How do Creationists explain why people look so different from one another?

God did it. 6_6

@chocolatechip is there some explanation for this in the Bible that I missed? :\ It has been a while.

@ANef_is_Enuf The implication I’m making is that creationism is a truckload of male bovine feces.You’re looking for a rational explanation from an irrational belief system.

@chocolatechip I’m not necessarily looking for a “rational” explanation. I’m looking for the official explanation. That seems like a pretty enormous piece of the puzzle for them to skip over. Not that I don’t think that it is possible that they’ve skipped over that part, I’m just curious to know if there is an official explanation from their side.
I laughed out loud at “truckload of male bovine feces.

Well evolution and creationism are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Some people may believe that the Earth and certain organisms were created at some point, and then evolution did the rest. There are also some who believe in micro-evolution, but not macro-evolution. I don’t think there’s such a thing as an “official” explanation though. Is there even such thing as an “official” set of exhaustive beliefs that encompass a certain religion?

@chocolatechip isn’t that the difference between Creationism and Intelligent Design? I was under the impression that those were (slightly) different theories. I thought that for the most part, Creationists believe that god did all of the work. ID believers, however, believe in micro-evolution, they just believe that it was all guided by an unseen force.
I’m not trying to be difficult, I really am trying to understand.

When perfection and imperfection combines the result will always be uncertain.
This is the reality of the existence of the imperfect man, their fleshy reproduction is always uncertain thus the many variation.

Now from the creationist who specifically boast about the bible, there is the explanation but since it challenges their core belief system its not likely you would hear it from them.

Further down in Genesis, there is the story of sons of God, which are angels, also mated witht he fleshly woman, these gave birth to giants among a few….Now the result of this will bring much more variation to the human specie as they continue to reproduce,
Thus the variation of races

@ANef_is_Enuf Intelligent Design is an attempt to give credibility to Creationism by giving it a pseudo-scientific sounding name. That’s all.

I think Creationists pull the thoughts and ideas out of their butts. That way they could explain anything. Fairy Tales… It’s easy to have an answer for everything when it’s all make-believe.

@chocolatechip with all due respect, I don’t think that is technically true. ID is a completely separate theory from Creationism. Pseudo-science, yes, I’ll agree with you on that much. They overlap in some aspects, but they aren’t the same thing.
Creationism tends to be religious to the very core, where ID insinuates that some unseen force has a hand behind it, they (typically) do not try to speculate who or what that force is, exactly. ID doesn’t come right out and say “god did it.” Creationism does.
I’m not saying it isn’t possible for the two of them to scratch each others’ backs, but they are two different theories, even if they share similarities.

Wow, @chocolatechip and @Deja_vu thanks for the insults, real helpful. @chocolatechip did although in the third post hit on the correct answers. its micro, how many cats do you see in the stages of turning into a dog, or where is the full spectrum or representations between man and ape. It seems if evolution were macro the spectrums wouldn’t be so segmented.

Since Creationism does not believe in evolution or scientific understanding of genetic diversity, it is explained as the hand of God making each person unique. No DNA hocus-pocus, just God’s work.

The error here is in trying to impose a rational knowledge structure on an irrational assumption.

@zenvelo, not accurate I believe in micro evolution.

@Season_of_Fall do most Creationists believe in micro-evolution? I know there are variations within Creationist believers and with ID theorists, but is that pretty much the standard?

Sorry @Season_of_Fall . I’m not a big fan of Creationism, mainly because they don’t believe in micro evolution. They don’t, you can’t argue that.

@Deja_vu to be completely honest, I didn’t think they did, either. I thought evolution as a whole was completely off the table as far as Creationists are concerned.

@ANef_is_Enuf your right.

I think most Christians believe in micro. My science of study is geology and I think the bible is misinterpreted most of the time. Do you know the first verse in the bible is better translated “the earth became formless” not “the earth was formless”

@Deja_vu I’m one and I do.

@Season_of_Fall Okay, you do. Give me a sec., I’ll find this artical were the big guys in Creationism don’t believe in any for of evolution.

Darwin was a Christian, his theories have been taken further than he proposed them to represent.

@Season_of_Fall you work in a scientific field, and you believe in Creationism? May I ask how old you believe the Earth is? I’m curious to understand how the two balance one another from your perspective.

There’s a difference between scientific theory and theory. Honestly I don’t think we came from apes.

I don’t work as a geologist. The earth is as old as science says it is. The first verse in the bible has a footnote that says “better interpreted as ‘the earth became formless’”

@Season_of_Fall – Quote:“how many cats do you see in the stages of turning into a dog”.
WHAT?

@Mat74UK, read the whole thread please

@Deja_vu if you want to get technical, we didn’t evolve from “apes” in the modern sense of the word. We evolved from ape-like animals that no longer “exist”... because we do.

Am I not playing in your feild to ask the question, where is the full spectrum than?

@Season_of_Fall – I have and I’ve still no clue where that came from!

@ANef_is_Enuf I agree with that :)

@Season_of_Fall who are you asking? I don’t think that I understand what you’re asking, either.

@Mat74UK, read my last post.

The evolution question, if we evolved from something significantly different than now why don’t different stages of the process still exist?

@Season_of_Fall – You must bear in mind that evolution is a very, very, very slow process almost as slow as your average Creationist.

Honestly, I would like to read a Creationists explanation for @ANef_is_Enuf‘s question.

Hmm, I put it all down the amount of begetting that went on in the Old Testament.

@Season_of_Fall specifically on the human spectrum? Or throughout the animal kingdom?

I have to get to work, my point is I believe in micro. I’m disappointed that the online bibles don’t have the Genesis 1:1 footnote, there lies one of the problems. @ANef_is_Enuf since I’m not having the last say, please demand respect in the remainder of your thread.

@ANef_is_Enuf from where the human line started till now. I have deadlines I’m chasing. Thank you for allowing me my say.

@ANef_is_Enuf have you done any reading on the Anthropic principle? Might be some interesting reading for you, independent of whether you consider it credible or not.

@Season_of_Fall I know you’re leaving, but my answer to that is natural selection. Those that fail to evolve do not survive, and this has been over a span of time that is significant enough that it is perfectly reasonable that there are not earlier species of humans on the planet today. The evidence supporting early human evolution is enormous. Sites have been found all over the world that show ape-like creatures that were using tools, living in colonies, hunting and gathering.. even performing rituals, but they were not yet human. Also evidence shows that these creatures began eating meat to support the caloric needs of a growing brain, a brain that would ultimately become ours. If those creatures did not adapt to the world around them, they would die off. Those that evolved would survive.
No, I have not.

I haven’t read all 41 responses yet, but the same question could be asked of evolutionists.
The first thing that came to my mind was Psalm 139:13, For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

We are each a unique creation, with attributes of our parents and a little divine knitting going on too.
(Do I even want to look at the discussion that preceded this response? I know how these religious questions tend to digress.)

@Judi but, if we all came from the same people (Adam & Eve), then how is it that our parents, and our parents’ parents all came to look so different?
And since many of these traits are protective features that suit our geographic location, isn’t that the same as evolution?

I thought it was the Tower of Babel story, or is that just for languages?

@ANef_is_Enuf – I’ve been keeping up a little with this thread, your last question is actually very telling. My earlier comment about ‘begetting’ is not entirely facetious, constant reproduction does create diversity. I am no expert on Genesis, nor on gene theory, but any given human partnership will produce divergent individuals. In my family (I am one of 5 direct siblings) three of us have blue eyes, I have green, one other has brown. There are two blondes, one redhead (well, she calls it auburn…), mine is ‘mouse’ and another is brunette. This variation is simply because of the way chromosomes get divided up as sperm and egg collide, then cell division occurs.

Then there are ‘recessive’ genes… As said, I’m not an expert, but given that we all evolved from a very small group of ancestors anyway, it is not so strange to assume that if there were only a single couple at the head of our ‘tree’ they would contain all of human variety. The human genome is huge, complex and contains every possible variation we see. Maybe (only my opinion, but this is a social question!) it is actually quite possible to explain the Creationist view, simply by backtracking on current gene theory? That actually makes my brain hurt slightly!

Respectfully, I suggest that the metaphorical and poetic language of the Bible and it’s testaments are actually early attempts to explain exactly what we are finding out. That the ‘act’ of creation is in fact, only ever, the union of opposites. The joining of two that are not alike, but have the capacity to conjoin and to make more. Begetting… ?

@auntydeb that makes sense, sort of. You’re saying that Adam and Eve had the genetic proponents, even if recessive, to make every feature in the human race. Did I read that correctly? Is that what Creationists believe, though?

@ANef_is_Enuf,
Read the rest of Genisis! There’s all sorts of stuff about humans breeding with Giants that would lend itself to genetic diversity.
Also, if we all evolved from fish, how did we get feet? Maybe the truth lies somewhere between.
God created us in a unique way, but our attributes still adapted to our various environments. Lighter skin in darker climates etc.

Well, clearly I don’t believe in Creation theory, or ID. I asked this question in hopes of learning what the standard or official or typical belief is among those that do, not to argue whether or not it is true. Although I knew this discussion would almost definitely float into that arena, my hopes were to gain an understanding of how people that believe differently than I do explain something that seems to me like an obvious question that needs to be answered.
So far I gather that some Creationists believe in micro-evolution, and that breeding with giants could create genetic diversity.

I also know that some purists believe that the Bible should be taken completely literally, and that some believe it should be left open to interpretation. So does that mean that this question isn’t one that is addressed in Creation theory, or just that it is one of those things that is up in the air among the variety of believers?

Hey @ANef_is_Enuf – the factual nature of your quest would do better in the General section surely? Are there any true Creationists in Fluther? Everyone seems so liberal and pretty modern about here. Makes it difficult to get those more fundamentalist views. But, no, my ideas above are certainly not related to the actual beliefs of Creationists. Just positing a viewpoint, relating the human propensity to make up stories to cover the difficult bits.

@auntydeb true as that may be, I know how well discussions like this actually fare in General. The whole thing would be full of modded posts, and I just don’t feel like making that much work for the mods.
I was open to discussion, I just hoped I’d get an actual answer somewhere in the midst of all of it.

I really didn’t mean to argue! I hate arguing religion. I was just surprised when I read those passages as an adult. It seemed all science fiction to me.

@ANef_is_Enuf – totally unnerstooood. Have had same prob myself – or rather another incarnation – before. Part of reason for leaving and then reincarnating! Hope something comes of the quest! :0)

People have babies all the time that look nothing like either of the parents. For example we have no idea where my brother came from….he looks the opposite of both my mom and dad so….maybe that, but on a bigger scale?

@Season_of_Fall

“The evolution question, if we evolved from something significantly different than now why don’t different stages of the process still exist?”

That’s kind of like asking when you put cake batter into the oven and bake it, why isn’t there any batter left once the cake is baked.

Populations evolve and change. In the case of humans, none of the offshoots survived the pressures of natural selection. This isn’t at all unusual.

However, in many other cases, with other species, both the parent species and its descendants do survive. As a couple of examples, polar bears are descended from brown bears, dogs from wolves, and domestic chickens from red jungle fowl. All of these species still exist.

As for the original question, Answers in Genesis, the go-to source for young-earth creationists, basically claims that there are no races.

one of my cats is completely evolving into a dog

They ignore all the people that look differently?

I’m a Christian, but I believe that God and the ancient Jews did not intend for the bible to be taken literally. It is not a scientific text and shouldn’t be looked at as one- It’s just to explain our relationship with God and need for a savior.

Creationists don’t completely deny the effects of environment on biology. Too much exposure to the sun results in a change in the appearance and feel of our skin. Likewise, over thousands of years, environmental factors could affect skin colour, hair colour, etc. But humans are humans, just like dogs are dogs. Evolution – macroevolution – is a different thing altogether.

(I’m not saying this is what I believe.)

@nicobanks

“Too much exposure to the sun results in a change in the appearance and feel of our skin. Likewise, over thousands of years, environmental factors could affect skin colour, hair colour, etc.”

What you are describing is Lamarckism, which is totally discredited, not Darwinian evolution.

@crisw Totally discredited? Well, yeah, obviously: we’re talking about Creationism. Are you suggesting there’s a scientific explanation for Creationism that hasn’t been discredited? Or that my comment doesn’t answer the question? Or what?

@nicobanks

“Are you suggesting there’s a scientific explanation for Creationism that hasn’t been discredited?”

No. Just that what you described isn’t an example of creationist or Darwinian thought. I’ve never heard a creationist use Lamarckism as an explanation.

Well, all I know is this is the rationale I’ve seen others describe many times.