Only sensible answers please.
I want to know what they think fossils are.
Do they not believe that people were shorter 500 years ago? Why do they think doors on old houses and graves were smaller? Do they not take this as evidence of the population changing over time?
Do they believe that there were ice ages? WHat do they think happened to plants and animals during this period?
2006-09-10 21:27:59 · 10 answers · asked by Bebe 4 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Biology
Since a plurality of people in the world are either Christian or Muslim, I'll stick with them. They generally believe their monotheistic God created the world wholecloth with all the animals already built in. They generally ignore the multitude examples of evolution that can be seen in a few years in smaller animals or even a few hours in bacteria, which can be done since they're usually incredibly ignorant of basic science.
A logical explanation of fossils is that God created the world with fossils. To me, this is an incredibly cruel joke since this would mean he's trying to trick people on purpose, but it is a rational explanation. Many others try to claim that radiocarbon dating is not sufficiently accurate such that the world really could be X number of years old as described in the Old Testament. This is of course false, as radiocarbon dating is inaccurate on the scale of decades, not the tens or hundred of millions of years usually talked about for old fossils.
As for people being different, again due to their poor understanding of science in general, and evolution specifically, they do not realize that shorter or smaller people can be due to evolution, so it is not an issue. However, you are largely incorrect in this assumption since bigger people today is understood to be a result of better nutrition rather than an evolutionary process. Malnourished people still grow up short. Heck, large differences can even be seen between 1st and 2nd generation immigrants to prosperous nations.
Ice ages are generally ignored as the lay person does not understand the timescales ice age cycles occur in, although most religions do include a large flood event, which many scientists argue actually happened historically based on the sheer number of historical documents (often religious) that mention it and geological/archaeological evidence. Again, one can argue God merely created the world whole cloth with all this evidence of ice ages built in despite it never having existed.
This is not dissimilar to Cartesian philosophy, which you are probably familiar with in various movies like the Matrix where it is explained that there is no way to be sure that the world is not an artificial construct and/or created moments ago. That is, the world could have been created 1 second and we would never know it.
You must understand that however ridiculous this may sound to us, it is the only possible explanations to them since they have believed their entire life that their religion is the deepest truth and everything else in life must proceed from there, no matter how ludicrous. To paraphrase Sherlock Holmes, once you eliminate the impossible, the remaining possibility, however improbable, must be correct.
2006-09-10 21:39:01 · answer #1 · answered by Sinai 3 · 1⤊ 1⤋
I'm not totally convinced in the current knowledge of how humans evolved into intelligent (lol) beings. I think what science states is possible but i leave the topic open.
In my opinion there are other possibilities. There could have been other intelligent life forms that helped in the process. Maybe another life form brought us here to begin with.
2006-09-11 04:34:47 · answer #2 · answered by Valient25 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Good question.
I might add; what do they believe about molecular comparisons of nuclear DNA? That some genes are shared throughout almost all species? That human and chimp DNA is >98% similar?
2006-09-11 04:38:00 · answer #3 · answered by Dastardly 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Most of the people who claim not to believe in evolution have no clue what evolution is. If you aks them what excaclty they don't believe in, you will get the weirdest answers.
Maybe they would not have any problems with evolution if they were told (and were able to understand) what it really means.
2006-09-11 04:34:01 · answer #4 · answered by helene_thygesen 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Evolution and God can co exist, just puts a little change on what religions believe, but god could still of started it all. Started us as small little micro species and we evolved from there.
2006-09-11 04:32:47 · answer #5 · answered by road_dawg_style 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Bible-flappin'!
2006-09-11 06:33:28 · answer #6 · answered by Putt 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
people were shorter because of modern nutrition,,,that was developed in the last 300 yrs,,,,,the bible does agree with dinosaurs ,that they roamed the earth,,,they have pics of dinosors with people in the inca pyramids you need to research with creationist sometime and give them a chance
2006-09-11 04:37:47 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
We have a creator. How can something exist if it was not made?
2006-09-11 04:34:59 · answer #8 · answered by Living the Alaskan life 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
why think? let them do it. life is too short. party on garth.
2006-09-11 04:32:18 · answer #9 · answered by sllyjo 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
hmmm...so many questions....but I would like to get em all answered.
2006-09-11 04:31:34 · answer #10 · answered by Lard Cherrybakins 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋