Evolution vs. Creation

Pshaw.

I think, regarding birth pain, that evolution is not supposed to make things less painful. Evolution - via natural selection - eventually changes things to be more effective. If it were more effective to give birth with less pain involved, then I'm sure that would eventually be the result of evolution...that we would evolve that way. But I don't think less birth pain necessarily is more effective - probably quite the reverse. *Shrugs* That's my two cents, anyway.

I agree with Bandini that this whole Creationism thing gets on my nerves. There would be no such thing as Creationism without science, and I mean real science.

But I can't see how religion can agree with evolution. Look at it this way. Faith means believing in what you're told by a particular book given to you by your parents (for me that's Shakespeare ;)). Being a Christian, I take it, means believing in everything written in the Bible - because the Bible and what is written in it is the essence of Christianity. There would be no Christians without the Bible. It doesn't do to believe in snippets - just in this, or just in that. If you're going to be a Christian, you may as be a whole one.

So in this light, if you're a Christian you should believe that the Earth is flat (Matthew 4:8) and doesn't move (Psalms 104:5), that witches exist (and should be burnt, or so said the priests who were the interpreters for God - well forget that one), that pi=3 (various sources, Kings 7:23), that rabbits chew the cud (Deuteronomy 14:6-7), that slaves are to be treated as property and are less than human (Exodus 21:20-21, Peter 2:18, and others), similarly with women (Ephesians 5:22-24, among others)...that ghosts exist...well if it had been written earlier we'd have some aliens in there as well, sure (not saying there aren't any, just that our image of them is somewhat...well I don't think aliens are the way we imagine them to be)...whew...I didn't mean this list to become so...er...controversial? But honestly, it's all in there. I wanted gentler things, such as belief in magic etc...well believing in God is of course believing in magic...but I digress.

I don't understand why so many women/girls follow Christianity, considering it treats them as inferior to men. Well, sure, so a man/some men/men with communication with some kind of god/or God himself (who is male, by most accounts).......wrote the Bible. It's very obvious. But why agree with it? Why agree with the treatment of wives as "property"? Why must a woman worship her husband as the husband worships God? Why all this "inferiority"? And why go with it?! If you're a guy and think women are inferior...well that's your problem. But if women think themselves inferior...that's seriously sad.

I also don't understand how so many down-to-earth-seeming guys can believe in all that stuff, you know, magic, ghosts, witches, invisible giants who can take a whole lot of something from nothing, who make men out of dust (I'm a little allergic to dust so I hope that won't be a problem), etc., etc., etc. But that's their thing. I obviously can't know how the psyche of a male works, so I'm not going to deal with it. ;)

Is this getting to be a bit too long? If so, my apologies. You know I get carried away about this stuff. Hope I've been respectful for once...:)

Darcy.
(Have you noticed I'm usually Darcy now in religious discussions and usually Miss Darcy everywhere else? Strange.)

Thank you Libram - I must admit I've never really explored the argument from 'the other side', apart from a paper I wrote on Wittgenstein's Fidesm, in which I argue that...well no time to go into it here. What I'm saying is I don't accept that out of thousands of cosmologies/religions etc., there can be one 'true' God. I know a Christian would just say "Ahhhh! But that's...", because everything is proof of God to a Christian. That said, I have had the odd numinous moment - probably because I was schooled in a Christian society ,so those feelings have terms of reference from this.

Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein. That name rings a bell. Was he the one who...screwed up his eyes in deep concentration before answering a question? Or was that someone else...

Ditto Bandini on what he (? excuse if not correct...) says about a "true" God. The Christian god is not any more true than all the other gods of different religions of different times (including of course the gods of ancient mythology). Believe what you want to believe, but saying that your own god is better than anybody else's, I think, is rather...well you know what I mean. I have nothing against honest Christianity, honest belief in whatever you do believe...but I don't like it when Christians behave irresponsibly towards members of other religions (or even different sects within their own religion) and, of course, us atheists. Believe what you like, but please don't intrude on the beliefs of others, if they have any...let them also believe what they like.

Atheists don't believe because there is no reason to believe. No reason at all. Or if so, why Christianity, and not any other of the hundreds of religions available? Why? Obviously, Christians are usually people who follow the religion they do simply because it has been passed down to them. Otherwise they have converted due to some "insight" or "revelation" (go into that later). But if you do believe, you should realise that there are contradictions, mistakes, and obscenities in the Bible (excuse me for saying so).

You should realise that we humans are of absolutely no importance to the world. We exist, that's it. There is no particular point in us being here (perhaps to become better human beings, but not a particular point that some god has set down for us). To quote Douglas Adams:

"...imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in - an interesting hole I find myself in - fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for."

What a perfect analogy (I got this quote out of Richard Dawkins' "A Devil's Chaplain"). It fits perfectly. Just perfectly. Down to the very last bit...I don't have that much respect for Adams as a novelist (sorry), but I must say, as a scientific thinker, he's rather good. Sometimes he writes very convincingly, though he's not my kind of writer. But I really respect him for that.

Oh, the time!

Darcy.

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So in this light, if you're a Christian you should believe that the Earth is flat (Matthew 4:8) and doesn't move (Psalms 104:5), that witches exist (and should be burnt, or so said the priests who were the interpreters for God - well forget that one), that pi=3 (various sources, Kings 7:23), that rabbits chew the cud (Deuteronomy 14:6-7), that slaves are to be treated as property and are less than human (Exodus 21:20-21, Peter 2:18, and others), similarly with women (Ephesians 5:22-24, among others)...that ghosts exist...

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That is only if you take the Bible litterally. And how can you know whether or not ghosts exist? They could very well exist. And as to Women...you do realise that they have been treated as inferior for a long time, and that now the situation is changing?

You should realise that many, many scientists believe and find no clash between their faith and their science. The Bible was written many years ago - but does it follow that it must be wrong? People do not change. We are very much as we were when we were mere hunters and gatherers. There are, I believe, many universal truths in the Bible. Else who would follow it?

Besides, who says God didn't make the earth those 4.5 billion years ago, created life, let evolution happen, and then the humans just misinterpreted some of what he said? Interpreting for God is a hard job, you can't always get it right.

If you are a Christian and not a hypocrite then you are a good person. You don't kill, don't lie, are morally upright...as long as you really follow, you cannot come to harm.

Miss Darcy seems to ignore something.

The world must be flat due to the same reason that God must exist. Some insects even have four legs. People are made of ribs and then at the Devil's tempting reproduce. Women are inferior to men in every way, they can be treated as property. Animals should be killed for a man who is invisible and directs us all on a cosmic playground. Children should be tortured for rebelling against parents who have brought them up wrong. Children ought to be sacrificed because the invisible maker orders it. Wars must be fought in the name of our Lord Jesus who is Dead, and is come to put a sword in man's hand (Matthew 10:34-35).

There is someone out there who can hear your every prayer, who knows you, and loves you, and will do anything for you if you are a good little sheep. Any little things you may need, if it's a work promotion or a new puppy dog - you pray for them, and your heavenly father gives them to you. But when it comes to cruelty, to starvation, to agony, to all evil in the world - does he stop it if you pray? If all the Christians in the world prayed for the end of suffering, God would never stop it, even if he could.

If you pray for something for yourself, yeah, it's okay, God can do it for you. But if you pray for something for somebody else, something that will help somebody else who is desperate, something that will perhaps cure somebody else of a disease - no response. God lets them continue in their suffering, or lets them die, which frees them from their anguish. Or actually, no, it doesn't free them from their anguish if they have grown up in an unchristian environment, or perhaps in the gutters, with no one to guide them, with nothing to stop them from revolting against the society that condemns them to such a pitiful existence. For a petty lifetime of immorality God will sentence you to an immortality of torment.

The fact is, there is no need for a Hell, there is quite enough suffering on Earth as it is. Rely on it that evil will be punished, there will always be conscience, there will always be torment to one who has sinned. But in some cases people...seem to suffer without cause. After leading a perfectly peaceful and moral life, many have to die in agony, punished for something they have not done; while all over the world evil rules unchecked. Does it not lead one to think that there might be something more? Not an afterlife, no, but perhaps the Eastern idea of reincarnation is not far off the target. If reincarnation were true at least to some extent, this would make sense. It seems rather strange, this short life, and then to think there is nothing more - you are left to rest without having reached perfection. I realise that many may not agree with this, however I am not trying to make anybody do so, I am only putting the idea forward for some consideration.

Just a few thoughts,

Loki

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Originally Posted by Libram

If you are a Christian and not a hypocrite then you are a good person. You don't kill, don't lie, are morally upright...as long as you really follow, you cannot come to harm.

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Therein lies the problem. You say "That is only if you take the Bible litterally." and act like there aren't some Christians that do take it literally. To really follow it, I'd sooner believe someone who followed it literally was really following more of it than someone who interpreted it, since they aren't following it to the T, they're adding in what they feel is right or wrong to it.

Not to mention, your idea about "There are, I believe, many universal truths in the Bible. Else who would follow it?" is a bit haphazard as well, since many religions have "truths" which are just as understandable and reasonable as the Bible, so they might follow them as well since they make sense, too. And believe it or not, some of them don't even have a god directing that set of truths because many things are picked up culturally and made into texts for verifications on cultural norms for others.

Don't get me wrong though, I know what you mean about Christianity changing over time to better adapt to society, but if anything, all that shows is how the book itself wasn't too effective in delivering its point, when (if God were all knowing and all) God could've just had it written proper the first time it was done instead of leaving all these practices in that aren't relevant 2000 years down the road. I'm all for liberal interpretation, but if one is going to do it, at least admit that one becomes a little less Christian with every alteration in the text...

On another idea: Whether God did make the world 4.5 bya and started evolution, or not, isn't so much the point if we can't reasonably deduct that there is a god in the first place. Then again, that's where the beliefs come in and lead us to reason that we all gotta explain the universe somehow and sometimes feeling there is a god doing it instead of natural order that works on its own just makes more sense to some.

Just late night thoughts in regards to what I read, :). And Loki, way to be a devil's advocate, but the mixed messages aren't helping anyone when you don't make a concise point.

I think that Christian ethics are basically pretty right on. It's basically be tolerant and love one another. Great. The problem is that religion is always used, by some, as an instrument to wield power over others. So we get the exact opposite of what Jesus tried to teach. The other problem is when it is used to restrict people from doing things or encouraging people to behave like sheep - that whole 'flock' thing got to me. Robert Anto Wilson added a caveat to Crowley's (not a great moral teacher IMO!) best known aphorism - "Do as thou wilt - and love - shalt be the whole of the law"

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Originally Posted by Dyrwen

And Loki, way to be a devil's advocate, but the mixed messages aren't helping anyone when you don't make a concise point.

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I am aware of that, Dyrwen, I had been planning to expatiate a little but unfortunately I was called away from the computer too soon. I thought I'd edit the post when I had more time...so I reckon I will do so now. :)

I see, sorry for jumping the gun. Your edit made much more sense of the post now, :)

No need to apologise, Dyrwen, jumping guns is my favourite morning exercise. ;)

Is it not strange that all the theists have disappeared somewhere?

-No wonder it's so quiet. It is rather difficult to have an Evolution vs. Creation debate without having anyone around to support Creation.

.......perhaps some people, theists, creationists, the 'believers' , have sensed/or do sense, a disturbance in the force.....perhaps the hush we hear is the bated breath of someone who is witnessing.... 'first-hand' .....the beginning of all that they have struggled to 'see', struggled to believe.....a dreadful silence announcing the beginning of the end......................and we can't see it...............

Or they're just thinking "****, my beliefs are absolutely ludicrous!" *Braces himself for onslaught of fervent, dogmatic knackers*

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.......perhaps some people, theists, creationists, the 'believers' , have sensed/or do sense, a disturbance in the force.....perhaps the hush we hear is the bated breath of someone who is witnessing.... 'first-hand' .....the beginning of all that they have struggled to 'see', struggled to believe.....a dreadful silence announcing the beginning of the end......................and we can't see it...............

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Perhaps. Perhaps they've just decided there's no use arguing any more...maybe they've realised it's hopeless to try to convince us...or maybe they simply don't have any arguments left.

Si, true. But of course all positions on reality may eventually reach such an apex, this is what I am implying, along with the point that all perceptions are arguably only as viable as the next, including the perception that anothers perception is or may be, imprecise. To deny the existence of the reality of another's spiritual or philosophical belief, sheerly from one's own unmet demands for a precise accounting, or concrete proof , seems hubric. Our own existence is not precise. Life is not precise. As for dogmatic knackers, I hope for myself to avoid such an approach to life not matter the strengths of my own beliefs. And while I personallly have no need for the existence of gods I shall not detact from another's approach to life. Me, I'm living to learn and it is all good...............