Can an Evolutionist be Saved?

[OldRegular]

Originally posted by Craigbythesea:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> I met Dr. Henry Morris when I was an instructor at VPI and he was head of the Civil Engineering Department, a position he held for 13 years

Dr. Carl Fliermans is employed at the Savannah River National Laboratory where he is a distinguished scientist. If I am not mistaken he was instrumental in isolation the cause of Legionaires Disease.

Dr Russell Humphreys, is a retired scientist from Sandia National Laboratory where he worked on nuclear physics, geophysics, pulsed power research, theoretical atomic and nuclear physics and the Particle Beam Fusion Project. He is author of the book Starlight and Time which I have mentioned previously on this forum.

Duh! What do the degrees and positions held by these men have to do with evolutionary biology? Absolutely nothing!

They are no more qualified to teach creationism that than Darwin’s grammar school teachers.

Austin, Steven A. - Professor of Geology
B.S., University of Washington, Seattle, WA,1970
M.S., San Jose State University, San Jose, CA, 1971
Ph.D., Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 1979

Cumming, Kenneth B. - Professor of Biology
B.S., Tufts University, Medford, MA, 1956
M.A., Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 1959
Ph.D., Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 1965

DeYoung, Donald B. - Professor of Astrophysics
B.S., Michigan Technological University, Houghton, Ml, 1966
M.S., Michigan Technological University, Houghton, Ml, 1968
Ph.D., Iowa State University, Ames, IA, 1972

Franks, Robert H. - Associate Professor of Biology
B.A., San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, 1956
M.D., University of California Los Angeles, CA, 1960

Stephen A. Austin is NOT employed by “ANY university that is noted for academic excellence in the sciences or any other kind of a university. He is employed by the ICR institute and creationist websites fictitiously say they he is a Professor of geology.

Kenneth B. Cumming is NOT employed by “ANY university that is noted for academic excellence in the sciences or any other kind of a university. He is employed by the ICR institute and creationist websites fictitiously say they he is a Professor of geology. The academic world does not even know that this man is alive!

Donald B. DeYoung is NOT employed by “ANY university that is noted for academic excellence in the sciences or any other kind of a university. He is employed by Grace College in Indiana, A four-year Christian Liberal Arts college. And even creationist websites admit that his specialty is solid-state and nuclear science, as well as astronomy. What do his degrees have to do with evolutionary biology? Zero!

Robert H. Franks is NOT employed by “ANY university that is noted for academic excellence in the sciences or any other kind of a university.

Gish, Duane T. - Professor of Biochemistry
B.S., University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 1949
Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, CA, 1953

Duane T. Gish has NEVER been employed as a professor of anything by ANY university that is noted for academic excellence in the sciences or any other kind of a university. In the academic world he is dismissed as having a lot of loose screws, and even the absence of some very important ones.

ANY website, atheist or otherwise, that willfully and knowingly exaggerates, distorts, and falsifies the academic accomplishments of it adherents and calls itself a “Christian” organization needs to re-think what it means to be a Christian. I certainly would not argue that the average evolutionary biologist is perfect, but I have NEVER seen one resort to such gross deception as the ICR.

Now it is you turn! Type in ALL the other names and see if you find a single man or woman who is employed as a professor at any university that is noted for academic excellence in the sciences. And remember that professorships in universities noted for academic excellence are very much more difficult to come by that research positions.

And please note that I did NOT hunt and pick! I started at the very top of the list that you provided and began working my way down the list till I was so sickened by the deception and deceit of the ICR that I could go no further.

</font>[/QUOTE]By the Sea, By the Sea, By the wonderful Sea.

You were dumping on the education of the ICR professors. I just wanted to show that you were being totally disingenous. Also Dr. Carl Fliermans is a biologist.

That being said evolutionary biology is an oxymoron!

To imply that all knowledge resides on certain University staffs is sophmoric. Frankly the attitude in all your posts is rather sophomoric.

 

[Mike Gascoigne]

Originally posted by StraightAndNarrow:
According to the New Testament, there's one unforgivable sin which is Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. I've always interpreted this as rejection of Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. My understanding is that other misinterpretations of the Bible are forgivable. I don't believe that belief in evolution is an unforgivable sin if it is one at all.

The unforgivable sin is the deliberate and decisive rejection of Christ, after all the facts have been plainly presented to us and the work of the Holy Spirit has been clearly seen. More specifically, it is the rejection of the work of the Holy Spirit and denouncing it as the work of the devil. The spiritual leaders of Israel committed this sin when they said that Jesus had an unclean spirit and denounced his miracles as the work of Beelzebub, and because of their position they prevented most of Israel from believing.

A Christian who believes in evolution comes nowhere near to committing the unforgivable sin. In many cases, evolution is just part of the pre-Christian cultural baggage that they have brought with them into the church. They might not even realise, until years afterwards, that it creates a problem of death before sin, but when confronted with the problem, they have to decide how to deal with it. If someone dismisses it as inconsequential, it means they have never really grasped the connection between sin and death, and it probably means they were never genuinely saved in the first place. Perhaps nobody ever explained to them that "The wages of sin is death" (Rom. 6:23) and they need to get saved properly.

Mike

 

[Craigbythesea]

Dr. Carl Fliermans is a biologist

His education is NOT in the area of evolutionary biology.

However, a much more important issue needs to be restated. The ICR deliberately and knowingly exaggerates and distorts the academic positions and qualifications of its members, and they do so routinely. This conduct is distinctly unchristian, and unethical to the extreme (I do not know of any other group of scientists that does anything like this), and I do not believe that Christians should have anything to do with such a grossly disreputable organization.

 

[Craigbythesea]

A Christian who believes in evolution comes nowhere near to committing the unforgivable sin. In many cases, evolution is just part of the pre-Christian cultural baggage that they have brought with them into the church. They might not even realise, until years afterwards, that it creates a problem of death before sin, but when confronted with the problem, they have to decide how to deal with it. If someone dismisses it as inconsequential, it means they have never really grasped the connection between sin and death, and it probably means they were never genuinely saved in the first place. Perhaps nobody ever explained to them that "The wages of sin is death" (Rom. 6:23) and they need to get saved properly.

Am I having a nightmare, or did I actually read this gibberish on a Christian message board?

 

[Mike Gascoigne]

Originally posted by Craigbythesea:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Dr. Carl Fliermans is a biologist

His education is NOT in the area of evolutionary biology.

However, a much more important issue needs to be restated... </font>[/QUOTE]No it doesn't. The theme of this topic is "Can an Evolutionist be Saved?" and all this stuff about ICR has got nothing to do with it.

Mike

 

[Craigbythesea]

No it doesn't. The theme of this topic is "Can an Evolutionist be Saved?" and all this stuff about ICR has got nothing to do with it.

Wrong! It has very much to do with it because a very large part of the argument against the theory of evolution comes from an organization that has been shown to deliberately and knowingly exaggerate and distort facts, proving that it cannot be trusted.

 

[Scott J]

Originally posted by Craigbythesea:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Dr. Carl Fliermans is a biologist

His education is NOT in the area of evolutionary biology.</font>[/QUOTE] So in order to disagree with evolution you must spend at least 8 years of your life being indoctrinated with it? That's ridiculous Craig.

Evolution's grip on academics is directly linked to the acceptable peer convention of thought. Anti-evolutionists do not get tenure, grants, or published. They cannot get fair peer reviews unless they somehow figure out how to argue against evolution without rejecting naturalism.

In 96 or 2000, PA had a pro-life Democratic governor. He was scheduled to make a convention speech. When his pro-life views were mentioned, he was cancelled. The elite of that party make no room for voices against abortion dogma. Similarly, the academic elites make no room for voices against evolution's dogma.

Suppression of academic freedom on this level should be embarrassing to those who are supposed to teach students to think critically.

 

[OldRegular]

Originally posted by Craigbythesea:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Dr. Carl Fliermans is a biologist

His education is NOT in the area of evolutionary biology.

However, a much more important issue needs to be restated. The ICR deliberately and knowingly exaggerates and distorts the academic positions and qualifications of its members, and they do so routinely. This conduct is distinctly unchristian, and unethical to the extreme (I do not know of any other group of scientists that does anything like this), and I do not believe that Christians should have anything to do with such a grossly disreputable organization.

</font>[/QUOTE]What do you do all day in the study of evolutionary biology, sit around and tell fairy tales or sing "joyland, toyland"? As I said before evolutionary biology is an oxymoron.

 

[UTEOTW]

"So in order to disagree with evolution you must spend at least 8 years of your life being indoctrinated with it? "

No. You can disagree all you want. But don't expect your opinion to matter. For the same reason that you do not trust your mechanic to diagnose your medical conditions and you don't ask your doctor to replace your transmission. If you wish to criticize evolution you will be expected to be an expert in the area who knows what he or she is talking about. Most of the criticsms I see come from a misunderstanding, either deliberate or through a lack of knowledge, of what the theory says. And groups like ICR, I have seen enough to say theirs is deliberate.

 

[OldRegular]

Originally posted by Craigbythesea:

However, a much more important issue needs to be restated. The ICR deliberately and knowingly exaggerates and distorts the academic positions and qualifications of its members, and they do so routinely. This conduct is distinctly unchristian, and unethical to the extreme (I do not know of any other group of scientists that does anything like this), and I do not believe that Christians should have anything to do with such a grossly disreputable organization.

You are making serious charges. To do so without definitive proof is definitely unchristian.

James 3:5-8
5 Even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!
6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell.
7 For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind:
8 But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.

 

[Scott J]

Originally posted by Craigbythesea:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> No it doesn't. The theme of this topic is "Can an Evolutionist be Saved?" and all this stuff about ICR has got nothing to do with it.

Wrong! It has very much to do with it because a very large part of the argument against the theory of evolution comes from an organization that has been shown to deliberately and knowingly exaggerate and distort facts, proving that it cannot be trusted.

</font>[/QUOTE]Evolutionists' can be shown to have deliberatel and knowingly exaggerated and distorted facts, Does that likewise prove that they cannot be trusted?

This isn't isolated either. Radio isotope dating is still cited. Naturalistic assumptions still provide the foundation for all of evolution's arguments- but is never mentioned in textbooks nor classrooms. In fact, you are far more likely to hear evolutionists contend that the theory is "fact" than to acknowledge that its basis is an unscientific philosophy.

It is amazing that you now condemn ICR because they aren't part of the group think. They may be wrong about many things. But they are no more dishonest than evolutionists and probably much less.

 

[James_Newman]

Originally posted by UTEOTW:
"So in order to disagree with evolution you must spend at least 8 years of your life being indoctrinated with it? "

No. You can disagree all you want. But don't expect your opinion to matter. For the same reason that you do not trust your mechanic to diagnose your medical conditions and you don't ask your doctor to replace your transmission. If you wish to criticize evolution you will be expected to be an expert in the area who knows what he or she is talking about. Most of the criticsms I see come from a misunderstanding, either deliberate or through a lack of knowledge, of what the theory says. And groups like ICR, I have seen enough to say theirs is deliberate.

So your suggesting that I should have to become a murderer to say that murder is wrong? How can one criticize something if he is not an expert in the field. The opinion of bible believing Christians may not matter to you, who have spent all your time filling your head with worldly wisdom instead of going to the true source of wisdom. You will find that your opinion will not matter to God. He will expect you to be an expert in creating universes before telling Him how it should have been done.

Isa 41
21 ¶ Produce your cause, saith the LORD; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob.
22 Let them bring them forth, and shew us what shall happen: let them shew the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to come.
23 Shew the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods: yea, do good, or do evil, that we may be dismayed, and behold it together.

If your idol of evolution can tell you the past, what does it say of the future?

 

[UTEOTW]

"You are making serious charges. To do so without definitive proof is definitely unchristian."

Check out the following. ICR claims...

http://www.baptistboard.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/28/2929.html#000011

http://www.baptistboard.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/28/2929.html#000014

http://www.baptistboard.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/28/2929/2.html#000015

http://www.baptistboard.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/28/2929.html#000007

http://www.baptistboard.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/28/2929.html#000012

http://www.baptistboard.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/28/2929.html#000008

That is a few examples. And notice something. These are not just examples of where they get something wrong. This is ICR asserting something that they should know to be false and misrepresenting what other have to say. For example, one of the links points to a story where two scientists collected rocks from a volcano where they knew the date the rocks fromed. They also knew a sample selection technique that would cause a wrong date and one that would lead to a correct date. They did both, had the dates determined, and showed that you had to properly select samples. ICR ignores the part where the scientists deliberately selected inappropriate samples and claim that these dates show that dating does not work.

 

[UTEOTW]

"So your suggesting that I should have to become a murderer to say that murder is wrong?"

Nope. You are not following the premise. TO kill someone requires little in the way of specialized knowledge and recognizing the error of that action is obvious.

To criticize evolution requires that you understand it. Else you are arguing from ignorance. Let me return to the doctor example. I am an engineer and therefore I do not have a long line of medical journal editiors beating my door down to peer review the latest medical papers. I am not qualified.

If you wish to intelligently criticize evolution, then you have a requirement to be an expert in it and to know what it says. If you do not, then you are arguing from ignorance.

 

[OldRegular]

Originally posted by Scott J:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Craigbythesea:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Dr. Carl Fliermans is a biologist

His education is NOT in the area of evolutionary biology.</font>[/QUOTE] So in order to disagree with evolution you must spend at least 8 years of your life being indoctrinated with it? That's ridiculous Craig.

Evolution's grip on academics is directly linked to the acceptable peer convention of thought. Anti-evolutionists do not get tenure, grants, or published. They cannot get fair peer reviews unless they somehow figure out how to argue against evolution without rejecting naturalism.

In 96 or 2000, PA had a pro-life Democratic governor. He was scheduled to make a convention speech. When his pro-life views were mentioned, he was cancelled. The elite of that party make no room for voices against abortion dogma. Similarly, the academic elites make no room for voices against evolution's dogma.

Suppression of academic freedom on this level should be embarrassing to those who are supposed to teach students to think critically. </font>[/QUOTE]Scott

You make a great point. People have, in effect, been brainwashed to believe that evolution is a fact. That is one reason that the evolutionist want to start teaching it th school children in an earlier post. In that post I noted:

"When a substantial number of students are graduating with only a marginal ability to read it seems that time spent studying evolution is wasted. Must a child be indoctrinated in the vagaries of evolution in order for them to understand reading, literature, history, geography, mathematics, physics, chemistry, or even high school biology? Why this incessant drumbeat that evolution be taught in public schools? The social impact of evolutionary thought with its ‘survival of the fittest’ is not trivial: it gave us Hitler, his master race, and the Holocaust; Marxist-Communism, Stalin, Mao, and their slaughter of millions; and Margaret Sanger, Eugenics, Planned Parenthood, and abortion - the American Holocaust. Could it be that the education establishment and certain in the scientific community wish to eliminate from the conscious thought of young people any belief in the accountability of man before his Creator?"

The conception is propogated that those who believe in special creation are either "stupid", "uneducated" as By The Sea monotonously tells us, “innocent”, or “gullible”. Now I seriously doubt that I am “innocent” and I do have some education but not in evolutionary biology, or is it evolutionary mythology? As to "stupid" or “gullible” I ask: Who is more stupid or gullible?

1. A person who has faith that an omnipotent God created the universe, all living things, and a man and a woman at a specific time and place; or
2. A person who has faith that ‘an unknown process’ produced from either nothing or inanimate matter the universe and then over a period of hundreds of millions of years all living species and by chance a human male and female at the same time and same place.

Whatever this ‘unknown process’ was, as I have noted previously, it directly contradicts the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which states that there is an inexorable tendency of all natural processes toward decay and disorder. Albert Einstein, perhaps the greatest scientist of the 20th Century, called the Second Law the Premier Law of Science.

 

[James_Newman]

I do not have to be a carpenter nor an exterminator to see that a house has termites.

 

[Scott J]

Originally posted by UTEOTW:
"So in order to disagree with evolution you must spend at least 8 years of your life being indoctrinated with it? "

No. You can disagree all you want. But don't expect your opinion to matter.

Ah... so educated opinions don't matter unless they are educated in a way that cause them to agree with convention.

For the same reason that you do not trust your mechanic to diagnose your medical conditions and you don't ask your doctor to replace your transmission.

No. It would be alot more like differing opinions between two doctors on the same medical problem. Your solution would be that unless they went to a school that taught only one possible diagnosis and treatment- discounting all novel approaches, they were not only unqualified to treat the problem but also unqualified to give an opinion about it.

These people have relevant training. Your analogy is completely off base.

If you wish to criticize evolution you will be expected to be an expert in the area who knows what he or she is talking about.

Would one who wishes to criticize creation be held to the same standard?

Most of the criticsms I see come from a misunderstanding, either deliberate or through a lack of knowledge, of what the theory says. And groups like ICR, I have seen enough to say theirs is deliberate.

And evolution supporters aren't deliberately hiding things? Please tell me you don't believe that. I realize there is a great deal of academic arrogance that makes them want to say "You wouldn't understand". But many things reasonably intelligent people do understand.

They do understand the difference between an unproven philosophical premise and a factual foundation. They do understand the difference between a real time observation and an interpretation of an observation... perhaps with more clarity than those within evolutionary science.

All three of the examples in your challenge turn out to be interpretations of observations, not observations. Yet you stated them as if someone had watched the claims unfold before their eyes. You as an intelligent Christian should be able to discern the difference but you use of those examples demonstrates that you can't. You, like other evolutionists, depended on me not discerning the difference between what was observed and what was presumed to have happened to produce what was observed. This illustrates nicely one of the previous quotes that said that 90% of what evolutionists say is without foundation... its conjecture based on nothing but a blind allegiance to the theory.

 

[UTEOTW]

"it directly contradicts the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which states that there is an inexorable tendency of all natural processes toward decay and disorder."

No, quoting a thermodynamics textbook, the second law says

No apparatus can operate in such a way that its only effect is to convert heat absorbed by a system completely into work.

No process is possible which consists solely in the transfer of heat from one temperature level to a higher one.

It is impossible by a cyclic process to convert the heat absorbed by a system completely into work.

Introduction to Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics, Smith and Van Ness, 4th Edition, 1987

"Must a child be indoctrinated in the vagaries of evolution in order for them to understand ... even high school biology?"

Yes. Because, as stated by Theodosius Dobzhansky in his famous essay of the same name, "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution." If you are to understand anything in biology, you must understand evolution. And this goes for anything related. When I have kids, I do not want them going to a doctor who does not understand the evolution of resistance to antibiotics by bacteria.

"Whatever this ‘unknown process’ was..."

Many of the process ARE known. Stasis, natural selection, drift, sexual selection, etc.

 

[UTEOTW]

"Ah... so educated opinions don't matter unless they are educated in a way that cause them to agree with convention."

No. They just have to be educated such that they understand what they are criticizing. If you do not understand it, how can you presume to know its faults?

 

[James_Newman]

None of these 'processes' result in a new species. None of these processes explain origins. The very foundation of evolution is sinking sand. It doesn't matter how many impressively carved logs you lay on top of it, it is still going to sink. If you say 'I'm a theistic evolutionist' so you can overcome these hurdles by saying 'God did it,' you should have His word to back you up on that. Otherwise, you are what the bible calls a false prophet.