One of the most interesting things about the evolutionists is that they need it to be true so that they can claim God to be a silly falsehood. Richard Dawkins, one of their foremost spokesmen, said "Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist." William Provine, a Cornell University evolutionary biologist, said Darwinism is the greatest engine of atheism devised by man.
Here are three things to think about and which some of you may want to discuss in this forum.
1) Random mutation to bring about the desirable traits needed for irreducibly complex mechanisms not only is highly implausible, but is mathematically impossible. Try just the human eye as a case in point. The list of others is almost endless.
2) Natural selection is actually just a pointless taut0logy. (Look that one up and give it some thought. )
3) Creating a new species is still on the "To do list" of the evolutionists. Remember, we are not talking about changes like the change in Jason after doing lots of step classes, but having him sire a kid that is not "human" any more. (Now let Jason and Michelle argue that one with their kids for a while.)
I just throw these things out for discussion and thought. Give it a go.
Dad Clark
12 comments:
Dad, your post assumes the readers here are godless atheists and disagree with you.
I don't think anyone here thinks we have evolved from amoebas, or chimps, or cavemen for that matter. But I don't have any problem with species adapting to their environment -- be it plants or animals. I don't think the idea of things evolving over time is godless at all.
I'm not nearly hairy enough to have evolved from a chimp, anyway. But I did learn on This American Life yesterday that the Federal Government is building "retirement homes" for chimps we humans have used for medical experiments or entertainment, but are no longer useful for those purposes. It was a fascinating and nearly unbelievable story.
I made no such assumption, rather the oposite one. I was only pointing out the feelings of most Darwiniacs. I so not think that any of the readers of this blog are what I call Darwiniacs.
On the idea of change over time, remember that evolution is not the change one makes by training, improving eating or life style, nor is it even the selective breeding done within a species such as dogs or pigeons, or horses. If by "adapting to our enviornment" you mean puting on a coat when it is cold, then I too follow that. That is not evolution as Darwin presented it. He talked of changes that resulted in new species being formed that then changed in genetic ways to form other new species, etc. So you actiually believe that has happened? Show me some of those transitional phases if you can, even in the fossel record.
So, at least you responded and gave us some great things to talk about. I am not concerned that you or anyone agree with me as much as I want to put some ideas out into the open that show how incompatable evolutionary ideas are with what I think is truth, religeous or otherwise.
Dad Clark
I guess this is what I meant about species adapting to their environment: you've got a forest and a wildfire comes through. What happens next is pretty amazing. Some plants die and have no mechanism to reestablish themselves. Some immediately resprout (think of oak or chaparral -- they are both basal resprouters) and are fine. Yet other trees die, but before they do, their serotinous cones open up and drop seeds to the ground, increasing the odds of future establishment.
The species with mechanisms for survival do indeed survive. Those without, don't. If enough of them are burned over time, the species may in fact disappear from the earth. Many people believe that species have adapted to develop mechanisms such as serotinous cones, but I know you don't believe that because your response to this was, "Doesn't that mean God didn't get it right the first time?" That indicates a belief that every species that ever existed on the earth has always been there and no new species have been formed from adaptations of others.
What I don't understand is why this isn't okay to creationists? I'm admittedly ignorant to most details, but I believe in God, yet I have no problem with the idea that species can in fact adapt. I'm not sure why those ideas have to be mutually exclusive.
I agree with you, Jess.
I don't think we evolved from monkeys. I don't really know a lot about this subject but I don't think it is entirely impossible for some species to evolve. We had a really good talk about this subject last night. I don't know, it brings up a bunch of unanswerable questions.
I could clog this blog writing about this subject but I will try to be brief.
Dad, you and I have had this discussion countless times over the last 15 years. What is most distressing about both sides of this argument is that they both militantly assume that they are correct without adequately knowing what the other side really thinks. I doubt Richard Dawkins has ever read the Bible and I doubt Limbaugh or Coulter or Billy Graham has ever read anything by Darwin (although I could be wrong on both counts). We tell people that if they want to know if the church is true then they need to read, study, and pray - not just take someone's word for it. The same is true here. How can anyone say that evolution did or didn't occur on whatever scale if they haven't taken the time to study it out for themselves?
Yes, I believe that evolution played a role in the creation of the world as we know it. I do not stand with the Richard Dawkins crowd but I don't stand with the Ann Coulter crowd either. I find both camps ill-informed about the other - largely because they refuse to listen objectively to each other.
Elder Eyring said in one of our stake conferences about 3 years ago that we (humans, children of God) did not come from apes. He has also said (and I can't for the life of me remember the name of the book) that it would be a travesty for parents to teach their children that evolution did not occur. I do not find those statements at odds with each other. The Bible tells us who created the world and why it was created. It does not tell us when or how. I certainly don't have all the answers and I enjoy reading what you all have written thus far.
I certainly don't know the answers to these things. I remember reading a church authority earlier this century say something like: I am not sure whether there existed some kind of pre-adamite creatures but we(church) should concern ourselves only with what happened after Adam, the human drama, and leave the rest for science to figure out."
I would hate to ever be in the position of refusing to consider newfound evidence simply because I have already made up my mind about everything and refuse to take into consideration that there could be new facts.
Philosophically I have a hard time understanding what true atheists have as a motivation to live. I think many atheists say they are atheists because they don't like organized religion or religion that they have thus far encountered in their lives. If they were true atheists they would follow the path of the true founders of existentialism which is that which comes from true meaninglessness...ending it.
Great. You guys have given us all something to talk about. This is cool, but coolness requires patience and percervience.
He is a good one I heard today from Hugh Nibley, given in a radio address about fifty years ago. He said that predgious is not forming an strong opinion about something, it is forming an opinion with out being willing to examine all of the evidence first.
So in time, may we all examine some eveidence. You who have some even modest beliefs in evolution need to answer some questions for me if you can. I will soon present some on the blog.
I would like to know just who is the Ann Coulter crowd. I have heard Dawkins and others speak and find them to be mindlessly prejudiced. They spent a great bit of time attacking and calling their opponants (like Behe), calling them fundementalist Christians to put them down. They go to great lengths to percecute their opponants but never seem to get around to talking about the arguments presented.
Hans, I believe that being an atheist is actually an impossibility by its accepted defintion. To "know" that God does not exist one would have to be a God with omnisienceI think that agnotisim is possible, however, if one chooses to ignore the overwhelming evidence. This actually is one of the points that I brought up in my blog post.
I will come in later with another post.
Dad Clark
So Jess,
I am not a creationist. At least not as it is commonly defined. I do not believe in God creating things from nothing. "See, there is matter unorganized."
Yes, I do not believe that there have been new species formed since the creation of the earth. You must remember that I subscribe to the belief of Brigham Young, that the formulation of things from previously existing parents and their transplanting on our earth was the method. Remember, celestial beings, (not just the human type) are spiritual beings, and have complete (including corporeal) natures. They can produce, evidently, both spirit offspring, and physical bodies (seeds if you will). Those physical bodies must have a "fall" and an atonement to become just like their parents in all aspects, but their origin is by procreation, not evolution.
Remember, it is said that God "planted" a garden eastward in Eden. He did not, in my opinion, evolve anything.
So what does the seemingly usefull ability of some plants in a burned forest do to show me that they "adapted" to anything? Is it adaptation or just a description of reality?
Dad Clark
I appreciate your points, Dad. I, also, dislike Richard Dawkins and others of his ilk. But it would be a mistake to paint everyone who believes in evolution or any part of evolution with the same palatte. Most scientists do believe in God and many of us are active church goers.
I guess what it really comes down to is to what level of "matter unorganized" were the building blocks of the earth. Perhaps I take it too literally but to me, unorganized matter occurs on an very small scale. Not atomically small but certainly not much bigger. I don't think the earth is something of a jigsaw puzzle with the Creator piecing chunks of other existing worlds together to make one whole. I believe the fossil record is a record of our world and the organisms that have existed on it. I do not believe, however, that God pushed the start button and stood back, letting things go as they may. As has been pointed out, the statistical probability of life as we know it springing from a primordial soup as a result of randomness is astronomical. One of the things that makes God who he is, is his perfect obedience to universal truth be it spiritual or physical (which really are one and the same). An interesting verse with regard to this subject is in Abraham 4. "...watched those things which they had ordered until they obeyed."
There is always more to chew on so keep it coming.
There is a scripture that says "All things were created spiritually before they were created naturally" (Moses 3:5). That would seem to strengthen Dad's argument, but I tend to think of it at maybe a different scale? Perhaps, like Jason said, they were created at the atomic scale and different pieces fit together differently over time and therefore operate differently over time. I guess my question is why does it matter?
It doesn't really matter. There are a lot of things that don't matter too much. However, that is why this is such an interesting subject and why Dad and I have been discussing it since Gillian was still in diapers. I have several more theories in regard to this subject but they would take up too much space and time in this setting. Please feel free to email or call me if you want to talk more in depth. It is difficult to find people who can or even want to discuss this subject.
Post a Comment