6 Simple arguments to disproving Atheism (once and for all)

[mo.mentum]

Aside from providing tons of false and partial evidence Mo.mentum still has yet to make a case for his brand of creationism.

If by some miracle you manage to prove evolution wrong... then what? You still have no case for creationism. Aliens planting life is just as probable as God doing it, in fact moreso since they don't have to break the laws of physics.

So how did plants evolve?

Or better yet.

How did the beavers learn to build their amazing, concave dams that raise the water level in a puddle so they can build a hut with underwater entrances. And also, they make sure the water is raised enough so that in winter it doesnt freeze all the way down. Older beavers dont teach their young this. So how could knowledge of building be passed down to subsequent generations.

You can't tell me that animals know that the best shape for a dam is concave because it took us years of engineering to figure that one out.

 

[Brimshack]

Ad ignorantium.

 

[Jet Black]

YOU ARE SUCH A COMIC. How can you compare SOLUBILITY and CHEMICAL reactions, to complex biological processes. You are sooo off i feel ashamed having to bring you back to the fold.

biological processes are chemical processes. (incidentally, no chemical reaction occurs in the salt example) sorry to have to point this out to you, but my point was to do with biological processes being energetically preferable. statistical processes in chemistry lead to situations that are energetically preferable. the complex biological processes that you talk of are examples of exactly this. take a string of a couple of hundred amino acids, and what happens? it folds into the same protein every single time. there is no hand of God in this process, there is no intelligence in this process, it is just the selection of an energetically preferable state by otherwise dumb physical laws. it is indeed an amazing sight, but it does not violate any physical law in any way.

 

[the_malevolent_milk_man]

Thanks. I don't see however how this makes my quote invalid. Just because Neodarwinists and punctualists dismiss this possibility that it should be dismissed.

Science has become the Inquisitional Church of our time, dismissing all other philosophical views. Every day researchers change their ideas about their conclusions and the most outlandish ones end up being accepted! [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse]! The earth is round, who woulda thunk it.

They said themselves. No other alternative but Creation. They're using another plug to the theory "animals with only soft parts that cant fossilize". First off, the leap from such creatures to the cambrian type animals would leave some sort of exoskeleton or light skeletal structures to fossilize or imprint on rock. There is NOTHING, NADA. If we can find fossils of bacteria, ur telling me we cant find those fossils???

Do you not understand what they mean? They said there is a gap in the fossil record, there are lots of gaps. Just becasue there is a gap doesn't mean that it didn't or did happen. Why do they reject the idea of divine creation? Because there is absolutely no evidence for it(unless you count a lack of evidence which has an explanation), such a being breaks the laws of physics, and it's just as probable as aliens planting life. A skip in the beat of the fossil record in no way compares to the three problems I just listed.

We can't find fossils of all bacteria, the chance of them beign fossilized is pretty low. The most common is that of blue-green algea, which date back to the precambrian. They're a special case becasue they have a thick cell wall, are larger than most bacteria, and form organized structures. Also the fact that there are zillions of the little critters inhabititing every nook and cranny of everything esnures that even though they are harder to preserve there will be more preserved because there are so many.


Again, I must refer you to the Vendian period where we do see the beginings of fossilized skeletons. Some vendian life also survived into the cambrian. Also you must note that oxygen was becoming much more available during this time. Before life mainly diffused oxygen, this limited them to small, soft bodies. With more oxygen available a circulatory system and hard body (exoskeleton) became a viable alternative. A change like an increase in oxygen would be a dramatic kick in the pants for all life and open up new evolutionairy paths. The new forms offered significant benefits over the old so it would be a time of punctuated evolution, thus explaining the fast change and appearance of new life which takes us back to the original point of the gap in the fossil record.

We really are searching for a needle in a haystack, we only have a handful of some organisms or sometimes just 1 speciman. Many we will never know about because there weren't enough fossilized for us to find. To ask for a detailed account of every transition of animals that are hard to fossilize from hundreds of millions of years ago is asking a bit much. If you want detail go look at horse evolution. The fossil record skips a beat at the vendian/cambrian border, nothing we can do about that. It's not a devestating blow to evolution, simply a minor irritation that doesn't prove anything one way or the other.

 

[vajradhara]

Mmm ah huh, yes yes mmm yes ah huh..of course..ah huh...oh wait, u've told me nothing new Arikay.

Sorry i forgot to post the article, my bad. http://www.harunyahya.com/refuted14.php

hmm.. i'm suspect of anything that harunyahya has to say since he was so blindingly incorrect with his summation of what Buddhism is.

As this isnt' the science forum, i will simply point out that Evolution is not Creation or CreationISM. Evolution does not attempt to address the question of God or no God, in its most generic meaning, it's simply a method to describe change.

 

[the_malevolent_milk_man]

So how did plants evolve?

Or better yet.

How did the beavers learn to build their amazing, concave dams that raise the water level in a puddle so they can build a hut with underwater entrances. And also, they make sure the water is raised enough so that in winter it doesnt freeze all the way down. Older beavers dont teach their young this. So how could knowledge of building be passed down to subsequent generations.

You can't tell me that animals know that the best shape for a dam is concave because it took us years of engineering to figure that one out.

Honestly I expected better from you, we learned this in 9th grade biology class. Genes create inherited behaviors, commonly known as instincts. Ever wonder why you're attracted to women? That's an instinct. Successful instincts pass on, obviously being attracted to women helps your chances of reproducing.

This applies to birds migrations, rats building nests, etc... By manipulating the animals genome you can change their behavior. Researchers can cause mice to huddle and build nests less. Odds are beavers are the same way. The type of dams they build are the result of behaviors derived from their genetic make up. Manipulate the correct genes and you can cause them to build differently. Creating a good dam that provides protection for you and your family is an obvious beneficial trait so it will be passed down.


Here's a good starter link to get an overview of animal behaviors
http://www.sirinet.net/~jgjohnso/apbio22.html
Here's a good one about manipulating animals behaviors
http://lists.envirolink.org/pipermail/ar-news/Week-of-Mon-20030616/002070.html


Yet again your entire arguement hinges on "I can't imagine how this can happen naturally so it must be supernatural". That attitude is so medieval. Have any response to your previous errors or just gonna keep throwing out more half truths and baseless arguements? Or how about some evidence of creation rather than attempts at falsifying evolution that ignore half the story. And yes, the article you presented was a lie in everything pertaining to evolution. We realize it's not a gob of flesh, that doesn't change the fact that the article is BS. I was pointing out that you fell into the same pitfall as the authors of the article have, you lump everything together (you've said as much by your own admission in an earlier post).


mo.mentum says
"Check out this quick article about how the established laws (not theories) of ThermoDynamics go against everything that evolution portrays.

This destroys evolution as a scientific theory because it counters established physical laws.

This destroys atheism as a system of belief because Creation is the only solution.

This destroys materialism because you cannot be a materialist without being an atheist. So see above point.

 

[mo.mentum]

you're not answering my questions about the architectural skills of the beaver. or the bee or the weaver bird, or the termite...etc etc etc etc

of course there is a chemical reaction happenign to the salt. the solubility of the water and the concentration of salt within causes the salt to be deposited as sedement..DUH

 

[mo.mentum]

Honestly I expected better from you, we learned this in 9th grade biology class. Genes create inherited behaviors, commonly known as instincts. Ever wonder why you're attracted to women? That's an instinct. Successful instincts pass on, obviously being attracted to women helps your chances of reproducing.

Oh. SO some plants take on a specific color or odor taht attracts bees or flies because the primitive plants (thier ancestors) that had some sort of feature like this survived? (which no one tells us how they acquired this feature in the first place) This argument is just as blind for a theist, than the creation idea is to ..whatever it is you are

If we wrere merely talking about an animal migrating by following a flock of birds, then yes you win.

1- But how does a beaver know how to build a perfect **** comparable to human damns in effectiveness and form?

2- How do the bees know that the best way to construct their honeycomnbs is a HEXAGON? (the shape that uses the least material and covers the most volume)

3- Why is it that mankind looks to nature to improve tecnology? Kevlar was invented after studying spider webs. STeel gerters that hold suspension bridges were designed with the human muscle tendons in mind.

Starts answering, stop nit picking the details.

AND, if you're so relying on instinct being explained. Check out Darwin's chapter on INSTINCT, it sthe chapter right after "PROBLEMS ON THEORY". He doesn't like instincts cuz it cannot be learned or transmitted.

Animals dont acquire NEW KNOWLEDGE of how to build things, no matter how long you give them.


ANYWAY! Im off on vacation for 2 weeks. SOrry ill miss your response.

 

[revolutio]

I don't really buy into the whole concept of "instincts" much.

Suppose you took a beaver and gave it no exposure to other beavers for its entire childhood then let it into a creek on its lonesome. Would it build a dam?
The same could be done for a bee.

I could be entirely wrong but I would be that over many many generations of beavers/bees they have learned through trial-and-error what works and what doesn't. Just like humans do. There is no instinct about it, they are just mimicking the actions of their parents.

 

[the_malevolent_milk_man]

Rev - You may be right about the beavers, I dunno 100% if it's learned or instinct in this case since there are no studies on it. However we do have precedence of such amazing instincts in other animals that have no social contact with their parents. Could be a combination of both genetic drive to build and learned behavior from parents. Since mammals need support when they're young they do pick up many behaviors from their parents. Animals raised in captivity by humans often have problems adapting to their natural enviroment because of their learned behaviors. So your question of "Suppose you took a beaver and gave it no exposure to other beavers for its entire childhood then let it into a creek on its lonesome. Would it build a dam?" can't really be done because mammals are dependent and very impressionable while they're young. It has to be exposed to other beavers or nurtured by humans, both of which will drastically alter it's personality and behaviors.


If you want evidence of instincts that can't be learned simply look to reptiles, bugs, and fish. Often they just have as many offspring as possible in egg form, leave, and never see their children(spray and pray as I like to call it). How is it that salmon know to return their birth place? Nobody ever told them they had to go back. Only other alternative is a natural instinct tells them that's what they're supposed do. Either that or a god tells them to go. Seeing as how we have evidence of genes affecting animal behavior and none for god talking to fish I'm gonna have to opt for instincts. Genes can motivate animals to build, as for exactly how they build that's a tad more complicated. As for bees they are a highly social animal, could be learned or genetic. Either they have a natural urge to build it the way they do (due to natural selection favoring their superior design thus propogating the genes) or they just pick it up from their surroundings or a combination of the two.

 

[the_malevolent_milk_man]

Oh. SO some plants take on a specific color or odor taht attracts bees or flies because the primitive plants (thier ancestors) that had some sort of feature like this survived? (which no one tells us how they acquired this feature in the first place) This argument is just as blind for a theist, than the creation idea is to ..whatever it is you are

If we wrere merely talking about an animal migrating by following a flock of birds, then yes you win.

1- But how does a beaver know how to build a perfect **** comparable to human damns in effectiveness and form?

2- How do the bees know that the best way to construct their honeycomnbs is a HEXAGON? (the shape that uses the least material and covers the most volume)

3- Why is it that mankind looks to nature to improve tecnology? Kevlar was invented after studying spider webs. STeel gerters that hold suspension bridges were designed with the human muscle tendons in mind.

Starts answering, stop nit picking the details.

AND, if you're so relying on instinct being explained. Check out Darwin's chapter on INSTINCT, it sthe chapter right after "PROBLEMS ON THEORY". He doesn't like instincts cuz it cannot be learned or transmitted.

Animals dont acquire NEW KNOWLEDGE of how to build things, no matter how long you give them.


ANYWAY! Im off on vacation for 2 weeks. SOrry ill miss your response.

1- see my post above and my explanation of spiders below

2- see above

3- Because nature has had millions of years and countless challanges to overcome compared to our few thousand years of engineering. If you compare early animals to their evolved descendents there is often an improvement in their physical structure that is adapted to the enviroment, horses for example. The same can happen with behaviors since they're both genetic.


Beavers and bees are both social animals so their behaviors can be both genetic and learned. To eliminate that variable and see purely genetic instincts at work we should look towards a solitary animal such as the spider.

Spiders are solitary animals that may never come into contact with adults of their species except for mating so the only tools they have are their natural abilities and instincts. The web design of a spider is species specific, if you look at the webs of two different spiders who never met, live in the same area, are the same species their webs will be practically identical. The web design is determined upon the enviroment and prey it is designed to catch. If introduced to a new enviroment the spiders web must be capable of catching enough prey or it will die. Natural selection takes over from there and only the successful design genes are passed down. Spiders of the same species but in different locations with different prey may have different web designs because of genetic drifts favoring a certain design from the previous area. The same conclusion can be used with other animals on how they create their "perfect" designs although with social animals you must also consider the possibility of part of it being spread around. Even in semi social animals such as mice we are able to manipulate their building habits thru genetic manipulation.


So we have two options here. 1- The behavior is gentic, which we have evidence for. 2- A god is talking to the spiders, which we have no evidence for. Hmmm... tough call.


"AND, if you're so relying on instinct being explained. Check out Darwin's chapter on INSTINCT, it sthe chapter right after "PROBLEMS ON THEORY". He doesn't like instincts cuz it cannot be learned or transmitted."

Get with the times, yet again your over a hundred years behind the times. Darwin knew nothing of genetics when he wrote the book, he had no knowledge of genetic based behavior either. That's why there is "Neo-Darwinism". It's the same basic theory but it corrects the mistakes Darwin made due to his limited data at the time.


"Animals dont acquire NEW KNOWLEDGE of how to build things, no matter how long you give them."

Depends exactly what you mean by knowledge. Chimps are capable of using reasoning to complete simple tasks such as stacking crates to reach a bannana suspended from the ceiling. Didn't a gorrilla, Koko, even learn sign language? No gorrilla before has ever done such a thing and it was accomplished in mere years. We're not the only animals capable of reasoning and thinking things out before we act, we're just the best at it.

As for knowledge such as instincts you're wrong again. New behaviors can also be learned thru social interaction. I doubt you read the easy link on animal behaviors so I'll copy/paste an exerpt about variations in feeding habits of a species that is based upon where they were born. These are solitary animals that wouldn't have picked up their behaviors from others.

"1. Steven Arnold tests the garter snake (Thamnophis elegans) for food preference. (Fig. 22.2)
2. Inland populations are more aquatic and feed on frogs and fish; they refused to feed on slugs.
3. Coastal populations are more terrestrial and feed on slugs.
4. Hybrid newborn garter snakes had an intermediate acceptance of slugs.
5. Work with smell receptors and tongue flicks showed physiological differences underlie the behavior."

http://www.sirinet.net/~jgjohnso/apbio22.html



Yet again you're wrong and only see the evidence you want to see. Your quote on Darwin is correct however you neglected that evolution has come a very long way since Darwin, genetics being a major factor that he had no knowledge of. And yet again your only arguement for intelligent design is that "I dunno how it happens, God must have dunnit".

 

[loveHIM_liveHIM]

I've been reading through all of these for about an hour now, but (having only started), I'm at post #70, so my comments will probably seem irrelevant...But I already had so many things to say; if I keep going I'll forget some of them.

First of all, why isn't anyone out there (other than mo.mentum) defending creationism? This is a sad reflection on creationists...

Secondly, as I started reading about an hour ago, I was very supportive of mo, but it seems that everyone has gotten so defensive about their beliefs that all they can do is attack other peoples; no one is being at all receptive to anyone else's ideas.

Lastly, my real points, to Mo.Mentum:
You're so eager to defend a Creator, but is your belief Bible-based? I ask because you say that it was a "few million years" after creation that humans showed up, and you also claim disbelief in "original sin" and a "world-wide flood". I believe in creationism, but I accept the Bible as a package deal--all true.
Also, Hitler was not Jewish. Nor did he revive pagan rituals. I would not say that he was a Christian, but he did believe himself to be. Feeding off of popular predjudices, he was able to twist Christianity into anti-semitism, using mass media (flyers, posters & newspapers) to portray all Jews as corrupt Christ-killers, still hungry for Christian blood.

As someone said earlier, just because someone claims to be "Christian" or "athiest" does not make their actions a true reflection of said belief system. Hitler was an idiot. Freud was mostly an idiot. All of you who are debating trivial points, please stop this attempt to add yourselves to the list of those that people are ashamed to admit sharing beliefs with.

 

[Carico]

We can't prove anything. We can have the most logical arguments but since people are coming from their own minds, they'll only understand what they understand. If we could prove things, then we could prove reality to a psychotic. The bottom line is that we'll all find out the answers when we die.

 

[Isaiah 53]

One minor detail to critique the OP....

We cannot know God directly, but He surely shows us His Might and Power in His creation. Science will bring about a post-atheist revolution in the coming decades.

You can know God when you enter into relationship with Jesus Christ...

PEACE IN CHRIST!!!

 

[Arikay]

"First of all, why isn't anyone out there (other than mo.mentum) defending creationism? This is a sad reflection on creationists..."

Because creationism is a falsified theory, has been for around 200 years. Especially the form of creationism that Mo believes in, who often seems to be an islamic copy of DrDino, one of the more false creationist organizations around.


"Secondly, as I started reading about an hour ago, I was very supportive of mo, but it seems that everyone has gotten so defensive about their beliefs that all they can do is attack other peoples; no one is being at all receptive to anyone else's ideas."

I believe I ended my part in this conversation because he refused to change a misquote that he had posted. So I decided that if he was unwilling to change a false statement, then I was unwilling to continue.

If you are supportive of Mo's ideas in this thread, then you have much to learn, as there were very few right ones.

I've been reading through all of these for about an hour now, but (having only started), I'm at post #70, so my comments will probably seem irrelevant...But I already had so many things to say; if I keep going I'll forget some of them.

First of all, why isn't anyone out there (other than mo.mentum) defending creationism? This is a sad reflection on creationists...

Secondly, as I started reading about an hour ago, I was very supportive of mo, but it seems that everyone has gotten so defensive about their beliefs that all they can do is attack other peoples; no one is being at all receptive to anyone else's ideas.

Lastly, my real points, to Mo.Mentum:
You're so eager to defend a Creator, but is your belief Bible-based? I ask because you say that it was a "few million years" after creation that humans showed up, and you also claim disbelief in "original sin" and a "world-wide flood". I believe in creationism, but I accept the Bible as a package deal--all true.
Also, Hitler was not Jewish. Nor did he revive pagan rituals. I would not say that he was a Christian, but he did believe himself to be. Feeding off of popular predjudices, he was able to twist Christianity into anti-semitism, using mass media (flyers, posters & newspapers) to portray all Jews as corrupt Christ-killers, still hungry for Christian blood.

As someone said earlier, just because someone claims to be "Christian" or "athiest" does not make their actions a true reflection of said belief system. Hitler was an idiot. Freud was mostly an idiot. All of you who are debating trivial points, please stop this attempt to add yourselves to the list of those that people are ashamed to admit sharing beliefs with.

 

[loveHIM_liveHIM]

Mo's version of creationism confuses me, as he supports the Bible on some points, but not all. If one believes the Bible to be only selectively true, who is to say which parts are trustworthy and which aren't?

I felt that you were fully justified in leaving the conversation. Malevolent_Milkman later posted the rest of the quote, so I did (finally) get to read the rest of it. Although, after reading it, I can grasp why Mo didn't feel he was twisting the meaning, it was still upsetting that he was "ignoring" all requests for the rest of it. In so pointedly refusing to reveal the whole quote, he made it appear that he was hiding something, which didn't help his points at all.

 

[Arikay]

Yeah, his version of creationism comes from an islamic source that some think is very deceptive.
Its islamic, however it does seem to follow the bible in some parts too. It is accepted by other christian creationist groups, and so some feel that its a deceptive way to try and convert islamic people to christianity.

As far as believing the bible to be selectively true, I would say that just like anything else, each part of the bible stands or falls on its own. You also have to look at the interpretation of the bible. As often its not the bible that is untrue but the interpretation. Take the flood for example. The literal interpretation of a global flood has been shown to be false. But that doesn't mean the bible is false, just that that interpretation of the bible is false.

as far as the quote, as milk Man posted, this is a fuller version of the quote,

""the Cambrian strata of Rocks ... are the oldest in which we find most of the major invertebrate groups. It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history. Evolutionists of all stripes believe, however, that this really does represent a very large gap in the fossil record, a gap that is simply due to the fact that, for some reason, very few fossils have lasted from periods before about 600 million years ago. One good reason might be that many of these animals had only soft parts to their bodies; no shells or bones to fossilize. .... Both schools of thought (NeoDarwinians and punctuationalists) agree that the only alternative explanation of the sudden appearance of so many complex animal types in the Cambrian era is divine creation, and both would reject this alternative."
R. Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, pg 229-230."​

In bold was what he quoted. The reason why its a misquote is because Mo starts by saying, "Zoologist Richard Dawkins, confesses:"
That is wrong, because he did not confess to anything, he basically said that it appears as though they just appeared, however, he goes on to explain possible reasons for this appearance.
The small quote does not represent Dawkins views on the matter, the larger quote does.

Mo's version of creationism confuses me, as he supports the Bible on some points, but not all. If one believes the Bible to be only selectively true, who is to say which parts are trustworthy and which aren't?

I felt that you were fully justified in leaving the conversation. Malevolent_Milkman later posted the rest of the quote, so I did (finally) get to read the rest of it. Although, after reading it, I can grasp why Mo didn't feel he was twisting the meaning, it was still upsetting that he was "ignoring" all requests for the rest of it. In so pointedly refusing to reveal the whole quote, he made it appear that he was hiding something, which didn't help his points at all.

 

[the_malevolent_milk_man]

As arikay said most people just aren't creationists. In fact probabbly the most knowledgeable supporter of evolution on the science board is a christian, Lucaspa.

I really don't blame Arikay for stopping, he saw how futile it was. However I just kept thinking "Oh man... he didn't just say that" /re reads the paragraph "[bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse], he actually did say that! There's no way I can just let that absurdity slide" /smite

 

[Dastoopidkid]

How do athiests believe the universe began? The Big Bang? What a load of c r a p. Simple facts make it impossible.

Nothing cannot compress itself. It somehow did in the theory.

There would be no mechanism to push nothingness to a single point.

There would be no fire to explode the nothingness.

There would be no way to push (explode) nothingness outward. A total vacuum can neither contract nor expand. According to the laws of physics, it takes energy to do work, and there is no energy in emptiness.

If it could explode outward, there would be no way to later slow outward, exploding gas in frictionless space.

It is impossible for gas to clump together on earth, much less in outer space without gravity. Gas moves from high density to low density, not the other way around.

It is extremely difficult, and perhaps impossible, for hydrogen to explode past the atomic gap which exists at mass 5 and 8. In the sequence of atomic weight numbers, there are no stable atoms at mass 5 and 8. Because of the mass 5 gap, it is unlikely that hydrogen can change into heavier elements than helium. Because of the mass 8 gap, neither of them can change into heavier elements.

 

[Arikay]

Might I recomend that you research the big bang a bit more, as nothing you have said is part of it.

The big bang was an expansion of spacetime and energy. It was not a conventional explosion, no fire, etc. Energy can and does exist in vacuums and on the quantum level its even possible for both the laws of conservation of energy and cause and effect to be broken.
Again, I would seriously suggest more research.
a good place to start is here,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_bang


Most people accept that the big bang started the universe and it was originally thought up by a christian priest.

The problem is at first cause, that is, what caused the big bang. We dont know, but we do have some ideas, one is deity. Of course, we may be always stuck at guessing since the current theory of the big bang says that standard physics breaks down at the big bang, so we dont completly know what was going on during that time.