The human race should be put down.

[Scouse]

I'd contribute to the thread again but Turamber's dodging all my questions.

By "dodging" I mean "avoiding like the plague"

 

[Scouse]

/creeps back in...


Slightly off topic (but related in a way) - did anyone know that the Catholic church is telling Africans that condoms don't help prevent AIDS?

I mean, half the fucking continent dying of an STD, a means of contraceptive that would help and the Catholic church lies through it's teeth with the end result that more people die than would have.

Organised religion the world over is dangerous as soon as it starts to force it's views on others (crusades, anyone?). The teaching of Creationism/ID in the United States instead of bona-fide science will indirectly lead to deaths.

Why? Because it not only hampers the teaching of a subject that saves lives on a daily basis it will also diminish the number of useful scientists coming out of the US - at a time when science in that country is in free-fall because of poor educational standards.

 

[DaGaffer]

C4 news had a slot the other night; Uganda had cut AIDS infection rates from 15% to 4% through a mix of condom promotion and abstinence promotion; a shining example to the rest of Africa. They've now dropped the condom element under pressure from a lot US religious charities who supply aid to the government. Guess what? Infection rates are rising again...

 

[Whipped]

There was a sick report a while ago about a radio station that was broadcasting ways to cure AIDS and one of the them was sexual intercourse with a baby!! Can't remember if this was a preist or shaman that was promoting it.

Needless to say, someone got caught doing exactly this.

 

[Stazbumpa]

I heard about this one too. Sick is not a descriptive enough word to use in this instance.


Anyway, where were we on the Creation vs Evolution debate?

 

[Turamber]

Humans and apes share a common ancestor we did not evolve directly from apes. Humans have a habit of wiping out species. There were once other 'ape-men'. Neanderthals. Except they we're made extinct. Probably by modern humans.

So humans wipe out every stage of their ancestral line but leave their cousin, the ape, alone? That makes little sense to me. Plus when you look at the numbers of the "ape-men" fossils that scientists have found, there are very very few of them. Evolution requires as much, or even more, faith to believe in than does a belief in God.

 

[Turamber]

I'd contribute to the thread again but Turamber's dodging all my questions.

By "dodging" I mean "avoiding like the plague"

*confused*

You asked me to explain why creation is taught in American classrooms, and why people giving evolutionary answers would be marked down or incorrect. I believe I pointed out, and if not I will do so again, that I am not responsible for anything that is taught in any classroom in any part of the world.

The last time I researched the matter I found that the teaching of creation had been made illegal in American schools -- but that was some time ago during the Clinton era. Personally I find that just as bad ... allowing children to make up their own mind about something that no one can ever be 100% sure about seems the best way to me.

 

[~Yuckfou~]

So humans wipe out every stage of their ancestral line but leave their cousin, the ape, alone? That makes little sense to me. Plus when you look at the numbers of the "ape-men" fossils that scientists have found, there are very very few of them. Evolution requires as much, or even more, faith to believe in than does a belief in God.

We didn't wipe them out, we evolved, they died out because they were unable to thrive. Diversification was and still is the key, we are constantly evolving, I've said it before on here "Natural Selection".
The planet is huge, in different areas different "varieties" of ape prospered. We are obviously superior to the others so we also proliferated across the planet. Museums are packed full of evidence, as are all the 100's of documentary channels we now have. I have never seen one shred of evidence that there is a god.
I've theorised often after a few beers that if someone like David Blaine was on our planet 2000 years ago he would have been thought of as a "Jesus".

 

[Will]

Turamber, I think you should look out "The Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins. It explains evolution better than anyone here can (except maybe me), and certainly better than I can be bothered to.

 

[Wij]

So humans wipe out every stage of their ancestral line but leave their cousin, the ape, alone? That makes little sense to me. Plus when you look at the numbers of the "ape-men" fossils that scientists have found, there are very very few of them. Evolution requires as much, or even more, faith to believe in than does a belief in God.

Plain wrong on every count here. Remember no individual ape lives forever so no mass killing of less-developed apes was required. They were just less successful at breeding, either through dying earlier due to lack of competitive advantage or through sexual selection. All kinds of proto-human skeletons have been found.

Look up the ape family tree. The most recent divergence was not even the human lineage, it was a the branching of Chimps and Bonobos from their common ancestor. Evolution never stopped with us. It wasn't aiming for humanity. Evolution isn't finished. It isn't aiming for anything. It's a simple tautology, things that are good and surviving and breeding, survive and breed.

Evolution requires no faith. It is a proven fact.

Don't bring in the argument about where early life came from. It's not relevant to evolution. Evolution makes no claim about the origin of life. That's a seperate issue.

 

[Stazbumpa]

I would just like to add my tuppence, with regard to this particular point:

That makes little sense to me. Plus when you look at the numbers of the "ape-men" fossils that scientists have found, there are very very few of them.

How many full T-Rex skeletons had been discovered by the time of the first Jurassic Park film?

Exactly 3.

If humanity was wiped out tomorrow by a comet, how much of us, fossils or otherwise, would survive to be discovered a million years later?

Very little, if anything at all. A skull or 2, maybe some teeth. The odd skeleton.

My point is that what lies buried is very, VERY difficult to find. Continental shift, and ice ages, have a habit of covering up what used to be there. And its not like there was a genocidal type of event where homo-sapiens won. The death of Neanderthals et al was gradual, due to food competition, breeding rates, possibly even interbreeding between them and other homonids.
They just couldn't keep up with us.

By the way, average life expectancy for a species is 5 million years, so how long do you reckon we have left?

 

[DaGaffer]

By the way, average life expectancy for a species is 5 million years, so how long do you reckon we have left?

Either a lot less or a lot more. Unlike every other species we can evolve ourselves, and probably will if we don't wipe ourselves out first.

 

[Tom]

I don't think we have much control over the way we evolve, despite our best efforts.

 

[Wij]

Not our actual evolution really (yet) but we do evolve the technology around us. It's like our extended phenotype.


\o/

 

[nath]

Ordinarily I'd be the one to come in and sit on the fence, say "well it's an opinion - everyone has one, who's to say who's right or wrong?" etc. etc.

Fact is, if you believe creationism over evolution (as opposed to believing in some higher power getting the ball rolling and evolution continuing from there) you're a fucking retard.

 

[Louster]

Not our actual evolution really (yet) but we do evolve the technology around us. It's like our extended phenotype.


\o/

I don't think anyone's collected enough Evolution Points to actually be able to upgrade yet.

(Did anyone else play that crazy Snes game?)

 

[Rubber Bullets]

Either a lot less or a lot more. Unlike every other species we can evolve ourselves, and probably will if we don't wipe ourselves out first.

A lot more seems unlikely.

Modern Homo Sapiens has been around for 120,000 years, did pretty much nothing special for the best part of 115,000 years, and then started getting civilised. For most of the last 5,000 years human advancement has been pretty slow, but in the last 100 years things have gone off the scale. As a race we have built up such momentum technologically that I can't see the human race or the planet (if we're not extremely careful) lasting for another 5,000 years let alone the balance on the 5 million we still have owing.

RB

 

[Turamber]

Okay, no more comments from me on this thread. Being called a "fucking retard" because I don't accept a theory about how we got here? Please. Evolution is not a new idea -- the ancient Greeks, for example, had a very similar theory. Yet there have been plenty of philosophers and scientists down through the centuries, including today, who reject the theory of evolution.

Its not a "fact", its a heavily debated subject -- even those who believe in evolution debate in great detail just how they think their theory works.

Unfortunately most people can not see past received wisdom and blithly repeat the same hackneyed old comments. But then I'm just a "fucking retard" so what do I know.

 

[Ch3tan]

You also need to stop taking each point so personally. The argument was and still is against the idea of creationism being taught as sceince in American schools.

The fact is that the people that try and force things like this on other people are usually blindly ignorant of anything that doesn't fit their belief.

 

[Wij]

I'm not spouting received wisdom. The subject is fascinating so I learnt about it myself. That's the beauty of science. It's all there for you to read. The proof is there and everyone can see it for themselves. Nothing is secret or "beyond our understanding". Just because some scientists disagree on some of the smaller details (like Dawkins and Gould) does not mean that the theory itself is not sound. That's like saying that cars don't exist because people debate whether turbos are better than naturally aspirated engines. Evolution is one of the most well-proven facts we have in the world today.

Anyway, I'm not calling you a fucktard. I love a good spirited debate. No offence from me m8

 

[TheJkWhoSaysNi]

Its not a "fact", its a heavily debated subject -- even those who believe in evolution debate in great detail just how they think their theory works.

While evolution isn't fact, natural selection is. Evolution explains how natural selection works.

Evolution a theory. In science the word theory does not mean ambiguity. A theory is 'the highest form of scientific understanding. A theory is an explanatory hypothesis which has passed test after test, and is still the best available explanation of the facts in question.'

 

[Wile E. Coyote]

Let us not forget the FSM version of Intelligent Design... Read this and convert infidels!

 

[Bodhi]

God didn't make the world, I did. I was bored at uni one day and had an abundance of Rizla papers for some unknown reason, so I decided to get creative. The Himilayas were a bit of a ****, I used most of me good papers up on that, so I only had the shitty ones left to do Wales. I got me mate Slarty to sort Norway out, the man is a genius. All those Fjords with just some silver Rizla and a wee bit of roach. I also made a den for my pet WindowLickers out of old curry cartons and some poo. I named it Birmingham. If you look closely at Saturn's rings, you can also see that they're made out of empty beer cans. And you thought I did nothing when I was a student........

 

[nath]

I only suggested that one would be a fucking retard if they believe creationism over evolution. I dislike organised religion in general but I accept it and accept peoples choices to believe in something like a supreme being etc. However, actually thinking that God placed us on the earth as the humans we are today or that Adam and Eve were the first humans is just dense.

Sorry, but it is.

 

[Whipped]

Let us not forget the FSM version of Intelligent Design... Read this and convert infidels!

I'm sold Any religon that allows me to dress up like a pirate is fine by me

 

[DaGaffer]

A lot more seems unlikely.

Modern Homo Sapiens has been around for 120,000 years, did pretty much nothing special for the best part of 115,000 years, and then started getting civilised. For most of the last 5,000 years human advancement has been pretty slow, but in the last 100 years things have gone off the scale. As a race we have built up such momentum technologically that I can't see the human race or the planet (if we're not extremely careful) lasting for another 5,000 years let alone the balance on the 5 million we still have owing.

RB

It's precisely because we're going to fuck-up the planet that we'll probably end up re-engineering ourselves. While its sometimes very difficult to put one's faith (see what I did there? ) in science, its probably the only thing that's going to get us out of the mess we're in. If nothing changes, I don't even think we've got 500 years, let alone 5000 or 5 million, but I don't think the green/sustainability route is the answer (there are too many of us chasing a finite pool of resources); up and out is the only way, but we know now that it won't be a 1950's vision of rayguns and rocketships, it'll be terraforming and genetic engineering.

 

[DaGaffer]

Let us not forget the FSM version of Intelligent Design... Read this and convert infidels!

All hail His Noodly Appendage!

 

[Guest]

That web site is coded by Morons *

















































*Could be lies

 

[Panda On Smack]

I only suggested that one would be a fucking retard if they believe creationism over evolution. I dislike organised religion in general but I accept it and accept peoples choices to believe in something like a supreme being etc. However, actually thinking that God placed us on the earth as the humans we are today or that Adam and Eve were the first humans is just dense.

Sorry, but it is.

Heh, how annoyingly narrow minded. I dont believe in evolution at all. I look at it the way you appear to view the concept of God/Creation but i dont spout my both off calling evolutionists nobheads because they dont believe what i do.

I realise replying in this manner on this forum is like playing with dynamite but hey, whatever.

 

[Scouse]

You asked me to explain why creation is taught in American classrooms, and why people giving evolutionary answers would be marked down or incorrect. I believe I pointed out, and if not I will do so again, that I am not responsible for anything that is taught in any classroom in any part of the world.

The last time I researched the matter I found that the teaching of creation had been made illegal in American schools -- but that was some time ago during the Clinton era. Personally I find that just as bad ... allowing children to make up their own mind about something that no one can ever be 100% sure about seems the best way to me.

Furry nuff. But you've made no comment on half the stuff that's been talked about. How about - Do you think it is morally right to teach Creationism/ID in school science lessons?


I mentioned that I thought the US constitution prevents religion being taught in schools (and someone else said it too). Whether it's the constitution or not it really doesn't matter: someone had the sense to say "religion doesn't belong in school - faith teaching should come from church and the family".

Fundamentalist Christian movements have, for many unfortunate children, turned their right to an unbiased education on it's head.


Question: What do you think about that?



(Sorry if it feels like a personal attack m8. It's not.)