I have been thinking and saying for a while now that people who think evolution and God can both be true either are in denial or don't properly understand evolution. I think religious people who claim they have "reconciled" evolution with their faith don't have a proper understanding of evolution. They just think it's "change over time". I can't really blame them I guess. I first heard of evolution like a decade ago and remained a theist for years. When I learned how it actually works I quickly became an atheist. I'm a biologist BTW (well, training to become one).

So I have been extremely baffled by theistic evolutionist scientists like Ken Miller and Francis Collins. I convinced myself they must be in denial. They must really be an atheist but pretend to believe in God, perhaps to keep a good public image. Or perhaps they are scared they'll lose grants if they claim to be atheist. I believe evolution and God are irreconcilable, even a deistic God. I think 100% of people who are sane, properly understand evolution, and actually wants to know the real truth will become an atheist. First, let me get some terms straight here then explain why I think this.

God - the one Supreme Being, the creator and ruler of the universe.

Design - to prepare the preliminary sketch or the plans for (a work to be executed), especially to plan the form and structure of: to design a new bridge. or.. to intend for a definite purpose: a scholarship designed for foreign students.

Create - to cause to come into being, as something unique that would not naturally evolve or that is not made by ordinary processes.

All from dictionary.com btw. The definition of God includes the word creator. Creator must include creator of life, no? I mean, a God that created the universe and earth only, and no life, is no God, right? This might be just a subjective idea of mine about what the definition of God should be, but does anyone disagree? Anyway, create, or design, means foresight. If it were possible for God to have planted the first cell, then have had the foresight to KNOW that that cell would certainly evolve into humans in 3.7 billion years, then it would be possible for God and evolution to both be true, with God being a deistic God. But evolution actually has no foresight, therefore evolution cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be called design or creation. We humans were not designed or created. This is where religious people who accept evolution disagree. They claim "there's no reason to think evolution is blind, mindless, and has no foresight. This is just a presumption." My counter is, "you're wrong. Evolution indeed is blind, mindless, and has no foresight and if you disagree then you don't properly understand evolution."

Anyway, so I listened to a 2-hour long youtube video of Ken Miller speaking on "the collapse of intelligent design", to try to understand this guy's mindset. And I found it. I was right, Ken Miller is in denial. I instantly realized this when he said, "evolution is blind". He said this while talking about the lie that the blood clotting system is irreducibly complex. Earlier, right after the human chromosome 2 talk, he said, "I'm a roman catholic, I believe in a designer in the general sense, but I don't believe in a deceptive designer".

Those two statements ("evolution is blind" and "I believe in a designer") are an oxymoron. They can't both be true, therefore I think I finally "figured" Ken Miller out. Thoughts?

Btw, I could explain why evolution is indeed blind and purposeless, but it's kinda a longish argument. I attempted to make it in previous threads, not sure how convincing I was. But I believe I have a pretty solid understanding of evolution, from the genetic level all the way up to population level. Hell, even at the molecular level (I'm taking cell bio and molecular biology ATM). Of course, Ken Miller and Francis Collins definitely have a much better understanding than me. And here, in this youtube video, Miller himself claims evolution is blind.

I can say that "gravity" is "blind, mindless, and has no foresight," yet it's possible for me to make an arrangement in which this "blind" force produces a designed outcome.

I think that

Evolution is a process though, gravity is not. If there is a designer, as Ken Miller believes, then design means foresight. Blind is the opposite of foresight. If there is a designer, then evolution is not really blind...yet he says himself it is blind, so he has contradicted himself.

Before you get "baffled" over theistic evolution, you should probably be able to explain how life can begin from non-life.

And why is that? Anyway, possibilities are a self replicating molecule was attached to an asteroid that hit earth, survived the impact and began evolution. Pure chance chemical reactions turned regular molecules into a self replicating one. A single bacteria is far too complicated for this to have happened, but what we think is the first life (bacteria) may have actually evolved from something simpler. The simpler you get, the less ridiculous it becomes for chance to produce it. Remember, we don't have a solid fossil record of 3.7 billion years ago (first known life) to 4.54 billion years ago (formation of earth). The common ancestor of all life might have lived during this time and have come about by chance.

Well, the thing is, you have to have a special kind of mind to be educated, to be able to think and still be a creationist. So thinking theists have three options:

1. Stop being a theist.
2. Try to sign up for creationism, even though it's clearly incorrect and a dishonest philosophy
3. Somehow reconcile evolution and theism.

Therefore 3 is a popular choice.

First off yoda, you are just starting out as a student of science. From the scientific content of the posts you have made, you have just scratched the surface. You are so far short of the capabilities of someone like Collins, that your criticism can easily be discounted as arising more from ignorance than from enlightenment. I have already corrected scientific errors in two of your posts in the past, even though your errors were outside of my field.

That said, your premise is childish and poorly thought out. Consider a card analogy. Shuffling a deck and dealing a hand of cards is in general random and blind, as you put it. But imagine that I shuffle and deal a hand to the two of us. I get a straight flush and you get a full house. How do you distinguish between an unfortunate blind event, and cheating. If I cheated, was the shuffle and deal "blind"? I would say not.

Do you see the relevance to the evolution question?

Fine. We'll use precipitation (as in, weather precipitation), which is a "process" and is "blind, mindless, and has no foresight." It's possible for me to make an arrangement in which this "blind" "process" produces a designed outcome (produce electricity, for example).

Maybe you should take the presumption that some people understand things better than you to heart. From what you presented, it seems that you don't actually believe it.

I don't see why that would be.

Another thread on the same topic? What's been clear from all of them is that your bafflement stems from you not properly understanding theism or evolution. I hope that's changed this time or this thread will be an exact replica of the others.

Not that I agree with the definition, but isn't this the definition you gave in the past?

Wow, it's really that hard for you to accept that other people have different beliefs than you? Your only evidence that they're lying is that you can't understand their beliefs. I think more reasonable than assume that these people (who understand theism and evolution better than you) are lying would be to assume that you need to better understand the concepts in question. It's not bad to admit that you have more to learn.

It seems like every thread that you make up is basically on an equivalent level of: any hand in poker can win, therefore poker is a game of luck.

Seriously do you think that you're the first person to think of these questions?

I've always been baffled by what your purpose is.

Now it sounds like you believe that there are alternative explanations about what's been created. As some time you decided to switch what explanation you believe. That sounds incredibly odd to me. People are Christians because they have a relationship with a person, not with an explanation.

Every place there's a religious discussion group there are countless atheists saying I'm baffled everyone doesn't agree with me. That always sounds so incredibly juvenile to me. If I'm a Democrat I can understand why Republicans believe what they believe, whether I agree or not. If I'm a Republican I can understand why Democrats believe what they believe, whether I agree or not.

I can understand why people are atheists. It's ridiculously easy to understand.

People became Christians because they met Christ. People now become Christians because they've seen the writings of the people who met him.

I don't think the MECHANISM of theistic evolution is baffling. If one way to create life is to start a process that will, over time, and based on causal chains, result in the evolution of life, then there's no reason intrinsic to the process why a supreme being might not use it.

But there IS a reason EXTRINSIC to the process to doubt the claims of theistic evolutionists, and that is that evolution suggests that we have no special importance, that we are just one more life form on one branch of the tree of life and we have whatever special characteristics that we have merely because they conferred some advantage as a matter of natural selection.

In other words, you can have God-directed evolution, but only if Christianity and the other selfish and egotistical ME ME ME I'M AT THE CENTER OF CREATION ITS ALL ABOUT ME! religions are false. Which they are.

I'm not positive that I agree with this. If evolution was being guided and humans were the goal, then we would be special. Or if we have a deterministic universe and the beginning conditions were set purposefully, evolution could have been used knowing it would lead to humans.

Evolution implying that humans (and all species really) are non-special only comes about from evolution being unguided or unplanned, right?

This would be correct in a hypothetical God scenario, but I don't think it works within the Christian God. One can discard Genesis all together, or accept the Bible when it states, humans were created in the "image of God", and Eve came from the rib of Adam. This would mean that humans in an evolutionary perspective reproduced asexually until Eve. Also, at what point of evolution is life in the image of God, or is all life in the image of God?

I assume mean Judaism, Christianity and Islam, not merely theism? Yes, those books/beliefs are so deeply and ridiculously incompatible with evolution as to make it a choice of one or the other.

Religion (and theism) itself isn't incompatible - there are many ways in which a God could have made the universe and still have non guided evolution.

You've never made a convincing argument that God and Evolution are incompatible. The fact is intelligence can(and does) use evolution as a tool to create very specific end products.

Here is an example of an intellect creating a picture of a human face using evolution.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS5HWBNvf9U

The guy set out to get a human face....was it just a coincidence he got a human face and not some other object....like a car or an elephant?

Guided evolution is a fact of existence. You cannot deny it and be taken seriously.

Here is an example of someone creating an something in the in the image and likeness of the Mona Lisa using evolution:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=...ture=endscreen

Nobody thinks a face will evolve by itself. Your argument is simple. I stated an argument earlier, so counter my argument, Christian.

Well if you're an atheist...you think a human face did evolve all by itself....I guess them atheists are nobodys.

You appear to be seriously misunderstanding the argument. No one is saying that a super powerful being couldn't create and guide whatever he wanted to appear. That's as obvious as 2+2.

I doubt there are very many people who believe in theisitic evolution and a literal interpetation of Genesis. Those two are indeed incompatible.

Now at what point is life in the image of God? When God declares it as such.

Yoda Choda doesn't believe that. He seems to believe that an all powerful being could not use evolutionary tools to create human beings.

YodoChoda is operating under the assumption that evolution must necessarily be unguided and that is what is leading him into error.

Obviously if God uses evolution, then it is not in the inner mechanics of the evolutionary process you will find the influence, but in the factors that determine the selection bias.

Wrong.

God can only have done one of three things:

1. Culled those he didn't like, or otherwise prevent them from breeding
2. Subtly and undetectably altered, thousands of times, the existing genes of particular creatures
3. Subtly and undetectably interferred, thousands of times, with the breeding process, by either giving one sperm a push over another one, causing an egg to move down that otherwise wouldn't, or altering the DNA within these either before or after conception

They all seem rather absurd. Very God-of-the-gaps, and kind of pathetic for a creature who was once believed to have made Adam out of clay after everything else existed (note: NOT from monkeys or a common ancestor. Either the bible deliberately lies or it has major falsehoods).

Abiogensis. It's even been duplicated in a laboratory. In fact, the lab experiment was able to produce more amino acids than exist in nature.

Ahahaha, no. We have no idea how to get it working. Nor has it ever been even close to observed. And amino acids under ideal conditions do not a make cell (or even a protein). Abiogenesis is still a huge mystery.