atheists

[Imperfect]

Good science includes change because it is not dogmatic. Typically this change involves more accurate information. For a thought experiment, try measuring the distance from where you are right now to an object that you can see. Then use a small object (like a shoe or watchband) to measure the distance. Then measure with an actual measuring implement, such as a tape measure. Each of these measurements are likely to change, but that doesn't prove that any of them were "wrong"... with more information, you simply became more accurate. As we gather more data, theories like evolution change in small ways towards becoming more accurate, but the change doesn't imply that any past version of the theory was "wrong" or misguided -- they were based on the best information available at the time.

Evolution's age doesn't imply anything about its accuracy any more than Christianity's age does. Islam is nearly as old as Christianity, but that doesn't mean you agree that this implies that Muslims are right. The internet is relatively new, but I doubt that you disagree with people's claims about the internet simply because such claims haven't been believed for long.

i know this. ive heard it all from a atheists POV. i know, like i said, "new evidence". but what kind of "evidence" keeps getting put to the side... wrong evidence. so why put any type a trust in something that is forever changing.

would you trust a "friend" if they have a ever-going habit of changing their stories?

scientists can research this as long as they want, but until they believe in God and Jesus, they will NEVER know the truth. but science doesnt believe that so they will never know the truth.

but 1 thing is for certain, the more science figures out, eventually, 1 day, they will believe because the truth is the truth and the truth doesnt change. but that must be why more and more atheist scientists have come around to believing over these last few years. they gave up the atheist / evolution train of thought. they realized that rubbish couldnt hold weight.

 

[Sanashankar]

Plus, attributing every wonder to
God kind of deflates the experience.

No longer can you look upon something with wonder and amazement... Just "oh, god did it"

I don't think that way, whenever i see the beautiful creation of God, the mysteries of the universe, i feel like I'm a small child wondering what an awesome brilliant God he might be.

The same God who created this




created this too



What a perfect God he is.

 

[Imperfect]

Someone I think once told me how do I explain how monkeys have thumbs just like humans, to prove evolution....then I realized koalas have thumbs, does that make us related to them? I am most definite everything is their own creature by God's hand.

so because monkeys have a thumb means they are us? such a shallow way of thinking lol

maybe goldfish evolved from a shark since they both live in the water and have vertical tails.

 

[Sanashankar]

1.We EXIST (there are only a few strange people who deny this fact of the cosmos, believing that all this is merely a dream. Let's not awaken them!). A creation of infinite DESIGN, SYSTEMS, INTERDEPENDENT ORGANS AND INTERDEPENDENT ORGANISMS, PURPOSE, HARMONY, BEAUTY, INTELLIGENCE (the human mind for example), REPRODUCTION, etc., etc., etc., DEMANDS an intelligent, purposeful, living, all-powerful CREATOR!

No sane and rational person, finding a Rolex Watch on a desert dune, would ever suggest that that marvelous mechanism invented ITSELF, and created ITSELF, and assembled ITSELF, without the aid of any intelligence whatsoever. And yet, supposed, intelligent men speculate that the great time-peace of the universe invented, created, and assembled itself without the aid of any intelligent creator.

2.Even if we make the quantum leap in our minds from no matter, no harmony, no systems, no design, to perfect harmony and design without the aid of a creator, how do we account for the fact of LIFE? Life is as complicated as the universe itself. A single cell has more communication and reproductive power than all the machines and computers built by man in the history of the world. Yet we are told that it "built itself." It spontaneously generated itself from primortal sea slime by the mixing of chemical in the sea and a genius stroke of lightning to get it all started. Never mind where the sea came from, the chemicals, and the lightning.

Life DOES NOT SPONTANEOUSLY GENERATE ITSELF! Life comes ONLY from pre-existing life, and life of the same KIND. These are facts of science,. (By the way, lightning KILLS LIFE, it does not create life from dead chemicals). Just based on the Law of Probability (I said "law" and not theory), it would take longer to mix the chemicals at random to produce the long chains of amino acids, etc., needed for life, by at least a trillion times longer than scientists estimate the age of the universe. In other words, IT DIDN'T HAPPEN THAT WAY.

 

[Imperfect]

1.We EXIST (there are only a few strange people who deny this fact of the cosmos, believing that all this is merely a dream. Let's not awaken them!). A creation of infinite DESIGN, SYSTEMS, INTERDEPENDENT ORGANS AND INTERDEPENDENT ORGANISMS, PURPOSE, HARMONY, BEAUTY, INTELLIGENCE (the human mind for example), REPRODUCTION, etc., etc., etc., DEMANDS an intelligent, purposeful, living, all-powerful CREATOR!

No sane and rational person, finding a Rolex Watch on a desert dune, would ever suggest that that marvelous mechanism invented ITSELF, and created ITSELF, and assembled ITSELF, without the aid of any intelligence whatsoever. And yet, supposed, intelligent men speculate that the great time-peace of the universe invented, created, and assembled itself without the aid of any intelligent creator.

2.Even if we make the quantum leap in our minds from no matter, no harmony, no systems, no design, to perfect harmony and design without the aid of a creator, how do we account for the fact of LIFE? Life is as complicated as the universe itself. A single cell has more communication and reproductive power than all the machines and computers built by man in the history of the world. Yet we are told that it "built itself." It spontaneously generated itself from primortal sea slime by the mixing of chemical in the sea and a genius stroke of lightning to get it all started. Never mind where the sea came from, the chemicals, and the lightning.

Life DOES NOT SPONTANEOUSLY GENERATE ITSELF! Life comes ONLY from pre-existing life, and life of the same KIND. These are facts of science,. (By the way, lightning KILLS LIFE, it does not create life from dead chemicals). Just based on the Law of Probability (I said "law" and not theory), it would take longer to mix the chemicals at random to produce the long chains of amino acids, etc., needed for life, by at least a trillion times longer than scientists estimate the age of the universe. In other words, IT DIDN'T HAPPEN THAT WAY.

i have been using the same exact arguments for years. thats crazy. except i used a computer, not a rolex.

 

[Sanashankar]

1. Would an intelligent Creator at some point in time communicate with His higher creatures? I think so. The Scriptures are unique in the world of literature and writing. There are for example, numerous laws of science presented in the Scriptures that scientists have only recently come to understand with his combined knowledge of thousands of years. Primitive writers could not have known many of the things attested to in the Scriptures.
   
   
2. There are hundreds of prophecies in the Scriptures that have been fulfilled in minute detail many years and even centuries AFTER the known date of the writings.
   
3. Concerning the spiritual teachings of the Scriptures, there is more real and absolute knowledge in the Scriptures regarding what man is and how he thinks and functions in a half dozen verses than can be found in all the psychology and philosophy books in the world.
   
   
4. My God answers PRAYERS!

God bless you

Points taken from L. Ray Smith - Exposing Those Who Contradict

 

[Sanashankar]

so because monkeys have a thumb means they are us? such a shallow way of thinking lol

maybe goldfish evolved from a shark since they both live in the water and have vertical tails.

hahaha....

 

[Cycel]

... we Certainly believe God exists. Everyone does. This talk of God in our world is so big and that just proves there must be something to His existence. It's actually the biggest talked about thing on this planet. You can lie to yourself and others, but you can't lie to God.

On Christmas day a couple of years back CBC radio ran a short documentary on Christmas in Japan. Turns out that many Japanese now practice a secular form of Christmas where Santa delivers presents, though he apparently often leaves them outside the door. What took me back were the street interviews of Christmas shoppers. The journalist asked Japanese shoppers what they knew of Jesus. Most had never hear of him.

Directline, everyone does not know God exists. Living in predominantly Christian countries we often have no awareness of this basic fact. I have never had any sense of God's presence in my life, not even back when I was a believer and accustomed to daily prayer. That, more than anything else -- I think -- is responsible for my becoming and atheist. From your experience God is “the biggest talked about thing on this planet” but that perception is really only a reflection of the importance of God in your own life which colours the way in interpret world. Other people have other perceptions that have little or nothing to do with God.

 

[CoooCaw]

Exactly half, CoooCaw, or one third, or three eights, or some other fraction?

I don't think I have ever seen the claim that Lucy is half way to being human. Lucy was an ape, but most importantly she was a bipedal ape.

If evolution is true then somewhere in our ancestry humans have a bipedal ape as an ancestor. Do you accept this proposition? I am not asking you to say evolution is true I am asking you recognize the evolutionist claim that if evolution is true then a bipedal ape like Lucy is somewhere in our ancestry?

if evolution is true then sometime there was an intermediate who was either both ape and human(a contradiction) or neither ape nor human - God foresaw this controversy and promissed that each would continue to bring forth - AFTER THEIR OWN KIND

 

[Imperfect]

On Christmas day a couple of years back CBC radio ran a short documentary on Christmas in Japan. Turns out that many Japanese now practice a secular form of Christmas where Santa delivers presents, though he apparently often leaves them outside the door. What took me back were the street interviews of Christmas shoppers. The journalist asked Japanese shoppers what they knew of Jesus. Most had never hear of him.

Directline, everyone does not know God exists. Living in predominantly Christian countries we often have no awareness of this basic fact. I have never had any sense of God's presence in my life, not even back when I was a believer and accustomed to daily prayer. That, more than anything else -- I think -- is responsible for my becoming and atheist. From your experience God is “the biggest talked about thing on this planet” but that perception is really only a reflection of the importance of God in your own life which colours the way in interpret world. Other people have other perceptions that have little or nothing to do with God.

................

 

[Cycel]

so because monkeys have a thumb means they are us? such a shallow way of thinking lol

This is not what evolutionists think at all. This is just another example of anti-evolutionists misrepresenting evolutionary theory. See my post #180 in this thread where I attempt to straighten out this unfortunate misunderstanding.

 

[Imperfect]

Evolutionary biologists don't make the claim that possession of a trait is proof of human ancestry.

If, for example, animal life exists on other worlds beyond our solar system I would be very surprised if some of them did not have eyes, legs, and perhaps even thumbs. Evolutionary development favors genes that produce traits beneficial to the organism. Traits can evolve independently so the fact the eagles have eyes, and koalas have thumbs, does not mean we evolved from the ancestors of eagles or koalas.

That said, if evolution is true, then according to the theory our ape ancestors would themselves have evolved from a monkey-like ancestor with thumbs.

Here is something to consider. Humans do not have tails, and neither do apes, but according to evolutionary theory our ape ancestors would have evolved from some monkey-like ancestor with a tail. According to evolutionary theory we should still possess in our genetic make-up the mechanism to grow a tail. In fact we have such a gene but it is switched off, nonetheless, once in a great while there is a genetic mutation and that gene is turned back on. Sometimes children are born with tails that are complete with vertebrae and muscle structure that allow that tail to be wiggled.

Those who are aghast at the prospect that evolution might be true need to explain to evolutionists why God in his completely independent creation of Adam and Eve would have given them the genetic component to grow a tail.

question-

you dont find it amazing how every animal has natural gifts, abilities, and physical build / make-up to live and survive in its habitat?

God is the creator. God created everything, every creature. God gives every animal, creature, being its special assets to live in its habitats. not only did he give them the special gifts, but wired them mentally to already know how and what to do to survive.

i know you are not saying the thumb theory, but for example, monkeys / apes have thumbs because of their habitat and way of living. they live around and on trees, thats why God gave them thumbs.. those thumbs didnt just magically evolve there.

and i DO believe aliens.. and of course they have thumbs. they may not have 5 fingers, but thumbs are a necessity to grab and hold objects.

 

[Cycel]

if evolution is true then sometime there was an intermediate who was either both ape and human(a contradiction) or neither ape nor human...

No. This is what I was trying to convey with the film strip analogy. Take the series of images of the baby photographed every day into adulthood. Could you examine one frame and say on this day the child has finally become an adult? Or could you examine a different frame and then declare that in the following image the child had become a senior but that in the one previous the individual was still middle aged? The changes are gradual and day by day the signs of aging slowly accumulate, but you can't pinpoint a day on which the person suddenly becomes elderly. And in the case the transformation from ape to human it is the same. The accumulation of human like features is so gradual from one generation to the next that you would find it impossible to name the generation that had become human because their parents wouldn't look any less human. You would not likely notice a change from one generation to the next, you would have to look over thousands of generations to perceive obvious change.

In the fossil record upright stature is achieved first but the skulls remain ape-like. Changes continue gradually. So for example skulls retain an ape-like appearance but the teeth gradually reduce in size and start to look more and more human. You can't speak of a specimen being half ape and half human because that type of thinking is a relic of the false assumption that there was some point at which the ape becomes human. No such point exists.

 

[Imperfect]

No. This is what I was trying to convey with the film strip analogy. Take the series of images of the baby photographed every day into adulthood. Could you examine one frame and say on this day the child has finally become an adult? Or could you examine a different frame and then declare that in the following image the child had become a senior but that in the one previous the individual was still middle aged? The changes are gradual and day by day the signs of aging slowly accumulate, but you can't pinpoint a day on which the person suddenly becomes elderly. And in the case the transformation from ape to human it is the same. The accumulation of human like features is so gradual from one generation to the next that you would find it impossible to name the generation that had become human because their parents wouldn't look any less human. You would not likely notice a change from one generation to the next, you would have to look over thousands of generations to perceive obvious change.

In the fossil record upright stature is achieved first but the skulls remain ape-like. Changes continue gradually. So for example skulls retain an ape-like appearance but the teeth gradually reduce in size and start to look more and more human. You can't speak of a specimen being half ape and half human because that type of thinking is a relic of the false assumption that there was some point at which the ape becomes human. No such point exists.

to say that man evolved from an ape is really utterly and completely illogical.

you say we evolved from apes, and say they naturally kind of faded from ape to human like a baby does from infant to adulthood...

do you realize how many different skulls would have been dug up? for every little detail, it would probably be somewhere in the thousands to millions of different skulls, etc.. but they only have 5-6 different skulls, with a story tagged to them. a silly 1 at that.

if you ask me, they are nothing more than extinct creatures of the ape family. not past humans. thats rubbish.

 

[Cycel]

question-

you dont find it amazing how every animal has natural gifts, abilities, and physical build / make-up to live and survive in its habitat?

Yes, and some of the things I see in the animal world truly amaze me, but I still put it down to evolution. I'd elaborate; there is more I want to say, but it's late and I need to hit the sack. Goodnight.

 

[Huckleberry]

Here is something to consider. Humans do not have tails, and neither do apes, but according to evolutionary theory our ape ancestors would have evolved from some monkey-like ancestor with a tail. According to evolutionary theory we should still possess in our genetic make-up the mechanism to grow a tail. In fact we have such a gene but it is switched off, nonetheless, once in a great while there is a genetic mutation and that gene is turned back on. Sometimes children are born with tails that are complete with vertebrae and muscle structure that allow that tail to be wiggled.

Those who are aghast at the prospect that evolution might be true need to explain to evolutionists why God in his completely independent creation of Adam and Eve would have given them the genetic component to grow a tail.

Here is something for you to consider, though I doubt you will.
A long time ago, some really bad angels fornicated with human women.
Some of the angels were probably beasts of one sort or another
(a lot of legends/myths about half-human-half-beast monsters).
So the progeny produced were what you might call mutated freaks.
Some of these mutated freaks had tails.
Some had six fingers and toes on each extremity.
Some were probably reptilian.
The world was full of these evil monsters to the extent that God decided to KILL ALL FLESH on the earth (not the sea).
Some of the genes from these freaks survived through Noah's family and still exist.

 

[Imperfect]

Yes, and some of the things I see in the animal world truly amaze me, but I still put it down to evolution. I'd elaborate; there is more I want to say, but it's late and I need to hit the sack. Goodnight.

there is no elaborating.

 

[CoooCaw]

No. This is what I was trying to convey with the film strip analogy. Take the series of images of the baby photographed every day into adulthood. Could you examine one frame and say on this day the child has finally become an adult? Or could you examine a different frame and then declare that in the following image the child had become a senior but that in the one previous the individual was still middle aged? The changes are gradual and day by day the signs of aging slowly accumulate, but you can't pinpoint a day on which the person suddenly becomes elderly. And in the case the transformation from ape to human it is the same. The accumulation of human like features is so gradual from one generation to the next that you would find it impossible to name the generation that had become human because their parents wouldn't look any less human. You would not likely notice a change from one generation to the next, you would have to look over thousands of generations to perceive obvious change.

In the fossil record upright stature is achieved first but the skulls remain ape-like. Changes continue gradually. So for example skulls retain an ape-like appearance but the teeth gradually reduce in size and start to look more and more human. You can't speak of a specimen being half ape and half human because that type of thinking is a relic of the false assumption that there was some point at which the ape becomes human. No such point exists.

that is the fantasy you find illustrated in text books but there is ZERO evidence of these intermediate forms

what ever is found is clearly an ape or clearly a human or clearly something else

IF EVOLUTION WAS TRUE THEN EVERYTHING DUG UP WOULD BE IN A TRANSITION FROM ONE THING TO ANOTHER - THIS IS NOT WHAT IS FOUND!!

and if the earth was millions or billions of years old we would be up to our neck in these fossils

whatever time frame you want; it is the easiest thing in the world to prove a young earth and you never had the luxery of all this time

 

[Starcrash]

i know this. ive heard it all from a atheists POV. i know, like i said, "new evidence". but what kind of "evidence" keeps getting put to the side... wrong evidence. so why put any type a trust in something that is forever changing.

would you trust a "friend" if they have a ever-going habit of changing their stories?

scientists can research this as long as they want, but until they believe in God and Jesus, they will NEVER know the truth. but science doesnt believe that so they will never know the truth.

but 1 thing is for certain, the more science figures out, eventually, 1 day, they will believe because the truth is the truth and the truth doesnt change. but that must be why more and more atheist scientists have come around to believing over these last few years. they gave up the atheist / evolution train of thought. they realized that rubbish couldnt hold weight.

If this is your view of evolution, then you simply don't know the history of evolution. Exactly what "ever-going habit of changing" do you think that it has gone through? When Darwin first conceived of the idea, he didn't know the mechanism behind it -- all he had observed was the effects. Shortly after his death, Mendel's discoveries of genetics gave evolution a mechanism and greater explanatory power. A scientist named LaMarck created a competing theory of evolution in which changes happened suddenly, from one generation to the other, but it wasn't widely accepted because his examples were few and didn't fit the general pattern. Within the last ten years, LaMarck's observations have been explained by epigenetics, a way that rapid changes in gene expressions over a generation can happen. None of these changes fit an "ever-going habit of changes", but rather fit my explanation of greater evidence making the theory more accurate.

And then there are the evolutionary lines. At one time, it was believed that humans came from gorillas because we look and act so much like them. When dinosaur bones were discovered, they were believed to be part of reptile evolution. These theories changed as soon as we were able to decode genes from both lines and compare markers... greater information made it clear that we were more closely related to chimpanzees and that dinosaurs more likely than not became modern birds. And it helps that we keep finding more fossils, establishing more links in the chain. Again, more information led to a more refined theory, not the need to "change the story".

Do you know the history of Christianity? Witch burnings used to be a part of that, and now they're not. Slavery used to be justified with the bible, and now it's not. Even in our own generation, we've seen a shift away from people dressed up in church and singing very old hymns to something more casual and modern (not in all churches, but in the "average" church). What is your explanation for these changes, if your religion is based on a never-changing truth and established in a book that doesn't change? Perhaps you shouldn't be so hard on science.

 

[Starcrash]

that is the fantasy you find illustrated in text books but there is ZERO evidence of these intermediate forms

what ever is found is clearly an ape or clearly a human or clearly something else

IF EVOLUTION WAS TRUE THEN EVERYTHING DUG UP WOULD BE IN A TRANSITION FROM ONE THING TO ANOTHER - THIS IS NOT WHAT IS FOUND!!

and if the earth was millions or billions of years old we would be up to our neck in these fossils

whatever time frame you want; it is the easiest thing in the world to prove a young earth and you never had the luxery of all this time

There is a practically uncountable number of "transition forms" found in the fossil record. Even if you can't be bothered to do the research, I'm sure you're well-aware that many dinosaur bones have been found. Dinosaurs no longer walk the earth, so they are not a current species. The discovery of dinosaur bones was quite a shock to everyone, but evolution readily explained them... the bible didn't. The bible doesn't explain extinction, massive varieties of very similar species (such as the millions of species of ants), or the separation of different evolutionary lines by continent. Evolution does.

We might be "up to our neck in these fossils" if all bones fossilized, but they generally decompose instead. Natural disasters churn up fossils, or destroy them, or lose them. Of course we'd still expect to find a lot of fossils due to the sheer number of dead animals over a sheer number of years, and we do. Sorry that it isn't living up to your expectations.

Finally, a young earth isn't supported by science because of the sheer amount of evidence for an old earth. Radiation dating methods have found countless lava deposits that are millions and billions of years old, and the various elements that we'd expect to have lost to short half-lifes are indeed lost due to the passage of time. Observatories are constantly mapping the universe, finding new stars and placing them. To discover how far away a star is, one simply has to triangulate it. Did you ever take trigonometry in school? Given two points of a triangle (such as two observing telescopes), the distance between those two points and the angle between them, one can find the distance of the other sides of the triangle leading to the third point (a star). In this manner, we've found stars that are millions of miles away, suggesting that they've had millions of years for the light to travel to Earth. And once we found these "closer" stars, we could observe ones that were further away through parallax and change in a single observatory's position due to Earth's rotation. The universe continued to "get older" as we find more and more older things in the universe, and an accurate reading of background radiation helped us get a final age of the universe. Even if you thought that these readings of distances in the universe weren't accurate, do you realize how far off these estimates would have to be to get an age similar to the bible's? It's like a 99.999999% margin of error if you are to be believed.