Blueskyboris

Stinger,

Bluesky: I agree with you!! However, what does our opinion have to do with the price of tea in China? As a liberal Christian, I have been searching for positive evidence of creation all my life. I haven't found any. I'm sure that you haven't either. So - what do we do. Do we make up evidence? Do we attack others who don't agree with our opinions?

I was just answering the question of the thread, Stinger. I am glad that our life experiences have intersected in such as way as you agree with me on this point, though.

Bluesky.

rlogan

Just highlighting the endless array of empty pontifications.



I guess this is like tele-evangelism. Where we just make up specious stuff.

Blueskyboris

Just highlighting another couple of empty rebuttals. Yet another indication of an inability to debate the thread topic.

Nice Squirrel

And salvation has what to do with evolution/creation? :huh:

Blueskyboris

Nice Squirrel,

And salvation has what to do with evolution/creation?

Salvation is rooted in the idea that humanity has "original sin". Please read post #1 in relation to my explanation of why the Creationist/Evolutionist divide is so extreme.

Bluesky.

Nice Squirrel

Bluesky,
I believe you mean this:

I'm lost on how evolution destroys the concept of original sin. If my Christian interpretation of original sin is the dividing up of the world into dichotomous catagories such as good/evil (a.k.a. taking Judgement into my hands) how can evolution negate this? If anything evolutionary theory supports this because our brains develop to a state where we do make dichotomous catagories for all things. (Sidenote: Does thins mean our computers should not be binary???)

And as has been pointed out. Evolution is not random. To quote Devo:

Talking Rain

I have always thought that this word was only used by creationists to describe their opponents, and I never really liked it. It struck me a odd. I believe it was someone on these forums who always made fun of it with the dictionary definition: "One who is skilled in evolutions." which I always got a kick out of.

But right now I am reading the book The Beak of the Finch by Jonathan Weiner (Unfortunate name if I've ever heard one.) and he uses the word frequently. (as shorthand for "Evolutionary Scientist" I think.) It is very disconcerting, and made me feel like a creationist was telling me about the evolution of Darwin's Finches.

My questions are: Where did this term come from? Is it being used by scientists or any other science writers? and where do I sign up to protest, if it is?

Atheist121

I never had a problem with the term "evolutionist", but trying to change "evolution" to "evolutionism" is nonsense. For some reason creationists go wild over things being an "ism." But there are a lot of "ists" in science. Scientists, biologists, chemists, physicists, astrophysicists, geologists, anthropologists, psychologists, botanists, etc. I don't see what would be wrong with calling one who studies evolution an evolutionist.

Clutch

While there are perfectly reasonable understandings of the term "evolutionist", I expect that it is popular among anti-science types in part because "-ist" also connotes political views: socialist, communist, Maoist... it semantically activates the idea of allegiance to a doctrine. Which is the picture of evolutionary theory they want to popularize. Part of politicizing the debate is depicting it in terms favorable to politicization.

newtype_alpha

Here's a thought: "evolutionist" is a term that has no meaning in and of itself except relative to its opposite: "creationist."

That being said, you can define a "creationist" as "Someone who believes that God created the world in the way described by Genesis 1 and 2," and evolutionist as "someone who adheres to a more scientific explanation about how the world came to exist in its current form." Note, however, that as far as scientists are concerned, there is no such thing as an evolutionist.

Evolution is a scientific theory, therefore the true advoctates of this theory present it in the same way scientists present every other theory, scientifically and impartially. These can be evolutionary theorists, biologists, paleontologists, geneticists or what have you. But an "evolutionist" is nothing more or less than a person who, for whatever reason, wants to push the theory on people, sometimes (perhaps usually) with an ulterior motive, namely proving creationists wrong.

Stop me if I'm going too far, but I think you can almost put it in terms of this: An evolutionist is someone who thinks creationism is B.S., and a creationist is someone who thinks evolution is B.S.