Bring on the Tiktaalik naysayers ...

Originally posted by David C
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tiktaalik.png

^^^ What's with the "I just ate Snoopy and Woodstock" grin?

It's about to eat the creationists ...

Originally posted by amannion
My apologies.
You claim your 'god is infinitely intelligent' statement is part of some logical process. I want to know how you arrive at that.
Because it certainly isn't by any logic.

It is by faith, what religion is about. If it was by fact it would not be religion. Faith is where you get god from, then logic sorts out the rest.

The more you arge there is no evidence or logic to god the more yu support the christian argument. Cheers!

I dont believe in it I am agnostic, I am just presenting the side of the argument.

Originally posted by Brother Edwin
It is by faith, what religion is about. If it was by fact it would not be religion. Faith is where you get god from, then logic sorts out the rest.

The more you arge there is no evidence or logic to god the more yu support the christian argument. Cheers!

I dont believe in it I am agnostic, I am just presenting the side of the argument.

But you've just blown your argument (and I take your point that it's not your belief) about an equation, by introducing faith. Any equation (or more likely series of equations) that might describe the nature of the universe exist within the scientific realm - faith is an entirely different beast.

Originally posted by amannion
But you've just blown your argument (and I take your point that it's not your belief) about an equation, by introducing faith. Any equation (or more likely series of equations) that might describe the nature of the universe exist within the scientific realm - faith is an entirely different beast.

No.

They are separate.

Faith=god.

God=equation.

For a start even science has faith. You have faith that what you are seeing is real and not a simulation in your mind.

Originally posted by Brother Edwin
No.

They are separate.

Faith=god.

God=equation.

By your maths then Faith = equation which doesn't make sense - or it does, but only if you believe that it does ...

By maths maby but it was just a way to explain it.

Through faith you get god. And if god hypheticaly exists he must know and has planned everything. Thus he put the creature there, decided what we should think of it, decided for people to argue whether he exists or not. He also decides who will go the hell and heaven, thus it is his free will not ours, which is a argument against christanianity, however he of course decided for me to say this.

Originally posted by Brother Edwin
By maths maby but it was just a way to explain it.

Through faith you get god. And if god hypheticaly exists he must know and has planned everything. Thus he put the creature there, decided what we should think of it, decided for people to argue whether he exists or not. He also decides who will go the hell and heaven, thus it is his free will not ...[text shortened]... rs, which is a argument against christanianity, however he of course decided for me to say this.

That might be the case, but there are many religious people who might also disagree with you. God might be the initial cause but doesn't necessarily need to keep a direct hand in things all the time.
Evolution for example is easily incorporated into a moderate Christian view since it is seen as God who started life and allowed evolution to take place. He (or she) doesn't need to actually create us specifically in this view - he merely makes the evolution of Humans possible.

Originally posted by amannion
OK creationists and IDers and anti-evolutionists, bring it on. Explain to me how the discovery of yet another transitional form - exactly what evolutionary theory predicts - can be explained by your 'scientific' models.

How do you know it's transitional? Did you catch it changing?

Originally posted by orfeo
How do you know it's transitional? Did you catch it changing?

No, of course not.
But then of course you know that your comment is entirely facetious. Evolutionary evidence is almost always from the past - so we usually can't see it in action, and certainly not for major transitionary species.

But the point is, evolution allows us to make a prediction. There should be transitionary fossils showing us the development of species. Here is a fossil that suggests just such a transitionary species. Hence, it counts as evidence to support the theory.
ID/creationism offers no such predictions or evidence, merely attempts to bag the crap out of evolution.

Put up, or shut up.

Originally posted by amannion
That might be the case, but there are many religious people who might also disagree with you. God might be the initial cause but doesn't necessarily need to keep a direct hand in things all the time.
Evolution for example is easily incorporated into a moderate Christian view since it is seen as God who started life and allowed evolution to take place. He ( ...[text shortened]... tually create us specifically in this view - he merely makes the evolution of Humans possible.

If he is all powerful and all knowing he knows and has decided what will happen.

If you mix two alchaolic drinks you know what the result will taste like, or a scientist mixes two chemicals he knows the result to take place. God knows every atom of everything thus can predict for certan(all knowing) how they will react thus what will happen. He would of known that putting certan atoms together would result in creatures evolving and certan people comeing up. Everything has a reason/cause even aparantly random things, he is thee origional cause thus he cantt of not knew what he was doing, thus he decided for all this to happen.

Thus the bible contradicts itself and there is no freewill other than gods.

Originally posted by amannion
No, of course not.
But then of course you know that your comment is entirely facetious. Evolutionary evidence is almost always from the past - so we usually can't see it in action, and certainly not for major transitionary species.

But the point is, evolution allows us to make a prediction. There should be transitionary fossils showing us the developmen ...[text shortened]... edictions or evidence, merely attempts to bag the crap out of evolution.

Put up, or shut up.

Yes, I *did* know my comment was facetious. I was wondering whether you would spot it.

I came across an interesting webpage - not necessarily the world's best written webpage, mind you - about a National Geographic article that had presented the ancestry of whales. The website was creationist, but it seems that a lot of scientists were quite unhappy with the NG article because it altered facts to 'fit the theory'.

In particular, the illustrations used to accompany the article - artist's impressions of how the fossils would have looked in real life - were demonstrably wrong. The pictures were designed to reinforce the impression that the ancestry of whales was all sorted out because the 'missing links' had been found.

I bring this up because I think that creationists don't have a monopoly on intellectual dishonesty or blind faith. Evolutionists too, including highly qualified ones, are capable of pushing facts to squeeze into their pre-conceived ideas. There are plenty of good examples in all fields of science of theories shaping evidence instead of the other way around. Often, what's happened is that evidence that DOESN'T fit a theory has been dismissed - when it should in fact cause the theory to be modified.

I'm not saying that the new discovery isn't valuable and informative. I'm saying that I'm not comfortable with the statement that opened this thread, as if to say this one discovery is some kind of conclusive proof of... well, I don't know what you had in mind.

But I doubt any serious scientist would jump up and down and say "you see, I told you so". Given the enormous abundance of life and the (relative) rarity of fossils, the chances of finding THE fossil that perfectly fits one's pre-existing theory and clinches it are actually pretty small.

Discuss the discovery - sure. Trumpet it like it's the holy grail - no thanks.

Originally posted by Brother Edwin


Thus the bible contradicts itself and there is no freewill other than gods.

How come God can have free will and not us?

And the bible says Jesus preached equality for all! :'(

Originally posted by Brother Edwin
No.

They are separate.

Faith=god.

God=equation.

For a start even science has faith. You have faith that what you are seeing is real and not a simulation in your mind.

So your saying that faith proves that God exists?

This is most wondeful! Shame I dont have free will to appreciate it. 😞

Originally posted by amannion
That might be the case, but there are many religious people who might also disagree with you. God might be the initial cause but doesn't necessarily need to keep a direct hand in things all the time.
Evolution for example is easily incorporated into a moderate Christian view since it is seen as God who started life and allowed evolution to take place. He ( ...[text shortened]... tually create us specifically in this view - he merely makes the evolution of Humans possible.

How about this.

God created the entire universe with transitional appearing fossils to separate the weak in faith from the rest.

Originally posted by amannion
OK creationists and IDers and anti-evolutionists, bring it on. Explain to me how the discovery of yet another transitional form - exactly what evolutionary theory predicts - can be explained by your 'scientific' models.

Once there was a gap here in the fossil record. After Tiktaalik, there are two gaps there, one on either side of Tik.

Until you find a chain of millions of fossils from a parent to its descendent to its descendent to its descendent right on up to my dear old grandmother Tilde (who was cremated) and prove with DNA tests that each one is directly related, I will never accept your atheistic lie from Satan!