Sethbag wrote:I will not be "pleased" if the church changes its teachings on problematic issues where science is concerned, if those changes help to make it more difficult for someone to find a basis on which to recognize the overall untruth of the LDS religion. It may be good that people more readily accept the science, but at the cost of having much of the evidence of the church's untruth being swept under the rug.
Yeh. sigh. Well, I am conflicted. I would love to see a future where most people have escaped crazy beliefs that are unsupported by the evidence (like the whole Joseph Smith story).
But what are the senarios that realistically could happen and which is best? I am hoping to avoid a future where even more people are anti-science creationists and where creationism is taugh in public schools. This could happen!
Sometimes I think it is a mistake to force the issue by convincing people that they must choose between evolutionary biology and Abrahamic religion. More and more people see it that way. Dawkins sees it that way and yet ironically so do a million Baptists. I am afraid most people will choose to disbelieve the science if we put it that way. Hell, its already happening as far as I can see.
By the way, I seriously doubt that the Dover trial could have been won if they had called to the stand Dawkins rather than Miller (who more or less won the day).
when believers want to give their claims more weight, they dress these claims up in scientific terms. When believers want to belittle atheism or secular humanism, they call it a "religion". -Beastie
yesterday's Mormon doctrine is today's Mormon folklore.-Buffalo
Yeh. sigh. Well, I am conflicted. I would love to see a future where most people have escaped crazy beliefs that are unsupported by the evidence (like the whole Joseph Smith story). But what are the senarios that realistically could happen and which is best? I am hoping to avoid a future where even more people are anti-science creationists and where creationism is taugh in public schools. This could happen!
Sometimes I think it is a mistake to force the issue by convincing people that they must choose between evolutionary biology and Abrahamic religion. More and more people see it that way. Dawkins sees it that way and yet ironically so do a million Baptists. I am afraid most people will choose to disbelieve the science if we put it that way. Hell, its already happening as far as I can see.
By the way, I seriously doubt that the Dover trial could have been won if they had called to the stand Dawkins rather than Miller (who more or less won the day).
The LDS Church tends to stay away from the mistakes made in the past by the Catholic Church. Sure there are and have been leaders with strong opinions, but D&C 107 has been there to enforce that all 15 apostles agree on what is and is not inspiration.
Otherwise, the rest of your longing is just atheist or agnostic speak.
I've been toying with the idea that evolution as such is false, but that it is the thing best supported by public evidence and therefore deserves to be called and taught as science even if things actually happened in some other way.
That's General Leo. He could be my friend if he weren't my enemy. eritis sicut dii I support NCMO
Then there is this stupid Ben Stein anti-evolution movie set to come out.
According to chap, that's an absurd comment. How can you judge something you haven't seen?
(tongue in cheek)
“All knowledge of reality starts from experience and ends in it...Propositions arrived at by purely logical means are completely empty as regards reality." - Albert Einstein
Then there is this stupid Ben Stein anti-evolution movie set to come out.
According to chap, that's an absurd comment. How can you judge something you haven't seen?
(tongue in cheek)
I know your being funny but there is a difference. We have been told the thrust of the movie already. The premise of the movie is known and it is stupid.
-not to mention clips and reviews of some who have seen it: http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/entert ... in-th.html
when believers want to give their claims more weight, they dress these claims up in scientific terms. When believers want to belittle atheism or secular humanism, they call it a "religion". -Beastie
yesterday's Mormon doctrine is today's Mormon folklore.-Buffalo
Call me an internet fringe LDS er but I think Mormonism had much more latitude than you propose here Seth. Joseph Smith seemed to think so as did Brigham. This is why official LDS doctrine is hard to pin down. It is a thing in flux. Not I think this poses some problems. A prime example is the FP statement on evolution. It seems tough to back peddle or even speculate on views that do not comply with that because other than canon that seems as official as one can get. The other issue is that the leadership over the past 25- 40 years has seemed to tighten the grip on doctrinal differences. This has resulted in a dumbing down of LDS Doctrine. Correlation is the primary driver of this and the basics and simple have been emphasized and other stuff left to speculation. And speculating is not encouraged. So I think the leaders grip is tighter. But heck just study the doctrine of the Godhead from 1829-1844. Joseph Smith added and adopted new ideas quite regularly. It seems he even brought a few new ones in then maybe dropped them before his death. Course this muddies t up further when the top leaders comment that the truth of Mormonism hinges on teh FV and that Joseph Smith new a lot about God as a result of the FV that when one studies it one can see that some of what he supposedly knew when he left the grove he did not talk about for quite some time.