[Preechr]

Originally Posted by ziggytrix

WTF do you want preechr, a nice easy-to-digest sound-byte proof? There is evidence for evolution. The fact that you don't understand it, does not mean it does not exist.

Again:

Yes, the obvious assumption to be made here is that I'm just too dumb to have understood any of that. Why is it that when I complain of a lack of enough time to even respond to posts you expect me to have ridden off on your 50 page tangent apparently delving completely into the mysteries of vestigal limbs in animals, which though titled in such a way as to appear to be proof of evolution, actually seems to a non-believer to be much more like evidence that some parts of biological structures seem similar? You ask if I want a summary? What is so hard about typing out: "Many bone structures of reptiles, birds, fish and mammals are similar, which indicates that all creatures share common ancestry." ??

The difference is that phrasing your comment more like my suggestion would be too much like something you'd find in an actual discussion, right?

I spent about 10 minutes skimming the website you googled up. Is my summary somewhat correct? The parts about fossils of many separate types of animals showing evolution from, like, a reptile to a bird are potentially fascinating... but I wonder why I'm expected to take it on faith that these parts of the fossil record prove so clearly that these various boxes of bones are what they are represented to be.

Believe it or not, I am somewhat capable of reading things. I can read stuff from one side of this argument that says something along the lines of: A Supreme Being created the universe and everything in it according to His Grand Design in 7 days. Trust Me... and then I read stuff from the other side of the argument that says essentially that the universe and all the stuff one might find within it just sort of happened over time for no particular reason... and then it seems a lot like that's followed up up with an eerily similar: Trust me.

Honestly, I expected a bit more from the latter side. While the former exists in a realm of human thought that precludes empirical reality on it's first page, the realm of Science at least in my understanding was supposed to be more tangible. Could you google me up a web page that presents common descent in such a way as to convince a skeptic? I'd do it, but I've always failed at that for some strange reason.

Yeah, maybe I'm unfairly skeptical. I'd love to join your religion, but I'm afraid I'll need a little evidence that you are in fact onto something here. Mostly, I've been told that since so many other people that are much smarter than me believe it, it must be so. I've yet to see a clear illustration that these are actually facts that we are discussing here. Darwinian evolution has been taught to children as fact since the sixties. Why is it so damn hard for an adult to see what's supposed to be so well-documented and proven? Holders of Marketing Degrees with an IQ of 75 can put together Power Point presentations... Is there a reason smart scientists cannot put together a web page that makes me say: Wow! They're right!

My point in this thread is NOT to convince any of you that God created the world or that He or She exists or that you should send me money so that I can finish my church on the Moon. My point is that evolutionism SEEMS to be as much a leap of faith as is creationism, and I'm asking for help from those of you who are obviously intellligent enough to have approached this subject at one point as skeptics and were convinced by facts. What's so wrong with asking for summarized data? This has been acknowledged as FACT for 50 years now by the scientific community at large. What's with the "Trust me?" Doesn't that seem odd to you guys?

Let me be clear that I have not one time posted that I believe creationism or intelligent design to be superior to evolutionism. I have consistently maintained that they are, or at least appear to be, on equal footing as they all require the belief in something that I cannot see. Because creationism and intelligent design both stem from Theology, I'm fine with that. I cannot forgive science for similar behavior, however. Evolutionists NEED to sit down and win this fight concretely or else they need to admit that they cannot and concede that any other theories are equally possible.

For me, and this is why I'm actually interested in this debate at all, I see this as a moral issue. There are very specific ramifications for the different types of thought produced within society from the basis of each of these theories, and I have my preferences. I am looking at this debate from a third person point of view, not as one invested in either side. When I see those purporting to be men of science, facts and logic behaving just as petulantly and suspiciously as any other mystic, I question it.

The fact that none of you has even yet considered answering my questions openly, preferring instead to make me into a character and attack that, hints to me that you've never actually tried to be skeptical of evolution yourselves.