Need help with a discussion: What IS Evolution

[Kodiak]

So, my goal in this thread is not to discuss the ideas of Evolution vs. Creationism. I've read through the HoS recently and learned that such things only have one direction. I'm impressed by the logic and argument present on this board and because of it I have come seeking advice in the following:

Tonight I was talking with my wife and one of our housemates, and we got on the topic about teaching religion in school. I am a practicing Mormon (as is my wife) and my housemate is "Born Again" for lack of a better term. We all agreed that its wrong to teach religion in school because it's not the place for such things. Then I was completely floored when my housemate, we'll call her Lisa, said "Yeah, that's why I think they shouldn't teach evolution in schools BECAUSE IT'S A RELIGION. For a few moments, my brain actually failed to comprehend what she said, since it made absolutely no sense. We went back-and-forth a while about the subject, and here's a summary:

Her claims:
1. Evolution is a religion, because it governs how people believe about the world.
2. Religion is beyond definition.
3. Evolution is a theory, with gaps and things which cannot be proven and must be accepted on faith, much like religion
4. Just because something is based on science doesn't mean it's correct.
5. Only the parts of evolution which can be completely proven should be taught to children. The rest should be left out of the classroom with Fairies and the Holy Ghost.

My assertions:
1. Evolution is based on facts which can be scientifically observed and confirmed Empirically.
2. The Theory of Evolution is the mechanism by which these facts are interpreted and understood as applying to life on Earth.
3. A Religion is a man-made construct which includes: Devotion to a higher power, Worship, Ritual Observance, a moral code.
4. Scientific proof or belief in said proof is NOT a religion because it does not satisfy #3.
5. Evolution should be taught in school because it is the foremost scientific theory regarding the formation of life on this planet and is rife with pristine examples of the scientific method at work.

I'd rather not get into a vs. debate about creation vs. evolution, but I'd appreciate some help in articulating the differences between science and religion. When I submitted to Lisa the above definition of religion she simply dismissed it as "That's your definition". I was willing to accept the idea that Evolution and Religion are both cosmologies through which a person may choose to observe and understand the world, but that they were not the same in any way.

I have come to greatly appreciate the discussion and debate on this forum, and look forward to your thoughts and tips as to how to explain to my friend how Evolution or a belief in the same is not equal to a religion.

[Singular Intellect]

You could've replied with the simple "If evolution is a religion, then so is gravity because they're both theories."

[Kodiak]

You could've replied with the simple "If evolution is a religion, then so is gravity because they're both theories."

Yeah, I tried that one, and it didn't help. She hit me with a "You're over simplifying". Actually, that brought up my favorite moment to memory: She told me that evolution was "just a theory", and when I explained that theories are based on fact she said "but it's not a theory, it's a belief!" That's right, in less that one minute evolution simultaneously was and was not a theory.

[Vehrec]

On the subject of her #3, there have been many attacks on Evolution over the past 150 years, and they all have only succeeded in increasing its strength. Evolution is able to absorb other theories into itself. The 'gaps' in evolution get smaller and smaller with every onslaught. Not that any scientist would accept anything on faith-because this would simply leave one's back exposed in the cutthroat research world. If she doesn't believe that junior scientists would come out of the woodwork when they smell blood coming off Darwin, she's never seen actual researchers. Someone should introduce her to the crazy world of Paleoanthropology and the infamous feuds the Leakey's get into.

On the subject of number 1, the neo-Darwinian synthesis does not shape how you believe-because it isn't a belief system. It is simply a naturalistic explanation of how life-once it came into existence- differentiated and spread and changed. Why anyone sees this as a basis for a moral code is beyond me. Please get her to explain why Evolution is a belief system.

On 4 and five-Absolute truth and correctness isn't needed. .999999 repeating =1 after all. Evolution might not be the whole world and all the worlds that might be in a nutshell, but it is a damn good way of explaining the world-too good to casually abandon.

[FSTargetDrone]

Religion is a philosophy, a belief, a worldview. Evolution isn't a "belief"; It is an observable process in nature.

[SilverWingedSeraph]

Her claims:
1. Evolution is a religion, because it governs how people believe about the world.

Blatant lie, one often used by Creationists.

2. Religion is beyond definition.

And yet the dictionary has managed to do just a fine job of defining it!

3. Evolution is a theory, with gaps and things which cannot be proven and must be accepted on faith, much like religion

As long as they're supported by facts and logic, then they're already ten steps above religion.

I'm really baffled by this woman's logic, and Creationist logic in general. There's no possible way you can define Evolution as a religion, without defining Science as a whole as a religion. Then again, I've seen them try that shit before too. The fact is, religion is based on faith. I.E. Believing without evidence.

There's plenty of evidence for science, and for evolution. Scientific theory is all about evidence, not just saying "it is because it is". Science is practically the opposite of religion. Then there's the problem that religion is defined as being:

1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

Even if you ignore the nice big bolded part, which rules Evolution out entirely, religion is based on "belief". Evolution is not. Evolution is based upon observations, facts and evidence.

[Kodiak]

Then there's the problem that religion is defined as being:

1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

Even if you ignore the nice big bolded part, which rules Evolution out entirely, religion is based on "belief". Evolution is not. Evolution is based upon observations, facts and evidence.

Yeah, I was truly baffled by this. I brought up the definition and it was dismissed out-of-hand which left me bewildered, because all of a sudden "facts" weren't admissible and that was just an opinion. Perhaps it comes down to not being able to explain something to a person who refuses your definitions of the world.

[Alyrium Denryle]

1. Evolution is a religion, because it governs how people believe about the world.

Flat out false. I can accept that species on this planet emerged through the processes of natural selection and drift operating on populations of ancestral organisms over time and attach ZERO societal values to that proposition. Now, I do attach value to that proposition. But that is part of a separate metaethical and metaphysical position I hold independent of evolution an sich

Now, if her definition of "beliefs about the world" is sufficiently broad as to encompass factual claims regarding causality (IE. a belief about the world such as accepting the proposition that objects fall when you drop them) physics is a religion, in fact all knowledge is religion and thus we should abolish schooling as unconstitutional.

2. Religion is beyond definition.

I am pretty sure the dictionary and religious scholars have this one. Usually a religion is broadly defined as "belief in and practices surrounding the belief in the sacred." to paraphrase. So no, religion is not beyond definition.

3. Evolution is a theory, with gaps and things which cannot be proven and must be accepted on faith, much like religion

What gaps now? Like the endogenous retroviruses, cooberated by the fossil record, and molecular clock data, as well as contemporary observation of organisms changing over time from standing variation and mutation that prove the fact of evolution? Or the 149 years of continuous testing of natural selection and drift? What gaps are these exactly? The only gaps I see are predicted by the theory, or are unknowns. If she wants to know how every single phenotype evolved she has a while to wait, because there are at least 10 million species on this planet existing right now, and probably a lot more than that. In fact, if she wants that level of proof before she will accept a proposition, she will have a long time to wait for ANY scientific theory to stop being religion. Why? two reasons

A) Every conclusion science reaches is tentative, contingent on new data
B) The universe is huge and we cant possibly know everything in it.

Of course, what I just said in A) is poignant for another reason. Faith is knowledge without evidence. Sometimes in spite of it. I dont have faith in evolution. I do not accept the proposition because in my heart I know it is true. I accept the proposition because I can make testable predictions based upon it that work. I can directly observe evolution every day in my line of work. I have no more "faith" in evolution than your friend has "faith" that she will not be shunted 5 meters to her left at random, or "faith" that she will not fall through the concrete she walks on and plummet to burning death at the center of the earth.

4. Just because something is based on science doesn't mean it's correct.

Because science is tentative and contingent on the data.

5. Only the parts of evolution which can be completely proven should be taught to children. The rest should be left out of the classroom with Fairies and the Holy Ghost.

And by her definitions, gravity, the germ theory of disease, plate tectonics, heliocentric theory, electromagnetism... etc

1. Evolution is based on facts which can be scientifically observed and confirmed Empirically.
2. The Theory of Evolution is the mechanism by which these facts are interpreted and understood as applying to life on Earth.
3. A Religion is a man-made construct which includes: Devotion to a higher power, Worship, Ritual Observance, a moral code.
4. Scientific proof or belief in said proof is NOT a religion because it does not satisfy #3.
5. Evolution should be taught in school because it is the foremost scientific theory regarding the formation of life on this planet and is rife with pristine examples of the scientific method at work.

correct

[SilverWingedSeraph]

Claiming that a definition for a word is "just an opinion", is like me saying the blue is actually red, and that anyone who disagreed was wrong, because colour can't be defined!

Wait! It can! It's called a dictionary!

The handy thing about words is that they all have a real, solid definition. Yes, even Religion. The definition of words is not subjective. If she disagrees with the dictionary definition of religion, she's just as wrong as if she disagreed with what colours are, or what order the letters of the alphabet come in.

Of course, the dictionary would also label your friend as a moron, but that's probably just my opinion too.

[Singular Intellect]

You could've replied with the simple "If evolution is a religion, then so is gravity because they're both theories."

Yeah, I tried that one, and it didn't help. She hit me with a "You're over simplifying". Actually, that brought up my favorite moment to memory: She told me that evolution was "just a theory", and when I explained that theories are based on fact she said "but it's not a theory, it's a belief!" That's right, in less that one minute evolution simultaneously was and was not a theory.

At that point I'd have simply said "Well, if you're going to lie to my face so you can pretend to be right, then there's no point in talking to you. I don't like talking to liars."

Naturally she'd object, to which you point out how she lied.

[Morilore]

Her claims:
1. Evolution is a religion, because it governs how people believe about the world.
2. Religion is beyond definition.

What the hell kind of retard is this, that she claims that religion is undefinable right after she fucking defines it?

[SpacedTeddyBear]

Jeez the Born Agains are always the loudest to screech persecution when someone questions the reality of their beliefs, yet are always at the forefront of criticizing subject matter in which they have little or no education on.

I think the first thing you should try to do, is to go to Mike's Creation vs Science website, sit her ass down in front of it and have her read it.

Otherwise.....
Assuming she's not also a YEC, you can argue that natural phenomena occurs regardless of our existence. Science is simply our best way of observing, categorizing, and analyzing these phenomena. The existence of religion demands some form of higher intelligence.

Secondly, she's already contradicted herself in calling evolution a theory in one argument, and a religion in another. Theories are generalized statements describing some particular observable system, which have been tested repeatedly to the point where it can widely accepted that it occurs as a fact. But what we can't say, is that it's the absolute truth. However, since these descriptions are so accurate, we can actually make future predictions regarding these systems.

Religion however, relies mainly on the notion that there is some unobservable deity in the sky somewhere. Whose existence can no more be proven, as the pink dragon that is sitting next to me. Even if you can't see him, I believe it's there because I can feel him all around me....... or is that just atmosphere.

[Cycloneman]

Claiming that a definition for a word is "just an opinion", is like me saying the blue is actually red, and that anyone who disagreed was wrong, because colour can't be defined!

Wait! It can! It's called a dictionary!

How can you define "red" in a dictionary? It's red. What are you going to say? A set of hues between purple and orange?

Holy shit it is defined in the dictionary haha and it's exactly as dumb sounding as I thought it'd be:

1. any of various colors resembling the color of blood; the primary color at one extreme end of the visible spectrum, an effect of light with a wavelength between 610 and 780 nm.

Though, it also has:

2. something red.

You can't define a word with itself! Way to fail me, dictionary.com!

[Darth Wong]

Her claims:
1. Evolution is a religion, because it governs how people believe about the world.

She apparently makes no distinction between "analyze" and "believe". Evolution is a theory which helps people explain mysteries which are otherwise inexplicable (such as the fact that the animal kingdom has an incredibly obvious tree-like structure; so obvious that naturalists arranged it into a tree long before Darwin was born).

2. Religion is beyond definition.

Religion is a belief system without empirical basis. There, I defined it. She loses.

3. Evolution is a theory, with gaps and things which cannot be proven and must be accepted on faith, much like religion

Ask her to give an example of something which cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt about evolution. Make a note of explaining to her that gaps in the fossil record or gaps in our knowledge do not constitute gaps in evolution theory itself. In fact, there is no such thing as a "gap" in a theory; only a mechanism whose predictions are falsified upon experimentation or observation.

4. Just because something is based on science doesn't mean it's correct.

That is correct. However, if something violates well-tested scientific principles (by magically transmuting dust into humans, for example), it is almost certainly wrong. It's like math that way; the fact that the math adds up does not mean you're right, but if your math is wrong, then your conclusions are almost certainly wrong. You could only be right by sheer luck in that case.

5. Only the parts of evolution which can be completely proven should be taught to children. The rest should be left out of the classroom with Fairies and the Holy Ghost.

The necessity for an evolutionary mechanism in order to explain the fossil record can be completely proven.

I'd rather not get into a vs. debate about creation vs. evolution, but I'd appreciate some help in articulating the differences between science and religion. When I submitted to Lisa the above definition of religion she simply dismissed it as "That's your definition". I was willing to accept the idea that Evolution and Religion are both cosmologies through which a person may choose to observe and understand the world, but that they were not the same in any way.

Science is empirical. Religion is not.

That's the clearest distinction one can draw; in order to elevate science over religion, one must only conclude that the physical universe is more "real" than one's religious beliefs. In order to equate religion and science, on the other hand, one must conclude that one's religious beliefs are no less real than the ground beneath his feet: an obviously unreasonable posture to anyone other than a raving fanatic.

By the way, it looks to me like she's relying heavily on an obvious black/white fallacy. Neither science or religion can lay claim to being absolutely proven, so she concludes that they have equal credibility. This is much like saying that neither you or I have infinite wealth, therefore we must have the same amount of money in the bank. It's ridiculously broken logic.

PS. You're probably wasting your time. "Born agains" are usually people who failed at life the first time around, and who think they can get a chance to redeem themselves by metaphorically being "born again" as new people, thus leaving the stain of their old lives behind. Almost all of them will tell you what awful people they were before they were "born again"; the whole movement is a collection of misfits. Because their entire self-esteem is now dependent upon having shed any responsibility for their past lives through this "born again" process, any attempt to refute any part of their belief system feels like an attempt to destroy their entire sense of self-worth. They tend to fight tooth and nail in order to hang onto their "born again" status for that reason.

[Surlethe]

Born-agains and fundies tend to have an extremely black-and-white view of the world anyway. It's ironic she accused Kodiak of oversimplifying, because her beliefs are sure to lead to an incredible bifurcation and oversimplification of pretty much everything around her.

As far as what evolution is, I have actually done some work to that end: Creationists' Guide to Evolution. It's a work in progress and not yet the best it can be, but I hope it helps you, Kodiak.

[Majin Gojira]

Wait, is she claims that Evolutionis a religion, and that a religion is undefinable, how the HELL can she prove that anything is a religion?!

[CaptainChewbacca]

Claiming that a definition for a word is "just an opinion", is like me saying the blue is actually red, and that anyone who disagreed was wrong, because colour can't be defined!

Wait! It can! It's called a dictionary!

How can you define "red" in a dictionary? It's red. What are you going to say? A set of hues between purple and orange?

Seems to me defining a color by wavelengths of light is exactly how you'd want to do it.

[Darth Wong]

Claiming that a definition for a word is "just an opinion", is like me saying the blue is actually red, and that anyone who disagreed was wrong, because colour can't be defined!

Wait! It can! It's called a dictionary!

How can you define "red" in a dictionary? It's red. What are you going to say? A set of hues between purple and orange?

Holy shit it is defined in the dictionary haha and it's exactly as dumb sounding as I thought it'd be:

1. any of various colors resembling the color of blood; the primary color at one extreme end of the visible spectrum, an effect of light with a wavelength between 610 and 780 nm.

Though, it also has:

2. something red.

You can't define a word with itself! Way to fail me, dictionary.com!

Don't use dictionary.com. Dictionary.com is for dumb-asses (for example, it defines atheism as "immorality", or at least it did when I was writing up my creationtheory.org website). If you use www.m-w.com instead, you get:

"1: a color whose hue resembles that of blood or of the ruby or is that of the long-wave extreme of the visible spectrum."

[Darth Wong]

Born-agains and fundies tend to have an extremely black-and-white view of the world anyway. It's ironic she accused Kodiak of oversimplifying, because her beliefs are sure to lead to an incredible bifurcation and oversimplification of pretty much everything around her.

Worse yet, her beliefs were pre-packaged for her, thus requiring zero mental effort on her part. She never had to actually think about anything. That's why, when you argue with this kind of imbecile, she tends to repeat herself a lot. And if you press her, she will invite you to come talk to her youth pastor or minister or whatever, because "he can explain it much better than I can".

Fundamentalism is designed for people who really don't even want to think. Who wants to do all the work of collecting information, working through complex concepts, recognizing that all knowledge is contingent upon the limitations in our data gathering process, etc? It's so much simpler to just say "here are all the answers, don't ask how we know, just take it on faith".

Mind you, born-agains and fundies are a bit different. Fundies are often lifelong adherents. Born-agains are typically people who were raised Christian, rebelled against authority in their teens, did drugs or other bad things in their late teens and early twenties, and then suddenly "woke up in my late twenties and realized that this was not how I wanted to live my life." The born-agains are worse than the fundies because they have the incredibly sanctimonious, condescending air of assuming that they understand you ... because they assume that you are just like they were when they were 19. I often try to forestall this attack by pointing out up-front that I've lived a squeaky-clean life: no drugs, no smoking, no promiscuity, no criminal activities, no DUI, almost no alcohol at all, etc. Because if I don't, then I know I'll get the "you just don't want to be held accountable for your blah blah blah ..." argument. My atheism has nothing to do with rebellion against my parents or anyone else, and I don't worry about accountability. I've lived an upstanding life: better than any born-again I've ever met. If there were cosmic accountability for our lives, they'd be in a lot more trouble than me.

[Terralthra]

Don't use dictionary.com. Dictionary.com is for dumb-asses (for example, it defines atheism as "immorality", or at least it did when I was writing up my creationtheory.org website). If you use www.m-w.com instead, you get:

"1: a color whose hue resembles that of blood or of the ruby or is that of the long-wave extreme of the visible spectrum."

It no longer does. It lists Atheism as:

1. the doctrine or belief that there is no God.
2. disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings.

It cites the American Heritage Dictionary, Princeton University WordNet, and the Random House Dictionary.

Really, dictionary.com is just a definition aggregator. The definitions are no better or worse than the source dictionary(ies) it cites on any particular word. AHD, RHD, and WordNet are all at least reputable dictionaries.

[Kodiak]

I really like what you have to say here, Mike, but I'd like some clarification on a few points:

She apparently makes no distinction between "analyze" and "believe". Evolution is a theory which helps people explain mysteries which are otherwise inexplicable (such as the fact that the animal kingdom has an incredibly obvious tree-like structure; so obvious that naturalists arranged it into a tree long before Darwin was born).

I keep running up against a "You believe in evolution? Are you saying we came from monkeys?" as though that is all evolution has to say about anything. Is this a straw-man fallacy, or some other flawed logic?

Ask her to give an example of something which cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt about evolution. Make a note of explaining to her that gaps in the fossil record or gaps in our knowledge do not constitute gaps in evolution theory itself. In fact, there is no such thing as a "gap" in a theory; only a mechanism whose predictions are falsified upon experimentation or observation.

I don't quite understand the bolded text. If you could elaborate I'd appreciate it. And pretend I'm 4

That is correct. However, if something violates well-tested scientific principles (by magically transmuting dust into humans, for example), it is almost certainly wrong. It's like math that way; the fact that the math adds up does not mean you're right, but if your math is wrong, then your conclusions are almost certainly wrong. You could only be right by sheer luck in that case.

I appreciate the simplicity of this explanation.

The necessity for an evolutionary mechanism in order to explain the fossil record can be completely proven.

Again, I'd appreciate some clarification as to what you're getting at here.

Science is empirical. Religion is not.

This is one of the reasons I've never tried to "prove" religion to anyone. I've taught about it, and answered questions about it, but there is no proof for it.

By the way, it looks to me like she's relying heavily on an obvious black/white fallacy.

That's exactly what it is! Thanks for giving me a name for it. That's one of the things that's so frustrating is I know that the logic is flawed but I have difficulty pointing out how.[/quote]

Thanks all for your input. This is really helping me put together an good groundwork to build on.

[Kodiak]

Ghetto Edit:

I think part of the difficulty is that the word "Theory" has become loaded in society to mean "Best Guess" or perhaps even synonymous with "Hypothesis". I say "Theory" and people equate it with "Yeah, communism worked too, in theory" or "An iceberg can't sink the Titanic, in theory" and the word then becomes devoid of its original meaning. *sigh*

[Alyrium Denryle]

I keep running up against a "You believe in evolution? Are you saying we came from monkeys?" as though that is all evolution has to say about anything. Is this a straw-man fallacy, or some other flawed logic?

For one, we do not believe in evolution. We accept it. Believing something is to imply faith in it. We provisionally accept evolution, contingent on data. So that is a strawman.

And no, we did not come from monkeys per se. We descended from a common ancestor to modern apes which was probably rather monkey-like. A strawman via oversimplification.

I don't quite understand the bolded text. If you could elaborate I'd appreciate it. And pretend I'm 4

Basically there are no "gaps" in the theory of evolution. Because the mechanisms are worked out. There is not an observation yet found which is not (or cannot) be explained by natural selection, mutation and drift. So in that respect there is no gap.

To use an analogy it is like multiplication tables. Every value is filled in using the mechanism of multiplication. No gaps. Even though the table can in theory go in until infinity. However, if for some reason we worked a problem and came up with something consistently not on the table, then we would need to rethink how we do math

Again, I'd appreciate some clarification as to what you're getting at here.

If evolution did not occur by some mechanism, we cannot possibly explain what we see in the fossil record. The bullshit creationists give you about how the fossils came to be where they are does not jive with the laws of physics.

[Darth Wong]

I keep running up against a "You believe in evolution? Are you saying we came from monkeys?" as though that is all evolution has to say about anything. Is this a straw-man fallacy, or some other flawed logic?

It's actually their way of avoiding the argument. The argument has to do with how we can determine whether these conclusions are valid. Rather than address the underlying logic, they simply mock the conclusion and ignore the logic. Surely, if the conclusion is ridiculous, they should be able to find some flaw in the supporting logic, correct? But they can't, which is why they resort to this trick: appealing to personal incredulity. Once upon a time, people probably felt the same way about Pasteur's Germ Theory: "are you telling me that there are tiny little animals so small that we can't even see them, and these tiny little animals can kill us? Madness, I say! Totally ridiculous!"

Ask her to give an example of something which cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt about evolution. Make a note of explaining to her that gaps in the fossil record or gaps in our knowledge do not constitute gaps in evolution theory itself. In fact, there is no such thing as a "gap" in a theory; only a mechanism whose predictions are falsified upon experimentation or observation.

I don't quite understand the bolded text. If you could elaborate I'd appreciate it. And pretend I'm 4

The mechanism of heritable change through selection is fully defined. Ergo, there are no gaps in the theory itself. The "gaps" she refers to are unanswered questions about (for example) the lineage of a particular species. But those are gaps in our fossil knowledge, not gaps in the theory of evolution. If you don't know the name of your great great great great great great great great great great grandfather, does this mean there is a gap in your family tree? Or is there a gap in the theory of human heredity? Obviously, only a fool would say that there is a problem with the theory of human heredity just because you can't account for everyone in your family tree. A theory is tested by seeing if it makes false predictions, not by seeing whether it can explain everything.

The necessity for an evolutionary mechanism in order to explain the fossil record can be completely proven.

Again, I'd appreciate some clarification as to what you're getting at here.

To put it another way, we can't "completely prove" that evolution is true. We can't even completely prove that we exist; we might all be a simulation, a la The Matrix. But we can prove that evolution is the best scientific theory to explain what we know of the fossil record, and in fact, it is the only theory which can do so. That is all the proof necessary to teach it in school.

Thanks all for your input. This is really helping me put together an good groundwork to build on.

You're welcome (although as I said earlier, I doubt you will have any effect on her).

[Zixinus]

Here's my go:

I'd rather not get into a vs. debate about creation vs. evolution, but I'd appreciate some help in articulating the differences between science and religion.

Very simple:

Religion: things that people pull out of their ass and other people have an enormous emotional attachment to because they like it.

Science: things that certain people figure out after strict and very rigorous testing and thinking, and testing the results of the thinking until we have figured out something workable (keyword is "workable").

That's the somewhat oversimplified version of it anyway.

When I submitted to Lisa the above definition of religion she simply dismissed it as "That's your definition".

You cannot argue againts such an argument without using an invaluable tool, a tool enormously powerful in such debates, a tool that has only one name that is uttered quite rarely: dictionary.

A word has a commonly-accepted definition in language. If she creates a new definition for words, she is then technically speaking another language or at least forming one.

I was willing to accept the idea that Evolution and Religion are both cosmologies through which a person may choose to observe and understand the world, but that they were not the same in any way.

Evolution is not a cosmology. It has no belief system in-built. Evolution is nothing more and nothing less, then a phenomenon/physical process that is observed and tested in the objective universe we all share.

5. Only the parts of evolution which can be completely proven should be taught to children. The rest should be left out of the classroom with Fairies and the Holy Ghost.

Then she basically dismissed her own argument: evolution is a VITAL concept for modern biology. Without it, there is simply no modern biology. Biology does not make sense without it, period. You simply cannot teach modern biology without evolution. That's like trying to teach mechanics or architecture without teaching them Newtonian mechanics.

We would be unable to make a coherent categorizing system for all the animals on the world without it. Yes, even how we categorise the animal kingdom has evolution "in it": animals are categorized based on their ancestry, which provides a coherent system that is both simple to use and expand.

Furthermore, there is no science taught in schools that is not completely proven (well, in schools that I consider proper anyway).

Here are my assertions to Lisa's arguments:

1. Evolution is a religion, because it governs how people believe about the world.

A religion is a complete belief system, while evolution is merely the model of a phenomenon found in nature (among other places actually).

As for the view of the world, we can by that logic argue that we could put helio-centric model of a the solar system on the battlefield as well. If I had more patience I would use her own reasoning to argue againts helio-centric worldwide the same way she does.

The same goes for economics. Or history. Or basically anything taught in school.

2. Religion is beyond definition.

dictionary.com and Merriam-Webster and every damn dictionary disagrees. There is nothing about religion that is undefinable. Something could only be undefinable when there is no clear characteristic unattributable to it. Religion has clear characteristics that can be defined.

3. Evolution is a theory, with gaps and things which cannot be proven and must be accepted on faith, much like religion

Evolution is science, therefore there any no gaps that are to be accepted on faith. It is true that some partitions of what can be found in your typical schoolbook has to be taken on faith due to size and content constraints, but you don't display the exact chemical reactions undergoing in coal when you explain how a steam engine works in general school.

4. Just because something is based on science doesn't mean it's correct.

While technically accurate, "correct" doesn't mean "true". Science by very nature thrives for truth, fixing every mistake or flaw it has until its completely accurate. Something based on science is far more likely to be correct then something based on emotional or sentimental judgement due to its critical and strict nature.

Furthermore, science is a tool to gain valid and accurate information about the universe. Nothing less or more. Science doesn't make a world-view, merely gives clarification and understanding of what we already see. What conclusions we arrive trough that is our own responsibility.

5. Only the parts of evolution which can be completely proven should be taught to children. The rest should be left out of the classroom with Fairies and the Holy Ghost.

Every part of the theory of evolution has been proven. Several time. Furthermore, it can testify and be tested on demand. There is nothing to be left out.