[quote]Sneaky weasel wrote:
AlphaDragon wrote:
Sneaky weasel wrote:
AlphaDragon wrote:
MeinHerzBrennt wrote:
I’d love to learn more about creation science. Please explain.
To all those posts about Creation Science:
I’m no scientist and can only give some layman explanations and examples, but have so little time these days that I cannot even attempt to answer most of the questions/challenges that have come up.
I was merely pointing out an option for those out there who have an open mind to see what other scientists are saying…specifically those tackling Intelligent Design.
Now, I can refer you to some “simple” books that can make things clearer from the Intelligent Design perspective:
-The Case for Creator (by Lee Strobel)
-(or any “The Case for…” books by Lee Strobel)
-“Darwins Black Box” (by Michael J Behe)
-“The New Answers Book” (By Ken Ham)
-“Creation Evangelism for the New Millenium” (By Ken Ham)
-(Ken Ham books in general)
-“Scientific Creationism” (by Henry M. Morris)
(These are the only ones I’m personally familiar with, although there are a pluthera more out there).
Again, I’m no scientist, but I do not have blind faith in a Creator. From an Intellignet Design standpoint, we are designed with a mind and are encouraged (even ordered) to use it.
None of those books (and I am familiar with them, especially Behe’s) constitute science in any conceivable sense of the term. For a theory to be scientific, it must make concrete, testable predictions about the observable world that have a possibility of being falsified, i.e. proven to be untrue with the introduction of new evidence.
“Creation Science” makes no such predictions. Even Behe, who is a very good scientist, makes this error in his book. The “creation science” argument is that “evolution couldn’t possibly have done THIS, therefore god did it.” Do you see how this theory offers no predictions at all? It is only negative evidence. It provides no understanding at all of our world.
This is what truly angers me about the concept of “creation science.” It proposes that we utterly disregard the tradition of empirical investigation that has thus far served us so very well. Would it be reasonable for you to say “I don’t know how an airplane stays up in the air, so I think God did it”? Of course not, and if you had the equipment, you could conduct a series of investigations that would demonstrate the Bernoulli effect, lift, drag, shear, etc. and you would come to a better understanding of how an airplane stays aloft. But if you say “God did it” your understanding stops right there. If you allow God into science, (and I am not saying that the two are irreconcilable, only that science has nothing to say about God) then all need for investigation and understanding STOPS. “God did it,” “God wants it that way,” or “God will take care of it” become the only answers that matter. I cannot say this emphatically enough: THAT IS THE WAY BACK TO THE DARK AGES.
First of all, I must say that I was pleasantly surprised to see that you took the time (previously) to at least investigate the possibility of Creation Science.
That fact speaks well of your intellect and your willingness to search.
Again, I’m no scientist, nor pretend to be…but in the defense of Creation Science, what other choice is there but to begin with a Creator? You have to begin with a base argument and go from there…a platform, so to speak. Evolution science has a similar thing, but starts from a different platform as a base.
Now, coming from a Creation Science standpoint, all that can feasibly be done is refute evidence presented by evolution scientists. This is true. Yet, they could never “interview” God to ask Him if things were created and how. It simply does not work that way.
They are using all the same data and proven scientific facts in order to refute evolution science because there is no way to understand the designing of things from an All Powerful God.
I wish there was, but there isn’t. You can’t make predictions beyond “God designed it that way.” That pretty much sums up the whole standpoint…simply put, we can’t make a test to see if God created it that way or not.
I think I understand your point, though. Yes, the Creation Scientist refutes the evolutionary theory but kind of leaves your jaw hanging for an explainable and “seeable” and testable answer…and you may feel kind of let down by the rationalization that “God did it that way,” but remember that these are still learned men and women with the same data that evolution scientists have.
They are not stupid, as I believe you know.
They research things too as it’s fascinating to them, and as many of them say, it actually increases their faith in Intelligent Design.
However:
Your example of the airplane and flight is not reasonable, though, for reason that even Creation Scientists would take and collect data to find an answer. IF there was real-world scientific evidence, they would, as scientists, have to conclude it was due to natural laws, etc.
Your example is trying to pass them off as chicken-bone-throwing savages relying on superstitions and overspiritualizing everything instead of actually researching and searching, which is definitely not the case with intellectual types (yes, Creation Scientists believe in God and Intelligent Design, but they still have an intellect and use it). They want answers, not mythology or legend or whatever.
Now, there are numerous people (well learned scientists) that actually have gone so far as to say absurd theories that are simply unthinkable that such intellectual men and women could actually believe (I mean, come on…Aliens???).
It’s been a very long day and I apologize for my poor explanation(s) but I can barely keep my eyes open. Still, I wanted to continue this dialogue as you seem to be open to discussion and not muck-slinging, belligerent or flaming.
I appreciate your desire to continue this conversation civilly. I’ll try to address your points in order.
Creationism and evolutionary theory do NOT begin from the same basis. Creationism begins with: “step 1: assume a creator,” while evolutionary theory begins with DATA–originally, Darwin’s data acquired from his studies of speciation in the Galapagos. Creationism seeks to fit the data to the theory, while evolutionary theory is constantly changing in order to better fit the observed data. One is science, and one is not.
If you acknowledge that “creation science” cannot provide any testable, observable predictions about the development of life on earth, then you do not have a scientific theory. What you have is a dogma. From here we could get into all sorts of debates over why God would have designed organisms in certain ways, but that really goes nowhere.
Your argument that “creation-scientists” are prepared to accept the scientific method in some circumstances and not others is not really reasonable. There are literally hundreds of thousands of pages of scientific evidence supporting evolution–you can’t claim that there is “no evidence” upon which to base evolutionary theory. I’ll quote Orthodox Christian evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky: “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” It is intellectual laziness to assume that because our current understanding of evolutionary theory does not completely explain every biological phenomenon on the planet, that it is false, and furthermore, that God did everything. If you are prepared to contend that God is responsible for evolution, then you must also be prepared to contend that God is responsible for every other element of a scientific theory that we do not currently understand. Do you see how absurd that is?
In the 17th century, everyone “knew” that light propagated through an ether. But as that theory became increasingly difficult to square with the accumulating evidence, ‘ether’ was discarded in favor of new theories. If you allow God to intervene at any step of that scientific process, then it all stops–“light surely does propagate through an ether, because God must have made it that way, and we don’t have another answer yet.” Do you see how that completely undermines the basis upon which ALL science operates?
I really do appreciate your desire to discuss this, but the mere fact that some individuals with degrees support “creation science” has no bearing on whether or not it has any truth to it. It is not a matter of how many people agree or disagree with a theory; it is a matter of how well that theory explains the phenomena that we observe around us.[/quote]
I really, really really have limited time, but wanted to take a little of it to come back to this topic, as you (again) are interested in a good discussion (again, appreciated).
First, let me say that I have not had the time to browse the rest of the replies after the last one I answered, and chances are great that I’ll only continue with the discussions I’m already involved in.
/
Let’s see what we can do, as this topic is getting quite long.
First, of course they both opposing sciences don’t begin from the same base. Evolutionary science begins from a “There is no Intellignet Design” basis while Creation Science begins from a “There is an Intelligent Designer” basis.
The methods each on employs in order to demonstrate it’s point of view must be different as they are coming from opposite sides of a spiritual spectrum.
I also disagree that it’s dogma. Why? Simply because the data is applied differently, from what I understand. Creation Scientists want to delve as deeply into the human genome (so to speak) as much as Evolutionary scientists…the difference is that their approach is to understand the creation more…and that is kind of in the same vein as trying to understand the way mankind formed.
Even though evolution science is deemed a science and creation science is not deemed so, BOTH have a platform with which they frame their findings. If creation science is “dogma,” then so is evolution science in that it’s (to use a poorly-chosen word) goal is to basically prove that God did not form mankind.
If one is to assume dogma, then both are guilty, according to your description.
(For the record, anyone who does not believe in macroevolution truly needs to open their eyes to different types of dogs, cats, humans, etc).
Moving onward:
True Creation Scientists never say that God created (used) evolution. This totally negates the purpose of Intelligent Design" and such thoughts are indeed foolish. that quote from
Theodosius Dobzhansky is utter crap because, as you said, you can’t combine the two sciences.
The fact is that both sciences have completely opposite bases from which they frame their research…one is with God creating everything from nothing, and the other one is that God did nothing. From there, both groups launch their individual research.
As you have stated, I also appreciate the discussion and your level of temperment, but for you to say that Creation science is wrong because it does not fit into the outline of what science should be (as defined by evolutionary science, in this case) is totally biased for evolutionary science and against Creation Science (kind of like saying “Basketball isn’t true because the rules are not like Football” (again, I’m not at my best right now…long day for me in China). They are both sports and the goals are the same, to win the game, but the “rules of engagement” are wrong.
