fur or feathers - there are no mid-points to link the 2.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[StevePhelps 0]

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If there is one "religious" tenet to live by, then it's the Wiccan rede.

"Be it harm none, do what thou wilst shall be the whole of the law"

Pretty much sums it all up don't you think ?

What's wrong with Jesus' great commandment?

Matt 22:37-39 Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' (NIV)


Hard to go wrong if we'd all do that.

[pajarito 0]

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What's wrong with Jesus' great commandment?

Matt 22:37-39 Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' (NIV)

Hard to go wrong if we'd all do that.

You've got to at least believe in “a God” to begin with. Until then, there’s no frame of reference to Matt 22:37-39. The pole at the top shows a majority of atheists and agnostics in the pool of dz.com responders. It's a shame but it appears to be true.

[Nightingale 0]

well... that depends. If Genesis is taken as symbolic, then no. If Genesis is taken literally, then yes. I guess an easy test would be to build the biggest boat you possibly could, and see how many species of animal pairs you could fit in there, plus enough food and fresh water for forty days.

For a good explanation regarding the impossibility of the Noah story, see http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Hangar/2437/sorting.htm because I'm not going to paste an entire article here, and its a pretty good explanation.


What a lot of creationists seem to forget is that evolution is not inherently atheistic. It doesn't explain how life got here, just what happened to it once it arrived.


Creationism doesn't really seem to be about creation, but rather, about disproving evolution. Because there is no proof for creation, Creationist attempt to indirectly prove it by disproving evolution. The "scientific creationist's" logic is that if they can disprove the Theory of Evolution then "scientific creationism" is the only explanation left for how we got here. However, it is impossible to prove one theory by disproving another. Disproving evolution does not validate creationism. Ruling out evolution does not automatically rule in creationism.

an interesting quote from Einstein:

"In the beginning (if there was such a thing), God created Newton's laws of motion together with the necessary masses and forces. This is all; everything beyond this follows from the development of appropriate mathematical methods by means of deduction."
Albert Einstein

[pajarito 0]

Sorry.......poll....not pole.....I hate when I do that.

[pajarito 0]

There are just as many supporting the story of Noah as factual and not symbolic.

http://www.carm.org/evo_questions/humanfloodfossils.htm

http://www.carm.org/questions/noahsark.htm

[nigel99 144]

ok - I agree with the point about people creationists trying to disprove evolution. They should be focusing on trying to develop their theories further. I am not advocating creationism just open mindedness - to me both theories could be wrong.

Shifting it slightly though why are SOME evolutionists so scared of people who disagree with them? I have heard at least 2 occassions on the radio over the past year when senior acedemics have gone bezerk because a school (private not state based) dares to emphasize the fact that there MIGHT be alternatives to darwenism? I mean trying to get a school shut down level of hatred/feeling about the subject.

Admittedly the UK is more secular than the states - in fact the same radio station (BBC4) actively mocks Bush for his prayer meetings - when the subject comes up.

Experienced jumper - someone who has made mistakes more often than I have and lived.

[Nightingale 0]

well, its a theory that can be easily tested... go build yourself an ark.

[pajarito 0]

I don't know if anyone will ever do it. I think that would be an extraordinary and expensive experiment. I would be interesting, though. I saw a special on TV on the subject and I believe a Navy shipbuilder said that at least the seaworthyness of the schematics of the Ark actually worked out.

[pajarito 0]

I'm a "spelling challenged" individual. My appologies again.

Seaworthiness

[Zennie 0]

I personally treat the Bible as a mythology and history of the Isreali people, but there is one part of the Noah story that is interesting.

If you look at many of the religious or historical texts that were written around the time of Genesis, you find many that also have a "flood" story of some sort.

My personal take is the climate was in a very severe state of flux at the time, and the unprecedented events would naturally cause the people of those times to believe it was the work of an angry god or gods.

- Z
"Always be yourself... unless you suck." - Joss Whedon

[billvon 2,426]

>To me alot of what you have described as evolution I attributed to
> mutation. i.e. if you buy into evolution theory then I guess you can call it
> micro-evolution and when the fruit fly is made longer/drug resistant etc,
>but when the fruit fly evolves to be a golden eagle then thats
>macro-evolution...

Which is just a lot of bits of micro-evolution.

Evolution proceeds in fits and starts. Most changes are incremental - the fruit fly gets larger, or it turns red, or grows an extra set of legs (which is a simple mutation.)

Some changes are larger. A whale looks nothing like a land animal - yet whales have vestigial hips and rear leg bones. And fossils have been found (Ambulocetus Natans) that show an intermediate step, a cetacean that still has legs, but is gradually losing them as it abandoned land to find a better evolutionary niche in the ocean.

Other changes are spontaneous and huge. An eye is one example. A human eye is really not that good of a design. The "wiring" and blood vessels are _in_front_ of the light sensitive parts of the eye, akin to putting the lens in the back of a camcorder and trying to shoot through the guts of the recorder (which can work if you make the rest of the camcorder small and transparent, but is still an odd way to do things.)

But consider what would happen if a compound eye (like an insect's) had a simple mutation that essentially reversed it. Instead of a sphere with lots of poorly-focused light sensors facing out, a random mutation changed nothing except the shape of the sphere - now there was a "backwards" eye facing the wrong way. Yet this eye would have something that no eye before it had, the ability to focus (via the pinhole camera provided by the hole where the eye used to be.) Sure, you'd have a problem with all the blood vessels and nerves being in the way, but the ability to resolve shapes better would be such a huge evolutionary advantage that such a change would quickly win the survival game, and gradual evolution would shrink the size of blood vessels and nerves until they didn't get in the way of vision so much.

Fast forward 400 million years and you have a human eye. It still has problems; the nerves cause a blind spot where they exit (in _front_ of the retina) and blood vessels leak and cause problems. But evolution has taken a bad design and tweaked it to the point where it works pretty well.

Gould has a good discussion of "punctuated equilibrium", how gradual mutations sometimes case slow change, but sometimes (via something like an inverted eye) very quickly takes a species by storm, and often creates an entirely new species. Sometimes it's a mutation like the eye one. Sometimes it's a change in the environment, such as mutations with vaugely hairy skin that do better in a sudden ice age. Within a very short time it seems like everyone's got fur.

>As to theories alot of the theories in science that are currently used
>have got to be supplemented by "fudge factors", and hence acedemics
>are actively paid and pursue alternative explainations. While it appears
>to me that people who search for alternative explainations to evolution
>(a theory that everyone has to admit has its holes) are described as
>religous wackos (of which many are - but not all).

I don't think alternative theories of evolution are wacko. I think trying to force science to conform to the bible is a pretty silly pursuit, though. Lysenko tried something similar, and a lot of people starved. Science does not respect personal beliefs, and wishing for something hard does not make it so.

History has shown that people who cling to religious beliefs about the earth being flat, or that it was really created in seven days, or that the earth was once completely covered with water, are inevitably either proved wrong or forced to modify their explanations to conform to the science that disproves those ideas. Witness the people who say that the deluge was really just the Black Sea flooding (which is likely) or that "seven days" might really mean seven billion years or something. As more examples of evolution come to light in the fossil record, I think they will modify their stance further to achieve some sort of torturous balance between a heavily reinterpreted bible and cherry-picked scientific fact. And that's fine; I just prefer to skip those steps and separate the moral messages in the bible from science, rather than try to twist faith to fit science.

>Until a theory pass's the criteria to become scientific law I believe that
>people are free to explore alternatives.

I think you may misunderstand the differences between theories and scientific law.

>As an example - we as humans engage in bio-engineering, design
> engineering covering robotics etc, it is POSSIBLE that a higher species
>CREATED us as a form of design engineering - now that can quickly
>form the basis of a religion where we do not understand the higher
> beings and therefore gods are created to explain the higher beings
> status.

Of course. Or we could all be living in a good simulation (a la the Matrix) or you could be a figment of my imagination. Or we could all be a figment of Sangiro's imagination with no real existence; only our posts, created on a massive intelligent computer, really exist. Such speculations do not really belong in the realm of science, though.

[pajarito 0]

I believe the most popular comparison is with that of Gilgamesh. Again, it really comes down to what you believe but this is an interesting article. The conclusion at the bottom addresses the "time of the event in relation to the writing of the stories" question. Just a viewpoint.

Clicky

[gjhdiver 0]

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If there is one "religious" tenet to live by, then it's the Wiccan rede.

"Be it harm none, do what thou wilst shall be the whole of the law"

Pretty much sums it all up don't you think ?

What's wrong with Jesus' great commandment?

Matt 22:37-39 Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' (NIV)


Hard to go wrong if we'd all do that.

There is if you don't belive in magical third parties. I'm not going to waste time appeasing non-existant meta beings.

That's why the rede is superior IMHO. It doesn't matter what your beliefs are. It just advises you to take as much pleasure from your life as you can, without causing harm to anyone else. I've yet to see what's wrong with that as a guiding principle.