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Author Topic:   I Am Not An Atheist!
Taz
Member (Idle past 3291 days)
Posts: 5069
From: Zerus
Joined: 07-18-2006


Message 16 of 382 (496892)
01-31-2009 11:19 AM
Reply to: Message 13 by Granny Magda
01-31-2009 1:21 AM


Re: "Evolutionism" ≠ Atheism
Here is something that I've always been puzzled about. Even if only 5% of the population is non-religious, that's 3 times more non-religious people than there are jews in Israel. How come we're 2nd class citizens?

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bluescat48
Member (Idle past 4190 days)
Posts: 2347
From: United States
Joined: 10-06-2007


Message 17 of 382 (496910)
01-31-2009 1:24 PM
Reply to: Message 16 by Taz
01-31-2009 11:19 AM


Re: "Evolutionism" ≠ Atheism
How come we're 2nd class citizens?
Maybe "1st class citizen ignorance" That, ignorance, is what usually accompanies bigotry.
Edited by bluescat48, : missing line

There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002
Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969

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Agobot
Member (Idle past 5530 days)
Posts: 786
Joined: 12-16-2007


Message 18 of 382 (497098)
02-01-2009 6:49 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by Percy
01-30-2009 10:02 AM


Percy writes:
I disagree with Creationists because they are wrong, deeply and fatally wrong. It has nothing to do with atheism.
--Percy
Human beings have all sorts of beliefs and the way in which they arrive at them varies from reasoned arguments and theories to blind faith. Some beliefs we feel we can justify and prove, some we feel simply as "gut feelings". Some of those we think we have proved beyond reasonable doubt, fall to pieces from time to time, it's all in the nature of our relationship with the mistery of the world.
Imagine I was a die-hard creationist and I said to you that God planted everywhere faked evidence of an old earth to test your faith in him. I am sure creationists can find a proper verse from the Bible supporting this assertion. How would you prove that they are "deeply and fatally wrong"?
PS. I am not a creationist, I am simply aiding their positions so that something similar to a "serious" debate can take place between evolution and religion. I believe it's an argument creationists could use against the "scientific method".

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Percy, posted 01-30-2009 10:02 AM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
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Buzsaw
Inactive Member


Message 19 of 382 (497103)
02-01-2009 7:34 PM


I see my question was answered in the OP.
Edited by Buzsaw, : change message.

  
Rahvin
Member
Posts: 4032
Joined: 07-01-2005
Member Rating: 9.2


Message 20 of 382 (497104)
02-01-2009 7:37 PM
Reply to: Message 18 by Agobot
02-01-2009 6:49 PM


Imagine I was a die-hard creationist and I said to you that God planted everywhere faked evidence of an old earth to test your faith in him. I am sure creationists can find a proper verse from the Bible supporting this assertion. How would you prove that they are "deeply and fatally wrong"?
Because that's simply a violation of Occam's Razor.
"Possible" != "supported by evidence." You'd still need to support the assertion of your trickster deity with evidence of its existence, else you're just violating parsimony again.

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DevilsAdvocate
Member (Idle past 3101 days)
Posts: 1548
Joined: 06-05-2008


Message 21 of 382 (497106)
02-01-2009 7:48 PM
Reply to: Message 18 by Agobot
02-01-2009 6:49 PM


Imagine I was a die-hard creationist and I said to you that God planted everywhere faked evidence of an old earth to test your faith in him. I am sure creationists can find a proper verse from the Bible supporting this assertion. How would you prove that they are "deeply and fatally wrong"?
This is where good old common sense in the form of deductive reasoning and Occam's Razor come in to play. Deductive reasoning in that we can infer that if this were true that God faked evidence supporting evolution that:
a. God is a cheat and cannot be trusted
b. We cannot trust anything we see around us
c. Science is completely useless
Occam's Razor is an axiom which stipulates that when faced with several alternate explanations of a phenomena that the hypotheses that contain the fewest assumptions and postulates the fewest entities (things that exist) is most likely the closest one to reality. Thus the idea that an all powerful, all knowing supernatural entity would go out of his way to fake the evidence countering his own existence to one particular species among millions of species on a small insignificant planet around a hum drum star among billions of stars in a galaxy among billions of galaxies in the universe, fails Occam's Razor hands down and thus is logically, philosophically and scientifically unsound.
I believe it's an argument creationists could use against the "scientific method
They can use anything they want "against the scientific method" and believe anything want. Just don't expect rational human beings to take any of this seriously or even consider these beliefs worthy of discussion or debate (and many rational human beings do not).
Notice though that a belief in the supernatural or even a personal theistic God does not necessitate throwing logic and the scientific method out the window. One has to differentiate between these two diametrically opposed ideas i.e. the idea that anything that does not jive with someone's strict interpretation of religious scripture and religious worldview is evil (opposed by God) vs the idea that science is a tool to be used to discover the "mind of God" so to speak and help us understand the world around us no matter what our religious beliefs or lack thereof are; and no matter where this road leads us. BTW I and many atheists, agnostics and deists are in this second category; while many die-hard creationists (though not all theists) of the like of Ken Hovind, Gish and others are in the first category.
Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 31 by Agobot, posted 02-02-2009 4:39 AM DevilsAdvocate has replied

  
DevilsAdvocate
Member (Idle past 3101 days)
Posts: 1548
Joined: 06-05-2008


Message 22 of 382 (497107)
02-01-2009 7:50 PM
Reply to: Message 20 by Rahvin
02-01-2009 7:37 PM


Because that's simply a violation of Occam's Razor.
"Possible" != "supported by evidence." You'd still need to support the assertion of your trickster deity with evidence of its existence, else you're just violating parsimony again.
LOL. Pinch, poke you owe me a coke. I wrote my post at the same time you wrote yours but looks like we are operating on the same wavelength.
BTW. GO STEELERS!

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

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Buzsaw
Inactive Member


Message 23 of 382 (497111)
02-01-2009 8:17 PM
Reply to: Message 15 by Modulous
01-31-2009 3:57 AM


Re: An eye opener for Buz
Modulous writes:
In the US, approximately 35% of the population are theistic evolutionists and 15% believe that God did not intervene in evolution. 45% are Creationists. That is according to this survey.
Something I cannot understand is how theistic evolutionists are not considered creationists, Christian evolutionists in particular. If they're Christian, they are Biblicalists of some sort and the Bible is most certainly creationist. \If 66% of evolutionists are theistic, that's a lot of creationists.
EvC (evolutionist vs creationists) would be a missnomer if the greater percentage of evolutionists are theistic/Christian.

BUZSAW B 4 U 2 C Y BUZ SAW.
The immeasurable present eternally extends the infinite past and infinitely consumes the eternal future.

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Replies to this message:
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 Message 26 by DevilsAdvocate, posted 02-01-2009 9:22 PM Buzsaw has not replied
 Message 27 by RAZD, posted 02-01-2009 9:30 PM Buzsaw has not replied
 Message 29 by bluescat48, posted 02-01-2009 10:47 PM Buzsaw has replied

  
obvious Child
Member (Idle past 4116 days)
Posts: 661
Joined: 08-17-2006


Message 24 of 382 (497117)
02-01-2009 8:32 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Buzsaw
02-01-2009 8:17 PM


Re: An eye opener for Buz
quote:
Something I cannot understand is how theistic evolutionists are not considered creationists
According to whom? The vast discussion over evolution vs creationism is between YECs and everyone else.
Just because they aren't YECs doesn't however make them not Creationists, just not creationists in the sense of what is normally discussed.
There has always been a distinction between YECs and other creationists.

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Blue Jay
Member (Idle past 2698 days)
Posts: 2843
From: You couldn't pronounce it with your mouthparts
Joined: 02-04-2008


Message 25 of 382 (497129)
02-01-2009 9:07 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Buzsaw
02-01-2009 8:17 PM


Theistic Evolutionists
Hi, Buzz.
Buzsaw writes:
Something I cannot understand is how theistic evolutionists are not considered creationists, Christian evolutionists in particular. If they're Christian, they are Biblicalists of some sort and the Bible is most certainly creationist.
This suggests to me that you don't realize what the greater debate is really about.
Here are a some different types of theistic evolutionist:
  1. Deistic Abiogeneticists:
    God created the first life-form, and evolution took over from there.
  2. Facultative Theists:
    The origin of life and its history are best explained by their corresponding naturalistic theories, but God may have occasionally inserted, removed or altered something to point evolution in a direction He wanted.
  3. Darwinian God Proponents:
    Evolution is such a beautiful idea, only God could have come up with it.
  4. New-Age Gaea-God Hippies:
    The universe is God, including the environmental forces that drive evolution.
  5. Non-Creator Theists:
    There is a God, but He didn't create the universe.
  6. Pascalistic Skeptics:
    Evolution is real, but don't rule God completely out just yet.
  7. Chronically Indecisivists:
    Evolution is real, and God is real, to varying degrees at different times in my life.
The point is that theistic evolutionists are simply people who both accept evolution and believe in some type of god. Since belief in a god isn't the issue in the EvC debate, then it isn't the distinguishing character between the two sides.
That the evolution side contains a great diversity of philosophical and theological mindsets should be a good indication to you that the debate isn't about theology.
Edited by Bluejay, : Underlining and new subtitle
Edited by Bluejay, : Added Non-Creator Theists to the list

-Bluejay/Mantis/Thylacosmilus
Darwin loves you.

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Replies to this message:
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DevilsAdvocate
Member (Idle past 3101 days)
Posts: 1548
Joined: 06-05-2008


Message 26 of 382 (497133)
02-01-2009 9:22 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Buzsaw
02-01-2009 8:17 PM


Re: An eye opener for Buz
Something I cannot understand is how theistic evolutionists are not considered creationists, Christian evolutionists in particular.
This is the crux of the issue. The problem is not between religion and atheism but with science and pseudoscience. Evolution is a fact of science accepted by atheists, agnostics, deists and theists alike. The concept that biological evolution absolutely did not and does not occur a.k.a. Creationism, vice theistic evolution (evolution is a natural process created and set in part by God) or atheistic (just remove the "God created and set in motion" part) evolution, is only accepted by a subset of theists and infintesimaly small fraction of scientists.
If they're Christian, they are Biblicalists of some sort and the Bible is most certainly creationist.
This is not how creationists themselves define themselves i.e.
Center for Science & Culture (CSC) aka The Discovery Institute, harbinger and headquarters for Intelligent Design and Creationism writes:
- supports research by scientists and other scholars challenging various aspects of neo-Darwinian theory;
-supports research by scientists and other scholars developing the scientific theory known as intelligent design;
-supports research by scientists and scholars in the social sciences and humanities exploring the impact of scientific materialism on culture.
-encourages schools to improve science education by teaching students more fully about the theory of evolution, including the theory's scientific weaknesses as well is its strengths.
These are not theistic evolutionists. They are religious "scientists" pushing a pseudoscientific concept using pseudoscientific means. If they accepted biological evolution as a reality, irregardless of religious beliefs, than there would be no dichotomy between these two incompatable ideas.
If 66% of evolutionists are theistic, that's a lot of creationists.
Theist "evolutionists" (like Ken Miller and others) are not creationists according to the Discovery Institute and creationists themselves.
EvC (evolutionist vs creationists) would be a missnomer if the greater percentage of evolutionists are theistic/Christian.
Again, these theist evolutionists would be on the E vice the C side of EvC. Do not automatically assume that the acceptance of biological evolution, a natural phenomena, as occurring requires someone to be an atheist, a philosophical worldview; even though both concepts are discussed here on EvC. The two concepts, biological evolution and the belief in a supernatural creator, are not mutually exclusive concepts; but theistic evolution is not creationism as defined by both the YEC themselves as well as by the theistic evolutionists.
Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.
Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

This message is a reply to:
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RAZD
Member (Idle past 1405 days)
Posts: 20714
From: the other end of the sidewalk
Joined: 03-14-2004


Message 27 of 382 (497134)
02-01-2009 9:30 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Buzsaw
02-01-2009 8:17 PM


Re: An eye opener for Buz
Hey Buz,
Something I cannot understand is how theistic evolutionists are not considered creationists, Christian evolutionists in particular. If they're Christian, they are Biblicalists of some sort and the Bible is most certainly creationist. \If 66% of evolutionists are theistic, that's a lot of creationists.
Because, Buz, the problem is not really between creationists, per se and science in general and evolution in particular -- the problem is between people who believe falsehoods and those that don't want those falsehoods taught as reality.
A creationist that believes in an old world and evolution is not at odds with reality, not trying to pretend a valid science is false, and most particularly not trying to force silly falsified beliefs into school science classes.
Enjoy.

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
Rebel American Zen Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.


• • • Join the effort to solve medical problems, AIDS/HIV, Cancer and more with Team EvC! (click) • • •

This message is a reply to:
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Nighttrain
Member (Idle past 3994 days)
Posts: 1512
From: brisbane,australia
Joined: 06-08-2004


Message 28 of 382 (497146)
02-01-2009 10:46 PM


Another Spectrum
Another Spectrum
”Fundamentalist: God is inerrant, the Bible is inerrant, I am inerrant. There is no evolution or science.
”Mainstream Christian; God is inerrant, the Bible could be inerrant, I use evolution and science, but I don`t really believe in either.
”Theist: I hear voices in my head. It`s my own personal God. Who cares about evolution or science?
”Deist: I am a scientist. I believe in evolution and science. But God is really, really powerful so I won`t risk offending Him.
”Agnostic: I believe in evolution and science. But there is a tiny possible chance that God exists, so I`ll straddle the fence and put up with the splinters.
”Atheist: I believe in evolution and science, but I suffer from a surfeit of evidence and can`t decide which to throw first at believers.
”Rational Primes (Primeys): the future of the human race. We have proven evolution and science. We are God.

  
bluescat48
Member (Idle past 4190 days)
Posts: 2347
From: United States
Joined: 10-06-2007


Message 29 of 382 (497148)
02-01-2009 10:47 PM
Reply to: Message 23 by Buzsaw
02-01-2009 8:17 PM


Re: An eye opener for Buz
Something I cannot understand is how theistic evolutionists are not considered creationists, Christian evolutionists in particular. If they're Christian, they are Biblicalists of some sort and the Bible is most certainly creationist. \If 66% of evolutionists are theistic, that's a lot of creationists.
One point is that many take Genesis as allegorical, rather than literal.
There is no conflict in this sense. Others believe that God is used evolution as a process.

There is no better love between 2 people than mutual respect for each other WT Young, 2002
Who gave anyone the authority to call me an authority on anything. WT Young, 1969

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by Buzsaw, posted 02-01-2009 8:17 PM Buzsaw has replied

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PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 30 of 382 (497154)
02-02-2009 1:51 AM
Reply to: Message 25 by Blue Jay
02-01-2009 9:07 PM


Re: Theistic Evolutionists
WHere would those who believe that God created (and/or sustains) the natural forces we observe so that abiogenesis and evolution would occur, to produce intelligent life fit into your classification ?

This message is a reply to:
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