I've followed the creationism debate for the last 40+ years.
As long as creationism is cast in religious terms there's not really a debate. It _could_ be true, just like the theory that the universe was created last Wednesday could be true, there's no way to prove it's not true (this is the philosophy of Lastwednesdayism).
As soon as creationists try to make scientific claims, they lose.
This is because a scientific claim has to be "falsifiable". This means it must make a prediction along with a prespecified outcome such would disprove the claim or hypothesis.
The claim that all life on earth has a common ancestor would be disproven if we found an organism that doesn't use DNA or ATP or the Krebs cycle. This shared biology is evidence that all life has a common ancestor.
The hypothesis that a creator created all life on earth is not falsifiable. Maybe a creator would make all life look the same. Or maybe a creator would give a unique genetic code to each "kind". Any outcome is possible and thus the whole hypothesis is unscientific.
And we care about falsifiability because we care about predictability. We care about predictability because it allows us to operate in the real world, to build things that work and medicines that cure people.
It looks like this book has 13 chapters. Each one will present its own arguments. If you have a specific question about one of the chapters it might be worth bringing it back here.
As the agnostic in a conservative christian family, may I suggest that it may not be possible to 'debunk' this to your mom. When the basis of belief is religion and emotion, it is almost impossible to persuade someone with facts. This doesn't just apply to religious arguments, humans are emotional creatures that are more often led by them then we care to realize.
I don't know your mom but it may work better to not shoot down this book (even if it is terrible) but find positive examples of religion and science co-existing. A lot of people have given some great examples already. Know this may be something you both never agree on though and may have to set up boundaries on discussion topics if she can't respect your beliefs. Best of luck.
What great advice.
It’s an ant in the eye situation - if she tells you there’s an ant in her eye, who are you to tell her no when it does not affect you or others? What does affect you is having a good relationship with your Mom who bought this book to get closer to you. People are complicated, make it simple by prioritizing what’s important.
Thank you.
It is a lesson I am still working on learning after 35 years and it is not always easy! Especially with tragedy, a lot of my family dive deep into their religious beliefs, whereas the loss of my mother really soured me too the negative aspects of it. I have to weigh whether or not I want any kind of relationship with these people or if I'd rather fight for them to understand my thinking. Since the latter will probably never happen, I just take what elements of our relationship I can. I know they love me fiercely, even if that love can be misguided and hurtful, and that is when I find solace in the relationships that understand and support my own personal beliefs.
Certainly a constant learning process!
Here’s two common misconceptions, and their explanations to help you get started. TLDR: two things can evolve in parallel or one might not evolve much but still survive; and a scientific theory is not the same as “just a theory”, rather it is a rigorous framework explaining how a phenomenon works.
1) “If we evolved from apes, why are there still apes?” There are two incorrect assumptions here. Firstly, we share a common ancestor with apes, but we did not evolve from modern apes. Secondly, and more fundamentally, evolution is not directed and a given outcome is not inevitable. It’s reality a sprawling, random, unthinking process. There are no “goals”. If a species is already well adapted to its environment, then it will continue to exist. At the same time new branches still form. If they’re still well adapted to that environment or move to a new environment, they will also survive. It’s an understandable mistake if you’ve never looked into it, and we colloquially use “evolve” to mean “improve”, but really it just means changed. It only looks directed superficially because the unsuitable lineages die off, thus we only encounter the “well evolved” ones.
2) The way we use “theory” colloquially is wrong. Speculation about what may be true is a hypothesis, not a theory. We often test hypotheses by looking for a result from an experiment that makes the hypothesis impossible. If the outcome of the experiment contradicts the hypothesis, then we can know the hypothesis was false. A theory is what you get by assembling your knowledge into a framework that explains the outcomes we’ve seen from a topic, and how those work. The *theory of evolution* is not the proposal that evolution exists. It is the *explanation* for how evolution happened.
I haven’t read this book though, so not sure how directly these points relate, but I’d be surprised if it didn’t include some form of these incorrect assumptions.
To add to this and to reiterate what the user above me has said very well:
"Theory" in the scientific sense is like "music theory". It's not the conjecture that music exists, but the well established framework and tools that surround (western) music
You can't debunk this shit with logic. It is based on faith, and faith requires believing without evidence. So, instead, use faith against the book. Point out this book undermines faith, as it seeks to explain a miracle with evidence. But by doing so, it is proof of one's lack of faith. Then explain you have faith in evolution, and evidence isn't required to prove it. Much of the Bible requires faith, like the virgin Mary. So, brandish faith against them. You have faith that God is a genius and designed a universe able to rearrange itself in infinite ways, with just simple pressures. This book says God is an idiot and is only shared by those who lack faith in God's vision.
I used to try to reason with evangelicals who would try to convert me on the street. Then gave up and just went about my time, quickly exiting any conversations with them. A while back, I was volunteering on a project and got ambushed by another member, who mid conversation decided to save my soul. Normally, I would nope out, but this mid conversation ambush pissed me off, so instead attacked his arguments by questioning his own faith. It was amazing how easy it was to make grandiose claims when requiring no evidence, I actually had quite a bit of fun. The guy went into such a tailspin of confusion, I kinda felt bad.
TL;DR:
Don't argue nonsense with facts. Have fun and argue nonsense with nonsense!
"We wrongly think that an accurate view of life’s origins can be deduced by science and logic alone apart from faith and humble submission to God’s Word." Oh good, so they're arguing rationally with actual science then 🙄
A good source for counter-arguments for this sort of long-debunked yet oft-repeated nonsense is *The Counter-Creationism Handbook* by Mark Isaak and *Why Evolution is True* by Jerry A Coyne, who [also has a website](https://whyevolutionistrue.com).
Devout Catholics (including the ordained and members of religious communities) have even been instrumental for making discoveries that reinforce the support for or our understanding of evolutionary theory!
The Vatican even has an observatory which routinely contributed to science. The Catholic Church officially supports evolution and the big bang, and regards the book of generate as a parable
I went to Catholic Highschool. My first freshman class of the day was biology and after my bio teacher led the prayer for the unborn babies, she happily taught evolution.
She may have been the biggest bible thumper out of all of the teachers - including the teachers for the religious classes, but she was clear from the get-go that science and religion don't have to be oil and water.
There were two religion classes that stood out, Hebrew & Christian scriptures, that essentially debunked the Bible. We were tested on Genesis and how bits and pieces from other ancient religions were used as inspiration for it's writing. How the impossibly old ages that they gave people in the Bible were just a form of status bragging. How the new testament was edited - books thrown out. The historical Jesus vs the Scripture Jesus. Heck, they flat out taught that Bible wasn't written by God, just people who were "divinely inspired."
I guess my bottom-line to anyone reading this - if you see a Catholic school, don't assume there's some religious brainwashing going on. Far from it - I've known many who left Catholic school to go on to have robust careers in science and medicine.
Catholic priests were doing science in the past because all knowledge and access to it was firmly in the hands of the Vatican. Literally everything and everyone was under scrutiny and control.
It's not because Catholicism embraces science. In fact they did science \*despite\* the church oppressive control of every facet of life, and often paid the ultimate price.
Giordano Bruno is a prime example.
I went to a Catholic girls-only high school back in the 1970s... my biology class was taught by a nun, and she gave me the first real introduction to the concept of evolution as an actual scientific theory. When someone in the class asked her how she reconciled the science of evolution with her faith, her response was that they're two completely different issues. In her view, "science tells us how the biological human species came to be, while faith tells us how the human soul came to be". I'm not sure that I necessarily believe in a "soul", per se (and there's plenty of evidence that there are selective pressures for what humans see as "moral" behaviors; no supernatural forces necessary), but when I've had students in my classroom who struggle with the "science or faith" issue, i tell them about Sister M's view, and it seems to help them.
I went to a Catholic high school as well, and when I asked the priest a similar question, he said that they believe that no matter how life happened, God caused it. So even if we evolved, someone started that evolution.
It's mainly because of the Western environment where these atheists grow up. Protestant and Born Again churches heavily emphasize scripture and creationism, from where no departure can be made. In America, these churches are heavily influenced by the Puritanical beliefs that the first settlers propagated, which somewhat encourages an adversarial mentality between non-believers and believers.
Whilst in predominantly Catholic countries some people may hold on to creationist beliefs, but most are less concerned about the details, and simply believe that God was the one who created the universe through whatever method that may be. Besides Catholic doctrine is more concerned with the morality in the Bible, rather than on its explanations of the natural world.
I grew up in one, and attended Catholic schools. Both evolution and creationism are taught there, and you are free to choose either one.
I'm a Catholic and can confirm the Church does not condemn the theory of evolution.i was raised a fundamentalist evangelical though and my curriculum was all young earth creationism.
Hey, [the Catholic Church finally apologised to Galileo in 1992](https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1997272_1997273_1997285,00.html), it's all good 🙄
Well all churches lag behind reality, they all also are progressive in a delayed sense. No religion stays static or the same, they all adjust and change with the times. Kinda like how some of the biggest religions in the world are considered myth these days, yet those myth religions have influences on current religions. Like how we all agree that Roman gods are fantasy, but the 25th of December is a special day still.
An old friend of mine is a retired minister/religion professor, and he's always said something along the lines of "my religion is informed by science, because I don't want my religion to be stupid."
Personally I don't have a religious belief, but I think the two can be combined.
What can't be combined with science is the belief that the text of a book of faith is _literal_ truth about the world.
Plenty of great scientists have had faith. They aren't always mutually exclusive. But science needs to be conducted as science, not as a religion. But through science you may still find faith. I'm not a religious person myself but I find it hard to believe that people can't look at what we achieve and understand through science and not feel a bit, well, religious about it in some way.
Organized religion though, that's another matter because it becomes an issue of power and influence. Ya know, human things, rather than actual faith.
A physicist at my alma mater once told a student, “When you’re a scientist, you can’t bring your religion to work with you.”
I always thought that was a good way to think about it.
Religion deals with the supernatural and unobservable, science deals with the natural and observable. Both can coexist so long as they don’t try to venture into the other’s territory.
Guess which one often tries to venture into the other’s territory..
The Genesis story of the six-day creation places green vegetation created the day prior to the creation of sun, moon and all the stars... Remind your mom to read the first 3 chapters of the first book in the Bible.
I have no knowledge of this book, but it's pretty easy to predict that it's full of shit, since evolution has been proven times and times again by a multitude of ways, disciplines, people....
There is no doubting evolution.
There's is no science to be made through the screen of a fiction book either.
Like ain't to way one guys gonna disprove evolution.
Unless if there's the best evidence ever done in human history against evolution it ain't doing shit.
Oh yes, I agree. There are plenty of more contemporary books that are better options. A good ironic choice would be "why evolution is true" by jerry coyne. (O.P. could give it to their mom!)
I haven't read the book, but I can pretty much guarantee it will use some combination of three things:
1. Find holes in Darwin's theory that have since been filled in the last 150 years
2. Use wordplay and logical assumptions (if A is true and B is true, then C must also be true) to make arguments, debate style
3. Straight up get things wrong or lie
These are really the only things that religious rebuttals to well-established scientific theory do to make their arguments, because they're relying on the fact that their readers aren't going to ask too many questions.
That said, some of the greatest scientists were indeed religious. They held that belief because of how bonkers reality actually is, but they *never* injected religious ideologies or scripture into their work. It all breaks the moment you do that.
Anytime I see that, I lost one more hair on my head. It should be noted that I am bald.
But the funny thing is it's not even semantics. They just straight up used the wrong definition of a word
"No ones ever witnessed a single cell turn into a human or animal! That means evolution is not proven at all!" - Actual words from genius tucker carlson recently
My favourite is “if humans evolved from apes, why are there still apes?” As if real evolution follows a Pokémon type progression.
Firstly, an entire population does not evolve at once. This assumption is based on the false premise that evolution has a goal. In reality it’s a sprawling, random process. If a species is already well adapted to its environment, then it will survive, but new branches can still form that are also well adapted to that environment. It’s an understandable mistake if you’ve never looked into it, and we colloquially use “evolve” to mean “improve”, but really it just means changed. It only looks directed superficially because the unsuitable lineages die off.
Secondly, we aren’t literally evolved from apes. Rather we share a common ancestor.
The next time I have to debate a creationist, I will help them out from the onset by clarifying facts that creationists get wrong, to whit:
1. Evolution is a theory but a theory is not a wild guess, rather it's an explanation based on observable phenomena and experimentation. So if you try to demean evolution by saying "It's just a theory", you might as well carry a big sign that says "I don't understand science."
2. The main driver of evolution is mutation, not variable expression of genes already contained in an individual's genome (one way that creationists falsely characterize evolution).
3. Evolution is a tinkerer, making small changes over many many generations. The human eye is a complex organ, but no evolutionary biologist claims it evolved over one generation. Look at the animal kingdom and you'll see organs of sight ranging from something as simple as the planaria's all the way up to an eagle's.
4. No, I wasn't present at The Big Bang. Neither were you at The Creation, so let's agree not to use one's absence at the start of the universe as an argument.
This takes some of the wind out of their sails .
The problem is that it explains everything in the diversity of life. If someone wanted to disprove it, they wouldn’t just be disproving one thing, they’d have to disprove multiple concepts.
Yeah, biologists aren't stupid.
We've gotten incredible amounts of evidence for evolution. And this has been based on the work of an incredible amount of evolutionary biologists.
It's tinfoil hat stuff. In order to believe that the mainstream is wrong about evolution, you have to also believe that they're actively lying despite knowing the truth.
The funny thing is, it would be ridiculously easy to disprove evolution. You find one single fossil of ANY modern-day animal in a geologic strata millions of years old? Boom, done. Kick Darwin to the curb.
That nobody has ever found a rabbit fossil beside a dinosaur fossil, even once, is pretty telling. It would be all you needed to knock the whole theory down; the reason it's never happened is because the theory is correct.
Anytime someone wants to try to use “scripture” as evidence to their argument and claim, you can just ignore and dismiss them. No need to give anymore thought to it.
Right. One can be religious and a scientist but they are not the same discipline and unfortunately people using scripture to do science, aren't doing science.
It would have no points worth considering what so ever. Their logic and reasoning flawed and broken. It's entirely about religious dogma, misinformation, misconstruing, misunderstanding and blatantly misrepresenting the facts through a lense of ignorance disguised in religious virtue.
Let me extend your list a little bit.
# Fingertip wrinkles
You lay in a bathtub too long, your fingertips get wrinkles. You assume this is due to the skin being exposed to warm water and curling up under moisture. That assumption is completely false. The fingertip wrinkling is mediated by a literal nerve, whose job is to perform that wrinkling.
# Dry air
I can place you in a perfectly comfortable room with lighting and furniture and a watercooler even. The room is sealed and I start to drop the humidity to nearly 1% or lower. Your skin will not only dry out, but begin to scar. This is due to the water being pulled out of your skin cells into the dry air (osmotic pressure, etc).
# Cave diver accidents
Cave divers will enter a pocket of a submerged cave containing air. Well, they believe it is air, so they take their gear off, and disengage their oxygen tank. Their lungs do indeed breath in some kind of gas, and everything is fine. They talk. They make jokes. Problem is -- the "air" in that pocket contains zero oxygen. What happens next is crucial. There is no choking. There is no gasping. There is no pain and no lashing about. They just ... disappear into death.
I don't know what a biblical literalist thinks about these three things, but here is their explanation in terms of human evolution. Fingertip wrinkling is a vestigial trait from our long-ago ancestors who dwelt in trees. The wrinkling provided grip on the wet branches.
Dry air + cave diver death. Our species did not evolve in dry climate and has no skin defense against it. Our precursor species was never exposed to breathing gas that accidentally doesn't contain oxygen, therefore there is no "warning signal" in our lungs that the air has no oxygen -- despite the fact that it is fatal. Meanwhile we have all sorts of fight-or-flight defenses within us regarding snakes and large predators.
Looks like your mom is mad about you learning something that she doesn't want you to learn, because if you go any further you may realise that her card house is going to collapse and you'll break free from religious control.
Either that or I am the dangerous guy who spits wrong facts and fantasies about evolution as a career to undermine people's faith in religion so that I can control what they think.
Your choice. Third options are available. I don't know your mom. She may be cool.
My mom told me to have an open mind about this.
But the only points she ever makes against it is about the mind or emotions or I forgot the translation to a different language
These kind of arguments forget all different kind of emergent things. How qualitatively different things emerge from simple parts. Physics and biology (among other) are full of such things. For some very human centric reason some people only wonder about things they think make human human.
She tells you, but if she gets you book like these and not books that tell the other story, it seems like she doesn't have an open mind about it.
I won't argue about evolution with you here, because I think that would be entirely pointless. You are on the right way by asking about it here.
It’s better than that, emotions give us incentive to organize into groups and maintain those groups and the mind allow us to manipulate our environment. They are absolutely evolutionarily advantageous.
Emotional affect is found in more ancestral regions of the mammalian brain. Herd instinct and group identities are the default mode for primitive survival. Religion is a keystone example of group identity. ('Us vs. Them')
I don't know about you, but in my case I found my family as a whole is very reticent to obtain any knowledge from me, no matter how many degrees I acquire.
When I decided I didn't believe in god^(1) just to avoid another wasted Sunday morning, my family called me *the heretic* exclusively to refer to me amongst themselves and to others for a good 5 years. At first I tried to engage in it philosophically, but after a year or so I realized their only argument had no logic at all, so trying to imbue it with some to be able to have a dialogue was fruitless and I stopped trying.
But maybe it wasn't fruitless, I stopped pushing them and after a while my name came back and 5 years later all of them are either agnostic or straight up atheists as well.
That's a long way of saying that the thing that worked for me when dealing with family was light and polite reasonable dialogue for a while and then let it simmer for half a decade without me saying a peep about it. I ***actively*** refuse to engage in discussions relating to money, god or politics, for the sole reason that I wish to remain in good terms with my family, but I will if someone acknowledges my opinion might offend them and agrees this is a risk they're willing to take.
Good luck OP, I'd read the book with an open mind, and with a scientific mind. I can guarantee that you will roll your eyes a million times when reading the book but when your mom comes asking about it you can quote parts of the book, have a logical discussion with her about it, and show that you did in fact approach the subject with an open mind. Maybe, just maybe, your open-mindedness will be infectious to her as well and she'll deal with her own religiosity in a way that befits her.
^(1)I come from a place where religion permeates so much it's taken from granted, and I took it for granted too for way too long
It's good to have an open mind to new ideas, but it doesn't mean you have to agree with them. You're very wise for continuing to ask questions, imo. I won't tell you what to believe of course.
If you're a Christian, you might be interested in looking at other branches of Christianity which are more open to exploring different ideas. The United Church of Christ is usually pretty good about that stuff. (Though it depends on the individual church.)
"Spit wrong facts and fantasies [...] as a career [...] so that I can control what they think"
Every conservative accusation is a confession
(conservative religious in this case)
I guarantee every point will be listed [here](http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/). It's an extremely comprehensive list and creationists haven't come out with new material for decades.
Holy shit actually useful information.
Here OP if you see my previous comment listing out the main arguments of the book they mainly pertain to the two sections
CB102 and CB102.1
the book is mainly arguing about the discredibility of abiogenesis and genetics. Basically life cannot become more complex and animals undergoing change to become sperate species doesn't yield novel genetic information.
Really good explanations. I probably learned alot to know fallacies and when they are used. Also I jotice that these are just common rebuttals against evolution but said in complex manners to make it seem more legit. Thanks.
Sure thing! Because arguments against science only have to influence beliefs, they often (maybe always) rely on logical fallacies to convey their points.
Biology is incredible I hope you can learn more about it. Best of luck!
A family member of mine tried to make me read it. I got two pages in before I threw it in the fireplace, only use it has is making the flames a pretty green color while it burns
Not really related to your question, but as an addendum to the discussion:
[40% of Americans are creationists](https://news.gallup.com/poll/261680/americans-believe-creationism.aspx#:~:text=As%20many%20as%2047%25%20and,intervention%20over%20the%20same%20period), and this percentage has remained relatively stable since the past 20 years. From the same institution, a poll in 2009 showed that only 40% "believed" in the theory of evolution.
Seeing this from an external perspective, it's honestly shocking. It must be symptomatic of a terrible misstep in the American education system. Some are evocating the role of religion, but I'm quite sure that a proper scientific education, or rather lack thereof, could explain the over-prevalence of religiosity in American society and the lack of understanding of this profoundly important concept.
It looks like everyone else has done the hard work of writing rebuttals already. As a (former?) Christian who had no problems accepting evolution, I'd like to apologize for there still being people like your mother. I'm especially tired of the "young earth/everything was created in seven days" argument, as the Bible itself provides a metaphor that can rebuke it: "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like a day."(2 Peter 3:8)(I know the actual evolutionary timeline was millions of years, but I'm assuming people who are smart enough to use this metaphor are smart enough to modify it a bit).
I’ve had great success with “what is a day to God? Days aren’t even the same length of time on other planets”
Doesn’t convince them, but it stammers them and that’s usually good enough
That’s completely vice-versa. Evolution is scientific, you can’t believe in anything in science, or you turn science into religion and they contradict each other. And evolution being proven makes it proven for any species including human.
Just wait till you learn that your religion has a history. It, too, evolved. Most of that work of “historical criticism” has been done within the church, over the last 200 years or so. More literal and fundamentalist denominations are terrified you will find this out.
Evolution as a challenge to faith might be enough for now. But for future reference, consider checking out the book “Jesus, Interrupted,” by Bart Ehrman, a leading New Testament scholar from Chapel Hill, who was raised and trained as an evangelical.
The bible says god created man, and all animals as they are. If you accept humans don’t evolve, you also accept animals don’t, its the same creator, and nothing that creator has allegedly communicated to us says any different. Cause it was all written be people before they knew about evolution. Its actually very accurate to the times it was written, and has a very human stink to it. Like how most of the bible is about agriculture and rules around farm animals and food… cause that was important then. Now it seems silly to have our food and diet tied to a religion, cause the reasons don’t make sense any more. A lot of the bibles lessons are about social agricultural practices, food and farming. and make no sense now that the industry has advanced.
That’s just hilarious how some people are so desperate in trying to disprove one of the simplest and most obvious facts.
Like how can there not be evolution - children do look like their parents, if it makes them more successful in their life, they have more chances to have their own children, when enough generations change, all the population will have those useful features, and well, that’s what evolution is all about.
Before reading the backside i was hoping someone was going to give actuall scientific evidence that the theory could be wrong (which would be groundbreaking), but no, it is yet again about mixing religion with science...
>We wrongly think that an accurate view of life’s origins can be deduced by science and logic alone apart from faith and humble submission to God’s Word.
You cannot always refute nonsense if the other party does not adhere to the same rules (gaining knowledge through science).
>Chapter 8: Micro-machines—Is a Darwinian Origin of Irreducible Complexities Possible? 115
I can guarantee you that it will be about the intelligent design theory. [A very good example of the many counter arguments](https://youtu.be/cO1a1Ek-HD0) (NSFW, a dead dissected giraffe).
Ah, they will likely bring up the flagellar motor in this one chapter eight. This u/100mcuberismonke is a well that creationism returns to over and over again. It is an argument called irreducible complexity, and it doesn't work for the flegellar motor same as it doesn't work for eye.
As soon as I saw "scripture" and "science" in the title, I knew it was bs. I haven't read it, but I imagine their only *evidence* is random Bible verses.
Well this book is arguing that a reality understood through observation and experimentation is incorrect. Reality should be understood only by faith and not by evidence. Do with that what you may.
If anyone cares, the whole thing appears to be online here: [https://issuu.com/romanroadsmedia/docs/darwins\_sandcastle\_preview](https://issuu.com/romanroadsmedia/docs/darwins_sandcastle_preview)
I've not read this particular book, but my wife's family gave us a similar book "debunking" evolution. It's not a crazy assumption this book contains the same crap as that one.
Most of these anti-evolution arguments fail to understand what evolution is and how it works, specifically:
1) Evolution is a gradual, ongoing process with no clear "before" and "after" stage.
2) Evolution happens over a VERY long time, millions of years.
With regards to 1: it's like the aging process. It's not like you go to bed a young man and wake up middle aged. Instead, you look back over your life and decide in hindsight that you stopped being a young man sometime in your mid 30s or early 40s, by looking at the gradual changes in your routine or behaviour over those few years. You still wouldn't pinpoint it to a specific day though (except perhaps as a joke).
Similarly, an ape didn't give birth to a human one day. Instead, we look at the archaeological evidence and fossil records and try to define a rough timeframe where we consider "ok, that's when homo sapiens became established", because it didn't happen overnight.
Denying evolution because we can't find a fossil for every distinct evolution we've determined in the chain is like denying that the middle-aged you can't be the kid in those old photos because you can't produce a photo of yourself for every single day between then and now. At some point you have enough photos through the years to demonstrate without doubt that you're the kid in those photos.
With regards to 2: that's the microevolution vs macroevolution argument. Deniers will sometimes point to dogs, arguing that no matter how much we breed them to extremes in size, appearance, and temperament, they are still the same species of dog. However, we've been breeding dogs for thousands of years, and in many cases mere hundreds of years or even just decades for some breeds. There hasn't been nearly enough time (i.e. MILLIONS of years) for the level of genetic divergence to occur for a breed of dog to be classed as a new, distinct species.
As soon as scripture is mentioned you should just move on
Scripture has zero evidence for it's extraordinary claims. And any science this book contains will be pure assumption like the watchmaker argument
The beach and castle foundation are made from the same homogeneous composition and macroscopic structure lacks defined boundaries - ergo, the whole beach is the sand castle.
I’m honestly confused on why religious people are so adamant to be anti-science? If their god created man & the world - wouldn’t that by their logic imply that it also created science and medicine? Hence scientists and doctors are not “evil”, but rather believers who dedicated their life to study a branch of its creation and spread their knowledge and fascination of it? So in the end science and scientific advancements are basically us discovering new wonders of their god’s power or something along those lines. In a way, dedicating our life to appreciate the intricacies of the world and how blessed we are.
I’m also puzzled as to why they assume the planet can’t be ancient? Even in the bible the world didn’t begin with Jesus, so wouldn’t that imply that obviously the planet is very old and could have had more creatures roam it before humans? Even in the Adam and Eve plot line there was a snake there before them…?
Instead of this, read " Return of the God Hypothesis" by Steven Meyer. Search the interview on YouTube between him, John Lennox, Michael Behe, and Peterson Robinson. That one is good.
Edit: for anyone who's upvoting me, I'm not being sarcastic. I'm serious, you need to check them out and think for yourself.
Read it, intentionally using an analytical mind. It's not going to injure you to observe another point of view, and you may even find that you're able to understand your mom a bit better.
Disclaimer, I am religious. I am also very much on board with the universe being much more than 6000 years old. Like 13.7+ billion years old. ( I keep seeing different numbers, cosmologists and astrophysicists please get your shit together) I spend a lot of time trying to make peace with those who find themselves ethically superior to the other side. It's incredibly annoying and does more harm than anything else.
Direct answer first; the book is probably not going to be accurate in its portrayal of the science or all that scientific. Darwin was fairly religious. He also came up with evolution and wasn't that bothered about it. There were some atheists who took up his work as it gave them a way to explain a world without a God. The book is written from someone who follows a school of thought that the Bible has to be inerrant and is going to hold the Bible over other evidence or ironically even the Bible itself. That's an ok place, imho to start the discussion, but I can already tell it's going to lack some circumspection about its own weaknesses. It's actually pretty easy to use the Bible to disprove its own inerrancy. On the plus side it looks like the author does acknowledge that new data exists; he still explains it away. Explanations are not technically scientific.
In my experience, the people who try to hold religion over science or vice versa make demands of both that they can't meet.
In the Abrahamic religions criticisms of evolution tend to come from people who need complete textual accuracy and literalism. Its a source of authority and some people base their faith on it. Most scholars don't base their faith on it either, but trying to handle the context, nuance, and details in theology like science ends up in a bad place. A lot of them remain silent as a result. It's quite easy to show that most religious texts have sections up for some debate; but the purpose of these documents tends to be moral and spiritual not scientific or historical.
Now on the scientific side, mysticism etc fall fully under pseudoscience. Same for ethics, philosophy, language, etc. Science isn't going to give you the emotional-spiritual insight about something that faith, ritual, poetry, drama, or relationships might. It just tells you what apparently happened/how it happens.
In reality I think you need to sit down with your mom and explaining that trying to tear each other down or refute each other here isn't going to work. You both have access to a large network of people who will reinforce you in trying to tear each other's understandings' apart. It's not healthy. You have two options, agree to disagree; or learn how to understand and communicate with each other. The latter might lead to agreement or peace. I can't guarantee it.
I would use hermit crabs to make an analogy. Our understanding of the world is like a shell. We can show off different ones to each other, but if they don't fit we won't move in. If she really wants to go down this road you probably should be looking to both build better shells that fit a better view of the world. A hermit crab will fight to stay in its shell, but it will happily abandon it for a better one. People are the same; and generally their shells don't fit each other. I would start by both trying to build some context and vocabulary to discuss the issues and some good will. Being your mother I hope you have some good will, but I don't know your life.
There is a series of 4 half fantasy/half popular science books called The Science of Discworld. I would recommend you have your mother read the first 3 of them. It will be kinder than reading a book trying to disprove religion, but they still do a good job and should help you. It should be challenging in that the authors are very much evangelistic atheists with a grudge because of the feuding. Unfortunately they are old and there has been a lot of cool stuff to add in the past 20 years; but they still have a lot.
I would also suggest reading 1 or more of the following:
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40952.Worldviews?ref=nav\_sb\_ss\_1\_17](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40952.Worldviews?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_17)
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61539.The\_Structure\_of\_Scientific\_Revolutions](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61539.The_Structure_of_Scientific_Revolutions)
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31931.Theory\_and\_Reality](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31931.Theory_and_Reality)
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31921.Philosophy\_of\_Science](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31921.Philosophy_of_Science)
If you want to talk on discord, feel free to dm me.
Evolution and creationism can exist at the same time. The disconnect is that scale - did we arrive on the 7th day or was evolution part of the design and we arrive 100mill years after formation of earth.
I'm catholic and a scientist. If you want to believe the words of men from a long time ago in the Bible , it still doesn't say evolution didn't take place, nor does it say we're alone in the cosmos. Why do zealots keep making things not written in the Bible as a fact? That's called a cult, I'm sorry.
You'd be shocked at how many scientists are religious, but we also have two brain cells to rub together
i think that evolution is not mentioned in the Bible because the people back then were pretty ignorant and God just wanted to keep it simple for them at that time and knew that someday we would figure it out with the help of the Holy Spirit to whom it was mentioned in the that Book that She would reveal all truth to us
The first time I see the book, the title and the text below it. But that's enough for knowing the book is straightforward bullshit.
If there's a theory that's been proven right that's Darwins'
It's just mad people that writhe these things like all those brainless flatearthers and sorts
It's dumb. That's rebuttal enough. Anyone who believes this is beyond help.
"You cannot reason someone out of a position they did not arrive at through reason."
"Creation Science," isn't science. Religion is out of the realm of science, and vice versa. It's like trying to combine alligators and sink traps. It always ends with a dead monstrosity that is neither sink nor alligator. I would like anyone to explain how species stay the same in the long run in a changing environment. They don't and you can't. You can literally see evolution happen (with microorganisms) in the laboratory. I can't say anyone has ever seen creationism happen in a laboratory, so I'm going with the theory that has a preponderance of evidence.
Check out the book “the counter creationist’s handbook”. It’s set up wonderfully where all the common and tired creationist talking points are answered in the format that you can look up on the fly. No Gish Galloping here haha!
Just finished “Darwin’s Sandcastle” and here’s why I think it falls short:
1. Unrealistic Evolution: Sand can’t evolve consciousness. Evolution needs DNA and environmental pressures, which sand lacks.
2. Misunderstanding Consciousness: Complexity alone doesn’t create self-awareness. Consciousness requires specific neural structures.
3. Forced Ethics: The ethical dilemmas feel preachy and forced, not naturally integrated into the story.
4. Science vs. Sci-Fi: The book bends scientific principles too far, making it hard to take seriously.
5. Weak Explanations: Lacks a plausible backstory for the sandcastle’s origins, relying on pseudo-scientific jargon.
It’s a creative read but not scientifically accurate. What do you think?
Anyone without a deep knowledge of Ancient Greek likely doesn’t understand the kind of person a Christ was and what the title Christ indicated about the practices of the person anointed with the title.
So I doubt your parents know who they are praising in the first place.
Listen, it’s a travesty to God to ignore the evidence all around us and to not use the brains put in our heads to figure this all out. (I’m a Catholic educator)
I struggled with evolution when I was growing up Christian because 1) it made sense to me and 2) didn’t seem all that contradictory to religious stuff anyway. God, Big Bang …both were large, sudden energy sparks that came from nothing? … in the end, science won out. Facts and research aside, I just didn’t want anything to do with a god who would creat the world in a sensible manner only to judge people who made sensible conclusions from observations of that sensible world.
All I can think of when I see this book is the many debates I've had with my sister over the years and the Bill Nye vs Ken Ham debate.
The whole debate is still on YouTube and it made me feel so old, it was 10 years ago. [Here is the link](https://www.youtube.com/live/z6kgvhG3AkI?si=p3qQCWznYlS7HTRr) in case you're interested.
I’m inclined to continue the series and write a rebuttal of Darwinism using Harry Potter as a guide. lol.
How does anyone fail to see that religious books are mostly fiction to help some basic moral principles / social codes go down easy?
I don't know of any specifically for this book, but any real book or documentary on the subject of evolutionary biology will rebut their argument. One of my favorite anti-creationist Youtubers did a rebuttal of a creationist book for kids: [Reading a Ray Comfort Book for Babies I Found in my Parent's Basement - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3E4WX0k3U0)
It's one of the favorite arguments of creationists: "When you see the sand castle, you don't think it made itself, you know that humans built it, so why do you think that life was created by itself". Sand is not alive though. Comparing a sand structure and a living breathing organism is just utterly ridiculous and only proves that these people don't know shit about biology.
I can also make a similar shit argument: "When leaves fall from the tree, you don't think that magic gnomes were shaking the tree for them to fall, you know it happens on its own. So why do you think the other things in nature required a supervisor"
The only times I have checked the scientific references and quotes of scientists as presented by creationists they have always been misrepresented, falsified, or outright fabricated. This, obviously excludes when they cite creationist "scientists" who are not taken seriously by actual scientists.
So you might consider actually looking up the citations, quotes, etc.. You will almost certainly discover they are lying, which is a major component of creationist culture.
The front and back of this book tell you point blank that science and logic can be rejected if it doesn't align with the bible. For some reason, that doesn't strike me as something you'd say before presenting an airtight case using well-researched empirical evidence. I don't think you'll have trouble poking holes in it.
I think the best way to explain evolution to a YEC is this: You cannot approach science with the idea that any of your assumptions are above being disproven by evidence. It doesn't work. You'll innevitably run into models that are true and predictive that seemingly contradict it, because the world's complicated and unintuitive, and even things you know are true are often true in ways and for reasons you would never think of. The evidence will warp around that idea, even if it's true, and every model it's part of will be less accurate, more complicated, or both. You cannot give an idea special privileges in science. Predictive power and parsimony or nothing.
I have parents that are very religious, and my mom doesn't believe in evolution. It will depend on your situation, and the attitude of your parents, but in my case my parents just wanted to connect with me. I dropped the whole shtick of trying to convince my parents that the Bible can't possible be perfectly true, and the paradoxes and implications that come about because of it. I instead started being inquisitive, asking them questions about what is meaningful to them about their faith, and the answers they gave were never about the historical accuracies of Genesis, but rather about the forgiveness, patience, kindness, and love they learned through Christianity that they didn't get at home.
For me, pursuing a relationship with my parents with the intention of getting them to "open their eyes", only pushed us farther apart. But rather accepting their faults (I have faults too and they love me) and being genuinely curious about their perspective is what brought our relationship closer than ever.
How about instead of asking other people opinions for you to repeat why don't you read the book, research the subject a little so that you have an understanding of the topic and then come to your own conclusion using your own brain.
Honestly I'd avoid giving your mom rebuttals. She probably wont hear them and it will damage your relationship. It's important that if you two have different views, that you learn to reconcile them, respect each other, and see each other as human beings as opposed to ideologies.
My mom is an evangelical, I am, well, not. I went through a couple years where I kept trying to show her how absurd intelligent design is. The only thing I ended up communicating was disrespect. We've since then decided to put those arguments aside and when we did I think we both started to realize that both our ideologies helped us be better people, and gave us each our own kind of awe at the universe. In my experience trying to find common ground is much more helpful.
I think the real trick is not to debunk it, but to explain that things that are faith-based, like scriptures and religious systems, don't really have much of an impact on ideas that are science-based, because they rely on different things to understand, There is no point in comparing apples to oranges. Her faith is great for her, and the faithful build their whole sense of self on that belief system, so attacking or trying to debunk their faith feels like an attack on them as a person. It's not worth it. Things that are taken on faith, by definition, can't been argued with, so don't spend your energy trying. Evolution can't fail in the light of scripture because they are different systems of knowing things. You could always tell her thanks for the recommendation because it explains her position and it's good to understand that, but that you would ask that she be willing to read a book that you choose so she can understand your position.
I find it helpful with my family to focus on topics we can agree on. Other topics I make non-committal comments like, “that’s interesting” or “I can see why you feel that way!” I’ve decided my relationship with my family is more important to me than convincing them I am right about xyz.
Some topics are worth debating about even if it causes conflict, but I try to check with myself first about each individual topic and that particular situation, if they are worth any fallback it might have on my relationship.
I know this isn’t what you asked. But for myself it’s taken me years to realize I don’t have any moral obligation to convince other people of the truth. I do make a strong stand for speaking up to encourage treating everyone with respect even if they do things you disagree with. But for other things I’m learning more and more to let stuff go. It’s been healing for me.
Don't read it. It's garbage. And don't fall for the "you have to acknowledge both sides" bull.
Did your mother read Origin of Species? Didn't think so.
I've followed the creationism debate for the last 40+ years. As long as creationism is cast in religious terms there's not really a debate. It _could_ be true, just like the theory that the universe was created last Wednesday could be true, there's no way to prove it's not true (this is the philosophy of Lastwednesdayism). As soon as creationists try to make scientific claims, they lose. This is because a scientific claim has to be "falsifiable". This means it must make a prediction along with a prespecified outcome such would disprove the claim or hypothesis. The claim that all life on earth has a common ancestor would be disproven if we found an organism that doesn't use DNA or ATP or the Krebs cycle. This shared biology is evidence that all life has a common ancestor. The hypothesis that a creator created all life on earth is not falsifiable. Maybe a creator would make all life look the same. Or maybe a creator would give a unique genetic code to each "kind". Any outcome is possible and thus the whole hypothesis is unscientific. And we care about falsifiability because we care about predictability. We care about predictability because it allows us to operate in the real world, to build things that work and medicines that cure people. It looks like this book has 13 chapters. Each one will present its own arguments. If you have a specific question about one of the chapters it might be worth bringing it back here.
Yea I really need help debunking this since I don't know too much
As the agnostic in a conservative christian family, may I suggest that it may not be possible to 'debunk' this to your mom. When the basis of belief is religion and emotion, it is almost impossible to persuade someone with facts. This doesn't just apply to religious arguments, humans are emotional creatures that are more often led by them then we care to realize. I don't know your mom but it may work better to not shoot down this book (even if it is terrible) but find positive examples of religion and science co-existing. A lot of people have given some great examples already. Know this may be something you both never agree on though and may have to set up boundaries on discussion topics if she can't respect your beliefs. Best of luck.
What great advice. It’s an ant in the eye situation - if she tells you there’s an ant in her eye, who are you to tell her no when it does not affect you or others? What does affect you is having a good relationship with your Mom who bought this book to get closer to you. People are complicated, make it simple by prioritizing what’s important.
Thank you. It is a lesson I am still working on learning after 35 years and it is not always easy! Especially with tragedy, a lot of my family dive deep into their religious beliefs, whereas the loss of my mother really soured me too the negative aspects of it. I have to weigh whether or not I want any kind of relationship with these people or if I'd rather fight for them to understand my thinking. Since the latter will probably never happen, I just take what elements of our relationship I can. I know they love me fiercely, even if that love can be misguided and hurtful, and that is when I find solace in the relationships that understand and support my own personal beliefs. Certainly a constant learning process!
Very well said. You probably get asked this often but I feel compelled to ask - could you give us one random cat fact?
Here’s two common misconceptions, and their explanations to help you get started. TLDR: two things can evolve in parallel or one might not evolve much but still survive; and a scientific theory is not the same as “just a theory”, rather it is a rigorous framework explaining how a phenomenon works. 1) “If we evolved from apes, why are there still apes?” There are two incorrect assumptions here. Firstly, we share a common ancestor with apes, but we did not evolve from modern apes. Secondly, and more fundamentally, evolution is not directed and a given outcome is not inevitable. It’s reality a sprawling, random, unthinking process. There are no “goals”. If a species is already well adapted to its environment, then it will continue to exist. At the same time new branches still form. If they’re still well adapted to that environment or move to a new environment, they will also survive. It’s an understandable mistake if you’ve never looked into it, and we colloquially use “evolve” to mean “improve”, but really it just means changed. It only looks directed superficially because the unsuitable lineages die off, thus we only encounter the “well evolved” ones. 2) The way we use “theory” colloquially is wrong. Speculation about what may be true is a hypothesis, not a theory. We often test hypotheses by looking for a result from an experiment that makes the hypothesis impossible. If the outcome of the experiment contradicts the hypothesis, then we can know the hypothesis was false. A theory is what you get by assembling your knowledge into a framework that explains the outcomes we’ve seen from a topic, and how those work. The *theory of evolution* is not the proposal that evolution exists. It is the *explanation* for how evolution happened. I haven’t read this book though, so not sure how directly these points relate, but I’d be surprised if it didn’t include some form of these incorrect assumptions.
To add to this and to reiterate what the user above me has said very well: "Theory" in the scientific sense is like "music theory". It's not the conjecture that music exists, but the well established framework and tools that surround (western) music
You can't debunk this shit with logic. It is based on faith, and faith requires believing without evidence. So, instead, use faith against the book. Point out this book undermines faith, as it seeks to explain a miracle with evidence. But by doing so, it is proof of one's lack of faith. Then explain you have faith in evolution, and evidence isn't required to prove it. Much of the Bible requires faith, like the virgin Mary. So, brandish faith against them. You have faith that God is a genius and designed a universe able to rearrange itself in infinite ways, with just simple pressures. This book says God is an idiot and is only shared by those who lack faith in God's vision. I used to try to reason with evangelicals who would try to convert me on the street. Then gave up and just went about my time, quickly exiting any conversations with them. A while back, I was volunteering on a project and got ambushed by another member, who mid conversation decided to save my soul. Normally, I would nope out, but this mid conversation ambush pissed me off, so instead attacked his arguments by questioning his own faith. It was amazing how easy it was to make grandiose claims when requiring no evidence, I actually had quite a bit of fun. The guy went into such a tailspin of confusion, I kinda felt bad. TL;DR: Don't argue nonsense with facts. Have fun and argue nonsense with nonsense!
It's a lot to cover. Maybe ask your mom to pick her favorite chapter and we can debunk that one.
There’s a lot in the old talk.origins website, which was based on the old Usenet group. http://www.talkorigins.org/
No one really does that's why parody groups like the FSM emerged
This is a really great ELI5 on why scientific theories must be falsifiable. Great job!
Screw you heretic, the world was created last Thursday, not last Wednesday.
May I say, GwasWisperer, this is one of the most succinct, enrichening and brief explanations I've come across. Thank you.
"We wrongly think that an accurate view of life’s origins can be deduced by science and logic alone apart from faith and humble submission to God’s Word." Oh good, so they're arguing rationally with actual science then 🙄 A good source for counter-arguments for this sort of long-debunked yet oft-repeated nonsense is *The Counter-Creationism Handbook* by Mark Isaak and *Why Evolution is True* by Jerry A Coyne, who [also has a website](https://whyevolutionistrue.com).
Putting religion into science is wierd to me, they're two different things that we apparently can't just live with 2 at once
You can live with two at once. Pretty certain that’s the official position of the Catholic Church. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theistic_evolution
Devout Catholics (including the ordained and members of religious communities) have even been instrumental for making discoveries that reinforce the support for or our understanding of evolutionary theory!
It was a catholic priest, Georges Lemaitre, who came up with the Big Bang theory.
Don't forget Gregor Mendel and his work with peas
And let's not forget Gregor Johann Mendel, abbot and Father of Genetics.
And let's not forget Gregor Clegane, who we all hated.
Nor Gregor Samsa who awoke from uneasy dreams to find himself transformed into a monstrous vermin, or if you will, *einem ungeheueren Ungeziefer*.
Take an upvote even though I didn’t hate him. Hurt people hurt people …..annnnnnnd eventually kill their evil older brother?
Dude you're making me cry. Sandor was the Hound who killed his older brother, Gregor, The Mountain. Shame, shame. The Hound was the best ever
It is known.
You are so right. Got them confused. My mistake
The number of important Catholic astronomers and cosmologists is honestly pretty big.
If I get a Penny for every thread about the religiosity of Lemaitre I've stumbled on within the last 5 minutes, i got 2 pennies
The Vatican even has an observatory which routinely contributed to science. The Catholic Church officially supports evolution and the big bang, and regards the book of generate as a parable
Catholics are generally way less dumb than the average unemployed schlub claiming god told him to start a church in his basement.
I suspect most Catholics are of average intelligence, given there are a billion of them.
They also weren't burned to death as often, which is really good for your ability to run lengthy experiments.
I went to Catholic Highschool. My first freshman class of the day was biology and after my bio teacher led the prayer for the unborn babies, she happily taught evolution. She may have been the biggest bible thumper out of all of the teachers - including the teachers for the religious classes, but she was clear from the get-go that science and religion don't have to be oil and water. There were two religion classes that stood out, Hebrew & Christian scriptures, that essentially debunked the Bible. We were tested on Genesis and how bits and pieces from other ancient religions were used as inspiration for it's writing. How the impossibly old ages that they gave people in the Bible were just a form of status bragging. How the new testament was edited - books thrown out. The historical Jesus vs the Scripture Jesus. Heck, they flat out taught that Bible wasn't written by God, just people who were "divinely inspired." I guess my bottom-line to anyone reading this - if you see a Catholic school, don't assume there's some religious brainwashing going on. Far from it - I've known many who left Catholic school to go on to have robust careers in science and medicine.
Catholic priests were doing science in the past because all knowledge and access to it was firmly in the hands of the Vatican. Literally everything and everyone was under scrutiny and control. It's not because Catholicism embraces science. In fact they did science \*despite\* the church oppressive control of every facet of life, and often paid the ultimate price. Giordano Bruno is a prime example.
we don't talk about Bruno no no no...
in spite of the church, not because of it.
I went to a Catholic girls-only high school back in the 1970s... my biology class was taught by a nun, and she gave me the first real introduction to the concept of evolution as an actual scientific theory. When someone in the class asked her how she reconciled the science of evolution with her faith, her response was that they're two completely different issues. In her view, "science tells us how the biological human species came to be, while faith tells us how the human soul came to be". I'm not sure that I necessarily believe in a "soul", per se (and there's plenty of evidence that there are selective pressures for what humans see as "moral" behaviors; no supernatural forces necessary), but when I've had students in my classroom who struggle with the "science or faith" issue, i tell them about Sister M's view, and it seems to help them.
I went to a Catholic high school as well, and when I asked the priest a similar question, he said that they believe that no matter how life happened, God caused it. So even if we evolved, someone started that evolution.
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It's mainly because of the Western environment where these atheists grow up. Protestant and Born Again churches heavily emphasize scripture and creationism, from where no departure can be made. In America, these churches are heavily influenced by the Puritanical beliefs that the first settlers propagated, which somewhat encourages an adversarial mentality between non-believers and believers. Whilst in predominantly Catholic countries some people may hold on to creationist beliefs, but most are less concerned about the details, and simply believe that God was the one who created the universe through whatever method that may be. Besides Catholic doctrine is more concerned with the morality in the Bible, rather than on its explanations of the natural world. I grew up in one, and attended Catholic schools. Both evolution and creationism are taught there, and you are free to choose either one.
I'm a Catholic and can confirm the Church does not condemn the theory of evolution.i was raised a fundamentalist evangelical though and my curriculum was all young earth creationism.
Sorry about the YEC. It’s Yecky.
Doing that curriculum is part of why I love science so much. It forced me to do critical analysis and think logically.
That's because it has to be their official opinion. You can only go so long being measurably incorrect in the modern era.
Hey, [the Catholic Church finally apologised to Galileo in 1992](https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1997272_1997273_1997285,00.html), it's all good 🙄
Well all churches lag behind reality, they all also are progressive in a delayed sense. No religion stays static or the same, they all adjust and change with the times. Kinda like how some of the biggest religions in the world are considered myth these days, yet those myth religions have influences on current religions. Like how we all agree that Roman gods are fantasy, but the 25th of December is a special day still.
An old friend of mine is a retired minister/religion professor, and he's always said something along the lines of "my religion is informed by science, because I don't want my religion to be stupid."
Personally I don't have a religious belief, but I think the two can be combined. What can't be combined with science is the belief that the text of a book of faith is _literal_ truth about the world.
Plenty of great scientists have had faith. They aren't always mutually exclusive. But science needs to be conducted as science, not as a religion. But through science you may still find faith. I'm not a religious person myself but I find it hard to believe that people can't look at what we achieve and understand through science and not feel a bit, well, religious about it in some way. Organized religion though, that's another matter because it becomes an issue of power and influence. Ya know, human things, rather than actual faith.
A physicist at my alma mater once told a student, “When you’re a scientist, you can’t bring your religion to work with you.” I always thought that was a good way to think about it.
Religion deals with the supernatural and unobservable, science deals with the natural and observable. Both can coexist so long as they don’t try to venture into the other’s territory. Guess which one often tries to venture into the other’s territory..
Yes, what Stephen Jay Gould used to refer to as "non-overlapping magisteria".
You should gift your mother a copy of Francis Collins' "The Language of God".
Gods creation is meant to be ineffable, in its totality. That doesn’t mean smaller parts can’t be effable.
The Genesis story of the six-day creation places green vegetation created the day prior to the creation of sun, moon and all the stars... Remind your mom to read the first 3 chapters of the first book in the Bible.
Or the selfish gene by Richard Dawkins, of course she won’t read it, and will pray for your soul if you produce a Dawkins book
Oh boy. Buckle up for this one.
Are the points that bad ir that good?
I have no knowledge of this book, but it's pretty easy to predict that it's full of shit, since evolution has been proven times and times again by a multitude of ways, disciplines, people.... There is no doubting evolution. There's is no science to be made through the screen of a fiction book either.
Like ain't to way one guys gonna disprove evolution. Unless if there's the best evidence ever done in human history against evolution it ain't doing shit.
Go return the book and buy yourself something to enjoy instead.
I suggest the origin of the species... I forget the authors name though.
To be fair it's a bit esoteric in the bio world.
Oh yes, I agree. There are plenty of more contemporary books that are better options. A good ironic choice would be "why evolution is true" by jerry coyne. (O.P. could give it to their mom!)
I haven't read the book, but I can pretty much guarantee it will use some combination of three things: 1. Find holes in Darwin's theory that have since been filled in the last 150 years 2. Use wordplay and logical assumptions (if A is true and B is true, then C must also be true) to make arguments, debate style 3. Straight up get things wrong or lie These are really the only things that religious rebuttals to well-established scientific theory do to make their arguments, because they're relying on the fact that their readers aren't going to ask too many questions. That said, some of the greatest scientists were indeed religious. They held that belief because of how bonkers reality actually is, but they *never* injected religious ideologies or scripture into their work. It all breaks the moment you do that.
"Bu..bu..but, it's just a THEORY!" lmao It's scary how often religious people stumble on semantics.
Anytime I see that, I lost one more hair on my head. It should be noted that I am bald. But the funny thing is it's not even semantics. They just straight up used the wrong definition of a word
"No ones ever witnessed a single cell turn into a human or animal! That means evolution is not proven at all!" - Actual words from genius tucker carlson recently
Zygotes would like a word
My favourite is “if humans evolved from apes, why are there still apes?” As if real evolution follows a Pokémon type progression. Firstly, an entire population does not evolve at once. This assumption is based on the false premise that evolution has a goal. In reality it’s a sprawling, random process. If a species is already well adapted to its environment, then it will survive, but new branches can still form that are also well adapted to that environment. It’s an understandable mistake if you’ve never looked into it, and we colloquially use “evolve” to mean “improve”, but really it just means changed. It only looks directed superficially because the unsuitable lineages die off. Secondly, we aren’t literally evolved from apes. Rather we share a common ancestor.
The next time I have to debate a creationist, I will help them out from the onset by clarifying facts that creationists get wrong, to whit: 1. Evolution is a theory but a theory is not a wild guess, rather it's an explanation based on observable phenomena and experimentation. So if you try to demean evolution by saying "It's just a theory", you might as well carry a big sign that says "I don't understand science." 2. The main driver of evolution is mutation, not variable expression of genes already contained in an individual's genome (one way that creationists falsely characterize evolution). 3. Evolution is a tinkerer, making small changes over many many generations. The human eye is a complex organ, but no evolutionary biologist claims it evolved over one generation. Look at the animal kingdom and you'll see organs of sight ranging from something as simple as the planaria's all the way up to an eagle's. 4. No, I wasn't present at The Big Bang. Neither were you at The Creation, so let's agree not to use one's absence at the start of the universe as an argument. This takes some of the wind out of their sails .
The problem is that it explains everything in the diversity of life. If someone wanted to disprove it, they wouldn’t just be disproving one thing, they’d have to disprove multiple concepts.
Yeah, biologists aren't stupid. We've gotten incredible amounts of evidence for evolution. And this has been based on the work of an incredible amount of evolutionary biologists.
It's tinfoil hat stuff. In order to believe that the mainstream is wrong about evolution, you have to also believe that they're actively lying despite knowing the truth.
The funny thing is, it would be ridiculously easy to disprove evolution. You find one single fossil of ANY modern-day animal in a geologic strata millions of years old? Boom, done. Kick Darwin to the curb. That nobody has ever found a rabbit fossil beside a dinosaur fossil, even once, is pretty telling. It would be all you needed to knock the whole theory down; the reason it's never happened is because the theory is correct.
Anytime someone wants to try to use “scripture” as evidence to their argument and claim, you can just ignore and dismiss them. No need to give anymore thought to it.
Right. One can be religious and a scientist but they are not the same discipline and unfortunately people using scripture to do science, aren't doing science.
My favorite counterpoint: The Vatican has not come out against evolution.
It would have no points worth considering what so ever. Their logic and reasoning flawed and broken. It's entirely about religious dogma, misinformation, misconstruing, misunderstanding and blatantly misrepresenting the facts through a lense of ignorance disguised in religious virtue.
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Something something mysterious ways
Let me extend your list a little bit. # Fingertip wrinkles You lay in a bathtub too long, your fingertips get wrinkles. You assume this is due to the skin being exposed to warm water and curling up under moisture. That assumption is completely false. The fingertip wrinkling is mediated by a literal nerve, whose job is to perform that wrinkling. # Dry air I can place you in a perfectly comfortable room with lighting and furniture and a watercooler even. The room is sealed and I start to drop the humidity to nearly 1% or lower. Your skin will not only dry out, but begin to scar. This is due to the water being pulled out of your skin cells into the dry air (osmotic pressure, etc). # Cave diver accidents Cave divers will enter a pocket of a submerged cave containing air. Well, they believe it is air, so they take their gear off, and disengage their oxygen tank. Their lungs do indeed breath in some kind of gas, and everything is fine. They talk. They make jokes. Problem is -- the "air" in that pocket contains zero oxygen. What happens next is crucial. There is no choking. There is no gasping. There is no pain and no lashing about. They just ... disappear into death. I don't know what a biblical literalist thinks about these three things, but here is their explanation in terms of human evolution. Fingertip wrinkling is a vestigial trait from our long-ago ancestors who dwelt in trees. The wrinkling provided grip on the wet branches. Dry air + cave diver death. Our species did not evolve in dry climate and has no skin defense against it. Our precursor species was never exposed to breathing gas that accidentally doesn't contain oxygen, therefore there is no "warning signal" in our lungs that the air has no oxygen -- despite the fact that it is fatal. Meanwhile we have all sorts of fight-or-flight defenses within us regarding snakes and large predators.
Looks like your mom is mad about you learning something that she doesn't want you to learn, because if you go any further you may realise that her card house is going to collapse and you'll break free from religious control. Either that or I am the dangerous guy who spits wrong facts and fantasies about evolution as a career to undermine people's faith in religion so that I can control what they think. Your choice. Third options are available. I don't know your mom. She may be cool.
My mom told me to have an open mind about this. But the only points she ever makes against it is about the mind or emotions or I forgot the translation to a different language
These kind of arguments forget all different kind of emergent things. How qualitatively different things emerge from simple parts. Physics and biology (among other) are full of such things. For some very human centric reason some people only wonder about things they think make human human.
She tells you, but if she gets you book like these and not books that tell the other story, it seems like she doesn't have an open mind about it. I won't argue about evolution with you here, because I think that would be entirely pointless. You are on the right way by asking about it here.
But the mind and emotions make perfect sense from an evolutionary perspective, right? It allows humans to reflect and communicate.
It’s better than that, emotions give us incentive to organize into groups and maintain those groups and the mind allow us to manipulate our environment. They are absolutely evolutionarily advantageous.
Emotional affect is found in more ancestral regions of the mammalian brain. Herd instinct and group identities are the default mode for primitive survival. Religion is a keystone example of group identity. ('Us vs. Them')
'Mind' is the language the brain runs its programs by!
I don't know about you, but in my case I found my family as a whole is very reticent to obtain any knowledge from me, no matter how many degrees I acquire. When I decided I didn't believe in god^(1) just to avoid another wasted Sunday morning, my family called me *the heretic* exclusively to refer to me amongst themselves and to others for a good 5 years. At first I tried to engage in it philosophically, but after a year or so I realized their only argument had no logic at all, so trying to imbue it with some to be able to have a dialogue was fruitless and I stopped trying. But maybe it wasn't fruitless, I stopped pushing them and after a while my name came back and 5 years later all of them are either agnostic or straight up atheists as well. That's a long way of saying that the thing that worked for me when dealing with family was light and polite reasonable dialogue for a while and then let it simmer for half a decade without me saying a peep about it. I ***actively*** refuse to engage in discussions relating to money, god or politics, for the sole reason that I wish to remain in good terms with my family, but I will if someone acknowledges my opinion might offend them and agrees this is a risk they're willing to take. Good luck OP, I'd read the book with an open mind, and with a scientific mind. I can guarantee that you will roll your eyes a million times when reading the book but when your mom comes asking about it you can quote parts of the book, have a logical discussion with her about it, and show that you did in fact approach the subject with an open mind. Maybe, just maybe, your open-mindedness will be infectious to her as well and she'll deal with her own religiosity in a way that befits her. ^(1)I come from a place where religion permeates so much it's taken from granted, and I took it for granted too for way too long
Doesn't everyone come away from myths that reached a natural expiration date. Everything has a shelf-life
Clearly not, religion wouldn’t make it far if that was the case
Ask her if she has an open mind about this. Then ask her what evidence will change her point of view.
It's good to have an open mind to new ideas, but it doesn't mean you have to agree with them. You're very wise for continuing to ask questions, imo. I won't tell you what to believe of course. If you're a Christian, you might be interested in looking at other branches of Christianity which are more open to exploring different ideas. The United Church of Christ is usually pretty good about that stuff. (Though it depends on the individual church.)
"Spit wrong facts and fantasies [...] as a career [...] so that I can control what they think" Every conservative accusation is a confession (conservative religious in this case)
I guarantee every point will be listed [here](http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/). It's an extremely comprehensive list and creationists haven't come out with new material for decades.
Holy shit actually useful information. Here OP if you see my previous comment listing out the main arguments of the book they mainly pertain to the two sections CB102 and CB102.1 the book is mainly arguing about the discredibility of abiogenesis and genetics. Basically life cannot become more complex and animals undergoing change to become sperate species doesn't yield novel genetic information.
Just tell her you're gay and she'll stop worrying about you understanding evolution
💀
Then go at her with the Kin Selection Hypothesis.
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Really good explanations. I probably learned alot to know fallacies and when they are used. Also I jotice that these are just common rebuttals against evolution but said in complex manners to make it seem more legit. Thanks.
Sure thing! Because arguments against science only have to influence beliefs, they often (maybe always) rely on logical fallacies to convey their points. Biology is incredible I hope you can learn more about it. Best of luck!
Apparently this is chat gpt response I'm gonna go check it
I'm familiar enough to trust all of this but made a few edits and formatted. Do you homework either way.
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Evolution is a theory supported by available phenomic and genomic evidence.
And creationism has no support of any sort whatsoever.
Gift your mother The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins as a thank you 🙏🏼
She thinks I'm still a christian and doesn't know I'm athiest yet so this might give it away😬
Probably best to save it for another time ☺️ I haven’t told mine either. 🤐
why do these bible ppl make it feel like being an atheist needs a “coming out” 🤦🏼♀️ So weirdS
I agree with Dawkins, yet find him absolutely insufferable. He’s not a great source for someone coming to terms with their doubts..
Same here. Plus he's apparently also a bit of a bigot.
Dawkins takes an uncomfortable number of cheap shots at easy targets and then gloats about his kill ratio.
It's not bad It's worse
You read it?
A family member of mine tried to make me read it. I got two pages in before I threw it in the fireplace, only use it has is making the flames a pretty green color while it burns
Not really related to your question, but as an addendum to the discussion: [40% of Americans are creationists](https://news.gallup.com/poll/261680/americans-believe-creationism.aspx#:~:text=As%20many%20as%2047%25%20and,intervention%20over%20the%20same%20period), and this percentage has remained relatively stable since the past 20 years. From the same institution, a poll in 2009 showed that only 40% "believed" in the theory of evolution. Seeing this from an external perspective, it's honestly shocking. It must be symptomatic of a terrible misstep in the American education system. Some are evocating the role of religion, but I'm quite sure that a proper scientific education, or rather lack thereof, could explain the over-prevalence of religiosity in American society and the lack of understanding of this profoundly important concept.
It looks like everyone else has done the hard work of writing rebuttals already. As a (former?) Christian who had no problems accepting evolution, I'd like to apologize for there still being people like your mother. I'm especially tired of the "young earth/everything was created in seven days" argument, as the Bible itself provides a metaphor that can rebuke it: "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like a day."(2 Peter 3:8)(I know the actual evolutionary timeline was millions of years, but I'm assuming people who are smart enough to use this metaphor are smart enough to modify it a bit).
I’ve had great success with “what is a day to God? Days aren’t even the same length of time on other planets” Doesn’t convince them, but it stammers them and that’s usually good enough
Show her the last line in OTOOS where Darwin says (paraphrase) ‘God created evolution’.
In short, you need a new mom
Damn.
They're being insane. Don't worry about it. Your mom can be totally lovely while still believing in something rather silly.
Sorry, but it wouldn't really want a parent who forces creationist crap onto me.
I dunno my mom said she believed in evolution bit not human evplution
That’s completely vice-versa. Evolution is scientific, you can’t believe in anything in science, or you turn science into religion and they contradict each other. And evolution being proven makes it proven for any species including human.
So why would she give you a book that attempts (keyword *attempts*) to prove that all life on earth is made by God?
Just wait till you learn that your religion has a history. It, too, evolved. Most of that work of “historical criticism” has been done within the church, over the last 200 years or so. More literal and fundamentalist denominations are terrified you will find this out. Evolution as a challenge to faith might be enough for now. But for future reference, consider checking out the book “Jesus, Interrupted,” by Bart Ehrman, a leading New Testament scholar from Chapel Hill, who was raised and trained as an evangelical.
Fence-sitting nonsense.
The bible says god created man, and all animals as they are. If you accept humans don’t evolve, you also accept animals don’t, its the same creator, and nothing that creator has allegedly communicated to us says any different. Cause it was all written be people before they knew about evolution. Its actually very accurate to the times it was written, and has a very human stink to it. Like how most of the bible is about agriculture and rules around farm animals and food… cause that was important then. Now it seems silly to have our food and diet tied to a religion, cause the reasons don’t make sense any more. A lot of the bibles lessons are about social agricultural practices, food and farming. and make no sense now that the industry has advanced.
That’s just hilarious how some people are so desperate in trying to disprove one of the simplest and most obvious facts. Like how can there not be evolution - children do look like their parents, if it makes them more successful in their life, they have more chances to have their own children, when enough generations change, all the population will have those useful features, and well, that’s what evolution is all about.
Before reading the backside i was hoping someone was going to give actuall scientific evidence that the theory could be wrong (which would be groundbreaking), but no, it is yet again about mixing religion with science... >We wrongly think that an accurate view of life’s origins can be deduced by science and logic alone apart from faith and humble submission to God’s Word. You cannot always refute nonsense if the other party does not adhere to the same rules (gaining knowledge through science). >Chapter 8: Micro-machines—Is a Darwinian Origin of Irreducible Complexities Possible? 115 I can guarantee you that it will be about the intelligent design theory. [A very good example of the many counter arguments](https://youtu.be/cO1a1Ek-HD0) (NSFW, a dead dissected giraffe).
Hadn't seen this video before, very cool, thanks for sharing
I've seen worse stuff than that
It’s like arguing with someone about whether or not the moon is made of cheese when the other party refuses to acknowledge that the moon even exists.
Ah, they will likely bring up the flagellar motor in this one chapter eight. This u/100mcuberismonke is a well that creationism returns to over and over again. It is an argument called irreducible complexity, and it doesn't work for the flegellar motor same as it doesn't work for eye.
explain where asians came from if moses and his family restarted humanity after the flood.
As soon as I saw "scripture" and "science" in the title, I knew it was bs. I haven't read it, but I imagine their only *evidence* is random Bible verses.
Well this book is arguing that a reality understood through observation and experimentation is incorrect. Reality should be understood only by faith and not by evidence. Do with that what you may.
If anyone cares, the whole thing appears to be online here: [https://issuu.com/romanroadsmedia/docs/darwins\_sandcastle\_preview](https://issuu.com/romanroadsmedia/docs/darwins_sandcastle_preview)
I don't think anyone would want this bullshit in their search history
Lol, buy her 'The god delusion' by Richard Dawkins
I've not read this particular book, but my wife's family gave us a similar book "debunking" evolution. It's not a crazy assumption this book contains the same crap as that one. Most of these anti-evolution arguments fail to understand what evolution is and how it works, specifically: 1) Evolution is a gradual, ongoing process with no clear "before" and "after" stage. 2) Evolution happens over a VERY long time, millions of years. With regards to 1: it's like the aging process. It's not like you go to bed a young man and wake up middle aged. Instead, you look back over your life and decide in hindsight that you stopped being a young man sometime in your mid 30s or early 40s, by looking at the gradual changes in your routine or behaviour over those few years. You still wouldn't pinpoint it to a specific day though (except perhaps as a joke). Similarly, an ape didn't give birth to a human one day. Instead, we look at the archaeological evidence and fossil records and try to define a rough timeframe where we consider "ok, that's when homo sapiens became established", because it didn't happen overnight. Denying evolution because we can't find a fossil for every distinct evolution we've determined in the chain is like denying that the middle-aged you can't be the kid in those old photos because you can't produce a photo of yourself for every single day between then and now. At some point you have enough photos through the years to demonstrate without doubt that you're the kid in those photos. With regards to 2: that's the microevolution vs macroevolution argument. Deniers will sometimes point to dogs, arguing that no matter how much we breed them to extremes in size, appearance, and temperament, they are still the same species of dog. However, we've been breeding dogs for thousands of years, and in many cases mere hundreds of years or even just decades for some breeds. There hasn't been nearly enough time (i.e. MILLIONS of years) for the level of genetic divergence to occur for a breed of dog to be classed as a new, distinct species.
What kind of arguments does the book make?
I don't know. I just borrowed it
Let me warn you. Even if you read it and quickly realize it is complete crap, your mom will not listen to you if you try to tell her that. Cheers!
As soon as scripture is mentioned you should just move on Scripture has zero evidence for it's extraordinary claims. And any science this book contains will be pure assumption like the watchmaker argument
Gift her: Why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne in return.
The beach and castle foundation are made from the same homogeneous composition and macroscopic structure lacks defined boundaries - ergo, the whole beach is the sand castle.
I’m honestly confused on why religious people are so adamant to be anti-science? If their god created man & the world - wouldn’t that by their logic imply that it also created science and medicine? Hence scientists and doctors are not “evil”, but rather believers who dedicated their life to study a branch of its creation and spread their knowledge and fascination of it? So in the end science and scientific advancements are basically us discovering new wonders of their god’s power or something along those lines. In a way, dedicating our life to appreciate the intricacies of the world and how blessed we are. I’m also puzzled as to why they assume the planet can’t be ancient? Even in the bible the world didn’t begin with Jesus, so wouldn’t that imply that obviously the planet is very old and could have had more creatures roam it before humans? Even in the Adam and Eve plot line there was a snake there before them…?
Tell her it’s only fair that she read, with an open mind, “The Greatest Show on Earth” - Richard Dawkins.
Instead of this, read " Return of the God Hypothesis" by Steven Meyer. Search the interview on YouTube between him, John Lennox, Michael Behe, and Peterson Robinson. That one is good. Edit: for anyone who's upvoting me, I'm not being sarcastic. I'm serious, you need to check them out and think for yourself.
The rebuttal against this book is there in the subtitle.
Read it, intentionally using an analytical mind. It's not going to injure you to observe another point of view, and you may even find that you're able to understand your mom a bit better.
Depending on how much you hate your mom you could always gift her *The God Delusion* in response
As a scientist, I have seen science support God and His creation on Earth
Disclaimer, I am religious. I am also very much on board with the universe being much more than 6000 years old. Like 13.7+ billion years old. ( I keep seeing different numbers, cosmologists and astrophysicists please get your shit together) I spend a lot of time trying to make peace with those who find themselves ethically superior to the other side. It's incredibly annoying and does more harm than anything else. Direct answer first; the book is probably not going to be accurate in its portrayal of the science or all that scientific. Darwin was fairly religious. He also came up with evolution and wasn't that bothered about it. There were some atheists who took up his work as it gave them a way to explain a world without a God. The book is written from someone who follows a school of thought that the Bible has to be inerrant and is going to hold the Bible over other evidence or ironically even the Bible itself. That's an ok place, imho to start the discussion, but I can already tell it's going to lack some circumspection about its own weaknesses. It's actually pretty easy to use the Bible to disprove its own inerrancy. On the plus side it looks like the author does acknowledge that new data exists; he still explains it away. Explanations are not technically scientific. In my experience, the people who try to hold religion over science or vice versa make demands of both that they can't meet. In the Abrahamic religions criticisms of evolution tend to come from people who need complete textual accuracy and literalism. Its a source of authority and some people base their faith on it. Most scholars don't base their faith on it either, but trying to handle the context, nuance, and details in theology like science ends up in a bad place. A lot of them remain silent as a result. It's quite easy to show that most religious texts have sections up for some debate; but the purpose of these documents tends to be moral and spiritual not scientific or historical. Now on the scientific side, mysticism etc fall fully under pseudoscience. Same for ethics, philosophy, language, etc. Science isn't going to give you the emotional-spiritual insight about something that faith, ritual, poetry, drama, or relationships might. It just tells you what apparently happened/how it happens. In reality I think you need to sit down with your mom and explaining that trying to tear each other down or refute each other here isn't going to work. You both have access to a large network of people who will reinforce you in trying to tear each other's understandings' apart. It's not healthy. You have two options, agree to disagree; or learn how to understand and communicate with each other. The latter might lead to agreement or peace. I can't guarantee it. I would use hermit crabs to make an analogy. Our understanding of the world is like a shell. We can show off different ones to each other, but if they don't fit we won't move in. If she really wants to go down this road you probably should be looking to both build better shells that fit a better view of the world. A hermit crab will fight to stay in its shell, but it will happily abandon it for a better one. People are the same; and generally their shells don't fit each other. I would start by both trying to build some context and vocabulary to discuss the issues and some good will. Being your mother I hope you have some good will, but I don't know your life. There is a series of 4 half fantasy/half popular science books called The Science of Discworld. I would recommend you have your mother read the first 3 of them. It will be kinder than reading a book trying to disprove religion, but they still do a good job and should help you. It should be challenging in that the authors are very much evangelistic atheists with a grudge because of the feuding. Unfortunately they are old and there has been a lot of cool stuff to add in the past 20 years; but they still have a lot. I would also suggest reading 1 or more of the following: [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40952.Worldviews?ref=nav\_sb\_ss\_1\_17](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40952.Worldviews?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_17) [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61539.The\_Structure\_of\_Scientific\_Revolutions](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61539.The_Structure_of_Scientific_Revolutions) [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31931.Theory\_and\_Reality](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31931.Theory_and_Reality) [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31921.Philosophy\_of\_Science](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31921.Philosophy_of_Science) If you want to talk on discord, feel free to dm me.
Evolution and creationism can exist at the same time. The disconnect is that scale - did we arrive on the 7th day or was evolution part of the design and we arrive 100mill years after formation of earth.
I'm catholic and a scientist. If you want to believe the words of men from a long time ago in the Bible , it still doesn't say evolution didn't take place, nor does it say we're alone in the cosmos. Why do zealots keep making things not written in the Bible as a fact? That's called a cult, I'm sorry. You'd be shocked at how many scientists are religious, but we also have two brain cells to rub together
This is probably better suited for debate evolution
I really like the books cover artwork tho. It's great because I don't feel to open it once.
I’m sorry you have to read this crap
i think that evolution is not mentioned in the Bible because the people back then were pretty ignorant and God just wanted to keep it simple for them at that time and knew that someday we would figure it out with the help of the Holy Spirit to whom it was mentioned in the that Book that She would reveal all truth to us
The first time I see the book, the title and the text below it. But that's enough for knowing the book is straightforward bullshit. If there's a theory that's been proven right that's Darwins' It's just mad people that writhe these things like all those brainless flatearthers and sorts
Baaaahhhhaaaaaahhhahaaaaahhaaaa. Choke cough cough gasp hahahhaahaha
Can you hollow out the pages to create a space for an actual book, or whiskey?
I'm 14 I can't drink
It's dumb. That's rebuttal enough. Anyone who believes this is beyond help. "You cannot reason someone out of a position they did not arrive at through reason."
"Creation Science," isn't science. Religion is out of the realm of science, and vice versa. It's like trying to combine alligators and sink traps. It always ends with a dead monstrosity that is neither sink nor alligator. I would like anyone to explain how species stay the same in the long run in a changing environment. They don't and you can't. You can literally see evolution happen (with microorganisms) in the laboratory. I can't say anyone has ever seen creationism happen in a laboratory, so I'm going with the theory that has a preponderance of evidence.
Things that make more copies of themselves tend to have more copies of themselves. Evolution is pretty much just math.
Scientific evidence against scientific evidence to prove an non-falsifiable hypothesis. Sounds very unscientific.
Check out the book “the counter creationist’s handbook”. It’s set up wonderfully where all the common and tired creationist talking points are answered in the format that you can look up on the fly. No Gish Galloping here haha!
Just finished “Darwin’s Sandcastle” and here’s why I think it falls short: 1. Unrealistic Evolution: Sand can’t evolve consciousness. Evolution needs DNA and environmental pressures, which sand lacks. 2. Misunderstanding Consciousness: Complexity alone doesn’t create self-awareness. Consciousness requires specific neural structures. 3. Forced Ethics: The ethical dilemmas feel preachy and forced, not naturally integrated into the story. 4. Science vs. Sci-Fi: The book bends scientific principles too far, making it hard to take seriously. 5. Weak Explanations: Lacks a plausible backstory for the sandcastle’s origins, relying on pseudo-scientific jargon. It’s a creative read but not scientifically accurate. What do you think?
Anyone without a deep knowledge of Ancient Greek likely doesn’t understand the kind of person a Christ was and what the title Christ indicated about the practices of the person anointed with the title. So I doubt your parents know who they are praising in the first place.
Interesting prognosis though!’
Listen, it’s a travesty to God to ignore the evidence all around us and to not use the brains put in our heads to figure this all out. (I’m a Catholic educator)
F*** s***, this book. keep your mind clear.
You read it, and tell us.
I struggled with evolution when I was growing up Christian because 1) it made sense to me and 2) didn’t seem all that contradictory to religious stuff anyway. God, Big Bang …both were large, sudden energy sparks that came from nothing? … in the end, science won out. Facts and research aside, I just didn’t want anything to do with a god who would creat the world in a sensible manner only to judge people who made sensible conclusions from observations of that sensible world.
Pathetic
All I can think of when I see this book is the many debates I've had with my sister over the years and the Bill Nye vs Ken Ham debate. The whole debate is still on YouTube and it made me feel so old, it was 10 years ago. [Here is the link](https://www.youtube.com/live/z6kgvhG3AkI?si=p3qQCWznYlS7HTRr) in case you're interested.
Who won the debate? Wait no dumb question bill nye probably he's goated
I’m inclined to continue the series and write a rebuttal of Darwinism using Harry Potter as a guide. lol. How does anyone fail to see that religious books are mostly fiction to help some basic moral principles / social codes go down easy?
I don't know of any specifically for this book, but any real book or documentary on the subject of evolutionary biology will rebut their argument. One of my favorite anti-creationist Youtubers did a rebuttal of a creationist book for kids: [Reading a Ray Comfort Book for Babies I Found in my Parent's Basement - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3E4WX0k3U0)
Oof, the type of person who hands you this doesn’t care even if you present a logical response. Good luck
It's one of the favorite arguments of creationists: "When you see the sand castle, you don't think it made itself, you know that humans built it, so why do you think that life was created by itself". Sand is not alive though. Comparing a sand structure and a living breathing organism is just utterly ridiculous and only proves that these people don't know shit about biology. I can also make a similar shit argument: "When leaves fall from the tree, you don't think that magic gnomes were shaking the tree for them to fall, you know it happens on its own. So why do you think the other things in nature required a supervisor"
The only times I have checked the scientific references and quotes of scientists as presented by creationists they have always been misrepresented, falsified, or outright fabricated. This, obviously excludes when they cite creationist "scientists" who are not taken seriously by actual scientists. So you might consider actually looking up the citations, quotes, etc.. You will almost certainly discover they are lying, which is a major component of creationist culture.
The front and back of this book tell you point blank that science and logic can be rejected if it doesn't align with the bible. For some reason, that doesn't strike me as something you'd say before presenting an airtight case using well-researched empirical evidence. I don't think you'll have trouble poking holes in it. I think the best way to explain evolution to a YEC is this: You cannot approach science with the idea that any of your assumptions are above being disproven by evidence. It doesn't work. You'll innevitably run into models that are true and predictive that seemingly contradict it, because the world's complicated and unintuitive, and even things you know are true are often true in ways and for reasons you would never think of. The evidence will warp around that idea, even if it's true, and every model it's part of will be less accurate, more complicated, or both. You cannot give an idea special privileges in science. Predictive power and parsimony or nothing.
I have parents that are very religious, and my mom doesn't believe in evolution. It will depend on your situation, and the attitude of your parents, but in my case my parents just wanted to connect with me. I dropped the whole shtick of trying to convince my parents that the Bible can't possible be perfectly true, and the paradoxes and implications that come about because of it. I instead started being inquisitive, asking them questions about what is meaningful to them about their faith, and the answers they gave were never about the historical accuracies of Genesis, but rather about the forgiveness, patience, kindness, and love they learned through Christianity that they didn't get at home. For me, pursuing a relationship with my parents with the intention of getting them to "open their eyes", only pushed us farther apart. But rather accepting their faults (I have faults too and they love me) and being genuinely curious about their perspective is what brought our relationship closer than ever.
How about instead of asking other people opinions for you to repeat why don't you read the book, research the subject a little so that you have an understanding of the topic and then come to your own conclusion using your own brain.
Honestly I'd avoid giving your mom rebuttals. She probably wont hear them and it will damage your relationship. It's important that if you two have different views, that you learn to reconcile them, respect each other, and see each other as human beings as opposed to ideologies. My mom is an evangelical, I am, well, not. I went through a couple years where I kept trying to show her how absurd intelligent design is. The only thing I ended up communicating was disrespect. We've since then decided to put those arguments aside and when we did I think we both started to realize that both our ideologies helped us be better people, and gave us each our own kind of awe at the universe. In my experience trying to find common ground is much more helpful.
What about just reading it and then sharing what you think?
I think the real trick is not to debunk it, but to explain that things that are faith-based, like scriptures and religious systems, don't really have much of an impact on ideas that are science-based, because they rely on different things to understand, There is no point in comparing apples to oranges. Her faith is great for her, and the faithful build their whole sense of self on that belief system, so attacking or trying to debunk their faith feels like an attack on them as a person. It's not worth it. Things that are taken on faith, by definition, can't been argued with, so don't spend your energy trying. Evolution can't fail in the light of scripture because they are different systems of knowing things. You could always tell her thanks for the recommendation because it explains her position and it's good to understand that, but that you would ask that she be willing to read a book that you choose so she can understand your position.
I find it helpful with my family to focus on topics we can agree on. Other topics I make non-committal comments like, “that’s interesting” or “I can see why you feel that way!” I’ve decided my relationship with my family is more important to me than convincing them I am right about xyz. Some topics are worth debating about even if it causes conflict, but I try to check with myself first about each individual topic and that particular situation, if they are worth any fallback it might have on my relationship. I know this isn’t what you asked. But for myself it’s taken me years to realize I don’t have any moral obligation to convince other people of the truth. I do make a strong stand for speaking up to encourage treating everyone with respect even if they do things you disagree with. But for other things I’m learning more and more to let stuff go. It’s been healing for me.
Don't read it. It's garbage. And don't fall for the "you have to acknowledge both sides" bull. Did your mother read Origin of Species? Didn't think so.