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No blood, no foul. I assure you that if you are not offended with me, I am one of the easiest people in the world with whom to get along. I have no arguments with people. As I say, hey, we ALL could be wrong...:)Quote:
Originally Posted by cuppajoe_9
Been away, now I'm back. Well I call change 'change' but you call it 'evolution'. Human beings have always been human beings and the danger of not accepting that is made manifest both in history and at present. You're too smart not to have noticed that. A prominent evolutionist has 'predicted' recently that humanity will 'evolve' into two groups; A genetic aristocracy and a genetic under class. Now regardless of the myriad 'facts' that you direct me to as smoke-screen those ideas are very dangerous mumbo-jumbo. Your point about gravity being just a theory is interesting. Some fifteen years ago while working in construction I fell from a scaffold. Had I the knowledge then that gravity was just a theory I could have consoled myself with the possibility that the angels of empirical science might come to sweep me up into some sort of airy-fairy free fall rather than the 'conclusion' that my 'reptilian?' brain leapt to - the incohate panic that my immediate death or paralysis was about to occur. Did I fly upward? Now that is an interesting question. One must take one's consolation where it is to be found I guess.
As Kim el Dingbat says we should be congratulating the North Korean scientists who have produced their little nuclear bomb. Scientists are such fine reliable folk, motivated only by the rigorous discipline of objective science. As our Canadian friend would say (only less politely) 'My fundament'. Scientists are like the rest of us motivated by half-felt, half-understood, deliberately mis-interpreted impulses. The hymn writer who said 'change and decay in all around I see' has been transmogrified into the evolutionist seeking evidence to support his ready made theory and finding the evidence because he wants to. Any evidence that does not fit is dismissed as just not ready to fit - yet. If the acceptance of this theory as fact is doing anything except closing minds then nothing I've read here or elsewhere offers contrary evidence. With all due respect to Cuppajoe (And that's a lot because he is very intelligent) the dismissal of contrary evidence does not do scientific thought any good and eventually leads to the type of tame scientists of the Kim Dynasty of North Korea.
Evolution is a dangerous idea, I don't dispute it. Safety, however, does not imply truth. We're not a the centre of the universe, the sun does not revolve around us, and worse: we're hardly made of anything (atoms are 99% vacuum) and we came from some sort of slime. Violence is going to come of it, I'm very very very very sorry to say, we're going to have to come to terms with it.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
Eeeyup. I'm not going to spell out exactly why I think it's mumbo-jumbo right here because it would take too long (you can read it on the News thread in the General Chat if you'd like), but the point is there are some bad scientists out there. However, there are also some very good scientists out there, it's just that they aren't always the ones who make the news.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
The point is that in science, a theory is not "just a theory". 'Theory' in science doesn't mean 'educated guess', it means 'a hypothesis that so well explains all the available data that it is accepted as fact. The 'reptilian' brain comment is interesting. Nobody's dispariaging your brain, and there's no reason to think that just because we evolved from less intelligent creatures that our powers of reason are not to be trusted. Our more recent ancestors probably would have accepted without question that the best treatment for madness is to drill a hole in the skull to let the demons out, but that's no reason to think that you and I are morons.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
Some do, some don't. No reason to lump all of us into the same category.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
Some scientists are immoral, yes, particularly ones who will be killed by insane Stalinist dictators if they act morally. This has nothing whatsoever to do with evolutionary biology.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
I've heard the 'scientist as religious figure' lament a number of times. Frankly, it's hogwash. If you look to any reputable evolutionary biologist for the answer to a moral problem, he will tell you to look elsewhere. Richard Dawkins, for example, frequently reminds his readers that he would not want to live in a society which takes it's ethical cues from evolution. I really cannot overstate the imporatnce of reading The Selfish Gene if you want to understand evolutionary theory.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
Yes, evolutionary theory has to change to acomodate the evidence, just like any other good theory. There have been challenges, but so far no fatal ones. The ID crowd's frequent cry that "half an eye is useless" has lead to a number of researchers tracking the evolutionary process of the eye. It's not as complicated as one might think, and they've even been able to track the process in currently existing animals with rudamentary eyes.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
A piece of fatal evidence to evolutionary theory could be quite simple (dig up a human skeleton in pre-cambrian rock and we need a new theory) but so far it hasn't happened.
Thank you very much. I completely agree. That's why I am so very happy when contrary evidence is not dismised but studided and evaluated, as in my 'half an eye' example.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
Reckon I've said all I want at present. My reference to the reptilian brain was a joking aside about that part of the brain which evolutionists claim is a vestigial remnant of the creature from the dark lagoon that you my friend and them seem to think was our ancestor. That part which is involved in profound things like 'flight or fight'. I wasn't implying that you had insulted me though no doubt in your apostolic evolutionary zeal the urge to do so might have flitted through that part of your own brain. I note that you have refrained. I remain deeply suspicious of the ammoral relatavism into which the too ready acceptance of evolutionary theory is leading us. I am a creationist without being one who reads the Genesis account literally. There are other interesting things to talk about and no doubt judging by the frequency of your posts I'll have the opportunity to converse ethereally with you elsewhere. I'll leave it to some of the American creationists to wield the cudgel for a while and deng dont they just swing it about!
I was never under the impression that I insulted you. You, on the other hand, have certainly just insulted me.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
*sigh* Ok, one more time: evolutionary theory says nothing whatsoever about how humans morally ought to behave. It is a scientific theory like any other. Any resulting moral relativism is the fault of the interpreter and not of the theory.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
Fortunately, around here anyway, they don't.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
I'll see you around.
Sorry my jousting friend - 'reptilian brain' is what some of the brain specialists sometimes call that part of not just yours but all our brains. Oh I do not like having to explain my explanations. Please take no offense by my reference to our conscious and unconscious impulses. We ALL have them. You should have noted more that I said you had 'resisted'. As Burns said visible bad behaviour is one thing easy to criticise (He often justifiably was) but we should observe that we do not always note or know what is resisted. I've enjoyed our exchanges but as one who tries to practice what has been preached to him from the pulpit and experience and Book I would not want us to part on unfriendly terms. It's probably my rather ironic sense of humour that leads to these misunderstandings but this is definitely my last post in this bit. You may have the last word. Do you think that our American friends are fearties?
If by this particular word which I confess I have yet to come across, although I read a lot of British Literature and am up on a good bit of British slang, me China, you imply that Americans are afraid, no. I am not and never have been. Take the time to read the whole thread and you will see where I stand. Better yet, go and read the extra-long Evolution VS Creationism thread and find my stance there. And others as well. Cowards need not apply here. :nod:Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison
If anything, they have the opposite problem.Quote:
Originally Posted by ennison