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Maybe the way to fight such movements is to go ahead with bastardizing the science curriculum with creationism, but then also fighting for the inclusion of every other faith’s teachings on the matter, too. The science curriculum will become bogged down in 180 days of creation teachings and nothing else will be taught!

Lawnboy:

There is a reason it is called the THEORY of evolution. It is scientific in nature, but not proven. Does evolution exist within species…..certainly. Is there any solid evidence showing that a dog evolved into a horse, or that any species evolved into an entirely different species……no.

It seems to me that both creationism and evolution are both theories—-neither one has been proven. So teaching them both doesnt seem at odds to me.

The primary question I would have in regard to evolution is this: Since we know that matter does not make itself, who created the first bit of matter that then ultimately evolved into what we have today? Nothing from nothing is nothing. Nothing does not create something.

This ultimately leads me back to the thought that someone—-some Creator—-put the building blocks there in the first place.

Joe,

Your comments come from a fundamental misunderstanding of the word Theory. In everyday life, “theory” means a potential, unproven idea. In science, that’s a hypothesis. In science, a Theory like evolution is backed up with significant investigation, proofs, experiments, etc. “a scientific hypothesis that survives experimental testing becomes a scientific theory”

Evolution is a Scientific theory. Creation is a religious theory. Evolution should be taught in science classes but not in religion classes, and Creation should be taught in religion classes but not in science classes.

No one claims a dog evolved into a horse. Both evolved from something else. And there is no reason to accept microevolution and reject macroevolution.

Evolution and science say nothing about what happened before the Big Bang, but the best scientific explanation for the phenomena we have observed is that a Big Bang happened and evolution got us to where we are. If you want to think there was a creator before that, that’s fine, but such a belief is a pre-conceived notion imposed on the scientific process, and it shouldn’t be taught in public schools.

There is a reason it is called the THEORY of evolution. It is scientific in nature, but not proven… It seems to me that both creationism and evolution are both theories—-neither one has been proven.

Science does not prove things. That’s not the way it works. Theories can only be disproven. Gravity is still a theory, and will always remain that way, just like evolution.

Nothing from nothing is nothing. Nothing does not create something.

Wonderful argument, except for the whole “what created God?” problem.

If God can have been around without anything creating him/her/it, so can the Universe. If the Universe requires a creator, so does God, and God’s creator, and God’s creator’s creator, and so on.

Evolution is a fact in that scientists know beyond reasonable doubt that it happened. The exact mechanism of evolution — that is, exactly how it happened — is still a theory.

Evolution is both a fact and a theory. Mainstream scientists consider it a fact that evolution occurred; how it occurred is still considered a theory. Stephen J. Gould describes this difference best:

“In the American vernacular, ‘theory’ often means ‘imperfect fact’ — part of a hierarchy of confidence running downhill from fact to theory to hypothesis to guess. Thus the power of the creationist argument: evolution is ‘only’ a theory and intense debate now rages about many aspects of the theory. If evolution is worse than a fact, and scientists can’t even make up their minds about the theory, then what confidence can we have in it? Indeed, President Reagan echoed this argument before an evangelical group in Dallas when he said (in what I devoutly hope was campaign rhetoric): ‘Well, it is a theory. It is a scientific theory only, and it has in recent years been challenged in the world of science — that is, not believed in the scientific community to be as infallible as it once was.’

“Well evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world’s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don’t go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein’s theory of gravitation replaced Newton’s in this century, but apples didn’t suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape-like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin’s proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered.

“Moreover, ‘fact’ doesn’t mean ‘absolute certainty’; there ain’t no such animal in an exciting and complex world. The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are NOT about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us falsely for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science ‘fact’ can only mean ‘confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional consent’. I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.

“Evolutionists have been very clear about this distinction of fact and theory from the very beginning, if only because we have always acknowledged how far we are from completely understanding the mechanisms (theory) by which evolution (fact) occurred. Darwin continually emphasized the difference between his two great and separate accomplishments: establishing the fact of evolution, and proposing a theory - natural selection — to explain the mechanism of evolution.”

Some nit-pickers might try to argue that nothing can ever be proven 100 percent in science, therefore there is no such thing as a fact, let alone evolution standing as a fact. H.J. Muller tackles this argument:

“The honest scientist, like the philosopher, will tell you that nothing whatever can be or has been proved with fully 100% certainty, not even that you or I exist, nor anyone except himself, since he might be dreaming the whole thing. Thus there is no sharp line between speculation, hypothesis, theory, principle, and fact, but only a difference along a sliding scale, in the degree of probability of the idea. When we say a thing is a fact, then, we only mean that its probability is an extremely high one: so high that we are not bothered by doubt about it and are ready to act accordingly. Now in this use of the term fact, the only proper one, evolution is a fact. For the evidence in favor of it is as voluminous, diverse, and convincing as in the case of any other well established fact of science concerning the existence of things that cannot be directly seen, such as atoms, neutrons, or solar gravitation…

“So enormous, ramifying, and consistent has the evidence for evolution become that if anyone could now disprove it, I should have my conception of the orderliness of the universe so shaken as to lead me to doubt even my own existence. If you like, then, I will grant you that in an absolute sense evolution is not a fact, or rather, that it is no more a fact than that you are hearing or reading these words.”

Life has indeed been designed, but by whom or what is the central controversy. Creationists believe it was an intelligent designer, namely, God; evolutionists believe it was a driving force of nature, namely, natural selection. Natural selection works when life forms with advantageous survival traits live long enough to breed, therefore passing on those traits to the next generation. Life forms with weaker traits die before breeding, and therefore disappear from the gene pool. Genetic diversity results in slight variations of these hereditary traits from generation to generation, which allows a species to adapt to the changing demands of a changing environment. This results in a suitability between life form and environment that many people mistake for intelligent design.

Lawnboy:

To understand what started the entire process is certainly worthy of scientific discussion, as opposed to religion. Science shows that there must have been something to explode in the big bang. Therefore, where did it come from. There should be some scientific solution to this question….but i have yet to hear one.

Ceejayoz points out the conundrum about who created God, and who created whomever created God. Yet that is precisely my point. If science has no answer to that specific question, then why not admit the possibility that an omnipotent God might transcend OUR natural laws of time and space. Unless we choose to believe that time has spiraled infinitely backward, NEVER having had a beginning, then we must believe that something started everything. Since science has no answer to this, perhaps religion does.

Actually, I was wrong above. There really doesn’t need to be a discussion of what happened before the Big Bang. The Big Bang created time. There are scientific explanations for how the Big Bang might have happened out of nothing.

So, religion doesn’t answer such questions any better than science does. Even if you’d prefer to think about religion for the pre-Big Bang period, we don’t need to bring religion into public schools while talking about the evolution of man, which was billions of years after the Big Bang.

Creationism will be added to the list of things that the Right has got embarrassingly wrong.

Creationism stems from the ignorance and fanaticism of the religious right, and this nonsense cannot withstand even the slightest scientific scrutiny or enquiry. Evolution on the other hand has withstood over a century of scrutiny and is based upon the sturdiest of logic and evidence.

It would be laughable that people take creationism seriously if it wasn’t for the fact that these people seem to have more influence than they merrit, and are trying to teach this superstitious mumbo jumbo in schools. The sooner the Flat-Earth brigade slip of the edge of the planet, and go from nothing back into nothing, the better.

Cee—

“Science does not prove things. That’s not the way it works. Theories can only be disproven. Gravity is still a theory, and will always remain that way, just like evolution.”
Gravity is no longer a theory, it is a “proven” Law of Scientific fact, (see Sir Issac Newton circa 1664) referred to as The Law of Universal Gravitation. The effects of gravity are proven every time an object drops to the ground, and every time an astronaut floats.

As to the large issue at hand, the theory of creation has no place in the public schools, because—dare I say it: the separation of church and state. If a parent wishes it taught to their child, do so at your local neighborhood church, or at home.

VEdwards and all posted

I still dont see why this creation thing has to be an issue for public schools. Either way you look at it, there IS NO way of explaining how things started - from either standpoint.

Yeah, its creation. God started it. Define god… aztecs believed in the sun, many native americans think creation started by the Coyote God… then there are the christian fundamentalists! and its THEIR God that always makes the rules.

So, what I will do with my kids and teach my kids not to listen to those christian bible thumpin freaks. And take them to the Museum of Natural History, and show them the dinosaur fossils and remains of ancient civilizations.
At least The museum explains their theories and has the evidence to back up their theories.

ever notice that the folks who believe in creationism appear to have been skipped over by evolution?

just a theory….