An "Evolutionary" Step Backwards?

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Yes, it is possible that God may have created the Earth with all the fossil record already there. But that would imply a certain streak of mischief in God to put that there just to trick palaeontologists and generate an evolution vs creationism debate.

I, for one, find evolution very difficult to deny. And I would suggest that humans are definitely still evolving. 50,000 years ago, humans would have been noticeably different from what they are now. And 50,000 years is a mere eye blink of time in evolutionary terms.

 

God probably just set a temperature and conditions, and left his nucleic acids and phospholipids to incubate for a few billion years. I can see life evolving from that, it doesn't take much.

 

Yeah, phospholipids. Can't believe nobody has mentioned them yet. They are the key to this whole thing.

 

Definitely!

No seriously, it is highly likely cells first came about because of these things - phospholipid membranes (simple lipid micelles) encasing nucleic acids allowing transcription to occur in an environment isolated from the outside world. A key step in any evolutionary path!

 

Haven't they done experiments where they've left amino acids in conditions similar to earth 5 billion years ago and seen them form simple proteins? That would certainly indicate that the proposed mechanism for the origin of life (according to science) is probably correct.

 

"The Big Bang could have taken place, but I cannot accept that this earth came about through random chance."

Why not? everything else is pure chance?
Do you really think that God made it sure that it was the exact spermcell that inseminated your mother egg-cell that did? If it was any other sperm cell you wouldn't have been here. It's as simple as that. For you to be here it was initially as 1 in a million shot. (not to mention how big the chances are that your father and mother met, and that those we're concieved... etc etc etc)
You see, it's all about chance...

"Haven't they done experiments where they've left amino acids in conditions similar to earth 5 billion years ago and seen them form simple proteins? That would certainly indicate that the proposed mechanism for the origin of life (according to science) is probably correct. "

Miller - Urey, there are some uncertainties though, but it works, and there are addenda to the theory that make those uncertainties go away.

And to prove evolution theory is quite simple:

Why do you think that mitochondria have seperate DNA than the creature they are part off?
Because the mitochondria (and most other cell organelles) evolved seperately but at some point, it was an evolutionairy advantage for them to "work" together.

Also, there are very simple experiments that can be done, or can be looked at. See AIDS, it becomes resistent to certain medecines... doesn't that sound like evolution? The new (mutated) AIDS-strand has an evolutionairy advantage over the old one... ie the old one dies.
Also, fruitflies can be looked at, where you have numerous different forms.


QED

 

1)"Theory" is NOT a rung on a ladder of increasing certainty. Theories NEVER become "laws". Today we have the theory(ies) of gravity/relativity that explain the law of gravity.
In science, "theory" means an explanation of a fact/observed phenomenom(or "law").

The difference between a "theory" and a "law" is as the difference between a how-to book on fly fishing and a fishing pole and/or tackle box.

2)Evolution has nothing to do with "random chance" and also nothing to do with "The Big Bang" theory. Evolutionary diversification happens for very specific reasons.

3)Evolution is observable, testable and falsifiable, and is yet unfalsified making it a sound scientific theory. One need not observe the passage of a million years to verify evolution. Science relies on both direct and indirect observation.

Creationism is not testable, has no grounds for falsification and is not observed making it nonsense.

4)Abiogenesis is the field which studies/theorizes about the orgins of life, not evolution. Evolution only deals with speciation.

5)It is all but impossible to show a creationist that speciation occurs because of the "Gish factor". Duane Gish is a prominent Creationist known for demanding evidence in the form of transitional fossils linking species 'A' and Species 'C'. When given transitional 'B' he just claims it is another seperate species and demands the transitionals between 'A' and 'B', ad nauseum .

Any example of speciation, be it the well-known fruit flies or what have you, will simply be met by denial from the Creationist with the bizarre rationalization that said variations are not seperate species but variations on a single species.

This falls apart when it is noted that said "variations" are incapable of interbreeding.

6) Evolution has NO "goals". We(humans that is) were not some optimal or desired result of biodiversity in primates. The opposable thumb did not devlope in order to enable us to use tools. Tool use developed because of our opposable thumbs.


I will stop there as several people here have hammered creationist contentions into the ground already with truth and reason.


On morality of God:


One poster here has continually asserted that God is the determinent of what is objectively "good" adn what is "just"(and presumably what is "evil" or "unjust").
Then hypothetically, it stands to reason that God could arbitrarily declare child molestation to be "Good" and you would be in no position to deny this. You would be forced by your faith to start molesting children.
This is of course ridiculous. We ALL determine what is moral by our own subjective standards. If this were not so then you could not have determined whether God himself was "good" as you would lack the ability to make such appraisals.

Atheists not only have morals, but we have solid scientific explanations for those morals(not that we need such explanations but since you asked...). To sum up: empathy is the chief reason(and this entails physiochemical reactions in general). We have greater difficulty killing other humans than we have killing spiders. This is because the more alien a creature is to us, the less empathy we have for it.

Besides empathy, altruism is a great motivator. We get tangible benefits from doing what others would appreciate. I am motivated to return a lost wallet, funds intact, because of how I want others to view me and the feeling I get from being so appreciated. I also empathise with others and no what it is like to lose large amounts of money or have it stolen.

 

At point 3:
Evolution and creationism are not exclusive.

5:
It is also impossible to show an atheist that God exists.

At Divine Moral:
So egoism is the basis for moral, I could steal from, murder and rape people I have no empathy for, and still be just and good, even Hitler and Stalin were just and good.
You could say I am wrong and evil, but you are just as wrong as I am.
It is a common practice to force moral on another individual by force, it's done by court. How can this court condemn me for doing something good? As if their moral is more true, more good and more just than mine?
It's called power, those with power define good and evil, a herd of man defines good and calls it the law. A creator defines good and calls it divine law.

[ March 03, 2005, 11:45: Message edited by: Morgoth ]

 

It's not the first time this has come up here, so I'd like to ask some questions as this debate does confuse me somewhat.

What exactly is it that is being taught in science in the US?

1)Is it the big bang theory? Surely rather pointless and abstract if you want to teach kids since the science behind this is to say the least too complex for your average 10 year old.

2) Is it evolution? Well, evolution is a fact. All species evolve at all times. Some changes are subtle, some are not. Just consider the average hight of humans. some few hundred years ago it was about a foot less than it is today.

3) Or is it the teaching that humans have evolved from a different species over x amount of time.

When I did science in Norway and the UK, the origins of life and the earth never really came up. The evolution of humans from a.n.other species was touched upon as a theory, briefly, but truly evolution was tought in terms of the changes of species that was observable and proveable.

We were also tought about God creating the earth, the animals, humans etc. It was called religious education. Sure RE was broader in both countries, but that's where we were tought about creationism.

Never have I come accross anyone in Europe yet who has ever described that as scientific since clearly it lacks any fundamental basis for being described as science.

Your choice to believe of course, but to describe it as science is cobblers and to teach it in science classes is wrong. It is a theory, not a scientific theory. Put it back in RE where it belongs.

 

@ Viking

The problem is they are teaching creationism alongside evolution in science class. As you have pointed out, and I have as well previously on this thread, if anything, creationism should be compared to the big bang, not evolution, as evolution makes no claims on the origin of life. It's more point #2 and #3 that you listed. Like you said, I doubt many children would understand an in-depth look at the big bang theory.

One point though - it is generally believed that the increase in human height (especially this century) has nothing to do with evolution. Even if you look at humans from 100 years ago, they were much shorter than we are today. Consider these facts:

In 1900, only 11% of men reached six feet in height, and only 13% of women reach 5 and a half feet in height.

In 1990 (when the study was conducted), now 27% of men reach six feet in height, and 24% of women reach five and a half feet in height. The reason for this change is not thought to be because of evolution, it's because of better nutrition, especially in childhood.

@Runequester - very well put - you summed up a lot of what I was trying to say, and put it much better than me.

 

@Morgoth

But they are in terms of the debate here. "Creationism"(capital 'C') is different, in this context, from the simple belief that God created the universe and may have used evolution to do it. My points are not directed at people who aknowledge that evolution is fact(regardless of whether God did it or not). My contentions are with those who assert such things as "evolution is just a theory" or "microevolution occurs but macroevolution is something different." and so on.

a)This has nothing to do with evolution or creationism. Evolution is not an atheist doctrine(atheists have no doctrines related to atheism)

b)This would only be true if God, in fact, does not exist. If God DOES exist then there is no reason he cannot potentially be known/understodd by humans as an existential entity.

Why do you think this? How did you get THAT from what I posted?

I think you are assuming there is an objective morality(i.e. what is "right" is right and what is "wrong" is wrong, regardless of perspective and context). Morality is subjective. You, me, everybody determines by their own standards what is "good" and this is often subject to context.

Otherwise, how would you be able to tell if God's (alleged) laws were 'good' or not?

A Muslim fundementalist blowing up a bus full of 'infidel christians' will be seen as a hero to fanatical Muslims but will be seen as the worst kind of evil by Christians.
Similarly, a fundementalist Christian who kills a bunch of 'unrepentent Muslims'(usually with the 'terrorist' justification, whether true or not) will be seen as a hero by fanatical Christians and 'the Great Satan' by Islamic fundementalists.

"Stealing" is wrong in some situations, from certain people's perspectives but not in other situations and from different perspectives(for example: A mother who literally has no option but to either not steal medicine and let her baby die of sickness or to steal medicine from a wealthy miser. If she chose the former, she would be viewed as more 'wrong' than by doing the latter, generally speaking).

If you had been born in a different part of the world, with different life-experiences, you would be seeing the terrorists as "good" right now and Christians as "evil". This may seem hard to believe or understand but geography is the biggest factor in ethical and religious beliefs.

By MY morals, Hitler and Stalin were wrong. Many Russians worshipped Stalin as a God. Many Germans(and many Americans, at least at first) thought Hitler a great hero(at least until the truth of the torture and genocide came out) and some still DO regard him as a hero. If one is able to convince himself or be convicned that he is persecuted or unjustly treated by a group of people then he will look to those who opppose that group as inspirational figures.
Neo-nazis tend to think that white people are being driven to extinction by non-whites. They see Hitler as someone who opposed non-whites. Ergo, they look to Hitler as an inspirational hero. Their morals are quite different than mine.

Correct. By MY morals/ethics you would be wrong because my ethics are based on my empathy for humans(and for life itself to a different extent). Since I can empathise with being violently attacked/raped, I would see those who do such things to others as 'wrong'.

As a violent rapist, you may well see ME as "wrong".

Unfortunately no one has yet invented a "Morality-meter" so we just have to rely on what we have(brains) to determine these things for ourselves.

Generally speaking, legislature is passed based on common notions of morality of the collective whole of society. Generally, 'crimes' require a 'victim' in order to be crimes. In other words, you can take a rattle-can and decorate your own property all you want but when you do so to others' property(when they have not requested such decoration) it is called "vandalism".
Sometimes the religious of society gain too much lobbying power and are able to push through "blue laws". Prohibitions which are aimed at stopping someone from doing an activity which hurts no one else, but which the religious in question do not enjoy(and can't understand why others would enjoy said activity).
These "blue laws" are the notable exception to the rule.

It cannot, provided that what you are doing is agreed to be good by all those affected. The victims of your rapes will not likely praise you for raping them.

It's a question of practicality. Societies develope amongst social animals(wolves, dinosaurs, humans etc.) because of the bonds and taboos shared by the members of the group. Wolves and jackals will violently turn on members who eat out of turn for example. Apes have been observed to exile other apes from the family group when they engage in murderous behavior.

Early hominids started with such basic taboos and learned to cooperate to overcome predators and such. As humans evolved and groups became larger and larger and technological progress grew, societies needed more and more taboos to maintain order and social bonding.

While it is true that humans will do much to attain power and those who attain power will do much to keep it and to enforce their will upon others, you are oversimlifying the matter.
Also, your specualtion about "Creators" and "divine laws" are bald assertions. I have never seen anything which warrants such an inference.

[ March 03, 2005, 22:24: Message edited by: RuneQuester ]

 

You stated that moral is based on two things which you explained in an egoistical way, empathy(you help others to please yourself) and altruism (you help others for the social benefits).
If I have no empathy for a person, I could do nasty things to him and still be morally correct, from my point of view anyway, not from the point of view from other but they are just wrong(I am right and somebody who says different is wrong. Would somebody have a moral he just knows is wrong?)

Exactly, that's why I wanted to discuss the point of getting religious (and based on that, moralistic) teachings back in to school.

Restating my point, a god cannot be shown to an atheist because an atheist can(and will) only see with science, and science can only be used to measure a physical world, whereas gods are supposed to live in the spiritual world. So atheists want physical proof of something not-physical.

I am assuming that a world with a creator(let's call that entity the Master Builder from now on, played too much Thief) has an 'objective' good and evil, that is, the moral of the Master Builder, the Master Builder may be dead wrong from your point of view, but you are just as wrong from his position. Consequently, no one is correct, but he can easily force his moral on you.
For the same reason why a crowd is allowed to force their collective moral on an individual, power.

If the world had no creator and no predefined laws(like this one) then the information age would slowly detoriate into nihilism, people would figure out that happiness is only a chemical reaction.
Free Will? Sorry, in a world of cause and reaction there is no such thing as free will (let the atheists try to prove that), your thoughs and acts are predertermined, your conscious is just a product of the subconscious, you are a product, a puppet with no master. You don't even have control over your body, the law of cause and reaction does.

 

Scary. Isn't there supposedly a magic number or equation that can predict just that - the predetermined fate of anything at any one time? One too many sci-fi movies for me...

 

Crap. I spent nearly an hour writing a response earlier and a series of mishaps caused me to lose the whole thing.

*Sigh* Let's try again...

Don't mean to break up your statement or mess up the context but can you clarify for me what you mean when you say that I "explained in an egotistical way"?

That is not empathy. Empathy is, to put it simply, understanding based on shared experience. We sentient beings each feel a degree of empathy for all livng things. This degree varies depending on how similar or alien to us the other creature is. We feel a great degree of empathy for other humans and not so much for spiders.

Reciprocal altruism is simply "you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours". Every "good" deed you do entails a reward which is lartgely why you do it. We get a good feeling when we know that others think highly of us for returning their lost wallet or purse adn we get a very bad/uncomfortable feeling when others think we have molested their children or somesuch.

Sometimes good behavior has even more tangibgle rewards but this is not essential.

The combination of altruism and empathy accounts for our observed adherence to our own moral/ethical systems.

It is impossible for you to be a human and not empathise with human beings. You CAN willfully ignore such empathy or allow temptation or greed to overshadow empathy but you cannot simply not understand what it is to be human if you are a human.

???

First off, I don't think this thread would be the place to start such a debate. Secondly, you seem to be equating religious indoctrination with ethical behavior. DO you feel that I am incapable of behaving morally without adhering to YOUR religious beliefs?

1) Atheism has NOTHING to do with science(and vice versa). Atheism is simply a lack of God-belief(s) or a refusal to willingly worship objects as gods.
We are ALL born atheist(even you). Newborns do not have any positive belief in gods. They have to be taught such things.

2)You are presupposing the existence of a "spiritual realm" when this is not infered by any concurrent observation we know of. In order for your claim of a spiritual reality to be valid, you would need to find some way to warrant the inference or make such known to me/us.
As it stands your spiritual realm is no more sensible than someone claiming the "Snozzwoggler exists" and saying it cannot be known by scientific methodology.

In short, I have no kore reason to believe in your non-physical world than I have to believe in your God.

You are going to have to produce this "creator"(sorry, I don't play Thief) for me or I cannot make sense of your claim. The universe behaves and operates as we would expect a natural/non-created universe to do. I have no need of the 'Creator hypothesis'.

So you are arguing that, if this being had existed he would be capable of doing terrible things to me so thereforre I should accept what YOU are telling me are HIS morals? What if someone claims that an even greater God than yours exists and this is the "true God" adn he can do much worse to you than what you believe your God can do? DO you then start worshipping THAT God?
What if your God declared that child molestation was "good" by his morals? Surely you are not in a position to question the almighty God right? Would you then think child molestation was good?

Of course not. Because you, like me decide for yourself what is "good" and what is "evil".

That is not an argument for objective morality! That is an argument for subservience and fear of those who you believe can hurt you. This is a good argument for emperor worship because, unlike imaginary gods, people in power(emperors) CAN CERTAINLY do unimaginable harm to you!

What "predefined laws" are you talking about(what does that even mean??)? WHy do you think that without god-beliefs we would come to nihilism?

BTW, we ARE figuring out the chemical reactions at the root of emotions but such specific terms as "happiness" are highly subjective adn cannot be accounted for by indentifying the physical reasons for the general feeling.

This is another bald assertion but why exactly do you want atheists to try and prove...whatever it is you want them to try and prove?

There is no reason for free will not to be a reality for atheists or materialists.

But there ARE reasons why it is incompatible with Christianity and monotheism in general! If you believe that God exists and he is "all knowing", then you CANNOT believe you have free will yourself! It would be impossible! What's more, GOd HIMSELF cannot have free will! Think about it; if God KNEW(not "suspected" but KNEW as 100% fact) that Adam and Eve would be conned by a talking snake in his "perfect garden", and he KNEW this 100 billion years ago, then how could he have EVER pondered a decision to create humans?
He could not because if he were able to decide NOT to create humans then he could not have KNOWN what Adam and Eve would do.

I have no idea what you are talking about there or what it might have to do with evolution or atheism or morality.

Why do you think this?!?

 

Is there a way to explain with only atoms and the law of cause->reaction, that you are free to make your own decisions?

No, thats why people like to believe in souls (which reside in a spiritual world), with it they have the ignorant(but blissfull) idea that they are more than they seem and that they serve a higher purpose.
Nietzsche would call it an insult to the earth, they are not content with the earth alone and want more.

I meant the sentence as: "a world without God, without predefined laws, like this world".
Very shocking perhaps, but I am an atheist too.

That is just so wrong, how do you think alien universes would work? Would you know how this universe would work if you have never seen it?
You don't, your ideas of universes are based on this one, you have no idea of how other universes would work when this is the only one you know.
Can you also expect that all the other suns have 8(yes 8, Pluto is no planet) planets like this one?

Yes. teehee, it depends whose moral, from my perception moral is what is mine, and what the others just call their moral is just wrong.
Like I said, I would not follow a moral I do not view as 'good' and 'just'(yes that is a loop).
And so with my limited perception of the world, I have to assume that mine is the correct moral(why else would I follow it?).

 

@Morgoth

I am not sure what you mean by the above but I DO feel that free will/decision-making is accounted for by purely natural mechanisms.

That's a misstatement of Nietzche's position but the point is that rules of inference do not indicate the existence of souls or the spiritual. Such specualtion is akin to postualing that a 3 bedroom house actually has a 4th bedroom but it is invisible and cannot be entered.

That does not help me. What do you mean by "predefined laws"? Do you mean the laws of nature/physics? At first it seemed you were talking about some divine moral laws of some nebulous "creator"/God.

Which alien universe are you talking about? I have no idea. I only know that the workings of THIS universe are accounted for by natural explanations thus far and we have no reason to think this will not continie to be the case. Until we discover something that cannot be explained by science adn can ONLY be explained by something else("faith"?), then this universe operates exactly as we would expect a ntural, godless universe to behave.

If I havd never seen it, I would not exist and if I did not exist, I would not know ANYTHING.

Exactly. We only have one universe that we know of. It is a natural/material universe. I do not speculate on what other universes might be like if they existed.

No. What is your point?

Again, what is your point here? You are now agreeing with me that morals are subjective. Why did you bother contending my points in the first place if you agreed with them?!?

*Boggle*

 

Then I will try again...

Try to explain to me, that people are totally free to make decisions with the materialistic idea that the world is and only is made of physical elements each following the laws of the universe.
A decision is then nothing more than lots of physical elements following the laws of the universe, this entire universe exists only of little physical elements following the laws of the universe.

If I decide to blow up the earth, then that's because of lots of little molecules following the laws of the universe in my mind, 'free' doesn't fit in because everything was then predetermined from the very beginning.

Like Tassadar said, if I knew the position of everything, and the speed of everything, and all the laws, then I could calculate all the paths of all the elements, every sentient thought, every decision. I would be, omniscient.

[Edit]
Dammit, I mixed omnipotent and omniscient, vewy confusing since they both start with omni....
[/Edit]

You speculated on how a natural universe would work, and said that this should be a natural universe because it acts like a natural universe, do you have a non-natural universe with you so we can compare?

That I agree with you, doesn't mean we shouldn't discuss.

That's a new thought for me, maybe those two ARE the same... heh.
But I was talking about divine laws.

No, but it makes it life more beautiful.

[ March 06, 2005, 11:37: Message edited by: Morgoth ]

 

There is merit in this. During the beginning of this particular universe, there may have a been a few very simple (relatively speaking) set of laws. Today things haven't changed, through time there just seems to be more chaos and randomness when in fact everything is still governed by the same simple rules. If one can discover a pattern, one could simplify the numbers and eventually come down to the original set of laws that presumably govern the development of the universe. Easier said than done considering how much the universe has grown compared to its Big Bang days.

Even if you found these constants/equations though, to predict anything with any sort of accuracy would be difficult. I'm guessing there are variables or parameters you'd have to get figures for before you could plug them into the equation(s). I've always found that experiments I do in the lab are never fully accurate (there are always slight variations in experimental conditions), and yet I always get the same results. It's always stumped me. I am guessing these laws are flexible enough that you don't have to get something exactly right, it just has to be close enough.

As for life, that could come about as a consequence of the development of the universe. So if there *was* a creator, all it would need to do was set the laws, press the enter key and watch (or not watch) everything unfold. There may be an untold number of these multi-dimensional universes. Or maybe there is no creator and universes are a natural occurance from some other set of laws that exist *outside* these universes. We will never get the big picture until we focus on the small things; what's already in front of us - and work from there.

 

@Morgoth

I do not speculate on whether determinism is in some sense correct or not. Ultimately, I do not care since even if everything WAS predetermined, there are far too many variables to ever be able to predict what someone will decide to do with 100% certainty.

I am not determinist however because the idea does not jive with observation and as a hypothesis, it is utterly unfalsifiable. I know that I can choose to eat an apple or an orange or nothing at all right now. I will ultimately make this decision based on a slew of factors including my personal tastes/experiences, my degree of physical hunger and even something as irrelevant as a coin toss if I so chose.
One can specualte that any decision I make was predetermined but this is no better than specualting that "God caused X to happen".


I never speculated on how a natural universe would work. I aknowledged how our natural universe DOES work. WE have ONE known universe. It operates by natural laws and we have never observed any part of it to do otherwise.

Your charge that I was speciulating about THIS universe is akin to saying I am speculating about my own existence.

(*And before anyone goes there, please, no Matrix/Taoist/Solopsist questions about whether we, in fact exist. I am not interested.)

I am not aware of any "non-natural" universe and by my materialist axiom, such a thing is impossible. You can convince me otherwise by providing an example of such a universe existing but aside from that, there is nothing more to discuss here.

Why do you think the universe would be more beautiful if souls and spirits existed and why is this important?


@Tassadar

Chaos theory throws a wrench into the whole idea of being able to predict things with certainty. Gould's contingency theory also makes it clear that, even if you had all the exact same variables and conditions present as existed 15 billion years ago(proverbially 'rewinding the tape'), it is unlikely that humanity would come to exist.

Also, you are forgeting one other option in your universal specualtions. The possibility (or even likelihood) that matter has existed always(in some form or another) and in infinite regress. A 'cause' is not necessary to existence itself. Cause and effect is simply a law of how things behave in a natural existent universe.

 

You want one? Your perception of the universe is unnatural, free will goes against the natural order.

When atom follows path, and reaction follows cause, where does the free will come in?
Let's think about free will on molecular level, since we are free to decide, our thoughts would affect the atoms in the brain, and not vice versa.
Because if the atoms affected the thoughts in our brain, then we would not be free to chose, but our thoughts and decidions would then just be chemical reactions.

I have absolutely no reason to assume that elements will follow a different path if the "tape was replayed", when ALL the physical elements on the beginning of tape are ABSOLUTELY the same.
And no, you can't use the "there are far too many variables to ever be able to predict what someone will decide to do with 100% certainty." argument, because that's only about perception.

Yet there are people still assuming that atoms might follow a different path, that laws of the universe and the other elements are not the only influences in a physical world.
That sounds pretty unnatural to me, since it might mean that the other mysterious influence could be *gasp* God *ungasp*

I don't know why you bring Gould's consistency into this, because it's too, a grab in the dark, something that can never be proven till we have completely control over all the environmental variables of an experiment.
It's well, what do you call it, unfalsifiable, I'm not sure, since I tried to check it up and it's not even a word.
Chaos theory? Does that matter? It states that new laws come into being when things get complcated, oops that 'law' thingum goes against free will as well. Since then our thoughts are still born out of chemical reactions following the newborn laws.

[ March 06, 2005, 14:36: Message edited by: Morgoth ]