Ben Stein is coming out with a new movie titled Expelled. It's about scientists who have lost their jobs or almost lost their jobs because they claim to see evidence of a creator in nature, as opposed to everything happening by random chance. Obviously, as LDS we believe in a creator. So I was wondering the perspective of the people on this board about the issue. I think it would be useful if you reviewed the website before commenting so that we can keep the discussion focused on the issues of the movie itself, and not a whole host of side issues that could result. I'd prefer it if you started other threads to discuss those issues, since I'm really interested in discussing this specific issue.
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If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen! - Samuel Adams
This looks like a really interesting movie. A Creator is definitely something the devil would not want us focusing on very much. And where scientists are generally viewed as the "best and brightest" among us, it's easy for the commoners to just take what they say as the Truth. I'd like to see this movie when it comes out.
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Life is tough but it's tougher if you're stupid. -John Wayne
I favor anything that brings attention to the bigoted, one-sided, agenda-forwarding nature of our nation's colleges. Tolerance and diversity my flabby rear end.
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And I'd discuss the holy books with the learned men, seven hours every day. That would be the sweetest thing of all.
Because some view themselves as being in competition with Him?
-- Edited by arbilad at 12:59, 2008-01-14
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If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen! - Samuel Adams
I think we'd all get along a whole lot better (as a society) if we took the time to describe and understand what constitutes scientific fact, theory, and hypothesis.
A hypothesis is an educated guess with little or no evidence to back it up.
A theory is a hypothesis which fits the known set of data, and has not been disproven by experiments and other observable evidence; or which has positive experiments and data to back it up.
Some theories are stronger than others. Theories change as the data becomes more complete.
Scientific facts are theories which have been around for long periods of time, and have massive amounts of empirical and experimental evidence, as well as real world applications to back them up.
Frankly, I wish scientific study would cease to need to prove or disprove a creator.
Given that science is fluid, changing with every new discovery; a scientific "proof" of God today is likely to be overturned by subsequent discoveries, and re-proven by sub-subsequent discoveries and experiments.
The existence of a creator needs to be in our hearts, and in our faith. It should neither need nor want for scientific confirmation.
Science must deal only with what can be observed and proven on the physical plane. Scientific study for proof of a creator is much like the parched man in the desert crawling toward a mirage of water.
This is not to say that scientists cannot have hypotheses about a creator, and should not be fired for having such hypotheses. However, evidence of a force from outside the area studied is not strong evidence of a creator; rather the existence of a creator is a hypothesis which fits portions of the observable data. Such a hypothesis is legitimate for a scientist to have.
Scientists should be well within their rights to say "I think that the outside force which caused this currently-inexplicable change was, indeed an all-powerful creator, but that is just my personal hypothesis, and I have no firm evidence to back that up. Yet."
ANYTHING (including the theory of natural selection) that is a theory or even just a hypothesis should be clearly labeled as such. REAL evidence for and against these facts, theories and hypotheses should be clearly presented.
I'm not really interested in having biology teachers hold forth to children about God. That is not their realm of "expertise." Seriously, if a university scientist spends time and tax money trying to prove "God," he or she really should look for funding outside the public sector.
Other scientists would be just as firmly within their rights to say "I think that the outside force which caused this currently-inexplicable change was, a powerful extraterrestrial society which occasionally comes by to intervene in the development of Earth, but that is just my personal hypothesis, and I have no firm evidence to back that up. Yet."
I saw how long your post was... and I thought, Wow. Hoss must really care about this topic. Then I started reading a little, and thought, yeah... yeah... I agree... Then I got to thinking, why is this post so long? He must REALLY REALLY care about this topic... then I got to thinking about me... and whether *I* cared about the topic. I realized, that deep down inside, I didn't. So then I thought it would be almost "selfish" of me to read your post... knowing that I would be left with a sense of apathy after all that effort you put into it... not to mention how much time I could save that I could spent looking at how I can make vegetables into musical instruments on YouTube... and well... so I stopped reading...
--Ray
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I'm not slow; I'm special. (Don't take it personally, everyone finds me offensive. Yet somehow I manage to live with myself.)