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Should 'Cosmos' give more airtime to creationists?


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Creationism is not science, so therefore no.

Evolution isn't science, either.  it is a philosophy and an untested hypothesis at the very best.

Evolution is science. There's a mountain load of evolution, and God could have easily created us using this process. Why do you dispute science?

You are the hapless victim of a grand lie.  God did not use evolution.  God created man apart from the created order.  The Bible makes it clear that man has no physical relationship with the animall kingdom. 

 

I don't dispute science.  I dispute the lie of evolution.

Evolution is not a lie, it is fact. I don't see why you guys can't accept evolution as a fact. I can, and it doesn't interfere with my Christian faith.

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Guest shiloh357

 

 

 

 

Creationism is not science, so therefore no.

Evolution isn't science, either.  it is a philosophy and an untested hypothesis at the very best.

Evolution is science. There's a mountain load of evolution, and God could have easily created us using this process. Why do you dispute science?

You are the hapless victim of a grand lie.  God did not use evolution.  God created man apart from the created order.  The Bible makes it clear that man has no physical relationship with the animall kingdom. 

 

I don't dispute science.  I dispute the lie of evolution.

Evolution is not a lie, it is fact. I don't see why you guys can't accept evolution as a fact. I can, and it doesn't interfere with my Christian faith.

 

Evolution has never been intuitively observed or empircally proven.  It has never been tested in any way shape or form.  You are simply gullible. 

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"To make this journey we'll need imagination, but imagination alone is not enough because the reality of nature is far more wondrous than anything we can imagine. This adventure is made possible by generations of searchers strictly adhering to a simple set of rules. Test ideas by experiment and observation, build on those ideas that pass the test, reject the ones that fail. Follow the evidence wherever it leads and question everything. Accept these terms, and the cosmos is yours."  Neil Degrasse Tyson, COSMOS Part I

 

 

jerryR34 said “No, it is a science show.”

 

When did atheism claim ownership of science? The philosophical equivalents of atheism (i.e. naturalism; the claim that no truth exists beyond the natural universe, and materialism; the claim that the material universe is all there is) are as equally unverifiable as any other faith perspective.

 

So why not allow creationists to present their case from a scientific perspective in the same manner as those presenting evidence, interpretations and arguments supporting the naturalistic faith? No one has directly observed what happened in the past. Both paradigms have models based on unverifiable faith assumptions – and both interpret the facts to support their respective models. Why not make a show presenting all evidence and arguments; allowing the viewers to come to fully informed conclusions – or at least be honest and premise every episode with a caveat; “This presentation only represents science having been interpreted from the naturalistic perspective.”

 

 

 

 “If creationists are going to talk about evolution, then yes, it might be a good idea to include experts.”

 

Would “experts” include highly credentialed scientists who are also Biblical creationists?

 

 

 

“If creationists are going to talk about God and their creation myth, then evolution and big bang might be included to add context”

 

Your framing of the debate presupposes the conclusion; i.e. creationism being untrue or “myth” – thereby demonstrating a lack of objectivity in your approach to the issue.

 

 

 

“If Cosmos should include creationism, where does it stop?  Should they include all creation myths?”

 

One claiming to be educated in scientific and critical thinking should not presuppose that any truth claim is a “myth”. If any account makes temporal/historical claims, then it can be modelled and should therefore be included in the discussion (assuming someone is available to provide a sincere defence of the position). The Biblical creation account provides an abundance of such claims.

 

 

 

“For centuries, the church asserted the earth was the center of the universe and the sun orbited it.”

 

Greek philosopher Aristotle presented the geocentric model – and “the church” embraced that model (i.e. it was never the church’s model) in the absence of sufficient observational data at the time. However, Christians during the time were free to present other models (i.e. Copernicus’ heliocentric model).

 

 

 

“People were killed for bringing forward observational data that contracted the church”

 

During the Catholic inquisition period, many Christians were killed for heresy. I am not aware of anyone who was killed specifically on account of their their non-geocentric views. It was during this hyper-sensitive period that Galileo presented his model; which was received enthusiastically at its initial presentation. According to Galileo himself (in his “Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina” (1615)), it was the academic community which pressured the church into prosecuting him three times (defended by the Jesuits) for his anti-Aristotelian model; which ultimately landed him under house arrest (i.e. not “killed”).

 

The irony of such charges is that Galileo (a self-professed, life-long, dedicated Christian) advanced the cause of science by questioning the prevailing Aristotelian paradigm of his time. Creationists are also mocked, ignored, marginalised and persecuted for daring to question the current established paradigm.

 

I have not had a chance to view the new “Cosmos”, but if it reflects the claims you have attributed to it, then it is being dishonest from the outset.

 

 

 

“We couldn't actually learn about our universe until that bias was overcome”

 

That is exactly how operational science is supposed to work. Direct observations have the power to break down established paradigms. But we cannot go back in time to make the direct observations in the past; necessary to attribute legitimate scientific confidence. So we cannot attribute observational confidence to any past claim - apart from faith.

 

 

 

“Science advanced exponentially when it went from being a philosophical pursuit to the scientific method of today.  A big part of that was taking anything metaphysical out of the equation”

 

So it didn’t really go from “philosophical pursuit to the scientific method”. It just changed starting premise from one unverifiable faith paradigm to another.

 

I would suggest that the industrial revolution producing more precise instruments in high quantities contributed to the resulting “exponential” expansion of scientific discovery – the same way the invention of the computer resulted in a subsequent “exponential advance” of science. The industrial revolution started 50 or so years before the first mention of the naturalistic paradigm in any scientific literature (i.e. Hutton and contemporaries first floated the concept which we now call “naturalism” in the late 1700s).

 

One should be careful not to confuse correlation with cause.

 

 

 

“Why would we want to take a step back to people being burned at the stake for going against the bible and bleeding people to release the "bad Humors"? … Do we want to go back to letting religion dictate to the government what the government could dictate to science?”

 

These statements are anachronistic and rife with logical fallacies.

 

You have failed to explain how being courageous enough to give fair and objective consideration to alternative arguments (i.e. alternative to the current scientific dogma) is, a) going to make all scientific advancement over the last 500 years disappear, and b) going to change governments from their current forms into theocratic demagogues.

 

No one is suggesting a return to anything. No one is even suggesting that our opponents give up their position. We are simply pointing out that in a putative scientific presentation, if only one paradigm is considered to the rejection of all others, there exists a fundamental lack of objectivity; therefore rendering any such presentation to be fundamentally unscientific.

 

 

 

“I think my knowledge of history is what reinforces my belief that science should only include observation of nature with no preconceived notions based on metaphysical beings”

 

But you are operating on the preconceived notion that no such beings exist – or at least that no such beings have interacted with the physical universe in a way that can be scientifically modelled. That is an unverifiable faith assumption which will directly influence which models and interpretations you prefer.

 

 

 

“See how badly we've messed up the message in the past - see how that has held us up for so long in understanding our environment?”

 

All faith paradigms provide their adherents with logical limitations. Apart from some unsupported assertions, you haven’t really provided any justification for how the theistic paradigm has inhibited scientific advancement.

 

For example, I would claim that we have only recently started studying the vast majority of the human genome (about 98%) – because the secular paradigm found it so incredulous that a 3 billion base, functional genomic permutation could arise through random evolutionary processes; therefore assigning non-coding genes to the “junk” or evolution-leftover pile. Recent studies (namely the ENCODE project) found that about 80% of the genome is biochemically functional. So in this instance, the secular paradigm was a hindrance to scientific advancement (a similar argument could be made for so-called “vestigial” organs).

 

 

 

“There's a place for God, but it is not in the lab”

 

That’s a clever quip, but it fails to consider the fundamental scientific distinction between the empirical and theoretical. The lab is for direct observation. You cannot make direct observations in either the past, or supernatural. The theoretical aspects of the scientific process occur before and after experimentation “in the lab”.

 

 

 

“How would you feel about Neil D Tyson getting some airtime at your pulpit.”

 

Spiritual and religious faiths don’t claim to be objective. Spiritual and religious organisations explicitly exist to promote one particular faith perspective – and make no pretence otherwise.

 

But Science is supposed to be an objective/unbiased process. That implies fair consideration of all claims – not just the ones that conform to the most popular faith perspective of the scientific community of the day.

 

 

 

"To make this journey we'll need imagination, but imagination alone is not enough because the reality of nature is far more wondrous than anything we can imagine. This adventure is made possible by generations of searchers strictly adhering to a simple set of rules. Test ideas by experiment and observation, build on those ideas that pass the test, reject the ones that fail. Follow the evidence wherever it leads and question everything. Accept these terms, and the cosmos is yours."  Neil Degrasse Tyson, COSMOS Part I”

 

That’s nice. He appears to have left out the ‘presuppose a purely naturalistic universe so that our interpretations of the facts (i.e. where the evidence “leads”) are limited to those which conform to naturalistic models of the universe; remembering that for claims about the past, we can only actually test models “by experiment and observation” since we cannot perform “experiment and observation” in the past.’ To transfer scientific confidence from a model to the foundational claim is to commit the logical fallacy called Affirming the Consequent.

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Creationism is not science, so therefore no.

Evolution isn't science, either.  it is a philosophy and an untested hypothesis at the very best.

Evolution is science. There's a mountain load of evolution, and God could have easily created us using this process. Why do you dispute science?

You are the hapless victim of a grand lie.  God did not use evolution.  God created man apart from the created order.  The Bible makes it clear that man has no physical relationship with the animall kingdom. 

 

I don't dispute science.  I dispute the lie of evolution.

Evolution is not a lie, it is fact. I don't see why you guys can't accept evolution as a fact. I can, and it doesn't interfere with my Christian faith.

 

 

 

Hi bestrfcplayer

 

You said “Evolution is science. There's a mountain load of evolution”

 

The creationist position is that; all of the very same facts interpreted to support the naturalistic models, can alternatively be interpreted to be consistent with the Biblical model. So nebulous claims about volumes, or libraries, or mountains of evidence (i.e. the amount of evidence supporting evolution), do not contribute anything of substance to the discussion.

 

 

 

“God could have easily created us using this process”

 

No doubt. No one is questioning God’s capacity. The Bible provides a model of reality stating that events occurred differently. Since all of the evidence can be interpreted to be consistent with the Biblical model, there is no objective scientific reason for Christians to question our faith in the Biblical account – as written.

 

 

 

“Why do you dispute science?”

 

This is equivocation (a logical fallacy). Evolution is not synonymous with science. The scientific method explicitly permits me to scrutinise any scientific claim. Any suggestion that I not be permitted to scrutinise a scientific claim stems from faith, not science.

 

I have a testable model of past events which is consistent with the evidence. Therefore I have every rational right to question the commonly expressed certainty in Common Ancestry and Standard Cosmology.

 

 

 

“Evolution is not a lie, it is fact. I don't see why you guys can't accept evolution as a fact”

 

Evolution is neither lie nor fact. Evolution is a set of hypotheses (i.e. Natural Selection, Common Ancestry, genetic mutations etc.) brought together under the same umbrella in an attempt to naturalistically explain the variety of life currently observed on earth.

 

Facts are empirical, evolution is theoretical – a fundamental scientific distinction. If a fact exists, then it is rationally indisputable (which is why so many misuse the term “fact” to artificially amplify confidence in their preferred theories and hypotheses).

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"To make this journey we'll need imagination, but imagination alone is not enough because the reality of nature is far more wondrous than anything we can imagine. This adventure is made possible by generations of searchers strictly adhering to a simple set of rules. Test ideas by experiment and observation, build on those ideas that pass the test, reject the ones that fail. Follow the evidence wherever it leads and question everything. Accept these terms, and the cosmos is yours."  Neil Degrasse Tyson, COSMOS Part I

 

 

jerryR34 said “No, it is a science show.”

 

When did atheism claim ownership of science? The philosophical equivalents of atheism (i.e. naturalism; the claim that no truth exists beyond the natural universe, and materialism; the claim that the material universe is all there is) are as equally unverifiable as any other faith perspective.

 

So why not allow creationists to present their case from a scientific perspective in the same manner as those presenting evidence, interpretations and arguments supporting the naturalistic faith? No one has directly observed what happened in the past. Both paradigms have models based on unverifiable faith assumptions – and both interpret the facts to support their respective models. Why not make a show presenting all evidence and arguments; allowing the viewers to come to fully informed conclusions – or at least be honest and premise every episode with a caveat; “This presentation only represents science having been interpreted from the naturalistic perspective.”

 

 

 

 “If creationists are going to talk about evolution, then yes, it might be a good idea to include experts.”

 

Would “experts” include highly credentialed scientists who are also Biblical creationists?

 

 

 

“If creationists are going to talk about God and their creation myth, then evolution and big bang might be included to add context”

 

Your framing of the debate presupposes the conclusion; i.e. creationism being untrue or “myth” – thereby demonstrating a lack of objectivity in your approach to the issue.

 

 

 

“If Cosmos should include creationism, where does it stop?  Should they include all creation myths?”

 

One claiming to be educated in scientific and critical thinking should not presuppose that any truth claim is a “myth”. If any account makes temporal/historical claims, then it can be modelled and should therefore be included in the discussion (assuming someone is available to provide a sincere defence of the position). The Biblical creation account provides an abundance of such claims.

 

 

 

“For centuries, the church asserted the earth was the center of the universe and the sun orbited it.”

 

Greek philosopher Aristotle presented the geocentric model – and “the church” embraced that model (i.e. it was never the church’s model) in the absence of sufficient observational data at the time. However, Christians during the time were free to present other models (i.e. Copernicus’ heliocentric model).

 

 

 

“People were killed for bringing forward observational data that contracted the church”

 

During the Catholic inquisition period, many Christians were killed for heresy. I am not aware of anyone who was killed specifically on account of their their non-geocentric views. It was during this hyper-sensitive period that Galileo presented his model; which was received enthusiastically at its initial presentation. According to Galileo himself (in his “Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina” (1615)), it was the academic community which pressured the church into prosecuting him three times (defended by the Jesuits) for his anti-Aristotelian model; which ultimately landed him under house arrest (i.e. not “killed”).

 

The irony of such charges is that Galileo (a self-professed, life-long, dedicated Christian) advanced the cause of science by questioning the prevailing Aristotelian paradigm of his time. Creationists are also mocked, ignored, marginalised and persecuted for daring to question the current established paradigm.

 

I have not had a chance to view the new “Cosmos”, but if it reflects the claims you have attributed to it, then it is being dishonest from the outset.

 

 

 

“We couldn't actually learn about our universe until that bias was overcome”

 

That is exactly how operational science is supposed to work. Direct observations have the power to break down established paradigms. But we cannot go back in time to make the direct observations in the past; necessary to attribute legitimate scientific confidence. So we cannot attribute observational confidence to any past claim - apart from faith.

 

 

 

“Science advanced exponentially when it went from being a philosophical pursuit to the scientific method of today.  A big part of that was taking anything metaphysical out of the equation”

 

So it didn’t really go from “philosophical pursuit to the scientific method”. It just changed starting premise from one unverifiable faith paradigm to another.

 

I would suggest that the industrial revolution producing more precise instruments in high quantities contributed to the resulting “exponential” expansion of scientific discovery – the same way the invention of the computer resulted in a subsequent “exponential advance” of science. The industrial revolution started 50 or so years before the first mention of the naturalistic paradigm in any scientific literature (i.e. Hutton and contemporaries first floated the concept which we now call “naturalism” in the late 1700s).

 

One should be careful not to confuse correlation with cause.

 

 

 

“Why would we want to take a step back to people being burned at the stake for going against the bible and bleeding people to release the "bad Humors"? … Do we want to go back to letting religion dictate to the government what the government could dictate to science?”

 

These statements are anachronistic and rife with logical fallacies.

 

You have failed to explain how being courageous enough to give fair and objective consideration to alternative arguments (i.e. alternative to the current scientific dogma) is, a) going to make all scientific advancement over the last 500 years disappear, and b) going to change governments from their current forms into theocratic demagogues.

 

No one is suggesting a return to anything. No one is even suggesting that our opponents give up their position. We are simply pointing out that in a putative scientific presentation, if only one paradigm is considered to the rejection of all others, there exists a fundamental lack of objectivity; therefore rendering any such presentation to be fundamentally unscientific.

 

 

 

“I think my knowledge of history is what reinforces my belief that science should only include observation of nature with no preconceived notions based on metaphysical beings”

 

But you are operating on the preconceived notion that no such beings exist – or at least that no such beings have interacted with the physical universe in a way that can be scientifically modelled. That is an unverifiable faith assumption which will directly influence which models and interpretations you prefer.

 

 

 

“See how badly we've messed up the message in the past - see how that has held us up for so long in understanding our environment?”

 

All faith paradigms provide their adherents with logical limitations. Apart from some unsupported assertions, you haven’t really provided any justification for how the theistic paradigm has inhibited scientific advancement.

 

For example, I would claim that we have only recently started studying the vast majority of the human genome (about 98%) – because the secular paradigm found it so incredulous that a 3 billion base, functional genomic permutation could arise through random evolutionary processes; therefore assigning non-coding genes to the “junk” or evolution-leftover pile. Recent studies (namely the ENCODE project) found that about 80% of the genome is biochemically functional. So in this instance, the secular paradigm was a hindrance to scientific advancement (a similar argument could be made for so-called “vestigial” organs).

 

 

 

“There's a place for God, but it is not in the lab”

 

That’s a clever quip, but it fails to consider the fundamental scientific distinction between the empirical and theoretical. The lab is for direct observation. You cannot make direct observations in either the past, or supernatural. The theoretical aspects of the scientific process occur before and after experimentation “in the lab”.

 

 

 

“How would you feel about Neil D Tyson getting some airtime at your pulpit.”

 

Spiritual and religious faiths don’t claim to be objective. Spiritual and religious organisations explicitly exist to promote one particular faith perspective – and make no pretence otherwise.

 

But Science is supposed to be an objective/unbiased process. That implies fair consideration of all claims – not just the ones that conform to the most popular faith perspective of the scientific community of the day.

 

 

 

"To make this journey we'll need imagination, but imagination alone is not enough because the reality of nature is far more wondrous than anything we can imagine. This adventure is made possible by generations of searchers strictly adhering to a simple set of rules. Test ideas by experiment and observation, build on those ideas that pass the test, reject the ones that fail. Follow the evidence wherever it leads and question everything. Accept these terms, and the cosmos is yours."  Neil Degrasse Tyson, COSMOS Part I”

 

That’s nice. He appears to have left out the ‘presuppose a purely naturalistic universe so that our interpretations of the facts (i.e. where the evidence “leads”) are limited to those which conform to naturalistic models of the universe; remembering that for claims about the past, we can only actually test models “by experiment and observation” since we cannot perform “experiment and observation” in the past.’ To transfer scientific confidence from a model to the foundational claim is to commit the logical fallacy called Affirming the Consequent.

 

 

 

:thumbsup:

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Creationism is not science, so therefore no.

Evolution isn't science, either.  it is a philosophy and an untested hypothesis at the very best.

Evolution is science. There's a mountain load of evolution, and God could have easily created us using this process. Why do you dispute science?

You are the hapless victim of a grand lie.  God did not use evolution.  God created man apart from the created order.  The Bible makes it clear that man has no physical relationship with the animall kingdom. 

 

I don't dispute science.  I dispute the lie of evolution.

Evolution is not a lie, it is fact. I don't see why you guys can't accept evolution as a fact. I can, and it doesn't interfere with my Christian faith.

Evolution has never been intuitively observed or empircally proven.  It has never been tested in any way shape or form.  You are simply gullible.

Evolution has been known to take place in viruses. This is how they can combat our antibiotics. And yes, adaptation is apart of evolution.

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What do we expect from the world? How many shouldas are there that they should?

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When did atheism claim ownership of science?

 

 

It never had to.  When the scientific method began to prevail (as opposed to philosophical science), there was a realization that we could observe nature without invoking the supernatural, and progress much more quickly in our understanding of the natural world.

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Evolution has never been intuitively observed or empircally proven.  It has never been tested in any way shape or form.  You are simply gullible.

Evolution has been known to take place in viruses. This is how they can combat our antibiotics. And yes, adaptation is apart of evolution.

 

 

 

===================================================================================

 

 

Evolution has been known to take place in viruses. This is how they can combat our antibiotics. And yes, adaptation is apart of evolution.

 

I think I've already told you this a number of times.....

 

Viruses aren't even classified as life, they need host DNA.  And you don't "Combat" Viruses with Antibiotics :huh:   Antibiotics only work on BACTERIA.

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Evolution has never been intuitively observed or empircally proven.  It has never been tested in any way shape or form.  You are simply gullible.

Evolution has been known to take place in viruses. This is how they can combat our antibiotics. And yes, adaptation is apart of evolution.

 

 

===================================================================================

 

 

Evolution has been known to take place in viruses. This is how they can combat our antibiotics. And yes, adaptation is apart of evolution.

 

I think I've already told you this a number of times.....

 

Viruses aren't even classified as life, they need host DNA.  And you don't "Combat" Viruses with Antibiotics :huh:   Antibiotics only work on BACTERIA.

Whoops. Really can't believe that I just forgot that. Sometimes I just say before I speak, and it really makes me a fool like it did here. Though there is a debate going on if viruses are classified as a life form. Me? I'm somewhere in the middle of that debate.

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