Some questions for Christians who accept evolution

[bhsmte]

I don't believe that macro-evolution is true, no. And the other points are not irrelevant because if mankind has no answers to the impossible problem of how the universe or life could have got started on it's own, then it's more logical to believe that God was the creator. That being so and I assume you agree with me so far, we have to ask ourselves whether it is likely that God would have used an evolutionary process to bring about life, with all its cruelty, disease and death prior to sin and why He would do that when He could just have made everything perfect from the beginning as per Genesis 1. Are we made in God's image or are we merely advanced animals which have evolved from pond scum? Also, we have to consider how that would affect the Gospel message as a whole if indeed God did use that method.

I don't pretend to be a scientist, so I have no way of relating to the finer details. However, I do know that there are other scientists who have come to totally different conclusions than those in the article you quoted, some of whom used to teach evolution, but have sinced changed sides and now regard creation as the more likely explanation of how we got here. Given that the latter seem to be more attuned to the information given to us in the Bible, I feel more comfortable accepting their expert analysis of the known facts of nature than those who seem to have decided that no God is necessary.

If you have no way of relating to the details, how can you conclude evolution is not true?

 

[Not_By_Chance]

It sounds like you didn't bother to read the post. It included, among many other sets of evidence, the summary at http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ , which describes 5 huge categories of evidence, each with many different sets of evidence. Since you are clearly too smart to have dismissed that without reading and understanding it, perhaps you could briefly summarize these, and explain why they are each wrong?

In Christ-

Papias

I've summarised my position in post 140. In essence, I don't have time to go into the technical stuff that scientists deal with, but I place my trust in those scientists who start from the standpoint that God did it now let's find out how, rather than those scientists that have decided that no god is necessary as everything got going and organised itself all on its own.

 

[Not_By_Chance]

If you have no way of relating to the details, how can you conclude evolution is not true?

I've seen and read about so many problems with the theory that I just can't accept it as being a valid explanation for how things came to be. Unless I get satisfactory answers to questions like those I posed a few posts ago, it will remain a non-theory as far as I am concerned.

 

[bhsmte]

I've summarised my position in post 140. In essence, I don't have time to go into the technical stuff that scientists deal with, but I place my trust in those scientists who start from the standpoint that God did it now let's find out how, rather than those scientists that have decided that no god is necessary as everything got going and organised itself all on its own.

There are a lot of scientists who are Christians that strongly agree with evolution, with Francis Collins below being one of them. And even the atheist scientists that don't believe in a God don't rule him out, they just don't see any evidence to include a God.

Karl Giberson: One of the things I appreciate a lot about Darrel Falk, who I think is a courageous voice in this conversation, is that he will come out and say that common ancestry is simply a fact. And that if you’re not willing to concede that the genetic evidence points to common ancestry than you’re essentially denying the field of biology the possibility of having facts at all. That’s the strong language that he uses.

Would you say that common ancestry and evolution in general is at that level? How compelling is the evidence at this point?

Francis Collins: The evidence is overwhelming. And it is becoming more and more robust down to the details almost by the day, especially because we have this ability now to use the study of DNA as a digital record of the way Darwin’s theory has played out over the course of long periods of time.

Darwin could hardly have imagined that there would turn out to be such strong proof of his theory because he didn’t know about DNA - but we have that information. I would say we are as solid in claiming the truth of evolution as we are in claiming the truth of the germ theory. It is so profoundly well-documented in multiple different perspectives, all of which give you a consistent view with enormous explanatory power that make it the central core of biology. Trying to do biology without evolution would be like trying to do physics without mathematics.

http://biologos.org/blog/francis-collins-and-karl-giberson-talk-about-evolution-and-the-church-2

 

[bhsmte]

I've seen and read about so many problems with the theory that I just can't accept it as being a valid explanation for how things came to be. Unless I get satisfactory answers to questions like those I posed a few posts ago, it will remain a non-theory as far as I am concerned.

Is it possible you can't accept them because of your personal theological belief?

Is is possible you can't accept them because you don't understand the details, as you have admitted?

 

[Not_By_Chance]

Just be honest and say, you will never go against your interpretation of the bible, no matter what the evidence.

You mean, just like when some evolutionists say things like, "Materialism is absolute for we cannot allow a divine foot in the door." Got it.

 

[bhsmte]

You mean, just like when some evolutionists say things like, "Materialism is absolute for we cannot allow a divine foot in the door." Got it.

Who said that?

And even if they did, how does that impact the evidence that exists for evolution? Seems like you are looking for excuses.

 

[Not_By_Chance]

There are a lot of scientists who are Christians that strongly agree with evolution, with Francis Collins below being one of them. And even the atheist scientists that don't believe in a God don't rule him out, they just don't see any evidence to include a God.

Karl Giberson: One of the things I appreciate a lot about Darrel Falk, who I think is a courageous voice in this conversation, is that he will come out and say that common ancestry is simply a fact. And that if you’re not willing to concede that the genetic evidence points to common ancestry than you’re essentially denying the field of biology the possibility of having facts at all. That’s the strong language that he uses.

Would you say that common ancestry and evolution in general is at that level? How compelling is the evidence at this point?

Francis Collins: The evidence is overwhelming. And it is becoming more and more robust down to the details almost by the day, especially because we have this ability now to use the study of DNA as a digital record of the way Darwin’s theory has played out over the course of long periods of time.

Darwin could hardly have imagined that there would turn out to be such strong proof of his theory because he didn’t know about DNA - but we have that information. I would say we are as solid in claiming the truth of evolution as we are in claiming the truth of the germ theory. It is so profoundly well-documented in multiple different perspectives, all of which give you a consistent view with enormous explanatory power that make it the central core of biology. Trying to do biology without evolution would be like trying to do physics without mathematics.

http://biologos.org/blog/francis-collins-and-karl-giberson-talk-about-evolution-and-the-church-2

Where did all the information (specified complexity) come from to build and maintain life then? Also, we all have an inbuilt ability to recognise design and yet when many scientists look through a microscope at the incredible complexity of living things they say that no designer is necessary. To me that beggars belief and takes a lot more faith than I could ever have.
Romans 1:25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

 

[Not_By_Chance]

Who said that?

And even if they did, how does that impact the evidence that exists for evolution? Seems like you are looking for excuses.

I'm not looking for excuses. There's nothing to excuse.
Here's some further information on the quote from creation.com

Professor Richard Lewontin, a geneticist (and self-proclaimed Marxist), is certainly one of the world’s leaders in evolutionary biology. He wrote this very revealing comment (the italics were in the original). It illustrates the implicit philosophical bias against Genesis creation—regardless of whether or not the facts support it.

‘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.

 

[bhsmte]

I'm not looking for excuses. There's nothing to excuse.
Here's some further information on the quote from creation.com

Professor Richard Lewontin, a geneticist (and self-proclaimed Marxist), is certainly one of the world’s leaders in evolutionary biology. He wrote this very revealing comment (the italics were in the original). It illustrates the implicit philosophical bias against Genesis creation—regardless of whether or not the facts support it.

‘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.

Please explain to me, how any words out of anyone's mouth, impact the evidence that exists for evolution?

 

[Not_By_Chance]

Is it possible you can't accept them because of your personal theological belief?

is possible you can't accept them because you don't understand the details, as you have admitted?

Possibly, but also possibly not. I've not come across any meaningful answers to any of the problems I quoted. And yes, we are all influenced by our personal biases, whether or not we admit it.

Nice Gish Gallop -- haven't seen one of those in a while.

No answers then. Just what I expected.

 

[bhsmte]

Possibly, but also possibly not. I've not come across any meaningful answers to any of the problems I quoted. And yes, we are all influenced by our personal biases, whether or not we admit it.

No answers then. Just what I expected.

Maybe if you committed yourself to learning the details you admit you don't know, you would have some answers, based on knowledge.

 

[Not_By_Chance]

Please explain to me, how any words out of anyone's mouth, impact the evidence that exists for evolution?

Well, if an ardent evolutionist candidly admits that no amount of evidence to the contrary would allow him to even consider that God was involved, that sort of lets the cat out of the bag about how neutral [not] evolutionary scientists are being does it not.

 

[bhsmte]

Well, if an ardent evolutionist candidly admits that no amount of evidence to the contrary would allow him to even consider that God was involved, that sort of lets the cat out of the bag about how neutral [not] evolutionary scientists are being does it not.

And it changes the evidence that exists for evolution how? You have not addressed this question.

 

[Winepress777]

Yes I an. Apologies if I missed your previous posts. I'm just trying to understand your thinking. You say that it's obvious that the universe is billions of years old yet you claim there's no such thing as evolution, so I'm just wondering how you square that circle? In your view there is no evolution so have the current animal and plant species been around unchanging for those billions of years despite fossil evidence to the contrary?

I don't know that any particular plant species has been around a billion years. I'm sure you know that the fossil record shows that different plant species have been coming and going for a half billion years, first simple, then spores, then seed plants according to the record. But you could google that, I'm not a detailed authority on that and I don't know which one has lasted the longest... I'm not sure if that answers your question or has to do with anything. It sure has nothing to do with evolution though is the entire point of my post originally.

 

[Shemjaza]

Where did all the information (specified complexity) come from to build and maintain life then? Also, we all have an inbuilt ability to recognise design and yet when many scientists look through a microscope at the incredible complexity of living things they say that no designer is necessary. To me that beggars belief and takes a lot more faith than I could ever have.
Romans 1:25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

The only new information required for evolution arises from mutation.

AGA TAC AGT
becomes
AGA TAC TAC AGT
becomes
AGA TAC TAG AGT

At its core that's all the genetic code. If the change produces reproductive success it is statistically more likely to spread through the population over the generations.

Many tiny changes happening, no design or designer necessary.

 

[sfs]

I don't believe that macro-evolution is true, no. And the other points are not irrelevant because if mankind has no answers to the impossible problem of how the universe or life could have got started on it's own, then it's more logical to believe that God was the creator.

I believe that God was the creator. So do lots of scientists, including evolutionary biologists. I don't see what that has to do with anything. In particular, I don't see what it has to do with the evidence for evolution.

That being so and I assume you agree with me so far, we have to ask ourselves whether it is likely that God would have used an evolutionary process to bring about life, with all its cruelty, disease and death prior to sin and why He would do that when He could just have made everything perfect from the beginning as per Genesis 1.

Whoa. The idea that we could simply guess how God would have done things -- I'm really not trying to be offensive here, but I find bordering on blasphemous. Who are we to tell God how he should do things? (And Genesis 1 doesn't say things were perfect; it says they were good. You know, like the land of Canaan was before the Israelites invaded it. Do you think that land was perfect and without flaw?)

Are we made in God's image or are we merely advanced animals which have evolved from pond scum?

Are we made in God's image or are we mere molded dirt? What does the one have to do with the other? And what does either have to do with evidence for evolution?

Also, we have to consider how that would affect the Gospel message as a whole if indeed God did use that method.

I'd much rather consider whether it's true, and then conform the Gospel message to the truth. And what does this have to do with evidence for evolution?

I don't pretend to be a scientist, so I have no way of relating to the finer details.

Fine. So don't comment on the evidence -- there's nothing wrong with having nothing to say on a subject. But if you think you're competent to offer opinions about scientific evidence, you'd better be able to back them up.

However, I do know that there are other scientists who have come to totally different conclusions than those in the article you quoted, some of whom used to teach evolution, but have sinced changed sides and now regard creation as the more likely explanation of how we got here. Given that the latter seem to be more attuned to the information given to us in the Bible, I feel more comfortable accepting their expert analysis of the known facts of nature than those who seem to have decided that no God is necessary.

Since the great majority of Christian scientists -- who all believe that God is necessary in everything -- accept evolution, perhaps you should rethink your conclusion. Have you read any mainstream scientists, including Christian ones, about evolution? Have you read any of the Biblical scholars who explain why Genesis should not be read as a scientific description?

 

[sfs]

I've summarised my position in post 140. In essence, I don't have time to go into the technical stuff that scientists deal with, but I place my trust in those scientists who start from the standpoint that God did it now let's find out how, rather than those scientists that have decided that no god is necessary as everything got going and organised itself all on its own.

Hmm. I start from the standpoint that God did and I want to find out how, but something tells me you're not going to place your trust in what I say. Why?

 

[sfs]

Well, if an ardent evolutionist candidly admits that no amount of evidence to the contrary would allow him to even consider that God was involved, that sort of lets the cat out of the bag about how neutral [not] evolutionary scientists are being does it not.

No, that should tell you how that individual views the possibility of God being involved. The rest of us didn't appoint Lewontin as our spokesman on religious and philosophical matters. Do you think it's fair if somebody finds a Christian who says something stupid, and assumes all Christians agree?

 

[sfs]

Where did all the information (specified complexity) come from to build and maintain life then?

What do you mean by specified complexity? We know mechanisms that increase the functional information in the genome, if that's what you're looking for.

Also, we all have an inbuilt ability to recognise design and yet when many scientists look through a microscope at the incredible complexity of living things they say that no designer is necessary.

Your argument seems to be this: we have an inbuilt ability to see design, and when experts in biology study life closely, they don't detect design . . . so therefore design?