Evolution and god tied together?

The concepts of God and evolution are not necessarily contradictory. It’s the notion of special creation that contradicts evolution.

Lots of people already hold this position including many christian groups

If there is a omnipotent god, it seems entirely possibly that evolution could be his/her/its work.

It’s weird to me that many Christians don’t think evolution is possible.
That’s like saying God can’t make evolution happen. So if they’re saying that, then suddenly God is no longer omnipotent.

There is no contradiction between the concept of a “higher power” and the scientific process of evolution. There is only a contradiction between the Judeo-Christian story of Genesis and evolution.

@The_Compassionate_Heretic ; Not all Christians! I wonder of the Genesis day was a trip around the universe, not a trip around the sun. No Biblical evidence to back it up, but God didn’t have to tell us EVERYTHING. He gave us an owners manual, not a schematic.

Maybe God created the bacteria, and then it evolved. Think about that yet? Didn’t think so.

As an agnostic, I’ve often thought (hoped?) this might be the case.

I remember being in CCD as a kid and asking the nun, “Couldn’t Adam and Eve have been apes?” Needless to say, it didn’t go over well

@cprevite
they were cylons

Evelyn just laughed at your question, but would give no explanation as to why.

N2O

I personally believe that some higher power set the universe in motion and then sat back to watch what happened. I don’t see why the concept of a higher power and evolution have to be mutually exclusive.

The two ideas do not have to be mutually exclusive. Many Popes have agreed that evolution can exist along with the belief in God http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19956961/

Have you ever considered that perhaps evolution is the higher power? Why does it have to have anything to do with God?

Millions upon millions of people have sex every day. Who is attracted to whom is largely out of our hands, determined by metagenetic influences, pheromones, and social desirability. Some people are attracted to the same sex, and their genes tend to drop out of the gene pool; others are attracted to the opposite sex, and their genes carry forward. And, among those, certain “desirable” types are more successful than others.

Behind all these attractions there may well be a hidden hand selecting for some traits and deselecting for others. For example, metagenetic studies suggest that for every male child a woman carries to term, the chance of her next male child being homosexual increases 25%. Girls who grow up with their natural fathers tend to mature sexually several months later than girls who grow up with an unrelated male in the house.

Women who were given the t-shirts of men to smell, and asked to choose a one, chose males whose immune systems were most complimentary to their own. The effects of famine and toxic exposures have reproductive effects, in some cases, for up to three generations. Geeks were packed off to monasteries in the middle ages; now they are the preferred mates to some women.

So, there are all sorts of things influencing natural selection that the operate outside of our awareness. In the aggregate they could constitute a kind of “hidden hand.”

I think it’s way cooler and more interesting to think about a universe without a supernatural presence, and to realize that it all came about naturally.

@Zuma, GA, and I’m not disagreeing with you, but the faithful find the idea of evolution being the higher power distasteful because it doesn’t give them that feeling of someone at the helm. Why do you think they always argue with the misconception that if evolution is true, then it was all random chance.

Wow, I’ve agreed with two people that I rarely agree with twice today, that has to be some sort of record.

@Chikipi Your question’s answer exists in the Catholic religion

I think evolution is contrary to the Bible, since the Bible says that death is a result of sin but from evolutionary theory we know there was death long before there were humans.

I know many people like ideas of theistic evolution, and there are many varied forms from deism to old-earth creationism. Personally, I find it all becomes a lot more clear if you reject the notion of a deity altogether, and accept evolution for the natural phenomenon it is.

I have always felt this way. I believe in God but I also believe in evolution. To be more specific I believe that God created everything with the intention for it to evolve if needs be.

Evolution of the ways God creates.

It depends completely on which god you are talking about. The word “god” can mean a huge variety of things, from Thor to Allah to a vague, universal force indistinguishable from what atheists identify as “the universe.”

If you are talking about Yahweh, the god of the Bible, as defined by the stories in the Bible, then yes, evolution absolutely does contradict the existence of that god. But if you want to ignore all of the unscientific parts of the Bible and call what’s left “God,” then I guess it would not.

Evolution is creation in progress.

Maybe, but the two parts might be pretty different than popularly perceived.