At 04:52 PM 10/21/2000 +0800, you wrote:
>Reflectorites
>
>On Fri, 20 Oct 2000 14:13:45 -0500, Susan Cogan wrote:
>
>[...]
>
> >BV>. . . Stephen doesn't question anyone's motives, intelligence, honesty or
> >>sincerely. He does question people's philosophy.
>
>SB>Stephen is a religionist. He is usually only able to question things
> >that , in his perception, don't support his religion.
>
>This is self-evidently false, because as Susan herself has pointed out, there
>are those with the same Christian "religion" as me who accept evolution.
>Susan herself posted something from Cliff Hamrick an evolutionist and
>an anti-IDist, pointing out he was "a Christian:
Some Christians have no trouble weaving the details of the world into their
religion. Their god is merely larger than the world and science. Other
religionists are very threatened by those who examine the world in detail
and are afraid that something will be discovered (or has been discovered)
that will prove their religion to be untrue. I think you, and nearly all
creationists (and I believe that IDists are merely a subset of
creationists) are in the latter category.
SB>Agnostics question everything. Motives, intelligence, honest and
> >sincerity are not sacred cows, above or outside what can be >questioned.
>
>Susan better have a talk with Chris. He has just said he rejects Christianity
>and Creationism as not even "logically possible".
I have talked to him about his extensively. He means logically impossible
in the philosophical sense. I'm sure he'd be happy to write you a 3000 word
essay on the subject.
My rejection of deity is much more simple. You are an atheist in regards to
all the gods that humans have ever believed in except one. I don't make an
exception.
>That makes for him some form of evolution *un*-"question"-able!
>
>In fact forget about Chris. Susan says she "question[s] everything". Does
>she "question" the fact of evolution *itself* (as opposed to any particular
>version of it).
This is an interesting question and I've been thinking about it on the back
burner for several days.
A dictionary.com definition: "Dogma: a religious doctrine that is
proclaimed as true without proof ."
"Proof" is the important word. I would say "evidence." For evolution there
are tons--literally--of evidence. So saying "I believe evolution to be
true" isn't quite a dogmatic statement. I question details of it--I
*especially* question evolutionary psychology which I find to be pretty
thin as a discipline. But the central fact of evolution? No. As you pointed
out, I'm not a biologist or paleontologist, but I've seen a ton of evidence
myself. I've read a lot of papers and books. I've volunteered at the
natural history museum, I've looked at a lot of the evidence personally.
I've seen enough, I'm convinced. As convinced as I can be of anything.
As far as ID is concerned I've seen Johnson trying to do the lawyer thing
and try to come up with "reasonable doubt" about evolution and seen that
most of his "evidence" against it is lifted from old creationist arguments
that were proved false 20 years ago. I've seen Behe propose irreducibly
complex organisms and systems and seen them collapse one by one as
evolutionary pathways are discovered. I've seen Dembski propose a filter
that *might* produce false positives but he doesn't seem to be willing to
share his data with anyone (I and most people suspect there is none).
Oh, yeah, and I've seen a chemist make a bald, unsupported statement that
Darwinism is going down the tubes. Now *that's* convincing! :-)
Susan
--------
Always ask. Hang out with people who make you laugh. Love as many people as
you can. Read everything you can get your hands on. Take frequent naps.
Watch as little television as you can stand. Tell people what you want. Do
what you love as much as you can. Dance every day.
--------
Please visit my website:
http://www.telepath.com/susanb
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