In our local newspaper than have been publishing letters to the editor about creationism vs evolutionism. Creationists tend to discount the fact that evolution does not in fact talk about the creation of life. It does in fact talk about the way life changes to adapt to it's environment.
People who believe in creationism tend to point out that God made the world and all life "Because the Bible tells me so!". However, the scientist will retort with "But evolution says that life, including man, has changed and evolved over time to better fit with the environment." which just causes the creationist to reply the same way.
Personally I am not up for a religious debate as for the simple fact that religious people will be offended by what I have to say about it. So, since this is my forum I am putting forth another explanation.
For a moment go back in the billions of years of Earth's history (yes, the world is more than 6K years old). There is no life here. Something causes a spark that changes those things. The planet changes to form an atmosphere, water in the form of rain begins falling. All these things come together to form the planet not very different from what we have today.
Now, something amazing happens. LIFE! Yes LIFE! Now that term has a broad meaning so we shall skip ahead a few million years and some Ages that have been classified. Now, we have MAN! He is rather stooped and somewhat short but he is man. Not the one we know today but none the less man. Now, what does he do? Well if you follow the principle of Intelligent Design nothing as he has no need too. We shall however follow the first part of that. Intelligence! Man developed the ability to think, how? Well simply by doing it. This lead man to live in caves. He learned of fire and accepted it as it made life better. Soon, he went from gathering to hunting and gathering. Then, when game became scarce he started migrating, moving from the caves into different structures. Then he learned to plant for food. Herd animals. He became taller, less hairy as the climate changed to a warmer one.
Man's appearance began to change as well. Less slope to the forehead. Brow ridges becoming not so pronounced. So on so forth. His skin tone changed based on where he lived. As did his hair color. Now some would say "Well Intelligent design at it's finest!" and to a degree they would be right. Evolution it's self proves intelligent design as any species that can't evolve with the changes in environment becomes extinct. Science proves that via the fossil record. Species that showed almost no change over thousands or even a million years died out. We still have dinosaurs today. Alligators and sharks are both prime examples of that. They have adapted and evolved to being smaller than their ancestors due to the smaller sizes of their pray.
The open mind does not automatically accept anything. It listens to the facts and theories. It chooses to get more information to begin it's own theory. That theory begins to build and take shape with more information. It is receptive to other theories that may run contradictory to those it already has so as either further cement it's theory or work to discard it.
The closed mind who says "Well no because THIS doesn't say it so it can't be true!" is the mind that will grow stagnant and devolve back to prehistoric man. They do this willingly as they have been spoon fed something for their entire lives and have limited, if any, ability for free thinking. They have no time for "misguided thoughts and nonsense".
Question them in depth about that and they get defensive and say you are "trying to subvert their beliefs and make them change to your sinning ways!". Or worse yet, fall back on something they can't prove. Many a great mind has been punished for free thinking. Even though those thinkers have done nothing but prove things are not always as they seem.
My intent here is not to bash religion in anyway at all. I am sure many of you realize I am talking about the Bible. The very same book that said the earth was set and did not move but all heavenly bodies rotated around it. This was the dominate thinking until the likes of Copernicus and Galileo. Both who were tried, and convicted of heresy. Copernicus was a member of that same clergy by the way. Galileo died on house arrest never having seen the fruits of his labors as it was illegal by church law to read or publish any of his works for a long time. They also said that the telescope was "The vision of Satan and an instrument of Damnation!".
I am not trying to change anyone's point of view, simply asking that people not be so closed minded to the world around them. There are many of things that religion simply does not explain because it can't. Open your mind to new thoughts and ideas then make your own assumptions and theories. I think if you do you will be happier for it!
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