[cat's meow]

This another set of things (not even complex science involved) to use when confronted with a Creationist/Intelligent design. I am not sure I have heard it argued this way but here goes:

Man is the sum of fact and faith, for us to exist and function (not go nuts) balance/understanding/compromise has has to be acheived. This is what I got from reading Aristole, Plato, Martin Luther King, Erich Kahler...and even passages of the Bible (I was brought up in the Anglican/Episcopal church...BTW, new female Bishop here in America, a good move in the right direction for them).

'Fact' is what we are as flesh and blood, the physics and science of the universe we understand. Yes, there are MANY things we can explain but not all things can be explained which are physical phenomenon.

Faith is why we are here. We do not know that, period. Faith (contrary to any devout religious person) cannot in any way be attached to one sect or religion. If we are to be happy and live on the planet together then the things have to be in balance for ALL, EVERY one of us around the world.

Here is my argument for a more secular view and why Creationism has a certain place but not in the context of Itelligent design or explain the real origins of man:

All humans are the same physically, they are no smarter or no dumber than each other. We are all common in all parts of the world. Based on our physical attributes alone we all HAVE to need the same things to be healthy and happy. Faith has to jibe with that in a common way to work out, to be compatible; common ground for everyone on the earth.

the American conservative, Creationist Christian POV:

I Creationist/evangelical explains that the Bible tells us about the creation of man and the there was no evolution. There are many problems with this.

First, how is the Bible (in it's 60+ conflicting versions) any more the truth than the Quran...Hebrew writings...Hindu...Shinto, etc, etc...the most sacred texts of other religious sects? This Creationist POV (call it Intelligent Design now) only takes into consideration a fraction of the entire population of the Earth, based on that faith (Christians, and basically born agains; Anglicans are not considered real Christians in this set of beliefs BTW). You have to find the common ground, you have to be able to get close to why WE ARE ALL HERE. You cannot possibly argue a point that says one sect is more right than any others about the dreation of mankind. The numbers on the planet do not make this happen. There has to be ONE origin for ALL mankind and it can't be just an Evangelical Christian origin.

Second, the Bible (this is true for many religious writings around the world) outlines very common, practical ground rules of how to live our lives. All of them (religious text) contain some basic ground rules that are the same, some of these writings have ween reinterpreted many, many times. The word of God, Vishnu, Moses, Allah...? No, not really...a lot of the stories are the same but the names are changed to fit that sect and the values they happen to have during any one epoch. These are all text written by man (and men in particular, a problem in my book), and inspired by the faith of that particular sect...the why are we here part of it. The current Bishop of the Anglican/Episcopal church even admits (heard it today), "the church is a living, breathing, ever evolving entity." That tells me this is about humans and our relationship to one another and not the absolute word of one particular God/diety.

Faith is our non-physical link to one another, nothing more and nothing less...there is no word of an absolute God...we have to have this faith and fact link to survive and in balance so to not go nuts. It does still leave plenty of things that are unexplained 'wonderment.' Love, hate, happiness, lonliness...we have to have one another to survive...no Monk in Tibet can pray for our souls to make this better, we have to be good to one another throughout the world.

Test this out next time on someone, the more insane they are the more out of balance faith and fact have become in their lives (CM's rule of direct measurable insanity). Consider my own list, and I do not claim to have all the answers, but it works with this list:

Hitler
Ann Coulter
Charles Manson
Jerry Falwell
Ann Coulter (oh...said that one, sorry)
Pol Pot
Stalin
David Koresh
Jim Jones
Ann Coulter (oh...damn, sorry again)

My smart a**ing aside you get the point I think. There is human wonderment in a faith context (still) and no, we do not KNOW exactly how long we have been here or how we got here,,,why we are here. We do not know if there is an afterlife (Jews are pretty straight ahead in their faith about that, I think they might have it right). We have to treat one another like we want to be treated (all sacred texts do have the Golden rule as a basis)

[Jennifer_SFBA]

Well, cat's meow, that is simple and generally pactical. For me, though, I know there are more answers out there than common wisdom provides. Science is growing and showing me so much more than I ever thought possible; spirituality I've discovered while considering implications of quantum physics (I saw that movie, "What the Bleep Do We Know" and read Hawkings and Kaku among others); a DVD I have by Arthur C. Clarke that provides compelling evidence for reincarnation., etc. I think the multiverse is stranger than we know and maybe stranger than we can know. I keep looking up, in awe and wonder of it all.

[cat's meow]

Well, cat's meow, that is simple and generally pactical. For me, though, I know there are more answers out there than common wisdom provides. Science is growing and showing me so much more than I ever thought possible; spirituality I've discovered while considering implications of quantum physics (I saw that movie, "What the Bleep Do We Know" and read Hawkings and Kaku among others); a DVD I have by Arthur C. Clarke that provides compelling evidence for reincarnation., etc. I think the multiverse is stranger than we know and maybe stranger than we can know. I keep looking up, in awe and wonder of it all.

Yes, I do have a pretty practical view...Hawkings book "Brief History of TIme" and other writings are very good BTW. What I mainly point out is the Creationist argument that is used by fanatical Christians is now 'seemingly' backed by some sort of goofy science they have thought up and you don't even have to argue on that level to wipe it out. It is very easy to debunk because the world you talk about is very complex and there is a lot we do not know...what I do know is that we all have to get along and faith is based on people and not science, they try to argue from a faith=science stand point...it will never work.

[FDRfollower]

I would warn anyone, that to debate the issue of Darwin vs.The Bible is seriously starting from a bad standpoint. Thomas Paine wrote a decent dissertation on the problem of the Catholic Church' doctrine and the source of the texts that they ultimately decided to put in the book.

Also, Darwin is a terrible standpoint upon which base the issue of science. We must not leave out the circles that he was part of, that were trying to codify a doctrine for the British empire based upon the idea that the Anglo-Saxon race was superior to other races, which in turn, became the "science" of Eugenics, and the horrible racist programs that came out of that.

To unify something like God/Science, take Johannes Kepler for instance. I've included sections from his paper "The Six Cornered Snow-Flake". He started with why snow takes the form it does, and then went into why bees make their honeycombs the shape they do?

This, then, is the geometric figure, as near as possible to a regular solid, which fills space, just as the hexagon, square, and triangle are the fillers of a plane surface. This, I repeat, is the figure which bees form in their combs, with only this exception that the cells have not got roofs of the same kind as their keel.
For if they added roofs too and any bee were stowed away between twelve or eighteen others, it would have no way out, enclosed as it would be on every side. Accordingly, as they had no need of roofs, there was nothing to prevent their prolonging the six walls in each cell on the scale of their own body beyond the limit of the rhombi in the keels, and making those on top unlike those on the opposite side.
Again, if one opens up a rather large-sized pomegranate, one will see most of its loculi squeezed into the same shape, except in so far as the pattern of veins, by which their nourishment is supplied, gets in the way.
Now the question arises in these two examples: what agent creates the rhomboid shape in the cells of the comb and in the loculi of the pomegranate? There can be no question of matter as the cause. For nowhere do bees find rhomboid leaves of this sort ready made to collect and fit together for the construction of their little dwellings; and it is not probable that the loculi in pomegranates alone should swell into angles, whereas in all other fruits the berries turn out round, where nothing hampers them, as the rising sap fills the tough and pliant rind and its pressure makes them swell--and even bulge out where the rind gives.
So in the loculus of the pomegranate, anyhow, the cause of its shape lies in the plant’s ‘soul’ or life-principle, which sees to the growth of its fruit. But this is not a sufficient cause of its shape: for it is not from its formal properties that it induces this shape in its fruit, but it is assisted by material necessity

But in honeycombs the reason is different. For bees are not rolled together pell-mell, like cells in a fruit, but marshall themselves as in line of battle, all with their heads projecting in one direction or its opposite, as they think best, all pushing in mutual support tail to tail. Now if this sort of rolling together were to make the shape, it would have to be that, when the viscous secretion of the bees set, the cells overlapped them, as shells grow over snails on their spiral. But it is certain that bees shape their own combs and themselves build up their many-storied blocks from the foundations.
The bee, therefore, by nature has this instinct as its property, to build in this shape rather than others. This original pattern has been imprinted on it by the Creator. The matter of the wax or of the bee’s body can have nothing to do with it; the processes of growth nothing either.
This observation at once raises the further question of the purpose, not which the bee itself pursues in its business, but which God Himself, the bee’s creator, had in mind when He prescribed to it these canons of its architecture.
Now here again at long last a consideration of bodies and matter enters into the determination of purpose. Three things can be said about this purpose. The first is a matter of common knowledge among natural philosophers, who pay attention to the hexagonal structure only as it presents itself outwardly with its openings. A plane surface can be covered without gaps by only three shapes, the triangle, the square, the hexagon. Of these the hexagon is the roomiest, and it is room for storing honey that bees provide themselves with.

[Thelonious]

The answer to all the puzzles about Creationism and Intelligent Design are here: http://www.venganza.org

[Michael DeM]

Optimism in Evolution

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/opinion/13judson.html?ref=opinion

By OLIVIA JUDSON
Published: August 12, 2008
LONDON

When the dog days of summer come to an end, one thing we can be sure of is that the school year that follows will see more fights over the teaching of evolution and whether intelligent design, or even Biblical accounts of creation, have a place in America’s science classrooms.

In these arguments, evolution is treated as an abstract subject that deals with the age of the earth or how fish first flopped onto land. It’s discussed as though it were an optional, quaint and largely irrelevant part of biology. And a common consequence of the arguments is that evolution gets dropped from the curriculum entirely.

This is a travesty.

It is also dangerous.

Evolution should be taught — indeed, it should be central to beginning biology classes — for at least three reasons.

First, it provides a powerful framework for investigating the world we live in. Without evolution, biology is merely a collection of disconnected facts, a set of descriptions. The astonishing variety of nature, from the tree shrew that guzzles vast quantities of alcohol every night to the lichens that grow in the Antarctic wastes, cannot be probed and understood. Add evolution — and it becomes possible to make inferences and predictions and (sometimes) to do experiments to test those predictions. All of a sudden patterns emerge everywhere, and apparently trivial details become interesting.

The second reason for teaching evolution is that the subject is immediately relevant here and now. The impact we are having on the planet is causing other organisms to evolve — and fast. And I’m not talking just about the obvious examples: widespread resistance to pesticides among insects; the evolution of drug resistance in the agents of disease, from malaria to tuberculosis; the possibility that, say, the virus that causes bird flu will evolve into a form that spreads easily from person to person. The impact we are having is much broader.

For instance, we are causing animals to evolve just by hunting them. The North Atlantic cod fishery has caused the evolution of cod that mature smaller and younger than they did 40 years ago. Fishing for grayling in Norwegian lakes has caused a similar pattern in these fish. Human trophy hunting for bighorn rams has caused the population to evolve into one of smaller-horn rams. (All of which, incidentally, is in line with evolutionary predictions.)

Conversely, hunting animals to extinction may cause evolution in their former prey species. Experiments on guppies have shown that, without predators, these fish evolve more brightly colored scales, mature later, bunch together in shoals less and lose their ability to suddenly swim away from something. Such changes can happen in fewer than five generations. If you then reintroduce some predators, the population typically goes extinct.

Thus, a failure to consider the evolution of other species may result in a failure of our efforts to preserve them. And, perhaps, to preserve ourselves from diseases, pests and food shortages. In short, evolution is far from being a remote and abstract subject. A failure to teach it may leave us unprepared for the challenges ahead.

The third reason to teach evolution is more philosophical. It concerns the development of an attitude toward evidence. In his book, “The Republican War on Science,” the journalist Chris Mooney argues persuasively that a contempt for scientific evidence — or indeed, evidence of any kind — has permeated the Bush administration’s policies, from climate change to sex education, from drilling for oil to the war in Iraq. A dismissal of evolution is an integral part of this general attitude.

Moreover, since the science classroom is where a contempt for evidence is often first encountered, it is also arguably where it first begins to be cultivated. A society where ideology is a substitute for evidence can go badly awry. (This is not to suggest that science is never distorted by the ideological left; it sometimes is, and the results are no better.)

But for me, the most important thing about studying evolution is something less tangible. It’s that the endeavor contains a profound optimism. It means that when we encounter something in nature that is complicated or mysterious, such as the flagellum of a bacteria or the light made by a firefly, we don’t have to shrug our shoulders in bewilderment.

Instead, we can ask how it got to be that way. And if at first it seems so complicated that the evolutionary steps are hard to work out, we have an invitation to imagine, to play, to experiment and explore. To my mind, this only enhances the wonder.

Olivia Judson, a contributing columnist for The Times, writes The Wild Side at nytimes.com/opinion.

[Jennifer_SFBA]

Is the totality of all energy conscious? Is there a morphic field? Do aliens seed life where they go? Do aliens re-combine DNA to create new life forms and seed those too? Are Homo Sapiens the result of alien DNA experimentation, or, in other words, are Homo Sapiens a created species among other species on our planet, Earth, or transplanted on Earth from other solar systems elsewhere in the multiverse?