Doubting Didymus

When I saw this, my eyeballs nearly popped out. I have NEVER seen a creationist with the scientific integrity and open mindedness to revise their beliefs based on evidence. This is an unprecedented ocurrance in my experience, and it fills me with hope for the future of biology.

I would like to devote this thread to discussions with GeoTheo about his new beliefs. What was the evidence that made you reconsider? I assume that you are still christian, so have you decided on the form of christian evolutionism that satisfys so many scientific theists? what part do you think god plays in evolution? I am interested in what beliefs replace young earth creationism when it is revised.

Also, I hope you don't find it patronising if I congratulate you profusely.

Albion

DD - sorry to butt in - but on another board where I post, there are a few posters who are ex-YECers. Some of them are also still Christians.

Doubting Didymus

Here I make a distinction between someone who is an actual practising creation scientist, and someone who simply believes in young earth creationism. It is the same distinction between actual evolutionary biologists, and people who simply accept the findings of evolutionary biology.

I have also seen many YEC's stop believing in YECism, but I find they were not generally active creation scientists involved in 'combating' evolution. Similarly, I have seen a few people who were 'believers' in evolution be swayed by 'creation bus' style preachings, but I have never seen a professional biologist change his beliefs based on evidence.

Albion

You mean an actual practising scientist who believes in young-Earth creationism or just a scientifically literate person who promotes it? I mean, there can't be that many of the former in existence (despite what certain websites might like to say).

Doubting Didymus

There are many qualified scientists that expouse YEC, but always in fields that are unrelated to biology. Thus, I refer to either category.

MrDarwin

I once managed to convert a young-earth creationist into an old-earth creationist in an online debate. I considered it a success, because I at least got him thinking about the issue, and hopefully opened his mind to examining the rest of his belief system.

I firmly believe that the YE part of YEC is what we should hammer on, because the arguments YECs use to justify their belief in a young earth are the most obviously flawed and most easily discredited part of YEC. Plus you can't get anywhere discussing evolution with a YEC until you get past the YE part.

GeoTheo

Well Doubting Didymus,
I am still fleshing my beliefs out on this issue.
So I can't say for sure where exactly I stand on everything. I do not feel shaken in my faith at all, especially since some great Christians such as C.S. Lewis also held to evolution.
I must confess however, that I have vaccilated a bit on the age of the Earth issue before, as some of the older posters like Oolon can attest.
That did bring about a bit of a "crisis of faith" for a few days. I was encouraged by a fellow Christian who posted on here at the time by the handle "Thunder" who had also recently adopted an "old Earth" view. He pointed me to the Hugh Ross organization -REASON TO BELIEVE. I listened to an audio stream of him debating Dr. Gish of ICR. Though, I am not exceptionally knowledgeable in geology, I came away with the impression that Ross knew what he was talking about and Gish did not.
I also came away with the impression that Gish was mischaracterizing Ross' position. Ross actually debated Gish only hesitantly to clear up some false acusations ICR had made about his organization. Generally when I witness a debate and I see that one person can see both sides acurately and that the other is attacking a straw man, I get the impression that the former has a better chance of being right. I had a really good impression of Ross as having more integrity. I had earlier been a fan of Gish having seen him demolish a professor at SUNY Binghamton in a live debate. But I had to go with Ross on this one.
I also heard him on Art Bell and was impressed with how he handled himself.
As I read more articles on the Reason to believe website, however, I found some inacuracies in the feild of biology and anthropology, a subject I am more familiar with. For example he lumps Neanderthal in with the Apes, when it is obvious it is not an ape. Also He pointed out that ICR actually believes in evolution because they claim that after the global flood there was massive branching out of the original species on the Ark.
They seperate kinds into all species that can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. This is problematic, and Oolon hounded me about it at the time and for good reason. There are some pretty diverse animals that can interbreed like Orcas and bottlenose dolphins.There is actualy a 3/4 Orca bottlenose cross in a zoo. I personally feel that if God created a common ancestor to orcas and dolphins a good bit of evolution has occured in the meantime. It is only a matter of degree. I was also reading Dawkins at the time and seeing how a little can equal alot over millions of years.
So I encountered the following delemma:
Evolution needs lots of time. In 6000 years it would be impossible. Once the young Earth is thrown out of the picture what is there to argue against evolution. Hugh Ross, sincere as I believe him to be, seems to be tying himself in a knot to avoid being an evolutionist, but has no problem with a 4.5 billon year old Earth and even the Big Bang. AIG and ICR pretty much admit to macroevolution occuring after the flood at a rate even faster than evolutionists hold.
So If I were to combine what I believed to be the best conclusions of each creation organization, what do I get. Evolution occuring over millions of years.
REASON also holds to a local, but Universal flood.
I have actually always had nagging doubts about a global flood. The endemic species found on large islands like Australia and Madagascar have been a problem to me. Why would all these Lemurs and marsupials travel from mount Ararat to Madagascar and Australia and nowhere else? And why would no mammals colonize Australia? Why only marsupials?
Also, Why do alien species (introduced by man) wreak such havoc on the ecosystem, If basically eveything came from the Ark at once? It is probably obvious to you, but I was trying to reconcile it with the flood.
It was obvious that marsupials evolved in isolation from placental mammals and could not compete with the mammals when they invaded the continent with the Aboriginies. It appears that the Dingo and man wiped out a lot. And more and more are being wiped out from the European invasion.
But having been used to a literal interpretation of Genesis, the Bible began to not make sense, so I basically buried my head in the sand and didn't post here or read any evolution books for a year.
But in other areas of my life, through various hardships, I turned to the Bible, primarily the NT as it turned out and began to experience success.
So my faith was strengthened. I moved to MN and experienced a lot of blessings in unique ways and really sensed the presence of God in my life.
So it was in this time of confidence in my faith I decided to explore the question again. I love biology, so while some Christians my show only a passing interest in origins questions, it was a subject destined to come up again and again for me. Especially since I plan to continue persuing a degree in biology.
I came to this site and began to debate and discuss and actually did see some flaws in logic here in some areas on the part of evolutionists.
I see holes in evidence and false assumptions. Though human evolution now seems reasonable to me, philosophically, I still think ALL Australopithecines are basically apes and no where near as bipedal as some would assert.
It was actually Richard Leakey sharing this view, that was a watershed moment. He is not dealing with this issue in terms of absolute truth and so can reject any portion of the picture being drawn by anthropologists at any time, when evidence drawing a different picture presents itself. He is not a dogmatist.
So wheras Lucy may very well be an extinct ape, that in no way disproves evolution. I also began to get a picture of the Scientific community and how skeptical they are of new evidence and the scrutiny they apply to it. I was impressed by their deductive logic in areas of tooth erruption and its implications. I began to see them as people honestly seeking to KNOW. There is integrity there. I still feel that without God in the picture you get a limited picture as to meaning, but as far as the physical mechanisms of things, I think Science gets an accurate picture.
Also on a side note, I have always felt that God would want me to seek truth and not be afraid of the truth and that all truth is God's.
I have always felt that ideas should stand or fall on their own merit. Thus I believe in a free society and the free exchange of ideas. This is actually a philosophy historically held by Baptists, who developed the doctrine of individual soul liberty. This relates to seperation of Church and State.
Unlike the protestant reformers who held to a State Church. This is why they were persecuted. They would not pay tithes to the State Churches in Europe and in the colonies.
So It angers me when I see the Baptist Board censoring other beliefs. This is really not a Baptist destinctive but I believe is an influence of Reconstructionists.

This is very long, I know but I hope it answers your question.

KnightWhoSaysNi

Hi GeoTheo,

Interesting story!

Any chance do you listen to his <a href="http://www.oneplace.com/ministries/creation_update/Archives.asp" target="_blank">Creation Update</a> webcast show? Though I don't agree with his views, I find his shows interesting to listen to.

If you'd like to read a debate where Gish was totally demolished, check out his debate with <a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ken_saladin/saladin-gish2/index.shtml" target="_blank">Kenneth Saladin</a>.

It's quite refreshing to see such open mindedness and willingness to change perspectives. I would also hope that I'm not limited by some kind of cognitive dissonance and would be willing to change my perspectives if the evidence presents itself.

Aie, Recons are indeed a scary bunch...

[ July 23, 2002: Message edited by: Nightshade ]</p>

Albion

I think one of the saddest things I come across in these debates is the attitude that if you don't take Genesis literally you can't be a Christian and that since Genesis must be right, science must be wrong. Where was a debate like this going on on another board, and the person who was trying to reconcile science and her faith eventually decided that it was an either-or situation and that her faith was more important to her. When asked about scientific evidence, she responded that it's well known that most scientists are atheists and that this clouds their judgement when interpreting their results. That board contains a number of Christians who accept evolution, including at least two who used to be strident young-earthers but have changed their minds - yet she still couldn't accept that evolution was somehow a symptom of atheism. It's nice to see that you've separated the two; it's just such a shame that fundamentalist propaganda is so strident that a lot of people are put in that awful position in the first place.

Bubba

Geo-Your story is fairly close to mine, but I don't seem to have the biology knowledge that you do.

I think your very correct when you say that Ross goes a long way to avoid believing in evolution. His position is to me illogical, even though I once held it. I simply feel that once one accepts an old earth, the weight of the fossil evidence and the ordering of fossils show progression over time which is simply...evolution.

I also think that you are correct about the integrity of scientists. I even know of a few YEC types with science degrees who hold YEC just because they hold a literal interpretation of Genesis. They are at least scientifically honest enough to admit that all of the typical arguements (moon dust, shrinking sun, Second law of Thermodynamics) are misused to the AIG/ICR lot...

Bubba