Interesting youtube debate, your opinion?

[DuckiesDarling]

Believing in a higher power does not necessarily mean you disavow evolution is my own personal opinion. But I found this intriguing video from Bill Nye The Science Guy and then a couple from detractors who don't really so much attempt to debate as they do to debunk. What is your personal opinion? I think salient points were made by Bill Nye.

Please do not attack any other person's faith or lack thereof, just the simple opinion on the basis of what we should teach children to have a better future. Thanks.



http://youtu.be/gHbYJfwFgOU



http://youtu.be/JxX11c1cSWU

[DuckiesDarling]

Part 2 of the rebuttal videos since max in one post is two vids :D


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-AyDtD6sPA&feature=share&list=UUXLsVwHXCzoS Y9b8M65p OJg

[Warrior Poet 69]

Sorry DD, not touching this one with a ten foot pole!

[Gearbox]

Please do not attack any other person's faith or lack thereof, just the simple opinion on the basis of what we should teach children to have a better future. Thanks.
I teach mine to question EVERYTHING! Even me.lol Evolution is is not an exscuse to stop thinking, stop questioning, assume it's all done & dusted and to ignore anything that contradicts that. Neither is creationalism!
IMO both should be offered as possibilities, and neither as dead cert truth. That way, future generations have something to chew on and not to get all heretic about. Bless em.:)

[CelticBerserker]

Believing in a higher power does not necessarily mean you disavow evolution is my own personal opinion.

Sums it up for me. My grandfather was a professor of nuclear medicine @ Johns Hopkins and a lifelong devout Catholic. He never seemed to have trouble balancing science and faith, nor do I really. Although I'm closer to Lutheran myself ;) All my family has ever told me to do is make up my own mind.

[tenni]

Interesting. I had not heard of the term "historical science" versus "observational sciences". I would suspect that observational science may exclude not just those that some label historical but physics, psychology and more. Although some aspects of psychology come from observable experimentation and studies.

Here is what I found when I googled.

"Historical science" is a term used to describe sciences in which data is provided primarily from past events and for which there is usually no direct experimental data, such as cosmology, astronomy, astrophysics, geology, paleontology and archaeology. The term is often misused by creationists for any science that "interpret[s] evidence from the past and includes the models of evolution and special creation."It is used to designate those sciences which creationists have complaints about, such as evolution and abiogensis, and is the opposite of operational or experimental science.

In her 2001 paper, "Historical science, experimental science, and the scientific method,"] (http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Historical_science#cite_note-1)\ Dr. Carol Cleland of the Department of Philosophy and Center for Astrobiology at the University of Colorado in Boulder writes:


“
Many scientists believe that there is a uniform, interdisciplinary method for the practice of good science. The paradigmatic examples, however, are drawn from classical experimental science. Insofar as historical hypotheses cannot be tested in controlled laboratory settings, historical research is sometimes said to be inferior to experimental research. Using examples from diverse historical disciplines, this paper demonstrates that such claims are misguided. First, the reputed superiority of experimental research is based upon accounts of scientific methodology (Baconian inductivism or falsificationism) that are deeply flawed, both logically and as accounts of the actual practices of scientists. Second, although there are fundamental differences in methodology between experimental scientists and historical scientists, they are keyed to a pervasive feature of nature, a time asymmetry of causation. As a consequence, the claim that historical science is methodologically inferior to experimental science cannot be sustained.
”


The National Center for Science Education points out on their website that:



“
Philosophers of science draw a distinction between research directed towards identifying laws and research which seeks to determine how particular historical events occurred. They do not claim, however, that the line between these sorts of science can be drawn neatly, and certainly do not agree that historical claims are any less empirically verifiable than other sorts of claims.



I didn't think that Nye was the best spokesperson for this debate. I didn't find his arguments and points as strong as they might be.

What I do think is sad and dangerous is how some seem to dismiss science and research as if it is appropriate. There seems to be a movement of emotionalism in society today and skeptical dismissing of scientific evidence.

[Mulder]

I know who Ken Ham is, I've read many articles by him, and for the most part, I agree with most of what he says. I am fully in line with The Creation, but there is no doubt that evolution of species has occured and will always continue to occur.

[void()]

Will never have human children. If able, would teach Love & Reason equally and that our world/s require Balance. May sound idealistic and simple, it is what it is.

[darkeyes]

It is and always will be an interesting debate.. there is no reason why a divine creator and evolution theory cannot co exist.. bang.. cosmos.. and then let the cosmos get on with it.. I certainly don't accept the 7 day 5000 odd year old earth genesis nonsense..

My Grandad used to get very het up with my dad and I... religious man, accepted Darwinism, and dismissed what the old testament told us of the creation of our world... Adam and Eve he scoffed at as a fairy story, which Pepper, is where I get the expression which so upsets believers.. forgive me that little fault, but it came from a religious Christian, Presbyterian who himself, a great believer in his God and Christ as his saviour believed that fairy stories were much in evidence in the bible... My dad believed that religion came from man's need to explain his world and his lack of knowledge... what he saw around him could not be explained and so over time unexplained things evolved into superstition evolved into belief in a God or Gods.. or as some would argue, a Goddess... I understood what my dad was getting at and over time my own consciousness and evolving thought added to my dad's belief that in time, God or Goddess, man created, was found to be a useful tool with which to control the people and played its part in creating those who have done for them and those who do.. those who have and those who have not.. those who have power and those who do not.. it played its part in controlling what people did and how they thought... so I dismissed God from my consciousness absolutely and completely.. I am not an agnostic.. I simply do not and cannot believe in a divine creator and it makes no sense to me...

As I grew and learned more of evolution, while it was not a spark to confirm the atheism which has always been, it was another piece of the evidence that the divine creator was a myth and dreamed up for the reasons I have given, millennia ago when humankind was at his most primitive and most ignorant.. not the killer piece of evidence but something else to add to my already well established beliefs..I don't consider God as impossible, but do as illogical.. I dont blame God or praise him for what we have.. I blame or praise humanity.. ourselves.. our ancestors and we who live now.. Gear said he teaches his child to question everything.. and so it should be.. our children question us on everything at home and it is something we should all encourage.. creationism has no place in schools as a science, but it does have a place in the education of children as a belief.. not the only belief but as a belief... as should other creationist theories and beliefs.. that of western society is not the only one...and even evolution, a science which has its place, also has its critics and disavowers, because like most sciences it is an imperfect science and within school curricula this too should be a part of our children's education..