Evolution != Atheism (re: the Rejection of Theism in Evolution)

How so?

it may seem like a very simple solution but you worded it so nicely.it's a very long story.

Arachnophilia responds to me:

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catholic christian.

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i've actually heard people use this argument before, and before the acceptance of evolution too. personally, i think it's pretty funny.

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I know. Pretty sad. The single largest group of Christians making up more than half of all Christians aren't really Christians.No wonder the "real" Christians are so worried about Islam...there are more of them.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

PurpleYouko responds to me:

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And I see the usual response coming through here. Personal insults! Maybe I'm not clever enough? That doesn't even dignify a response.

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Personal? I say that to everyone. It's hardly personal. That's one of the first things everybody needs to learn: Nobody knows everything. Everybody is dumb at something. It's what helps us keep our humility: There is always something you and I are not clever enough to figure out.

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Face it, the only argument for the existance of God is that all this stuff must have been created.

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Says who? You? Who made you the expert on god?

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Then how do the Catholics manage to do it

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By pretty much making stuff up as they go along and not encouraging any form of free thought is my experience of it.

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Catholics "made up" evolutionary theory as they went along?

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The official position of the Catholic church is that evolution is the only valid scientific theory we have to explain the diversification of life upon this planet.

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And how long did it take them to come to that realization after spending such a long time condemning TOE as anti-Christian propeganda or some such crap?

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Do you know?It was before Vatican II, after all. It's not like their 400-year-too-late apology to Galileo by JPII. The Catholic church has learned very hard the lesson of not trying to declare scientific evidence false.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

FYI "Stuff" does not equal evolutionary theory. Stuff, in my context, means pretty much everything else though. No not really. I could probably find out pretty easily, as could anyone. I have better things to do though.
I can tell you this much though, from first hand experience. Some priests are still doing it right now, no matter what the vatican tells them to use as an 'official' position. OK maybe I took it too personally. Possibly it is your terminology. IMO 'clever' refers to inteligence and not knowledge. Insults to inteligence are personal even if not intended as such. Being uninformed does not make one any less 'clever'.PY

i was kidding?

Ok then name one that stands up to scientific scrutinization. Any science. Not just TOE.Kinda hard to be an expert in the non-existence of something wouldn't you say? PYThis message has been edited by PurpleYouko, 01-06-2005 11:25 AM

PurpleYouko responds to me:

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Catholics "made up" evolutionary theory as they went along?

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FYI "Stuff" does not equal evolutionary theory.

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But that's what the Catholic church advocates. Therefore, we're back to the original question: If it is impossible to believe in god and advocate evolutionary theory, how do the Catholics manage to do it?

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Do you know?

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No not really.

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Then why were you so quick to imply otherwise about the state of the Catholic church? If you don't know, that's fine. But why pick on somebody you don't know?

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Some priests are still doing it right now

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And Behe, a published biochemist, claims that ID is a viable "theory." The fact that there are fools does not mean that everybody is a fool.

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IMO 'clever' refers to inteligence and not knowledge.

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But it's both. Some subjects will always be difficult to understand for any given person. We won't know what they are until we try. Our brains just don't work that way. The problem is assuming that "intelligence" is this all-encompassing thing that is universal and applicable to every single scenario. It isn't. Practice will make you better, but thinking is a learned skill and familiar methods of thinking will always be stronger than unfamiliar methods and some methods will always be difficult.F'rinstance, I've been playing the clarinet since I was about 10. Years of reading only treble clef, of picking out a single note in a chord should they have written all the clarinet parts into a single staff, etc., etc. have had their effect upon how my brain works.Reading piano music is hard. My brain just doesn't work that way. I understand the concept but years and years of reading clarinet music has trained my brain to think in certain ways. It's hard enough to see the whole chord on a single staff...to try and read two staves at once (and with one in counterpoint to the other!) is just beyond me. I could probably learn, but it'd pretty much take starting over from scratch.And I'll never be as good as those who can play pretty much any instrument out there. They have a skill that I have never acquired.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

PurpleYouko responds to me:

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Ok then name one that stands up to scientific scrutinization. Any science. Not just TOE.

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Excuse me? I'm not the one making the claim. That's you. Burden of proof is always on the one making the claim.Where was it decided that god created everything? Why can't god have found the universe?

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

"Found"? As in "found lying discarded at the edge of the multiverse superhighway"? Wow. I don't think I've ever heard that one. Well done, Rrhain, it's a rare day when I run across a completely novel way of looking at something. Wouldn't that presuppose a whole slew of god-like entities? Maybe the Christian version is the super-entity variant of a homeless derelict wino. Or maybe our universe was stolen in its infancy (say, pre-Planck time), then turned loose by the super-entity version of a malicious child. Wouldn't THAT be mind-boggling...

And then there's the Ancient Greek way of looking at things, Quetzal, which is anthropomorphization of existence. The earth wasn't "created." It came into being not by god but as god. Chaos did not "create" Eros and Nyx and Gaia but rather they emerged as those things personified. The existence of things like the air and the stars and the sun and the moon aren't things that were "created" but born. It's a very different way of looking at things.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Official policy doesn't necessarily reflect the beleifs of the masses. I have also come across a number of Catholic preists who don't actually beleive in God at all. From time to time over the years there have also been news storys about bishops who are self confessed atheists. Don't ask for references here. I wouldn't know where to start looking. I expect we all read the same stories at the time.
I would suspect that the official policy of accepting TOE is just there for the same reason as Easter or Christmas. The Catholic church has a history of incorporating other 'pagan' beleif systems into itself and then just papering over the cracks. (ie. making stuff up)
As I stated previously, in my experience Catholics are not encouraged to think for themselves so that means that if the Pope says it is OK then it must be OK. No big mystery there. No denying that. The world certainly has plenty of fools though. Those who just follow the pack with no sign of an original thought throughout their entire lives. I tried to learn to play the electric guitar for a while. I even got half way good on the bass guitar but I could never manage to play lead riffs any sense. Just didn't have the patience for it.
Different people's brains are certainly wired differently so I guess if your definition of 'clever' is subjective to different areas in which the brain is preferentially hard wired for certain activities then that makes sense.
My brain is obviously wired to understand the definition in a more general way. But let's not bother arguing about definitions. It's kinda pointless.PY

My only claim here was that the only argument for the existence of God at all was that everythinh must have been created.OK I will retract that and replace it with this.There are NO logical and scientifically backed arguements for the existence of God. Even (most) beleivers will agree that they cannot prove his existence. It is a matter of Faith, not scientific proof.
I still contend that if a person professes to study science (TOE or otherwise) then they need to have an enquiring mind set that accepts empirical evidence above all else. The absence of evidence on a subject leaves little or no room for 'faith' that it actually exists, particularly when the available evidence tends to point the other way. There is simply no logical reason to beleive.PY

PurpleYouko responds to me:

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Official policy doesn't necessarily reflect the beleifs of the masses.

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Irrelevant. The existence of those who don't does not nullify the existence of those who do.Are you seriously claiming the Pope is an atheist?And if you can't handle the idea of the leaders of the religion believing in god as well as advocating evolution, let's take someone further down the line. Ken Miller. He's a cell biologist and a Catholic. He doesn't seem to have a problem with the two.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

PurpleYouko responds to me:

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Excuse me? I'm not the one making the claim. That's you. Burden of proof is always on the one making the claim.

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My only claim here was that the only argument for the existence of God at all was that everythinh must have been created.

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And it is now your responsibility to justify that claim. Since when was it agreed that such was the case? Who said god had to create the universe? Why can't god have found the universe? Why can't god be the universe?

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There are NO logical and scientifically backed arguements for the existence of God.

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But then again, there aren't any for the nonexistence of god, either. God has this amazing tendency to defy concrete definition and proof requires solid definitions that can be manipulated. God tends to refuse to put himself inside the little box to be poked and prodded.In other words, god is outside the purview of the instruments you are trying to use.

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I still contend that if a person professes to study science (TOE or otherwise) then they need to have an enquiring mind set that accepts empirical evidence above all else.

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True...with regard to science. Science is not capable of telling us everything, though. Science can tell you quite a lot about an acoustical wave: Its amplitude, frequency, strength, how far it will travel in various media, etc.What it cannot do is tell you if it is music.

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The absence of evidence on a subject leaves little or no room for 'faith' that it actually exists

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Incorrect. This is only true when we have a good, solid definition of what it is we are using science to examine and only if science is a good tool to use for said examination. Not everything falls into such a category.

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There is simply no logical reason to beleive.

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But what logical reason is there not to believe? It has to go both ways. That's the maddening thing behind the Continuum Hypothesis. Godel was able to show that if you assumed it was true, you didn't reach a contradiction, but that isn't good enough to say it actually is true. Cohen later came along and showed that if you assumed it wasn't true, you also didn't reach a contradiction. Thus, we have no logical reason to think it's true...and no logical reason to think it's false.Not having a good reason for something doesn't mean the something doesn't exist. It simply means you don't have a good reason.

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Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!