What if Evolution is True?

[Jose]

From my point of view, evolution is a really interesting theory that explains the history of life on earth. I see no religious significance to it, one way or another. Yet, there are others who consider it to be a Very Bad Thing.

This raises the question: why would it be so bad for evolution to be true? Maybe to simplify this, I'll consider several discrete issues:

1. What will happen if it turns out that evolution really is true?

2. Why will this happen?

3. What evidence is there to support this prediction?

I would be interested to hear what the creationists have to say in response to these questions. I would also be interested to learn whether the evolutionists can offer evidence that would indicate a different outcome.

Thanks for the help!

--Jose

[Chimp]

Fire,

You have mentioned Noah's ark in several posts...it has not been found.

They have found something under the snow, that they think maybe be
the ark, but have been unable to investigate due to government restrictions.
This is hardly the smoking gun you refer to.

http://www.noahsarksearch.com/ararat.htm

I assume by Jesus' robes you mean the Shroud of Turin...again there is
nothing definitive to suggest it is authentic. There is still a huge debate
raging about the authenticity of the Shroud.

http://www.shroud.com/

You haven't presented an actual argument against evolution.

If you have a link to a site with information on where Eden is and
pictures of a talking snake...you might be on to something.

[fire_of_Jesus]

is this what u where looking for? www.crystalinks.com/ gardenofeden.html
i hope u find it very interesting

[Chimp]

Did you actually read the URL you posted?

Your source is a psychic reader and astrologer who presents no evidence.

[micatala]

is this what u where looking for? www.crystalinks.com/ gardenofeden.html
i hope u find it very interesting

Just asking: Are you serious about this site?

THe site is run by a self-described psychic who calls herself Ellie Crystal. She seems to have a very mystic philosophy of life, neither Christian nor scientific. She refers to the Garden of Eden as a "a metaphor linked to creation by through sacred geometry. It is another creational myth."

[israeltour]

if evolution is true then how did all these different religions flourish?

Are you seriously saying that if God used evolution that you wouldn't worship Him?

how did they find noahs ark on Mt. Arack?

Are you seriously suggesting, that if God used evolution that we'd be unable to find the ark?

and the ark was the exsact leangths as it was in the bible and made out of the same wood, how strange that is if God never even existed, wow i wonder how Moses could have predicted that a boat with all those measerments could have came to rest on Mt. Arack.

Are you seriously saying that if God used evolution that He'd be incapable of flooding the world?

if evolution is true then why did they find Jesus's robes in his tomb?

Are you seriously saying that if God used evolution, then Jesus wouldn't have died for our sins?

Let me ask you this: what was God hovering over in Genesis 1:1? Who created it? and when? and why was it so dark and desolate?

[Jose]

if evolution is true then how did all these different religions flourish?

Ah...you're looking at the Thread Topic the other-way-around. The point is: here, we assume evolution to be true. Yet, despite this, all of these religions flourish. It seems to me, that this is a simple result of human ingenuity. We have a need to explain things, especially our origins. In the absence of scientific information (particularly genetics and molecular biology), people told stories, which became religions.

Now, if evolution were not true, and one particular religion is (they can't all be true, after all), then why would god, or the gods, allow those other religions to come into existence at all? Why not just tell everyone the same story?

how did they find noahs ark on Mt. Arack?
...
and the ark was the exsact leangths as it was in the bible and made out of the same wood, how strange that is if God never even existed, wow i wonder how Moses could have predicted that a boat with all those measerments could have came to rest on Mt. Arack.

It turns out that there have been many ark-hoaxes over the years. They follow a pattern in which the ark is discovered, then somehow the person who discovered it dies without telling where it was (like the Lost Dutchman Mine), or there's difficulty getting governmental permission to go back and complete the excavation, or some other kind of snafu. Thus far, none of the stories have actually borne fruit, even if they've been aired on TV.

Speaking of TV, it has been shown that kids are becoming increasingly unable to distinguish "special effects" from reality. They are also becoming increasingly unable to imagine (since so much is presented to them pre-imagined), which makes it hard for them to visualize the things in science that are too big, too small, too slow, or too fast to experience directly.

if evolution is true then why did they find Jesus's robes in his tomb?

Two interesting things here. If Jesus really existed, then that fact has nothing to do with the truth or non-truth of evolution. To jump from "Jesus was real" to "that proves evolution couldn't have happened" is unwarranted. The jump makes some assumptions that you haven't explored--like the assumption that the fundamentalist interpretation of Genesis, ignoring the contradictions, must be true, and that truth of one part of the bible proves the truth of other parts of the bible, and therefore, if any part of the bible is true, then the fundamentalists' objections to science must be valid. I don't buy these assumptions.

Second, the Shroud--the presumed robes--has been dated, and shown to have been produced many hundreds of years after Jesus' death. That is, it was produced, hidden, then "found" and presented to the world.

In any event, for the purposes of this thread, and from the scientific viewpoint, evolution is true, AND all of this biblical stuff occurred also. Perhaps the biblical stuff results entirely from human ingenuity, telling stories, writing the bible, developing psychological methods to ensure that followers remain followers (like "you're damned if you even think of questioning the dogma"), etc. Or, perhaps, god chose one single point in time to reveal his story to one particular group of nomads who had developed their society enough to understand his message--and he gave them his message in terms they could understand (ie, without the genetics and molecular biology). Perhaps he assumed their descendents would be smart enough to blend new knowledge with his message. Is it likely that he would have wanted them to ignore all of the clues he left in his creation? Is it likely that he would have given them the brains to figure out what those clues mean, but then wanted them not to use those brains?

On another tack, lots of fundamentalists claim that the teaching of evolution has led to all kinds of horrid things, from homosexuality to the Columbine shootings to the degradation of so-called family values. But, if evolution is, and always has been true, then we can't blame these things on evolution, can we?

[micatala]

On another tack, lots of fundamentalists claim that the teaching of evolution has led to all kinds of horrid things, from homosexuality to the Columbine shootings to the degradation of so-called family values. But, if evolution is, and always has been true, then we can't blame these things on evolution, can we?

. . . . and you could add racism, as has been asserted in the Bones of Contention thread.

This is a good point, but I think we should distinguish between evolution actually being true, and evolution being widely accepted as or assumed to be true. I think some fundamentalists are more concerned about the latter than the former. I think some would be happy enough if evolution were never accepted as true, even if it is actually true and they know it was true.

The arguements used in support of the contention that evolution has led to all sorts of evil usually often include the idea that if someone believes evolution is true, then they believe that they are 'just an animal that arose from the slime' and that because of this self-conception, they will not see themselves as the image of God and will not follow the moral teachings of God as laid out in the Bible, nor will they hear and accept the spiritual message of the Bible.

Whether evolution is actually true or not is sort of irrelevant to this scenario, what is important is the belief that it is true. This, I think, may be one reason why some creationists seem to have little regard for the truth, since it is not the actual truth that matters, but the belief. I don't want to paint with too broad a brush here, since I do not think this is true of all 'creationists,' but I think it is a dynamic that does occur often enough to have an effect.

Part of the reason I think these arguements gain traction is that I think there actually is some credence to the idea that 'belief in evolution' can lead some people to challenge or even reject their faith. I think one could find documented examples of this happening with regards to the Copernican controversy 400 years ago. However, my own view is that denying the truth of evolution ultimately does no good. It only leads to a worse result when people find out they have been purposefully decieved into rejecting or denying evolution.

We should face the facts bravely and not stick our heads in the sand, and have faith that our faith can survive, even if our particular doctrines are adapted. This is, after all, what happened with respect to most of those who lived through the Copernican controversy.

[Jose]

On another tack, lots of fundamentalists claim that the teaching of evolution has led to all kinds of horrid things, from homosexuality to the Columbine shootings to the degradation of so-called family values. But, if evolution is, and always has been true, then we can't blame these things on evolution, can we?

. . . . and you could add racism, as has been asserted in the Bones of Contention thread.

This is a good point, but I think we should distinguish between evolution actually being true, and evolution being widely accepted as or assumed to be true. I think some fundamentalists are more concerned about the latter than the former. I think some would be happy enough if evolution were never accepted as true, even if it is actually true and they know it was true.

This is an important distinction. I agree entirely with your analysis, that fundamentalists fear that "belief in evolution" will lead to people abandoning their faith, and behaving like animals. But, that's the subject of the thread, "consequences of believing in evolution," as opposed to this topic, which is based on the assumption that evolution is true, whether fundamentalists want to believe it or not.

According to the latter assumption (ie the scientific conclusion), none of the horrid things imagined by fundamentalists happen. Furthermore, it explains why immoral behavior, whether sex, murder, or bombing Iraq, seems to be pretty well distributed across humanity, whether Christian or not.

The arguements used in support of the contention that evolution has led to all sorts of evil usually often include the idea that if someone believes evolution is true, then they believe that they are 'just an animal that arose from the slime' and that because of this self-conception, they will not see themselves as the image of God and will not follow the moral teachings of God as laid out in the Bible, nor will they hear and accept the spiritual message of the Bible.

I recognize this as the basic reasoning, but it seems very weird to me. This makes the assumption that morality depends absolutely on the bible. Does this mean that no one of any other faith can ever be moral? If not, why isn't the world filled with licentious hedonism by people not following biblical law? Why, instead, do I see more adult bookstores along the freeway in the "bible belt" of the US than I do in those immoral states that voted for Kerry--and my own birth-state, where in my first 20 years, I only ever met one person who went to church? [I'm reminded here of the offer made by southern baptists a few years ago to save those of Jewish faith by helping them accept god...they thought they were reaching out and being kind.]

Whether evolution is actually true or not is sort of irrelevant to this scenario, what is important is the belief that it is true. This, I think, may be one reason why some creationists seem to have little regard for the truth, since it is not the actual truth that matters, but the belief. I don't want to paint with too broad a brush here, since I do not think this is true of all 'creationists,' but I think it is a dynamic that does occur often enough to have an effect.

No, too broad a brush would be inappropriate, though a narrow brush would certainly paint accurately. The fear is that civilization as we know it will collapse, so any methods are justified to save it.

As I see it, the real problem is that they are so rabidly against evolution that they won't learn how it works, and therefore, they persist in hating impossible caricatures of it. Evolution is actually no big deal. It's also genetically inescapable--the way genetics works, it is impossible to prevent evolution from happening.

I suspect that you're right about the Copernican controversy, and that the advance of science promises to lead more people away from faith. At least, it will lead people away from unwavering belief in the mythologies associated with faith (all faiths?). I find it curious that so many people really want the mythology to be true, and would turn their backs on real knowledge to protect the myths. It seems so much easier, and so much more fulfilling, to regard the mythology as metaphorical teachings from which we can learn a great deal, and at the same time accept the scientific findings as an expansion of our knowledge about god's world. But then, I wasn't raised as a fundamentalist, or taught that if I learned about evolution, the world would descend into darkness and chaos.