I have never heard an explanation for "who married Cain?" If there was only Adam and Eve and son's Cain and Able and Able was dead---Cain went out and found a wife? Where did his "wife" appear from--??? Unless this question is answered how can anyone believe 'the written word?
mearokus - 13 years ago
Point 1: Adam is clearly shown to be in the lineage of Christ in the Gospel geneology, so either the writer was mistaken or Adam was a real person.
Point 2: The Big Bang could be the mechanism that God used to create the universe. No contradiction there. However, I believe it FAR more plausible that everything came from something/someone than that it came from absolutely nothing. When you inevitably ask where God came from, I will take you directly back to this point: Either everything came from SOMETHING or it came from NOTHING. One has to be true and the other has to be false. Stop asking where God came from and give an answer as to the more plausible of the two opti0ns!
Point 3: Evolution and Creation can never come together on the most fundamental aspects -- unless one gives way to the other. Either there is design inherent in life and in the order of the cosmos or it was one gigantic, random cosmic accident. Evolutions steadfastly deny ANY design, except the supposed "design" of natural selection.
Point 4: If you are a Christian that believes in Evolution (upper case E), how do you explain the existence of a spirit which will one day be in eternity? Did it evolve via Natural Selection? How do you explain a supernatural thing via a purely natural process?
Point 5: The Bible's objective is not to give a scholarly, scientific explanation of how things came to be. How could it - it was written 2000-3000 years ago! How do you scientifically explain something that is applicable and understandable over that vast a period of time? If you choose not to believe in a Designer, go for it. Just explain to me how everything came from nothing.
Point 6: Just because Adam and Eve were the first created beings doesn't mean they were the ONLY created beings, does it? It also doesn't necessarily mean there were others and there's nothing in scripture to disprove either view. There's no sense in arguing this point!!
Poll set to private and the article edited to include that results are "under review" Gogo PZ
mojojojo - 13 years ago
"Results for this poll have been set to private." ? Embarassed that people didn't give the response you wanted?
forksmuggler - 13 years ago
Where are the results? What kind of poll is this? Wait, let me guess: the numbers didn't skew in the intended direction, and are now being censored. That about right?
MagpieJames - 13 years ago
Why can't we see the results of the poll? Was the truth of what people actually believe too emarassing?
Moebius - 13 years ago
@Walter: Wrong. As a Catholic, it was easy for me to conciliate Evolution with Adam & Eve. To put it simply, Adam and Eve were the first humans "with a soul". Their children also had souls, and so their children's children. Eventually, all mankind had a soul. So disproving Adam and Eve has absolutely no effect on a christian (well, at least a christian who could come up with this idea). Of course, illiterate christians who cannot come up with this will either a) Reject Evolution, or b) Reject christianity altogether.
That said, online polls are completely pointless when they're as simple as this. For a poll to be effective, you need to add more questions to see where your sample comes from: The US, and which state in the US, or other country? What is the religious affiliation? What is your education level? etc.
Then, with enough detail in the poll, we could have a more representative idea of who believes what, and if he is educated enough to understand science, Evolution and the Big Bang.
It makes me laugh seeing how gullible christians believe atheists are "out there to strip them of their faith with science". Science has NOTHING to do with faith. If Science makes you not believe, either your faith is wrong, or YOUR INTERPRETATION of the faith is wrong.
@pete: "Seems like there is no proof either way. So when that happens, one must call names and belittle the other side of the arguement."
Actually there's ample proof. There's just an amazing number of religious folks that bury their head in the sand when presented with it.
@pete: "Monkeys have a close dna, so there has to be evolution? The other side of that is wow, maybe they have the same creator."
False Dichotomy (look it up)
@pete: "Man has been around since the dinosaurs"
Err... No, they haven't.
@pete: "the bible mentions the dinosaurs"
Citation needed.
@pete: "fossils prove that man was around with them."
The few "examples" of this have been well and truly debunked as evidence.
@pete: "So, in conclusion, I believe my way, (doesn't hurt you)"
...just requires the effort to ignore the evidence.
@pete: "you believe your way (doesn't hurt me).
...despite being firmly based in reality.
@pete: "But seems like there is a creator since there is such a push to disprove HIM."
Non-Sequitur.
@pete: "So I will pray for all you who do not believe in God and His holy Word."
Please don't. What if the flavor of God that you're praying to is the wrong one? After all, there are thousands of flavors of Christianity and they can't all be right. Some of them have downright "evil bastard" interpretations of Him. What if they're right and you condemn me to hell (not that it's mentioned in the bible anywhere) because you prayed to the wrong one?
Praying for someone is evil.
moran b. eeghuzzar - 13 years ago
Adam and Eve were and are real. They run a sex toy shoppe around where I live...nice people!
Jamey - 13 years ago
THE BIG BANG: God spoke and BANG! ther it was.
Steve - 13 years ago
@Matheson http://youtu.be/VLUoRXrYhHc
pete - 13 years ago
Seems like there is no proof either way. So when that happens, one must call names and belittle the other side of the arguement. Monkeys have a close dna, so there has to be evolution? The other side of that is wow, maybe they have the same creator. Man has been around since the dinosaurs, the bible mentions the dinosaurs, fossils prove that man was around with them. So, in conclusion, I believe my way, (doesn't hurt you) you believe your way (doesn't hurt me). But seems like there is a creator since there is such a push to disprove HIM. So I will pray for all you who do not believe in God and His holy Word.
And the poll was mysteriously set to private. Got to wonder why :D
Walter - 13 years ago
To me the question should by “Why” are Some Evangelicals Beginning to Question the Existence of Adam and Eve?
Adam and Eve is the foundation of Christain belief. Of God’s just judgement and mercy. Eve said: “Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.” [Moses 5:11.]
So the question is “Why”. The answer is simple, if you destroy the foundation the rest will fall.
This is just another leftist attempt to destroy Christianity.
Jilly - 13 years ago
In the beginning God... I believe in the existence of God. Go ahead and spout scientific theories and postulates. I believe God spoke and it was... Period. Man was created in God's image as a moral being. He had the ability to choose right vs wrong. He choose to follow the will of man rather than the will of God. Thus we now find ourselves living in a world where amazingly enough, 87% choose to deny the existence of God.
I am thankful for the sacrifice of Jesus who died for the sins of this world (including the afore mentioned 87%). It's through His grace we have the hope of eternal life beyond this world.
I see the handiwork of God revealed in countless ways every day. It strengthens my faith. I also see the handiwork of man. It reinforces why I choose to believe in God.
adam - 13 years ago
The most reasonable choice still takes into consideration that a God does exist, just that it didn't have anything to do with Creation etc.
This poll is blatantly biased and therefore is not worth answering.
What a crock of shit.
Quincyme - 13 years ago
You do realise that a link has appeared on Pharyngula (sorry PZ). This means your cosy poll has been hijacked by us strident atheists. So, no, you are not like Sweden at all. Keep up the good work guys. Let's see if we can get it to 90%.
bones - 13 years ago
Wow, we are more like Sweden than I thought. Well that's a relief!
coralline - 13 years ago
Matheson,
You're either a liar or nearly functionally retarded. Not a single one of your points "setting me straight" does that. In fact, each makes you look as though you've done NO research on them, or at least have swallowed various creationism sites hook, line, and sinker. Cute bullshit about light's phase speed and group velocities, by the way. You're blathering about evanescent waves as though you understand them at all.
Bippy - 13 years ago
This poll seems fixed. Right now it only shows that about 83% of people acknowledge evolution, when about 99.6% of scientists acknowledge evolution. 83% is way too low.
My comment was apparently cut, so here's the rest of it.
"Where did the elements come from cause only a few off the periodic table are mentioned in the Big Bang?
If you need the elements to make the stars, but you need the stars to fuse the elements, then how does any of that work?"
You don't need "the elements" to make the stars, other than hydrogen and the occasional trace amount of helium. Now, the early universe after the Big Bang was hot enough for the abundance of subatomic particles to fuse and form the very simple atoms necessary for stars to form (1 proton and 1 electron to form hydrogen-1; add 1 neutron and you get deuterium; fuse 2 deuterium atoms and you get helium) and create all heavier elements by further nuclear fusion.
"They've found a fossilized Nike & a petrified cowboy. There are 19 foot stalactites in the basements of man-made buildings, not hundreds of years old. They found an entire mammoth frozen in ice & their estimates on the age of it's skin vs it's teeth were thousands of years apart."
Got any reference for any of this nonsense?
"Oh yeah! We've also proven that light can go faster than "light speed,""
That would be awesome, but experimental results are actually conflicting. So no, we haven't.
"C'mon people....according to the Bible the planet was under water approximately 4500 years ago. It's generally agreed in most scientific communities that the Sahara desert was under water about 4000-5000 years ago. Coincidence?"
That never happened. The Saharan climate simply shifted between wet and arid conditions in the past, and more than once, but it was never "under water." That aside, there is not enough water on the planet to flood its entire surface, and storing that amount of water underground or in the atmosphere, as the Bible suggests, is a physical impossibility. It just doesn't work.
"1. His original intentions are rather irrelevant. Even Darwin set out on his journey on the Beagle hoping to shed light on the alleged divine creation. Exploring the reality of facts changed that. Here is a little quote by Lemaître:
'As far as I see, such a theory remains entirely outside any metaphysical or religious question. It leaves the materialist free to deny any transcendental Being. He may keep, for the bottom of space-time, the same attitude of mind he has been able to adopt for events occurring in non-singular places in space-time. For the believer, it removes any attempt to familiarity with God, as were Laplace's chiquenaude or Jeans' finger. It is consonant with the wording of Isaiah speaking of the 'Hidden God' hidden even in the beginning of the universe ... Science has not to surrender in face of the Universe and when Pascal tries to infer the existence of God from the supposed infinitude of Nature, we may think that he is looking in the wrong direction.'
The fact that "verse" happens to have the meaning it does in modern English doesn't mean anything, since "universe" comes from the Latin "unus," meaning "one," and "versus," perfect passive participle of the verb "vertere," meaning "to turn." Put together it literally means "turned into one" and it could be interpreted as "the whole." Hence the modern notion of "everything that exists."
2. Quite the opposite. Considering the extremely small mass of the proposed singularity, so small as to make it a quantum event, and the fact that our universe is essentially a zero-energy environment, it turns out that creating a universe from nothing is a very economical process. Indeed, quantum fluctuations make "big bangs" quite inevitable events.
3. There is quite a lot wrong with this. One: the Big Bang was not an explosion, but an expansion of space itself. Two: the process of star formation was separated from the Big Bang itself by, at the very least, 150 million years (but potentially up to 1 billion years), most of it having seen nothing more than random interactions of subatomic particles first and simple atomic nuclei later. Such interactions were essentially random, due to the randomness of the density differences in the early universe. Three: the conservation of angular momentum doesn't actually require that all structures in the universe spin in the same direction, but merely that changes in spin intensity and direction be compensated by the other elements in a system.
4. I'm really not sure what your point is. Care to explain?
5. The evidence for the existence of the Oort Cloud is actually pretty convincing. That aside, the Kuiper belt is another reservoir of celestial bodies and it has been observed directly. Even that aside, you seem to be under the impression that all comets must have been flying around since the formation of the solar system. The very point of a reservoir is the notion that icy bodies become comets and begin losing their mass only when perturbed from their rest state by gravitational interactions. Bottom line, not all comets were "launched" at the same time.
6. Gravitational interactions (look up orbital resonance) with the other Jovian satellites have created strong enough tidal forces on Ganymede to heat its mantle and prevent its core from otherwise cooling.
7. Crab nebula? What the hell are you talking about? The Crab nebula is the remnant of a supernova event observed and recorded by Chinese and Arab astronomers in 1054 (given a distance of about 6500 light years from Earth, that gives an age of just over 8500 years). The fact that the supernova was observed by humans should already tell you that it cannot be the source of our sun. That aside, we've already established you don't quite understand the law of conservation of angular momentum.
"Where did the elements come from cause only a few off the periodic table are mentioned in the Big Bang?
If you need the elements to make the stars, but you need the stars
Matheson Kwik said, "I anxiously await anyone's response..."
Unless, of course, those responses point out how foolish your entire post really was. I love it when people who know nothing about science try to use it to support their religious beliefs. What's next? Jesus was an example of parthenogenesis?
GodsGodsGod - 13 years ago
Also, in case you're wondering, it's Gods all the way down.
Provit - 13 years ago
^ We're on a site where the most popular article is "did Barney Frank pass gas live on TV? You decide!" I'm not sure people are really up for you getting into this too seriously.
GodsGod - 13 years ago
@mikmik: So, where did God come from??
-----
That was me. My bad!
mikmik - 13 years ago
@Brian - 6 hours ago
@Ryan G: I commend you for your faith in the Big Bang and evolution... it takes more faith to believe that something came from nothing, than something to come from someone.
- - - -
No one said the universe came from nothing, every single scientist say "we don't know where it came from because the laws of physics break down /change and we can't predict or extrapolate to the very instant inflation started."
Brian, you believe something came from nothing - God. Maybe you want to explain where He came from???
If you say He is eternal and was always here without beginning, I can easily say that about the universe and the Big Bang was just a phase change of an eternal reality.
But, God, where did He come from? If you give any answer whatsoever, I want to hear a hypothesis from you, or you are just another hypocrite applying a double standard. If everything had to come from something, then where did God come from???
If God was always here without a beginning, then something can exist without a beginning, so why not our universe??
As a matter of fact, it is so far fetched that a god character would spontaneously exist that it makes the Big Bang look like a common occurrence, so much less complicated that idea is.
So, where did God come from?? If you claim that is beyond our understanding, then you must accept that where the universe came from "may" be beyond our understanding, or you would be in a hypocritical position again.
In fact, absolutely zero understanding or deeper knowledge has ever come from or been able to develop, from the idea of God, yet science is always learning and discovering more and learning which grows our knowledge.
@mathesonQ, you are essentially a liar because you obviously have made zero attempt at finding out if there is any basis to your claims, for you would immediately, with the tiniest bit of effort, discover things like that the Oort cloud has been seen, it has been detected other ways, it is a microscopic fraction of the distance we can see away from us. We can see millions of times farther at similar resolution. "It is to far away to see," LMAO!
olasonn - 13 years ago
Matheson Kwik is doing the standard Creationist routine, reading something from a Creationist website and automatically accepting it, since it fits with his faith. Writing confidently as if he knows what he's talking about, when everyone with even the slightest scientific knowledge can see he's clueless. Pouring out lots of points hoping one can't be refuted on the spot, so he can claim victory to his god by way of default.
Been there, done that, I'm ashamed to say.
God - 13 years ago
No, no.. they're right.. I didn't do that.
Will J - 13 years ago
The Big Bang theory, is the one of the most proven ideas that mankind has encountered, and does not require one to "believe" in it to be true. The idea of an intelligent designer comes from primitive man's inability to explain how nature worked, and the idea of a god or "God" made more sense for them at the time. It is my opinion, I find it absurd that so many people in our present society actually believe the Bible to be a work of the literal creator of the universe, and was obviously written by people; not any sort of supernatural being.
Addressing your points in order:
1. This doesn't actually back your point at all.
PS: Your lack of understanding of etymology does not equal "God"
2. The failure to explain its cause does not allow you to fill in the gaps with your fairy tales.
3. Your lack of understanding of physics does not equal "God"
4. Citation needed. Your made up "facts" do not equal "God"
5. Your lack of understanding of astronomy does not equal "God"
6. Citation needed.
7. Ref 5, 4 & 3
You have a long way to go. I would recommend starting with some rudimentary high school level science classes. I suspect someone will attempt to explain the answers to the questions you've asked, but I doubt you'll be able to understand them.
Chris - 13 years ago
Evolution is not something you have to believe in because it is FACT.
Kevin - 13 years ago
Matheson, evolution by natural selection has nothing to do with the big bang or the beginning of the universe. That was a sweet rant, but maybe next time you could lay out a well thought-out argument over the actual topic of the poll.
Brandon P - 13 years ago
not* accept it
Brandon P - 13 years ago
@Matheson
Those are some pretty idiotic comments you're throwing out there. Do you hold a degree in physics? Astronomy? Quantum Mechanics? If you do, you should publish a paper about your claims, I'm sure the scientific community would love to see the evidence you have to support your remarks. There's plenty of evidence to support the Big Bang model, and I know it's something that you can't understand, which is why you're attempting to refute it. Cosmic background radiation confirms that objects in space are moving away from one another, angular momentum doesn't apply since newtonian physics doesn't take into account general relativity, the overabundance of simplistic elements (hydrogen/helium) is described by the big bang's current model. Seriously, the evidence is there, you just chose to accept it.
Matheson Kwik - 13 years ago
Oh yeah! We've also proven that light can go faster than "light speed," I know it doesn't make any sense, it's like something that "super saturated," anyways...plus we know that gravity can effect light , cause if black holes.
So who knows how fast light travels thru deep space...maybe light-years aren't even light-years out there. They could be light-minutes, if there's no gravity to slow it down.
Don't just believe what they feed you in school. Even radiometric carbon dating doesn't work like they say. They've found a fossilized Nike & a petrified cowboy. There are 19 foot stalactites in the basements of man-made buildings, not hundreds of years old. They found an entire mammoth frozen in ice & their estimates on the age of it's skin vs it's teeth were thousands of years apart.
C'mon people....according to the Bible the planet was under water approximately 4500 years ago. It's generally agreed in most scientific communities that the Sahara desert was under water about 4000-5000 years ago. Coincidence?
Matheson Kwik - 13 years ago
Sorry Coralline, but I gotta' set you straight on a couple things. First of all. There is absolutely no proof or even evidence really that the big bang ever happened. None at all, whatsoever. Not even a shred. It's a purely theoretical theory. With some major holes.
1. Georges Lemaître, the original author of what we now call the "Big Bang theory" was a catholic monk attempting to explain how God could create the universe out of nothing. PS "uni-verse" means "single spoken sentence." A single sentence like idk..."Let there be light."
2. Even the Big Bang fails to explain what exactly causes the proposed singularity to suddenly explode & cause it's rapid expansion. It's widely agreed that a massive, almost infinite source of energy would be required to set that chain of events in motion. Like God big.
3. If the universe is debris from a single, ever expanding, spinning explosions, everything would be spinning the same way. That's called the "Law of the Conservation of Angular Momentum." Nobody can explain how we have planets, moons & galaxies that spin backward if they all came from a singularity.
4. We know that a star dies about every 30-40 earth years, but cannot count backward billions or even more than a couple thousand years worth of dead stars.
5. Comets only generally last about 10,000 years, but we still have comets & the only proposed explanation, is the Oort cloud, which is so far away we can never find any evidence it exists.
6. If moons like Ganymede were billions or even millions of years old, their liquid core would've solidified. & it would no longer have a magnetic field.
7. If stars were formed from crab nebula like it's proposed, an object like the sun, which has more than 90% of our solar systems mass would have to have a lot of our solar system's angular momentum also, but it only has 2%. So it's impossible for the sun to have come from crab nebula.
So...it the big bang is true then,
What made it go bang & why didn't the singularity just stay singular?
Why are pieces of a single "Big Bang" spinning in different directions? (not possible)
If a star dies every 30-40 years (they do) where are the billions of year's worth of dead stars?
If comets typically burn for about 10,000 years (they do) why aren't they all burnt out? (don't say the Oort cloud. Jan Oort just made that up from scratch. There has never been even the tiniest shred of empirical evidence to suggest the existence of such a thing & it's too far away to study. Comets themselves cannot be used as evidence for a theory that's supposed to explain where comets come from, in the first place. That's circular logic.)
How are liquid cores that are, allegedly billions of years old still spinning?
Why doesn't an object like the sun have more than 2% of the angular momentum in our solar system, when it has over 90% of the mass?
Where did the elements come from cause only a few off the periodic table are mentioned in the Big Bang?
If you need the elements to make the stars, but you need the stars to fuse the elements, then how does any of that work?
My answer is God made it this way so that the Big Bang theory and anyone who buys that crap, would look kinda' dumb.
I anxiously await anyone's response...
coralline - 13 years ago
Ryan G.
You're using "theory" as the general public uses it. That's fine, but "theory" in, say, "The theory of evolution" is a much, MUCH stronger word, describing a framework with real explanatory power and, in this case, a *fact*, too. In science, the phrase "just a theory" doesn't make any sense whatsoever. The Big Bang and evolution gave up being "guesses" long ago, but they are theories in the strongest, most scientific sense of the word.
Brian - 13 years ago
@Ryan G: I commend you for your faith in the Big Bang and evolution... it takes more faith to believe that something came from nothing, than something to come from someone.
@Kyle: is humanity absurd for believing in gravity? Is it backwards to believe in that concept since it was proposed greater than 25 years ago? Maybe it is getting a little outdated as well...
Kyle - 13 years ago
Totally absurd that this poll would show a majority supporting a literal interpretation of the bible. Its a significant reminder of how backwards the US is when it comes to things like this.
Ryan G - 13 years ago
I really never understood the big debate here. I believe in God and in the big bang and evolution. You can have you cake and eat it to. For people to pick and choose which science to believe in is ridiculous. The big bang and evolution stopped being theory long ago. Why is it so hard to believe that these are not gods work to?
I have never heard an explanation for "who married Cain?" If there was only Adam and Eve and son's Cain and Able and Able was dead---Cain went out and found a wife? Where did his "wife" appear from--??? Unless this question is answered how can anyone believe 'the written word?
Point 1: Adam is clearly shown to be in the lineage of Christ in the Gospel geneology, so either the writer was mistaken or Adam was a real person.
Point 2: The Big Bang could be the mechanism that God used to create the universe. No contradiction there. However, I believe it FAR more plausible that everything came from something/someone than that it came from absolutely nothing. When you inevitably ask where God came from, I will take you directly back to this point: Either everything came from SOMETHING or it came from NOTHING. One has to be true and the other has to be false. Stop asking where God came from and give an answer as to the more plausible of the two opti0ns!
Point 3: Evolution and Creation can never come together on the most fundamental aspects -- unless one gives way to the other. Either there is design inherent in life and in the order of the cosmos or it was one gigantic, random cosmic accident. Evolutions steadfastly deny ANY design, except the supposed "design" of natural selection.
Point 4: If you are a Christian that believes in Evolution (upper case E), how do you explain the existence of a spirit which will one day be in eternity? Did it evolve via Natural Selection? How do you explain a supernatural thing via a purely natural process?
Point 5: The Bible's objective is not to give a scholarly, scientific explanation of how things came to be. How could it - it was written 2000-3000 years ago! How do you scientifically explain something that is applicable and understandable over that vast a period of time? If you choose not to believe in a Designer, go for it. Just explain to me how everything came from nothing.
Point 6: Just because Adam and Eve were the first created beings doesn't mean they were the ONLY created beings, does it? It also doesn't necessarily mean there were others and there's nothing in scripture to disprove either view. There's no sense in arguing this point!!
Poll set to private and the article edited to include that results are "under review" Gogo PZ
"Results for this poll have been set to private." ? Embarassed that people didn't give the response you wanted?
Where are the results? What kind of poll is this? Wait, let me guess: the numbers didn't skew in the intended direction, and are now being censored. That about right?
Why can't we see the results of the poll? Was the truth of what people actually believe too emarassing?
@Walter: Wrong. As a Catholic, it was easy for me to conciliate Evolution with Adam & Eve. To put it simply, Adam and Eve were the first humans "with a soul". Their children also had souls, and so their children's children. Eventually, all mankind had a soul. So disproving Adam and Eve has absolutely no effect on a christian (well, at least a christian who could come up with this idea). Of course, illiterate christians who cannot come up with this will either a) Reject Evolution, or b) Reject christianity altogether.
That said, online polls are completely pointless when they're as simple as this. For a poll to be effective, you need to add more questions to see where your sample comes from: The US, and which state in the US, or other country? What is the religious affiliation? What is your education level? etc.
Then, with enough detail in the poll, we could have a more representative idea of who believes what, and if he is educated enough to understand science, Evolution and the Big Bang.
It makes me laugh seeing how gullible christians believe atheists are "out there to strip them of their faith with science". Science has NOTHING to do with faith. If Science makes you not believe, either your faith is wrong, or YOUR INTERPRETATION of the faith is wrong.
@pete: "Seems like there is no proof either way. So when that happens, one must call names and belittle the other side of the arguement."
Actually there's ample proof. There's just an amazing number of religious folks that bury their head in the sand when presented with it.
@pete: "Monkeys have a close dna, so there has to be evolution? The other side of that is wow, maybe they have the same creator."
False Dichotomy (look it up)
@pete: "Man has been around since the dinosaurs"
Err... No, they haven't.
@pete: "the bible mentions the dinosaurs"
Citation needed.
@pete: "fossils prove that man was around with them."
The few "examples" of this have been well and truly debunked as evidence.
@pete: "So, in conclusion, I believe my way, (doesn't hurt you)"
...just requires the effort to ignore the evidence.
@pete: "you believe your way (doesn't hurt me).
...despite being firmly based in reality.
@pete: "But seems like there is a creator since there is such a push to disprove HIM."
Non-Sequitur.
@pete: "So I will pray for all you who do not believe in God and His holy Word."
Please don't. What if the flavor of God that you're praying to is the wrong one? After all, there are thousands of flavors of Christianity and they can't all be right. Some of them have downright "evil bastard" interpretations of Him. What if they're right and you condemn me to hell (not that it's mentioned in the bible anywhere) because you prayed to the wrong one?
Praying for someone is evil.
Adam and Eve were and are real. They run a sex toy shoppe around where I live...nice people!
THE BIG BANG: God spoke and BANG! ther it was.
@Matheson http://youtu.be/VLUoRXrYhHc
Seems like there is no proof either way. So when that happens, one must call names and belittle the other side of the arguement. Monkeys have a close dna, so there has to be evolution? The other side of that is wow, maybe they have the same creator. Man has been around since the dinosaurs, the bible mentions the dinosaurs, fossils prove that man was around with them. So, in conclusion, I believe my way, (doesn't hurt you) you believe your way (doesn't hurt me). But seems like there is a creator since there is such a push to disprove HIM. So I will pray for all you who do not believe in God and His holy Word.
that is all...
And the poll was mysteriously set to private. Got to wonder why :D
To me the question should by “Why” are Some Evangelicals Beginning to Question the Existence of Adam and Eve?
Adam and Eve is the foundation of Christain belief. Of God’s just judgement and mercy. Eve said: “Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.” [Moses 5:11.]
So the question is “Why”. The answer is simple, if you destroy the foundation the rest will fall.
This is just another leftist attempt to destroy Christianity.
In the beginning God... I believe in the existence of God. Go ahead and spout scientific theories and postulates. I believe God spoke and it was... Period. Man was created in God's image as a moral being. He had the ability to choose right vs wrong. He choose to follow the will of man rather than the will of God. Thus we now find ourselves living in a world where amazingly enough, 87% choose to deny the existence of God.
I am thankful for the sacrifice of Jesus who died for the sins of this world (including the afore mentioned 87%). It's through His grace we have the hope of eternal life beyond this world.
I see the handiwork of God revealed in countless ways every day. It strengthens my faith. I also see the handiwork of man. It reinforces why I choose to believe in God.
The most reasonable choice still takes into consideration that a God does exist, just that it didn't have anything to do with Creation etc.
This poll is blatantly biased and therefore is not worth answering.
What a crock of shit.
You do realise that a link has appeared on Pharyngula (sorry PZ). This means your cosy poll has been hijacked by us strident atheists. So, no, you are not like Sweden at all. Keep up the good work guys. Let's see if we can get it to 90%.
Wow, we are more like Sweden than I thought. Well that's a relief!
Matheson,
You're either a liar or nearly functionally retarded. Not a single one of your points "setting me straight" does that. In fact, each makes you look as though you've done NO research on them, or at least have swallowed various creationism sites hook, line, and sinker. Cute bullshit about light's phase speed and group velocities, by the way. You're blathering about evanescent waves as though you understand them at all.
This poll seems fixed. Right now it only shows that about 83% of people acknowledge evolution, when about 99.6% of scientists acknowledge evolution. 83% is way too low.
@Matheson Kwik No evidence?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#Observational_evidence
I'm not even going to address all of the stupid that leaks from your post (I'm sure someone else here already did). Educate yourself.
My comment was apparently cut, so here's the rest of it.
"Where did the elements come from cause only a few off the periodic table are mentioned in the Big Bang?
If you need the elements to make the stars, but you need the stars to fuse the elements, then how does any of that work?"
You don't need "the elements" to make the stars, other than hydrogen and the occasional trace amount of helium. Now, the early universe after the Big Bang was hot enough for the abundance of subatomic particles to fuse and form the very simple atoms necessary for stars to form (1 proton and 1 electron to form hydrogen-1; add 1 neutron and you get deuterium; fuse 2 deuterium atoms and you get helium) and create all heavier elements by further nuclear fusion.
"They've found a fossilized Nike & a petrified cowboy. There are 19 foot stalactites in the basements of man-made buildings, not hundreds of years old. They found an entire mammoth frozen in ice & their estimates on the age of it's skin vs it's teeth were thousands of years apart."
Got any reference for any of this nonsense?
"Oh yeah! We've also proven that light can go faster than "light speed,""
That would be awesome, but experimental results are actually conflicting. So no, we haven't.
"C'mon people....according to the Bible the planet was under water approximately 4500 years ago. It's generally agreed in most scientific communities that the Sahara desert was under water about 4000-5000 years ago. Coincidence?"
That never happened. The Saharan climate simply shifted between wet and arid conditions in the past, and more than once, but it was never "under water." That aside, there is not enough water on the planet to flood its entire surface, and storing that amount of water underground or in the atmosphere, as the Bible suggests, is a physical impossibility. It just doesn't work.
"1. His original intentions are rather irrelevant. Even Darwin set out on his journey on the Beagle hoping to shed light on the alleged divine creation. Exploring the reality of facts changed that. Here is a little quote by Lemaître:
'As far as I see, such a theory remains entirely outside any metaphysical or religious question. It leaves the materialist free to deny any transcendental Being. He may keep, for the bottom of space-time, the same attitude of mind he has been able to adopt for events occurring in non-singular places in space-time. For the believer, it removes any attempt to familiarity with God, as were Laplace's chiquenaude or Jeans' finger. It is consonant with the wording of Isaiah speaking of the 'Hidden God' hidden even in the beginning of the universe ... Science has not to surrender in face of the Universe and when Pascal tries to infer the existence of God from the supposed infinitude of Nature, we may think that he is looking in the wrong direction.'
The fact that "verse" happens to have the meaning it does in modern English doesn't mean anything, since "universe" comes from the Latin "unus," meaning "one," and "versus," perfect passive participle of the verb "vertere," meaning "to turn." Put together it literally means "turned into one" and it could be interpreted as "the whole." Hence the modern notion of "everything that exists."
2. Quite the opposite. Considering the extremely small mass of the proposed singularity, so small as to make it a quantum event, and the fact that our universe is essentially a zero-energy environment, it turns out that creating a universe from nothing is a very economical process. Indeed, quantum fluctuations make "big bangs" quite inevitable events.
3. There is quite a lot wrong with this. One: the Big Bang was not an explosion, but an expansion of space itself. Two: the process of star formation was separated from the Big Bang itself by, at the very least, 150 million years (but potentially up to 1 billion years), most of it having seen nothing more than random interactions of subatomic particles first and simple atomic nuclei later. Such interactions were essentially random, due to the randomness of the density differences in the early universe. Three: the conservation of angular momentum doesn't actually require that all structures in the universe spin in the same direction, but merely that changes in spin intensity and direction be compensated by the other elements in a system.
4. I'm really not sure what your point is. Care to explain?
5. The evidence for the existence of the Oort Cloud is actually pretty convincing. That aside, the Kuiper belt is another reservoir of celestial bodies and it has been observed directly. Even that aside, you seem to be under the impression that all comets must have been flying around since the formation of the solar system. The very point of a reservoir is the notion that icy bodies become comets and begin losing their mass only when perturbed from their rest state by gravitational interactions. Bottom line, not all comets were "launched" at the same time.
6. Gravitational interactions (look up orbital resonance) with the other Jovian satellites have created strong enough tidal forces on Ganymede to heat its mantle and prevent its core from otherwise cooling.
7. Crab nebula? What the hell are you talking about? The Crab nebula is the remnant of a supernova event observed and recorded by Chinese and Arab astronomers in 1054 (given a distance of about 6500 light years from Earth, that gives an age of just over 8500 years). The fact that the supernova was observed by humans should already tell you that it cannot be the source of our sun. That aside, we've already established you don't quite understand the law of conservation of angular momentum.
"Where did the elements come from cause only a few off the periodic table are mentioned in the Big Bang?
If you need the elements to make the stars, but you need the stars
Matheson Kwik said, "I anxiously await anyone's response..."
Unless, of course, those responses point out how foolish your entire post really was. I love it when people who know nothing about science try to use it to support their religious beliefs. What's next? Jesus was an example of parthenogenesis?
Also, in case you're wondering, it's Gods all the way down.
^ We're on a site where the most popular article is "did Barney Frank pass gas live on TV? You decide!" I'm not sure people are really up for you getting into this too seriously.
@mikmik: So, where did God come from??
-----
That was me. My bad!
@Brian - 6 hours ago
@Ryan G: I commend you for your faith in the Big Bang and evolution... it takes more faith to believe that something came from nothing, than something to come from someone.
- - - -
No one said the universe came from nothing, every single scientist say "we don't know where it came from because the laws of physics break down /change and we can't predict or extrapolate to the very instant inflation started."
Brian, you believe something came from nothing - God. Maybe you want to explain where He came from???
If you say He is eternal and was always here without beginning, I can easily say that about the universe and the Big Bang was just a phase change of an eternal reality.
But, God, where did He come from? If you give any answer whatsoever, I want to hear a hypothesis from you, or you are just another hypocrite applying a double standard. If everything had to come from something, then where did God come from???
If God was always here without a beginning, then something can exist without a beginning, so why not our universe??
As a matter of fact, it is so far fetched that a god character would spontaneously exist that it makes the Big Bang look like a common occurrence, so much less complicated that idea is.
So, where did God come from?? If you claim that is beyond our understanding, then you must accept that where the universe came from "may" be beyond our understanding, or you would be in a hypocritical position again.
In fact, absolutely zero understanding or deeper knowledge has ever come from or been able to develop, from the idea of God, yet science is always learning and discovering more and learning which grows our knowledge.
@mathesonQ, you are essentially a liar because you obviously have made zero attempt at finding out if there is any basis to your claims, for you would immediately, with the tiniest bit of effort, discover things like that the Oort cloud has been seen, it has been detected other ways, it is a microscopic fraction of the distance we can see away from us. We can see millions of times farther at similar resolution. "It is to far away to see," LMAO!
Matheson Kwik is doing the standard Creationist routine, reading something from a Creationist website and automatically accepting it, since it fits with his faith. Writing confidently as if he knows what he's talking about, when everyone with even the slightest scientific knowledge can see he's clueless. Pouring out lots of points hoping one can't be refuted on the spot, so he can claim victory to his god by way of default.
Been there, done that, I'm ashamed to say.
No, no.. they're right.. I didn't do that.
The Big Bang theory, is the one of the most proven ideas that mankind has encountered, and does not require one to "believe" in it to be true. The idea of an intelligent designer comes from primitive man's inability to explain how nature worked, and the idea of a god or "God" made more sense for them at the time. It is my opinion, I find it absurd that so many people in our present society actually believe the Bible to be a work of the literal creator of the universe, and was obviously written by people; not any sort of supernatural being.
@Matheson Kwik;
Addressing your points in order:
1. This doesn't actually back your point at all.
PS: Your lack of understanding of etymology does not equal "God"
2. The failure to explain its cause does not allow you to fill in the gaps with your fairy tales.
3. Your lack of understanding of physics does not equal "God"
4. Citation needed. Your made up "facts" do not equal "God"
5. Your lack of understanding of astronomy does not equal "God"
6. Citation needed.
7. Ref 5, 4 & 3
You have a long way to go. I would recommend starting with some rudimentary high school level science classes. I suspect someone will attempt to explain the answers to the questions you've asked, but I doubt you'll be able to understand them.
Evolution is not something you have to believe in because it is FACT.
Matheson, evolution by natural selection has nothing to do with the big bang or the beginning of the universe. That was a sweet rant, but maybe next time you could lay out a well thought-out argument over the actual topic of the poll.
not* accept it
@Matheson
Those are some pretty idiotic comments you're throwing out there. Do you hold a degree in physics? Astronomy? Quantum Mechanics? If you do, you should publish a paper about your claims, I'm sure the scientific community would love to see the evidence you have to support your remarks. There's plenty of evidence to support the Big Bang model, and I know it's something that you can't understand, which is why you're attempting to refute it. Cosmic background radiation confirms that objects in space are moving away from one another, angular momentum doesn't apply since newtonian physics doesn't take into account general relativity, the overabundance of simplistic elements (hydrogen/helium) is described by the big bang's current model. Seriously, the evidence is there, you just chose to accept it.
Oh yeah! We've also proven that light can go faster than "light speed," I know it doesn't make any sense, it's like something that "super saturated," anyways...plus we know that gravity can effect light , cause if black holes.
So who knows how fast light travels thru deep space...maybe light-years aren't even light-years out there. They could be light-minutes, if there's no gravity to slow it down.
Don't just believe what they feed you in school. Even radiometric carbon dating doesn't work like they say. They've found a fossilized Nike & a petrified cowboy. There are 19 foot stalactites in the basements of man-made buildings, not hundreds of years old. They found an entire mammoth frozen in ice & their estimates on the age of it's skin vs it's teeth were thousands of years apart.
C'mon people....according to the Bible the planet was under water approximately 4500 years ago. It's generally agreed in most scientific communities that the Sahara desert was under water about 4000-5000 years ago. Coincidence?
Sorry Coralline, but I gotta' set you straight on a couple things. First of all. There is absolutely no proof or even evidence really that the big bang ever happened. None at all, whatsoever. Not even a shred. It's a purely theoretical theory. With some major holes.
1. Georges Lemaître, the original author of what we now call the "Big Bang theory" was a catholic monk attempting to explain how God could create the universe out of nothing. PS "uni-verse" means "single spoken sentence." A single sentence like idk..."Let there be light."
2. Even the Big Bang fails to explain what exactly causes the proposed singularity to suddenly explode & cause it's rapid expansion. It's widely agreed that a massive, almost infinite source of energy would be required to set that chain of events in motion. Like God big.
3. If the universe is debris from a single, ever expanding, spinning explosions, everything would be spinning the same way. That's called the "Law of the Conservation of Angular Momentum." Nobody can explain how we have planets, moons & galaxies that spin backward if they all came from a singularity.
4. We know that a star dies about every 30-40 earth years, but cannot count backward billions or even more than a couple thousand years worth of dead stars.
5. Comets only generally last about 10,000 years, but we still have comets & the only proposed explanation, is the Oort cloud, which is so far away we can never find any evidence it exists.
6. If moons like Ganymede were billions or even millions of years old, their liquid core would've solidified. & it would no longer have a magnetic field.
7. If stars were formed from crab nebula like it's proposed, an object like the sun, which has more than 90% of our solar systems mass would have to have a lot of our solar system's angular momentum also, but it only has 2%. So it's impossible for the sun to have come from crab nebula.
So...it the big bang is true then,
What made it go bang & why didn't the singularity just stay singular?
Why are pieces of a single "Big Bang" spinning in different directions? (not possible)
If a star dies every 30-40 years (they do) where are the billions of year's worth of dead stars?
If comets typically burn for about 10,000 years (they do) why aren't they all burnt out? (don't say the Oort cloud. Jan Oort just made that up from scratch. There has never been even the tiniest shred of empirical evidence to suggest the existence of such a thing & it's too far away to study. Comets themselves cannot be used as evidence for a theory that's supposed to explain where comets come from, in the first place. That's circular logic.)
How are liquid cores that are, allegedly billions of years old still spinning?
Why doesn't an object like the sun have more than 2% of the angular momentum in our solar system, when it has over 90% of the mass?
Where did the elements come from cause only a few off the periodic table are mentioned in the Big Bang?
If you need the elements to make the stars, but you need the stars to fuse the elements, then how does any of that work?
My answer is God made it this way so that the Big Bang theory and anyone who buys that crap, would look kinda' dumb.
I anxiously await anyone's response...
Ryan G.
You're using "theory" as the general public uses it. That's fine, but "theory" in, say, "The theory of evolution" is a much, MUCH stronger word, describing a framework with real explanatory power and, in this case, a *fact*, too. In science, the phrase "just a theory" doesn't make any sense whatsoever. The Big Bang and evolution gave up being "guesses" long ago, but they are theories in the strongest, most scientific sense of the word.
@Ryan G: I commend you for your faith in the Big Bang and evolution... it takes more faith to believe that something came from nothing, than something to come from someone.
@Kyle: is humanity absurd for believing in gravity? Is it backwards to believe in that concept since it was proposed greater than 25 years ago? Maybe it is getting a little outdated as well...
Totally absurd that this poll would show a majority supporting a literal interpretation of the bible. Its a significant reminder of how backwards the US is when it comes to things like this.
I really never understood the big debate here. I believe in God and in the big bang and evolution. You can have you cake and eat it to. For people to pick and choose which science to believe in is ridiculous. The big bang and evolution stopped being theory long ago. Why is it so hard to believe that these are not gods work to?