jerryR34

I think the biggest obstacle is lack of evidence for God. If one did not know of and already believe in the Bible, one certainly could not trace the evidence back to the Book. The very existence of the universe is evidence for God. Which God? There is no scientific evidence you can give that would point to the God of the Bible without first knowing about and believing in the God of the Bible. I am still looking for a good answer to this.

I think the biggest obstacle is lack of evidence for God. If one did not know of and already believe in the Bible, one certainly could not trace the evidence back to the Book.

I've never said I don't believe, I'm just not a young earth creationist.

God created the laws of physics and all of the forces of the Universe that makes that equation possible. That the entire universe can be reduced to mathematical equations indicates a Creator and designer. It's not that the lab experiment would be enhanced by including God. Rather it the one doing the experiment that is changed or enhanced to see the glory of God in science. Science is a way of exploring the scope of God's creation. The Bible is not meant to be a science book, if it were, there would have been much more detailed revelations given in other areas of science. It was revealed to relatively ignorant people in the infancy of our civilization in terms they could understand. The Creation story was just that, a story for those people put in the simplest terms. All civilizations have a creation myth, and creation is evidence for all of them. When you try to make the Bible into a science book you degrade God's word.

Hi Kwik - what would be better to you - a person who trys to reconcile science and the Bible and believe in Christ or someone who throws out the Bible because it does not agree with science?

Not that anyone is sticking to reality with this, but imagine how cold our planet would be without the sun... That doesn't make any difference when God is sustaining all life on it. You live in a skewed reality that assumes the natural world is all there is. It is entirely pointless to debate you on scientific grounds when you can invoke the supernatural whenever it suits you. That is why we need to keep God out of science classes. How would it look on a biology exam to just say "because God said so..."? The word "science" means "knowledge." It doesn't really refer to a particular kind of knowledge. So the word science in its purest and strictest definition doesn't rule out knowledge of God. And you are oversimplifying things. No one is discounting science at all. The problem is that science depends on a Creator who is logical and is able to create a universe that is predictable, logical and uniform. Without predictable uniformity, you can't do science. If the universe isn't consistent and logical and uniform, astronomers can't make predictions. God is at the bottom of all natural forces and processes, guiding and sustaining them. Science cannot work from chance or happenstance. Sorry, I should clarify...when I refer to science I am referring to the scientific method. The scientific method deals with observations of the natural world. Occam's razor would preclude any supernatural agency. No it wouldn't. An all-knowing all-powerful creator is the best explanation for how the universe came into being. A book is testimony to the author. A song is testimony of its composer, a computer program is testimony of its designer. So it makes sense that creation is testimony of its Creator. Occam's razor would most definitely apply in this way. Show me how God is in E=MC2. A mathematician may believe in God, but he will reduce all equations down to their simplest form, and not will include a creator. Can you give me one lab experiment that would be enhanced by including God in the experiment? Not including him does not make him irrelevent - it amazes me how fragile some people's faith is...

Not that anyone is sticking to reality with this, but imagine how cold our planet would be without the sun... That doesn't make any difference when God is sustaining all life on it. You live in a skewed reality that assumes the natural world is all there is. It is entirely pointless to debate you on scientific grounds when you can invoke the supernatural whenever it suits you. That is why we need to keep God out of science classes. How would it look on a biology exam to just say "because God said so..."? The word "science" means "knowledge." It doesn't really refer to a particular kind of knowledge. So the word science in its purest and strictest definition doesn't rule out knowledge of God. And you are oversimplifying things. No one is discounting science at all. The problem is that science depends on a Creator who is logical and is able to create a universe that is predictable, logical and uniform. Without predictable uniformity, you can't do science. If the universe isn't consistent and logical and uniform, astronomers can't make predictions. God is at the bottom of all natural forces and processes, guiding and sustaining them. Science cannot work from chance or happenstance. Sorry, I should clarify...when I refer to science I am referring to the scientific method. The scientific method deals with observations of the natural world. Occam's razor would preclude any supernatural agency.

Your "Yes" implies you are agreeing with something I said. I never said there is any insurmountable error in science, and am not sure what scientism is. Just wanted to clarify.

Not that anyone is sticking to reality with this, but imagine how cold our planet would be without the sun... That doesn't make any difference when God is sustaining all life on it. You live in a skewed reality that assumes the natural world is all there is. It is entirely pointless to debate you on scientific grounds when you can invoke the supernatural whenever it suits you. That is why we need to keep God out of science classes. How would it look on a biology exam to just say "because God said so..."?

Not that anyone is sticking to reality with this, but imagine how cold our planet would be without the sun...

God is the livegiver. God supernaturally sustains all life even today. Nothing lives without His permission. If you are going to invoke the supernatural, all bets are off and we cannot have a science conversation - your arguments are entirely based on faith.

Hi Jerry, you said “It sickens me that creationists piggyback this kind of argument onto legitimate science and physics. Bad for science and bad for Christianity.” Let’s briefly examine Standard Cosmology history. Step 1: You presuppose a uniformitarian reality, and apply those assumptions to reverse Hubble’s observations of an expanding universe. You end up with an unobserved conceptualization of the beginning of the universe – as a mass of heat and energy called a “cosmological egg”. Step 2: Realizing that this “egg cosmology” model can be used to support the faith presupposition of an atheistic (or naturalistic) reality; you tweak and reframe the conceptualized model as a “Big Bang”. That is, an almost infinite singularity undergoes a rapid expansion (aka “Bang!”) into (i.e. forming) the observed universe. The most popular proposed origins of this singularity include; quantum fluctuations and multiverses – both of which are untestable, unfalsifible (and technically supernatural). Step 3: You set the rate of expansion at 50km per second per mega-parsec to sit the mathematical model in line with current (1960s) observations. Anyone who dares disagree with this figure (of an unobserved process) is to be ruthlessly mocked. By this figure, the universe is 16 to 18 billion years old (i.e. 17 billion + or – 1 billion years). Step 4: When observations collected over the next 30 years are found to be inconsistent with this initial figure, the mathematical model is re-tweaked so that the new figure (80km per second per mega-parsec) is consistent with observations. So now the universe is considered to be 13.71 billion years (+ or – 1%). Step 5: You encounter 2 massive inconsistencies between the mathematical model and new (1980s) observations; the Horizon problem and the Flatness problem (I’ll let you look up the details). So how are these problems reconciled? What we do is conceptualize (i.e. imagine/invent) a super-rapid expansion event of the universe itself (which we shall call “Inflation”) occurring shortly after the initial Bang. With no plausible cause, the universe suddenly expanded at a rate thousands of times the speed of light, then suddenly and inexplicably slowed. So how much Inflation is required? Since we are dealing with an unobserved event (and therefore cannot scientifically measure the actual amount of Inflation), we can tweak the mathematical model till the amount of Inflation makes the model consistent with current observations. Step 6: You encounter another massive inconsistency between the mathematical model and the observations; there is not enough gravity in the universe to explain the motion and structure of galaxies. So how do we reconcile this inconsistency? What we do is conceptualize a substance (which we shall call “Dark Matter”) to provide the necessary gravity. So how much “Dark Matter” is required? Since we are dealing with an unobserved substance (and therefore cannot scientifically measure the actual amount of Dark Matter), we can tweak the mathematical model till the amount of Dark Matter makes the model consistent with current observations. Initial estimates had Dark Matter making up ~94% of the known universe. Step 7: The mathematical model has the expansion of the universe slowing down because the energy of Big Bang and Inflation is being slowly used up and countered by gravity. The problem is - all observations suggest that the expansion of the universe is actually speeding up. So how do we reconcile this inconsistency? What we do is conceptualize a substance (which we shall call “Dark Energy”) to provide the model with enough energy to accelerate the rate of universal expansion. So how much “Dark Energy” is required? Since we are dealing with an unobserved substance (and therefore cannot scientifically measure the actual amount of Dark Energy), we are free to tweak the mathematical model till the amount of Dark Energy makes the model consistent with current observations. - Now 40 years ago, the secular scientific community was supremely confident in their cosmology model; i.e. the model of a 17 billion year old universe with a Big Bang expansion rate of 50kms-1m-p-1 – and no Inflation, Dark Matter or Dark Energy. Today, no one would take you seriously if your cosmology model excluded any of these newer conceptualizations. Which doesn’t necessarily make it wrong – but all serves to demonstrate how malleable and unfalsifiable the current cosmology model really is. Now let’s examine Creationist Cosmology. Step 1: You presuppose a Biblical theistic reality; which incorporates an eternal, supernatural Creator of the physical universe, and His scriptures delivered to humanity. These scriptures therefore form the basis of your model of reality. Step 2: You encounter an alleged scientific inconsistency between secular scientific claims and Biblical claims; namely pertaining to cosmology and the age of the universe. So how do we reconcile this inconsistency? We do three things; 1) Firstly we scrutinize the claims of secular science; pointing out the highly speculative, plastic and fundamentally unverifiable nature of the proposed model. 2) We then search out the scriptures and the scientific literature for possible solutions the alleged inconsistency. 3) We combine the implications of general relativity with the Biblical claim that God “stretched out the heavens” to conceptualize a force called Time Dilation; whereby stretching space also stretches time – so that billions of years can exist in outstretched parts of a 6000 year old creation. So how much “Time Dilation” is required? Since we are dealing with an unobserved force (and therefore cannot scientifically measure the actual amount of Time Dilation), we are free to tweak the mathematical model till the amount of Time Dilation makes the model consistent with current observations. Since the same logical methodology is generally applied to both models, your propensity to consider only one model to be “legitimate science and physics” speaks more to your lack of objectivity, than to the legitimacy of the arguments themselves. The main differences I see in the models (apart from the obvious divergence in faith presupposition) is that the creationist model is more parsimonious, and that those who propose and advocate the creationist model are ready to acknowledge that it contains highly speculative elements – As opposed to the secular model where its advocates claim to “know” that their speculations are true, even though they have never been scientifically observed. And yet you somehow find a way to judge our position as exclusively “Bad for science”. “Answering what you don't know with "God did it" only stifles learning - learning about God and learning about science.” "God did it" is a pejorative oversimplification of our position; levelled at us by those who are unable to give unbiased consideration beyond their own limited set of axioms. It would be like me reducing the naturalistic position to "It did itself". The existence of God is a logical possibility – regardless of whether one believes in God or not. Therefore, the arbitrary dismissal of God’s involvement in a claim is not rationally justified. Nevertheless, if we truly claimed that God did something based on nothing more than the absence of knowledge (as you are claiming), then the argument would be logically weak. However, since our claims are explicitly supported in our model, then our claim is justified (though not verified) by every rational standard. “Ironically, this is one area where a creationist could probably come up with mathmatical proof to bolster this idea - starting from E=MC2. This could even be published in peer reviewed journals.” Creationist models detailing the math have been published – though not in secular journals. It’s cute that people still see peer review as an infallible standard of scientific legitimacy – as though all scientific journals are objectively open to non-secular scientific implications. This trust is maintained in spite of secular journal editors having stated unequivocally that they are loath to consider any submissions for publication with creationist implications; Even though secular (i.e. non-creationist) science educators have lost careers for daring to suggest engagement with creationists; Even though scientists with healthy publication histories suddenly found even their non-creationist-related papers being rejected after coming out of the creationist closet; And even though the peer reviewed scientific literature itself is highly critical of the peer review process. For example; Confirmatory bias is the tendency to emphasize and believe experiences which support one's views and to ignore or discredit those which do not. The effects of this tendency have been repeatedly documented in clinical research. … In addition to showing poor interrater agreement, reviewers were strongly biased against manuscripts which reported results contrary to their theoretical perspective. (Mahoney MJ (1977) ‘Publication Prejudices: An Experimental Study of Confirmatory Bias in the Peer Review System’, Cognitive Therapy and Research, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 161-175(161)) [Available at: http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/1097087/908376224/name/mahoney.pdf ] peer review is impossible to define in operational terms (an operational definition is one whereby if 50 of us looked at the same process we could all agree most of the time whether or not it was peer review) … Robbie Fox, the great 20th century editor of the Lancet, who was no admirer of peer review, wondered whether anybody would notice if he were to swap the piles marked ‘publish’ and ‘reject’. He also joked that the Lancet had a system of throwing a pile of papers down the stairs and publishing those that reached the bottom. When I was editor of the BMJ I was challenged by two of the cleverest researchers in Britain to publish an issue of the journal comprised only of papers that had failed peer review and see if anybody noticed. I wrote back ‘How do you know I haven’t already done it?’ (p178) … there is no agreed definition of what constitutes a good paper or a good research proposal. … we have little evidence on the effectiveness of peer review, but we have considerable evidence on its defects. In addition to being poor at detecting gross defects and almost useless for detecting fraud it is slow, expensive, profligate of academic time, highly subjective, something of a lottery, prone to bias, and easily abused. … People have a great many fantasies about peer review, and one of the most powerful is that it is a highly objective, reliable, and consistent process. … peer review is a subjective and, therefore, inconsistent process. (p179) (Smith R (2006) ‘Peer review: a flawed process at the heart of science and journals’, Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, Vol. 99, pp. 178-182.) [Available at: http://jrs.sagepub.com/content/99/4/178.full.pdf ] Throughout the literature, charges of systematic bias—not just isolated incidents—are repeatedly aired … (p3) the stringency and consistency with which peer review procedures are applied across this population are variable. … (p4) There are many reasons to challenge this ideal notion of impartiality in peer review. … (p5) Confirmation bias is the tendency to gather, interpret, and remember evidence in ways that affirm rather than challenge one’s already held beliefs (Nickerson, 1998). Historical and philosophical analyses have demonstrated the obstructive and constructive role that confirmation bias has played in the course of scientific inquiry, theorizing, and debate (Greenwald, Pratkanis, Leippe, & Baumgardner, 1986; Solomon, 2001). In the context of peer review, confirmation bias is understood as reviewer bias against manuscripts describing results inconsistent with the theoretical perspective of the reviewer (Jelicic & Merckelbach, 2002). (p9) (Lee CJ, Sugimoto CR, Zhang G & Cronin B (2013) ‘Bias in Peer Review’, Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Vol. 64(1), pp. 2-17.) [Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/asi.22784/pdf ] In 2013, the journal Science conducted an investigation into peer review. They created a fake scientific manuscript with obvious errors and submitted it to 304 scientific journals. 157 were accepted for publication. (Bohannon J (2013) ‘Who’s Afraid of Peer Review?’, Science, Vol. 342, pp. 60-65.) I am not anti-peer review by any means. But it is clearly not the pillar of objectivity that your comment implies. I was actually just looking for a verifiable formula to back up the Gravitational Time Dilation anthonyjmcgirr used to refute the currently accepted science of the age of the universe. I appreciate the time you took to type all that out, but your assumptions and God of the gaps assertions don't hold water.

~ Beloved, Where Is Gravity Without It's Corresponding Mass? In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. Genesis 1:1 And Where Is The Sun And The Moon And All The Stars Before Day Four? And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Genesis 1:14-19 The Biblical Truth Is Kind Of Crushing To The Millions Of Fictitious Years Of Man's Evil Imagination Isn't It Where is photosynthesis whithout the sun? There is a scientific error in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, about the nature of plants. Genesis depicts God creating plants on the third day even though the sun, which is responsible for the ability of plants to live, isn't created until the fourth day. You can't have plants without photosynthesis and you can't have photosynthesis without the sun, so the biblical account of creation contradicts what we know from science. If you are going to grasp at biblical science straws, you should grasp at all of it.

Why water down the faith? God has never done anything wrong. I think it is terribly presumptuous of us to try to explain his actions. We should say God is perfect - end of discussion. Stringing people along with contrived explanations makes for a weak-faithed congregation.

That is nonsense. Where did I go wrong?

The only apologetics that can explain rape and slavery in the bible is that God is perfect, therefore anytihng he does is perfect. This includes committing, ordering, or condoning slavery, rape, incest, eugenics, genocide etc. You can put any spin on it you want, but in the end if God did it, it is not immoral, and we should stop apologizing for it (note the difference between apologizing and apologetics).

Yeah, I have heard that before, the small micro changes lead to the larger macro changes and it is hogwash. For one thing, it's never been observed. There is really no way that changes within a species to adapt to environmental conditions will lead to evolving into an entirely different species. To suggest that it can is to believe in the absurd. Again, because of your faith, you are unable to objectively view the evidence. If you get a chance, you should read the book "Your Inner Fish". Even if you don't believe in evolution, it's an interesting read, and if nothing else will help you in your anti-evolution debates.

Ironically, this is one area where a creationist could probably come up with mathmatical proof to bolster this idea - starting from E=MC2. This could even be published in peer reviewed journals.

I am not using "my" definition of Evolution. I am using Evolution in the conventional sense that any scientist would use it. You are operating, evidently from some home-spun definition you have concocted to make your arguments make sense in your mind. ... You are skewing the YEC position. Natural selection and mutations in the YEC view occur within in a given species. That is not "evolution" per se. That is adaptation to environment. The problem is that when people use "evolution" in the conventional sense they are referring to the macro-evolutionary process of one species evolving into another completely different species. (such as lizards evolving into birds). It's quite ironic to watch you accuse someone of a "home-spun" definition of evolution. There is no such thnig as Micro and Macro evolution as you have defined here - creationists have spun their own definitions... Yes there is. Evolutionists like to use the old bait and switch on people when they say there is evidence for evolution. Their 'evidence' amounts to finch beaks and bacteria strains. They try to get people to believe that lizards can evolve into birds simply because bacteria can develop into new strains of bacteria as defense against anti-biotics and other bacteria killing agents. We know the difference between the ability of creatures to adapt and evolve within a species in response to a new environment and the notion that one species can evolve into a new species. You are unable to grasp the evidence available and unable to think on a long time scale. That creationists want to limit our children in these areas is what really scares me about YEC and ID.

I am not using "my" definition of Evolution. I am using Evolution in the conventional sense that any scientist would use it. You are operating, evidently from some home-spun definition you have concocted to make your arguments make sense in your mind. ... You are skewing the YEC position. Natural selection and mutations in the YEC view occur within in a given species. That is not "evolution" per se. That is adaptation to environment. The problem is that when people use "evolution" in the conventional sense they are referring to the macro-evolutionary process of one species evolving into another completely different species. (such as lizards evolving into birds). It's quite ironic to watch you accuse someone of a "home-spun" definition of evolution. There is no such thnig as Micro and Macro evolution as you have defined here - creationists have spun their own definitions...

Answering what you don't know with "God did it" only stifles learning - learning about God and learning about science.

Pahu - please keep in mind, Evolution does not attempt to eplain abiogenesis. Maybe you should start another thread for that with a different name.

Liberals who don't believe the Bible are not in a position to tell me anything about translations. We should learn from everyone. This reminds me of Darwin's quote "Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge:" Keep your mind open... I'm done with this thread....

From my readings through the bible, egalitarianism is frowned upon it the bible. Verses like slaves obey your masters and render unto Cesar inform us that some are born into higher roles than others - almost like the cast system in India. I'm interested to know how many of you out there would be for a totaly egalitarian society here on earth, or do you believe that God always intended some to be subservient to others by birth.

Wow, you don't watch Colbert do you? Ever heard of Poe's Law?