Atheism quotes
- Thread starter WHITE DEVIL
- Start date
From a philosophical perspective though, it is still a theory. We could not state that it is an undisputed fact unless every case of evolution were observed and proven to follow the rules that evolution is based on.
Science is superior to religion in the sense that not only is it reproducible, but it allows for challenges - if there are any flaws in a specific theory, then that theory is either adapted to fit the observations or thrown out of the window. Since the development of the theory of evolution by means of natural selection, millions of observations have supported it's method whereas none have disputed it. This is no small achievement seeing that 'God's people' were up in arms, trying desperately to show it to be untrue.
I'm one of the strongest advocates of evolution by means of natural selection, but for the sake of argument I avoid using the word 'fact' when describing it. It is, however, the strongest theory ever to have been devised, and the chance of it being untrue is so infentesimably small that it is, for all intents and purposes, a fact.
Science is superior to religion in the sense that not only is it reproducible, but it allows for challenges - if there are any flaws in a specific theory, then that theory is either adapted to fit the observations or thrown out of the window. Since the development of the theory of evolution by means of natural selection, millions of observations have supported it's method whereas none have disputed it. This is no small achievement seeing that 'God's people' were up in arms, trying desperately to show it to be untrue.
I'm one of the strongest advocates of evolution by means of natural selection, but for the sake of argument I avoid using the word 'fact' when describing it. It is, however, the strongest theory ever to have been devised, and the chance of it being untrue is so infentesimably small that it is, for all intents and purposes, a fact.
I also want to ask him a question - what kind of proof for evolution should be presented according to him?
if you're not accepting all the evidence avilable cliaming it's inconclusive, you have to be able to say what you consider conclusive evidence
otherwise you're simply dismissing all the evidence presented to you because it doesn't fit your views, period.
if you're not accepting all the evidence avilable cliaming it's inconclusive, you have to be able to say what you consider conclusive evidence
otherwise you're simply dismissing all the evidence presented to you because it doesn't fit your views, period.
Is that so? Believers of what, there are many things you can tie the word "believer" with. You're a joke, you're the most closed minded atheist or scientist on this board. Most atheists on here have denied the existence of God for the fact that they haven't seen him with their five senses. They never completely threw out any notions or possibilities that God or a god may exist. As far as the Spaghetti monster ball god question, you're just looking for fallacies homie. Then could I say, for the 100 people that believe in this ridiculous monster as their god, what can you say about The God of the Christians, Jews and Muslims? What about the Hindus, Zoroastrians, and Sikhs? But never mind, cause you chose to blindly accept what sciences approves as fact, just like a blind zealous believer would, accepting any dogma from a religious leader.
Seriously, with the General population of Christians which is about 1 billion people, and 1 billion Muslims, adding the Jews into the Mix, how could 1/3 of the world's population go on for thousands of years(Jews and Christians) and the past 1500 years(Muslims) living believing in such a stupid thing?
Since you have already told Heresy and pretty much "believers" on this board that you refuse to understand the bible, which I'm pretty sure you won't understand other religions, there's no use in going on with an argument or conversation with you.
Seriously, with the General population of Christians which is about 1 billion people, and 1 billion Muslims, adding the Jews into the Mix, how could 1/3 of the world's population go on for thousands of years(Jews and Christians) and the past 1500 years(Muslims) living believing in such a stupid thing?
Since you have already told Heresy and pretty much "believers" on this board that you refuse to understand the bible, which I'm pretty sure you won't understand other religions, there's no use in going on with an argument or conversation with you.
Haha, no I'm not like that bruh, I'm not even 'religious' per se, I just believe in a God. I have certain issues with different aspects of different religions so I'd never reject evolution simply because it doesn't 'fit my view'. I'm just extremely open minded and I live by the quote of Shakespeare who wrote:
"The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool."
Even if I did commit myself to believing in evolution there's a chance that I'd be wrong so I'd rather keep an open mind seeing as how in my opinion there's more evidence for a God than for evolution.
As far as any claim being made I simply require demonstratable or mathematical proof. Out of all of the so-called sciences evolution seems to have the most difficult time doing this which makes it suspect. Too many models and not enough concrete data to coincide with the models of the theory and in my opinion evolution survives on 75% imagination and 25% science.
Physics - Observable and laws can be proven mathematically (compromising)
Astronomy - Observable (compromising)
Core Biology - Observable (compromising)
Chemistry - Observable and laws can be proven mathematically (compromising)
Psychology - Observable and at times theoretical (compromising)
Cosmology - Theoretical and at times observable (compromising)
Darwinism/Evolution - Completely theoretical (uncompromising)
Religion - Spiritual and faith based (uncompromising)
Ok, I'm fully aware of some of the details that provide a case, like retro genes and pseudo genes which is supposed proof of shared ancestry, but I've read good arguments against it, plus, there's just way too much that man doesn't know due to his blunder. Many proposed nonfunctional parts of the body for instance, have later been found to serve a function and interpretations of data changes over time(shared ancestry can resemble common design and vice versa). Put yourself in context of the times, people swore on everything that the earth was flat not too long ago but science changes. No doubt that even if evolution were a fact we've only scratched the surface of it and 100+ years of study can never be enough time to crack the mysteries of life. How much information is out there and how much do we have? 1%, .5%? Out of the information we do have who's to say that we're interpreting it correctly or if we're possibly linking it with things that generally don't link and creating theories out of it?
From what I know, here's what I'll admit..
1)All things change over time and genes are unstable (they mutate)
2)Environmental factors stress this process even more and creatures somehow adapt to environments best suited for them.
3) Humans do in fact resemble apes and I guess that it would be a logical conclusion to presume that humans and apes have a recent common ancestor.
Do we know this for sure and should I invest my energy into accepting this theory and debating it with people at the expense of religious belief? I don't think so, both sides have great arguments in my opinion but I lean towards a God because it answers more questions for me than evolution does. When evolution begins to answer those questions with associated proof then I'll take my time out to take it as seriously as I do the laws of gravity and thermodynamics .
1. Can any one here prove to me that life came from inorganic matter, then explain how? (This is extremely difficult for me to believe and is one of the big reasons I can't come to terms with this theory)
2. Someone please explain to me what is a conscious and what is morality? (not the 'theoretical' aspects, the scientific ones since this is very important for theists to know before making any sudden and significant changes in belief systems).
3. Where did all of this information come from, including the first bit of information? Also how was this one cell so successful so early on, were they already equipped with protection against external forces? (Where did all of these DNA sequences come from and how'd they arise from a random sequence in a single cell at the beginning of time and how'd it spread so far?)
All the way back up to us..
4. What is a species, what decides that, and what is homo floresiensis, a human or a homo erectus descendant?
5. Where are all of the transition fossils besides the few we have? (yea, I know, fossils are hard to find, just pleading the question)
6. Why do so many people believe in a God compared to those who don't? (Which means nothing but it's hard to believe that billions of people are simply delusional.)
These are just generally questions trying to ask why religion or simply theism should be replaced with evolution? Has evolution truly gained that much ground or is it still in its infancy? Religion has probably been around since Adam, evolution has been around since Darwin so in my opinion evolution simply has a hard burden of proof to uphold. In the end what will it take for me to accept evolution?
Show it to me, where is it? If you can't do that physically or mathematically (in some type of formula), then it's just a theory still in my opinion..
"The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool."
Even if I did commit myself to believing in evolution there's a chance that I'd be wrong so I'd rather keep an open mind seeing as how in my opinion there's more evidence for a God than for evolution.
As far as any claim being made I simply require demonstratable or mathematical proof. Out of all of the so-called sciences evolution seems to have the most difficult time doing this which makes it suspect. Too many models and not enough concrete data to coincide with the models of the theory and in my opinion evolution survives on 75% imagination and 25% science.
Physics - Observable and laws can be proven mathematically (compromising)
Astronomy - Observable (compromising)
Core Biology - Observable (compromising)
Chemistry - Observable and laws can be proven mathematically (compromising)
Psychology - Observable and at times theoretical (compromising)
Cosmology - Theoretical and at times observable (compromising)
Darwinism/Evolution - Completely theoretical (uncompromising)
Religion - Spiritual and faith based (uncompromising)
Ok, I'm fully aware of some of the details that provide a case, like retro genes and pseudo genes which is supposed proof of shared ancestry, but I've read good arguments against it, plus, there's just way too much that man doesn't know due to his blunder. Many proposed nonfunctional parts of the body for instance, have later been found to serve a function and interpretations of data changes over time(shared ancestry can resemble common design and vice versa). Put yourself in context of the times, people swore on everything that the earth was flat not too long ago but science changes. No doubt that even if evolution were a fact we've only scratched the surface of it and 100+ years of study can never be enough time to crack the mysteries of life. How much information is out there and how much do we have? 1%, .5%? Out of the information we do have who's to say that we're interpreting it correctly or if we're possibly linking it with things that generally don't link and creating theories out of it?
From what I know, here's what I'll admit..
1)All things change over time and genes are unstable (they mutate)
2)Environmental factors stress this process even more and creatures somehow adapt to environments best suited for them.
3) Humans do in fact resemble apes and I guess that it would be a logical conclusion to presume that humans and apes have a recent common ancestor.
Do we know this for sure and should I invest my energy into accepting this theory and debating it with people at the expense of religious belief? I don't think so, both sides have great arguments in my opinion but I lean towards a God because it answers more questions for me than evolution does. When evolution begins to answer those questions with associated proof then I'll take my time out to take it as seriously as I do the laws of gravity and thermodynamics .
1. Can any one here prove to me that life came from inorganic matter, then explain how? (This is extremely difficult for me to believe and is one of the big reasons I can't come to terms with this theory)
2. Someone please explain to me what is a conscious and what is morality? (not the 'theoretical' aspects, the scientific ones since this is very important for theists to know before making any sudden and significant changes in belief systems).
3. Where did all of this information come from, including the first bit of information? Also how was this one cell so successful so early on, were they already equipped with protection against external forces? (Where did all of these DNA sequences come from and how'd they arise from a random sequence in a single cell at the beginning of time and how'd it spread so far?)
All the way back up to us..
4. What is a species, what decides that, and what is homo floresiensis, a human or a homo erectus descendant?
5. Where are all of the transition fossils besides the few we have? (yea, I know, fossils are hard to find, just pleading the question)
6. Why do so many people believe in a God compared to those who don't? (Which means nothing but it's hard to believe that billions of people are simply delusional.)
These are just generally questions trying to ask why religion or simply theism should be replaced with evolution? Has evolution truly gained that much ground or is it still in its infancy? Religion has probably been around since Adam, evolution has been around since Darwin so in my opinion evolution simply has a hard burden of proof to uphold. In the end what will it take for me to accept evolution?
Show it to me, where is it? If you can't do that physically or mathematically (in some type of formula), then it's just a theory still in my opinion..
Just because the possibility that there is a God exists, even if it's infinitesimally small, I am supposed to believe it, with zero evidence indicating it is true, right? And, if I don't, I am immediately, labeled "closed-minded".
I will tell you why I'm closed-minded - because when the believrs here are presented evidence, arguments, logical conclusions about how extremely unlikely (I'm using the mildest expression possible) the existence of God is, based on what we know about the world today, they just can't fight it, because they have nothing in support of their claims.
Here is where their last defensive tactics come in use - "Naw, you're closed-minded, because you don't accept the possiblity", "You don't know the Bible" etc.
I know what's written in the Bible well enough to consider it one big lie (except for the occasional accurate historical description here and there)
I am not going to waste my time studying something that has no relevance to the world I'm living in. For me the Bible doesn't have even a 1/1000000 of the useful information which I can find in a single issue if Nature.
When I asked HERESY to "educate my lost soul in the word of God", he did what? Nothing...
Well, if you don't want those who don't know the word of God (according to your own words) to hear it, then it is extremely hypocritical to blame them for not knowing it.
OK, I asked a question and you posted a long ass comment without answer ing it, I'll remeber that and take it as you escaping my question
Now point by point:
Mathematical proof is possible only in mathematics and pure logic
It is not possible in any experimental science, including physics and chemistry. Physical laws are not 100% certain (I am sorry if you thought they are, but they're not) because they have to be experimentally verified and often they tend to be valid in certain systems with certain approximation but not in absoulte terms. Same for chemistry. Does that mean that chemistry and physics are note real? Not at all because these laws have been tested so many times, it is extremely unlikely that they're false.
Evolution is not a science, it is the fundamental theory of biology. Dismissing evolution, you dismiss the whole modern biology. It is true that things in biology are the most uncertain compared to the other two natural sciences, because you have very little control over your experimental system, but that doesn't mean what biologists have found so far is false.
Forget about the pure mathematical proofs, they don't exist neither in physics in chemistry (there is a reason why Hawking and Witten will never get the Nobel prize), nor in biology.
As far as demostratable proof is concerned, plenty of it is available, don't make me cite again that loooong list of observed evolutionary events in the last century.
cite them, I haven't read any good alternative explanation
yes, there's a lot ot be learned
does it mean we have to dismiss our current model, which fits the data so well, just because "there's too much we don't know"
BTW nobody understand how gravitation works, but that doesn't prevent you from believing in it. Why?
Physics is not a complete science, there is an enormous amount of work to be done there, yet nobody attacks it. Maybe because nobody's emotions are hurt by physic...?
BTW theories of modern physics also don't leave much space for a God of the Christian type, perhaps that's the reason why physicists are the second most atheistic group after biologists...
How does that disprove evolution?
Atavisms are given in textbooks (or at least they should be, I don't know which shitty americam textbook you have read) as examples of evolutionary changes, not as proof for it.
Homologous organs are a whole different story though
Evolution is the valid theory until proven wrong, period. Nothing better explainig the data has been proposed.
I suggets that you put youself in the context of times and realize that the theory of evolution was developed by creationists, who were lookin to explain how God created living organisms. They faced the came emotional objections you have. If there was any valid evidence against the theory, the theory would not exist now
not true, organisms adapt to the envirionment whatever it is, it doesn't have to be the one that's "best suited for them"
otherwise they die
That's a step in the right direction, congratulations!
Which questions does God explain better?
God poses one big unsolvable question - where did God came from?
First, the separation between inorganic and organic matter is entirely conventional. Your body is mostly inorganic matter (H2O) and it is constantly releasing inorganic matter (CO2 and H2O, salts) from it's metabolism. Every organism is constantly renewed and the molecules necessary for that renewal ultimately come from plants (who fix CO2) and bacteria (who fix nitrogen), and plants and bacteria get CO2 and nitrogen from the air, which is inorganic
Your question doesn't make sense at all.
As far as the proof for the chemical synthesis of life - living organisms today are entirely chemically based so they must have started to be chemically based at some point - the logic says the best candidate for that moment is the very origin of life
You use these terms left and right so you should know better than me
I can only tell you morality is a vague terms used to descirbe certain behaviourial characteristics of humans which have been selected for in evolution either on the level of genes or on the level of mems, most likely both. Consciousness is the set of processes that happen in your brain based on eletrochemical potentials and synapses between neurons, connected in complex networks, allowing your brain to analyze the information coming form the environment . David Anderson from Caltech, Richard Axell and others are doing some very exciting work right now in Drosophila and mouse where they can actually visualize each and evey neuron responsible for a particular type of behaviourial reaction. Same mechanisms operate in humans, just much more complex
It almost certainly wasn't a cell, a cell is a too complex strucutre for life to begin with it. You are obviously uninformed about the current theories explaining the origin of life which is OK, I am not going to teach you all that stuff, but you also have some misconceptions about biological information which I'll try to fix.
First, when you say "Where did all of this information come from" you need to define what information is. All that was needed for life to begin was long biopolymers capable of replicating themselves. Once you have that, they will form populations and Darwinian selection can start doing its job. Random synthesis of RNAs yields self-replicating molecules, this has been experimentally tested many times. Now, because I am sure, you'll point out "The chance of that happening...", I have to say that there is no function in biology that can be performed by just one particular sequence. Many different molecules can do the same thing, and many more have been simultaneously synthesized.
Nobody really knows how the genetic code was first set up, how nucleic acids and proteins adopted their current roles, there are many unanswered questions, all that happened at least 4 billion years ago. Perhaps we
ll never know the exact order of events, but we know that random synthesis of non-periodic heteropolymers is sufficient to create a diverise set of catalysts.
Once you have replicating heteropolymers, selection can start and they can evovle. A crucial point is that there were no DNA repair systems then and replication wasn't so carefully controled so evolution must have been much much faster.
The common mechanism of increasing information in biological systems is gene duplication followed by divergence of the sequences.
That's the way protein families arise.
BTW, I think most people don't realize that the origin of life is actually irrelevant to evolution because it just doesn't deal with that question. Evolution describes the change of genetic infromation with time. How life first appear doesn't really change anything.
What is Homo floresiensis is is currently debatabe, I can't answer the question
A species is a set of individuals in populations that can freely cross with each other and that can't cross with individuals from other species (with few exceptions)
Very often the boundary between two species is not well-defined, especially when speciation is under way, there are numerous examples
some are in museum collections waiting to be described, some are waiting to be discovered, others have been destroyed by geological process, and some do not exist because the organisms they would have belonged to couldn't fossilize at all or it just happened that way that they didn't left any remains
We have more than enough examples of transitional fossils to be sure evolution happened, I can assure you. Just because you don't know about them, that doesn't mean scientists don't know either.
religion is a very stable meme:
and then I don't understand why you think what most people think is necessarily true, it is well-known that most people are idiots
There is no proof Adam existed
Gravity has only been around since Newton which is not that much more time than evolution.
Relativity is even younger...
The age of a scientific theory has nothing to do with its validity, it's evidence that matters and it's overwhelmingly in favour of evolution
You're just showing how incredibly dumb you are by saying this
Pure mathematical proof is not possible in natural sciences, I'm saying this for the n-hundreth time. The proof is in the amount of the evidence we have. It is not my fault you haven't made the effort to look it up, I personally have presented more than enough here, so I don't have to that again, but still:
1. Evolution has been observed and reproduced numerous times in nature and in labs, on the level of molecules, cells and organisms - evolution happens
2. The fossil record, the comparative genomics, anatomy, morphology, embryology and physyology clearly show that evolution happened in the past
Now point by point:
Mathematical proof is possible only in mathematics and pure logic
It is not possible in any experimental science, including physics and chemistry. Physical laws are not 100% certain (I am sorry if you thought they are, but they're not) because they have to be experimentally verified and often they tend to be valid in certain systems with certain approximation but not in absoulte terms. Same for chemistry. Does that mean that chemistry and physics are note real? Not at all because these laws have been tested so many times, it is extremely unlikely that they're false.
Evolution is not a science, it is the fundamental theory of biology. Dismissing evolution, you dismiss the whole modern biology. It is true that things in biology are the most uncertain compared to the other two natural sciences, because you have very little control over your experimental system, but that doesn't mean what biologists have found so far is false.
Forget about the pure mathematical proofs, they don't exist neither in physics in chemistry (there is a reason why Hawking and Witten will never get the Nobel prize), nor in biology.
As far as demostratable proof is concerned, plenty of it is available, don't make me cite again that loooong list of observed evolutionary events in the last century.
cite them, I haven't read any good alternative explanation
yes, there's a lot ot be learned
does it mean we have to dismiss our current model, which fits the data so well, just because "there's too much we don't know"
BTW nobody understand how gravitation works, but that doesn't prevent you from believing in it. Why?
Physics is not a complete science, there is an enormous amount of work to be done there, yet nobody attacks it. Maybe because nobody's emotions are hurt by physic...?
BTW theories of modern physics also don't leave much space for a God of the Christian type, perhaps that's the reason why physicists are the second most atheistic group after biologists...
How does that disprove evolution?
Atavisms are given in textbooks (or at least they should be, I don't know which shitty americam textbook you have read) as examples of evolutionary changes, not as proof for it.
Homologous organs are a whole different story though
Evolution is the valid theory until proven wrong, period. Nothing better explainig the data has been proposed.
I suggets that you put youself in the context of times and realize that the theory of evolution was developed by creationists, who were lookin to explain how God created living organisms. They faced the came emotional objections you have. If there was any valid evidence against the theory, the theory would not exist now
not true, organisms adapt to the envirionment whatever it is, it doesn't have to be the one that's "best suited for them"
otherwise they die
That's a step in the right direction, congratulations!
Which questions does God explain better?
God poses one big unsolvable question - where did God came from?
First, the separation between inorganic and organic matter is entirely conventional. Your body is mostly inorganic matter (H2O) and it is constantly releasing inorganic matter (CO2 and H2O, salts) from it's metabolism. Every organism is constantly renewed and the molecules necessary for that renewal ultimately come from plants (who fix CO2) and bacteria (who fix nitrogen), and plants and bacteria get CO2 and nitrogen from the air, which is inorganic
Your question doesn't make sense at all.
As far as the proof for the chemical synthesis of life - living organisms today are entirely chemically based so they must have started to be chemically based at some point - the logic says the best candidate for that moment is the very origin of life
You use these terms left and right so you should know better than me
I can only tell you morality is a vague terms used to descirbe certain behaviourial characteristics of humans which have been selected for in evolution either on the level of genes or on the level of mems, most likely both. Consciousness is the set of processes that happen in your brain based on eletrochemical potentials and synapses between neurons, connected in complex networks, allowing your brain to analyze the information coming form the environment . David Anderson from Caltech, Richard Axell and others are doing some very exciting work right now in Drosophila and mouse where they can actually visualize each and evey neuron responsible for a particular type of behaviourial reaction. Same mechanisms operate in humans, just much more complex
It almost certainly wasn't a cell, a cell is a too complex strucutre for life to begin with it. You are obviously uninformed about the current theories explaining the origin of life which is OK, I am not going to teach you all that stuff, but you also have some misconceptions about biological information which I'll try to fix.
First, when you say "Where did all of this information come from" you need to define what information is. All that was needed for life to begin was long biopolymers capable of replicating themselves. Once you have that, they will form populations and Darwinian selection can start doing its job. Random synthesis of RNAs yields self-replicating molecules, this has been experimentally tested many times. Now, because I am sure, you'll point out "The chance of that happening...", I have to say that there is no function in biology that can be performed by just one particular sequence. Many different molecules can do the same thing, and many more have been simultaneously synthesized.
Nobody really knows how the genetic code was first set up, how nucleic acids and proteins adopted their current roles, there are many unanswered questions, all that happened at least 4 billion years ago. Perhaps we
ll never know the exact order of events, but we know that random synthesis of non-periodic heteropolymers is sufficient to create a diverise set of catalysts.
Once you have replicating heteropolymers, selection can start and they can evovle. A crucial point is that there were no DNA repair systems then and replication wasn't so carefully controled so evolution must have been much much faster.
The common mechanism of increasing information in biological systems is gene duplication followed by divergence of the sequences.
That's the way protein families arise.
BTW, I think most people don't realize that the origin of life is actually irrelevant to evolution because it just doesn't deal with that question. Evolution describes the change of genetic infromation with time. How life first appear doesn't really change anything.
What is Homo floresiensis is is currently debatabe, I can't answer the question
A species is a set of individuals in populations that can freely cross with each other and that can't cross with individuals from other species (with few exceptions)
Very often the boundary between two species is not well-defined, especially when speciation is under way, there are numerous examples
some are in museum collections waiting to be described, some are waiting to be discovered, others have been destroyed by geological process, and some do not exist because the organisms they would have belonged to couldn't fossilize at all or it just happened that way that they didn't left any remains
We have more than enough examples of transitional fossils to be sure evolution happened, I can assure you. Just because you don't know about them, that doesn't mean scientists don't know either.
religion is a very stable meme:
and then I don't understand why you think what most people think is necessarily true, it is well-known that most people are idiots
There is no proof Adam existed
Gravity has only been around since Newton which is not that much more time than evolution.
Relativity is even younger...
The age of a scientific theory has nothing to do with its validity, it's evidence that matters and it's overwhelmingly in favour of evolution
You're just showing how incredibly dumb you are by saying this
Pure mathematical proof is not possible in natural sciences, I'm saying this for the n-hundreth time. The proof is in the amount of the evidence we have. It is not my fault you haven't made the effort to look it up, I personally have presented more than enough here, so I don't have to that again, but still:
1. Evolution has been observed and reproduced numerous times in nature and in labs, on the level of molecules, cells and organisms - evolution happens
2. The fossil record, the comparative genomics, anatomy, morphology, embryology and physyology clearly show that evolution happened in the past