Creation or Evolution: The Statistics!!! - Page 2

truthseeker · 09-17-2005, 12:17 AM

Genesis-style creation doesn't seem 'whole' to me. Genesis 4:15 tells me that Adam, Eve, and their offspring were not the only people on the earth.

To think that God took some clay, rounded it up, threw it down, and said "let us make man in our image", isn't adequate. I think God is deeper than that. All around us there is evidence of evolution - why shouldn't humans be subject to it as well? When the sperm meets the egg, it becomes a zygote. It continues to go through the process of evolution until it is viable to live outside the womb. But wait! It doesn't stop there.... The infant becomes a toddler and continues to go through an evolution until that child becomes an adult. Just that simple process that we have seen all of our lives makes me believe that all this began with molecules and kept growing. I don't think that it is impossible for man to have evolved to the straight-backed, two legged form.

StarshipEnterprise · 09-17-2005, 01:43 AM

I voted Evolution. I think the scientific explanation is the best one yet. But for many people, this is not an "either or" question. When I asked my muslim friend if he was a creationist he said, "in this country, there are two extremes, everything being created at once, and evolution." Then he whent on to explain that he believed in the evolution of animals but not of people. There are also many cristians who beleive mostly in creation, but incoorperate some evolution into it as well.

Bandit · 09-17-2005, 01:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by truthseeker

Genesis-style creation doesn't seem 'whole' to me. Genesis 4:15 tells me that Adam, Eve, and their offspring were not the only people on the earth.

To think that God took some clay, rounded it up, threw it down, and said "let us make man in our image", isn't adequate. I think God is deeper than that. All around us there is evidence of evolution - why shouldn't humans be subject to it as well? When the sperm meets the egg, it becomes a zygote. It continues to go through the process of evolution until it is viable to live outside the womb. But wait! It doesn't stop there.... The infant becomes a toddler and continues to go through an evolution until that child becomes an adult. Just that simple process that we have seen all of our lives makes me believe that all this began with molecules and kept growing. I don't think that it is impossible for man to have evolved to the straight-backed, two legged form.

ok then which came first? the man or the woman?

if the man came first & Eve evolved out of Adam...that does not seem right. i think God created a male & a female, created them He. How can that be?
unless you think the woman came first? then adam would be eves son & not her husband.

in the like figure God started growing Jesus in the womb of Mary & we know Jesus came before the church.

How, what, where, when & how long it took...i can't believe i am discussing this again, but i liked your post Truthseeker.

the evolution theory as it is, does not seem whole to me. the prehsitoric still seems to be a different issue from modern man, so I vote creation (ID), again.

Master · 09-17-2005, 04:41 PM

i believe god is energy and energy is everything and everyone.

The whole universe is energy.

I believe in evolution, mainly because it is right before our eyes.
Everything - the entire universe and our earth as well as man made objects
are evolving every second of the day.

And because everything comes from energy or god, that means god is evolving as well. This also means that god is our creator through evolution.

Genesis is not to be taken literally, but metaphorically.

Bandit · 09-17-2005, 04:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Master

Genesis is not to be taken literally, but metaphorically.

i take it both ways

Vajradhara · 09-17-2005, 08:00 PM

Namaste Awaiting the Fifth.

the difference between belief and acceptance of the theory of evolution, in my view, comes down to evidence.

belief can be had regardless of evidence. acceptance, it seems, is predicated on accepting the evidence presented.

this is, perhaps, where we could get into the discussion of what constitutes "justified knowledge". i would posit that the Scientific Method allows us to have justified knowledge whereas belief does not.

by the by, Brian, the Modern Synthesis does describe mechanisms which account for the change in allele frequencies in a population. whether or not it is correct, is a different concern, wouldn't you agree?

metta,

~v

Plaidback · 09-17-2005, 11:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Master

i believe god is energy and energy is everything and everyone.
The whole universe is energy.

that is not a belief, it is the truth

Quote:

I believe in evolution, mainly because it is right before our eyes.
Everything - the entire universe and our earth as well as man made objects
are evolving every second of the day.

Evolution is process applicable to life form, man made object can develop, and change, they do not evolve.

Quote:

And because everything comes from energy or god, that means god is evolving as well. This also means that god is our creator through evolution.

God is Energy, remember, Energy made of truth and love,( elements, spirits,
and dimensions) something that is Constant, impossible to change, impossible to evolve.
It just is, forever. When it comes to Us, God is Life itself, existance.Our Soul.

Every life depends on truth and love, truth and love does not depend on Life, truth and love was here before life, truth and love created life.

Quote:

Genesis is not to be taken literally, but metaphorically.

Genesis is Prophecy, and the only way to understand prophecy is to find truth
in it.

hammer · 09-18-2005, 01:23 AM

Evolution here!

Silverbackman · 09-18-2005, 05:24 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Awaiting_the_fifth

After all the talk recently about Creation and Evolution, I was curious to find out just how many of our CR brethren believe in Evolution and how many in a Genesis style creation.

Please note that this is in no way limited to the Christian idea of Creation, any version of a creation myth is applicable.

I vote evolution.

We have had this before but oh well.

I cannot vote because I believe in both evolution and creation. God created the universe billions of years ago and evolution did the rest

. So in other words God used evolution to create the universe.

littlemissattitude · 09-18-2005, 06:54 AM

I voted for evolution. While I understand that the details of the mechanisms involved have not been fully discovered and understood, I am confident that evolution occurred.

I also feel the need to reiterate Brian's statement that evolutionary theory really does not deal with how life came to be in the first place. As I understand it, biological evolution began to happen after life came into being.

And, I need to take issue with those who want to allow evolution for all other life forms, but not for humans. The structure of DNA is shared by all life forms on the Earth. I think that is all the evidence that is necessary to show that all life forms came out of the same process. Additionally, it is scientific fact that the DNA of humans and chimpanzees is somewhere between 93 percent and 97 percent the same (depending on which source you read). That speaks powerfully to the idea that chimpanzees and humans have a shared ancestor.

Does this mean that I think there is no room for the existence of God or gods? Not at all.

Does it mean that I have problems with the Genesis accounts of how things came into being? You bet, especially since there are two different and mutually exclusive accounts within the first two chapters of the book and I don't buy the idea that one is a spiritual account of creation and the other is a physical account of creation, as the difference has been explained to me.

Silverbackman · 09-18-2005, 08:44 AM

I think the Genesis creation story is nothing more than a made up myth. I rather focus on the teachings of the prophets, because only those have been unchanged.

Quahom1 · 09-18-2005, 02:29 PM

"Genetic drift, may be between 2-7% between Chimpanzees and Humans, however the genetic drift between all mankind is no more that 0.03%. The most drastic of the differences is the division between populations in sub-Saharan Africa and the rest of humanity. Thus it is considered that modern humans originated in Africa and that the population from which the rest of humanity descended left Africa somewhat less than 300,000 years ago, ultimately replacing earlier humans, like the Pithecanthropines (Homo erectus, like Peking Man, etc.), who had also evolved in Africa but left many thousands of years earlier."

"Part of this research was the theory of "Eve," a single female in Africa, around 200,000 years ago, from whom every living human being is now descended. This does not mean that there were not other human females -- there were -- or that we are not descended from them too -- we are. The theory is based on the circumstance that some human genetic material is contained in the mitochondria, little organs in a cell outside the nucleus (where most genetic material is contained). Sperm cells do not pass on their mitochondria to a fertilzed egg and so all human mitochondrial DNA is inherited from the mother. If a woman has only sons (a highly desirable result in many traditional cultures), then her own mitochondrial DNA is actually lost. Over time, this seems to have happened to all lines of descent of mitochrondiral DNA, except one, the line from "Eve." Another interesting feature of the chart is the closeness of American Indians to modern population across Europe, the Middle East, and northern East Asia. Thus, curiously, Europeans are more closely related to American Indians than to Polynesians. Finally, it is noteworthy that skin color is not at all helpful is providing clues to genetic affinity. The darkest colored people on earth, in Africa, India, Melanesia, and Australia, are scattered between groups that are only distantly related. Dark skin color is certainly a function of living under the equatorial sun for many generations, but all human populations have the genetic wherewithal to make that adaptation."

"The March 29, 1999, Newsweek reports (p. 72) that population geneticist Jody Hey and anthropologist Eugene Harris, of Rutgers University, reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that, using DNA techniques again, the African population split from the non-African about 189,000 years ago. The article presents this as well before the emergence of "modern" Homo sapiens and somewhat surprising, but it actually seems fairly consistent with the numbers presented above. If Home sapiens goes back 300,000 years and "Eve" is around 200,000 years ago, then it is not beyond the bounds of crediblity that we could get the basic split in the populations not too long after that. The margin of error is also probably pretty large."
(Kelley L. Ross, Ph.D.)

From this article, much is gleaned, and fuel for the fire of evolution and creation is added. First off, man is not that old, in fact the youngest form of life to join planet earth. Second, it appears that man does have a common mother, based on micro biological evidence. We seem to all share traits coming from a single female. However, there is also evidence that before man (that is the garden of eden, man), there were prototypes, that did not make it, and they went back at least 100,000 years before the arrival of modern man (from a single mother). Now, some carry the traits of protoman, but all of us carry traits from a single modern man. Also note that Chimpanzees do not carry any of those unique markers that we all carry.

There is a huge chasm between a .03% varience in genetic drift and a 2-7% varience.

Seems to me that one could argue that evolution has occured all along, however, something happened about 189,000 years ago that set man apart from all other life forms, and that it was significant enough to not only cause a physical isolation from the rest of the animal kingdom, but isolation in every other way as well.

Genetic drift cannot be over come (by today's technology) to breed human with Chimp, but neither can it be over come to breed Chimp with Gorilla (Chimps are closer genetically to man than they are to Gorillas).

Indeed, as far as physical attributes, man has more in common with equines, and that is an impossible cross breed potential (unless one believes in centaurs).

Perhaps, 200 millenia ago sentience finally dawned in Man, and God smiled and said "Good morning, I've been waiting for you to awaken. We've got lots to do..."

my thoughts.

v/r

Q

Master · 09-18-2005, 02:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Plaidback

God is Energy, remember, Energy made of truth and love,( elements, spirits,
and dimensions) something that is Constant, impossible to change, impossible to evolve.
It just is, forever. When it comes to Us, God is Life itself, existance.Our Soul.

Interesting comment Plaidback.
Does this mean that time and distance is an illusion?

And if this is so then that means that there is no evolution. It also means there is no creation. It means that there just is. Do you agree?

Plaidback · 09-18-2005, 06:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Silverbackman

I think the Genesis creation story is nothing more than a made up myth. I rather focus on the teachings of the prophets, because only those have been unchanged.

Prophecy is story that is going to happen, prediction about event, that is going to take place in exact time in future. Prophet, inspired by God (truth & love),
wrote that Vision down, created a book, and those books by various Prophets
are put into One called Torah. True enough, it was given to Jews, but it
Concern entire Humanity, not like Jews believe, only Jews.
To put things in todays perspective, those Jewish Prophets were storytellers,
just like we have Directors and Actors today. And some have told Us same stories Prophets did, but in their way, inspired by same "Muse".
So Moses was Spielberg or Lucas of His time, giving us Truth, that have happend, and is still happening.
God is everything, including Science, so story about creation by Moses was just
Metaphoricaly presented Tale adjusted to fit Jewish mindframe of those days.
That's why Moses "spiced up" story about creation with " six " day of "God's"
work, to fit that into, work six days, and dedicate Saturday to God.
But, in real life God do not have "Days".
That is why is important to look @ Genesis as only book that have double
Standard. It is testimony about Beginning and the End of Human race as we know it.
If you have people today, that literaly believe in, Man being created from
Dirt, and woman having conversation with Snake, it's just proof that,
with brain they were given to work with, they couldn't jump to any other conclusion.
Genesis is metaphore about end of times, repeated in Revelation, in which
first human couple, rejected God's truth and excepted Belief instead.
For which, "punishment" was death.
Now humans have to reject Beliefs and recognize truth if they want to
exist forever, because we are in those days, when You will either Die, or
Exist forever ( which is not Life anymore ).
Six days are 6000 years, (in Our terms ),true enough, Man and woman did turned into "Dirt" (metaphoricaly) today, and is time to make that cross
from mortality into eternity.
First couple was flesh and blood when they were Eternal, so this flesh of ours
can also cross into eternity, because Our body is capable of producing
chemical that rejuvenate and stop aging of a Cell.
Meaning when The End happen, Older People that are going to cross into eternity will Phisicaly rejuvenate into shape they desire. And the last babies born will grow to desired Human form ( or what we used to call age )

So no, Genesis is not a Myth, Myth is Illusion, Genesis is Truth.

Plaidback · 09-18-2005, 07:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Master

Interesting comment Plaidback.
Does this mean that time and distance is an illusion?

People are reluctant to accept God's truth, because of fear in loosing control over their life. Which is so childish. It is simply accepting the Truth,
that We Are Making Choices, behind which is God. We just walking the Path,
He created for Us, just like He created everything else. All we need is pure joy of
feeling His Love, inside Us, as Him being our Life.
That is why time is an Illusion, again we playing on God's turf, and God does not have time. We live in places that thanks to rotation of planet, giving us Day and Night, and we invented ( as most inteligent species ) " time measuring " devices.
Truth still is, we are born in one day, we live one day, and we die in same day.
Distance is not illusion, and it exist in Eternity, where measurements don't.
Balance, simmetry, and distance are spiritual dimensions, just like they are
Mathematical. Whenever you feel what Me or anybody else feel, there is no
spiritual Distance between Us.

Quote:

And if this is so then that means that there is no evolution. It also means there is no creation. It means that there just is. Do you agree?

Evolution is reality, we can not deny that. It is clear to see how Human brain
evolved, and it is going to get into a full potential use also.With simple
thought process that will reveal your personal truth to you, about who you really are, you will get to a process similar to deleting all files you don't need on your computers hard drive. And speed of your thinking will increase, because your brain will be focused on future only, not past.
Creation must have happend, One way or another, first Human couple came to a scene, followed by first birth. How, when, who cares .