Originally posted by Quasar1011
On the other hand, evolution theory is borne of science, you say. On another thread, the process of lizards evolving into birds was described. Please tell me how long this process takes; especially, if the process is longer than one lifetime.
That has got to be the most jaw-dropping thing I have read in this entire thread. Real life isnt the movies. New life does not suddenly erupt into higher forms the the bodies of its parents. It is a gradual process over millions of years. Sometimes it happens suddenly due to a catastrophic environmental effect, that acts as a catalyst. By "suddenly" read "in geologic" timeframe, could be as quick as a few 100,000 years. Birds do not give birth to dogs and turtles dont suddenly sprout wings within one gernation! Although at times I wonder if seeing that would be the only thing that would convince you in the validity of evolution, even though that isnt what it means. I say that because I have heard that tired arguement before "Birds dont turn into mammals" and all that crap. It's hilarious watching a BT trying to wrap his tiny brain around such a concept as change over millions of years. Seeing him furrow his brow in a vain attempt to undrestand, getting fustrated and angry because he's been told one thing all his life and tries to argue his case using fallacious arguements. It's quite a sight, I've seen it plenty. Paleontologists are STILL trying to work out the specifics of the dino and I've seen some wildly occilating theories. Some argue whether they were warm blooded or only slighty, whether T-rex had feathers or not? But the concensus is pretty certain on one thing: Approx 65 million years ago a big rock hit the Yucatan. Caused all sorts of bad things, lots of animals and plants died. Those that survived and thrived were the ones able to find food wherever it might be. Small rodent-like mammals that were our ancestors were already around but needed the big Dinos to get out of the way, and small dinosaurs that already had feathers and workable wings that could fly and look for food over large areas. These over time spread, EVOLVED, and filled various niches throughout the globe, just as the lowly shrew-things evolved into other creatures like elephants, deer, US over the cource of 65 million years. That is what the bone/fossil record tells us. It's imperfect yes, but it certainly is a lot more practical than saying POOF, everything is created out of nothing, with everything perfectly in its proper place. Accepting the existence of extinct creatures, especially those never mentioned in biblical text is a no-no because it makes cracks in the fascade of the "infallible Bible" whoppity doo!
And yes, ToE is a guessing game a lot of the time, sort of like the answers on a Magic 8-ball. Probably, More than likely, All signs point to Yes, We're not 100% certain, just 90-99.9% with all the evidence at hand. It's not perfect, but its the MOST ACCURATE THEORY we have to date.
And as for SEEING GOD. give me a break! Arthur C. Clark has written "Any sufficiently advanced civilization will appear as magic to a suitably primative civilization"
The Aztecs thought the Spanish were gods. Who knows who or what the ancient poeples of the fetile crecent saw? The description Ezekial gives about the fiery chariot with 4 angels with 4 wings sounds like a damn flying saucer and a helicopter to me. The bible is riddled with these accounts, what about the Manna Machine within the Ark of the Covenant? My theory is that some Martian with a messiah complex decided to come down and screw around with the primatives of this planet 6-10000 years ago and we are still being messed up by it. If primative people's saw lights dancing in the night sky they'd just assume they were angels, me on the otherhand would think it was martians up to no good.
But on back to the reason why poeple fight so ferverently against ToE. They are frightened. To give into the thought that it may be true would go against every fiber of what they have been taught their entire lives. To give into it would preclude the existence of a supreme being and intelligent creator of the universe. Without that Being, everything else goes down the tubes too, especially Heaven and life after death. They have been taught that if they proclaim this and that, make everyone else's lives miserable by "acting" holier than thou, they get eternal reward in a place that is proclaimed to be "perfect". Take that away and poeple go nutz. They go into denial, they get angry and they get violent. I asked one of my Holier than Thou, Bible Thumping Friends at school. "Imagine for just 1 moment that you are wrong and there is no God, and there is no Heaven, what would you do?" not only did he not answer it, he dodged the question and I kept getting the same asnwer from other poeple "But what if I'm right???" "You didnt answer my question smeghead." I would always get the same frustrating answer "But what if I'm right?"
"Well keep thinking that as all those worms and grubs eat your rotting carcass when you're 6 feet under"
See? It's that sort of denial that is really counter productive. Believing in something with all your faith doesnt make it so. "I believe with all my heart that there are no bullets in that gun pointed at my head, even though my eyes tell me different. " Bang!
I remeber a famous US Politician from the 80's: John Tower. He was a congressman for many decades before becoming Secretary of the Interior I think, then died in a plane crash in 1989. I'm about 90% ceratain he said this "Let's cut down ALL the forests, afterall, Judgement Day is soon upon us." Just what can you say to something like that?
Curt and other guys are trying to be curteous, good for them. I for one could care less because I don't care who's toes I step on because I'm not really aiming for anyone in particular.
