Email from a creationist,
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Life's DNA is exceedingly complex. King David put our organization this way:
Psalms 139:14-16 "I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them."
When a young mechanic learns how to change a car's spark plugs or change the oil he has gained some understanding of the engine, but he does not possess the ability to replicate such an automobile from scratch himself.
Is any simple automobile the result of random chance? Of course not. Yet today, geneticists have learned how to manipulate a few things within DNA. Aren't we like high schoolers, peering into the complexities of life and barely able to understand what it is we see? We are "fearfully and wonderfully made."
Evolution proposes that "God was not needed." As such it creates a "mental hiding place" where the same person who would admit that a car could not happen by chance will turn right around and claim that organic life happened by chance.
Taking something simple - compare a big oil refinery with the complex human digestive system. The refinery must be retooled if the incoming oil has any change in its composition. Yet your digestive system can handle a slice of pepperoni pizza, a handful of jelly beans, with a glass of soda - breaking down each organic substance down to the molecular level!! Each protein, mineral, fat, and sugar, gets individually processed. And the human digestive system is 100% biodegradable, portable, and was self-assembled. An oil refinery is simple in comparison. Did the oil refinery happen by chance? Does it improve by itself over time? Is it made of biodegradable parts? Do we have to concentrate to digest food? No, it happens while we then turn our attention to read, or talk, or drive a car (...that also did not fall together by time and chance); a car that runs on fuel from a big oil refinery.
If DNA is simple, then why does it take some of our most advanced equipment in order to even study it in the first place? Evolution is a "mental hiding place" to deny God's proper place in our lives. He is our Maker and we each have the choice of making Him our Lord.
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Oh my! What a mess!! Let's see....watchmaker argument, argument from wonder, argument from ignorance, god of the gaps, argument from wonder again, argument from ignorance again, appeal to emotion, argument from ignorance. I think I got them all, but I may have missed a few.
Religion is a mental hiding place.
A car is a human invention. Why this argument continues to be offered as "evidence" baffles me. We have seen evolution first-hand; the same can not be said of God.
As someone whose "fearfully and wonderfully made" body contains broken genes that have caused no end of trouble with my digestive system, if there were any intelligence involved in "creating" humans, there would be no broken genetic codes - a perfect being cannot by definition create anything but perfection.
If God so wants us to "know" and worship him, why, even with our advanced equipment, have we no clear evidence of his existence? We can see DNA; at no time has anyone, ever, seen God.
Evolution is a better explanation for life, more well-supported by observation, evidence, testability and falsifiability. On its own it explains how life probably arose on Earth, and there's absolutely no reason to add a supernatural element to a natural process - what's the point.
If this God fellow you believe in is my "maker" I find him unworthy of worship, because he really did a crappy job coding my family's genetics. If I churned out that much bad code, I'd find myself out of a job really quick! You'd think an omniscient Creator wouldn't be less attentive to detail and perfection than a lowly human computer geek... this seems to NOT be the case, when genetic imperfections (mutations) are taken into account.
Just some random thoughts...
Invisible friends are for children and psychopaths.
A primitive man confides that he is not an authority on anatomy. Fair enough.
A lot of car nuts custom build their own cars from scratch, but that's beside your point, which is:
I assume you're attempting to illustrate - for the umpteen trillionth time - the asinine and utterly ignorant idea that the big bang or evolution or some other natural process is a theory of chance. Pathetic, as always.
The year is 2007. We are more than "barely" able to understand what we see when we peer into a microscope, and so far, we haven't seen pixie dust at any level.
"Evolution" says absolutely nothing about the existence of God. "Evolution" can't talk. Granted, that conclusion can be met when you study the facts, but there are plenty of Christians who are able to reconcile the theory of evolution with their faith.
Again with the "chance" thing.
http://talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/
No excuses. Fucking EDUCATE yourself.
Where does God enter into any of this?
I find my brain numbing just trying to comprehend what this question could even mean.
Actually, it's a scientifically proven theory, not a state of mind.
And I "choose" to evaluate the evidence that "He" has supposedly provided me with, and have concluded that the cocksucker either:
1) doesn't exist2) doesn't give enough of a shit to get off his lazy God-ass and provide me with tangible evidence for "His" existence (making "Him" unworthy of worship)3) is intentionally misleading me away from "Him" by providing me with evidence contradictory to "His" supposed word (making "Him" unworthy of worship)
cars are a wonderul example of evolution! after all, we didn't go from the invention of the wheel to fred flintstone to dodge vipers in a week. well, maybe a biblical week... indeed, the viper did not did not happen by chance, nor was it the product of the god du jour miraculously metamorphosing it from a bread loaf. it is the result of centuries of critical thought, scientific method, trial and error, blood and sweat. from the wheel to the wheelbarrow to the cart to the chariot to the wagon to the model-t to the ford pinto to the viper. ok maybe not in that exact order, i'm not much of an automotive anthropologist, but you get the idea.
then again, rereading your post. prolly you don't get it. perhaps you oughta pray fearfully and wonderfully harder for the answer to that one.
if (born++) {truth=null};
I love the jump from there being a creator to us having to accept him into our lives.
Even if there was a creator why do we assume he or she or it cares about how we live and would be able to answer our prayers? Why is there this constant need to religious people to tell other people they need to accept their God?? I am so tired of this crap. You live you life and leave me the fuck alone. Be an ignorant prick while I make the most out of this life.
"Those who think they know don't know. Those that know they don't know, know."
Why didn't somebody just ask this germ how long the evolutionary change has taken us to make a car and/or factory (I'll give it five hundred years, at most; and that's generous), and then to get him to compare it to the time it took to evolve the human body (when, even if looking Biblically, we've still got a 3,000 year headstart)?
Forgive my cynicism, but one suspects he wouldn't even understand the somewhat simple assertion I (we?!) am making here. And, quite frankly, I wouldn't waste too much time explaining how natural selection works over millions of successive generations, as I'd merely be told that God had a hand in all that, too; minus any evidence, of course.
Creationists - you've got to love 'em.
"Truth, in matters of religion, is simply the opinion that has survived".
--
Sir Oscar Wilde
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Yes, DNA is quite impressive.
I believe that is proof that DNA is impressive.
[
The theory of Evolution proposes no such thing. Since the theory of Evolution deals with the heritable characteristics of populations of organisms over time, the theory presupposes that life already exists--thus, it neither affirms nor denies the possible existence of a Creator. That said, some scientists have proposed various hypotheses to account for the existence of life without the necessity of a Creator, however it should be noted that none of these hypotheses can be proven scientifically.
The Saint
I would like to refer the author of the question to a theological discussion site that follows both sides of what I feel to be the heart of the matter. Here is an excerpt (from a theist actually):
"The Ultimate 747 argument goes something like this: if life, the universe, and everything was created by a personal God, then the God who created it is necessarily more complex (and therefore more improbable) than the order we see in the universe. It does no real good to say that God is outside of the universe, because that doesn't really explain anything. Further, such reasoning hampers scientific progress, because if we allow for the existence of such a God, then whenever we come upon something we can't (yet) understand, we chalk it up to 'God did it.' "
The above excerpt is referencing Dawkins' book The God Delusion. Pages and pages worth of breaking down this faulty argument are just waiting to be read there by the curious.
I would also refer the reader to further his or her education by studying the anthropic principle before publicly discussing astronomic probability with such authority.
Finally, thank you for putting your belief up here to be challenged and tested. You are a credit to your faith system. Remember, the Devil wouldn't put a doubt in your mind. He wants you to think you are resolute however superficially. Its the Holy Spirit demanding those questions be answered beyond a shadow of a doubt because the Holy Spirit knows that if you let these questions go now, your soul will pay the price in the afterlife. So don't give up. Your religion tells you your everlasting soul depends upon it.
"No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking." Voltaire