Anthony Flew becomes a theist

[KenseiKurisuchan]

Anthony Flew has for a very long time been a spokesperson for athiests as a very educated man presenting arguments against anything that theists would throw at him. He recently became a theist when studying the human genome, saying that it is too complex to be random and intelligence must have been involved in its creation. Full article below:
http://theroadtoemmaus.org/RdLb/21PbAr/Apl/FlewTheist.htm

[Tobias]

interesting...to see that science has actually made a an athiest change into a theist.

That is all

[Shurikane]

Hehe, the irony is delicious!

[reaper]

All well and good it actually falls in line with alot of the things i believe.

But it cannot be limited to the human genome. Any genome be it a mono or multi celled organism. the fact is they are all crazy complex.

I for one believe in A god or at least over riding power in the universe because I don't see how inorganic material floating around in the oceans could combine to somehow create DNA, not to mention the phenomena of sentient life arising some 2.5 billion years later.
To imagine a force that could create life from nothing, but not only that but create it in such a way that it is ever evolving and changing into more advanced life is to put it simply, mind blowing.

Science however will never prove the validity of allot of the ludicrous things found in the bible, such as the creation myth. You know because the earth alone has been dated at almost 5 billion years old.
Nothing would ever make me believe as something as ludicrous as the earth and all life culminating in sentient life in 7 days. Thats just stupid.

I have actually sat down and logically went through the creation myth step by step and it pans out somewhat consistently with evolutionary theories., except the 7 days.
there are two major flaws that jump out to me with 7 days.
1 its pretty damn egotistical to thing that a infinitely existing omnipotent being would convince itself to our time structure,
2 what the hell is 7 days to a ifinently existing omnipotent being?

[Excel Zero]

Holy cow I am actually gonna jump in on this one and I will try to keep this as short as possible.

As a science major I belive in the empirical existence of things. In short, If I can test it, it is here.

As a man of questionable faith, I am bound by my own ideas that there is an overwhelming and overseeing power out there.

Now I want it documented and known by all who read this that I am NOT in any way taking sides. All I am doing is objectively arguing each side and showing one major flaw in each.

Creationism

It is very difficult to imagine something as complex as the human body being jumbled together and then suddenly working in a way that free thought is actually flowing through us. (This is of course if you believe that randomness does not exist and you believe pre destination) If you look at what evolution says, we started with a single celled organism who came from nothingess and BAM, you got human life after a period of a couple billion years. Now half my brain follows this course but I see an elementary flaw as a man of science and medicine. If I am to believe that creation is what took place, then I also am to believe basically whatever the thundrous being above says. So where is the flaw? Individuality of course. You have Catholocism, Christinaity, Muslim, Shinto and all sorts of factioning taking place even as we live and breath. If there is one absolute truth, then what is it? Now a Christian may say that the Holy Trinity and one true God is what took place. These people may wholly believe and have every ounce of their faith based in this. Now if this is the absolute truth, then why are others out there believing something different with every ounce of their being? I believe that if someone believes it, then in consequence it can be true. The problem I have with many religious fanatics is that when you have something that they might not be able to explain, they tend to fall into childish arguments such as "Because I have faith in it." Just because you have faith in it doesn't make it true for me.

Evolution

Now as a man of science I read up alot on theoretical physics and what not. Though I don't believe everything I read I found a wonderful example of how evolution could have happened. One of the 'malfunctions' of man is that we view the world in only four dimensions. Length, Width, Depth, and Time. We understand all of these just fine because they are a part of everyday life. However, many physicists believe and have in some cases diagramed that there are up to 26 dimensions that can describe the position and actions of an object. What many cosmologists and physicists believ has happened is a remarkably refreshing description of what happened at the instant of creation. They believe that in the mysterious fifth dimension, there exists the rest of the universe that us 3-D folks cannot comprehend but can be illustrated indirectly. Here is the example. Pretend for a moment that you have control over a land called Flatland. The people existing there are two dimmensional. You lay the world on the table in front of you and watch the happy residents go about their day. Suddenly you have this devious idea. You take your finger and point it downward toward the paper. Now the flatlanders cannot see your finger above their world because they cannot see the mysterious 3rd dimension of Depth. Now you touch the paper and begin to stick your finger into their world right in front of a now frightened 2 dimensional person. Remember that all he sees is just the 2-D outline of the finger, so to him he sees this mysterious circle appear in front of him, it grows as the wider area of your knuckle enters his plane and shrinks then disappears as you recede your finger and pull it out of their world. A truely terrifying experince for him but it offers this indirect explination of the Big Bang. Many of these 3D scientists believe that matter existed in the universe before the Big Bang but since it was in the fifth dimension or even beyond, we cannot begin to imagine what it may look like, so to us, nothing was ever there. So this fifth dimensional matter explodes with incredible force and thus, new life has begun. All the matter is five dimensional but we only see the three dimensional side of it and thus we percieve that nothing turned into something. I happen to find that to be an amazing idea and put some stock into it. But as before mentioned I find a near fatal flaw in this as well. If we assume this theory is true, how does science explain that there is no origin in time? How does physics explain that there is no beggining of time as we know it? So just as religious members may fall childish in their arguments of their own ignorance, scientists do the exact opposite. They tend to over debate and exhaust arguments about other equally amazing questions about life until you now have forgotten about the original question about the beggining of time?

Conclusion

My conclusion is that science and religion can be hand in hand if treated in a mature matter. The biggest problem is that man in this lifetime cannot begin to comprehend the truely awesome power of either debate. If it is evolution, then how will we ever be blessed enough to see into the fifth dimension and beyond? However, if it is Creation, then how will we ever possess the amazing omnipotent mind of the Lord, or whatever deity you believe in when we exist in a feeble and finite body?

Wow...that felt really good to finally get this out. Again I have not even begun to choose a path as I am researching many different idealogies for myself and I suggest if your will is strong enough, you do the same.

Excel

[Graillik Tur]

alright, lets get down to the nitty gritty. 7 day theory...understand that this is not an 'egotistical' idea. If there was a being that could create life from things that already exist in the realm of reality, we would give that being unsermountable respect...wait...we've done that. We cloned sheep, we created life from something that wasn't life before. Now imagine a being so old and educated that it has trancended the dimensions of time and space, why would this not be feasable? As humans we have made leaps and bounds in or technology. Now is is not feasable that a being with the knowlegdge to control atoms at will could not create life in 7 days?

Science is however on the verge of proving such a powe exists, in a universal threory called string theory. With this theory we could explain the inner workings of all matter with great degrees of success, is that not a god, one that can simply see the entire picture and bend its outcome to his will?

Don't begin to believe that a 'god' would be bound to the rules we have in our 4 dimensions.

[Excel Zero]

But even string theory has it's flaws. Edward Witten who is the founder of string theory even agreed that no one is smart enough to solve the unified field theory of strings and super strings. Since then other theories have been constructed that can someday surpass strings. Michio Kaku explained once that "String Theory exists but it taunts us because we are not smart enough to understand it.

So again we get stuck in the problem that science can't really verify the existence of a god and religion has yet to show itself to everyone in the world as the absolute truth.

The issue is that you could explain it simply in both ways if the people who were listening to you where ready to accept any of your ideas.

I could say to that person that the reason we'll never be able to understand or solve string theory is because it must exist in either 10 or 26 dimensions and we simply do not have the capacity to observe those dimensions due to our finite minds.

Or I could say to that person that the reason we'll never solve string theory is because God gave us a mind and free will but has the capacity for omnipotence and made us finite for his own reasons.

So it isn't that you or anyone who argues these and other ideas are wrong. It simply means that at this moment it isn't right for all of us, thus is isn't the absolute truth for some of us.

I sure do adore the fact that you are one of the great ones who fights die hard for your ideals. Way to be Grailick (and that isn't sarcasm I really do respect that side of you)

Excel

[Kiyomi]

Graillik, how is cloning a sheep creating life from something that did not exist? In all reality, it is just a different version of breeding. All they do to clone is take a blank egg and insert the DNA from an already existing animal into it. That is not creating something from nothing, that is just taking one container and emptying it of its contents in order to fill it with the contents of another container. Then the egg just goes along as if it had been formed by normal mating and fertilization. It copies itself over and over, forming an embryo, and eventually a new life. In fact, we cannot even grow the resulting embryo without a surrogate mother. That surrogate must even be in estrus (in heat) in order to accept the egg and allow it to grow in its womb.

Now if we took something that did not already have the genetic material of what we were trying to create and formed it into real life with the genetic material we wanted, that would be creating life from non-life. i.e. if we took a pile of dirt, formed it into the shape of a sheep with our hands, then miraculously breathed life into it (or however it would happen), resulting in a live sheep, that would be creating life from something that was not previously life.

If our ability to clone a sheep is creating life from non-life, then every time an animal or human gives birth, they are also creating life from non-life. So in essence, all we did was to control the process in which life is formed to a higher degree. Selective breeding is a form of controlling the process in which life is formed, too. If you mate two albino rabbits, you are thus insuring that every baby born will be an albino rabbit. That is a form of selection, just as cloning is a form of selection. Cloning is just a higher level of control. In return, though, if something is wrong with the orignal, there is no way to change that problem whereas with selective breeding you have the chance to remove that problem. In cloning you are forced to accept that the offspring will have excact same traits as the original. With selective breeding, you just have to cross your fingers and hope the offspring get the traits that you want them to get from each parent. I may be running in circles a bit here, but I am trying to show how cloning and selective breeding are very similar. Each has its problem, and neither can create life from non-life nor can you pick and choose which traits the offspring will have with either cloning or selective breeding.

[reaper]

[KenseiKurisuchan]

Quick note on the seven days:

The Hebrew word used for day in Genesis 1 simply means a period of time. Generally, a day is what was used as that period in Hebrew texts, but it could easily be different periods of time than actual days. There are plenty of theologians whom I respect that don't believe in the actual seven days. Myself, I don't really care which happened; I just realize that God could have created in as many days as He wanted, whether it be seven or seven billion.