The old evolution debate

[Andara Bledin]

Religion is also the primary (and probably only) factor behind same-sex marriage bans.

Religion isn't the reason, it's the excuse. People are against them because they're xenophobic bigots. Most of them just use religion as a shield against being called on it.

^-.-^

[Ipecac Drano]

You didn't state anything that conflicts with what I said.

No? Let's see:

Unless they have one of those stupid door-to-door religions, no it doesn't.

Those "door-to-door" religions don't affect others as much as other religions do. Mormons and Jehovah Witnesses may interrupt your morning routine, but some of the Baptists are trying to upset school curricula and both they and the Catholics are putting limitations on what a woman can do with her body.

So, you said that only "door-to-door" religions affect others, and I said that other religions do. I would say there was a conflict.

Religion isn't the reason, it's the excuse. People are against them because they're xenophobic bigots. Most of them just use religion as a shield against being called on it.

In some cases, yes. But there are people who sincerely look down on homosexuality because they were taught it was against their god. Sure, some time back someone decided to push that part of Leviticus because they were homophobic, but there are those who were taught by them who will actually hate gays due to religious zealousy.

[Ipecac Drano]

[mikoyan29]

This morning on NPR, they were talking about a few evangelicals that were re-examining their views vis a vis Adam and Eve.

[Ghel]

Interesting. Which evangelicals and what were they saying?

[mikoyan29]

Interesting. Which evangelicals and what were they saying?

ONe of them was a geneticist and he said that the initial pool of "humans" was about 10,000. In order for us to have mutated in the time that is claimed by many evangelicals, we would already be mutating again. And of course, some of these guys are getting pretty poor treatment from the groups (kind of like Galileo).

[Ghel]

Does this NPR article describe the discussion you heard? It sounds the same.

The Christian belief that Jesus' sacrifice absolved humanity of Original Sin only makes sense if there was a literal Adam and Eve and that they ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. If the Genesis account is allegory or myth, then Jesus' death was meaningless. That's why evangelical and/or fundamentalist Christians are so opposed to evolution - it takes away the basis for their religion.

[mikoyan29]

Does this NPR article describe the discussion you heard? It sounds the same.

The Christian belief that Jesus' sacrifice absolved humanity of Original Sin only makes sense if there was a literal Adam and Eve and that they ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. If the Genesis account is allegory or myth, then Jesus' death was meaningless. That's why evangelical and/or fundamentalist Christians are so opposed to evolution - it takes away the basis for their religion.

That would be the one. For me, I'm more in line with the current Catholic view of things. We can not deny the existence of evolution but we can say that man didn't become man until he basically became self aware.

[Ghel]

Are you saying that you believe that evolution proceded on its course without divine intervention until, at some point, God stepped in and magicked self-awareness into two of the proto-humans and named them Adam and Eve?

[jackfaire]

God stepped in and magicked self-awareness into two of the proto-humans and named them Adam and Eve?

It sounds more like he is separating human the species and Man the culture.

Until a certain point we were simply another "dumb" animal living in nature then something happened and we put a piece of sharpened flint on a stick, lit a fire and started in small ways controlling more of nature than our cousins could.

[Gravekeeper]

Until a certain point we were simply another "dumb" animal living in nature then something happened and we put a piece of sharpened flint on a stick, lit a fire and started in small ways controlling more of nature than our cousins could.

Nothing happened save evolution. Which likely took thousands of years to get to that flint on a stick point. Two things we know made as smarter are socialization and sensory multitasking. Much of the evolution of our brains is tied directly to our emerging social behaviour. While we've recently proven ( by doing weird things to fish ) that sensory multitasking results in evolution and a divergence of species as well.

Also we farked everything and basically assimilated the other two competing humanoid species around at the time through hot, hot interspecies love. We weren't in any way special or chosen, we humped opposing species into genetic submission.

[jackfaire]

Nothing happened save evolution.

Which is exactly what I said. Unless you want to call us deciding one day to start using tools in a different way than other species something different.

I never said there was some magic moment but like anything we have done as a species there was a first time someone did it. There was a first time someone used something in a way that another species didn't think to do and that started to set us apart as we then did more of that.

Like the first time someone twigs a new slang word and soon lots of people are saying it until you get whole groups of people saying, "Man that was sick" and others going, "Uhm so it made you vomit?"

When I said cousins I didn't mean other humans I meant other animals. Based on Evolution we all came from the same soup so all living things are our cousins.

[Gravekeeper]

When I said cousins I didn't mean other humans I meant other animals. Based on Evolution we all came from the same soup so all living things are our cousins.

And then humped them into genetic submission~

[Andara Bledin]

And then humped them into genetic submission~

Pretty much this. Popular theory right now is that our particular branch wasn't as advanced; we merely reproduced faster and took out the competition by sheer weight of numbers.

And quantity over quality has ruled us since.

^-.-^

[mikoyan29]

It sounds more like he is separating human the species and Man the culture.

Until a certain point we were simply another "dumb" animal living in nature then something happened and we put a piece of sharpened flint on a stick, lit a fire and started in small ways controlling more of nature than our cousins could.

I think that is about right.