Evolution

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

And that cause is God, correct?

Indeed. And God Himself doesn't require a cause because He is not part of the natural world

 

[Jonathan Walkerin]

You did exactly the same when you compared the chance of a living being with the chance of life coming from non-life.

That is abiogenesis though. Evolution works on living populations.

Indeed. And God Himself doesn't require a cause because He is not part of the natural world

Your logical fallacy is special pleading

 

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

That is abiogenesis though. Evolution works on living populations.

Then check again what you replied to. You commented on the chance of life evolving from non-life, not of evolution.

 

[Daniel9v9]

@Jonathan Walkerin

There’s a lot I can say about all of this, but let me just comment on 3 things:

1. You’re entitled to your opinion and belief, but please respect that this thread is in an Orthodox Lutheran section. This is to say, if you’re Roman Catholic, you subscribe to very a different confession of faith; and may I add, a theological system which has increasingly embraced Higher Criticism. This exegetical approach is rejected by Orthodox Lutherans, because it’s highly problematic on so many levels.

If you want discuss Macroevolution from a Higher Critical point of view, perhaps it would be better to create a post in the Catholic or General Theology section. This is a long-winded way of saying, if you embrace the theologically (not morally!) liberal position of Higher Criticism, there’s not much room for a fruitful debate here.

2. Just to help you appreciate the complexity of the debate: Macroevolution is not a hard science. It’s a theory or belief system, built on big assumptions, rooted in an underlying but very distinct worldview, which is Pantheistic or Deistic at its core.

To illustrate this quickly: It is not factual to say that an object can evolve from nothing to something, from inanimate to animate, from single-cell to multi-cell, from self reproduction to be needing a partner, and from species to species - and all of this in sequence and on its own. There are many compelling theories about this, but they only make sense in their own theoretical/philosophical framework, for this sequence with these stages requires massive leaps of faith, and therefore we cannot treat this as a hard science.

3. We cannot divorce theoretical science from philosophy. This is a point that is greatly overlooked in our day! To illustrate this very simply: What is created ex nihilo, out of nothing, cannot be measured.

Suppose there was a man who could create things out of nothing. In one instance, his hand is empty, but in the next, there is a rock. Now, if this rock was given to a contemporary scientist, for him to study it and determine its origin, given his presupposition, he would almost by necessity conclude that it must have developed over a very long period through different means, and he would furthermore attribute qualities to the rock that it has the ability to change. But in doing so, he’s failing to take into account the creator.

This is the fundamental error of shallow scientism and Macroevolution, and this worldview has been adopted by Higher Critics, and then made its way into the Church.

Macroevolution and Scriptures are two competing ideas that Higher Critics have attempt to fuse, but very unsuccessfully. For instead of synthesising the two, they’ve ended up with a variety of third systems. The regrettable thing is that this has become so common that it’s assumed to be true by many people. But if you dig deep and look at everything that is being claimed, you can find that it’s actually tremendously inconsistent and problematic.

I hope this helps to explain the Orthodox Lutheran perspective and to show how complex an issue it is. It’s not simply a case of someone being “scientific” and others being “unscientific”, which is a common but shallow notion in our day.

 

[FaithT]

@Jonathan Walkerin

There’s a lot I can say about all of this, but let me just comment on 3 things:

1. You’re entitled to your opinion and belief, but please respect that this thread is in an Orthodox Lutheran section. This is to say, if you’re Roman Catholic, you subscribe to very a different confession of faith; and may I add, a theological system which has increasingly embraced Higher Criticism. This exegetical approach is rejected by Orthodox Lutherans, because it’s highly problematic on so many levels.

If you want discuss Macroevolution from a Higher Critical point of view, perhaps it would be better to create a post in the Catholic or General Theology section. This is a long-winded way of saying, if you embrace the theologically (not morally!) liberal position of Higher Criticism, there’s not much room for a fruitful debate here.

2. Just to help you appreciate the complexity of the debate: Macroevolution is not a hard science. It’s a theory or belief system, built on big assumptions, rooted in an underlying but very distinct worldview, which is Pantheistic or Deistic at its core.

To illustrate this quickly: It is not factual to say that an object can evolve from nothing to something, from inanimate to animate, from single-cell to multi-cell, from self reproduction to be needing a partner, and from species to species - and all of this in sequence and on its own. There are many compelling theories about this, but they only make sense in their own theoretical/philosophical framework, for this sequence with these stages requires massive leaps of faith, and therefore we cannot treat this as a hard science.

3. We cannot divorce theoretical science from philosophy. This is a point that is greatly overlooked in our day! To illustrate this very simply: What is created ex nihilo, out of nothing, cannot be measured.

Suppose there was a man who could create things out of nothing. In one instance, his hand is empty, but in the next, there is a rock. Now, if this rock was given to a contemporary scientist, for him to study it and determine its origin, given his presupposition, he would almost by necessity conclude that it must have developed over a very long period through different means, and he would furthermore attribute qualities to the rock that it has the ability to change. But in doing so, he’s failing to take into account the creator.

This is the fundamental error of shallow scientism and Macroevolution, and this worldview has been adopted by Higher Critics, and then made its way into the Church.

Macroevolution and Scriptures are two competing ideas that Higher Critics have attempt to fuse, but very unsuccessfully. For instead of synthesising the two, they’ve ended up with a variety of third systems. The regrettable thing is that this has become so common that it’s assumed to be true by many people. But if you dig deep and look at everything that is being claimed, you can find that it’s actually tremendously inconsistent and problematic.

I hope this helps to explain the Orthodox Lutheran perspective and to show how complex an issue it is. It’s not simply a case of someone being “scientific” and others being “unscientific”, which is a common but shallow notion in our day.

<<<This exegetical approach is rejected by Orthodox Lutherans, because it’s highly problematic on so many levels.>>>>

In what ways?

 

[Jonathan Walkerin]

Suppose there was a man who could create things out of nothing. In one instance, his hand is empty, but in the next, there is a rock. Now, if this rock was given to a contemporary scientist, for him to study it and determine its origin, given his presupposition, he would almost by necessity conclude that it must have developed over a very long period through different means, and he would furthermore attribute qualities to the rock that it has the ability to change. But in doing so, he’s failing to take into account the creator.

Sure. The problem with this is that if we include omnipotent creator to scientific equation we can just ignore everything we consider reality anyway.

I mean who knows we were alive yesterday. Perhaps we were created this morning with imbedded memories. Perhaps we are a simulation in angels heavenly gaming board, perhaps we are evolved blue cheese God forgot on the table. It is possible after all. With God everything is possible.

It is just not very useful.

2. Just to help you appreciate the complexity of the debate: Macroevolution is not a hard science. It’s a theory or belief system, built on big assumptions, rooted in an underlying but very distinct worldview, which is Pantheistic or Deistic at its core.

To illustrate this quickly: It is not factual to say that an object can evolve from nothing to something, from inanimate to animate

You are talking about macro evolution and illustrating abiogenesis.

It would considerably decrease the complexity of the debate if you understood the terms.

Evolution - science has a pretty good theory and proof from multiple fields of science how that works and while you are totally free to gripe about it the theory of evolution is just about the most tested theory there is and so far we haven’t found anything to invalidate it nor anything that would explain the facts and evidence better.

If you can come up with something better and prove it there is a Nobel waiting for you.

As for abiogenesis - we just don’t know yet.

Just for curiosity. What do you think stops micro evolution becoming macro evolution over tens of thousands of generations ?

 

[chad kincham]

There are indeed many scientists who belief in macroevolution. Science cannot allow supernatural things like God and evolution is the only wide-spread theory to explain our world without a creator. But is the theory of evolution logical?

Professor Richard Lewontin, a leading evolutionary geneticist, claimed to speak for many when he confessed: "Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism.

It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door."

Read that quote a few times. You'll start to understand why today's scientists support macroevolution although it is an "unsubstantiated just-so story" that is "against common sense" and a "patent absurdity".

Now towards the specific points you mentioned:

1) eukaryotic cells/life:
Trefil called the evolution of prokaryotes (cells without organelles) into eukaryotes (cells with organelles and other structures lacking in prokaryotes) an "enduring mystery of evolution" because of the lack of evidence of the evolution of organelles, and the total lack of plausible links between eukaryotes and prokaryotes.

The difference between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells are striking, to say the least. But if the latter evolved from the former, why are there no intermediate stages between the two? Why, for example, are there no cells with loose DNA and organelles? If the evolutionary line really went from prokaryotes to eukaryotes, and we have many living samples of each, why did none of the intermediate stages survive?

2) origin of humans:
I could write a whole book about this, but here's the very short version:
Assuming that humans have ape-like ancestors without a single half-ape/half-human creature found, is an absurdity. Not only has never a half-ape/half-human been found, evolutionists even had to try to fake such thing (Piltdown forgery) because they needed "proof". Scientists calculated that for the thousands of mutations from ape to "modern man" you need some 150,000,000,000 "forerunners", often represented as cave-dwelling hunters. Not only are there not enough fossils, tools, or whatever, found to believe in such a vast amount of pre-humans, the General Population Conference also kills all hope of the evolutionists. Data of the development and extrapolation into the past make clear that the assumption of thousands of millions of pre-humans is both physically and archaeologically unrealistic.

3) Extinction of dinosaurs
I've honestly never heard of a way to use dinosaurs to support evolution. In fact Mary Schweitzer (an atheistic scientist) was one of the first scientists to discover soft tissue (like blood cells) in dinosaur bones. Every biologist knows that soft tissue cannot survive millions of years, and its existence is a very strong evidence to the conclusion that dinosaurs existed thousands of years ago, not millions of years. Schweitzer is since then working hard on figuring out a way how soft tissue could survive long enough to fit it back in with the theory of evolution - so far without success.

The existence of life itself is one of the greatest mysteries for atheistic scientists, and no theory they came up with to this day does even remotely make sense.
Chandra Wickramasinghe, Professor of Applied Mathematics and Astronomy at Cardiff University, who worked alongside astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle, and is widely regarded as an expert on this subject, calculated the odds against life starting accidentally as one in 10 to the power of 40,000. Wickramasinghe says that is equivalent to no chance: „I am 100 per cent certain that life could not have started spontaneously on earth.“ He says that his conclusion had come to him as quite a shock, because he had previously been „strongly brainwashed to believe that science cannot be consistent with any kind of deliberate creation“. He concludes: „The only logical answer to life is creation – and not accidental random shuffling“.

Some of them who are honest enough to reject evolution as happening on earth, just switch to transpermia or panspermia, and claim space aliens planted life here.

There’s even less evidence that aliens did it, though.

 

[chad kincham]

You did exactly the same when you compared the chance of a living being with the chance of life coming from non-life. The chance that non-living matter produces life is smaller than the chance that a bomb in a copy shop results in a dictionary. Both events have nothing "alive" to start with.

There’s an established law of science, called the law of biogenesis, which states that life only comes from existing life.

Abiogenesis is a failed theory.

 

[Jonathan Walkerin]

Some of them who are honest enough to reject evolution as happening on earth, just switch to transpermia or panspermia, and claim space aliens planted life here.

There’s even less evidence that aliens did it, though.

Well just about all scientist accept evolution happening on earth.

Level of support for evolution - Wikipedia

You seem to most talk about abiogenesis on earth and alternatives to that.

Aliens is one theory certainly but as you mentioned there is no evidence for that, far more likely culprits are the planetary matter that has been ejected in to space due to collisions and whatnot then striking other planets.

Still waiting for any evidence of that either. Go find a space rock with fossils on it there is another Nobel waiting.

 

[Jonathan Walkerin]

There’s an established law of science, called the law of biogenesis, which states that life only comes from existing life.

Abiogenesis is a failed theory.

Law of biogenesis Definition and Examples - Biology Online Dictionary

Law of biogenesis



Definition
noun
(1) The principle stating that life arises from pre-existing life, not from nonliving material.
(2) Recapitulation theory: the theory formulated by E.H. Haeckel in which the individuals in their embryonic development pass through stages analogous in general structural plan to the stages their species passed through in its evolution; the theory in which ontogeny is an abridged recapitulation of phylogeny.
Supplement
The theory has been discredited in time when modern science and genetics have raised doubt its validity.

So your law is in fact a principle and/or a failed theory.

 

[FaithT]

What’s the LCMS position on micro and macro evolution? And what does it teach about fossils and such that suggest evolution is true?

What does the LCMS teach about fossils which suggest evolution is true?

 

[Daniel9v9]

Sure. The problem with this is that if we include omnipotent creator to scientific equation we can just ignore everything we consider reality anyway.

I mean who knows we were alive yesterday. Perhaps we were created this morning with imbedded memories. Perhaps we are a simulation in angels heavenly gaming board, perhaps we are evolved blue cheese God forgot on the table. It is possible after all. With God everything is possible.

It is just not very useful.



You are talking about macro evolution and illustrating abiogenesis.

It would considerably decrease the complexity of the debate if you understood the terms.

Evolution - science has a pretty good theory and proof from multiple fields of science how that works and while you are totally free to gripe about it the theory of evolution is just about the most tested theory there is and so far we haven’t found anything to invalidate it nor anything that would explain the facts and evidence better.

If you can come up with something better and prove it there is a Nobel waiting for you.

As for abiogenesis - we just don’t know yet.

Just for curiosity. What do you think stops micro evolution becoming macro evolution over tens of thousands of generations ?

There's a lot I can say about this, but suffice to say, it's not just one or two things that are being debated but fundamentally the entire system of thought. And because you subscribe to Higher Criticism (either knowingly or unknowingly) which we reject, and I contend - for very good reasons - it's impossible for us to have a meaningful debate. Please respect the forum rules and don't advocate theologically liberal views in an orthodox section. You can post in the Catholic or General theology section, for example.

I'd suggest studying the dubious roots and failures of the Higher Criticism movement, then perhaps you can see the complexity of the issue a bit clearer.

 

[Daniel9v9]

<<<This exegetical approach is rejected by Orthodox Lutherans, because it’s highly problematic on so many levels.>>>>

In what ways?

This is a big topic in and of itself, which involves theology, history, and science. I don't want to derail the topic, but just to give you a super brief and somewhat simplistic outline:

Higher Criticism a field of systematic study of the Bible, where the person studying the text is above the text as opposed to subject to the text (as he should be!) - he judges the text, rather than listening to it; he aims to determine the correct and universal way of reading a text, and based on this, separate truth from error. In other words, they typically view the Bible as a book that merely contains God's Word, so they try and separate between what's God's Word and what's man's word, which is highly problematic.

The movement did bring about some valuable ideas and practices, but overall, it failed miserably to achieve its goal of discovering the one true way of reading the Bible using their investigative approach, given their different methods and conclusions. Moreover, there was an overwhelming tendency to read things into the text that doesn't belong in the text. For example, philosophers would interpret large portions of the Bible as abstract philosophical ideas and not as actual historical events. Similarly, sociologists would understand things sociologically. In Higher Criticism, there is very little room for miracles, and the Bible is essentially understood to be a poorly compiled body of random and competing fragments of political, various ancient religious, and moralistic ideas. The whole unity and central point of the Bible is compromised.

In very simple terms, instead of focusing on the actual text, they spend most of their time and energy looking behind the text, and in doing so, compromise the true and plain meaning as found in its natural context. It's just not a good way to handle God's Word; it's inconsistent, dishonest, arbitrary, and it opens the door to a world of heresy.

 

[FaithT]

This is a big topic in and of itself, which involves theology, history, and science. I don't want to derail the topic, but just to give you a super brief and somewhat simplistic outline:

Higher Criticism a field of systematic study of the Bible, where the person studying the text is above the text as opposed to subject to the text (as he should be!) - he judges the text, rather than listening to it; he aims to determine the correct and universal way of reading a text, and based on this, separate truth from error. In other words, they typically view the Bible as a book that merely contains God's Word, so they try and separate between what's God's Word and what's man's word, which is highly problematic.

The movement did bring about some valuable ideas and practices, but overall, it failed miserably to achieve its goal of discovering the one true way of reading the Bible using their investigative approach, given their different methods and conclusions. Moreover, there was an overwhelming tendency to read things into the text that doesn't belong in the text. For example, philosophers would interpret large portions of the Bible as abstract philosophical ideas and not as actual historical events. Similarly, sociologists would understand things sociologically. In Higher Criticism, there is very little room for miracles, and the Bible is essentially understood to be a poorly compiled body of random and competing fragments of political, various ancient religious, and moralistic ideas. The whole unity and central point of the Bible is compromised.

.

Is that a typical way for Catholics to read the text? I ask because I’ve been in Catholic Bible studies before, when I was Catholic.

 

[chad kincham]

Law of biogenesis Definition and Examples - Biology Online Dictionary

Law of biogenesis



Definition
noun
(1) The principle stating that life arises from pre-existing life, not from nonliving material.
(2) Recapitulation theory: the theory formulated by E.H. Haeckel in which the individuals in their embryonic development pass through stages analogous in general structural plan to the stages their species passed through in its evolution; the theory in which ontogeny is an abridged recapitulation of phylogeny.
Supplement
The theory has been discredited in time when modern science and genetics have raised doubt its validity.

So your law is in fact a principle and/or a failed theory.

Its the recapitulation theory by Haeckel that was discredited, and it was a bogus theory that has nothing to do with biogenesiss being discredited, because it made the claim that a fetus went through every stage of past evolution as it developed in the womb.

Since macro evolution is bogus, being a metaphysical philosophy of naturalistic materialism, and not actual science, of course Haeckel’s recapitulation theory was false.

However, since evolutionists only care about propagating their naturalistic theory, and not about truth, the recapitulation theory is still found in many high school, and college textbooks.

And since abiogenesis has been thoroughly discredited, and is a failed hypothesis, the law of biogenesis has not been disproven.

Analysis by information theory of the possibility of a living cell arising from random bonding of amino acids, has shown that it’s impossible for it to occur, per Yockey, for one, who has said that the primordial soup hypothesis has failed, and should be completely discarded.

Astronomer Fred Hoyle famously said that his analysis of the odds of abiogenesis occurring, shows that the odds are better for a 747 to be assembled by a tornado going through a junkyard, than for a living cell to arise from random bonding of amino acids.

Therefore, Louis Pasteur’s law of biogenesis has not been discredited.

 

[chad kincham]

Law of biogenesis Definition and Examples - Biology Online Dictionary

Law of biogenesis



Definition
noun
(1) The principle stating that life arises from pre-existing life, not from nonliving material.
(2) Recapitulation theory: the theory formulated by E.H. Haeckel in which the individuals in their embryonic development pass through stages analogous in general structural plan to the stages their species passed through in its evolution; the theory in which ontogeny is an abridged recapitulation of phylogeny.
Supplement
The theory has been discredited in time when modern science and genetics have raised doubt its validity.

So your law is in fact a principle and/or a failed theory.

Its the recapitulation theory by Haeckel that was discredited, and it was a bogus theory that has nothing to do with biogenesis being discredited, because it made the claim that a fetus went through every stage of past evolution as it developed in the womb.

Since macro evolution is bogus, being a metaphysical philosophy of naturalistic materialism, and not actual science, of course Haeckel’s recapitulation theory was false.

However, since evolutionists only care about propagating their naturalistic theory, and not about truth, the recapitulation theory is still found in many high school, and college textbooks.

And since abiogenesis has been thoroughly discredited, and is a failed hypothesis, the law of biogenesis has not been disproven.

Analysis by information theory of the possibility of a living cell arising from random bonding of amino acids, has shown that it’s impossible for it to occur, per Yockey, for one, who has said that the primordial soup hypothesis has failed, and should be completely discarded.

Astronomer Fred Hoyle famously said that his analysis of the odds of abiogenesis occurring, shows that the odds are better for a 747 to be assembled by a tornado going through a junkyard, than for a living cell to arise from random bonding of amino acids.

Therefore Louis Pasteur’s law of biogenesis has not been discredited.

 

[FaithT]

If LCMS can only believe in microevolution, what about what this says below and what about all the scientists who believe they have evidence for macroevolution?
I just read this when I googled macroevolution:


<<<<<What evidence is there for macroevolution?
Macroevolution studies how taxonomic groups above the level of species change. Its evidence draws frequently from the fossil record and DNA comparisons to reconstruct how various organisms may be related.>>>>>>

 

[Daniel9v9]

Is that a typical way for Catholics to read the text? I ask because I’ve been in Catholic Bible studies before, when I was Catholic.

This touches on yet another big topic, which has to do with what our authority in interpreting Scriptures is. The Roman Catholic Church claim Bible and their church (which includes extra-biblical revelation) as their authority, which in recent times have opened the door to adapt the Higher Critical method and subscribe to various ideas out of that movement. Not every Roman Catholic do, but it is common.

 

[FaithT]

I’m just stuck right now. Not knowing what to believe about evolution. The LCMS can believe in microevolution, right? But it also believes that Adam and Eve were just like us, right, with no microevolution involved?

Is there any scientific evidence that supports that or are the fossils found supportive of evolution and the LCMS wrong?

 

[Daniel9v9]

If LCMS can only believe in microevolution, what about what this says below and what about all the scientists who believe they have evidence for macroevolution?
I just read this when I googled macroevolution:


<<<<<What evidence is there for macroevolution?
Macroevolution studies how taxonomic groups above the level of species change. Its evidence draws frequently from the fossil record and DNA comparisons to reconstruct how various organisms may be related.>>>>>>

It’s a complex issue, because it’s not a simple case of looking at nature and seeing the hard evidence directly. It is the interpretation of data through a very distinct philosophical worldview, which is competing with the Bible.

It's not "science vs the Bible", but "science and philosophy vs the Bible". The Bible is compatible with the actual science (though it also allows for miracles), but not with the philosophy. And the philosophy distorts the science.

I’m just stuck right now. Not knowing what to believe about evolution. The LCMS can believe in microevolution, right? But it also believes that Adam and Eve were just like us, right, with no microevolution involved?

Is there any scientific evidence that supports that or are the fossils found supportive of evolution and the LCMS wrong?

Very simply, LCMS believes in hard facts and God's Word, and these things do not disagree. They reject theoretical science that (A) cannot be proven and (B) compromise God's Word.

Whenever we talk about different worldviews, it's more useful to talk about them in terms of entire systems, rather than comparing individual ideas within each system. I always emphasise this point, because it's good to appreciate that all systems of thought make sense in their own right. They're all logical in one sense, otherwise people wouldn't believe in it. But even though they can be logical, they can't all be true, for they all make very exclusive claims. Macroevolution isn't wrong on individual objective points, but as a whole system and approach.

To make a simple illustration of this:
You have the system of Macroevolution Theory on one side, and the Bible on the other. Then you have Higher Criticism trying to synthesise the two, and in doing so, creating a third system, which agrees with neither of the above.

Adam and Eve were real people created by God directly. It's not symbolical, nor does hard science disprove it. There are no hard evidence that disproves God's Word, but only competing ideas.