Paleontologists brought to tears, laughter by Creation Museum

Epicurus said:
Your article:

Creationism is a theory not supported by most mainstream Christian churches.
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"Mainstream"? Most Christians are no longer part of "mainstream" churches. They belong to radical evangelical churches that don't obey the laws of common sense and support the indefensible.
 
Watermark said:
"Mainstream"? Most Christians are no longer part of "mainstream" churches. They belong to radical evangelical churches that don't obey the laws of common sense and support the indefensible.
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Translation: My assumptions were wrong and it is embarrassing so I'll pretend that "most" does not mean "the majority" of something because I just really really don't want it to.
 
Damocles said:
Translation: My assumptions were wrong and it is embarrassing so I'll pretend that "most" does not mean "the majority" of something because I just really really don't want it to.
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I said that "many" doesn't mean "majority". "Most" usually means majority, although in some instances it could be used inaccurately to refer to a plurality.
 
Watermark said:
I have evidence. Just not perfect evidence. It's statistically improbable that a majority of Christians believe in evoltuion.
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Well present what you have. If it's solid enough to draw the conclusion you have, it stands to reason that others could do the same, whether or not I do.
 
http://people-press.org/commentary/?analysisid=118

Gallup did a poll in which they found that 45% did not believe in evolution. 13% said that evolution happened without interference from god, which is about the same percentage that don't believe in God at all. If you take the 13% out, and assume almost all of them were the non-religious, then the majority of what's left (which will probably consist soley of religious people) believes in literal biblical creation.

Since almost all religious people are Christians, it's safe to assume that the majority of Christians in America believe in the literal creation story. And if I'm wrong, I'm wrong by like 1 or 2 percent. Or there are a lot of nonreligious people who believe in the literal biblical creation story.
 
Damocles said:
Translation: My assumptions were wrong and it is embarrassing so I'll pretend that "most" does not mean "the majority" of something because I just really really don't want it to.
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his assumptions are correct. You can't pick and choose what you want. Christianity believes that the bible is the literal word of god. There may be some people that decide to be cafeteria christians and choose what they like, but in doing so, they are moving away from what christianity truly is.
 
CaptBillyTheKid said:
Yeah, not so much. Until I see some evidence to back up your claim, you two are just pissing in the wind, and I'm right because I said it would be his undoing.
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My statistical analysis is pretty rough, but "the majority of Christians believe in evolution" is not the null hypothesis. Both propositions are equally valid. Therefore, the one with the best evidence should be accepted. You've presented no evidence, and I've presented evidence that is pretty convincing. Therefore, I carry the day.
 
Watermark said:
My statistical analysis is pretty rough, but "the majority of Christians believe in evolution" is not the null hypothesis. Both propositions are equally valid. Therefore, the one with the best evidence should be accepted. You've presented no evidence, and I've presented evidence that is pretty convincing. Therefore, I carry the day.
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I did not see your evidence until just now. While sketchy at best, I'll accept your challenge and be back with my own evidence.
 
Watermark said:
Then you're an idiot.
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lords, if I were half as dumb as you I would likely be institutionalized......the amusing part is you have reached this conclusion despite the fact we all know you don't know what Genesis 1:1 even says without looking it up......
 
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And within 5 minutes, I have what I was looking for. From ARIS

In broad terms, ARIS 2008 found a consolidation and strengthening of shifts signaled in the 2001 survey. The percentage of Americans claiming no religion, which jumped from 8.2 in 1990 to 14.2 in 2001, has now increased to 15 percent. Given the estimated growth of the American adult population since the last census from 207 million to 228 million, that reflects an additional 4.7 million "Nones." Northern New England has now taken over from the Pacific Northwest as the least religious section of the country, with Vermont, at 34 percent "Nones," leading all other states by a full 9 points.


"Many people thought our 2001 finding was an anomaly," Keysar said. We now know it wasn't. The 'Nones' are the only group to have grown in every state of the Union."


The percentage of Christians in America, which declined in the 1990s from 86.2 percent to 76.7 percent, has now edged down to 76 percent. Ninety percent of the decline comes from the non-Catholic segment of the Christian population, largely from the mainline denominations, including Methodists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Episcopalians/Anglicans, and the United Church of Christ. These groups, whose proportion of the American population shrank from 18.7 percent in 1990 to 17.2 percent in 2001, all experienced sharp numerical declines this decade and now constitute just 12.9 percent.


Most of the growth in the Christian population occurred among those who would identify only as "Christian," "Evangelical/Born Again," or "non-denominational Christian." The last of these, associated with the growth of megachurches, has increased from less than 200,000 in 1990 to 2.5 million in 2001 to over 8 million today. These groups grew from 5 percent of the population in 1990 to 8.5 percent in 2001 to 11.8 percent in 2008. Significantly, 38.6 percent of mainline Protestants now also identify themselves as evangelical or born again.
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In short, the majority of Christians (as stated by your article and mine) do not strictly believe in creationism, with the Evangelical sect consisting of only about 12% of the population.

Link: http://www.americanreligionsurvey-a...cs_on_the_move_non-religious_on_the_rise.html
 
CaptBillyTheKid said:
In short, the majority of Christians (as stated by your article and mine) do not strictly believe in creationism, with the Evangelical sect consisting of only about 12% of the population.
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it depends also on how you define "evangelical".....prior to the Bush administration the word was used to distinguish Christians from "fundamentalists" and "liberals"......now it has morphed to primarily describe "fundamentalists" as opposed to "mainstream".......

thus a decade ago you would have counted something like 12% fundamentalists, 12% liberal Christianity, and evangelicals making up the rest of Protestants....."new earth" creationists would have been more like 3% of all Christians......
 
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PostmodernProphet said:
it depends also on how you define "evangelical".....prior to the Bush administration the word was used to distinguish Christians from "fundamentalists" and "liberals"......now it has morphed to primarily describe "fundamentalists" as opposed to "mainstream".......
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That's ARIS determination, not mine. They define the Evangelicals as those outside of mainline Christianity, such as Lutherans, Catholics, Baptists, Etc.
 
That's different than the numbers I saw for the evangelical population.

But the evangelical population isn't the only population the necessarily believes in strict creation. My analysis of the evolution poll deals a lot more directly with the subject.

Really good evidence would be an evolution poll that breaks things down exactly by religious demographics, but I couldn't find that, which is why I broke down and finally posted the sketchy analysis.
 
Watermark said:
I would definitely count Southern Baptists as fundamentalist.
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and traditionally you would be right.....however, today, everyone calls them "evangelicals"......note for example that Capt's cited article distinguishes Methodists from "evangelicals", yet the "method" which gives Methodists their name is evangelism......they were the original "evangelicals".......
 
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Well people often mix evangelical and fundamentalist. Methodists are generally pretty sane until you go down south. Down here there's very little difference between them and the Baptists besides the fact that they sprinkle instead of dunk.
 
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