J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
Rephrase that please.
- Status
T
Tenofovir
Guest
Non sequitur. Denying evolution does not imply “God did it directly”. Besides you’re incredibly wrong because early scientists were all people who were duh, Christians, and probably believed in a 6000 year old earth and “God did it” and yet somehow Newton, Pasteur, Copernicus, Brahe, Bacon etc. all came up with the knowledge we have. Saying God did it, in Catholicism, is to say God is the First or Ultimate cause. It’s not to say HOW God does things. But that their ultimate cause lies in God, in that existence is at this very moment sustained by the First Cause or Unmoved Mover. In a universe with God we have reason to believe there is order which can be known and not utter chaos. We believe that what happens today with bacteria and with the laws of physics happened 13 billion years ago and yesterday and will happen tomorrow. Why? Well either it’s a brute fact or it’s a fact with an underlying nature lying in God. (In Catholicism we use the 4 causes. You can see that whether evolution is true or not, these would not be affected, and the belief in God does not equate inability to do empirical science.)
This is important because this is a the real point of contention between “Creationists” and Evolutionists.
I think most Young Earth Creationists have no problem with natural selection and selection of positive traits inside a particular species, often called microevolution. Most people who have strong feelings for or against evolution do have a problem with what happened before and the whole man-is-just-a-glorified-ape, which does not actually follow from evolution, but many New Atheists, science fetishists and some “Creationists” believe.
But this depends also on metaphysical/philosophical import, and is not science. That conditions at the time of the Big Bang and throughout history are just right that Carbon, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Water etc can form and can form stable DNA/RNA/protein compounds which can form complex structures which can lead to metabolically active life which can become more complex and lead to abstract thought and grasp of universal truths is just uncanny and proof of God sustaining and creative function, right here and right now.
Is there empirical research to show that man evolved from early apes? Or is it just a clever bit of detective work based on correlating fossils and genetic similarities between animals? I don’t follow it but Behe and some of his colleagues have published some papers in peer review too.
As most, as in 99.9% of scientific knowledge is not related to evolution I would disagree.
It would not for example destroy our understanding of antibiotic resistance. We see antibiotic resistance in practice. We would study it and understand it, why and how it happens in today’s populations while we may not have been able to conclude - oh duh, man came from some ape at some stage. Now we may reject some irrelevant stuff but nothing which would prevent us from studying resistance and developing new strategies to combat it, including novel antibiotics or drugs which block bacterial enzymes or antibiotic pumps. We don’t need evolution to understand how a penicillinase enzyme works, where it comes from and how we can block it. It would however probably divert funds away from useless paleontology research and more into genetics, molecular biology and so on so that we could cure some of these diseases and ills people have to suffer from each day. Millions of people die from malaria, yellow fever, viral hepatitis, cancer, AIDS, etc.
I think you need to think longer about this topic and the light bulb will go on and you’ll see that yes denial of evolution does not imply denial of all science nor the ability to not be able to use the scientific method. Nor does it imply that one would deny all knowledge.
There are YECs who have done terrific research in genetics. I heard the inventor of the “Gene Gun”, John C. Sanford is a YEC. He is one example of how EMPIRICALLY you are wrong. As mentioned guys like Copernicus, Galileo, Da Vinci etc were all YECs. It didn’t stop them from being ahead of their time and ahead of the typical GNU atheist-science fetishist or millions of mediocre and useless PhDs we have around the world.
Have a nice day.
T
Tenofovir
Guest
The presence of similar genes in different species, according to ID folks could be attributed to a reuse of the same design.
P
Peter_Plato
Guest
Perhaps there are none here who oppose evolution, so “those who oppose evolution” do not exist to answer you. The fact that no one has volunteered to take up your challenge might mean no one here precisely fits your description.
There have been issues raised concerning the claims of evolutionists regarding the “reach” or extent to which the word can be applied, but that is far from “opposing” evolution.
Has anyone, for example, denied or opposed the idea that living things change or adapt to their environments over time? No.
Or that natural selection might be an operative mechanism (but not the only one) by which adaptation occurs? No.
The fact that Frick and Frack want to pigeonhole everyone into three camps: creationist, theistic evolutionist or atheist means nothing regarding where other posters stand with reference to the topic. There are a multitude of nuanced POVs that are simply being denied by the dogmatists on this thread.
The “brick wall” that Gricken observed was operative can be viewed from two sides, but that does not mean everyone is trapped within the non-existent confines of that wall.
J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
Okay, take a moment then to clarify your position: Evolution - For or Against?
THEN, answer us all this: Is God a trickster?
T
Tenofovir
Guest
Man evolution is one, and just one scientific theory. Gregor Mendel was able to figure out simple genetic inheritance without any knowldegde of evolution. Watson and Crick (and their poor post grad/post doc students) were able to figure out DNA without invoking Darwin or Dawkins.
So I think you’re hopelessly wrong. Sorry.
T
Tenofovir
Guest
A good example is the understanding of special relativity in making GPS systems. Without Einstein and his successors, we would not have GPS satellites? Of course we would. We’d also correct the errors for the different passage of time between the satellite based clock and earth based clocks. A complete understanding of relativity would not be necessary for GPS to work reliably.
(Of course this analogy is false because “evolution” is not synonymous with genetics.) But even where the underlying physics is poorly understood, engineers and scientists can overcome these problems in a practical sense.
(Of course this analogy is false because “evolution” is not synonymous with genetics.) But even where the underlying physics is poorly understood, engineers and scientists can overcome these problems in a practical sense.
J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
But Mendel, Watson, and Crick would not
be able to advance us in medicine and so
forth excluding the realization of evolution.
T
Tenofovir
Guest
No they would. When we study disease in humans we look at the organisms and the diseased tissues themselves. We don’t think, OK, the first hominid, did he/she suffer from Gout too? (or more complex questions). We study actual gout. We notice that people get joint disease in such a such a pattern. When we biopsy/autopsy the joint we see such and such an inflammatory process which differs from normal joints and other diseases, say rheumatoid arthritis. Evolution is unnecessary.
A good example. The person who performed the first heart transplant: Christiaan Barnard. He had zero training in evolution in his med school and post grad specialization. Yet he has been immortalized in history for this great feat.
J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
Not everything in medicine needs evolution, but in a world in which viruses
and bacteria are changing more and more rapidly, understanding evolution
helps a lot.
T
Tenofovir
Guest
We understand this by repeatedly sampling pathogen DNA/RNA. We know that mutations occur. We know that pathogens exchange DNA/RNA. We don’t need evolution in the sense of “man is descended from animals”. YECs accept this and so this is a defeater to those fundamentalist atheists and science fetishists who want to use evolution as some sort of rule of thumb to determine if someone can do good science or not.
It’s like using porcine (pig) valves in humans. We don’t need to understand how at some stage in the past man’s ancestor and the pig’s ancestor were one and the same. We need to understand pig and human physiology, anatomy and histology today and now and we then can employ the grafts or valves in human beings with some success. We have no way of knowing if such an ancestor existed or not, but we suspect it did, yet it has no bearing at all on whether a porcine graft will hold in such and such a patient.
Note that the knowledge of pig and man’s anatomy does not come from study of evolution. Rather we studied man and have been eating pork for 1000s of years and one day scientists started studying pigs.
L
lightbeamrider
Guest
There are examples from Scripture where God sends deceiving spirits. 1 Kings 22:20-22. There is confusion and madness as curses in Dt.28. Some are turned over to a depraved mind in Romans. Believe lies. (1:25)
T
Tenofovir
Guest
All in all I think talk of evolution is a red herring. There is a probably some sort of battle going on between militant atheists/science fetishists and the religious/Church. The former want to push their morality on all people, and they think evolution undermines Christianity. It does not. Even St Thomas Aquinas hinted that evolution is true, this was centuries before Darwin. He did not think it undermined the existence of God or morality or any such. He is after all a saint. He should surely have been burned at the stake for heresy… ne? 
America with its anti-evolution conservative and scientifically backward (as many science fetishist or GNU atheist will proclaim) population somehow is the leading country for science and technology in the world and not just because of its size (certainly USSR/China/India do much worse).
Gosh how can this be? Simple. Obviously evolution is irrelevant except to the few fields of evolutionary psychology etc, which are not very helpful.
America with its anti-evolution conservative and scientifically backward (as many science fetishist or GNU atheist will proclaim) population somehow is the leading country for science and technology in the world and not just because of its size (certainly USSR/China/India do much worse).
Gosh how can this be? Simple. Obviously evolution is irrelevant except to the few fields of evolutionary psychology etc, which are not very helpful.
J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
I do believe Carm answers your blasphemous suggestion that God is a deceiver.
carm.org/god-send-deceiving-spirit-1kings-22-22
And about your accusation that God causes confusion to people “ON PURPOSE”
as seen in Deuteronomy 28, the context is speaking on a psychological level, not
an intellectual level, that men will be cured with madness etc. Besides, we are liv-
ing in a time when God doesn’t exercise terrible curses upon his creation, as this
is the Age of Grace.
DOTH THOU DENIETH THE WORDS OF PAUL?
“For God is not the God of dissension, but of peace:
as also I teach in all the churches of the saints.”
– (1 Corinthians 14:33)
L
lightbeamrider
Guest
Carm is virulently anti Catholic. In that manner CARM finds common ground with the KKK.
Accusations? On purpose? You need to work on your comprehension.
LOL. All those things mentioned in the curses section of Deut. happens in this age of grace. Deut. 28 is not obsolete.
E
edwest2
Guest
D
dshix
Guest
Whoa. I had to leave the forum for a few days due to business and this thread exploded. 
Will take me a while to catch up.
Will take me a while to catch up.
J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
I did not realize the KKK part, can this be verified?
I do realize that they are anti-Catholic, that’s why I would not
look to them if I wanted to find Catholic Doctrine and so forth.
Can you find from a Catholic source giving something alterna-
tive to what Carm said about 1 Kings 22?
Well when one asks “Is God a trickster,” and your response is:
What else am I supposed to think?
Can this be demonstrated?
J
Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
Challenge?
E
edwest2
Guest
Gregor Mendel found that “… certain traits in pea plants follows particular patterns, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance. The profound significance of Mendel’s work was not recognized until the turn of the 20th century, when the independent rediscovery of these laws initiated the modern science of genetics.” A google search would find the story.
Modern drug discovery is based on trial and error. It is not predictive. Since a virus like HIV/AIDS has the built-in ability to change its outer protein coat, scientists are having a hard time dealing with it. In general, drug discovery, as practiced today, involves hundreds of containers filled with the virus/bacteria/cancer cells and different chemical combinations are tried. Those that did not harm the target get marked off, those that did are examined further. Animal models are next. They contain the virus/bacteria/cells and the drug is injected. Side effects are observed. For example, if the animal dies, a lower dose is tried, but if the lower dose does not have an effect on the target, other candidates are injected. Once an effective drug is found, the side effects are measured. If the animal shows minimal side effects, then an application has to go to the FDA to get permission to try the treatment on human subjects.
A general google search will reveal the time and money needed to find a successful drug candidate, but generally speaking, some side effects may appear in some percentage of patients if the drug passes clinical trials and gets FDA approval, which can take years.
Recently, a brand name drug has been shown to cause diabetes in some women, who are now entitled to some form of compensation. It would be inappropriate to name it here.
Viruses and bacteria have well-known built-in machinery to deal with outside threats. Human beings have some, but not others.
Peace,
Ed
- Status