The Bible, Creationism, and Prophecy (part 1)

Wibbs

I would have to say it's not correct. Our lungs and lungs in general have a very good fossil record to fall back on. Gas exchange across mucus membranes is very common in the animal kingdom. There are even many examples of primitive lungs around today. Again that statement is incorrect.

Wibbs

Easy one. Look at the way you walk. Does your right arm swing at the same time as your left? Nope it swings opposite. Just like in a four legged animal. Guess what that means? It means we evolved from a four legged animal.

Zombrex

Medin wrote:

The design of the alveoli in our lungs is at a perfect state IF it was any different
from what it is now then we would not be able to breath at all. Therefore the alveoli cannot evolve due to evolution. It was made once and it hasn't changed.

Look at your TV (or your computer monitor)

If you remove just one piece of that, any piece, I'm pretty sure it won't work. I wouldn't recommend you try that btw

Now, we have established that nearly every single piece of electronics in your TV has to be present for the TV to work (otherwise why would the piece be there).

Now get a TV from the 1970s. None of the electrical equipment that is in your TV is present in the TV from the 70s. Yet, bizarrely the TV from the 70s worked and possibly still works.

How can this be? Your TV will flatly refuse to function at all if you remove any of the bits, yet this TV from the 70s, that has none of the bits in your TV still some how works.

You might be saying "Oh course it works, they are different designs!"

And if you are you have hit on the key to evolution.

Evolution is not the adding or subtracting of bits. It is the altering of design. The only bit that is effected by mutation is the genetic blue print in an organism. This blue print is then used to construct the organism itself. Just like the blue prints for your TV. The whole thing still has to work together, it will just be a simpler system that future generations.

Once your TV has been build based on the original blue prints you cannot add or subtract any components. The thing works the way it is, and to subtract any bits would make it stop working. Same with a human. You cannot simply remove a bit of the lung and expect it to keep working. You will fall over and die, because that bit fits into a functioning design where all bits are need.

But, just like a TV, you can alter the blue print (the genetic code) and produce a different human, just like you can alter the blue print of a TV and build a different TV (the TV from the 70s is different design to that of your one).

Evolution didn't just add alveoli to the design of the lungs. That would be like saying you just selotaped a SCART connection onto current TV and hoped for the best. Previous evolutionary designs still needed to work, in the way that a TV 70 the TVs still needed to work, even if it was missing the bits you find in a modern TV. A previous design of the human lung wasn't simply missing alveoli, in the same way a TV from the 70s isn't the exact same as your TV just with out the remote control attachment.

Medin

Wibbs wrote:

Easy one. Look at the way you walk. Does your right arm swing at the same time as your left? Nope it swings opposite. Just like in a four legged animal. Guess what that means? It means we evolved from a four legged animal.

Perhaps my arms evolved from the palm tree. Who can refute this analogy?
Same way, your analogy is most certainly wrong. I could give you an analogy on anything. Who says it's gonna be a correct one?

Medin

Wicknight wrote:

Look at your TV (or your computer monitor)

If you remove just one piece of that, any piece, I'm pretty sure it won't work. I wouldn't recommend you try that btw

Now, we have established that nearly every single piece of electronics in your TV has to be present for the TV to work (otherwise why would the piece be there).

Now get a TV from the 1970s. None of the electrical equipment that is in your TV is present in the TV from the 70s. Yet, bizarrely the TV from the 70s worked and possibly still works.

How can this be? Your TV will flatly refuse to function at all if you remove any of the bits, yet this TV from the 70s, that has none of the bits in your TV still some how works.

You might be saying "Oh course it works, they are different designs!"

And if you are you have hit on the key to evolution.

Evolution is not the adding or subtracting of bits. It is the altering of design. The only bit that is effected by mutation is the genetic blue print in an organism. This blue print is then used to construct the organism itself. Just like the blue prints for your TV.

Once your TV has been build based on the original blue prints you cannot add or subtract any components. The thing works the way it is, and to subtract any bits would make it stop working. Same with a human. You cannot simply remove a bit of the lung and expect it to keep working. You will fall over and die, because that bit fits into a functioning design where all bits are need.

But, just like a TV, you can alter the blue print (the genetic code) and produce a different human, just like you can alter the blue print of a TV and build a different TV (the TV from the 70s is different design to that of your one).

Evolution didn't just add alveoli to the design of the lungs. That would be like saying you just selotaped a SCART connection onto current TV and hoped for the best.

A previous design of the human lung wasn't simply missing alveoli, in the same way a TV from the 70s isn't the exact same as your TV just with out the remote control attachment.

Wicky, it's too late man, so I'll say nite nite 4 now.
But, just one thing - why u contradicting ur own self?

1. Evolution is not the adding or subtracting of bits.
2. It is the altering of design.
3. A previous design of the human lung wasn't simply missing alveoli.

1. contradicts 2. 2. contradicts 3. and 3. contradicts 1. Am I missing something here? :eek:

Wibbs

Medin wrote:

Perhaps my arms evolved from the palm tree. Who can refute this analogy?
Same way, your analogy is most certainly wrong. I could give you an analogy on anything. Who says it's gonna be a correct one?

Ehhhhh, a palm tree doesn't have limbs for a start. My analogy is far more correct than yours. Do you have limbs? Yes. Do they move in a particular way? Yes. Why do they move in that particular way? You just don't want to see it. Let me ask you another question, what part of you is not found in any mammal? What part of you is unique to humans. Not size of organs, I mean organs and feature themselves. I think wicknight's analogy to TV design has flown right over your head. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Zombrex

Medin wrote:

Wicky, it's too late man, so I'll say nite nite 4 now.
But, just one thing - why u contradicting ur own self?

1. Evolution is not the adding or subtracting of bits.
2. It is the altering of design.
3. A previous design of the human lung wasn't simply missing alveoli.

1. contradicts 2. 2. contradicts 3. and 3. contradicts 1. Am I missing something here? :eek:

Yes you are. The adding and subtracting is a result of the altering of the design, in the same way that if you alter the design of a TV it will require the adding of bits, but no one would say when they design TVs all they do is stick new things onto old TVs (that wouldn't working the first place).

The entire system has to still work, in the same way that a 70s TV has to still work. A TV from 2007 isn't simply a TV from the 70s with bits added on, and likewise a TV from the 70s isn't simply a TV from 2007 with bits taken out.

Say you have two boxes, box A and box B, connected by a string C providing electricity between the two boxes

Now someone like yourself might go It is impossible that such a device evolved, because if I were to simply remove the C then the electricity cannot flow between the boxes

The problem with that is that it works on the false assumption that all evolution did was add the string in the first place. So you looking at it think that to rewind time and evolution backwards you simply remove the string. And you are right, if you do that it won't work.

The problem is that this is most likely not what evolution did. Imagine that 5 million years ago the two boxes were beside each other. The electricity can flow between the two boxes because they touch. String C is doing something completely unrelated in between the boxes. Now a series of mutations cause the boxes to move slightly apart, so they are no long touching. Now this might have caused the system to stop working, but string C, which wasn't part of the system before, finds that it can carry a tiny bit of the electrical current.

So the system is now using string C for something it wasn't originally intended for. And the electricity flow isn't as strong as it once was. The system is still working, but its not working as well as it was in terms of electricity flow. So you have to look to see if there is any advantage of having the two boxes slightly apart. If there isn't then the species of box has no advantage and dies off without effecting the wider population.

But if having the two boxes slightly apart does give an advantage greater than the disadvantage of the weaker electrical signal, then this system does better than all the non-mutated systems, and replaces them in the population.

So further down the line another series of mutations occurs that causes string C to become more conductive. Now this version has the boxes further apart and it is conducting electricity as well as it was before. So this version has even more advantage over the previous version. And all it took was 5 million years of constant reproduction and mutation (I'm only picking out the mutations that do something useful, and ignore the trillions that don't)

In this example evolution didn't just add String C to bridge the cap between the two boxes. The two boxes moved apart slowly and it just happened that string C, which was doing something else, became adaptive to bridge this cap. It could have all gone horribly wrong, if the two boxes had moved apart and string C wasn't able to carry the signal. The system would have stopped working (died if you think of it as an organism) But if you are producing mutations in offspring thousands of times a year for a few million years it will happen eventually.

jonny72

Medin wrote:

Do you people believe that actual infinity really exists? For instance, that Universe had no beginning. If yes, can you prove it? The opposite can be done - that actual infinity cannot exist.

Infinite what? numbers? time? objects?

Can you prove the theory of gravity, can you? huh? I WANNA SEE SOME PROOF HERE..

Medin I think you should really say what you do believe in first..
How do you think life came to be?
Do you believe there could be life on other planets?
Is it just evolution you're having a go at?
Are you very religious, etc..

I think you're just getting a rise out of people here to be honest..
Creationism can conveniently be explained in a few lines, the theory of Evolution on the other hand.. its a bit more complex than that..

I mean heres a good example..
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=392292&in_page_id=1766&in_a_source=&ito=1490

These animals have changed and adapted..

Its getting tiring defending evolution, I want some creationists to build an Ark and see how many species they can get on it..

Medin

I was quite disappointed to find out that in Richard Dawkins’ book, The God Delusion, was devoid of any informativity. Chapter three, Arguments for God’s Existence, is the only major attempt to refute the popular God arguments. This chapter, and this is the same for the whole book, plays upon the ignorance of his readership. What I mean by this is that his language from the very beginning is very emotive and full of appeals to emotion. Dawkins builds up this use of language in such a way as to support the little information he provides for the arguments against God. His brevity and dismissive tone can easily win the hearts of many who are ‘sitting on the fence’. This tactic, as some linguists would describe as a psycholinguistic strategy, is very common amongst those who refuse to have a frank and honest dialogue. The following example will show how Dawkins deliberately fails to engage in a serious intellectual discussion as he consciously omits the stronger arguments and counter arguments to his age old swiping statements that have been emanating from the collective mouth of Atheism.

One example should suffice. He starts chapter three by very briefly outlining the cosmological argument. He states that this argument and its conceptual derivatives “rely upon the idea of a regress and invoke God to terminate it.” This is where Dawkins fails to give the argument any justice. One form of the cosmological argument is the kalam cosmological argument, and it has the following logical structure:

1. Everything that has a beginning of its existence has a cause of its existence.

2. The universe has a beginning of its existence.

Therefore:
3. The universe has a cause of its existence.

4. If the universe has a cause of its existence then that cause is, by rational necessity is an uncaused ‘entity’.

Therefore:
5. An uncaused, unique and totally transcendental entity exists

The kalam cosmological argument, dates back to medieval Muslim philosophers such as al Ghazali and it has recently been restored to popularity by the Philosopher William Lane Craig.

What distinguishes the kalam cosmological argument from other forms of cosmological argument is that it rests on the idea that the universe has a beginning in time. According to the kalam cosmological argument, however, it is precisely because the universe is thought to have a beginning in time that its existence is thought to stand in need of explanation.

The first premise of the argument is the claim that everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence. In order to infer from this that the universe has a cause of its existence the proponent of the kalam cosmological argument must prove that the past is finite, that the universe began to exist at a certain point in time.

The crucial premise of the kalam cosmological argument, then, is the second: “The universe has a beginning of its existence”. How do we know that the universe has a beginning of its existence?Might not the universe stretch back in time into infinity, always having existed? The proponent of the kalam cosmological argument must show that this cannot be the case if his argument is to be successful.

Advocates of the kalam cosmological argument claim that it is impossible that the universe has an infinite past.

So far so good. This argument can be appreciated by anyone who is sane and rational.

Dawkins uses three very common ‘refutations’, he states “They make the entirely unwarranted assumption that God himself is immune to the regress .” and “there is no reason to endow that terminator with any of the properties normally ascribed to God: omnipotence, omniscience, goodness, creativity of design…” and “Some regresses do reach a natural terminator…..If you ‘cut’ gold any further than the level of the single atom, whatever else you get is not gold.” To summarise these counter arguments I will put them in plain English:

If there is a sole cause for the universe, then who created the sole cause?

If there is a sole cause what evidence is there to say what its characteristics are i.e. its essence?

The universe and existence can be infinite as this has been proven mathematically and many examples show that you can have a natural terminator.

Dealing with the first counter argument. Dawkins obviously falls into the trap of not understanding the argument. His self imposed philosophical restrictions – hard core empiricism – has restricted his scope for any major mental activity. If we consider, as would Dawkins himself would too, that time and space are part of the universe then if the whole universe had a cause that cause could not be subject to time and space. So rationally, it would not be possible to subject any of these concepts to this cause. Also, the very fact that this cause must be uncaused is a rational necessity. I will illustrate this with an example. If Dawkins is right and every terminator or cause has another cause ad infinitum, that would mean an infinite regress. A simple example destroys this rational fallacy, in the words of my friend Hassan Choudhury:

“This can be thought of like reserving a book from the university library that is in heavy demand (for the sake of argument let us agree this is the only copy available). If there were four people in the queue before you for the book then you would have to wait for the four to finish before using it for your assignment. Similarly if there were four thousand people in the queue before you for the book then you would have to wait for the four thousand to finish before using it. If an unlimited, infinite (i.e. endless) number of reservations stood between you and the book you would never receive it as an endless number sequence would never end…..It is not possible for an event to exist at the end of an endless chain of events thus we cannot exist at the end of infinity. The universe has not always existed.”

This means that if there is always a cause for every cause we would never have had the existence of the universe as each cause will be dependent on its own cause. If that is the case, an infinite number of causes would inevitably mean no existence. Another example is:

“The same example is often illustrated by reference to a sniper requiring an instruction from his superior in his chain of command to open fire. Of course his superior has to wait till his own superior directs him and so on up the chain. If the chain of command were only ten minutes long the sniper would have to wait ten minutes for the command to fire. If it were one hundred years long the sniper would take one hundred years for the command to fire. If the chain were unlimited, it would be infinite, endless and the sniper would never receive the order to fire. It is not possible for an event to exist at the end of an endless chain of event thus we cannot exist at the end of infinity.”

So Dawkins first so called refutation statement is dealt with.

The second counter argument is understandable. I have to admit that I have to commit intellectual blasphemy and agree with Dawkins here. No one can attribute an essence or characteristic to an unknown cause. To do this would be irrational. Take the following example; if someone right now was knocking at the door, assuming that you were not expecting anyone, could you describe the character of the person behind the door? Would you know their gender? Or their name? Of course not. This is the same with the attributes of the cause of the universe. But what I must add here is that there is an intellectual Islamic approach to the counter argument. Muslims would all agree that information is required to explain the characteristics and essence of the cause or creator. Muslims would argue that there is a book, the Qur’an that can be rationally proven to have come from this entity. Therefore the information and knowledge from this book would describe the nature and essence of this creator. This is a slightly more complex argument, so for more information on this please see http://www.theinimitablequran.com/ . But Dawkins ‘refutation’ doesn’t refute that a Creator exists, having an explicit assumption on the Creators essence doesn’t nullify its existence. Many of you do not know me but assuming I am a bad person or good doesn’t take away the fact that I exist.

The third so called ‘refutation’, can be easily dealt with. Hassan Choudhruy states:

“The idea of infinity has always been problematic since there is a distinction between a possibleinfinite and actual infinite. A figure can increase towards infinity but will never get there (since numbers are limited). We can therefore say this process is indefinite rather than infinite. Students of calculus will recognise this for the example of the function f(x) = 1/x. If one increases x indefinitely, one increases it without limit, and as x becomes very large, the function f(x) becomes very small. The graph of the function (a hyperbola) provides a straight line that is tangential to the curve at infinity, nevertheless, this will never be actualised; it will never be the case….Even David Hilbert, perhaps the greatest mathematician of the 20th Century, has similarly argued against actual infinity:

‘…the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. The role that remains for the infinite to play is solely that of an idea’.(Hilbert, 1964, p139)”

So there are obvious issues with the concept of an actual infinity. Even if we were to assume a mathematical model for an actual infinite, it has never been found in reality. Using the words of another friend Hakan Cerrah, ‘the concept of an actual infinite has no ontological export into the real world’, that is, it can’t be found anywhere.

However despite these concerns let us examine the claim in the best traditions of debate and discourse. The following examples should suffice:

If the universe did not have a beginning, then the past would be infinite, i.e. there would be an infinite number of past times. There cannot, however, be an infinite number of anything, and so the past cannot be infinite, and so the universe must have had a beginning.

Why think that there cannot be an infinite number of anything? There are two types of infinites, potential infinites and actual infinites. Potential infinites are purely conceptual, and clearly both can and do exist. Mathematicians employ the concept of infinity to solve equations. We can imagine things being infinite. Actual infinites, though, arguably, cannot exist. For an actual infinite to exist it is not sufficient that we can imagine an infinite number of things; for an actual infinite to exist there must be an infinite number of things. This, however, leads to certain logical problems.

The most famous problem that arises from the existence of an actual infinite is the Hilbert’s Hotel paradox. Hilbert’s Hotel is a (hypothetical) hotel with an infinite number of rooms, each of which is occupied by a guest. As there are an infinite number of rooms and an infinite number of guests, every room is occupied; the hotel cannot accommodate another guest. However, if a new guest arrives, then it is possible to free up a room for them by moving the guest in room number 1 to room number 2, and the guest in room number 2 to room number 3, and so on. As for every room n there is a room n + 1, every guest can be moved into a different room, thus leaving room number 1 vacant. The new guest, then, can be accommodated after all. This is clearly paradoxical; it is not possible that a hotel both can and cannot accommodate a new guest. Hilbert’s Hotel, therefore, is not possible.

A similar paradox arises if the past is infinite. If there exists an infinite past, we would never have the present day. If there was an infinite set of past events and each event requires the previous event to occur, would we ever have the present? Of course not. This is because if today is dependent upon the fact that yesterday happened, and there is an infinite set of these dependencies (i.e. forever) - today will have not occurred. This is similar to the library book example mentioned earlier.

That such a paradox results from the assumption that the past is infinite, it is claimed, demonstrates that it is not possible that that assumption is correct. The past, it seems, cannot be infinite, because it is not possible that there be an infinite number of past moments. If the past cannot be infinite, then the universe must have a beginning.

Additionally if one begins with a number, and repeatedly adds one to it, one will never arrive at infinity. If one has a heap of sand, and repeatedly adds more sand to it, the heap will never become infinitely large. Taking something finite and repeatedly adding finite quantities to it will never make it infinite. Actual infinites cannot be created by successive addition.

The past has been created by successive addition. The past continuously grows as one moment after another passes from the future into the present and then into the past. Every moment that is now past was once in the future, but was added to the past by the passage of time.

If actual infinites cannot be created by successive addition, and the past was created by successive addition, then the past cannot be an actual infinite. The past must be finite, and the universe must therefore have had a beginning.

Finally if I were to set out on a journey to an infinitely distant point in space, it would not just take me a long time to get there; rather, I would never get there. No matter how long I had been walking for, a part of the journey would still remain. I would never arrive at my destination. Infinite space cannot be traversed.

Similarly, if I were to start counting to infinity, it would not just take me a long time to get there; rather, I would never get there. No matter how long I had been counting for, I would still only have counted to a finite number. It is impossible to traverse the infinite set of numbers between zero and infinity. This also applies to the past. If the past were infinite, then it would not just take a long time to the present to arrive; rather, the present would never arrive. No matter how much time had passed, we would still be working through the infinite past. It is impossible to traverse an infinite period of time.

Clearly, though, the present has arrived, the past has been traversed. The past, therefore, cannot be infinite, but must rather be finite. The universe has a beginning.

In conclusion it can be understood that Dawkins fails to give the major arguments any justice, and he consciously ignores the counter refutations to his age old swiping statements. Maybe he felt they were intellectually convincing, so he decided to protect his ‘dogma’ and brush the truth under his swelling carpet.

To be continued…..

(by Hamza Andreas Tzortzis)

Zombrex

Hamza Andreas Tzortzis is a religious blogger and journalist (as in he actually writes about religion, along with believing in Islam), so its not a great surprise he wasn't that happy with Dawkins book. His arguments against it though are pretty silly.

Tzortzis wrote:

If we consider, as would Dawkins himself would too, that time and space are part of the universe then if the whole universe had a cause that cause could not be subject to time and space. So rationally, it would not be possible to subject any of these concepts to this cause.

What Tzortzis doesn't realise is that is actually Dawkins point :rolleyes:

Either the necessity for creation or causality is universal or it isn't.

If they are universal then God two must have a cause and a creator. If causality is not universal then there is no reason to say that the universe must have a cause because everything has to have a cause.

Dawkins is merely working on the assumption of the "proof of God" that causality and creation is universal, and then pointing out that that is ridiculous because it must also be applied to God. If it is not universal then it doesn't have to be applied to the universe either.

From this one does get the impression that Mr Tzortzis hasn't actually read The God Delusion properly, as I remember this being quite clear.

Wibbs

What if a god creates a universe and all the laws in it, including causality, but since a god created it does it mean that he would be subject to those laws? He wouldn't need to be bound by causality. I can paint a picture and because it's me doing the creating it can be as abstract or naturalistic as I like. It doesn't reflect what I am. It reflects my wishes to move paint around, fair enough, but the painting is what it is. A self portrait may look very like me, It doesn't mean the painter, me, is made of canvas and paint. I dunno, I'm rambling here.:D

I suppose I'm trying to say we're observing a universe where we live, constrained by it's laws. We can go all the way back to milliseconds after the big bang, but beyond that is conjecture(branes etc). A conjecture bound by the constraints of the very universe we live in. A universe of cause and effect. A god or divine spark would not be constrained by such laws.

Zombrex

There is also the fact that even if the universe had a "cause" there is no rational reason to believe that cause was an act of creation.

What if the cause was a random flux of an energy wave in some form of a singularity that caused the Big Bang

Would people worship the energy wave as a God? Of course not.

But as you point out causality (cause and effect) is a property of this universe. We have no frame of reference for what happened before the Big Bang, so it is nonsense to state that the universe had to have a cause, and even more nonsense to state that this cause had to be an intelligent act of creation.

Medin

Wicknight wrote:

There is also the fact that even if the universe had a "cause" there is no rational reason to believe that cause was an act of creation.

What if the cause was a random flux of an energy wave in some form of a singularity that caused the Big Bang

Would people worship the energy wave as a God? Of course not.

But as you point out causality (cause and effect) is a property of this universe. We have no frame of reference for what happened before the Big Bang, so it is nonsense to state that the universe had to have a cause, and even more nonsense to state that this cause had to be an intelligent act of creation.

HA HA I don't believe what sort of excuses you will randomly find to DENY the creation, man, I just don't believe this!!! :D:D LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL RANDOM??!? :D:D

SO you believe creation (if creation rite?) of the Universe was a RANDOM thing, yet you wouldn't say the same for your "extra gene", ha? RANDOM?!? :D:D LOOL man my stomack randomly hurts from your randomness thinking, LOOOL :D:D

And also - you would argue that "evolution" had intelligent design behind it, yet you fail to admit that the Universe (as a much more complex "randomness") has even greater design behind it. C'mon man, show some random common sense will you?

Medin

Perhaps your mind starts panicking when it comes that you gotta deny the creation, so you just gotta pull some random excuses then? LOOL
Don't worry, you ain't gonna live forever, so no need to be afraid the whole eternity

Zombrex

Medin wrote:

SO you believe creation (if creation rite?) of the Universe was a RANDOM thing

No, I'm saying the cause of the universe could have been a random event.

There is no reason to believe that it could not have been, or reason to believe that it must have been created by some super intelligence that itself did not need to be created. That would just be guessing, and rather silly guessing at that.

While I understand the religious need to assign purpose to existence it must be remember that it is just that, a human need. It is not based on reality or reason. We just feel better if we think that someone designed all this because it means we don't have to think about it any more. But making humans feel better isn't really the purpose of scientific exploration or discovery.

Medin wrote:

, yet you wouldn't say the same for your "extra gene", ha? RANDOM?!?

Actually I would .. mutation is a random process.

Medin wrote:

And also - you would argue that "evolution" had intelligent design behind it

No, actually I wouldn't. Evolutionary development is "designed" by the natural process of Natural Selection. This can great a design but it is non-intelligent, in the same way that natural processes allow a river to find the path of least resistance from a lake to the sea.

In a more primitive time a human might look at a river and go "Wow, that is amazing. How did the river know to flow that way to the sea, around all the mountains. There must be some intelligence behind it"? Of course there isn't, the primitive human just doesn't understand how the geology of it all works, producing a river that flows right to the see. So instead he assigns intelligence to the river's path, as if some all knowing creature worked out the best way for the river to flow and then made it that way.

We as humans tend to attribute agency to natural phenomena, we believe that someone is controlling it. We do this quicker than we can work out what is actually happening.

So when we see a river, or the weather, or life, or the universe itself we go "Someone must have made it like that"

It is instinctive, but also very incorrect and rather silly.

Splendour

Wicknight wrote:

The species in the homo genus that did have capabilities equal or close to humans, such as the Neanderthals, are extinct. But they did exist and they were intelligent (tools, community, language, just like us). How that fits into your "humans are special" framework I don't know, but it is incorrect to say that we are the only advance life form that has ever evolved on Earth.

From the evidence we they were indeed an intelligent species, but certainly not near or above the thinking of man. Also, for all their 'human like qualities', they have become extinct whereas man is alive and kicking and ruling the world! Or so he thinks...

Zombrex

Splendour wrote:

From the evidence we they were indeed an intelligent species, but certainly not near or above the thinking of man.

"Certainly not" according to whom? Neanderthals are believed to have had complex language, which means they were sentient, self aware and intelligent. Just like us. They used tools, wore clothes, and possibly even had sex with humans (inter-species breeding)



Are you honestly going to say that they were nothing like us?

If we are made in God's image, who's image are the Neanderthals made in?

Splendour wrote:

Also, for all their 'human like qualities', they have become extinct whereas man is alive and kicking and ruling the world! Or so he thinks...

That has little bearing on the issue. If we were all wiped out by a plague or war or asteroid next week would you conclude that humans were not actually intelligent after all.

Sapien

Medin wrote:

HA HA I don't believe what sort of excuses you will randomly find to DENY the creation, man, I just don't believe this!!! :D:D LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL RANDOM??!? :D:D

SO you believe creation (if creation rite?) of the Universe was a RANDOM thing, yet you wouldn't say the same for your "extra gene", ha? RANDOM?!? :D:D LOOL man my stomack randomly hurts from your randomness thinking, LOOOL :D:D

And also - you would argue that "evolution" had intelligent design behind it, yet you fail to admit that the Universe (as a much more complex "randomness") has even greater design behind it. C'mon man, show some random common sense will you?

Can we have JC back?

Zombrex

Sapien wrote:

Can we have JC back?

Yes what is it with the string of smilies and LOL that some posters seem to resort to instead of, well, making a point

It gets rather tiresome. I wonder did Plato when he was writing his famous debate between Socrates and the Greeks, put smilie faces after everything they said

"And what, Socrates, is the food of the soul? Surely, I said, knowledge is the food of the soul.:D :eek: :eek: :eek: LOLOLOLOLOL:eek: :eek: "
Protagoras
by Plato


I would imagine not...

Wibbs

Wicknight wrote:

"Certainly not" according to whom? Neanderthals are believed to have had complex language, which means they were sentient, self aware and intelligent. Just like us. They used tools, wore clothes, and possibly even had sex with humans (inter-species breeding)

OT, but the jury is still out on a lot of that. While they had a hypoid bone very similar to moderns, we will never know about how complex their language was. Intelligence is another area. While they had big brains(actually one sample had a bigger brain than moderns), it appears it was structured differently. They had little if any symbolic concept and any they did have only shows up late in the day when moderns showed up and that appears to be mimicry. One of the theories as to why such a successful hominid died out is down to their apparent social groupings. All the tools and materials found with neandertals is from a very small local area. Moderns on the other hand had tools from much further afield. This meant trade and interaction with other modern groups. Neandertals show none of that, which would suggest a radically different way of species interaction. While I personally believe that they did interbreed with us, again the jury's out on that one. It could be where we get white skin, blue eyes, red hair and a few other features generally only found in modern populations where Neandertals once were.

If we are made in God's image, who's image are the Neanderthals made in?

Regardless, that's a very good point. Goes for all extinct hominids. In any case why does God have hands etc.

Medin

Sapien wrote:

Can we have JC back?

who's JC?

Splendour

Wicknight wrote:

"Certainly not" according to whom? Neanderthals are believed to have had complex language, which means they were sentient, self aware and intelligent. Just like us. They used tools, wore clothes, and possibly even had sex with humans (inter-species breeding)



Are you honestly going to say that they were nothing like us?

If we are made in God's image, who's image are the Neanderthals made in?



That has little bearing on the issue. If we were all wiped out by a plague or war or asteroid next week would you conclude that humans were not actually intelligent after all.

They had cameras :eek: I concede...

The words which jump out in your argument are 'believed to have had...' and 'possibly'. Scientific evidence shows they are not descendants of man, nor do they have the same DNA as humans.. If on the other hand science were to prove they were in fact that they had human DNA, I would have no problem accepting they were a tribe of 'bush' people who are now extinct.


If we were wiped out by plauge etc...none of us could survive, but the reason mankind is still alive and kicking when so many animal have become extinct is because we have been endowed with brains unlike an other species.

Sapien

Medin wrote:

who's JC?

Someone who seems more and more like Cicero every time you submit a post.

jonny72

Medin you still haven't told us what you believe in yet..
Whats your theory..

Zombrex

Splendour wrote:

They had cameras :eek: I concede...

Forensic scientists can accurately reconstruct the facial features based on a skeletons. We know this is what they looked like. You can refuse to accept that if you like, but your refusal is rather immaterial.

What, you never watched CSI?

Splendour wrote:

Scientific evidence shows they are not descendants of man, nor do they have the same DNA as humans..

That is the point. If they were homo sepians (humans) we wouldn't be discussing this. The simple fact is that humans were not the only species to evolve to an advanced level of intelligence and technology.

Splendour wrote:

If we were wiped out by plauge etc...none of us could survive, but the reason mankind is still alive and kicking when so many animal have become extinct is because we have been endowed with brains unlike an other species.

That is very true. As Wibbs points out we were more intelligent that Neanderthals. But 25,000 years ago there difference between us and Neanderthal was not as great as you imagine. Remember we weren't building cars and creating antibiotics 25,000 years ago either.

Asiaprod

Sapien wrote:

Can we have JC back?

Indeed. Could JC have evolved into Medin.

Medin, cut out the smilies and Icons, they distract me from the fact that you are not really saying anything. Start to answer some of the questions others have asked you. If you do not, then I will have to view you as a troll, and ban you accordingly.
Asia.

Splendour

Wicknight wrote:

Forensic scientists can accurately reconstruct the facial features based on a skeletons. We know this is what they looked like. You can refuse to accept that if you like, but your refusal is rather immaterial.

C'mon, scientists could take the skull of a gorilla and reconstruct it to look like that!

Have never watched CSI, and don't think you be either. Too much T.V. fills your head up with this nonsense!! CSI indeed...

Son Goku

Wibbs wrote:

A universe of cause and effect.

The universe isn't bound by cause and effect. Large sections of it have no cause and effect relationship. How can you have cause and effect when there is no absolute way to say which proceeded the other (General Relativity), or both of them happened for no reason (Quantum Mechanics) or the effect lead to the cause (Quantum Mechanics) or things which are uncaused (General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics).

Splendour wrote:

C'mon, scientists could take the skull of a gorilla and reconstruct it to look like that!

No they couldn't. Extrapolating the facial features of something from its skull is an exact science. Stop talking ass.

Zombrex

Splendour wrote:

C'mon, scientists could take the skull of a gorilla and reconstruct it to look like that!

No actually they couldn't, at least not if they followed the correct method. You produce what you produce, that is the point of the exercise.

But also why would they want to do that in the first place?

robindch

Wicknight wrote:

#6000

Nice one, Wiki!

At this rate, we should hit ten thousand around August, 2008