Why Evolution is true and why many people don't like it!

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Raptor
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18 Jul 2014, 8:37 pm

Have any of you ever considered that most creationists don't really buy creationism but are none-the-less still in denial about evolution in the same sense that a Baptist minister would be in denial if one of his kids was gay. They know it but since it's agin th' good book or some other personal beleif they refuse to acknowledge it.
I don't see any value in going back and forth debating this all weekend so don't look for me to do so.
What is is.....


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Last edited by Raptor on 18 Jul 2014, 10:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.

TheBicyclingGuitarist
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18 Jul 2014, 8:57 pm

Raptor wrote:
Have any of you ever considered that creationists don't really buy creationism but are none-the-less still in denial about evolution in the same sense that a Baptist minister would be in denial if one of his kids was gay. They know it but since it's agin th' good book or some other personal beleif they refuse to acknowledge it.
I don't see any value in going back and forth debating this all weekend so don't look for me to do so.
What is is.....


Creationists are very badly misinformed about the subject by their websites, videos and books, so of course they cannot make intelligent decisions about something they do not have accurate information about. But the biggest lie they push is that this is a choice between science and God. Most Christian denominations are not as out of touch with demonstrable reality as the fundie churches are. One can be a creationist (believe in a Creator) without denying the reality of evolution or the age of the earth. The biggest divide isn't between creationism and evolution; it is between Young Earth Creationism and reality.

But if one is convinced one must read Genesis literally, their problem is clear. If there was not a literal original pair of first humans (Adam and Eve) then there is no original sin, no need for Jesus and their whole religion falls apart. What they don't realize is if one insists on the Biblical literalist interpretation, and IF that God is the only true God, then that God must be lying to us either in His Book or in His Creation because a literal reading of Genesis is falsified by all the evidence of the physical world. Young Earth Creationists believe in a prankster trickster God even if they don't realize they do.


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DentArthurDent
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18 Jul 2014, 10:35 pm

TheBicyclingGuitarist wrote:

But if one is convinced one must read Genesis literally, their problem is clear. If there was not a literal original pair of first humans (Adam and Eve) then there is no original sin, no need for Jesus and their whole religion falls apart.


Indeed, to my mind the only semi rational stance a religious person can take is Deism, any belief in the Bible that goes beyond a folkloric attempt to make sense of the known world at the time of writing is either foolish or the person has not read the book in a critical manner, and building your world view on an ideology you have given only the barest cursory inspection is also foolish.


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AspieOtaku
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19 Jul 2014, 3:35 am

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDZ8UiGUauY[/youtube]


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Janissy
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19 Jul 2014, 6:17 am

TheBicyclingGuitarist wrote:

But if one is convinced one must read Genesis literally, their problem is clear. If there was not a literal original pair of first humans (Adam and Eve) then there is no original sin, no need for Jesus and their whole religion falls apart. What they don't realize is if one insists on the Biblical literalist interpretation, and IF that God is the only true God, then that God must be lying to us either in His Book or in His Creation because a literal reading of Genesis is falsified by all the evidence of the physical world. Young Earth Creationists believe in a prankster trickster God even if they don't realize they do.


This is the part that baffles me. If Genesis is taken literally, the reader must go through all sorts of contortions and denial in order to avoid cognitive dissonance. But if it is taken as metaphor it works beautifully as spot-on analysis of the human condition.

It takes a lot of denial to dismiss all the fossil evidence of hominid evolution and insist that two modern humans popped into existence-the only two of their kind- and disobeyed God to eat from the Tree of Knowledge because a snake said it was ok. But as metaphor it is fully consistent with everything we know about evolution. The concept of "sin" takes a certain level of brainpower so humans/hominids wouldn't have it until a certain level of brain evolution had been reached-eating from the Tree of Knowledge. The snake is a metaphor for the primal and sometimes destructive impulses still in our brains from pre-mammalian ancestors.

The consequences of eating from the Tree of Knowledge are consistent with evolution too- but only if read as metaphor. Women really are "punished" with painful childbirth because of the changes hominids went through upon eating fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. Brilliant babies have giant heads and walking upright requires a narrow pelvis. Ouch. And the punishment for men that work will always be horrid drudgery? Also consistent with evolution. Doing what you have to do to put food on the table (and also to make a table) is a lot harder when you are intelligently aware of the terrible consequences of failure and can envision them and worry and stress.

As literal account, Genesis is easy to debunk. As metaphor I stand in awe of the accuracy.