Need help in debating Creation with Science

[skahle]

Hi all. I am new to this forum. I need help debating the origins of the universe with a "scientist".

You can read this deabate on Facebook here: http://www.facebook.com/notes/lori-roll ... 2920210927

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Here are the last few posts on face book:

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Let's be fair here. The epistemology of theology is vastly different than the epistemology of science, and trying to evaluate the two in any fair measure is impossible.

I will say that the Pope, who last I c...hecked is the supreme Earthly authority on all thing Catholic, has stated that: 1) evolution is a fact, and 2) the big bang is a fact.

You may have your history (and interpretation of evolution) a bit wrong...

The big bang created the universe. It occurred (to our best estimates) about 13.7 billion years ago. The Earth formed about 4.6 bya, and life followed about 3-3.5 billion years ago. The big bang did not give rise to life, nor would any explosion.

Life likely began as simple polymers formed - perhaps as RNA or a simple polypeptides. Experiments have shown that simple biological macromolecules can form under reducing conditions, which corroborate our notion of what the early Earth was like.

Humans did not come from monkeys. Humans are anatomically and genetically a part of the great apes, which shared ancestry with other primates.

No matter, I am sure this is all coming back to you.

I am happy you have faith, and I would never want to mess with that, nor should any educator.See More
2 hours ago · LikeUnlike
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Lori Rollin
REDUCING conditions? I think I just had a seizure. You brought back WAYYY too much stuff that I had purposely forgotten. Haha. I've learned allllll of what you're saying, but after actually practicing medicine and seeing the things I've see...n....I just cannot (in my mind) rationalize RNA or simple polymers forming into the complex structure that is the human body, mind and functions. Maybe it was how I was raised (religious to an extent), maybe b/c my grandmother (a very staunch, stoic woman whom was quite cynical from my memory) had a near death experience some years before she passed (RIP Gram). I'll always be a student, learning new and wonderful things everyday, but something "otherwordly" tells me that everything is not always what it appears to be...and there are greater forces at work...some things that science cannot explain (try as the scientists might) and that only a higher power of some type could be the rationale.See More
2 hours ago · LikeUnlike
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Scott Kahle Where did the polymers come from?
about an hour ago · LikeUnlike
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Glenn Fox They formed via dehydration synthesis reactions between monomers.
27 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
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Scott Kahle and where did these monomers come from?
24 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
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Glenn Fox They form from basic molecules with energy in reducing conditions. The molecules form in reactions from elements. Elements came from the Big Bang.
6 minutes ago · LikeUnlike
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Scott Kahle Where do the basic molecules come from. What energy source caused the Big Bang? And why?
a few seconds ago · Like
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Glenn Fox
So, let me get this straight: Science can explain roughly 14 billion years of existence, and the fact that it cannot (at this very moment) give us every answer to an infinitely regressive series of questions, and you think that it is flawed...? I'd say we are just getting warmed up.

In the scientific epistemology, there is simply no better explanation. The popular competing alternate explanation invokes a supernatural being. Perhaps the Greek or Hindu gods did it. Or perhaps Allah. Or Yaweh. I am satisfied with the scientific explanation. It fits all of our observations of the world and is congruent with centuries of hypothesis testing. Like I said before, you cannot logically evaluate theology and science as there fundamental definitions of what knowledge is and how it is advanced differ. To put it another way, one of us just demonstrated '2+2=4,' the other just said 'potato.'See More
2 hours ago · Like

[MarcusOfLycia]

Science can't explain 14 billion years of existence. Science -can- provide us with information about the world around us which we can then interpret in myriad ways to figure out what might have happened in the past. I never noticed the fallacy before of personifying science as a man, but it really clicks now. Science can't say anything because its a method for finding information. The fact that -scientists- interpret the evidence differently (some Christian, some atheist, some Muslim, etc) shows us that it is the scientists themselves who decide what the science 'says'. Its the job of human interpretation.

Its interesting that he thinks that because existence since the big bang has some explanations, that it doesn't really matter where it started from. His 2+2 analogy is flawed. Maybe you'll find this one more accurate: One of us just demonstrated how to interact with a computer simulation, and the other one just said "who wrote the simulation and built the computer?", to which he gets the reply "it doesn't matter! I can explain the simulation!" Its actually interesting that he appeals to having knowledge at all. In a purely naturalistic universe, all he has are sophisticated arrangements of atoms in his head. Perhaps if he thought about the implications of naturalism and the meaningless of existence, he wouldn't feel the need to debate. After all, why not save the energy to do something that is more pleasurable than fighting with people. He's inadvertently appealing to a Christian idea of correcting error (at least in his mind) in order to have this debate.

He's wrong about theology and science having different definitions of knowledge. I wonder if he's studied scholasticism and the foundations that lead to the scientific revolution. It was theological in origin, design, implementation, and reasoning. Sounds like they both have similar definitions of knowledge to me. Perhaps your friend would be better served by actually investigating theology, or by at least admitting that a true scientist would admit we don't and never will have all the answers to the way the universe works. I've generally found in areas from science to religion that if somebody is confident that they're belief system explains everything and that they understand it fully (I get this idea from when he says 'there simply is no better explanation'. There's plenty of explanations), they either have very weak faith in it and are looking to reinforce it, or they aren't mature enough to warrant debate and discussion (both of these I know from past experience in my own self).

[rajanpunj]

i agree with marcus to a great extent, but scientists have even proven that 2+2 may or may not be equal to 4. well said about scientists who are collecting info and then using it. there is certainly a god in a form which is not known to us.

[jlay]

I see a lot of basic issues with this person's positon. Now we can try and address each one, and perhaps we should. More importantly is understaning why you need an apologetic, and what is your apologetic, and how to apply it in these situations. We recently had a thread on presuppositional apologetics. The normal tendency is to want to debate these individual issues without addressing the greater matter. Your friend has a faulty worldview. He summed it up in saying, "I am satisfied with the scientific explanation." Science doesn't explain why we have a universe, why we have laws of science to begin with, why laws of logic work, as Marcus already explained.
There is simply no reason to expect anything other than chaos from a meaningless bang. He tries to avoid the question he himself posits when he says the BB created everything. If the BB is the reason, then it only goes to ask what was before the big bang. What was the source of the bang. If the universe began, then what laws where in effect? If natural laws are due to the existence of our universe, then what was at work prior to its existence? He goes off on unreasonable supernatural explanations, and essentially mocks. However, anything before the laws of nature that created the conditions for the laws of nature would be what? Supernatural. A perfectly valid deduction. And now that we have natural laws, why should we rely on them as a means to understanding our universe?

The fact that he will say things like the pope says evolution is a fact, is good evidence of a faulty worldview. This is a faulty appeal. Opinion and polling does not determine truth or facts. He is appealing to the authority of the Pope, yet rejects the very religion that claims the Pope's authority is bestowed supernaturally. It's contradictory.

The big bang created the universe.

This is faulty. It shows a lack of understanding of the big bang. First, there is no testable or observable method to witness the creation of the universe. 2nd, the big bang didn't create the universe. If something banged, then something banged it. As he himself points out, If you've ever seen an explosion, the only thing they create is destruction of existing material. So, he completely ignores the existing material that banged.
It is also an example of reification. Assigning qualities to an event or concept as if it were a mind.

The big bang created the universe. It occurred (to our best estimates) about 13.7 billion years ago. The Earth formed about 4.6 bya, and life followed about 3-3.5 billion years ago. The big bang did not give rise to life, nor would any explosion.

All he has done here is regurgitated a time line with no evidence. It is simply arbitrary. It occured? Where. No universe equals no time, space or matter. When? 13.7 billion years ago. What about 13.7 billion years and one minute ago? Time is a product of existance. How did a nothing with no time, space or matter to create in, create everything? So what is nothing? No time, no material, no space. Thus, no laws of nature. NOTHING?

there is certainly a god in a form which is not known to us.

Raj, This is a self-defeating statement. There is CERTAINLY a god who is NOT KNOWN to us.
If you are certain, then how can you claim to not know? Contradictory. Of course if you also believe that 2+2 can be proven to not equal 4, then I guess you can believe anything.