Academy of Sciences -- San Francisco
Just something to read in the interim... I especially like the last statement...
This place was one of the most influencial field trips I remember taking growing up... They never did like my questions though...
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Friday, September 26, 2008
Has Science evolved? part one...
The unfortunate answer to the above question is yes... And, much like the Law of Entropy states, it has not been for the better...
You would think that after years of experience, of dedicated and deep probing by scientists that the mysteries of life would have been solved by now...
You could think that, but you would be wrong...
Now just to get this out of the way... I love Science, I would even go as far as stating that I do believe in the fundamentals of it... I also love God, I would even go as far as stating that I do believe in hte fundamentals of him... At therin lies no problem...
Throughout my teenage life and into adulthood, people have plagued me with the same question over and over again... "How can you be so involved with Science and with God?" While my response may have evolved through the years, what I believe about it has not...
So now, I would like to share with you my 3 answers to this question... (In my foundational order)
1. God wrote the laws of Science... As we understand the laws and ways of our universe, we can understand the handiwork of God... God gave us a command to subdue and have dominion over the earth... So it would make sense that God would allow us a way to organize, hence Science...
2. As Science delves deeper, they find order... The farther into the macro-cosmos we go, the more of the same stuff we find, the smaller into the micro-cosmos we go the more detailed it gets... Both extremes point to continutity... Everything we are finding out there is the same stuff we are finiding out there, than the same thing that started what is out there started what was here... And as we look under the microscope and we keep probing we find that there is an even greater organizational structure there than on the macro-level... The Bible teaches that God created everything (That would be the macro-cosmos) and that Jesus Christ holds everything together (micro-cosmos)...
3. God fills in where science does not have a scientific answer... This last answer is the one that I have recently added to my arsenal... The first point I want to make is notice that I said a "scientific" answer... A "scientific" answer is an answer that has been proven, tried and true, via the Scientific Process... Not something that is assumed, guessed, hypothesized, etc... The second point I want to make is that notice I did not say the inverse of this statement (Science fills in where God does not have a religious answer...), because I do not believe that is true... Prime example... Cosmology... What happened at the beginning of time? Science is trying to answer that question... The problem with that is that there is no way to apply the Scientific Process to it (and if there was, give that guy a Nobel Prize)... And if you cannot apply the Scientific Process to it, then it cannot be Science and it must be a belief, and who better to answer that question than God? But yet science wants to answer that question... Why? That is in the next post...
You would think that after years of experience, of dedicated and deep probing by scientists that the mysteries of life would have been solved by now...
You could think that, but you would be wrong...
Now just to get this out of the way... I love Science, I would even go as far as stating that I do believe in the fundamentals of it... I also love God, I would even go as far as stating that I do believe in hte fundamentals of him... At therin lies no problem...
Throughout my teenage life and into adulthood, people have plagued me with the same question over and over again... "How can you be so involved with Science and with God?" While my response may have evolved through the years, what I believe about it has not...
So now, I would like to share with you my 3 answers to this question... (In my foundational order)
1. God wrote the laws of Science... As we understand the laws and ways of our universe, we can understand the handiwork of God... God gave us a command to subdue and have dominion over the earth... So it would make sense that God would allow us a way to organize, hence Science...
2. As Science delves deeper, they find order... The farther into the macro-cosmos we go, the more of the same stuff we find, the smaller into the micro-cosmos we go the more detailed it gets... Both extremes point to continutity... Everything we are finding out there is the same stuff we are finiding out there, than the same thing that started what is out there started what was here... And as we look under the microscope and we keep probing we find that there is an even greater organizational structure there than on the macro-level... The Bible teaches that God created everything (That would be the macro-cosmos) and that Jesus Christ holds everything together (micro-cosmos)...
3. God fills in where science does not have a scientific answer... This last answer is the one that I have recently added to my arsenal... The first point I want to make is notice that I said a "scientific" answer... A "scientific" answer is an answer that has been proven, tried and true, via the Scientific Process... Not something that is assumed, guessed, hypothesized, etc... The second point I want to make is that notice I did not say the inverse of this statement (Science fills in where God does not have a religious answer...), because I do not believe that is true... Prime example... Cosmology... What happened at the beginning of time? Science is trying to answer that question... The problem with that is that there is no way to apply the Scientific Process to it (and if there was, give that guy a Nobel Prize)... And if you cannot apply the Scientific Process to it, then it cannot be Science and it must be a belief, and who better to answer that question than God? But yet science wants to answer that question... Why? That is in the next post...
Monday, September 22, 2008
Do you value life?
I know I do...
I just got finished sharing a button with my associates over at Facebook that reads "I vote for people that don't kill babies."
I also saw recently a bumper sticker on a van that read, "Smile, your parents chose life."
Too often I think that life is under appreciated. I know on occassion I have thought so personally... Questioning this or that, and sometimes even God...
But as the case solution often is, it is really a matter of perspective... What is life?
To answer this question we can go to science... Life is blah, blah, blah... and the problem with that is that amongst the "so-called-scientists" they cannot figure out at what point life starts... Is it at conception, after all the cells are now multiplying to form an individual? Is life at a certain trimester during the pregnancy process? Is life at the point the little baby (ehem... excuse me "fetus") sticks it's baby-toe or its head out? What if only part of it is outside and it dies, was it only half-human, half thing? It all sounds too muddled... Now do not get me wrong, I love Science, it is a great way to understand the stuff all around us, but does some stuff really need explaining or do we already know the answer? (Ex. Why do we eat?)
To answer this question we can go to science... Life begins within the womb, at conception, etc... But the most common retort to this statement is that this is a matter of belief and religion, not science... Well if science can use the excuse that it can explain things where "religion fails," then why cannot "religion" explain things where "Science fails" with the same credibility? It sounds like a double standard to me...
So the Bible teaches that Abortions are wrong... It is flat out murder... But then the other side comes in with one of their three main arguments (If there are others, I am sorry I did not include them, these are just the 3 I have heard multiple times...)
1. It is not human, it is a fetus (in other words a thing...) You tell a mother that the "thing" that is kicking inside her belly is not human... As harsh of an observation as that was that is what the "Pro-Choice" people are arguing...
2. A women should have the right to choose what to do with her body, you do not want to take away her rights do you? Do I want to take away rights, hmmm... Let me think about that... Hmm... No, I do not... Let's see who is taking whose rights... The mother "CHOSE" to have sex knowing full well what the possible outcome maybe... Then now, as if by miracle, she is pregnant... She gets to chose what to do with the life inside of her, just because it is her body... Let us think about that last part... First, it is not all her, half of that belongs to him... Secondly, if the fetus was a part of her body, then would not the removal of it be more harmful... Finally, back to the CHOICE thing... The baby does not have a choice, in fact, it never stood a chance... (But then there are those who do not think that the baby is human... See point #1...)
3. What if she was raped? So we should punish the child for the crime someone else committed? Believe me, I feel pain and sorrow for the lady who got raped... I really do, but why do we have to kill the baby? Why not focus at that point in time on the getting the rapist? Or spend the time on planning on what to do with the baby... Instead the first thought is, "Ohh... This is a baby as a result of a rape, let's get rid of it..."
So I guess I could say I have three problems that are preventing me from supporting abortions...
1. The negative perspectives that it promotes. It's not human, it is worthless...
2. The hypocricy of it... We are Pro-Choice (As long as the father and the baby are not the ones doing the choosing...)
3. The fact that even amongst their own group they cannot give a sound, scientific answer as to when "Life" starts.
My conclusion...
Until there is a point in time in which an expert on the Creation of Life speaks and tells us when life begins, then I will just have to wait...
-- Waiting --
-- Waiting --
Oh yeah, (snaps my fingers) that is right... God created life and he said it begins at conception in Psalms and Jeremiah even said that God knew him while he was still in the womb... Well, God has been right in all other areas of Science, why not trust him in this one too...
I just got finished sharing a button with my associates over at Facebook that reads "I vote for people that don't kill babies."
I also saw recently a bumper sticker on a van that read, "Smile, your parents chose life."
Too often I think that life is under appreciated. I know on occassion I have thought so personally... Questioning this or that, and sometimes even God...
But as the case solution often is, it is really a matter of perspective... What is life?
To answer this question we can go to science... Life is blah, blah, blah... and the problem with that is that amongst the "so-called-scientists" they cannot figure out at what point life starts... Is it at conception, after all the cells are now multiplying to form an individual? Is life at a certain trimester during the pregnancy process? Is life at the point the little baby (ehem... excuse me "fetus") sticks it's baby-toe or its head out? What if only part of it is outside and it dies, was it only half-human, half thing? It all sounds too muddled... Now do not get me wrong, I love Science, it is a great way to understand the stuff all around us, but does some stuff really need explaining or do we already know the answer? (Ex. Why do we eat?)
To answer this question we can go to science... Life begins within the womb, at conception, etc... But the most common retort to this statement is that this is a matter of belief and religion, not science... Well if science can use the excuse that it can explain things where "religion fails," then why cannot "religion" explain things where "Science fails" with the same credibility? It sounds like a double standard to me...
So the Bible teaches that Abortions are wrong... It is flat out murder... But then the other side comes in with one of their three main arguments (If there are others, I am sorry I did not include them, these are just the 3 I have heard multiple times...)
1. It is not human, it is a fetus (in other words a thing...) You tell a mother that the "thing" that is kicking inside her belly is not human... As harsh of an observation as that was that is what the "Pro-Choice" people are arguing...
2. A women should have the right to choose what to do with her body, you do not want to take away her rights do you? Do I want to take away rights, hmmm... Let me think about that... Hmm... No, I do not... Let's see who is taking whose rights... The mother "CHOSE" to have sex knowing full well what the possible outcome maybe... Then now, as if by miracle, she is pregnant... She gets to chose what to do with the life inside of her, just because it is her body... Let us think about that last part... First, it is not all her, half of that belongs to him... Secondly, if the fetus was a part of her body, then would not the removal of it be more harmful... Finally, back to the CHOICE thing... The baby does not have a choice, in fact, it never stood a chance... (But then there are those who do not think that the baby is human... See point #1...)
3. What if she was raped? So we should punish the child for the crime someone else committed? Believe me, I feel pain and sorrow for the lady who got raped... I really do, but why do we have to kill the baby? Why not focus at that point in time on the getting the rapist? Or spend the time on planning on what to do with the baby... Instead the first thought is, "Ohh... This is a baby as a result of a rape, let's get rid of it..."
So I guess I could say I have three problems that are preventing me from supporting abortions...
1. The negative perspectives that it promotes. It's not human, it is worthless...
2. The hypocricy of it... We are Pro-Choice (As long as the father and the baby are not the ones doing the choosing...)
3. The fact that even amongst their own group they cannot give a sound, scientific answer as to when "Life" starts.
My conclusion...
Until there is a point in time in which an expert on the Creation of Life speaks and tells us when life begins, then I will just have to wait...
-- Waiting --
-- Waiting --
Oh yeah, (snaps my fingers) that is right... God created life and he said it begins at conception in Psalms and Jeremiah even said that God knew him while he was still in the womb... Well, God has been right in all other areas of Science, why not trust him in this one too...
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