Evolution


LionHeart
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The more I think of it, the more I believe that evolution is a bunch of mumbo jumbo. For example, one of the premises behind the theory is mutation out of necessity. For example, If an animal is exposed to a certain environment in which it cannot thrive, it supposedly adapts to that environment. So pray tell, was it such a neccessity of life that we be able to pick up a penny that we formed finger nails? Perhaps bums evolved from monkeys and then we evolved from bums.

Also for many things, there are factors that have nothing to do with the life form in question. For example, the dandilion, or the tumble weed. They utilize the wind to spread their seeds. I find it hard to believe that they mutated that way out of necessity for survival. It must be a result of the creative mind of the creator.

There seems to be a perfect balance of things on this Earth. Hundreds of things seem to be balanced so perfectly so as to be able to support life on this Earth. For example, the distance between the Earth and the sun. If you move the Earth slightly further away, it becomes too cold. If you move it slightly closer, it becomes too hot. Other examples are the thickness of the Earth's crust, the fact that plants and animals support each other. Or consider this one: the very speed at which the Earth, as well as all the other planets travel around the Sun. If you slow them down, their orbit decays and they fall into the sun. If you speed them up, they fling out into space and become comets. And we have our giant neighbor Jupiter. Jupiter is a huge planet that takes the hit for the Earth whenever a large asteroid threatens to hit us.

The mathematical odds of these things all happening by chance to seemingly meet the single goal of enabling Earth to support life would be billions to one.

I'm sure for most of us, the conclusion to all of this is a no brainer; that there ultimately is a divine creator. But I do enjoy observing all of the evidences of the existence my Father in Heaven. And I can't help but marvel at the thousands of such things that are on this planet and the size of the blueprint it must have required. And realizing the effort that went into this project, it only saddens me when people attempt to explain away His existence through such rediculous theories.

L.H.

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What has always troubled me about evolution is the problem of the origin of life. We have yet to identify or even slightly describe or conceive how lifeless matter spontaneously and arbitrarily gave birth to the elementary primitive life-form from which all life evolved.

I can remember being taught in school as a youngster that in old-times people believed that setting fire to a bundle of hay would bring about new life, but only later did men realize that these frogs and mice had been born under natural circumstances and had made residence in the hay only to be disturbed by the fire. It was related by my teacher that such nonsense was laughable. It is interesting that only a few years later the same institution wanted me to believe that very idea, saying a bolt of lighting caused a chemical reaction and brought about the incredible first biological experiment through formation of an amoeba in a pool of water billions of years ago which spawned all we know as life today.

Although all science since then has done nothing but disprove it, we still are told there had to be an exception somewhere.

-a-train

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I find the theory of evolution to be a house of straw as well.

Going along with what you were trying to express, Lionheart, how does an environmental factor (a penny on the ground; or leaves high in the tree in the case of a giraffe or pre-giraffe needing to eat the high leaves and therefore increase survival) inform the DNA instructions? How does the environmental factor bear upon that at all?

The answer at least partly, is that the theory of evolution imagines that there are innumerable mutations that arise spontaneously and randomly (in response to no stimulus other than unknown energy or intraDNA processes) and these mutations are all BORN biological items, but the ones that have short necks (giraffes) dies out (Starvation) before reproduction and ability to pass on their short neck genes, whereas since the long necks were able to EAT, they reached the age of reproduction and passed on genes and this lasted enough generations until there was an entire specie of long necks.

This seems to me to be a very inadequate explanation as well.

The following is an excerpt of a book I am writing titled: "The Origin of the Human Body"

"Think of your body as a separate object.

A machine. A vessel. An instrument. It takes up space. It is formed of matter. It has capacities and capabilities and functions.

Your body was conceived. It developed and was born. It continued to develop to its (hopefully) prime. There was an extended prime period. Your body is aging and will die. When your body is buried, it will break down. It will be eaten by microorganisms.

Conception, birth, death, and many of the other words I have used could bear definition, but we will forgive ourselves of that yet.

I ask this question.

What is the origin of my body?

What is the origin of the human body?

Oddly enough, I and we know the answer to that exactly, from direct observation.

. . . . We know that the sperm and ovum each carry twenty-three chromosomes that represent some half of the genetic code of the body they come from. When the sperm and ovum meet and fuse, the two sets of (twenty-three) chromosomes become one set of forty-six chromosomes and a new human body (not to be confused with the term ‘new person’) has been initiated.

This is all very clear.

If we turn our minds to the past, in our imaginations we can watch the conceptions of billions of human bodies in that past. Myself, then my mother and father, then my grandparents and so on in innumerable generations that we cannot give name to.

Human bodies produce (reproduce) new human bodies. This is inarguable.

At what point in that past, that chain of generations, do we see that a human body is produced from a non-human body or non-human object/process? Why do we see that and at what point in time did our realization of that information arise?

Since it is observable that human bodies are generated from human bodies, what has caused us to conclude something inobservable (so far), namely that a human body was generated from something non-human?

This is a concept that is agreed to be true among us. We feel that we have learned it.

There was a time and space that did not have human bodies in it, we say. And then a human body existed – once? Then many times. A human body was made. Was born. Arose. Was generated, produced. Created.

Forget about where we learned it. Forget about terming that ‘where’ as religion or science or something else.

Simply answer this question.

If we KNOW that a human body is created from two other human bodies, then how and when and why did we learn, or believe that we learned, that in the past there was ever a different process for generating a body? What record or report are we receiving information from to conclude this, since we are limited from directly observing the far past?

For the purposes of this book, let us begin here: let us rely on our observation only. A human body is generated from another human body. That is our only conclusion. Let us not come to any other conclusion until we have passed through this book–wherein we will view records, reports, etc. They may lead us where they will to a conclusion about the ultimate origin of the human body.

I can tell you right now that there are only four possible ends to the story. One, we will conclude that human bodies ALWAYS come from other human bodies–there IS no other different process and there never was. Two, we will conclude that the first human body was generated from some other non-human biological organism. Three, that the origin of the first human body was from some other object or process neither human NOR biological. Remember, too, that for conclusions two and three, there would have been a FIRST human body. Since we cannot observe it, we are on a search for the record of it. There would be a FIRST, or possibly a FIRST SET. Number two relies on a biological birth process (probably) and a birth, in our experience, takes a few hours only. So, for number two, we have an entire existence with no human body THERE, and then within the time it takes for gestation and birth (several months only), there now exists ONE HUMAN BODY.

The fourth conclusion is this: a little bit of the first three conclusions in some combination.

It could happen."

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Here's a very long article that Snow posted regarding Evolution back in 2006:

Mormons and Evolution

Please note that this is an essay that covers the current state of evidence for evolution in a summary fashion. It is written by a man, David H. Bailey, who has published a good deal of research in this area, and who is a faithful Latter-day Saint.

David H. Bailey

I must confess that I find the continuing debates about what some LDS general authorities have said about evolution and the age of the earth, or what the "official" LDS position is on these issues, to be rather tiresome at this point in time. Such debates just don't matter any more, except perhaps to historians, because the scientific facts supporting the basic notions of these theories are now just too well established. Past writings by General Authorities or other religious leaders criticizing these theories only prove that they are human. I think it's time we accepted this and moved on.

Please indulge me while I discuss this matter in some detail.

I. Overview of Current Scientific Evidence

Once one could argue that there were uncertainties in geological dating, or that there are too many "missing links" in the fossil record, or that the fundamental mechanisms of heredity and evolution were not known. But in the last few decades, things have changed.

That the earth is many millions of years old is now well established. Measured dates of individual geological layers, even when taken from samples on opposite sides of the earth, agree. Many thousands of these measurements have been made, using a number of different techniques. Can they all simultaneously be in error? One modern dating technique is known as "fission track" dating. This is based on the spontaneous fission of uranium atoms, which occurs at a well-established rate not influenced by temperature, pressure, or chemical combination. Such fissions leave a distinctive track in specimens of a certain type of crystal. Thus by counting the number of tracks in a given specimen, and by measuring its uranium content, a very reliable date can be determined.

With regards to evolution, every year or so it seems we hear of some new discovery of early hominid fossils -- not just isolated teeth or bones, but nearly complete skeletons in some cases. A number of other convincing "missing link" fossils have recently been discovered. Natural evolution has been exhibited in ways obvious to anyone, including changes observed in the resistance of certain diseases to medicines, and in changes in the AIDS virus since it was first discovered.

The recent advancements in molecular biology, including the discovery of the structure of DNA and the role of mutations, has provided a clear mechanism for heredity and evolution. Computer simulations of these processes not only verify the theory of evolution but have also been applied to completely different fields. The resulting schemes, which are known as "genetic algorithms", are for some computational problems the most efficient solution schemes known.

Further, countless comparisons of DNA sequences between species have now been published. Hemoglobin molecule sequences have also been catalogued for many species. These results provide virtually incontestable evidence of evolution, since scientists no longer have to rely on vague similarities in appearance between different species -- the evolutionary distance between species can now be objectively and quantitatively measured. For example, the 141-long alpha chain of the hemoglobin molecule is identical in chimpanzees, differs in only one location in gorillas, yet differs in 25 locations in rabbits and in over 100 locations in fish.

Even more dramatic are the recent announcements of recovering DNA from ancient organisms. Ironically, one of the most dramatic of these discoveries, namely dinosaur DNA, was made by an LDS scientist (Scott Woodward at BYU). These developments herald the advent of what Charles Darwin, in his wildest fantasies, might not have imagined possible: the direct analysis of the course of evolution, including human evolution, at the DNA level, through the eons.

All of these results are supported by reams of meticulous research, and there is more than enough dissent in the field to insure that any weakly supported or imprecisely argued claims are ripped apart. Too bad the religious world doesn't subject itself to such rigorous analysis!

II. Creationist Counter-Arguments

A small group of "creation scientists", funded by a coalition of fundamentalist Christian sects, has generated literature criticizing the conventional scientific theories, and proposing its own alternate theories. Many religious-minded people, including many LDS people, have found these arguments convincing, since they reinforce a straightforward literal interpretation of Biblical scriptures. However, they fall far short of having sufficient substance to be taken seriously by knowledgeable scientists (and not just because of their Biblical slant).

The most sophisticated and convincing of the creationist arguments are based on probability. I myself studied probability theory while a graduate student Stanford, and as far as I can see these arguments are all fallacious. The usual flaw is that they ignore the trillions of possible alternate biological systems that could have arisen on earth but didn't. All one can really conclude from these lines of reasoning is that our particular DNA sequence and biochemistry are unlikely to be duplicated elsewhere.

The creationist literature pretty well goes downhill from here. For example, they like to argue that evolution is impossible because it is contrary to the second law of thermodynamics. Sadly, the LDS authority Elder George R. Hill used this line of reasoning in his article in the June 1993 Ensign. But the SLOT only applies to closed systems, not to the earth's biosphere, which is continually receiving prodigious amounts of energy from the sun. Using the creationists' SLOT argument, one could just as well conclude that snowflakes, convection currents in pots of hot water, as well as all other spontaneously organizing phenomena, are fundamentally impossible.

Another creationist argument is that if conventional geologic dating were correct, then the Apollo astronauts would have been engulfed in 100 feet of moon dust. This claim is based on some early, flawed estimates of the rate of flow of space dust. These estimates were corrected many years ago with more accurate measurements, made by spacecraft. Needless to say, these newer measurements are completely consistent with the small amount of dust found by the astronauts.

One other creationist favorite is the famous "human" footprint found in an ancient dinosaur fossil bed near the Paluxy River in Texas. But this has been exposed as a fraud. It is also completely inconsistent with other fossils in the area, which represent thousands of species, yet not a single specimen of any mammal larger than a mouse.

Some of the creationist theories are so ludicrous that I don't know how any intelligent person can present them and hold a straight face. One of these is the notion that all of the worldwide geological layers were deposited during Noah's flood, and that the reason more advanced animal fossils are found near the top is that they could swim better. Why then indeed are the geological layers so well defined? What about infants, the sick or the aged -- why didn't they sink to the bottom?

III. Geology and Evolution at BYU

Those of you who have attended BYU are probably aware that the conventional scientific theories of geology, paleontology, botany and zoology are taught at the school, with the approval of the administration. These departments have successfully beaten back several attempts to impose creationism at the university. BYU has a number of very well respected scientists in this area, including Scott Woodward (mentioned above) in DNA, Duane Jeffery in genetics, and Jim Jensen (now retired) in geology, who assembled what is currently the largest collection of dinosaur fossils. It is stored under the BYU football stadium.

It is important to note that not one of the numerous LDS scientists at BYU currently espouses the creationist viewpoint, according to a recent surveys of the faculty. Thus those Mormons who insist on a literal reading of Genesis not only place themselves outside the mainstream of worldly scientific thought, but they also place themselves outside the mainstream of LDS scientific thought as well.

IV. Religious Implications

None of this means that one has to abandon belief in God, the Plan of Salvation, the Atonement of Christ, or any other basic doctrine. One can even believe that God oversaw the process of creation and evolution and be consistent with known scientific facts. But, in my opinion, thinking latter-day saints (or thinking Christians of any denomination, for that matter) cannot continue to cling onto the classical notion that God created the earth and universe a few thousand years ago, or that there were no living or dying beings on earth before Adam. We have to at least accept the basic outline, that the earth is many millions of years old, and that there has been a steady progression of living organisms, culminating in beings much like modern humans, through the ages.

The only other choice, as far as I can see, is to posit that God created the earth out of thin air about 6000 years ago, complete with an intricate system of fossil-laden, radiometrically dated rocks, plus a hundred other very convincing indications of a old evolutionary origin. Further, depending on how one reads Genesis, one may have to posit (as creationist Duane Gish has actually suggested) that God created the entire universe at this time, complete with light rays already streaming on a path to the earth as if they had originated from stars that are millions of light years away. Why? As a "test of faith"?

I submit that such a creator, guilty as he/she presumably is of executing a deliberate fraud of an inconceivably wide-ranging scope, is utterly unworthy of our worship or obedience. My God is a god of truth, reason and rationality, who rewards diligent, honest seekers of truth with ever grander rewards of knowledge.

Furthermore, if Mormons continue to deny very well established scientific facts, then the LDS Church will find itself in a camp with only most extreme wing of the literal fundamentalists. This in general is the same group which produces most of the anti-Mormon propaganda that is distributed. Would this have been the wishes of Joseph Smith, Brigham Young and other founders of our faith? Is this your wish?

Joseph Smith shocked his contemporaries by teaching that the Bible is incomplete, incorrectly translated and not necessarily 100% inspired. He also taught, contrary to orthodox Catholic and Protestant doctrines, that God's miracles are not contraventions of natural law, but that instead God works within the realm of natural laws, and that we can discover these laws by diligent study and faith. Joseph specifically denied the doctrine of creation ex nihilo.

Brigham Young was particularly explicit in rejecting a highly literal

reading of the creation scriptures: “ As for the Bible account of the creation we may say that the Lord gave it to Moses, or rather Moses obtained the history and traditions of the fathers, and from these picked out what he considered necessary, and that account has been handed down from age to age, and we have got it, no matter whether it is correct or not, and whether the Lord found the earth empty and void, whether he made it out of nothing or out of the rude elements; or whether he made it in six days or in as many millions of years, is and will remain a matter of speculation in the minds of men unless he give revelation on the subject. If we understood the process of creation there would be no mystery about it, it would be all reasonable and plain, for there is no mystery except to the ignorant.” [brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 14, pg. 116 (May 14, 1871).]

Growing up in Utah Valley, with its ring of mountains exposing intricate, convoluted geological layers, and with amazing fossils (esp. dinosaurs) at numerous locations around the state, it seemed clear to me that the Lord led the Saints to this region so that they would not be seduced by creationism. Why then do Mormons cling to Biblical literalism even today? It beats me!

V. Conclusion

A quote from Elder B. H. Roberts sums up this discussion quite well: “On the other hand, to limit and insist upon the whole of life and death to this side of Adam's advent to the earth, some six or eight thousand years ago, as proposed by some, is to fly in the face of the facts so indisputably brought to light by the researcher of science in modern times, and this as set forth by men of the highest type in the intellectual and moral world; not inferior men, or men of sensual and devilish temperament, but men who must be accounted as among the noblest and most self-sacrificing of the sons of men -- of the type whence must come the noblest sons of God, since ‘the glory of God is intelligence’ (D&C 93:36); and that too the glory of man.”

These searchers after truth are of that class. To pay attention to and give reasonable credence to their research and findings is to link the church of God with the highest increase of human thought and effort. On that side lies development, on the other lies contraction. It is on the former side that research work is going on and will continue to go on, future investigation and discoveries will continue on that side, nothing will retard them, and nothing will develop on the other side. One leads to narrow sectarianism, the other keeps the open spirit of a world movement with which our New Dispensation began. As between them which is to be our choice?

[brigham H. Roberts, "The Truth, the Way, the Life: An Elementary Treatise on Theology", 1930 (republished by SRA in 1994), pg. 363-364.]

Note that the above passage was written by B. H. Roberts in 1930. Consider for a moment how much more compelling this conclusion is today!

M.

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M,

You are not LDS and have not covenanted with God so why would you want to quote an LDS member that is quoting an LDS author on something to which you can not possibly identify? :angry2:

Sorry; letting that one go was too hard for me today. I hope you see what I was doing there and it is taken for what it is-just a joke taken from another thread. :)

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For those of you who have seen the cute movie Baptists at our Barbecue -- remember the exchange between Tartan and Mrs. Jones? something to this effect:

Mrs. Jones: "Why if the Lord can create the earth in seven days . . . [etc]"

Tartan: "Well, not literally."

Then I think Mrs. Jones started beating Tartan up for the heresy!! Lol ROFL.

Check it out!

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No doubt Joseph Smith disregarded Creation Ex Nihilo. Brigham Young explicitly denied the 'adobe' style creation of man. The problem is this, Brigham also told that Adam wasn't created from dust literally but came from another sphere. 'Natural Selection' may be hard at work, but Adam could not have descended from the apes if he came from another sphere... ...at least not this earth's apes.

We also need to take a close look at what happened when Adam partook of the the forbidden fruit. If no death in any species could take place before his transgression, then he either fell millions of years ago before all those dinosaurs died or they didn't die until more recently.

The theory also has been raised that fossils and geological phenomena pre-dating Adam could have also pre-dated Creation and are part of the pre-existant matter used to make the earth. The indications of such could be that the earth was used in a more primitive form for another purpose before being prepared for the temporal existance of Adam's family.

Basically, all the science we know combined with our Scriptures still give us only the tiniest glimpse at it's formation. I think the LDS are more able to swallow old-earth theories and etc. due to a different understanding of Creation than mainstream Christianity anyway.

I like the B.H. Roberts quote.

-a-train

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Here's one of my earlier posts dealing with this:

I found the above article to be sound and I agree with much of it.

There are a number of things which are not taught or discussed among LDS Church members that bear consideration. The main problem most LDS members have with evolution is that it requires the occurence of the death of billions of organisms over millions of years to account for the fossil record in the strata of the earth's crust. Yet the scriptures say there was no death before the Fall of Adam (Moses 6:48, 59). How can these two seemingly contradictory teachings be harmonized?

There is a way for both views to be correct at the same time. The first clue is found in the Pearl of Great Price. Readers should note that the account of creation in the Book of Moses is a record of the spiritual creation of the earth and the life forms inhabiting it, etc... while the account of creation in the Book of Abraham is a record of the physical creation of the earth and the life forms inhabiting it, etc...

Abraham 5:3 says the Gods decided to sanctify the earth on the seventh day of the physical creation. Well okay, what does sanctify mean in this context? Does it just mean to designate it as a day of rest? Or could it mean something else entirely? Let's turn to D&C 77:12 for the answer:

"Q. What are we to understand by the sounding of the trumpets, mentioned in the 8th chapter of Revelation?

A. We are to understand that as God made the world in six days, and on the seventh day he finished his work, and sanctified it, and also formed man out of the dust of the earth, even so, in the beginning of the seventh thousand years will the Lord God sanctify the earth, and complete the salvation of man, and judge all things, and shall redeem all things, except that which he hath not put into his power, when he shall have sealed all things, unto the end of all things; and the sounding of the trumpets of the seven angels are the preparing and finishing of his work, in the beginning of the seventh thousand years—the preparing of the way before the time of his coming."

I've put important bits in bold type. I'm not putting forth this idea as gospel truth (if you'll pardon the pun), but bear with me if you'd be so kind. This verse links the sanctification of the earth and all life on it on the seventh "day" of creation with the sanctification of the earth that will take place at the beginning of the Millennium, after Christ's Second Coming. Well I won't list all the scriptures but I'm sure we're all pretty familiar with the fact that during the Millenium there will be no death, the earth will be changed (valleys exalted, mountains brought low, etc...) and essentially "translated" into a more glorious state than it now occupies.

So we have sanctification being loosely defined as changing a telestial planet where death occurs into a more glorious planet where there is no death. Hmmm, a glorified earth without death...sound like the conditions of the earth during Adam and Eve's stay in the Garden of Eden prior to their Fall?

Well if you look at D&C 77:12 again, it not only says that the earth wasn't sanctified (which involves banishing death if we define sanctification according to the sanctification of the world during the Millennium) until the seventh "day" of creation, but it also says that on the seventh "day" of creation is when man was formed of the dust of the earth...basically, when Adam and Eve were placed in Eden.

So let's construct a few syllogisms, shall we?

Syllogism #1:

A. During the Millenium, there will be no death and the earth will become more glorious than it now is;

B. D&C 77:12 calls this change "sanctification;"

Therefore...

C. Sanctification can mean changing the planet into a more glorious state where there is no death.

Taking the C from above and using it as the starting point for a new syllogism:

Syllogism #2:

A. Sanctification can mean changing the planet into a more glorious state where there is no death;

B. D&C 77:12 says God sanctified the earth on the seventh "day" of its creation process;

Therefore...

C. For the first "six" days of the earth's creation process, it was unsanctified.

Taking the first and second syllogism's C's we form the next syllogism:

Syllogism #3:

A. For the first "six" days of the earth's creation process, it was unsanctified;

B. Sanctification can mean changing the planet into a more glorious state where there is no death;

Therefore...

C. Before the seventh "day" of creation when the earth was sanctified, there could have been death among the forms of life inhabiting it.

Note again how D&C 77:12 links the placement of man onto the earth with its sanctification. This sanctification can rightly be called "a beginning." It was the beginning of the earth's existence in a more glorious, death-free state, and it was the beginning of mankind's existence on this new death-free earth. So...

Syllogism #4:

A. The earth was sanctified on the seventh "day" of creation;

B. Adam and Eve were formed of the dust of the earth on the seventh "day" of creation;

Therefore...

C. There was no death on the earth after the arrival of Adam and Eve, until their Fall.

Hence, Adam truly did bring death into the world with his and Eve's transgression. This does not preclude the possibility that life forms inhabiting the earth could have died before the earth's seventh-"day"-sanctification. As we've seen, sanctification is linked with changing matter and life to a death-less state of existence (as per the Millennial change to come). So for first six "days" of the earth's creation process, all manner of life could have lived, multiplied, and died on the earth, leaving massive amounts of fossil data for us to uncover in our day. But, after the seventh "day" when the earth was sanctified and Adam and Eve were placed on it, there would have been no death if Adam and Eve hadn't partaken of the forbidden fruit.

With these concepts in mind, it is entirely possible to marry the seemingly contradictory ideas proposed by science and faith, namely:

First, the idea that organisms (simple and complex) lived and died for millions of years in this earth's ancient existence; and,

Second, the idea that there was no death prior to Adam's Fall after the earth was sanctified or made death-free on the seventh period of creation.

Remember, Abraham's account of the earth's physical creation refers to the seven periods as "times," not "days" as does Moses's account of the earth's spiritual creation. Furthermore, Abraham never states that the seven periods of time were equal in duration.

So one last syllogism:

Syllogism #5:

A. For six periods of time in the earth's creation process death could have existed among the many life forms living on it (since it was not yet sanctified);

B. The earth was sanctified or made death-free in the same period of time (seventh) when Adam and Eve were placed on the newly-sanctified earth;

Therefore...

C. After the earth was sanctified, there would have been no death from the time Adam and Eve arrived until their Fall, hence Adam did bring death into the world as the scriptures teach.

I'm not saying this is the gospel truth. I'm proposing a way of reading and interpreting scripture and scientific data that allows both to exist side-by-side without contradiction. I will leave you all to draw your own conclusions. My view about all of this is liquid and dynamic, open to change as new facts and/or revelations come to light. For now, I take the stance that death could have existed prior to the earth's seventh-day-sanctification, but not after Adam and Eve arrived on the earth until they transgressed.

These concepts are explored in greater depth in the excellent book "Earth in the Beginning," by LDS author Erik N. Skousen, Ph.D.

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M,

You are not LDS and have not covenanted with God so why would you want to quote an LDS member that is quoting an LDS author on something to which you can not possibly identify? :angry2:

I must be crazy? :D

Sorry; letting that one go was too hard for me today. I hope you see what I was doing there and it is taken for what it is-just a joke taken from another thread. :)

I giggled as soon as I started reading Doc. ;)

M.

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None of us doubts that God created the world. Theistic evolutionists argue that God did so by setting laws of nature in place that worked over "billions and billions of years." Old Age creationists argue that some aspects of evolutionary theory may help to explain what God did, but suggest that God was very intimately involved in the work. Young Earth Creationists believe that it is essential to read the creation accounts as literally as possible, and argue that the earth was created by God in seven literal days (including the rest time), and that the event happened between 5700 and about 30,000 years ago.

Me? I go with the Old Age creationist paradigm. I also believe that it is silly to pit science against religion. Science explicates God's creation.

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  • 3 years later...

In order to understand evolution, we have to break it down. Let’s look at crops. Let’s say I have 100 tomatoes. If I take the two smallest ones and plant their seeds, I will get a group of smaller tomatoes. Let’s say I do that over and over again, over about 20 generations of tomatoes. I will have a tomato roughly the size of a cherry tomato. Now, the environment does the same thing with plants. If there is a group of brown and green bugs on a green leaf, then a bird comes along, the bird is going to eat the ones it can see best, the brown ones, thereby evolving the population on the leaf to being only green bugs. That is called natural selection.

I have a lot of things to cover on here, so let me be brief. The reason why the earth is the perfect distance from the sun is because it moved there. It wasn’t placed here, but it moved here. It started out too far away, and has been moving in closer and closer ever sense. Radiometric dating has showed us that the earth is approximately 4.6 billion years old, while life started at around 3.2 billion years ago. During those 1.4 billion years the earth couldn’t support life. It was slowly but surely moving closer and closer. Also, the fact that we’re on a planet that can support life isn’t that amazing. Look up in the sky, there are literally billions to trillions of stars that we can see, and some of them have planets in the same position as the earth. It’s not like it’s a coincidence that we’re on earth, it’s just a matter of being on one of the many planets that supports life. The thickness of the crust in the earth isn’t that amazing either. It can be explained by scientific means. And the speed at which the earth travels around the sun isn’t that important. If we were twice as fast, or twice as slow, we’d still be alive today, however gravity and lunar tides would be different.

One last thing I will comment on for now is the origin of life. It seems very complex; however science has showed how it happened. It wasn’t like a cell just popped on the earth, if first started out with the combination of different chemicals under the various pressures and temperatures on the surface of the earth to create one self replicating enzyme. You like to stand back in awe looking at how one being created all of this, and I like to stand back in awe seeing how this all fits together in one giant puzzle, creating life, the universe, and everything in it, without the need of a designer.

If you have any more specific questions or comments, please post them. I will try to check this forum often.

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The more I think of it, the more I believe that evolution is a bunch of mumbo jumbo. For example, one of the premises behind the theory is mutation out of necessity. For example, If an animal is exposed to a certain environment in which it cannot thrive, it supposedly adapts to that environment.

Um... no. The question is are you setting out to build a straw-man or are you that unfamiliar with the principles of evolution? Either way it kinda knocks the wind out of your sails. Tell me, would you take someone seriously who decided to lecture against basketball and started out talking about how handling the puck is the most ridiculous part of the game?

Edit: Note I'm not commenting on your conclusion. Not really up for a game of let's argue about evolution, but if you want to play you may want to touch up on the particulars or reconsider misrepresenting the opposing 'team'.

Edited by Dravin
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Um... no. The question is are you setting out to build a straw-man or are you that unfamiliar with the principles of evolution? Either way it kinda knocks the wind out of your sails. Tell me, would you take someone seriously who decided to lecture against basketball and started out talking about how handling the puck is the most ridiculous part of the game?

Edit: Note I'm not commenting on your conclusion. Not really up for a game of let's argue about evolution, but if you want to play you may want to touch up on the particulars or reconsider misrepresenting the opposing 'team'.

Wonder if OPs vies evolved, since it was 4 years ago:p

04-04-2007, 07:25 AM

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