The Faith & Religion mega Thread

Originally Posted by OregonJim How is this "on track"? What does it have to do with the current conversation(s) or the title of this thread? Why would I want to "evolve"? The word has no meaning in this context. Change (if that's what you mean) for the sake of change also has no meaning. Are you saying you want me to change my beliefs? Why?

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ml#post5563670

You may not follow the same train that's all... http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ml#post5565974

You've lost me. I have no idea what you mean. Will wait for others to return.

And to unclarify that last post was to imply :cool: not \. (tick) .|. (tick) ./ (tick.) (Stem cells? )

How 'bout those Broncos!?!

Now I don't follow?

NOT to imply would ever lead!

If the "answers" can't be implemented, what's the point.?

An it harm none, do what you will.

Originally Posted by netcrawl An it harm none, do what you will.

Well said but what if "they" don't realize it* may harm many?

Originally Posted by unSpawn @OregonJim, @enorbet: mature, constructive discussion is what helps make LQ a great place to be. And sure, there's no problem with discussions getting a bit lively. Discussing things also means trying to really understand what moves fellow LQ members. The best way to avoid that is to stop trusting one another, stop listening, stop asking the right questions. This almost always ends up as a set of monologues, wild accusations, and if we're lucky an outburst of Godwins' Law (meaning I can close the thread w/o any thought and smack ppl good). Not all topics were created equal. That goes especially for volatile threads like "The Faith & Religion mega Thread". In the end you have both shown you failed to carry the discussion in a mature, constructive way. This means I'm gonna put both of you in your own corner to cool down. For the time being this means no replies to each others posts, no taunting, no hinting, no snide remarks, no spillage elsewhere nor anything else that can be construed as addressing this little accident in any way. I'll be revisiting this thread in a few days and if I find you have deliberately ignored my directive there will be repercussions. @All: the above goes for the rest of you too. I do not want to see anyone "fanning the embers" so to speak. Get this thread on topic with mature, constructive posts that actually foster discussion or forego posting.

Hello, unSpawn

First of all, your moderation effort here at LinuxQuestions is always highly appreciated, and I hope that everybody, here in this particular thread, will agree with me. As far as I'm concerned, I usually have no problems with people discussing about religion, as long as no disinformation and misconceptions are spread about those sources and fields of human knowledge that have been showing - to anybody having a reasonably open intellect - the obsolescence, anthropocentrism, and fallacy of so many religious beliefs and superstitions, and of their related, often heavily and intentionally manipulated writings.

The sources and fields of human knowledge which I mentioned are of course the scientific culture, built with serious scientific research, rigorous ethics and peer review, as well as mathematics and the underlying rules of logic, the powerful tool that helps us to separate valid forms of thought from invalid, fallacious ones. Again, I have no problems with religious people discussing about their own faith, as long as they don't try to feather their own nest by misrepresenting and discrediting the purpose and nature of a method, culture and ethics that allowed the human kind (or most of it, hopefully) to free itself from some of the worst and bloodiest forms of obscurantism.

It seems that after feeling threatened in their former, decayed supremacy by a (scientific) culture and method that are actually able to bring solid arguments and real, shareable evidence in support of their own assertions, some religious people and institutions are trying to mimic the language of science and the form of sound logic thought, without actually using either one of them. Unfortunately, those gentlemen and gentlewomen are forgetting that disinformation, rhetorical tricks and loud voices are not a good means to reach any form of truth whatsoever, and even less to genuinely and honestly help other people to form their own mind.

Going back to this particular thread, I feel that I have to rally in defense of enorbet, as he proved to be one of the most patient, balanced, tolerant and generous subscribers of this very long discussion, well before Mr OregonJim came along with his personal, unshakeable religious faith. In particular, whenever somebody posted the usual clichés about scientists, the scientific culture and method, as well as other related topics, enorbet patiently, respectfully and often extensively corrected such (unfortunately) common misconceptions, providing sources and helpful links as well. Of course human patience is usually limited, and even the most patient man, when provoked, will eventually end up with some potentially unwelcomed reaction. Me included.

I won't list the fallacies deposited in this thread by OregonJim, as many of them have already been emphasized by some of us. Such fallacies, for the record, are among the usual, well-known ones deployed by creationists in order to make their own assertions look "scientific", trying to depict actual, serious scientific research as "unscientific", while consistently falling into the traps of double standards and circular logic in the process. On the other hand, there is one particular source, ambiguously quoted by OregonJim, that heated up the discussion in this thread, causing enorbet to lose his patience, and I think that I can explain and justify his disgusted reaction to that particular quote. I'll do that in a separate post.

As I mentioned in my previous post, and for the sake of fairness to enorbet's position, here's the discussed quote, including some context by OregonJim in response to enorbet himself:

Originally Posted by OregonJim (...) And, you assume that Lucy is a human ancestor when it has been proven to be a relative of the gorilla, not man: Scientists from the departments of anatomy, anthropology, and zoology at Tel Aviv University reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Vol. 104, pp. 6568-72, April 17, 2007) that the jawbone of the Lucy species (Australopithecus afarensis) is a close match to a gorilla's. The scientists concluded that these australopithecines do not have any role in being a modern human ancestor. Surely, the peer-reviewed "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences" is among your list of "credible sources". I also recall reading, in the same journal, that the bones of Lucy were gathered from a 100 foot radius circle and pieced together. They may or may not come from the same species of animal, but they certainly do not come from the same specimen. Therefore, any other conclusions are highly speculative at the very best. Assumptions, assumptions. (...)

Meanwhile, enorbet already tracked down the actual paper from the PNAS:

Yoel Rak, Avishag Ginzburg, Eli Geffen Gorilla-like anatomy on Australopithecus afarensis mandibles suggests Au. afarensis link to robust australopiths Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2007 Apr 17; 104(16): 6568-6572. Published online 2007 Apr 10

Please note that there is no trace of OregonJim's quote in the paper, especially of the last, allegedly conclusive sentence. In fact, what the mentioned paper does is formulating a scientific hypothesis (but more on this later). On the other hand, after searching for OregonJim's quote on the Internet, these are my only results:

1) Lucy isn't the missing link! (unkonwn author)
Source: www.creationtips.com ("Crystal Clear Creation")

2) "Lucy" is Not the Missing Link! ("compiled and commented by David J. Stewart")
Source: www.jesus-is-savior.com ("Jesus Christ is the ONLY way to Heaven!!!")

3) The Fossil Record Provides Scientific Evidence for Macroevolution (online debate)
Source: www.debate.org ("a free online community")

As you can see and verify, each one of them comes from a creationist, and none of these results shows any sign of scientific reliability. The second result ("Jesus is savior") cites the first one ("Crystal clear creation") as its source, while the creationist contender in the third result (the online debate) simply plagiarized it (i.e. he used it as if it was his own, without citing it as a source). But here's the text, almost identical in all the above results:

Three scientists from the departments of anatomy, anthropology, and zoology at Tel Aviv University reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Vol. 104, pp. 6568-72, April 17, 2007) that the jawbone of the Lucy species (Australopithecus afarensis) is a close match to a gorilla's. The article's abstract admits that "This finding was unexpected given that chimpanzees are the closest living relatives of humans." The scientists concluded that this pretty much discounts these australopithecines as having any role in being a modern human ancestor.

Note the difference in the last sentence, when compared with OregonJim's quote. After reading the original paper, the obvious conclusion is that OregonJim probably didn't even read it, and that he simply quoted a second-hand, amateurish, inaccurate and unreliable creationist "source" as if it was the original. I don't know if he altered the last, allegedly conclusive sentence in his own quote, or if he copied and pasted it from somewhere else (where?), but at this point that would only be a detail.

In fact, an important thing to note is that OregonJim implicitly presented his quote as if it was taken from the original paper, or at least from a scientifically reliable source that correctly represented its content, but it clearly wasn't either case. Another even more important thing to note is that his quote tries to present the original paper's scientific hypothesis, which expresses doubt about the evolutionary link between Australopithecus afarensis and the human species, as if it was a proven, clear, certain fact:

Originally Posted by OregonJim The scientists concluded that these australopithecines do not have any role in being a modern human ancestor.

The emphasis is mine, and there is no such conclusion in the paper. Even if OregonJim didn't alter his second-hand quote, but copied and pasted it from another unknown, inaccurate, unreliable source, at least he showed us that he doesn't actually have the "very deep understanding of the scientific process" that he boldly claimed to possess, if he still doesn't know the fundamental difference between a scientific paper and an unreliable and falsified citation of it in a random creationist website; or between a scientific hypothesis that has yet to be verified, and a proven fact. In other words, it seems that he doesn't grasp the important difference between authenticity and falsification, between doubt and certainty, and perhaps for this reason he insists in depicting science as if it was a religion (when convenient), while presenting his own personal faith as if it was scientifically justified, while completely missing the oxymoric irony of such position.

I understand enorbet's reaction, and I understand why he lost his patience, especially after reading some of OregonJim's aggressive and frustrating replies, where he simply and stubbornly denied that he did anything wrong when misrepresenting the content of a scientific paper the way he did. I might actually give OregonJim the benefit of the doubt, as it is possible that he really believed that he was quoting a scientifically reliable source; but this would only confirm his scientific ignorance and what I already suspected: that his only sources are apologetic websites and religious publications that have nothing to do with science itself. On the other hand, if OregonJim is intentionally doing scientific disinformation based on creationist prejudices, then I think that enorbet's reaction was fully justified. Unfortunately, a prudent, tolerant and rational style of discussion seems to be largely insufficient when dealing with an unshakeable, stainless and aggressive religious faith based on one-sided literature.

Originally Posted by OregonJim I understand your views but, like sundialsvcs, I don't understand how you can identify as a Christian. You seem to be mixing and matching beliefs from different religions, and adding beliefs of your own making (like a non-eternal hell). There is a wide latitude of beliefs that fall under the "Christian" banner, but they all have a core subset in common - and neither you nor sundialsvcs seem to come close to meeting the "requirements" for using the "name"...

Because I accept Jesus as my lord and savior, and I'm not aware of any other religion that does this.. I'm not here to misguide or sway anyone to my beliefs, I just wanted to highlight what I feel is important. That we should all love one another..

Originally Posted by Philip Lacroix I understand enorbet's reaction, and I understand why he lost his patience, especially after reading some of OregonJim's aggressive and frustrating replies, where he simply and stubbornly denied that he did anything wrong when misrepresenting the content of a scientific paper the way he did.

First of all, you seem to be trying to pesuade a moderator as to "who is right" and "who is wrong". The moderator's job is rightly to keep the peace and uphold forum guidelines, not to arbitrate the (perceived) value of content. While you may not agree with "creationists" or other religious individuals, they DO have the right to express their views just as you do.

Second, you still do not see the point I have been TRYING to make - the "quote box" you referenced IS NOT A QUOTE! There is no misrepresentation here. INSIDE the quote box, which was used merely to set apart the information from the rest of the post, is a REFERENCE to a PAPER, along with MY conclusion (which is a paraphrase of the PAPER's conclusion). The "quotable information" is IN THE PAPER REFERENCED IN THE BOX, not the box itself! I fail to see why this is so hard to understand, especially since I've now explained it multiple times!

Third, your posts don't seem to be in keeping with unSpawn's moderation request to let the subject "cool down" and not to "fan the flames".