What do Aussies believe re: Evolution?

I'm curious to see if Aussies think the same way of Americans on the subject of evolution.
I found this chart of "What do Americans Believe"
three choices
a) God created the Earth in the last 10,000 years
b) God guided evolution of man over millions of years
c) Pure evolution - no God involved
no need for a lot of commentary (but up to you)
but would appreciate your time in voting, thanx.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

PS I decided not to give you the option of "don't know"
lol - we'd all have to vote that in truth
just your best guess based on your own philosophy.

As for "didn't answer" - you mob of wits would all vote that as well if it was an option

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

I suppose to answer truthfully one has to know the meaning/description of belief. Wik says ....

Belief is the psychological state in which an individual is convinced of the truth of a proposition. Like the related concepts truth, knowledge, and wisdom, there is no precise definition of belief on which scholars agree, but rather numerous theories and continued debate about the nature of belief.

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My concise oxford says .... belief n. trust or confidence (in) ; acceptance of any received theology ; acceptance (of thing fact statement etc.)

So for mine I can`t answer truthfully `cause I`m not a beaver.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

No God in my view, we are a freak of evolution, part of the big bang as part of the universe. Some say they see wonderfull lights and great feelings when they have a near death experience. I was knocked out once and I saw vivid stars and a sore head afterwards.

On average we seem to be differrent philosophically to Amerricans. There was a report out of US last week of a youg lad gaoled for life for killing his Father who it was proved had physically abused his son throughout his childhood. Certainly we must not condone murder but sometimes the circumstances need to be weighed in.

Religion seems to be more and more zero tolerance and is this perhaps some desperate attempt to avoid the big issues and how we are stuffing up the world. Interesting hornets nest.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

Wysiwyg said:

I suppose to answer truthfully one has to know the meaning/description of belief. Wik says ....

My concise oxford says .... belief n. trust or confidence (in) ; acceptance of any received theology ; acceptance (of thing fact statement etc.) So for mine I can`t answer truthfully `cause I`m not a beaver

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so just your best guess....

either at the answer (no right or wrong) , or
what the original Americans assumed "belief" meant

PS I reckon your definition is spot on btw.

Your call, but I would have thought if you can't answer questions that imply you believe in X, then maybe , .. ?? Y is a better answer

Explod - I hear you - there was a case where an American who killed his father (granted with mitigating circumstances - bit like your case) was sent overseas as a missionary rather than do jail

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

I always liked this example of why there is no God.

http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/


Dave

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

I would suggest that you guys read some history of philosophy. The notion that we evolved was know to the ancient greeks, there arguments were not the same ones we use today, but they were sound.
Since Darwin, we see that evolution is the central unifying idea in biology and have even been lucky enough to decrypt the mechanism.
A healthy civilisation requires people to have strong beliefs, beliefs strong enough to supress violence within a soceity and direct it outward. Our dying civilisation is christian, hence in the late denial phase we have a return to evangelism, which is essentially willfull stupidity, a counter reformation from modernity, which is why Americans go for it.
The irony is that reason alone will not sustain civilisation and what is true and what the mass of people beleive will always be at odds.

"Religion begins by offering magical aid to harassed and bewildered men; it culminates by giving to a people that unity of morals and belief which seems so favorable to statesmanship and art; it ends by fighting suicidally in the lost cause of the past. For as knowledge grows or alters continually, it clashes with mythology and theology, which change with geological leisureliness. Priestly control of arts and letters is then felt as a galling shackle or hateful barrier, and intellectual history takes on the character of a "conflict between science and religion" Institutions which were at first in the hands of the clergy, like law and punishment, education and morals, marriage and divorce, tend to escape from ecclesiastical control and become secular, perhaps profane. The intellectual classes abandon the ancient theology and -- after some hesitation -- the moral code allied with it; literature and philosophy become anticlerical. The movement of liberation rises to an exuberant worship of reason, and falls to a paralyzing disillusionment with every dogma and every idea. Conduct, deprived of its religious supports, deteriorates into epicurean chaos; and life itself, shorn of consoling faith, becomes a burden alike, to conscious poverty and to weary wealth. In the end, a society and its religion tend to fall together, like body and soul, in a harmonious death. Meanwhile, among the oppressed, another myth arises, gives new form to human hope, new courage to human effort, and after centuries of chaos builds another civilization."

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Happy trading.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

Found that passage you presented to be my thoughts also kevo.Something I understand.

Had one look at the site link you provide and hit the X in the top right hand corner of the screen.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

Kevo, fantastic post, wish I could sum something up like that. So we find ourselves between a rock and a hard place, the rationals have thier hands bitten off and the irrationals promise the world

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

The thing that I don't understand about evolution vs. creation is the whole 10,000 years vs. millions & millions of years.

There is a massive difference between the two.

I would have thought with the technology and research available to man these days that scientists would be able to establish and agree on the approximate age of the earth.

Why is this fact never agreed on ??

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

ZacR said:

The thing that I don't understand about evolution vs. creation is the whole 10,000 years vs. millions & millions of years.

There is a massive difference between the two.

I would have thought with the technology and research available to man these days that scientists would be able to establish and agree on the approximate age of the earth.

Why is this fact never agreed on ??

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Science is the art of coming up with a theory and then trying to disprove it, if you can't you then publish the theory. Evolution has stood this test and hasn't been disproved scientifically, the biblical theories have failed this test repeatedly.

When science fails to prove your religious faith, you just employ your own scientists to come up with theories that suit your agenda and change proven scientific method to give you the outcomes you want. Hence "intelligent design" the theory that we are to well designed to be an accident, the amercian christian right have embraced this failed theory as gospel and have started teaching it in schools. GW Bush is a supporter of this kooky rubbish.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

ZacR said:

The thing that I don't understand about evolution vs. creation is the whole 10,000 years vs. millions & millions of years.

There is a massive difference between the two.

I would have thought with the technology and research available to man these days that scientists would be able to establish and agree on the approximate age of the earth.

Why is this fact never agreed on ??

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Fundamentalist Christians have determined the age of the Earth by counting up all the instances of someone begatting someone in the bible. This method of determing the age of the Earth can originally be attributed to Archbishop Ussher.

Scientists have determined an approximate age of the Earth by using radiometric dating which is based upon the decay rates of naturally occuring isotopes.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

Well 2020 Hind... becoming pretty clear how a lot of us here on the forums think. Interesting thread but what can we resolve?

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

not sure m8 - I want to stay impartial - (but I guess everyone knows my views - although I wonder about the middle option - as did Einstein I guess - except when he wondered about something, he was able to avoid his eyebrows getting in a knot - which is my main problem lol

as for the age of the earth bit , stockguru makes sense to me.
(one estimate based on the decay rate
one on the birth rate )

well, better be-gatting along to Dan Murphy's before it closes lol

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

kevo said:

"Religion begins by offering magical aid to harassed and bewildered men; it culminates by giving to a people that unity of morals and belief which seems so favorable to statesmanship and art; it ends by fighting suicidally in the lost cause of the past. For as knowledge grows or alters continually, it clashes with mythology and theology, which change with geological leisureliness. Priestly control of arts and letters is then felt as a galling shackle or hateful barrier, and intellectual history takes on the character of a "conflict between science and religion" Institutions which were at first in the hands of the clergy, like law and punishment, education and morals, marriage and divorce, tend to escape from ecclesiastical control and become secular, perhaps profane. The intellectual classes abandon the ancient theology and -- after some hesitation -- the moral code allied with it; literature and philosophy become anticlerical. The movement of liberation rises to an exuberant worship of reason, and falls to a paralyzing disillusionment with every dogma and every idea. Conduct, deprived of its religious supports, deteriorates into epicurean chaos; and life itself, shorn of consoling faith, becomes a burden alike, to conscious poverty and to weary wealth. In the end, a society and its religion tend to fall together, like body and soul, in a harmonious death. Meanwhile, among the oppressed, another myth arises, gives new form to human hope, new courage to human effort, and after centuries of chaos builds another civilization."

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thankx kevo
source of that quote maybe

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

https://www.aussiestockforums.com/forums/showthread.php?p=200265&highlight=descartes#post200265

But these three (3) questions still are unanswered
* was the first (1) kick-off taken by God?
* who'll second (2) that first (1) page of Hansard?
* and third (3), was the first (1) second (2) odd?
(or even)

"well" - said the actress to the bishop - artyman: "I've come forth (4) - to have a fifth (5) over some six (6) while we thrash it out, sugar"

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

as stockguru posted - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Ussher
amazing this bloke can calculate it (well , can keep a straight face and say he knows it) to the day !
23 Oct 4004 BC.

Anglican Archbishop of All Ireland ? - may I suggest he was lost?

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

2020hindsight said:

to the day !
23 Oct 4004 BC.

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Just a quick check
let's pretend I'm the verifier.
23 Oct 4004 BC.
what day of the week?

between 23 Oct 4004 BC and 23 oct 2007AD
we have 4004+2007-1 = 6010 years (See below - delete zero year)
of which 6010 / 4 = 1502.5 were leap years, = 1502 (approx )
hence there were 6010x 365 + 1502 days = 2195152 days
hence 313593 weeks and 1 day

Now 23 Oct 2007 AD will be a Tuesday
therefore 23 Oct 4004 BC was a Monday

and CHECK!! “creation was the night preceding that " – i.e.
early start (or as they say these days , sparrow fart) on the Monday.

PS since then man has evolved into a 38.5 hour per week animal
PS he has got meaner ,
and his erect demeanour now more resembles the shape of a lounge.
PS a few more years of this and we'll be able to officially declare a new species
"the lounge lizard"

PS seems that "BC" more accurately means "Before Conception" rather than "Before Christ" (my words)

The modern English term "before Christ" (BC) is only a rough equivalent, not a direct translation, of Bede's Latin phrase ante incarnationis dominicae tempus ("before the time of the lordly incarnation"), which was itself never abbreviated. Incarnation means the conception, not the birth, of Christ, which since the 4th century has been celebrated on 25 March, nine months before the date on which the celebration of his birth at Christmas (25 December).

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so ... does that mean that 24 March on year 1 is BC?
and instead of year 500BC, should we really say " 500 BTTOTLI ?"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_zero
Since Bede, historians have not counted with a year zero. This means that between, for example, 500 BC, January 1 and AD 500, January 1 there are counter-intuitively only 999 years:

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Bede (c.672–735) was the first historian to use a BC year, and hence the first to adopt the convention of no year 0 between the BC and AD epochs, in his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (Ecclesiastical history of the English people, 731). Previous Christian histories used anno mundi ("in the year of the world"), or anno Adami ("in the year of Adam", beginning five days later, used by Africanus), or anno Abrahami ("in the year of Abraham", beginning 3,412 years later according to the Septuagint, used by Eusebius), all of which assigned "one" to the year beginning at Creation, or the creation of Adam, or the birth of Abraham, respectively. All began with year 1 because the counting numbers begin with one, not zero. Bede simply continued this earlier tradition relative to the AD era. Bede continued to use this zero epact in his De temporum ratione (On the reckoning of time, 725), but did not use it between dates BC and AD. .......

Bede did not sequentially number any other calendar units (days of the month, weeks of the year, or months of the year — but he was aware of the Jewish days of the week which were numbered beginning with one (except for the seventh which was called the Sabbath) and partially numbered the days of his Christian week accordingly (Lord's day, second day, …, sixth day, Sabbath in English translation).

In chapter II of book I of Ecclesiastical history, Bede stated that Julius Caesar invaded Britain "in the year 693 after the building of Rome, but the sixtieth year before the incarnation of our Lord", while stating in chapter III, "in the year of Rome 798, Claudius" also invaded Britain and "within a very few days … concluded the war in … the fortysixth [year] from the incarnation of our Lord".[1] Although both dates are wrong, they are sufficient to conclude that Bede did not include a year zero between BC and AD: 798 − 693 + 1 (because the years are inclusive) = 106, but 60 + 46 = 106, which leaves no room for a year zero.

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PS gotta feeling that every now and again there's a slight adjustment of leap years - but lol
don't have time for it now

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leap_years Leap year rules
In order to get a closer approximation, it was decided to have a leap day 97 years out of 400 rather than once every four years. This would be implemented by making a leap year every year divisible by 4 unless that year is divisible by 100. If it is divisible by 100 it would only be a leap year if that year was also divisible by 400.[2][3] So, in the last millennium, 1600 and 2000 were leap years, but 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not. In this millennium, 2100, 2200, 2300, 2500, 2600, 2700, 2900 and 3000 will not be leap years, but 2400 and 2800 will be. The years that are divisible by 100 but not 400 are known as "exceptional common years". By this rule, the average number of days per year will be 365 + 1/4 - 1/100 + 1/400 = 365.2425.

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Leap year algorithms
Calculating leap years is simple, and is provided here by two different pseudocodes that determine whether a year is a leap year or not:

Standard
if year modulo 400 is 0 then leap
else if year modulo 100 is 0 then no_leap
else if year modulo 4 is 0 then leap
else no_leap
Vectorized
mask400 ← year modulo 400 EQ 0 ; this is a leap year
mask100 ← year modulo 100 EQ 0 ; these are not leap years
mask4 ← year modulo 4 EQ 0 ; this is a leap year
return ((mask4 and ~mask100) or mask400)
where ~ is the bitwise logical NOT operator. These algorithms are for a Proleptic Gregorian calendar, which include leap years before the official inception in 1582.

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Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

2020.

I think it was something you wrote.
A statistic about each star in the universe being compared to the size of a hair folacle width.
10 to the pin head.
How much of the surface of the earth would they cover.
Of the estimated 25 trillion stars.
(1) Youd cover the whole surface of the earth.
(2) Plus every planet in our solar system
(3) 250 times!

Now for the human species to be so arrogant to suggest that ITS god/s created all. And that it cant even settle on a universal explanation of creation because it doesnt know and to find one would kill the power of religion. And STILL has to resort to faith to explain away the unknown.

Says to me that mankind is simply a very young naive species,which in many countries is led by the strong (Religions) by giving the vast majority of civilisation hope that there is more than their pitiful existance.
Belief,Faith and hope are as we have seen through centuries very powerful and manipulative indeed.

Yep we evolved and are still evolving,I think we are a very primative life form relative to what is likely to be out there.

Must say
Very suprised at the lopsided results here given the results on the poll on the Is there a God thread.

Re: What do Aussies believe re Evolution?

2020hindsight said:

thankx kevo
source of that quote maybe

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2020Hindsight, a source is difficult when what Kevo has postulated has been built gradually on a chain of intellectual thinking going back 2500 years.

My wife had a crack at reading the piece this morning over breakfast and in disecting the message it made me revisit a conclusion reached at uni. (when we knew everything and were going to force feed change on the world, struth, another missed opportunity)

If you think about it there are two levels of education, the force fed repititious dogma and the free open campus to all possibilities. They are led by our cultural circumstances with wealth and poverty playing a big part. It has been resolved in societies where education all the way is an equal right to all individuals. It falls down because the powerful become greedy and want to control.

From the middle/dark ages the reawakening saw such uprisings as the commune of Paris, where people asserted themselves as individuals and for a right to have a say. It has survivied well in that part of the world till the present but interestingly a lot of intellectual Europe is in regression. I think we achieved it to some degree in Australia from the 60s through to the late 80s,

Some peoples will always need guidance to cope, others will be greedy and want to control and others will want to allow the flowers to grow unnihibited and free; getting it all together is the great conundrum.

It has always been my view that there is no democracy without equal education for everyone, which is why your Bill Gates et. al put their life fortunes in these directions.