Evolutionism Vs Creationism. How can you just choose to believe because you were told to?

Question

On one hand you have an archeologist, digging out dinosaur skeletons and finding our ancestral records... with proofs to display AND on other hand, there is a book with stories that involve magic and fancy stuff that is really hard to believe.

Then, What is the debate about? faith? Can't we all have faith and morality and have a logical scientific approach at the same time?

To Gracefully_yours: Hi, well dinosaur skeletons prove that there were giant reptiles and no human civilizations in the days religeous books are said to portray fully-organised civilizations.

Sorry for messing up the nickname, it should read- "gracefully saved."

snafu22bohica, I kinda agree with you.

Celestine N, huh?

Logsemán, nicely put.

regerugged, And what else did Darwin tell you on the dinner table? I am sorry to be using sarcasm but, the complexity is explained by survival easily. Those who could divide, reproduce and survive, flourished AND those who couldn't died. What's so difficult?

songkaila, I'd like to meet those some archeologists and astronomers. Escapism!!

marissa, huh?

Alessandra R, nice poem but, bad arguements. Things like first kiss, love etc... can be explained through endocrinology and genetics. Not going there.

Gatsby Follower, I'm not doing the assignment 'cause I can't find a scientist who could prove that someone came back days after his death OR someone lifted up the earth to make way for the giant cockoack and so on...

Oops! read "disprove" in place of "prove" in the above sentence.

Soft And Blunt: Yea, I agree, now lets do that!!

Stand-up philosopher: You don't really have a point there... NOT!

Someone T.O. snooze: Why is it that most creationists don't make sense? (Sorry)

alchemist_n_tx: LOL YOU ROCK! (sorry to those who he offended)

IL Padrino, Your answer makes little to no sense. Who told you creationists are liberal in their approach?

Terry K, I feel for you 'cause I can almost feel you. Let me just take you forward to a modern era of science! Welcome to the 20th century (it's Impossible to bring you to 21st century)

Here a few points you should know:

* Mass and energy equivalence. Yes, mass can be created.
* Thermodynamics laws and the theory of evolution are two different things.
* Newton's Laws were about MOTION and not EVOLUTION. Evolution and motion are two different fields of study.

Best of luck!

Answer 1

Some of us were taught evolution while we were growing up, and chose creationism later.

Some archeologists, when they dig up fossils and see a certain order or progression in the species, conclude that evolution is responsible. Others notice the gaps between the different 'stages' and reason that if it were really evolution, there ought to be a more continuous line.

And then they look at Genesis 1 and notice how perfectly it fits what they actually observe... The progression of the different types of species is indeed just like you will find in the fossil record.

And some astronomers look at the evidence presently at our disposal, focusing on this or that element, and conclude that the universe is billions of years old; others notice other elements that may have escaped the notice of evolutionists, and conclude the universe is much younger than that.

And scientists of all kinds look at the sheer complexity of the universe we live in, and conclude that it shows clear signs of having been designed by Someone - the probability of it all happening by chance is just too small...

For example, here is an extensive quote from an old friend from college who is now a neuroscientist working at the University of California(*):

I read with amusement your sparring with a Darwinist. The truth is Darwinism
is not a science, it's an ideology, a philosophy, a Faith System. You will
find a few rare Darwinists who have enough integrity to admit as much. And
then they condemn Christianity for being solely based on blind faith!!!
Well, Christianity has more solid evidence to back up its foundational
tenets than does Darwinism. The more we delve into molecular biology the
more we make discoveries that are at odds with basic Darwinist
pre-suppositions. Read Michael Behe and Michael Denton. But you see
Darwinism is an ideology and they can't abandon it any more than communists
could abandon Marxism despite its glaring deficiencies because the
alternative would be too unpalatable. Atheist Jacques Monod made a statement
(I'm paraphrasing it) that science was forced to accept Darwinism because
the alternative (Creation) was too fantastic to contemplate and therefore
unthinkable.So it has to be accepted upon faith. I remember as an
undergraduate a Darwinist professor of mine who was challenged and used
bizarre evasive answers to dodge the issue. On one occasion he described
this tortuous and unbelievable scenario of how the bones of the inner ear
evolved. On bright student asked:
"But professor Carroll, how would the animals eat and swallow their food
since these rotating bones would be in the way during the early phase of
rotation?"
The professors answer was a marvel of self contradiction. "Well these
changes accumulated over a very long period of mutations but happened very
quickly."
On another occasion he posited three scenarios for how bird wings evolved.
The same Smart Alec in the class chimed in "Well which of the three then is
it?"
Answer: "Well all three are equally valid and equally true.Birds have wings.
They have evolved and each theory is equally true so you have to accept them
all as true." (even though elements of each theory contradicted elements of
the others).
No Darwinist bothers to answer certain key questions in biochemistry and
molecular biology because they don't fit a naturalistic random chance
scenario and therefore are the Achilles heel of Darwinism. How do organisms
acquire literally MILLIONS of new perfectly coded sequences of DNA, preserve
them without the cells editing mechanism deleting them as it does with most
mis-synthesized DNA,while preventing them from expressing inappropriate gene
products over time, and then suddenly activate them generations later at the
RIGHT time to form new complex structures? There has never been demonstrated
a way that happens. Most changes in species are minor and involve usually
the LOSS of some genetic information in order for a mutation to be
expressed. Mind you well that most mutations are lethal, many are detected
and edited out by the cells own DNA synthesis regulatory systems. Add
something to the genome and it may result in the cell producing some useless
product that may accumulate and kill the cell.And how do complex
multi-component regulatory systems evolve? That is the central question
asked by Michael Behe. Darwinism is in fact a type of theology. I find it
easier to believe in the guiding hand of an infinite Divine Intelligence
than what I call the cosmic chemical goof in a mud puddle to explain life's
origin.

End of quote :>

Answer 2

First of all, I wish to present an assignment to the asker: Find a point where this "book with stories that involve magic and fancy stuff" has been proven completely erroneous by modern scientists with actual tangible and present evidence. You can't count the origins of the universe or life, both sides are just theories (more on that later). Perhaps you could find a town mentioned in a specific spot that has been excavated with no trace of the town. Or perhaps a person is listed inacurrately, with faulty information applied to this person. I fear you may be in for a long search.
That statement aside, your question is COMPLETELY true. You CANNOT believe just because you were told to. That is how the children in Germany became Nazis, that is how the Jonestown Cult sprung up, and that is how a theory became fact in modern America.
I will elaborate with this simple statement: it is impossible to determine without question the origins of the universe precisely. Without any human being tangibly there to record, we can only collect other evidences and make inferences based on those evidences. But this is where the system breaks down. An inference can NEVER be 100% guaranteed, for if it were, it would be a recorded or experimental fact. Let me use an example: I cannot infer that a chicken lays eggs, for it is researched and proven time and time again that they do. But If I have a dinosaur skeleton before me, I can only infer what happened to it, I can never truly know. One classic example, the Apatosaurus. This official name of the dinosaur formerly called the Brontosaurus means "untruthful lizard". It was called that because the previous classification of it, as the Brontosaurus, was later proven inacurrate. They had the skeleton, they just made bad assumptions. The ironic part is, it was not the lizard who was untruthful.
Similarly, do not believe creationism because your Sunday school teachers tell you to. And do not believe macroevolution because your biology teacher tells you to. Look into both sides of the debate and study it for yourself, than make an educated decision.

P.S. I feel it is important to add that I do not personally believe in the six literal days of creation. I believe that that was the language given by God to man to express the idea of six periods of unspecified length, but certainly much longer than 24 hours.

Answer 3

The evolution theory is flawed. Even Charles Darwin, who was a Christian, lost interest in his own idea, later in life. There are too many holes in the theory for it to be called anything but a "theory." For example, if man evolved from apes, why do we still have apes. How can some of a species evolve while others of the same species do not?
Creationism is based on faith, science and logic. How do you explain the complexities of any living thing? Man has been able to examine down to genes and chromosomes. The structures are so complex, what explains their existence? Coincidence? How, when, where, why, who started them? Science does not have all the answers. But, since we are still living, we don't know by meeting him personally that there is a God. Some choose to believe. Some do not.

Answer 4

It is silly to believe anything just because somebody told it to you: you need to examine the data for yourself. It is also silly to say that evolution is "just a theory", and that creationism is "just a theory", and it makes no sense to prefer one over the other. We shall now consider why.
A scientific theory can properly be defined as a refutable universal statement about the way the world works. "Universal" means that it is valid over all space and time; a universal statement about the real world is in principle unproveable (there could be an exception lurking somewhere which no one has yet found) but may be refutable -- you can show that it is wrong by finding a counterexample. The word "refutable" is key, because it can be proved that the predictive power of any theory derives strictly from its refutatbility. This immediately leads to a corollary: an irrefutable theory can predict nothing, and hence is useless.
Applying this to evolution, we see that it is a scientific theory. If there were no variation, or if there were no selection mechanism, evolution could not occur. But there is variation, and there is natural selection, so the theory is not refuted. This does not, of course, guarantee that it is true; indeed, no such guarantee is possible. But evolution is established science: workers in the field routinely rely on it to make predictions which they consider useful (because they are correct). This alone would be reason enough for accepting it. But there is much more: evidence for it, from numerous fields, is overwhelming. Readers interested in details may read a question in this forum posed by haterhater, and answered by Emily Rose, sometime in May.
By contrast, creationism is not a scientific theory: there is no way, even in principle, that one could show that it is not true. Hence, it can predict nothing, so considering it is a waste of time.
In sum: we accept evolution because it works, and reject creationism, not because it is necessarily wrong, but because it is necessarily useless.
About faith: I consider faith to be the ultimate evil. If faith is defined as being the belief in something without evidence, or in the face of contrary evidence, it is evident that this is surrendering logic. But the ability to apply logic is the distinguishing characteristic of our species. Hence, anyone who has faith has surrendered the essence of his humanity and is nothing but an animal. And what could be more evil than that?
About morals: The theory of evolution applies to societies as well as species, and a society which has an appropriate moral code will survive over one that does not. The common moral strictures against murder and theft are clearly beneficial to societies, so appear in almost all moral codes amongst societies that have survived.

Answer 5

Here in Europe we are more used to the misdeeds of our churches. That means, the Church has learnt not to mess in the science, since everytime they tried it it made a boomerang effect and the Church lost credit. Example: does the Earth draw an orbit around the Sun or was it the other way round? The Popes burnt many people because they defended the first hypothesis, and at last, they had to give up its investigations, for it was proven that those were all wrong.

Has the Church undergone something similar in the USA? No, in fact it has happened the contrary. Once they lose all of their credit there, science will progress definitely.

Answer 6

That is a false choice. It is like asking you to belive one lie or another.

On one hand we have the "evangelicals" who expect me to belive that the entire universe was created in 144 hours, as we measure hours today. They interperet the Bible for their own ends and leave out the parts they dont like. then they take things out of context and twist the words like a lawyer or politician would. The do not take into account that God could have easily modified the rotation and revolution of the planets so that 6 days could take millions of our years, or that God could be on an entirely different work schedule. And I'll be burned at the stake as a heretic if i point out that God is beyond the constrants of time to begin with and makes up His own days and nights.

On the other hand, we have the "evolutionists" who expect me to belive that sentient beings "evolved" from single celled things and later from monkeys. TOTALLY BY RANDOM CHANCE! The biological odds of going from single cell to human and all the other millions of species of life on the earth in the space of a few billion years is nearly impossible. Also, what of our self awareness? When i last checked, worms and flowers were surviving quite well without self awareness. where did this come from? how is it that i have the idea to question the origin of my ability to question the origin of my ability to question the origin of my self awareness? Such things will not enable me to survive, so why have them?

I suggest that both the religious and the scientfic communities attempt to find the truth instead of thumping their Bibles and fossils and chanting "we are right!"

Answer 7

The debate is not religion vs science, but science vs science. There is more than one way to look at the evidence presented for evolution.
The problem is that only one interpretation gets presented in the schools.
The truth is that no one observed the creation of the universe or any type of evolution beyond micro evolution.
So, if there is no observation, we are left to interpret the evidence. And if science has taught us anything it is that our interpretations are usually wrong unless we have direct observation.
So, how is it that only one view is taught? That is called indoctrination, not education.
The Creationists have the advantage because they are taught both sides and can make a choice. Evolutionists are usually taught the creation side by other evolutionists who will put a biased slant on it. They never get taught creation by creationists. But creationists are taught evolution by evolutionists. The way you described the bible as a book of magic and fancy stuff proves my point. You got taught that either by someone's biased view of the bible or by deducting that from non creation sources. I guarantee you if you were taught by a creationist, you would have a different understanding of it.
But you think that we get our science from the bible. We use the same scientific equipment and techniques as evolutionists. However, our interpretation happens to coincide with many biblical accounts of the origin of life and world changes.
It is a recorded history book that can point you in the direction to look. It's like having a map to scientific discoveries.
So, who would you say has seen both sides more clearly and can make the more informed decision?

**Response to your edit**
My answer makes perfect sense if you would think about it. I don't see the difficulty in understanding what I said. The debate is over interpretation of the evidence.

***RH,
Variation and natural selection are also processes of creation and can be just as easily used for evidence of creation.
Both theories require these processes.
Here's the main difference:
We only observe micro evolution. Evolutionists believe (by faith) that micro evolution is evidence for macro evolution. They cannot prove it and it has NEVER been observed. Evolutionists will say that you CANNOT observe the process because it takes too long. So, they are admitting that they believe in macro evolution by faith.
Creationists do not have the same faith based belief. Our faith is in the bible. We believe that the documented accounts of creation is true.
According to both beliefs, creationists believe the bible is true and have faith in that.
Evolutionists believe that Darwin was right and have faith in his book.
We have not seen God, and you have not seen macro evolution. Both belief systems require faith. So, you can't say that creationists are the only one's that need faith to believe in their theory.
You can say that there's evidence for evolution, but there is equal evidence for a God. Neither theory wins the battle with evidence.
Now, regarding your definition of faith. You are correct in that it CAN be evil. It all depends on how it is applied. If someone believes that they will go to heaven for blowing up an airplane, that type of faith is dangerous.
However, without faith, you would become paranoid. You need faith to function on a daily basis or else you will suffer from mass paranoia. You have to have faith that the person who packed the steak in the supermarket didn't contaminate it with poison. You must have faith that your house will not collapse. You must have faith that the elevator cable isn't ready to snap. The list goes on.
You apply faith in almost every aspect of your life. We know that houses do collapse, food does get contaminated and machines break to cause deaths. So, why do we continually put faith in these things if we know they can fail?
Is that being dangerous, wreckless, or reasonable?

Answer 8

Evolution: It is something which can be described by the ONE who has witnessed it. And the ONE who has witnessed HIMSELF is the CREATOR HIMSELF. The human side of the evolution can be questionable.
What at the best we can do is, write something about the present in English(Agreed by all) and bury it in different parts of the world , so that we will at-least have a comprehensive evolution theory for the future times.
U may agree or not to my point of view.

Answer 9

It's personal choice. That's the great thing about it. You could believe totally in evolution, or totally in creationism. OR you could do like me and believe in a mixture of both. I figure that God is almighty so maybe he PLANNED evolution. It sorta' messes up that whole, "man was created in god's likeness" thing. But if you don't take it literally then maybe god created us to evolve into his likeness. Maybe we're not done yet. Maybe we won't actually be in God's likeness for another 500 years.. Something to think about.


How come I didn't get a comment on my answer? I feel so left out. LOL

Answer 10

The Bible was written between 2000 and 3500 years ago.

Evolution started in the 1800's.

The Bible tells of people living with dragons, Leviathan, Behemoth and unicorns.
The word dinosaur was first used in the 1800's when.

Evolution says that dinosaurs have been extinct for millions of years, and that man has been around for only several hundred thousand years. The two have never meet.

There are rocks with dinosaurs and human footprints together across the country and around the world (so imprints have one footprint overlapping the other).

How can evolution be correct?