14 March 2006

It's either Atheism or Creationism: There is no middle ground.

Since most people are not mad enough to believe in Creationism (though a large and growing number do manage it by being so deluded as to deny evolution, cosmology, paleontology, geology etc. etc. just so they can believe the literal truth of a bible written by men over 2000 years ago who were ignorant of such scientific advances) then people must choose atheism.

Those who try to steer a middle ground between religion and evolution are being even more illogical than the Creationists.

Robert Stovold of the Brighton & Hove Humanist Society has written an excellent article - "Evolution: A Nightmare for Theologians".

"The human embryo develops like that of a monkey – both embryos develop fur, a tail, and toes that are opposable (like our thumbs). In the human embryo though, the tail is almost totally re-absorbed (only a small tailbone remains). Most of the fur is lost, and the opposable toes twist around so that they are useful for walking but not for gripping. It’s unlikely that a divine designer would make things develop in such a roundabout way, but evolution can explain all of this quite neatly."

7 comments:

  1. This is completely ignorant. There are many non-atheist religions which do not subscribe to Creationism! What about Hinduism, for crying out loud? You have heard of Hinduism, right?

    Maybe you have heard of Roman Catholicism. For Catholics, there are three soures of authority: the scripture, the traditions of the Christian community, and the teachings of the Church. If the Church says the Bible is wrong on Creationism, then the Bible is wrong. That is what the Church has said.

    You conflate non-atheism with some bizarre straw man version of scriptually fundamentalist Protestantism. You pretend that Hinduism, Buddhism, Catholicism and so on don't exist, because any would ruin your argument.

    This straw man must be one of your most pathetic yet.

    Why do bother to insult your readers with this drivel? Why do you bother to insult so many religious people? Does it make you proud to remind them how much DNA evolution has condemned them to have in common with you?

    What are you afraid of?

    To use an analogy - you will remember analogy: it's one of those form of reasoning which isn't the same as deduction - the way you argue is like triumphantly beating a cripple in a running race when you could have chosen to race against someone who was fit. It's nothing to be proud of; frankly, it's rude and embarrassing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Myself I don't think that is ignorant or rude at all. It's someone's point of view. It is certainly no ruder than someone of a particular faith saying that someone who is an atheist or agnostic or even of another faith is wrong.

    If one is going to be logical, surely science is called for becuase it is a methodolgy based on logic and proof. In which case evolution is the only logical explanation for the development of life that we currently have. I think it doesn't really matter if the alternative is some form of creationism or some other belief. That's a perfectly logical position, even if you don't agree with it.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anon: Ultimately all religions believe that their particular god or gods CREATED the world and all life in it. That to me is CREATIONISM. Aspects of Hinduism and Buddhism in this respect can be described as a philosophy rather than a religion because some of them believe that god IS the universe. Any other belief in spirituality or afterlife is also inconsistent with evolution.

    Creationists may say they accept evolution, but that is inconsistent with a belief that a god created the world. Hence there is no middle ground, it is either or.

    No serious scientist denies evolution. If there was another scientific theory that had anywhere near the amount of evidence that evolution has, then that would be a viable alternative. In the absense of this alternative, it is the accepted scientific theory - evolution or the myths of creationism, that is all there is.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Have you ever considered just admitting that you are wrong sometimes instead of pretending that words have some meaning other than the conventionally accepted one?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Parts of Hinduism suggest that the world is a flat disc supported by four elephants. If you want to defend that, that is up to you. I have admitted I am wrong when I am wrong, maybe it's your turn.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Neil is right. Some Creationists believe that evolution is a lie and some believe that it's part of a divine plan. But they are all creationists, because creationism only means a belief that God created the world.

    That's what Wikipedia says and that's what I believe...

    ReplyDelete
  7. Damn Wikipedianists.

    ReplyDelete

Pages