Should Christians embrace evolution ?

[rossum]

Mathematics deals with probabilities.

As does science. If you look at a scientific paper there will be error bars on the experimental results. Those error bars are usually set at 95% or so. For example the currently accepted value of the Gravitational constant is G = (6.67428 ± 0.00067) x 10[sup]-11[/sup]. There is a 95% probability that the actual value of the constant lies with the given plus or minus error range. Your understanding of science is deficient.

Evolutionary proponents imagine that they can suspend the rules of science to declare that because they cannot prove that one fossil is the ancestor to another

Again you are showing your deficient understanding of science. There is no proof in science. Proof is for mathematics, not science. As I said before, if you want absolute certainty then science is the wrong place for you. In science you will only ever get probabilities. The error in the gravitational constant is in the fifth significant figure. The errors in the evolutionary hierarchy of common descent are in the eleventh significant figure.

You make my point. See how easy it is to shift definitions within evolutionary science, so-called?

You failed to answer my question. Were you talking about Genus Homo or species Homo sapiens? If you ask an imprecise question then you will get an imprecise answer.

Such subjective language.

Have a look at the chart again. Take a ruler and measure the distances between the three peaks. There is nothing subjective about my use of the word “closer”.

rossum

 

[StAnastasia]

Why does anyone think that Creation in the Bible precludes or excludes evolution? As long as we don’t believe that our ancestors were apes, why can’t it be both/and?

Human and apes share common ancestry. Humans aren’t descended from modern apes.

 

[StAnastasia]

Well, StAnastasia -

I’m humbled by a lot of things, when I take time to think, too.
I wish you and yours a safe and peaceful Thanksgiving Day, Mass and family Dinner.

You too, Donsnow. Mine are out of school and we are baking pumpkin pies and talking theology! Happy Thanksgiving. I may be off line after tomorrow; my father’s country cabin where we will be staying has no Internet.

 

[PEPCIS]

"rossum:

Can you tell by looking at a fossil how many children that fossil had and how many children those children themselves had? Neither can the scientists, which is why they only claim what they can be sure of. “Potential ancestor” is the best that you will get. If you want absolute certainty then go and talk to a Jehova’s Witness. Science deals with probabilities

.

PEPCIS:

Mathematics deals with probabilities.

As does science. If you look at a scientific paper there will be error bars on the experimental results. Those error bars are usually set at 95% or so. For example the currently accepted value of the Gravitational constant is G = (6.67428 ± 0.00067) x 10[sup]-11[/sup]. There is a 95% probability that the actual value of the constant lies with the given plus or minus error range. Your understanding of science is deficient.

Insults not-with-standing, the point is not that science does not use mathematics to explain the level of uncertainty in a conclusion, but rather that evolutionary science (a different creature than “science”) ABUSES the use of probability in the support of baseless conclusions (read: having no basis in scientific fact).

This was particularly shown in our discussion when I pointed out the pathetic lack of fossil evidence in regards to the specimens (or lack of them) which we discussed - yet this did not prevent evolutionists from SPECULATING about their supposed positioning in the chain of life. All of that (the positioning of fossil specimens into a chronological chain of life) was accomplished without ever once having any witness of the event, but basing it upon SPECULATION.

Evolutionary proponents imagine that they can suspend the rules of science to declare that because they cannot prove that one fossil is the ancestor to another, that they can miraculously determine which fossil is related to another solely on the chance of probabilities - which themselves are not related to any aspect of paleontology.

rossum:

Again you are showing your deficient understanding of science. There is no proof in science.

I never said that there was. However, there is the idea of falsification, which is the fancy way of saying “prove.” In science, if the idea is not falsifiable, it is not a proper scientific proposition. Since placing specimins into a chain of life is lacking any PHYSICAL means of falsification, then it is rightly rejected by creationists.

rossum:

Have a look at the chart again. Take a ruler and measure the distances between the three peaks. There is nothing subjective about my use of the word “closer”.

It didn’t change. It’s still subjective. You want me to look again? I don’t think if I looked at it a hundred times that the subjectiveness would ever change.

 

[Catholic_Johnny]

Let us move beyond the polite jousting and fencing and cut to the heart of the matter. The modernist wants to subject all reality to evolutionism as did Teillard de Chardin, who’s works remain under the monitum. The modernist posits so-called science (actually unproven theories dependent upon faith) against religion and these impertinent thieves and liars impose the idea upon the faithful that Truth itself evolves. They do so under the name of Catholic and indeed have successfully infiltrated the heirarchy of the Church. St. Pius X thunders against them in *Pascendi Dominici Gregis *with undiminished prophetic exhortation:

1. To finish with this whole question of faith and its shoots, it remains to be seen, Venerable Brethren, what the Modernists have to say about their development. First of all they lay down the general principle that in a living religion everything is subject to change, and must change, and in this way they pass to what may be said to be, among the chief of their doctrines, that of Evolution. To the laws of evolution everything is subject - dogma, Church, worship, the Books we revere as sacred, even faith itself, and the penalty of disobedience is death. The enunciation of this principle will not astonish anybody who bears in mind what the Modernists have had to say about each of these subjects. Having laid down this law of evolution, the Modernists themselves teach us how it works out. And first with regard to faith. The primitive form of faith, they tell us, was rudimentary and common to all men alike, for it had its origin in human nature and human life. Vital evolution brought with it progress, not by the accretion of new and purely adventitious forms from without, but by an increasing penetration of the religious sentiment in the conscience.

The modernist also flippantly shoves our Blessed Redeemer Jesus Christ to the side and attempts to deconstruct Genesis on his own philosophical terms. Jesus upholds Mosaic authorship and St. Basil the Great in his glorious Hexameron makes this the primary consideration when treating Genesis: Moses spoke with God ‘face to face.’ Jesus spoke with Moses at the Transfiguration.

Do not attempt to steal St. Thomas Acquinas in support of your errors, modernists. It is the Angelic Doctor who tells us in Summa:

“Christ’s human intellect is enriched with the fullness of infused knowledge. For, by reason of the hypostatic union, the human faculties of our Lord are as perfect as such faculties can possibly be; and to have infused knowledge is a perfection of the human mind. By divinely infused knowledge, Christ as a man knows all that any or all human minds can learn by the rational power (for instance, Christ perfectly knows all human sciences); he also knows all revealed truths, and all truths made known to the human mind by the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the gratuitous graces.”

Moreover, evolutionists posit an ignorant Adam who gradually increased in wisdom and knowledge through evolutionary progress. The reality is that Adam, who also spoke with God ‘face to face’ experienced paradisical life in perfect innocence and lived 930 years. Rather than being one step from an ignorant brute primate Adam is made ‘a little lower than a god’ (Psalm 8) and taught the entire human race those truths we read in Genesis 1-3. Adam is the genius son of God, father of our humanity and in his 930 years acquired wisdom, knowledge and experience that modernists not only deny but agressively argue against because this Adam overthrows the entire gradual progress theory and renders anthropological evolution bankrupt.

Lastly, there are no intermediate stages of civilization available to archeologists. Civilization emerges full blown and mature in Mesopotamia less than 10,000 years ago just as Genesis describes. There are zero, none, nada archeological evidences in existence that offer empirical evidence for a pre-Mesopotamian civilization. Spurrious dating methods such as carbon dating do not satisfy evidentiary requirements that are met by archeological standards. If anthropological evolutionism were true, there would be layers and layers of archeological evidence to consider, especially among modernists who subscribe to the failing theory of geological uniformitarianism.

Jesus Christ our Blessed Redeemer is referred to by St. Paul as the Second Adam. Adam is relevant to our Christology. The true Adam taught by the Catholic Church is the diametrical opposite of the bizarre charicature modernists make of him (you’ve seen the GEICO ads - “so easy, even a cavemen can do it.”)

Happy Thanksgiving,
cj

 

[blairius]

. . .
Lastly, there are no intermediate stages of civilization available to archeologists. Civilization emerges full blown and mature in Mesopotamia less than 10,000 years ago just as Genesis describes. There are zero, none, nada archeological evidences in existence that offer empirical evidence for a pre-Mesopotamian civilization. Spurious dating methods such as carbon dating do not satisfy evidentiary requirements that are met by archeological standards. If anthropological evolutionism were true, there would be layers and layers of archeological evidence to consider, especially among modernists who subscribe to the failing theory of geological uniformitarianism.

Jesus Christ our Blessed Redeemer is referred to by St. Paul as the Second Adam. Adam is relevant to our Christology. The true Adam taught by the Catholic Church is the diametrical opposite of the bizarre charicature modernists make of him (you’ve seen the GEICO ads - “so easy, even a cavemen can do it.”)

Happy Thanksgiving,
cj

Human bones, cave paintings and Neolithic axe heads are the only pieces of evidence (that I know of).

There’s a mathematical equation for human population growth which can be used in reverse to estimate world population in the millennia BC. One can use various data points and assumptions, like the average number of children (that live long enough to reproduce themselves) and the estimated European population before and after the Black Plague years or at the beginning of the Roman Empire (world pop estimate of 100-300 million). I crunched this stuff once and got 2 people at about 10000 BC. If the big theory of evolution is true, then this population paradox must be accounted for: how did the small tribes of Homo Sapiens live from the Toba supervolcano (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toba_catastrophe_theory), thru a couple of ice sheet maxima and make it to 10000 BC ? - that’s over 60,000 years.

 

[bluelake]

The title of a new book. The preface is here:

mothwo.blogspot.com/2009/09/new-book-should-christians-embrace.html

An issue that is at the forefront of a global anti-theist marketing campaign, including this forum. The goal is to create a sense of urgency linked with an emotional plea for acceptance. I would encourage my Fellow Catholics to abandon any sense of urgency regarding this subject, read what the Church has said and written about it, and be mindful that the origin of man cannot be fully explained by science.

Peace,
Ed

We, as christians walk by faith.
The origen of man according to the word of God can be found in Gen.1
The Bible isn’t a science book

God bless,
bluelake

 

[Abu]

StAnastasia:
“Denton is beloved of creationists who conveniently overlook the fact that, in his second book Nature’s Destiny, he recanted his earlier anti-evolutionary stance, while remaining theistic.”

No, Dr Denton is not a theist but a naturalist, still feeling that “the cosmos……can be comprehended ultimately in its entirety by human reason and in which all phenomena, including life and evolution and the origin of man, are ultimately explicable in terms of natural processes.” (Nature’s Destiny, xviii).

Even that the you failed to understand, as your grasp of facts is very tenuous.

Readers need to know:
“9. Naturalism. Let us take the important question of the origin of biological life. Denton admits that no naturalistic theory of evolution has suggested a scientifically credible answer to this. In Denton’s own words: “But even if it seems very likely that the becoming of life is built in, it has to be admitted that at present, despite an enormous effort, we still have no idea how this occurred, and the event remains as enigmatic as ever” (ND 293). What he is saying in effect is this: Granted that creation by God is excluded, empirical scientists have no idea how biological life originated. And Denton excludes creation by God in keeping with his naturalistic presupposition that “the cosmos is a seamless unity” in which “all phenomena, including life and evolution and the origin of man, are ultimately explicable in terms of natural processes” (ND xviii). For Denton, this is “the basic naturalistic assumption of modern science” (see paragraph 4 above).

"With regard to this principle I would offer two distinctions. First of all, it is a basic assumption of many, probably most, modern empirical scientists that physical nature is a closed system ultimately explainable in terms only of itself, but this assumption is not essential to the findings and structure of modern science. Secondly, it is reasonable for an empirical science which as such is based strictly upon the observation and statistical recording of natural recurrences, not to be able to recognize within its own field of competence divine interventions or even interventions caused by free human decisions. But that does not entitle empirical scientists to exclude divine or human interventions that are observable in other fields of science, such as the fields of history, philosophy, and theology. Nor is an empirical scientist justified in limiting certified knowledge to the data of the empirical sciences and in thus excluding his need to acknowledge the results of other sciences. Hence, what comes particularly into focus at this point is the difference between simply not finding divine interventions within the special fields of empirical science and declaring, as an empirical scientist, that no such divine interventions have taken place or are even possible. The fact is that every empirical scientist is living in a larger world of reality and reasonably needs to fit his specialized knowledge into the knowledge of the larger world. [My underlining].

“Denton’s work is a pathfinder for the sincere Darwinian who is striving to find his way out of the purposeless world of “evolution by chance alone.” Denton’s concluding statement about the design of the universe is an eloquent tribute to a reality that goes beyond the misconstrued world of Darwinism…” [My emphasis]
[Msgr John F McCarthy: LT117 - Michael Denton's Nature's Destiny - Book Review]

 

[Catholic_Johnny]

Human bones, cave paintings and Neolithic axe heads are the only pieces of evidence (that I know of).

Exactly, Blairius. They can also be attributed to the types of nonliterate aborigynal societies that are with us to this day.

There’s a mathematical equation for human population growth which can be used in reverse to estimate world population in the millennia BC. One can use various data points and assumptions, like the average number of children (that live long enough to reproduce themselves) and the estimated European population before and after the Black Plague years or at the beginning of the Roman Empire (world pop estimate of 100-300 million). I crunched this stuff once and got 2 people at about 10000 BC. If the big theory of evolution is true, then this population paradox must be accounted for: how did the small tribes of Homo Sapiens live from the Toba supervolcano (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toba_catastrophe_theory), thru a couple of ice sheet maxima and make it to 10000 BC ? - that’s over 60,000 years.

Well done! But we also have the Hebrew genealogies that go back to Adam which are quoted by Matthew and Luke.

Happy Thanksgiving!
cj

 

[StAnastasia]

Even that the you failed to understand, as your grasp of facts is very tenuous.rl]

Abu, I take it you are not a scientist.

 

[rossum]

Insults not-with-standing, the point is not that science does not use mathematics to explain the level of uncertainty in a conclusion, but rather that evolutionary science (a different creature than “science”) ABUSES the use of probability in the support of baseless conclusions (read: having no basis in scientific fact).

Please show us, together with your calculations, where evolutionary science abuses probability calculations. For example, where are the errors in this paper: Selander et al (1986) Methods of Multilocus Enzyme Electrophoresis for Bacterial Population Genetics and Systematics?

This was particularly shown in our discussion when I pointed out the pathetic lack of fossil evidence in regards to the specimens (or lack of them) which we discussed

While we would indeed like to have more fossils to study there are enough available to provide a reasonable outline of what happened. Your sources on the fossil record are incorrect, as is shown by the mention of Piltdown (disproved since 1953) and Nebraska man (error recognised in 1927). We have gathered a lot more evidence since then.

All of that (the positioning of fossil specimens into a chronological chain of life) was accomplished without ever once having any witness of the event, but basing it upon SPECULATION.

Forensic science also may have to work without any witness to the event. Are you going to release all prisoners convicted solely on the basis of forensic evidence? We can use what we see in the present to make reasonable extrapolations about what went on in the past. Every non-avian dinosaur fossil ever found is dated before every ape fossil ever found. Are you saying that it is not reasonable to conclude that the non-avian dinosaurs went extinct before the apes evolved?

I never said that there was.

It certainly looked like it to me. To quote your post: “because they cannot prove that one fossil is the ancestor to another” (emphasis added). Why do you criticise biologists for using probabilistic methods in science, when you are aware that there is no proof in science?

However, there is the idea of falsification, which is the fancy way of saying “prove.”

This is incorrect logic. Just because something has not yet been falsified does not make it proven. To take a mathematical example, nobody has yet falsified the Goldbach Conjecture yet no mathematician will describe it as proved. Its status is still uncertain.

In science, if the idea is not falsifiable, it is not a proper scientific proposition. Since placing specimins into a chain of life is lacking any PHYSICAL means of falsification, then it is rightly rejected by creationists.

Have you ever read Darwin? He gave us two ways to falsify his theory:If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.

If it could be proved that any part of the structure of any one species had been formed for the exclusive good of another species, it would annihilate my theory, for such could not have been produced through natural selection.

• both from Chapter Six of Origins.
  Haldane’s Devonian rabbit is another possible falsification.

Contrary to your statement, it is creationism which cannot be falsified. Darwin described things which could not evolve. Can creationism describe things which could not have been created?

rossum

 

[Ismael]

Could you please tell me which part of the following is “allegory” and which part I can believe as “literal”?

[SIGN]1In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
2And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.[/SIGN]

It’s all allegorical. Unlike, for example, the Book of Kings, it’s not an historical account.

To take this passage literally contraddicts the facts we have observed.

Why can’t it be a layman’s account, as dictated by God through His Spirit, as the Bible claims it is? But more to the point, how is the Biblical story of creation any different than the Just-so stories of evolutionists?

What are the ‘just-so stories’ of evolutionists?

Anyway:

1- The Bible
The Bible is written by men inspired by God. (It’s not like the Quran, which Muslims believe to be directly written by God)

**The scope of the Bible **is theological (we learn about God because God revealed Himself to us through the prophets) and moral (God teaches us, through the prophets, what is right and wrong).

God did not intend the Bible to be a substitute for reason and for ‘scientific research’. Those things we can accomplish by ourself with our own mind and intelligence (which is a gift from God and He gave it to us to use).

Since scientific research come from reason, it needs not to be revealed to us by God.

2- Evolutionary theories
Evolutionary theories are models based upon empirical proofs: experiments, observations, etc…

These theories are correct as long as they do not contraddict the fact.

If in the future some facts will be discorvered that prove the theory of evolution wrong, than it’s wrong… for now it’s an acceptable theory to explain the facts.

But of course. My point was that Augustine rejected a straight allegorical approach for one that was literal. He insisted that we should only propose an allegorical interpretation for those verses which clearly could not be interpreted literally.

Yes, Augustine says that the Bible is allegorical where a literal interpretation contraddicts the facts given us through reason.

Since we have a good idea how the universe developed, we can pretty much take Genesis 1-3 as allegorical.

Allegorical does not mean that the Bible is wrong or false, but that the author who wrote those texts was using symbolic language to convey his message.
Understanding which is which is not an impossibly hard task: reason itself aids us.

The historical accounts in the Bible for example are literal, since they are quite accurate (there might be some small imprecisions here and there, but that happens in most non religious historical documents as well).

The visions of the prophets are symbolical in nature (I think anyone agrees to that).

So Augustine was an evolutionist?

No. The theory of evolution did not exist and the awareness of evolution in nature was minimal if not nihil. So he could not have been an evolutionist.

I believe he might have accepted evolution if he lived in our time (but it is only speculation)

Also: what you mean by “evolutionist”. Are you refering to ‘merely accepting evolution’ or believing that ‘evolution explains everything’?

A person who accepts evolution as it is: scientific theory that relates to the physical world does not need to be an atheist or a materialist.

 

[buffalo]

In science you will only ever get probabilities.

As does ID.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

This is how I look at it not being a scientific expert. I trust in God.

I know that God created the Universe and all creatures. For me it does not really matter how this came about as I know that God is behind it all.

 

[buffalo]

Let us move beyond the polite jousting and fencing and cut to the heart of the matter. The modernist wants to subject all reality to evolutionism as did Teillard de Chardin, who’s works remain under the monitum. The modernist posits so-called science (actually unproven theories dependent upon faith) against religion and these impertinent thieves and liars impose the idea upon the faithful that Truth itself evolves. They do so under the name of Catholic and indeed have successfully infiltrated the heirarchy of the Church. St. Pius X thunders against them in *Pascendi Dominici Gregis *with undiminished prophetic exhortation:

The modernist also flippantly shoves our Blessed Redeemer Jesus Christ to the side and attempts to deconstruct Genesis on his own philosophical terms. Jesus upholds Mosaic authorship and St. Basil the Great in his glorious Hexameron makes this the primary consideration when treating Genesis: Moses spoke with God ‘face to face.’ Jesus spoke with Moses at the Transfiguration.

Do not attempt to steal St. Thomas Acquinas in support of your errors, modernists. It is the Angelic Doctor who tells us in Summa:

Moreover, evolutionists posit an ignorant Adam who gradually increased in wisdom and knowledge through evolutionary progress. The reality is that Adam, who also spoke with God ‘face to face’ experienced paradisical life in perfect innocence and lived 930 years. Rather than being one step from an ignorant brute primate Adam is made ‘a little lower than a god’ (Psalm 8) and taught the entire human race those truths we read in Genesis 1-3. Adam is the genius son of God, father of our humanity and in his 930 years acquired wisdom, knowledge and experience that modernists not only deny but agressively argue against because this Adam overthrows the entire gradual progress theory and renders anthropological evolution bankrupt.

Lastly, there are no intermediate stages of civilization available to archeologists. Civilization emerges full blown and mature in Mesopotamia less than 10,000 years ago just as Genesis describes. There are zero, none, nada archeological evidences in existence that offer empirical evidence for a pre-Mesopotamian civilization. Spurrious dating methods such as carbon dating do not satisfy evidentiary requirements that are met by archeological standards. If anthropological evolutionism were true, there would be layers and layers of archeological evidence to consider, especially among modernists who subscribe to the failing theory of geological uniformitarianism.

Jesus Christ our Blessed Redeemer is referred to by St. Paul as the Second Adam. Adam is relevant to our Christology. The true Adam taught by the Catholic Church is the diametrical opposite of the bizarre charicature modernists make of him (you’ve seen the GEICO ads - “so easy, even a cavemen can do it.”)

Happy Thanksgiving,
cj

CJ you are right. To evo’s the arrow points up. To the Catholic the arrow points down.

 

[buffalo]

It’s all allegorical. Unlike, for example, the Book of Kings, it’s not an historical account.

To take this passage literally contraddicts the facts we have observed.

What are the ‘just-so stories’ of evolutionists?

Anyway:

1- The Bible
The Bible is written by men inspired by God. (It’s not like the Quran, which Muslims believe to be directly written by God)

**The scope of the Bible **is theological (we learn about God because God revealed Himself to us through the prophets) and moral (God teaches us, through the prophets, what is right and wrong).

God did not intend the Bible to be a substitute for reason and for ‘scientific research’. Those things we can accomplish by ourself with our own mind and intelligence (which is a gift from God and He gave it to us to use).

Since scientific research come from reason, it needs not to be revealed to us by God.

2- Evolutionary theories
Evolutionary theories are models based upon empirical proofs: experiments, observations, etc…

These theories are correct as long as they do not contraddict the fact.

If in the future some facts will be discorvered that prove the theory of evolution wrong, than it’s wrong… for now it’s an acceptable theory to explain the facts.

Yes, Augustine says that the Bible is allegorical where a literal interpretation contraddicts the facts given us through reason.

Since we have a good idea how the universe developed, we can pretty much take Genesis 1-3 as allegorical.

Allegorical does not mean that the Bible is wrong or false, but that the author who wrote those texts was using symbolic language to convey his message.
Understanding which is which is not an impossibly hard task: reason itself aids us.

The historical accounts in the Bible for example are literal, since they are quite accurate (there might be some small imprecisions here and there, but that happens in most non religious historical documents as well).

The visions of the prophets are symbolical in nature (I think anyone agrees to that).

No. The theory of evolution did not exist and the awareness of evolution in nature was minimal if not nihil. So he could not have been an evolutionist.

I believe he might have accepted evolution if he lived in our time (but it is only speculation)

Also: what you mean by “evolutionist”. Are you refering to ‘merely accepting evolution’ or believing that ‘evolution explains everything’?

A person who accepts evolution as it is: scientific theory that relates to the physical world does not need to be an atheist or a materialist.

Wherever Revelation touches upon reality it is true. Science is a subset of truth not a superset. Faith and reason cannot be opposed for they flow from the very same God. Empirical science cannot be opposed. It is our human interpretation that can be wrong. To keep us on the right path our reasoning must be illuminated by Revelation.

The very first line of Genesis contains a lot more than meets the eye.

In the beginning - time
God created the heavens - space
and the earth - matter

Science has only confirmed this recently, but it was Revealed a very long time ago.

The Catholic Church has been defending against evolution right from the beginning. This is not new.

 

[Ismael]

Wherever Revelation touches upon reality it is true. Science is a subset of truth not a superset. Faith and reason cannot be opposed for they flow from the very same God. Empirical science cannot be opposed. It is our human interpretation that can be wrong. To keep us on the right path our reasoning must be illuminated by Revelation.

Exactly what Ausutine and Aquinas also stated (and more recently John Paul II and Benedict XVI)

The Catholic Church has been defending against evolution right from the beginning. This is not new.

I am not sure if the term ‘defending’ is strictly correct, but Pius XII, in the 50’s (when evolution was not yet backed by empirical research as thourroughly as it is now, certainly not from invetsigation of the DNA of different species) in Humani Generis stated that The Theory of Evolution was an interesting theory and that it did not contraddict the Christian faith.

Pius XII only disapproved of ‘polygenism’, however I think the recent popes did not argue against it.

 

[buffalo]

Exactly what Ausutine and Aquinas also stated (and more recently John Paul II and Benedict XVI)

I am not sure if the term ‘defending’ is strictly correct, but Pius XII, in the 50’s (when evolution was not yet backed by empirical research as thourroughly as it is now, certainly not from invetsigation of the DNA of different species) in Humani Generis stated that The Theory of Evolution was an interesting theory and that it did not contraddict the Christian faith.

Pius XII only disapproved of ‘polygenism’, however I think the recent popes did not argue against it.

THe thinking that led down the path to evolution was present as early as 7BC. The ECF’s had much to say on it.

 

[tjm190]

Exactly my point. You’re simply operating from talking points. This is the old evo-argument which claims that “a theory is more than just a theory when everyone (read: evolutionists) all agree to it.”

No… I’m saying theory has more than one definition. Evolution is an explanation for a natural phenomena supported by a great deal of evidence- so it’s a theory. “it’s possible that XXX may have YYY effect on ZZZ” is a theory too. The two are not equivalent.

Well, that’s the claim, now isn’t it? The hard part is to prove it by scientific evidence.

Prove what? I’m telling you what the word theory means in that context. Linguistics isn’t an empirical science.

Evolutionists say that all the time. Where have you been?

In general out of frustration when those they debate against have thrown up the ‘well you can never be 100% sure’ brick wall.

 

[Ismael]

THe thinking that led down the path to evolution was present as early as 7BC. The ECF’s had much to say on it.

Uhm…ok, I am not an expert on the ‘ancient history of the theory of evolution’… I usaually go as far as Mendel