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Author Topic:   In defense of nihilism
crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1467 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 247 of 306 (268848)
12-13-2005 3:07 PM
Reply to: Message 245 by iano
12-13-2005 2:03 PM


Re: God's game
You know, honestly, it doesn't take all that much to establish that the theory of evolution is a funamentally accurate, at least generally, description of the history of life on Earth. For instance a simple experiment performed at home can easily demonstrate the power of random mutation and natural selection to effect species change.
The only people who require more are those who, because of a prior intellectual committment to an ideology that can only be true if certain obvious scientific conclusions are false, have raised their requirement of evidence so high that it becomes an invincible barrier of ignorance.
Now, getting into details - sure, the more detailed into evolutionary history you'd like to go, the more qualifications you'll need to assess arguments and evidence. The qualifications, after all, are simply a representation of how much you've already learned.
But in regards to coming to the general understanding that random mutation and natural selection are creative forces with more than enough ability to produce novelty and information to be the explanation for the diversity of life we observe, no, that doesn't take a CV as long as your arm. It takes an open mind to facts and the intelligence to draw conclusions from them. No faith required; just open eyes.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 245 by iano, posted 12-13-2005 2:03 PM iano has not replied

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