Skip to main content
Skip to main navigation
Skip to talk navigation

Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Saved Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Flip

Join the discussion on our Education forum.

Join the discussion on our Education forum.

Education

new thread on creationism

17 replies

stitch · 17/03/2006 16:02

coz the other one had to much about george bush on it
you can believe in creation without believing the biblical version.
darwinian evolution fits the known facts. BUT i dont think that our knowledge of genetics supports evolution at all.
life is too complex to have arisen on its own, through random chance. a simple one cell amoeba is a gazillion times too complicated to have come about by random chance.

OP posts:

Report

SenoraPostrophe · 17/03/2006 16:06

You can believe that stitch, that's you're right. and it can be discussed in assembly/RE. But it's not science.

lacrimosa · 17/03/2006 16:07

Why do you believe it could not have come about by random chance?

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:09

Agree with SP.

Intellegent Design/creationism isn't science and should be taught in RE not science lessons.

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:09

Agree with SP.

Intellegent Design/creationism isn't science and should be taught in RE not science lessons.

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:10

So good I posted it twice

What was the chance of that happening.....same thing cropping up twice eh?

stitch · 17/03/2006 16:15

hmmmm,,, dont know about that one. not too bothered about whether or not it is taught in science or not.
13 years ago when i was doing molecular biology and genetics stuff at uni, i remember being totally awed by the beauty of it. the whole process of gene transcription, expression etc was just too perfect to have arisen by chance. remember discussing it at the time. and i remember that i didnt believe that the universe had been around for long enough for such a system tohave arisen by absolute chance. even assuming the max age of the place

OP posts:

maretta · 17/03/2006 16:19

Have you read the Richard Dawkins books. They explain very well how complex life could have arisen by random chance alone.

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:19

I have a fair bit of awe in the old system myself

The worrying thing about ID is that it says, 'We can't explain it, God did it' Which kind of puts a stop on any further research/deeper understanding/better explanations etc

Kathy1972 · 17/03/2006 16:21

Genetics not support evolution? Eh? But it totally does!

When Darwin first developed his theory hardly anything was known about genetics. All the discoveries that came later about the nature of genes backed it up very neatly, surely?

I understand your problem with thing arising by chance, Stitch, but the point about evolution is that the complete organism didn't come about by chance - it's natural selection. The point as I understand it (not an expert!) is that things evolved in interim stages, so to take something like the eye, it doesn't have to have suddenly appeared in one go, there would have been cells that were more sensitive to light than others and so on. There would be thousands of chance mutations all the time, most of which would confer no advantage so they would not have been reproduced in large numbers, but the ones which did confer advantage would get to reproduce more and more. The use of the phrase 'by chance' is a bit misleading IMO.
Someone else can probably explain this better and if I am getting it wrong please tell me so someone, but I think that's how it works!

Kathy1972 · 17/03/2006 16:23

x posts - ok I see what you mean about genetics Stitch. But I still find it more plausible than the idea of a creator.

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:25

and you can think about the 'chance' issue this way.

Imagine I deal out a deck of cards. It will have a particular order.

The odds agains them being dealt out again in the same order are massive. But that doesn't negate the fact that they came out in that order the first time round, does it?

We are looking from the 'far end' of evolution. Life didn't start this complex!

maretta · 17/03/2006 16:25

There's also been a phenominal amount of time for natural selection to take effect.

In only about 100,000 years humans have breed wolves to make all the dogs you see today.

stitch · 17/03/2006 16:41

put a monkey in front of a computer. what are the chances that he will correctly type out the entire works of shakespeare thirty times?
that give s a slight idea of the element of chance we are talking about
natural selection and darwinian evolution are fine. no problems. but step by step evolution of the sort you are talking about isnt possible imo

OP posts:

stitch · 17/03/2006 16:49

but thats just it, i dont think the time is enough. 20 billion years may seem like a long time to us, but, its not really enough i think for life to arise.
wolves and dogs are not all that different. but a lump of inanimate matter and the simplest living organism are so hugely different as to defy comparison.
im not arguing from a religious pov, but a scientific one. whilst i think that creatioonism is a bit of a get out clause, i still think its a valid a theory.

OP posts:

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:50

But not a scientific one.

sfxmum · 17/03/2006 16:55

what worries me is that the languange of science seems to have gone out of everyday life, no rigour of thought. children need to learn how to think critically maths philosophy and proper science are needed.
i find it strange that i grew up in a catholic country and was taught evolution and now i have to worry about what my daughter will learn at school

Blandmum · 17/03/2006 16:56

And the last pope said that there was not bar on Catholics learning about evolution and accepting it!

Flip

Please create an account

To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.