Is Christianity a retelling of pagan stories? NO.

[Xiam]

anonymous attributes

What do you mean, evolution has evidence, and billions of years? we can't even predict the weather right, and your atheist priests think they know what happened billions of years ago?

My atheist priests? My atheist priests? My atheist priests? Every inflection is needed, because every part of that phrase is outright ******** nonsensical.

Also didn't I make that crack about weather? You stole my bit and you don't even get that, at least as far in as a week, and with fairly decent results, we can pretty much predict a lot of the incoming weather. The problem is, weather systems are increidbly intricate and we (that is to say, human beings) are still working on technology to better collect data to better predict the weather.

And yes, that's what fossils ******** do, you look at the progression from fossil to fossil (believe me, in spite of the rare circumstances of bones being fossilized, there are a lot), and you can see the ******** changes. What's more, you can see evolution in action today with things like dog breeds. Just span out changes like those, but multiply them for every chunk of time to that equivalent on and on into millions of years, and you get what is happening.

We know how sediment forms, and we know long it takes to become rock. So we know how to date the ******** layers.

anonymous attributes

We can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history within the range of a few thousand years, or how about something much closer, like Columbus?

This feels like something I've ranted about before. Incidentally, we know what happened because we have writings of that time. We have to go through a filter of bias, but we know what happened.

anonymous attributes

But we know what happened billions of years ago ay?

We don't know how the lives generally went beyond what we can infer from their corpses, but we do know how they moved, what they were likely to be related to, how long ago they lived, what they may have eaten, and a general guess at what they looked like, yeah.

anonymous attributes

There is no bias in science? science is not a man, what kind of statement is that XIAM?!

Science is not a man. Like I said. It's a method. You have no bias in 2+2=4, you put two and two together, and bam, it makes ******** four.

anonymous attributes

It takes human beings to look at science, and if you think there is no interpretation or bias on that, no matter who they are, that is intellectually dishonest of you to make that claim.

Sigh... as much as I hate to admit this, because I ******** hate it to begin with... math does not work by human interpretation or bias. There is no intellectual dishonesty in math. Except in imaginary numbers.

anonymous attributes

Scientists who have worked in the lab for years were literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist. Maybe XIAM, no other interpretation is ALLOWED.

Sources on these firings? Specifically, getting right down to the nitty gritty, the details on why they were fired. Were they fired for their beliefs or were they falsifying evidence?

I'm not going to keep responding to this s**t. Mostly because I've expanded the post long enough and this is going to end up ridiculously long because you don't have any more control over your insane ramblings than I do with mine. But also I don't like you, and I actually feel kind of ashamed to even be talking to you. Like, kind of greasy and grimy, you know?

And I'll tell you why. "Your atheist priests." Those three words, right up there. "Your atheist priests."

I have no affiliation with them whatsoever. I am not atheist. And atheists don't have priests.

You don't know me, you don't know what I believe, you don't know what they believe, and you've proven that. Therefore I don't think I can trust you with any claims of information, knowledge, research, or even hard-nosed, rational logic.

(Also you're trying to argue that one side is biased with your own blatantly biased sources. So there's that whole bullshit hypocrisy thing going on.)

So, you know... ******** off. I'm not buying it.

[anonymous attributes]

Xiam

anonymous attributes

What do you mean, evolution has evidence, and billions of years? we can't even predict the weather right, and your atheist priests think they know what happened billions of years ago?

My atheist priests? My atheist priests? My atheist priests? Every inflection is needed, because every part of that phrase is outright ******** nonsensical.

Also didn't I make that crack about weather? You stole my bit and you don't even get that, at least as far in as a week, and with fairly decent results, we can pretty much predict a lot of the incoming weather. The problem is, weather systems are increidbly intricate and we (that is to say, human beings) are still working on technology to better collect data to better predict the weather.

And yes, that's what fossils ******** do, you look at the progression from fossil to fossil (believe me, in spite of the rare circumstances of bones being fossilized, there are a lot), and you can see the ******** changes. What's more, you can see evolution in action today with things like dog breeds. Just span out changes like those, but multiply them for every chunk of time to that equivalent on and on into millions of years, and you get what is happening.

We know how sediment forms, and we know long it takes to become rock. So we know how to date the ******** layers.

anonymous attributes

We can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history within the range of a few thousand years, or how about something much closer, like Columbus?

This feels like something I've ranted about before. Incidentally, we know what happened because we have writings of that time. We have to go through a filter of bias, but we know what happened.

anonymous attributes

But we know what happened billions of years ago ay?

We don't know how the lives generally went beyond what we can infer from their corpses, but we do know how they moved, what they were likely to be related to, how long ago they lived, what they may have eaten, and a general guess at what they looked like, yeah.

anonymous attributes

There is no bias in science? science is not a man, what kind of statement is that XIAM?!

Science is not a man. Like I said. It's a method. You have no bias in 2+2=4, you put two and two together, and bam, it makes ******** four.

anonymous attributes

It takes human beings to look at science, and if you think there is no interpretation or bias on that, no matter who they are, that is intellectually dishonest of you to make that claim.

Sigh... as much as I hate to admit this, because I ******** hate it to begin with... math does not work by human interpretation or bias. There is no intellectual dishonesty in math. Except in imaginary numbers.

anonymous attributes

Scientists who have worked in the lab for years were literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist. Maybe XIAM, no other interpretation is ALLOWED.

Sources on these firings? Specifically, getting right down to the nitty gritty, the details on why they were fired. Were they fired for their beliefs or were they falsifying evidence?

I'm not going to keep responding to this s**t. Mostly because I've expanded the post long enough and this is going to end up ridiculously long because you don't have any more control over your insane ramblings than I do with mine. But also I don't like you, and I actually feel kind of ashamed to even be talking to you. Like, kind of greasy and grimy, you know?

And I'll tell you why. "Your atheist priests." Those three words, right up there. "Your atheist priests."

I have no affiliation with them whatsoever. I am not atheist. And atheists don't have priests.

You don't know me, you don't know what I believe, you don't know what they believe, and you've proven that. Therefore I don't think I can trust you with any claims of information, knowledge, research, or even hard-nosed, rational logic.

(Also you're trying to argue that one side is biased with your own blatantly biased sources. So there's that whole bullshit hypocrisy thing going on.)

So, you know... ******** off. I'm not buying it.

I am pretty sure I didn't steal the weather example from you, we both just use it. But it sounds like we had different ideas behind them. I also want to let you know when I said Atheist priests, that was a joke. I thought that would be evident, but you know, text?

Anyway, besides that there is so much I could say. I think I am going to be pretty basic here in my response to you.

As far as seeing evolution today? no, we do not. We see dogs producing dogs, that is all we have ever seen. The Bible says, "And they produced after their kinds." There is no new information. Small dog, big dog, shaggy dog, silky dog, still a dog, Xiam.

Now, as far as history is concerned, you said "we know what happened because we have writings of that time." no, we do not "know" by the writings, we believe. There is no way to actually KNOW it.

as far as interpretations on billions of years ago, I'll have to refer back to the information I presented. Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABdXZMs5SeA

Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyfRYO_ul_8

For more information just type into Youtube "Kent Hovind Creation Science." And you will be met with debates, seminars, and a wealth of information.

Also, when I said it takes humans to look at the information and interpret, you made an example by math, which is supposed to answer the question? What, is evolution math? math is not the science we are talking about here, that is not a good example, in fact it not even an example of what we're talking about here.

Now, as far as your last block of text, whew, that is off the wall my man. Firstly, the thing about the atheist priests was a joke.

Also, as far as this statement is concerned "You don't know me, you don't know what I believe, you don't know what they believe, and you've proven that. Therefore I don't think I can trust you with any claims of information, knowledge, research, or even hard-nosed, rational logic."

I don't care to know you Xiam, that has nothing to do with any kind of information that may be presented by outside sources. Also, because of the last silly bit " Therefore I don't think I can trust you with any claims of information, knowledge, research, or even hard-nosed, rational logic"...thats just childish. Go for it Xiam. Its not all about you. I thought I made that clear.

"Also you're trying to argue that one side is biased with your own blatantly biased sources. So there's that whole bullshit hypocrisy thing going on." I never said Christianity was exempt from bias. That is another accusation by you in order to defend yourself. That's find, defend yourself, but it has no truth to its conclusion. That is your interpretation, and its a biased interpretation. Its incorrect.

"So, you know... ******** off. I'm not buying it." That is okay, there are many fish in the sea, its not all about you. I addressed any and all people who may see the information in the thread.

100 reasons why evolution is stupid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8DDIe_2cHM

[Sandokiri]

anonymous attributes

What do you mean, evolution has evidence, and billions of years? we can't even predict the weather right,

First problem: the inability to divine the future accurately is not relevant to whether we can read evidence of the past.

Quote:

and your atheist priests think they know what happened billions of years ago? We can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history within the range of a few thousand years, or how about something much closer, like Columbus? But we know what happened billions of years ago ay?

As someone with off-and-on (and usually on) interest in archaeology and palaeontology, I can say this.

The sciences of history do indeed work from incomplete evidence, and cannot produce complete pictures as a result. In that, your claim that we "can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history" is true. However, these sciences operate by constructing possible models based on the available evidence, and refine and/or discard models in light of new evidence. The model that seems the best fit for available evidence is often the one that gets taught at "lower" (eg, school) levels - with the added caveat that other biases unrelated to science (eg, patriotism) may alter even that. But that's another problem for another discussion.

Take, for example, the view of theropod dinosaurs. Even thirty years ago, we'd thought most of them (other than the feathered ancestors of Class Aves such as Archaeopteryx) to be scaled; with new evidence, we now understand that many of them were feathered, and even have some trace evidence for what colours some of those feathers had.

That's the trick though. The more specific the evidence is, the more specific that aspect of the model can be. Obtaining a range of "time-ago" is quite general by comparison; and the methods have been tested and cross-tested with various materials. I'm sure you'll bring up, or in your video link-drops may have brought up, the problems with those methods; but those problems were discovered by science, and the mechanisms of why and where the problems exist are generally understood.

Quote:

There is no bias in science? science is not a man, what kind of statement is that XIAM?! It takes human beings to look at science, and if you think there is no interpretation or bias on that, no matter who they are, that is intellectually dishonest of you to make that claim.

It's a true statement: the scientific method is not biased. It's a narrow road designed to help scientists avoid introducing their bias into their models.

As an example of this, take Linnaeus. He was definitely biased; his taxonomic research was funded by those who wanted him to identify humans as a unique order of animals - and being (as most were back then) a creationist, this was also a personal bias. Yet, identifying the evidence, he concluded against his double bias that humans could only be properly placed in the Order Primates, with the other apes.

Peer review is a system designed to check an individual scientist's bias, by distributing a hypothesis and its related research to many scientists that have many different biases, and adding the bias "I want to blow holes in your hypothesis so that I can jump on it and make a better one." But peer review also checks the objections (which is how Sir Richard Owen was ultimately discredited: he'd objected to Darwin's theory by claiming that a part of the brain called the hippocampus minor is unique to humans - a claim that was key to his own theory. However, other apes have the structure.)

Quote:

Scientists who have worked in the lab for years were literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist.

Expelled is about as bad as Religulous. Those particular creationists / ID proponents were not "literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist." The two biggest examples are Sternberg and Gonzales.

Sternberg wasn't even employed by the Smithsonian, and was essentially doing volunteer work; all the same, he had (and continued to have) the access. Where he went wrong was to declare himself the most qualified reviewer for a particular paper that was actually outside his field, and published it without anything resembling a proper cycle of peer review.

Gonzales had been a rather good scientist, "working in the lab for years," but then went to Iowa State and became a professor. His scientific production all but vanished, he was producing only a trickle of grad students, and virtually none of those were getting degrees. You don't get tenure (lifetime employment) by failing that hard.

So no. The scientific community doesn't toss people for having this bias or that. Newton's alchemy doesn't lead us to toss Newton's laws of motion.

Quote:

""I'll say this once, to make it absolutely clear: Science has no bias. It takes the facts, and it draws the conclusions that the facts present."" Facts "present."? What do they present? that fact that it could and probably will change in the future? How then is it a fact?

The facts are the evidence. The conclusions derived from them are subject to change as more facts are discovered. That's the difference. 3nodding

Quote:

For more information just type into Youtube "Kent Hovind Creation Science." And you will be met with debates, seminars, and a wealth of information.

To be honest, if you really want to push creationism, Kent Hovind is probably your worst choice; and I say that as someone who has watched the videos (mostly after my brother's Calvinist friends at the time tried to get him hooked on them, and I wanted to see what the buzz was about.)

Just focusing on what he says about science, he tends to rely on bad facts, obsolete evidence, and arguments that even other creationists have abandoned. The reason he seems better than that (eg, in his debates) is that he masks this with a very solid rhetorical style that scientists tend to be unable to keep up with. It's not because the scientists don't know the science; it's rather because the skills of being entertaining, playing to the audience's common biases, rapidly firing off snippets of information and using the "small words" aren't typical tools in a scientist's toolbox, especially when talking about science in a semi-formal or formal setting.

[anonymous attributes]

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

What do you mean, evolution has evidence, and billions of years? we can't even predict the weather right,

First problem: the inability to divine the future accurately is not relevant to whether we can read evidence of the past.

Quote:

and your atheist priests think they know what happened billions of years ago? We can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history within the range of a few thousand years, or how about something much closer, like Columbus? But we know what happened billions of years ago ay?

As someone with off-and-on (and usually on) interest in archaeology and palaeontology, I can say this.

The sciences of history do indeed work from incomplete evidence, and cannot produce complete pictures as a result. In that, your claim that we "can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history" is true. However, these sciences operate by constructing possible models based on the available evidence, and refine and/or discard models in light of new evidence. The model that seems the best fit for available evidence is often the one that gets taught at "lower" (eg, school) levels - with the added caveat that other biases unrelated to science (eg, patriotism) may alter even that. But that's another problem for another discussion.

Take, for example, the view of theropod dinosaurs. Even thirty years ago, we'd thought most of them (other than the feathered ancestors of Class Aves such as Archaeopteryx) to be scaled; with new evidence, we now understand that many of them were feathered, and even have some trace evidence for what colours some of those feathers had.

That's the trick though. The more specific the evidence is, the more specific that aspect of the model can be. Obtaining a range of "time-ago" is quite general by comparison; and the methods have been tested and cross-tested with various materials. I'm sure you'll bring up, or in your video link-drops may have brought up, the problems with those methods; but those problems were discovered by science, and the mechanisms of why and where the problems exist are generally understood.

Quote:

There is no bias in science? science is not a man, what kind of statement is that XIAM?! It takes human beings to look at science, and if you think there is no interpretation or bias on that, no matter who they are, that is intellectually dishonest of you to make that claim.

It's a true statement: the scientific method is not biased. It's a narrow road designed to help scientists avoid introducing their bias into their models.

As an example of this, take Linnaeus. He was definitely biased; his taxonomic research was funded by those who wanted him to identify humans as a unique order of animals - and being (as most were back then) a creationist, this was also a personal bias. Yet, identifying the evidence, he concluded against his double bias that humans could only be properly placed in the Order Primates, with the other apes.

Peer review is a system designed to check an individual scientist's bias, by distributing a hypothesis and its related research to many scientists that have many different biases, and adding the bias "I want to blow holes in your hypothesis so that I can jump on it and make a better one." But peer review also checks the objections (which is how Sir Richard Owen was ultimately discredited: he'd objected to Darwin's theory by claiming that a part of the brain called the hippocampus minor is unique to humans - a claim that was key to his own theory. However, other apes have the structure.)

Quote:

Scientists who have worked in the lab for years were literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist.

Expelled is about as bad as Religulous. Those particular creationists / ID proponents were not "literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist." The two biggest examples are Sternberg and Gonzales.

Sternberg wasn't even employed by the Smithsonian, and was essentially doing volunteer work; all the same, he had (and continued to have) the access. Where he went wrong was to declare himself the most qualified reviewer for a particular paper that was actually outside his field, and published it without anything resembling a proper cycle of peer review.

Gonzales had been a rather good scientist, "working in the lab for years," but then went to Iowa State and became a professor. His scientific production all but vanished, he was producing only a trickle of grad students, and virtually none of those were getting degrees. You don't get tenure (lifetime employment) by failing that hard.

So no. The scientific community doesn't toss people for having this bias or that. Newton's alchemy doesn't lead us to toss Newton's laws of motion.

Quote:

""I'll say this once, to make it absolutely clear: Science has no bias. It takes the facts, and it draws the conclusions that the facts present."" Facts "present."? What do they present? that fact that it could and probably will change in the future? How then is it a fact?

The facts are the evidence. The conclusions derived from them are subject to change as more facts are discovered. That's the difference. 3nodding

Quote:

For more information just type into Youtube "Kent Hovind Creation Science." And you will be met with debates, seminars, and a wealth of information.

To be honest, if you really want to push creationism, Kent Hovind is probably your worst choice; and I say that as someone who has watched the videos (mostly after my brother's Calvinist friends at the time tried to get him hooked on them, and I wanted to see what the buzz was about.)

Just focusing on what he says about science, he tends to rely on bad facts, obsolete evidence, and arguments that even other creationists have abandoned. The reason he seems better than that (eg, in his debates) is that he masks this with a very solid rhetorical style that scientists tend to be unable to keep up with. It's not because the scientists don't know the science; it's rather because the skills of being entertaining, playing to the audience's common biases, rapidly firing off snippets of information and using the "small words" aren't typical tools in a scientist's toolbox, especially when talking about science in a semi-formal or formal setting.

No, at that time it was the science books that were outdated, and he exposed that, not only outdated, but the lies that were in them, and thats just a portion of it.

[Sandokiri]

anonymous attributes

No, at that time it was the science books that were outdated, and he exposed that, not only outdated, but the lies that were in them, and thats just a portion of it.

I'm not referring to those, actually - but, for example, this list of should-be-tossed arguments compiled from creationist websites. While the list is not a critique of Hovind, many of those arguments have been used and defended by Hovind. (This link is AiG's response to Hovind's defence.)

[anonymous attributes]

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

No, at that time it was the science books that were outdated, and he exposed that, not only outdated, but the lies that were in them, and thats just a portion of it.

I'm not referring to those, actually - but, for example, this list of should-be-tossed arguments compiled from creationist websites. While the list is not a critique of Hovind, many of those arguments have been used and defended by Hovind. (This link is AiG's response to Hovind's defence.)

Do you want me to get you in contact with Dr Kent Hovind? I can actually do that, I have the connections. I listen in on his phone calls all the time.

let me know, and you can debate him, or maybe something lighter if you choose, ask him questions, what ever you want, so he can defend HIMSELF and answer you HIMSELF. That would be really neat. let me know and I will connect you get you a phone call with Kent Hovind.

[Xiam]

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

What do you mean, evolution has evidence, and billions of years? we can't even predict the weather right,

First problem: the inability to divine the future accurately is not relevant to whether we can read evidence of the past.

Quote:

and your atheist priests think they know what happened billions of years ago? We can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history within the range of a few thousand years, or how about something much closer, like Columbus? But we know what happened billions of years ago ay?

As someone with off-and-on (and usually on) interest in archaeology and palaeontology, I can say this.

The sciences of history do indeed work from incomplete evidence, and cannot produce complete pictures as a result. In that, your claim that we "can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history" is true. However, these sciences operate by constructing possible models based on the available evidence, and refine and/or discard models in light of new evidence. The model that seems the best fit for available evidence is often the one that gets taught at "lower" (eg, school) levels - with the added caveat that other biases unrelated to science (eg, patriotism) may alter even that. But that's another problem for another discussion.

Take, for example, the view of theropod dinosaurs. Even thirty years ago, we'd thought most of them (other than the feathered ancestors of Class Aves such as Archaeopteryx) to be scaled; with new evidence, we now understand that many of them were feathered, and even have some trace evidence for what colours some of those feathers had.

That's the trick though. The more specific the evidence is, the more specific that aspect of the model can be. Obtaining a range of "time-ago" is quite general by comparison; and the methods have been tested and cross-tested with various materials. I'm sure you'll bring up, or in your video link-drops may have brought up, the problems with those methods; but those problems were discovered by science, and the mechanisms of why and where the problems exist are generally understood.

Quote:

There is no bias in science? science is not a man, what kind of statement is that XIAM?! It takes human beings to look at science, and if you think there is no interpretation or bias on that, no matter who they are, that is intellectually dishonest of you to make that claim.

It's a true statement: the scientific method is not biased. It's a narrow road designed to help scientists avoid introducing their bias into their models.

As an example of this, take Linnaeus. He was definitely biased; his taxonomic research was funded by those who wanted him to identify humans as a unique order of animals - and being (as most were back then) a creationist, this was also a personal bias. Yet, identifying the evidence, he concluded against his double bias that humans could only be properly placed in the Order Primates, with the other apes.

Peer review is a system designed to check an individual scientist's bias, by distributing a hypothesis and its related research to many scientists that have many different biases, and adding the bias "I want to blow holes in your hypothesis so that I can jump on it and make a better one." But peer review also checks the objections (which is how Sir Richard Owen was ultimately discredited: he'd objected to Darwin's theory by claiming that a part of the brain called the hippocampus minor is unique to humans - a claim that was key to his own theory. However, other apes have the structure.)

Quote:

Scientists who have worked in the lab for years were literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist.

Expelled is about as bad as Religulous. Those particular creationists / ID proponents were not "literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist." The two biggest examples are Sternberg and Gonzales.

Sternberg wasn't even employed by the Smithsonian, and was essentially doing volunteer work; all the same, he had (and continued to have) the access. Where he went wrong was to declare himself the most qualified reviewer for a particular paper that was actually outside his field, and published it without anything resembling a proper cycle of peer review.

Gonzales had been a rather good scientist, "working in the lab for years," but then went to Iowa State and became a professor. His scientific production all but vanished, he was producing only a trickle of grad students, and virtually none of those were getting degrees. You don't get tenure (lifetime employment) by failing that hard.

So no. The scientific community doesn't toss people for having this bias or that. Newton's alchemy doesn't lead us to toss Newton's laws of motion.

Quote:

""I'll say this once, to make it absolutely clear: Science has no bias. It takes the facts, and it draws the conclusions that the facts present."" Facts "present."? What do they present? that fact that it could and probably will change in the future? How then is it a fact?

The facts are the evidence. The conclusions derived from them are subject to change as more facts are discovered. That's the difference. 3nodding

Quote:

For more information just type into Youtube "Kent Hovind Creation Science." And you will be met with debates, seminars, and a wealth of information.

To be honest, if you really want to push creationism, Kent Hovind is probably your worst choice; and I say that as someone who has watched the videos (mostly after my brother's Calvinist friends at the time tried to get him hooked on them, and I wanted to see what the buzz was about.)

Just focusing on what he says about science, he tends to rely on bad facts, obsolete evidence, and arguments that even other creationists have abandoned. The reason he seems better than that (eg, in his debates) is that he masks this with a very solid rhetorical style that scientists tend to be unable to keep up with. It's not because the scientists don't know the science; it's rather because the skills of being entertaining, playing to the audience's common biases, rapidly firing off snippets of information and using the "small words" aren't typical tools in a scientist's toolbox, especially when talking about science in a semi-formal or formal setting.

Well, now I don't have to respond. You did a much better job, mine would just be further angry ranting.

Although in regards to this:

Quote:

The sciences of history do indeed work from incomplete evidence, and cannot produce complete pictures as a result. In that, your claim that we "can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history" is true. However, these sciences operate by constructing possible models based on the available evidence, and refine and/or discard models in light of new evidence. The model that seems the best fit for available evidence is often the one that gets taught at "lower" (eg, school) levels - with the added caveat that other biases unrelated to science (eg, patriotism) may alter even that. But that's another problem for another discussion.

I probably would have addressed how what information we can derive from the information we have is far more accurate and less biased than reading from translated texts based on oral tradition from a group of people who didn't even know how big the Earth actually was at the time of said writing.

Or um... wait, I think I missed something I wanted to say before I started rambling again...

Ah! Got it. Something I mentioned before, too. While I can't attest to every individual scientist, science itself - being a method for discovery rather than some ideology - has no confirmation bias. The evidence is not picked out and selected for what fits a preconceived notion, and it should never be fabricated to fit it either. This is - again, as I said before - the difference between people who support evolution vs. people who support a literal concept of creation.

Creationists read the Bible, believe it to be true, and therefore go seeking evidence to support it.
Evolutionists (if they can even be called that) look at the evidence first and foremost, and draw what conclusions they can. There is no bias because they're not trying to prove anything. If anything, they're trying to disprove everything. And anything that doesn't fit the new evidence has to be thrown out.

Phlogiston, for instance, or - like you said - pretty much the entirety of alchemy. It had to be revised with new evidence as to how combustion, and all matter, actually works. Alchemy's still pretty good for philosophical (or, at times, psychological) concepts, but otherwise not so good at chemistry.

Uhhh... AA or that other person mentioned Columbus, right? Ha! I'm sure someone's going to think I'm talking about flat earth, no! He thought the Earth was actually smaller than it was, and people were unnerved by this because they thought it'd all be ocean and he'd never make it to the Indies. Turns out, both parties were wrong, there was a huge damn continent in the way.

Our understanding changes with the times, and those who cannot accept this - like Creationists, who will swear up and down that, no matter what they find, it must either confirm their beliefs or be disregarded as some biased, false information - will be left in the dust, clinging to their old myths while the rest of us continue on.

AA, you don't believe Zeus lobs thunderbolts at us, do you? Yes/No? It's static electricity, right?



(And yet I ranted anyway, sorry.)

[anonymous attributes]

Xiam

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

What do you mean, evolution has evidence, and billions of years? we can't even predict the weather right,

First problem: the inability to divine the future accurately is not relevant to whether we can read evidence of the past.

Quote:

and your atheist priests think they know what happened billions of years ago? We can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history within the range of a few thousand years, or how about something much closer, like Columbus? But we know what happened billions of years ago ay?

As someone with off-and-on (and usually on) interest in archaeology and palaeontology, I can say this.

The sciences of history do indeed work from incomplete evidence, and cannot produce complete pictures as a result. In that, your claim that we "can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history" is true. However, these sciences operate by constructing possible models based on the available evidence, and refine and/or discard models in light of new evidence. The model that seems the best fit for available evidence is often the one that gets taught at "lower" (eg, school) levels - with the added caveat that other biases unrelated to science (eg, patriotism) may alter even that. But that's another problem for another discussion.

Take, for example, the view of theropod dinosaurs. Even thirty years ago, we'd thought most of them (other than the feathered ancestors of Class Aves such as Archaeopteryx) to be scaled; with new evidence, we now understand that many of them were feathered, and even have some trace evidence for what colours some of those feathers had.

That's the trick though. The more specific the evidence is, the more specific that aspect of the model can be. Obtaining a range of "time-ago" is quite general by comparison; and the methods have been tested and cross-tested with various materials. I'm sure you'll bring up, or in your video link-drops may have brought up, the problems with those methods; but those problems were discovered by science, and the mechanisms of why and where the problems exist are generally understood.

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There is no bias in science? science is not a man, what kind of statement is that XIAM?! It takes human beings to look at science, and if you think there is no interpretation or bias on that, no matter who they are, that is intellectually dishonest of you to make that claim.

It's a true statement: the scientific method is not biased. It's a narrow road designed to help scientists avoid introducing their bias into their models.

As an example of this, take Linnaeus. He was definitely biased; his taxonomic research was funded by those who wanted him to identify humans as a unique order of animals - and being (as most were back then) a creationist, this was also a personal bias. Yet, identifying the evidence, he concluded against his double bias that humans could only be properly placed in the Order Primates, with the other apes.

Peer review is a system designed to check an individual scientist's bias, by distributing a hypothesis and its related research to many scientists that have many different biases, and adding the bias "I want to blow holes in your hypothesis so that I can jump on it and make a better one." But peer review also checks the objections (which is how Sir Richard Owen was ultimately discredited: he'd objected to Darwin's theory by claiming that a part of the brain called the hippocampus minor is unique to humans - a claim that was key to his own theory. However, other apes have the structure.)

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Scientists who have worked in the lab for years were literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist.

Expelled is about as bad as Religulous. Those particular creationists / ID proponents were not "literally fired because it was learned that they were creationist." The two biggest examples are Sternberg and Gonzales.

Sternberg wasn't even employed by the Smithsonian, and was essentially doing volunteer work; all the same, he had (and continued to have) the access. Where he went wrong was to declare himself the most qualified reviewer for a particular paper that was actually outside his field, and published it without anything resembling a proper cycle of peer review.

Gonzales had been a rather good scientist, "working in the lab for years," but then went to Iowa State and became a professor. His scientific production all but vanished, he was producing only a trickle of grad students, and virtually none of those were getting degrees. You don't get tenure (lifetime employment) by failing that hard.

So no. The scientific community doesn't toss people for having this bias or that. Newton's alchemy doesn't lead us to toss Newton's laws of motion.

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""I'll say this once, to make it absolutely clear: Science has no bias. It takes the facts, and it draws the conclusions that the facts present."" Facts "present."? What do they present? that fact that it could and probably will change in the future? How then is it a fact?

The facts are the evidence. The conclusions derived from them are subject to change as more facts are discovered. That's the difference. 3nodding

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For more information just type into Youtube "Kent Hovind Creation Science." And you will be met with debates, seminars, and a wealth of information.

To be honest, if you really want to push creationism, Kent Hovind is probably your worst choice; and I say that as someone who has watched the videos (mostly after my brother's Calvinist friends at the time tried to get him hooked on them, and I wanted to see what the buzz was about.)

Just focusing on what he says about science, he tends to rely on bad facts, obsolete evidence, and arguments that even other creationists have abandoned. The reason he seems better than that (eg, in his debates) is that he masks this with a very solid rhetorical style that scientists tend to be unable to keep up with. It's not because the scientists don't know the science; it's rather because the skills of being entertaining, playing to the audience's common biases, rapidly firing off snippets of information and using the "small words" aren't typical tools in a scientist's toolbox, especially when talking about science in a semi-formal or formal setting.

Well, now I don't have to respond. You did a much better job, mine would just be further angry ranting.

Although in regards to this:

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The sciences of history do indeed work from incomplete evidence, and cannot produce complete pictures as a result. In that, your claim that we "can't even figure out an accurate retelling of history" is true. However, these sciences operate by constructing possible models based on the available evidence, and refine and/or discard models in light of new evidence. The model that seems the best fit for available evidence is often the one that gets taught at "lower" (eg, school) levels - with the added caveat that other biases unrelated to science (eg, patriotism) may alter even that. But that's another problem for another discussion.

I probably would have addressed how what information we can derive from the information we have is far more accurate and less biased than reading from translated texts based on oral tradition from a group of people who didn't even know how big the Earth actually was at the time of said writing.

Or um... wait, I think I missed something I wanted to say before I started rambling again...

Ah! Got it. Something I mentioned before, too. While I can't attest to every individual scientist, science itself - being a method for discovery rather than some ideology - has no confirmation bias. The evidence is not picked out and selected for what fits a preconceived notion, and it should never be fabricated to fit it either. This is - again, as I said before - the difference between people who support evolution vs. people who support a literal concept of creation.

Creationists read the Bible, believe it to be true, and therefore go seeking evidence to support it.
Evolutionists (if they can even be called that) look at the evidence first and foremost, and draw what conclusions they can. There is no bias because they're not trying to prove anything. If anything, they're trying to disprove everything. And anything that doesn't fit the new evidence has to be thrown out.

Phlogiston, for instance, or - like you said - pretty much the entirety of alchemy. It had to be revised with new evidence as to how combustion, and all matter, actually works. Alchemy's still pretty good for philosophical (or, at times, psychological) concepts, but otherwise not so good at chemistry.

Uhhh... AA or that other person mentioned Columbus, right? Ha! I'm sure someone's going to think I'm talking about flat earth, no! He thought the Earth was actually smaller than it was, and people were unnerved by this because they thought it'd all be ocean and he'd never make it to the Indies. Turns out, both parties were wrong, there was a huge damn continent in the way.

Our understanding changes with the times, and those who cannot accept this - like Creationists, who will swear up and down that, no matter what they find, it must either confirm their beliefs or be disregarded as some biased, false information - will be left in the dust, clinging to their old myths while the rest of us continue on.

AA, you don't believe Zeus lobs thunderbolts at us, do you? Yes/No? It's static electricity, right?

Do you want me to get you in contact with Dr Kent Hovind? I can actually do that, I have the connections. I listen in on his phone calls all the time.

let me know, and you can debate him, or maybe something lighter if you choose, ask him questions, what ever you want, so he can defend HIMSELF and answer you HIMSELF. That would be really neat. let me know and I will connect you get you a phone call with Kent Hovind.

[Xiam]

anonymous attributes

Do you want me to get you in contact with Dr Kent Hovind? I can actually do that, I have the connections. I listen in on his phone calls all the time.

let me know, and you can debate him, or maybe something lighter if you choose, ask him questions, what ever you want, so he can defend HIMSELF and answer you HIMSELF. That would be really neat. let me know and I will connect you get you a phone call with Kent Hovind.

Okay, you responded way faster than I could go in and edit a spoiler in so my post didn't take up so much space because I quoted all that information. I don't think you even read my post.

No. ******** you, I'm not interested in your witch doctor.

[Sandokiri]

anonymous attributes

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

No, at that time it was the science books that were outdated, and he exposed that, not only outdated, but the lies that were in them, and thats just a portion of it.

I'm not referring to those, actually - but, for example, this list of should-be-tossed arguments compiled from creationist websites. While the list is not a critique of Hovind, many of those arguments have been used and defended by Hovind. (This link is AiG's response to Hovind's defence.)

Do you want me to get you in contact with Dr Kent Hovind? I can actually do that, I have the connections. I listen in on his phone calls all the time.

let me know, and you can debate him, or maybe something lighter if you choose, ask him questions, what ever you want, so he can defend HIMSELF and answer you HIMSELF. That would be really neat. let me know and I will connect you get you a phone call with Kent Hovind.

There's a short list of sentient beings in this or any world that I'd be willing to contact via phone. Kent Hovind is not on that list, for the simple and exclusive reason that he is not family or friend.

Besides, his positions are readily available in a form that can be considered and investigated, and gone back into and re-considered.

[anonymous attributes]

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

No, at that time it was the science books that were outdated, and he exposed that, not only outdated, but the lies that were in them, and thats just a portion of it.

I'm not referring to those, actually - but, for example, this list of should-be-tossed arguments compiled from creationist websites. While the list is not a critique of Hovind, many of those arguments have been used and defended by Hovind. (This link is AiG's response to Hovind's defence.)

Do you want me to get you in contact with Dr Kent Hovind? I can actually do that, I have the connections. I listen in on his phone calls all the time.

let me know, and you can debate him, or maybe something lighter if you choose, ask him questions, what ever you want, so he can defend HIMSELF and answer you HIMSELF. That would be really neat. let me know and I will connect you get you a phone call with Kent Hovind.

There's a short list of sentient beings in this or any world that I'd be willing to contact via phone. Kent Hovind is not on that list, for the simple and exclusive reason that he is not family or friend.

Besides, his positions are readily available in a form that can be considered and investigated, and gone back into and re-considered.

It sounds like you are limiting Kent Hovind from expanding his position or being able to answer direct questions.

Okay tell you what. If you have a question (or if brief, two or three) for Kent Hovind, let me know and I will give it to him. The answer also will be uploaded via Youtube. PM me if interested. You do not need to give out your name. Just think about it.

[Sandokiri]

anonymous attributes

It sounds like you are limiting Kent Hovind from expanding his position or being able to answer direct questions.

Not at all; he can expand and revise his position all he wants, and I'll consider those as I encounter them. I'm just not all that interested in asking any questions of him, since creationism / evolution discussion isn't particularly high on my interest list currently. 3nodding

[anonymous attributes]

Sandokiri

anonymous attributes

It sounds like you are limiting Kent Hovind from expanding his position or being able to answer direct questions.

Not at all; he can expand and revise his position all he wants, and I'll consider those as I encounter them. I'm just not all that interested in asking any questions of him, since creationism / evolution discussion isn't particularly high on my interest list currently. 3nodding

Alright, fair enough.