Why evolution and Christianity cannot logically mesh

This sort of belief is common, and might actually be part of traditional western thought. I have come across atheist philosophers with a similar view of animals as mechanical robots with no consciousness. Such beliefs are more common on the political right, with some on the political left going to the opposite extreme.Historically, it wasn't just animals. Members of primitive tribes were treated as sub-human. As recently as 50 years ago, many conservative Christians in the U.S.A were treating blacks as subhuman.Even today we see Bush, with support from conservative christians, demonizing some people as terrorists, in order to justify torturing them. Never mind that they might actually be innocent.

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Compassionate conservatism - bringing you a kinder, gentler torture chamber

Oh there's the "Unknown purpose" defence ("God has a reason, but we don't know what it is"). It's logically unassailable but not really a position that can be defended rationally.But unless the Fall actually helps really explain suffering then you're forced back to supposing that there are reasons that justify the suffering - and unless you can find convincing reasons the "Unknown Purpose" defence is about as good as you can get.

quick correction--all life is is a collection of chemical compounds. All the emergent properties that we can measure are the result of these chemical compounds and their interactions. Pain deals with nerves--a quite complex interaction of chemical signals. SO no, animals (including ourselves) are still nothing more than a bag of chemical compounds.(unless, of course, if such a thing as the soul exists, but science can't prove or disprove that, for the very nature of it's being)(but then we're still bags, but one more ingredient added)

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can I ask why you've started almost the exact same thread? You've already one for your crusade against the compatibility of christianty and evolution, why do you need this one? especially as that other one still has at least 150 posts to go. I don't think you should've opened this one faith.

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The problem I have with this is I don't see how one can have a partially accurate or a little bit accurate morality.In order for the concept of "sin" to make sense, there must be an objective morality and we must know what it is.I don't see how one's moral system can be skewed but not altogether wrong. Any skewing would make it wrong. Let's say our objective moral rule was, "Thou shalt not murder." And let's say we have a man who has a skewed version of this rule. What would it be?
Maybe it would be that he thinks thou shalt not murder except for those you don't like, and then it's okay. So this man, thinking that his moral vision is accurate, goes around murdering those he doesn't like, and he thinks that what he is doing is quite correct. His conscience does not bother him in the least because according to his skewed version, he is a proper moral person. In such a case, he would not have sufficient moral knowledge to be said to have sinned: he was doing what he thought in the bottom of his heart to be right.Edited by robinrohan, : No reason given.

you want to know where your objective sin is? (aside from up your ass, that is) In God--it is only God who judges us when we die, only he who has the authority to decide what we did or didn't do was right or wrong, sinful or good. Sin is a religious concept, it's rules not to be confused with our civic rules--the penal, tax, civil, et al codes. Civil rules, while quite subjective in nature, are used to let society run. Sin rules are not for society, but for getting into that golden place known as heaven (or hell, pending decision).SO there you have it--our subjective morality in the form of civil laws to let society function, and an objective set, only usable by God, to let heaven function.oh, one last thing--how can God's judgement be objective? Well, he is all-knowing, right?[rant]
First attacking jar, then attacking a false evolution paradigm (evolutionism, which isn't real--I posted something about that in the other thred), and now to an attack on our philosophies. Is there nothing that you won't attack, you dog?
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more may come
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Of course it can be defended rationally. God is patently of a different order than us. Therefore aspects of his workings will not be open to our reason. We can attempt reasonable inference given other data. No harm in that.

No, the "Unknown Purpose" defence is not rationally defensible. A rational defence would have to give a good reason to think that there were such reasons. Simply arguing that we cannot understand God's thinking falls short of that.

Your presuming about conscience not bothering him. A man can murder and have that on his conscience. Conscience tells us what we ought to do and not do. When we do right it confirms we have. When we do wrong it confirms we have done wrong. And it will function so until it is silenced out by a mans will. Then a man can do truly depraved things without being bothered by conscience. His is a sorry end. He cut of his lifeline.Strictly speaking, mans has not 'skewed' morality according to traditional Christianity (of the type you seem to assume - a nod to Archer thus). Man is totally depraved and his thinking totally dark. It is the wrestle between this and Gods call (through conscience/nature/his word etc) which results in actions that vary wildly. With two persons wrestling with the steering wheel (God and a man) you get wildly varying results. And so it will remain until either God or man lets go of the steering wheel. At that point the car will steadyily head in the direction of the person holding it. Its a sorry day for a man and God the day God lets go. And a joyous one for God and man the day the man lets go.The way sin works is that man is doomed from the outset. Without any action by God he would be thrown on the rubbish heap as useless. He could just be wiped out and annihilated at that state. There is no justness in punishing him - for he acted, like an animal would, totally according to his fallen nature - he could not act otherwise.The problem for him seems to arrive out of the fact that God does not leave man alone. A man has had the benefit of Gods call operating on him and in doing wrong acted willingly to do wrong. In silencing Gods call, if this is what he does, he was the one who put that call to death. He chose to do so. That is why he can be punished for his sin. His sin is his own choice.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

The rational defence of "we do not know" is that there is ample evidence elsewhere to suggest reason all over the shop. Reasons that make rational sense abound.So to suppose, whenever we come up against an unknown, that there is no reason for it - flies in the face of the evidence we have got.Evolution itself works on such tentives.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

I suggest you explain yourself better. "Reasons that make rational sense abound" - for what ?

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Evolution itself works on such tentives.

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I don't think so - you really need to consider the problems with the idea of an "Unknown Purpose" before you make such a claim.

It's not exactly the same. The reason is that I was talking about animal pain on that other one and was told by the authorities (there's a big sign) that it was off-topic. Since I wanted to talk about animal pain, I strted this new thread. Hope you don't mind.

I can only answer for myself; My own musings are philosophical, scientific, and religious ones, intermingled and a bit complicated, and perhaps convoluted. So I'll give a bried answer;I believe God intended mankind and animals, but that there is a mystery of the flesh within all lifeforms, which is essentially selfish, (selfish gene, and survival tactics). I believe any flesh would kill to survive, in a particular circumstance, rendering all flesh guilty. Not God.Basically, I think God possibly "let" the earth get on with bringing life forth. An individual organism, in some vague manner, can "choose" to survive or die. They chose to survive, some, by killing. Apparently, this would mean a modern organism such as a lion individual, would be a victim of those long-ago choices made by early lifeforms.Perhaps there is no understanding it from a human perspective. I struggle with it but am not going to pretend to have a nice neat answer, I can only struggle with it. I believe it would be premature to conclude God is then cruel. I don't think that's necessarily the case.

Murder is a legalistic term. Thou shalt not kill illegally. Where man might go wrong is how he defines unlawful killing.For instance - if I was transported to the Old Testament days I'd probably contend that stoning a woman to death on some spurious charge was not moral. One of us is right. Unless of course, objective morality is variable with time and applicable laws.Still, a lot of people think its OK to illegally kill someone in the right circumstances: Euthanasia, abortion, death penalty etc etc. If morality is nation and time-related specific (depending on your local laws) then a good deal of people still who have a skewed sense of morality when it comes to murder.

I criticized Jar for what I consider bogus interpretations of scripture.I'm explaining evolutionism not attacking it.What "philosophies" am I attacking? Yes.