Creation vs. Evolution

[Yinlowang]

Today at 04:41 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #10 

So please, indulge me, let's pretend it has nothing to do with evolution, tell me how the universe formed.

Inflation is the most widely accepted at the moment.  I say at the moment because we cannot see anything earlier than 10^-43 seconds after the big bang.  However Inflationary Big Bang cosmology has made alot of predictions in what we should see in the universe and it has not been wrong yet, so I provisionally accept it.

This is a good lower level overview of inflationary cosomology.  Was in Discover http://www.discover.com/apr_02/featguth.html .  If ya want something more technical try http://nedwww.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/Guth/Guth_contents.html

As to what started it, I like Morat's answer.  Nothing is unstable

 

[Melchior]

Today at 09:21 PM Cantuar said this in Post #20 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708812#post708812)

You know, I don't quite get your original post, having re-read it. You put up a bunch of questions and answer them with "Genesis 1:1" or whatever. But Genesis 1:1 doesn't tell you anything about how God did what he did, it just said that God created everything. Don't you have any curiosity about how God did all that? I assume he left all those clues about that in his creation for a purpose.

Technicaly, it doesn't say God created everything, it says that he created Heaven and Earth and all things on it. Although I am sure this is due to the limited knowledge of the authors of the Bible, it is not stated that God is the creator of the universe. We just insert him in that role because modern day understanding of an omnipotent god would have him be an intelligent designer of the universe. I am not convinced that God needs to be this.

 

[Cantuar]

Well, whatever he did create (and didn't it say he created all the stars and so on?), just answering "Genesis 1:1" still doesn't show much interest in how he created and why the earth and solar system and universe (if you accept God as its creator) are packed with clues about their creation.

 

[Melchior]

Today at 09:31 PM Yinlowang said this in Post #21 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708826#post708826)

Inflation is the most widely accepted at the moment.  I say at the moment because we cannot see anything earlier than 10^-43 seconds after the big bang.  However Inflationary Big Bang cosmology has made alot of predictions in what we should see in the universe and it has not been wrong yet, so I provisionally accept it.

Going to be a bit picky here. We can't possibly see anything from about 300,000 years after the big bang, since that is when the "lights went on" so to speak as stars started to shine. Even then, the Hubble has only been able to pear back to within about a billion years of the big bang. The ~10^43 seconds after the big bang is as far back as we can mathmaticaly speculate with inflation theory without having a unified theory between relativity and quantum mechanics.

Inflation has been pretty much proven with the existance of the cosmic microwave background and the meassurements of the CMB by several satelites. We also know interestingly that their wont be a Big Crunch as we are now know to be in a Flat universe.

 

[Pete Harcoff]

Today at 03:56 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #17 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708763#post708763)

Pete, I was hoping you would get involved in this dialog as I have a question specifically for you (but others may feel free to answer).  Please visit this site: evolutionfairytale.com/cleanerf.htm

I can't hyperlink it, because I haven't had 15 posts or whatever.  The site outlines a symbiotic relationship?  How does evolution theory account for such a thing?

Symbiotic relationships aren't that hard to account for with modern evolution theory. What is often ignored by people criticizing evolution, however, is the whole idea of selection. That is, only the "winners" in a symbiotic scenario go on to successfully propagate. For example, picture a scenario where there are umpteen fish and various sharks. Only the fish that are successfully able to extract a meal from a shark's mouth will go on to propagate the species. Furthermore, the sharks that allow (whether by chance or decision) the fish to successfully "clean" its mouth, will likely have a survival advantage (healthier mouth) over the sharks that chow down on the fish instead.

The little scenario the web site sets up is but a single event. There's no telling how every such event is going to turn out. Yes, maybe some fish get eaten. But we only see the end result of the generations of fish that don't get eaten.

Also, while I'm no expert in marine biology, I was always under the impression that sharks don't automatically eat every single fish they come across (I'm sure you've seen footage of sharks swimming passively through schools of fish). Maybe those little "cleaner fish" don't taste very good.

Lastly, the web site is typical of creationist sites in drawing positive conclusions about premise A, from evidence they feel disproves premise B. In short, failure to explain something (symbiosis) with one theory does not automatically make the other theory true.

 

[Yinlowang]

"See" was probably a bad choice of words I used "see" kinda figuatively, Like we can see with the minds eye. 10^-43 is where that breaks down.

 

[Melchior]

Today at 09:52 PM Yinlowang said this in Post #26 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708890#post708890)

"See" was probably a bad choice of words I used "see" kinda figuatively, Like we can see with the minds eye. 10^-43 is where that breaks down.

Yah, I knew what you ment. I was just premting someone who would use that to attempt to weaken your argument.

 

[Quath]

Today at 12:12 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #11

Quath,

What formed spacetime?

As far as I can guess, it formed itself.  The geometric view of relativity is that matter and energy curve spacetime.  If you cranked up the energy density enough, you would curve spacetime back in on itself and it would wink out of existance.  (The Big Crunch).  Playing this backwards and you get the Big Bang.  So it looks to me like some permutation of nothingness resulted in our universe. 

It is basically the same answer as to "what formed God?"  If you say God was always there, you can say the Big Bang was always there.  (Note: always is a trickyy word since it implies time and there was no time outside our known universe.)

Scott (Quath)

 

[NebraskaMan]

I do want to stop and say thanks to everyone for your thoughts and responses.  Lack of flaming good, intelligible responses good, calling a persona name because you can't break down his logic...bad!

My simple question (as my heading states) is as follows:

Everyone pretend that you believe in my God (if you don't already), who saves by faith.  If he provided a testable proof or postulate for everything in the Bible, what would be left to accept on faith?

 

[Arikay]

But god doesnt dirrectly save by faith. doesnt he save by the belief that jesus died for your sins?

So if it was proven that jesus died for your sins, it wouldnt change any christians beliefs, and everyone would still be saved.

Today at 02:13 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #29 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708946#post708946)

I do want to stop and say thanks to everyone for your thoughts and responses.  Lack of flaming good, intelligible responses good, calling a persona name because you can't break down his logic...bad!

My simple question (as my heading states) is as follows:

Everyone pretend that you believe in my God (if you don't already), who saves by faith.  If he provided a testable proof or postulate for everything in the Bible, what would be left to accept on faith?

 

[Melchior]

Today at 10:13 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #29 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708946#post708946)

Everyone pretend that you believe in my God (if you don't already), who saves by faith.  If he provided a testable proof or postulate for everything in the Bible, what would be left to accept on faith?

Oh, that’s easy, his righteousness. God is an emotional god. We have many stories of his jealousy, anger, love, and compassion. He dispenses justice based on those emotions. He also requires a morality that is in opposition to the morality of today’s cultures.

The leap of faith is that we would need to accept that God is right, and that it is his moral standards that we should follow, and not those we have created for ourselves.

 

[Yinlowang]

Today at 06:43 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #29

My simple question (as my heading states) is as follows:

Everyone pretend that you believe in my God (if you don't already), who saves by faith.  If he provided a testable proof or postulate for everything in the Bible, what would be left to accept on faith?

My question to you is what is so special about accepting something on faith? 

In every other aspect of your life, accepting something on faith is a rather dumb thing to do. 

 

[Quath]

Today at 02:13 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #29
Everyone pretend that you believe in my God (if you don't already), who saves by faith.  If he provided a testable proof or postulate for everything in the Bible, what would be left to accept on faith?

The specifics are always open to be believed by faith.  There are 33,000+ Christian denominations that believe in God and yet differ enough on the specifics of their religion.  (Plus there is 1% of Christians that do not believe in God.  Go figure. http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/02-26-2003/0001898157).

Scott (Quath)

 

[JohnR7]

Today at 05:36 PM Yinlowang said this in Post #32 In every other aspect of your life, accepting something on faith is a rather dumb thing to do. 

Did you ever hear of the placebo effect? Why is it that one third of the people who take a sugar pill shows improvement?

 

[lucaspa]

Today at 11:48 AM NebraskaMan said this in Post #1

Hello all, 

First, I am a Christian.  I believe God is the creator of all that was, is and is to come. 

Fine. That's what Darwin believed, too.  So what?

In a sense, you are right, but what you are left with, is a choice of faith:

"Do I put my faith in evolution or in God?" 

How about accept that evolution is the method God used to create? 

"Christians should look on evolution simply as the method by which God works."  James McCosh, theologian and President of Princeton, The Religious Aspects of Evolution, 2d ed. 1890, pg 68.

If evolution leaves a question unanswered, and the Bible makes provision for the answer, it makes it hard to put your faith in evolution. 

You act like evolution is a worldview.  That isn't true.  It appears that although you weren't born yesterday, you weren't born long enough ago to recognize that evolution isn't atheism.

So, let's begin with some questions that I would like to see evolution's answers for (This list will grow as this thread grows).

1. Where did all of the matter/dust involved in the "Big Bang" come from?  My answer: Genesis 1:1

This isn't evolution.  However, the scientific answer is: "we don't know."  There are at least 5 hypotheses for the matter/energy/spacetime that appeared at the Big Bang.  One of them is deity.  Would you like to know what the other 4 are?

2. How did the matter/dust start moving?  My answer: I don't need one, see my answer to #1

Space expands.  Remember, the Big Bang was extremely hot and got hotter when the antimatter and matter annhilated each other. Heat is movement.

3. The law of angular momentum reasons(for all who have never heard this before) that the planets should be rotating in the same direction as the matter that was spinning when the big bang occurred.  Yet, three of the planets in our solar system (and 10 moons) rotate in the opposite direction of the others.  Why?  My answer: Genesis 1:1 

Where in Genesis 1:1 is this addressed?  Collisions when the plantes and moons were forming could easily put some into "retrograde" orbits.

Now, that is only three questions to get us going.  Please don't flame, as I am only trying to start an educational debate.  If you don't know the answer to the questions, then please explain how you are not exercising just as much faith believing in evolution as I am exercising by believing in God.

Evolution isn't atheism.  So yes, atheists are exercising faith.  But scientific theories (you haven't yet mentioned evolution) are not taken on faith. They are accepted according to the evidence.

So, you came here expecting to challenge a bunch of atheists.  But this isn't the theism vs atheism debate. 

Creationism is a scientific theory.  One that was falsified by 1831 by scientists who were all Christians, and many of them ministers.

What you listed was god-of-the-gaps theology, which isn't Christian theology. 

You have 3 misconceptions:

1. Bad theology.
2. Thinking that evolution is atheism.
3. Your questions don't have a scientific answer.

 

[lucaspa]

Today at 05:36 PM Yinlowang said this in Post #32


In every other aspect of your life, accepting something on faith is a rather dumb thing to do. 

Only if you define faith as not having a reason. But that isn't the common definition of faith.

In every other aspect of your life, you accept things on faith.  One example.  Last November I went into a voting booth and chose candidates I believed would do the better job.  Did I have any science?  Nope.  Did I have reasons?  Sure. But it wasn't science.  My choices were based on faith, not science.

Even more, the act of voting expressed my faith that this is a good way to select leaders. Again, I have my reasons, but it is still faith.

 

[lucaspa]

Today at 03:11 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #10

It seems most everyone else didn't have a problem with my questions.  As for saying that evolution has nothing to do with the big bang theory...WHAT?

There are six forms of evolution, as I understand it:

Cosmic,Chemical,Stellar,Organic,Macro and Micro.

You are still trying to equate evolution with the worldview of atheism.  All of these are separate theories.  Only creationists try to make them all be "evolution". 

I didn't plagiarize, I didn't copy, I stated my opinions and questions that I have come up with from my own studies and research. 

You just made a claim.  We can test that. Why is it your post is identical, word for word, of the other posts?  How likely is that without plagiarization? 

So please, indulge me, let's pretend it has nothing to do with evolution, tell me how the universe formed.

The how is the processes discovered by science.  The physical universe originated in the Big Bang.

There are 5 hypotheses as to the cause of the Big Bang.  (The problem is also known as First Cause, the Uncaused Cause that set the universe going for all subsequent cause and effect.)  In no particular order they are:

1. Logical and mathematical necessity.  In brief, the equations describing the universe are so powerful that a universe formed for them to describe.

2. No Boundary.  In this hypothesis, the 4 space dimensions were merged with time at the Big Bang and formed something called "imaginary time". In this case, "imaginary" refers to the mathematical term of the square root of -1.  In this formulation, the universe just IS, with no "beginning" and thus no creation.

3. Deity.

4. Quantum fluctuation.  We know that particles pop into and out of existence all the time in the vacuum where there are no particles.  The equations show that the universe really has zero net energy.  Therefore the equations view the entire universe as one huge virtual particle.  M theory equations show that spacetime could also be a quantum fluctuation.

5. Ekpyrotic.  This is a new one.  In it our universe formed from the collision of two quantum membranes.

 

[lucaspa]

Today at 03:56 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #17

  Really?  I thought macroevolution was change from potentially one species or "kind" of animal (i.e. dog) to another (i.e. cat); while, microevolution was change within a kind (i.e. siamese cat evolving to a tiger)

First, science doesn't use the word "kind".  Creationist alone use it.  But they don't have any consistent definition or concept of it.  And they have no way to tell whether two organisms are different kinds or not.

Some definitions from evolutionary biologists:
Microevolution is "changes within populations and species". 
Macroevolution is "the origin and diversification of higher taxa". Douglas Futuyma, Evolutionary Biology, pg 447, 1998

However, both micro and macroevolution are part of the same process:

"But we must ask, what exactly are these genera, families, orders, and so on?  It was clear to Darwin, and it should be obvious to all today, that they are simply ever larger categories used to give names to ever larger clusters of related species.  That's all these clusters, these higher taxa, really are: simply clusters of related species.

Thus, in priniciple the evolution of a family should be no different in its basic nature, and should involve no different processes, from the evolution of a genus, since a family is nothing more than a collection of related genera.  And genera are just collections of related species.  The triumph of evolutionary biology in the 1930s and 1940s was the conclusion that the same principles of adaptive divergence just described -- primarily the processes of mutation and natural selection -- going on within species, accumulate to produce the differences we see between closely related species -- i.e., within genera. Q.E.D.: If adaptive modification within species explains the evolutionary differences between species within a genus, logically it must explain all the evolutionary change we see between families, orders, classes, phyla, and the kingdoms of life.  Niles Eldredge, The Triumph of Evolution and the Failure of Creationism. pgs 76-77.

 The site outlines a symbiotic relationship?  How does evolution theory account for such a thing?

Quite easily.  Evolution of parasitic relationships are easy to explain: one organism gains benefit from letting another organism do part of its work. However, there is a cost: decreased vitality of the host. And when the host dies, so does the parasite.  So any variation in the parasite or host that lessens the virulence of the parasite is advantageous.  If the parasite assumes part of the burden of keeping both alive, that variation is going to be selectively advantageous.

Nebraska, you need to think about what you read and what you are saying.  Think about what you read on creationist websites, read what evolution really is, and then think your way through various claims.  Is the claim really true?  Is there no way for evolution to explain symbiotic relationships?  If you think it thru, you will find the pathway for evolution and natural selection yourself.

 

[gentu]

Yesterday at 04:48 PM NebraskaMan said this in Post #1 (http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?postid=708109#post708109)


3. The law of angular momentum reasons(for all who have never heard this before) that the planets should be rotating in the same direction as the matter that was spinning when the big bang occurred.  Yet, three of the planets in our solar system (and 10 moons) rotate in the opposite direction of the others.  Why?  My answer: Genesis 1:1 

I think this question can be answered in a relativistic point of view. If everything in the Universe is spinning from the get-go, who can tell if the Universe is spinning? From anyone's point of view in this Universe where everything's spinning, it looks as if it's perfectly still! That means that any spinning of planets and solar systems has to come from some other effect. The Universe can't break into spinning eddies of solar systems because this would require friction to be applied from a vacuum to be the explanation.

 

[Yinlowang]

John, I am not as up to speed on this as I would like but it is my understanding that the placebo effect is largely an artifact of poorly designed testing procedures and at best has a temporary effect on subjective areas of medicine. Do you know of any studies that show the numbers you have claimed in areas that are not subjective, or do you have any studies that show that the effect is not temporary in chronic cases?