Natural selection v Intelligent design

[bhsmte]

That makes sense, but as with scientific theories that coome from modern scientists, they don't require us to say that God doesn't exist, or that he had no role in the creation of life. It's not a matter of God vs. Science.

Science only deals with what it can observe.

 

[Near]

Science only deals with what it can observe.

More precisely, people can only deal with what they're aware of. Secular scientists aren't really having in mind God when coming up with theories. So the absence of God in discussions and projects of science should not be counted as a good reason to believe that ID is false.

 

[paulm50]

Point being, just because people are able to come up with other theories, doesn't make those theories true.

That can be said about the bible. Which is why we rely on evidence, and the evidence for Evolution vs Creation comes down hugely on the side of Evolution.

Multiple intelligent beings behind the big bang, or the creation of life on Earth is one explanation. Why aren't we including that? Why limit ID's possible designer(s) to the God of the Bible?
You previously seemed to advocate the idea that there wasn't some sort of being, God or not, who may have been behind the creation of life on earth.
Anyways, you seem to have faith that the bible is wrong. Why would the answer "have to be no"? Why is Genesis, as you say, so clearly wrong?

What I believe is, there may be a god, I wait to see proof. Until then I go with Nature as the proof is so overwhelming.

As for the validity of Genesis, where's the proof any of it it's right?

That makes sense, but as with scientific theories that come from modern scientists, they don't require us to say that God doesn't exist, or that he had no role in the creation of life. It's not a matter of God vs. Science.

So where's the proof, that god exists?

If there is a god, we are yet to find it, As the lack of proof of Genesis, the amount of proof against it. There's no case for the writers having knowledge of god.

 

[Near]

That can be said about the bible. Which is why we rely on evidence, and the evidence for Evolution vs Creation comes down hugely on the side of Evolution.
What I believe is, there may be a god, I wait to see proof. Until then I go with Nature as the proof is so overwhelming.
As for the validity of Genesis, where's the proof any of it it's right?
So where's the proof, that god exists?
If there is a god, we are yet to find it, As the lack of proof of Genesis, the amount of proof against it. There's no case for the writers having knowledge of god.

Yes, the same can be said about the bible.
You can rely on "evidence", and so can I. However, when you're referring to evidence, it isn't clear to me that the data behind the so-called evidence, necessarily supports your world-view.
Scientific data presented these doesn't lead me to believe that there is no God.

I believe in God, not as the result of modern science, because of his grace (if my faith is in what is true); he's led my on the path of faith. If God doesn't exist, well it's merely been my upbringing, and environment which has led me to my belief.

You keep referring to some sort of battle between faith and science, and God and Nature, but I see no reason to view it as a competition. I can observe the same evidence you refer to (which you haven't really described), and I can believe in God too, without contradiction.

You don't have faith in God because you weren't led down that path, whether it's because God didn't give his saving grace to you, or that your upbringing and other factors present in your life led you to your current state.
Belief in God isn't based on proof; there are plenty of arguments for God's existence but they're not going to make anyone believe anything. They're more like models which may or may not be true, atheists dismiss theological arguments all the time.

As for Genesis, it provides a model of how we came about. The same is true for non-religious models. Abiogenesis, where's the proof that it actually came about. I'll grant that it's somehow possible, but did it actually occur? I don't have scientific data available to say that I know how things came to be.
You can either believe it, or disbelieve it. There is no overwhelming proof that God doesn't exist.

 

[paulm50]

More precisely, people can only deal with what they're aware of. Secular scientists aren't really having in mind God when coming up with theories. So the absence of God in discussions and projects of science should not be counted as a good reason to believe that ID is false.

The absence of god in science is because there's no proof god exists. So the absence of being able to prove god exists is a good reason to not believe god created anything.

The contradictions in the bible as to how we should live and how we are made, is further confirmation the bible writers had no contact with anything when writing the bible.

Approaching this debate as if it were level is misleading. There's 100s of years of science that's growing faster every day of how we arrived here. Against no evidence at all of the bible being right about how we got here and a lot proof that Genesis is wrong.

Creation, Flood, Moses, Job, all stories until someone presents proof. Jericho, sodom And Gomorrah, Solomon, David, exaggerations until we find proof otherwise. For instance did Jericho fall to an Israeli Army? Yes it's proven. Was the Army led by Joshua? Debate is still on. Was it crushed the way the bible says? No proof whatsoever.

 

[paulm50]

Yes, the same can be said about the bible.
You can rely on "evidence", and so can I. However, when you're referring to evidence, it isn't clear to me that the data behind the so-called evidence, necessarily supports your world-view.
Scientific data presented these doesn't lead me to believe that there is no God.

What scientific data?

You keep referring to some sort of battle between faith and science, and God and Nature, but I see no reason to view it as a competition. I can observe the same evidence you refer to (which you haven't really described), and I can believe in God too, without contradiction.

The battle is between those who want to teach children something with no merit, people who want to deny Gays the right to marry, people who think they have a given right to oppress others.

You don't have faith in God because you weren't led down that path, whether it's because God didn't give his saving grace to you, or that your upbringing and other factors present in your life led you to your current state.
Belief in God isn't based on proof; there are plenty of arguments for God's existence but they're not going to make anyone believe anything. They're more like models which may or may not be true, atheists dismiss theological arguments all the time.

I was brought up in a Christian household, went to bible school. When I asked questions, I was told to shut up and believe it all happened. As you say the existence of a god isn't based on proof, it's based on people telling you to believe. Whereas science is based on proof and learning.

As for Genesis, it provides a model of how we came about. The same is true for non-religious models. Abiogenesis, where's the proof that it actually came about. I'll grant that it's somehow possible, but did it actually occur? I don't have scientific data available to say that I know how things came to be.
You can either believe it, or disbelieve it. There is no overwhelming proof that God doesn't exist.

No Genesis does not provide a story of how we came about. And there's the problem. It's so wrong that as you say it is only disproved.

And there is scientific data available to say how things came to be. There is overwhelming proof that if a God exists, the bible writers had no knowledge of him. Even down to the way our bodies are made they are clueless about how we work.

 

[Near]

The absence of god in science is because there's no proof god exists. So the absence of being able to prove god exists is a good reason to not believe god created anything.

The contradictions in the bible as to how we should live and how we are made, is further confirmation the bible writers had no contact with anything when writing the bible.

Approaching this debate as if it were level is misleading. There's 100s of years of science that's growing faster every day of how we arrived here. Against no evidence at all of the bible being right about how we got here and a lot proof that Genesis is wrong.

Creation, Flood, Moses, Job, all stories until someone presents proof. Jericho, sodom And Gomorrah, Solomon, David, exaggerations until we find proof otherwise. For instance did Jericho fall to an Israeli Army? Yes it's proven. Was the Army led by Joshua? Debate is still on. Was it crushed the way the bible says? No proof whatsoever.

You keep mentioning science and evidence, yet no data support the claim that there is no God. Do you know of any scientific findings that lead us to believe that God doesn't exist? Gee, the 100's of years of science you mention, you haven't really mentioned anything specific. It's like you're making introductory statements to a paper you're writing, a big headline, but there aren't any sources of data that you've brought up leading anyone to believe that God doesn't exist.
The absence of God in science is due to methodological naturalism, scientists by practice aren't seeking God, or thinking of God when conducting "science". Scientists are concerned with many fields, for example, microbiology. There isn't any inquiry in that field about God as far as I know. God isn't in the spotlight of science because there is just no reason to.
I'm not really trying to prove the bible to anyone. I have faith in the bible, and there are good arguments, I believe, that support my faith.

 

[paulm50]

You keep mentioning science and evidence, yet no data support the claim that there is no God. Do you know of any scientific findings that lead us to believe that God doesn't exist? Gee, the 100's of years of science you mention, you haven't really mentioned anything specific. It's like you're making introductory statements to a paper you're writing, a big headline, but there aren't any sources of data that you've brought up leading anyone to believe that God doesn't exist.
The absence of God in science is due to methodological naturalism, scientists by practice aren't seeking God, or thinking of God when conducting "science". Scientists are concerned with many fields, for example, microbiology. There isn't any inquiry in that field about God as far as I know. God isn't in the spotlight of science because there is just no reason to.
I'm not really trying to prove the bible to anyone. I have faith in the bible, and there are good arguments, I believe, that support my faith.

The only evidence there is a god is in various bibles. They have all been routinely disproven.

As for evidence of god. Here's poser for you.
If there were one, and he wanted us to know him and follow his rules, why does he remain so hidden? When there is so much evil, why has he not come to Earth to show he exists, to stop people being evil, denying him, etc. Just uses nature to kill people?

And please no answer like, how are we to know his thinking. Because so many spend so long telling us what he thinks we should do.

 

[KCfromNC]

Multiple intelligent beings behind the big bang, or the creation of life on Earth is one explanation. Why aren't we including that? Why limit ID's possible designer(s) to the God of the Bible?

Because the people who created ID admit is just protestant Christian religion tweaked so it can be snuck into schools to indoctrinate other peoples' kids with.

 

[Asyncritus]

I showed above.natural selection is a nonsense.

So what's left?

Answer: nothing.

Granted that there are mutations. But if natural selection is a nonsense, which it is, as shown above, then evolution is also a nonsense, because there is no mechanism left to forward the process.

As Holmes said, when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

Therefore God exists, has been, and is active in the natural world.

 

[Asyncritus]

Science only deals with what it can observe.

Not true. Many writers point out that evolution is at least as faith-based as belief in God. Google it, and you'll see.

 

[Asyncritus]

What scientific data?

The battle is between those who want to teach children something with no merit, people who want to deny Gays the right to marry, people who think they have a given right to oppress others.

The belief in God has no merit? You've got to be kidding yourself.

Gays to marry? The incidence of anal gonorrhoea, AIDS and other related diseases is going to take a major increase. And who's going to pay for the treatment?

I was brought up in a Christian household, went to bible school. When I asked questions, I was told to shut up and believe it all happened./quote]

A pity. Whoever you questioned should be shot in the behind.

As for evidence of god. Here's poser for you.
If there were one, and he wanted us to know him and follow his rules, why does he remain so hidden? When there is so much evil, why has he not come to Earth to show he exists, to stop people being evil, denying him, etc. Just uses nature to kill people?

Don't worry - He will come to earth. Says so very plainly.

As you say the existence of a god isn't based on proof, it's based on people telling you to believe. Whereas science is based on proof and learning.

And how many times has science been wrong?

And there is scientific data available to say how things came to be. There is overwhelming proof that if a God exists, the bible writers had no knowledge of him. Even down to the way our bodies are made they are clueless about how we work.

You're wrong again. There is no scientific data to say how things came to be. Scientific guesswork maybe - but that's it. Can you account for how 2.5 BILLION bits of information came to enter the human genome? And make sense? And order? And how a DNA molecule ever came to be - with all its order and complexity?

You might like to read 'There Is A God' by Anthony Flew, once the worlds most notorious atheist. He has some things to say that may interest you - or not, as the case may be.

Good luck.

 

[stevevw]

As Prof. David Stove showed, natural selection is too flawed to be worthy of any consideration. Thus:

Theoretically, natural selection rigidly weeds out the weak, those incapable of surviving and other such groups.

Therefore, those groups cannot survive if natural selection is working.

But those groups include the females, and the young of every species. Therefore, no species can possibly survive more than one generation, as the females and young would be wiped out or eaten by the males of the species.

This is a fact ignored or not recognised by the evolutionary community: and there is no answer to it.

No wonder Stove could say: 'Darwinism says many things, especially about our species, which are too obviously false to be believed by any educated person, or at least by an educated person who retains any capacity at all for critical thought'.

The book is called 'Darwinian Fairytales' and is available on Kindle for a few bucks for those with an independent cast of mind.

Darwin didn't have any solid evidence for natural selection when he first made his theory. And thats what it was an unproven hypothesis. Many people believed that the evidence pointed to design in nature. Darwin's theory suggested a new idea of how creatures were made that opposed the creation idea. It was based on the limited variations found in micro evolution of animals within their kinds. Even in Darwin's day people knew there were limitations to how much an animal could vary from its original makeup through artificial breeding. Darwin was a pigeon breeder himself. But there was no evidence for macro evolution where the same mechanisms of micro evolution could be extended to create new kinds of animals.

Later Dobzhansky suggested that macro evolution was the same as micro evolution and that we should just add time.
This was still based on a big assumption as it was acknowledged that macro evolution could not be observed. So Dobzhansky has more or less said just because we havnt got any direct evidence doesn't mean we cant assume its correct. This was known as "the reluctant sign of equality".
As Dobzhansky put it, "Experience seems to show . . . that there is no way towards an understanding of the mechanisms of macro-evolutionary changes, which require time on a geological scale, other than through a full comprehension of the micro-evolutionary processes observable within the span of a human lifetime and often controlled by man's will. For this reason we are compelled at the present level of knowledge reluctantly to put a sign of equality between the mechanisms of macro- and micro-evolution, and, proceeding on this assumption, to push our investigations as far ahead as this working hypothesis will permit."

So this really started the idea of the modern theory of evolution and this is what everything is built upon which is still a big assumption. Tests done since then have never substantiated macro evolution yet many claim its a fact. Any examples used such as the darker colored moths surviving because they blended into the trees better that were darkened from the pollution. Or Darwin's finches or the Bacteria evolving anti biotic resistance or to digest nylon are all examples of variations within a kind. Evolution is limited and he variations are using the existing info and recombining or switching on and off aspects of the existing genetics.

Natural selection has not been verified as a mechanism to create better, fitter and more complex creatures. Evolution says that a beneficial mutation can gradually morph one kind of animals into another. But the evidence shows that this is not the case. The fossil record, observational evidence and tests show it is very limited and actually is harmful. So mutations and natural selection actually does the opposite of what the Neo Darwinian theory states. A mutation for evolutionary change that will change the body plans of creatures has to happen early in development.

But biologists know that any mutation at this stage of development wont be tolerated and will destroy the development of a organism. This was especially noted in the Nobel prize winning work of Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard and Eric F. Wieschaus. They showed the effects of mutations on early development in fruit flies. The effects were harmful and usually ended with the destruction of the fly lava. Other scientists have also shown this and I have posted many links to support this.

So natural selection and mutations have no support to prove macro evolution as apposed to micro evolution. As stated before Darwinian evolution is based on a trick where they use something that is true and then expand that into something thats not. They give it more ability then it has and it is all based on assumption as it has never been observed and tests have not verified this.

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1995/press.html

 

[bhsmte]

More precisely, people can only deal with what they're aware of. Secular scientists aren't really having in mind God when coming up with theories. So the absence of God in discussions and projects of science should not be counted as a good reason to believe that ID is false.

Science cares what the evidence shows and side discussions don't count for much.

With ID, there is no scientific definition of what it is and no test to determine if

Not true. Many writers point out that evolution is at least as faith-based as belief in God. Google it, and you'll see.

When it comes to evolution, I am not concerned what "writers" have to say, I rely on what the actual scientists say.

Evolution scares some people, because it threatens their faith and many have motivation to write all sorts of false things about it.

 

[bhsmte]

I showed above.natural selection is a nonsense.

So what's left?

Answer: nothing.

Granted that there are mutations. But if natural selection is a nonsense, which it is, as shown above, then evolution is also a nonsense, because there is no mechanism left to forward the process.

As Holmes said, when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

Therefore God exists, has been, and is active in the natural world.

If you proved that natural selection is nonsense, submit a paper for peer review and collect your Nobel prize.

 

[Larniavc]

It is only acknowledging God and allowing Him to lead the way will we find true peace and harmony with nature.

This is untrue. I'm a cognitive behavioural therapist by trade and daily I help patients find peace and harmony in their lives: no god required.

I dont think you need to be a scientists to realize there is more going on than what some who support evolution are saying are saying.

You need NOT to be a scientist to think this way. This is almost an argument from ignorance.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Darwin didn't have any solid evidence for natural selection when he first made his theory. And thats what it was an unproven hypothesis.

Actually, he did. He spent years collecting the evidence. In any case, it has been over 150 years since Darwin published his seminal work. Since then, multiple parallel lines of evidence have provided further support to evolution. The theory is so well established that it is considered foundational to contemporary biology.

Many people believed that the evidence pointed to design in nature. Darwin's theory suggested a new idea of how creatures were made that opposed the creation idea. It was based on the limited variations found in micro evolution of animals within their kinds. Even in Darwin's day people knew there were limitations to how much an animal could vary from its original makeup through artificial breeding. Darwin was a pigeon breeder himself. But there was no evidence for macro evolution where the same mechanisms of micro evolution could be extended to create new kinds of animals.

Please define "kind" and tell us what we should expect to see if a new "kind" of animal were to evolve.

Later Dobzhansky suggested that macro evolution was the same as micro evolution and that we should just add time.
This was still based on a big assumption as it was acknowledged that macro evolution could not be observed. So Dobzhansky has more or less said just because we havnt got any direct evidence doesn't mean we cant assume its correct. This was known as "the reluctant sign of equality".
As Dobzhansky put it, "Experience seems to show . . . that there is no way towards an understanding of the mechanisms of macro-evolutionary changes, which require time on a geological scale, other than through a full comprehension of the micro-evolutionary processes observable within the span of a human lifetime and often controlled by man's will. For this reason we are compelled at the present level of knowledge reluctantly to put a sign of equality between the mechanisms of macro- and micro-evolution, and, proceeding on this assumption, to push our investigations as far ahead as this working hypothesis will permit."

So this really started the idea of the modern theory of evolution and this is what everything is built upon which is still a big assumption. Tests done since then have never substantiated macro evolution yet many claim its a fact. Any examples used such as the darker colored moths surviving because they blended into the trees better that were darkened from the pollution. Or Darwin's finches or the Bacteria evolving anti biotic resistance or to digest nylon are all examples of variations within a kind. Evolution is limited and he variations are using the existing info and recombining or switching on and off aspects of the existing genetics.

Those cases that you call "variations within a kind" are exemplary of evolution. The theory does not predict a crocoduck, which is what creationists seem to expect of evolution. I recommend watching Aron Ra's brilliant Foundational Falsehoods of Creationism series. Specifically, the 11th episode in the series, which focuses on macroevolution.

Natural selection has not been verified as a mechanism to create better, fitter and more complex creatures. Evolution says that a beneficial mutation can gradually morph one kind of animals into another. But the evidence shows that this is not the case.

Until you define what you mean by "kind," this claim cannot be examined. If you mean that we haven't observed ducks hatching creatures that are half-duck half-crocodile, then you are right - no such observation has been made. But evolution doesn't predict such observations anyway, so the point is moot.

 

[Asyncritus]

If you proved that natural selection is nonsense, submit a paper for peer review and collect your Nobel prize.

The book has already been written, and I have referred to it. It's called Darwinian Fairytales, by prof. David Stove. He should get the Nobel prize.

I challenge anybody to refute the argument using whatever logic they care to employ.

 

[Larniavc]

yet no data support the claim that there is no God.

The scientific method does not include trying to prove a negative. Ask yourself this: how is trying to prove your god does not exist any different from trying to prove Enki does not exist?

 

[bhsmte]

The book has already been written, and I have referred to it. It's called Darwinian Fairytales, by prof. David Stove. He should get the Nobel prize.

I challenge anybody to refute the argument using whatever logic they care to employ.

Let me get this straight; a philosopher, who has no biology degree, is going to refute and prove the theory of evolution wrong?