The Bible, Creationism, and Prophecy (part 1)

PDN

daithifleming wrote: »

Sorry, but i still think you are talking utter nonsense. It got even worse when you brought up the faulty logic of debating this with creationists who have god as their preposition.

Just stop and think about that for a moment.

When you debate with a creationist, particularly about the Flood, you are talking to someone who believes that God is capable of speaking the entire universe into existence by a few words. They also believe He can, if He so desires, flood the earth so that every human being in every part of the world drowns.

So you string together arguments that, in order to stand up, must assume the following kind of presuppositions.
a) God is not capable of stopping carnivores from eating one another on the ark.
b) God is not capable of enabling animals to deviate from their usual diet.
c) God is not capable of allowing carrion or stranded animals to be concentrated disproportionately where the existing carnivores are gathered.

You are, therefore, committing a classical logical fallacy. For any creationist to see any force in your arguments they would need to already share your presuppositions and to have abandoned their belief in an omnipotent interventionist God. Circular argumentation of the highest order.

Scofflaw

PDN wrote: »

Just stop and think about that for a moment.

When you debate with a creationist, particularly about the Flood, you are talking to someone who believes that God is capable of speaking the entire universe into existence by a few words. They also believe He can, if He so desires, flood the earth so that every human being in every part of the world drowns.

So you string together arguments that, in order to stand up, must assume the following kind of presuppositions.
a) God is not capable of stopping carnivores from eating one another on the ark.
b) God is not capable of enabling animals to deviate from their usual diet.
c) God is not capable of allowing carrion or stranded animals to be concentrated disproportionately where the existing carnivores are gathered.

You are, therefore, committing a classical logical fallacy. For any creationist to see any force in your arguments they would need to already share your presuppositions and to have abandoned their belief in an omnipotent interventionist God. Circular argumentation of the highest order.

I can't help but feel you are very slightly wide of the mark. The claim of Creationism is that Genesis is scientifically provable - that is, provable by reference to the evidence we see around us, and reproducible means.

If one invokes God's intervention, one weakens that claim - because one is talking about a non-reproducible miracle.

None of us would deny that an omnipotent interventionist God could arrange things exactly as desired, presumably down to the last sub-atomic particle. That, however, is not the Creationist claim, so I rather fear you are chasing a red herring.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Ekancone

Scofflaw wrote: »

I can't help but feel you are very slightly wide of the mark. The claim of Creationism is that Genesis is scientifically provable - that is, provable by reference to the evidence we see around us, and reproducible means.

If one invokes God's intervention, one weakens that claim - because one is talking about a non-reproducible miracle.

None of us would deny that an omnipotent interventionist God could arrange things exactly as desired, presumably down to the last sub-atomic particle. That, however, is not the Creationist claim, so I rather fear you are chasing a red herring.

cordially,
Scofflaw

He beat me to it. (Although i did point this out to PDN a page or so back)

PDN

Scofflaw wrote: »

I can't help but feel you are very slightly wide of the mark. The claim of Creationism is that Genesis is scientifically provable - that is, provable by reference to the evidence we see around us, and reproducible means.

If one invokes God's intervention, one weakens that claim - because one is talking about a non-reproducible miracle.

None of us would deny that an omnipotent interventionist God could arrange things exactly as desired, presumably down to the last sub-atomic particle. That, however, is not the Creationist claim, so I rather fear you are chasing a red herring.

cordially,
Scofflaw

I disagree that Creationism claims that Genesis is scientifically provable. You may have come across individual Creationists who make such a claim (and if I had the patience to read this entire crazy thread I may well find that some posters here have made such a claim). However, I do not think that is the position of Creationism per se. Creationism claims that physical phenomena and observable scientific data are consistent with and even supportive of a literalist understanding of the Genesis account. However, that position does not involve the Creationists abandoning their belief in an omnipotent interventionist God.

Of course my understanding of Creationism may be completely wrong. (It wouldn't be the first, or last, time I'm wrong about something.) If so I would appreciate some link that demonstrates that the the 'scientifically provable' claim is an essential part of Creationism. It certainly doesn't appear so from any dictionary definition or encyclopedia entry I have seen.

PDN

daithifleming wrote: »

He beat me to it. (Although i did point this out to PDN a page or so back)

No you didn't. You made a reference to IDers entering the scientific arena, namely :

daithifleming wrote:

Interesting. Except that it is the ID'ers who are attempting to make their hypotheses scientifically valid. Therefore they have willingly entered the scientific arena. So the argument is not useless as long as they pursue this policy.

Your point was that if IDers enter the scientific arena then they have to accept the same presuppositions as some scientists who refuse to believe in an omnipotent interventionist God.

I ignored that response for two reasons.
a) ID is an argument that certain features of the universe (eg irreducible complexity) in life-forms constitute scientific evidence of a designer. It is essentially a philosophical concept (the teleological argument) redressed in scientific garb. It is actually a separate issue from Creationism.

b) Whether Creationists enter the scientific arena or not, they are still doing so on the basis of their belief in an omnipotent interventionist God. Therefore arguments that presuppose the impossibility of such a Being still constitute circular reasoning.

However, another inconsistency in your position occurs to me. If you insist that Creationists, by entering the scientific arena, must play by scientific rules and accept common presuppositions in that arena - then what about you entering the Christianity arena? Common courtesy would seem to demand that, by debating issues on the Christianity forum, you have to abide by our presuppositions? Sauce. Goose. Gander.

Either way, your response about IDers entering the scientific arena was certainly not the same (except perhaps somewhere in the recesses of your mind) as Scofflaw's assertion that Creationists are claiming that the Genesis account is scientifically provable.

Zombrex

PDN wrote: »

Instead we have had the following kind of dishonest nonsense.

:rolleyes:

The only person I can see being dishonest here is you PDN. You made the claim, the assertion that the carnivores (all of them) off the Ark could have survived on fish and other dead marine life. You claimed that a beached whale would make a substantially snack for any carnivore

PDN wrote:

Carnivores can eat both carrion and aquatic animals ...The odd beached whale or manatee would provide a substantial snack for any carnivore.

That statement is simply false. It is not true. Some carnivores can eat marine animals, a lot cannot. I have no idea if you realised that at the time, but I'm in little doubt that you realise it now.

When it was pointed out to you that carnivores in general don't eat fish and they certainly don't eat rotten fish, you used bears as an example that some how defend your original assertion and then started attacking everyone for "desperation".

It is a very Creationist thing to do, attempt to disprove a general statement by using a very specific and isolated example. For example when JC is constantly pressed to explain how rock could form quickly under the flood water he always comes up with a specific example of how certain concrete can form under water, ignoring that this is a specific example that doesn't expand out a general sense.

You are doing exactly the same with your bears example.

The fact that bears eat fish demonstrated simply that bears eat fish. It doesn't demonstrate that carnivores, all of them or in general, can and do eat fish or other marine animals.

You are simply jumping around the fact that your "reasonable" theory of how the meat eating animals off the Ark could have survived is utterly implausible.

You are being intellectually dishonest in your strained attempts to justify it with the odd example of a bear here and a rabbit there. You must realise that these isolated examples do not demonstrate your theory.

Of course none of that is particularly unusual for this thread. What does get my goat is your consistent charge that those who point out this are themselves being "dishonest" and "desperate" and another other charge you will think of next.

That seems to be your default stance against everyone these days is to instantly start implying they are lying, everyone is being dishonest except you.

It is rather annoying, particularly when you are so blatantly using such dishonesty and mis-direction yourself.

PDN

Wicknight wrote: »

:rolleyes:

The only person I can see being dishonest here is you PDN. You made the claim, the assertion that the carnivores (all of them) off the Ark could have survived on fish and other dead marine life. You claimed that a beached whale would make a substantially snack for any carnivore



That statement is simply false. It is not true. Some carnivores can eat marine animals, a lot cannot. I have no idea if you realised that at the time, but I'm in little doubt that you realise it now.

When it was pointed out to you that carnivores in general don't eat fish and they certainly don't eat rotten fish, you used bears as an example that some how defend your original assertion and then started attacking everyone for "desperation".

It is a very Creationist thing to do, attempt to disprove a general statement by using a very specific and isolated example. For example when JC is constantly pressed to explain how rock could form quickly under the flood water he always comes up with a specific example of how certain concrete can form under water, ignoring that this is a specific example that doesn't expand out a general sense.

You are doing exactly the same with your bears example.

The fact that bears eat fish demonstrated simply that bears eat fish. It doesn't demonstrate that carnivores, all of them or in general, can and do eat fish or other marine animals.

You are simply jumping around the fact that your "reasonable" theory of how the meat eating animals off the Ark could have survived is utterly implausible.

You are being intellectually dishonest in your strained attempts to justify it with the odd example of a bear here and a rabbit there. You must realise that these isolated examples do not demonstrate your theory.

Of course none of that is particularly unusual for this thread. What does get my goat is your consistent charge that those who point out this are themselves being "dishonest" and "desperate" and another other charge you will think of next.

That seems to be your default stance against everyone these days is to instantly start implying they are lying, everyone is being dishonest except you.

It is rather annoying, particularly when you are so blatantly using such dishonesty and mis-direction yourself.

I can certainly see that my use of the word 'any' was a sloppy (although not dishonest) use of language. Therefore my statement that 'any carnivore' would find that a beached whale constitutes a snack was false. Thank you for pointing that out to me. If such a rebuttal had been presented to me at the time I would have certainly acknowledged my error.

A more correct statement would have been something along the lines of, "A beached whale would provide a substantial snack for some carnivores".

Zombrex

PDN wrote: »

I can certainly see that my use of the word 'any' was a sloppy (although not dishonest) use of language.

As I said I don't think anyone here would care that much except that you were giving out about the weakness of other posts and that others were being dishonest towards you. Everyone makes slips like that, for example Robin probably should have said

"history shows that beached whales generally don't get eaten by carnivores" rather than the original sentence which appears (by accident I imagine) to make a more definitive statement.

PDN wrote: »

A more correct statement would have been something along the lines of, "A beached whale would provide a substantial snack for some carnivores".

Certainly, but that doesn't explain how the rest of them survived, and as such we find ourselves back at square one with daithifleming original question- did they eat thin air?

PDN

Wicknight wrote: »

As I said I don't think anyone here would care that much except that you were giving out about the weakness of other posts and that others were being dishonest towards you. Everyone makes slips like that, for example Robin probably should have said

"history shows that beached whales generally don't get eaten by carnivores" rather than the original sentence which appears (by accident I imagine) to make a more definitive statement.

Hmm, my problem there is that a statement that event X does not generally happen is no rebuttal at all to a hypothesis that suggests event X happened at one particular point in history. Therefore I took Robin's words at face value. However, I am happy to accept that he was, like myself, just being sloppy with words.

My accusations of dishonesty are not, however directed against the odd word here and there, but rather at a distortion and misrepresentation that is very common on this thread (on both sides of the debate). So someone takes an example and (either from stupidity or dishonesty) pretends that the example constitutes the whole.

I mention that fish and aquatic mammals (gathered by varying means) could provide food sources for carnivores. A response immediately tries to poke fun at me as saying that one particular acquatic creature (fish) could be gathered by one particular carnivore (lion) by one particular method (swimming).

I mention beached whales as one of a number of possible food sources for carnivores, but responses misrepresent me as saying that beached whales were the only food source for all carnivores.

I mention carrion as one of a number of possible food sources for carnivores, but responses misrepresent me as saying that carrion was the only food source

I mention rabbits as one fast breeding species that could provide a sustainable food source fairly quickly for some carnivores, but responses misrepresent me as saying that rabbits would be the sole food source for one particular carnivore (lions).

This does not appear to be one person using language sloppily on one or two occasions. Instead it is a consistent pattern of misrepresentation that is indeed dishonest and makes any kind of debate meaningless.

Certainly, but that doesn't explain how the rest of them survived, and as such we find ourselves back at square one with daithifleming original question- did they eat thin air?

No, we only find ourselves back at square one if you are continuing the same pattern of falsely treating my reference to beached whales as an assertion that beached whales were the only possible food source.

Other possible food sources could include carrion and also fresh aquatic food sources such as: fish, crustaceans, squid, octopi, snakes, frogs, dolphins, seals, turtles, manatees etc.

Scofflaw

PDN wrote: »

I disagree that Creationism claims that Genesis is scientifically provable. You may have come across individual Creationists who make such a claim (and if I had the patience to read this entire crazy thread I may well find that some posters here have made such a claim). However, I do not think that is the position of Creationism per se. Creationism claims that physical phenomena and observable scientific data are consistent with and even supportive of a literalist understanding of the Genesis account. However, that position does not involve the Creationists abandoning their belief in an omnipotent interventionist God.

Of course my understanding of Creationism may be completely wrong. (It wouldn't be the first, or last, time I'm wrong about something.) If so I would appreciate some link that demonstrates that the the 'scientifically provable' claim is an essential part of Creationism. It certainly doesn't appear so from any dictionary definition or encyclopedia entry I have seen.

I'm afraid you'll have to read the thread, because that is certainly the claim that is being discussed here.

However, the claim that "physical phenomena and observable scientific data are consistent with and even supportive of a literalist understanding of the Genesis account" is essentially the same claim.

If one claims that the evidence supports the Genesis Flood, one is saying that the evidence is that of a mass of water covering the earth. That claim is entirely meaningless if the Flood can leave any evidence whatsoever, depending on God's will - because it becomes possible for the evidence to look like evidence of a picnic instead, or of a lightbulb, of for there to be no evidence whatsoever.

One can either claim that divine intervention arranged things "just so", or one can claim that the events described in Genesis left the evidence one would expect.
cordially,
Scofflaw

PDN

Scofflaw wrote: »

I'm afraid you'll have to read the thread, because that is certainly the claim that is being discussed here.

To read the thread, alas, would be a punishment greater than I could bear (to paraphrase Cain). So I shall withdraw.

Zombrex

PDN wrote: »

No, we only find ourselves back at square one if you are continuing the same pattern of falsely treating my reference to beached whales as an assertion that beached whales were the only possible food source.

I am working under the assertion that marine animals, animals that survive in the ocean and as such would, theoretically, survive some form of a global flood (not the one JC and Wolfsbane believe happened, but that is a different issue), and dead carcasses of animals killing in the flood itself, are your possible food source.

As has been pointed out various times already a lot of carnivores cannot survive on a diet of marine life. That is a major problem before you even get to the issue of how they actually manage to get this food source.

A lot of carnivores are not scavengers and cannot survive on carrion. They require fresh meat in their diets. This is assuming that carcasses could even survive the length of the flood in any edible fashion in the first place.

Your assertion, at the very start, that carnivores can "eat both carrion and aquatic animals" is not true.

Some carnivores could, theoretically, survive in this fashion (though I have trouble seeing how they could in reality), many others could not, even theoretically.

So (once again) we come back to the issue of what the carnivores that cannot eat carrion or aquatic animals, ate.

PDN

Wicknight wrote: »

Your assertion, at the very start, that carnivores can "eat both carrion and aquatic animals" is not true.

You're doing it again.

Annatar

Yeah, just imagine the amount of fodder to be stored on the Ark for herbivores alone, for the 40 days plus afterwards while the plant life recovered.

Fresh water, for all the animals, while onboard and afterwards... till the rainwater built up sufficient supplies, and any contaminents are washed away

The huge mountain of meat for carnivores, during the 40 days and the many many years afterwards, while the herbivore population increased to such a size where it could sustain carnivores. The pressure to supply meat would also increase as time went on as the carnivores multiplied as well.

While the mountain of meat is huge... what size is the amount of salt required to preserve it all??
Where to get the meat in the first place?
What size is the Ark now?

And how to get around the annoying bit about inbreeding in the animals... After what? 2 - 3 generations they would be sterile

Planet wide flood nope, localised flood yeah. Especially if it was only Noah's farm animals he took onboard

Zombrex

PDN wrote: »

You're doing it again.

No actually, I'm not.

daithifleming
Exactly, and what did the carnivores feed on? Thin air?

PDN
Carnivores can eat both carrion and aquatic animals.A flood as described in Genesis would, as it receded, leave carcases of animals behind. Also, I would think it rather obvious that water contains lots of fish, crustaceans and mammals that would feed carnivores.

Your response to daithifleming

• Carcases of dead animals.
• Fish, crustaceans and mammals in the waters.

That is your solution to daithifleming's issue of what did the carnivores eat. And apparently at the time of that post you considered this answer rather obvious.

No mention of whales, or bears or rabbits. Specific examples are irrelevant. Your original post was a general assertion and it is solely from your original post that I am basing this.

I appreciate that you may, in hindsight, consider your original post a little rash, and recognise that it at most explains how some carnivores may have possibly survived (that in itself has its own issues of plausibility).

But as I've already said, that simply means that daithiflemings quite valid and justified question remains unanswered.

Hot Dog

Any carcasses would become waterlogged and sink within a day or 2. The idea that there would be enough food floating about for carnivores to eat is laughable. Also, fresh water, what did they drink?

PDN

Wicknight wrote: »

No actually, I'm not.

Yes you are.

My post, which you have quoted, states that carnivores can eat both carrion and aquatic animals. This is a reasonable answer to the question as to what did carnivores eat if not thin air. My assertion is not untrue in that some carnivores can eat carrion and some can eat aquatic animals.

I appreciate that you may, in hindsight, consider your original post a little rash, and recognise that it at most explains how some carnivores may have possibly survived (that in itself has its own issues of plausibility).

But as I've already said, that simply means that daithiflemings quite valid and justified question remains unanswered.

Not at all.

If someone can demonstrate that it was physically impossible for some carnivores to survive for a limited period of time on a diet of either carrion or of any kind of aquatic life form then that would certainly be a valid point to make.

However, no-one has done so yet. Therefore the question of "What would the carnivores eat?" has a proposed answer.

pH

PDN wrote: »

If someone can demonstrate that it was physically impossible for some carnivores to survive for a limited period of time on a diet of either carrion or of any kind of aquatic life form then that would certainly be a valid point to make.

Done. Now will you stop this silliness?

PDN

pH wrote: »

Done. Now will you stop this silliness?

Thank you for pointing out that insects such as ants and termites would provide an additional food source for carnivores.

pH

PDN wrote: »

Thank you for pointing out that insects such as ants and termites would provide an additional food source for carnivores.

I have no idea what point you are trying to make.

Here's what you said:

If someone can demonstrate that it was physically impossible for some carnivores to survive for a limited period of time on a diet of either carrion or of any kind of aquatic life form then that would certainly be a valid point to make.

Are you saying that Pangolins can survive on a diet of carrion or aquatic life forms or are you conceding that I have a point to make?

Annatar

PDN wrote: »

Thank you for pointing out that insects such as ants and termites would provide an additional food source for carnivores.

Erm wouldnt Ants and termites be slightly drowned?



Food for carnivores is not just for a few days... It years!!!!
How many years till the herbivore population is large enough to sustain itself AND losses to carnivores????

Annatar

Whats the story with carrion based diseases? They would be a tad rampant ....

PDN

pH wrote: »

Are you saying that Pangolins can survive on a diet of carrion or aquatic life forms or are you conceding that I have a point to make?

I am conceding the point that I had completely overlooked flying insects and termites and the fact that a flood of such a magnitude would have uprooted trees and logs etc floating around. I had also completely overlooked the thousands of different varieties of aquatic insects and bugs.

The link you provide to Wikipedia is certainly interesting. I do not know if Pangolins could survive on aquatic insects - the article doesn't actually address that question. It would, however, seem more likely that they would have eaten the termites out of some of the floating logs or trees.

Scofflaw

I'm afraid this argument almost exactly demonstrates the difference between the scientific and the pseudo-scientific approaches.

On the one hand, we know scientifically that lots of animals can only live on a restricted diet - more often the herbivores than the carnivores, in fact - koala bears being a very good example, since they eat only eucalyptus leaves. Fructivores, of course, would have been equally badly off, since soft fruit would neither survive the flood, nor be available again for perhaps years afterwards. Insectivores would also find it impossible to survive, since insects were not taken onto the ark. While some insects may have survived clinging to the famous 'mats of vegetation', you're not talking about a whole ant colony (a) surviving, and (b) digging themselves a new nest in time to become dinner for a hungry pangolin - and pangolins eat pounds of insects each day.

On the other hand, in the broad brush-strokes of pseudo-science, we have "carnivores eat meat, carrion is meat, therefore carnivores were OK", or "insectivores eat insects, there were insects, therefore insectivores were OK" - and the debate is over.

The whole point is moot, of course, since these animals were mutating every 3.5 hours anyway, while trying to get from Ararat to their eventual 'destinations' quickly enough to leave no fossil traces of their passing - in the case of the koala bears, down to Australia and across the Wallace Line along with every single other marsupial, presumably carrying eucalyptus seeds. I pity them, for they had only tiny little leggies, and thousands of miles to travel.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Zombrex

PDN wrote: »

If someone can demonstrate that it was physically impossible for some carnivores to survive for a limited period of time on a diet of either carrion or of any kind of aquatic life form then that would certainly be a valid point to make.

Has that point not already be raised a dozen times on this thread with the example of lions?

You are a little late to the party I fear. I am a little surprised that you wouldn't be already aware that there are carnivores that require certain diets to survive.

Zombrex

Scofflaw wrote: »

On the other hand, in the broad brush-strokes of pseudo-science, we have "carnivores eat meat, carrion is meat, therefore carnivores were OK", or "insectivores eat insects, there were insects, therefore insectivores were OK" - and the debate is over.

QFT

Sums up whole style of Creationist debate on this thread.

Ekancone

Scofflaw wrote: »

The whole point is moot, of course, since these animals were mutating every 3.5 hours anyway, while trying to get from Ararat to their eventual 'destinations' quickly enough to leave no fossil traces of their passing - in the case of the koala bears, down to Australia and across the Wallace Line along with every single other marsupial, presumably carrying eucalyptus seeds. I pity them, for they had only tiny little leggies, and thousands of miles to travel.

I laughed out loud when i read this. The scary thing is that people actually believe this.

Scofflaw

daithifleming wrote: »

I laughed out loud when i read this. The scary thing is that people actually believe this.

There's a long discussion about it (at some point this thread should be indexed!) - proposed migration routes, silly reasons why the marsupials all ended up in Australia, etc - all while eating Flood leftovers.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

Couldn't resist! Post 9000, on page 450...who knew? 450 pages - it's a book. A biggish book, at that.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Ekancone

Scofflaw wrote: »

Couldn't resist! Post 9000, on page 450...who knew?

cordially,
Scofflaw

There will be an awful scramble for 10,000. How about this? Whichever side claims that flag decides the victory of this debate so we can all go home to our wives and children?