Does Darwin's theory of evolution contradict Catholicsm?

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Rau said:
The fossil record has revealed that the most fundamental prediction of Darwinian evolution - gradualism - has failed miserably.
In any other field of science, if a theory’s most fundamental prediction fails miserably, that theory’s worth is seriously questioned. But, oh no, not with Darwinism - scientific rigour goes right out the window when pseudo-science takes over.
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How long do you imagine soft tissue and blood cells can stay intact? Even frozen food degenerates slowly - would a frozen steak last 5778 years in your fridge?
 
Glark said:
A Catholic theologigian might suggest you are splitting hairs and reading the text too literally and not pragmatically.
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“Too literally”? This from the person who suggests reading AiG? You read the Bible literally, but you do not bother to read what the Work of God is telling you. Try reading that other book more literally.
What is your Buddhist interpretation, then?
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In religious terms the question is an irrelevant distraction:
[The Buddha said:] “The religious life, Malunkyaputta, does not depend on the dogma that the universe is eternal, nor does it depend on the dogma that the universe is not eternal etc. [many dogmas omitted here] Whatever dogma obtains there is still birth, old age, death, sorrow, lamentation, misery, grief and despair, of which I declare the extinction in the present life.”

– Cula-Malunkyovada sutta, Majjhima Nikaya 63
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For answers to questions about the material world I look to scientists.

rossum
 
Glark said:
… unless dinosaurs existing at the time as humans threatens their quasi-religious belief in billions of years of evolution.
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No. We have had dinosaurs living with humans ever since humans existed. One flew past my window just now. Birds are dinosaurs.

You sources’ lack of understanding of evolution misleads you into thinking that finding a living non-avian dinosaur would be a problem for evolution. It wouldn’t be. We have found living Coelacanths, once thought extinct. We have found living Wollemi pines, once thought extinct.

Science is aware that we do not have a complete fossil record, so it is not unusual for the dating of a species to be moved earlier or later if a new fossil is found. A living example of a species is just more of the same. If we found a living Dodo, how would that refute evolution? And Dodos were dinosaurs, remember.

rossum
 
Glark said:
How long do you imagine soft tissue and blood cells can stay intact? Even frozen food degenerates slowly - would a frozen steak last 5778 years in your fridge?
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Dunno - but you are having trouble quoting me. Seems you quoted someone else and claimed I said it!! That’s very naughty.
 
Rau said:
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rossum:
We have had dinosaurs living with humans ever since humans existed. One flew past my window just now. Birds are dinosaurs.
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Don’t forget Crocs - hardly changed in millions of years!
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What animal has changed ?
 
Good point! Not many complex animals on the earth today were so similar a million years ago.
 
Glark, you’ve clearly memorized your cherry picked defences and immunized yourself against the evidence. I cannot communicate with the likes of you. All the best.
 
Techno2000 said:
What animal has changed ?
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Cetaceans. 65 million years ago their ancestors were land-living. Their move into the water came later.

By all means try to find a Cetacean fossil earlier than a non-avian dinosaur fossil.

That is the error of those YEC websites who think that a later (or even living) dinosaur is a problem for evolution. It isn’t. If they understood evolution they would realise than an earlier dinosaur would present a real problem. A Cambrian dinosaur fossil would be impossible for evolution to explain; the equivalent of Haldane’s Precambrian rabbit.

rossum
 
Techno2000 said:
Then all the transitional fossils that lead to the bird should be there in the fossil record… can you show us the fossil links ?
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“All”? No, not unless you can show us the bones of Adam, Eve and all the Old Testament patriarchs together with their wives. The fossil record is incomplete.

Some? Yes we have some. Various feathered dinosaurs like Jinfengopteryx, Archaeopteryx, and toothed birds like Ichthyornis.
Code: 
                    Feathers Flight   Bony Tail  Teeth
                    -------- ------   ---------  ------
Dinosaurs              No       No      Yes        Yes  :  Stegosaurus.
Feathered Dinos       Yes       No      Yes        Yes  :  Jinfengopteryx
Archaeopteryx         Yes      Yes      Yes        Yes  :  Archaeopteryx
Early Birds           Yes      Yes       No        Yes  :  Ichthyornis
Modern Birds          Yes      Yes       No         No  :  Corvidae
At each step only one thing changes.

rossum
 
So this one little chicken size fossil proves birds were once dinosaurs ?
 
I think the definitive answer to the question posted in the thread title of “Does Darwin’s Theory of Evolution Contradict Catholicism?” is:

If you want it to, then yes.

If you don’t want it to, then no.

Fair enough?
 
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Glark said:
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niceatheist:
I’m not seeing any article to that effect.
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If I google “do all life froms fall into a nested hierarchy”, it is the first article offered, so I don’t understand why you can’t find it.
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The very top link is from the Discovery Institute, a Creationist/ID organization, overstating what is really a debate between various taxonomists to some sort of refutation of the tree of life.

Got any actual citations from peer reviewed journals?
 
niceatheist said:
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Glark:
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niceatheist:
I’m not seeing any article to that effect.
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If I google “do all life froms fall into a nested hierarchy”, it is the first article offered, so I don’t understand why you can’t find it.
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The very top link is from the Discovery Institute, a Creationist/ID organization, overstating what is really a debate between various taxonomists to some sort of refutation of the tree of life.

Got any actual citations from peer reviewed journals?
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I should also add that this is a very cleverly worded article, which really spends most of its time complaining about how cladists and other taxonomists attempt to fit specific fossils into the tree of life. Obviously, where you have no molecular data, and where an ancient species may have features that are hard to fit into any one category, there’s always going to be uncertainty. But how exactly that falsifies the tree of life is beyond me, since when we look at the molecular data of all extant species that we have analyzed thus far, they do fit into that tree.

So unless your underlying claim is that millions of years ago there were species that were the product of some other abiogenesis and/or creation events that the tree of life that all current species fit into, really the Discovery institute’s “critique” is little more than yet another tired “god of the gaps” argument.
 
Techno2000 said:
The point I’m trying make is compared the size the hippo it looks tiny.Nobody would ever associate it with a cedar tree.
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Exactly. So, if you’re trying to impress on a person the scope of the size of the animal, then you compare its tail to something really big and impressive, so that the fact that it dwarfs a cedar is impressive!
 
Glark said:
How on earth does any Christian come to the conclusion that God Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth, is not an intelligent designer?
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Who’s saying that? The position here contrary to yours is merely that six-day creation isn’t literal, not that God isn’t involved in creation…
 
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