How to choose between creation and evolution.

[bhsmte]

Absolutely wrong. One must believe among other things that one exists in a real world where certain laws are inviolate and that one's senses do not give one false information. Belief of some sort is required to care enough to act at all in any way.

I think the point was, what a specific faith belief has to do with science, not whether someone exists in a real world to have one.

 

[VirOptimus]

Where did I conflate the two?

When you mention ”good”, thats religion/metaphysics.

 

[VirOptimus]

You do understand that science must be combined with a 'moral imperative' (the spiritual element) to do the good it promises. Because it fails to do this we have all or most of the historical problems that have plagued mankind from the beginning.

What science fails to grasp is that while scientists themselves don't view science as a religion millions of others do, and look teary-eyed and worshipful to science to save them from their problems, be they moral or material. In response science retreats to it's ivory tower laboratories to continue peering at life myopically through their microscopes.

Science has nothing to do with morals.

 

[VirOptimus]

Absolutely wrong. One must believe among other things that one exists in a real world where certain laws are inviolate and that one's senses do not give one false information. Belief of some sort is required to care enough to act at all in any way.

No, this is quite flatly wrong.

 

[grasping the after wind]

I think the point was, what a specific faith belief has to do with science, not whether someone exists in a real world to have one.

The post was in response to the OP's basically saying that if one does a one will believe b and if one does c one will believe d . The idea was not that one would have a specific faith belief but rather that doing a specific thing would tend to make one believe that something was the case. The response that science has nothing to do with belief was therefore ridiculous and needed to be rebutted.

 

[grasping the after wind]

No, this is quite flatly wrong.

I am sure you believe that to be true.

 

[VirOptimus]

I am sure you believe that to be true.

I know it is true. No belief needed.

 

[Brightmoon]

You don’t need belief to be in the real world . People in deep comas can’t think and they’re in the real world. I just don’t think that’s a good argument

 

[Brightmoon]

If an asteroid wiped out the entire human species and fleas eventually evolved into the dominant intelligent lifeform, they would recreate pretty much the same science but have different religious beliefs. Religious beliefs are not important to describing the natural world

 

[PsychoSarah]

The post was in response to the OP's basically saying that if one does a one will believe b and if one does c one will believe d . The idea was not that one would have a specific faith belief but rather that doing a specific thing would tend to make one believe that something was the case. The response that science has nothing to do with belief was therefore ridiculous and needed to be rebutted.

-_- all experiences can influence beliefs, regardless of whether they relate to scientific fields or not. The biggest reason that I am an atheist is because I read the BIBLE. I read it, and eventually other religious texts, without the social pressure or constant assertions that these texts were representative of reality. Because quite frankly, without those factors, most people wouldn't read it from cover to cover and become a theist.

People can change their beliefs as long as evidence is present that is sufficient for their standard of evidence... and that it exceeds the evidence needed to instill the initial belief.

Regardless, that something can influence beliefs doesn't make it have beliefs.

 

[DogmaHunter]

I was responding this comment, not the ones you refer to above.

DogmaHunter said:

"Correcting your mistakes and actually learning something, doesn't seem to be one of your priorities..."

I was referring to the ones above, to back up the comment you are responding to.

This strongly suggests (infers) more broad intellectual 'weakness' than in the discussion about the current topic, thus an ad hominem.

No. It is a factual observation of the things you said during said discussion.
It's right there in post #581:

Acknowledging the obvious mistakes you made. That would be a start.
Acknowledging that what things appear to be, are often not what they actually are.

I would put that way down on my list of important things. Most things are what they appear to be.

But whatever.

 

[DogmaHunter]

Design is anathema to evolution. If something shows design it likely has design, and thus a designer.

Unless the apparant design, is the result of a natural process, off course.
You know... like most designs in nature are...

Therefore design, by default, must be denied by evolutionists.

No. We just don't need to load up the term "design" to imply intent by some conscious undemonstrable entity.

I don't need to deny the design of snowflakes, to acknowledge the natural process that forms them. The design, is the result of the natural process.

What is curious is that evolutionists use terms like "evolved to function" in a certain way, the very phrase directly implies design

...by natural processes. Like natural selection.

 

[DogmaHunter]

You do understand that science must be combined with a 'moral imperative' (the spiritual element) to do the good it promises.
Because it fails to do this we have all or most of the historical problems that have plagued mankind from the beginning.

No idea what you are talking about.
Perhaps you should back up your assertions.

What science fails to grasp is that while scientists themselves don't view science as a religion millions of others do, and look teary-eyed and worshipful to science to save them from their problems, be they moral or material

Who and where are these people?

In response science retreats to it's ivory tower laboratories to continue peering at life myopically through their microscopes.

Another vague, unevidenced, accusation.

 

[PsychoSarah]

Unless the apparant design, is the result of a natural process, off course.
You know... like most designs in nature are...

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No. We just don't need to load up the term "design" to imply intent by some conscious undemonstrable entity.

I don't need to deny the design of snowflakes, to acknowledge the natural process that forms them. The design, is the result of the natural process.



...by natural processes. Like natural selection.

Designs made by conscious entities versus those that are a product of an intelligent force such as a human have distinctions to them. To state otherwise is to claim that they are indistinguishable and thus make it entirely impossible to evidence a designer by virtue of the design. (note that I am not arguing against you).

 

[Speedwell]

Who and where are these people?

Many of them are creationists who are anxious to have science validate their faith.

 

[rjs330]

No this is all wrong.

ID is unfalsifable and therefore not science. Its just religion.

Unfalsifiable science is just a construct of man. Man has decided in his wisdom to define science using an unfalsifiable construct. Therefore anything that is observable in this world such as the design of anything with a function is okay. However with biology it's not. It's quite illogical, but then who said man is logical. It's perfectly logical to look at the world around us and see a functional object and declair a design. But suddenly when it comes to the complex functionality of life we say we cannot accept design. Not logical.

 

[rjs330]

Hierarchical trees are basically a way of representing relationships of things based on underlying data. That's all they really are.

There are various different algorithmic ways of generating them and naturally different data sets that can be used. So you've have to look at how they are specifically constructed before making any claims about any assumptions in their construction. You can read more about it here: Computational phylogenetics - Wikipedia

But the trees themselves are not an assumption. They are just an output.

Oh man is that so full of assumptions it's ridiculous. Let's look at this simple statement. The goal is to assemble a phylogenetic tree representing a hypothesis about the evolutionary ancestry of a set of genes, species, or other taxa.

The goal is to assemble a tree representing what? Evolutionary ancestry!

Look at homology. It's defined by assumption that similarities mean common ancestry. If you look at the link you posted and take a look at the homology link you will find in the writing where it defines it.

It starts with the assumption that similarities mean common ancestry.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

Unless the apparant design, is the result of a natural process, off course.
You know... like most designs in nature are...

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No. We just don't need to load up the term "design" to imply intent by some conscious undemonstrable entity.

I don't need to deny the design of snowflakes, to acknowledge the natural process that forms them. The design, is the result of the natural process.



...by natural processes. Like natural selection.

Snowflakes have regular patterns, but are they by 'design'? If so who is the designer?

 

[pitabread]

Oh man is that so full of assumptions it's ridiculous. Let's look at this simple statement. The goal is to assemble a phylogenetic tree representing a hypothesis about the evolutionary ancestry of a set of genes, species, or other taxa.

The goal is to assemble a tree representing what? Evolutionary ancestry!

Phylogenetic trees are by definition trees that represent hereditary ancestry. Nobody ever said otherwise. However, that doesn't change the fact that the trees themselves are algorithmic constructs based on underlying data.

It's also worth noting that phylogenetic trees do have real-world application (such as pathogen tracking) and in at least once instance I know of have been used as evidence in a criminal trial.

So if you're attempting to blindly hand-wave them away just because you don't like what they represent, you're being about as silly as I was when I was denying the moon.

 

[rjs330]

Are you starting to appreciate the absurdity of denying the existence of the moon?

I'm trying to get you to understand that this is how you sound to the rest of us when you keep denying the reality of biological evolution.

That's because you accept the evolutionary construct. Your understanding is clouded by your desire to believe whatever you are told. Despite the fact that no scientist has EVER been able to show it ever occurring. Evolution uses similarities and commonalities and make the assumption that since such things exist therefore all came from a common ancestor. Yet there is no way to show that it actually occurred. We don't observe it occurring even today. We can't test it to see if it does occur. In fact all testing that has been done has failed to show it actually occurring. All testing and observation has shown is all things remain in the same group or family and do not leave it to move to another. They have not been able to see or observe a branching that branched off into a completely different group or family. No one has been able to create it test such a thing.

Yet we look at life and say it happened because we found similiarities in life. It's assumed it happened.