Mageth

Oh, and ex libris, for a hint of how much more complicated ship building is than just "a simple operation of mass and water displacement", take a look at this thread.

Vinnie

Just a quick note. I've seen a lot of argumentation for the flood, global, local, universal, non universal and so forth. Most proponents would argue that all the ark had to do was float. We built concrete boats in my honors physics class in high school that floated. The real question is how well could such a vessel with stand the waves of an alleged flood like the Genesis one? But then the resort to Divine care is too easy for flood proponeents.

Vinnie

Fr.Andrew

(Vinnie): "Kosh, I am just having fun messing around."
(Fr Andrew): Whew!

Mageth

I'd also like to ask ex libris about the raven and the dove that Noah released from the ark. If Noah only hauled two (or seven? depends on whether you believe Ch. 6 or 7) of each "kind" on the ark, are ravens and doves then different "kinds"?

jayh

The real issue, as you know, is that such things don't scale, which was probably a misunderstanding among the ancients who recorded that tale. The imagined the biggest boat they could and expected that it could e built the same way as the boats they knew.

Spaz

Everything makes sense if people just put it into it's historical context rather than deluding themselves into believing it's divinely inspired.

ex_libres

Secular future,
What makes you think that my belief in the bible and God is based on "BLIND" faith? I have manuscript evidence, archeological evidence, fullfilled prophecy, laws of statistics and common sense to support my beliefs. I will be brief; there is a lot more out there than these examples.
1. Manuscripts- Qumaran scrolls have been compared to todays text showing very little change in text as transmited to us. What changes have been made in no way take from the context. Supports reliability.
2. Archeology- Of all the archeological finds concerning the biblical text, not a single one has contridicted the biblical text but rather confirms them. In fact some archeologists use the bible as a guide. Supports reliability.
3. Prophecy/Statistics- Christ fullfilled over three thousand prophecies. I will give you the ones that could have been self fullfilling. How do you explain the ones that were not like the thirty pieces of silver, the tomb of a rich man, etc.. The odds of just one prophecy bieng fullfilled is astronomical.
4. Common Sense- How many people do you know would willingly die a horrible death like the apostles for something THEY KNOW IS FALSE? People die all the time for what they believe to be true, but never for what they know to be untrue. How about the conversion of Saul? A Jew who had a personal goal of wiping out Christianity who became one of its greatest champions i.e. Paul.

No God? Lets test that. In order for you to know their is no God, you would have to travel to all the corners, nooks and crannies of the universe and check everywhere. You come back and say, "I looked everywhere and there was no God." I might say he zigged while you zagged. Then, you say, Okay, I will go to all places all at once." Oh, oh. That would make you omniscient: your God. You see, when people say their is no God, they are the ones exercising blind faith in God's nonexistence. I, on the other hand, though I can't prove it conclusivly that God exisists, have better reasons to believe than you do not to.

If you want to hear a much more detailed explination of why to believe, read Testimony of the Evangelists by Simon Greenleaf. He was the FORMOST AUTHORITY on Judicial Law. A jew who was challenged by his law students to disprove the resurrection. After several years of research he converted to Christianity. I wonder why? Read it and find out. Unless of course you prefer to ignore anything contrary to your blind opinion.

CX

First off please provide verifiable evidence for this claim (i.e. comparison of Qumran texts to current canonical OT). Second, what about the NT? Thirdly the argument is irrelevant to the point anyway since reliable transmission does not prove reliability of content. If I write something false and it is copied faithfully 1,000,000 times it is no less false.

This argument is oft repeated, but nonetheless fallacious for a couple reasons. Firstly even if every verifiable detail regarding geography, historical events attested outside the OT etc were confirmed that does not demonstrate the truth of unverifiable supernatural elements of the stories. The West Wing TV show is accurate in minute detail compared to the real geography of Washington D.C. the layout of the White House etc. but it is still a fictional account. Secondly modern archaeology casts considerable doubt on a number of fundamental narrative elements contained in the OT. I recommend reading any number of scholarly books on the subjects of Ancient Near East history, the Levant, Judaism etc.

This is fallacious on two counts. First, "the odds of just one prophecy bieng fullfilled" is not "astronomical". Given enough prophecies and sufficiently vigorous effort to find their fulfillment many many will invariably be discovered. What is astronimical is the chances of a specific prophecy coming true. Consider the lottery as an analogy. The chances of you personally winning the lottery are astronomically small, however, the chances of someone winning the lottery are all but guaranteed. People win the lottery all the time. Secondly, our only information concerning the life of Jesus, aside from the barest details, come from the NT. So then the question becomes did Jesus fulfill a prophecy or did the authors retroject jesus into prophetic pronouncements? I guarantee you that evaluating similar claims for Mohammed you would be significantly more inclined to hypothesize the latter rather than the former.

This is just plain silly. Human beings are irrational creatures whose motives can rarely be determined and whose actions are not limited to what makes sense. People could die for something they know to be false for any number of reasons. But even that isn't the point. In the first place we don't really know how most of the apostles died. In the second place there is no reason to suppose that early Xians knew the Xian message and story to be false. That does not therefore make it true. Millions or perhaps billions of people have fervently believed things which were nonetheless false (consider the nearly 1 billion Muslims on the planet). Did the people who flew the planes into the WTC know that Islam was false? If we presumed they believed it was true does that therefore prove that it is true simply because they died a horrible death for it? Or how about the number of Jews who were tortured and killed during the inquistion because they refused to recant and convert to Xianity? Does that prove those Jews believed in something that is true?

Mageth

CX handled this admirably, but I'll add my bit:

Originally posted by ex_libres
Secular future,
What makes you think that my belief in the bible and God is based on "BLIND" faith? I have manuscript evidence, archeological evidence, fullfilled prophecy, laws of statistics and common sense to support my beliefs.

And all of these, perhaps except "fulfilled" prophecies, may be useful in establishing some modicum of confidence in the bible as a partially historically accurate document of a certain age, but do nothing to establish any of its supernatural claims, including the existence of the Biblical god.

And even the prophecies, if indeed fulfilled (which is not as firmly established as you seem to believe - the gospels, for example, were written long after the events they portrayed, so it would have been a simple matter for the authors to embellish their claims with a few "fulfilled" prophecies) don't necessarily prove the existence of the biblical God - there is the possibility that the prophets were using other mechanisms to "predict" the future.

1. Manuscripts- Qumaran scrolls have been compared to todays text showing very little change in text as transmited to us. What changes have been made in no way take from the context. Supports reliability.

No, it illustrates copying accuracy; it says nothing about how "reliable" the texts are.

2. Archeology- Of all the archeological finds concerning the biblical text, not a single one has contridicted the biblical text but rather confirms them. In fact some archeologists use the bible as a guide. Supports reliability.

Well, there's been no archaeological evidence found that I know of to support the Exodus story. Going beyond archaeology into geology and other sciences, the Creation and Flood myths are also without any real-world evidence. So the bible, starting from the first several books, isn't exactly reliable as an historical record.

3. Prophecy/Statistics- Christ fullfilled over three thousand prophecies. I will give you the ones that could have been self fullfilling. How do you explain the ones that were not like the thirty pieces of silver, the tomb of a rich man, etc.. The odds of just one prophecy bieng fullfilled is astronomical.

Creative writing added to bolster the claims of Christ's divinity.

4. Common Sense- How many people do you know would willingly die a horrible death like the apostles for something THEY KNOW IS FALSE?

The supposed deaths of the apostles are Church Tradition, and there is serious doubt as to the accuracy of most of the accounts.

People die all the time for what they believe to be true, but never for what they know to be untrue.

People die all the time for their religious beliefs. The Abrahamic religions tend to be the best at that. Christianity by no means has a corner on that market.

How about the conversion of Saul? A Jew who had a personal goal of wiping out Christianity who became one of its greatest champions i.e. Paul.

Well, how about it? How about the other thousands of devout Jews of the day that didn't convert?

No God? Lets test that. In order for you to know their is no God, you would have to travel to all the corners, nooks and crannies of the universe and check everywhere.

But wait - I thought your god was supposed to be everywhere, omnipresent. All I have to do is look under one rock; if a god defined as omnipresent isn't there, then logically I can conclude it doesn't exist.

I've looked, and he's not there.

In addition, I could ask you: no Vishnu? No Thor? No Molech? No Allah? Then ask you to test that. With your logic, you can't deny the existence of any other god that's ever been defined, or even the countless undefined ones. In fact, you can't deny the existence of anything.

You come back and say, "I looked everywhere and there was no God." I might say he zigged while you zagged. Then, you say, Okay, I will go to all places all at once." Oh, oh. That would make you omniscient: your God.

I thought Jesus said "Seek, and you shall find" or something like that. So if I go looking and don't find God, does that mean Jesus was wrong?

Your god's supposedly also omnipresent, remember? What use is he if he's hiding under some rock on some far-distant planet in another galaxy, not willing to be found?

You see, when people say their is no God, they are the ones exercising blind faith in God's nonexistence.

No, I don't see. Which god? I lack belief in god(s). Reason? There's not enough evidence to support belief in any of them I've ever heard defined. It takes no "blind faith" to reach that conclusion.

I, on the other hand, though I can't prove it conclusivly that God exisists, have better reasons to believe than you do not to.

Well, you haven't shown any of them here.

If you want to hear a much more detailed explination of why to believe, read Testimony of the Evangelists by Simon Greenleaf. He was the FORMOST AUTHORITY on Judicial Law. A jew who was challenged by his law students to disprove the resurrection. After several years of research he converted to Christianity. I wonder why? Read it and find out. Unless of course you prefer to ignore anything contrary to your blind opinion.

And I or others here could list for you a number of sources that do just the opposite. Dan Barker wrote one such book, I believe (Losing Faith in Faith). Unless of course you prefer to ignore anything contrary to your opinion. (I won't call it "blind", as you should not have called our opinion "blind"; that's simply not true for either of us in forming such opinions.)

Kosh

I certainly hope so, since CX and Mageth have devasted the 4 you listed. Maybe you could start another thread and show us the other (hopefully better) ones?

I think your numbers have become a bit inflated. Could you perhaps be refering to this bit of apologetics?

If so, please read this article to see just how ridiculous the claim is.