Johnny Skeptic

Who knows what Christians will say in the future? What credible evidence do you have that the Genesis creation story, and the flood story, were not the result of human imagination? When Galileo said that the world is round, it was the Christian church that threatened to kill him unless he recanted his theory, which he did. Most Christians endorsed slavery, colonization, and the subjugation of women for about 90% of time since Christianity was founded. Who knows?, maybe Christians will one day return to endorsing those atrocities.

Every time that you discuss science you embarrass yourself. Consider the following:

A web definition for catastrophism is "Once-popular belief that events in earth history had occurred in the past a sudden events and by processes unlike those operating today. Periods of catastrophic change were followed by long periods of little change. A subgroup, the Diluvialists, contended that Noah's Flood was the last of many floods which had occurred throughout earth history." A web definition for uniformitarianism is "The hypothesis that current geologic processes, such as the slow erosion of a coast under the impact of waves, have been occurring in a similar manner throughout the Earth's history and that these processes can account for past geologic events."

http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utente:Bramfab/sandbox

Today, most geologists combine catastrophist and uniformitarianist standpoints, taking the view that Earth's history is a slow, gradual story punctuated by occasional natural catastrophic events that have affected Earth and its inhabitants.

Johnny: Now then, rhutchin, do you finally get it? Occasional catastrophism DOES NOT necessarily indicate divine involvement. It is a certainty that most geologists DO NOT consider a global flood to be an example of an "occasional natural catastrophic event." Are you not aware that most geologists, including some evangelical Christian geologists, do not believe that there was a global flood? Typical of fundamentalist Christians, you are interested in science, but ONLY when it agrees with you. That is dishonest. The article shows that most geologists today believe that asteroids, comets, and other NATURAL phenomena created the world that we live in today.

jakejonesiv

If you have seen the Borat movie, you will know many still do, including antisemitism.

Jake

myfishgrewlegs

rhutchin said:
Let's say I accept that statement as proof, not that I necessarily do, but if I did, please explain to me how that equates to proof of the bible being true?

Angra Mainyu already made this point:
but as you seem to have ignored that in your replies, I thought I'd point it out again. :banghead:

rhutchin

It wouldn't. As far as I understand it, there is no possible natural explanation for the origin of life. Spontaneous generation of life seems to be impossible (absent a cause which apparently does not exist in the natural world because no one can figure out how it might happen). That requires a non-natural cause that we can call God. Whoever this God is may be difficult to determine, but the Bible alleges to identify God (as does the Koran, the Book of Mormon, and other religious documents). The presense of life is proof that God exists but not proof that any particular religious document is true.

How about being more specific about where I have ignored it. If I did, it was unintentional.

rhutchin

It doesn't matter, does it? What matters is what the Bible says and that will not change.

You have the Biblical account. It is evidence. You can assign it any credibility that you want.

I understand that it was the scientific establishment in the universities that opposed Galileo. Galileo was being funded by the Catholic church, so was the church fighting against itself? Unfortunately, yes. The scientists opposed Galileo and had the ear of the pope, so Galileo was threatened with death.

Maybe we should get people who call themselves Christians to actually read the Bible.

No reason for me to be embarrassed here.

So. Scientists always have the luxury of learning more and changing their minds. Unfortunately, many scientists believe that which they hypothesize without doing the research to prove it.

rhutchin

Just babble.

How about the cost of cigars?

Not exactly. My response is that the evidence is what it is and you can assign any credibility you want to it.

The Evil One

Just to pick up on this, because I think it's important.

rhutchin said this on the last page, and has said something very similar to it in the post at the end of the thread as I write this.

It's important because it is, in a way, a fall-back position for rhutchin. rhutchin is very keen to explain things as human choices, on this and other threads. The reason being - I surmise - that once belief or non-belief is a choice, anything unpleasant that happens to those who don't believe - or who don't follow the rules he thinks his God has laid down - can be dismissed as the consequence of a free choice on the part of the person involved.

rhutchin, I am going to nail you on this one. We cannot assign the Bible "any credibility that we want". The credibility level of evidence is a function of the nature of the evidence itself, NOT a choice of the person who assesses it.

The Bible is a collection of mostly-anonymous documents. Anything claimed in the Bible is thus claimed "on the word" of the writer only. One thing we know about evidence is that the word of a human being, taken alone, does not count for much. We do not have any choice about this - it is a fact of evidence which derives from the known facts that human beings often lie, or are deluded, or are mistaken - the only thing we can choose is whether or not to accept these facts of evidence or to pretend they do not exist.

Of course the Bible claims it is divinely inspired, which if true would give it greater weight than "a human's word", but - problem! - we only have "a human's word" that it is divinely inspired - so no help there.

We cannot choose to take "a human's word" for something as strongly credible evidence when everything we know about the nature of evidence tells us it is not. We KNOW that we have to look for addiitonal evidence - e.g. physical evidence, or corroboration from unrelated additional "human word".

We cannot choose how credible the evidence of the Bible is. Its credibility is a function of its nature, and that is not very credible at all.

driver8

All untrue. If there is any proof to be found anywhere in your statement, it is that man has created god out of his inability to comprehend his existence, nothing more.


I'd like to know more about your god. Be so kind as to answer some questions:

How did your god create the universe? Was it through the waving of a wand or simply the furrowing of a brow?

From what did your god create the universe? Did matter pre-exist your god, or did it think up matter in a moment of inspiration? If there was no matter before your god existed, where did your god come from?

Is your god composed of matter or only of energy? If your god is composed of matter, how is it immortal? If your god is composed only of energy, how is that energy directed to act on matter? Please explain both macro and subatomic scales.

If your god can have children and create other gods, can it also have parents?

Is your god all-powerful? Being all-powerful certainly consumes a great deal of energy. If so, what does your god eat?

Are these questions too difficult to ponder, or conveniently just unknowable? Surely your bible explains these things. If not, I would suggest it is because it is indeed not divinely inspired, but the misguided manifestation of man's yearning for knowledge.

Let me tell you how I understand it. There is nothing that exists that is not by definition natural, nor could there be.

I wouldn't have responded at all to you had it not been for this jewel:

That deserves at least one WOW. With beliefs such as this, your religion serves no god, only petty men.

If, however, you choose to exercise this belief, please be aware that there are many others who you are obliged to knock off:

http://ezinearticles.com/?You-Shall-...gion&id=328067

In short:

Hmmm. I guess that wasn't short, but it appears to be the will of your god, who certainly enjoys a good killing now and then. Perhaps you would know what the penalty is for my poly-cotton shirt, for Leviticus 19:19 does warn me 'Keep my decrees.
" 'Do not mate different kinds of animals.
" 'Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed.
" 'Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material.

Do you agree with these sentiments? Do you think they are the sentiments of a god or of men? Do you still think the bible is a reliable reference for the origin of life?

Johnny Skeptic

As can you, but how does making such a statement help you to convince undecided readers that the writers were speaking for God and not for themselves? What is your evidence that the writers were speaking for God and not for themselves? If your only evidence that the Bible is true is because it says that it is true, just say so and we can discuss other topics. It appears that your only evidence is faith, not logic. There is good evidence that the Bible contains errors and contradictions, but you always refuse to discuss those issues, so how is any progress possible? Even if the writers were speaking for God, you still lose because the God of the Bible does not have good character. No matter what the risks are, no decent man can will himself to love a human or a God who does not have good character. If God told lies, you would not be able to love him, and yet you ask people to love a God who has committed many atrocities against mankind that are much worse than lying is. You have somehow been able to abandon your principles and morals, at least in God's case, but decent people are not able to do that. The most important issue is God's character, not humans' character. No belief system is valid unless its foundation is valid. The entire foundation of the Bible is that God has good character. If God does not have good character, he has no business asking anyone else to have good character.

You still have some posts left to reply to in the thread on 2 Peter 3:9. Do you intend to reply to them?

Julian

While I have no interest in wasting my time refuting the other-worldly 'reasoning' that weigh down most of your bizarre posts, I did want to correct this historical observation for the benefit of any lurkers.

Galileo was not funded by the church, he was funded by the Medici as well as income from his university positions, institutions at which he didn't even have to show up to get paid. While it is true that many of the older, conservative 'scientists,' staunch Aristotelians, were greatly upset by Galileo's theories (mostly the theory originated by Copernicus who wisely waited to publish until on his deathbed) and urged the church to strike at Galileo, it was an attack led by the church on theological grounds.

It is a complex issue. The Aristotelians (they don't deserve the designation 'scientists') certainly had influence in Rome because they supported a system that was more easily harmonized to a literal reading of the bible. The Pope had always been Galileo's friend and had showered great praise on his earlier works and had full knowledge of the book that caused all the trouble (Discourse on the Tides, if memory serves). It was just that the Pope was under increasing strain due to the spanish pressure owing to the thirty years war and was growing increasingly paranoid.

There are many other reasons, too lengthy and derailing to go into here. To summarize, the Aristotelians certainly had their share of blame but this was an attack by the church, without which the 'scientists' would have stood no chance of humbling Galileo.

Julian