Junebug
Well-known member
so is gravity
Yup. And it experienced such a sea change about 100 years ago that it wouldn't be recognizable to Newton.
so is gravity
And there is more than 150 years' worth of testable, observable, replicable data in support of it.
Not of speciation. Microevolution is a given. Macro is a different ball game.
Did your anthro professor not tell you about that? Shocking.
There are tons of evidence of speciation. You just choose to ignore it because it doesn't conform with your religious beliefs.
It doesn't take faith, the evidence of speciation laid out pretty clearly in fossil records.
You are welcome to your belief, but it isn't science.
Not of speciation. Microevolution is a given. Macro is a different ball game.
Did your anthro professor not tell you about that? Shocking.
My anthro press or told us that if you didn't believe in macro, you could drop.
Biology at Wake? And you're so dismissive of theories? I hope Dr. Eure doesn't read the boards.
Not "I will convince you" but "you can drop." What a joke.
Yes, Bio at Wake.
I wouldn't say I'm dismissive of theories. I just think its important to recognize its just a theory. We laugh at scientific theories from hundred years ago (like the "ether" idea of explaining the movement of light) but we act as if our present thinking is indisputably correct. It's very myopic.
Its incredible to think about how your mind must work. I applaud your open-mindedness and critical thinking in your approach to science, yet find it so crazy that going on in the very same mind of someone who questions evolution is someone who doesn't question the fact he believes approximately two thousand years ago a virgin gave birth to a man who would go on to rise from the dead and if you eat his flesh in a ritual each Sunday and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master then one day you will live forever. All this is necessary because at one point in time a talking snake convinced a woman to eat from a magical tree.
But you're right. Evolution has so many holes!!!
I believe none of those things. You have an extremely unsophisticated understanding of modern theology.
I wouldn't say I'm dismissive of theories. I just think its important to recognize its just a theory. We laugh at scientific theories from hundred years ago (like the "ether" idea of explaining the movement of light) but we act as if our present thinking is indisputably correct. It's very myopic.
Evolution is not merely a hypothesis we accept for the sake of argument as you seem to think it is. Again, you're misusing the word 'theory' in this context. A scientific theory is a framework for analyzing a set of facts. The process of evolution is a fact. It happens. The body of evidence in support of it, at the micro- and macro- levels, is too great to ignore. It may be counterintuitive to you, but the evidence is there.
A theory will inevitably have different interpretations and as-yet unanswered questions/future research directions, as evolution does, but still remain scientific. These differences are what drive hypotheses, their experimental testing, and subsequent acceptance or rejection. Some of the reviews here, though technical in places, do a good job of summarizing some of these different points of view (in particular those on p. 22 and p. 26): http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/19458906/1750262941/name/Science+Special+Edition+-+Darwin+200.pdf (this is the most complete though concise, free resource I know of online. I can also fully endorse Richard Dawkins' and Jerry Coyne's recent books, which don't even overlap all that much due to the sheer volume of evidence each presents)
Unlike evolution, there was never any evidence for the luminiferous ether. That was indeed a hypothesis. It was rejected when experiments failed to provide any evidence of it. You'd be more correct to refer to something like, say, String Theory as "just a theory." As of now its mathematical predictions cannot be experimentally tested (doesn't mean they won't be in the future), so it remains as more of a set of hypotheses. It's just way off base to label evolution the same way. We're past that.
as opposed to what?
I don't understand what you are asking me here. I'm saying that much modern Christian theology holds that a literal belief in the things you mentioned in your post isn't necessary, or, for that matter, even correct. To assume, as you did, that christianity is stuck in the dark ages and requires literal belief in those things reveals extremely unsophisticated religious thought.
I don't understand what you are asking me here. I'm saying that much modern Christian theology holds that a literal belief in the things you mentioned in your post isn't necessary, or, for that matter, even correct. To assume, as you did, that christianity is stuck in the dark ages and requires literal belief in those things reveals extremely unsophisticated religious thought.
Jesus rising from the dead is central to Christianity.
Agreed. But much modern theology holds that the resurrection was not a literal event.
How does that work?