Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Time For Class Proving Evolution

But again, this notion that belief in evolution (or in this case "secular humanism") equates to a religion is just nonsense. It's an attempt to completely change the terms of the debate by destroying any destinction between religious and non-religious behaviors.

School is a place for teaching facts, or at least our best current understanding of them. Some things- nutrition comes to mind- have changed dramatically, and what was taught as fact a few decades ago turned out to be wrong. The neat thing about science, as opposed to religion, is that the scientific process can admit it is wrong and move forward. Religion, being based on dogma, cannot, generally speaking.

Another problem with the inclusion of creation myths as fact in school curricula is which myths to teach! Shall it be decided by majority? By which religion is willing to be most violent about it? Proportionally? By committee? Shall we sacrifice goats and use their entrails to decide? Etc.

But returning to the notion that secular humanism is a religion. I'm no religiosity expert, Lord knows, but working off the top of my head here it seems that religions require a God or Gods, an entity to whom one pledges their soul, an entity that is seen as powerful beyond compare, wise beyond comprehension, and so on.

The notion that "science" (or Darwin!) is viewed as such an entity is absurd. Science seeks to understand things that are powerful beyond compare; science seeks to codify the sum of human wisdom. It does not embody those things.

In summary: calling evolution or secular humanism a religion is a weak play, intended to give the faithful a fallback position to retreat to when, in my opinion, they have lost the debate.

Jeff-O:


Very well put.

I fully believe the Creation account. I also happen to believe, with Biblical evidence, there was a long period of time (likley hundreds of millions of years) between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2.

To another point, man is fallible: God is not. God would not provide an account of His story, with flaws. Wherever they are presumed to be found, one must contemplate misunderstanding of scripture based on human failings, or that the real meaning or reconciliation will be revealed when we are face to face.

It would be if it were so, however his post is fully incorrect and begging the point.

Rick:


Your dealing with Faith vs Science (which also requires faith with evidence) The bible is a book of storys that have been handed down to teach man how to act with some morals, except when we want to over run another culture in the name of our god.

Tough sell with out blinders.

The smilarities are there, both require faith in absence of concrete proof.

I would say that since there are literally hundreds upon hundreds of creation scientists, and there are quite a few unexplainable holes in evolution theory, the debate is far from over.

What remains to be seen is whether the faithful of evolution theory will ever acknowledge it.

I hear what you are saying. It is a theory and the point is to continue to examine it. It is not a law, far from it. The Creation Story is just a story though.

Not necessarily. You are assuming that a Creator would be bound by the constraints of Physical Law that exist in our universe.

That might not be true.

SCOTUS disagrees...

Fellowship of Humanity v. County of Alameda. Check it out. One of their Holidays.... Darwin Day.

Secular Humanist themselves disagree, and do in fact consider themselves a religion. Any simplistic google search would reveal that....

Then any search on Darwin and Humanism would show that evolution is in fact boldy united as a foundational tenent of Humanism.

Fact. Evolution is the faith of Secular Humanism.

IMO, if evolution is taught, then so should Young Earth Creationism, Old Earth Creationism, and Intelligent Design. All of which are various interpretations of the SAME scientific data. All of which are based upon theories of faith.

Imagine, students with a well rounded education!!


Can't have that, when Utopian propoganda is so much more useful to the State.

That's where we disagree Jeff.
It is not a weak play.

Your unwillingness to concede that I'm allowed a belief that your version of science is a theory is the wholesale mentality as to how gov'ts gain control over the people. Look all through history, including the Church history where the authorities promulgate nothing that will permit thinking outside the system and, in fact, keep the people oppressed through ignorance by asserting a religion. In this case the religion is secular humanism...man is his own god.

If you want to treat secular humanism as FACT and teach it in school as such, then you are indeed practicing fascism, pure and simple, foisting your beliefs on unsuspecting children and forcing them to believe something in a manner that is by all accounts, extortion. If the students refuse to regurgitate the beliefs of the system, they are failed.

You want to call it a weak play because it's a strong play and the correct play.

Thank you, Sir!

Too easy!

HAJ: no. Evolution is not the faith of secular humanism.

Man, you guys see the world through colored glasses!

I guess I get it. In your religious belief system, there is that which is Godlike, or... pro-God. Then there's that which you perceive to be otherwise. In the black-and-white dichotomy of God v. Devil anything not Godlike is automatically assigned a corresponding, negative weight or value.

But HAJ, I say this with respect, but sir, this secular humanism = religion thing is one of he biggest crocks of [bleep] ever foisted upon believers. IT IS NOT A RELIGION. It is not remotely like a religion. It can only be seen as such if one's whole world revolves around this notion of God. Understand this: we don't believe in your God. Or any other God. We do not worship a God. We do not subscribe to a dogmatic belief system- which is a prerequisite for being religious in the sense you describe.

The lack of a religion is not a religion, and just because (I'm sorry) some cult thinks the world is out to get them, don't make it so.

School, public school, in a secular country, teaches the facts as we best understand them.

I have zero problem with teaching the various Creation Myths to kids in the schools- in a religious class, and with no preference given to the myths. Teach them all. They are all equally absurd, but, in that they are an interesting window into how the primitive mind saw the world, they are quite interesting and thought-provoking.

But they are absurd. A list of the various creation myths would demonstrate the utter fultility and blatant intellectual dishonesty in trying to teach ANY of them as "fact".

On the other hand, there's an overwhelming body of evidence that shows that every single one of those creation myths does not jibe with the geological and anthropological record. So, even though science can, will, and does make mistakes, it still provides us with the most cogent and well-vetted mechanism for interpreting the physical world around us.

Jeff, define religion as you understand it.

The existance or lack of existance of a diety has no part in defining a religion.

Here's one. I say we give this equal footing with, say, Christianity. And Darwin.

"Marduk Creates the World from the Spoils of Battle

����� In the beginning, neither heaven nor earth had names. Apsu, the god of fresh waters, and Tiamat, the goddess of the salt oceans, and Mummu, the god of the mist that rises from both of them, were still mingled as one. There were no mountans, there was no pasture land, and not even a reed-marsh could be found to break the surface of the waters.

����� It was then that Apsu and Tiamat parented two gods, and then two more who outgrew the first pair. These further parented gods, until Ea, who was the god of rivers and was Tiamat and Apsu's geat-grandson, was born. Ea was the cleverest of the gods, and with his magic Ea became the most powerful of the gods, ruling even his forebears.

����� Apsu and Tiamat's descendents became an unruly crowd. Eventually Apsu, in his frustration and inability to sleep with the clamor, went to Tiamat, and he proposed to her that he slay their noisy offspring. Tiamat was furious at his suggestion to kill their clan, but after leaving her Apsu resolved to proceed with his murderous plan. When the young gods heard of his plot against them, they were silent and fearful, but soon Ea was hatching a scheme. He cast a spell on Apsu, pulled Apsu's crown from his head, and slew him. Ea then built his palace on Apsu's waters, and it was there that, with the goddess Damkina, he fathered Marduk, the four-eared, four-eyed giant who was god of the rains and storms.

����� The other gods, however, went to Tiamat and complained of how Ea had slain her husband. Aroused, she collected an army of dragons and monsters, and at its head she placed the god Kingu, whom she gave magical powers as well. Even Ea was at a loss how to combat such a host, until he finally called on his son Marduk. Marduk gladly agreed to take on his father's battle, on the condition that he, Marduk, would rule the gods after achieving this victory. The other gods agreed, and at a banquet they gave him his royal robes and scepter.

����� Marduk armed himself with a bow and arrows, a club, and lightning, and he went in search of Tiamat's monstrous army. Rolling his thunder and storms in front him, he attacked, and Kingu's battle plan soon disintegrated. Tiamat was left alone to fight Marduk, and she howled as they closed for battle. They struggled as Marduk caught her in his nets. When she opened her mouth to devour him, he filled it with the evil wind that served him. She could not close her mouth with his gale blasting in it, and he shot an arrow down her throat. It split her heart, and she was slain.

����� After subduing the rest of her host, he took his club and split Tiamat's water-laden body in half like a clam shell. Half he put in the sky and made the heavens, and he posted guards there to make sure that Tiamat's salt waters could not escape. Across the heavens he made stations in the stars for the gods, and he made the moon and set it forth on its schedule across the heavens. From the other half of Tiamat's body he made the land, which he placed over Apsu's fresh waters, which now arise in wells and springs. From her eyes he made flow the Tigirs and Euphrates. Across this land he made the grains and herbs, the pastures and fields, the rains and the seeds, the cows and ewes, and the forests and the orchards.

����� Marduk set the vanquished gods who had supported Tiamat to a variety of tasks, including work in the fields and canals. Soon they complained of their work, however, and they rebeled by burning their spades and baskets. Marduk saw a solution to their labors, though, and proposed it to Ea. He had Kingu, Timat's general, brought forward from the ranks of the defeated gods, and Kingu was slain. With Kingu's blood, with clay from the earth, and with spittle from the other gods, Ea and the birth-goddess Nintu created humans. On them Ea imposed the labor previously assigned to the gods. Thus the humans were set to maintain the canals and boundary ditches, to hoe and to carry, to irrigate the land and to raise crops, to raise animals and fill the granaries, and to worship the gods at their regular festivals."

Jeff, I'm not offended sir. I thank you for taking the steps to maintain a civil discussion here. I will do the same.

Can you answer me this?

Is atheism a religion?

Sounds crazy doesn't it!?

Using science to support it is no different than using science to support Biblical claims, which is ALSO, no different than using science to support the wildly accepted religion of Humanism, and it's off shoots (e.g. secular humanism).