Is evolution a controversial science?

[McCulloch]

Both religion and controversial science could be taught in elective College courses where they belong.

He was referring to evolution as controversial science. While there may be quite a number of legitimate controversies within the science of biology regarding evolution, evolution itself is not a controversy at all among biologists.

Question for debate: Is evolution as taught at the high school level, a controversial science? Is there any controversy among currently practicing biologists regarding the basic science behind evolution?

[McCulloch]

Animals do not have any such morals or standards.

Yes they do. Humans are not the only animal with moral standards. The human brain is the most advanced known brain. We can abstract and reflect better than any other animal.

An animals is not reasonable nor empathic nor compassionate and animals do not show concern for other animals.

This statement is false. Because of our advanced brain, humans can be more reasonable, more empathetic and compassionate than other animals. But it is a matter of degree only.

The true point and purpose of civilization is to get people to stop living as animals.

What do you mean by this?

Here in the USA we all grew up with Christian moral standards whether we followed them or disobeyed, so no one here grew up by animal standards unless they were severely abused by the custodial parent or guardian.

What do you mean by Christian standards? What do you mean by anamal standards? Are those the only two options? What about Jewish standards? Muslim? Buddhist? Humanist?

It is absurd to view human progress as animalistic.

Thank you for your unsupported vague and patently absurd opinion on this matter.

Of course there is that racist version of evolution that views white Americans as the higher evolved and other people as lower evolved, and thereby that version of evolution would support our higher values as inherited instead of being from our Christian roots.

Is there any actual practicing evolutionary biologist who promotes such a view? Please cite specific current examples. If you cannot, then please stop raising this red herring. Here is a clue. Biologists have stopped talking about higher and lower stages of evolution decades ago.

[JP Cusick]

Close. Evolution offers no basis for forming morals. One attempting to find a moral code in evolution is both highly confused and foolish.

First off is that I want to confess my error as I said "Atheist" when I really mean Atheism, as I referred to the people (Atheist) instead of the concept of Atheism.

So yes of course Atheist have morals and there is that-of-God is all persons which gives every person a moral sense of right from wrong, and I do not really mean to attack the person when it was just their ideology that I find fault.

So as to the quote above = evolution has no morality = and that is my point too that evolution is morally bankrupt.

The same with Atheism that it has no morality = and that is my point too that Atheism is morally bankrupt.

The people have their own moral conscience yes, thank God, but the concepts of Atheism and evolution do not.


----------------------------------------------------

This nonsense deserves deeper inspection. Let's do a thought experiment here JP. If a Christian is held captive by ISIS, and ISIS knows that he has knowledge about a water treatment facility that distributes to a million people, and they ask him where to inject poison into the system so they can kill all million people, and he lies about what they should do so that they fail, is that lie a sin?

Yes of course that too is a sin, but you are ignoring far too much in this scenario.

For one thing the person (the so called Christian) could refuse to answer instead of telling that lie, or they could delay by asking to see the stuff, so there are other options besides just to lie or not to lie.

It is people who tell the truth based on our conviction that the truth is righteous and the truth is powerful so that when a person starts deliberately being truthful then that opens up a door to a wide range of options, and it is only those who lie who find very limited options.

Plus I would ask why would any true Christian be fighting or resisting ISIS (correct name ISIL)? why would a true Christian be involved in that horrible immoral hostility against our Islamic brethren?

A person can not be participating in evil and then at the last minute start to consider to act like a Christian or not? they are living in sin but then at the end worrying whether it is a sin to lie or not to lie? but of course people do this hypocrisy anyway and they do this kind of hypocrisy all of the time, so in the end that lie is indeed just another sin on top of their other sins.

Your scenario points to one moment in time - as if one moment is the criteria - but instead we are to live as a moral agent throughout our entire life - and then the one moment would not be the criteria.

[McCulloch]

So as to the quote above = evolution has no morality = and that is my point too that evolution is morally bankrupt.

Of course evolution has no morality. Physics, chemistry, mathematics and geology have no morality either.

The same with Atheism that it has no morality = and that is my point too that Atheism is morally bankrupt.

Atheism and theism by themselves have no morality. But just as various theisms have a moral framework, so also can atheism. Humanism is an atheistic moral framework.

[H.sapiens]

Close. Evolution offers no basis for forming morals. One attempting to find a moral code in evolution is both highly confused and foolish.

First off is that I want to confess my error as I said "Atheist" when I really mean Atheism, as I referred to the people (Atheist) instead of the concept of Atheism.

So yes of course Atheist have morals and there is that-of-God is all persons which gives every person a moral sense of right from wrong, and I do not really mean to attack the person when it was just their ideology that I find fault.

So as to the quote above = evolution has no morality = and that is my point too that evolution is morally bankrupt.

The same with Atheism that it has no morality = and that is my point too that Atheism is morally bankrupt.

The people have their own moral conscience yes, thank God, but the concepts of Atheism and evolution do not.


----------------------------------------------------

This nonsense deserves deeper inspection. Let's do a thought experiment here JP. If a Christian is held captive by ISIS, and ISIS knows that he has knowledge about a water treatment facility that distributes to a million people, and they ask him where to inject poison into the system so they can kill all million people, and he lies about what they should do so that they fail, is that lie a sin?

Yes of course that too is a sin, but you are ignoring far too much in this scenario.

For one thing the person (the so called Christian) could refuse to answer instead of telling that lie, or they could delay by asking to see the stuff, so there are other options besides just to lie or not to lie.

It is people who tell the truth based on our conviction that the truth is righteous and the truth is powerful so that when a person starts deliberately being truthful then that opens up a door to a wide range of options, and it is only those who lie who find very limited options.

Plus I would ask why would any true Christian be fighting or resisting ISIS (correct name ISIL)? why would a true Christian be involved in that horrible immoral hostility against our Islamic brethren?

A person can not be participating in evil and then at the last minute start to consider to act like a Christian or not? they are living in sin but then at the end worrying whether it is a sin to lie or not to lie? but of course people do this hypocrisy anyway and they do this kind of hypocrisy all of the time, so in the end that lie is indeed just another sin on top of their other sins.

Your scenario points to one moment in time - as if one moment is the criteria - but instead we are to live as a moral agent throughout our entire life - and then the one moment would not be the criteria.

If what you honestly meant to say was, "to the best of my knowledge evolution has not morality" I could accept that. But you said, "evolution is morally bankrupt." That statement merely identifies you as one with a depauperate background in animal behavior and behavioral ecology. I recommend that you spend some time reading up on Game Theory, Evolutionary Stable Strategies and the Evolution of Biological Interactions before you run your ratchet any farther.

Try: https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowled ... e-25953132

Until you have read up a bit, I recommend to you Proverbs 17:28.

[catguy00]

The trans-Atlantic slave trade and the genocide of Native Americans occurred well before Darwinism. Looks like racism already existed.

Darwin published the "Origin of Species" in 1859 which was at the very height of the African slavery in the USA, and it was in the midst of the same era of the mass murder of Native American Indians, so Darwinism was a product of his times and certainly fit into that mentality.

No. The trans-Atlantic slave trade had been ended. Regardless, my point was that these racist views existed for centuries before. Had nothing to do with Darwinism. Just like lynching and Jim Crow laws after Origin of the Species had nothing to do with Darwinism.

[JP Cusick]

No. The trans-Atlantic slave trade had been ended. Regardless, my point was that these racist views existed for centuries before. Had nothing to do with Darwinism. Just like lynching and Jim Crow laws after Origin of the Species had nothing to do with Darwinism.

I do not know of any history of racism itself going back much farther than the 1400's because ancient history tells us nothing of racial strife or hostilities.

Ancient history tells of people fighting based on ethnicity as like the Romans and Greeks saw their selves as better that anyone else, but ethnic differences were mainly differences of religious and or of culture, of language, of homeland, but never is it categorized as based on race or color.

The beginning of racism is marked as after the discovery of America and the Spanish conquistadors enslaved the native American Indians, and later the African slavery into the Americas was totally based on the color and racial distinction - that was the true beginning of racism directed primarily at the African people and the native American Indians.

The "Jim Crow Laws" were based on white superiority based on Christianity and what they called "Social Darwinism".

The white power was based on Christian racism which shifted over to Darwinism just after the civil rights movements of 1954-1968, when the white power based on Christianity got overthrown and Darwinism was its replacement.

Darwinism did not start the racist bandwagon but Darwinism certainly justified and empowered the racism from the first publishing of the "Origin of Species" (1859) and onward as now still ongoing in the 21st century.

[JP Cusick]

Of course evolution has no morality. Physics, chemistry, mathematics and geology have no morality either.

The problem with secular evolution is that it is anti religion and thereby it is anti morality.

When I preach about evolution then I include that God is the one evolving life and humanity and thereby my Theist kind of evolution is morally upright.

Claiming that the scientific version of evolution just has no morality is a disingenuous cop-out because it is thereby anti moral.

It is irresponsible (sinful) to give to society any message which is anti moral.

Atheism and theism by themselves have no morality. But just as various theisms have a moral framework, so also can atheism. Humanism is an atheistic moral framework.

Theism always includes a moral backbone and moral standards.

However I do concede that if a person were to call their self as a "Humanitarian Atheist" then I would support that.

The thing is though that Atheism is not about the Humanism, and it does not include humanism.

In many ways secular science gets closer to the truth then are many religions, but if secular science has super smart learning and intelligence then that poses as a true danger to us all when it is not attached to charity and compassion for the rest of humanity.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to post 107 by JP Cusick]

The problem with secular evolution is that it is anti religion and thereby it is anti morality.

Your religious documents indicate that there are occasions in which it is necessary to slaughter helpless women and children and babies. This fact alone disqualifies your religious beliefs from any claim to morality.

[JP Cusick]

Your religious documents indicate that there are occasions in which it is necessary to slaughter helpless women and children and babies. This fact alone disqualifies your religious beliefs from any claim to morality.

The only ones I ever hear saying to stop the slaughter are religious people.

The USA has an ongoing doctrine of over 300 years and continuing today of slaughtering helpless women and children and babies, but the USA includes the murder of anyone in our scopes - and only religious people ever tell the USA to stop this.

The Bible is complex in that it tells us both of what we are to do and what we are not to do, and the Bible tells us to stop the slaughtering.

There is no bigger claim to morality than that.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Your religious documents indicate that there are occasions in which it is necessary to slaughter helpless women and children and babies. This fact alone disqualifies your religious beliefs from any claim to morality.

The only ones I ever hear saying to stop the slaughter are religious people.

The USA has an ongoing doctrine of over 300 years and continuing today of slaughtering helpless women and children and babies, but the USA includes the murder of anyone in our scopes - and only religious people ever tell the USA to stop this.

The Bible is complex in that it tells us both of what we are to do and what we are not to do, and the Bible tells us to stop the slaughtering.

There is no bigger claim to morality than that.

Apparently it is okay to kill babies "sometimes." And although I do not personally support the practice of abortion, I would like to point out that one of the reasons those who do support abortion gave for that support is exactly the many years of ongoing slaughter of women and babies that was occurring at the hands of untrained abortionists prior to Roe v Wade. A back alley practice that would naturally be resumed were Roe v Wade to be overturned, and which rabid anti-abortionists seem to be hypocritical in not recognizing.