Young Earth Creationism....Fail

[Firsttime]

Are you honestly claiming that a slightly distorted truth is just as bad as a twisted, mangled, charred beyond recognition truth?

If the goal of the process is to either establish truth(or fact) or recognize a preexisting truth(or fact) yes I am.

 

[Firsttime]

"b) A lot of people say so. See "Democracy" and tell me how a consensus among humans somehow legitimizes a deity."


...which is why the peer review process exists.

Substitute anything in place of deity, just because people can come to a general consensus on anything does not mean that the opinions or beliefs or facts or whatever you want to call them have any kind of legitimacy on any kind of universal scale. Again, this goes both ways. If every person became a Christian tomorrow that would in no way prove the existence of a God. In the same way if every single PhD on the planet earth came together tomorrow and said the universe was 14 billion years old their consensus would in no way prove that it was.

That's all I'm saying, everyone is pushing something. No one is purely objective in this debate. I just read through most of this thread and the vibe I get in this and most threads like this is that the scientists are somehow these holy people who just desire for everyone to know the truth.

 

[SparkyJJO]

If you are suggesting that the universe is necessarily not past-infinite, you are demonstrably mistaken.


I don't really care how you want to define your term. There's no reason to believe your definition is instantiated in reality. It's frankly amusing that you'd declare your definition of God as though the fact you've defined it that way had any real meaning.

Anyone can postulate a definition. "Smerb" means "the individual that will pay me 1 million dollars on my 50th birthday." Now, I can just decide to believe in Smerb, and I can take that money straight to the bank!

Maybe I should define Smerb to be eternal, too, just in case.


You speak as though you do not understand the fuzzy nature of species delineations, nor the real significance of the hierarchical pattern of common descent. Evolution isn't a ladder-like progression. Biological diversity expands outward in all directions like a bush or a tree, each limb contemporaneous with the others. You think evolution is false because cats will never evolve into dogs or monkeys, and you don't realize that even while mammals will never evolve into marsupials, they will themselves evolve into bison, manatees and men, or koalas, possums and bandicoots.

First, demonstrate, prove that matter is indeed eternal. Here's a hint: it's not.
Second, the laws of thermodynamics are totally against evolution - things naturally devolve into chaos, disorder, not higher levels of precision and order. This is seen every single day.
Third, you are stating these things about evolution, which I have heard a million times already, but still fail to provide even a shred of proof that some prehistoric critter evolved into what we have today. In other words, I'm still waiting for any real rebuttal to my statements, but haven't gotten any. And I don't expect to. In my 7 years of being on these forums I have yet to ever receive a solid rebuttal to anything of this. The most I get are half-baked attempts with illogical fallacies, or just name calling, neither of which prove anything

I'm done here though, because, again, like in the past 7 years, this kind of thing leads nowhere except people getting grumpy. And that does nobody any good

 

[Brainonska511]

Substitute anything in place of deity, just because people can come to a general consensus on anything does not mean that the opinions or beliefs or facts or whatever you want to call them have any kind of legitimacy on any kind of universal scale. Again, this goes both ways. If every person became a Christian tomorrow that would in no way prove the existence of a God. In the same way if every single PhD on the planet earth came together tomorrow and said the universe was 14 billion years old their consensus would in no way prove that it was.

That's all I'm saying, everyone is pushing something. No one is purely objective in this debate. I just read through most of this thread and the vibe I get in this and most threads like this is that the scientists are somehow these holy people who just desire for everyone to know the truth.

Sigh.....

It's not the consensus of some random scientists that determines if something should be held as theory or not. It is also backed up by mounds of evidence and observation.

Stop trying to backhandedly discredit the scientific method.

 

[Brainonska511]

First, demonstrate, prove that matter is indeed eternal. Here's a hint: it's not.
Second, the laws of thermodynamics are totally against evolution - things naturally devolve into chaos, disorder, not higher levels of precision and order. This is seen every single day.
Third, you are stating these things about evolution, which I have heard a million times already, but still fail to provide even a shred of proof that some prehistoric critter evolved into what we have today. In other words, I'm still waiting for any real rebuttal to my statements, but haven't gotten any.

Entropy of the universe is thought to always be increasing, but that doesn't mean that it is increasing in the small scale all the time. You can easily decrease entropy by actively fighting it or by using other factors.

Since you wanted to start the thermodynamics argument, there are two parts to the Gibbs-Helmholtz equation: dG = dH - TdS. Where dG is free energy, dH is change in enthalpy, and dS is change in entropy. You can easily have a situtation where something decreases in disorder but has a negative free energy (favored to happen) because it can be enthalpically favored.

And to tie that into biology - there are many systems that are not favored entropically and favored enthalpically, and v.v. Some of them are "spontaneous" and some of the require the shuffling of and breaking of bonds in things like ATP to fight the more favorable spontaneous, uncatalyzed reaction.

There is plenty of evidence supporting evolution - from the fossil record to evolution performed in the lab with bacteria (getting a certain gene to be more efficient through directed evolution), to just looking at the human genome across the planet.

 

[Jeff7]

Substitute anything in place of deity, just because people can come to a general consensus on anything does not mean that the opinions or beliefs or facts or whatever you want to call them have any kind of legitimacy on any kind of universal scale. Again, this goes both ways. If every person became a Christian tomorrow that would in no way prove the existence of a God. In the same way if every single PhD on the planet earth came together tomorrow and said the universe was 14 billion years old their consensus would in no way prove that it was.

And all I was saying was that the side of Christianity is defending the existence of an infinitely powerful, infinitely intelligent, sentient being, and what they claim is the ultimate truth anywhere in the Universe. It just seems that a consensus among humans shouldn't be used as a means to defend something of that magnitude.
Infinitely extraordinary evidence requires infinitely extraordinary evidence.
Thus far, none has surfaced.

The scientific community seeks to understand the Universe as best as we can, but there are no claims being made which come anywhere close to that of an infinitely-everything being.

That's all I'm saying, everyone is pushing something. No one is purely objective in this debate. I just read through most of this thread and the vibe I get in this and most threads like this is that the scientists are somehow these holy people who just desire for everyone to know the truth.

So yes, we may be on the same page on some of this.
My take is simply that, should this deity be so very easily offended about people accepting his existence or not, maybe he should do something about it himself, rather than have all us tiny organisms duke it out in his place. Who better to offer up infinitely extraordinary evidence?

(Yeah, blah blah, faith this and that. It's an excuse to say, "There's no rational reason I should believe what I do, but I'm going to do it anyway, and say it's a strength." Faith = rationalizing that for which there is no reason. And for whatever insane reason, faith has been romanticized as an amazingly good thing.)

Originally Posted by SparkyJJO
First, demonstrate, prove that matter is indeed eternal. Here's a hint: it's not.
Second, the laws of thermodynamics are totally against evolution - things naturally devolve into chaos, disorder, not higher levels of precision and order. This is seen every single day.
Third, you are stating these things about evolution, which I have heard a million times already, but still fail to provide even a shred of proof that some prehistoric critter evolved into what we have today. In other words, I'm still waiting for any real rebuttal to my statements, but haven't gotten any.

Brainonska did a decent job on this.

But hey, you can do a great experiment on entropy, and go against your own statement.
Entropy was described to me as a way of measuring the amount of useless energy in a system. More entropy means that more of the energy present isn't available to do meaningful work.

So here you go, some ways for you to increase entropy in a localized system:
- Charge a battery.
- Electrolysis of water to make hydrogen.
- Wind up a clock.

See what's going on? You're pushing energy into a system.

Guess what happens on Earth: An immense amount of energy pours into the system every day, courtesy of the Sun.
Now, if you look at the whole solar system, yes, eventually it'll decay. The Sun will use up its hydrogen, helium, and so on, eventually shedding some of its outer layers, with the remnants collapsing to a white dwarf. The planets will continue radiating their remaining heat until all no longer have liquid/gooey cores (some already are that cool). The system will essentially be dead.

But until then, there's a lot of useful energy available in the system, and you'll get localized systems, such as Earth, where you can see an increase in entropy, and an increase in complexity.

Thermodynamics: Never an effective argument against evolution. Damn sunlight.

 

[Firsttime]

Sigh.....

It's not the consensus of some out of some scientists that determines if something should be held as theory or not. It is also backed up by mounds of evidence and observation.

Stop trying to backhandedly discredit the scientific method.

I don't recall mentioning the scientific method. There is nothing wrong with the method. Rather the people are generally at fault. There are no perfect people, once I've been shown some I'll recant this. In an issue as contentious as this with so much at stake there can not be true objectivity so the real facts of the issue will always be distorted by the competing world views.

I feel I've got my point across, good luck with the rest of this thread haha. I'm off to learn Microsoft Access for a test tomorrow.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

Substitute anything in place of deity, just because people can come to a general consensus on anything does not mean that the opinions or beliefs or facts or whatever you want to call them have any kind of legitimacy on any kind of universal scale.

Now you're just being disingenuous. Facts collected empirically are never going to be absolutely certain, but that doesn't mean that they can't be ideas which are relatively more certain than others.

Again, this goes both ways. If every person became a Christian tomorrow that would in no way prove the existence of a God.

The claims of Christianity are not scientific. You don't understand that while individual people practice the scientific method, the method itself is independent of the individual.

In the same way if every single PhD on the planet earth came together tomorrow and said the universe was 14 billion years old their consensus would in no way prove that it was.

Scientific facts do not depend on the number of people that believe them. They depend on whether or not other people can observe them.

That's all I'm saying, everyone is pushing something.

Cynicism is pathetic.

No one is purely objective in this debate. I just read through most of this thread and the vibe I get in this and most threads like this is that the scientists are somehow these holy people who just desire for everyone to know the truth.

No, you just need to actually understand what their claims are, and the means by which they've come to their conclusions.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Looks like we aren't making much progress

 

[lifeobry]

It wasn't a religious arguement.

Argument.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

First, demonstrate, prove that matter is indeed eternal. Here's a hint: it's not.

It is not known that the total energy of the universe is finite. Think about it for a second. Do you know where the edges of the universe are?

Second, the laws of thermodynamics are totally against evolution - things naturally devolve into chaos, disorder, not higher levels of precision and order.

Ilya Prigogine and his Nobel Prize beg to differ.

This is seen every single day.

Maybe in your magical fairytale land it is.

Third, you are stating these things about evolution, which I have heard a million times already, but still fail to provide even a shred of proof that some prehistoric critter evolved into what we have today.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

There ya go, smart guy. Don't complain about the quantity of reading. There's a lot of evidence for evolution.

In other words, I'm still waiting for any real rebuttal to my statements, but haven't gotten any. And I don't expect to. In my 7 years of being on these forums I have yet to ever receive a solid rebuttal to anything of this.

Consider yourself refuted.

The most I get are half-baked attempts with illogical fallacies, or just name calling, neither of which prove anything

Well those days have come to an end.

I'm done here though, because, again, like in the past 7 years, this kind of thing leads nowhere except people getting grumpy. And that does nobody any good

And here is the stereotypical creationist grand finale: the pre-emptive escape -- indicating he intends to continue believing whatever he wants to believe, never having to even address or acknowledge the refutations which pile up on his head.

 

[Praxis1452]

Entropy of the universe is thought to always be increasing, but that doesn't mean that it is increasing in the small scale all the time. You can easily decrease entropy by actively fighting it or by using other factors.

Since you wanted to start the thermodynamics argument, there are two parts to the Gibbs-Helmholtz equation: dG = dH - TdS. Where dG is free energy, dH is change in enthalpy, and dS is change in entropy. You can easily have a situtation where something decreases in disorder but has a negative free energy (favored to happen) because it can be enthalpically favored.

And to tie that into biology - there are many systems that are not favored entropically and favored enthalpically, and v.v. Some of them are "spontaneous" and some of the require the shuffling of and breaking of bonds in things like ATP to fight the more favorable spontaneous, uncatalyzed reaction.

There is plenty of evidence supporting evolution - from the fossil record to evolution performed in the lab with bacteria (getting a certain gene to be more efficient through directed evolution), to just looking at the human genome across the planet.

A person with an actual understanding of thermodynamics? His 3 minute reading of thermodynamics is more than enough proof for everything.

btw sparky, The total energy in the universe is constant, but that doesn't mean energy can't be lost or gained in local situations. It happens all the time. Your understanding of entropy is FAIL.

 

[Mike Gayner]

Thread delivers.

 

[AbAbber2k]

Thread delivers.

Post 666.

This is a sign from God. This thread has been tainted by the Mark of the Beast and shall herald the coming of the End of Times!

REPENT AND THOU SHALT KNOW SALVATION!

All you heathen science people will burn. Way to question God's design, assholes.

 

[Mr. Lennon]

And here is the stereotypical creationist grand finale: the pre-emptive escape -- indicating he intends to continue believing whatever he wants to believe, never having to even address or acknowledge the refutations which pile up on his head.

Oh so very true.

Pretty funny how this debate here ended the same way mine did in the OP.

Knowledge will not kill these ridiculous views...time will.

 

[jonks]

Here we go. I'm not a scientist, nor do I claim to have any real understanding of many of the processes being discussed here. However, the assumption in this thread that scientists are any less biased then the preachers is absolutely insane. Everyone is working towards an agenda operating from a set of presuppositions. Whether you hold to the religion of Christianity or that of Humanist Science no one is immune from subjectivity. Everyone is out for the furthering of their own viewpoints, me included, true objectivity does not exist. And if it did it certainly would never be present in such an incredibly volatile issue with so many ramifications on every facet of society.

2+2 = 4

You can believe differently if you want, but you'd be objectively wrong, just like people who argue the earth is 6000 years old because they believe the bible say so. It's not a debate. A "scientific theory "does not mean the same thing as "theory" means in the vernacular. You don't have to be a scientist to know this.

Tip: when 99.9% of scientists and educated persons hold with a certain scientific theory, and that theory is really only contradicted by religious sects who feels the theory somehow offends their belief system, the issue ceases to be one of subjective debate. Are there any non-religious people who stridently believe the earth is 6000 years old?

 

[meltdown75]

actually i believe it to be closer to 6500 years

 

[sandorski]

actually i believe it to be closer to 6500 years

6127 Heathen! Recant or be smitten by His Divine Vengeance!! :twisted::twisted:

 

[meltdown75]

6127 Heathen! Recant or be smitten by His Divine Vengeance!! :twisted::twisted:

i've always enjoyed the term "smitten"

 

[Brainonska511]

actually i believe it to be closer to 6500 years

6127 Heathen! Recant or be smitten by His Divine Vengeance!!

6345 - his noodley appendage will strangle you from on high.

 

[sandorski]

i've always enjoyed the term "smitten"

Recant or become intimately knowledgeable(in a Biblical sense) with it!!

 

[meltdown75]

Recant or become intimately knowledgeable(in a Biblical sense) with it!!

i'd be a fool to pass up becoming intimately smitten.

 

[Red Dawn]

Even the Catholics think the young earth creationists are fucking loons.

 

[sandorski]

i'd be a fool to pass up becoming intimately smitten.

So be it. Each Night for one Lunar Cycle, Gabriel the Hung shall smite thee. Thy wails shall be heard by many and they shall know that 6127 is the Holy Age of the Firmament and all contained therein.

 

[sandorski]

6345 - his noodley appendage will strangle you from on high.

I shall use my Level 27 Kobayashi Shield!