Posts by Rob Pomeroy

Royal Society: Schools should show creationism 'respect'

re: Standard of proof

@ Mark: Eh?

Actually all I was pointing out was the typical inconsistency in this debate when it comes to proof. The evolutionist normally will insist that he/she HAS proof of evolution. The creationist may question that proof. I too would question the 'proof', since there appear to be quite a few glaring holes in it, in particular the assumption that extrapolation is wholly dependable over millenia. And this, despite the lack of the 'concrete evidence' that science outwardly prides itself on - e.g. masses of examples of transistional species.

On the other hand, when the evolutionist asks the creationist for proof of God's existence, the creationist may (quite rightly, in my view) deny the possibility of such proof. Instead it is a point of faith. Therefore, while it is legitimate for the creationist to ask for the proof that the evolutionist claims exists, it is not legitimate for the evolutionist to ask for the proof of creationism, when no such claim is being made.

Or to put it another way, at least the creationist is honest enough to admit that some things cannot be proved and simply boil down to faith. The evolutionist is less honest, perhaps.

But that is unfair of me. There do exist some evolutionists who admit that there are some things unknown which are taken "on trust" (i.e. faith). And there are some creationists who insist that they have incontrovertible proof of a divine entity's existence. The truth is we don't truly 'know'; none of us do.

I just wish that more people approached this subject with an open, non-dogmatic mind. In my limited experience, the atheists are every bit as closed and dogmatic as the theists. I rather think this comments thread bears that out.

Standard of proof

I wonder why it is that people who base their lives on what science preaches, demand such a high standard of proof of religion, whilst demanding virtually no proof at all from the priests of science?

"THERE IS NO ABSOLUTE MORALITY!"

Fine, it's okay for me to kill you then. (End of argument.)

God makes you stupid, researchers claim

Argh.

And now the spelling nazis will get me. 'Footnoot'!

Paris, for obvious reasons.

Whale tales

Just a footnoot really: There have been a couple of references here to the story of Jonah which is understandably treated with some scepticism. I seemed to recall an old tale about a guy in modern times who had encountered a similar fishy situation. Turns out it's one of those urban myths which has been somewhat debunked. A pity really because it's one of those things that some Christians rely upon to shore up their faith.

In my brief online research, I found an apologetic for the story of Jonah though which is worth a read by anyone irrespective of religious persuasion, if you're interested in testing the veracity of the tale. You can catch it here: http://www.gotquestions.org/Jonah-whale.html but to save you some time, the (for me) salient paragraph reads:

"Skeptics scoff at the miracles described in the book of Jonah as if there were no mechanism by which such events could ever occur. That is their bias. We are inclined however to believe that there is One who is capable of manipulating natural phenomena in such supernatural ways. We believe that He is the Creator of the natural realm and is not therefore circumscribed by it. We call Him God and we believe that He sent Jonah to Nineveh to coerce their repentance."

Quite. No point in an atheist (or any other kind of -theist) saying "miracles can't happen". Because that's exactly the point. A miracle by definition is something that "can't happen". And yet they do seem to happen and whether we like it or not, there are masses of evidence (by which I mean first hand eye-witness accounts) that they do. If you just say that those first-handers were mistaken, mad or liars, you are simply revealing your preconceptions (in much the same way that the pre-Galileo church did).

PS @"God" I wonder why you forgot to specify what kind of aquatic creature it was, in the original texts?

Not enough evidence for God?

Nah, you really aren't looking hard enough are you... (The very same evidence the non-theistic scientists use to posit God's non-existence, the theist uses to posit the opposite. There's plenty of evidence - the difference is in how we choose to interpret it.)

Bravo Taskis. (Well for paragraphs 1 to 5 anyway.)

So a hefty chunk of the comments above can be summarised as: "I am intelligent. You don't believe what I believe therefore you are stupid and [insert insult of choice here]." Such "logic" speaks for itself, doesn't it?

It's nice to see all the old favourites being trotted out here anyway, such as:

"The bible is full of contradictions. (It must be, I heard it somewhere. Haven't really read it myself though because it is obviously bunkum. At least that what they told me in [school/college/the pub])."

"Religion is all about control." (Ah, so atheistic communism is about what, exactly? And remind me what Hitler, Stalin and all the other Nietzsche disciples were up to?)

"Religion is responsible for all evils." (See previous paragraph.)

"Science has proven God doesn't exist and the sooner the theists get this into their thick skulls, the better it'll be for everyone." (An amusingly faith-based statement of belief.)

"Look at George Bush. He believes in God and he is obviously stupid." (*cough* One of the most powerful men in the world? Is that jealousy I detect?)

Disappointingly I haven't spotted the "If there's a God, why all the suffering" classic yet, but give it time.

The only suprising thing is that no one seems to have brought homosexuality or abortion into the debate yet. ;-)

I.T. angle? Well Reg, this gets the page hits up, doesn't it!

Ah good, more pointless expensive research

Surely all this "proves" is that those who are wealthy and better educated (let's call them 'Westerners') are more likely to be arrogantly self-sufficient? In some populous places such as India, average levels of education are very low and average levels of theistic belief (of varying kinds) are very high. But surely there are many more logicial inferences to be drawn than that there is a causal connection?

I wonder how much money was spent on this research...

For the record: way above average IQ. And way above average, rationalistic belief in God. Yes you did read that correctly.

Blue Whale pushes email for free

"Free" Hah!

I love this part from their privacy policy: "In order for us to deliver BlueWhaleMail™, the BlueWhaleMail™ software allocates a unique serial number to the specific software installation on the phone. It is not possible for us to provide BlueWhaleMail™ without allocating this unique serial number to your phone."

And, "It will not be possible for us to provide you with BlueWhaleMail™ if you do not respond to our questionnaires."

I'll stick with manually checking for personal email, thanks.