gopher wrote: "..a myth is no longer required to explain the unexplainable..".
Not sure what that means.
In the past, myths were developed to explain things that were not understood by primitive minds. For example, most cultures and peoples of the world have various creation myths. Stories that were created to explain where we came from, and how things came to be.
In one Egyptian creation myth, The god Tem because he was lonely, began masturbating. In some versions of this myth, he actually ejaculated into his own mouth, probably symbolic of procreating with himself. His semen became all things wet, and his breath became all things dry. From the moisture and dryness, came the earth and the sky, and from these spring all other things.
I think we are advanced enough to realize that life did not spring forth from someone ejaculating into their own mouth. There is an Asian myth (I think it's asian) where the ocean rests on the back of a fish. When the fish drinks in and spits out water, it causes the tides. When the fish wiggles, it causes earthquakes.
Scientifically, we now understand that the tides are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun. And we know that earthquakes are caused by, among other things, the friction of tectonic plates as they move against one another. Earthquakes can also occur from volcanic activity.
When a primitive human being saw tide waters coming in and going out, how was he to explain this? Clearly something sucked it in, and spit it back out. It's water. Fish live in the water. Hence, it must be a fish sucking in water and spitting it back out. It must be a HUGE fish in order to accomplish this, since the oceans themselves are so huge, so naturally, when it wiggles, being so large, that must be where earthquakes come from.
We no longer require stories such as this to explain things to us. We now recognize that there are other forces at work in the universe... and it is not monster fish. Or gods who ejaculate into their own mouths.
Now do you understand?
gopher wrote:
but I find that those in the scientific community present plenty of 'myths' as fact
No they don't. I think from the examples above, you can understand what a true myth is. Scientists develop hypotheses based on discoveries made. Often these discoveries have multiple interpretations that are possible, and you will find, especially in early stages, various hypotheses of the same data. As new discoveries occur, some hypotheses are shown to be inconsistent, or even impossible, and are dimissed. Conversely, very often, as years pass, new data will affirm some hypotheses as accurate. The more time passing, and the more varied data collected, the more likely it is that a hypotheses can be shown to be true, to the degree that things are provable. In DNA testing, some DNA can be shown to be many millions to 1 in favor of a match. While there is an infinitesimal possibility this DNA belongs to some other individual, the actual potential is so minute, that it is deemed to be fact. In the strictest sense, it could perhaps be said, that all that is absolutely provable is "I am" or "I exist". You think and have consciousness, so you KNOW that you "are". Beyond that, perhaps everything else to some degree is debatable. But this is extremism. We can KNOW with a high degree of certainty, many many things, through experimentation and replication.
gopher wrote:
For instance, they would have you believe that:
-The 'big bang' is fact. They are guessing, and a wild one at that IMO. Hence it is still called 'the big bang THEORY', which is easy to understand once you examine it..
The "Big Bang" which incidentally is actually a disparaging term coined by someone who intended to mock this theory, is pretty universally accepted now. It rests on too many facts to go into here, but among the provable and measurable facts are two very central ones...
1) The universe is expanding outwardly, at a very uniform rate, no matter where in the universe we look. Imagine throwing a pebble into a calm lake, and you see the rings spiralling outward in a very equal and uniform manner from the center, where the force was applied. Now imagine rather than on a plane, an explosion which shoots material outward, spherically in all directions at the same time. Then take this farther, where the present state of the cosmos has expanded from an origin of infinite density and temperature.
2) The Universe has cooled from an initially hot and dense state.
Force, of an explosive nature, generates intense heat, and the more force released, the greater the heat. Now combine the two facts listed, and you can see the logical conclusion. Now, unless you believe that the Universe began expanding from some half-way point.... but why then, has it cooled from a state of intense heat? You can see why it makes sense.
gopher wrote:
-Evolution is a proven fact. It isn't, and they are far from proving it even 150 years after Darwin. Hence they try to make you forget that it is still a THEORY, and a weak one at that.
Evolution is a big word. You act as if Darwin was the beginning of evolution theory, as well as the end of it. Neither is true. Evolution has been considered from as far back as Greek philosophers from the 6th century BCE, who considered it and debated it. And since Darwin's work "On the Origin of Species" was published, various theories have contributed to a better understanding of the principles at work. Darwin for example, was at a loss to explain how new species arise. Later theories have developed satisfactory explanations of this, which when tied together, form, basically, a "unified theory" of evolution, which is now pretty much universally accepted.
You cannot merely dismiss "evolution" itself, as there are many aspects to it. What you are upset about, is the proposition that humans originated from animals. Clearly organisms evolve over time. Speciation occurs, where new species come into existence, and extinction occurs, where species disappear. A natural process takes place where certain traits which contribute to survival and procreation are passed down, and inherited from one generation to the next, so that animals within a species who don't possess these qualities begin to fail, and the ones left are those which were better equipped for survival. This is a fluid and organic process which changes over time, based on competing organisms, environmental changes. You have adaptation. Mutation. All these elements are part of evolution, You can't possibly disagree with all aspects of evolution?
Our bodies are flesh and bone. Genetically, humans and chimps are said to be as much as 99.4% identical. In recent years, organs such as hearts, livers and kidneys, have been transplanted from baboons and pigs into humans, with the longest survival that I am aware of, being 9 months. But that is a remarkable time period. Nine months living on an animal's organ in a human body.
As a person of faith, who believes in a Creator, my personal belief is that humans are unique, that we are different than animals, and not just as measured by brain capacity. But our bodies are connected with nature, with the earth... we have an animal nature as regards our flesh, but a spiritual nature as regards our souls. Our flesh is temporal, it ages and decays and dies and disentegrates. This is by design. The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy always increases in an isolated system. Entropy is in essence, a measurement of the energy no longer available for work during a thermodynamic process.
A closed system, is one which has reached maximum entropy. For example, think of a fire that burns until the fuel is completely expended. When left alone, any heat source inevitably results in heat loss expended to surrounding objects. Things go from a state of heat, to a state of cold. Nothing is self-generating and maintains heat without some outside force. So everything essentially is in a state of decay, or breaking down. This is the nature of the physical universe. Our bodies were ALWAYS intended to decay and die. So what does it matter what substance it is made of? It is part of the physical universe. Dust to dust, right? It is our souls which are spiritual, and eternal. That is the part of us which relates to God. Evolutionary processes does not have to affect that relationship in any way. It should not destroy your faith, accepting that your body is physical and not so unique from animals, and in fact, is animal in nature. It is your spirit which relates to God.
When people lack basic moral principles, we tend to say of them "They live like animals". I think this statement is actually more profound than most people realize. I believe that when we reject our spiritual nature by persuing almost exclusively physical impulses or desires, we are in essence, returning to our animal inheritance. We are living in the flesh. Eating, drinking and screwing whenever and with whoever. It is abandoning our spiritual inheritance that darkens our conscience.
I believe God created us as his children, and created a physical environment for the purpose of "containing" our spiritual nature, to allow us an environment with which to grow and mature our spiritual selves. Within the confines of time and space, our spiritual self is restrained to a degree, so that what we feel is not actuated until that feeling is transfered to action through our bodies. In other words, I may "think" and "feel" that I want to punch you out, but limited by time and space, during the process of that feeling becoming action, one may have time, even if it is seconds, to change his mind. When we change our mind often enough that it becomes habit, I think we actually grow spiritually, so that we no longer even feel the impulse as strongly as we originally did. Or compare it with smoking. When I have quit smoking, it is very difficult at first, and the impulse is strong to sneak one. If I master that impulse, over time, eventually I convince myself "Hey, why even think about it, I know I'm not going to smoke one." and eventually even the desire disappears. This is an example of mastering our bodies through the dominance of our mind and will.
I think this is also one of the ways that spiritual growth occurs. In my studies of world religions, one common rite, or trait, is the denial of physical desires of various kinds. For certain periods of time, most religions call on it's adherents and certainly it's officiators and ministers, to deny physical pleasure or desire for set lengths of time. Catholic priests practice sexual abstinence. Some practice vows of silence. Fasting among many religions is common. Sexual abstinence. Giving up certain foods on certain days.
I believe it is the inspiration of God to ALL these religions, that overcoming the body, puts us in touch with our spiritual nature. It helps us discipline and therefore mature ourselves spiritually. We live less in the flesh and it brings us toward the spiritual. We seek less, outside of ourselves and begin seeking inwardly, which is where we find God. All physical pleasures and desires require physical stimulus. When we cut off that stimulus, even if temporarily, we have nowhere else to look really, than inwardly, to the spirit. In this way, we seek more, we listen more, we GROW more. Ideally, we grow and mature, and over time, become more and more like God, resembling His own nature, which after all, even the Bible commands of us: "Be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect".
I believe that God has been moving history itself, and mankind with it, farther and farther away from our animal, or physical inheritance and more and more closely to our spiritual inheritance.
Not only is physical evolution to me, NOT in opposition to God, but it is perfectly in harmony with God's plan for us as his children, to grow and mature and be like Him. To become a being of love, growing from selfishness to unselfishness, from seeking less of how to be served, and instead how to serve others. From a nature that seeks to serve itself primarily, to subduing one's physical desires to attain a higher spiritual understanding, which leads to serving and helping others.
