Does god exist?

[Rammjet]

Confirmation retreats?

[~Twisted]

Confirmation retreats?

Basically church for teenagers.

[Red Hackdaw]

Confirmation retreats?

alright when ur in the "journey" to confirmation you have a trip or 'retreat' somewhere before you get confirmed. I currently have to take a 2 hour religon class every other sunday this year for confirmation.

[~Twisted]

alright when ur in the "journey" to confirmation you have a trip or 'retreat' somewhere before you get confirmed. I currently have to take a 2 hour religon class every other sunday this year for confirmation.

As I said... Church for teens.

[DaFlamingPotato]

Confirmation retreats?

Our retreat was more of a one-day thing, some other parishes get more involved.
The goal is to prepare ourselves for Confirmation and clean up any final questions or things we have.
My Confirmation is Sunday.
I may not really believe in God, but I believe in trying to be a good person and caring about others. This has shown me the power of group spirit and the kinds of good things that can be accomplished. I think whether or not you believe in God isn't important; what's important is that you are fully involved in the cause. So I've decided to tag along for a while.
I learned a lot today.

[Blackie6789]

Fine explain this.

Catholic extermination camps


Surpisingly few know that Nazi extermination camps in World War II were by no means the only ones in Europe at the time. In the years 1942-1943 also in Croatia existed numerous extermination camps, run by Catholic Ustasha under their dictator Ante Paveli, a practising Catholic and regular visitor to the then pope. There were even concentration camps exclusively for children!

In these camps - the most notorious was Jasenovac, headed by a Franciscan friar - orthodox-Christian serbians (and a substantial number of Jews) were murdered. Like the Nazis the Catholic Ustasha burned their victims in kilns, alive (the Nazis were decent enough to have their victims gassed first). But most of the victims were simply stabbed, slain or shot to death, the number of them being estimated between 300,000 and 600,000, in a rather tiny country. Many of the killers were Franciscan friars. The atrocities were appalling enough to induce bystanders of the Nazi "Sicherheitsdient der SS", watching, to complain about them to Hitler (who did not listen). The pope knew about these events and did nothing to prevent them. [MV]

Even if god was real do you think he would want this?

In the first place, I completely agree that this is wrong and I'm quite sure you do also. However, I would like to ask you why you think what occurred was wrong. In an evolutionary scenario, why should this be a problem at all>? If the victims could not survive, they wouldn't pass their weak genes on to the next generation; in fact, only the strong people would survive which would be a plus according to evolution. Why do you feel a sense of wrongdoing? If there is no God, and we are the products of mutated pond scum, why should you have any emotion at all? It would make sense that there would be a feeling of wrong doing if a God implanted a conscience into your being. My point is that it doesn't make sense to feel pity towards these people in an evolutionary scenario at all. Going back to your argument, what makes you say that he was a Christian and that God supported him? What fallible Catholics do is one thing; what a perfect God does is another thing. I cannot shrug off this incident; but I can show you that God did not support this occurrence at all; so it really doesn't prove or disprove anything on an argumental basis. I do appreciate you bringing this to my attention since I find it unfortunate that many people think that the Pop is perfect and infallible; this incident shows that even the Pope can make mistakes at times.

Technically it does describe how speciation occurs- thus 'origin of species', but blackie is misinterpretting this statement and 150 year old book title in order to justify his purile belief that 'evolution is the enemy- and it describes how life was made,', which is just wrong wrong wrong; blackie should be focussing his super-christian hate on abiogenesis and other sciences, rather than evolution.

So Poozy is basically saying that evolution is NOT the origin of species? I agree that evolution is not the origin of life [although to an extent, it does rely on abiogenesis if you do not believe in God]; however, it seems absurd to me that he would think that evolution would not be the explanation of how species diversified.
Evolution is more then the belief that species diversify overtime; it is the belief that all forms of life share a common ancestor; for instance, according to evolution, humans share a common ancestor with fruit flies--as well as apes, and hominids. Evolution states that all of life shares a common ancestry with each other; it is the theory of how the origin of species happened.

As for Alan Feduccia, I may not agree with all his views; however, my point was not that I don't agree with all his views, my point was that he doesn't support the Archeopteryx. Dragging his other views is irrelevant; I don't care if he likes to eat sushi; all I care about at the moment are his beliefs [based on observation] regarding the Archeopteryx.

[Rammjet]

Poozy mistakenly thought you meant 'origin of life'. Of course poozy knows evolution describes speciation; he's made many posts which demonstrate such an understanding.

Evolution is NOT the belief that all species must all share a common ancestor; life could have originated on earth once, twice or any number of times, and this would not affect the evidence or argument for evolution at all, not one bit. In fact many biologists are trying to prove that life originated more than once. :]

The fact many species share common ancestors, and they might all share 1 common ancestor, is an extrapolation- not a core aspect of the argument. For example some bacteria may have been introduced to earth by meteors ferrying them through space...they wouldn't have a common ancestor with earth life...but this wouldn't disprove evolution.

Alan believed that archeopteryx was a cousin-relation of the theropods, rather than a direct descendant; you grossly misrepresented his views, and if his views did come into favour in the scientific community...do you know what difference it would make to the theory of evolution? None.
You simply cherry-picked one of his arguments and then contorted it to try and win a battle, not understanding that even if your contorted version of his argument was right, it wouldn't win the war: proving archeopteryx is a 'cousin' rather than a 'son', would not prove the KT extinction didn't happen, would not prove that Evolution is wrong, would not prove that God exists.

Sometimes I think I need to spell everything out to you, blackie. It's like you're deliberately not doing research properlly- did you ever read that book I recommended? Did you even go to the Library?

[Rammjet]

Edit: This will absolutely melt your brain, the theory of evolution would still apply if life originated twice- on two different planets, and then their descendants traveled through space, met and found they were so similar they interbred.

That would be a unification of two lineages, rather than a diversification- weird huh? In fact this sort of thing does happen- and you can see it happening. For example some Swiss lakes, which used to contain 17 species of fish, responded to pollution by interbreeding*- and weirdly 17 species became 1 new amalgamated species.

*Species shouldn't be able to interbreed, but some rules can be bent and others broken in weird situations such as amalgamations of species.

[Delta]

Edit: This will absolutely melt your brain, the theory of evolution would still apply if life originated twice- on two different planets, and then their descendants traveled through space, met and found they were so similar they interbred.

That would be a unification of two lineages, rather than a diversification- weird huh? In fact this sort of thing does happen- and you can see it happening. For example some Swiss lakes, which used to contain 17 species of fish, responded to pollution by interbreeding*- and weirdly 17 species became 1 new amalgamated species.

*Species shouldn't be able to interbreed, but some rules can be bent and others broken in weird situations such as amalgamations of species.

I believe this is what would happen to dogs and eventaly wolves should humans should cease to exist, is it not?

[Rammjet]

I believe this is what would happen to dogs and eventaly wolves should humans should cease to exist, is it not?

Probably. Another good example comes from the scottish highlands; the native species of deer is 'red deer', but 'sika deer' were introduced from Japan.

The sika and the red deer interbred to make hybrids, and the hybrids interbred with other red deer, so that now most red deer have some sika genes in them, but not the ones in the Hebridies because the sika deer never got there.

Even humans are an example; a typical westerner has 1 to 4% neanderthal dna in them.

[PooZy]

no blackie, when you said evolution described how species originated I thought you meant the 'beginning of life'

[Delta]

Blackies online, my long post senses are tingling.

[Blackie6789]

Edit: This will absolutely melt your brain, the theory of evolution would still apply if life originated twice- on two different planets, and then their descendants traveled through space, met and found they were so similar they interbred.

I think it should be of note that as of yet, there is not proven planet that can support complex life; in fact, there are many specifications that must be fulfilled in order for a planet to support life. I'm pretty sure you've read my previous post on this, so you should know what I'm talking about. Additionally, like much of the evolutionist/atheist arguments, this is a "just so" story. It's a great story of how something could have occurred, but there's absolutely no evidence that it DID occur. Regarding your example, it should be of note that on this planet interbreeding does occur; in your example, 17 species of fish became--another variance of fish. As I've repeatedly pointed out, this is not an example of evolution; in fact, the Bible supports your example, so you really aren't proving much.
Your argument is a good example of "evolutionist nonsense".

Alan believed that archeopteryx was a cousin-relation of the theropods, rather than a direct descendant; you grossly misrepresented his views, and if his views did come into favour in the scientific community...do you know what difference it would make to the theory of evolution? None.

Alan was not the only thing I cited if you took time time to read my original post; in fact, his findings supported my original citation which is right here:
Doubts about homology between theropods and bird digits remind us of some of the other problems in the "dinosaur-origin" hypothesis. These include the following: (i) The much smaller theropod forelimb (relative to body size) in comparison with the Archaeopteryx wing. Such small limbs are not convincing as proto-wings for a ground-up origin of flight in the relatively heavy dinosaurs. (ii) The rarity in theropods of the semilunate wrist bone, known in only four species (including Deinonychus). Most theropods have relatively large numbers of wrist elements, difficult to homologize with those of Archaeopteryx. (iii) The temporal paradox that most theropod dinosaurs and in particular the birdlike dromaeosaurs are all very much later in the fossil record than Archaeopteryx.
Again, the Archeopteryx is NOT an example of a transitional fossil; there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that supports this fact.
In regards to the book, I have not read it since my school library does not have it. If I have time, I may go to our town library...

[Rammjet]

Blackie; I'm not arguing that two species from distant planets actually did interbreed; I used it as a hypothetical example. I then qualified it with some more boring real examples. ^^ [for example swiss freshwater fish, which merged their species as a result of environmental changes to their lake habitat, which favoured inter-species premiscuity]

This is an example of evolution; an entirely new species emerged from 17 previous species which couldn't breed directly to create fertile offspring [but hybrid to hybrid etcetera could create fertile offspring]
Production of new variations is exactly what evolution is, the sooner you recognise the definition the better.


The archeopteryx is currently considered as an example of theropod dinosaur, which shows avian qualities, by the paleontological community. Some individuals no doubt disagree, as scientists do about EVERY THEORY. Your 'overwhelming evidence' is apparantly not as authoratitive as you're trying to promote, because it has not disuaded the paleontological community. :] So sorry, you lose.

And you know what, blackie? Whether this fossil is a direct descendant or a cousin makes absolutely no difference to the theory of evolution, only to paleontology. Furthermore there are many, many, many other examples of fossils which you would refer to as 'transitional', but I'm sure you'd quote the circulated rumours and miss-represented scientists from 'darwinism refuted' again [yes, I check the places where these arguments are being circulated- and where YOU probably quote them from]

I doubt you even checked your school's library. It's vital you actually read something about evolution, because I'm absolutely fed up on constantly correcting your very naive mistakes; evolution is barely relevant to the existance of Gods and Godesses, but for some reason you're obsessed with single-handedly disproving established theories by misrepresenting quotations from paleontologists. Gosh, it doesn't take a genius to see what's wrong with that.

[Blackie6789]

Production of new variations is exactly what evolution is, the sooner you recognise the definition the better.

There are many definitions of evolution; in fact, just google it and see the variety. I took this quote from Talk Origins Website:

"In the broadest sense, evolution is merely change, and so is all-pervasive; galaxies, languages, and political systems all evolve. Biological evolution ... is change in the properties of populations of organisms that transcend the lifetime of a single individual. The ontogeny of an individual is not considered evolution; individual organisms do not evolve. The changes in populations that are considered evolutionary are those that are inheritable via the genetic material from one generation to the next. Biological evolution may be slight or substantial; it embraces everything from slight changes in the proportion of different alleles within a population (such as those determining blood types) to the successive alterations that led from the earliest protoorganism to snails, bees, giraffes, and dandelions."
- Douglas J. Futuyma

What I find odd about this quote is that no one has any problem with this; no one denies change does occur (which we can observe in the present). What we do deny is when you take this one step further and claim that these changes result in a completely new organism. For instance, the change from a dinosaur to a bird; evolution states that you use the above processes to EXPLAIN how this change could have occurred. Jonathan Wells puts this very well:
Darwinism claims that every new species that has ever appeared can be explained by descent with modification. Neo-Darwinism claims these modifications are the result of natural selection acting on random genetic mutations."'
If all there was to evolution was just "descent with modification", no creationist would have any problem whatsoever with evolution. What they have a problem with is when you say that descent with modification can explain how one kind of animal can change into a completely new kind.

The archeopteryx is currently considered as an example of theropod dinosaur, which shows avian qualities, by the paleontological community. Some individuals no doubt disagree, as scientists do about EVERY THEORY. Your 'overwhelming evidence' is apparantly not as authoratitive as you're trying to promote, because it has not disuaded the paleontological community. :] So sorry, you lose.

I really do not see scientists disagreeing with the theory of gravity... However, thats beside the point. My point is that the Archeopteryx is the most well known evolutionary fossil. In fact, it is only recently that scientists are realizing the problems with it. When it was first discovered, it was heralded as a "breakthrough" to Darwins theory; in fact, this elation at finding the fossil probably resulted in a bias that displayed the Archeopteryx as more of a likely transitional then it actually is. In fact, even in recent times, we see this bias displayed for instance, the scientist who "fell on his knees when he saw the fossil". It is quite clear that there is a bias that this fossil is a powerful example of a transitional. Not all scientists are prepared to admit that there are serious--even fatal problems with the Archeopteryx; they don't want to admit that for the past 200 years, the entire scientific community has misjudged this fossil. There is enormous evidence against this "transitional"; it is only recently that scientists are realizing how flawed this fossil actually is.

[Ted the Tiny Cactus]

There are many definitions of evolution; in fact, just google it and see the variety. I took this quote from Talk Origins Website:

"In the broadest sense, evolution is merely change, and so is all-pervasive; galaxies, languages, and political systems all evolve. Biological evolution ... is change in the properties of populations of organisms that transcend the lifetime of a single individual. The ontogeny of an individual is not considered evolution; individual organisms do not evolve. The changes in populations that are considered evolutionary are those that are inheritable via the genetic material from one generation to the next. Biological evolution may be slight or substantial; it embraces everything from slight changes in the proportion of different alleles within a population (such as those determining blood types) to the successive alterations that led from the earliest protoorganism to snails, bees, giraffes, and dandelions."
- Douglas J. Futuyma

What I find odd about this quote is that no one has any problem with this; no one denies change does occur (which we can observe in the present). What we do deny is when you take this one step further and claim that these changes result in a completely new organism. For instance, the change from a dinosaur to a bird; evolution states that you use the above processes to EXPLAIN how this change could have occurred. Jonathan Wells puts this very well:
Darwinism claims that every new species that has ever appeared can be explained by descent with modification. Neo-Darwinism claims these modifications are the result of natural selection acting on random genetic mutations."'
If all there was to evolution was just "descent with modification", no creationist would have any problem whatsoever with evolution. What they have a problem with is when you say that descent with modification can explain how one kind of animal can change into a completely new kind.
I really do not see scientists disagreeing with the theory of gravity... However, thats beside the point. My point is that the Archeopteryx is the most well known evolutionary fossil. In fact, it is only recently that scientists are realizing the problems with it. When it was first discovered, it was heralded as a "breakthrough" to Darwins theory; in fact, this elation at finding the fossil probably resulted in a bias that displayed the Archeopteryx as more of a likely transitional then it actually is. In fact, even in recent times, we see this bias displayed for instance, the scientist who "fell on his knees when he saw the fossil". It is quite clear that there is a bias that this fossil is a powerful example of a transitional. Not all scientists are prepared to admit that there are serious--even fatal problems with the Archeopteryx; they don't want to admit that for the past 200 years, the entire scientific community has misjudged this fossil. There is enormous evidence against this "transitional"; it is only recently that scientists are realizing how flawed this fossil actually is.

tl;dr

[Bean_Boy]

I feel like Rammjet/Poozy are debating with Blackie about Evolution (I am in no position to debate here)
I feel like Delta throws in random things about religion's extremists (Most of them are copy and paste)
I feel like I haven't really seen any posts from Twisted, but a lot of thanks from him.
I feel like DaFlamingPotato is a christian, but I'm pretty sure he said he was an atheist. (anyone else?)
I feel like I should post here, but I have almost nothing to say.
I feel confused


So, i've decided to have us take a look at this song

I recommend viewing the lyrics, whether or not you enjoy this genre.
From what I gathered in the entire song, it is declaring a possibility of God, but yet a disagreement of organized Religion. This is a great song to discuss, It seems the internet has exploded due to some of these lyrics.

starting with the beginning:
"Human beings in a mob
What’s a mob to a king? What’s a king to a God?
What’s a God to a non-believer who don’t believe in anything?"
obviously, this is saying that God has no power over someone who doesn't believe in him. (I have several discussions about this alone)

so...whatcha think?

[chris0]

This thread still exists, hah. xP

Has any progress been made?

[Bean_Boy]

This thread still exists, hah. xP

Has any progress been made?

members from both parties will agree...


Absolutely not

[Rammjet]

There are many definitions of evolution; in fact, just google it and see the variety. I took this quote from Talk Origins Website:

"In the broadest sense, evolution is merely change, and so is all-pervasive; galaxies, languages, and political systems all evolve. Biological evolution ... is change in the properties of populations of organisms that transcend the lifetime of a single individual. The ontogeny of an individual is not considered evolution; individual organisms do not evolve. The changes in populations that are considered evolutionary are those that are inheritable via the genetic material from one generation to the next. Biological evolution may be slight or substantial; it embraces everything from slight changes in the proportion of different alleles within a population (such as those determining blood types) to the successive alterations that led from the earliest protoorganism to snails, bees, giraffes, and dandelions."
- Douglas J. Futuyma

What I find odd about this quote is that no one has any problem with this; no one denies change does occur (which we can observe in the present). What we do deny is when you take this one step further and claim that these changes result in a completely new organism. For instance, the change from a dinosaur to a bird; evolution states that you use the above processes to EXPLAIN how this change could have occurred. Jonathan Wells puts this very well:
Darwinism claims that every new species that has ever appeared can be explained by descent with modification. Neo-Darwinism claims these modifications are the result of natural selection acting on random genetic mutations."'
If all there was to evolution was just "descent with modification", no creationist would have any problem whatsoever with evolution. What they have a problem with is when you say that descent with modification can explain how one kind of animal can change into a completely new kind.
I really do not see scientists disagreeing with the theory of gravity... However, thats beside the point. My point is that the Archeopteryx is the most well known evolutionary fossil. In fact, it is only recently that scientists are realizing the problems with it. When it was first discovered, it was heralded as a "breakthrough" to Darwins theory; in fact, this elation at finding the fossil probably resulted in a bias that displayed the Archeopteryx as more of a likely transitional then it actually is. In fact, even in recent times, we see this bias displayed for instance, the scientist who "fell on his knees when he saw the fossil". It is quite clear that there is a bias that this fossil is a powerful example of a transitional. Not all scientists are prepared to admit that there are serious--even fatal problems with the Archeopteryx; they don't want to admit that for the past 200 years, the entire scientific community has misjudged this fossil. There is enormous evidence against this "transitional"; it is only recently that scientists are realizing how flawed this fossil actually is.

Let's get this straight blackie: Evolution,[ and we're talking about biological evolution here, not stellar evolution, okay? ] is a change in the genotype [usually] of a population.

That ISN'T a 'whole variety' of definitions; it's a very clear and appropriate definition, which you seek to ignore for some reason.
All evolution is IS DESCENT WITH MODIFICATION, JUST AS YOU SAY YOU HAVE NO PROBLEMS WITH.
Saying you have a problem with the fact modification can...well, modify a species, is absolutely idiotic.

Here's a litterate example: I change a letter in the word 'modify', is it unreasonable to think I could actually arrive at a new word through this process? No.
Modify, dodify, donify, donafy, donaty, donate.

Stop being so frightened of the fact the world is explicable, and that change does happen. It's inevitable that a biological system can be changed within any degree if -it's members reproduce, -it's members reproduce with a variance, that guarantees it's possible for the biological system to evolve.





You don't know about scientists disagreeing on the theory of gravity? Have you been living under a rock? The theory of gravity is always under question because our current understanding of gravity indicated galaxies should revolve and rotate in different fashions to the way they currently do. Dark matter is currently a favoured explanation, but the problem could also be solved by changing our theory of gravity.
Archeopteryx is not the most well known evolutionary fossil: T-rex and Triceratops are, they participated in an evolutionary arms race for millions of years.
Darwin's theory of evolution doesn't rely entirely on this one fossil you know. Scientific theories have well...a habit of being so rigorous they rely on more than just one data-point.
The fossil is a powerful example of change to anybody WITH A BRAIN, because it shows aspects of both reptillian dinosaur morphollogy and avian morphollogy, which is absolutely amazing, and it's not biassed to recognise that.

You have always misrepresented the views of scientists in this thread to suit your own petty pathetic means; you continually claimed they were 'becoming more theistic' when the exact opposite was true, for instance. Your understanding of contemporary affairs is simply warped beyond all recognition. You know what difference it would make to evolution if archeopteryx was a cousin of the theropods rather than a direct descendant? NONE AT ALL. In fact, archeopteryx would still be an example of a 'transitional fossil' even if it wasn't a theropod- because it still displays both reptillian and avian morphollogy- and that's never going to conveniantly dissapear for you.


I'm so fed up of arguing over biological fact with you, when most of them are entirely irrelevant to the existance of Gods.

-Whether archeopteryx is a theropod or not is irrelevant to whether it is an example of a 'fledgling' avian species.
-Whether archeopteryx is a transitional fossil or not is irrelevant to theory of evolution as a whole.
-The theory of evolution is irrelvant to how life was started.
-How life was initiated isn't strictly relevant to if there is a God anyway.

Do you see how massively off topic you are?