The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #100330   Message #2032087
Posted By: Little Hawk
21-Apr-07 - 02:25 PM
Thread Name: BS: New things about atheism
Subject: RE: BS: New things about atheism
"Suggested is like saying evolution is a theory."

Correct. It is a theory. It may well be partially correct. It may well be partially in error. It may be largely in error. It may yet be succeeded by a more convincing scientific theory. There's been a lot of precedent for that sort of thing in the world of science, if you look at the past few hundred years. ;-) All you're doing is putting absolute faith in the present scientific orthodoxy...the way religious people put faith in religious orthodoxies.

"When all the data point in the same direction it isn't a suggestion any more."

When people are already inclined to only look in one direction, it's surprising how all the evidence seems to point that way. They find exactly what they go looking for. The same is true of people who think the Bible is the literal word of God. They think that all the evidence points in the same direction too...they direction THEY want it to. ;-)

You, like they, are an absolutist who thinks he knows THE ONE AND ONLY TRUTH, and that's all there is to it. You, like they, are probably quite wrong in that assumption.

I bet you that in a hundred years from now science will have greatly modified or even superseded the theory of evolution with a brand new one, and some self-important fellows like you will be quite sure that the new theory is "absolutely beyond question".

Why not admit that maybe you don't know for sure how human life developed on this planet, and that no one else does either? Would that hurt too much?

I admit that I don't know for sure, and it doesn't hurt a bit. I am not afraid to admit that I don't know. We have theories. We will continue to have theories. Lazy thinkers will continue to cling to those theories with the absolute faith of a religious fanatic. It has ever been so. People are deeply afraid to admit how little they know...so they just parrot stuff someone else, someone in authority, has told them with utter and absolute assurance. ("Daddy" must know best, right?)