Hi UTEOTW,
Following this quote I have repeated it with my comments interspeersed in it.
Originally posted by UTEOTW:
Hello dawna! Welcome to the fray.
You do not have many posts to your name, yet you have already found this thread and posted a couple of times. I take that to mean you are interested in this subject. Our moderators have recently promised that the forum dedicated to this subject will be back up and running shortly and I would like to invite you to come participate when it happens. There are a few related threads floating around, but I and others seem to be avoiding most of them until the proper forum reopens.
On to your post. I have to be honest and say I did not read them in entirety simply because long copy and pastes don't really interest me. But I did muddle through enough to get the gist of the first post. Ham's main point seems to be that the different interpretations of the data comes from differing presuppositions.
It is my opinion that there is a fatal flaw in his reasoning. The flaw is that it does nothing for explaining how people come to accept evolution who do not have a presuppostition that it is true.
The first example has to be the first people to see the evidence for an old earth or for an old universe or for evolution were challenging the paradigm of the day. They did not have a preconceived notion of billions of years, they had quite the opposite. It was the data that led them to their conclusions despite the presuppositions of the day.
Second, you do nothing to explain enigmas like myself. I grew up and entered adulthood with the belief in a young earth and a strong suspicion of these people who proclaimed an old earth. But when I, even with my strong bias towards the YEC position, looked at the evidence I was quickly conviced of the reality of an old universe and of the overwhelming evidence for evolution to be a fact. There are many people like me. People who are Christians and yet come to accept the evidence when examined. And plenty of people who are Christians who actually work in the fields of biology amd paleontology and astonomy and geology and who accept the paradigms of their field.
Ham made a startling confession in what you posted. "Once the Bible is eliminated in the argument, then the Christians’ presuppositions are gone, leaving them unable to effectively give an alternate interpretation of the facts." From my perspective, the same thing happens once you accept the creation story as true but not literal. At that point you have no evidence for a young earth! What an addmission by Ham. He tries to dismiss it, but the truth is that the acceptance for an old earth falls out of the evidence. If you are unable to provide a better interpretation of the evidence, which Ham admits cannot be done, then all the protestations are meaningless and useless.
UTEOTW
Member
Member # 3409
posted November 10, 2003 08:43 AM
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Hello dawna! Welcome to the fray.
You do not have many posts to your name, yet you have already found this thread and posted a couple of times. I take that to mean you are interested in this subject. Our moderators have recently promised that the forum dedicated to this subject will be back up and running shortly and I would like to invite you to come participate when it happens. There are a few related threads floating around, but I and others seem to be avoiding most of them until the proper forum reopens.
On to your post. I have to be honest and say I did not read them in entirety simply because long copy and pastes don't really interest me. But I did muddle through enough to get the gist of the first post. Ham's main point seems to be that the different interpretations of the data comes from differing presuppositions.
It is my opinion that there is a fatal flaw in his reasoning. The flaw is that it does nothing for explaining how people come to accept evolution who do not have a presuppostition that it is true.
My Response:
>>>Ken Ham is not talking about the presupposition of assuming evolution is true. If you will read the articles carefully, you will find that Ken Ham mentions the presupposition beliefs of no god, naturalism, and materialism. I believe one should add to the list the presupposition belief of uniformitarianism. Starting with these presuppositions leads people to the development of the evolutionary interpretation of the data.<<<
The first example has to be the first people to see the evidence for an old earth or for an old universe or for evolution were challenging the paradigm of the day. They did not have a preconceived notion of billions of years, they had quite the opposite. It was the data that led them to their conclusions despite the presuppositions of the day.
My Response:
>>>You are correct about them not having a preconceived notion of billions of years. They started with the presuppositions of not wanting god to be real, naturalism, materialism, and uniformitarianism. I believe many of them, secret non-Christians, secretly wanted something to give them an intellectual sounding excuse to get out from under the moral constraints of Christianity. Again, it was these starting presuppositions that lead those people to develop the evolutionary interpretation of the data, which included the need for an extremely long period of time to gives a semblance of possibility to the evolutionary hypothesis.<<<
Second, you do nothing to explain enigmas like myself. I grew up and entered adulthood with the belief in a young earth and a strong suspicion of these people who proclaimed an old earth. But when I, even with my strong bias towards the YEC position, looked at the evidence I was quickly conviced of the reality of an old universe and of the overwhelming evidence for evolution to be a fact. There are many people like me. People who are Christians and yet come to accept the evidence when examined. And plenty of people who are Christians who actually work in the fields of biology amd paleontology and astonomy and geology and who accept the paradigms of their field.
My Response:
>>>I have talked to many Christian that give the same testimony that you gave above. I usually question them to try to find out what presuppositions they were holding before they abandoned the Bible YEC hypothesis. These presuppositions include their beliefs and secret desires, if they are willing to reveal their secret desires. I do not have any idea about the details of your beliefs and secret desires before you abandoned the YEC hypothesis. Some of the presuppositions that I found in many of them, that were willing to reveal that much detail, were elements of naturalism, elements of materialism, uniformitarianism, that Genesis chapters 1-10 is allegorical, not literal; and I also found that they had a very strong desire not to have their intellect ridiculed by the large non-Christian crowd of evolutionists. I often suspected that the strong desire to not have their intellect ridiculed was so strong that it caused them to accept many of the elements of naturalism, elements of materialism, uniformitarianism, and that Genesis chapters 1-10 is allegorical, not literal.<<<
Ham made a startling confession in what you posted. "Once the Bible is eliminated in the argument, then the Christians' presuppositions are gone, leaving them unable to effectively give an alternate interpretation of the facts." From my perspective, the same thing happens once you accept the creation story as true but not literal. At that point you have no evidence for a young earth! What an addmission by Ham. He tries to dismiss it, but the truth is that the acceptance for an old earth falls out of the evidence. If you are unable to provide a better interpretation of the evidence, which Ham admits cannot be done, then all the protestations are meaningless and useless.
My Response:
<<< I believe the old earth interpretation only falls out when you have accepted additional presuppositions like many of the elements of naturalism, many elements of materialism, uniformitarianism, along with a strong desire not to have you intellect ridiculed by the large non-Christian crowd of evolutionists. You have to have more presuppositions then just the presupposition of the Bible creation account being allegorical, non-literal.<<<
A brother in Christ,
David C. Geminden
davidgeminden@yahoo.com and
davidgeminden@netscape.net
"Jackelope Logic" & "Weak Conscience Christians and Legalism"
http://www.geocities.com/davidgeminden/index.html