When was the last time we had a true fundie creationist seriously posting to SDMB? At best we have everyone from atheists to non-fundie Christians saying what they think a creationist would say. If any creationist jewish dopers pipe in I suspect it will be something along the lines of “if G*d told Moses, Moses never wrote it down” rather than an an argument based on wild interpretations.
:hijack:
It isn’t? I was told in bio that it was a vestigal organ. That was originally used for the bacterial digestion of cellulose.
Why did God create Black Holes?
In order to play dice with the universe in a spot where His followers who were opposed to gambling couldn’t see Him. 
On a more serious note, I have to admit that for once Joe Cool and I see eye to eye on a quasi-religious question.
Those of you who were looking for a miracle as proof of God…
Wha…? Really? When did science-minded people stop worrying about the how, and become concerned with the why? Science has no interest in explaining why things happen, or why things are. Or did somebody publish the reason for gravity and I missed it? Last I heard, all we knew was THAT it exists and some of the basics of HOW it acts.
I did come up with some excuse. Maybe God made a black hole simply because he thought it would be neat. Why does an artist create? Why does a man climb a mountain? For his own enjoyment. Or for his own personal aesthetics. Or because he wanted to. I also came up with my stab at a more “science-minded” reason: Maybe it’s just an effect of the rules God set in place when he made the thing.
We don’t know the reasons behind things here on earth. We know that they interact with other things and we know some of HOW they interact, but not why. As somebody else already said, what’s the reason for the appendix? We’ve been aware of it for at least hundreds of years. Black holes were only theorized (and never observed yet) a few dozen years ago. But already we demand a reason for their being?
By the way, I resent the implication that just because I’m a believer that means I’m not science-minded. Remember that science attempts to explain what is observed. It does not try to speculate what might have happened in places and times that can’t be known.
Polycarp, you made me actually laugh out loud. 
We probably agree on more than just that. It’s just that this board tends to bring out our disagreements.
Joe_Cool, am I correct that you meant that post homorously or sarcastically? I say this because your 1st and 4th paragraphs contradict each other.
Clearly, although science is not interested in the “why”, science-minded people can be.
There are credible doubters of black holes as well. By “credible,” I mean the likes of Nobel prizewinner Dr. Martinus Veltman, as opposed to the preacher who considers a black hole to be wherever your 10% tithe went this past month.
Nevertheless, the existence of something which behaves as black holes are theorized to behave has been observed, often and carefully enough that whatever they are, we can no longer deny that they are out there.
…is of course, “why not?”
:rolleyes:
It wasn’t? Are you trying to say that the stars have shifted significantly enough in the last 6000 years?
If God is all knowning, then he knew about the disney movie Blackhole and thought if he doesn’t set this up right we’ll never have that cool Vincent robot. Of course I could be wrong 
No. But the earth wobbles in it’s rotation. In a few thousand years, Polaris will no longer be the north star (meaning the star that is directly over the North Pole). In another few thousand years after that, the wobble will bring Polaris back to it’s status as the pole star.
Zev Steinhardt
This is a little off-topic, but this thread made me think of something that occured to me in class today. Nuclear fusion made all the atoms, right? Starting from hydrogen, two slammed together and created helium, then another one added to that to make lithium, etc etc, all the way up to Iron. I’m not sure about how the stuff beyond that was made, but my point is that the only places where this has been done (naturally) was in stars. Hence, all atoms come from stars…I think what I’m trying to ask is do creationists oppose the idea of matter, (i.e. ourselves) coming from something made in stars? Is this another point of contention for them, and how do they respond to it? I don’t really want to hijack this thread, but I’m curious to know what has been said about that…
Maybe they changed their minds back. I don’t know, I’m no bio major- just a lowly english one. When I was in school they taught us that the appendix was no longer considered a vestigal organ and neither were the tonsils (and no, I have no idea what they do). I graduated in 2000 from highschool, so go easy on me.
Why not? What do we use black holes for? For most people in the world they are something to marvel at. Why can’t this be reason enough for God?
Admittedly, I am not a creationist and this is a non answer as the OP was written, but…
Off to Great Debates
No, it wasn’t intended to be humorous or sarcastic. I’m a victim of lazy and careless phrasing.
My first paragraph moves from the statement that science-minded people need a reason why. Science isn’t concerned with the why, so when you’re concerned with the why, you’re acting as a philosophically-minded person, not a science-minded one. It’s a role, not a fundamental attribute. When I’m acting as a science-minded person, I’m concerning myself with the mechanics of whatever I’m studying, not its purpose.
The 4th paragraph is simply expressing my distaste for the common statement that anybody who is a Christian hates science and is a superstitious stone-ager. I tend to be quite science-minded, as a matter of fact, and it does not interfere with my faith in God as long as I keep in the front of my mind that there are things I don’t understand, and that will likely always be the case. So when there’s a conflict, it’s a shortcoming in my understanding, nothing more.
Because if God made a universe without gravity, we’d have to come up with a less poetic name for our ‘Fall from Grace’.
Joe_Cool I understand that you have a genuine distaste for those who think that all Fundy Christians can not be science minded and live in the stone age. It is a true gross over generalization. I have to say that most of the Christians I know who are the ‘bible toting type’ do ahve everything figured out and if they were to think real hard on the subject of black holes they would in fact say because its Gods will or something like that.
But I still wonder what would happen, or what would they say if some time in our future an alien specie came down , landed on earth and said “hey your not alone, we’ve been watching for years…and just thought we’d come down and say hello” non threatening, just a quick hello/goodbye.
I am being quasi-facetious, but really, would they just say “Well God created the aliens too!”…??? would they have an answer to that as well?
That’s really not such a puzzle as you make it sound. In fact, it’s pretty simple. I happen not to think that there is any intelligent alien life, or that if there is, it’s so unlikely for us to encounter it for several reasons**, that it doesn’t matter.
However, there is nothing in the bible (that I’m aware of) that precludes alien life. It would not be any sort of blow to my faith if I turned out to be wrong.
If you believe, as I do, that God made everything that is, and there turns out to be an alien intelligence, then I’d have to say that God made that too. After all, this hypothetical intelligent species does fall under everything that is. For some reason you seem to regard that as a cop out, but I honestly don’t understand why. Just as with black holes, I don’t have to know the reason for there to be a reason, and God’s decision to create something does not hinge on my (or any other of his followers’) ability to understand why.
**The reasons I don’t believe we’ll ever encounter alien life have nothing to do with religion. I had it all typed out, but it would have been a major hijack. If anybody has any interest in discussing it, let me know and I’ll start a new thread.
I guess after much discussion Joe_Cool has nailed it on the head.
The operative phrase here is *IF[i/i] you believe as I do…
I do believe Joe that you do consider yourself science minded from time to time. However, as you know science is based in empirical findings, and as the existence of God can not be empirically proved. An answer such as the one you provided sends us back to the begining of the debate. I suppose some will say that the empirical evidence for the existance of God is all around us… I would say, yup it sure is if that is what you believe.
**By the way I thought it was widely regarded as a mathematical improbability that there isn’t intelligent life in the universe. Is Math a universal truth or valid enough to say that 1+1 definitely equals 2?
Nope. For many years now, the appendix has been known to be an important part of the immune system.