Why don't you accept the evolution theory?

I'm looking for reasons why some people here don't accept the evolution theory. I know this has probably been posted already a thousand times, but since no one is discussing it anymore, I thought I could give it a fresh start. Feel free to use evidence that you think refutes the theory, but no bible quotes please.

Hi, I would try and respond in my opinion. First off since it's start the theories have totally changed way to many times for me. Get some old books and see if this is not true. Now days we even have a languag for this theory because it has so many holes. I would ask two things that are easy and hard. If the scriptures were totally rewriten as many times as evolution has, or if you could find lies or mistakes on every page it would be silly to believe such a story true? Now try to find any thing any part of these theories and if you can write it in plain common sence English to prove evolution, I will dis prove it with the same.

alexander garcia said:

Hi, I would try and respond in my opinion. First off since it's start the theories have totally changed way to many times for me. Get some old books and see if this is not true. Now days we even have a languag for this theory because it has so many holes. I would ask two things that are easy and hard. If the scriptures were totally rewriten as many times as evolution has, or if you could find lies or mistakes on every page it would be silly to believe such a story true? Now try to find any thing any part of these theories and if you can write it in plain common sence English to prove evolution, I will dis prove it with the same.

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Hm, so you're saying that just because theories have been proven wrong before, current scientific theories are unreliable? :tsk:

alexander garcia said:

Now try to find any thing any part of these theories and if you can write it in plain common sence English to prove evolution, I will dis prove it with the same.

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Animals change over time.

I, too, cannot understand how people can reject the best theory currently available.

alexander garcia said:

Hi, I would try and respond in my opinion. First off since it's start the theories have totally changed way to many times for me. Get some old books and see if this is not true. Now days we even have a languag for this theory because it has so many holes. I would ask two things that are easy and hard. If the scriptures were totally rewriten as many times as evolution has, or if you could find lies or mistakes on every page it would be silly to believe such a story true? Now try to find any thing any part of these theories and if you can write it in plain common sence English to prove evolution, I will dis prove it with the same.

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Science and Religion make different claims though. It is GROSSLY unfair to treat them the same in this manner.

Religion claims it knows the answers. No doubts or questions. It is correct and always has been. Therefore past inconsistencies smear this stance.

Science on the other hand claims it cannot provide definitive answers. It can only provide answers - to the best of current knowledge. We are simple beings trying to understand the world around us. We are bound to get things wrong from time to time and have to revisit past ideas and correct them. This is what science is about.. To insist that science should have the answers instantly and correct is just plain absurd.

although i follow the idea of survival fo the fittest, evolution is based on the premis that life develop as product of random chance, which suggests to me that the chances are we should not be there - which means (to me anyway) that it is more likely we have a creator, at least in the sense of one who guided evolution

Mike182 said:

although i follow the idea of survival fo the fittest, evolution is based on the premis that life develop as product of random chance, which suggests to me that the chances are we should not be there - which means (to me anyway) that it is more likely we have a creator, at least in the sense of one who guided evolution

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Fair thought. The only problem is that it may be proven one day that life forming is actually LIKELY. If the formation of life was a simple and easy process, and it may actually be, would you still hold the same belief?

Mike182 said:

although i follow the idea of survival fo the fittest, evolution is based on the premis that life develop as product of random chance, which suggests to me that the chances are we should not be there - which means (to me anyway) that it is more likely we have a creator, at least in the sense of one who guided evolution

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What is the random chance of my having a customer (when I worked in the Bank) whose family still lived in the village deep in the Congolese forest where I was born ?

There are so many events taking place, at any one time, in evolution, that one will work, and will lead to greater things. That's the wonder of "Chance".

Mike182 said:

although i follow the idea of survival fo the fittest, evolution is based on the premis that life develop as product of random chance, which suggests to me that the chances are we should not be there - which means (to me anyway) that it is more likely we have a creator, at least in the sense of one who guided evolution

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Im glad that you understand that initial life developing is not a part of evolution - but an assumed premis. Although, Religious evolutionists would point out that evolution could just as well be based on the premis that the first simple life organism was created by god. I know you understand this - but it is an important point.

Ormistons respone is good, but I have another way of approaching this.

Chance is a funny thing. One could say the chances of winning the lottery are so remote its not worth placing any serious hope on. However, it would be rather foolish to say the chances of someone winning the lottery are slim, since the chances of someone winning get very close to 1 in 1 with enough people playing. Right?

No really the whole argument against the chances of life appearing are entirely based on how many attempts there have been. Now can you honestly tell me you can grasp the sheer magnitude of millions of not billions of years? We live such a tiny fraction of that. Then add to that the sheer size of the universe. Billions of stars in billions of galaxies. Who knows how many other planets there are with the right conditions for life? The numbers are huge whatever. So life appearing somewhere in the universe is not as unlikely as you believe.

I believe in a God and I believe in evolution, I don't see why the two are incompatible to so many.

Science does not have all the answers, but as long as the scientific community doesn't allow it's views to become as rigid as many religions have, everything will be alright.

Fear. Fear is the real reason most Christians refuse to believe in God and evolution.

They have mistakenly accepted the argument from fearful preachers that evolution is the devil's work. They have mistakenly accepted the argument from many atheists and agnostics that evolution disproves the existence of God. I have heard both arguments right here on RF!

Like plate tectonics and tides, evolution is a tool that God designed. He has set the rules and devised the various schemes that would eventually produce man. He doesn't have to guide his program any more than a computer programmer has to guide a well written code. If a computer programmer can create evolutionary code, then why can't God?

But perfect love casts out fear. You don't have to live in fear for ever. Trust God. Evolution doesn't cast any aspersions on God. God never condemns evolution. Neither should we.

alexander garcia said:

Hi, I would try and respond in my opinion. First off since it's start the theories have totally changed way to many times for me. Get some old books and see if this is not true. Now days we even have a languag for this theory because it has so many holes. I would ask two things that are easy and hard. If the scriptures were totally rewriten as many times as evolution has, or if you could find lies or mistakes on every page it would be silly to believe such a story true? Now try to find any thing any part of these theories and if you can write it in plain common sence English to prove evolution, I will dis prove it with the same.

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Theories like this always change and become better over time because people discover new things and find new evidence. This is perfectly normal and it would be far worse if the theory would’ve never changed over time, like for example creationism. Even though massive evidence points out that creationism is flat out wrong, it never changes and thus always stays faulty. The evolution theory is nowadays such a good theory exactly because of that change. If you say the modern evolution theory has many holes, please tell me which holes because I don’t know any at all, and I’m pretty sure you won’t be able to think of any that I can’t refute. The scriptures are nothing but a fairy tale to me, as to the literal interpretation of it. It does contain many interesting life lessons and is quite the valuable document to be figuratively interpreted, but as to a literal translation, please... I don’t try what you’re trying to say with that last line, but if you want me to prove the theory, that’s impossible because theories like these are unprovable, since proof is only possible for mathematics. That’s why things like the theory of gravity can never be proven. As for the evidence that supports the evolution theory, I doubt you can refute any of this.

mike182 said:

although i follow the idea of survival fo the fittest, evolution is based on the premis that life develop as product of random chance, which suggests to me that the chances are we should not be there - which means (to me anyway) that it is more likely we have a creator, at least in the sense of one who guided evolution

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Well given the amount of time life has had to arise, and the prebiotic conditions, it seems very likely to me that life could have arisen this way. But in fact this has nothing to do with evolution, so let’s stick to the topic. The only thing that guides evolution is natural selection, so if some creator had anything to do with life, he would only have been able to interfere around the big bang (the place where science starts to have trouble explaining things), and his interference would have contained all the information as to how everything would develop from there, because of the laws of physics. So I don’t see any need for a creator to guide evolution or anything at all on this earth.

Hi, I would try and respond in my opinion. First off since it's start the theories have totally changed way to many times for me. Get some old books and see if this is not true

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So you would respect science more if they still claimed their previous ideas were right when there was evidence proving them wrong?

although i follow the idea of survival fo the fittest, evolution is based on the premis that life develop as product of random chance, which suggests to me that the chances are we should not be there - which means (to me anyway) that it is more likely we have a creator, at least in the sense of one who guided evolution

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If god guided evolution then he would have made MS, Alzheimers, Down syndrome and so on.

Opethian said:

I'm looking for reasons why some people here don't accept the evolution theory. I know this has probably been posted already a thousand times, but since no one is discussing it anymore, I thought I could give it a fresh start. Feel free to use evidence that you think refutes the theory, but no bible quotes please.

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I believe that God created all and that man and woman and all of creation was created as the Bible states.

I believe that creation took place over a significant period of time.

I'd say it's possible that certain life could have evolved over that time frame but the source of that evolution (if evolution was a factor at all) was intended and created by God.

I don't "believe" in evolution. I've little scientific backround and i'm particularly ignorant in regards to general biology. I'd be a fool to delve into such "either/or" debates armed with nothing more then regurgatated, junk-science "evidence" all the while furrowing my brow over how "unintuitive" and "non-sensical" standing scientific theories (that i've made no effort to study) are. Or maybe my failing is my inability reconstruct all known scientific in short order and explain away the universe with my imaginings....

I'll throw out a common evolution question that I've for which I've never seen a reasonable answer. If we truly evolved from an ape-like creature as evolution suggests, it must have been done in many small survivable genetically dominant phases. Why are none of those phases in existance today?

I don't have a problem with Evolution per se but I have serious problems with abiogenesis. I believe in many of the processes that evolution theory speaks of but I don't believe that we can trace all life down to a single cell organism.

Well Polaris,

Why does only one team win the Superbowl? Man EXCELS at competition and EXCELS even more at crushing anything that might compete against him. The American Bald Eagle was almost wiped from the face of America. Why? Because we thought they killed OUR livestock. Same with the grey wolf as well as the panther. It's not so much that we should succeed, but that all others should fail miserably!

I'll throw out a common evolution question that I've for which I've never seen a reasonable answer. If we truly evolved from an ape-like creature as evolution suggests, it must have been done in many small survivable genetically dominant phases. Why are none of those phases in existance today?

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Well, suggest we start from an ape-like creature. Mutations can occur that give a new mutant certain benefits to the others of his population, and in his environment, and the number of these kinds of organisms in the total population rises because of their greater fitness. After a while, the new mutant type will completely outcompete the other types of organisms and they will disappear. What can happen too, is that the mutations give the new mutant certain benefits only in a part of the environment that its species inhabits, that way it will outcompete the rest of the population in that environment, but the other type will remain to reproduce in the other part of the environment.
So we have phases of new mutants completely outcompeting the rest of the species (thus always destroying the previous phase when a new one has arisen), and phases when they can coexist (this is where evolutionary lines branch of, ie man - chimpansee, urang utan etc... ). Logical enough?