From: callum@bain3.bain.oz.au (Callum Gibson)
Subject: Re: Creation & Evolution - the great side issue.
Organization: Bain & Company, Sydney, AUSTRALIA
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 23:55:45 GMT

Andrew William Easton (u9264442@cc.uow.edu.au) wrote:
> (stuff deleted)
> >that God created man in his own image, especially.  Death entered the world
> >through sin, but if we'd evolved then death would have been in the world
> >already.
> What makes you say that? I can't see any reason why that would be the case.

You can't see any reason why death is needed for evolution or why death wasn't
around before the fall?  I explained it below but maybe you missed it?

> >Sort of.  As I said above, there's more behind it than just the scientific
> >description of what happened.  I mean, what is the reason we are so tempted
> >to believe in evolution?  It's because we want to make it compatible with
> >science, we want to believe scientists more than God.
> No, we just want to explain what we can see (one of the central reasons for
> any religion). The Lord never said that the world did not evolve, so we are 
> not disbelieving him to say it did.

As you may have noticed, I'm not particularly wrapped by all the scientific
issues at hand here, mainly because I'm not a scientist and so I'd have to
take someone else's word for it which so far has gotten me nowhere.  What I'm
saying is that even though the bible does not explain how God made the world,
if any theory comes along that apparently has theological implications in
it then surely we must examine it carefully.  You keep saying it doesn't but
have you missed the point of what I was saying about death.  I'm not
presenting this as proof against evolution, but I would like these theological
issues ironed out.  Let's start with a clean paragraph.

Okay.  If God created a world with perfection, is it not true that he would
have created it without death as described in Genesis 1 & 2?  Well, maybe this
is a point of contention.  I would have thought if a perfect relationship
existed between man and God then it would be silly to have them up and die
on Him.  As a Christian, it begins to be dangerous to start wittling away
at Genesis and say well, that is really only a story and there was no perfect
relationship, or we weren't vegetarians, no flood, etc etc etc.  Don't you
think we can only take that argument so far and still be able to take the
bible seriously at all?  Note, I'm not even talking literal days here - I'm
speaking on a very general level of interpretation, that God created people
to have a relationship with them, then they rebelled.

> >But the former is exactly what has been happening.  If creation can be
> >described by natural processes then you don't need God, you don't need his
> >rules.  If an unborn child is just a collection of cells with no soul, and
> >looks just like the embryo of a fish, elephant, and any other animal you
> >care to mention,
> so are you denying that it does? Embryos look similar in the early stages of
> development. That is afact of life, no matter what you believe.

Let's not get off the topic.  I am suggesting that evolution provides an
excuse (to those who want one) that God does not exist.  I'm not talking
proof.  There is no proof or disproof of God.

> >Foundation attributes of lot of modern society's attitudes to the ideas that
> >are in harmony with evolution, namely that there is no God and that the world
> >just got like it is of it's own accord.
> They are not the ideas of evolution. Evolution does not deny God, and there is
> no proof (although some people believe it anyway) that the hand of God was not
> involved.

I agree that evolution does not directly deny God's existence.  But we have
to look at more than just that.  Evolution may have affect the way we think
of God, for example.  If evolution has theological implications then it is
important we try and understand them.  Don't keep saying that it has no
bearing.  Please explain why you think it doesn't (perhaps wrt my example).

> >> Best wishes,
> >cheerio
> bye.
adios.

regards,
    Callum
-- 
Callum Gibson                           callum@bain3.bain.oz.au
Eyeball Temporary Analyst/Programmer    BH : +61 2 258 1620
Fixed Income Division                   Fax: +61 2 258 1128
Bain & CO, Sydney, Australia.           AH : :-)