I think something is missing from your experiment idea, the way you talk about the aquarium gives the idea that it is a closed system which in reality it wouldn't, life, microbial or not would not be able to develope itself in a closed system. The Earth was an open system, it recieved massive hits from asteroids, comets etc. and those could bring the ingredients for life etc. From where would the microbes get their food in your aquarium? Maybe they can live by recycling their resources, but I hardly think they will evolve into something else.
I'm sorry if you find the thread offensive, it wasn't supposed to be.
I think it is offensive, but not for me. I even watched the debate. It just gave people another reason to behave like ****s and insult each other, especially Christians, since internet is full of Bill Nye fanboys knowing him from one TV show who have no idea what he actually does today. Ken Ham is poor guy who offended millions of decent Christians and internet hero atheists used this opportunity. Now these threads are everywhere, atheists trying to pick the absolutely worst examples of Christians and generalize it to billions of people, while Christians have another reason to hate atheists and become more like Westboro. GG
Yeah. you're right. OK then let's say every once in a while something falls into the aquarium All sorts of things. Rocks. A candy bar wrapper. A bug. doesn't matter. There's still no bona fide guarantee. While all these things that fall into the aquarium could be instrumental in developing and pretty much responsible for shaping the evolution of whatever is in the aquarium, those things could also bring about it's demise.
@majod:
Uh yeah a few people on this thread are using it as a virtual soap box to preach about their faith in atheism. Give them a break. Their friends in the real world are probably tired of hearing it. And they gotta preach somewhere.
But if you'd read a little bit, the discussion is trying to determine the likelyhood of similar development on the other planets out there
And it's not a flame war or anything. We're all just grabbing things and putting them out there for the rest of us to take in and discuss.
You really don't get that on too may threads these days.
Actually there are evolutionary certainties. Evolutionary science is being used to develop air foils, for example. Basically, the engineers develop a set of parameters they are looking for - minimum drag, a certain amount of lift, and building material limitations. They can iterate through a number of successive generations, with the simulator making selections within certain envelopes and maintaining a viable population. Over time, the best examples of that population will begin to show the traits the engineers want. Eventually they will end up with something that fits the original design requirements.
Evolution is not random. Random mutation is a part of it, but only a part. Random mutation tempered by natural selection and environmental pressure makes certain things assured.
Let's say I'm playing with your dice. I have 10 D20s and I'm looking for a roll to end up with a sequence that goes 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. If I keep rolling for enough time, it will eventually land on this combination, but I might have to wait a ridiculous time because the probability of landing on this combination with one roll is very low.
But, what if I select ONE die per roll to freeze when it lands on the correct number? For instance, in a roll of 8 2 5 1 16 19 4 11 7 9, I can freeze the 2 and roll 9 dice again.
Sometimes I won't land on a correct number, and I'll have to roll all the same dice again, but the time it takes for me to reach the result is much shorter, and the probability of me landing on the correct number goes up and up as I freeze dice. That is how natural selection works, in a nutshell.
Well, I have only seen a few comments being disrespectful to others, I think the thread has been staying pretty "objective" to every one's ideas. I have not taken a look at other forums but I am almost sure that the majority have some sort of fights.
The subject itself brings the fight with it but like I said in the first post, keep the bad comments away and I think we've done a pretty good job.
Also... I think we still don't have christians posting in the thread?
Now I agree with you, actually I get what you say when you talk about odds and dices and chances, the difference between you and me I guess is that I think that the odds are greater.
For me when you start talking about "odds" then unless you have a very limited imagination about the scale of the universe, however slim those odds are they make it a certainty that there is intelligent life on other planets. If it's possible (and clearly it is because here we are) then it's a certainty, imo. It's also too depressing to think that if the earth is destroyed there is no life at all in the entire universe.
Indeed, and it's also important to imagine time as well. Ultra-basic life didn't emerge on earth until 700 million years after the formation. That ultra-basic life remained pretty much the same for another 1.5-2 billion years, when Eukaryotes came in. Most of the development of what we now call animals only happened in the last 500 million years (Cambrian explosion).
Since Eukaryotic life came in, the increased complexity of information allowed a much more rapid evolution than the simple single celled life from before.
I believe all of you around here do NOT exist. You are imaginary people, created by my imagination. I therefore must be god (or his dog).
Note to self: I have to remember why I created creationism.
Unless I am myself an imaginary being created by your imagination?
Early people feared death and what followed it. Once communication became possible somebody attempted to ease people's minds with a religion of sorts. There is no way to prove them wrong, so the idea sticks, and evolves to the complex thing that it is today. Religion is not a bad thing in and of its self, and there's nothing wrong with it because it does have a purpose in any society which allows emotion.
Organized religion as it exists today, however I feel has been used more as a tool for gaining and maintaining power than easing people's minds. All of today's major religions were established in times when science was well behind where it is now (with Islam being the youngest). This is the reason that religion can be proved incorrect in its current form.
We have no way of knowing exactly what happens to a person's consciousness after they die, and it will likely remain that way for ages if not forever. This is where religion still has a play in today's world. The religions themselves cannot be respected by anybody exactly as they are today if they believe in science, but their ideas about a person's consciousness after life should still be.
Science is ever evolving, and may later prove its self wrong when enough evidence proves it so. Religions have never been able to be proved wrong until recently, and they are so stepped in tradition that they will not accept it. Accepting it would also reduce the power of the organization which is behind it, and as thus prevents them for accepting the truth as science presents it. This is why organized religion is losing masses of followers worldwide.
You're free to believe what you want obviously, and I never come here to impose my belief system on people (I've only ever discussed my faith in one thread before), but when people play that card, like SamH did years ago on me, that bothers me.
I have an over Mensa-level based IQ based on three different tests (not that I think that IQ tests are the end all be all, it just means I can retain information well, maybe not much more but I don't know what other "measurement" to pull out for even a scrap of credibility)
I'm also a Christian, and I 100% believe in my faith, and my viewpoint used to be just like yours years ago. So call me what you like, deluded, nuts, but calling me stupid just lights me up a little bit.
I've been in these debates and they go nowhere, and it's just too fashionable and hip to hate on Christians in modern culture.
I understand 100% why people feel this way though. The unfortunate thing is that just like with absolutely everything else in life, a fraction of group X do something stupid, and now the whole group is labelled as a bunch of morons. I get the dynamic.
Most of the reason I DON'T share my faith with people who aren't close to me is for precisely this reason - I feel like I have to apologize for the conduct of the church at large. I'm not denominational (the first sign that something is wrong is when a group that is founded on a single belief diverges into "compartments") I simply follow Jesus and read my Bible and attend church. I've learned to accept that this is a mystery to most people especially those with above average intelligence like many on this forum. But that certainly doesn't make me stupid
Although I saw snippets of the debate (I don't have the stomach for them because I know the creationist will eventually say something that will be unfortunate) and some dubious things were said.... not everything he said is over the top.
I think we do need to keep in mind that we really don't fundamentally understand the nature of either life OR the universe, this context that we exist in. Time itself is a physical property of the universe, and we've been around such a short time in the grand scheme of things. I mean what are the implications on time(tm) from our current frame of reference flying through the cosmos at these speeds, compared to the matter that burst into existence (again nobody can tell you "from where" because we're not infinite beings like God is) Think of how limited we are in the scope of our observational abilities - being limited by the speed of light is humbling in my opinion. Really, we could be in for all of celestial hell to break loose and we'd have no idea until it was too late
Whenever a creationist (which I am, yes), is asked "so... do you believe the universe was created in 7 literal days?" (you can hear the chuckles of the "atheists") .. the guy pauses and goes "yeah... uh that's what the Word of God says so I believe it!". I die a little inside. There would be no "days", and now POW every Christian is stupid because of that. That's just as intolerant as every other type of prejudice. The problem is that we're all humans and we all fail. Look at the state of the planet folks - I see people all the time wondering "if God is so good blah blah why is the world in the shape it's in?"; all the while HUMANS made it that way. Indeed, what brilliantly advanced beings and highly evolved creatures we are just look at the state of affairs today, go us. What is God supposed to do? Remove our free will so we're not equally free to shoot someone in a movie theatre as we are to give $1000 to a family in need?
In any event, enough ranting from me. I have way too much to say and not enough time to say it all.
If you actually read my post's seriously you'll see that I also support a creationist view.
It may not be obvious, and there is no reference to a 'god(s)', but it's not entirely outside the realm of possibility. http://www.mindfulnessbell.org ... understanding-of-reality/
have you tried education on top of a high iq? becuase with actual knowledge of the world theres no way to recocile the idea of creationism or a christian god for that matter with your knowledge
also i reckon that north america must have a really terrible translation of the bible pretty much no one in the world believes in creationism
even the bloody vatican of all places sides with science on the matter of "how"
Well this was pretty much what I was expecting, and I'll save the exhaustive reply for when I have the drive to do so...
I'll answer your questions on a basic level for now I guess (though I told myself I wasn't coming back to this thread... but I can't NOT, I stuck my head out).
Shot, I'll pretend your comments weren't laced with a little bit of "matter of fact style aggression".
NO I don't have a post secondary degree. But I'm not a proponent of education the way it is today. I passed "high school" as it is here in Canada, no formal post secondary education. I did exactly no homework and got mid to high 80s consistently. Good but not amazing grades with almost no work.
That being said I was teaching university students C and Assembler when I was in grade 8; one family friend thought was ridiculous. Years past that I was still able to write one co-worker's wife's university assignment for a C++ program being only self taught in my teen years which got an A. edit: again this is no claim to fame, but I can "think".
I still enjoy learning on the subjects I enjoy on my own time, and I don't think that our (civilized) education systems function as well as they should. They force the regurgitation of facts rather than the understanding of the fundamental principles behind them - a cursory glance at Veritasium's channel on Youtube displays a plethora of "university students" that have no bloody clue about the basics you and I take for granted, so let's not get too high on the "education" high horse.
Besides which, how many great "discoveries" are shrouded in monetary greed and fictional facts? Every medical journal that arises seems to contradict the last - "cholesterol is BAAAD" - 2 years later "wait... NO, actually some is good"... 2 years later "WAIT NO - it depends on that ratio of the bad and good! really! we have it sorted now!". Confidence inspiring.
We're so shallow into the scientific waters that I have little confidence in the concrete absolutism of what we call "science", despite the fact that everyone acts like humans have discovered everything there is to know (displayed in the attitude that what we know couldn't have been created), and even more unreasonably; have the capacity to do so. Read that again: if you think we even have the capacity as human beings to "discover all that there is to discover", then I think the arrogance of us humans has reached it's pinnacle.
And who cares about the Vatican? It simply personifies everything you think you know about Christianity, when in fact in has absolutely nothing to do with it; which is why you use it as an example.
Catholicism has little to do with simple, Biblical Christianity but that's a whole different ball of conversations.
I know some absolutely retarded programmers. Like, crazy levels of stupid. Programming is just a language, you don't have to be a genius to speak French.
You're misunderstanding what people mean when they indicate faith is stupid. It has nothing to do with individuals and is only a criticism of the belief. Tom Cruise is a smart dude in general but he has some retarded beliefs. Doing well in programming does not preclude someone from doing or thinking something stupid. I tested into the top 1% among high school students in everything but math and I say and think retarded stuff all the time. Even Christopher Hitchens had some bigoted, sexist views come to light a few months before his death.
I see two major flaws in the logic you're using:
"Human's can't discover everything that is discoverable"
Of course, if it is undiscoverable, then it does not exist, because it has no effect on the universe. Even the things we can't see, like quantum tunneling and entanglement, are both discoverable because of their effects on the universe. If it changes anything, we can discover it. If not, it matters not, because it might as well not exist.
Under M-theory we could even detect other universes through gravimetric measurement.
"Confidence inspiring journals"
Would you prefer it if the first journal was never amended and we continued on in ignorance that our practices were useless or worse, harmful? I must assume you would prefer this because that is what you seem to have done by accepting religion. "God did it. Nothing will change my mind. If we discover this is wrong then my confidence in my current knowledge is shaken."
Let it be shaken. This is good. This is how we learn.
These two premises combined can be very dangerous to bettering our understanding. The prudent thing is reject them. By stating "we cannot discover everything, and when we discover anything it just invalidates old understanding", we become apathetic to self betterment. This is the ultimate tragedy of religion.
I agree; just like there's engineers who can't build a bridge that doesn't leak rain on my head when I go to a Canucks game. I get it. Sorry if it was an invalid example but I didn't think most kids could write a university level test having no formal education in the language - but this is a moot point going forward so I'll leave it at that.
Except they don't say that the belief is stupid, they say; as Becky alluded to, that the individual is stupid. Don't try to slant the semantics away from what's being intimated!
So what you've literally just told me, is that humans have the capacity to discover everything. "If it changes anything we can discover it" - this is exactly where your argument falls flat on its face, as I said in my previous post. That - dear reader - is a MASSIVE assumption! If you don't see why then I'm not sure how to make it clear to you that it's very, very, very unlikely to be the case. That viewpoint means basically that "everything" revolves around a human point of view which in the context of something as massive as the universe, is rather a bit beyond self-centered.
Take "life" for example. We humans have a method and criteria for defining life as we know it. In fact that phrase as wisely often use - life "as we know it". If conscience and "life" were defined by any parameters we have a flying clue about, we wouldn't be writing journals (which you discuss flippantly later on) decades later that say "gee - perhaps these individuals we thought were brain-dead (comatose) actually were feeling and receiving stimulus the whole time - shit, our bad" in the last 2 months. The main issue here is that we give ourselves way too much credit.
To address the latter part of your argument, I would never propose the cessation of research if that's what you're trying to imply. It's excellent and I enjoy it. My only point here is to perhaps, get someone to try to see things from a slightly different point of view.
i wasnt doubting that you could i was doubting that you do often enough and have done so in the past
1) see thats exactly what i mean by a lack of education you clearly havent got the faintest idea how much a researcher makes (hint: its pocket change compared to how much someone with the intellect necessary to research and write articles good enough to get in journals could easly make)
2) yes thats very confidence inspiring sicne it shows sciences fundamental willingness to accept having been wrong in the face of new evidence; which is vastly superior to clinging to a very limited view and understanding of the world that a couple of desert nomads had 3000 years ago
again lack of education
science is the antithesis to absolutism
probably pretty much everything science knew in the days of lets say darwin and wallace has been revised amended refined or flat out bulldozed over
you might want to look into how science actually works and make take a look at a boock on scientific history to see it in action
no one in science can currently prove right now that we havent been created and if youd listened to the video you would have heard nye mention so a couple of times
we can prove however that creation didnt happen the way a couple of desert dwellers envisioned it 3000 years ago
and except for a small number of fringe christian extremists mostly in north america the christian world agrees that genesis is about who created the world and not the actual process of how it happened chonologically
now the who our current understanding of science cant prove or disprove since if we take the classical model of the big bang (everything including space-time itself started at the big bang) then that puts a obervational horizon in our way that we cant cross ( i still think the unmoved mover model of creation is a god of the gaps situation though)
personally i think we should be able to prove or disprove a god that has any relevance in todays world since if said god has direct influence on the universe and does influence the universe we should be able to test and observe that influence
no we think we can discover all that we can observe
how about the majority of christians alive right now?
so the central institution of the largest congregation of christians has nothing to do with christianity? do you even listen to yourself?
i assume what you call biblical christianity is the extremist fringe faiths of christians that left europe some centuries ago?
1) no "if i can observe it i can discover it" is not a massive assumption
2) you like to hark on (wrongly) about the assumptions made in science but seem to be unwilling to question the even more massive assumption that a book written by people with a very limited knowledge of even just earth
a) has any relevance today
b) is the literal word of god
again have you even looked at the bible with the same critical eye?
again badly educated of how science works
thats what happens in science every day in fact you even critizised science for it in the previous post (which makes this statement even more baffling and ridiculous)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F ... logy#In_Christian_thought In Christian theology, God is described as omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent; a notion which some people, Christians and non-Christians alike, believe implies that not only has God always known what choices individuals will make tomorrow, but has actually determined those choices. That is, they believe, by virtue of his foreknowledge he knows what will influence individual choices, and by virtue of his omnipotence he controls those factors. This becomes especially important for the doctrines relating to salvation and predestination.
I think you are just cherrypicking your favourite parts from the religion using your own biological sense that is result of evolution. If you say you believe then why not believe it all literally? Nye asked many times why Ham takes some parts of the bible as poetry while others bits are to be taken literally. What is poetry and what is not is just question of opinion. Back in the day when the bible was actually written people were actually stoned to death. Why are you not stoning people to death today? Honest question.
It's like saying I think the law book is a fine book and I think everyone should follow the laws. But not the parts about stealing. I think stealing is fine.
When it comes to religions all I'm seeing is that people use the religious ideas and literature to just justify their own prejudices, ideas and opinions. If there is something in the religion they disagree with (like stoning people to death) that part is just ignored or explained away as poetry. Homophobics get a real hardon when the ugly act of man sex is described as sin but too bad premarital sex is a sin too. But meh, that bit was just poetry.
If bible is words from god then how can you leave anything out if you really believe? If you believe in creationism then why don't you believe in stoning people for adultery?
First, it is good to see the discussion took off in the right direction; interesting arguments and a polite tone.
Thanks for sticking your chin out. The thread needs a little weight on the "believe" side to be more interesting. You say "research" is excellent and you "enjoy it". In what way do you enjoy it? To fully enjoy science results, one must also understand it (which in some cases is not easy). If one understands the presented research evidence, results and consequences, it is impossible to keep a "belief" in, for instance, 2000 years old documents. If you understand the research and concluding evidence, it is impossible to see other explanations valid. However, many results are not (yet) concluding, hence research continues to gather and analyse facts. Meanwhile, there's no reason to replace the gap with an illusion. The evidence will come time and space allowing.
The really "big" thing presents itself once you start to understand what we really know (based on scientific studies) and what it means to humanity. It is a feeling of huge proportions, filling life with true meaning, awesomeness, joy and respect. Truly fascinating! I sense personally that it creates a far greater feeling than an elevated illusion of a godlike "all-knowing" force built on the belief in false statements and execution of old traditions could ever deliver. That is just too plain simple to me. However, I do respect everybodys standpoint and wishes to persuade noone forcefully to think this or that. As long as people are happy, I'm happy. It is when consequences of religions are becoming damaging, that I raise my voice. Keep up the interesting/respectful discussion.
Nobody should give Ball Bearing Turbo a hard time cause of his beliefs. As much as I may tease Christians, I dunno maybe it's being American and that freedom of religion thing, but they have every right to their beliefs as anyone else does.
In fact my goofy Idea of development of life doesn't really factor God out... It's just not put in. An intelligent creationist point of view shouldn't be simply dismissed out of hand.
The Vatican...
You know what that's good for Ball Bearing? It is so established and set up, that it can withstand things the Protestant denominations or Non-denominationals can't. Especially the non-denominationals.
If one of those asteroids does come crashing down and wipes out 60% of the planet, chances are the Roman Catholic Church and it's dogma, AKA Christianity, will survive. That can't be said of Anglicans, Baptists, Lutherans or any of post Calvinist branches that are all over N. America. The same for the Greek Orthodox or the Coptic Christians. The Roman Catholic Church is the safest bet. Plus the Vatican has all sorts of canonized papers and all that neat stuff that might just make it through for future generations.
@ Blas... 92% Catholic in Mexico? I thought Protestantism was on the rise there.
A lot of us and us mixes (lol Juedos...? my spanish spelling sucks) are protestant on this side of the valley.
One friend of mine, his Dad is a Mexican Baptist Preacher.
Just cause the majority of us don't believe Ball Bearing, we can't totally discount your point of view either. In my opinion, it holds just as much weight. Cause at the very best, with all the research we've posted links to and read with all the crazy examples, at the end it's still just speculation.
LOL after this thread, I'm kinda wondering WHAT to believe.
Nonetheless, at the risk of sounding like Racer X_NZ (which I probably will at various points if I respond to all of you), those in higher places often... "influence" said publications, or fund them in the first place expecting a certain conclusion. Don't pretend this doesn't happen, it's just a more subtle form of advertising with a different audience sometimes.
The issue I have is that every new "discovery" is treated in culture like it's the new concrete truth. Perhaps not within the scientific community itself, but the "facts" communicated to us lowly uneducated imbeciles are purported to be all but infallible. Diets change, new products are generated to profiteer off of every amazing new discovery, and round and round we go.
Ok - well if you read what I said instead of constructing condescending retorts, you'd note that if I meant what you're saying that I'd have directly contradicted myself - I was referring to the attitude of the public at large towards every released scientific "fact". Again sorry for not being clear I was in a hurry.
Again I stated previously that I'd only watched snippets of the video.
Fair. But you have to keep in mind that we really have no idea what our limitations really are. What if we have the capacity as beings to observe is relatively nothing more than grain of sand on a beach? That is to say; if somehow, someday, humanity reached some theoretical limit (which must exist unless our capacity to discover is infinite - I don't think so), it could very well be so small compared to what "is". Aaaand we'd still likely act like the know-it-alls of the universe.
Fixed.
Yes, I do. The Vatican is know more for it's internal crime and corruption, and Catholicism is not, on a very very basic level, Christianity in practice. I'm not saying that a Catholic individual cannot be a Christian but they're not necessarily synonymous with each other, but that takes some basic Biblical knowledge to understand.
No, not at all.
Extremism is dangerous. Christians should be extreme in their love for others, nothing more.
re: 1, yes it is a massive assumption if you read the words he wrote and what I responded to. He literally said that "if it exists, we can discover it". He did not say "if I can observe it I can discover it". Maybe you interpreted it that way, but that not what he said - read what he said, and how I responded again.
Shot, if science was as conclusive as you say, and scientific education is the end all be all to disprove what you so vehemently seem to desire to disprove, there wouldn't be guys with PhDs that believe what I do, but there's plenty of them. I have a feeling that you haven't read their books though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F ... logy#In_Christian_thought In Christian theology, God is described as omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent; a notion which some people, Christians and non-Christians alike, believe implies that not only has God always known what choices individuals will make tomorrow, but has actually determined those choices. That is, they believe, by virtue of his foreknowledge he knows what will influence individual choices, and by virtue of his omnipotence he controls those factors. This becomes especially important for the doctrines relating to salvation and predestination.[/quote]
Nowhere is scripture does it state that God has determined our everyday choices, despite what Wiki says. In fact, it does say ANYWHERE, that he controls those factors - in fact, quite the opposite; it states Satan as the "prince of the power of the air" and as the ruler of the "present age" of humanity; which means that the much of what we call the "world system" is influenced by evil. That seems to jive with the greed and injustice, hunger and pain I see every day. If God was influencing everything as that article states (which is NOT what the Bible states) then He'd be doing a pretty crappy job.
These are fair questions.
Firstly, the New Testament completely fulfills the Old Testament and a Christian who attempts to follow "the law" has missed the point of the NT completely. These people are often legalistic and judgmental.
Part of the challenge of correctly interpreting scripture is knowing what context something was said in the original languages, and sometimes having a familiarity with idioms of the culture. In terms of cherry-picking I apologize if it comes across that way. I do agree that a lot of people do that and it drives me nuts, and in fact the Bible states that that's exactly what people will do! 2 Tim 4:3 states this clearly.
Also we don't stone people because the spiritual requirement for punishment was poured out and completed once and for all on Jesus at the cross. That's the whole point of Christianity. This is why we Christians don't have Priests. Biblically, no "hail marys" or any other "action" on our part is necessary for salvation. Simple acceptance of the atonement. That's it, that's why it's called the "Gospel" or "Good News" - not that mad news, the "you better behave news" etc. This is where Catholicism has diverged into a culture of fear and religiosity that most often completely misrepresents the Gospel, and the Bible, and God.
I also better point out that I don't believe I could ever "reason" someone into faith in Christ. Deluded as you may think I am, I am not *that* deluded .
However I've seen things on missions trips that you cannot explain with your science journals, that's for darn sure.
What would lead a small population that grow up in isolation for their entire lives on a desert island to believe in God? Missionaries are considered, not without cause, to be as questionable and ill-reputed as anybody in the world of religion. It's a great veil behind which a nation can impose their will on population, spreading the "word" and the world is a far less free and diverse place because of it, Go Jesus.
Ultimately all there is is the bloody book. You can say this guy believes this or that guy had this experience, but if someone told me that a PhD Astronomer that had never even heard of God or the bible one day believed (not pondered or considered or wondered) that everything had been created 6 thousand years ago in a week by an all powerful super-being, then I would take notice of that. There are lots of reasons why someone who has grown up as a christian might remain so no matter what, and also reasons why someone (however educated) might become a christian, but I guarantee scientific proof is not one of them.
Nice, another case of throwing the baby out with the bath water. I'd never in a million years go and knock unannounced on someone's door. On missions trips, our goal is to help people. Bring them food, make wells, that sort of thing. If people ask about our beliefs we tell them, but we're not there to bulldoze or coerce people. The way I look at it, how I live my life should speak for itself, no "evangelizing" required. Generally if people ask I tell them, I'm not here to impose anything on anyone despite entering this thread. .
you are aware that bad science gets pointed out and corrected very quickly or doesnt make it through the review process in the first place?
im sorry i thought we were talking about actual science here not some badly done reports on science and how advertising mangles scientific results?
i dont give 2 shits about how wrong joe average is about scientific discoveries this issue is about the truth and about what truth we are teaching comming generations not about what advertised rubbish about this and that joghurt someone buys
then maybe you shouldnt comment on it
especially if youre already expecting to be offended by the backlash resulting from poor understanding and not really knowing what the subject of this thread is
and how exactly does this relate to the question at hand?
no not fixed... mangled
catholics are by far the largest denomination in christianity and if you add up all the other churches (the middle numbers not the xtremes of the ranges given there) you still end up with less than the number of catholics for which indeed the vatican is the only athority http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L ... ions_by_number_of_members
creationists are a fringe group that more or less exclusively exists in north america and makes up about half of the people there so at worst around 200 million an absolute nothing compared the the large majority of christians that isnt impervious to reason
im pretty sure that there is 1.2 billion people in the world (give or take 1/6 of everyone in the world) that completely disagree with you there
exactly my point about creationism
i suppose that explains 56m 16s in the video then?
no what he said was "if it doesnt have any observable effect then it might as well not exist"
which is absolutely true because anything that may exist but has no observable effect on the universe behaves no different than something that doesnt exist as far as we as part of the universe are concerned
again there is a very small number of extemists that believe what you do
also im fairly none of their believes have ever been published in any of the respectable journals since as unscientific as they are they would never make it past peer review
if any of them ever writes a book that is based on things published in reviewed papers and real science instead of magic handwaving and here be dragons i might read them
for someone who claims to know the bible better than the pope you have a bit of a weird grasp on what it says:
Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.
According to INEGI (The institute in charge of the census) in the year 2000, 88% of the population was catholic, 7.6% non catholic (Which includes protestants, jews etc.) and 3.5% did not have a religion. In the census of 2010 the numbers were:
Catholic 82.7%
Non Catholic 9.7%
Other Religion 2.9%
Non Religious 4.7%
As you can see, catholics are going down but non catholic-other religions are going up as well as non religious.
We have christians in our family, jehovah witnesses and off course catholics. I'm the only atheist as far as I know, my grand father was kind of an atheists, I can't really say he was but I heard him say funny stuff about religion in times.
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