Mutations, bad not good (Introduction)

by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Monday, July 11, 2011, 23:15 (4884 days ago) @ dhw

DHW, -I think there is a 4th possible path that you have not listed. I am a theist, and for that I make no apologies. However, I am not against a scientific understanding of our origins, nor do I pretend to know how the UI did it if it did do it. It is beyond our current technology and understanding. -The 4th possible path is one of humility. It is admitting that you do not know now, so that you can learn and know in the future. If you start with an idea, you will find data that supports your idea, and ignore everything else. That is human nature, and that is what we are seeing from the vast majority of scientist, regardless of their polarized spiritual beliefs. -My path is to state what we can observe, have observed, and make predictions about what we will observe in the future, and then test those observations, all done free from personal bias. You could show me the mechanism that enabled us to evolve to our current evolutionary form from start to finish, and if your science was sound and your data good, I would except it. Yet, that would still not change my opinion one way or the other regarding my theistic beliefs. Science instills wide-eyed wonder into my faith, it does not define it. -In our other thread I set out criteria(my criteria which admittedly is only based upon my own limited knowledge) for proof of speciation. This, my friend, is the crux of my whole argument. I do not particularly care, one way or the other, if we all came from a bubbling bowl of primordial soup or if we are, each and every one of us, hand crafted works of art created by the God(s). I simply wish that we not make grandiose claims that far exceed what we can prove, and that we refine, unequivocally, what our claims and meanings are. If you mean species as sexually incompatible members of a group that were formally sexually compatible, fine, but the burden is on the one defining that to prove. That is called science. Recently, in this forum, there was a thread about killer whales. In the article, they boldly stated that they were in fact view three different species of killer whales, without so much as even attempting to prove the statement by testing. The claim was made solely on the fact that they had different hunting tactics. If this were the case, then I am afraid that none of us on this forum are of the same species. You can take on the classification Homo Philosophicus Scoticus, and I will claim Homo Idioticus Whiticus Americanus. We can even have a naming contest to see how many species of humans we can classify. -That we have two eyes, two ears, a nose, a mouth, four limbs, and sexual reproductive organs proves nothing more than that we are efficiently designed, whether by chance or pre-planning. That we look like apes proves nothing. To me, the entire crux lies in speciation, or as they say, 'the proof is in the pudding'.-
Regards,
Tony