sk8bloke22

sorry if that seems like an obvious answer to u ppl. its just that some guy on that other thread on the gaming forum told me that yes thermodynamics does prove the process of evolution, blah blah, but it doesnt defy god's existance. i looked on talkorigins.org and basically it says that there is no real evidence.

i mean personally it seems logically that if we hav some sort of an idea of how we originated (evolution) then surely the theory of god becomes more and more crappy, to put it bluntly. but there must be some ideas, theories or factual evidence that can use evolution in a more powerful way against the existance of a god.
im probably missing something, as im still havent understood fully thermodynamics in its deepest form due to the large amounts of writings on it. but i get the basic idea of entropy increasing in a closed system, and entropy decreasing in an open system.

one thing i also dont get is that how does someone explain how a closed system (the entire universe or wateva) came into existance?

Mageth

In the first place, thermodynamics does not "prove" (the process of) evolution.

In the second place, the theory of evolution does not address, nor is the science of evolution concerned with, the existence or non-existence of any particular god(s). It is contra to various creation myths (particularly in combination with various theories of abiogenesis), and does cause problems for some other religious doctrines, e.g. "original sin."

[ January 21, 2002: Message edited by: Mageth ]</p>

tronvillain

Evolution is totally compatible with certain god-concepts, while it is incompatible with others. Perhaps what you mean is that god-hypotheses hae lost their explanatory power to evolution, but that has nothing to do with disproving them.

Now, it is not that thermodynamics proves evolution, it is that evolution obeys thermodynamics (despite creationist claims to the contrary).

How does one explain the existence of a closed system such as the universe? As far as I can tell, one does not. At the moment, it appears to be a brute fact.

[ January 21, 2002: Message edited by: tronvillain ]</p>

sk8bloke22

ok cheers. thanks for clearing that up.

Asha'man

Every god-concept I know of requires that natural law applies at least some of the time. The question is how often? How much does god interfere?

Evolution simply implies a little less intervention than creationism. Evolution does not require any intervention, but does not exclude it.

Kevin Dorner

It can't be stated enough:

Theistic (god-moderated) evolution, and deep-time earth sciences/cosmology have been accepted by all mainstream Protestant and Catholic churches worldwide, for a long, long time. Though Genesis might be read in sermons, the passages are interpreted as being allegorical, or that the "days" are of deep time.

Young-earth creationism is a small movement of American (there are not many creationists elsewhere, though there are a few Canadian ones... sigh) fundamentalist Christians who are trying their best to convince the rest of the churches, using every intellectual dirty trick in the book, that: one can't be a "true" believer and still accept evolution and an old earth, that a great percentage of scientists share their views, that there is a great deal of data to support them, that there is a vast conspiracy to keep their views from the mainstream, and that there are great doubts and little evidence for what modern science currently professes.

And that's as simply as I can put it.

Oolon Colluphid

Sadly, not true. They are generally nowhere near as vocal as in the States, but there's groups all over the world. <a href="http://www.creationsciencemovement.com/" target="_blank">here</a> is a UK one, for instance. I strongly suspect that there's plenty of them, just that they're not so organised. Now admittedly evolution is a subject I tend to bring up in conversation , but in my everyday life I have encountered three creationists... and a close friend (sadly a Christian) recently went on a Xian course thingy where, but for my priming her with the standard cretinist questions and answers, she'd have been doubtless open to the, er, wackier elements of her faith.

If you think that science might be a better guide to reality than an old book, you can't relax, and pass it off as just an American phenomenon, anywhere.

Cheers, Oolon

E_muse

Hello again sk8bloke! Firstly, always feel free to ask questions. That is one way in which we learn and develop our minds. I'm sure the only reason that the answers to some of your questions are 'obvious' to others on these boards is that at some point in the past, they have asked the same questions as you.

On to your point.

The theory of evolution seeks to explain the physical processes which gave rise to all forms of life on this planet. It is an explanation based upon physical cause and effect.

A theist would not necessarily have a problem with evolution. He (or she!) could simply say that evolution explains 'how' God did it!

Richard Dawkins (and I'm sure many others) have sought to try and make the claim that saying Goddidit is a lazy way out and is the death of scientific enquiry. I would disagree. A theistic scientist can always ask, "How did God do that?"

Also, there are certain questions which science cannot answer. These are the 'why' questions. 'Why are we here?' and so on. Some would argue that such questions are as meaningless as 'What flavour is green?'.

I think that the account of origins in Genesis lends itself more to a evolutionary outlook than the ideas commonly held by YECs. I'll go into this more if you wish.

liquid

Yes, unfortunately creationism is not a minority movement in terms of influence.

Although adherents in the classes who actually know what they are talking about i.e. scientists and those educated to a similar level, are a vanishing minority, the 'ignorant' masses actually have a lot of creationist sentiments. More Americans believe the world is 6000 years old than not.

Additionally, prominent christian politicians and the like support their activities - Dubya among them.

They are also very common in Australia, and there is a small number in Canada and the UK, but in general Europe does not ahve the problem, partially because almost all our churches accepted evolution decades ago and we don't ahve such a fundie attitude.

Oolon Colluphid

They can ask... but their answers will always be in terms of naturalistic mechanisms, not miracles. The goddidit explanation means zapping it by a miracle, which is about as irrefutable and unscientific as you can get. It automatically preludes further enquiry, because this entity (god) is uninvestigatable. ‘Why this way rather than that?’ – ‘Because that’s how god wanted it.’ End of story.

So what you’ve got there is a non sequitur. Assuming you have heard of Ockham’s Razor ( ), why bother to include this additional entity in the explanation? You’ve got a mechanism that works whether god is there or not, so he’s superfluous.

I suppose it depends on what sort of answer you’re after, but IMO science has some pretty good answers to ‘why’ questions too. In your example, it is because of the interaction of, in Jacques Monod’s phrase, chance and necessity. If you want allegedly deeper, ‘spiritual’ answers, they’re a dime a dozen, take your pick.

It tastes of coffee, according to the synaesthesic <a href="http://www.ncu.edu.tw/~daysa/synesthesia.htm" target="_blank">here</a>. .

Yes please, because it doesn’t make much sense as it stands. But in a new thread, yeah?

TTFN, Oolon

[ January 22, 2002: Message edited by: Oolon Colluphid ]</p>