The Word Evolutionists

I'm not sure it's a lack of understanding so much as a lack of respect.I mean, I imagine scientists understand maybe better than anyone what might prompt someone to faith in a higher power. But they may feel no particular need to "coddle" what they see as a sort of mental laziness.For instance, with a little training in psychology I could easily understand why someone might become an alcoholic, and how that might cause them to visit abuse on others. That doesn't mean, though, that I'm not going to have anything but sharp words for an abusive alcoholic.I don't think Dawkins thinks of you as abusive alcoholics, or anything, but I'd say it's pretty fair to characterize his position as being fairly disdainful of religion and supernaturalism in general, and I imagine it's because he sees it as a kind of mental cowardice - an unwillingness to face the universe without a sort of spiritual safety blanket.Yeah, I dunno. I'm not sure it's fair for Dawkins to criticize - I'm sure he has his own little comfort space, his own little things he does to carve out a safe corner of the world. Then again, his macaroni-and-cheese habit - or whatever - probably isn't the source of anything like the Spanish Inquisition.

Well, you can imagine that the existence of religion is a little puzzling to us, sometimes. I mean, it's pretty obvious to many of us that you're believing in something that there's no evidence for whatsoever. Why would someone believe in something that, for all intents and purposes, doesn't even exist?Anyway, our suspicions that it's about fear and comfort tend to be confirmed every time one of you believers busts out Pascal's Wager - "shouldn't you believe like we do just in case?" - or tries to paint atheism as a belief system that can't protect people against baby-eating psychos. Again, you may think that, but just about everybody who has faith talks about the comfort and peace of mind they get from the knowledge that a higher power is looking out for them and will greet them and their loved ones in the afterlife.When we characterize faith as a comfort thing, it's because the faithful are always talking about the comfort they get from faith. If there was really something there to trust, it would be.

Well, I'd say I have as great an understanding as possible - I had some, once.As far as I can tell now it's much like how abusive relationships work - when the relationship works, it confirms for the victim that the abuser isn't really that bad, that he's really a basically good guy. When it isn't working, the victim makes excuses for the abuser - it's not his fault, I can't understand why he does that, it must be something I did.Every time I hear a believer give glory to God for the good things and excuse Him from the bad, I hear an abused girlfriend defending her abuser. So yeah, I think I have a fairly good understanding of faith - a deeper and better understanding than most people who have faith.Why do abuse victims stay with, and even return to, their abuser? The same reason many people won't even countenance a life without faith. Because they don't have the confidence in their own abilities that it takes to abandon what you know, what makes you comfortable, and face uncomfortable truths. Well, if you were, or had been an atheist, I would at least consider that that might be true. Again, you seem to forget that I was once a believer just like you, with just as much faith then as you have now. It puzzled me at first, then I figured it out. But it's a puzzle that a lot of atheists go through.

Oh, of course it is. But read between Pascal's lines, and you'll see the motivation of their own faith:"Aren't you afraid we're right and you're wrong? Wouldn't it be safer and more comfortable for you to play it safe, not to take the risk you might be wrong?"Honestly the intellectual cowardice of Pascal's Wager is very off-putting, and I thought so even when I was a Christian. Why on Earth would anyone be convinced by the idea "dont bother to try to find out what's true or not; just play it safe and make sure you've covered all the bases." It's like that wormy guy in The Mummy who prays to all the different religions. What kind of honest faith is supposed to stem from covering your ass?

I hope so. I can't even wrap my brain around the idea of always having been an atheist; so I'm slightly worried about my future children. I've considered adopting a fake faith just so that they have something to reject later as they mature, because that was a pretty important part of my maturity.I have no idea how to raise a kid who doesn't believe in God. But then, I have no idea how to raise a kid at all.

But they did take root, for many years, and bore fruit.Oh, I see what you're saying. You're saying that, even if a plant takes root, grows strong, and bears fruit, if it ever dies, it was never alive.Well, that's a pretty weird definition of life, Mike. It's a pretty weird definition of faith. How on Earth would you tell the difference between a so-called "true believer" (like you, I guess), and a believer who just hasn't lost their faith yet?In other words, Mike, why would you believe you know any more about faith than I do, when you can't even prove the faith you have is real? Yeah, I know. None of the bad stuff that's ever happened to you was really God's fault. Of course.

Well, says you, but I have the advantage of perspective on you - I've examined faith from both the inside and the outside.So, in fact, I'd say I have a pretty good understanding of why people have faith. Oh, I'm sure you don't find my conclusion pleasant, but that doesn't make it any less accurate. The same way you can compare a Douglas Fir and a two-by-four. They're just different stages of a process. But the fact that the two-by-four is dead doesn't mean that it was any less of a tree when it was alive. Mike, your faith will grow and change too, if you're willing to let it. That might even mean that you change and grow into a person who doesn't need faith anymore. But trying to run from unfortunate truths doesn't lead to wisdom or security, it leads to hollowness.

Oh, really? Because you don't really strike me as the kind of person with a really mature faith. You strike me as a teenager, with that kind of teenage vigor that some people apply to hobbies, and some to relationships, and some to religion. In other words you're a fire that burns hot, loud, and quick.That guy Truthlover? There's a guy with a mature faith. His fire has coals, it has warmth and heat and staying power. It's soft and quiet but it'll burn the night through.Maybe you, or maybe some of you young Christians reading this see his faith and think it weak. Well, you should take heed, for you'll never be mature until you can see the true strength of a practical faith, and the weakness of the zealot. I can't change your mind, Mike. That's not my purpose. I can show you the path, but the journey is yours to take. Sorry to sound like a fortune cookie but it's true. Of course, the opposite is true - all you can do is show me your path.Isn't that why we all come here? To show each other paths? Food? You can't eat gold. Good luck trying to convince him, though. I guess that's where we are, now.

Refuting what? You're telling me that I didn't have faith at a certain time in my life. I'm telling you that I did. Since I'm the only one here who actually lived my life there's literally nothing you could know that could trump my actual life experience.I'm supposed to believe that you, who I don't even know and lives in a country I've only ever visited like 6 times, knows me and my life better than I know myself? Please. Well, hell, Buzsaw strikes me as a teenager - he has that kind of faith - and I know he's about 50 or so. Maybe I wasn't talking about chronological age, but making a metaphor. No. I'm saying these things because, whenever TL talks about his faith, I say to myself "now there's a faith that I respect and admire, a faith that doesn't seem like whistling in the dark, a faith I could get behind. If only I believed in God."That he's an evolutionist is a natural result of the sort of faith he has, a faith that doesn't reject knowledge because the Bible says to. But it's not the reason that I find his faith so admirable. Can I ask you to believe that I was referring not so much to a chronological age but a level of maturity? I'm sorry if it came off that way. I wasn't trying to say that I think you think TL's faith is weak, but I'm fairly sure that his faith has been characterized as weak by a number of other Christians here, mostly the young folks. I wasn't trying to lump you in with them, but I'm sorry that it came off that way.To be honest, though, I don't know what you think about the sort of faith TL displays, so I wasn't quite willing to not lump you in, either. I guess it's up to you. You're free to comment on TL's faith, or not. If you hold that position, then think about my comments. If you don't hold that position, ignore them.But some people here do consider TL's faith to be weak, and since we were on the subject of strong and weak faiths, I thought I would take the opportunity to speak to them. I wasn't trying to be mean, but rather, trying to communicate a life lesson.

I think that I could agree with that, yes. Though I don't think it's easy to tell the difference.

When you say "overwhelmingly", you you mean that mutations never go uphill, even slightly, or do you mean that mutations seldom but occasionally do go slightly uphill?If you agree that the latter is true, what if we had a kind of process that could "pick" or "select" only those "uphill" mutations? Would you agree, then, that in that situation, mutations could provide "uphill" movement? Never? Or seldom? You don't sound too sure, frankly, and while I might agree that "seldom" is accurate, I know that "never" is just plain wrong.

Now, that's just not true. Slight "uphill" changes, at random, must be possible. I mean, if I have a random letter generator, there's a slight random chance that it'll generate, at random, a meaningful sequence. It's mathematical fact. Don't get ahead of yourself, now. Are uphill changes, even slight ones, possible? Just answer the question.Oh, and don't confuse natural selection with mutation, which you keep doing. Nobody has suggested that natural selection is a creative process. It's simply a selective process.So, answer the question. If you had one process that took us downhill most of the time, but occasionally, randomly took us uphill; and then you had a process that kept us from going downhill and only let us go uphill; and put them together, wouldn't you have a process that would take us nowhere but uphill, very slowly? Sounds like we would to me.

Once again you've conflated natural selection and random mutation.Selection doesn't create, and mutation doesn't select. Honestly what's so confusing about that that you can't tell the difference?Try to keep it straight this time: new sequences come about as a result of mutation. Natural selection weeds out all but the ones that add additional information. The result is a continuing process of gaining information. Right. Those changes provide slight uphill travel. Natural selection provides a bias - a ratchet, you could imagine it - to prevent us from going down the hill.What's the result? Steady uphill travel. What's had to understand about that, almeyda?