itt: evolution and trolling

[Kolar]

And for the longest time people wouldn't accept a universe that had a beginning, and eventually an end. But given the overwhelming evidence for the big bang it became accepted into the current cosmological frame work. That took decades of research, testing and advanced technology to come to that point. ID has not gotten off its feet in comparison. It's dead in the water. And to note at least the Catholic faith has had some respect for the scientific method and has actually supported such pursuits as cosmology.

Edit: Lemaître was also a physicist, he wasn't about to pull some bad math and physics proofs out of his ass to prove his religion right. Until Hubble came along even Einstein thought his theory was junk but new information like that the universe is expanding by noticing the red shift of other galaxies in relation to ours changed his and others minds. I'm not saying that makes any theory just as plausible or likely, Lemaître made a case for an expanding universe, not a universe created by God(s) and actually had solid math and physics as well as physical evidence of our observations of the universe to back it up.

[milosh]

Bible quotes are coming out, so I'm done with this conversation. I have stirred the boiling pot enough, and I am resigning my position as forum troll. Good luck with all further discussion.

[castromarx]

Actually, this thread died at post #132 via Godwin's Law (and your dig at Marx)

[Summa]

Nice attempt Exalt, but you forgot one tiny thing. We carbon dated the fossils to far before 2000 years ago. NO DINO FOR YOU

EDIT: and oh yeah, one solitary reference could just be shear dumb luck, plus most of the is from the old testament which is not supposed to be taken literal according to most branches of christianity (even though they took it literally back in the day)

[Epinephrine]

I was just wondering how we know that the big bang took place, and what all it entails Epi? I'm genuinely interested since I've never really researched it.

Here's the most simple way I can explain it... It's been a while since I learned about it formally so I can't be any more specific:

1) Light is a wave.

2) All waves, when moving towards you are compressed from your point of view, when moving away they seem to be expanded. This is the basis for radar guns that the police use, and it is called the Doppler effect. For light which is a wave, this means that waves coming towards you look more blue, and waves moving away are more red.

3) If you take a good survey of the sky, we see that the vast majority of the most distant objects (aka galaxies, as all the individual stars that we see are within our own galaxy) are redder then they should be. Using further astronomical calculations and observations including comparing brightness of similarly sized galaxies and so on, we have been able to asertain that in fact the further away a galaxy is from us, the MORE red it is. That is, the further away from us an object is, the faster it is moving away from us.

4) We know that light has a speed that we can measure. So we know that we are seeing distant objects as they were billions of years ago because that's when their light first came from us. We can also using various methods calculate how far the most distant objects are from us, and they are approximately 14 billion light years away, or to put it another way, those objects existed 14 billion years ago.

5) We can conjecture that the universe is not infinite with infinite matter, because if it were, the entire sky would be white as infinite stars in an infinite universe would mean eventually if you go far away enough, every single point of the universe would be filled with someone from our perspective on Earth, and thus there would be no blackness of space.

6) Beyond the furthest galaxies, the only thing that we can see is... background radiation. In fact if we take a very careful measurement of the night sky, we see that from every single direction, we can see a residual background radiation which is only minorly above absolute zero. We can conjecture that this represents the leftover heat from the big bang.


So we know a few things. Firstly the universe is expanding, and that further away objects are going away even faster. We know that if it is expanding, at some point things were a lot closer together, which is just logical. We know that we can only see so far, and since time = distance with light, we can only see so far back in time. Beyond that we cannot see anything but background radiation.

From various calculations, we think that which we cannot see was actually because it was before galaxies could not form yet. The early universe was too hot for matter and energy to exist seperately. Eventually as the universe expanded enough, there was enough space for everything to cool down enough to form matter. The residual stuff is the background radiation.

The background radiation which is not uniform (but actually slightly different in all parts by microscopic amounts) tells us that the early universe was not uniform. This non-uniformness was probably the effects of gravity and other forces which allowed the energy to change into matter and into stars and galaxies.

Eventually if we extrapolate back far enough from expansion and from all the observations that we have, we know that we can see up to about 100,000 years after what we postulate to be the big bang. Before that we have no observations whatsoever. It is more of a conjecture that if it is expanding it all started at one point... and that point is the big bang.


As for what the universe is actually expanding into, no one really knows.

The rest of it is super complicated mathematics that I haven't learned myself as I'm not an astronomer.

[Kolar]

To add to Epi's post there are competing ideas on the fate of the universe. I believe the most supported one right now is a "cold death". Every star in the universe uses up its fuel and no new stars are born, eventually the universe becomes cold, with no new stars forming life can no longer survive (if it still does at that point).

The other one the "Big Rip" calls for everything in the Universe to expand to a point where it "rips", everything from galaxies, stars, planets all the way to atoms rip apart.

The big crunch is another one which I don't think a lot of people support anymore. The universe basically collapses on its self back to the singularity.

[Galleleo]

I would like to point out science never claims anything to be true, rather science aims to prove things are false. Alot of non-scientists (and some scientists) don't seem to understand this.

A piece of evidence, or research could come to light that destroy some science we would call "true".

The only thing with proofs and truths is mathematics

I don't remember everything exactly again. But this is not entirely true. There are different thought lines within science. That one, the fallacy thingy, that everything is true until it gets falsified is from Kant I believe.

I am not saying you are completely wrong, but it does depend on which thought line you follow.

[DankNuggets]

ITT: at most, 5 people debate the subject at hand. Another 5-10 come in, post once (calling the people actually debating trolls), and then misrepresent the people originally debating the subject. In fact, several people think that this thread needs to be closed or locked, simply because they haven't contributed, feel that the subject matter is too complicated to bother with a dignified response, or don't understand any thread that isn't about trash talking.

Damn, if you don't want to read the thread, don't open it.



Epi-

going back to the pre-derailment of the topic at hand, i've got to say that i agree with the assessment you've made. It's important to realize that even though the term "intelligent design" has been made into a crusade of pseudoscience by a religious faction, it can also be interpreted with a less dogmatic approach using scientific facts, and coming to inferences based on gaps in the science. Yes, religion and science don't mix well, but they're intrinsically bound together, so it's inevitable that they will be used to back up/refute each other. Coming from someone who doesn't go to church, but believes in a god, I'll say that even when I did go to church, no one refuted evolution. Most "religious" people (i'll avoid specific denominations) probably don't take The Bible word for word. However, they still believe in god, and that he is somehow related to our creation and the creation of the universe. They don't go on to say how we walked with dinosaurs or any other bullcrap that goes AGAINST science. Like you said, they use it to fill in gaps which the general population feels are unlikely to be answered by scientific discovery.


all who think it's not improbable for life to start spontaneously-

i said the 1/million chance to be milosh was wrong because he'll still be a person.

you say that you're right because he's still milosh

I now say you're wrong, because anything that comes about is equal to milosh in terms of what he is - a complex form of life, a human, etc. all outcomes to the situation = human, =complex life

as far as the world starting with a 1/million chance, there's no evidence to suggest that it would be the same. There's plenty of evidence that no matter how a sperm an egg come together, it will ALWAYS make a human, nothing else.

No evidence that life CAN exist any other way than it does now: we haven't found life elsewhere, and the life we find here works in THE EXACT SAME WAYS. There's no evidence that even a 2/million possibility would make life work. There IS evidence that if you change the ONE way that life works, it ceases to function. I understand that 1/whatever # means there's still 1 chance of it happening. That's the definiton of probability, you'll get nowhere arguing your point by repeating definitions without making the inferences.

Seriously, try making life work any other way. You haven't answered this with the same scietific rigor you use to dispute the other facts, you just say "maybe it could".


WHO HERE THINKS THAT EVERYONE WHO BELIEVES IN A GOD DOESN'T ALSO BELIEVE IN THE BIG BANG, EVOLUTION, AND MOST OTHER ACCEPTED SCIENTIFIC THEORIES??

you're wrong ! there are people who can make there own beliefs about god without following the religious beliefs of those who have an agenda to push.

[Exalt]

Nice attempt Exalt, but you forgot one tiny thing. We carbon dated the fossils to far before 2000 years ago. NO DINO FOR YOU

EDIT: and oh yeah, one solitary reference could just be shear dumb luck, plus most of the is from the old testament which is not supposed to be taken literal according to most branches of christianity (even though they took it literally back in the day)

ok lets look at this

The 6 day creation and 1 day rest, equaling the 7 day creation as you know it, occurred over millions of years for each day. God has a different sense of literal time if he is omnipotent and omniscient. Any idea that we have of time in the first place would have come from God if he indeed does exist. A day to us is and should be a very small time frame, because we are all finite, and live only around 100 years before we die. God being infinite would obviously expand the time frame to a more reasonable measure, something most people cannot imagine because they cannot even fathom what infinite means. Every discovery and mathematical equation we can come up with was already known to God before we came up with it. All of this can be assumed if God indeed does exist.

So after the fore-mentioned theory, lets discuss dinosaurs in terms of how the bible relates them and what science says.

Evolutionists advocate that dinosaurs evolved from some ancient reptile 200 million years ago, and that they became extinct roughly 65-70 million years ago. Man (in one form or another) allegedly evolved approximately 2-3 million years ago, and thus was separated from the dinosaurs by some 65 million years of geologic time.

Creationists who accept Genesis 1-2 as an accurate, historical record of God’s creative activity, oppose such claims, and maintain instead that the dinosaurs were created by God within the six literal days described in the biblical record. Genesis informs us that all creatures were created during the Creation week (also in Exodus 20:11 and 31:17). Genesis also instructs us regarding the fact that dinosaurs, as land-dwelling animals, were formed on day six—the same day on which man was created. With this in mind, the conclusion is that dinosaurs and men co-existed at the same time on Earth.

According to Evolutionists, mammals evolved at the end of the triassic, at the same time as dinosaurs. Mammals spent their first hundred million years as small creatures living in the nooks and crannies of a dinosaur’s world. Their sixty million years of success following the demise of the dinosaurs has been something of an afterthought. With this in mind, it is completely unthinkable, in evolutionary terms, that dinosaurs and advanced mammals (like elephants or giraffes) could have co-existed.

Now lets look at real scientific discoveries:

A discovery reported in the January 13, 2005, issue of Nature challenged everything evolutionists have ever maintained regarding dinosaurs and mammals. The Associated Press reported:

“Villagers digging in China’s rich fossil beds have uncovered the preserved remains of a tiny dinosaur in the belly of a mammal, a startling discovery for scientists who have long believed early mammals couldn’t possibly attack and eat a dinosaur” (Verrengia, 2005).

The authors discovered the fossil remains of two different mammals. One was 50% larger than previous mammal fossils that were considered to be living with the dinosaurs. The other was fully intact—and had a dinosaur in its stomach. Obviously, if mammals were small little creatures the size of mice, then they would not be big enough to eat a dinosaur.


One of the co-authors of the Nature paper, Christophe Soligo of London’s Natural History Museum, stated in regard to the find: “What we demonstrate is that modern orders of mammals appeared well before dinosaurs disappeared...”


This already debunks evolutionist claims of dinosaurs dying out 60 million years ago.

In 1990, scientists carbon dated specific dinosaur bones and dated them to be a mere 16,120 years old. That's nowhere near 65 million years ago.


In conclusion with all of this, evolutionist theories cannot work if dinosaurs indeed did coexist with humans. The creationist theory as told by the bible can and does work.

[Kolar]

going back to the pre-derailment of the topic at hand, i've got to say that i agree with the assessment you've made. It's important to realize that even though the term "intelligent design" has been made into a crusade of pseudoscience by a religious faction, it can also be interpreted with a less dogmatic approach using scientific facts, and coming to inferences based on gaps in the science. Yes, religion and science don't mix well, but they're intrinsically bound together, so it's inevitable that they will be used to back up/refute each other. Coming from someone who doesn't go to church, but believes in a god, I'll say that even when I did go to church, no one refuted evolution. Most "religious" people (i'll avoid specific denominations) probably don't take The Bible word for word. However, they still believe in god, and that he is somehow related to our creation and the creation of the universe. They don't go on to say how we walked with dinosaurs or any other bullcrap that goes AGAINST science. Like you said, they use it to fill in gaps which the general population feels are unlikely to be answered by scientific discovery.

I think most reasonable people here understand that. Not specifically ID but creationism is used to fill in the shit we haven't figured out for the personal spirituality of many people. I personally find no problem with this as we're just human, we all observe our world in different ways and have different experiences. But I do disagree with you, trying to use either rationalize the beliefs and existence of the other is not a good idea.

No evidence that life CAN exist any other way than it does now: we haven't found life elsewhere, and the life we find here works in THE EXACT SAME WAYS. There's no evidence that even a 2/million possibility would make life work. There IS evidence that if you change the ONE way that life works, it ceases to function. I understand that 1/whatever # means there's still 1 chance of it happening. That's the definiton of probability, you'll get nowhere arguing your point by repeating definitions without making the inferences.

We haven't had the ability to search for it until very recently. We likely will find it elsewhere, but that is only a possibility at this point. That is rational to believe in because the basic chemicals and environments that makes up life here on Earth does exist elsewhere. But searching for divinity in our creation is outside of science because Science does not respect the existence of the super natural, it only deals with the natural, testable, explainable world. This is what the ID movement hopes to do, allow for supernatural causation to preclude natural and expansive scientific investigation. "We don't know so lets continue trying to figure this shit out" is replaced with "Everything is this way for a reason, case closed. No more looking." That is what this is about with ID.

Edit: We also know of different kinds of life. I said this like 4 pages ago we've found microbes on the ocean floor which lives off the sulfur of volcanic flows. Life can exist in very harsh environments so our ideas about where and how it can thrive has needed adjusting over the past 20 years. Also I think we've agreed using probability to explain our existence is flawed, I haven't gotten into it but we don't use the idea that it is probable Evolution happened and caused "intelligent" life to thrive (humans), therefore everything else is invalid... Evolution happened, case closed. It's more complex then that.

[milosh]

Just a disclaimer now that I have left this discussion: I have my own views about the universe, and just because another person who believes in ID says something it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with them at all. It is foolish to categorize and group people together because of one broad unifying belief. If you are particularly interested in my personal beliefs--which I highly doubt anyone is--you can contact me personally through a private message or at my e-mail(miloshtw@gmail.com). Happy debating.

[PH]

Actually, this thread died at post #1 via your textual diarrhea

fixed.

[Squeezer]

Exalt:

Or we could rationalize that ancient writers had no concept of time considering God created the Earth in 6 days, yet Moses, Abraham, and others lived to be 500+

[Exalt]

Exalt:

Or we could rationalize that ancient writers had no concept of time considering God created the Earth in 6 days, yet Moses, Abraham, and others lived to be 500+

explain this one to me because i dont understand the point, yes they lived a long time according to the bible, yet they are human, God is infinite, a day to God could be 1000-millions of years while a day for a human is literally 24 hours

[DankNuggets]

explain this one to me because i dont understand the point, yes they lived a long time according to the bible, yet they are human, God is infinite, a day to God could be 1000-millions of years while a day for a human is literally 24 hours

his point is that they obviously didn't live to be 500 years old, and that The Bible is full of hyperbole and contridictions. The reason being that obviously it was God himself that told man that he created the world in 7 days, so they believed him even though it's the wrong time frame. God did't write the Bible, a man did. Therefore, the accounts of a man living 500 years were written by a man, who should have a good understanding of how long a year is. Though for all practicle purposes, idk that a year was 360 days to a nomadic desert tribe, they could've had a totally different time-keeping system. Or they could just be the traditional storytellers that exaggerate old stories. Or whoever translated the particular book could've exaggerated or been wrong. Frankly, it's not important enough for me to delve into in greater detail.

I'm not sure if he's trying to refute what you've said, because he really didn't do a good job of it, only really proves that the Bible shouldn't be taken literally...