Creationism vs Evolution

[wonderboy416]

I don't get it. You've gone here at length about people assuming unfounded beliefs, and then you assert one of your own. If you really adhere to your stated recognition of evidence and verification trumping mere beliefs, how about actually proving some for your own assertion?

I don't have proof, but I would never claim that to be a fact.
I would claim evolution to be a fact.

There's a huge difference.

Lots of people think 9/11 was an inside job, lots of people don't... Does their position on that matter discredit everything else they think or believe? I'm not following your logic... if I were to then I should think that all Christians are completely nuts because there's no proof or evidence supporting their religious views, that should not discredit their opinions on say... fashion or something else similar.

We all know the CIA has been behind many government assanations, that they essentially setup and funded Al Qeada in its beginnings, have close ties to the Bin Laden family and supported Sadamm Husein's reign of power as he could control the region as few others could.. is it unreasonable to think that terror cells are supported by gov't who ties to business stand to profit tremendously from this elusive enemy?
That's a whole other issue, I have my reasons for thinking the way I do, but I would never, ever assert them to be fact...

 

[kEiThZ]

Great. Atheist truthers now?

I am truly stunned that for all your claims about the faithful being ignorant, you'd ignore reams of evidence by independent scientists and analysts about the events of 9/11 and everything that transpired after. At least the Jehovah's witnesses aren't telling people that the CIA or the Jews killed their relatives so that we could build a pipline through Afghanistan to move oil from the Caucasuses...to India.

 

[wonderboy416]

Great. Atheist truthers now?

LOL, you'll see on the 9/11 thread that I am not sure what happened.
What does being an atheist have to do with believing that our political and monetary systems are easily corruptable?
I know many people of many different faiths who feel the same way.
Do you honestly believe that the IMF and World Bank do good for the world?

Anyway, this is not about wonderboy416's opinions on the political system or otherwise, your energy would be better spent on the given topic.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

kEiThZ, how do you know what the jehovah's witnesses are telling people? do you know every single one of them and know every single conversation they have had?

what's with the atheist truther label? why not urban toronto truther? or canadian truther? what does truther have to do with atheism?

 

[gristle]

Prometheus, I am assuming that kEiThZ is making reference to wonderboy's postings on 9/11.

Wonderboy has disparaged religions (which is merely a way of categorizing the people who are religious) as being falsehoods constructed on mere stories and without proof. Yet his operating political belief regarding governments is one that operates without the benefit of any evidence. It strikes me as rather hypocritical - as does the obfuscation of attempting to draw a comparison between a belief in 9/11 stories with evolution. The point is that he puts down religions because they offer no proof, but then asserts a belief in conspiracy theories - and acknowledges no proof.

From his perspective, what's the difference?

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

but the label atheist truther? it's an unnecessary association like drive thru truther or bike lane advocate truther.

 

[wonderboy416]

From his perspective, what's the difference?

I don't know how comfortable I feel having others put words into my mouth...

I have stated that religion makes extraordinary claims but offers zero proof of them.

We know that Hitler staged the Reichstag fire, we know that the US stood down when Pearl Harbour was attacked (after which the US public overwhelmingly supported the war effort), we know that the CIA has hired guns who aim to breakup governing parties that it doesn't agree with (John Perkins among many others has come forward admitting as much), we know that aspartame was only approved by the FDA when Donald Rumselfd overturned the FDA's decision to not allow it (and then he went on to become the CEO of Searle, the company holding the rights to it), we know the plans to invade Afghanistan were on Bush's desk 2 days prior to 9/11 (coincidence or not, how can that not sound fishy?) .... we know of hundreds of more examples of corrupt behavior by the public sector. The US gov't has directly funded Bin laden (and seemingly let him go about his merry way despite having ample means to catch him), they have sold weapons to terrorist cells - these are all well documented facts. I didn't say I subscribe to any crazy conspiracy theories, but based on the facts at hand, I believe it's very likely that terrorist groups are state sponsored (we know for a fact several are). We also know for a fact that these perpetual wars the US has entered in are making billionaires out of Americans while ramping up inflation by lending more money to itself at high interest rates.

There is enough circumstantial evidence to justify a belief that corruption runs rampant throughout the world's governing systems (I often wondered what my economics profs would say to my political science profs at York if they were to have a conversation back when I was studying both fields, it most certainly would have been heated).

There is zero circumstantial evidence to justify a belief in any of the crazy stories propagated by the various religions around the world.

The difference is night and day.. and just in case you missed it the first time, I never claimed my belief to be a truth or fact, simply an opinion based on circumstantial evidence (I'm sure most of our elected representatives are well-meaning and not easily bought off). There's a mountain of hard evidence supporting evolutionary theory, and not a single scrap of anything supporting creationism... You might as well attack me for the colour of shoes I wear if you're going to make these grossly wild assumptions about how I came to my own opinions.

 

[nfitz]

Lots of people think 9/11 was an inside job ...

I don't think that's true. An inside job? That's the most insane suggestion I have ever heard. I have not heard one person in the real world ever say that.

I have seen a few nutters on the Internet make such claims ... but they also go on about all such of strange stuff such as holocaust denial, faked moon missions, and aliens running the government ... and it's quite clear that they are suffering from some kind of pscyhological issues (and in one case, I later learned one individiual was posting from within a federal prison, where he was serving time for murder ... not suprisingly conspiracy theories were part of his "defence".).

Discussing creationism is one thing (is it me, or is the poll a little too black and white) ... but let's not make claims like this.

 

[wonderboy416]

I don't think that's true.

Then it would hinge on one's definition of "lots". I am not part of that group, but I would certainly think that hundreds of thousands of people would constitute "lots".
If one is to believe some of the polls taken then that number would be well into the millions.

 

[nfitz]

Then it would hinge on one's definition of "lots". I am not part of that group,

I didn't think you were ... I'd have been more diplomatic if I thought that was the case!

but I would certainly think that hundreds of thousands of people would constitute "lots".

Hundreds of thousands in Toronto? That would be lots. Hundreds of thousands in the world? Well, I'd think there might be 2 or 3 countries where you could find that. I suppose I shouldn't lump the nutters in with those in another culture who might have been misinformed by biased media.

If one is to believe some of the polls taken then that number would be well into the millions.

They poll on these things? Even if you found a million people, that's 0.1% of the population. The rate for schizophrenia alone is higher than this ... so I could believe that you could find a million people.

 

[wonderboy416]

^

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_opinion_polls

Canada
In September 2006 an Ipsos-Reid poll found that 22 percent of Canadians believe "the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, had nothing to do with Osama bin Laden and were actually a plot by influential Americans."[20]

 

[nfitz]

Good grief ... what is wrong with people? I'd really like to see the methodology on that poll; it seems bizarre that so many people would say such a thing.

Hmm, and only 6% here believe in creationism - which while unlikely, certainly seems a lot more plausible than the US government crashing jets into the Pentagon and World Trade Centre. I wonder how 9/11 would poll here ...

 

[wonderboy416]

I wonder how 9/11 would poll here ...

http://urbantoronto.ca/showthread.php?10814-September-11th-Real-or-Fraud

A small sample of the total UT population, but not inconsistent with the results of other polls.

You deem creationism to be more plausible than 9/11 being a conspiracy.
I'd actually argue the opposite. We've seen the US be complicit towards attacks against its own people in the past (see Pearl Harbour, Operation Northwoods etc). While unlikely, it's not entirely out of the question that it would happen again... All prior attacks were a pre-cursor to war. 9/11 happens - America engages in 2 wars that were otherwise unjustifiable (hmmm... they never did find those weapons of mass destruction now did they?).

This is a silly comparison, but I can at least see where the 9/11 conspiracy theorists draw their suspicions from. In my humble opinion, they're not as crazy as someone who believes in talking snakes and people living inside of whales...

 

[nfitz]

http://urbantoronto.ca/showthread.php?10814-September-11th-Real-or-Fraud

A small sample of the total UT population, but not inconsistent with the results of other polls.

Wow, I'm shocked. I didn't think anyone could that gullible. I guess all the spam in my mailbox should be proof otherwise.

I'd actually argue the opposite. We've seen the US be complicit towards attacks against its own people in the past (see Pearl Harbour, Operation Northwoods etc). While unlikely, it's not entirely out of the question that it would happen again...

Are you suggesting that a government that couldn't even fake any evidence of WMD in a war zone that they occupied managed to pull off something like this?

Pearl Harbour ... yeah, it was Americans bombing Pearl Harbour ... get real. There's some evidence that someone was asleep at the switch and didn't react to warnings they should have ... but isn't that always the case?

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

from 9/11 to all consequences resulting to this point, the inside job belief doesn't hold up. sure 9/11 was milked in the most bizarre ways but that doesn't mean it was an inside job. just because someone makes lemonade, poorly mind you, it doesn't mean they invented lemons.

it think there's alot of people who have so much faith in the competence of the system, they just can't believe it can fail and would rather attribute the failure to the system meaning to do it. it's the transposition of the "i didn't make a mistake, i meant to do that for this purpose" mentality on to the system.