Evolution
Out of context: Reply #34
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- BrokenHD0
This is a quote from the comments of the article i posted above (written by Ralph Damiani), I found it eloquent on the subject and thought I'd share it...
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As an agnostic, I find it intriguing, to say the least, how some people's Faith remains unmoved by the progression of science. They may have driven home in their fossile fueled cars and accessed this page from their wireless internet connections in their multicore laptops, perhaps not unlike Moses would have done if he lived to date. Yet, heaven forbids a few billion years in which we were not the center of the universe (apparently, we are now).
Faith does not need to object Reason if you're sensible enough to accept the physical reality and the nature of our existence as evolving questions to which there will always be a number of new answers, sometimes replacing outdated ones. But also, there will always be new mysteries to which the role of a God can ever be present, as many religious scientists, no doubt, will agree. Einstein never did.
It takes but a moment to rephrase and redirect one's Faith in order to accomodate the new facts that surface, and will continue to do so, as we become knowledgeable of things previously unknown or uncertain in our history and the history of life. Gone is the mud and sparkling winds, enters DNA and evolution, but is the actual recipe so important? Why so much resistence?
If I were to believe in God in the traditional sense, I would hardly see the need to do so in the role of a hermit bedouin stranded in medieval times. Yes, they had little choice in the realm of satellites, eletron microscopes and carbon dating, so they never had much of a reason to question their nightstand literature, busy witch hunters as they were.
But where we stand today, I wonder how this very same mindset can still exist! One can only hope to hear "So yes, there may not have been an actual Adam and Eve, but that doesn't diminish the metaphorical importance of Eden, as we approach the power to synthetize life ourselves" and instead there are those ready to swear by all saints the amount of days it takes to create the universe?
It's really difficult to make a strong argument against the theory of biological evolution when you're ready to regard the Bible as a historical account of everything there is, written by God through men. In the realms of unlikeliness, at least one of those theories is nearing conclusion. Well, at least for those not ready to dismiss it a liberal conspiracy (that would be highly amusing though).
To any extent, good science doesn't -NEED- to render the Bible useless. Quite the contrary. It's actually ironic how one the most timeless and flexible aspects of the Bible, one that would render it permanently relevant for mankind, which is the moral applicability of its paraboles, is lost to readers without an ounce of imagination.
Instead of re-interpreting pertinent lessons written thousands of years ago and translate them into our contemporary lives, they are, sadly, more concerned about propagating a doctrines. And this is where science really outshines religion in my humble opinion: Flawed as it may be, (and mainstream science if full of them) it encourages you to seek your own conclusions, and by using your God given brain, no less, you can actually prove others wrong.