Rkn, I can promise you my IQ is well below 160. The vast majority of us are sure to have avg. IQs too, with a few outlier geniuses and idiots. The main problem with arguments of science verses religion is making gross category mistakes and mixing your metaphors. In biology, it does matter if you're dealing with facts. Physical law does matter a lot. It does matter how creatures evolved, their biochemistry, origins, etc. Religion operates under different principles, it's more relative and personal. Arguing biology versus religion is a failed endeavor from the outset. It gives rise for the need for and the failure of statements like 'Dr. SoandSo proved the holy book scientifically," which is absurd. Nothing in physics or biology proves a creator, that's a whole different field subject to vastly different criteria. No science texts I've ever studied mentioned creators except in some historical context, about how Darwin had to overcome societal opposition, or how Galileo was incarcerated, etc. Mixing religion and science is like a cook claiming the real secret to great bernaise sauce is to be sure to rotate your tires every 8,000 miles. My distaste comes from folks who claim evolution doesn't occur or that species don't share relations, it's downright psychotic. Insert your god anywhere in the process that makes you comfortable, but don't deny the process in the bargian; there's a disturbing disingenuity to that.

CigarPrimate

"a cook claiming the real secret to great bernaise sauce is to be sure to rotate your tires every 8,000 miles."

that's for bordelaise sauce. checking the air in your tires is for bernaise sauce.

now that i think about it, i might have it backwards.

Rick - funny you should mention that. The original Hebrew may read "In beginning, God created . . ." not "In THE beginning...." etc. One modern writer takes off on that nuance to discuss whether God created everything from nothing or created order out of existing chaos.

eleltea

but why?

Well according to modern physics whatever happened did so out of existing chaos. I can't think of one credible source suggesting something comes from nothing. The universal laws of conservation, and based on all known evidence, indicate that mass, charge, momentum, and energy are conserved, nixing the something from nothing scenario as far as we can say.

CigarPrimate

"The universal laws of conservation"

when were they passed?

was it a republican or a democratic senate?

As a man of science, I can't take religious thought seriously. I think the two are mutually exclusive. Evolution is a proven fact. Just look at antibiotic resistant bacteria to see it happening right now.

J

Religion was created by man. God did not say let there be Catholics, lutherans, Holiness, etc. He wanted people to follow his word. To follow his word you must have his word, thats the King James Bible. Back when Moody, Torrey, Sunday were having tent meetings, revivals, thousands of people were coming to Jesus. Nowadays you have so many translations floating around its ridiculous. When man started changing gods word society started to change.
Rick get a KJV and read it. before you read say this
Dear God if there is a God I'm about to read from this bible. If in fact this is your word open my eyes. Try that w/ the gospel of John. You have nothing to lose since you don't believe in God.

Woody

"You have nothing to lose since you don't believe in God. "

Only his self-respect.

Do you write letters to Santa Claus since you have nothing to lose?

eleltea is right...I'm a biblical hebrew student, and the first word of the bible, which is usualy translated as "in the beginning" is more propery translated as "in A beginning." This is not a play on words or anything of that nature. The first word is INDEFINITE, meaning non-specific ...a, not the.

Another bad translation is the word "fear" within the bible as it relates to "fear of god." the more proper translation is "awe of god." small difference, but important.

just my two cents

Wood-man

i never said i din't believe in a god. i said the idea of a god or no god was of no importance to me.

let's say there is a god for the sake of the
discussion, so what.

coda

were you talking about or to me?

Rick, I agree that IQ is really irrelevant in what you are discussing here. My point was that many boast of intelligence and being of importance but are yet so close minded that their view is the only plausible explanation.
Why can some people not agree to disagree and respect the others right to have an opinion. If I want to pray at a ball game, why can I not have that right? At what point are my inalienable rights to give to the inalienable rights of another? Only when it enfringes upon them, but don't think of taking away someone's rights just because it is something you do not want to hear. It is called civic virtue and true it has everything to do with knowledge of what is fundamentally right and wrong and having respect for your fellow citizens!
So believe in whatever it is in which you so desire, just remember that we all have that right. God Bless you and Merry Christmas.
RJ

Rickster,

My last comment was neither to or about you, my friend; it was in response to Wood-man's most recent post enjoining you to pray before reading the Bible.

Surely, anyone must admit that having conversations with someone whom you do not believe exists has to be on our little wallet card entitled "The Seven Warning Signs of Insanity".

(Conversing with someone that you do believe exists, but doesn't, is merely delusion, and may or may not be on the back of the card. It can be tolerated in 12 year olds with observation.)

However, Rickster, I want to bring up your aversion to labels. Please take a test for me.

How Many Gods Do You Believe In (and I want a number only!)?

If your answer was:

Zero: You are an atheist

One: Theist (of which there are many flavors)

More than one: Polytheist. (This seems to be out of fashion nowadays.)

Don't care -- same as "zero" above, since you do not believe in one or more gods.

Rick, you don't have to choose a label to qualify for one. I am not sorry, but you seem to be an atheist. I used to be an "agnostic" until I realized that was just sitting on the fence. The fence is comfortable for a while, but it tends to really get in your crack after a while.

Bongo, isn't it also true that the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" is more correctly translated "Thou shalt not murder"?

CP, there are quantum physicists who believe in a universe consisting of a kind of matrix where particles pop into and out of existence spontaneously.

Even primordial soup begs for a cook.

Yea, and John Nash thought he worked for the CIA and Ted Kaczynski was the Unibomber, and don't forget Platonist physicist Roger Penrose and his tubulin soul computers. As for cooking, just remember that after the rapture that's what I'm going to be doing to your primo sticks and non-evangelical daughters. Que vive vice!

LLT, now that I re-read your post, things don't pop into and out of nothing. Take an electron-positron pair, when they meet an anihilate one another, they get transformed into gamma particles, as in E=MC^2. The anihilation of anti-particles releases (is transformed into) energy, so no mojo is violated; the laws of conservation still hold.

coda

"Zero: You are an atheist" ok, but.

i never said i did or didn't believe in a god. as i said before, i am as little interested in the idea of a god as i am in who quarterbacks the chicago bears.

so if i answer "How Many Gods Do You Believe In (and I want a number only!)?" i don't have an answer because the question is irrelevant in my life, what will you now call me?

call me irresistable.
call me iresponsible.
but it's undeniable true................

why so much fuss about the subject. dapperdan wants to "save me." but he didn't say from what.

suppose when the rock in front of the cave was moved and there was a dead jesus laying there, would most of the world have become hindus or muslems. in stick ball if the batter hits a parked car, that is a hindoo, a do-over, but that is only of interest to stickball players. and how do you account for the fact that toby and i had a cruise stopover in cartagena one sunday and only one store was open, a souvineer and tee shirt shop.

i bought the tee shirt that had the logo 59th street stickball champions. when i was younger i used to live in the project under the 59th street bridge in queens new york. how did the owner know i was going to be there and where i used to live.

but that is a different story.

do you think that guy that was on tv could actually hear the voices of the dead talking to members of the audience through him.

how did kudabuks (sp) drive a car with that paste and a towel around his face?

can david blain really levitate?

when someone is very sick why do people ask their god to make that person get better, when it was their god who allowed it to happen in the first place? getting sick is not free will.

they used to kill a goat and then pray. did their god need a dead goat?

hebrew interpetation of the second commandment:

"You shall have no other gods besides Me...Do not make a sculpted image or any likeness of what is in the heavens above..."
One is required to believe in God and God alone. This prohibits belief in or worship of any additional deities, gods, spirits or incarnations. To deny the uniqueness of God, is to deny all that is written in the Torah.
It is also a prohibition against making or possessing against objects that one or other may bow down to or serve such as crucifixes, and any forms of paintings or artistic representations of God.
One must not bow down to or serve any being or object but God.

jews wear hats in synagoge because god is not present in the building. they take off their hats only in god's presence.

where is written that jesus changed that so that people can now wear crosses and have statues and get relief from their sins from another human being because they pay a fine?

Rick, Job was one of your boys, wasn't he? He didn't choose his boils, either, but boy oh boy was he steadfast in his faith. Patient, too.

Job is another one of those words, like Polish and Nice, that change pronunciation when they are not capitalized.

BTW, you ask too many questions. You wanna know everything now or you wanna get to heaven?

I just remembered my favorite Omar:

Some for the glories of this world, and some
sigh for the Prophet's paradise to come.
Ah, take the cash and let the credit go
Nor heed the rumble of a distant drum.

Omar drank a little.

RICK...WOW! That's all I know to say...oh and great for you! So if we evolved and creationism is non-existent, therefore there is no Creator (no God), then there is no heaven, if there is no heaven, there is no life after death...right? Hmmmm...so what is the point of your existence? Do you believe that you should eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow you die? I would really like to know this!

Dave...I knew I liked you for more than the fact we share the love of the leaf...AMEN brother!!!!

Goody