The Bible, Creationism, and Prophecy (part 1)

Ekancone

Gegerty wrote: »

And do all creatures share the same god or is there a cat god? So all the fossils of creatures that have been discovered are all different species?

Anyway, back to humans. I was watching the body shock documentaries, they document freak genetic mutations. People with 3 legs, giant people, dwarve people etc. Assuming there is no evolution, how can these things happen? Because according to creationism these people would have been from a species that existed back with Adam and Eve. But they were born from normal humans (normal but who carry defect genes).

Something to do with mans fall, and the degradation of Adam and Eve's 'perfect' DNA or some complete nonsense.

sdep

Galvasean wrote: »

Excellent post sdep.
I was actually a bit taken aback by the claim that the platypus had avian DNA and had trouble sourcing it.

I think perhaps the impression arose because the platypus researchers compared the new platypus genome with the chicken and various mammals. Some DNA features were seen in chicken and platypus, and some in the platypus and other mammals. Some features were unique to the platypus too.

Evolution predicts that DNA sequence features shared between the platypus and the chicken will also be the in genomes of reptiles, only we haven't got round to sequencing them yet (only fragments of reptilian genomes are currently published). When we do sequence some reptiles fully, there's another testable prediction made by evolution.

Zombrex

BrianCalgary wrote: »

Boy all the assumptions about what all Christians do and don't like to talk about. :rolleyes:

At that time incest wasn't an issue. Incest as a law didn't happen until Moses' time.

Back at the time of Adam and Eve incest wasn't an issue. So Cain and Abel's wives were their sisters. Adam and Eve had many children over the length of their lives.

There is no passage anywhere in the Bible that says Cain and Abel married their sisters.

wolfsbane

daithifleming wrote: »

Something to do with mans fall, and the degradation of Adam and Eve's 'perfect' DNA or some complete nonsense.

Exactly! - except for the last comment. Let me help you with the new text enhancer: nonsense.

iUseVi

Wicknight wrote: »

There is no passage anywhere in the Bible that says Cain and Abel married their sisters.

Yeah they just seem to fill that one in with their intellects. Which department of the thought police should I report this to? :rolleyes:

wolfsbane

Gegerty said:

And do all creatures share the same god or is there a cat god? So all the fossils of creatures that have been discovered are all different species?

Only one God, who made all things.

The fossils were just creatures like we have today, only many of them from species no longer existing. Some remain to this day:
http://creationontheweb.com/content/view/4975/

All came from the original kinds created in he beginning, some 6000 years ago - just as we do.

wolfsbane

Wicknight wrote: »

There is no passage anywhere in the Bible that says Cain and Abel married their sisters.

There's no passage that says they drank water - does that mean they were a different life-form? Or are we supposed to read this history just like we do any other? They drank water; they married the only women available; etc.

wolfsbane

Sir Molle wrote: »

Are there actually creationists in this thread? I thought only really dumb Americans were creationists!

Ciaran500 is right: JC and I are creationists. JC is Irish, I am British, and a whole range of nationalities are creationists.

For example - one international group:

Creation Ministries International
http://creationontheweb.com/content/view/42/

But see here for further links:
CREATION WEB SITEShttp://www.rae.org/revevlnk.html

Sir Molle

wolfsbane wrote: »

Ciaran500 is right: JC and I are creationists. JC is Irish, I am British, and a whole range of nationalities are creationists.

For example - one international group:

Creation Ministries International
http://creationontheweb.com/content/view/42/

But see here for further links:
CREATION WEB SITEShttp://www.rae.org/revevlnk.html

Did you drop out of school or something? I don't mean to offend you or anything, I just don't get exactly why anyone would believe this nonsense. I can understand why maybe someone might believe in this stuff if they were living in a society where this kind of thinking is common, like in Saudi Arabia or America or some place, because of the influence society has on the mind. But in a pretty secular first world country such as Ireland or the UK?! I don't get it.

It's on par with believeing that the world is flat.

wolfsbane

2Scoops said:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Akrasia
That doesn't answer the question as to why platypus can have DNA from 3 groups of species at once. Creationists are adamant that reptiles can't possibly evolve into mammals or birds (or even that dogs can't evolve into wolves...)
Again, I understand your argument but a creationist can easily say that God just made platypuses that way, and DNA sequences are just his way of building organisms. This will not be a mental roadblock to a creationist.

Correct.

But let me point out Akrasia errs also when he says we hold that dogs can't evolve into wolves - If I get his drift, he thinks we believe they do not have a common ancestor. Wrong - dogs and wolves are of one created kind.

wolfsbane

Skepticism spreads - and Humanists complain!

One Large Defeat for Science in Canada
http://www.csicop.org:80/si/2008-01/bauslaugh.html

Ekancone

wolfsbane wrote: »

Exactly! - except for the last comment. Let me help you with the new text enhancer: nonsense.

Quite what perfect DNA constitutes is the big question...

Galvasean

wolfsbane wrote: »

One Large Defeat for Science in Canada
http://www.csicop.org:80/si/2008-01/bauslaugh.html

How nice of you to point out an article making fun of I.D.

iUseVi

Galvasean wrote: »

How nice of you to point out an article making fun of I.D.

Yeah I thought that was slightly strange.

wolfsbane wrote: »

Skepticism spreads - and Humanists complain!

One Large Defeat for Science in Canada
http://www.csicop.org:80/si/2008-01/bauslaugh.html

Did you actually read that?!

2Scoops

wolfsbane wrote: »

But let me point out Akrasia errs also when he says we hold that dogs can't evolve into wolves - If I get his drift, he thinks we believe they do not have a common ancestor. Wrong - dogs and wolves are of one created kind.

A dog SPONTANEOUSLY turned into a wolf?! I find that very hard to believe. Did a zebra suddenly turn into a horse as well? [/satire]

Zombrex

wolfsbane wrote: »

There's no passage that says they drank water - does that mean they were a different life-form? Or are we supposed to read this history just like we do any other? They drank water; they married the only women available; etc.

there is no passage in the bible that says they were the only women available

2Scoops

Wicknight wrote: »

there is no passage in the bible that says they were the only women available

Aye. The great thing about genesis is that it says so little that you can fill in the blanks with whatever your imagination can come up with. You can quite literally make it up as you go along. In fact, that sentiment is the very foundation of J C's wacky posts. :pac:

Zombrex

2Scoops wrote: »

Aye. The great thing about genesis is that it says so little that you can fill in the blanks with whatever your imagination can come up with.

exactly my point, and funnily enough people who claim to take the Bible literally have no problem doing this.

There is no mention anywhere that Cain and Abel married their sisters (not exactly a minor detail), there is no mention anywhere that they had sisters to marry. The only mention of sisters is after Abel was dead and Cain was banished. There is no mention than any of the sisters went to Nod with Cain, or where in Nod already when he arrived. There is no mention than the sisters where banished to Nod for any reason, why would they even be there?

Strange :rolleyes:

MooseJam

is this Nod you speak of the land of Nod, where we go when we sleep, or are they just named the same ?

Galvasean

wolfsbane wrote: »

he thinks we believe they do not have a common ancestor. Wrong - dogs and wolves are of one created kind.

So, for the record. Correct me when I'm wrong/gone too far. I just want to know where you stand.

You are in agreement that dogs and wolves share a common ancestor and are closely related?

You agree that speciation can occur?

You believe that God created a small group of animals which later changed (or evolved) into the variety of forms we see today?

Does the same apply to the animals on the fossil record, but do not exist today?

wolfsbane

2Scoops wrote: »

A dog SPONTANEOUSLY turned into a wolf?! I find that very hard to believe. Did a zebra suddenly turn into a horse as well? [/satire]

No. Listen carefully children: wolves and dogs both come from the original created kind, by natural selection. That original would resemble them - dog/wolf-like. They did not come from any type of fish, bird, horse, cat, etc.

Same goes for the horse and zebra - from an original horse/zebra-like animal.

wolfsbane

Galvasean wrote: »

So, for the record. Correct me when I'm wrong/gone too far. I just want to know where you stand.

You are in agreement that dogs and wolves share a common ancestor and are closely related?

You agree that speciation can occur?

You believe that God created a small group of animals which later changed (or evolved) into the variety of forms we see today?

Does the same apply to the animals on the fossil record, but do not exist today?

Yes.

Ciaran500

Did anyone ever post a good definition of a "kind"?

wolfsbane

Wicknight wrote: »

exactly my point, and funnily enough people who claim to take the Bible literally have no problem doing this.

There is no mention anywhere that Cain and Abel married their sisters (not exactly a minor detail), there is no mention anywhere that they had sisters to marry. The only mention of sisters is after Abel was dead and Cain was banished. There is no mention than any of the sisters went to Nod with Cain, or where in Nod already when he arrived. There is no mention than the sisters where banished to Nod for any reason, why would they even be there?

Strange :rolleyes:

I know you struggle with logic, but there really is no short cut.

Adam & Eve are declared to be the only created humans. They have sons. One son kills the other and is banished. His wife bears a son. Logic fills in the gaps - she was his sister. The Genesis account was not about Adam and Eve's daughters, but about their sons. So only incidently are the daughters mentioned.

This is normal enough stuff for historical narrative.

You also need to read the text more carefully. You say, There is no mention than the sisters where banished to Nod for any reason, why would they even be there? But neither the text nor me says Cain found his wife in Nod. Here's what it actually says:
Genesis 4:16 Then Cain went out from the presence of the LORD and dwelt in the land of Nod on the east of Eden. 17 And Cain knew his wife, and she conceived and bore Enoch. And he built a city, and called the name of the city after the name of his son—Enoch.

Quite consistent with him taking her with him into exile.

Ekancone

Ciaran500 wrote: »

Did anyone ever post a good definition of a "kind"?

There is no formal definition.

wolfsbane

iUseVi wrote: »

Yeah I thought that was slightly strange.



Did you actually read that?!

Yes. The humanist was deploring the skepticism shown towards evolutionary theory by the lefties. Am I mistaken?

wolfsbane

Ciaran500 wrote: »

Did anyone ever post a good definition of a "kind"?

I posted something but can't remember when. A simplistic version would be any organisms that can breed together.

A scientific attempt:
Many creationists share the problematic desire to have
a definition of baramin that makes it easy to recognize.
Marsh’s heavy emphasis on hybridization as the defining
feature of a baramin has certainly contributed to this bias.10
An unambiguous criterion makes research easy, but even the
hybridization criterion has serious limitations (e.g. it is inapplicable
to asexual or fossil organisms). Because of these
problems, baraminologists of today focus on approximating
the limits of the baramin using a suite of characteristics.
To assist in the approximation, we employ three terms that
are derived from Marsh’s baramin:11
1. The monobaramin is a group of organisms that share
continuity, either genetic or phenetic.
2. The apobaramin is a group of organisms that is discontinuous
with everything else. Creationists have long
used bats as an example of animals that are unrelated to
any other mammals.12,13 Since we don’t know how many
kinds (baramins) of bats God created, baraminologists
refer to the bats as an apobaramin.
3. The holobaramin is roughly what we call the ‘Genesis
kind’. Technically, it simply combines the definitions
of monobaramin and apobaramin. A holobaramin contains
a complete set of organisms that share continuity
among themselves but are discontinuous with all other
organisms.
Because these definitions are not mutually exclusive,
they form the basis of the baraminological method of
successive approximation. If you divide groups of organisms
into smaller and smaller apobaramins by subtractive
evidence, you will eventually come to a point when you can
legitimately divide the group no longer. Similarly, if you
add more and more species to a monobaramin by additive
evidence, you will eventually come to a point when you
cannot legitimately add any more species. Hopefully, the
point at which the apobaramin can no longer be divided
and the point at which the monobaramin can no longer
be expanded is the same point: the holobaramin. At this
point, the ‘membership list’ of the monobaramin and the
apobaramin are exactly the same; therefore, this group
probably represents the holobaramin.
http://creationontheweb.com/images/pdfs/tj/j16_1/j16_1_15-25.pdf

wolfsbane

Sir Molle wrote: »

Did you drop out of school or something? I don't mean to offend you or anything, I just don't get exactly why anyone would believe this nonsense. I can understand why maybe someone might believe in this stuff if they were living in a society where this kind of thinking is common, like in Saudi Arabia or America or some place, because of the influence society has on the mind. But in a pretty secular first world country such as Ireland or the UK?! I don't get it.

It's on par with believeing that the world is flat.

The thousands of scientists who are creationists disagree with you. I'm not a scientist, but I've enough education to be able to read their statements, follow their arguments to some degree and to see how the evolutionists react and argue against them. The latter is as telling as the former.

You should practise a bit more skepticism.

MooseJam

wolfsbane wrote: »

The thousands of scientists who are creationists disagree with you.

Are there thousands ? have you a reference, I could believe there were a handfull but doubt very much there are thousands

iUseVi

wolfsbane wrote: »

Yes. The humanist was deploring the skepticism shown towards evolutionary theory by the lefties. Am I mistaken?

Umm lefties? Not sure about that, but apart from that basically, yeah.
Not sure how that really supports your position though.

wolfsbane wrote: »

The thousands of scientists who are creationists disagree with you. I'm not a scientist, but I've enough education to be able to read their statements, follow their arguments to some degree and to see how the evolutionists react and argue against them. The latter is as telling as the former.

You should practise a bit more skepticism.

Thousands? Don't make me laugh. Show me half a thousand please. And dead ones don't count.