Genesis: an exposition of the text

[Bonky]

1 hour ago, Enoch2021 said:

1.  Christianity isn't a 'religion'.

It has all the markings of what a religion is.  It has sacred texts [that can't be questioned], practices/rituals, holy places, a messiah etc.  

[Enoch2021]

5 minutes ago, Bonky said:

It has all the markings of what a religion is.  It has sacred texts [that can't be questioned], practices/rituals, holy places, a messiah etc.  

Religion: Belief without Evidence.

The Object of that 'Belief' is irrelevant, can be: rocks, mud, wind, fire, pink dragons, ect ect.

regards

[BobRyan]

On 4/14/2017 at 10:30 AM, Bonky said:

Therein lies my comfort with science more so than religion.  Science can often [not always] get closer to what isn't true leaving us a better picture of what might be true.  Religion has no interest in uncertainty, it declares what is true and any questioning coming from outside that worldview is often met with ad hominem comments.   I'm not necessarily referring to anyone here, I mean in my experience in general.

That was a response to this statement by me 

Quote

 

 On 4/14/2017 at 10:11 AM, BobRyan said:

True that we can "observe" claims proven true or false about building houses -- but the door is wide open to wild guesswork when it comes to things that science can neither reproduce nor observe (such as the creation of life... the creation of a planet, or solar system). Lots of wild stories for example about the interior of Jupiter changed significantly after the Shoemaker Levi impacts. Science goes from wild-story to increasingly less wild as more actual facts surface 

 

The Christian religion claims to have been told the truth from the start - by the Creator of all nature, Creator of all laws of nature, has told us what "is truth". Science has no such assurance. It has to "discover over time" that spontaneous generation of fleas from dust - was total hogwash in science. Just like the helio-centric universe with all the universe revolving around our sun was total hogwash. Science had to discover over time that Othaniel Marsh's bogus horse series (still on display at the Smithsonian) showing smooth transition from Hyrax to horse - was total hogwash. It was creating links "via imagination" that did not exist in real life. The Bible had the right answer all along.

In that smooth transition horse-series science has "arranged a story" for us to view - a story with strong emotional impact. They ARRANGE the fossils showing smooth transitional sequences - with smooth contiguous size and shape changes SHOWN specimen by specimen starting with the very earliest sequences! They created the arrangement out of imagination to fit a narrative.

The "belief" that "an amoeba will sure enough turn into a rabbit over time - given a talented enough amoeba and a long and talented enough period of time - filled with just-so mount-improbable stories that are easy enough to tell" is a religious conviction. It is a by-faith-alone argument on behalf of belief in evolution-ism.( If you just look at the facts in what they are saying). This is so obvious even to them - that one of their own premier evolutionist  has expressed his dismay with what he is stuck with as an atheist evolutionist.

Edited April 17, 2017 by BobRyan

[Hawkins]

On 4/14/2017 at 10:30 AM, Bonky said:

Therein lies my comfort with science more so than religion.  Science can often [not always] get closer to what isn't true leaving us a better picture of what might be true.  Religion has no interest in uncertainty, it declares what is true and any questioning coming from outside that worldview is often met with ad hominem comments.   I'm not necessarily referring to anyone here, I mean in my experience in general.

 

Science is experiment/observation based. The limitation of science is that we can only do experiments and observations inside our own realm (time-space). Religious claims are almost exclusively about existences/entities lying outside of our realm which science is never the right tool to reach.

You feel more comfortable of relying on an incapable tool, while we choose to rely on a more powerful and fundamental tool, that is faith!

 

======

The fundamental way for humans to get to a truth of any kind is by putting faith in human witnessing.

99.99% humans don't have the evidence that black holes exist. They trust with faith that the scientists as the direct contacts (eyewitnesses) have the evidence. That's how 99.99% humans get to a scientific truth by faith.

99.99% humans don't have the evidence for whatever historical events/figures happened in the long past. They trust with faith in what have been written down by the historians as direct or indirect witnesses. That's how 99.99% humans get to a historical truth by faith. If you randomly grab a history book and read through section by section with the same question "how this section is evidenced", then basically you can ignore the book as a whole. You can ignore human history as a whole this way.

99.99% humans don't have the evidence of events happening around the world. They trust with faith in what have been broadcast by the media with reporters/journalists as direct or indirect witnesses. That's how 99.99% humans get to a truth of recent occurrence in this world by faith.

 

We don't have serious witnessing/witnesses for the deeds of a flying unicorn. However we do have serious witnesses for the existence of God. They are as serious as having martyred their own lives for the witnessing of the truth of Jesus Christ. We have faith in their witnessing. That's what Christianity is!

 

[Hawkins]

On 4/14/2017 at 1:35 PM, Bonky said:

It has all the markings of what a religion is.  It has sacred texts [that can't be questioned], practices/rituals, holy places, a messiah etc.  

Religion is the most reliable way for humans to carry forward an important theory (theology to be more specific) through the timeline of humanity.

That's why you can't have any human writings older than 2000 years for you to reconcile its contents with what we read today. The Chinese have more than 5000 years of history, however we don't any ancient scrolls older than 2000 years supporting the history books we read today. That is to say, we have no way to reconcile to tell whether the contents we read today remain the same contents written more than 2000 years ago.

 

On the other hand, we have a whole library of Red Sea Scrolls for us to tell that the contents of the OT Bible we read today, remains theologically the same as humans read 2000 years ago.

Similarly, we have 2 independent sources of NT Bibles, namely the NIV and KJV, which are theologically (not necessarily contextually) identical for us to tell that in terms of our salvation through the New Covenant (a whole theology) what we read today remains the same as humans read some 2000 years ago.

To put it another way, if God exists and He has a crucial message (i.e., human salvation theology) to convey. It is thus witnessed that the same message of salvation we are conveying today remains the same message conveyed by humans some 2000 years ago. This verifiable witnessing can only be achieved through a religion we call Christianity (and Judaism) . This is so because we don't have a large amount of humans keeping the history books seriously. However we have a large amount of humans keeping the religious Bible seriously. That's how the contents of the Bible conserved with its theological content intact throughout humanity, or otherwise this is simply impossible through the imperfect hands of humans. Humans are never good keepers of original documents!

[Hawkins]

On 4/14/2017 at 9:52 AM, Bonky said:

And in my experience when dealing with religious claims I can try to show you the hurricane is naturally occurring you could simply retort "It just looks that way, the turtle is invisible and he's causing the winds and conditions".  

Regarding your first statement about God building houses, we know a lot more about how houses are built than about the nature of the existence of a Universe and the nature/existence of organic life.  I don't object to those who believe God created life, I only object to those who say "The only explanation is that God created life".   

It only shows that you have a misconception (as as result of modern education)  about what human witnessing is and what the reliability of science is.

Why science is reliable? Science isn't necessarily reliable in all cases. Science has a reason to be reliable under certain conditions.

Science is considered reliable because it is (originally) about the discovery of existing sets of rules governing a repeatable behavior. Scientific theories are about to bring up a predictable model in explaining a repeatable behavior without error. 

So that,

We can predict without error before each and every single experiment that water will dissolve into oxygen and hydrogen. It is because this prediction never fails (or else you deserve a Nobel Prize) that we can confirm that it's a scientific truth. Similarly, we land on the surface of moon or Mars because we have an infallible physics theory which can predictably and reliably bring us there. We don't risk on "the physics theories could be wrong". That's why whenever a rocket explodes in such a mission, we won't say that "the physics theories are wrong". It can only be human errors or unpredictable factors making the precise calculation not possible, such as the force generated by the burning of fuel cannot be precisely calculated by our current technology of applied science. That is to say, the physics theories themselves will have a 100% successful rate.

 

That's the reason why science is reliable. Not because how it is applied to non-repeatable historical events such as the Big Bang. Not because how it is applied to non-predictable end-to-end processes such the evolution claims. It is because of how it is applied to repeatable behavior and to make the end-to-end repetition predictable. It is the infallible predictability which confirms its truth.

[Bonky]

On 4/17/2017 at 9:16 AM, BobRyan said:

The Christian religion claims to have been told the truth from the start - by the Creator of all nature, Creator of all laws of nature, has told us what "is truth". Science has no such assurance. It has to "discover over time" that spontaneous generation of fleas from dust - was total hogwash in science. Just like the helio-centric universe with all the universe revolving around our sun was total hogwash. Science had to discover over time that Othaniel Marsh's bogus horse series (still on display at the Smithsonian) showing smooth transition from Hyrax to horse - was total hogwash. It was creating links "via imagination" that did not exist in real life. The Bible had the right answer all along.

I notice in your examples it was more science that corrected itself, not the Bible correcting science.   Science has no assurance that we can answer all questions or explore all possibilities, I'm very ok with that. 

22 hours ago, Hawkins said:

On the other hand, we have a whole library of Red Sea Scrolls for us to tell that the contents of the OT Bible we read today, remains theologically the same as humans read 2000 years ago.

This tells us nothing about whether the contents are true or if so to what degree.  What assurance do I have that there aren't any exaggerations, tall tales, legends etc that were written down?

22 hours ago, Hawkins said:

Similarly, we have 2 independent sources of NT Bibles, namely the NIV and KJV, which are theologically (not necessarily contextually) identical for us to tell that in terms of our salvation through the New Covenant (a whole theology) what we read today remains the same as humans read some 2000 years ago.

See my point above. 

22 hours ago, Hawkins said:

To put it another way, if God exists and He has a crucial message (i.e., human salvation theology) to convey. It is thus witnessed that the same message of salvation we are conveying today remains the same message conveyed by humans some 2000 years ago. This verifiable witnessing can only be achieved through a religion we call Christianity (and Judaism) . This is so because we don't have a large amount of humans keeping the history books seriously. However we have a large amount of humans keeping the religious Bible seriously. That's how the contents of the Bible conserved with its theological content intact throughout humanity, or otherwise this is simply impossible through the imperfect hands of humans. Humans are never good keepers of original documents!

And I don't see a correlation with what the Bible proclaims and what I perceive in reality.  I don't see an inkling of evidence that the supernatural exists.   I don't even see Christians really closely obeying/listening to the words of Christ.  In America we can't wait to bomb our enemies, christians divorce pretty regularly etc.  I'm not seeing great words of wisdom that are handed down to us that we couldn't figure out ourselves. 

I am very open however to new information or new insights that I don't currently have. 

Edited April 19, 2017 by Bonky

[Bonky]

22 hours ago, Hawkins said:

That's the reason why science is reliable. Not because how it is applied to non-repeatable historical events such as the Big Bang. Not because how it is applied to non-predictable end-to-end processes such the evolution claims. It is because of how it is applied to repeatable behavior and to make the end-to-end repetition predictable. It is the infallible predictability which confirms its truth.

I don't disagree.  I don't think ANYBODY has a clear answer to the nature [understanding] of our Cosmos and/or the biological life within it.  All I'm saying is that this doesn't give us the right to declare that the answer must be some creator God because it couldn't be anything else.  We don't know enough to say that.   I am no biologist or physicist, but when I read about evolution, it makes more sense to me than do the counter claims of special creation.  

[BobRyan]

1 hour ago, Bonky said:

I notice in your examples it was more science that corrected itself, not the Bible correcting science.   Science has no assurance that we can answer all questions or explore all possibilities, I'm very ok with that. [/quote]

As an answer to this? 

The Christian religion claims to have been told the truth from the start - by the Creator of all nature, Creator of all laws of nature, has told us what "is truth". Science has no such assurance. It has to "discover over time" that spontaneous generation of fleas from dust - was total hogwash in science. Just like the helio-centric universe with all the universe revolving around our sun was total hogwash. Science had to discover over time that Othaniel Marsh's bogus horse series (still on display at the Smithsonian) showing smooth transition from Hyrax to horse - was total hogwash. It was creating links "via imagination" that did not exist in real life. The Bible had the right answer all along.

===========================

Is it your claim that the Bible does not claim that the fleas, the hyrax, the horse came from God - but rather evolved so that we can have such horse-from-hyrax stories as a possible option according to the Bible?? really??

Quote

And I don't see a correlation with what the Bible proclaims and what I perceive in reality.  I don't see an inkling of evidence that the supernatural exists.  

Is that because it is "very Apparent" to you that dust, dirt, rocks and gas will indeed turn into a horse given enough time, chance, luck, 'mount improbable'? "Stories easy enough to tell but they are not science"??

Quote

Quote

  I'm not seeing great words of wisdom that are handed down to us that we couldn't figure out ourselves. 

I am very open however to new information or new insights that I don't currently have. [/quote][/quote][/quote]

 

Daniel 9 predicts 490 years of human history - and the first coming of Christ happened "right on time" by that timeline.

Daniel 7 predicts 1260 years of the dark ages (as does Revelation 11,12,13) that happened exactly as predicted.

 

For starters.

================================

In any case the title of the thread is about what Genesis says... Is it your claim (as was Darwin's claim) that Genesis denies the doctrine on origins being preached within evolutionism? If so - then we do agree on something at least.

Edited April 19, 2017 by BobRyan

[Enoch2021]

1 hour ago, Bonky said:

I don't think ANYBODY has a clear answer to the nature [understanding] of our Cosmos and/or the biological life within it.  All I'm saying is that this doesn't give us the right to declare that the answer must be some creator God because it couldn't be anything else.  We don't know enough to say that.     

Factually Incorrect...

We sure 'Know' how it didn't; Therefore... we KNOW how it did.  It's called a Disjunctive Syllogism:

There are ONLY Two Possible World-Views (*Ontological Primitives*) that can be held to account for how we (Universe/Us) are here;

Unguided -- Nature (Matter)    or     Guided --- Intelligent Agency (God) 

 

George Wald (Nobel Laureate Medicine and Physiology)...

“The reasonable view was to believe in spontaneous generation; *the only alternative*, to believe in a single, primary act of supernatural creation. THERE IS NO THIRD POSITION."

Wald, G., “The Origin of Life,” Scientific American, 191 [2]: 45-46, 1954.

http://www.academia.edu/2739607/Scientific_GOD_Journal

 

Let's break it down...

1: "The reasonable view was to believe in spontaneous generation".  Nature (UnGuided).

"The Only Alternative" ...

2: "a single, primary act of supernatural creation." God (Guided).

*True Dichotomy*: Nature (UnGuided) vs. God (Guided); *" THERE IS NO THIRD POSITION "*. If you outright refute/deny One Choice; THEN, based on the Laws of Logic ---- you Ipso Facto MUST 'believe' the other.

Disjunctive Syllogism: A logical argument of the form that if there are only two possibilities, and one of them is ruled out, then the other MUST BE TRUE.

If you wish, I'll PUMMEL Nature/Natural Phenomenon as "The Cause" for 1285th time with respect to the "Cosmos" and/or Life.  

Say "when".

 

Quote

I am no biologist or physicist, but when I read about evolution, it makes more sense to me than do the counter claims of special creation.

  You (and they) can't even DEFINE IT (!!), for goodness sakes.  

Watch, I'll show you...

1. 'evolution' What's that...?? Define evolution...?

2. Post the *Scientific Theory* of evolution...?

3. Post the Formal Scientific Hypotheses then *Experiments* that concretized it into a *REAL* Scientific Theory...?

4. Highlight The Independent Variables used in Each TEST...?

If nobody can speak to these 'coherently', how on Earth can it make 'more sense' ??

 

regards