What do you believe in? Evolution or creationism?

[niky]

Hmmm...what is Darwin's Theory of Evolution anyway? Intelligent Design?

According to the book I've read, Darwin's Theory of Evolution is the widely held notion that all life is related and has descended from a common ancestor: the birds and the bananas, the fishes and the flowers -- all related. Darwin's general theory presumes the development of life from non-life and stresses a purely naturalistic (undirected) "descent with modification". That is, complex creatures evolve from more simplistic ancestors naturally over time. In a nutshell, as random genetic mutations occur within an organism's genetic code, the beneficial mutations are preserved because they aid survival -- a process known as "natural selection." These beneficial mutations are passed on to the next generation.

This has been discussed many times in my graduate school class and different opinions and ideas have come out in the open. Many intellectuals say that Intelligent Design isn't science, because you start with the presupposition that God or something created the universe. I belive this is not true. It follows the evidence wherever it leads. Do you rule out at the outset the possibilities of a creator, and then only look at evidence that tries to create a naturalistic explanation for the data? Or, are you open to the possibility of an intelligent designer?

I think if you do look at cosmology and physics and biochemistry and genetics and consciousness and astronomy, the arrows point in a direction and I think that direction is toward an intelligent designer.

Look at cosmology and physics, these are two of the most powerful areas that point toward a creator. The evidence over the last 50 years that points toward the beginning of a universe allows an old Muslim argument to kick into gear, which says that whatever begins to exist has a cause. The universe began to exist; therefore the universe has a cause.

We have scientific data that indicates the universe did have a beginning, and so that argument takes on new meaning. Couple that with the fine-tuning of the universe, the dozens of parameters of physics that are so tuned to allow life to exist. Just those two areas of science point powerfully toward the existence of a creator who's beyond time and space, who's immaterial, who's powerful, who's smart.


If astronomy and physics and biochemistry suggest an Intelligent Designer, should we not have the freedom to consider that as a possibility?

Linus Pauling, who won the Nobel Prize twice, said science ought to be the search for truth. Let's not limit our search to only a naturalistic explanation. Let's leave open the possibility that we may not know everything about the universe. There may be a dimension that we don't quite comprehend. If the evidence points in that direction, let's pursue it.

When I was still in Highschool at Holy Family Academy, I remember my prof in history, convinced us of the truth of Darwinism based on different facts than I had been taught at the time. I learned everything ranging from the famous origin-of-life experiment back in the 1950s that supposedly recreated the atmosphere of the early Earth and shot electricity through it to create amino acids; to the side-by-side comparisons of the different fetuses that Ernst Haeckel drew back in the 1800s, which everybody now knows are frauds; and Darwin's tree of life, which is this idea that there's a common ancestor and that neo-Darwinism can account for all of the flowering branches of different species of animals through time.

Now, if you critically analyze each case one by one, I walk away with great skepticism.

If you look at public opinion polls, the public at large is generally skeptical about Darwinism. It just doesn't ring true to a lot of people. There's an underlying widespread skepticism that neo-Darwinism could explain the diversity of life.


I take a different approach to that than some people do. I want more evolution to be taught, not less. What I mean by that is, right now, students are only getting one side of the coin. They're only getting a cursory overview of what neo-Darwinism is and being told some facts that some people believe support it. I want them to hear more about it. I want them to hear the evidence that challenges neo-Darwinism. I want students to be able to critically think about whether or not this makes sense. I want them to be free to follow the evidence wherever it points. That, to me, is academic freedom, that they should be able to pursue the evidence.

I'm not saying that Intelligent Design ought to be taught in all schools. I am saying that kids ought to be open to possibilities and pursue the evidence wherever it points, including in that direction.


*sigh* Just my two cents....

Ernst Haeckel did not support Darwinian Theory, and was kind of a nut job.

The origin-of-life experiments would maybe have been successful if they kept at it for a few million years. :lol:

The evidence that challenges Darwinism on the ID and Creationist side is pretty thin, and much of it is based on unsound science and oftentimes, is complete malarkey. The ID side of the debate is held up mostly by Creationists, who challenge even the age of the Earth to support the 6000 year old Earth theory.

Yes, there are exceptions to the rule of Evolution. There are gaps and spurts in the development of species, but then this is only counter to classical Evolution. It has been shown in recent times that small subsets of a species in isolation can evolve very quickly (in a few thousand or tens of thousands of years)... a time-frame that leaves a very narrow window in which the species can leave a fossil. And most species lived in places that did not encourage fossil formation. We can thank natural catastrophes for the tons of fossils we do have.

*Sigh* Science does not start from the presupposition that there is no designer. It looks at the facts, and as the facts stand, Evolutionary theory can account for much of what we see in the world today. What science does have to say about "Intelligent Design" is that it is impossible to tell whether or not there was a Intelligent Designer.

Is it too hard to believe that an ET or God seeded our planet with primordial DNA, pre-programmed to enact the evolutionary process? Would have been more effective than having to babysit the process for over a billion years. The fault of ID/Creationism is that they think there should be an IDer or God before they look at the evidence. They then attack the evidence because they think it disproves God. Scientists look at the evidence objectively, whether or not they believe in a God. And a lot of them do believe in God.

The fact that our Universe is optimal for the creation of life does not prove anything. For if it weren't, then there would be no life to observe the existence or non-existence thereof. The "fine-tuning" of the Universe to support life does not indicate the presence of a Creator, it just means that of all the possible Universes, this one single Universe had just the right conditions to support the emergence of life.

It is accepted in scientific circles now that there are possibly other Universes beside this one, and only in those Universes that do possess life do debates like these occur. :lol: But we will never know, because we cannot observe anything outside our physical Universe.

Thus, the existence of a God (let's not quibble, any Intelligent Designer powerful enough to create a Universe is a God to us) cannot be proven or disproven by science. Merely because we cannot observe anything outside our own physical Universe.

As for what Pauling says, a lot of scientists feel this. According to Einstein: "God does not play dice with the Universe". They refuse to accept the fact that we are merely the product of random chance, quantum chaos. So trust me, scientists, as a whole, are not trying to disprove God, they're doing their damndest to look for him.

They're all looking for the magic bullet that will prove whether our Universe was tailored or not, and they haven't found it, yet. Thus, Intelligent Design is not Science, at the moment, merely philosophy. The evidence does not point there.

And, AFAIK, according to BBC polls, the acceptance of Intelligent Design is still lower than the acceptance of either Creationism or Darwinism.