Sites to answer an evolutionist?

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Reepicheep

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Before stating my request:
I think this forum is the most appropriate one in which to post this. If I’m mistaken, I would ask the first Moderator who notices this thread to move it to the correct forum, or to remove it altogether if that seems best to you.

Now my problem:
I’m about to get into a discussion on the subject of Evolution, with a good friend who is a convinced Athiest.He has a good scientific education, knows more about the Theory of Evolution than I do, and is about 30 IQ points brighter than I am.

I therefore urgently request of any who know. Where can I find good, reliable scientific information on the subjects of archelogy, paleantology, the age of the Earth and the Universe…that will be accepted and respected by a scientifically educated Athiest, but that does not simply dismiss out of hand the possibility that Evolution is wrong?

Please, do not proint me to any Young Earth Creationist sites. He and I are in agreement that the Earth’s age is measured in billions of years, not thousands of years.
 
Evolution and Catholic teaching are not automatically at odds. It depends entirely on what is meant by evolution and what one concludes as far as the purpose of life. Evolution in no way proves Atheism.

Scott
 
Scott Waddell:
Evolution and Catholic teaching are not automatically at odds. It depends entirely on what is meant by evolution and what one concludes as far as the purpose of life. Evolution in no way proves Atheism.
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Nor, should one use this science to interpret, or debunk, or allegorize, the first book of the Bible.
 
New-found skull could sink our current ideas about human evolution.

After a decade of digging through the sand dunes of northern Chad, Michel Brunet found a skull 6-7 million years old. He named it Toumaï.

Toumaï is thought to be the oldest fossil from a member of the human family. It’s a dispatch from the time when humans and chimpanzee were going their separate evolutionary ways. A thrilling, but confusing dispatch1,2.

Sahelanthropus tchadensis - Toumaï’s scientific name - was probably one of many similar species living in Africa at that time. “There must have been a group of apes knocking around between 5 and 8 million years ago for which there’s a very poor fossil record,” says anthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University in Washington DC.

Toumaï is the tip of that iceberg - one that could sink our current ideas about human evolution. “Anybody who thinks this isn’t going to get more complex isn’t learning from history,” says Wood.

“When I went to medical school in 1963, human evolution looked like a ladder,” he says. The ladder stepped from monkey to man through a progression of intermediates, each slightly less ape-like than the last.

Now human evolution looks like a bush. We have a menagerie of fossil hominids - the group containing everything thought more closely related to humans than chimps. How they are related to each other and which, if any of them, are human forebears is still debated.

Most members of the group are less than three million years old. After Toumaï, the next-oldest hominid is the 6-million-year old Orrorin tugenensis. But Orrorin is known only from a few teeth and bone scraps, and its evolutionary allegiances are controversial.

Our knowledge of Toumaï’s period is “at the 1963 stage”, says Wood.

more…
 
I am a Geologist by degree and trade. Evolution is just a theory and not a real good one at that. It is silly to believe that an animal can crawl out of the sea grow lungs etc. and become a land animal and survive during the interim.

I took quite a bit of paleontology while going to the University. You see the fossil record is really quite complete for about 600 million years. During this time we see a giant expansion of complex lifte forms.

These life forms appear and dissapear dramatically and rapidly at various and numerous times to the present. In the fossil record there are no apparent ‘Missing Link’ that show one life form evolving into another life form-period-none. This I believe is the same with the so called ‘Evolution of Man’ . Ask your bright friend -Where are the missing links?

Also the mathmatics of life appearing randomly in 4.5 billion years are scientifically impossible, mute, nada, zilch - period! That is also a fact that can be verified.

There are numerous books contesting Darwinism on the market.
 
<< I therefore urgently request of any who know. Where can I find good, reliable scientific information on the subjects of archelogy, paleantology, the age of the Earth and the Universe…that will be accepted and respected by a scientifically educated Athiest, but that does not simply dismiss out of hand the possibility that Evolution is wrong? >>

Short answer: a university library. 👍

Or buy my top three books by Christian evolutionists:

Perspectives on an Evolving Creation edited by Keith Miller
Coming to Peace with Science by Darrel Falk
Finding Darwin’s God by Kenneth Miller

And I second the American Scientific Affiliation of Christians mentioned by Orogeny above.

Here is a presentation "Beyond the Evolution vs. Creation Debate" by Denis Lamoureux you both should watch, he lays it all out. He’s a former young earther, evangelical Christian.

And don’t forget the 2004 statement on creation and evolution released by Cardinal Ratzinger’s International Theological Commission, read especially paragraphs 62-70.

Phil P
 
I am a Catholic who regards himself as relatively bright. While I do not subscribe to the argument that God created the world in 7 “human” days I have no doubt that he created the universe, solar system, earth, and man. I once knew a bright Priest who worked on the Mercury and Gemini space programs back in the 1960’s. What he told me I tend to adhere to. “The universe is so complex, yet orderly and the odds of it all coming together at just the right place and time at random to form everything, including humans, is by most peoples counts, mathmatically impossible, or at least the odds are some gigantic number to one.” If anything science is helping to prove that there is a God because everytime we discover a new scientific equation to explain something, see into new depths of the universe, discover the interconnection of all life on this planet; we discover that despite its enormity, it all has a set of laws and orders that it follows. This would not be possible without God."
 
rsage << I am a Geologist by degree and trade. >>

I doubt that. 😛 Are you sure?

rsage << Evolution is just a theory >>

“Often the statement ‘Well, it’s just a theory,’ is used to dismiss controversial theories such as evolution, but this is largely due to confusion between the scientific use of the word theory and its more informal use as a synonym for ‘speculation’ or ‘conjecture.’ In science, a body of descriptions of knowledge is usually only called a theory once it has a firm empirical basis, i.e. it is consistent with pre-existing theory to the extent that the pre-existing theory was experimentally verified, though it will often show pre-existing theory to be wrong in an exact sense, is supported by many strands of evidence rather than a single foundation, ensuring that it probably is a good approximation if not totally correct, has survived many critical real world tests that could have proven it false, makes predictions that might someday be used to disprove the theory, and is the best known explanation, in the sense of Occam’s Razor, of the infinite variety of alternative explanations for the same data. This is true of such established theories as evolution, special and general relativity, quantum mechanics (with minimal interpretation), plate tectonics, etc.” (see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory)

rsage << and not a real good one at that. >>

“While there is little consensus among scientists about how the origin of this first microscopic life is to be explained, there is general agreement among them that the first organism dwelt on this planet about 3.5 - 4 billion years ago. Since it has been demonstrated that all living organisms on earth are genetically related, it is virtually certain that all living organisms have descended from this first organism. Converging evidence from many studies in the physical and biological sciences furnishes mounting support for some theory of evolution to account for the development and diversification of life on earth, while controversy continues over the pace and mechanisms of evolution.” (Cardinal Ratzinger’s International Theological Commission, July 2004, especially paragraphs 62-70)

see also Evidence for Macroevolution by Theobald

rsage << It is silly to believe that an animal can crawl out of the sea grow lungs etc. and become a land animal and survive during the interim. >>

Acanthostega is a good candidate. Sounds half-fish, half-amphibian to me. There are many others.

rsage << In the fossil record there are no apparent ‘Missing Link’ that show one life form evolving into another life form-period-none. >>

I point to my own article and books you can find at your local university like On the Origin of Phyla by Valentine (invert to vert evolution), Gaining Ground by Clack (fish to amphibian evolution), Dinosaurs of the Air by Gregory Paul (reptile to bird evolution), and Vertebrate Paleontology and Evolution by Carroll (1988) and his recent books. The evidence is overwhelming for macroevolution. Sorry to disappoint. :rolleyes:

rsage << This I believe is the same with the so called ‘Evolution of Man’ . Ask your bright friend -Where are the missing links? >>

See same Cardinal Ratzinger’s International Theological Commission, paragraph 63 on human evolution. Also these Hominid Species are good candidates for missing links.

rsage << There are numerous books contesting Darwinism on the market. >>

Yeah, but no good ones. And none are written by professional biologists. BTW, “Darwinism” is not atheism, see this article Charles Darwin and Intelligent Design

The best recent one might be Uncommon Dissent: Intellectuals Who Find Darwinism Unconvincing (ISI Books, 2004) edited by Dembski. But I would recommend Keith Miller (geologist), Darrel Falk (biologist), and Ken Miller (biologist, no relation to Keith) as sufficient rebuttals. And please don’t bring up Mike Behe since he is a theistic evolutionist as I’ve demonstrated in 500 past threads. 😃

Phil P
 
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rsagebrush:
I am a Geologist by degree and trade. Evolution is just a theory and not a real good one at that.
Click to expand...
Just a theory? Like plate tectonics? How’d you do in structural geology?
It is silly to believe that an animal can crawl out of the sea grow lungs etc. and become a land animal and survive during the interim.
Click to expand...
The infamous argument from incredulity.
I took quite a bit of paleontology while going to the University. You see the fossil record is really quite complete for about 600 million years. During this time we see a giant expansion of complex lifte forms.

These life forms appear and dissapear dramatically and rapidly at various and numerous times to the present. In the fossil record there are no apparent ‘Missing Link’ that show one life form evolving into another life form-period-none. This I believe is the same with the so called ‘Evolution of Man’ . Ask your bright friend -Where are the missing links?
Click to expand...
Interesting. You used the term “missing link” in your study of paleontology:hmmm: ?

You are not aware of transitional forms or do you deny that they exist? Or did you miss that class?
Also the mathmatics of life appearing randomly in 4.5 billion years are scientifically impossible, mute, nada, zilch - period! That is also a fact that can be verified.
Click to expand...
What does that have to do with evolution?

Peace

Tim
 
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