Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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christopher:::
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

Post by christopher::: »

Good thoughts, chika-Dee and mindfulmom. :smile:

I think interconnectedness and emptiness are two ways of describing Nature's complex systems, depending on how you look at them. And in Buddhism we do recognize these systems, aware that every form is a compounded structure of parts coming together temporarily, to form a whole....

"A flower cannot be by herself alone. A flower has to "inter-be" with everything else that is called non-flower. That is what we call inter-being. You cannot be, you can only inter-be... So the true nature of the flower is the nature of inter-being, the nature of no self. The flower is there, beautiful, fragrant, yes, but the flower is empty of a separate self. To be empty is not a negative note. Nagarjuna, of the second century, said that because of emptiness, everything becomes possible. So a flower is described as empty. But I like to say it differently. A flower is empty only of a separate self, but a flower is full of everything else. The whole cosmos can be seen, can be identified, can be touched, in one flower. So to say that the flower is empty of a separate self also means that the flower is full of the cosmos. It’s the same thing. So you are of the same nature as a flower: you are empty of a separate self, but you are full of the cosmos."

~Thich Nhat Hanh
"As Buddhists, we should aim to develop relationships that are not predominated by grasping and clinging. Our relationships should be characterised by the brahmaviharas of metta (loving kindness), mudita (sympathetic joy), karuna (compassion), and upekkha (equanimity)."
~post by Ben, Jul 02, 2009
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chicka-Dee
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

Post by chicka-Dee »

christopher::: wrote:"A flower cannot be by herself alone. A flower has to "inter-be" with everything else that is called non-flower. That is what we call inter-being. You cannot be, you can only inter-be... So the true nature of the flower is the nature of inter-being, the nature of no self. The flower is there, beautiful, fragrant, yes, but the flower is empty of a separate self. To be empty is not a negative note. Nagarjuna, of the second century, said that because of emptiness, everything becomes possible. So a flower is described as empty. But I like to say it differently. A flower is empty only of a separate self, but a flower is full of everything else. The whole cosmos can be seen, can be identified, can be touched, in one flower. So to say that the flower is empty of a separate self also means that the flower is full of the cosmos. It’s the same thing. So you are of the same nature as a flower: you are empty of a separate self, but you are full of the cosmos."

~Thich Nhat Hanh
And if many of us can come to realize this, deeply, the world would be altered in inimaginable ways... :namaste:
mindfullmom wrote:Each time a thread appears on this topic it ends up going on for miles and miles. I think it's a wonderful example of our collective conscious EVOLVING forward in an effort to CREATE something new.I chose those words carefully as I have been condititioned (up to this moment) to believe that creationism and evolution are one in the same. They are both empty of a separate existence aren't they?

If god created the universe, who created god? And if the big bang created the universe, what created the big bang? Isn't this emptiness at its best? Or is my understanding off?

I agree when the Buddha says that sometimes we are asking the wrong question.
I can't find the story but it is about the man struck with an arrow and as he lays there bleeding to death, he demands to know from which direction the arrow was shot, what it was made of, how fast it was travelling, etc. While all that is being investigated, he dies because he does nothing to tend to the wound. Isn't that what we are doing here? There is suffering (the arrow) and then more suffering created from the first suffering (death from the arrow). Since there doesn't seem to be any way to really know either way, why not focus ourselves on the present moment, on the breath, on the rise and fall?

I agree with Chickadee. Our understanding of interconnectedness (emptiness) is the key to it all. We may know it on an intellectual level but do we know it in the way we think, speak and act? And we all arrive at it in different ways. The linear thinker might want to pull apart the whole and separate it out into little "bits and pieces" (like quantum physics) and in doing so may penetrate the true nature of reality. The global thinker might not need to do that and might find analyzing systems a better way to see our interconnectedness. Either way you have made it there. Our schools and our workplaces compartmentalize because there is a need to do so, imo. There is so much to learn and so much to know, we have to start somewhere. It's up to each one of us to pursue a more global view indivdually whether we are talking about school subjects or work skills.

But I went off topic. Don't most religions believe that god is in us, we are in god? I'm not of the belief that a personal god exists, but isn't that the same as emptiness? :shrug:

And I would like to thank all of you here, as a result of reading this thread I am now different then I was before and you are all part of me now :bow:
Very good thoughts, mindfullmom :smile: :bow: You remind me that I tend to think (as most of us do) that my own conceptulizations are the 'right' ones, lol. I do agree that we each 'arrive' at this realization of 'interconnectiveness' or 'emptiness' or whatever you may prefer to name it, in different ways, each in our own time and way. I have this sort of 'need', as christopher::: said, to 'help' others to 'see' this Truth. But really, we may only be able to 'help' those that 'see' things in a similar way that we, personally, do. And who is to say which is the 'right' way of looking at it? Perhaps ALL views are really 'right' and can lead to the same, One Truth, which may be the same as saying that NONE are 'right'? The Truth, it seems (with a capital 'T'), is afterall, a Paradox. When we can learn to embrace paradox, then we are really getting somewhere, I'd say :smile: .

Thank you to us all for this wonderful discussion. :group:
"The image is a dream. The beauty is real. Can you see the difference?" ~Richard Bach from "Illusions"
mindfullmom
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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On a more scientific level, is there any proof of evolution?

Excuse my lack of knowledge on this but I have not kept up with the times.

I know this is part of the debate here, but from what I was taught way back in school, evolution was a fact. Is it really? I know we can look at similar types of animals and see how they evolved but what about between species. Like say, is there any break in the chain between a lion and an elephant? Is every species separate and distinct or blended together? Have we just not found these "missing links" or do they exist?

I know I am asking questions similiar tomy earlier statement about which direction the arrow was shot from and what it was made of and so on, but it is interesting to learn about.
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Ben
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

Post by Ben »

Dear members

Please return to topic.


Ben
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

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Ceisiwr
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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mindfullmom wrote:On a more scientific level, is there any proof of evolution?

Excuse my lack of knowledge on this but I have not kept up with the times.

I know this is part of the debate here, but from what I was taught way back in school, evolution was a fact. Is it really? I know we can look at similar types of animals and see how they evolved but what about between species. Like say, is there any break in the chain between a lion and an elephant? Is every species separate and distinct or blended together? Have we just not found these "missing links" or do they exist?

I know I am asking questions similiar tomy earlier statement about which direction the arrow was shot from and what it was made of and so on, but it is interesting to learn about.


Lots of it, science doesnt accept something just because it sounds nice

Sorry for short post, will answer more fully tomorow, need sleep atm

metta
“The teacher willed that this world appear to me
as impermanent, unstable, insubstantial.
Mind, let me leap into the victor’s teaching,
carry me over the great flood, so hard to pass.”
mindfullmom
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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The common thing i hear from the religious that accept evolution is that God guided it in some way, however as i said earlier evolution shows how you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it. And if he did what a lovely being he is encouraging a system that is built on competition and killing, extinction and suffering

Theism states that God made man, evolution proves that nature and natural selection made man. Evolution and God dont go
How does evolution show that you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it?

In what way does evolution prove that nature and natural selection made man?

I'm not trying to stir the pot, I have a genuine interest.
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christopher:::
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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mindfullmom wrote:
The common thing i hear from the religious that accept evolution is that God guided it in some way, however as i said earlier evolution shows how you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it. And if he did what a lovely being he is encouraging a system that is built on competition and killing, extinction and suffering

Theism states that God made man, evolution proves that nature and natural selection made man. Evolution and God dont go
How does evolution show that you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it?

In what way does evolution prove that nature and natural selection made man?

I'm not trying to stir the pot, I have a genuine interest.
Evolution is the result of the process of natural selection. But Natural selection doesn't always lead to successful creations. That's why there are no more saber tooth tigers, or dinosaurs. They existed only until they could no longer compete successfully. Humans have been the most successful animal, but we've now endangered our existance, and the existance of many other species, cause of some of our properties...

Kind of like the saber teeth or the jaws of T-rex, we have some habits and ways of living that helped us in the past but no longer do, and could lead to our extinction.
How does evolution show that you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it?
Good question! Natural selection doesn't fully account for everything, imo.

:tongue:
"As Buddhists, we should aim to develop relationships that are not predominated by grasping and clinging. Our relationships should be characterised by the brahmaviharas of metta (loving kindness), mudita (sympathetic joy), karuna (compassion), and upekkha (equanimity)."
~post by Ben, Jul 02, 2009
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tiltbillings
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

Post by tiltbillings »

christopher::: wrote:
mindfullmom wrote: How does evolution show that you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it?
Good question! Natural selection doesn't fully account for everything, imo.
What kind of intelligence guides the evolution of Ebola, AIDS, cancer, the TB bacillus, the Black Plague, any number of devastating parasites? As Mark Twain supposedly said, "If there is a God, He is a malign thug." If there is intelligent designer, the designer is a horror story writer.

This bears repeating with a bracketed addition:
"What are we to make of [the intelligence guiding] a creation in which the routine activity is for organisms to be tearing others apart with teeth of all types - biting, grinding flesh, plant stalks, bones between molars, pushing the pulp down the gullet with delight, incorporating its essence into one's own organization, and then excreting with foul stench and gasses the residue. Everyone reaching out to incorporate others who are edible to him. The mosquitoes bloating themselves on blood, the maggots, the killer-bees attacking with a fury and a demonism, sharks continuing to tear and swallow while their own innards are being torn out-not to mention the daily dismemberment and slaughter in "natural" accidents of all types: an earthquake buries alive seventy thousand bodies in Peru, automobiles make a pyramid heap of over fifty thousand a year in the U.S. alone, a tidal wave washes over a quarter of a million in the Indian Ocean. Creation is a nightmare spectacular taking place on a planet that has been soaked for hundreds of millions of years in the blood of all its creatures. The soberest conclusion that we could make about what has actually been taking place on the planet for about three
billion years is that it is being turned into a vast pit of fertilizer."

--Ernst Becker THE DENIAL OF DEATH
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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tiltbillings wrote:
christopher::: wrote:
mindfullmom wrote: How does evolution show that you get complex life without any being or intelligence guiding it?
Good question! Natural selection doesn't fully account for everything, imo.
What kind of intelligence guides the evolution of Ebola, AIDS, cancer, the TB bacillus, the Black Plague, any number of devastating parasites? As Mark Twain supposedly said, "If there is a God, He is a malign thug." If there is intelligent designer, the designer is a horror story writer.
Hi Tilt. Well, if you believe what Buddha taught, then you have to leave a place for karma in that picture, no? I'm not an expert on the subject, but as i understand it karma is thought to have a lawfulness to it... like gravity. There is no malign thug, but there is proposed a well ordered and lawful nature to the Universe. AIDS and the black plague dont simply strike beings hap-hazardly, from a Buddhist perspective, do they?

Those who believe in God simply add another level to the picture, associating that lawfulness with a Higher Spiritual Power. And if you believe in such a power, death is not something to be feared. Yes, the body becomes fertilizer, but the spirit lives on....

Thus God, belief in heaven and soul, the idea and faith in a Higher Wisdom, serves as a refuge for many people...

:heart:
"As Buddhists, we should aim to develop relationships that are not predominated by grasping and clinging. Our relationships should be characterised by the brahmaviharas of metta (loving kindness), mudita (sympathetic joy), karuna (compassion), and upekkha (equanimity)."
~post by Ben, Jul 02, 2009
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tiltbillings
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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christopher::: wrote: Hi Tilt. Well, if you believe what Buddha taught, then you have to leave a place for karma in that picture, no? I'm not an expert on the subject, but as i understand it karma is thought to have a lawfulness to it... like gravity.

What do we want to read into the word "lawful?" Let us not unnecessarily anthropomorphize or “deopomorphize” kamma.
There is no malign thug, but there is proposed a well ordered and lawful nature to the Universe. AIDS and the black plague dont simply strike beings hap-hazardly, from a Buddhist perspective, do they?
Not everything that happens to an individual is the result of kamma, including disease and accidents.
Those who believe in God simply add another level to the picture, associating that lawfulness with a Higher Spiritual Power.
And they open themselves up to serious questions about this supposed god:
"If God designs the life of the entire world -- the glory and the misery, the good and the evil acts, man is but an instrument of his will and God
alone is responsible." J V.238.

"He who eyes can see the sickening sight, why does not God set his creatures right? If his wide power no limits can restrain, why is his hand so rarely spread to bless? Why are his creatures all condemned to pain? Why does he not to all give happiness? Why do fraud, lies, and ignorance prevail? Why triumphs falsehood, -truth and justice fail? I count your God unjust in making a world in which to shelter wrong." J VI.208

"If the pleasure and pain that beings feel are caused the creative act of a Supreme God [Issara-nimmana-hetu], then the Niganthas [Jains] surely must have been created by an evil Supreme God." MN II 222
And if you believe in such a power, death is not something to be feared. Yes, the body becomes fertilizer, but the spirit lives on....
What spirit? Even taking "spirit" figuratively, it lives on to suffer further.
Thus God, belief in heaven and soul, the idea and faith in a Higher Wisdom, serves as a refuge for many people...
Which eventually needs to be let go if one is to find truly lasting freedom from the pain of the world.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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by tiltbillings » Thu Aug 06, 2009 10:17 pm

christopher::: wrote:
Hi Tilt. Well, if you believe what Buddha taught, then you have to leave a place for karma in that picture, no? I'm not an expert on the subject, but as i understand it karma is thought to have a lawfulness to it... like gravity.

Tilt: What do we want to read into the word "lawful?" Let us not unnecessarily anthropomorphize or “deopomorphize” kamma.
How can we not anthropomorphize kamma? Can we really separate out lawfulness, karma, and a human element here? Isn't this all interrelated and dependant?

Which brings up another question: Before animal and human life dominated the earth back when it was mostly say, minerals and bacterias, was karma working then? If so, how?
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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mindfullmom wrote:
by tiltbillings » Thu Aug 06, 2009 10:17 pm

christopher::: wrote:
Hi Tilt. Well, if you believe what Buddha taught, then you have to leave a place for karma in that picture, no? I'm not an expert on the subject, but as i understand it karma is thought to have a lawfulness to it... like gravity.

Tilt: What do we want to read into the word "lawful?" Let us not unnecessarily anthropomorphize or “deopomorphize” kamma.
How can we not anthropomorphize kamma?
The Buddha did not do so, and that is a pretty good model to follow.
Can we really separate out lawfulness, karma, and a human element here? Isn't this all interrelated and dependant?
Again, what is the actual Buddhist word for "lawfullness?" This a word imported into Buddhism by Western translatrors. It is not part of the lexicon of the Buddha's teachings.
Which brings up another question: Before animal and human life dominated the earth back when it was mostly say, minerals and bacterias, was karma working then? If so, how?
The answer to this is very simple, but let me ask you, what is kamma?
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

Post by nathan »

Scrap them both. Half baked people shouldn't teach anything, especially not teach piecemeal knowledge as fully explicable knowns of some particular significance when in fact, for example, nothing is known about our origins with anything remotely resembling certainty.

:alien:
But whoever walking, standing, sitting, or lying down overcomes thought, delighting in the stilling of thought: he's capable, a monk like this, of touching superlative self-awakening. § 110. {Iti 4.11; Iti 115}
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Ceisiwr
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

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nathan wrote:Scrap them both. Half baked people shouldn't teach anything, especially not teach piecemeal knowledge as fully explicable knowns of some particular significance when in fact, for example, nothing is known about our origins with anything remotely resembling certainty.

:alien:

Do you mean scrap Evolution as well, how bizzare. Should we start scraping all other knowledge as well and go back to the stone age?



Denying Evolution is delusional
“The teacher willed that this world appear to me
as impermanent, unstable, insubstantial.
Mind, let me leap into the victor’s teaching,
carry me over the great flood, so hard to pass.”
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Re: Evolution and Intelligent Design/Creationism

Post by appicchato »

clw_uk wrote:Do you mean scrap Evolution as well, how bizzare. Should we start scraping all other knowledge as well and go back to the stone age?



Denying Evolution is delusional
Last time I looked scrapping and denying were two different undertakings...
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