PROOF that Evolution is a Myth

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

It depends on how you view it. Like I said, to many people "evolution" is "creation".

God isn't always in the template of organized Western religion. It is many things to many people. What you are saying only matters in one particular small view that doesn't represent a majority.

What I was saying merely applied to the creationists that we are talking about in this thread. Which are evangelists bible thumpers. They are the ones advocating creationism taught in school. The people who hold the belief that God designed evolution into the world aren't the ones saying that evolution is wrong because of the banana. But I think we are basically agreeing now.

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by Cheese

And Im sure all parental decisions are correct? As you mentioned religious programming didnt do anything for you....but Im sure it has made many children paranoid of an afterlife? Im sure youve met a few?

And for some people, the lack of religious programming made them believe in a God. I'm sure you'll find more and more people like that as more and more children are raised in atheist households.

[Thunderball]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

Not that I don't believe you, but where did you get that about Catholic schools having a higher level of achievement?

I've looked at a few Fraser Institute rankings and I never noticed anything other than private schools kick ass and the the other schools -- Christian, public, Catholic et cetera fill out the rest of the list pretty evenly.

I'm referencing the achievement test results that are published every year. My former High School (Bishop Carroll) was consistently in the top 10 in the province, as was St. Mary's and another Catholic high school. The private schools were the best, but the Catholic ones were close behind, and then public schools.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by FireFly

Ah yes, those who interpret the Bible literally and fail to realize that it's all an interpretation. Queue Cheese with his comments about "Well if it's truely the word of God, why would He allow it to be interpreted any way but the correct one?"

You don't think it's a valid argument?

[Cheese]

Originally Posted by FireFly

There are schools for other religions. As a matter of fact, there's a Muslim school in NE Calgary that I know of and walk by on my way to work.

Apparently Cheese, you fail to realize that tolerance does not equal acceptance. Should we force you to kneel down and pray to any God any time during the day? Why should we force Catholics? It's one thing to teach about other religions as those who attended Catholic school can attest that they ARE taught about other religions, and it's another to force people to practise said religion.

Skirting the question again eh?
Any other religious school in Canada is NOT a publicly funded choice. There is no tickmark to allow you to send your tax dollars to the Muslim school of your choice...so why Catholic? Is it "tolerance"?

[Burninator]

Sending a child to a Catholic school is not giving them a choice in the same way that if you sent a child to a school that advocates atheism is not giving them a choice. Yes, the child can change it's mind later in life, but the indoctrination either way can make that choice very hard or impossible. Ideally it would be fair to school your child in a religious neutral zone (such as public school). Now whether or not the best decision to teach or not teach them about religion is up in the air in my books.

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

You don't think it's a valid argument?

Did God come on down and write a book? Some people might say yes, and the're the ones taking everything literally, who I'll agree are a little crazy.
Or a rational person can see it as a teaching aide to get the ideas across, you know, about morality.

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

You don't think it's a valid argument?

I've posted my thoughts about this in a number of threads, I'm sure. And no, it isn't. The book was written in a language that people could understand 2000 years ago. How far have language and knowledge gone since then? There are things we have now that we didn't have 20 years ago, let alone 2000. You can't take it all literally as many things were written so that they could be understood by those reading (or listening to) them then, as well as now.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by FireFly

Apparently Cheese, you fail to realize that tolerance does not equal acceptance. Should we force you to kneel down and pray to any God any time during the day? Why should we force Catholics? It's one thing to teach about other religions as those who attended Catholic school can attest that they ARE taught about other religions, and it's another to force people to practise said religion.

How are the bolded parts any different then sending your child to Catholic school?

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

Originally Posted by Cheese

Skirting the question again eh?
Any other religious school in Canada is NOT a publicly funded choice. There is no tickmark to allow you to send your tax dollars to the Muslim school of your choice...so why Catholic? Is it "tolerance"?

Nope, in this case it's majority, and history.
Who knows, when one day the Muslim population reaches a size that it can support a school system almost equal in size to the Catholic system (the Catholic system in Calgary is ~ 45% the size of the Public system), then they may be successful in getting their own check box. And if they do good for them.

[Thunderball]

Originally Posted by Cheese

Skirting the question again eh?
Any other religious school in Canada is NOT a publicly funded choice. There is no tickmark to allow you to send your tax dollars to the Muslim school of your choice...so why Catholic? Is it "tolerance"?

History. Christians, notably catholics, set up many of this Country's first schools, especially out west.

Later on, when the country was born of a mostly protestant leadership, the catholics insisted that they have a separate system. For a time, there wasn't public and catholic, it was protestant and catholic. Protestant became the mainstream, and catholic held to their beliefs (which have also liberalized a lot)... and now we have what you see today. Catholics are also the largest percentage of Canadians, practicing or otherwise (something in the 40-45% range). Since they recently have been admitting non-Catholics (people with distant catholic ancestry), their argument is that they represent a large enough group of people to warrant funding. Rightly or wrongly. Its pretty heavily engrained into the education system, and any attempts to sway this would meet with huge opposition for a few reasons.

First: The Catholic system is funded only by those taxpayers who choose it.

Second: Other cultural institutions with less broad community reward, and with a lower percentage of participants are funded by public monies. (1/3 of students go to Catholic schools)

Third: There are a large amount of catholics in Alberta, practicing or not who believe in this tradition.

Fourth: Many believe Catholic Schools provide a better education for free

Fifth: There is no logical reason to change.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

You don't think it's a valid argument?

The way I see it, understanding God and understanding the science behind existence has the same problem. It takes a system of higher complexity to understand a system of lower complexity. It's why we will never be able to prove all the mechanics of the universe with our human minds, and assuming there is a high power, we could not expect humans to be able to understand forthright what it is - hence the need to interpret.

Unless someone believes that one day our minds will evolve to the point that they have a higher complexity than nature, the universe and existence, we will never be able to discount the spiritual side of humanity... of course if our minds did evolve to that point, itwould make us essentially gods anyway, at which point we'll have to be believers.

[kipperfan]

Originally Posted by Bring_Back_Shantz

Nope, in this case it's majority, and history.
Who knows, when one day the Muslim population reaches a size that it can support a school system almost equal in size to the Catholic system (the Catholic system in Calgary is ~ 45% the size of the Public system), then they may be successful in getting their own check box. And if they do good for them.

We will never know because it will never happen....but I would almost guarantee that even if said Muslim school board grew to be similar in size to the Catholic board it would never, ever be publicly funded....but that is just my oppinion and of course I have nothing at all to back it up with.

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by Cheese

Skirting the question again eh?
Any other religious school in Canada is NOT a publicly funded choice. There is no tickmark to allow you to send your tax dollars to the Muslim school of your choice...so why Catholic? Is it "tolerance"?

Again? I don't believe I skirted it in the past, so you can't tell me I'm skirting it again. Why is the only other option atheist? Is that tolerance?

Why Catholic? A number of reasons, the biggest being democracy and majority rules. The Catholic school board is how old? The Catholic church was the only method of education for how long? I'm not about to justify it because I don't think it can or should be justified. However, it has to do with the fact that we are a judeo-christian society, whether you like it or not, and next to 'no religion' or 'other', the second largest group of Canadians would be 'Catholic'. When the majority of your citizens are of one denomination, they have the right to send their money to a school which educates their children the way they want to. Believe it or not, that would be Catholic.

Perhaps if non-Catholics would quit sending their kids to Catholic school, the Catholic school board would shrink in size and some schools would be converted to non-denominational. Maybe you should talk to those parents. Maybe when persons of other religions decide that there is need of a public school in their area that is publicly funded and run on their denomination, they'll get one. Perhaps it's apathy... we just don't care.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by Bring_Back_Shantz

Did God come on down and write a book? Some people might say yes, and the're the ones taking everything literally, who I'll agree are a little crazy.
Or a rational person can see it as a teaching aide to get the ideas across, you know, about morality.

Well if it's a matter of rationality, I guess I can see it as a teaching aide. I don't think it's irrational to say "I don't need a teaching aide to learn the basics of morality" though. I don't think anyone else does either.

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

Originally Posted by Cheese

And Im sure all parental decisions are correct? As you mentioned religious programming didnt do anything for you....but Im sure it has made many children paranoid of an afterlife? Im sure youve met a few?

Honestly, I can't say that I have.
For someone that purports to know enought about religion to brand them all stupid, you sure come off as seeing only the stereotypical view of this subject.

Most of the people I know are a lot like me. Basically good people, and not overly concerned with going through the motions of Chruch etc, because they think that afterlife or not trying to do the right thing is a good way to live your life.

Those who I do know that are really religous (Catholic, Protestant, Muslim) are not that way out of fear, and don't teach fear to their children. Cheezy as it sounds, the message of the Catholic Church is love, not fear, and I'd imagine most of the other mainstream, and not the "extreme right, creationist, bible is literal types" are generally the same. I've never once heard a "Fire and brimstone" speach.

I'm not religious, and I'm not going to take my kids to church, but I will send them to a Cahtolic school because I think that gives them a good balance of education, and Morality, and if they have questions, i'll be well equiped to answer them. See Cheese, unlike as you seem to believe, some of us sheep are capable of rational thought, and that doens't mean that we can't see some value in teachings such as "Don't kill your neighbour".

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by Burninator

How are the bolded parts any different then sending your child to Catholic school?

They aren't, but you don't have to send your child to a Catholic school. You do have a choice.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

The way I see it, understanding God and understanding the science behind existence has the same problem. It takes a system of higher complexity to understand a system of lower complexity. It's why we will never be able to prove all the mechanics of the universe with our human minds, and assuming there is a high power, we could not expect humans to be able to understand forthright what it is - hence the need to interpret.

Unless someone believes that one day our minds will evolve to the point that they have a higher complexity than nature, the universe and existence, we will never be able to discount the spiritual side of humanity... of course if our minds did evolve to that point, itwould make us essentially gods anyway, at which point we'll have to be believers.

There is always a point in human history where don't understand something. But why do we always attribute that lack of understanding to something divine?

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by Bring_Back_Shantz

Most of the people I know are a lot like me. Basically good people, and not overly concerned with going through the motions of Chruch etc,

Now you gotta admit that is kind of a funny spelling error, given the subject.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by FireFly

They aren't, but you don't have to send your child to a Catholic school. You do have a choice.

But your child doesn't. That's what I am getting at.