Evolution, Atheism, and Redefining Terms

When having discussions, it is very important to be certain that people are in agreement about how terms are defined. It can even be accomplished by stating which definition will be used. Otherwise, people can end up jawing about a whole lot of nothing and "talking past" one another.

Credit: Pixabay / Andrew Martin

There are many terms that can cause confusion in discussions about origins. It is extremely important that creationists know their own material, and to keep Darwin's disciples from pulling the ol' bait 'n' switch. That is, equivocating terms, such as discussing natural selection and variations, then they are asserting evolution occurred. Another trick from atheists is to insist on the redefinition of atheism to mean "lack of belief in God or gods", an intellectually and morally dishonest trick that works against them anyway. (I sincerely believe that they want to put us on the defensive, often through efforts at intimidation.) Keep atheists and evolutionists on the subject and don't change horses — I mean, definitions — on the way.

When wading into the waters of apologetics and the origins debate, it usually doesn’t take long before we hit problems defining terms. Many words commonly used in these debates have large ranges of meaning that often get conflated and confused with each other. If we are to have a meaningful dialogue, we must be careful to define our terms carefully so that everyone understands each other.

L.K. from the United States wrote:

I’d prefer a response, or whether it be to still contact me in this email so I have a larger character limit to choose from, or to direct me to a better area, as your Q&A section wasn’t that helpful.

But I’d like to let you know two simple things.

Atheism is not a religion, it is a word, it has one definition, regardless of how people use it, it will always mean what its defined as, a lack in belief of god, and just because people lack a belief in god does not mean a god doesn’t exist, nor that it DOES, just because something doesn’t exist mean it does, but I’ll get into that later.

And evolution, evolution simply means CHANGE OVER TIME, regardless of how you think it is, the animal doesn’t have a genetic coding for different types of beaks (well, in a birds case, id be surprised if a dog had a beak) for many types of beaks, it has one “Switch”, which tells the beak when to grow, and when to stop, and multiple other “Switches” telling the beak how to form, they don’t have a pelican beak in one switch, and a finch beak in the other.

Also, natural selection is the process evolution takes, saying natural selection is a thing, but evolution isn’t is just plain stupid.

Mutations are evolution in a less controlled sense, but most times if the mutation is detrimental it will not be passed on.

Just, this entire website is full of unscientific lies meant to spread christianity, from making your own definitions to words to using arguments already disproven.

CMI’s Shaun Doyle responds:

Shaun had an excellent response. To read it, click on "Defining terms carefully — Why we need clarity when we debate evolution".