Evolution?

[IzakielSturge]

From a Creationist perspective, there had to be a grand designer due to the complexity of the universe.

From my perspective, there was no beginning, and there is no end. The Creator wouldn't have had a beginning, so this isn't more complicated than Creationism's explanation. Since there was no beginning, infinite opportunity existed for life to happen on accident. 

Even if there is just no end, everything happens one time out of infinity.

Probability and Order Versus Evolution | The Institute for Creation Research

The Creationist argument seems to mainly hinge on how unlikely something as complex as life could have come about by accident. Probabilities, on the surface extremely impressive, are utilized that fall apart when exposed to the Infinite Opportunity explanation of evolution.

[andy06shake]

From a Creationist perspective, there had to be a grand designer due to the complexity of the universe.

From my perspective, there was no beginning, and there is no end. The Creator wouldn't have had a beginning, so this isn't more complicated than Creationism's explanation. Since there was no beginning, infinite opportunity existed for life to happen on accident. 

Even if there is just no end, everything happens one time out of infinity.

Probability and Order Versus Evolution | The Institute for Creation Research

The Creationist argument seems to mainly hinge on how unlikely something as complex as life could have come about by accident. Probabilities, on the surface extremely impressive, are utilized that fall apart when exposed to the Infinite Opportunity explanation of evolution.

Here is a question following the creationist ideology.

On the fourth day, God created the Sun, Moon, and Stars.

How could he have had three days previous without a Sun? 

It's all full of holes imho.

I will, however, accept the premise of a creator or creator force just down to the fine-tuned universal constants that make the universe sing.

Personnly i think the question is above humanity's pay grade and/or ability to ask in our present condition.

[FlyersFan]

Here is a question following the creationist ideology.

On the fourth day, God created the Sun, Moon, and Stars.

How could he have had three days previous without a Sun? 

That's taking the bible creation story literally.
Most Christians understand that's allegory.
Christians believe in creationism, but not necessarily the biblical account as literal.

Most Christians believe that God created everything, in His own way and in His own time.

For instance ... the first man and woman ... the Adam and Eve story is allegory but at
some point there was a first man and a first woman.    If God used evolution, it's still
Gods guiding hand in the process.    That's creationism with a modern understanding
of science.   (and how I see it)

ST PJP II spoke about it .... From Google AI Assist - Yes, Pope John Paul II accepted evolution as more than just a hypothesis, acknowledging scientific findings that supported it as a "process of creation" by God, but emphasized that God directly imbued humans with a spiritual soul, a transition science can't explain. In his 1996 address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, he stated that new knowledge confirmed evolution as "more than a hypothesis" but stressed that it must align with faith, with God acting as the ultimate Creator, not a mere "magician".

[FlyersFan]

I will, however, accept the premise of a creator or creator force just down to the fine-tuned universal constants that make the universe sing.

The fine tuned universe argument goes a long way.  
Lots written about it. 

[IzakielSturge]

I accept Creationism as a possibility but lean more toward random chance explaining things.

As an example of why, it would make sense to me for God, if all loving like the Bible claims, to have created the universe without suffering. There may still have been free will, and there could yet have been avoidance of damage. Life might have been built with an objective instinct to resist and repair damage.

And free will does not require the existence of bad people. Just as human beings raised properly in the correct environment are less likely to commit crimes against consent, God could have "raised" humanity to be nearly perfect yet finite, being Omnipotent in respect to the prospect. He could have given them the exact correct emotions and environment to choose the good over the bad.

[BeyondKnowledge]

Creation is the story of what happened. Evolution is the explanation of how it happened. And yes, days are not literally days in the story of the creation. Just as you can't figure out how old the Earth is by adding up all the days in the Bible. There are very many days that nothing significant happened and those days were not mentioned.

[argentus]

From a Creationist perspective, there had to be a grand designer due to the complexity of the universe.

From my perspective, there was no beginning, and there is no end. The Creator wouldn't have had a beginning, so this isn't more complicated than Creationism's explanation. Since there was no beginning, infinite opportunity existed for life to happen on accident. 

Even if there is just no end, everything happens one time out of infinity.

Probability and Order Versus Evolution | The Institute for Creation Research

The Creationist argument seems to mainly hinge on how unlikely something as complex as life could have come about by accident. Probabilities, on the surface extremely impressive, are utilized that fall apart when exposed to the Infinite Opportunity explanation of evolution.

Who says it has to be either/or?   I see no problem with God having put an elaborate Terran (and presumably elsewhere) evolution into action in order to fulfill S/His experiment.   It isn't just in The Holy Bible where the God(s) decided to flush the experiment and start over;  MANY different cultures have a historic flood story that reshaped their culture.   

I am a scientist.   I have been one for so long that my parents would maintain that I was born one, if you asked them.  That doesn't make me unique;  I identify as a man fill with profound curiosity, and ongoing desire to never stop learning.    See?  Just like everyone else.   I confess to a fondness for measurable data.  I am also a musician, a decent carpenter, a writer, and I'm good at sheetrock and concrete finishing.  

There is this perception of a battle between science and theology.    I've never seen it.  Some of the world's most amazing mathematicians, physicists, inventors, artists were also religious.  Many historically-recorded people of the faith also pursued scientific studies.   Both religion and science have and can be weaponized into devices of great horror and hardship to the creatures on and in the Earth.  There is no high ground to be acquired nor held. 

So, I'll see your very probable incredible combinations of variables which created life, and raise you a God's long game.    For some crazy reason unknown to me, I think God's game is Billiards.

I tend to believe in your view as infinite changes without beginning or end.   How would it end?   How COULD it end?    If there was a Big Bang, that might've just been the refurbishing of the neighboring universe.   They might have been WAY behind the other universes, and ya know we have to keep up with the Yahwehs.  AND that's only taking into account the things that occur with the perception of our dimension.   Hmmm.  IS it "ours"?   Surely we share it with others.

[andy06shake]

And yes, days are not literally days in the story of the creation. Just as you can't figure out how old the Earth is by adding up all the days in the Bible. There are very many days that nothing significant happened and those days were not mentioned.

Well, it's a convenient explanation if somewhat colluded.

Another possible interpretation could be that the people who made up these stories.

Did not have a real clue as to the celestial mechanics involved or what stars are.  

If I were to hazard a bet...

[argentus]

Well, it's a convenient explanation if somewhat colluded.

Another possible interpretation could be that the people who made up these stories.

Did not have a real clue as to the celestial mechanics involved or what stars are.  

If I were to hazard a bet...

Yes, and they wrote about what they saw, and what they felt, combined with the mythos of their culture and others.   It intrigues me those various cultures of old such as the Sumerians documented orbital mechanics and distant objects which they could not have possibly been able to see from the surface of Earth.  

In college I decided to reread the Holy Bible and highlight it whenever I read a passage that resonate to me as definite "science".   Wellll........   Fairly soon, there was as much highlighted as not.   "The Bible is not interpretive"  I've been told,  "it is to be taken literally."   Okeydoke.   Still, I can put myself into the waywaywayback mindset of a person who had never witnessed modern technology, and then describing the wheels within a wheel of Eziekel.   I still have that KJV Bible.   It is very illuminating.

[Tecate]

I have always felt that we evolved to the point where God said, cool, they are ready for sentience. To me that explains the first people Adam and Eve type story. It also explains how Cain could find a wife and establish a city.

I also feel that new universes are formed by black holes (what happens on the other side), so I don’t think anyone should all of a sudden follow my train of thought.

As usual, my 2 pesos…


Tecate