Chimeras - Genetic Anomolies

[John917]

Understanding and knowledge of the creation is designed to do one thing: To lead us to the Creator. I don't believe that Christians necessarily need to delve into the world of science in order to more accurately or more authoritatively defend the faith.

empahsis mine.

I respectfully disagree. The "world of science" is not cut off from the Christian worldview. In fact, science was born at a time when Christianity was the prevailing view of the culture. Nancy Pearcey writes a well researched article called "Christianity Is a Science-Starter, Not a Science-Stopper" posted here:http://www.pearceyreport.com/archives/2005/09/post_4.php.

Although it is popular in our culture today to seperate, science from religion and faith from reason, we do so at our peril. Christianity is an integrated worldview, rooted in science, history and philosophy that encompasses all of reality. Physical and metaphysical. The notion that we are to function with our hearts in the divine and our heads in the sand is not found in scripture, but is rather a lie sold by the culture and bought by many of my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. For that I am deeply concerned.

While discussions of the human soul and our speculation on how and when it is formed may seem like a trivial grey matter exercise, the conclusions we form from scripture and creation and argue in the public square have implications if they are not well though out. For example, how would you respond if in an abortion debate, someone used this human DNA chimera example as empirical evidence that souls do not exist? Granted they still have the burden of proving the unborn is not a human being, with or without a soul. But should we not be prepared to give a reasonable answer in gentleness and respect for our view?

Regards,

John

[Ovedya]

The notion that we are to function with our hearts in the divine and our heads in the sand is not found in scripture...

"And do not be fashioned according to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and well pleasing and perfect." (Rom. 12:2)

"Set your amind on the things which are above, not on the things which are on the earth." (Col. 3:2)

(ie. Culture, religion, philosophy, and improvement in behavior, as spoken of in the first two chapters of Colossians. Also see Gill's exposition).

I don't recall having ever read in the Bible where we have to formulate logical or scientific proofs for the authenticity of the Christian faith. That is strictly "Greek thinking," and it's very foriegn to Hebraic thought and theology. (Read: http://www.followtherabbi.com/Brix?pageID=1854 and, http://www.presenttruthmag.com/archive/XXIX/29-2.htm)

...And I think these verses have some importance in this subject:

"But rather, O man, who are you who answer back to God? Shall the thing molded say to him who molded it, Why did you make me thus?" (Rom. 9:20)

"You turn things upside down! Shall the potter be considered to be like the clay, That what is made should say of him who made it, He did not make me, Or what is formed should say of him who formed it, He has no understanding?" (Isa. 29:16)

"Woe to him who strives with the One who formed him - The shards among the shards of earthenware. Shall the clay say to the One who forms it, What are You making? And your work say, He has no hands?" (Isa. 45:9)

"He who watches the wind will not sow, and he who looks at the clouds will not reap. Just as you do not know what the path of the wind is or how the bones are formed in the mother's womb, so you do not know the work of God, who makes everything. In the morning sow your seed, and in the evening do not hold back your hands; for you do not know which will prosper, this one or that, or whether both alike will be good." (Eccl. 11:4-6)

[Guest LadyC]

It's incredible what religious people can believe in Apply the same thought processes to anything else, they throw you into an asylum. It's obvious that the concept of soul only had meaning when we knew nothing about birth, now we can see that there is no clear point when someone suddenly becomes a human being, it's a slow continuous progression. Ignoring the facts helps to accept the existence of souls, but when someone actually tries to reconcile it with reality then monsters like the first post in this thread are born and everything ends in laughter.

lepaca, i'm so thoroughly confused by your outright disdain for what you call "monsters", and for what you call "religious people".

do you know Jesus?

[John917]

Ovedya,

Thank you for your reply. I appreciate the verses you reference, however I fail to see how they support your argument. Let me explain:

"And do not be fashioned according to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and well pleasing and perfect." (Rom. 12:2)

What do you think transformed means in the passage above? Spiritual transformation right? Isn't it interesting that Paul states this is to be done by the renewing of our minds?....he didn't say...foster good feelings for God, or just think happy thoughts!

"Set your amind on the things which are above, not on the things which are on the earth." (Col. 3:2)

(ie. Culture, religion, philosophy, and improvement in behavior, as spoken of in the first two chapters of Colossians. .....

In all due respect this verse is couched in a discourse on holy, moral living, not a command to retreat from answering the culture of our time. Consider the verse in context:

1Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4When Christ, who is your[a] life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

5Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices 10and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. 11Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all. (Ref: Col 3:1-11)

While it is unclear the exact heresy Paul was trying to squash in this letter to the Colossians, I can find nothing in it to support your assertion that earthly things such as knowledge, philosophy and culture should be ignored by Christians. While attending to them is not the most important thing, Paul's example of preaching the Gospel to every creature, in culture, is a good indicator we should too. Perhaps everyone is called in a unique way, according to their spiritual gifts. But even our Lord Jesus Christ was "in the culture". He dressed and ate according to the culture and spoke the language.

Consider 1 Cor 9:20; To the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain Jews; to those who are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain those who are under the law; to those who are without law, as without law (not being without law toward God, but under law toward Christ), that I might win those who are without law. To the weak I became as weak, that I might gain the weak. I have become all things to all men, that I may by all means save some. Now I do this for the sake of the Good News, that I may be a joint partaker of it.

The human DNA chimera is just one example of a potential roadblock for a skeptic. I do not understand how the other verses you posted apply to this subject. Perhaps you could state what you believe the context is for those verses and that would help me understand your argument a bit better.

Regards,

John

[secondeve]

It's incredible what religious people can believe in Apply the same thought processes to anything else, they throw you into an asylum. It's obvious that the concept of soul only had meaning when we knew nothing about birth, now we can see that there is no clear point when someone suddenly becomes a human being, it's a slow continuous progression. Ignoring the facts helps to accept the existence of souls, but when someone actually tries to reconcile it with reality then monsters like the first post in this thread are born and everything ends in laughter.

lepaca, i'm so thoroughly confused by your outright disdain for what you call "monsters", and for what you call "religious people".

do you know Jesus?

I think - and I'm guessing, here, cos the reply confused me, too - that monsters refers to the Chimaera, which is a monster of Greek mythology with a goat head, a lion head, an eagle head and a serpent for a tail.

[John917]

Lepaca,

Thank you for your reply. I want to understand what you're saying here:

Why not having a purpose is less acceptable then having one? Obviously you're one of those guys who want to feel special, so you decided to believe that someone big and mighty cares for you.

Are you saying that God exists because it makes me feel comfortable? Or are you saying that I've invented God as an emotional crutch?

The existence of everything from redwood trees, to dolphins to human beings is in fact a miracle in either view - the Christians or the atheists. It has only happened once and the processes by which it has happened can not be explained by purely naturalistic causes.

Assertion without proof or evidence.

As you are a human being, you are proof. My assertion that your origin cannot be explained by purely naturalistic causes is true. If you disagree, simply explain how the human race came to be without invoking the Supernatural.

A view of origins that involves a supernatural action, without a Supernatural agent to perform that action. There are no paintings without a painter, there are no buildings without builders.

That's only because paintings and buildings don't reproduce.

You've only moved the discussion back to our ancestors and said nothing about how human beings came to be.

Yet the atheist lives in the same created world as believers, denying and contradicting their experience that there is a Creator with their philosophy. So the joke, if you want to call it that, is on the non-believer.

What experience?

Do you believe what you wrote above is true? You do - right? So if you're right and I'm wrong, then there must be something objectively true about your statements that are not true of mine. If that is the case, then please explain how there is something called truth, given your view of origins- a non-personal, random beginning, for no reason at all.

Regards,

John

[Ovedya]

What do you think transformed means in the passage above? Spiritual transformation right? Isn't it interesting that Paul states this is to be done by the renewing of our minds?....he didn't say...foster good feelings for God, or just think happy thoughts!

The renewing of our minds does not include mental exercise such as one would get through academia. The renewing of our minds is a process by we first set our minds on the Spirit and allow the Lord to transform us, and to conform us to His glorious image (Eph. 4:23; Titus 3:5; Rom. 8:6; 2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29)

In all due respect this verse is couched in a discourse on holy, moral living, not a command to retreat from answering the culture of our time.

The things of the earth are the things of the earth. Whether they be worldly lusts, the lusts of the flesh, or culture, religion and philosophy. These are the things of fallen humanity not the things of God. Apparently you didn't read the references I gave above. Gill's exposition points this out.

The human DNA chimera is just one example of a potential roadblock for a skeptic. I do not understand how the other verses you posted apply to this subject. Perhaps you could state what you believe the context is for those verses and that would help me understand your argument a bit better.

Simply, I do not believe that Christians focussing their attention in an unbalanced way on the non-essentials of the faith is healthy. While it may be interesting to speculate on whether Adam had a belly button, where Cain's wife came from, or how scientifically water can pour from a rock, in my opinion it serves no purpose in bringing a believer to maturity.

Now, from a defensive standpoint - if that's your focus - it may be good to be aware of science and of the various advances in science, in order to more pointedly defend the faith. But I would submit that in some cases such an endeavor is more damaging to a believer's personal relationship with the Lord, and can potentially stumble him or stunt his spiritual growth. An example of this practically may be the man who, not so long ago, died of a heart attack because of his insatiable desire to play a certain video game. He played this game for several days, ignoring his basic needs for food, water, and sleep. A believer may likewise become so distracted by the various scientific fields, and the many subjects which can (and does) inundate and consume him, that he soon forgets his vital need for spiritual nourishment, washing, and rest which the Lord Himself affords, resulting in spiritual death (A deadening of the spirit).

I personally have witnessed (And I believe that others can likewise attest of their own experiences) believers who are so consumed with combatting liberalism, feminism, evolution, and the many controversial social issues which plague the Western world, that they have lost all their "flavor" of the Lord. Their concept of "the faith" is that it is purely political and/or social. Ask them who the Lord was and they may say, "A political dissident" or, "A catalyst for social change." Yet contrary to these is Peter's simple answer, "You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God."

[Ovedya]

John,

Unless you feel to continue our discussion, I'll leave you to corresponding with our resident atheists. I don't want to interrupt the course that you are currently on with them.

Grace to you,

~O

[Candi770]

Human Life begins at conception.

I believe this is true.

Another foundational theological axiom I believe is true is that the human soul is created at conception. While I lack direct scriptural support for this view, beyond the Genesis account of God breathing life into Adam, it is a reasoned conclusion I hold as true nonetheless.

Greg Koukl at Stand to Reason explains this position better then I....

"There is no evidence scripturally for a preexistent human being apart from the body so my presumption is that when the sperm and ovum become a new independent human life the immaterial part of man is present as well. That's somewhat of a conjecture. But my sense of things is that the most reasonable way to understand the soul in relationship to the human being is that at the time a human being is created and comes into existence, all aspects of that human come into being. There is no reason to dichotomize the human life and the soul. It strikes me as the tidiest and most reasonable thing that when a being comes into being, that being is everything that it is." (Ref: http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5208)

I have recently read about a genetic anomoly called a DNA chimera. You can read more about this phenomena here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_Fairchild

and here:

http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/...tragameticHuman

The reader's digest version of this is that a human DNA chimera is a composition of two people genetically. Apparently two fertilized eggs, "merge" (don't ask me how) into (1) blastocyst, to create a single person who has (2) sets of unique DNA. One strand from each of the fertilized eggs.

As stated, this is something I've recently come across. I have no formal training in the biological sciences. I would like to understand the science behind this further, because on it's face, this anomoly creates some fairly obvious problems for the axiom that the human soul is created at conception. The least of which is what happens to the soul of the merged egg? Does anyone know more about the science of this? Or is my metaphysical supposition wrong about the formation of the soul?

Regards,

John

The Learning channel had something about this, the Lady had two sets of dna because she was going through something, medical problem or custody battle with her kids , can't remember and her children's blood didn't match her-so they told her their was no proof that the kids she had were hers. She had hospital documentation, that didn't matter. 2 women went through this.

She was normal on the outside-no monster. They found that the dna was different, in different parts of her body.

I guess this would be like people who are both male/female.

candi

[John917]

Are you saying that God exists because it makes me feel comfortable? Or are you saying that I've invented God as an emotional crutch?

The latter. There is no reason why life, the universe and everything should have a purpose. You want them to have a purpose because it feels better that way.

You're right in one sense. I do want life to have purpose. I assume you do too. But that doesn't mean it does. Without God life is meaningless - there is no purpose. So the question is - does God exist or not? And if He does, then we're not going to discover this if we rely only on our emotions. What we like or dislike.

Because it does not follow that just because I want God to love and care for me, that He doesn't. Just as it doesn't follow that you don't want God to exist therefore he doesn't. That mode of thought will never get us any closer the truth. God is going to be who He is, regardless of what you or I want. So the important question becomes - is my knowledge of God correct or not? Why do you think your knowledge of God is correct?

Once again, you're are making an absolute assertion: our origins cannot be explained without invoking the supernatural. However, the supernatural is as unproven as the naturalistic explanations of our origins and the origins of matter, so why should we "invoke" it at all? There's no reason to do that, especially in the light of the fact that we already have naturalistic, proven explanations for a lot of things and zero support for any other kind of explanations. You want an answer so you invent the answer you like best. You'd rather bang your head against the wall then admit that you, like everyone else, simply don't know about our origins.

Well, no that's not correct. The different theories of origins is actually something I've studied quite a bit. I am not an expert, but I believe I have seen sufficient evidence from many different sources and observed enough of life to make a determination that the macro theory of evolution is absolutely false and the design hypothesis is true.

You mean you want to know what "truth" is? What has been proven is true, what hasn't been is speculation and what has been disproven is false

Well you've described a process by which we can test an idea. My question is why is there something we call truth? How do you explain such a concept given your worldview.?

Now, you said that I have an experience of our creator. I asked you what you're talking about. What experience do I have that I don't know about?

I was referrring to the very conversation we're having. You claim that God does not exist. You also said that I've invented purpose and God because it makes me feel better - it's an emotional crutch. In otherwords, you're making an objective truth claim that's true for you and me. So you are claiming that there is something objective to reality outside of ourselves that can be known. And that is an assumption of a theistic worldview - not an atheist's worldview. In otherwords, given your presuppositions of the world, there is no reason at all to assume what I claim to know is true for anyone but myself. If God doesn't exist, if follows that truth and morality are relative. Either to the individual or to the culture. But you're not saying that. You've argued as though god doesn't exist for either one of us. So you may claim god does not exist, but you can't prove that claim empirically through science and if you're right and he doesn't exist, then truth is relative and he may exist for me. But you're claiming he doesn't exist for me, which is inconsistent with your worldview, and you indeed experience a reality similar to what I do. An experience of objective, verifiable reality.

Francis Schaeffer's son said "there is a continuity of categories between God's mind, creation and our minds". If we do not assume that God made reality to be known by human minds, I find no logical reason whatsoever why I should believe you're saying anything that applies to me. You've simply asserted that I should adopt your perception that God does not exist. Why?

John