Most atheists do not know what science says about our origins

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DOC said:
And did these 11 apostles choose to die for what they knew to be a false story.

Apostolic Age—1st century

* Saint Stephen, Protomartyr, was stoned c. 35 A.D.
* James the Great (Son of Zebedee) was beheaded in 44 A.D.
* Philip the Apostle was crucified in 54 A.D.
* Matthew the Evangelist killed by a halberd in 60 A.D.
* James the Just, beaten to death by a club after being crucified and stoned.
* Matthias was stoned and beheaded.
* Saint Andrew, St. Peter's brother, was crucified.
* Mark was beaten to death.
* Saint Peter, crucified upside-down.
* Apostle Paul, beheaded in Rome.
* Saint Jude was crucified.
* Saint Bartholomew was crucified.
* Thomas the Apostle was killed by a spear.
* Luke the Evangelist was hanged.
* Simon the Zealot was crucified in 74 A.D.
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How do you know what they believed or didn't believe? What makes you think that simply saying "Oh, yeah, Jesus... Just a guy I had a couple of drinks with," would have spared anyone's life?

And anyway, it looks like they all died before the gospels were written. Hmmmm, that was convenient -- with all these witnesses who might contradict their story out of the way, the writers pretty much had a free pass to write anything they thought sounded good, didn't they? Maybe they were the original "Liars for Jesus"...

And while we're on the subject, did anyone at Jonestown die for a story they knew to be false? Do their deaths validate any claims to divinity made by Jim Jones? Did the Heaven's Gate loons die for a story they knew to be false? Does their willingness to die for their beliefs make the beliefs themselves any more likely to be true? By that standard, 19 9/11 terrorists beats 12 apostles. Looks like you're betting on the wrong horse, DOC.
 
Yes, that is weird... as though willing to die for something makes it true. That is what is so scary about faith-- if faith is good--the key to salvation-- then EXTREME faith is better... and what better way to show your faith than to do something you'd never normally do for it.

Andrea Yates drowned her five children, because she was afraid that her poor mothering could damn them to hell. So she killed them before they could sin in such a big way--she made the ultimate sacrifice because she truly believed her kids were just starting their "happily ever after" earlier and that she was ensuring that it would be in heaven. She figured she was already going to hell, but didn't want her children to suffer the same fate. And you really, really believe Christian ideology-- she's a martyr--she ensure her childrens' eternal glory over her own... that makes her more of a martyr than God.

The hijackers had extreme faith. So did the people in Waco... and the Heavens Gate crowd (they removed their nads for their space journey... if only fear of hell would make pedophilia clergy man THAT faithful.)
 
Hokulele said:
I am going to agree with Meadmaker here in that I think DOC has completely misunderstood the whole concept of a single ancestor.
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Let's be careful, here. I didn't exactly say that. I said that on a particular point, he probably hadn't given it all that much thought, because the point wasn't all that important to him.

Trying to describe or discover the characteristics of the common ancestor would be something that an evolutionary scientist might find interesting, but a creationist wouldn't care all that much. DOC thinks the idea that a bacterium was a common ancestor of a blue whale and a redbud tree is absurd. I doubt he would give a great deal of thought to the exact characteristics of that ancestor. Perhaps he has read enough to understand it, or perhaps not. I can't tell from his writings thus far.

That, to me, is not all that interesting. What he has said is that if people understood it, they might reject evolution entirely. I say that people do understand it, and they haven't rejected evolution as a consequence. I would like to hear him address why he believes that people don't accept that portion of the theory, and why, if they did, they would reject the theory.
 
Meadmaker said:
Let's be careful, here. I didn't exactly say that. I said that on a particular point, he probably hadn't given it all that much thought, because the point wasn't all that important to him.
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I am only talking about the general concept of "descent from a single ancestor" in the post you quoted, not the particular point in the OP. The very fact he worded the OP the way he did implies he does not understand the concept, other than in a Genesis sort of way. I apologize if that is not what you meant.
 
articulett said:
Exactly... and many posters weighed in to show not only did they know a lot more on the subject than he did, but his great grandancestors could have even been a virus or a slime mold and probably contained both... and the details are rapidly being filled in and the line backwards in time more clear. He had no alternate theory... creationists never do... they just want to make the other side sound incomprehensible or absurd and they learn or say just enough so that they think they are conveying that. And what they are conveying is the poor arguments that were able to sway them... it's the argument creationist will refine and hone, because people like DOC and Kirk Cameron, etc. spread them because, by golly, they think it's some major point in favor of their alternate unexpressed magical hypothesis.
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Of course the Creationists don't have an alternate theory, they don't think they need one. "God did it" is the only acceptable view on the origins of humanity--indeed, ALL scientific questions from how the human mind works to how the stars and planets where formed. Prying into these questions with anything other than a theistic outlook is by it's very nature, blasphemous.

Read The Discovery Institute's infamous "Wedge Document" and their goals are all right there in black and white. Biology is just the first step for these people, and other "materialistic sciences" like astronomy, geology, chemistry, physics or any other disciplines that doesn't fit the Christian view of the universe will be next on the chopping block.

If we give these people an inch or let their claims go unchallenged, it will be the end of science. (Which is something I'm sure DOC and his ilk would love to see.)
 
wollery said:
No DOC, do you understand what the term "come from the same single organism" means in terms of the theory?
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Yes, its quite simple. If that "one" single solitary organism (let's call him Mr. A) had died for some reason. All the plants and animals and humans and dinosaurs etc. would not have evolved from it. And you or I wouldn't be here. We all came from that one organism (according to the theory). What don't you understand about that. There was a "first" one celled organism and all plants and animals came from that "first" single organism. If the theory says something else than articulett and meadmaker were wrong and you need to tell us how articulett and meadmaker were wrong.

I get the impression that some of you would believe -- Oh, if that first one cell bacteria had died there would always be another one down the line to come along. That's very unlikely. That's why modern science with all its technology can't create a simple one celled organism from organic matter. Only God can create a one celled living organism -- if indeed, that's how He chose to create man instead of creating him instantly.
 
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DOC said:
I get the impression that some of you would believe -- Oh, if that first one cell bacteria had died there would always be another one down the line to come along. That's very unlikely. That's why modern science with all its technology can't create a simple one celled organism from organic matter. Only God can create a one celled living organism -- if indeed, that's how He chose to create man instead of creating him instantly.
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La la la... :cool:
 
DOC said:
Yes, its quite simple.
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Then why do you get it wrong?

DOC, just because you missinterpret the concept doesn't mean we have to.

I could willfully pretend that christians are all vampires becuase they drink blood once a week. Does this make it real? Does this interpretation hold up? Why, or why not?
 
articulett said:
Exactly... and many posters weighed in to show not only did they know a lot more on the subject than he did, but his great grandancestors could have even been a virus or a slime mold...
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Some might have known more about the "theory" of how this first one celled bacteria supposedly came into existence (through the actions of viruses and molds) but this thread is not on the theory of how this first single organism came about. This thread deals with what I believe is the fact that most atheists do not know that all plants and animals and you and your relatives came from a single one celled bacteria (according to science). How this single one celled bacteria is theorized to have come into existence is not really relevant to the OP.
 
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Skibum said:
Does that mean that when mans technology is able to create a one celled organism, man will become god?
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Well it would certainly give atheists a lot more ammunition than they have now. But I don't believe it will ever happen.
 
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I dunno why i bother but..

This thread deals with what I believe is the fact that most atheists do not know that all plants and animals and you and your relatives came from this single one celled bacteria
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MOST DO KNOW THIS (as long as we don't split hairs over "single once celled bacteria) !

You have been told this OVER and OVER.. why do you persist.

WE DO KNOW IT
WE DO KNOW IT
WE DO KNOW IT..

Get it ???

Just because YOU and your nutty band of fundies find it weird doesn't mean it is !

What is weird is that you find the concept that an impossible entity “poofed” things into existence.

What is even weirder is that the entity you believe in is based on a made up bunch of stories by primitive tribesmen in a small corner of ancient Earth !
 
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Mark A. Siefert said:
Of course the Creationists don't have an alternate theory, they don't think they need one. "God did it" is the only acceptable view on the origins of humanity--indeed, ALL scientific questions from how the human mind works to how the stars and planets where formed. Prying into these questions with anything other than a theistic outlook is by it's very nature, blasphemous.

Read The Discovery Institute's infamous "Wedge Document" and their goals are all right there in black and white. Biology is just the first step for these people, and other "materialistic sciences" like astronomy, geology, chemistry, physics or any other disciplines that doesn't fit the Christian view of the universe will be next on the chopping block.

If we give these people an inch or let their claims go unchallenged, it will be the end of science. (Which is something I'm sure DOC and his ilk would love to see.)
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I have read it... and the Dover transcripts. The doubletalk and nothingness jump out at me. It's always about mucking up understanding rather that clarifying. Their whole aim is to make it sound like science doesn't know, therefore they do (because their god told them) or something like that. It's so damn miraculous, that scientists are arrogant to even try to understand it. God of the gaps, etc. But they're old and so pompous sounding that I hope the next generation rightly relegates them to the dinosaur heap via ridicule as we have done to witchdoctors past. True and useful information catches on almost as fast as the information that promises salvation or threatens non-belief. But this will change as people are exposed to so many things they are supposed to believe via faith (often contradictory things) and so many potential hells they could end up in for non belief... that they will be forced to look what the evidence says about the matter. That's my hope anyhow.

It will be grassroots bottom up spreading of the information via the internet and the computer generation--while pompous older folks will be fearmongering about those newfangled internets and series of tubes :) and "catching the gay" and attempting to control the information so nobody knows the emperor is totally naked. But information that is good at spreading has a way of stymieing even the most fascist attempts at control.
 
joobz said:
Then why do you get it wrong?

DOC, just because you missinterpret the concept doesn't mean we have to.
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To meadmaker, this is what I mean when I say that most atheists do not know that all plants and animals came from the "same" one celled organism (a bacterium) according to the current theory of mainstream science.
 
DOC said:
Well it would certainly give atheists a lot more ammunition than they have now.
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Well, we have made synthetic life. What now? Oh that's right, you just ignore it... or call it "non life" or set the requirements so high and gods influence as so unknowable that he must have had a finger in it somehow, right?

And we know... Lots of Christians and theists are well aware of the details of common descent-- Francis Collins for one. He didn't think synthetic life was possible, and I wonder what tap dancing he is doing now. As long as you think you can't understand something because god did it-- you CAN'T... not because of god-- but because the god notion stops all further inquiry!
 
DOC said:
Well it would certainly give atheists a lot more ammunition than they have now.
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Well seeing as how the scientific community has mountains of research and confirmed test results and is responsible for everything you see around you from the computer you're typing on to the car in your garage to that flu shot you got last week, I'd say that's more than ample ammunition.

The religious side has a bunch of conflicting books written by ancient nut-jobs and liars and is historically responsible for doing more to hold back the advancement of mankind (at least Christianity holds true to this). This is not convincing; it's lunacy.
 
DOC said:
Well it would certainly give atheists a lot more ammunition than they have now.
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that's funny. I thought the gain of science was to help mankind by giving us new ways to treat disease, improve our lives and environment, and generally give us a more realistic understanding of our universe.
 
DOC said:
To meadmaker, this is what I mean when I say that most atheists do not know that all plants and animals came from the "same" one celled organism (a bacterium) according to the current theory of mainstream science.
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We all know that we come from the primordial soup... the nature of that last universal common ancestor is not known in it's entirety. But whatever that line of descent is-- it is the same for all of us from our last common ancestor backwards in time. And we meet up with our invertebrate kin at the sea worm in the article quoted... yes... it was a microbe--whether it was a microbe we'd call bacteria or a virus or a diatome or eubacteria or a bacterial colony is not known... but we know that the details will come from science-- not from primitive holy texts.

I do not know of any person who understands evolution who doesn't also understand that life (including ours) traces backwards to the primordial seas. That makes logical sense. Your alternate hypothesis which is never presented for examination and which has no evidence in its favor does not.
 
DOC said:
Well it would certainly give atheists a lot more ammunition than they have now. But I don't believe it will ever happen.
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Ammunition for what? Knowledge just leads to more knowledge--you don't ammunition for that! The truth just keeps being true no matter what anyone believes. We don't get together and talk about how much we believe in gravity or have faith in atomic theory or talk about how sorry we feel for those who don't have the power of understanding dna in their lives. We don't tell each other how saved we are because we've been able to make ourselves believe in molecular genetics.

The faith-heads need the ammunition because how else are they going to scare people into believing such nonsense?
 
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