Creation & EvolutionForum for the discussion of this important topic. This forum is open to non-believers. There is a Christians-only forum in the Christians-only section too.
We're not talking about love or our lifestyles. We're talking about the alleged "design" of a specific nerve in the human body and how it is not optimal (or, at least, how it indicates evolution rather than direct design).
This nerve is but one example of less-than-optimal "design" in living organisms. If God created all organisms, he did so in an imperfect way. Hence, He cannot be perfect, because a perfect being would make things perfectly.
Well, my response to this is something Darwin himself noted.
If we were all perfect, we'd reproduce, never die and take over the earth and there wouldn't be enough resources for us all and then we'd become extinct very quickly.\
How many humans would be on earth right now if we were perfect and never died?
__________________
To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
The circuitous pathway of the RLN only makes sense in the the light of ToE.
__________________ We are surrounded by endless forms, most beautiful and most wonderful, and it is noaccident, but the direct consequence of evolution by non-random natural selection - the only game in town, the greatest show on Earth. ~R.D.
Well, my response to this is something Darwin himself noted.
If we were all perfect, we'd reproduce, never die and take over the earth and there wouldn't be enough resources for us all and then we'd become extinct very quickly.\
If we'd never die, then we'd never become extinct. You're essentially saying "If we didn't die, we'd die."
How many humans would be on earth right now if we were perfect and never died?
Lots. But we're not perfect. Exactly my point.
__________________ "I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day." - Douglas Adams
"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" - Douglas Adams
"Skaloopdidit" - Keeping Skaloop as the first cause until science can rule him out. "I'd be a theist if it weren't for God." - Me
"But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." (Genesis 2:17)
"And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:
Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken." (KJV Genesis 2:22-23)
So they didn't die because they ate the fruit of knowledge, they died because God prevented them from eating from the tree of life, to keep humans from becoming like him!
Why, I wonder? Sounds almost as if he were insecure.
But wait! Maybe Adam and Eve were fish or amphibians, and evolution is the result of Original Sin! That would explain the recurrent laryngeal nerve!
__________________ "A belief which leaves no place for doubt is not a belief; it is a superstition." - Jose Bergamin
"You can't trust an honest man." --- Anonymous
"He does not believe who does not live according to his belief." -- Thomas Fuller
"The fact that the author thinks slowly is not serious, but the fact that he publishes faster than he thinks is inexcusable." -- Wolfgang Pauli
"He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" -- Micah 6:8
"It is because we believe absurdities that we are able to commit atrocities." -- Voltaire
"This isn't right. This isn't even wrong." -- Wolfgang Pauli
"Je ne suis pas marxiste." -- Karl Marx
"Faith is believing what you know ain't so."-- Mark Twain
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." -- Albert Einstein
But if when sinful, man would have eaten of the tree of life and lived forever, he would have had eternal misery, because he was fallen, and death and suffering had entered into the world. Also, due to disobedience, he now had no right to the tree of life, only Christ could have that right, being the only sinless obedient person ever, and only those who come to Christ can have the right to eternal life also.
OK, Recurrent Larangeal Nerve:
No-one seems read my previous post on this, so here are the possible explanations in short:
a) Timing. Rudimentarily put, the nerve divides into two, one controls a small upper part of the voice box, the RLN controls the lower, if the nerve impulses reached them at the same time, we might not be able to talk.
b) Connections. There are other branches of the RLN that branch off towards the deep nerves of the heart and to the mucous membranes and muscles of the throat and the windpipe. In a giraffe then, surely it needs to be much longer.
c) Pattern of development. During development in the womb, the heart descends during late embryo development, it will bring the nerve bundle with it.
The RLN seems to control much more than we think it does, and there is probably a practical reason for it being how it is, time will tell.
To ask this question would imply that you have no idea what true love is. If God did away with free will He too would do away with true love in place of programmed love. You can program a computer to say “I love you”, but can it really mean it? Of course not. The point most of us are missing is that this is only a small part of a larger picture. God did make a perfect creation, and if we don’t stop trying to justify our lifestyles by denying God’s existence, then we are going to miss what God has planned. It’s never been put into words better than, “If you love something let it go, and if it comes back to you, it’s yours.” God let us go in this creation and if we come back to Him, we are His, and those who don’t will be forever lost. Those of us who do, will see perfection.
That is an interesting ad hoc explanation (a sort of "Just So Story" if you will) but I do not believe it represents orthodox Christian thought. If I understand correctly, orthodox Christian though does not depict mankind as experiencing a journey away from and back to God, but rather depicts God as breaking into human history in order to actively reconcile mankind to himself. IOW it is far more theocentric than your explanation above. (Those who know more about it please correct me.)
I also question your offhand statement that denying God's existence is per se motivated by the desire to justify one's lifestyle. An intellectual assertion can be made quite apart from the lifestyle of the person making it. In each case one would have to carefully explore the motivation behind the statement of non-belief in order to draw any conclusion regarding it, a task that may at times be impossible to undertake given the covert and complicated nature of human motivation.
May I also suggest that once something that you have let go returns to you, it still does not belong to you. Ownership is an illusory concept. Continuing to let go while responding affectionately and lovingly in joyful fellowship is difficult to do, but I would expect a God to be able to do so as a reflex. No?
__________________
The House of Self-Collection
If you imagine someone who is brave enough to withdraw all these projections, all and sundry, then you get an individual conscious of a pretty thick shadow. Such a man has saddled himself with new problems and conflicts. He has become a serious problem to himself, as he is now unable to say that they do this or that, they are wrong and they must be fought against. He lives in the “house of self-collection.”
This is a good example, but one that will be unconvincing to any die-hard creationist. Any flaw in any animal or design can be explained with the simple phrase, "God wanted to do it that way."
Originally Posted by Split Rock
I guess they can say it was the result of "The Fall" and "The Curse."
Let me quote from C. G. Jung’s Answer to Job:
But if you keep the opposition between God and man, then you finally arrive, whether you like it or not, at the Christian conclusion “omne bonum a Deo, omne malum ab homine,” with the absurd result that the creature is placed in opposition to its creator and a positively cosmic or daemonic grandeur of evil is imputed to man. The terrible destructive will that breaks out in John’s ecstasies gives some idea of what it means when man is placed in opposition to the God of goodness: it burdens him with the dark side of God...
It is all our fault.
__________________
The House of Self-Collection
If you imagine someone who is brave enough to withdraw all these projections, all and sundry, then you get an individual conscious of a pretty thick shadow. Such a man has saddled himself with new problems and conflicts. He has become a serious problem to himself, as he is now unable to say that they do this or that, they are wrong and they must be fought against. He lives in the “house of self-collection.”
Linear Mode
