I awoke Easter Sunday to all kinds of friends, family and neighbors updating their Facebook pages with scripture and proclamations that “he has risen“. Once I got past the initial “seriously?” phase, it reminded me that I had to do a post on religion and money, so what better time than after Easter?
If you follow my tweets, you know I’m a pretty analytical guy that looks at the world through the eyes of science and nature (rather than “faith), the random and chaotic nature of the universe (rather than believing that there’s a God that gives a crap if Tebow wins the superbowl, decides if a cancer patient lives or dies, or that somehow he’s working in mysterious ways when he inures the world with such horrors, pain and suffering on a daily basis – the world is cruel, random and chaotic) and that while I won’t even bother trying to change your mind if you’re a believer (because you’ve obviously already refused to accept evidence to the contrary), I do find it interesting to consider the role of religion in today’s world. Sometimes, it’s a question of what kids should be taught in school, the economic consequences of millenia of wars over religion, the positive contributions of religious charitable contributions and institutions over the years, or simply how people weave religion into their personal finances, there’s often something to think about.
With a name like Darwin, how could I not publish this? Evidently, the more the inhabitants of a country deny the realities of evolution, the less likely that country is to have a high GDP – except – for the ole’ US of A – because as we all know, we’re just about the richest country on earth – and the most analytically backwards…
Continue Reading Acceptance of Evolution and Wealth – Interesting Correlation…
Facts from CIA world fact book. Stats from 2006. Greece, Ireland, Italy, Spain.
HAHAHAHA
Such a honey pot, even I won’t snarf at this one… I think I’m going to start crying I’m laughing so hard.
Where are the brown countries?
“Do unto others.”
Thank you for this post.
Given #1) All those mostly European countries have a much lower population than the United States.
Given #2) The chart shows that about 40% of the USA believes in evolution. That’s about 120 million people … a larger population than any of the other nations listed in the chart.
Therefore, the ONLY valid conclusion is; it the USA population who believes in evolution, that is responsible for our GDP. Religious people pray for wealth, atheists actually create it.
I have spoken.
So shall it be.
These sorts of things go in the lies, damn lies and statistics category. See, the atheists can drum up their own as well to “prove” that their way of thinking is better.
http://epiphenom.fieldofscience.com/2009/07/why-some-countries-are-more-religious.html
“Worse societies are more religious
I pulled together data on frequency of prayer from over 50 countries, and found that countries where people prayed more frequently had lower life expectancy and scored lower on the Peace Index. They also had higher infant mortality, homicide rates, and levels of corruption, and had more AIDS and more abortion. That’s pretty conclusive.”
I don’t put much stock in any of this — Correlation does not equal causation. Correlations are not even very interesting most of the time.
Repeat every day until you get it. Most people never do and spend their lives looking for spurious correlations to justify themselves.
So man was created from? space aliens?And where did the earth come from?
I thought of making a bumper sticker,I can beleave YOU were decended from primates.
I wish you all a happy life,I look around me at all the people trying to find happiness with things.
I once read an article called Rich and miserable.Just look at the nutty society around you.
I tell people to go to a local church and do some soul searching,make some friends and be a part of the local community.
flash
You’ve been pretty cranky lately … picking a lot of fights. Whass’up?
I didn’t realize you were anti-science. There is a one big diference between science and theology.
Science never says it is infallible. Science corrects itself when new data proves older data false. It may take a while, but it eventually happens. For example, science once believed the earth was flat. Do they still believe that?
Science ENDS with conclusions … which it then tries to falsify. Theology STARTS with conclusions … and nothing will ever falsify it. Best pictured here;
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God created science.
Don’t blame GOD for religion.
Religion is men controlling other men.
To: Flash
From: GOD
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Sigh!! Quote above ….
“All major religions and mythologies stem from early humanity’s attempt to understand what we now call volcanos and oxygen.”
—— Bill Lauritzen, “The Invention of God”.
.
“When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance.”
—— Exodus 20:18, Moses on Mt. Sinai receiving the ten commandments
“So man was created from? space aliens?And where did the earth come from?” — Ron
I dunno with 100% certainty. Does anyone?
Here are the choices …. everybody has their favorite. But no one knows for sure.
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I’ve been reading this book:
It is a very interesting perspective from an Anglican Bishop that does not deny or avoid the obvious inconsistencies or cling to a literal viewpoint. He engages the conversation about faith with honesty and love in a way that I find both refreshing and appealing even as I don’t always agree. He does make me think though, and that is worthy.
To deny all things spiritual is to deny the experiences of many people on many levels. As a physicist and engineer there have been many things that I have been able to measure, but there are things that I cannot measure even as I know that they are real. Sound quality is a good example. I can easily measure amplitude, phase, and frequency. I can measure those things equally and get dissimilar results qualitatively. Someday I may have better measurements, and I hope I do, but until then I accept that there are aspects to what I can do that are quantifiable and aspects that are qualitative. To look at science as having the answer is as short sighted as saying God can be put in a neat and tidy box (if he exists).
I have a faith experience. It is not very literal, and it is always in flux. It is real for me, and although I am constantly challenging it I am also constantly growing it. I think the realm of the spiritual is much like the realm of the quatum in that it is undeniable (to me) and nonsensical (to me). Someday I will have a deeper, more engaged understanding; it will likely make less sense then.
He who lives in love lives in God and God in him. That is good enough for me for now.
Cordially,
Sonic
AWD…
Suck on my big boomer bitchboy.
flash
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Ans if Revelation comes true …. God will kill several billion humans.
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Stuck,a majority of people also believe the two parties of stupid are working on behalf of we the people.
I rest my case.
…more evolution believers. Yes, get out the vote.
http://www.sadanduseless.com/2012/04/you-cant-fix-stupid/#more-9588
Darwin starts this thread … and then doesn’t weigh in? What the hell is that about??
Sonic — +1 on that book by John Sponge. I’ve read several of his books. Even met him on a couple occasions … well, I shook his hand after church … he preaches in a church nearby here in NJ. He’s quite a radical, and not very beloved by “mainstream” Christianity. That’s one reason I like him, a lot.
flash
Thanks for the clarification. I agree with you, there certainly is a LOT of “junk science” out there. Kind of very sad when you think about it. One can’t even trust people whose job it is to be ….. OBJECTIVE. Everybody has a fuckin’ ax to grind these days ……..
Stucky – Sorry I disappeared for a while, I’ve been having a prolonged discussion with God (kidding, sorry, but anyone that thinks they have conversations with an imaginary being may want to talk to a professional)…Anyway, to answer a few:
Flash – Science holds the answers as long as the assumptions going in are sound, the data is evaluated in the appropriate light and logic prevails. The medical studies you cite are just as guilty of being designed poorly as the regulatory system is skewed toward pharmas having the ability to include favorable studies while excluding unfavorable studies. This is not as prevalent now, but there are many medicines on the market now (especially anti-psychotics and depression meds) which abused this approach.
Ron – How can you look at a primate and not deduce that we have a common ancestor? Jesus, it’s the only other type of creature on earth with an opposable thumb. We share almost all the same DNA. Chimpanzees even have the same blood types that humans have – and your body will not reject a transfusion from them! (only animal on earth this will work for in humans). The list goes on. It’s ludicrous to pretend otherwise; you just have to read a book or two on evolutionary biology and the evidence is painfully obvious.
Bottom line is, I was brainswashed as a child just like 99% of the rest of Earth’s population. I was raised Catholic, church, first communion, the whole 9 yards. From about 7 years old on, I felt it was a bizarre ritual of grown men dressing up in strange costumes, claiming they talk to God and pretending to turn water holy, etc. (oh, and if you don’t take the host the right way it burns your mouth or something?). They creeped me out too before as an adult, I became aware of the press accounts of thousands of child rapes swept under the rug over the years. Surely this has occurred for over a thousand years, so perhaps the number is hundreds of thousands or even millions of child rapes. But rather than attack organized religion for the terror and shame they proferred, I just look at why science provides the answers for me. The vast majority go on to accept the faith of their ancestors. Occasionally, some either convert or realize the whole thing’s a series of elaborate stories meant to maintain law and order (and put some select men in power) which has continued for millenia. If you were born somewhere else in the world you’d probably worship a different diety. Seriously, if you were born in India or Pakistan, you’d be a Christian? (yes, that is a minority religion in many countries, but statistically speaking, the odds are low). Interestingly, many religions have very similar stories, characters, even the names are similar in the old language. Check out “Religulous”. The last minute is mind-blowing.
I guess when you put “militant” in front of something, it’s a way to attack an opinion or ideology without having anything substantive to say otherwise. I don’t condone violence nor do other prominent atheists (or ANY that I’ve ever heard of). I don’t know any atheists in real life; I’ve never met one. I have just read a bunch of books and formed some glaringly obvious conclusions (to me) over the years. I am still astounded that people actually believe humans randomly appeared on earth one day. They loaded up a few millions species of creatures on a ship (who didn’t eat each other or have anything to drink), dinosaurs were really “Jesus ponies” and so on. It’s bizarre. I wish it were a joke, but people feel so strongly about it that I would literally be killed for having an opinion in many parts of the world. Crazy indeed. I don’t recall atheists killing people anywhere in history. Plenty of examples to the contrary.
Flash, when politics or agendas enter the science fray, then it’s no longer objective and the conclusions are suspect. Some things are very basic though. I mean, do you believe we should be teaching kids about “alternative theories” like creationism and intelligent design (which is a primarily Republican/right-wing push especially in the mid-west) or teach them the truth? The rest of the world is laughing at us in so many ways; our public school results are terrible compared to the rest of the world, when are we going to get serious?
I’m not on some anti-religious crusade; like I said, I’m married to at least a “spiritual” believer, my entire family and hers are religious, all our friends are, and I’ve never actually met a self-proclaimed atheist in my personal life. I’m just about telling it like it is – especially on the evolutionary stuff. Going back to the initial post, I’m not sure there’s a causal relationship at all, but I just found the trend/visual correlation and the outlier to be interesting and I’m glad I posted because there’s been a lot of great discussion on it (and as always here, lots of great external links to back up your stances!).
@Darwin
You stayed out of the fray for a while …. but the delay was worth it. Excellent responses!!
@flash
I said before you seem to have an anti-science bent, and you denied it, but your subsequent posts continue to reinforce my initial commentary. People who prefer science over God do NOT treat science as a God-replacement. We fully realize there is a lot of bad science, and junk science, out there. But that’s no excuse to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
Darwin’s Money -. I mean, do you believe we should be teaching kids about “alternative theories” like creationism and intelligent design (which is a primarily Republican/right-wing push especially in the mid-west) or teach them the truth?
Creationism , intelligent design,and evolution are neither left nor right .There are mere philosophies of choice.
Personally I think the soft science of evolution should not be taught in any public school.
Public schools should stick to the hard sciences of math, geometry , computing …
There is nothing to gain by filling a kids head full of social science theory even before the kids has mastered the essential tools needed to survive in an increasingly competitive workplace.
That said, the State unifies/centralizes by force of power which is a fragile unity at best . Forcibly taking form one group to appease another the state builds as much resentment as it does support .
Right or wrong, the introduction of the anti-Christian force of evolution theory has only served to further erode the community of church fellowship by decreasing believers and along the with growing gap between opposing cultural backgrounds of race is just another factor in the disunity that pervades North America as a nation.
A divided house cannot stand, so said our greatest criminal of a president.
Science is a mere tool and can be used for good or bad.
Unlike the shallow faith placed in the state or science, faith in some higher omnipotent power is not only the great unifier of all people, but the inspiration for greater things as well.
Without Christianity and the unifying presence of God ,I sincerely doubt that civilization as we know it today would ever exist.
Politics has never known such a unity.
http://lewrockwell.com/gordon/gordon96.1.html
Ralph Raico on Authentic Liberalism
by David Gordon
Raico’s response emphasizes the Christian roots of liberalism. John Neville Figgis famously claimed that “political liberty is the residuary legatee of ecclesiastical animosities”; but, unlike Figgis, Raico does not look to the Reformation and its quarrels for the source of freedom. Rather, he focuses on the universal church as an alternative source of loyalty to the state in medieval Europe:
That culture was the West – the Europe that arose in communion with the Bishop of Rome…. The essence of the European experience is that a civilization developed that felt itself to be a unity and yet was politically decentralized. The continent devolved into a mosaic of separate and competing jurisdictions and polities whose internal divisions themselves resisted central control. (p. 59)
The route to a renaissance of the American fine arts lies through religion… When a society becomes all-consumed in the provincial minutiae of partisan politics, as has happened in the US over the past 20 years, all perspective is lost. Great art can be made out of love for religion, as well as rebellion against it. But a totally secularized society with contempt for religion sinks into materialism and self-absorption and gradually goes slack, without leaving an artistic legacy.
Camille Paglia, “Religion and the Arts in America”, A lecture at Colorado College, February 2007, available on CSPAN
“The question remains. Have atheists employing science done more good or harm to humanity ?”
—- flash
Let’s take a slight digression.
1) WHY are you so obsessed with this question? Or, stated another way, why is it important to you?
2) WHAT are you trying to prove?
3) If the answer is “more harm to humanity” …. what is the solution? Not allowing atheists to become scientists? Forcing them to convert? Sending them to the Gulag?
@stuck
Atheist regularly portray Christianity as some backward force that foments war and is an enemy to science.Neither of which is the case.
Christianity has brought more peace, prosperity, art and technology to bear than atheists care to admit.
I’m merely pointing out that the science as administered by government is not sacrosanct and in the hands of atheist governments has led to more mass murder and suffering than can ever be laid at the door of religion.
I fully support the right of everyone to freedom of speech and religion -even the religion of new age atheism worshiping at the altar of science- but I also reserve the right to reject the meanderings of the worshipers of sciences as just that.
I believe in the principles of libertarianism as recorded by the national Libertines Party.
I just wish those that force feed their ideology would do the same.
Libertarian Party Statement of Principles
We, the members of the Libertarian Party, challenge the cult of the omnipotent state and defend the rights of the individual. We hold that all individuals have the right to exercise sole dominion over their own lives and have the right to live in whatever manner they choose, so long as they do not forcibly interfere with the equal right of others to live in whatever manner they choose. Governments throughout history have regularly operated on the opposite principle, that the state has the right to dispose of the lives of individuals and the fruits of their labor. Even within the United States, all political parties other than our own grant to government the right to regulate the lives of individuals and seize the fruits of their labor without their consent.
We, on the contrary, deny the right of any government to do these things, and hold that where governments exist, they must not violate the rights of the individual; namely, (1) the right to life – accordingly we support the prohibition of the initiation of physical force against others; (2) the right to liberty of speech and action – accordingly we oppose all attempts by government to abridge the freedom of speech and press, as well as government censorship in any form; (3) the right to property – accordingly we oppose all government interference with private property, such as confiscation, nationalization, and eminent domain, and support the prohibition of robbery, trespass, fraud, and misrepresentation. Since governments, where instituted, must not violate individual rights, we oppose all interference by government in the areas of voluntary and contractual relations among individuals. People should not be forced to sacrifice their lives and property for the benefit of others. They should be left free by government to deal with one another as free traders, and the resultant economic system, the only one compatible with the protection of individual rights, is the free market.
The author says:
“If you follow my tweets, you know I’m a pretty analytical guy that looks at the world through the eyes of science and nature (rather than faith), the random and chaotic nature of the universe.”
Liar!
Faith: confidence or trust in a person or thing; also a belief which is not based on proof, is a faculty of the human mind that we all use even to believe the theories of science and physics we have built our world on. Just because you don’t believe in God doesn’t mean God doesn’t exist. The people of the past were taught not to put human or physical attributes to God because God is not physical. So you are right to reject the current attributes people of today assign to God. We have no capacity to comprehend God just like we do not have to capacity to comprehend the universe in its totality. Science has given us the capacity comprehend and to work the universe in our locality only. Religion has given us to capacity to think about order; that is all. You say the universe is “random and chaotic” which is a rational response from our mind to something we can’t totally comprehend. Our form or order only pushes the apparent chaos and randomness to the side of our order; it does not eliminate it. Sooner or later the chaos returns. Like Zimmerman’s 2nd degree murder charge. This charge is not based on truth but is seemingly based on creating a false order to contain mob rule. How long can this charge hold up? The order is temporary.
So don’t short change faith; you use it everyday when you wake up. You have faith that the science that holds this society together mechanically will continue to work its magic to make your life comfortable. God does indeed exist; but not in the rational mind of man. The rational mind of man is expert at connecting thoughts into associations and creating rabbit trails to nowhere. The Martin shooting is seemingly becoming one of those thought associations.
Stucky: Are you poking fun at your ancestors?
Who created the seed and the egg? It wasn’t man or anything we know of. The only answer is God.
Who created money and the idea of wealth? Man. Who created the idea of evolution; the associative idea that we are somehow advancing; another rabbit trail to nowhere? Man.
Who is the creator of life? God. Who is the destroyer of life? Man.
God the creator. Man the destroyer. See a pattern here? Is man not the serpent? The devil? The Athiest?
Wow, just wow.
What an enjoyable thread, well up to the end. Maybe I’m off but I get the feeling Stucky & I are pretty close on the faith-o-meter, Darwin is more radically invested than I, in anti-not-provable of any stripe.
Then there’s Flash, whom I usually find myself agreeing with, or at least being intrigued enough to look up your assertions and copies and links. Then *pow* along comes this.
First by your examples it seems you equate “atheist” to “not-Christian, maybe throw in the Jews/Muslims” NOT using the Merriam Webster definition of “one who believes that there is no deity.” Sorry, using our actual known human history I call bullshit. Nearly EVERY society was led/controlled/ herded by some deity(ies) since written history began, and I’m sure before. Just because a narrow view of human existence throughout history is your favored approach, it does not make it so.
You seem to spend an inordinate amount of time searching out hidden agendas of the PTB, yet you give ZERO time to YOUR own person PTB. I find that a fascinating aspect of the human condition.
I “belonged” to multiple flavors of Christianity as a child. I’ve had everything from formal mass to speaking in tongues and blaming sin for your diseases. By the age of ten, the outright hypocrisy of my “fellow” Christians was making me crazy. Kinda like the outright apathy and ignorance of my fellow citizens makes me feel today. Trapped in Bizarro world.
For me, I chose to stand up to my mom (which required me getting a job on Sundays because Dad would always choose work over god – his dad firmly believed work harder, then pray) and quit going to church.
Then I spent every spare moment of the better part of two years in my Rockefeller built library’s Religion, Philosophy, and History sections. I studied Christianity last, as after a decade of Sunday school, bible study, adult bible study and the like, I was pretty familiar.
Amazing the things I learned, amazing how information – real, solid, cross-verifiable evidence & accounts – led me to see patterns in history and learn much of human psychology (and how religion fills that) and phsiology. I started my quest without one adult encouraging me, but quite a few mocking or condemning me for daring to learn about the entire world and not just the Christian slant of it.
One thing I learned, Christianity was in NO way the “bringer of enlightenment” to the world. The Greeks, Romans and Egyptians were incredibly advanced technologically, and medically, and in many surprisingly “modern” ways. Once their societies crumbled (due to the same problems we find in Christian and other societies too, they weren’t special and neither are we when it comes to being screwed over by the PTB) and the Christians began to take over, our world was plunged into the dark ages, for centuries. I might add while China thrived and created things like gunpowder. You should check it out, there are actually books written by Christians telling you all about it.
For years I thought I was agnostic. Then I realized that I believe in powers/things I cannot see, but I don’t believe that some guy/girl/group is up somewhere giving two shits about me, or the human race.
And if your (or anyone else’s) god would doom me to a life of hell (after this one) just because I was curious enough to come to my beliefs through years of study, then all I have to say is that ain’t very Christian-like (or other) attitude, now is it?
Whatever.
Yes, SOME atheists are militant, and evil. As are some Christians, some Jews, some Muslims, some Wiccan, some Buddhist (though by definition usually aren’t), some Hindu, but most people aren’t. They are just everyday good people that want to do right by their families and have a little joy in their lives before they turn to dust and blow into the sands of time.
But we atheists got nothing on human suffering compared to the “true” believers. Nothing. To deny that is to deny the vast majority of the world’s history.
Bomb away.
TeresaE
God predicted automobiles, for it says in the book of Acts; “they all left in one Accord ..”
As are you and I. Great post. Change a few details and it could be my own story. I’d clip your toenails for free!
I will answer all these horrible arguments shortly. I am looking for incredibly long articles I can copy and paste.
Stucky- I can provide countering data showing otherwise.
Sure I’m interested, but regardless the limited data you might be able to dredge up, the fact of the matter is that many so called religious wars were actually political motivated
Stucky–So, who is doing all the killing, really?
Semantics = bullshit … funny poster though.
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE1.HTM
DEATH
BY GOVERNMENT
By R.J. Rummel
New Brunswick, N.J.:
Transaction Publishers, 1994.
Truth will come to light; murder cannot be hid long
—-Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice
CONTENTS
Figures and Tables
Forward (by Irving Louis Horowitz)
Preface
Acknowledgments
1. 169,202,000 Murdered: Summary and Conclusions [20th Century Democide]
I BACKGROUND
2. The New Concept of Democide [Definition of Democide]
3. Over 133,147,000 Murdered: Pre-Twentieth Century Democide
II 128,168,000 VICTIMS: THE DEKA-MEGAMURDERERS
4. 61,911,000 Murdered: The Soviet Gulag State
5. 35,236,000 Murdered: The Communist Chinese Ant Hill
6. 20,946,000 Murdered: The Nazi Genocide State
7. 10,214,000 Murdered: The Depraved Nationalist Regime
III 19,178,000 VICTIMS: THE LESSER MEGA-MURDERERS
8. 5,964,000 Murdered: Japan’s Savage Military
9. 2,035,000 Murdered: The Khmer Rouge Hell State
10. 1,883,000 Murdered: Turkey’s Genocidal Purges
11. 1,670,000 Murdered: The Vietnamese War State
12. 1,585,000 Murdered: Poland’s Ethnic Cleansing
13. 1,503,000 Murdered: The Pakistani Cutthroat State
14. 1,072,000 Murdered: Tito’s Slaughterhouse
IV 4,145,000 VICTIMS: SUSPECTED MEGAMURDERERS
15. 1,663,000 Murdered? Orwellian North Korea
16. 1,417,000 Murdered? Barbarous Mexico
17. 1,066,000 Murdered? Feudal Russia
References Index
Stuck, the last post was mine.
The point I’m making is simple.True Christians follow the path of peace and believe God’s gift of free will should be accessible to everyone.
Murderers are not true Christians regardless what they profess.
Junk science serves absolutely no purpose.If you want junk science taught to your kids, do it at home and leave the schools hours for studying real science.
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T-bird,
You are absolutely correct. A belief in evolution requires a huge leap of faith/
http://www.conservapedia.com/Evolution
Lack of Any Clear Transitional Forms
As alluded to earlier, today there are over one hundred million identified and cataloged fossils in the world’s museums.[70] If the evolutionary position was valid, then there should be “transitional forms” in the fossil record reflecting the intermediate life forms. Another term for these “transitional forms” is “missing links”.
charles darwin’s theory of evolution
Charles Darwin wrote: “When we descend to details, we cannot prove that a single species has changed; nor can we prove that the supposed changes are beneficial, which is the groundwork of the theory.”[71]
Charles Darwin admitted that his theory required the existence of “transitional forms.” Darwin wrote: “So that the number of intermediate and transitional links, between all living and extinct species, must have been inconceivably great. But assuredly, if this theory be true, such have lived upon the earth.”[72] However, Darwin wrote: “Why then is not every geological formation and every strata full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely-graduated organic chain; and this perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against my theory.”[73] Darwin thought the lack of transitional links in his time was because “only a small portion of the surface of the earth has been geologically explored and no part with sufficient care…”.[74] As Charles Darwin grew older he became increasingly concerned about the lack of evidence for the theory of evolution in terms of the existence of transitional forms. Darwin wrote, ““When we descend to details, we cannot prove that a single species has changed; nor can we prove that the supposed changes are beneficial, which is the groundwork of the theory.”[75]
Scientist Dr. Michael Denton wrote regarding the fossil record:
“ “It is still, as it was in Darwin’s day, overwhelmingly true that the first representatives of all the major classes of organisms known to biology are already highly characteristic of their class when they make their initial appearance in the fossil record. This phenomenon is particularly obvious in the case of the invertebrate fossil record. At its first appearance in the ancient Paleozoic seas, invertebrate life was already divided into practically all the major groups with which we are familiar today.[76] ”
Creationists assert that evolutionists have had over 140 years to find a transitional fossil and nothing approaching a conclusive transitional form has ever been found and that only a handful of highly doubtful examples of transitional fossils exist.[77] Distinguished anthropologist Sir Edmund R. Leach declared, “Missing links in the sequence of fossil evidence were a worry to Darwin. He felt sure they would eventually turn up, but they are still missing and seem likely to remain so.”[78]
David B. Kitts of the School of Geology and Geophysics at the University of Oklahoma wrote that “Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them…”.[79]
David Raup, who was the curator of geology at the museum holding the world’s largest fossil collection, the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, observed:
“ “[Darwin] was embarrassed by the fossil record because it didn’t look the way he predicted it would …. Well, we are now about 120 years after Darwin, and knowledge of the fossil record has been greatly expanded. We now have a quarter of a million fossil species but the situation hasn’t changed much. … [W]e have even fewer examples of evolutionary transition than we had in Darwin’s time.” – David M. Raup, “Conflicts Between Darwin and Paleontology,” Field Museum of Natural History Bulletin 50 (January 1979): 22-23, 24-25. ”
One of the most famous proponents of the theory of evolution was the late Harvard paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould. But Gould admitted the following:
“ The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils…We fancy ourselves as the only true students of life’s history, yet to preserve our favored account of evolution by natural selection we view our data as so bad that we never see the very process we profess to study.[80]
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Creationism: The ULTIMATE Junk Science
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Proof of creationism:
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What is really all boils down to …..
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TE -First by your examples it seems you equate “atheist” to “not-Christian.maybe throw in the Jews/Muslims” NOT using the Merriam Webster definition of “one who believes that there is no deity…I “belonged” to multiple flavors of Christianity as a child. I’ve had everything from formal mass to speaking in tongues and blaming sin for your diseases. By the age of ten, the outright hypocrisy of my “fellow” Christians was making me crazy.”
Just because you know or aware of a few crazy self-professed Christians is no reason to label them all as such
In defense of the argument that Christianity is anti-science and backward , I merely tried to show that science is not sacrosanct and in fact has been misused for not only personal fame and fortune vai very dubious research , but that atheist leaders have used science to mass murder millions in the twentieth century alone.
I could care less what anyone believes and expect tha same from loud mouth militant atheists.
That’s all..
As far a the contributions of Christians to the art and science….there’s hardly any culture than can match.
List of Christian thinkers in science
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_thinkers_in_science
If not for the foundation of christianity there would never have been a western civilization to destroy.
Christianity S Contributions To Civilization (1928)
http://www.archive.org/stream/christianityscon011938mbp/christianityscon011938mbp_djvu.txt
Stck …not one is denying dino roamed the earth, im just saying he didn’t turn evolve into your great Aunt Hilda
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Richard Dawkins -It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid or insane (or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that). “Put Your Money on Evolution” The New York Times (April 9, 1989) section VII p.35
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There are several thousand anti-atheist pics out there. I hope you don’t post too many more.
As for this thread, it’s gottem silly, so I’m done with it.
To address a few comments from above and some thoughts…
On wars and killing – to try to classify “atheist wars” and contrast with holy wars is kinda silly. It’s orders of magnitude more on the religious war side. But then, if you want to claim that all religious wars were really “political” (which often stems from religion, but let’s not split hairs), then why would the same designation not apply to the claimed “atheist killers”. Anyway, this all misses the point though. Regardless of whether religion has been good, bad, indifferent to the world, it doesn’t address the underlying issue of whether it’s all myths. So, let’s discuss that:
Presumably, if you’re bother by this article and dialogue, you’re Christian. If you’re not, insert your religion and follow the same rationale. We have dozens of popular religions, hundreds of less popular ones, but to pick a few… If you’re Christian, then you believe in Jesus Christ, the stories of old/new testament, etc. If you’re Muslim, it’s Allah and the prophet Mohammed (dozens of spellings, sorry), Hindu – plenty of gods, and the list goes on. There can be only one truth right?
So, if you’re a Christian and you believe what you’ve been indoctrinated into as a child is the correct story, so all the other ones must be fabrications, correct? Still with me?
If that is the case, then why are you perfectly willing to believe that dozens of other religions are fabricated but yours is not? Do you see the lack of objectivity there? Muslims got it wrong? How could Billions (and the fastest growing religion) be wrong? Whatever reply you insert to defend the true nature of your religion is the same argument that defies all other religions.
Let’s talk about objectivity:
I was born and raised Catholic. I went to church, my parents taught Sunday school, I did first communion, etc. I prayed. I went along with the whole thing as a child just like you. As I grew up and took on intellectual pursuits ranging from astrophysics to anthropology to evolutionary biology, it became blatantly obvious how and why religions were established. –> I was raised in the same set of conditions of millions of American “believers” but I sought answers in widely accepted and unrelated sources and came to the conclusion that I did. Now THAT’s objective. Having never questioned your teachings especially in light of all the contradictory observations and literature is NOT objective. What am I missing here?
Conversely, denying the forces of evolution is really no different than Holocaust denial or 9/11 conspiracy theories. I mean, without having been there yourself, of course, there’s never undeniable “proof” of what happened, but it’s pretty obvious. Hitler ordered the mass murder of millions, Bush did not bomb the towers and all the creatures that exist today exhibit the properties they do because of random mutations that happened to survive throughout their prior generations. We observe DNA mutations easily in living creatures today and observe evolution of everything from viruses and bacteria to fruit flies and other creatures with rapid reproductive cycles. There’s a pretty clear fossil record for hundreds of species laying out a very clear pattern of evolution over the millenia. To think of the perfect miracle-like conditions required to even create a fossil, surely our fossil record (what’s been found, and what fossils were ever created) only comprise a very small fraction of all the creatures that have ever lived in between. To deny evolution occurs is NOT objective.
I know, if you’re a devout believer, the evidence doesn’t matter. No matter what the truth is, you’ll always believe the same thing. Because that’s “faith” for ya. Faith doesn’t require objectivity or evidence, only stories.
I don’t mean to insult anyone’s beliefs here, but in order to have a legitimate dialogue on religion, evolution, and why we’re here, tough questions must be asked.
“There can be only one truth right?” —– Darwin’s Money
Well, that’s the $64,000 dollar question, isn’t it?
2+2=4. E=MC2. In such examples, where science, math, and other objective proofs can be given, yes, there can only be one truth.
But there’ is nothing objective about religion or philosophy. Who is to say there can’t be more than one truth?
Usually, it is religions based on monotheism. If there is only one God, and he reveals himself directly, indirectly, or however ….. then clearly every other God must be a false one. But, polytheism in all it’s forms has no problem with several truths. You worship your god, I’ll worship mine, and it’s all good.
For example, the Romans didn’t give a rats ass who the conquered people worshipped — in fact, they encouraged a continuation of existing beliefs — as long as they paid tribute to Rome. Or, is there any example of American Indian tribes going to war against each other because the other tribe didn’t believe in the “right” god? Buddhism is also extremely tolerent of other faiths. Again, it is the monotheists who are the most rigid in declaring, “Only our truth is truth!”.
flash
Why the vitriol? Religious debate sure brings out the emotion, eh?
More than a few folks here share their personal stories, beliefs, experiences , etc. This is a good thing, imho. Why shit all over Darwin? That was uncalled for.
Transitional fossil right here.
Proof that Pussy evolved well before the rest of the human female.
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