home school evolution questions

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ask a yes or no question and you'll get a paragragh..

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Did you ever think that the question you asked wasn't actually answerable by a simplistic binary answer?

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His response was that it was a waste of time to try and inform creationists, because they didn't listen. He said he'd spent a couple years on newsgroups, and I was the first creationist he'd ever met who paid any attention to what he was told. He did offer to rethink his approach now that one person had cared what the facts were.

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In the past, I have noted several Creationists who were participating in these forums who were otherwise quite bright and started out wanting to simply understand the "other side", end up getting very upset and agitated and angry at a certain point in the debate. That point would come pretty soon after all of their objections, mostly due to lack of information and unfamiliarity with science and it's methods, had been solved/explained.It seemsed to be that they simply got scared. They had been convinced that to be a good Christian you weren't allowed to accept modern scientific thought, and when it started to make sense to them intellectually, the congnitive dissonance caused them considerable pain.

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I merely presented the fact that most of the people who replied to him did not answer his question, but just went over the top and began critisizing.

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I find it rather overpoweringly ironic that you should be pointing out a bit of curtness of some our evo's posts when posters like jdean and Zephan have been, nearly without exception, abusive, offensive and obviously intended to annoy, yet you have not seen fit to rebuke them in the least.

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Don't you think your reaching a bit? That's a pretty detailed opinion concidering you lack of extrasensory perception. It's doubtful you or anyone else "scared" a Christian or "caused them considerable pain".

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Considering that you were not witness to any of the 6 month long series of posts I am referring to, your dismissal of my analysis requires much more in the way of ESP than my opinion as an actual paricipant of the discussion in question.I am fully aware that I am forming an opinion and that I don't actually "know" the truth, but I think I can form some pretty good educated guesses from their reactions and what they wrote.When someone who previously was perfectly level and reasonable and was asking probing, intelligent questions and wasn't initially anti-science at all suddenly starts saying things like, "I don't care what you say, the Bible is true and Evolution is false!" and then runs away from the discussion, I think I have a pretty good idea of their emotional state.

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Trust me, most of the evos arguments are not that convincing to a creationist.

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I don't need you to tell me that, believe me. I have talked to a lot of people over the years, and this situation has only come up a couple of times. Most Creos are true believers and evidence means nothing to them.

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So before you break your arm patting your own back, I feel obligated to set the record straight.

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You are setting nothing straight, sorry.

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The best part is that Truthlover is an evo just like the people who jumped his case. I guess thats proof that the evos will eat their young...Just kidding

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You actually bring up an intersting point here.Science-minded people are not usually much interested in banding together to "defend the faith", but in critical analysis. Even been to a scientific conference or been to a PhD defense in the sciences? It's brutal. The questioning and doubt and trouble shooting is all part and parcel of doing science and being a critical thinker. Science doesn't get done by declaration or edict, but by theories standing up to very stringent critical review. It's the best way to make sure mistakes are caught and only the best information survives.Contrast this with the Creationists, for whom criticism of each other is almost never done.

Thank you! I think you and Dr Bill should meet.?He is a former YEC seminary student who had a similar experience.

Wow, that is quite a story, and I congratulate you on your intellectual honesty and your persuit of knowledge!I am interested in how your wife reacted past her initial heart attack; did she read the books you read, etc.?Also, what was your fear in accepting the evidence, and how do you feel now about having been shielded from evolution?

Wow, TL, all I can say is wow.I have only met a few folks like you who have gone through the changes you have. I can't really say that I have gone through the same kind of thing, but I did have a particularly iuncomfortable couple of discussions about my Agnosticism with my Catholic sister. She was quite patronizing and insulting, and I was shocked.I hope you don't mind me asking you these somewhat personal questions. It is so rare to be able to communicate with someone who has lived in both "lives" so to speak that I am anxious to learn more about your previous mindset.I was recently talking with someone here about the dark side of Christian history. I made the point that any "ideology of utter certainty", religious or otherwise, was what made atrocities like the 9/11 attacks and the Holocaust possible.What is your opinion?Also, I am wondering what the nature of your church's "belief" in evolution is? Is it something you accept provisionally, due to the evidence, or is it something that you believe because you have all decided to believe it?

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Then he includes himself as one who has chided against instant salvation, and says we're all stupid for doing so. In fact, no one really knows anything, not even Schraf the rocket scientist, who doesn't even really understand relativistic theory.

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Then after including himself among us stupid people, he then tells us all the things he knows, including understanding the theory of relativity better than Schraf, so that we can all change our opinions to his.

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heeheeheeheeheeheeheehee!(Just to set the record straight, I am NOT a rocket scientist, and I DON'T understand very much about Relativity, nor have I ever claimed anything like this.)

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We have some things we believe with certainty, so I don't know that I'm not incriminating myself and us by saying that. Although, one of the things we believe with certainty is that God really hated all our certainty and rudeness and worked very hard to get us to change.

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I suppose my point was that dogmatism and blind faith are are dangerous things. Not ever questioning is a dangerous thing.

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You threw me with this one. I'm not sure what you mean. It's something we have accepted provisionally, due to the evidence. Isn't that the same as deciding to believe it?

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Do you mean made it a dogma or something? Our village is together, because we want to learn to follow Yeshua together. So, in order to live with us a person has to believe that Yahshua is really God's Son, or why would he be wanting to follow someone whose been dead for 2000 years? He also has to believe that God wants a people, not just some persons, because our whole focus is togetherness. You don't get to be alone here. Otherwise, we don't have any dogmas, not evolution nor much else at all. Everything else is provisional.

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Was that the focus of your question?

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Well, you said that your wife hasn't done any reading at all about evolution, yet she believes it because the church she belongs to believes in it. To me, this is the wrong reason to accept any scientific concept, because scientific concepts stand or fall on the evidence rather than how many people or what kind of people believe they are true.That's why I asked about how your church, and the people within it, came to their acceptance of the ToE. I wondered if most of the people there just "believe" it on faith, and how many people have a more tentative, scientific way of thinking about it.

OK, I think I understand your position and your church's stance now, thank you for explaining.Hey, please let me/us know how the presentation with your class goes.Best wishes for a great success.