Evolutionism vs the Gospel

No, you are assuming my position is the opposite of yours, but it is not. You elevate Genesis above Psalms because Psalms is poetry. So, thinking I'll do the opposite, you assume that I must demote Genesis below Psalms -- but that's not what I do! Instead, I read them both much the same way. I acknowledge that both contain imagery that is based on the author's present understanding of the world. This is in the poetic statements (the greater light "ruling" the day in Genesis 1; the sun being "as a bridegroom" in Psalm 19) as well as the more direct statements (the structure of days and the firmament in Genesis 1; the sun daily departing and returning to its dwelling place in Psalm 19). I take both Genesis 1 and Psalm 19 seriously -- both the poetry, the statements based on a different cultural understanding of the universe, and the message of praise to the Creator that both proclaim.

I do not dismiss poetry as untrue, and I do not dismiss people who lived earlier as stupid because their science knowledge was different than mine. If God could inspire Paul to use a culture's idol to point to the one true God (Acts 17), then I have no doubt God could also use earlier ideas about the nature of the universe to reveal God's sovereignty over all creation.

At least you've stopped using names in this false accusation. When you did, you were challenged by those you named and were unable to prove your assertion since nobody has said what you claim. Now, you continue to make the claim, but in a more nebulous form. I guess that's progress.

In reality, it's not about the people back then being stupid compared to us, it's about us all being stupid compared to God. So, when it comes to explaining the supernatural, God uses stories and parables to put the unimaginable into terms that humans can grasp. Neither creationism nor evolution comes close to explaining the full mystery of God's creative act. Anyone offended by the idea that God could condescend to us should reconsider how well their intelligence compares to God's.

Bob, you outed yourself! Congratulations.

[ August 21, 2004, 04:47 PM: Message edited by: Mercury ]

 

"A lie "half told" then?"

Uh...No. Non-literal does not mean "lie."

BTW, who are you quoting as saying "half told?"

"A lie "told inefficiently" and with "trickery"??"

Uh...No. "Trickery" would be the "appearance of age" that some advocate for some strange reason.

BTW, who are you quoting as saying "told inefficiently" and "trickery?"

"If God meant this as a symbol for evolution - a TEACHING of evolution using symbols - why is it that NOT EVEN EVOLUTIONISTS TODAY use those symbols to "TEACH evolutionism"??"

The Bible is not concerned with hard science so there is no need to presume that it is attempting to teach evolution through symbols. So the quesation is without merit. As far as creation, the intended message was different than a blow-by-blow account.

"Or is this "another" place where you do not let "a few inconvenient facts get in the way of a good story"???"

Bob, as demonstrated on the now closed thread, you are the one who will not let the facts get in the way of your assertions. We went on for PAGES asking you to justify your claims about the conference in the face of increasing evidence to the contrary. You never supported your assertions but you sure were willing to continue making them dispite the facts.

BTW, just who are you quoting as saying "another?"

"Or is this your way of saying "First we swallow our junk science mythology THEN we inject those errors in the text of scripture and call that EXEGESIS"?"

Nope. We demonstrate that everyone uses outside knowledge to help them interpret scripture and then point out the hypocrisy of those who then criticize others for doing the same thing that they do.

Besides, you are yet to demonstrate you "junk" science claims. We went for 21 pages without you every justifying the claims of your initial post. OTOH, many, many examples of YE junk were pointed out. The so called facts used to support YE are built of a bed of sand.

 

"Wrong. There is plenty of evidence of that in the natural world. In fact the blunders and gaffs of evolutionism in its "appeals to junk science" are displayed on the "evolution appeals to junk science thread" IN addition to the evidences we find FOR a REAL 7 day creation week."

Where do you think you showed ANY gaffs? All you showed was your inability to quote scientists in context, your ability to misrepresent what science has to say, and your ability to avoid calls for you to support your false assertions.

Now, there were many YE gaffs and out and out lies exposed on that thread.

 

"What you fail to realize is that all that 'overwhelming' evidence is manufactured upon the pre-supposition of uniformitarianistic thought. "

Nice assertion. Never backed up. When you have on the rare occasion tried to dip into the facts, the problems of YE manifest themselves very quickly. The flood model you advocated where the author himself gives a heat release high enough to boil the oceans three times. You Burlington Canyon / Grand Canyon junk where you say because a small canyon was eroded in soft sediments quickly that the Grand Canyon could have been also dispite the contrary evidence such as the high, sheer walls, the meanders, and even the millions of years required at the rate you cited for the Burlington Canyon. Your appeals to Shannon information where you use Shanon as an authority to lend credibility but then immediately abandon Shannon because he comes to a different conclusion than you do. SO then you quote a guy who gives us theorems without derivation or evidence and which turn out to be circular in the end. YOu inability to explain why duplication and mutation is not able to provide "new information." And so on.

"Just about every culture on earth has some global flood story either in their history or in their mythology."

Wow. Most of the world has floods and most of them have flood legends. Who would have thought?

"This evidence is also willfully ignored. Evolution and it's theories are built upon willful ignorance of evidence that goes against the theory."

Then show us. Take the mainstream interpretations and dissect them to show where they are wrong and give an interpretation that better fits the data.

"Every single piece of evidence you listed is synthetically manufactured based on the pre-supposition that nothing in Genesis is true. YEC have answers for all of them that are based on the Bible being true AND accurate."

Nice assertion. Prove it. Take a few of them and make a case. If you could you would have.

"Oh... so you've got some credible evidence from pre-flood do you? And you know that it was pre-flood how exactly?"

Why don't you tell us which layer are pre-Flood, flood and post-flood? I ahve asked this before and each time it falls on your deaf ears.

"That radiometric dating dated it as billions of years old?"

Radiometric dating is very useful for demonstrating great age. I guess you think that all those layers were laid down sorted according to their radioisotopic ratios while they were sorting the life into a column that just happens to look like evolution. You know, that is something else I have challenged you many time to tell us how it happened. You never have.

This could be interesting if someone actually tries to answer. Gup20 and Bob will tellus that some complicated hydraulic sorting led to the fossil record as we see it. Helen will tell us that the flood was so intense that the life was pulverized and did not make many fossils. (Actually, this would be the result of Gup's flood model, too, based on the hundreds of feet per second water flows in Baumgardner's model. But he ignores that part and sticks wit the hydraulic sorting.) Now these are opposite opinions, but they will not bother to correct each other. BUt since YEers make so much hay over minor differences of opinion in science, shouldn't we take this to show the major disagreements in YE. Y'all really need to agree to a story and stick to it. I think there is a good likelyhood that you could argue against many YE positions just using other YEers who hold an opposite position.

"Evolutionists USED to believe that one of the following killed the dinosaurs:"

Before the evidence of am impact began to accumulate.

Have you never tried to figure out how something works? You always guess right the first time before you get to try different things? If so, I want to take you to the golf course and the ski slopes that next time I go. You would be a professional.

Why do you think it is a problem that science actually investigate something and did not know the answer the day they started? Do you not understand the concept of research?

"However, scientists and giving more and more credibility to catastrophism as the most logical cause of the dinosaurs getting wiped out"

Doesn't this just destroy your assertions about uniformitarianism right there? YOu are admitting that they consider catastrophe.

 

"What was shown on that thread is that the PERFECT example of a LINK BETWEEN Reptiles and birds (the LINK BETWEEN A and C) that evolutionists HERE claimed to have in evolutionism WAS DENIED not only by Christians but by EVOLUTIONISTS!! Instead of a PROTO-Bird archaeopteryx was found BY EVOLUTIONISTS to be a TRUE BIRD!"

You will continue to make this assertion in the face of all evidence, yes?

It has been shown conclusively that the participants of the conference you cite actaully thought of archy as a transisional. You have ignored this evidence and ignored repeated calls for you to support you assertions. I find it hard to believe but it is fun to keep pointing it out. You make my case for me.

"Instead of group DERIVED FROM dinosaurs BIRDS were found BY EVOLUTIONISTs to be just as likely as a SISTER group and NOT a derived group FROM dinosaurs."

Yes there is a minority opinion that the common traits evolved sooner than thought and that the birds and the dinosaurs share a common ancestor instead of birds coming directly from theropods. This poses no problem for evolution but it is still quite contrary to your claims. Why do you think this helps you?

"INSTEAD of a prot-bird leading TO real mature Birds -- EVOLUTIONISTS admitted that REAL bird PRE-DATED archaeopteryx! "

Wow, part of a population evolves and the rest of the population doesn't all die out! What a concept. I am glad we have wolf fossils so we can have an idea about what the animals that we got dogs from were like. Oh wait. We still have wolves running around.

"What was shown on that thread is that the pure fabrications presented by evolutionists in the past (the Horse series for example) are TODAY admitted to be "a positive embarassment" by evolutionists today. A complete fake! An example of a smooth transition SEQUENCE that NEVER HAPPENED in all of time - in all of nature!!"

The only part of that statement that is correct is that the horse sequence is not smooth. The rest is lies built up by your sources where they take quotes from when the bushiness and jerkiness were discovered as more evidence came in and twist and butcher them until it sounds like the sequence does not exist at all. The only thing it demostrates is the dishonest means that some YEers will go through to prop up their house of cards.

"What was shown on that other thread is that EVOLUTIONISTS like Isaac Asimov EXPOSE the flaw in evolutionism that DEMANDS by "massive increase" in entropy to prop up its "stories". "

Nope. What was shown was that you in time after time ignored your own choices for esperts on the matter when they told you why entropy is not a problem for evolution. What was shown was that you do not have the ability to recognize what true thermodynamic entropy is even when spelled out in detail from texts and experts on the subject.

"What was SHOWN on that other thread is that the "life - starting from NOTHING" abiogenesis claims of evolutionists like Richard Dawkings
was shown to be IMPOSSIBLE based on the mono-chiral orientation of amino acids for all living cells and the fact that NO experiments in the lab produce the mono-chiral proteins NEEDED by ALL LIVING cells."

Nope. You were shown references that show optically pure compounds being produced using common materials as catalyst.

 

Let me just state here quite dogmatically, but as politely as I can: that you are wrong.

Can you find any evidence anywhere where the Jews accepted the Book of Genesis as a poetical book and not as one of the Books of Moses to be taken as a historical account laid down by Moses?
Can you find any evidence anywhere where the early church accepted the Book of Genesis as a Book of poetry and not as a historical book?
Can you find any evidence anywhere where any of the church fathers or any of the reformers took this book to be a book of poetry rather than a historical account. Did Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jacob's 12 sons all speak in poetry? Where is the evidence that this is a book of poetry? Where is the evidence that Genesis one should be taken "poetically?"
DHK

 

I may be wrong, but if so it won't be for the reasons you've given, since they show you haven't understood my position. You're pretending that I reject the historicity of Genesis 1 because it is poetry, but I have not said that. I hate to be redundant, but I already answered this in the post of mine you quoted:

I acknowledge that both contain imagery that is based on the author's present understanding of the world. This is in the poetic statements (the greater light "ruling" the day in Genesis 1; the sun being "as a bridegroom" in Psalm 19) as well as the more direct statements (the structure of days and the firmament in Genesis 1; the sun daily departing and returning to its dwelling place in Psalm 19). I take both Genesis 1 and Psalm 19 seriously -- both the poetry, the statements based on a different cultural understanding of the universe, and the message of praise to the Creator that both proclaim.

Perhaps my incorrect usage of the word "both" in the last sentence is what caused the confusion, since I actually gave three items instead of two. It's not about poetry. It's about whether God can speak through human imagery.

PS: Thanks for giving me a chance to respond instead of using your mod powers to "get the last word".

 

A greater light ruling by day is a literal description of the sun which rules or shines in the day. You can't be more direct than that.

The sun being "as a bridegroom." The word "as" sets it off as a similie, a definite figure of speech. Thus we know that it is figrurative. It is poetical. Genesis one is not. That is obvious.
DHK

 

Actually, you just were more direct when you said it "shines in the day" instead of rules the day.

Exactly. That's in contrast to describing the home of the sun as a tabernacle -- something not set off with a simile, and not obviously a figure of speech (the only reason to treat it as such is because of what science tells us).

My point is that we do well to realize that both poetic and non-poetic statements can be based on a human understanding of the world rather than God's all-knowing perspective. God condescends. I'm happy he does, because otherwise I could never know him.

 

There are no similies or figure of speeches in Genesis one. It is "God said," "God created," God made," "And the evening and morning were the ___day," "And the waters brought forth," etc. It is all a factual account of how God created the world, with verbs that show definitive action. There are no figures of speech here, only an historical account which the writer expects us to believe as it is written.
DHK

 

Bob

If you wish to have credibility in this debate support your assertion that the Archaeopteryx conference decided that is was just a bird and not a transitional nor in any way related to reptiles. I have presented evidence that the authors you cited presented evidence both at the conference and in other forums that show that they believed archy to be a transitional. I have given you a pretty good list of papers presented at the conference that show that those speakers also thought of archy as a transisional. I even even pointed out that the tile of the proceeding is The Beginning of the Birds showing that the conference was concerned with the evolution of the birds of the place of archy in that discussion. In the face of all this, you continue to make the same false assertions and pretend that there have not been any calls for you to support your assertion or to renounce it.

 

I consider personification to be a figure of speech, and "the greater light to rule the day" is personification. Stars don't rule. People rule. God rules. To say that a star (our sun) rules is to personify it by applying human characteristics to it. There's nothing wrong with the statement, but it is either a figure of speech, or something said by a person who believed that our star is a being of some kind. I think it's probably just a figure of speech.

It also makes sense if the days of Genesis 1 are to be divided between creating realms (days 1-3) and creating creatures to inhabit those realms (days 4-6). The sun, moon and stars of day four are described as creatures (or inhabitants), same as the birds and fish of day five and the land animals and humans of day six. By contrast, the creation of light, the firmament, dry land and vegetation during the first three days is all about creating a suitable environment for these creatures.

But of course, if the account is just bland history then all this symmetry must be accidental.

[ August 21, 2004, 06:32 PM: Message edited by: Mercury ]

 

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