HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: tobis@meteor.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: Evol & God : CANNOT Co-exist!
Date: 2 Sep 92 19:25:22 GMT
Organization: University of Wisconsin, Meteorology and Space Science

In article <1992Aug28.003330.4541@ccu.umanitoba.ca> vnelson@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Gerald Vernon Nelson) writes:

>God playing evolution, is CREATION.

It is clear that you have to define your terms with some precision.
What do you mean by "God". What do you mean by "creation"? What do you
mean by "evolution"? If you define "evolution" as 'development of existing
biological systems in a universe in which nothing that can be called 'God'
exists', your assertion is clearly true, and clearly trivial.

It also becomes clear that you are offering a case in point for those
creationists who maintain that 'evolutionism' is a philosophy, rather
than 'evolution' being a theory that superbly accounts for known observations.

My own view is that 'God' is defined as "the Universe in its entirety, including
those ontological features which allow sentience to exist". Accordingly,
God exists by definition, and I don't need to worry about "loss of faith".
There are those who would maintain that such a view is merely tautology, and
adds nothing of value to the discussion, and strictly speaking it adds little
beyond a shorthand for what I take to be an extremely powerful and useful
abstraction. (This approach has a name among philosophers which escapes me
at the moment. Can anyone refresh me?) This approach leaves intact the
central insights of saints and prophets through the ages, which are 
spiritual, or if you prefer, experiential, rather than scientific, without
compelling me to accept the useless baggage of primitive hypotheses
of physics, e.g., creationism.

So to me, evolution is a physical fact, observed with enough precision to
be in no more doubt than, say, gravity. And God exists, by definition.

In the particulars of the debate, this puts me close to the view that
God "set up the conditions" for evolution to take place, but this phrasing
makes me uncomfortable. Rather God IS THE SET OF CONDITIONS that allow
evolution to occur.

In Stephen Hawking's memorable phrase, we have to wonder why the Universe
"goes to all the trouble of existing". Materialist philosophical outlooks
seem to me to trivialize the astonishing, and I have to say miraculous,
fact that we exist. It seems to me that an attitude of awe and wonder
and gratitude is entirely appropriate. 

mt
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: Laplace' Quote
Date: 28 Aug 92 22:31:44 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: LLNL

In article <25843@dog.ee.lbl.gov> sichase@csa3.lbl.gov writes:
>In article <5207@tuegate.tue.nl>, wsadjw@rw7.urc.tue.nl (Jan Willem Nienhuys) writes...

@ "Sire, je n'ai pas besoin de cet hypoth\`ese" if my memory is correct.
@ To put this in perspective, before Laplace it *was* assumed that the Creator
@ interfered with planetary motion; the stability of the Solar system was
@ an unsolved problem.  Napoleon (who having been educated in a military

>The stability of the solar system *is* an unsolved problem.  

	Perhaps not a completely solved one, but some work _has_ been
done in that direction via long-time simulations. The result: the
Solar System is weakly chaotic. This does not mean that the planets
simply bounce around, Velikovsky-style, but it does mean that the
planets' orbit parameters are chaotic _within definite boundaries_.
The time scale of this chaos is significant: a couple of million years
or so if memory serves me correctly, much too long for Velikovskian
catastrophes in historical times.

	However, the simulations extend back to only a fraction of the
age of the Solar System, so we are missing tests of stability over
that time. I suspect that such a test would have to be statistical,
due to the orbit chaos.
From: dabbott@augean.eleceng.adelaide.edu.AU (Derek Abbott)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: QM revisited.
Date: 31 Aug 92 01:01:52 GMT
Organization: Electrical and Electronic Eng., University of Adelaide

In article <1992Aug27.222940@IASTATE.EDU> btd@IASTATE.EDU (Benjamin T Dehner) writes:
>In article <1992Aug27.031145.8282@augean.eleceng.adelaide.edu.AU>,
>dabbott@augean.eleceng.adelaide.edu.AU (Derek Abbott) writes:
>> I've just come across some entertaining quotes:
>>
>>
>> "Those who are not shocked by quantum theory do not understand it" Neils Bohr
>>
>> "I don't like it, and I'm sorry I had anything to do with it" Erwin
>Schroedinger
>>
>
>       So?  If you have something to say, say it.

Enough has been said.

>>
>>
>> For those of you who remember the QM debate we had a few months ago
>> on sci.skeptic,
>>
>>                   Enjoy.
>
>       Jeez.  Not even the sound and the fury.

That's Dan's style, not mine :-)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,sci.physics,alt.folklore.science
From: lfoard@Turing.ORG (Lawrence C. Foard)
Subject: Re: The dangers in microwaved food...
Organization: The Turing Project, Charlottesville Virginia.
Date: Mon, 24 Aug 1992 04:15:49 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.134953.1500@mpifr-bonn.mpg.de> p257shu@fs1.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de (Susanne Huettemeister) writes:
>Recently the German NewAge journal raum&zeit (space&time) carried a
>long 'scientific' study that supposedly proved that microwave-cooked
>food will unconditionally lead to cancer in anyone eating it. 

Someone who takes the microwaves "nuke" nick name to seriously :-)

>The proof: 
>luminescent bacteria swimming in milk from a microwave oven 'shine'
>longer, and other arguments of that level. 

If you have a noticeable quantity of luminescent bacteria swimming in
your milk I would be worried :-)

>But still, this paper has
>been taken serious even by usually skeptical people, because at first
>glance it looks sound. Anyway, could someone lead us to serious reviews
>of the health risks (or even benefits) inherent in microwaved food?
>Since the technology has been on the market for a while and extremely
>widespread these days, studies should abound. Thanks!

Cooked food has been used for 10's of thousands of years atleast, 
Microwaves do nothing more than any other method heating food. Infact
they may do less since they don't burn parts to a crisp.
-- 
>>Unix/C Contract worker available 5 years C/unix work experience<<  ______
Available for Telecommuting/Travel and contracts on the T Line       \    /
in the Boston MA area. Send me e-mail for a copy of my Resume.        \  /
       -- VWIS 508-793-9568 (2400 baud), Linux support BBS.--          \/
Xref: sparky sci.skeptic:15880 alt.alien.visitors:6383 talk.religion.newage:4196
From: kring@efes.physik.uni-kl.de (Thomas Kettenring)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,alt.alien.visitors,talk.religion.newage
Subject: Re: Saga of the Family of Light I - Pleiadians13
Date: 4 Sep 92 01:05:09 GMT
Followup-To: alt.alien.visitors,talk.religion.newage
Organization: FB Physik, Universitaet Kaiserslautern, Germany

In article <3SEP199213095407@amarna.gsfc.nasa.gov>, pease@amarna.gsfc.nasa.gov (Pease) writes:
>Of course this is all just speculation anyway; but one possibility is
>that the DNA serves as a filter (or tuner) and that the complete past
>is stored in the electro-magnetic energy fields that make up everything.
>
>The DNA then tunes one in to that information which matches ones
>particular tuner (frequency, vibrations).
>
>Just a possibility of how it could be.

Sorry, you can't impress sci.skeptic readers with that technobabble.  I know
what electro-magnetic fields are, what energy is, what frequency and vibrations
are.  Your sentences may sound scientific for a layman but for anybody
who knows a little bit physics they hardly parse.

I took sci.skeptic out of the Followup line.  Put it back if you want, but
that will only create unnecessary flames.

-- 
thomas kettenring, 2 dan, kaiserslautern, germany
Science is like democracy - it's not perfect, but it's the best thing available.
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
From: schumach@convex.com (Richard A. Schumacher)
Subject: Re: Evol & God : CANNOT Co-exist!
Organization: CONVEX Computer Corporation, Richardson, Tx., USA
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 1992 16:48:11 GMT
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by a user at CONVEX Computer
              Corp. The opinions expressed are those of the user and
              not necessarily those of CONVEX.

In <1992Aug28.003330.4541@ccu.umanitoba.ca> vnelson@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Gerald Vernon Nelson) writes:

>God playing evolution, is CREATION.

And Vern Nelson playing at debate, is PEDANTRY.



Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
From: vnelson@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Gerald Vernon Nelson)
Subject: Re: Evol & God : CANNOT Co-exist!
Organization: University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 00:33:30 GMT

In <10469@sun13.scri.fsu.edu> pepke@gw.scri.fsu.edu (Eric Pepke) writes:

>Isaac Asimov wrote a pretty essay about this.  A bunch of physicists were 
>playing pool and discussing creationism.  One brought up the question, why 
>play pool at all when it was so much simpler to pick up all the balls, 
>walk around the table, and drop the balls into the pockets?  That's 
>standard creationism: god made things like this and they stayed that way.  
>However, mightn't a god enjoy the play of evolution the same way pool 
>players enjoy the play of the game?

Playing pool by dropping the balls into the pockets is not playing pool,
it is playing "dropping balls into pockets".

God playing evolution, is CREATION.

Vern Nelson
Xref: sparky sci.skeptic:14973 talk.origins:10059
From: torkel@sics.se (Torkel Franzen)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,talk.philosphy.misc
Subject: Re: Why binary logic?
Date: 1 Sep 92 21:36:06 GMT
	<1992Aug27.040522.18524@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>,<1992Aug28.075924.11599@augean.eleceng.adelaide.edu.AU>
	<1992Sep1.181533.5531@cco.caltech.edu>
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Kista

In article <1992Sep1.181533.5531@cco.caltech.edu> carl@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU
 (Carl J Lydick) writes:

 >Well, let's see.  If we're dealing with something with only two states
 >(that IS what is meant by "two mutually exclusive and opposing concepts"),
 >it would seem to make sense to use a two-valued logic system.

  The concept of "something with only two states" is itself in general
dependent on which logic you use. For example, in intuitionistic as
opposed to classical logic, "two mutually exclusive and opposing
concepts" does not necessarily imply "something with only two states".
Or in other words, "X has property P" and "X does not have property P"
are mutually exclusive and opposing concepts in intuitionistic logic,
but this does not mean that we are justified in asserting "X has or
does not have property P".
Xref: sparky sci.skeptic:15446 sci.bio:3049 talk.origins:10402
From: sichase@csa3.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,alt.culture.usenet,talk.origins
Subject: Re: Common knowledge? Boishemoi!
Date: 25 Aug 92 21:02:40 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Distribution: na
Reply-To: sichase@csa3.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.198
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

In article <1992Aug25.105458@IASTATE.EDU>, danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock) writes...
> 
>   Just for fun, could you provide a list of the evil or anti-social
>implications of evolution that are "common knowledge" in your community? I
>suspect that most are not actually implied by evolution but rather by
>distortions of evolution BUT if evolution does have evil implications I want to
>know.

I would take your argment one step further.  Let us grant the creationists
the possibility that evolution has some "evil implications."  Now what? 
Should we abandon the truth because it conflicts with our notions of how
society should be organized?  Should we stick our heads in the sand? 

It is *not* a fact that Africans are a separate species.  But what if we
had found out that they were?  Should we have ignored it?  Killed all
the scientists to keep the secret from spreading?  What?

It seems to me that we have to accept reality for what it is.  We can 
refute false conclusions drawn from misunderstandings of evolution.
But we must also insist that all the real conclusions are facts of life.
Somehow, by arguing the way you do, you imply that if the creationists were
to ultimately come up with unrefutable evidence that evolution leads to 
evil social consequences that we would actually be forced to give it up.

-Scott
--------------------
Scott I. Chase			"The question seems to be of such a character
SICHASE@CSA2.LBL.GOV		that if I should come to life after my death
				and some mathematician were to tell me that it
				had been definitely settled, I think I would
				immediately drop dead again."      - Vandiver
From: sichase@csa1.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: panspermia
Date: 3 Sep 92 19:25:01 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory - Berkeley, CA, USA
Distribution: na
Reply-To: sichase@csa1.lbl.gov
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.254.196
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4   

In article <18597nINNj3l@moe.ksu.ksu.edu>, jsanders@phys.ksu.edu (Justin M. Sanders) writes...
>In article <95281@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
> 
>>Yep, panspermia (which hardly anybody takes seriously, but never seems
>>to go away) really just begs the question. If life wasn't formed on
>>earth, then we'd have to find out where, how and when it formed
>>somewhere else. 
> 
>About the best that can be said for panspermia is that it allows one to 
>remove the constraints on abiogenesis imposed by conditions on the early
>Earth.  Need a reducing atmosphere?  Just posit one on the "homeworld."

About the best that can be said for panspermia is that it might be right.
We really don't know.  It's certainly hard to imagine, but then again nobody
has yet to devise a reasonably irrefutable model of abiogenesis on the Earth,
although I certainly believe that someone eventually will.  Only then do 
I think that people will discard panspermia.  

It seems that there is something warm and cuddly about the notion that
we are the heirs of some kind of space seed.  People want to be more
connected with the rest of the Universe - to know that there is someone
else out there, etc.  I think that this is mostly responsible for the 
attention that panspermia gets among the laity.

-Scott
--------------------
Scott I. Chase			"The question seems to be of such a character
SICHASE@CSA2.LBL.GOV		that if I should come to life after my death
				and some mathematician were to tell me that it
				had been definitely settled, I think I would
				immediately drop dead again."      - Vandiver
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
From: m23364@mwunix (James Meritt)
Subject: Re: The Evolution vrs. creationism debate
Keywords: The debate
Organization: MITRE Corporation, McLean VA
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 16:35:35 GMT

In article <1992Sep1.153512.1207@cco.caltech.edu> keith@cco.caltech.edu (Keith Allan Schneider) writes:
}dtyler%jt_home.uucp@amber.athena.lkg.dec.com (David Tyler) writes:
}
}[stuff deleted]
}
}>2. Talk to a scientist, find out what happens when two people with the SAME
}>gentic-makeup breed and have offspring. If the Adam and Eve theory where
}>true, we would all be idoits! 
}
}No, this isn't true.  If is jsut more likely that incest will cause a number
}of recessive traits to blossom.  Incest in general creates usually 
}healthy children.  Sometimes, the children are sickly.

You overlook their common defense:  There WERE NO negative recessive traits
before the fall.  

}>3. Think about it, Cristianity is VERY lucky to survive this long, first the
}>Romans, then the "light at the end of the tunnel of ignorance and hate"
}>(i.e. "The Enlightenment" of the 1700's), In the 1800's, Darwin, who had
}>SCIENTIC PROOF FOR HIS THEORY! Then the revelation about the dinosaurs as
}>living creatures in the 1900's (When people began to look futher into the
}>mesizoic age. (Sorry for the spelling) 
}
}If you unserstand the psychology behind religious belief, you'd understand
}why Christianity and other such religions have been around for so long.
}People need a comfort against the cruel environment.  Also, once instituted,
}religion becomes a self-propogating thing.  People practice religion 
}because if they don't, they will feel an anxiety.  Read some Freud and Jung
}for more info.

BTW:  What makes you think that it did?  There are a number of people who do
not believe that the christianity(0) of 2k years ago resembles the
christianity(168724) that you find now (or any of the wild variants).

}
}>4. So many fossils are around that creationism seems to be dim in
}>comparison.
}
}Again, the religion folk have all the proof they need right within their own 
}minds.  They for the most part have had religious experiences which are
}interpreted as a proof of God.  They pray, and something listens.  The trouble
}is due to their mistaking their own unconscious for a supernatural presence.

Not exactly.  (Blind) faith, not proof.

Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
From: jkiley@andy.bgsu.edu (James H. Kiley)
Subject: Re: Proof: God wrote the Bible
Organization: Bowling Green State University B.G., Oh.
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 00:34:59 GMT

Ohhhh, posts like this drive me nuts.
The bible wasn't written in English originally, you fool.  Vowel/consonant
ratios will *not* be the same in, say, Hebrew.

Jim Kiley
jkiley@andy.bgsu.edu
From: lawson@acuson.com (Drew Lawson)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic
Subject: Mike McCants' Debating Skills (was: Young earth creationist logic NOT!)
Date: 28 Aug 92 17:42:00 GMT
Reply-To: lawson@aldia.UUCP (Drew Lawson)
Distribution: usa
Organization: ACUSON, Mountain View, CA

In article <3660@execu.execu.com> mike@execu.execu.com (Mike McCants) writes:
>In article <1992Aug27.171036.12606@acuson.com> lawson@aldia.UUCP (Drew Lawson) writes:

>>There is a difference between intentionally doing something and doing
>>something with intent.


>>I can intentionally build a tower without intending you to fall off of it.
>
>God could intentionally create an Earth 6000 years ago that has every
>appearance of being billions of years old.  And put rational men on it
>to discover His physical laws.  And be so dimwitted as to not forsee
>that they will be mislead?  Well, He certainly didn't "intend" that, did
>he?

Is your standard method to garble the discussion whenever you lose on a point?
The above drivel has nothing to do with the statement it was responding to.


>No, of course He didn't intend that.  We can't possibly know His purpose,
>but it could not be that.  Anything but that.  He is so inscrutable that
>our poor minds can't even think of a purpose that would be worthy of him.
>
>Can you?
>
>Does that purpose (if you can think of one) conflict with evolution?

Yes I can and yes it does.

If you think that I will openly enter a discussion on this with someone
who has shown himself to be interested only in argument, you mush think
I am even more foolish than you have implied.  (and that would take a
lot)

If you want someone to engage you in debate, the least you can do is to
occasionally stick to the topic.

-- 
Drew Lawson                      If you're not part of the solution,
lawson@acuson.com                you're part of the precipitate
From: mike@execu.execu.com (Mike McCants)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,talk.origins
Subject: Re: Logic and God (was: Young earth creationist logic NOT!)
Date: 25 Aug 92 17:38:47 GMT
Followup-To: sci.skeptic
Distribution: usa
Organization: Comshare, Inc. Austin Development Center

In article <1992Aug24.151922.5348@acuson.com> lawson@aldia.UUCP (Drew Lawson) writes:
>
>You are expecting God to set up the system
>such that you are unable to make a mistake.
                   ^^^^^^
Now really - the use of "unable to make a mistake" makes this a very
silly statement.  Do you really think that a scientist has this
expectation?  Have you heard any scientists claim infallibility recently?

A scientist expects that if he makes a mistake, there will be some
way for him to observe something that indicates that he has made
a mistake.  As long as he fails to observe anything that indicates
that he has made a mistake, he has no reason to think he has made
a mistake.  If God so perfectly constructs the historical evidence
so that there is no indication that the theory of evolution is a
mistake, and if it is a mistake, then he has deceived us.

If I produce a "perfect" counterfit bill, one that cannot be distinguished
from a legally printed bill, then I know it's a fake, but you are
deceived when you accept it as payment.  If God recently produced a
"perfect" historical record, then he knows it's a fake and we are deceived.

So, do you argue that he did indeed produce a perfect deception?
Or do you argue that it is imperfect and we have yet to find its
imperfection?

Do you argue that the perfect deception is revealed only when we
accept the Bible as the literal truth?  Can you see why a scientist
would not be impressed with this argument?

>What if they were created for another
>purpose entirely, one which people (in general) have yet to discover?

Who claims to have discovered "why" the universe was created?
Is this claim a "scientific" one?

>No, I do not know that purpose, that doesn't tell me that there is
>none.

What DOES tell you that there is one?  Is it "intuitively obvious"?
Is it "revealed truth"?

>My assurance of truth (which I hold primarily to have
>personal application) comes from study of the scriptures accompanied by
>pondering and prayer.  This brings the guidance of the Holy Spirit to
>help me to understand and choose what is right.  I also ponder and pray
>about other (non-scriptural) issues to understand how this all applies
>to the rest of my life.
>
>I fully understand that someone out there is likely to ridicule me for
>the above paragraph, which is why I normally don't express it openly.
>Hopefully, it will offer some insight to one person out there.

A statement of personal faith should not be ridiculed.  It is quite
courageous of you to post it.  But, how can I trust your personal
statement that the theory of evolution is a mistake, when all of
the scientific evidence indicates the contrary?  How is your statement
of faith relevant to a scientific argument on the merits of the
theory of evolution?

>Drew Lawson

Mike McCants