Why Wear the Whole Hat?

Post Reply New Topic

Philosophically speaking, it does not follow that if I believe the scientific method works, therefore, I cannot also believe in God. Neither does it follow that if I believe in God, I must believe in the historicity of Genesis, and, therefore, I cannot believe in evolution as a particular result of the scientific method. To say such things is to wear the whole hat.

Last edited by spdjeanne on 03 Dec 2007, 1:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I have repeated this argument in the exact context in which I first heard it. Even if you don't think it was the original intended context of the argument, I don't see how that makes the argument any weaker.

Note: I am not saying that the theory of evolution must include God to be a viable theory. I am saying that the theory of evolution does not have to exclude God to be a viable theory.

of course evolution is random it has no guide or creator. It happens on its own with out authority of any kind. "The Big Bang Theory." I was using the scrabble example to state how miraculous it would be for the world to just explode out of an atom and end up perfectly the way it is. How our bodies are able to heal and the animals all have special traits and all particles and just everything. And if you say its guided by the laws of physics and natural selection can you explain how or give me a link to an explantion please? Another question I'd like to ask about evolution is does it state everything is matter? Than what about morals? they arn't matter, where did they come from, and why is it wrong to kill people. Also your interpretation of the bag of letters and natural selection makes sense to me i definately agree with that, and the human mind can comprehend that, we understand that eventually each letter will fall out because we can choose which ones to keep and spill out some more random ones. But how did the world form? it mutated? but what exactly mutated and what type of mutation if at all? how exactly did it happen. With scrabble letters.. pretty simple they are blocks with letters painted on them and people can dump them out of a bag, evolution no guide and no helper, just pure chance. Another argument would be that the Bible historically outdates Darwinism. How did the Bible have the laws of physics such as gravity in it.

I said Christianity not God, if you believe in Christianity you have to believe the Bible, otherwise you arn't a Christian, because you wouldn't be living for Christ or choosing Him as your savior. If you believe in a false god than i guess you could believe in evolution, but not the God of the Bible, because he created the world and evolution has no creator. See what I was trying to say? I do agree with what you said though, but I was saying Darwinism and Christianity.

Myles17, I am a Christian, and believe that Christ is King, but I do not believe that that necessitates my believing in all of Genesis as a historical document or even that it is meant to be taken historically or literally. I hope you will hold off on your judgment of me and let God be my judge, which I believe is more appropriate. I, too, was talking about Darwinism and Christianity, and I do not believe that they are mutually exclusive.

Well if Genesis is not historical than that means it was just written today? or doesnt exist in reality? And I'm judging you because I disagree agree with you saying your a Christian which is defined by making Christ your lord and savior and believing the bible is TRUE. If i have to hold my judgement off on you than who will judge you the animals? And God is your judge thats why you need to read the Bible which He wrote. Or wait until you die.

The continued assertion that if a God is not in control then all events occur at random is obviously a misunderstanding of the universe. As primitive as our understanding of the universe may be it is still clear that the universe operates under a rigid system of laws and events proceed according to those laws. It is very much not random.

Then you're no longer talking about the christian god. For that matter you could only be talking about the type of god Deists believe in, that is, a god that doesn't interfere in human affairs.

well if laws are random then why follow them. did evolution make laws when it naturally selected things. Which ones did it make? and do all of these apply to everyone and are all of them universally known like when a child is playing and they say someone is cheating. How do they know a person is cheating? Intelligent design by a creator? Why is it not fair? because the big bang happened and made some rules like a bag of scrabble letters spilling out and saying "go to Mexico and dont do drugs" Why would you follow a rule thats so random thats absurd

Myles17, I believe you confuse the Bible with God. In other words, you seem to think the Bible is God instead of about God. As for you being my judge, I only asked you not to judge me for your own benefit. I couldn't care less what you think of me.

jfrmeister, I am neither a Deist, nor do I think that evolution constrains Theism in the way you have suggested. Your understanding of what belief in God entails does not seem to be very generous or accurate and often smacks of straw.

I'm saying this based on what the bible actually says. Unless you think the book of genesis is just some kind of metaphor, because otherwise, the book of genisis and evolution are totaly incompatible.

I think I've made it pretty clear that I don't believe that the creation storys in Genesis were meant to be taken historically. I seems obvious, since there are two of them and since they are written in the same genera as other mythological stories of the time, that they were meant to be taken as myth not scientific fact. This is not to say I don't believe there is a grain of truth in them as there often is in these sorts of stories.

I accept the Theory of Evolution because of what I've studied myself in Biology classes both at the high school and college levels. I also, believe in the God of the Bible, but I do not take every word of the Bible literally.

I think that most Christians who claim to take the Bible literally, if they were truly honest with themselves, could find at least five, if not more, scriptures that they could not take literally no matter what they claim to the contrary. I do not feel that taking the Bible as literally as possible is a prerequisite to being a Christian or having salvific faith in God.

Last edited by spdjeanne on 03 Dec 2007, 10:25 am, edited 1 time in total.

This is the underlying problem with having debates with christians. They're like snowflakes, each one's beliefs are unique.

With over 33,000 official flavors of christianity, some of which contradict each other... who is right?

Myles17, you misunderstood two things. Sand referred to laws like the first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy), or conservation of momentum, not to laws like "Thou shalt not kill".

It is also wrong that a guiding intelligence is needed for all non-random processes. Dissolve some sugar or salt in water. The sugar or salt in solution is in a very random distribution. Let the water evaporate. The sugar or salt will go back into the fairly well ordered crystal state. Do you think a guiding intelligence is needed to stick every molecule or ion into place?



Would you be willing to accept that any of them is right?

I find it offensive when, as happens here regularly, someone says "all atheists are evil, just look at Stalin". If someone wants to criticize me, let them base their criticism on what I do, say and think, not on what they would like me to do, say and think so they can trot out their stock criticisms of people who act differently and believe something else than I do. You give the impression of trying to push spdjeanne into a bible thumping fundamentalist position. What for? If you want to criticize her beliefs, you must deal with what those beliefs are. If you want a fundamentalist to bash, find one, there are enough of them. You don't have to try to make more of them.

Gromit, thanks for not wearing or making me wear the whole hat.

jfrmeister, each person has their own set of beliefs whether they are Christian, Atheist, or something else. No matter what position you take, people will always be like snowflakes. Such an observation used as an argument against any belief, Scientific, Religious, or whatever, is utterly fallacious.

If you were refering to anything other than a divine creator, your argument would be correct. In the context your using it, however, to use your term, it's uttely fallacious. That is, of course unless you accept the notion that we create god and not the other way around. If you don't think that god is manmade (I mean that quite litteraly, made by men, just look at how much misogyny is in the bible) then what you're doing is obvious, it's what almost all christians do. You cherry-pick the bible for those things you want to believe in while ignoring the rest. I think this is one of the red flags about theistic belief. If what people were believing in was true... it would be universal thoughout the world. Instead there's a million different beliefs, each one of them, equally false.

What you consider to be a straw-man argument, is some other christians sincerely held beliefs