Intelligent Design: Viable Theory or Religious Rewording?

• ManO'War

  

  "God" is a man-made concept. Once man vanishes from this planet, so will "god".
• HitsRus

  

  Man is a God-made concept. Once God vanishes from this planet, so will man.
  
  
  Just to reiterate what I have said before...I believe evolution should be taught in science class, and that intelligent design discussions are philisophical and belong in that realm.
• jmog

  ManO'War wrote: "God" is a man-made concept.

  Have any proof for that statement or is it pure opinion?
• BCSbunk

  jmog wrote:

  BCSbunk wrote:
  I do not need to reread it I understand it well. You are attributing Philosophical/logical evidence is equal to empirical evidence.
  
  You see there is empirical evidence of macroevolution lots and lots of evidence. Proof? no, proofs are for mathematics There is not lots and lots of empirical evidence for any sort of gods (whatever they are).
  
  I would also like you to scan back and please repost where I stated macroevolution is fact? Evolution is fact and it follows with microevolution combined with the tons of fossils showing the transitions that macroevolution is a fact.
  
  That still does not account for teaching non-science in a science classroom which not one single person has reasonably demostrated why we should.
  
  Want to teach myths and fantasys? Then have a myths and fantasy class where all the creation stories are all taught with equal validity.
  
  We can call it Creation myths 101.

  I swear you either have not read what I have posted carefully or you have reading comprehension issues.
  
  1. I don't support ID in a science classroom and have said it over and over again on this thread.
  
  2. You say "show me where I said macroevolution is fact" and then in the same sentence say "macroevolution is a fact". You don't make my search very hard.
  
  3. I am not saying that logical/philosophical evidence is equal to empirical evidence. I have said that just like I wouldn't use logical proofs to say that the existence of god is a fact, you can't use evidence of a theory to say the theory is fact.
  
  4. Also, you might want to look up the definition of empirical since you keep saying we have empirical evidence of macroevolution. Empirical evidence is evidence by observation or testing a hypothesis and watching the results. The last I checked no one has ever seen macroevolution happen in front of us. So no, while there maybe some scientific theories and ideas that support macroevolution through bone structure variations in different species (namely reptiles and birds), there is zero empirical evidence of it. However, these are just hypothesises and theories of how things evolved, not empirical evidence. There is a ton of empirical evidence of microevolution, but not macroevolution.
  
  5. Proofs aren't just for mathematics, proving something is fact is used in science as well (hint: math and science are intertwined). That's how scientific theories, once they've been proven, become scientific laws.

  1. I don't support ID in a science classroom and have said it over and over again on this thread.

  Good we agree.
  

  2. You say "show me where I said macroevolution is fact" and then in the same sentence say "macroevolution is a fact". You don't make my search very hard.

  Yes please before that which is the context show me where I stated it. I do not consider word games clever. I did not state it before that last post so I was misrepresented.
  

  4. Also, you might want to look up the definition of empirical since you keep saying we have empirical evidence of macroevolution. Empirical evidence is evidence by observation or testing a hypothesis and watching the results. The last I checked no one has ever seen macroevolution happen in front of us. So no, while there maybe some scientific theories and ideas that support macroevolution through bone structure variations in different species (namely reptiles and birds), there is zero empirical evidence of it. However, these are just hypothesises and theories of how things evolved, not empirical evidence. There is a ton of empirical evidence of microevolution, but not macroevolution.

  I completely understand empirical and we have done experiments and have fossils which show the transtitions. That is empirical evidence. You simply refuse to acknowledge it. I have listed many species that show transition.
  
  To say something like "we have not seen macroevolution happen in front of us." shows ignorance. Of course we have not seen it it takes millions of years but we have fossils showing those transitions.
  
  Evolution is both fact and theory. However theories are nothing to sneeze at. Only the ignorant say things like "Well it is just a theory."
  
  Lets try it out.
  
  Oh the theory of gravity? Thats nice but its just a theory who cares.
  
  Oh the Germ theory of disease? Thats great but it is not a fact it is just a theory.
  
  Theories are not to be trivialized.
• I Wear Pants

  Something being a theory does not mean that it is unproven.
• ManO'War

  

  jmog wrote:

  ManO'War wrote: "God" is a man-made concept.

  Have any proof for that statement or is it pure opinion?

  The proof is that people worshiped many gods at one time, I guess some still do in some parts of the world. This one god religion is pretty recent in the scheme of things. If the one god story was true, then it would have been true from the beginning. But I'm sure you have some religious double talk to explain away that unconvenient fact too.
  
  BTW, I watched a program on The Science Channel the other day about a 77 million year old dinosaur, I guess according to Jmog they were only off by 76,994,000 years!
• HitsRus

  

  What I think is obvious from the 256 posts that have been made is that science deals with, and is limited by, empirical evidence. Hence scientific discussions and science classes should be about things can be verified by what we can observe, measure and detect. It really doesn't matter whether it is 'proof' or 'theory'. Intellectual and philisophical discussions about whether the universe was created or just happened, and attempts to prove a creator logically and philisophically belong in a different venue. I have seen very few posts that would mix the two, including the input from those like myself who think the universe was designed with a purpose, and who know that there is a god.
  To paraphrase a piece of wisdom from the Bible..."whose image is it on the coin?"...Render to Caesaer what is Caesaer's, and to God, what is God's.
  In the same way...render to science, what is science.
• HitsRus

  

  ManO'War wrote:

  jmog wrote:

  ManO'War wrote: "God" is a man-made concept.

  Have any proof for that statement or is it pure opinion?

  The proof is that people worshiped many gods at one time, I guess some still do in some parts of the world. This one god religion is pretty recent in the scheme of things. If the one god story was true, then it would have been true from the beginning. But I'm sure you have some religious double talk to explain away that unconvenient fact too.
  
  BTW, I watched a program on The Science Channel the other day about a 77 million year old dinosaur, I guess according to Jmog they were only off by 76,994,000 years!

  
  There are universal themes that run through all religions. You must stop looking at religion as 'something to be proved' and more as a method of finding your way to the creator, harmony, oneness etc. There is a spiritual side of man that runs through all cultures.
  Whether or not one particular religion says something seemingly contradictory, does not disprove the concept of God, a divine purpose, or man's spirituality.
• ManO'War

  

  That's the point, there is no creator. Humans have made all of this up to make them feel important and to have some crutch to lean on/blame things on. Our brains have evolved having a hard time grasping the fact that when things die, they ceast to exist.
  
  We, as humans, could get a lot more accomplished if we just accepted this fact, and used the time we do have alive on improving things, instead of waisting time and money on worshiping gods.
• HitsRus

  

  ^^^that's your opinion. So....why do we want to improve things...why don't you just grab for all the gusto you can since you only have a limited time before you cease to exist? Apparently, an innate purpose runs thru your consciousness that goes beyond your animal nature.
• BCSbunk

  HitsRus wrote: ^^^that's your opinion. So....why do we want to improve things...why don't you just grab for all the gusto you can since you only have a limited time before you cease to exist? Apparently, an innate purpose runs thru your consciousness that goes beyond your animal nature.

  This is a non-sequitur. It simply does not follow that because we want to improve things there must be an innate purpose. That is logical fallacy.
• ManO'War

  

  It's called teamwork. Other animals do it too. I guess because dolphins use teamwork to improve their chances at survival they must have an innate purpose running through their consciousness??
• BCSbunk

  ManO'War wrote: It's called teamwork. Other animals do it too. I guess because dolphins use teamwork to improve their chances at survival they must have an innate purpose running through their consciousness??

  Well the Dolphin god made them with a porpoise is that not obvious?
• ManO'War

  

  Ha ha...good one!
• jmog

  ManO'War wrote:

  jmog wrote:

  ManO'War wrote: "God" is a man-made concept.

  Have any proof for that statement or is it pure opinion?

  The proof is that people worshiped many gods at one time, I guess some still do in some parts of the world. This one god religion is pretty recent in the scheme of things. If the one god story was true, then it would have been true from the beginning. But I'm sure you have some religious double talk to explain away that unconvenient fact too.
  
  BTW, I watched a program on The Science Channel the other day about a 77 million year old dinosaur, I guess according to Jmog they were only off by 76,994,000 years!

  1. Not all ancient culture's/religion's were multi-theistic. Judaism has been mono-theistic for at least 5000 years, it predates Greek mythology, Roman mythology, etc. So you are wrong, not all ancient religions were polytheistic.
  
  2. Did they tell you how they dated that dinosaur? Please tell me it was carbon-14, that would be hilarious.
• jmog

  ManO'War wrote: That's the point, there is no creator. Humans have made all of this up to make them feel important and to have some crutch to lean on/blame things on. Our brains have evolved having a hard time grasping the fact that when things die, they ceast to exist.
  
  We, as humans, could get a lot more accomplished if we just accepted this fact, and used the time we do have alive on improving things, instead of waisting time and money on worshiping gods.

  That's your opinion, not fact.
  
  Humans "made up" the idea of evolution as well, and much more recently than they "made up" the idea of god. So by your own logic evolution must be "made up" and wrong since it was "made up" so much more recently than any other theory of the origin of life?
• ManO'War

  

  Yea, you're right. That ole trickster God just put stuff deep into the ground to give us something to do while we are waiting for Heaven's gate's to open up...and we can all fly up there with our angel wings.
• jmog

  ManO'War wrote: Yea, you're right. That ole trickster God just put stuff deep into the ground to give us something to do while we are waiting for Heaven's gate's to open up...and we can all fly up there with our angel wings.

  Your sounding a pompous know-it-all.
  
  Who said God put anything in the ground? Search the posts and see if anyone has said that.
• ManO'War

  

  Humans dig up fossels from deep underground, therefore he had to plant them there to begin with, or else the earth is older than 6,000 years old.
• jmog

  ManO'War wrote: Humans dig up fossels from deep underground, therefore he had to plant them there to begin with, or else the earth is older than 6,000 years old.

  The fact that fossils are in the ground does not mean the Earth is older than any number you want to throw out there.
  
  I've already discussed radiometric dating issues/bad assumptions, I'd hate to explain it again, look back in this thread alone.
  
  EDIT: I will add that I have never said I know for a fact the Earth is <10,000 years old, I just said that there are many bad assumptions and holes in the dating techniques that scientists have used to say the Earth is billions of years old. Also, when you correct these assumptions for what appears to be more likely assumptions (through actual microscopic observations) then the age of the rocks becomes in the 1000s or 10,000s, not billions.
• analogkid

  JMOG,
  It appears that you have a fundamental but common misunderstanding of the relationship between a scientific theory and a scientific law. A scientific law is an observation of a specific phenomenon that has been made many many times and is generally accepted as fact. It is often stated as an equation. For instance the law of conservation of mass says that the mass of system before a change must be the same as the mass of the system after a change. With a remarkable degree of regularity this can be observed in the natural world around us and it allows chemists to predict how much of raw materials are needed to make a given amount of product. The law offers no explanation as to why this is so. Laws do NOT explain they simply state what is observed. The explanation came a couple of decades after the law was discovered. Conservation of mass as well as several other scientific laws only made sense if one theorized that the world was made of small things called atoms and if those atoms had certain characteristics (see Dalton's Atomic Theory). The point is the atomic theory connected together many observations from the world of chemistry including several laws under a common theme using natural principles. At no point did Dalton actually 'see' the atoms in order for him to infer their presence. As a matter of fact one could argue that we still can not 'see' atoms yet our confidence in their existence is stronger than ever. Only the details have changed as we have gained more information. Back to the point, theories do NOT become laws. Their nature is to use natural explanations as to why the world works the way it does. By nature they change over time as new information allows for refinement of the theory. Every so often they give way to a better natural explanations that better fits the set of observations. I hope that this helps you in your quest for understanding.
• majorspark

  

  ManO'War wrote: Humans dig up fossels from deep underground, therefore he had to plant them there to begin with, or else the earth is older than 6,000 years old.

  Not all who believe in the Bible subscribe to the age of the earth being less than 6,000 yrs. Though the bible dates human history on this earth, there are passages in the Bible that make it clear to me that the existance of the earth predates human beings. So before you broad brush everyone who believes the bible keep this in mind.
• jmog

  analogkid wrote: JMOG,
  It appears that you have a fundamental but common misunderstanding of the relationship between a scientific theory and a scientific law. A scientific law is an observation of a specific phenomenon that has been made many many times and is generally accepted as fact. It is often stated as an equation. For instance the law of conservation of mass says that the mass of system before a change must be the same as the mass of the system after a change. With a remarkable degree of regularity this can be observed in the natural world around us and it allows chemists to predict how much of raw materials are needed to make a given amount of product. The law offers no explanation as to why this is so. Laws do NOT explain they simply state what is observed. The explanation came a couple of decades after the law was discovered. Conservation of mass as well as several other scientific laws only made sense if one theorized that the world was made of small things called atoms and if those atoms had certain characteristics (see Dalton's Atomic Theory). The point is the atomic theory connected together many observations from the world of chemistry including several laws under a common theme using natural principles. At no point did Dalton actually 'see' the atoms in order for him to infer their presence. As a matter of fact one could argue that we still can not 'see' atoms yet our confidence in their existence is stronger than ever. Only the details have changed as we have gained more information. Back to the point, theories do NOT become laws. Their nature is to use natural explanations as to why the world works the way it does. By nature they change over time as new information allows for refinement of the theory. Every so often they give way to a better natural explanations that better fits the set of observations. I hope that this helps you in your quest for understanding.

  I don't have a misunderstanding of theories vs laws.
  
  As a scientist myself (3 scientific degrees) I understand the relationship between theories and laws.
  
  I said that theories are our thoughts on how the universe behaves, laws are things we know as "facts" about how the universe behaves.
  
  At times theories do become laws and vice versa. Before there was a law of conservation of mass was first stated as a physical theory by Russian scientist Mikhail Lomonosov in 1748. The theory was later confirmed through many exhaustive experiments to be "fact" and changed to the law of conservation of mass.
  
  So you are incorrect, theories are tested over and over again in science, and at the time they are found to be factual, they are not a theory anymore, they are a law.
  
  Newton's Universal Law of Gravititation was originally a theory.
  
  You name a scientific law, and I can nearly guarantee that when it was first proposed it was a scientific theory or a scientific principle.
• BCSbunk

  majorspark wrote:

  ManO'War wrote: Humans dig up fossels from deep underground, therefore he had to plant them there to begin with, or else the earth is older than 6,000 years old.

  Not all who believe in the Bible subscribe to the age of the earth being less than 6,000 yrs. Though the bible dates human history on this earth, there are passages in the Bible that make it clear to me that the existance of the earth predates human beings. So before you broad brush everyone who believes the bible keep this in mind.

  Yeah it predates it according to the bible by exactly 5 days. Earth was made on day one and man was made on day six.
• ManO'War

  

  Jmog, how come you are the ONLY one that knows the carbon dating is a farce???
  
  Like I said in the past, you should then get your own show and debunk all of these "experts", then you will win a Noble Prize and be wealthy.