What we must accept if we accept evolution

Of course it isn't, however it isn't at odds with the theory of evolution in any way. One could accept both as true with no logical inconsistency. The purpose of the scenario was to show:

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one could easily accept the theory of evolution, but reject materialism and naturalism AND have a purpose in life to boot.

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without any logical inconsistencies. Agreed - as are all scientific theories, pretty much by definition. If we accept a certain physical explanation for a certain physical phenomenon does that mean we logically cannot accept a certain supernatural explanation of an entirely different physical (or indeed a non-physical) phenomenon? I wouldn't say that the theory of evolution is evidence of (say) my magical story. I would simply say that my story could be true and the theory of evolution could be true at the same time with no logical inconsistency. It is not necessary to be a materialist to be logically consistant whilst accepting the ToE.

If God set it in motion, then all bets are off. We could have anything. But there's a problem with this idea. If God set evolution in motion, then God is not a good God. Evolution is cruel, bloody, murderous. Life is set up in such a way that in order to survive, life forms have to feed off other life forms. It would be morally nicer if we ate dirt and rocks, although that does sound like a rather insipid diet. The YEC's offer the Fall as an explanation for Nature, but the Fall and evolution don't mix. Logically, it makes sense to me, but I'm no great logician, so my real view is tentative. I'm speaking here with a tone of certainty for the sake of argument. Emotionally speaking, of course, these ideas are inconceivable and unacceptable.

I said that they go hand in hand, and evolution promotes materialism. Damn think of something new.

You aren't being clear. Are you saying that belief in evolution promotes materialism or that the actual process of evolution has made us materialistic.

The Fall only pushes God's responsibility back one step. What kind of parent would a human be who left children alone with loaded guns, or matches just saying, "Now don't play with them or you will die."The Fall as a myth is acceptable but to literally believe it is an act of self hypnotism and the victim taking the blame as we see in abuse among humans. God is not responsible we are cause we are bad and sinful. But human parents work hard to educate their children, but according to YEC'ers God writes books full of silly stories and insists we believe. The Fall does not explain suffering or evil adequately at all.Buddhism requires a lot more study to grasp but it offers a much more penetrating insight into suffering. The Buddha spent many years grappling with that specific problem. He wasn't attempting to make sure people didn't sacrifice at competing altars and obeyed the King and the Priests. He struggled with one problem, suffering and how to be free of it.lfen

Yeah, and the way you get rid of it is by ceasing to desire things. And then you go to Nirvana or somewhere where you no longer exist as an individual--like a drop falling into the ocean. If you don't exist as an individual, then as far as I can see you don't really exist. In my view, it would be better to exist (with full individuality) even in pain than not exist--as long as the pain is not unbearable.But this is off-topic.

TOE says that life evolved via natural selection, mutation and a few other phenemona. Natural selection does not mean minds tweaking different life forms. It's a purely automatic process.Your fanciful theory tells us that there might be another explanation for evolution than these natural processes of selection and mutation. But if that is the case, TOE is false. It is not false in one sense; "evolution" has occurred but it's controlled and guided by these minds, and thus the naturalness of natural selection has been falsified. So I would say you cannot believe in TOE and believe that tweaking-mind theory at the same time. You can believe in evolution, but it would be a different type of evolution than that spelled out in TOE.In order to accept TOE, you have to accept NATURAL selection.

Not at all. I could accept germ theory and believe in souls and God. I could accept atomic theory and believe in souls and God.But TOE is different. It's not just any physical explanation of just any physical phenomenon. It explains the origin of humanity. It explains the origin of mind.It tells us that mind came from the physical (there was nothing else for it to come from). If mind comes from the physical, then it's physical too. The physical can only produce the physical.Sidlined and Parsomnium have explained to us about the aura of incorporeality that we have: it's an illusion. Thoughts are really something physical. If they are physical, they have a physical cause. All physical events are automatic events. So thoughts are automatic events. Determinism.I have been determined to believe what I believe. There's a problem with that, of course. If my beliefs are physically caused, then they were not derived logically, and can only be true accidentally."You think that because you are a man," said the woman tartly. She's saying his ideas can be dismissed because they are CAUSED. They are a result of his male hormones or something like that. Therefore, they can only be true by a fluke, since they were not logically derived.All our thoughts are this way.

I'm a bit mystified by this "aura of incorporeality", because the description does not match anything in my experience. This seems quite wrong to me. I don't believe that thoughts are any more physical than the money in my bank account.

Just visualize something that you remember well, like a house you used to live in. Do you see it? There it is, the incorporeal house in the incorporeal yard, with the incorporeal sun shining down on it. Then where did they come from? How did thinking evolve? What are thoughts made out of?

But my visualizations are not that good.I wouldn't use "aura of incorporeality" for that. Obviously, thoughts originate in neural activity. The neural activity is partly learned and partly evolved.Why do thoughts have to be made of anything? What is music made of? What are numbers made of? What is the money in my bank account made of?There are lots of things in our lives that don't match what we think of as physical. If you still want to call them physical, then you owe us a definition of "physical" that fits.

The ToE says that populations change due to variations in heriditable features which are acted upon by a selection process. The variations part is usually in reference to random mutations of the genome during replication. The ToE is perfectly fine with other types of mutations leading to change, such as directed mutations (for example humans genitiically modifying crops changes the allelle frequencies of those populations). Natural selection is the only observed form of selection outside of human artificial selection, though the latter is not verboten to ToE, if evidence of such selection came to light. But natural selection can exist as well as supernatural selection. It wouldn't falsify ToE, it would just mean that ToE as it stands is an incomplete theory...and given the tentative nature of scientific conclusions is a perfectly 'natural' state of affairs. No you can accept ToE because ToE DOES explain how populations change. That there might be other things that cause the heriditable variations is not anathema to ToE, neither does the possibility of other selection media such as our artificial selection (or selective breeding) jeopardise the ToE at all.

No it doesn't. I've said this before. The Theory of Evolution simply provides an explanation for how populations change over time. Populations *do* change over time, the ToE puts together an explanation regarding the causes of this change.If we say, humans were created by God. We can then say, 'how has our population of humans changed since Adam and Eve' and the response would be 'The allele frequency variations were caused by variations in the genome coupled with a selection process'.If we say, all organisms share a common ancestral population. We can then say 'how has our original population changed into the diversity we see today?' and the answer would be 'The allele frequency variations were caused by variations in the genome coupled with a selection process'.The same explanation with two different origins.If you define the 'mind' as a non-physical entity, then ToE certainly makes no attempt to explain its origins. If you define the 'mind' as a physical construct of the brain, then yes the ToE can attempt to explain its origins (though it would need a lot more data than is available to succeed in its explanation). ToE does not tell us that mind came from the physical, there could be somewhere else for it to come from. A naturalist would tell you that the mind stems from the physical, but a supernaturalist might not. If the mind does not come from the physical then the ToE has no comment on it or how it came about (the ToE is about physical properties, heriditable features varying etc. If the mind is not a heriditable feature that can vary then the ToE is not a tool that can be used to explain it). That is an opinion though, and a philosophical one at that. What if thoughts aren't really something physical? If thoughts and mind aren't physical I'm sure they aren't heriditable features that can vary.

YOur arguments still rely on falsely attributing ideas to the ToE that are not part of the ToE. The ToE can only explain the "origin" of the mind to the point where we understand the origin of mind. Where there is serious doubt the ToE is agnostic. The ToE is compatible with substance dualism and is not a reason for rejecting it.

We can "think" or "make sense" (if something 'makes sense' it is made of some *thing*) in more than two ways.With reptiles and the "third brain" whatever that thing is in itself OR material, there is MORE than a bicameral mind in ours connected. No matter what is selected, what is not within this continuum as first adumbrated might exist but is extant.The "mind" of invertebrates has some qualities so quantifiable.Whatever in life does not think or we can not think it does ( a plant etc) still receives the same material force reality physically.If we deny this is really existent we only fool someone else, not ourselves.TOE probably says a lot more about the "origin" of this physical mind.