Is the Bible acceptable?

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It is just as ignorant to say, "well Darwin says". To believe the Bible is an act of faith, to believe Darwin is also an act of faith. It is the job of both faiths to interpret science.

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How often do you see anyone on the evolution side appealing to Darwin, except when Darwin's words or beliefs are the issue at hand ? We know that Darwin - for all his greatness - is not the last word. We know that many people have built on, extended and improved his work. There is no "faith of Darwin" competing with creationism - only science.

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How strong is your faith in Darwin? Darwin was not even sure what he believed was true.

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And Darwin's uncertainty - the uncertainty of the scientist - is one reason why it would be better to appeal to what he said than it would be to appeal to the Bible. Darwin was aware of the limitations of the knowledge of his time, and took great care to investigate and consider the evidence. The humility of doubt is a far better guide to reliability than the false certainty of faith.

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By "faith of Darwin" I mean evolution, which in its basic theory remains pretty much the same as in its original form.

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But nobody believes that because of faith in Darwin. There has been a huge amount of scientific work since Darwin. If the basics of the theory haven't changed it's because they have stood up to investigation.

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Darwin questioned the whole theory... to build upon that is to build on shaky ground.

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That's wrong, as I said. Darwin's doubts are a strength, not a weakness. That's because Darwin was a scientist, not a preacher - and because evolution is science, not religion.

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It is evolution that competes with creationism, not science.

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You contradicted yourself there. Evolution IS science. That's why Darwin's doubts aren't a weakness and why evolution is not founded on faith in Darwin.

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Doubt = reliability? hmmm. Is doubt in evolution what drives people to pursue it?

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Sure it is. People who doubt take the time to check - they do the work, to try to get it right. That's what Darwin did. People who have huge faith in their own ideas - like many creationists - don't bother to check and often get things very badly wrong.

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Creation is a science just as much as evolution is a science.

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No, it's not. It's pretty obvious that creationism is a religious position.

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Well Darwin didn't really start to doubt until after he took the time to check.

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Can you produce any evidence for this ? I doubt it. Darwin had doubts from the start, that's why he did the huge amount of work he did.

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Things are not necessarily wrong because they are not checked (I'm not advocating not checking things).

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Of course I am not saying that. What I am saying is that if you don't bother to find out the facts you will often be wrong. Creationists place a good deal of unwarranted faith in themselves.

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But for the creationist, their faith is not in their own ideas, but God. They recognize that faith in God is far superior to their own ability to make sense of the world around them. That shows humility.

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By which you mean that they have the "humility" to say that God must do as they say He did. They don't allow for the possibility that their beliefs about God might be wrong.

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They doubt in their own ideas just as much as evolutionists do theirs. The difference being that creationists do not pursue their doubts, but have faith in God.

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In my experience that simply isn't true. Firstly many of their errors aren't even directly based on their religious belief (for example the creationist who claimed that the Scopes trial was about getting a special place for evolution, before it was accepted by the scientific community). Then there are their errors about what the Bible says. Then there are all the differing views within creationism - are we to take it that God can't make up his mind on what happened or is it that creationists are following their own ideas even there ?

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You doubt in evolution... You also doubt in creation... but for some reason you choose to only pursue evolution.

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I choose to follow the truth - or as close as we can get. Science is a good guide to that. Discredited religions are not - and nor is the self-worship that underlies creationism.

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Back to my original point, the Bible is just as valid to science in explaining creationism as a scientific theory, as Darwin is to explaining evolutionary theory.

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Your point is obviously wrong. The Bible is not a work of science. The Origin of Species is. It may be old and in many respects outdated - the mere fact that that is recognised shows that your arguments about faith in Darwin are inaccurate - but it still is a work of science. And it is useful for describing the theory of evolution because it is a landmark work in that field (not because of the author). It is not myth and legend as the sections of the Bible creationists insist on taking more or less literally are.

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Any time you make an observation or statement about the natural world, it can be looked at scientifically. The natural elements within the creation model are studied as creation science.

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Looking at them scientifically would not include assuming that they are unquestionably true - no matter what the evidence shows or assuming that they mean what you want them to mean). In fact it would require rejecting both approachesFor instance the "kind after kind" in the BIble quite likely refers to the folk-concept of species - that there are different types of animals and that they breed true. There's no evidence that it refers to significantly larger taxonomic divisions which humans would be expected to make or that it refers to a limit on evolution (indeed, the actual statement is quite compatible with evolutionary theory since if it ruled out all differences between parent and offspring it would be false). Indeed creationists have not even come up with a scientific way of identifying one of their invented "kinds".Creationists therefore have invented their own idea - which is not in the Bible and is not supported by science. Thank you for choosing an example which so clearly shows that crreationism is not only not science. It also shows how creationists "humbly" put their "faith" in God - by putting their words in His mouth in an attempt to convince the gullible.

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So It depends on your evolutionary view. If you believe everything evolved from the same single celled organism, then all life is the same kind. If you believe in creation though, then kind is the same as species.

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Creationists more frequently take "kind" to include a number of species (because they want to invoke a post-Flood period of rapid macroevolution and diversification so they can cut down on the number of species that need to be carried in the Ark).However the "no new information" is another example of creationist "science' - an ad hoc invention intneded to deny any evolution they object to. While they call it "information" they don't seem to know what they mean by it. I suppose they call it "information" in the hopes that people will be fooled into thinking that it means something.

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Well that includes everyone inbetween the two extremes. I lean toward the "no new information" extreme. I do agree with natural selection, but not to a point that one cannot reproduce within their own kind.

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Well I'm sorry that you tend to the "indulge in meaningless rhetoric to deny evolution" extreme. Selection by the way is a guiding force and not related to creating information.I would add that there is excellent evidence for speciation - including evidence that interfertility is not necessarily retained (Ring species, for instance).

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"no new information" means no new genetic mutation that is beneficial to the organism.

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Since beneficial mutations are known to occur, your position has been proven false.

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don't believe so, but maybe you could point me at some other threads where there is discussion on that.

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I can't remember a thread. Probably because it's too well established. But you remember what I said about creationists not bothering to check the facts ? You're a living example.Here are some web pages discussing it. Please check out the references if you still have doubts. Examples of Beneficial Mutations and Natural selectionAre Mutations HarmfulThis is one example of a peer-reviewed article (chosen because the full text is available on the web. There are many others - check out pubmed - but usually only the abstract can be read without a subscription)
Non-African Origin of a Local Beneficial Mutation in D. melanogasterHere's another paper, describing an experiment
Fitness effects of advantageous mutations in evolving Escherichia coli populations