Creationist's Problem: Fossil Layers and Humans

Arachnophilia,I'm sorry if I offended you in my last post. I didn't mean that. You have to understand, however, that it is thoughts like yours about homeschooled kids that make a HUGE discrimination in the general public thought against homeschooled families.
I homeschool through a certain charter school and I played football for the first time last year. I thought I could go in there, be myself and be accepted, but some of the kids on the team had perdjudices against me and homeschooled kids so they didn't even TRY to get along with me. It didn't have a lot to do with social skills, they just wouldn't even talk to me much. They thought I was stupid when in reality, I probably got a higher score on THEIR standardized testing than most of them did.
Homeschooled kids are NOT dumb, even if their reason to homeschool IS to get away from other religious peer pressure (evolution and humanism.) So try to think a little more carefully before discriminating against homeschooled kids.This message has been edited by Proboscis, 11-11-2004 11:28 AM

actually, you don't know the first thing about the way i feel about homeschooled children.i was very briefly homeschooled myself, and my brother was homeschooled for several years.but there is a difference between being homeschooled and avoiding education. one is an attitude of plain ignorance. it is often best to learn about things you disagree with. sometimes, it might even change your mind.and i think you meant humanism, not humanitarianism. jesus was a humanitarian.

quote:

---

Homeschooled kids are NOT dumb, even if their reason to homeschool IS to get away from other religious peer pressure (evolution and humanitarianism.) So try to think a little more carefully before discriminating against homeschooled kids.

---

Hey, I wholly agree that homeschooled kids are not dumb. However, they may be ignorant of certain areas of knowledge as is supported by the scientifically ignorant statements made by numerous creationist homeschooled kids here at this forum.Learning what evolution says is not the same as believing evolution is true. Before someone denies the validity of christianity, wouldn't you think it fair that they first learn what christianity is? Before someone denies that the Holocaust happened, don't you think it fair that they should look at the evidence? Why is it any different for evolution? How can you, as a creationist, overturn one of the most strongly supported theories in science if you don't even understand what it is based on? If someone is going to be a life long creationist, don't you think they have the obligation to learn what evolution is based on and what it says?And so what if humanism is pervasive in high schools (although I really doubt that it is). If your faith is so weak that it is swayed by your peers then it isn't a faith worth having to begin with. Wasn't it Paul that said "Be in the World, but not of the World"? How are you going to bring people to Christ if you go out of your way to avoid them?

Let's get back to the topic. Open a new thread about home-schooling if you want to discuss it further.Adminssimo Hambre

Sorry, this isn't gonna be about homeschooling completely, but I have to say one more thing. I have another thing I'm going to say anyway, so the homeschooling thing is just going to be part it.Hey! If you want to discuss the education levels ON the theory of evolution, I have a MUCH better grasp on it than every one of my public schooled friends. Only the homeschooled kids have the time to do the research and MAKE their own choice of what to believe. All of my other friends honestly know just enough to only think I'm dumb because I don't believe in "science" when to be truthful, I'm NOT rejecting what the evidence says, they are. Like I said, I wrote a research paper on this subject so I know a LOT more than they do about evolution, unless they've taken the initiative to study it in their own spare time. The ONLY side presented in the public school systems is the evolutionist side and that's the ONLY reason why they believe it. I've had enough of that. You don't see young evolutionists come in here with any better arguments do you?? Sorry if I sound a little mad, but you offended me. LOL I know enough to keep you busy reading anyway though! If I'm so dumb, then why even bother reading my posts? Lol, I'm just pulling your leg!Okay, sorry about that. I have a question for all of you. What is your "concrete" evidence for evolution anyway? All you guys ever say is, "You're dumb because you're a Creationist." What is so dumb about believing that God created the world, which is too complex to come about by chance anyway? Ok just thought I'd throw that out there!

If you want to talk about evolution why not try answering the first post ?Even if all the strata were laid down catastrophically (a subject for a different thread but suffice to say it is less than likely) it still doesn't explain this particular piece of evidence.

quote:

---

Okay, sorry about that. I have a question for all of you. What is your "concrete" evidence for evolution anyway? All you guys ever say is, "You're dumb because you're a Creationist." What is so dumb about believing that God created the world, which is too complex to come about by chance anyway? Ok just thought I'd throw that out there!

---

No offense taken, and I hope you feel the same way. Never take my attacks on scientific issues personally. I know many creationists and we get along just fine (same could be said about my Republican friends as well).To get back on topic, there is no single piece of evidence that I would call "concrete". It is the mountains of separate evidence that points to one conclusion, that life changed over millions of years resulting in the biodiversity we see today. That much is as close to fact as science gets. The "theory" part is how that change came about, the mechanisms that caused changes in morphology and physiology. This theory is summed up in the Modern Synthesis which relies heavily on ecology and molecular biology.For a start, the topic of this thread is a great place to start. The position of fossils is one of those pieces of evidence that points to evolution. More specifically, if humans have been around since the dawn of the Earth (or the beginning of creation) why don't we find human fossils and human artifacts in every sediment layer? Why don't we find human fossils next to dinosaurs, archaeopteryx, or other ancient fossils. Why can't we find a anatomically modern fossil that dates older than 150,000 years, even if radiometric dating is untrustworthy. This is something that creationism can't answer, but the theory of evolution explains completely.The position of any fossil is a huge problem for creationism but supports evolution at every step. The problem is that the order of fossils in the ground is echoed in the DNA of living species. In other words, if two species share a recent common ancestor according to the fossil record then their DNA is very similar. If a global flood sorted these fossils, then it didn't do so by ecological niches, density, or any other characteristic besides DNA. If a global flood sorted these fossils, then it sorted the fossils by the DNA of those organisms. Call me crazy, but I don't think raging waters are able to sort organisms by their DNA content.How does creationism explain the position of fossils in the fossil record? What evidence supports the claim that a global flood was able to sort fossils by their DNA?

I am a Creationist I guess, but I do belive that humans ADAPTED over time. I don't think that we have ever been fish or amphibians, but we have made adaptations to our environments and sins. The first humans(Adam and Eve) looked nothing like todays humans because they were the first, they had not yet sinned, and they lived the Garden of Eden. The food they ate was different, as well as the water I can assume, so they were different. Maybe they were three feet tall and covered in hair, but they were created by God.

---

Better to be silent and thought a fool than to open your mouth and prove it.

The same genetic techniques we use to establish paternity of a child inform us that we're related to those organisms, too.If you accept it in the first case, why not the second?

Perhaps you could describe in some what more detail what you think occured.If you happen to be a YEC (young earther) you might start in the dates and dating forum and answer the issues presented there.Clearly there was a time when there were no humans on earth. A very long time. Given that we are clearly closely connected to both extant animals and even closer to other animals that existed before us it isn't unreasonable to conclude that we are connected to them with them being our distant ancestors (or related to them).If you disagree perhaps you'd like to specify why you disagree and explain why there is such a strong appearance of this being what actually occured.

Wisdom and age are not synonomous, sir. I don't know what a YEC is, and I can agree with you in some ways. I do not doubt that humans and animals are related in some way, but humans did not come from fish. I share the belief of the Native Americans that once men and animals could change shape and converse with one another(of course, I belive that Bigfoot are a kind of people that we have forgotten).
Over time(in thousands or millions of years I cannot say) sin and enviornment have affected the adaptation of humans.
When Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden tree, they relized the were naked and were ashamed, so they began wearing clothes. After thousands or millions of years, the thick body hair that they may have once had now disappears because it serves no purpose. Slave in the Southern US were once bred, so perhaps through out time, other slaves were bred for certain characteristics. In the Old Testament, humans once lived to be hundreds of years old, and now we live to maybe 80 is we're lucky. That alone has to say that adaptation has occured.
What little that I know of the Bible is from listening to my family debate on it, so excuse the lack of variaty in my knowledge.

Oddly enough, mum says I myst go to bed. I haven't laughed this hard for a time. Listen to me, arguing with adults and making a fool out of myself, all while mum says that it's bed time. So very funny. Thank you all for the intellectual stimulation that is not offered in public highschools. Thank you all for putting up with my young notions.

---

Better to be silent and thought a fool than to open your mouth and prove it.

I don't think that you're making a fool out of yourself. As I said in another thread; we are all ignorant in more areas than we are knowledgable. Being ignorant is acceptable. Staying ignorant when an opportunity is there to learn is not acceptable.Now, you must not think that all we say is correct just because we are adults or because we sound clever or because some of us have advanced degrees. Your challenge in life is to figure out how to separate the BS from things that have some chance of being right.Ask lots of questions, learn how to think and then t h i n k! You have to make up your own mind.

First off, I find you charming Ok... Where to start: We have many examples of this on this very forum . You are absolutely right, and I think you will find the EVC to be a place where all are welcome. We have many participants varying from very young... to very... well... Ned A YEC is usually a 'Young Earth Creationist'. These are people who belive the biblical account is literal. That is, the world came to be exactly how the bible stated, in six days, in the given order.They are usually inerrantist as well, believing that EVERYTHING the bible says is true, as written. Well, you will be surprised to learn that scientists don't think so either. However, we do share a common ancestor with them.You see, evolution doesn't propose that one day man was fish and the next day he was man. It doesn't say that one day a monkey gave birth to a human. Evolution simply says that organisms change over time, and that over LONG periods of time those little changes build up into big changes.As crashfrog pointed out above, the same methods used by scientists to determine weather or not you and your parents are related, reveal to us that us and the great apes are related, and fish, and even fungus! Of course, the more different the organism, the less we share in common genetically.It's simply undeniable, our relationship to all living things on this earth is encoded in our DNA. Yes they have, it has affected all living things (well, at least the environment part ). You see, our environment gives us our shape. This is what is called natural selection.Now, natural selection is not saying that suddenly the earth is flooded so I grow gills and fins, in fact, natural selection asserts that changes must be gradual for suitable adaptations to arise.Envision a creature like the bear, it's climate starts getting colder, he starts ranging farther north. Bears who have thicker fur start outliving the bears who have less thick fur because they can withstand the cold longer. So over time, these thick furred bears are more successful at reproducing than the other bears. This means that their cubs will have thicker fur, and so on until all the bears have thicker fur. Expand that process over millions of years, and you will likely see a very different bear at the end of the road Perhaps even a new species.Just look at the variety humans have created in dogs in the last few thousand years. It's hard to belive that a Great Dane and a Chihuahua share the same ancestor.Anyway, evolution is a fascinating subject that would take much more than a web site to explain. I urge you to actually explore and research the subject as I belive you will gain much from it.

Did it occur to you that maybe the things that the Bible says happened didn't happen at all?Did you know that it's a common literary technique in mythology to inflate the age of legendary persons to make them seem more heroic?