I agree with UGetPaid.... I see the Bible as saying what happened and science to say how it happened. According to Genesis, the acts of creation took place in a week, with separate acts occurring in different days. Yet if the world nor any of the stars were in existence at the beginning, then the term "day" is absolutely meaningless (even moreso if you consider that the universe has billions of planets each with their own "Sun" and different rates of rotation making a "day" variable unit of measure). If God is omniscient and omnipotent, then it stands to reason that God would have known at the beginning how to create an on-going process to create humans with a plethora of different traits, such as evolution.
Discarding the theory of evolution also adds credence to God being mean, indifferent, and / or fallible. We know that there are genetic abnormalities and genetic disorders. If God created humans "from scratch" so-to-speak, then God must have incorporated those genetic conditions in humans as well. Either God did so purposely but didn't care that it would hurt humans (ie God is indifferent), God did so purposely in order to punish humans (ie God is mean), or God did so accidentally (ie God is fallible). Considering that God made male humans first (according to Genesis), then saw that man was unhappy, and so created woman later, I'm more inclined to believe that the god in the literal Bible is both fallible and not omniscient....
If on the other hand you believe that God created the evolutionary process in order to create humans, then the genetic issues can be seen as being "good". The process of evolution utilizes mutations and other genetic changes to add variety to the species' genetic makeup. Although some of these mutations may lead to the individual organism suffering, having the variety in the genetic code can also lead to another organism (of that same species) to develop an advantage in its survival. Sickle cell anemia is a genetic disorder that causes red blood cells to become deformed under certain conditions which causes them not to function correctly leading to the anemia (the inability for the red blood cells to carry oxygen as effectively). The disease is a recessive trait that only occurs when a person has the same mutation from both of their parents. Although the disease leads to many issues such as pain attacks, anemia, infection, and even strokes, it also is a very effective natural preventative to developing malaria. When the organism responsible for malaria tries to infect red blood cells (as a part of its normal life-cycle), the red blood cells will "sickle" / deform causing those blood cells to rupture and die before the organism has finished growing thus preventing it from spreading throughout the host. Additionally, people that have the sickle cell trait from only one of their parents also maintain an advantage in resisting malarial infection while at the same time experiencing few (if any) of the signs / symptoms of sickle-cell disease. As the mortality and morbidity rates are worse for malaria than sickle-cell disease, the sickle-cell trait can be seen as being "good" as a natural resistance to the more "bad" disease of malaria. Also since there are several variations of the sickle-cell gene (different mutations cause the same or very similar trait to be expressed) being found at different levels around the world, it has been taken as evidence of an evolutionary process that is occurring in humans (ie God would not create different mutations for the same trait had God introduced the genetic condition when first creating humans).
Community Forum
Topic: Do You Believe in Evolution? (Read 6934 times)
August 17, 2010, 03:57:28 pm
