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I have a maybe-weird take on all this - maybe both are right.

It is pretty clear to anyone that can accept electricity as a fact of life (which claims scientific backing but don't ask me to name it!), should also be able to claim evolution as a fact of life. That is to say, to deny the evolution of species as a fact is just silly.

On the other hand, it had to start somewhere, and while I'm old, not a single one of me friends was there either in the year 4040 BC, as one might take as literal interpretation of the Bible. Likewise, we were not there 4 billion years ago at the site of the big bang. There is clearly room for faith in all this discussion.

Ultimately, I find all this such a waste of energy. If one wants to find Biblical references during a Sunday school class, or have group meetings in your living room to discuss it, great. But the cynic in me says this is just a distraction from other pressing matters, fanned by those who want you fiercely focused on this while they rob your home.

As a religious man, it seems my 10% of wages from a decent manufacturing job will be of greater use to the earthly-glory of God than 10% of wages as a Wal-Mart greater. I thing Jesus wants us to be of greater use than as discount shoppers, so I'll put my energy into saving America through saving American industry.

Dr. Griffin says:

"Spontaneous generation" once had scientific acceptance, but Pasteur (a creationist) put that idea in the same trash heap to which evolution is headed.

Wow. A red herring! How cool is that? Pasteur proved that maggots don't "spontaneously generate" in raw meat. He did not prove anything besides that in his experiment. No doubt, the good doctor knows this. Next, I expect you'll hear him talking about how the 2nd law of thermodynamics precludes evolution. Is this string of notes on evolution fun or what?

Eric,

The 2nd law of thermodynamics doesn't preclude evolution, but it does mean the universe had a beginning. Now, how does something come from nothing? How did the universe begin?

Cosmologists haven't settled on an answer to that question yet. But the work continues. I know that religions around the world purport to have "the" answer to the question, but as I've already pointed out, the questions raised by those answers are even harder to deal with.

You don't know how it happened, but you have eliminated the possibility that it could be God. Scientists are clinging to the hope that matter could have created itself. Now that's what I call SCIENCE!

Ever hear of Occam's Razor? Scientists are quite familiar with the concept. Using "God" as an answer leads to the result of an infinite regress. Surely, you can see why science can't accept such an inelegant answer. Can you give a good, logical reason to even consider that path?

Eric,

How does the belief that God created the universe lead to an infinite regress? I have an idea of what you are talking about, but I want to be clear on your view before I respond.

This is a subject only debated form the views of ones belief structure. It's an argument that cannot be won by either side, therefore a losing one.
You believe this, I believe that and science can't prove either.

ECUMAN, the concept that God created the universe is a form of fallacy called "begging the question." The question that arises from the statement is "who created God?" And God's creator would logically require a further creator... ad infinitem

This is a natural consequence of the underlying assumption that everything, including the universe, requires a cause. Trying to say the God is "uncaused" is a special pleading, also understandably frowned upon logically. You say that a vast, complex universe can't exist without a creator, yet anything capable of creating this universe would necessarily be more vast and complex than its creation. By this logic, God needs a creator more than the universe does.

On the other hand, if you're willing to accept the existence of a vast, complex thing like God as an uncaused thing, what's so difficult about accepting the less vast, less complex univserse as being uncaused?

Eric,

I am not saying that it is IMPOSSIBLE that the universe is uncaused. The current evidence we have for the universe (Big Bang Theory, background radiation, etc.) indicates a beginning (cause) for the universe. I know of only two kinds of causes for things, event causation and agent causation. The universe today is a result of a large number of prior causes. However, it cannot be the result of an infinite number of prior causes. That would be the infinite regress you pointed out. Also, given the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, the universe would have run down an eternity ago and we would not be having this discussion! My argument is not that NOTHING is uncaused, but that the current evidence shows that the universe cannot be uncaused.

Therefore, it makes sense to me that the cause of the universe would come from something that is outside of time, space and matter.

Who created God?

Ecuman,

Of all creationists I've ever read on this blog, you definitely seem to be the one who is most honestly trying to think through everything logically. But you've made a fallacious statement here.

You said that scientists are clinging to the hope that matter created itself. No, they're not. One of the fundamental laws of science is the Law of Conservation of Matter, which says that matter can neither be created nor destroyed.

You probably meant to say that scientists are clinging to the hope that life created itself. That's not true either. No scientist (or any human being with an ounce of common sense) would say something so absurd. Scientists say that at some point, somehow the most primitive of life was formed from whatever causes. I'm not knowledgeable about this at all, but I believe the current most accepted theory of how that happened is abiogenesis. Google it.
After the most primitive forms of life were formed, they began to undergo slow changes over billions of years.

And Creationism is a belief, not a fact.

--Tom