We ARE still evolving, it took millions of years to get to where we are and now that we are more efficient, the progression is less visible. Look at the bushmen tribes in africa. They have been around since before the great Bantu migration which spread human life to the entire african platuea when humans first started creating civilizations. They, even to this day are are extremely short, with the average man being around 5' and the average woman being about 4'9".
Truthfully, I see no reason why creationism and evolutionary science can't just 'kiss and make up' so to speak. To the creationists who try to assign some specific period of time to the 'creation of earth'- doesn't it seem the height of arrogance to imply that we have the same concept of time as an unfathomable powerful immortal being? Seven days for us might well be less than a millisecond for your God. Furthermore, considering the complexity of our bodily systems, our bodily functions, and even other organisms down to the smallest bacteria....the chance of unguided evolution producing such life is infinitisimally small. Who's to say that some divinity, some creative force (not necessarily the christian God, per se, or any god at all-perhaps just an unfathomable 'essence' that is infused in life), didn't give evolution a bit of a 'push'? I would like to state my religious ideology before continuing. I am an antitheist. What this means is that I am rabidly against organized religion. I've had nothing but bad experiences with it, and I don't appreciate being 'coerced' into a faith with the phrase 'but you'll suffer eternally after death if you don't!'. I'd rather think freely in life and suffer hellfire once I die than blindly follow, thanks. I don't mean to offend anyone- if you've got faith, I'm happy for you. Keep it to yourself, though. I believe in....something. What I mean by that is I believe that there's SOMETHING out there that created us, that gave us life. There's SOME divine force or divine being out there. I believe it's completely unfathomable to human beings, and even a minimal understanding of it would cause our minds to break. Whether or not it actually takes an active role in the lives of its creations....I firmly hold that it does not. But as this is not a debate about the existance of god or of a divine being, I will end my statement there. I just thought it might be prudent to let you all know where I'm coming from. I have a strong trust in science, but I also know that it doesn't have all the answers- no one human being or practise does, and anyone who claims to is just trying to manipulate people.
I've been reading Climbing Mount Improbable over the last few weeks. Here's a summary of one of it's main points: Evolution is not a theory of chance. It is very common that people interpret it that way, since there is always a chance that an animal will pass down one gene or another. That's only evolution between single generations, though. The other half of evolution is not based on chance at all. In the long run, better adapted animals live and worse adapted ones die. Evolution as a whole is not based on chance. Let's assume for a second that evolution is actually based on chance. Let's say that the chances of a human being formed are 1 in 1,000,000,000. No matter how complicated life is, the creator of that life must be even more complex. If we assume that god created humans, then god must be even more complex than the humans he created. It's actually more likely, no matter how you look at it, that life formed on it's own.
Absolutely. Evolution is controlled by natural selection. The odds that life forms, more or less a complete human being, are probably even lower than that. But, let's say that the odds of life forming on a single planet over the course of the current age of the Universe thus far are 1.00x10^-9. There are at least 1.25x10^11 galaxies in our Universe according to current estimates. Our own Milky Way galaxy has at least 1.00x10^11 stars within its area. Say each has 8 planets (like ours, but definitely an overestimate). That puts the count at about 1.0x10^23 planets in the Universe. That's a million billion billion planets. That massive number means that (using the probability above) there are at least 1.0x10^14 planets with life on them in the Universe. That's 100,000,000,000,000 planets. Not too shabby of odds right? Even if that probability were order of magnitudes larger, there would still be a significant number of planets with life on them in the galaxy. A more accurate estimate would be the implementation of the Drake Equation which calculates the number of civiliations in our galaxy alone with which communication might be possible (advanced sentient life). The current estimate of this value is 10 in our galaxy. Multiply that by the 1.25x10^11 galaxies in the Universe and that is still pretty massive. We are probably more insignificant than we give ourselves credit for. Infinitesimally small maybe, but given enough time, the probability of EVERYTHING approaches one. That means that given enough time, anything will happen. Even the most ridiculous things. Take lead turning into gold (alchemy is always fun). Classical chemistry said it was impossible. Quantum mechanics says it's improbable. But given the age of the Universe (~14 billion years) and the ever-moving world of the sub-atomic particle, there is no reason to believe that it [transmutation] has never happened. The same can be said with the improbability of life. The systems that make up the human body seem impossibly complex, but that is the wrong viewpoint. It is improbable. Never impossible. Given enough time, the probability of everything approaches one.
This explanation is just a way to try and justify what the book of Genesis says, and what evidence shows to be true. People who interpret events in the Bible this way only do so when confronted with contradiction, yet when the book agrees with reality or doesn't contradict itself they don't claim that they don't understand that either. They even go so far as to preach that their book is true and lessons need to be learned from it. "Hey this book is great and totally true! Except when it isn't!" Only two words are wrong here, "unguided" and "small." Natural selection is a profoundly powerful guiding force when you consider it one step at a time. There was even a laboratory experiment concluded about a year ago that conclusively demonstrated bacteria evolving a totally new trait in a mere 20 years. Basically a researcher started with a single e. coli bacteria, and from it he tracked all of the offspring way down the line for about 44,000 generations. Over time he observed that the bacteria grew larger cell sizes, grew faster and faster, and had lower population densities, all simply modifications of current traits. But then he saw a brand new trait evolve. After those thousands of generations of raising bacteria in the same environment the entire time, his e. coli bacteria evolved the ability to metabolize(eat) a chemical called citrate. This was important because normally, e. coli can't use citrate. In fact, inability to metabolize citrate is one of the distinguishing features biologists use to identify E. coli. Then, the population that had the citrate metbolism trait were able to use not just the glucose, but also the citrate in their environment to feed on. They grew faster and denser than their competitors, and so produced more offspring than their competitors, until eventually they were the entire population. This is exactly what natural selection is, the ones who are better at survival and reproduction produce more offspring, and eventually the trait spreads through the whole population. Does it make sense why that example can be applied to real life populations? A new function gained that provides any advantage at all will give an organism more offspring until eventually the whole population has that trait. Lets be honest here, nobody advocating creationism or intelligent design actually believes that it could have been anything other than their god or a god in general. When ID proponents are confronted with the fact that they're just trying to sneak biblical creation into the classroom, they mumble something about how they don't know who or what the creator was, and it could have been aliens for all they know. Yet not a single one of them will stand up and say they believe aliens created life on Earth. I really hate trying to tie religious belief or lack thereof to just one word. I'm glad you spent the extra time to actually say what you mean by antitheist. Personally, I'm an atheist. Doesn't mean I've concluded that there absolutely cannot possibly be a god, it just means I lack belief in a god because I don't see any reason to think there is one. This should be off topic in this discussion, unfortunately it isn't entirely because the most support for creationism comes from religion. Agreed.
Sorry to both sides for putting in my 2 cents but, why can't both sides be correct ? I am a christian and I beleive in a divinely guided evolution. "The Good Book" states that one day to God is a millenia to man. This book has also been translated maney times and it is possible that some things aren't exactly the same maybe it was 1 day to god = a billion to man. If you take this into account genesis doesn't conflict with the big bang or eveolution. Jesus also told stories to people in order to teach them moralesand a way of life, maybe thats wat genesis was. Could you imagine a sceintist explaining the big bang theory and evolution to primitive man, Then tell him to write it down and play telephone for a few hundred years, yeah i think it might come out about the same. ANd lastely to the scientific community at first the electron was just a theory they couldn't see it but they had faith it was there To the religous community evolution doesn't say we came from monkeys it sayswe had a common ancester thats all, and what slowed human evolution was our ever expanding minds that cure sickness and keep the strong and the weak passing on there genetic code
You can't even truly compare the two. Evolution is a scientific principle that has and can be tested as valid. Belief in a religion cannot be tested because there is no empirical way to ascertain whether that belief is true or not. That aside, both sides cannot be correct because they contradict one another. The theory of evolution says we descended from a common ancestor via the mechanisms of natural selection. Creation says a deity created all life in its current form. Intelligent design says a deity had a hand in the development of life into its current form. Evolution and creationism can NEVER agree because one requires the input of an omnipotent, undetectable, untestable entity. The other relies simply upon the laws of Nature. Who decided your god gets to use a different time scale? What then is one day in the life of Zeus when compared to man? Actually, Genesis does conflict with evolution. Genesis 1:20-26 (king james) According to Genesis, your god made every single animal found on the planet in its exact form at the time of creation. That would mean either evolution never occurred or it hasn't done anything. The scientific community never had faith that it was there. That's not how science or the scientific method works. The electron was theorized by scientists after tests with cathode ray tubes and then through the meticulous scientific method, proven to be subatomic particles swarming around the nuclei of atoms. Faith in the existence of such a particle is a non sequitur as faith cannot be tested. It cannot be measured the same way the negative charge of the electron can and has been. Evolution cannot be slowed. It happens every single time a child is born. It is constantly happening within our body as our cells and their mutations fight for dominance. Macroevolution takes place over millions of years and considering that **** sapiens are but 200,000 years old, we should not be seeing the effects of such evolution. Yes, modern medicine has indeed slowed the natural selection against people with undesireable mutations, but it still is ever-relevant in our development.
i died inside when i read that there is nothing in the Qur'an that says anything about killing infidels in it it actually says that christians and jews are their friends and they all beleive in the same god but in different ways. i would beleive that god created the first matter of the big bang and let it go like that it makes more sense then oh we were created some 5 thousand years ago and havent changed since then. adaptation, evolution, survival of the fittest, those are all the same albiet in different time spans. that if God can stop evil but is not willing, he's malevolent and if he's willing but not able, then why call him god.
So god made plants one thousand years before he made the sun? And he made light two thousand years before he made light producing objects? Crazy stuff man.
I like the part where this math doesn't even make sense anyways. 1 day to God = 1,000,000,000 to man Age of Universe = 14 billion "human" years The Universe is 14 days old in the eyes of God So God spent 6 days making everything on the planet right? That puts us at 6 billion years after the Big bang. Too bad the Earth doesn't even exist yet (age of Earth ~4.5 billion yrs) Oh, and for God to see this massive dilation of time, he would have to be moving at least twice the speed of light, which is impossible. Even if it were possible, then he would be unable to cause the events of creation in our timeline as he is moving so fast that the cause and effect interface no longer functions. And don't say that God is not subject to our physics because if you claim that he follows a time system that is related to our own, then he must also follow the same physics.
Its a case of shifting goalposts. People try to mix biblical creation with evidence based evolution by making stuff up. They pull out of nowhere the idea that biblical 6 days was just 6 days as God sees it, but then you do what Nitrous did or you did and show that those numbers are still retarded. Since they've already decided to go with a tactic of making stuff up, its easy for them to counter your proof that they're wrong by making more stuff up so that the words "god" and "creation" have new definitions every 5 minutes. The only argument that you can use against people who are making stuff up is just to call them on it, and if they don't go away just keep pointing out over and over that they're using their imagination rather than any evidence.
I don't see how this is a legitimate debate. On one hand, you have hard, factual evidence supporting one theory (evolution), and on the other you have pure faith that people interpret as fact. I believe this debate was over a long time ago when that little book "On the Origin of Species" was published.
I personally believe in evolution so: Take a deck of cards. If you suffle the cards and deal them like so : [[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[] chances are they will be random. In a universe with an infinite amount of time, continually shuffiling and dealing cards will result in the cards appearing in every order possible. Essentially, thats a metaphor for given time all events that have even a chance of 1 in 123,456,789,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 will eventually happen.
Yea, Ok so this is basically if you actually believe in God or not. If you do believe in creation, then most likey you read the bible and believe in God. If you believe in the evolution, then most likely you know mothing about the bible and don't believe in God, no offense to anyone but i am just stating the obvious. I believe in creation because God made us, we din't from from know ***** monkey,lol, Yes God made monkeys to as i believe. There is no way we went from having fur to not having it because look at all of the animals, they all still have it, what did they come from monkeys to. We don't evolve to just not having fur because we have houses and things now a days. If we didn't have houses or clothes, then we would still need fur, but out bodies don't know if we have houses, uimean how can they,so in that case, this means that we never had fur.
Many Atheists/Agnostics know a lot about the Bible. That is some retarded logic, HUMANS DO HAVE FUR, we just have a lot less and it is a lot thinner. Seriously, you're retarded.
Well,seriously you have no right to call me retarted because i state what I think of it Man It really sounds like you are putting down God. I dont care how much I get in trouble on the site, if you are putting him down, then screw you, this isn't a site to be putting down GOD in any way, so stop, this site isd about HAlo
WE'RE IN THE DEBATE SECTION, THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH HALO. Anyone can put down God if they want to.