The Bible, Creationism, and Prophecy (part 1)

wolfsbane

samb said:

Agreed. We use our ability to imagines 'visualisations' in order to comprehend. Do you have difficulties with this?

Indeed not. Just that we have to be careful we don't 'visualise' only what we want to believe. Applies to both creationists and evolutionists.

BrianCalgary

robindch wrote:

In exactly the same way that I'd be concerned if the pilot of the plane I was in thought that the earth was flat because the bible says it is.

Where does the Bible say this?

robindch wrote:

Or if an astronaut decided that the sun went around the earth, as implied elsewhere in the bible.

And This?

robindch wrote:

And if I saw my doctor settling down for a prayer session before operating upon me, I can assure you that I'd be out the door as quick as I could to find somebody who's concerned with me and not his religion.

I'd thank him for welcoming the almighty God into the operating room with him, to give him his steady hands and wisdom to perform the operation. The problem with our society is that God has been kicked out.

wolfsbane

ISAW said:

Jesus never commented on the Earth being created 6000 or so years ago.

You obviously have missed His validation of the Genesis account and of the OT history in general. Likewise His inspired authors give us the genealogies in the OT and in the gospels of the NT that give us the c.6000 year date.

Finally there is a problem with Biblical Fundamentalism. Some people believe that everything in the bible is literally true. this includes killing witches, stoning homosexuals and adulterers, the Earth being created 4004 BC and so on. These beliefs are not compatible with scientific evidence or with social values.

I think even our opponents would agree that witches, homosexuals and adulterers were literally executed in the OT times. The dating of Creation I referred to above. That the date is not in accord with science is the point of debate. The scientists who support creationism say that it is. That execution of witches, homosexuals and adulterers is contrary to modern social values is true - for the West, anyway. But the mandate to kill such sinners was not a universal one; it was given by God only to the theocratic nation of Israel. No such obligation is upon us today.

What did the early christians do for the first five centuries for example? They didnt have bible texts. They also had things other than the bible to go by - namely the oral tradition.

In fact the early Christians had at the beginning the OT, plus the apostles in person and their letters and authorised accounts (eg. Luke's gospel and his Acts of the Apostles). Later they had the OT and the these documents. These documents we now call the New Testament. The oral traditions should have only the weight of opinion - they must conform to Scripture to be valid advice. Just like Christ taught about the oral traditions of His time. Often oral traditons come to contradict Scripture or impose burdens that God never imposed. When Jesus was asked, “Why do Your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.”
He answered and said to them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God because of your tradition?" See http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2015:1-13;&version=50;

Scofflaw

wolfsbane wrote:

The damage from solar radiation is not confined to skin cells. You know that radiation from the sun and from rocks (eg. radon gas) can damage to the core. The combined effects of natural forces has introduced genetic degradation over time, not genetic enhancement. With a mere 6000 years since the perfect genepool, we are in fair condition. But what would we be like after, say 200,000 years? We do pass on the defects in our genes, witness the hereditary disorders around us. Do you not think Selafield endangers not only the present population of the east coast of Ireland but also its children by genetic disorders?

Honestly, wolfsbane, sometimes I despair of you. You are convinced that mutation is only harmful, something for which you have no evidence, and which you have repeatedly admitted you have not the scientific training to understand. And yet, here you are peddling the same old garbage.

This:

wolfsbane wrote:

The combined effects of natural forces has introduced genetic degradation over time, not genetic enhancement.

is simply a belief of yours. It bears no relation to what science knows, and bears no relation to anything in the Bible, and yet you put it forth as if it were Gospel truth (to coin a phrase). You are unable to answer questions put to you, and yet you are sure you are right, even about things that are not written in the Bible.

Why are you here?

regards,
Scofflaw

Son Goku

wolfsbane wrote:

The damage from solar radiation is not confined to skin cells. You know that radiation from the sun and from rocks (eg. radon gas) can damage to the core. The combined effects of natural forces has introduced genetic degradation over time, not genetic enhancement. With a mere 6000 years since the perfect genepool, we are in fair condition. But what would we be like after, say 200,000 years? We do pass on the defects in our genes, witness the hereditary disorders around us. Do you not think Selafield endangers not only the present population of the east coast of Ireland but also its children by genetic disorders?

Again, you'll have to drop the notion of "perfect" and "degraded" when it comes to DNA. There is simply DNA, no good or bad. Just adapted or not adapted to current conditions.
If Radioactivity changes a parent's DNA and it has less successful offspring with respect to the current environment because of this, then the offspring will have a reduced chance of having offspring themselves.
The damage will very rapidly disappear from the gene pool.
There are hereditary disorders, but the point is that the human race is not swamped by them, nor has the amount of them ever really increased.

Sure Selafield present a danger to the human gene pool (and more importantly the health of children in general), but that doesn't count against evolution. Sources of radiation created by humans isn't a valid counterpoint to evolution, as the didn't exist in the natural world in the past.

Basically, non-beneficial mutations caused by radiation which mutated sex cells were too rare and too easy to breed out to counteract evolution. These mutations are just occasional intra-generational noise in the gene pool.

wolfsbane wrote:

But that gives no excuse to rule out an intellient creator of these material processes. It is this insistence of that matter itself is the only permissible originator of matter and its processes that is both illogical and prejudiced.

To be frank, does this mean that I should now start adding diagrams with God boson interactions when I'm doing a QFT calculation?
Or do you mean that it is possbile that God created the general rules of physics?
If it's the latter, then sure, maybe he did. However, that doesn't change a single calculation in physics.

Science doesn't insist that matter itself created matter, modern theories of physics and the early universe don't even involve the very intuitive notion of matter. Instead we do things called "path integrals over geometries".
This isn't a materialist presupposition, this is very obtuse mathematics that agrees with experiment.
The Big Bang is a very, very, very abstract idea where every intuitive human concept breaks down. It isn't "nothing exploded", nor is it "matter made itself".

You can't say something is illogical or prejudiced if you don't know fully what the idea entails.

robindch

> But that gives no excuse to rule out an intellient creator of these material
> processes. It is this insistence of that matter itself is the only permissible
> originator of matter and its processes that is both illogical and prejudiced.

Blah, blah, blah. We've been over this with you twenty times or more - evolution concerns biology not the Big Bang which is the domain of cosmology.

> That too is disputed by qualified scientists.

(Blah, blah, blah) ^ 2. Likewise, only we must have done this around fifty times -- creationists don't contribute to the scientific process -- get used to it. And if I put my mind to it, I could probably find 0.1% of qualified historians who thought that the Holocaust didn't happen -- people like that nice David Irving chap now resting in an Austrian jail for spreading lies.

At this stage, wolfsbane, I'm no longer interested in going around in any more of your circles. You have shown yourself tiresomely unwilling to take the time to learn anything about what you're discussing, nor, by reading and digesting our posts, even to respect the time that the posters on this thread have put in, politely, in helping you out of your current darkness.

So, there I leave you -- the best of luck in finding your own way out.

samb

wolfsbane wrote:

samb said:

Indeed not. Just that we have to be careful we don't 'visualise' only what we want to believe. Applies to both creationists and evolutionists.

I agree emphatically, we need evidence

robindch

> > I'd be concerned if the pilot of the plane I was in thought that the earth was flat because the bible says it is.
> Where does the Bible say this?

Isaiah 40:21-22, where it refers to the "circle of the earth". Also in Isaiah 11:12, where we're told that the earth has "four corners".

> the sun went around the earth, as implied elsewhere in the bible.

Habakkuk 3:11 and Joshua 10:13, both of which say that the sun "stood still", implying that they thought that the earth was still and the sun did the moving during its traverse from east to west across the viewable sky.

Not, I hasten to add, that there's anything wrong with the bible saying these things -- they were widely believed to be true at the time when the bible was written, it's just that with the passage of time and the accumulation of evidence, they turned out to be false.

BTW, before you tell me that I'm stretching the meaning of these verses, let me point out that these were amongst the ones used by church authorities to convict Galileo of heresy in daring to suggest that the church's Ptolemaic dogma disagreed with observed fact. In other words, these verses were once taken to be as literally true as creationists now take the story of genesis.

robindch

robindch wrote:

BTW, before you tell me that I'm stretching the meaning of these verses, let me point out that these were amongst the ones used by church authorities to convict Galileo of heresy in daring to suggest that the church's Ptolemaic dogma disagreed with observed fact. In other words, these verses were once taken to be as literally true as creationists now take the story of genesis.

tbh galileo would have been left alone if he hadn't been acting like an idiot making fun of the pope...

Excelsior

Also, it is a spurious argument to say "these were once taken literally by someone". Were they intended literally is the (rather modernistically naive, I'll grant you) question that is to be asked.

robindch

> Were they intended literally is the question that is to be asked.

Ah yes, straight to the nub of the matter!

Creationists say that it's all literally true, together with all of its implications that the earth is flat, was created well after the domestication of the dog, and is circumnavigated by the sun. Less extreme readers say that bits of it are true, some are metaphorical and some are wrong, but little agreement has been reached amongst these readers as to which bit is which. People like me say that it's a nice story, in places, a frightful piece of nonsense in places, but generally doesn't say much that's either original or not said better elsewhere. People are of course free to take their pick as to what's the most realistic option

wolfsbane

Scofflaw said:

You are convinced that mutation is only harmful,

Could you point out where I said this?

It bears no relation to what science knows, and bears no relation to anything in the Bible, and yet you put it forth as if it were Gospel truth (to coin a phrase).

It is not asserted by the Bible, so it is not gospel truth. I assert it ( the entropic decline of the gene-pool) only on the level of common sense. I would be interested to see the scientific evidence that genetic mutations are on balance helpful and add to the complexity of life. Sounds highly unlikely to me.

wolfsbane

Son Goku said:

To be frank, does this mean that I should now start adding diagrams with God boson interactions when I'm doing a QFT calculation?

No.

Or do you mean that it is possbile that God created the general rules of physics?
If it's the latter, then sure, maybe he did. However, that doesn't change a single calculation in physics.

Yes, that. But the main point is that objection to the idea that the universe was created in fully mature and functioning as we see it (less the marks of the Fall) is ruled out of reckoning by scientism. If it were on the basis that the evidence does not accord with it, then that would be a proper response that is open to debate. But the basis is that a Designer cannot be allowed to have done so, as they allege this is importing religion into the lab. That is not a logical conclusion but a presuppositionally biased one.

Son Goku

the entropic decline of the gene-pool

Entropy can't effect the gene pool, that makes no sense.

wolfsbane wrote:

Yes, that. But the main point is that objection to the idea that the universe was created in fully mature and functioning as we see it (less the marks of the Fall) is ruled out of reckoning by scientism. If it were on the basis that the evidence does not accord with it, then that would be a proper response that is open to debate. But the basis is that a Designer cannot be allowed to have done so, as they allege this is importing religion into the lab. That is not a logical conclusion but a presuppositionally biased one.

It's on the basis that it is an utterly useless and needlessly complicated hypothesis.
If something dates to 13.7 billion years old, then it is logical to conclude that it is 13.7 billion years old over other conclusions, such as it being made fully formed last Thursday or in 1867 A.D. or 1578 B.C. or........................

As I said before:
"Nobody actually entertains the idea that drugs kill bacteria because they feel socially awkward around each other in a way that looks identical to chemical reactions."

Essentially, if the evidence points blatantly to something, we assume it over the infinity of things which would look identical to it, but involve adding pointless addendums. Occum's razor, but more importantly common sense.

Do you really think it's a presuppositional bias to think things are what they look like? Maybe it is, but it's been a damn useful one so far. I certainly don't think it is illogical and biased.


(This is unimportant: Not to mention the case that there is actually some evidence against it. Particles require a point in the universe to originally have been hot and dense in order for symmetry breaking. They don't move like classical objects which could be created "in transit". Their quantum mechanical amplitudes require a past. The fact that processes depend on path integrals implies that particles need the past to be there. However this is a technical issue and not really that important to the discussion.)

robindch

> So what does science concern itself that isn't material? Surely scientists
> should only be interested in what they can measure? What I was trying
> to say is that accusing a scientist of being preoccupied with materials
> is meaningless, because that's his/her job description really.

Yes, that's the point. Basically, I was saying that creationists get themselves up into a complete heap over this strange thing that I don't really understand which is called "materialism" and which is falsely equated with secularism and atheism and is therefore hated with a passion. It's almost as something were created, just so it could be fought against.

Anyhow, personally, I'm quite happy having the biologists in my life discuss biology, and the doctors discuss medicine, and my car mechanic settling down with a spanner and oilcan, rather than the lot of them resorting to incomprehensible, long and tedious ritual dances + speeches in forgotten languages to explain the existence of ring species, fix my sore back, or change my car's spark plugs.

robindch

> The court has prohibited free speech by not allowing the teaching
> of creationism. Even where the majority would want it taught

'fraid not. The court has upheld the constitutional separation of church and state. Why not look at it from the other side -- ok, you're not getting your kids indoctrinated with your own-brand religion, but then again, they're also not getting infected with catholic doctrine, or lutheran, or calvinist or, heaven forfend, any of the heretical perfidy of the muslim, the jew or the buddhist!

> The USA school system is run by the American teachers Association,
> the most powerful union in the US, which sets curriculum and is hostile
> to Christianity.

Unfortunately untrue. The school curricula are largely, if not exclusively, defined by each individual state's Board of Education, with some selective power devolved to individual country school boards. The unions have minimal input, despite your false assertion that they control the lot.

> If they were Christian the cases in PA and Kansas would never
> have gotten to the courts. Why would Christian parents have
> needed to go teh route they did if fundies ran the show as you claim?

The reason that it did go to court was *because* christian fundamentalists took over, for example, the Dover school board who required the state to teach religion as fact. Can't do that in the USA -- that's violation of the constitution as they rudely found out when they were taken to court, assuming of course that they were daft enough not to know that quite well in the first place. You will recall also that every single member of the the school board that passed this crazy resolution was fired out of office in the election towards the end of last year, and the first act of the incoming fundie-free school board was to toss out the "religion as fact" clause.

> So you are advocating keeping them ignorant of creationism, because
> you don't agree with it, and this ignorance will allow them to pursue
> free-thought?

No, I am advocating being honest to them. Teach fact as fact and if you have to teach religion, then make sure that it's advertized as religion before you start.

> Absolutely, teach them about the flying spaghetti monster, they will
> see how ridiculous some ideas can be.

FYI - You seem to have missed the point of the FSM, which is that it is satirizing creationists. Try reading Bobby Henderson's open letter again and spot the similarities between Pastafarianism and creationism.

wolfsbane

robindch said:

creationists don't contribute to the scientific process -- get used to it. And if I put my mind to it, I could probably find 0.1% of qualified historians who thought that the Holocaust didn't happen -- people like that nice David Irving chap now resting in an Austrian jail for spreading lies.

Like Irving, you are in denial of the obvious. And, really, do you think thousands of accredited historians would sign up to Holocaust denial? If that could be confirmed, we would indeed need to reveiw the whole issue. But it is clear to all but a few individuals that Hitler was indeed seeking to help evolution on its way.

At this stage, wolfsbane, I'm no longer interested in going around in any more of your circles. You have shown yourself tiresomely unwilling to take the time to learn anything about what you're discussing, nor, by reading and digesting our posts, even to respect the time that the posters on this thread have put in, politely, in helping you out of your current darkness.

I share your sentiments. I do however appreciate all the inputs, delusional or otherwise from our evolutionist friends. I am glad that the scientific detail I cannot engage with is available for them on the ICR, AiG and BSC sites, amongst others. I encourage you to expose your ideas to their challenge more often.

wolfsbane

robindch said:

Isaiah 40:21-22, where it refers to the "circle of the earth". Also in Isaiah 11:12, where we're told that the earth has "four corners".

Habakkuk 3:11 and Joshua 10:13, both of which say that the sun "stood still", implying that they thought that the earth was still and the sun did the moving during its traverse from east to west across the viewable sky.

Not, I hasten to add, that there's anything wrong with the bible saying these things -- they were widely believed to be true at the time when the bible was written, it's just that with the passage of time and the accumulation of evidence, they turned out to be false.

So you think Isaiah believed in a circle with four corners? And that the use of 'the sun stood still' meant the Bible teaches the sun moves rather then the earth? That would make our TV weatherforecasters guilty of the same thing - 'sunrise' and 'sunset'. Your desperation to disprove the Bible has robbed you of your common sense. Do you want us to speak of 'earthfall' and 'earthset' instead? Firgures of speech, robindch, common figures of speech.

As to what some arrogant fools applied them to in their dispute with Gallileo, Excelsior puts it well - it was what was intended by the writer that counts.

BrianCalgary

robindch wrote:

'fraid not. The court has upheld the constitutional separation of church and state. Why not look at it from the other side -- ok, you're not getting your kids indoctrinated with your own-brand religion, but then again, they're also not getting infected with catholic doctrine, or lutheran, or calvinist or, heaven forfend, any of the heretical perfidy of the muslim, the jew or the buddhist!.

Indoctrination is the following:
1 : to instruct especially in fundamentals or rudiments : TEACH
2 : to imbue with a usually partisan or sectarian opinion, point of view, or principle

Here is an article on that seperation and what it means to the American:
http://www.tothesource.org/2_21_2006/2_21_2006.html

The court has stifled free speech.

I don't see how teaching religion in schools qualifies, unless everything that is taught would be indoctrination. We were taught the fundamentals of evolution, does that mean we were indoctrinated with that belief?

robindch wrote:

Unfortunately untrue. The school curricula are largely, if not exclusively, defined by each individual state's Board of Education, with some selective power devolved to individual country school boards. The unions have minimal input, despite your false assertion that they control the lot.!.

Courses are chosen with the input of teachers who attend conferences and look at new curriculum. They are valid as long as it agrees with state standards. The parents have virtually no input, as their opinions are dismissed because they don't have the educational knowledge in order to decide such matters. It invariably falls into the lap of the teachers and their representatives at the state level.

robindch wrote:

The reason that it did go to court was *because* christian fundamentalists took over, for example, the Dover school board who required the state to teach religion as fact. Can't do that in the USA -- that's violation of the constitution as they rudely found out when they were taken to court, assuming of course that they were daft enough not to know that quite well in the first place. You will recall also that every single member of the the school board that passed this crazy resolution was fired out of office in the election towards the end of last year, and the first act of the incoming fundie-free school board was to toss out the "religion as fact" clause..!.

Like I said, the fundamentalists don't run the show as you claimed. The board was duly and properly elected and made the decision to allow creationism to be taught. They were then challenged. It would be interesting to see what a vote in Dover would bring up. Would creationism be allowed to be taught alongside evolutionism? Here in Canada all you need is one dissenter and Christianity is out.

robindch wrote:

No, I am advocating being honest to them. Teach fact as fact and if you have to teach religion, then make sure that it's advertized as religion before you start...!.

But, creation by God is a fact, and is held to be by many people. I feel that just because you disagree with it 'as fact' you wish to shut the rest of us up, and confine us to teaching it as 'myth'?

The problem is that religion isn't taught.

Parsley

I think wolfsbane's problem (also afflicting many others) is that he was born and raised reiligiously, and as we all know, kids will believe whatever their parents tell them. He is too stubborn and stuck in his ways he refuses to entertain any other notions that oppose what he was taught.

(this is just the impression I'm getting from reading his posts)

Just ask yourself, if you were born, and brought up without any religious or scientific "bias", and somebody showed you a piece of rock that was 13.7 billion years old, wouldn't you believe that the earth was at least 13.7 billion years old?

I'm trying to re-inforce Son Goku's point here but I'm not doing a very good job cos I'm sleepy. I'm sure he could finish it off for me...

Scofflaw

BrianCalgary wrote:

But, creation by God is a fact, and is held to be by many people. I feel that just because you disagree with it 'as fact' you wish to shut the rest of us up, and confine us to teaching it as 'myth'?

The problem is that religion isn't taught.

1. the court did not state that creationism could not be taught. It stated that it could not be taught in science classes, because it is not science.

2. even were it fact (clearly I disagree!), that still does not make it science. That Charles Dickens wrote novels is fact - but it's not taught in science classes, because it is not science. The rise of the Nazi Party is a fact, but it is not taught in science class, because it is not science. Creationism is not taught in science classes because it is not science.

What exactly is the point of pretending that Creationism is science? The Bible is not a scientific work, nor does it purport to be. Whether robin is right or wrong about the meaning of 'the four corners of the earth', I'm afraid it's not a scientific statement.

If you wish to claim literal truth for Genesis, then, really, fine, whatever - call it a 'literally true history', but to make it 'scientific' is simply not possible, because there is no science in there. Nor is there any notion of what science and the scientific method are in the Bible, because science is too recent.

I accept that there is a conflict between what the Bible says and what science says. On that basis, I reject the literal truth of the Bible. On the same basis you reject the literal truth of science. I can therefore claim my viewpoint is scientific, and you cannot, any more than I can claim my view is properly Christian, whereas you can.

Really, it's like watching Cinderella's ugly sisters trying to fit their foot into the glass slipper. First you must cut off this toe, then you must cut off that one, then you must shave something off the heel. To claim that what you have at the end is a foot is to misuse the term.


regards,
Scofflaw

robindch

> The court has stifled free speech.

No, it hasn't. To repeat what I said earlier, in full accordance with the Constitution, the court has declared illegal the teaching of a particular religious viewpoint in state-funded time. As a supporter of that viewpoint, you no doubt feel aggrieved by this, but the text of the Constitution is quite clear on the matter -- no direct state support for religion. But that doesn't stop you teaching this outside of state-funded time though if you want to, hence the need for all those sunday schools to make up for the lack of religious instruction while in school.

> Like I said, the fundamentalists don't run the show as you claimed.

So, if fundamentalists don't run the show, then can you tell me exactly what President Bush, the two Houses of Congress and the Supreme Court do all day long, given that all now contain Republican majorities, and the Republican party is largely controlled by fundamentalist christians?

> But, creation by God is a fact, and is held to be by many people. I feel
> that just because you disagree with it 'as fact' you wish to shut the rest
> of us up, and confine us to teaching it as 'myth'?

"Creation by god" is not a fact by any reasonable definition of the word "fact" and it is dishonest of you to claim that it is. What you seem unable to distinguish between are the concepts of "fact" and "belief" -- out of interest, what do you understand by these words?

Asiaprod

Scofflaw wrote:

Really, it's like watching Cinderella's ugly sisters trying to fit their foot into the glass slipper. First you must cut off this toe, then you must cut off that one, then you must shave something off the heel. To claim that what you have at the end is a foot is to misuse the term.

That sums this issue up perfectly, nicely put.

robindch

> Firgures of speech, robindch, common figures of speech.

No sh*t! I'll just remind you how I finished up that posting, as I think you got a bit carried away writing your indignant reply:

BTW, before you tell me that I'm stretching the meaning of these verses, let me point out that these were amongst the ones used by church authorities to convict Galileo of heresy in daring to suggest that the church's Ptolemaic dogma disagreed with observed fact. In other words, these verses were once taken to be as literally true as creationists now take the story of genesis.

So, I'll say it again -- it's not me who's taking the bible literally, it's you guys and people like you from five hundred years ago

hairyheretic

BrianCalgary wrote:

But, creation by God is a fact, and is held to be by many people. I feel that just because you disagree with it 'as fact' you wish to shut the rest of us up, and confine us to teaching it as 'myth'?

A fact can be independently verified, and requires no belief in it.

If religion is to be taught in schools, then let it be taught as religion only.

BrianCalgary

Scofflaw wrote:

1. the court did not state that creationism could not be taught. It stated that it could not be taught in science classes, because it is not science.

2. even were it fact (clearly I disagree!), that still does not make it science. That Charles Dickens wrote novels is fact - but it's not taught in science classes, because it is not science. The rise of the Nazi Party is a fact, but it is not taught in science class, because it is not science. Creationism is not taught in science classes because it is not science.

What exactly is the point of pretending that Creationism is science? The Bible is not a scientific work, nor does it purport to be. Whether robin is right or wrong about the meaning of 'the four corners of the earth', I'm afraid it's not a scientific statement.

If you wish to claim literal truth for Genesis, then, really, fine, whatever - call it a 'literally true history', but to make it 'scientific' is simply not possible, because there is no science in there. Nor is there any notion of what science and the scientific method are in the Bible, because science is too recent.

I accept that there is a conflict between what the Bible says and what science says. On that basis, I reject the literal truth of the Bible. On the same basis you reject the literal truth of science. I can therefore claim my viewpoint is scientific, and you cannot, any more than I can claim my view is properly Christian, whereas you can.

Really, it's like watching Cinderella's ugly sisters trying to fit their foot into the glass slipper. First you must cut off this toe, then you must cut off that one, then you must shave something off the heel. To claim that what you have at the end is a foot is to misuse the term.


regards,
Scofflaw

I have to hand it to you. A great summation, that I can agree with.

wolfsbane

Son Goku said:

Entropy can't effect the gene pool

All real processes go with an increase of entropy. Heat loss may be a direct part of that, but regardless, the fact is all things move from a higher ordered state to a less ordered one over time. Sometimes we can inject new energy into the system - as the costly repairs to my car attest! - but how is the gene pool improved? By interbreeding we reduce the negative consequences, but over time the damage mounts. Starting from a perfect gene pool 6000 years ago, we are still functioning well, but start 200K+ ago and the degradation would be enormous.

Anyway, that is my layman's understanding of it. See here for a scientific exploration: http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/370.asp and the relevant sections in http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/Area/isd/mcintosh.asp and this interesting exchange between a creationist scientist and an evolutionist http://www.answersingenesis.org/Home/area/feedback/negative_13May2002.asp

Do you really think it's a presuppositional bias to think things are what they look like? Maybe it is, but it's been a damn useful one so far. I certainly don't think it is illogical and biased.

It is a helpful assumption. But it should be open to review. One set of appearances may conflict with another: only one can be right, so the assumption must be set aside. For example, the apparent age of the earth by one dating method will conflict with that by another. The appearance of evolution of the species (really an inference from the data) conflicts with the appearance of irreducible complexity.

wolfsbane

Parsley said:

I think wolfsbane's problem (also afflicting many others) is that he was born and raised reiligiously, and as we all know, kids will believe whatever their parents tell them. He is too stubborn and stuck in his ways he refuses to entertain any other notions that oppose what he was taught.

(this is just the impression I'm getting from reading his posts)

Your impression is quite mistaken. I was born and raised non-religiously. I only became a Christian when I was 17. My formative years were immersed in the secular mindset. Sci-Fi was my favourite reading. Evolution was no problem for me.

But it became a problem when I really started to think about the wonder of our universe and of human life in particular. Death of animals and people around me I saw was something significant.

As I began to read the Bible I began to question the godless understanding I was involved with. I became pretty convinced the Bible was nearer the mark. Then came the time when I was fully convinced that the God revealed in the Bible was real, and that the Bible told the real history of the world. I obeyed His command which He has given to all men: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=51&chapter=17&verse=29&end_verse=31&version=50&context=context

wolfsbane

robindch said:

So, I'll say it again -- it's not me who's taking the bible literally, it's you guys and people like you from five hundred years ago

You missed the point completely. Anyone arguing that Isaiah meant that the sun moved around the earth was utterly foolish or just using any argument to reinforce their position. You nor they can say Isaiah meant that. Common sense and common practice tell otherwise.

Just because creationists hold some things to be literal does not mean they hold all things the Bible says to be so. In fact, I pointed that out several times. Prophecy often was couched in figurative terms. But historical record was not. You totally misrepresent creationists in suggesting otherwise.

But in fact your comments were not an attack on creationists at all: it was on the Bible. Your point was that the Bible was unreliable. But it was your argument proved to be so.

wolfsbane

In post 1008 Scofflaw said:

In no way is Snelling's paper scientific. It rests on a lie.

Snelling's work, in turn, is then used, in various Creationist arguments, to falsely give the impression that (a) dates obtained using this method are unreliable, (b) that the 'true' dates would therefore be younger, and (c) that they would be younger by orders of magnitude.

All of these are false - (a) relies on the lie Snelling has told about Dalrymple, (b) would be incorrect anyway, since excess argon would give erroneously young dates, not erroneously old, and (c) would also be incorrect, since the error margin is smaller than the dates by an order of magnitude, not larger (noting Dalrymple's proviso).

This kind of thing is not science, and would correctly not be allowed in any reputable scientific journal. Nevertheless, it sits there on the ICR site, and is used to bolster the claims of a "scientific controversy", or to attack dating results that Creationists disagree with. Those who have no scientific understanding are likely to take it at face value without realising that they are being lied to for the sake of a minority religious agenda.

That is a substantial argument, by way of allegation. I therefore took it up with the ICR and Dr. Snelling.

He kindly sent a personal reply. In that he states:
'The truth is that I never claimed that Dalrymple ignores the issue of excess
argon. To the contrary, in my chapter in the first RATE book published in
2000 I was careful to quote Dalrymple extensively and to make sure I did not
misrepresent him. The unbelieving scientist who is making the claim that I
lie is allowing his bias to cloud his judgement and falsely accuse me.

May I suggest you obtain a copy of that first RATE book and read the
relevant section of my chapter, chapter 5, namely, pages 125-159. While
Dalrymple acknowledges that excess argon may cause problems with rocks a few
million years old or younger I maintain that he ignores the obvious
implication that the same problem could well exist in older and ancient
rocks. After all, the reason he recognises that excess argon is a problem
in young rocks is because he has other means of knowing that those rocks
are young. On the other hand, it logically follows that if excess argon
causes a problem in young rocks, then it likely would cause a problem in
older rocks.

And that's what I go on to show in the first RATE book by
quoting examples from the secular geologic literature primarily, but also
from our own research. What I show is that argon is mobile and can be
inherited by rocks and minerals making them older or younger depending on
whether there has been gain or loss, and this is routinely recognised in the
secular geologic literature. I have given copious examples in that chapter
which are fully referenced. For example, there is the case of biotite
flakes that give different ages on their edges to their centres, ages
different by hundreds of millions of years. Then there are plagioclase
crystals in metamorphic rocks that give ages of twice the age of the earth!
There are also diamonds that give ages older than the age of the earth! So
much for excess argon not causing a problem with supposedly ancient rocks.
Who's the one being dishonest? Certainly it is not me, because I have just
used examples from the secular geologic literature. Rather, it is this
unbelieving scientist who is either blissfully or deliberately unaware of
these copious examples in the secular geologic literature.

Then there are examples from our own research, such as our work on the
Cardenas Basalt in the Grand Canyon, which was published in a 1998 ICC
paper. For those rocks the potassium-argon isochron age they give is
younger
than the uniformitarian age for the overlying strata! Then there is my
recent Creation magazine article on the metamorphosed basalts at the bottom
of the Grand Canyon. From the one outcrop samples less than a metre apart
give potassium-argon model 'ages' of around 1200 million years and 2500
million years. These are samples from the same rock and the same outcrop!

Hopefully these few comments will be a help to you. And hopefully you will
be able to read yourself what I have written. Indeed, the entire first RATE
book is now available as a .pdf file on the ICR website, so even if you
haven't purchased a copy of the book you should be able to download the
relevant section of my chapter and read through it. You will see then that
I have provided ample documentation and examples to refute the ignorant
claims being made by this unbelieving scientist in his efforts to undermine
the integrity of myself and my work, but that kind of attack simply will not
succeed given the weight of evidence that is already available in the
secular geologic literature against these radioisotope dating methods. It
only saddens me that Christians allow unbelieving scientists to sway them,
instead of accepting that the creationists are working with the utmost
integrity as fellow Christians, while the unbelieving scientist has his
integrity tainted by the evil one, sadly.'

The creationist sites are there for those seeking the truth. No need to go around in circles here. I can only offer limited scientific response, but the sites give the substantial arguments, and links to follow for further detail. Perhaps Excelsior will post the sticky he proposed, listing those sites?