Is evolution a religion?

[shernren]

I'm sure you understand the personal motivations, as they are widely known and I believe I have stated them in this thread. Everyone has a conscience - and everyone has sinned. If one is to reject relegion, they must grasp some other explaination. That explaination is evolution theory. A poor explaination sure, but nevertheless, widely accepted as such. Why would they hold such a flimsy view? Consider the thought process of anyone who denies the existance of a creator (agnostic or athiestic) and that should answer your question.

I've never understood this kind of reasoning. Does an atheist see a different physical reality from a theist? If I blaspheme the Holy Spirit before looking through the microscope do I see something different from my neighbor who has prayed before he looked into his?

 

[Randombitsofstring]

From Wiki: "In the larger sense, religion is a communal system for the coherence of belief."

Evolutionist belief is that evoltion is the responsible cause of life as we know it. TEs apparently believe God set evolution in place and decided to commune with Homo Sapien Sapiens while ignoring all other of his creations that evolutionist class as Human.

In the light of the above quote from Wikipeadia yes evolution is a religion as it is a communal system, and it is a belief system. This is because there are many evolutionists and they believe it is true.

Communism is also a religion as is capitalism and democracy. Anything that people believe in and base their life upon in a recognisably communal way (that is many people believe the same and behave the same) then it is a religion.

I almost always stay away from threads like this, but I’m sorry that is the silliest thing I’ve read in a long time.

I believe in gravity. I guess I’m not a Christian any longer since clearly as defined by you and Wiki and I’m worshiping gravity.

 

[Deamiter]

I almost always stay away from threads like this, but I’m sorry that is the silliest thing I’ve read in a long time.

I believe in gravity. I guess I’m not a Christian any longer since clearly as defined by you and Wiki and I’m worshiping gravity.

Wow, yeah. Going to school or *gasp* posting at Christian Forums could also be classified as a religion under that definition!

Of course, nobody in this culture uses the word "religion" in that way. When creationists call evolution a religion, they aren't comparing it to blogging and gravity, they're trying to say it's contrast to Christianity -- that you can only have one religion and it's either Christianity or evolution.

Lots of words have secondary or tertiary meanings that are rarely used if at all. To maintain clear communication, it's probably best to stick to primary definitions instead of playing semantic games in a propaganda war to scare people away from the "unchristian religion of evolution!"

 

[Dracil]

Only if gravity is a religion.

 

[Assyrian]

The irony is that a large proportion of the YECs who happily insist that evolution is a religion, would also insist, in a different conversation, that Christianity isn't a religion...

 

[simplyg123]

Only if gravity is a religion.

the effects of gravity can be observed which makes it a science, how can we observe evolution, when it takles long periods of time for it to take place. scientist apply faith in computer models, unproved theories that certain varibles are constant, and in time to come to a conclusion. All of which are an uncertain theory

 

[Melethiel]

the effects of gravity can be observed which makes it a science, how can we observe evolution, when it takles long periods of time for it to take place. scientist apply faith in computer models, unproved theories that certain varibles are constant, and in time to come to a conclusion. All of which are an uncertain theory

Evolution IS observed, and we even have a good idea of the mechanism behind it. While the effects of gravity are observed, we have no idea of how it really works, or even what it really is (an attractive force? a curvature in space-time?).

 

[Mallon]

the effects of gravity can be observed which makes it a science

We can observe the effects of evolution today, too: Biodiversity. What you cannot observe is the force of gravity itself. Nor can we observe the large-scale evolution of entire lineages in real-time because of our limited scope (though we do see speciation happen, both in real-time and in the fossil record). In this way, gravity and evolution are on par with one another.

how can we observe evolution, when it takles long periods of time for it to take place.

We observe evolution in much the same way you observe the war in Iraq...
Because you do not live in Iraq, you cannot watch the war unfold in front of you. Instead, you are forced to watch segments of the war on TV at the end of the day. In your mind, you piece these segments together and conclude that there is one big, lasting war going on in Iraq, not just a bunch of little, seperately-created ones. You can validate your conclusion by going to Iraq and seeing the war unfold before you.
In the same way, scientists see these snapshots of the fossil record, and note the various segments in which the lineages seem to branch and speciate over time. We can validate these conclusions by looking to today's world and noting the same branching speciation patterns in action.

scientist apply faith in computer models, unproved theories that certain varibles are constant, and in time to come to a conclusion. All of which are an uncertain theory

Seems the scientists who actually DO the research themselves have a little more certainty in their theory than you do. So what qualifications do you have to question them?

 

[simplyg123]

We observe evolution in much the same way you observe the war in Iraq...
Because you do not live in Iraq, you cannot watch the war unfold in front of you. Instead, you are forced to watch segments of the war on TV at the end of the day. In your mind, you piece these segments together and conclude that there is one big, lasting war going on in Iraq, not just a bunch of little, seperately-created ones. You can validate your conclusion by going to Iraq and seeing the war unfold before you.
In the same way, scientists see these snapshots of the fossil record, and note the various segments in which the lineages seem to branch and speciate over time. We can validate these conclusions by looking to today's world and noting the same branching speciation patterns in action]

True as this may be, i assure you the screenshots and clips of the was i see on tv, are a bare glimpse of the soiders view. What i mean by this, i could never understand the wars complete view, or mechanics, without being there. I could even be decieved by what i am seeing. From most of the views you see on the news, it doesnt look too bad, but that because they do not show the blood and gut shots.
So froma mere clip, i could very well be dicevied

So thank you for the view, it helps make my point.

Seems the scientists who actually DO the research themselves have a little more certainty in their theory than you do. So what qualifications do you have to question them?

I do not argue the law of gravity. I do not argue the theory of centrifugal force, Nor do i argue that light travels faster then sound. These examples have proved themselves beyond the shadow of a doubt. Do this with evolution and i will accept it the same

 

[Mallon]

True as this may be, i assure you the screenshots and clips of the was i see on tv, are a bare glimpse of the soiders view. What i mean by this, i could never understand the wars complete view, or mechanics, without being there. I could even be decieved by what i am seeing. From most of the views you see on the news, it doesnt look too bad, but that because they do not show the blood and gut shots.
So froma mere clip, i could very well be dicevied

So thank you for the view, it helps make my point.

Wow. That's quite the twist. Unfortunately, you didn't draw the parallel to the fossil record.

I do not argue the law of gravity. I do not argue the theory of centrifugal force, Nor do i argue that light travels faster then sound. These examples have proved themselves beyond the shadow of a doubt. Do this with evolution and i will accept it the same

I can't possibly. You admitted in another thread that there is no amount of evidence that could convince you otherwise. The Bible says the earth and everything in it was created in six days, and that settles it for you. I'm not going to waste my time laying evidence before you if you're just going to continue to cling to your presuppositions.

 

[Melethiel]

I do not argue the theory of centrifugal force

Quite funny that you consider this to have been proved without a doubt, when Physicists consider centrifugal force to be a "fictitious force." It doesn't really exist.

 

[simplyg123]

Quite funny that you consider this to have been proved without a doubt, when Physicists consider centrifugal force to be a "fictitious force." It doesn't really exist.

so what keeps the water in the bucket when spinning it round and round

 

[simplyg123]

what ever you call the force there is obviously a force present

 

[chaoschristian]

so what keeps the water in the bucket when spinning it round and round

centripetal force

if I remember my secondary physics correctly

 

[Melethiel]

so what keeps the water in the bucket when spinning it round and round

A combination of momentum and centripetal acceleration. Honestly, this is very basic physics.

 

[random_guy]

I do not argue the law of gravity. I do not argue the theory of centrifugal force, Nor do i argue that light travels faster then sound. These examples have proved themselves beyond the shadow of a doubt. Do this with evolution and i will accept it the same

Good thing Einstein doesn't hold your believes. You are aware that the Law of Gravity was shown to be incorrect in certain conditions, right? That's why science doesn't deal with proofs, because nothing is absolute. Of course, that's the difference between Creationists and scientists. Creationists resist change, even if new evidence points to their position being wrong, where as scientists will gladly change their views if a better theory comes along. I guess this is where "Stay the course" that Bush uses comes from.

 

[Dannager]

so what keeps the water in the bucket when spinning it round and round

 

[gluadys]

the effects of gravity can be observed which makes it a science, how can we observe evolution, when it takles long periods of time for it to take place. scientist apply faith in computer models, unproved theories that certain varibles are constant, and in time to come to a conclusion. All of which are an uncertain theory

I think you are having problems with defining what evolution is. Why do you think it takes a long time? It depends on the degree of evolution, and on the generation time of the species. We can see evolution happen in a few weeks with bacteria, because the generation time of bacteria is a matter of minutes. But even with more complex species, we can see some degree of evolution in relatively short time periods.

Pick up a book called _The Beak of the Finch_ by Jonathan Weiner. There are many examples (mostly, but not only, of finches) where evolution was observed to happen in just a year or so.