Is it okay to not believe in certain non-doctrine teachings of the church? (evolution, abortion)

[rossum]

The problem with Intelligent Design is that it tries to be both philosophical and scientific at the same time.

Every theist is at some level an ID proponent. YHWH/God/Allah/Brahman etc. created/designed the universe and all it contains. That is a religious/philosophical concept and is generally outside science. Science merely studies the mechanisms YHWH etc. used.

The Discovery Institute version of ID (DI-ID) is on a much smaller scale, it sees the Designer (God isn’t allowed in US schools) as twiddling base pairs in DNA. That is understandable, because DI-ID is fundamentally a political attempt to replace the teaching of evolution in schools. On a political level, it has had a few successes. However, because it is so politically focussed, DI-ID has failed almost completely on the scientific level.

DI-ID has no scientific support. Behe’s work was interesting, but ultimately a failure. Dembski has tried, and failed, to provide mathematical backup. At base, the best DI-ID can do is, “It sure looks designed to me”. That is not good enough for science.

You, for instance, began defending ID with claims of statistical improbabilities. But when pressed for scientific backup for these claims, you switched to your philosophical/religious (and better) defense.

I am glad you noticed. Many ID websites throw around probabilities, which are either not becked up by figures at all, or else the figures are derived from false or inapplicable premises. I do not blame DI-ID supporters for this, they are basically being lied to by the Discovery Institute and repeat those lies here in good faith. DI-ID has no real experimental support, so they have to fabricate the appearance of such support.

rossum

 

[tifischer]

Excellent explanation Leaf.

This follows the Z. Cobalt Theory of Evolution and Surrival of the Fittest:

A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the herd is hunted, it is the slowest and weakest ones at the back that are killed first. This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members! ; In much the same way, the human brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells.

Excessive intake of alcohol, as we know, kills brain cells. But naturally, it attacks the slowest and weakest brain cells first… In this way, regular consumption of beer eliminates the weaker brain cells, making the brain a faster and more efficient machine! That’s why you always feel smarter after a few beers.

God can do anything. The brain can only operate as fast as God will allow.

Actually what you are describing is not evolution it is only how well an animal adapted to its environment. Evolution again deals with random spontaneous mutation not only natural selection. You seem to be confusing these two concepts. It is easy to say observe natural selection and jump to the conclusion of evolution but when you start to understand that to believe that you would have to first believe that the fittest had previously already randomly spontaneously mutated to carry the trait that gave it an advantage. This is statistically not probable.

The theory of evolution would suggest that during the ice age when man was evolving the most obvious natural selection would be to select for random mutations of people who produce more hair…it is easily selectable visually and it does not take much intelligence to know that hair helps keep the body warm as well as other benefits (thus almost all land mammals have a good amount of fur). However, instead we ended up being some of the most bald creatures in existence having only a little hair on our bodies (relative to many of the creatures that went extinct during the ice age) and most of our hair is on our heads. Some on this forum defended evolution by saying well then they selected for intelligence during the ice age but signs of higher levels of intelligence (detailed art not just sticks and stones) did not appear until almost the end of the ice age. Considering the image of the human that came out of the ice age it would be more reasonable to believe that man was create in the image of God than in the image of natural selection of the most fit for it’s condition.

 

[Zoltan_Cobalt]

God can do anything. The brain can only operate as fast as God will allow.

Actually what you are describing is not evolution it is only how well an animal adapted to its environment. Evolution again deals with random spontaneous mutation not only natural selection. You seem to be confusing these two concepts. It is easy to say observe natural selection and jump to the conclusion of evolution but when you start to understand that to believe that you would have to first believe that the fittest had previously already randomly spontaneously mutated to carry the trait that gave it an advantage. This is statistically not probable.

The theory of evolution would suggest that during the ice age when man was evolving the most obvious natural selection would be to select for random mutations of people who produce more hair…it is easily selectable visually and it does not take much intelligence to know that hair helps keep the body warm as well as other benefits (thus almost all land mammals have a good amount of fur). However, instead we ended up being some of the most bald creatures in existence having only a little hair on our bodies (relative to many of the creatures that went extinct during the ice age) and most of our hair is on our heads. Some on this forum defended evolution by saying well then they selected for intelligence during the ice age but signs of higher levels of intelligence (detailed art not just sticks and stones) did not appear until almost the end of the ice age. Considering the image of the human that came out of the ice age it would be more reasonable to believe that man was create in the image of God than in the image of natural selection of the most fit for it’s condition.

So you are saying that my “beer vs brain cells” is all wrong???

 

[Rau]

…The Big Bang theory says that all matter in time and space came together at the exact same point and time in the infinite vacuum of the universe…that’s not statistically probable, yet the science indicates that it may have happen. Quantum Tunneling does not make sense without a creator…electrons that can overcome energy barriers…these energetic anomalies, where do they come from? My favorite is how could you physically feel the Holy Spirit unless there was a creator…feelings are otherwise based on chemical reactions…if everyone could simply will themselves without God into Therese De Avila ecstasy of God then they would and everyone would be a nun or if everyone could simply will themselves to be Jesus without God, then they would…and children would have the world for their imaginations and willingness to believe is far greater than most adults! There would be a lot of little superman’s in the world is all I am saying. I could go on and on…

The Big Bang theory does not say that the matter coalesced within an infinite universe!!

None of these scientific theories demand a view that there is no God (though some scientists posit that).

 

[Rau]

Laws of nature…ha ha. Study Quantum Tunneling…electrons that cross energetic barriers. Matter cannot be created nor destroyed…then where did it come from? Ever feel the Holy Spirit? That is not a Law of Nature. Laws are made by man to help us best understand our surroundings. They are not perfect definitions that explain all of nature.

Yep, and thank God for quantum tunneling - very useful in electronic devices! And it does not involve any violation of the conservation of energy principle.

 

[Rau]

God can do anything. The brain can only operate as fast as God will allow.

Actually what you are describing is not evolution it is only how well an animal adapted to its environment. Evolution again deals with random spontaneous mutation not only natural selection. You seem to be confusing these two concepts. It is easy to say observe natural selection and jump to the conclusion of evolution but when you start to understand that to believe that you would have to first believe that the fittest had previously already randomly spontaneously mutated to carry the trait that gave it an advantage. This is statistically not probable.

The theory of evolution would suggest that during the ice age when man was evolving the most obvious natural selection would be to select for random mutations of people who produce more hair…it is easily selectable visually and it does not take much intelligence to know that hair helps keep the body warm as well as other benefits (thus almost all land mammals have a good amount of fur). However, instead we ended up being some of the most bald creatures in existence having only a little hair on our bodies (relative to many of the creatures that went extinct during the ice age) and most of our hair is on our heads. Some on this forum defended evolution by saying well then they selected for intelligence during the ice age but signs of higher levels of intelligence (detailed art not just sticks and stones) did not appear until almost the end of the ice age. Considering the image of the human that came out of the ice age it would be more reasonable to believe that man was create in the image of God than in the image of natural selection of the most fit for it’s condition.

Not much “evolution” can happen during a little ice age! Or are you suggesting God prevented us hairing-up?

 

[LeafByNiggle]

The theory of evolution would suggest that during the ice age when man was evolving the most obvious natural selection would be to select for random mutations of people who produce more hair…

For a fuller understanding of the history of hair you have to go back to when our ancestors first lost their hair. It turns out this point can be estimated by comparing the number of genetic differences in the two related species of lice that infect man. There is one species for head hair and the another for pubic hair. Scientists theorize that these two species of lice evolved from a single species that infected the entire body of hair when hair covered the entire body. When head hair and pubic hair became distinct areas with more difficult travel (for lice) between them, the lice began evolving into area-specific lice. By knowing the approximate rate of mutations, one can estimate when the split took place. But I diverge.

The purpose of hair is much more than keeping warm in winter. Just witness the continued presence of hair on large mammals in the tropics, even though they never get that cold. But there was an advantage that came with the loss of hair, and it had to do with a new technique of hunting. Prior to the loss of hair, simians could only hunt by ambush, which was difficult. Their prey could run much faster. But one thing their prey could not do was to run very long. Their endurance was limited by their fur preventing the quick evaporation of perspiration to keep from overheating. So all the proto-humans without hair had to do was to keep running after the same gazelle until that gazelle collapsed from heat exhaustion. It might take a hour or two, but they would get him in the end. In fact there are tribes in Africa that hunt this way today.

Once this advantageous characteristic evolved, it would take a very long period of a different environment to make hair reappear all over the body. As Rau said, an ice age is way too short for something like this to develop.

 

[tifischer]

For a fuller understanding of the history of hair you have to go back to when our ancestors first lost their hair. It turns out this point can be estimated by comparing the number of genetic differences in the two related species of lice that infect man. There is one species for head hair and the another for pubic hair. Scientists theorize that these two species of lice evolved from a single species that infected the entire body of hair when hair covered the entire body. When head hair and pubic hair became distinct areas with more difficult travel (for lice) between them, the lice began evolving into area-specific lice. By knowing the approximate rate of mutations, one can estimate when the split took place. But I diverge.

The purpose of hair is much more than keeping warm in winter. Just witness the continued presence of hair on large mammals in the tropics, even though they never get that cold. But there was an advantage that came with the loss of hair, and it had to do with a new technique of hunting. Prior to the loss of hair, simians could only hunt by ambush, which was difficult. Their prey could run much faster. But one thing their prey could not do was to run very long. Their endurance was limited by their fur preventing the quick evaporation of perspiration to keep from overheating. So all the proto-humans without hair had to do was to keep running after the same gazelle until that gazelle collapsed from heat exhaustion. It might take a hour or two, but they would get him in the end. In fact there are tribes in Africa that hunt this way today.

Once this advantageous characteristic evolved, it would take a very long period of a different environment to make hair reappear all over the body. As Rau said, an ice age is way too short for something like this to develop.

Consider all those animals that do need to run long distances…why did the gazelle not evolve to be without hair so that it could run faster and escape the predators?

The ice age was a very long period of time that you could run for miles and not worry about breaking a sweat in the heat.

You still got to admit the statistical probability of life being created in infinite space and time is just not probable. Even to consider the probability of random spontaneous genetics…there is a long list of differences between apes and humans that are dramatically different. If you compare the difference of a horse from the time of evolution to now and then compare the differences between an ape to a human…very dramatic change there. We are not just talking size and hair here. We are talking about high intelligence, a-posable thumb, vegetarian to meat eating, bent over to upright…in less than the time a horse took to “evolve” from a small horse to a large horse (about 6 million years compared to 60 million years). The dramatic change isolated to one species during this time would be better explained by a catalyst such as the almighty creator, God.

 

[tifischer]

I forgot to mention that the ice age lasted for about 2.5 million years…hardly a short time. I think if God wanted to get people to naturally select to have hairy mates during that time it would not have been difficult. I suggest that God made man in his own image.

 

[tifischer]

So you are saying that my “beer vs brain cells” is all wrong???

Yeah…after a few beers I would feel my face on the floor.

Beer effects some more than others and as God desires…and most people don’t think they are smarter after a few beers…maybe it only inebriated the cells that discern intelligence so you feel smarter, because if you were truly smarter you would not drink any more beers.

I have no tolerance for alcohol being that I don’t drink but on rare special occasion and even then no more than 4 oz cause I will get buzzed. Yet, when I am an EM I can drink a few ounces left over easy with no problem, by God’s grace. It would be more like Beer vs ADH anyhow. God could easily increase your production of ADH if he wanted to increase your tolerance or he could simply take away the effect, because God can do anything.

Anyone who has felt the presence of God’s Holy Spirit should believe this easily. To feel is a chemical phenomenon, yet we can feel the Holy Spirit. That means that God can transcend from the spiritual realm to the physical realm, hello baby Jesus. Yet, we are all Catholics so we believe this every-time we go to mass and we believe in countless miracles that would witness of God interceding physically. God directing natural selection by creating pressures while guiding humans to respond to such pressures accordingly and by physically interceding at a molecular level is not impossible.

 

[Rau]

I forgot to mention that the ice age lasted for about 2.5 million years…hardly a short time. I think if God wanted to get people to naturally select to have hairy mates during that time it would not have been difficult. I suggest that God made man in his own image.

Last ice age is measured in tens of thousands of years, not millions. This is the period where substantial portions of earth covered in ice.

 

[Rau]

Consider all those animals that do need to run long distances…why did the gazelle not evolve to be without hair so that it could run faster and escape the predators?

The ice age was a very long period of time that you could run for miles and not worry about breaking a sweat in the heat.

You still got to admit the statistical probability of life being created in infinite space and time is just not probable. Even to consider the probability of random spontaneous genetics…there is a long list of differences between apes and humans that are dramatically different. If you compare the difference of a horse from the time of evolution to now and then compare the differences between an ape to a human…very dramatic change there. We are not just talking size and hair here. We are talking about high intelligence, a-posable thumb, vegetarian to meat eating, bent over to upright…in less than the time a horse took to “evolve” from a small horse to a large horse (about 6 million years compared to 60 million years). The dramatic change isolated to one species during this time would be better explained by a catalyst such as the almighty creator, God.

Anything can be perfectly explained by an appeal to the intervention of the creator.

 

[tifischer]

Last ice age is measured in tens of thousands of years, not millions. This is the period where substantial portions of earth covered in ice.

Wiki says it started about 2.5 million years ago…It ended about 10 thousand years ago.

“The current ice age, the Pliocene-Quaternary glaciation, started about 2.58 million years ago during the late Pliocene, when the spread of ice sheets in the Northern Hemisphere began. Since then, the world has seen cycles of glaciation with ice sheets advancing and retreating on 40,000- and 100,000-year time scales called glacial periods, glacials or glacial advances, and interglacial periods, interglacials or glacial retreats. The earth is currently in an interglacial, and the last glacial period ended about 10,000 years ago. All that remains of the continental ice sheets are the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and smaller glaciers such as on Baffin Island.”

Also interestingly these glacier melting in the last glacial retreat would cause outburst floods, or a mega flood over the Earth.

 

[Rau]

I forgot to mention that the ice age lasted for about 2.5 million years…hardly a short time. I think if God wanted to get people to naturally select to have hairy mates during that time it would not have been difficult. I suggest that God made man in his own image.

So, you understand that to mean God is corporeal, with not much hair? The meaning of “in his own image” has been addressed by a few questions to the Apologists. I don’t recall any mention of hair.

 

[Rau]

Wiki says it started about 2.5 million years ago…It ended about 10 thousand years ago. I will look for more history.

Yes please. Read more carefully.

 

[tifischer]

So, you understand that to mean God is corporeal, with not much hair? The meaning of “in his own image” has been addressed by a few questions to the Apologists. I don’t recall any mention of hair.

If you want to know what in His own image means, look at Jesus.

 

[Rau]

If you want to know what in His own image means, look at Jesus.

That called circular reasoning.

 

[tifischer]

That called circular reasoning.

Well, at least we also know he had hair.

 

[tifischer]

Mutations have random effects on the organism. Natural selection non-randomly prefers the organisms that reproduce better than average. Natural selection is a non-random filter, selecting from a partly-randomly generated pool of organisms. The great majority of our genomes is a direct copy from our parents, and so is not random.

I note that you have still not provided any numbers to support your earlier assertions about probabilities.

rossum

As I said before…Although I did enjoy my statistical studies I did not receive a degree in such. maybe one day I will ask a mathematical genius to calculate it. I probably could with time…if I remember correctly when you r trying to calculate the probability of one event in an infinite state of possibilities then your probability will reduce to zero. Understanding the statistical probability of 1 out of infinity doesn’t take a PhD in statistics

And Natural Selection is not evolution…Natural selection in evolution would be of a random spontaneous mutation that occurs before selection… life based on randomness in an infinite vacuum of space and time is not probable.

 

[Zoltan_Cobalt]

Well, at least we also know he had hair.

Do we?

I know some Jewish men who are bald.