We Don't Get It, So God Did It

Baniboy · July 5, 2009

When you're debating against an evolutionist, you can only use logic, science and evidence in your arguments. However we always see these idiots that like to attack against a scientific theory with very unscientific arguments, like Kent Hovind(who is now in the jail by the way ), and simply lying to people's faces!

How to not make a fool out of yourself in the eyes of who you're debating against and everyone else.

First note: Actually learn about what you're debating against, nobody will even consider debating you when you obviously have no understanding over the theory of evolution.

Got off with that, now some really stupid arguments you should not use:

1. "If evolution is true, then why there aren't any transitional fossils", probably what you'll receive as a response is silence. Not silence of "I don't what to say", more like: "I'm shocked of your stupidity". This is a lie that many people have repeated over and over again, they don't seem to understand that repeating a lie no matter how many times, doesn't make it true.

2. "Evolution says that we evolved from nothing". NO, NO, NO! This will make you look very stupid. There's abiogenesis to explain the origin of life and how life began on earth, which is a good theory and has been tested and apparently, long amino acid chains can form without fairy dust :excl:

3. "If we evolved from apes, why can't we see apes evolving into humanoids today?". Evolution doesn't state that we evolved from modern apes, but that we had a common ancestor. Remember, that every modern living being has evolved, not just us. Simply, from an early ape specie which then divided into 2 subspecies which then caused the extinction of the original specie since they were more succesful.

4. Don't use quotes of famous people stating god/creationism is real, it proves nothing but your idiocy. Many famous people in history believed the earth was flat. Did it make it flat? That is called quote mining FYI.

5. Stay in the point, if you're talking about common ancestry, don't start talking about "the eye is too complex to have evolved", ALRIGHT!?

6. "The eye/wings is/are too complex to have evolved" Take an example of flying bats, they're mammals, and their bones aren't like birds' bones. So why would an "intelligent designer" (aka god(s)) do that, if bats had liter bones they could fly like birds. The only way this is explainable today is with evolution.

I was just thinking of how I could find more of these stupid questions, and guess where? "Dr" Hovind's article of course!!! :excl: Take an example of a man that doesn't know difference between quantum physics, evolution theory, general physics, big bang theory, abiogenesis and much more. "Great" man claiming he has been teaching highschool science for 15 years yet he apparently couldn't even pass today's tests! I stopped reading after a while, since it kept getting more and more stupid, here's a small quote:

These questions are provided by Dr. Hovind and Creation Science Evangelism http://creationtoday.org/.

If you think evolutionists have all the answers, try a few of the following questions on 'em.

The test of any theory is whether or not it provides answers to basic questions? Some well-meaning but misguided people think evolution is a reasonable theory to explain man's questions about the universe. Evolution is not a good theory it is just a pagan religion masquerading as science.

1. Where did the space for the universe come from?

2. Where did matter come from?

3. Where did the laws of the universe come from (gravity, inertia, etc.)?

4. How did matter get so perfectly organized?

5. Where did the energy come from to do all the organizing?

6. When, where, why, and how did life come from dead matter?

7. When, where, why, and how did life learn to reproduce itself?

8. With what did the first cell capable of sexual reproduction reproduce?

9. Why would any plant or animal want to reproduce more of its kind since this would only make more mouths to feed and decrease the chances of survival? (Does the individual have a drive to survive, or the species? How do you explain this?)

10. How can mutations (recombining of the genetic code) create any new, improved varieties? (Recombining English letters will never produce Chinese books.)

11. Is it possible that similarities in design between different animals prove a common Creator instead of a common ancestor?

12. Natural selection only works with the genetic information available and tends only to keep a species stable. How would you explain the increasing complexity in the genetic code that must have occurred if evolution were true?

"Creation science"!!! that kept me laughing for a long looooooong time!

Let's answer, shall we?

1. That's not about evolution you idiot!

2. uhh... stupid people in this world...

3. This guy apparently does not understand what evolution is about.

4. Matter isn't perfectly organized, it is, however, organized which is caused by the laws of physics and again, has nothing to do with evolution. I saw this man other day on youtube asking why planets are round, he didn't know/understand so god must've done it. How stupid can people be? GRAVITY, I commented, yet he didn't accept that, perfect example of idiocy.

5. *SILENCE* :excl:

6. Read your textbooks or just google abiogenesis. The idiot who wrote this also wanted to include a "why" question. The truth is that we don't know, and that is a better answer than "god did it", because god did it means that we have already decided why and we are not gonna search for one and not even look at the evidence. "I don't know" is better because we are still searching. And I could also assume that when this person asks why, he probably is searching for inner meaning and purpose of life, which doesn't apparently exist. This person can not accept the fact that he/she isn't above the nature. This person can't accept that after death, there's simply nothing. No human being can, at least I think so. Trying to even think about complete zero is impossible, because human beings don't understand complete zero. I'm sure I can't, at least not if I actually start thinking about it and try to explain it. We can't accept that there is not much to life than a bunch of chemical reactions, not invisible energy.

7. DNA can reproduce without magic dust because sea floor contains amino acids. It has been proven that amino acid chains can make copies of themselves when there is material available PLUS the sea floor that had some of chemicals I can't remember right now that makes chaining process possible. This again, isn't about evolution, but I was nice enough to answer. :angel: and yet again, a "why" in the question... This is getting boring.

8. I don't personally know, but I found that there are some suggestions. Find about more in wikipedia: http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ But I would like to say that it couldn't be "a cell", since cells just divide into 2 cells. So it would've been a multi-cellular organism. Or maybe not, it could be possible that a cell could leave its duplicating RNA inside another cell, which would mess things up a bit and because I'm not a biologist, I'll leave this to biologists.

9. Because I'm not good at answering this, I'll mine a quote here

The Creationist fails to understand that evolution worksupon a species, not an individual within a group of individuals in that species.

Evolution is for explaining the diversity of life, not this crap.

10. In this sentence our "hero" doesn't realize that according to evolution, "letters" could change their shapes and form chinese letters which would then produce a chinese "book".

11. It is, but the "creator" would be an idiot! Incapable of producing quality stuff, and just changing the existing design when it could design anything!. I will quote another answer too:

What we find is that the genetic

simularities between two species indicate a perfect line

of speciation which is so complete that every animal now

living on the Earth as well as every plant so far

cataloged can be placed within a non-overlapping tree;

a perfect science. - flr

12. Kinda funny, because one of the primitive living organisms has much more DNA than human; Amoeba. Human genome also is not suuper-dooper-complex like they say, it's the same amount of data as 10 000 kilobytes. Back to the question, our hero, wannabedoctor Hovind doesn't apparently know anything about mutation and natural selection.

Most of people debating against evolution don't even understand it, and they don't even want to. Even if they did, THEY IGNORE THE FACTS.

Please reply! It would be fun if you shared your own ideas too.

truefusion · July 6, 2009

How to not make a fool out of yourself in the eyes of who you're debating against and everyone else.

Ooo, sounds interesting. Can i point things out, too?

Please reply! It would be fun if you shared your own ideas too.

Ah, thanks.

Actually learn about what you're debating against, nobody will even consider debating you when you obviously have no understanding over the theory of evolution.

I should point out before i start pointing things out that, while i'm not a supporter of God of the gaps arguments, me pointing things out that are against your statements does not necessarily mean i agree with what you rebuked or that i believe that the questions against the theory of evolution (regardless of whether or not they are relevant to the theory) has a point, but rather to basically show that nothing was really dealt with.

1. "If evolution is true, then why there aren't any transitional fossils", probably what you'll receive as a response is silence. Not silence of "I don't what to say", more like: "I'm shocked of your stupidity". This is a lie that many people have repeated over and over again, they don't seem to understand that repeating a lie no matter how many times, doesn't make it true.

2. "Evolution says that we evolved from nothing". NO, NO, NO! This will make you look very stupid. There's abiogenesis to explain the origin of life and how life began on earth, which is a good theory and has been tested and apparently, long amino acid chains can form without fairy dust

3. "If we evolved from apes, why can't we see apes evolving into humanoids today?". Evolution doesn't state that we evolved from modern apes, but that we had a common ancestor. Remember, that every modern living being has evolved, not just us. Simply, from an early ape specie which then divided into 2 subspecies which then caused the extinction of the original specie since they were more succesful.

4. Don't use quotes of famous people stating god/creationism is real, it proves nothing but your idiocy. Many famous people in history believed the earth was flat. Did it make it flat? That is called quote mining FYI.

[...]

6. "The eye/wings is/are too complex to have evolved" Take an example of flying bats, they're mammals, and their bones aren't like birds' bones. So why would an "intelligent designer" (aka god(s)) do that, if bats had liter bones they could fly like birds. The only way this is explainable today is with evolution.

[1][2] Begs the question.

[3] Even though i already know that the theory of evolution doesn't assert that we came from monkeys per se, you can clearly see that it starts begging the question at "Remember" and so on.

[4] Wouldn't the opposite be true, therefore nullifying most of your answer to the 9th and 11th question from, apparently, Dr. Hovind and Creation Science Evangelism?

[6] Asserts a false dilemma.

In case you need more of an explanation on why your statements commit the fallacies i pointed out: For the ones i said it begs the question, basically doing research on begging the question should be enough. However, as you mentioned in the beginning, in order to debate this, you have to provide evidence, otherwise your statements are equal in weight as your opponents. For example, the following begs the question: "The theory of evolution has been tested and proven many times, therefore it has to be true"—which nullifies your answer to question 7 from Dr. Hovind and Creation Science Evangelism.

For the false dilemma, you don't need evolutionary descent for a bat to have lighter bones. But to say more on number 6, while number 6 also requires evidence that bats have heavier bones than birds, since it is hypothetical and since a false dilemma is more apparent, i refrained from accusing number 6 of question begging.

"Creation science"!!! that kept me laughing for a long looooooong time!

The word "science" can pretty much be replaced with "the study thereof." While "Creation Science" may include Theology, whether you are a creationist or an evolutionist, each side has a premise they rely on as a basis for their studies.

1. That's not about evolution you idiot!

2. uhh... stupid people in this world...

3. This guy apparently does not understand what evolution is about.

4. Matter isn't perfectly organized, it is, however, organized which is caused by the laws of physics and again, has nothing to do with evolution. I saw this man other day on youtube asking why planets are round, he didn't know/understand so god must've done it. How stupid can people be? GRAVITY, I commented, yet he didn't accept that, perfect example of idiocy.

[...]

6. Read your textbooks or just google abiogenesis. The idiot who wrote this also wanted to include a "why" question. The truth is that we don't know, and that is a better answer than "god did it", because god did it means that we have already decided why and we are not gonna search for one and not even look at the evidence. "I don't know" is better because we are still searching. And I could also assume that when this person asks why, he probably is searching for inner meaning and purpose of life, which doesn't apparently exist. This person can not accept the fact that he/she isn't above the nature. This person can't accept that after death, there's simply nothing. No human being can, at least I think so. Trying to even think about complete zero is impossible, because human beings don't understand complete zero. I'm sure I can't, at least not if I actually start thinking about it and try to explain it. We can't accept that there is not much to life than a bunch of chemical reactions, not invisible energy.

[...]

8. I don't personally know, but I found that there are some suggestions. Find about more in wikipedia: http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/ But I would like to say that it couldn't be "a cell", since cells just divide into 2 cells. So it would've been a multi-cellular organism. Or maybe not, it could be possible that a cell could leave its duplicating RNA inside another cell, which would mess things up a bit and because I'm not a biologist, I'll leave this to biologists.

[...]

10. In this sentence our "hero" doesn't realize that according to evolution, "letters" could change their shapes and form chinese letters which would then produce a chinese "book".

11. It is, but the "creator" would be an idiot! Incapable of producing quality stuff, and just changing the existing design when it could design anything!. I will quote another answer too:

[...]

[1][2][3] You do realize calling someone an idiot on some random, public forum that they're bound to know nothing about is pointless, right? :angel: Nevertheless, while their question(s) may seem irrelevant, i thought you said you would be answering his questions. :excl:

[4] While i am uncertain on how "he didn't accept" gravity as an explanation, simply stating gravity as an explanation does not do away with God, for gravity can still be traced back to God. While it may be common for unbelievers to believe that a natural explanation does away with God, it is still fallacious to believe that.

[6] Saying "God did it" does not answer the question, "How did He do it?" Therefore, while it is common for unbelievers to believe that merely having an answer to the question "why" does not provoke further research, it is fallacious to rely solely on that implication, therefore causing further research where inspired. But to add to what you said, you can't say one won't look at the evidence if no one has done any alternative research. Also, being a believer (though not limited to Christians) does not imply that we could not handle being restricted to nature. It just so happens that detachment from the flesh is a Biblical promise. But you don't have to believe in any religion to believe in spirits or to consider the possibility, otherwise you'd be able to claim that shows like Ghost Hunters is religious.

Interestingly enough, though, even though you say look up "abiogenesis" as to suggest that there is an answer to his question there, your response is, nevertheless, "[we] don't know."

[10] Even though your answer doesn't make any sense even under the eyes of the theory of evolution, you could have just said, "While it may not produce any Chinese books, it can certainly produce a better English book!"

[11] How would that make the Creator an idiot? You seem to be addressing a different question here. The question was about similarities in design, not mutations over time. It could be argued that if things mutated over time, it could be the creator perfecting his creation, but the question was about similarities in design. By similarities in design we can argue that the design process was finalized and implemented, therefore further implementations would be unnecessary or at least not requiring the creator.

Even if they did, THEY IGNORE THE FACTS.

It is quite possible that "the facts" were begging the question.

rob86 · July 6, 2009

It's interesting (lame) how that guy Hovind bulks up his argument with completely irrelevant arguments. You think he'd at least stick the questions not related to evolution in the middle or the end to make his ignorance a little less obvious. He brings up questions that he can't answer himself -- unless you consider baseless theories of magic to be an answer. I (personally) can't explain where space and matter came from, but I'd rather admit it's something we don't know and should attempt to find out, then to give up research and say it was just created by God and never find any proof of that. If creation by a deity ever turns out to make sense in a modern world, I'll believe it. Back in ancient times there were less explanations for why things were so it's understandable religion was thriving. One thing I don't admire about some Believers, is that they have absolutely no interest in understanding the truth. I live to learn, even if the truth hurts, to discover and explore the world. To understand. Life, The Universe, and Everything (h2g2 :angel: ) is incredible, vast and almost unbelievable. Sometimes I'm amazed by many things, an insect, a plant, the stars. People and why they are the way they are (psychology). I discuss these things in awe of our incredible world with a God-believing friend and they have no interest in why things are the way they are, why would they evolve this way. Their only opinion is "God made it that way" -- boring!. That's not for me, I yearn for understanding with intelligent theories, not so far completely unprovable myths. Scientists/"Evolutionists" may or may not know the facts, yet, or ever, but at least they attempt to understand and their theories make some sense. Creationist theories aren't even logical and honestly, they're often delusional to non believers. At best, they're something like, "Well, look at the eye! It's too complex to have just evolved, obviously!" Well yeah, it is hard to believe, but what isn't hard to believe? Almost everything in the entire universe is hard to believe yet things happen, inventions are made, things are discovered, the impossible becomes possible, the unbelievable becomes reality. Do people ever stop to think how incredible and unbelievable life as we know it today would have been to humans 2000 years ago? Even 50 years ago. Yet all of these highly unbelievable things are explainable. There are logical explanations why why things are/work, and we can reproduce that. Not everything can be explained yet, but it's stupid to expect to understand everything "over night". We're only a relatively young species in the universe!At worst, their arguments are borderline insane. I know perfectly intelligent and sane people who believe in Bible stories that are as nothing but ludicrous. Believing in God is one thing, and atleast somewhat understandable. If you're going to claim that there were intelligent talking animals to have a conversation with and a man parting the sea and an innumerable number of even more highly unbelievable things (I can't remember) that people actually believe, PLEASE, HAVE SOME LOGICAL EXPLANATION! I could never believe in something so unbelievable when there is no explanation/proof, and when there are alternatives (evolution) that actually make sense. I don't know if evolution is 100% true fact, but it sure is a better argument to anyone with a truly open and unprejudiced mind. The thing that really bugs me is that it's egyptian religion and greek deities and roman what what not are all today almost unanimously accepted as being nothing but very interesting fictional stories. The religions of today are just as unbelievable and very very similar...... ? Hint hint..? Religious books are interesting and story-like for a reason, text books are for factual information. You don't open up a factual book on astronomy and see Mr Julius Jupiter the farmer magically being turned into a planet because he was a great man and his children who missed him so became satellites destined to play around him happily forever. You see, well this is Jupiter, 5th planet from the sun, has many satellites.In all these years of human history, there's never been logical proof of the existence of God or that he created everything. Gods and religions in history have been discredited and antiquated, nobody believes in them. I have a feeling the modern religions will soon (in the big picture) be extinct as well. More and more religious myths are revealed as false all the time. The sun revolves around the earth because God made earth special? FALSE! People believed Heaven was in the sky, yet man pierced the sky and entered space, surprise, no heaven. Where is Heaven? Ah, some where else I suppose! I welcome someone to prove it the existence of God and his hand in creation with real facts and not the argument that "Unexplainable(for now!!) = God did it!" I have an open mind. I have had no biased negative opinion of believers, I have been open to their arguments my entire life as my interest is in TRUTH and UNDERSTANDING, I'm no scientist, or an authority on the subject of our existence, I don't claim to know, I'm just an interested human being trying to understand, but good grief Creationists.. have a decent argument don't say "We don't get it, so God did it!" . Life is confusing and complex and we my never fully understand, but at the very least believe in something that makes SOME sense, not something that makes zero (negative?) sense and is believed by people ranting and raving about burning in the pits of hell and God wrecking havoc on entire countries for sinning.I guess my post wasn't too much about evolution vs creationism..but really what is there to say? Charles Darwin's theory of Evolution is a relatively young theory which happens to make a more than a little bit of sense and stands up to most arguments. Creationism is an ancient truckload of highly unbelievable, still completely unexplainable (except for "against" explanations mind you) and unprovable theories that curiously resembles a fairy tale story not unlike already extinct and unanimously unbelieved religious beliefs from ancient cultures. To me, it's rather obvious which theory a person with an open mind should be subscribing to.

Edited July 6, 2009 by rob86 (see edit history)

KansukeKojima · July 6, 2009

It's interesting (lame) how that guy Hovind bulks up his argument with completely irrelevant arguments. You think he'd at least stick the questions not related to evolution in the middle or the end to make his ignorance a little less obvious. He brings up questions that he can't answer himself -- unless you consider baseless theories of magic to be an answer. I (personally) can't explain where space and matter came from, but I'd rather admit it's something we don't know and should attempt to find out, then to give up research and say it was just created by God and never find any proof of that. If creation by a deity ever turns out to make sense in a modern world, I'll believe it. Back in ancient times there were less explanations for why things were so it's understandable religion was thriving. One thing I don't admire about some Believers, is that they have absolutely no interest in understanding the truth. I live to learn, even if the truth hurts, to discover and explore the world. To understand. Life, The Universe, and Everything (h2g2 :angel: ) is incredible, vast and almost unbelievable. Sometimes I'm amazed by many things, an insect, a plant, the stars. People and why they are the way they are (psychology). I discuss these things in awe of our incredible world with a God-believing friend and they have no interest in why things are the way they are, why would they evolve this way. Their only opinion is "God made it that way" -- boring!. That's not for me, I yearn for understanding with intelligent theories, not so far completely unprovable myths.

That is commendable that you are searching for the truth :excl:

. I believe that all of us must search for the truth about this universe. It is quite sad to see many people who have no regard for things such as this, they simply exist without learning about anything that pertains to our existence, etc.

I believe this world is philosophically and logically bankrupt. I also believe that description applies to the atheist world-view. I am beginning to see a trend among many atheists. It is that they simply set up a straw-man of Christian beliefs to attack. While there are many people who simply say "God did it" because of their lack of understanding, I believe someone who truly wished to be engaged in truth will yearn to understand the truth. As a Christian, I do not simply say that "God did it", however I do see that there are problems with the atheist world-view (such as the inability for atheism to account for logical absolutes). There either is a God or there is not (one of these MUST be true, it is a logically necessary), and if the atheist position is wrought with philosophical problems then I would much rather place my faith in the theistic position. In other words, there is a reason why I believe God has created the universe - and it is not my ignorance on the subject.

That being said, I would declare the reason that I am a Christian is not solely because I have seen a certain amount of evidence for God, etc. Nor is the reason that I am a Christian the philosophical problems problems that exist within atheism. The reason I am a Christian is due to a supernatural work in my heart (regeneration) which has lead me to repentance and faith in Christ for salvation. This is not an argument I use against atheists to prove the existence of God, I only wish to clarify that the sole reason I believe is NOT based purely on scientific evidence or philosophical arguments. However, the evidence and arguments I have been presented with do act as support for my belief in God's existence.

Scientists/"Evolutionists" may or may not know the facts, yet, or ever, but at least they attempt to understand and their theories make some sense. Creationist theories aren't even logical and honestly, they're often delusional to non believers. At best, they're something like, "Well, look at the eye! It's too complex to have just evolved, obviously!"

Well yeah, it is hard to believe, but what isn't hard to believe? Almost everything in the entire universe is hard to believe yet things happen, inventions are made, things are discovered, the impossible becomes possible, the unbelievable becomes reality. Do people ever stop to think how incredible and unbelievable life as we know it today would have been to humans 2000 years ago? Even 50 years ago. Yet all of these highly unbelievable things are explainable. There are logical explanations why why things are/work, and we can reproduce that. Not everything can be explained yet, but it's stupid to expect to understand everything "over night". We're only a relatively young species in the universe!

You made the assertion that creation is illogical. Why is it such? Bear in mind that just because something does not fit in your world-view does not mean it is illogical. What actually is contradictory about it and why do the laws of logic not allow for it? As well, just because it is delusional to non-believers does not make it false. Truth is not decided by popular vote.

Hopefully from what I have written at the beginning of this post, you will see that I am also a person engaged in seeking the truth - not just simply relying on something that is comfortable to me and saying "God did it". I will admit there are many Christians who do not spend time educating themselves on apologetics, scientific, philosophical, or theological concepts. This is unfortunate because it leads to an inability to defend their beliefs and it also causes people to draw the conclusion that all of us are delusional and do not think rationally or logically.

Commenting on your second paragraph in the above quotation, I would also like to point out that atheists often have the same demands of Christians. There are cases in which Christians are unable to explain certain biblical phenomena to the atheists standards, so they use that to say that the Christian is wrong. On the contrary, just because someone does not have the knowledge of something at that specific moment does not mean their position is incorrect. This also applies for atheists, even if they are unable to account for certain phenomena via science (at the present time), it does not mean their position is automatically and ultimately wrong and they may just need more time in order to explain things.

At worst, their arguments are borderline insane. I know perfectly intelligent and sane people who believe in Bible stories that are as nothing but ludicrous. Believing in God is one thing, and atleast somewhat understandable. If you're going to claim that there were intelligent talking animals to have a conversation with and a man parting the sea and an innumerable number of even more highly unbelievable things (I can't remember) that people actually believe, PLEASE, HAVE SOME LOGICAL EXPLANATION! I could never believe in something so unbelievable when there is no explanation/proof, and when there are alternatives (evolution) that actually make sense. I don't know if evolution is 100% true fact, but it sure is a better argument to anyone with a truly open and unprejudiced mind.

First, I would like to note that just because an argument is not in the bounds of "scientific" or if it transcends the "natural realm" (so to speak) and is supernatural, does not mean it is illogical. Also, you do something within this paragraph such as saying that things like parting the red sea is unbelievable but say you would rather believe in alternatives such as evolution. First of all, parting the red sea has nothing to do with evolution. This argument does not work very well because you are trying to use the perceived inability for these events to occur in order to further your support of evolution. Parting the red sea has nothing to do with evolution.

I would ask that you read this article on how miracles do not defy the laws of logic:

http://forums.xisto.com/no_longer_exists/

That being said, there is a logical explanation for why these supernatural miracles occurred. The explanation that these things occurred because of something God did does not defy logic in the least bit. What it does defy is your presupposition that there is no God... which many atheists somehow equate with logic

The thing that really bugs me is that it's egyptian religion and greek deities and roman what what not are all today almost unanimously accepted as being nothing but very interesting fictional stories. The religions of today are just as unbelievable and very very similar...... ? Hint hint..? Religious books are interesting and story-like for a reason, text books are for factual information. You don't open up a factual book on astronomy and see Mr Julius Jupiter the farmer magically being turned into a planet because he was a great man and his children who missed him so became satellites destined to play around him happily forever. You see, well this is Jupiter, 5th planet from the sun, has many satellites.

First, I would like to point out that the argument about how Christianity is similar to the religions of the ancient egyption, greek, etc. has been used for years. I don't know why it is continued in its use because it has been debunked by countless scholars in the past. Every few years it seems like a movie comes out which is promoting that argument, and scholars are quick to take it down with facts.

The latter half of your paragraph insinuates that the bible is written like a myth. The majority of the bible is written as an account of events which took place, and the writing style does not fit they style of the myth writers during the times when the various books of the bible were being written. The majority of books in Old Testament scripture are accounts of the history of the Jewish people or prophecies (prophecies are not myths, these are words which have come out of a prophets mouth which predicted the future fate of Israel and other nations as well as specific individuals, etc.) which have been recorded. New testament scripture is comprised of eye witness accounts (read: the four gospels) of Jesus' life, epistles (letters) written to various churches around the middle east roughly during the lifetime of the apostle Paul, and a single book of end-times prophecy. The biblical books are not myths and legends, but for the most part (aside from poetry (Song of Solomon), and Psalms, etc.) it is recorded events which people witnessed, letters, or prophecy.

In all these years of human history, there's never been logical proof of the existence of God or that he created everything. Gods and religions in history have been discredited and antiquated, nobody believes in them. I have a feeling the modern religions will soon (in the big picture) be extinct as well. More and more religious myths are revealed as false all the time. The sun revolves around the earth because God made earth special? FALSE! People believed Heaven was in the sky, yet man pierced the sky and entered space, surprise, no heaven. Where is Heaven? Ah, some where else I suppose!

First, you assertion that there has NEVER been any proof in the whole human history of mankind should not be taken seriously. Are you actually capable of knowing, every single evidence provided for God in all of history? No you are not, and therefore you cannot make that assertion. I would also submit that there is logical proof for the existence of God, and please remember that your presuppositions that there is no God does not define what logic is (I mentioned that atheists have a tendency to do this earlier).

Secondly, beliefs such as the sun revolving around the earth existed because people made observations and at the time could not account for things any other way. However, things such as this do not contradict biblical scripture. Also, about heaven existing in the sky, the bible is quite clear heaven is a spiritual realm, not a physical manifestation in the sky (otherwise our spaceships and airplanes would be colliding with angels ) . Often times confusion that the bible states other wise stems from the sky being referred to as the "heavens". They are not literally the spiritual heaven.

I welcome someone to prove it the existence of God and his hand in creation with real facts and not the argument that "Unexplainable(for now!!) = God did it!" I have an open mind. I have had no biased negative opinion of believers, I have been open to their arguments my entire life as my interest is in TRUTH and UNDERSTANDING, I'm no scientist, or an authority on the subject of our existence, I don't claim to know, I'm just an interested human being trying to understand, but good grief Creationists.. have a decent argument don't say "We don't get it, so God did it!" . Life is confusing and complex and we my never fully understand, but at the very least believe in something that makes SOME sense, not something that makes zero (negative?) sense and is believed by people ranting and raving about burning in the pits of hell and God wrecking havoc on entire countries for sinning.

I accept your challenge :excl:

A philosophical argument that I am very fond of is the Cosmological Argument.

1. The universe exist.

2. Its possible for the universe not to exist, of course.

3. If the universe exists, it must have been caused into existence. If it is possible for it to not exist, it must have been caused to exist otherwise it would not exist.

A. You cannot say that something has brought itself into existence. If you don't exist, you have no attributes and no nature. Because you don't have any attributes, nature, and because you do not exist, you are incapable of doing anything - including bringing yourself into existence.

4. Time could not have existed for an infinity allowing for time enough for the universe to be caused.

A. If time is infinite, you cannot cross an infinite amount of time to get to now (this present moment in time). If you wished to go back an infinite amount of time to get to the first initial cause, you could not because of the nature of infinity (expanding forever in both directions: past and future). There would be an infinite regression of causes, and there would be no original cause.

B. Because the universe exists, it must have been caused. There must have been a specific point at which the universe was created. As shown above, time could not have infinitely existed allowing for the universe to be caused because there would be an infinite regression of causes which means there was not initial cause.

5. Therefore, there has to be an uncaused cause for all things (the universe).

6. The only thing that fits the definition of an uncaused cause is an eternal God. The bible says God is from everlasting to everlasting.

Another argument, which is EXTREMELY extensive and takes time to understand, is the Transcendental Argument for the Existence of God. I will explain the very shortened version of it below, but I will provide a link for the full version of the argument.

1. Logical absolutes exist.

A. These logical absolutes are transcendent and apply to the entire universe (to the best of our knowledge. It is logical to assume they are, if you go to another galaxy 2 still equals 2).

B. These logical absolutes are not the result of the existence of the physical universe. If the universe was to suddenly cease to exist, logical absolutes would still be true.

C. Logical absolutes are not the product of human minds. Human minds differ and contradict each other and even themselves. The laws of logic are consistent throughout this world are are not in existence because of human thought.

D. Logical absolutes are concepts, in that they are grasped by the mind. They are conceptual by nature (note: this does not mean they are a product of human minds).

2. Because logical absolutes exist and are consistent everywhere, and are not a product of anything in the universe (they transcend the universe), an absolute and transcendent mind MUST have authored them because nothing else can account for them. This mind is called God.

Now, this argument is only valid unless atheists can come up with something to account for the existence of logic. However, this argument has been attacked a fair bit already, but as it stands (to the best of my knowledge) no atheist has been able to account for the existence of logical absolutes. The only explanation is God. If all other possibilities have been exhausted, and only one remains, then that last remaining possibility must be the correct one. It is a logical imperative.

Click here to read the full version of the argument.

I guess my post wasn't too much about evolution vs creationism..but really what is there to say? Charles Darwin's theory of Evolution is a relatively young theory which happens to make a more than a little bit of sense and stands up to most arguments. Creationism is an ancient truckload of highly unbelievable, still completely unexplainable (except for "against" explanations mind you) and unprovable theories that curiously resembles a fairy tale story not unlike already extinct and unanimously unbelieved religious beliefs from ancient cultures. To me, it's rather obvious which theory a person with an open mind should be subscribing to.

This last paragraph is essentially a summation of all the points in your post, and they have all been addressed above. My fingers are tired now

anwiii · July 6, 2009

i have to laugh whenever i hear these debates from both sides. it really is funny to me. why can't people just say that they truely don't have all the answers? at least that would be an honest answer. with all the areguement lies truth that nobody will ever admit to for the sake of arguing and being right. to say if any one thing cannot be proved, it must be "god" is just pure ignorance along with all the rest of the arguements from both sides.walk in to a store with your friend. tell him to write down what he sees. write down what YOU see. compare notes. guess what. what he and you see may be similar, you both will also see totally different things. who's right, who's wrong. why can't both be right. heck, all major religions practice their faith in their own way. they have different "laws" and beliefs to their religion. who's right and who's wrong...with millions of followers to each major religion. what if they all were right and wrong at the same time?god is with them all so why aren't they practicing the same religion or faith? no. you aren't going to see a catholic wedding ceromony performed for two people who aren't catholic. you aren't going to see a minister of the presperterian faith send over their congregation to believe what the catholics believe. so what. all relgions don't believe in any other religion but theirs...even the different forms of christianity faiths for the sole purpose of an individual finding god at a better place.so we are left with science fact and some theories.....or we are left with faith(which most all religions claim faith to be the basis of their belief)i know little about science....nor do i care to. i'll just accept those in a position to be smarter in the areas i am to do their job well and trust in it. faith, i have had faith in many things. mostly people. one thing i know about faith is that it lets you down over and over again in life and faith is no basis for any kind of arguement. BUT just because faith lets us down, that doesn't disprove or prove anything that has to do with god. and why "god" why all the arguements about "god". because of the books in the bible and the religions that practice what is man made. in fact, god could be something completely different. what about more than one god? what about a higher power that has a name NOT GOD? what about the unknown?i have known christians who have followed the bible to a T. when raising their own children, they were two of the most cruelest parents i have ever witnessed. they would always revert back to a quote in the bible.i hear comments like god is trying to perfect certain species which would be the explaination to evolution. would this mean that god was never perfect him/her own self to try and continuously perfect something?personally, this subject is a wasted subject. i doubt anything will ever be proven either way because one side is trying to argue faith and the other side is trying to argue the unknown....or IGNORANCE as i will call it. we are ALL ignorant. sure, we all me be smart in our own little areas we are gifted in and the gifts we hold from which we were born with....but not 1 person will ever know it all.let's say someone has actually met god....for real...100% true. this dude actually met god. does that mean there is only one god? no. so then the arguments will continue. what is god and what is nature. oh....and even if it were a fact that one has met god....doesn't mean people will believe. unfortunately we live in a society that has the words on our national currency but if one walks the streets preeching he has seen god, he will be institutionalized. i hear so many people that believe in god giving god all the credit to their own lives. oh no....these people didn't overcome life's hardships....god helped them and if it weren't for god, they'd be dead or living a life of crime. these people can't even take credit where credit is due them.now my last paragraph is based on what i've seen personal and which i hold my own belief in that a lot of people believe in god because they have nowhere else to turn. they believe so strongly because that one belief they always failed to believe in is a last resort and they turn to god out of their own insecurities and fear. religions therefore are recruiting people out of their own insecurieties and fear. somewhat like any cult has to offer their own followers.i am definately not discrediting any major religion. but i do discredit how all religions operate. they are not perfect....nothing is in this world is. i there are strength in #'s, why then can't all religions compromise to make the #'s grow 10 fold....where the faith, the organization, the belief, the power of prayer in #'s can completely benefit the world for the better? you wont see it because there is greed in religions. there is polotics in religions. all these religions have something in common though. they believe in a god. and people will worship their god. they will give god all the credit for their own actions. all the sins and all the successes....almost like they aren't even living a life of their own. some would call that slavery. some would just call it a bunch of worker ants that only have one purpose in life. to serve.we all know science has nothing on god. but then, neither does faith and any one religion hold strong and true when preaching about a belief.so why all the arguements? why all the debates when in the end, there is only one thing that has been proven through all the chitter chatter about god and religions. that one thing is ignorance. we will all still be ignorant in the end. we wont have the answers.maybe this is how it's supposed to be if this has always been the conclusion to all the debates. if it is so and we are all meant to be ignorant collectively, maybe we aren't all supposed to be ignorant as individuals as everyone has their own life to live. everyone will experience different experiences in life than anyone else born. maybe isntead of arguing about something that has nothing to do with us individually, we should start concentrating on what affects us on an individual basis. if there is a god, does he want us to all be the same? does he want us to believe in the same beliefs? is god really going to eventually create that perfect world? what would happen if there was such a perfect world? what would happen if there were no more mistakes and consequences? what would it be like if this world was just unexplainable, we are meant to work all our lives and die, never to be reborn...just become a mixure of debree, dirt and dust and mud? what if there isn't a god and life really does hold no meaning? what would be stopping people from killing themselves and cutting their lives short to bypass all the pain and suffering life holds for everyone....along with the happiness, enjoyment and contentment at times? i mean, if i believed after i die, i am not reborn somehow, i couldn't possibly want to live through 80 years of pain and suffering....or holding a job for 60 years like a creature of habit. but yea...lighting off those fireworks is fun so i guess i'll live for that....but will have to wait another year.my point is this. everyone has their own purpose in life. they feel it strong or they would just wither away and die. where then does this purpose come from? where? were we born with it or was it through years of molding from our parents through their own expectations in life for us? did god create this purpose? any christian will say yes. a religion based on only faith that has let people down since year one. faith is some what like trust....but with a twist of expectation involoved within faith that MAKES it faith because if we ever find out faith was wrong, we ARE let down because of that expectiation twist that trust doesn't hold(unless there are man made conditions on trust).i have 5 best friends. one of them is born again. he told me his job was to spread the word. spread the word. now the only reason to spread any word is to recruit people to believe in that word. that is the ONLY reason to do such a thing...even if you may not know the person you are spreading the word to. even if that person already believes in that word. that is every christians duty as i am told...as it is written in the bible. what if i already believed in god though and the one preaching gods word was of a different faith? i have been approached by others that certain faiths were the wrong faith for different reasons. so is that faith they are preaching the say all or is that religion....who has millions of followers speaking the truth?i think before the non believers start trying to argue wether there is a god or not, they should wait for all the major religions to come together and believe in the same thing....until they can come together, the non believers will have a good point of their own NOT to believe in any one religion that preaches gods word. if gods word is truth and truth is written in the bible, what is the problem with religions coming together as one....and not seperate? yea...i see a good arguement there for the non believer to wait until the people with faith and get their crap together and stop seperating themselves where in fact stregth is in the #'s. and maybe these non believers should keep their own selves in check and start working on their own selves and lives rather than argue something that will never be solved. maybe they can find something more productive to do in their own lives, spirit and soul that can make a difference in their own generations to come. argue something unique in what they KNOW. guide in what they KNOW. pass down what they KNOW.me, i will never believe in any one religion. i will never believe that there is only one "god"(the one dictated in the bible). and i will always believe that there will always be more out there that science will eventually catch and at the same time where science will NEVER catch. i will always believe in ignorance and i will always believe that ignorance is a good thing. something to push us for the answers based on truth to any one individual that makes us unique and different. just like no one will see the same thing, no life will lead on the same path. there will always be different beliefs and there will be truth to it ALL!

Baniboy · July 6, 2009

Note that this was not a debate against or for evolution, this was simply a post to point out that you shouldn't use these arguments that are very unscientific and already debunked, since it seems that everyone coming up with these arguments think they are the first one to do so! I quoted simply because I didn't know the answer. I didn't quote so I could prove that "if a man with that kind of intelligence believes in something, you should too"(like often non-evolutionists quote Albert Einstein), I quoted the answer for that question I found on the web. I quoted because I'm not a biologist neither any other expert on any fields of science.

I didn't answer some questions because they didn't have anything to do with evolution.

There are plenty of transitional fossils between fish and amphibians, reptiles and birds etc. I don't have to answer this(how wings/eyes evolved), you can google it and find many transitional fossils for wings and also many for eyes.

Evolution doesn't disprove any god. But it states that the diversity of life we see today was achieved through the process of natural selection.

Interestingly enough, though, even though you say look up "abiogenesis" as to suggest that there is an answer to his question there, your response is, nevertheless, "[we] don't know."

Abiogenesis somewhat provides the answer through explaning how DNA lifeforms were formed.

[10] Even though your answer doesn't make any sense even under the eyes of the theory of evolution, you could have just said, "While it may not produce any Chinese books, it can certainly produce a better English book!"

No, I was pointing to mutation. Mutation is a random process that can produce new DNA, so with time, a specie can produce unique features.

[11] How would that make the Creator an idiot? You seem to be addressing a different question here. The question was about similarities in design, not mutations over time. It could be argued that if things mutated over time, it could be the creator perfecting his creation, but the question was about similarities in design. By similarities in design we can argue that the design process was finalized and implemented, therefore further implementations would be unnecessary or at least not requiring the creator.

At least according to christian belief, god is all-powerful and all-knowing. Such god would not have to perfect his design or split his own design into two or more branches and destroy the original creation. Why does ostrich have hollow bones like birds but it doesn't fly? Did the intelligent designer make weaker bones on purpose? There are a lot of things that don't make sence if it was/were intelligent designer(s) that created animals.

I didn't list evidence about my debunks because they are pretty much available all over the web.

What makes creation science funny is that it is not science because it doesn't use the scientific method to prove things. Therefore not science, PERIOD.

I was not attacking this one guy, but this one guy happened to have all these weird arguments that are already debunked. These are repeated over and over again. I was simply informing what to not use to be taken seriously.

Replying to Rob,

I do not think that any holy books should be taken literaly, because it wouldn't even make sence. Most of the holy books were written before modern science, and after modern science started to develop people started to find out about things and the relihious explanations weren't valid anymore.

That is why creationism doesn't make sence if it hasn't been hammered into your head when you were young. Funny fact, creationism didn't make sence even when I was 6. But this topic is about evolution and what arguments not to use when debating against it.

The thing that really bugs me is that it's egyptian religion and greek deities and roman what what not are all today almost unanimously accepted as being nothing but very interesting fictional stories. The religions of today are just as unbelievable and very very similar...... ? Hint hint..?

Exactly! Anyway, to me, evolution theory is what makes sence out of this giant soup of nonsence. Sure it has some holes, it had more holes when Darwin first "created" it. Most holes have been fixed now, thanks to DNA, fossils and other stuff.

First, I would like to point out that the argument about how Christianity is similar to the religions of the ancient egyption, greek, etc. has been used for years. I don't know why it is continued in its use because it has been debunked by countless scholars in the past. Every few years it seems like a movie comes out which is promoting that argument, and scholars are quick to take it down with facts.

Actually it could be that the other one is no more logical than the other. Just like Biblical god isn't more logical than Thor, Krishna, Allah and the flying spaghetti monster. But the comparison is to state that none of them make sence, since both are saying that a supernatural being or beings created life in an undescribable way.

1. The universe exist.

2. Its possible for the universe not to exist, of course.

3. If the universe exists, it must have been caused into existence. If it is possible for it to not exist, it must have been caused to exist otherwise it would not exist.

A. You cannot say that something has brought itself into existence. If you don't exist, you have no attributes and no nature. Because you don't have any attributes, nature, and because you do not exist, you are incapable of doing anything - including bringing yourself into existence.

4. Time could not have existed for an infinity allowing for time enough for the universe to be caused.

A. If time is infinite, you cannot cross an infinite amount of time to get to now (this present moment in time). If you wished to go back an infinite amount of time to get to the first initial cause, you could not because of the nature of infinity (expanding forever in both directions: past and future). There would be an infinite regression of causes, and there would be no original cause.

B. Because the universe exists, it must have been caused. There must have been a specific point at which the universe was created. As shown above, time could not have infinitely existed allowing for the universe to be caused because there would be an infinite regression of causes which means there was not initial cause.

5. Therefore, there has to be an uncaused cause for all things (the universe).

6. The only thing that fits the definition of an uncaused cause is an eternal God. The bible says God is from everlasting to everlasting.

1. To verify universe's existance you must be observing it from outside.

2. Everything is possible, but not probable. To verify this you would have to be outside the universe, using the scientific method.

3. Just because human beings don't understand that something can exist without a cause, doesn't mean it can't, again, you have to observe from outside. So how can god exist if it needs a cause too. If something isn't matter or energy, by the laws of physics, it doesn't exist. "Because you do not exist, you are incapable of doing anything - including bringing yourself into existence." - Neither does god

4. Pointing to the big bang, scientists don't have theories, but they have some ideas. Google is your friend.

6. So for god. eternal god isn't possible because you already stated that it needs an "uncaused cause" to exist. You are not observing this from outside of the universe and this isn't a good answer.

The existance of god is very possible, I agree, but I don't think it's anything like a human mind has made up till now. There are many religions, and as far as I can see, nothing makes christianity, buddhism or islam "the right one".

BUT just because faith lets us down, that doesn't disprove or prove anything that has to do with god. and why "god" why all the arguements about "god". because of the books in the bible and the religions that practice what is man made. in fact, god could be something completely different. what about more than one god? what about a higher power that has a name NOT GOD? what about the unknown?

I agree with you.

Wow this topic has gone so offtopic Your posts were interesting to read.

truefusion · July 6, 2009

[...] [1] why can't people just say that they truely don't have all the answers? at least that would be an honest answer.

[2] walk in to a store with your friend. tell him to write down what he sees. write down what YOU see. compare notes. guess what. what he and you see may be similar, you both will also see totally different things. who's right, who's wrong. why can't both be right. heck, all major religions practice their faith in their own way. they have different "laws" and beliefs to their religion. who's right and who's wrong...with millions of followers to each major religion. [2.1] what if they all were right and wrong at the same time?

[...] [3] in fact, god could be something completely different. what about more than one god? what about a higher power that has a name NOT GOD? what about the unknown?

[...] [4] i hear comments like god is trying to perfect certain species which would be the explaination to evolution. would this mean that god was never perfect him/her own self to try and continuously perfect something?

[...] [5] but not 1 person will ever know it all.

[...] [6] these people can't even take credit where credit is due them.

[...] [6.2] they believe so strongly because that one belief they always failed to believe in is a last resort and they turn to god out of their own insecurities and fear.

[...] [7] where the faith, the organization, the belief, the power of prayer in #'s can completely benefit the world for the better? you wont see it because there is greed in religions.

[...] [7.2] some would just call it a bunch of worker ants that only have one purpose in life. to serve.

[...] [8] so why all the arguements? why all the debates when in the end, there is only one thing that has been proven through all the chitter chatter about god and religions. that one thing is ignorance. we will all still be ignorant in the end. we wont have the answers.

[...] [9] i think before the non believers start trying to argue wether there is a god or not, they should wait for all the major religions to come together and believe in the same thing.

[1] Because it leaves you with nothing to work from, therefore there is a higher chance of people doing nothing but waiting on others to do something about it. So it may actually be better to have a false or inaccurate position than no position at all.

[2] While in the store analogy one person could be on one side of the store and the other on the other side, differing views can only follow from the store analogy if when both of them switch papers and move to the opposite of the store and can't find what each other wrote down. And that is the only time both can be right (i.e. allowing for the possibility of store rearrangement). However, the store analogy is too simple for something as complex as religion.

[2.1] Due to the implications from each religion, that would be illogical. Hence why your store analogy allows for both of them being correct, because it is not as complex as religion.

[3] From a cosmological standpoint, the universe only implies one God, therefore multiple gods is unnecessary and could be seen as special pleading. The word "God" is used only due to its definition. It does not have to be "God," but since it points out something specific which differentiates from "the unknown," the term "God," therefore, is used. "The unknown" is like saying, "I don't know"?it leaves you with nothing, therefore it cannot be used to explain something.

[4] One could argue that since creation is in "alpha stages," therefore require modifications every now-and-then, that the creator wasn't smart enough to create a perfect being. However, that argument would be a false dilemma. But to add to that, why would a God want to create something perfect? If God is perfect, then it would follow that to create something perfect would be to create something exactly like God, not merely in God's image, but 100% God. I do not see why an intelligent being would want to create something as powerful as and equal to Himself.

[5] It is logically impossible to make this claim while admitting ignorance.

[6] Though i can't show that He did, the statement presupposes that God didn't intervene in any way.

[6.2] Often times, the last resort is turning to God. Many believers don't turn to God enough and only do so when they see their life going down the drain. Sometimes they don't even do that.

[7] Those are known as Charities in the name of Christ. But, while there may be corrupt people within the religion, you are forgetting that there are also atheists and other unbelievers trying to steer people away from the faith?the very thing that drove them to want to help others in the first place.

[7.2] Whether or not you're serving God, no matter what you are always serving someone?even if it is just yourself. But you can't help others if you only serve yourself, and since the only way to serve God is to provide for others, serving God is therefore better than serving yourself.

[8] As with number 5, it is logically impossible to plead ignorance and state the conclusion as absolute. Also, debates often fail because those debating (whether it be one or more persons) are ignorant of logic. Plus, if the conclusion of all debates were ignorance, science, courtrooms, et cetera, too, would be pointless.

[9] It is easier to bring other religions together if we first prove that there is a God (though i believe God's existence has already been shown to be the more logical path). Indeed, for even if all the theistic religions got together and agreed all on one thing, it does not follow that atheists would in turn become theists.

[1] I quoted because I'm not a biologist neither any other expert on any fields of science.

[2] I didn't answer some questions because they didn't have anything to do with evolution.

[3] There are plenty of transitional fossils between fish and amphibians, reptiles and birds etc. I don't have to answer this(how wings/eyes evolved), you can google it and find many transitional fossils for wings and also many for eyes.

[4] Abiogenesis somewhat provides the answer through explaning how DNA lifeforms were formed.

[5] No, I was pointing to mutation. Mutation is a random process that can produce new DNA, so with time, a specie can produce unique features.

[6] At least according to christian belief, god is all-powerful and all-knowing. Such god would not have to perfect his design or split his own design into two or more branches and destroy the original creation. Why does ostrich have hollow bones like birds but it doesn't fly? Did the intelligent designer make weaker bones on purpose? [6.2] There are a lot of things that don't make sence if it was/were intelligent designer(s) that created animals.

[4] I didn't list evidence about my debunks because they are pretty much available all over the web.

[7] What makes creation science funny is that it is not science because it doesn't use the scientific method to prove things. Therefore not science, PERIOD.

[8] I was not attacking this one guy, but this one guy happened to have all these weird arguments that are already debunked. These are repeated over and over again. I was simply informing what to not use to be taken seriously.

[1] But your responses would not have begged the question if you actually did point us to an article on biology that proves what you said, in detail.

[2] But you never said you would only answer them if they related to the theory of evolution. In fact, this topic on "God did it" need not involve the theory of evolution. While the person who wrote the questionnaire was specifically trying to take down the theory of evolution through their questioning, it does not mean you do not have to answer the questions properly because they have nothing to do with the theory of evolution, especially since you said, "Let's answer, shall we?"

[3] This also begs the question. But in reality, if you tell a person this and that are transitional fossils, you are clouding the person's judgment by asserting that they are transitional fossils. When a believer asks for transitional fossils, they generally are looking for something that it cannot be argued that these fossils are fully formed. If you show them something that is fully formed, they could argue that you are committing the fallacy of appeal to probability, since similarities do not prove necessarily that this one creature came from another. This is one of the reasons why the theory of evolution remains a theory.

[4] Unless all sources say the exact same thing, it is better to point the reader in the direction of actual proof. Otherwise, they may find that what you told them to look for provided nothing to the discussion.

[5] I know you were, it's the same thing electriic ink used against a common (though somewhat flawed) teleological argument concerning paintings. But since this is all based on probability, data could be lost in the process or the "ink" in the "book" (or the "book" itself) can die off, therefore, due to the fact there are more things that can go wrong than right, the chances of the "ink" becoming something different and better than its previous form are dropped dramatically.

[6] Everything kind of animal does not require being the same for the creator to be intelligent, especially if the creator wanted variety.

[6.2] But your example(s) didn't show why it doesn't make any sense. If anything, it shows that you expected them (or wanted them) to be a specific way, and when finding out that they weren't, you concluded "it doesn't make sense."

[7] Whether implicit or explicit, one does not have to admit that they use the scientific method. In the end the scientific method is merely verifying your premises, evidence and conclusion and seeing if the conclusion remains the same (assuming you concluded things logically).

[8] Right, similar to my Christian Debater's Handbook (though it could use some updating, which i'll do later).

KansukeKojima · July 6, 2009

Actually it could be that the other one is no more logical than the other. Just like Biblical god isn't more logical than Thor, Krishna, Allah and the flying spaghetti monster. But the comparison is to state that none of them make sence, since both are saying that a supernatural being or beings created life in an undescribable way.

I was speaking about the argument that Christianity essentially "stole" parts of its religion from previously existing religions of the Egyptians, etc. This argument has been used for years, but it is invalid and has been debunked by many scholars. I believe the movie Zeitgeist uses this argument, but of course, it has been debunked.

Also, why does it not make sense to say that a supernatural (though, I would rather say Divine) being created life? Just because you don't accept it does not mean it is illogical. I would like you to explain why it doesn't make any sense.

1. To verify universe's existance you must be observing it from outside.

2. Everything is possible, but not probable. To verify this you would have to be outside the universe, using the scientific method.

3. Just because human beings don't understand that something can exist without a cause, doesn't mean it can't, again, you have to observe from outside. So how can god exist if it needs a cause too. If something isn't matter or energy, by the laws of physics, it doesn't exist. [/b]"Because you do not exist, you are incapable of doing anything - including bringing yourself into existence." - Neither does god

4. Pointing to the big bang, scientists don't have theories, but they have some ideas. Google is your friend.

6. So for god. eternal god isn't possible because you already stated that it needs an "uncaused cause" to exist. You are not observing this from outside of the universe and this isn't a good answer.

1. Why are we debating about the cause of the universe, evolution, etc. if the universe doesn't exist? The fact that we are arguing about it means that we assume it does exist. For the sake of discussion we assume it exists.

2. You misunderstand. It is possible for the universe to not exist. This means that the universe will either exist, or it will not exist as both options are possible options. As per point one, we already assume the universe is in existence or else any of these discussions are pointless.

3. It is logically necessary that if the universe exists it must have been caused by something else to exist. Something is incapable of bringing itself into existence according to logic. This means that something outside of the universe would have had to cause its existence.

A. God, by definition, is the uncaused cause. You mentioned that if something is not matter or energy, then according to physics it does not exist. God transcends the physical world and is therefore not bound by the laws of physics. Furthermore, I never stated that God caused His own existence. By definition, God has existed eternally without any cause.

4. I do not think you understand this part of the argument. If time has always existed, there would be no beginning of time. This would mean that time is infinite (forever in both directions, past and future). You cannot cross an infinite amount of time to get to now. This means that there would have never been a single initial cause for the universe because there would be an infinite regression of causes. You cannot have an infinite regression of causes or else there would have never been an initial cause.

5. Therefore, there has to be an uncaused cause for the universe.

6. I stated that the universe needs an uncaused cause to exist. God does not need a cause to exist because by definition he has eternally existed. He is the uncaused cause. This is not a problem because He is not bound by time, and therefore point #4 is not an issue in the case of God. Finally, as stated above: If you will not assume the existence of the universe then why are we discussing things pertaining to existence, etc.?

The argument still stands.

I would appreciate it if you addressed the other argument which I brought up:

Another argument, which is EXTREMELY extensive and takes time to understand, is the Transcendental Argument for the Existence of God. I will explain the very shortened version of it below, but I will provide a link for the full version of the argument.

1. Logical absolutes exist.

A. These logical absolutes are transcendent and apply to the entire universe (to the best of our knowledge. It is logical to assume they are, if you go to another galaxy 2 still equals 2).

B. These logical absolutes are not the result of the existence of the physical universe. If the universe was to suddenly cease to exist, logical absolutes would still be true.

C. Logical absolutes are not the product of human minds. Human minds differ and contradict each other and even themselves. The laws of logic are consistent throughout this world are are not in existence because of human thought.

D. Logical absolutes are concepts, in that they are grasped by the mind. They are conceptual by nature (note: this does not mean they are a product of human minds).

2. Because logical absolutes exist and are consistent everywhere, and are not a product of anything in the universe (they transcend the universe), an absolute and transcendent mind MUST have authored them because nothing else can account for them. This mind is called God.

Now, this argument is only valid unless atheists can come up with something to account for the existence of logic. However, this argument has been attacked a fair bit already, but as it stands (to the best of my knowledge) no atheist has been able to account for the existence of logical absolutes. The only explanation is God. If all other possibilities have been exhausted, and only one remains, then that last remaining possibility must be the correct one. It is a logical imperative.

Click here to read the full version of the argument.

kobra500 · July 6, 2009

The Major problem I have with a few of those questions is that they make no sense. The problem is with this: "If you think evolutionists have all the answers, try a few of the following questions on 'em." Now I know bani pointed it out briefly, but I will go into detail. Evolution explains the diversity of life in the universe, it does not explain where life origionated, where the universe origionated or anything else. It's the equivelent of asking a guitarist how to play the piano, he might understand it a little but being a guitarist won't teach him the piano. Secondly, even if they can't answer the question straight away they can go research it, it is stupid to just assume victory, because someone doesn't decide to put God into every gap in their knowledge. After all these gaps are eventually filled, and the person says "oh of course, but what about these gaps. Just goes to show my signature is correct.

Edited July 8, 2009 by kobra500 (see edit history)

anwiii · July 6, 2009

bani- i really liked your post, but you were specifically talking about how you shouldn't use these arguments that are very unscientific and already debunked. that would only be true if science could prove one way or another. if something exists or not. since relegions base their belief on faith, science has nothing to do with proving or disproving anything to do with god. at least that's how i see it and think it's just wasted energy since maybe these believers know something science will never be able to prove or disprove.truefusion- this is one of the first times i have actually seen you give a true opinion base on what you believe. i respect that. so let me ask you this. god is supposed to be inside us all. we shall call god "the holy spirit" in this analogy. since god is inside us all, wouldn't that make us god? could it be that the stregth really is in the #'s? maybe only a certain amount of godliness is inside us and it's different for everyone(i believe this to be fact without the god analogy anyway). but if you collectively combine us all, the differences would make up the complete god. the possibility to combine everyone's stregnths and to the extent where all our differences compliment eachother. one thing i have also add that i know i already don't believe is it is better to serve other before one's self. sounds selfish but i will tell you why i believe being selfish is good. if you can't take care of yourself, how can you possibily take care of others? if your not strong in what life gives you, how can you be strong enough to help others? i know you can argue that if someone accepts god in their lives, that they will recieve help from god to be strong enough...but then that goes directly to my point that these people can't take credit for being there for others since they couldn't have done it without god. i say take care of ones self FIRST. THEN and only then are you able and strong enough to be there and help other. otherwise, one can say these people could be misguided and will misguide others through their own weaknesses.i dunno. i may be wrong...but everyone i have ever tried to guide without being religious, i always told them that they need to be there for themselves FIRST to be able to be there for others. i believe it's important because if they don't eat right or excersize and stay healthy, don't do drugs or anything that can make you unhealthy, they are cutting off their life source and the ability to serve and help others that could be much more long lasting and fullfilling for lives in general. this should especially be true in the healing professions because you really don't need the doctor making any mistakes on the operating table when he needed to take time out for his own self FIRST because he has a human life in his hands. but then, i know that can be argued when a lot of people will take the belief that the situation was in gods hands...but then this statement will be just another excuse for an arguement because even the ones who believe in god argue about what exactly is in god's hands.i think it would be better for all if there were stregth in #'s just because there ARE arguements on god issues amoung religions. even though there are bad apples in all orginizations, just because there are arguements amoung religions and faiths shouldn't discredit one or the other. BUT it is one reason why not more people are believers. this is one of the reasons because instead of the strength in #'s by combining and possibily compromising ones own faith, they seperate themselves. others see this as being weak and not as strong as a religion has the potential for. in this case, maybe it's up to the religions and those who believe in god to come together rather than preach something that is one sided. wouldn't god be that much more credible when people try to talk about his existance? so in a way, the religions that believe in him are actually discrediting him indirectly.although i am not religios, i do believe and practice some of what is in the bible. i also believe in other things like the wiccans practice things like whatever you do will come back 3 fold or 10 fold. funny thing is, there are similarieties with that and what has already been written in the bible. but one religion has made it a law or rule within their religion to make that point a bit stronger than what was written in the bible.that's another pro for there is strength in religion. there are so many interpretations of the bible, it isn't even funny when in fact there should only be one. the truth. especially in the new testiment when the story telling begins from different people who had experienced things first hand. how can those books ever be interpretted differently than what was originally written and "true"(true is an assumption when it's ridiculous to think that exagerated truths weren't invented back then). if there was only one interpretation of the bible, it would be less confusing to others. since religions are making it confusing. maybe they DO have to get their crap together before they ever start preaching THEIR side since the word is only as credible as the one preaching it. this really does discredit god in a way among the different religions. it will always be one sided. that's why i think it's a waste of time arguing points like this when the strengths from within ones own self can actually lead the way. NOT something practiced by millions of people with millions of different interpretations.it's sad that we this arguement will last for centuries when the real answer is within. if someone has to be convinced of something by someone else spreading a one sided word that can be argued, it really is pointless. the existance of god and his word has been spread already to the societies of this world that aren't in seclusion. so why the need to spread it more? what is the urgency to repeat ones self in spreading the word? why is it that even though the word has effectifely been spread, that there are still a crap load of non believers or people like me that don't really know what to believe specifically as one truth? maybe the word spreaders are so concentrated on spreading the word that they FAIL to spread it the right way where others can understand the word they are trying to spread? if that is true, then that can be considered discrediting god indirectly as well. i can't deny that the bible is a great book when it's the one book read by the most people in the world. but what if it is outdated? newer versions have been created(with again more interpretations) to siimplify the spreading of the word in the new age. but why does one need the bible to preach what is true?i have gone to many churches of different faiths of christianity. NOT ONE take the time to help an individual ind god in a sermon. all a sermon comes from is what is written in a book and once in a while comparing it to a real life new age experience that most people can relate to. big deal! anyone can be a preacher if that's all it takes. but i believe that's not everything it takes. it takes a person to TEACH HOW to find god based on what is already inside an individual. real steps one can take. a path a person can follow in steps. churches don't teach anything like that for the most part.there are only a select few churches or temples i have been where they actually take preaching to a new level and guide people through steps and different scenarios for those steps for different people. like meditation. meditation has been practiced for hundreds of years but it isn't taught in churches of christian faiths unless one considers a small 2 seccond prayer meditation. if so, then why not practice and preach a 15 minute prayer? that is unheard of.i dunno. i am rambling. all i know is that there IS ignorance. even among believers and the ones trying to spread the word the same way from beginning of time even when times change. religions need to change with the times in order to be truely organized and healthy religions.reminds me of the time when someone tried to preach their own word about a company called amway. they wanted me to come to a meeting about a business opportunity. they always claimed that they have to help people to benefit their own selves. i went to the meeting around 1994 and i made a suggestion to who would have been my sponser. i said....heck, i can do this. i will pay in to this but i wont try to sell crap the same way they have been doing it for years and years. there are better ways. i will create a website and base it around the amway business. you know what i was told? don't reinvent the wheel. don't try to better something that has already been proved a success as amway was already a multi million dollar company. well, i was led to being discredited by those who felt they knew better. 5 years later, amway had created their own website and everyone followed. incomes doubled, trippled, and quadrupled for those that were open to that change. so i compare that true experience with how the word of god can be spread differently to empower more people. but this isn't happening collectively with all religions. the only place i have found that tries to incorporate all religions are the self realization centers....there are no ministers or priests. only monks. ones who do have their own beliefs but wise enough to incoporate all people of all religions and faith. i know this post seems a lot off topic....i just couldn't help myself. indirectly though, it really isn't off topic because it always described what can be argued or proved or disproved and opinions of the potential to get to the answers people may be looking for so the credibility of god or religions can grow stronger or weaker based on the arguements discussed

Edited July 6, 2009 by anwiii (see edit history)

kobra500 · July 7, 2009

Right, I've already replied once but that was only really regarding a very brief bit, for old times sake, heres my reply to truefusion. :angel:. and contrary to what you might think, I do actually like TF, regardless of wether he likes me, but I have a great deal of respect for him which is nothing to do with faith, but lets have a look.

Baniboys Questions:

1. "If evolution is true, then why there aren't any transitional fossils", probably what you'll receive as a response is silence. Not silence of "I don't what to say", more like: "I'm shocked of your stupidity". This is a lie that many people have repeated over and over again, they don't seem to understand that repeating a lie no matter how many times, doesn't make it true.
2. "Evolution says that we evolved from nothing". NO, NO, NO! This will make you look very stupid. There's abiogenesis to explain the origin of life and how life began on earth, which is a good theory and has been tested and apparently, long amino acid chains can form without fairy dust biggrin.gif

3. "If we evolved from apes, why can't we see apes evolving into humanoids today?". Evolution doesn't state that we evolved from modern apes, but that we had a common ancestor. Remember, that every modern living being has evolved, not just us. Simply, from an early ape specie which then divided into 2 subspecies which then caused the extinction of the original specie since they were more succesful.

4. Don't use quotes of famous people stating god/creationism is real, it proves nothing but your idiocy. Many famous people in history believed the earth was flat. Did it make it flat? That is called quote mining FYI.

[...]

6. "The eye/wings is/are too complex to have evolved" Take an example of flying bats, they're mammals, and their bones aren't like birds' bones. So why would an "intelligent designer" (aka god(s)) do that, if bats had liter bones they could fly like birds. The only way this is explainable today is with evolution.

Responses from truefusion

[1][2] Begs the question.
[3] Even though i already know that the theory of evolution doesn't assert that we came from monkeys per se, you can clearly see that it starts begging the question at "Remember" and so on.

[4] Wouldn't the opposite be true, therefore nullifying most of your answer to the 9th and 11th question from, apparently, Dr. Hovind and Creation Science Evangelism?

[6] Asserts a false dilemma.

In case you need more of an explanation on why your statements commit the fallacies i pointed out: For the ones i said it begs the question, basically doing research on begging the question should be enough. However, as you mentioned in the beginning, in order to debate this, you have to provide evidence, otherwise your statements are equal in weight as your opponents. For example, the following begs the question: "The theory of evolution has been tested and proven many times, therefore it has to be true"—which nullifies your answer to question 7 from Dr. Hovind and Creation Science Evangelism.

For the false dilemma, you don't need evolutionary descent for a bat to have lighter bones. But to say more on number 6, while number 6 also requires evidence that bats have heavier bones than birds, since it is hypothetical and since a false dilemma is more apparent, i refrained from accusing number 6 of question begging.

My Response:

[1] There are Transitional Fossils, I won't take Baniboys retrospective of calling them idiots but It does annoy me. There are infact quite a few try google, we are lucky to have so many fossils anyway, we could easily have no fossils at all. We still havn't found any rabbits in the pre-cambian as well.
[2] Evolution doesn't say we evolved from nothing, it explains we evolved from the simple organisms that were here when it started (likely from meteor/astreroid) you as bani boy said have to use other theories to work that out, it cannot be used to disprove evolution before the theory of evolution starts, you could even say God created the cells, it doesn't make evolution wrong.
[3] Why can't we see any half whatever we evolved from (has recently been discovered I think, do your own research, half human. Well I hate to break it to you guys and girls but its because there all dead. Thats it, thats why. Thats where natural selection comes in, the died because they wern't as good, likely we killed them or worse, who knows its outside living memory, but the way evolution works means that everyone evolves at pretty much the same rate, because those who don't die, I might also add that there wernt a lot of us as we first became "humans" or close to, and would have been origionally in a very small area.
[4] I not going to argue to much with Truefusions point here, because he is right, what baniboy meant to say or what I would say more like, is that for example don't use quotes of Einstien for example out of context, not to not use them at all. The same is true for creationism but I don't think that he took Mr Hovinds quotes out of context, they aren't retorical or anything of that nature. You are of course free to quote anyone you like as long as you capture their true meaning.
[6] I agree with truefusion on this, but you can explain these things using both Evolution and Creationism they would both work, its just evolution has the evidence, creationism has a 2000 year old text written people who couldn't of known better from "gods will" apparently.`

Right I'm going to go back and edit this with the rest of truefusions points but I have stuff to do, Truefusion please hold on just a little longer to reply, i'd rather you reply to the whole thing , though you can break it down if you wish.

The main point is you need to research this yourself, don't take my word for it, for example merely searching for "list of transitional fossils" returns a wikipedia page and any no. of things which should back it up. Also the same goes for baniboy and truefusion, the main reason I'm posting is that Bani boys section is riddled with holes and not often clear, and hes forcing me to agree with Truefusion which is not a nice feeling

. Right, to be continued ...

Quick Edit: Baniboy, I meant your post was more of a rant, and less of an explanation.

Part 2: Right, is Creation Science a science, well whether or not it is is rather trivial, just because a Peanut has nut at the end of it, doesn't make it a nut (it is a pea, look it up). Likewise just because you can say Creation Science doesn't make it any more true or scientific, Creation science fails because the assertions it makes are quickly rebuked. For example "There are no transitional fossils" - yes there is, heres a list. and also it can't be studied by empirical evidence, if the bible was released as a peer review paper it would bring nothing to the table, and meanwhile the creation science, lets call them squad, the creation science squad to my knowledged have never published any peer review papers on it, and if they have there assertions have been debunked. It is likely because creatioism cannot be studied scientifically. They try to proove it by disprooving evolution. (function X could not of evolved over time in gradual stages therefore X must have been created by God. theres even a book on the subject, except they use chance as the opposite method to Creationism, when evolution is not chance, it is the opposite) each examples has been proved to be false and a way it could have evolved has been discovered for every creationist example. Again, look it up yourself, think for yourself.

Q)So is it a Science?
A)Possibly,

Q)So what?
A)Absolutely

Again I'm forced to agree with Truefusion, natural explanations do not do away with God, but you must admit, they make the need for him less and make the idea of God less reasonable, of course this doesn't matter, the thing about being omnipitent, is you can crop in anywhere you like. That does not mean, that you have done.

Baniboys answer to point 11

11. It is, but the "creator" would be an idiot! Incapable of producing quality stuff, and just changing the existing design when it could design anything!

Truefusion Response to Baniboy

How would that make the Creator an idiot? You seem to be addressing a different question here. The question was about similarities in design, not mutations over time. It could be argued that if things mutated over time, it could be the creator perfecting his creation, but the question was about similarities in design. By similarities in design we can argue that the design process was finalized and implemented, therefore further implementations would be unnecessary or at least not requiring the creator.

Well again I have to sort of agree with truefusion, it would not make him and idiot, theres plenty of other reasons why he is, but I won't back up that statement because Its 1:30 am. using logic based on god being omnipitent and omniscient although a omnipitent, omniscient creator would have no need perfect his creation because he as a perfect being, could not create imperfect beings because then he would not be perfect, but that is assuming heavily, but it is still logical. he would have not made a mistake. and then truefusion goes on to explain the arguement the point was supposed to make, in favor of why Evolution is true without saying a word against it, his explanation is good enough that I don't have to write my own. Thanks Truefusion.

This was my reply to truefusion, I hope it made sense and wasn't full of grammatical errors, and again, hoping that you guys will think for yourselves whatever the answer you get comes to, with that I can be satified, I suppose thats where my respect for truefusion, he thinks for himself (I think). Night all.
Edited July 8, 2009 by kobra500 (see edit history)

Baniboy · July 7, 2009

I will reply to this tomorrow, 'cause I was almost finished with a megapost on this topic and the I accidently destroyed it when I was dragging an image to the tab I was writing the reply on. So, I don't think I can repeat my masterpiece again but I'll try, but not today... sorry

truefusion · July 8, 2009

[...] [1] god is supposed to be inside us all. we shall call god "the holy spirit" in this analogy. since god is inside us all, wouldn't that make us god?

[...] [2] could it be that the stregth really is in the #'s?

[...] [3] one thing i have also add that i know i already don't believe is it is better to serve other before one's self. sounds selfish but i will tell you why i believe being selfish is good. if you can't take care of yourself, how can you possibily take care of others? if your not strong in what life gives you, how can you be strong enough to help others? i know you can argue that if someone accepts god in their lives, that they will recieve help from god to be strong enough...but then that goes directly to my point that these people can't take credit for being there for others since they couldn't have done it without god. i say take care of ones self FIRST. THEN and only then are you able and strong enough to be there and help other. otherwise, one can say these people could be misguided and will misguide others through their own weaknesses.

[...] [4] wouldn't god be that much more credible when people try to talk about his existance? so in a way, the religions that believe in him are actually discrediting him indirectly.

[...] [5] that's another pro for there is strength in religion. there are so many interpretations of the bible, it isn't even funny when in fact there should only be one. the truth. especially in the new testiment when the story telling begins from different people who had experienced things first hand. how can those books ever be interpretted differently than what was originally written and "true"(true is an assumption when it's ridiculous to think that exagerated truths weren't invented back then). if there was only one interpretation of the bible, it would be less confusing to others. since religions are making it confusing.

[...] [6] religions need to change with the times in order to be truely organized and healthy religions.

[...] [7] ones who do have their own beliefs but wise enough to incoporate all people of all religions and faith.

[1] While God is supposed to be inside of us all, that is unfortunately not the case. John explains how to be one with God in 1 John 4:13-16. But even if God was inside us all, it wouldn't make us God. Christianity's oneness with God is not the same as Gnosticism or Pantheism.

[2] Strength is in numbers, yes.

[3] I too believe one should take care of one's self before they are able to take care of others. However, i have contemplated on ways to avoid being (or at least appearing) selfish even when taking care of yourself in this fashion, which therefore differs slightly from the position you have expressed. But the best way to explain this is by first mentioning how i define selfishness (though i'm not 100% satisfied by this definition): I define selfishness as (consciously) taking all the benefits or taking most of the benefits when others can benefit too; due to that, by this definition it is impossible to appear selfish if you distribute evenly all benefits among those who are capable of benefitting also. For example, for something as simple as a piece of pie: if there are four people who are interested in the pie and you're one of them, taking 1/3 or greater of the pie would be selfish by my definition of selfishness; taking 1/4 would not be selfish. From this definition it could be argued that taking less than 1/4 and leaving the rest for the others is generous, but i would rather that they were willingly generous rather than (following from the example) taking less because they can't handle 1/4th of the pie. By being willingly generous it allows for the possibility of generousity becoming a habit. Unfortunately, this somewhat assumes that generousity itself will not lead to their own down fall, but i also believe in the following proverb: Proverbs 11:24.

I should also mention that by "taking care of one's self" i do not necessarily mean to limit things financially or to health, for i include spiritually also. But to get back on ways to avoid selfishness while helping yourself: Though one should pick trustworthy people, one way to avoid being selfish while helping yourself is to seek the help from others. In this way you are giving others, those who want to help, a chance to help (especially if you can't help yourself), rather than blowing them off because of pride or whatever the reason. Another way to avoid being or appearing selfish is by obtaining a partner who is in the same position as yourself; in that way you grow together. If the two (though it may be a bigger group) are in too bad of a condition to help each other (though i would hope not), then they can revert to the first way i mentioned. These are the only ways i have right now; i don't have enough information to currently formulate more ways.

[4] Differences within the religion is not really a major worry concerning loss of faith or a reduction in numbers, as those who are already believers tend to stick to the faith regardless of different interpretations. The main reason for loss of faith is generally due to weak foundations. Also, while in a church, it is generally assumed that the existence of God and the validity of the Bible is a given, therefore discussions on the existence of God and the validity of the Bible are considered unnecessary or not discussed often, so they use that time for other things. Of course and unfortunately, many times due to those assumptions, the chances of weak foundations become significant. Thankfully, there are apologetics out there, but many don't suffice or they don't reach the kind of standard i would like them to reach. That is, many of them don't really address the (really) tough issues, and for those that try to address them, many of them don't provide a satisfactory answer (those that do are generally hidden deep within the internet). That's one of the reasons why i started my Christian Debater's Handbook (though not the main reason). So, in this case, yes, foundations would be stronger (and perhaps less mockery from unbelievers) if people were properly taught how to argue for the case of God. But implementing the implied system is slightly tricky due to the interests of the people (though i am generally speaking about teens and younger here).

[5] Many interpretations come from people taking a far too technical view of scripture; most from ambiguity from the text, though much of the ambiguity of the text is due to ignorance of the Jewish culture, how people thought back then, of the Hebrew, Greek and whatever other language Scripture is found in, and logic; from liberals; confusing literal with metaphoric and vice versa; et cetera. And these aren't necessarily mainstream. But i wouldn't say there are "many" interpretations as to make the amount appear like an actual, living exaggeration. Differing interpretations only become a problem when they replace, equal or surpass in status the core of Christianity, which is supposed to be the cross, the ressurection and redemption through Christ (though there is more). And when such a problem occurs, it can't really be left alone, therefore debates arise. But ambiguities and many interpretations can occur in any discussion or writing no matter what the topic and efforts the author took to avoid such things.

[6] That's one of the reasons for differing interpretations. It can be argued that one of the reasons for Christianity's popularity (i'm talking about what is written in the Bible, not what people preach) is due to lack of change. But it can also be argued that people just didn't change properly with the times, but trying to figure out the proper or better way implies trial and error, in which case potential believers can be lost.

[7] Within Christianity it is not wise to incorporate other faiths, as that would ruin the whole point to Christainity. While it may be wise to do what Paul did while he was in Athens (Acts 17:16-32), to use the similarities from other religions to argue for Christianity, therefore attaining people from other faiths, i would say that is as far as it can go for "incorporating" people of other faiths.

[...] [1] heres my reply to truefusion.

[[2]] There are Transitional Fossils, I won't take Baniboys retrospective of calling them idiots but It does annoy me. There are infact quite a few try google, we are lucky to have so many fossils anyway, we could easily have no fossils at all. We still havn't found any rabbits in the pre-cambian as well.

[...] [[3]] you could even say God created the cells, it doesn't make evolution wrong.

[[4]] Why can't we see any half whatever we evolved from (has recently been discovered I think, do your own research, half human. Well I hate to break it to you guys and girls but its because there all dead. Thats it, thats why.

[...] [2] The main point is you need to research this yourself, don't take my word for it, for example merely searching for "list of transitional fossils" returns a wikipedia page and any no. of things which should back it up.

[...] [5] and hes forcing me to agree with Truefusion which is not a nice feeling

[...] [6] and then truefusion goes on to explain the arguement the point was supposed to make, in favor of why Evolution is true without saying a word against it, his explanation is good enough that I don't have to write my own. Thanks Truefusion.

[1] :angel:

[2] See, the Wikipedia article is a direct and specific source of information, not a general, unclear source like, "go search for it yourself." However, i can't say that the Wikipedia article would suffice. For one, they show more drawings than fossils on that article—which have been known to not be an accurate representation, especially since a specific incident concerning a drawing by Ernst Haeckel. Secondly, from the images themselves, i get the impression that they are playing a mere guessing game. This is further supported by the introduction of the article, where it says that the article merely exhibits similarities to one another.

[3] Mhmm

[4] Sorry to break this to you ( :excl: ), you actually asserted a false dilemma. Even if it were the case that they died out, you wouldn't be able to prove it due to lack of evidence (fossils), therefore leaving open for the possibility of other explanations. Due to the fact that the only thing implying intermediate fossils between between one creature to the next is the presupposition of the theory of evolution, you cannot say as if it were absolute that these creatures merely "died out," since you can't show that they ever existed. You have to therefore accept the fact that there is no evidence of their existence. Of course, Creationists have for a long time been arguing that there are a lot of gaps in the fossil record, and they may forever argue that they want every step of the process rather than every 1, 20, 100 or what-have-you miles of the process before they accept it (even if it may be unreasonable on their side).

[5] :excl:

[6] Hah! I didn't really notice that opening. However, i wouldn't say it is closed enough to be in support of the theory of evolution. :excl:

kobra500 · July 8, 2009

No but I am giving you an example. I do not honestly know a lot about transitional fossils, all I know is that they have been proven to exist. I agree a wikipedia article would not suffice, but there is peer review papers and I don't know what, the question was simply saying why isn't there, which is like asking why apples aren't fruit, they just are... as I said, if you're interested look it up for yourself. Erm, you seemed to of misunderstood me unless they're living where we can't find them they must of died out, it would be illogical to suggest anything else, unless as I said they are hiding under rocks, the reason I made this point was because if I am right about God this is the logical answer to the question, it wasn't to say that they did exist, only if they did this is why they died out. Your point is there not there because they never were, but I was explaining why they are not here without God, that doesn't mean that they were ever here but it IS an option, and since evolution is true (sorry, it just is, because of Evidence, not faith), it is the likely one. There is evidence of there existance, I just havn't researched it enough to be able to answer you, I won't going into too much detail because I'm really not qualified to answer you, but there are plenty of people who are, who have researched the subject, but you won't find the hanging out on the Xisto forums. But I only know there has been evidence discovered because I had read a article about some research that had found the common ansestor, I'd look it up but I don't archive slashdot emails which is where I found the article. So there is evidence, wether or not you accept it to be true.

Edited July 8, 2009 by kobra500 (see edit history)

Baniboy · July 8, 2009

Number 6 is a false dilemma, it has nothing to do with that question. It's a leftover from another reply to Hovind's question. Anyway, here's what I was saying: "We have many transitional fossils between reptiles and birds, and also the evolution of the eye is possible as we have evidence for that too." Click here and here.

Bats do have hollow bones, but so do all mammals. Mammals have hollow bones filled with marrow(so do bats) but bird bones are filled with air. What makes bats capable of flight is also a good example of evolution. Let me quote:

Bats have marrow in their bones, just like any other mammal, but the

extreme narrowness of their bones means that the marrow-filled cavities are

proportionally smaller than in other mammals, effectively giving them

lighter bones than other mammals, an alternative adaptation for flight.

RNA can form without god(s) (of course not if you go to a subatomic level and ask what keeps particles from breaking apart). The catalyst for this process is called Montmorillonite. Nucleotides can form through chemical reactions without god magically "creating" them out of nothing. These nucleotides theen can form polynucleotides (poly meaning many/multi FYI). The catalyst for this chemical reaction to form nucleotide chains is montmorillonite. My source is many publications in research gate.

That is for only one nucleotide, I know, but I'm sure we'll discover how the other 3 for DNA form more in the future.

I also recommend watching this video 1 min and 54 sec of it's beginnning.

A perfect and all-knowing designer wouldn't design so many flaws. The truth is that many mutations - no matter how beneficial they may be - have side effects. You can watch this video for more info.

your response is, nevertheless, "[we] don't know."

"god did it" means, nevertheless, "we don't know". What I meant that scientists are not totally lost when it comes to the origin of life.

@KansukeKojima:

Evolution doesn't disprove god neither god does disprove evolution. Evolution DOES disprove the creationism in most religions. You can't believe in contradicting theories(creationism is not a theory, but I didn't find any other good words for describing what it is).

To me it seems that you believe that by logic you prove the existance of god, but you don't. You make a compromise in your logical thinking to make the existance of god(s) possible. Your logic is apparently like this:

Everything needs a cause, but now you make up your own stuff, you say that although evrything does need a cause, but not god, because he's eternal and what not. Logic doesn't work like that. You say that god is not bound to the laws of physics and logic. So... you get it? The only thing I can think of that isn't bound to the laws of physics and logic is human imagination. Yes, logical absolutes apply everywhere, so to god. You could wipe out the whole god thing and just say that universe is eternal, you wouldn't have to make compromise in your logic to understand the stuff around you.

Other problem is of course, human mind can not understand what eternal means. You can understand normally time like this: let's say I say I'm 15 years old(which I am btw ), you make sence of it by trying to remember how much 1 year is(not by days, but how long it feels to you) and multiplying it by 15 and somehow imagining... Now let's apply that to eternal. 1 or more (amount of time of your choice) multiplied by eter... *Wait.. I can't do that!* See? The result wouldn't make sense, it wouldn't give you a measurable answer. Eternality itself(I don't know if that's even a word..) however, is possible. So remember this, you can't simply get out of it by saying "god by definition is eternal", because the only way this would make sense is that god(s) is/are not being(s), but the force behind the laws of physics. Then, the statements "god is everywhere" and "god is eternal" do make sense, but I'll also add, "god is everything". So in some sense I would use the word "god" as a synonym to the word "universe"

/* My own "belief" */

I personally believe(not know, but I believe in what I believe by using my own logic) that universe is eternal. The big bang could've been caused by a shrinking universe(or something else, but this is the best we got right now). So, if universe is eternal(cycle), everything somehow starts to make sense. Except the "why" question of course, but that isn't even explained in creationism. We can never understand the deeper meaning of why something happened/happens, because it would cause an eternal cycle of why questions which we can not answer to. The reason this makes sense to me is that because no matter or energy could've came out of nowhere, they always existed. This applies because is that something which is not energy or matter, doesn't exist and *POOF* - coming to existance doesn't make sense nor is possible by the laws of physics, they must've always existed and cycled continously creating the universe, life and everything we know.

/* End of my personal thoughts that have so little evidence behind them, but my logic makes sense to me (hehe). If it doesn't to you, please tell why */

Now my choice of calling people idiots, it's because they know they have a large influence on others, they missuse it by lying to them. That, dear trapsters, is "evil".

Now moving into even more stupid arguments:

Click here and watch this video.

My reply, bananas evolved from wild bananas due to human artificially breeding them for good qualities. Source: google image search with keywords "wild banana". Let's move on now...

Now, microevolution has already been proven using the scientific method (Side note to truefusion: creation science is as much science as reptiles are birds, they do however share a common ancestor: thirst for knowing what is happening around you.). Because creationists can't deny it, all they can(actually they can't, but they think they can) deny is macroevolution, which is microevolution on a larger scale. After a short natural selection and mutation process(microevolution), subspecies still share most of the original specie's unique charecteristic combos. In macroevolution, they, the "subspecie" which has now developed into its own specie, shares some similar unique charecteristic combos with it's ancestor, but has many charecteristic combos which are unique to that specie only. In short, stop using this argument as well.

It's used to deny that evolved from early hominids/humanoids, which is like saying these:

Posted Image (wolf, probably hasn't evolved much in the last 11 000 years)

can evolve to these:

Posted Image (chihuahua, cute little fella)

But hominids that look so much similar to us, are devil's work to test our faith and what not... I don't have time now to show an example of hominid but use google search.

Quick edit: This came out to be a bit longer than I intended it to be, but it's also much better than the post I was writing earlier (the one that got destroyed).

Quick edit2: Creationism fights against the first law of thermodynamics, so does big bang if they claim it came out of nothing, just because we don't have evidence before it. In other words if your theory fights against some usual stuff we know about the universe, it isn't that dead yet, but if it doesn't go by any laws of thermodynamics, you have lost your credibility. enough said.

Edited July 8, 2009 by Baniboy (see edit history)

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