Has anyone in this forum changed evo/creo sides?

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It seemed as though you all almost blindly accepted that more people shift from the Creationist Model to the Evolutionist Model.

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Well, it is true that there are plenty of folk who have switched from accepting evolution to believing in creationism. But that is usually the result of a conversion to a literalist sect, and the change in beliefs as to origins just changes because the person now accepts the literal reading of her scriptures.I have not yet spoken with anyone who decided that the theory of evolution is false based solely on the scientific evidence. I suspect there must be some, but my assumption is that the numbers are fairly small.

As I said, almost every account I ever heard of someone changing their beliefs to creationism was an account of a general religious conversion, and science didn't seem to have to do with it.I have made requests on several message boards for someone to relate whether they became creationists based on an examination of the scientific evidence. So far, no one has ever responded.

Sorry, Navy, but I think there is some misunderstanding. You seem to think that I am trying to convince you of something. Let's try this again.Your question was: My answer is: I don't know. I only have some anecdotal evidence (my own, mainly) to give some idea of what the answer is. It has been my experience that although I, personally, know of many people (including myself) who changed from being a creationist to accepting the theory of evolution due to the scientific evidence, I do not know of anyone who came to believe in creationism due to the scientific evidence. All the people that I have ever heard of who came to believe in creationism did so as a result of a religious conversion.Note that in my paragraph I have been very careful to say that this is simply my own experience. I know of no scientific studies on this. If you don't find this convincing, well, I don't see why you think that I want to convince you of anything.But maybe it's still not very clear what I am trying to say. If you still think that I am trying to convince of something, tell me what you think that I am trying to say. Maybe I can then clarify things.And, to the general audience, I still invite anyone who has changed her mind and accepted Biblical creationism after an examination of the scientific evidence to share her story with us.

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Why would God need to lie to us.

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Exactly, Navy! To repeat PualK's point, God did tell us that the universe is millions of years old. Astronomy, Geology, Physics, and Biology are all fill with pretty definite evidence that the universe is about 13 billion years old, the earth is four and a half billion years old, life has been around for about three and a half billion years, and so forth. To ignore the physical evidence, that God presumably created, in favor of a human-written book seems a bit odd to me.

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I have faith that the truth I believe will win at the end of the day.

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I, too, believe that eventually the truth will out. Pretty depressing, otherwise.

Thanks for the compliment, truthlover.Although I don't believe, myself, that any part of the Bible is "God-breathed", I would never deny that there is a "truth" to be found in it.

No, no, I got your point. I was just trying to state that, despite my tendency toward irreverence at times, I do, even as a self-described atheist, have respect for the Bible.In fact, I'm afraid when I left Christianity I reacted pretty badly against it. So during my spiritual journey, I ended up discovering Lao Tzu as a source of spiritual comfort and guidance.Had I belonged to a more liberal Christian denomination, I may remained in the fold, so to speak; I may have still lost my belief in the literal existence of God, but I would probably have kept the Bible as a source of spiritual guidance, even if I didn't interpret it literally.Edited to correct a typo. (And I even use the Preview feature, too!)[This message has been edited by Chiroptera, 03-14-2004]

Hi, Jazzlover.I've told my story enough times that people may be getting tired of it, but I don't mind telling it again.I used to be a conservative fundamentalist Baptist. I suppose that my doubts were growing for a while; as I mentioned, I was quite disturbed when I read the Gospels and realized that Jesus' social message was quite at odds with the conservative politics that I believed in at the time. I came up with some rationalization for it. I was also a bit nervous when I realized that the account of the ressurrection in the four Gospels were inconsistent.But the final straw was the theory of evolution (which is why I continue to have such a strong interest in it). I came to the conclusion that the Theory of Evolution explained the world much better than a literal reading of Genesis. I simply could not continue to believe in the creation story in Genesis as literal history.Unfortunately (or fortunately?), I was so steeped in the fundamentalist dogma that the Bible had to be 100% literally true, or none of it was true, that my entire faith was shattered.And this was not a choice on my part. I really fought losing my faith. I tried to continue to beleive, tried to convince myself that I still believe, prayed that God would strengthen my faith, and so forth. But in the end I had to be honest with myself, and the others around me, that I just didn't believe in God any more.If I had belonged to a more liberal Christianity, it is possible that I would have remained a Christian. Or, even if I would still have became an atheist, it would have been a slower, less traumatic transformation, and the Bible would still be on my night stand by my bed instead of the Tao Te Ching.