Barbarian
Member
The big issue is the filoque, the "procedes from the Father and the Son" which was added later. It matters a lot to Eastern Orthodox Christians, who don't agree with it.
Christian Forums
This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!
-
-
Guest, Join Papa Zoom today for some uplifting biblical encouragement! --> Daily Verses
[__ Science __ ] Study: Only 37% of American Pastors Have a Biblical Worldview
- Thread starter AIG.com
- Start date
Paul E. Michael
Member
Tell us, according to you, what is "the way God says He" "created living things according to their kind".
Barbarian
Member
He says that the earth brought forth living things. Pretty much what science has come to realize.
Genesis 1:24 And God said: Let the earth bring forth the living creature in its kind, cattle and creeping things, and beasts of the earth, according to their kinds. And it was so done.
If He is the omnipotent Creator, why wouldn't He make nature to do what He wanted?
Since even most creationists know that new species evolve from existing ones, why is that such a problem?
From IDer (and antiDarwinian) Michael Denton in Nature's Destiny:
t is important to emphasize at the outset that the argument presented here is entirely consistent with the basic naturalistic assumption of modern science—that the cosmos is a seamless unity which can be comprehended in its entirety by human reason and in which all phenomena, including life and evolution and the origin of man, are ultimately explicable in terms of natural processes. This is an assumption which is entirely opposed to that of the so-called “special creationist school.” According to special creationism, living organisms are not natural forms, whose origin and design were built into the laws of nature from the beginning, but rather contingent forms analogous in essence to human artifacts, the result of a series of supernatural acts, involving God’s direct intervention in the course of nature, each of which involved the suspension of natural law. Contrary to the creationist position, the whole argument presented here is critically dependent on the presumption of the unbroken continuity of the organic world– that is, on the reality of organic evolution and on the presumption that all living organisms on earth are natural forms in the profoundest sense of the word, no less natural than salt crystals, atoms, waterfalls, or galaxies.
In large measure, therefore, the teleological argument presented here and the special creationist worldview are mutually exclusive accounts of the world. In the last analysis, evidence for one is evidence against the other. Put simply, the more convincing is the evidence for believing that the world is prefabricated to the end of life, that the design is built into the laws of nature, the less credible becomes the special creationist worldview.4
Paul E. Michael
Member
Thanks for replying, Barbarian.
Are you saying that Ken Ham (or others who are more or less on the same page with him regarding Genesis) are denying "that the earth brought forth living things"? Surely they don't say something like, "On the contrary, the earth did NOT bring forth the living creature in its kind..." So, if you think they are, nevertheless, somehow denying that the earth brought forth living things, could you give an example of how they would be verbally expressing such a denial?
Also, how is the claim that all sorts of land animals are descended from fish and other marine life (which claim, I take it, by many people is called "science")—how is that claim thought to jibe with Genesis 1:24, if you think it does? It seems we are not told that the earth brought forth marine life.
Barbarian
Member
They seem extremely agitated whenever someone points out that God created living things through nature, rather than poofing them into existence (as most other Middle Eastern Religions claimed). God is more than any of those little gods; He is the ominipotent Creator, who made the world to do as He intended.
As the early Christians noted, the "days" of Genesis are actually different aspects of creation. A poetic description. Notice the atmosphere produces birds, the hydrosphere produces fish, and the lithosphere produces land animals. These three elements produced living animals at the command of God, Who is often presented in the Bible as fire. The allegory pulls together the four elements of earth, air, water, and fire. Four elements - the completed creation of the natural world.
So nature produces life, as God intended it to do. Which is consistent with the evidence as well as Biblical scholarship. A Hebrew scholar would not miss the metaphor:
The Hebrew number four has to do with “the creation of things made.” Is the number in Hebrew for “world”.
Hebrew Meaning of 4
Are you seeing the number 4 a lot? Like 4:44? What does this mean and what is God speaking in numbers? The Hebrew number four has to do with “the creation of things made.” Is the number…
wellspringisrael.com
(edit) This is not what Ham would like it to be. But the powerful description of creation in terms of the elements and symbolized by the number 4 is both consistent with His word and with the facts we observe in His creation.
Last edited:
Paul E. Michael
Member
"They seem extremely agitated"
They seem extremely agitated, or they are extremely agitated? What makes them seem extremely agitated to you? The fact that they do not believe, and that they express their disbelief of, something you want them to believe and tell them to believe? Perhaps it is some projection, on your part, to say that those who reject what you'd have them accept "seem extremely agitated"?
"God created living things through nature"
What do you mean by that? If you consider, say, someone's pet racoon to be a living thing, would you say God created it? And if so, what would it be for God to create it "through nature"? Of course, we do not find it said, in the Bible, that God created anything "through nature"—that's not a Bible phrase. And, besides, if we did find it in Genesis, I take it you would tell us that it is merely "poetic description," which response, of course, is a ready, cheap, and easy way for you to shrug off the question as to what, if anything, you mean by your extra-Biblical phrase, "create...through nature".
"He is the omnipotent Creator, who made the world to do as He intended."
I'm happy, Barbarian, to be able to have (I take it) some camaraderie with you, here, in that you are willing to use the word, "omnipotent," to describe God, despite the clamor made by many proud boobs one encounters on the internet, who love going about saying asinine things like, "Well, if God is omnipotent, then can He create a rock He cannot lift?" And, as an aside, if you, yourself, in the course of your days and years, happen to have put any thought into how one might go about countering that silly, but popular, attention-getting ploy—or perhaps have even had personal experience dealing with it, yourself, in conversation, I'd be interested to hear from you your thoughts on the matter, if you'd be interested to share them. I, myself, have figured out a pretty simple, effective way of countering it, but, by "effective," here, I do not mean that it I can cause fools, against their will, to stop being the fools that they are.
Personally, I'm usually not very much moved by claims about what "the early Christians" supposedly believed/did—at least, such claims, used as attempted debate props against truth to which I assent, do not have any automatic priority of claim to my sense of, uh, beholden-ness. Especially as, so commonly, we are handed a phrase like, "the early Christians," with no quantifier, such as in "all the early Christians," or "some of the early Christians," or "most of the early Christians," etc. This is not to say, though, that I can't get myself interested in looking into such questions.
Since you put quotation marks around the word, 'days,' in your phrase, "the 'days' of creation," as if to indicate that you think Moses (or whoever you think wrote Genesis), in writing the word, 'day,' did not really mean a day, I ask you what you imagine he was referring to by the word, 'day'.
"A poetic description."
But, the early chapters of Genesis are a description, right?
What do you mean by "the atmosphere produces birds"? Doesn't what lots of people call "science" say that dinosaurs produced birds? And, if "the hydrosphere produces fish," and if, as "science" tells us, fish produced land animals, then, what do you mean by "the lithosphere produces land animals"?
Also, what verse are you trying to explain by saying "the atmosphere produces birds"? I think I can see why you'd say "the hydrosphere produces fish"—because, in Genesis 1:20-21, we have:
20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
My guess is that you're just using the phrase, "the hydrosphere," as a fancy way to refer to the waters. Similarly, I take it that by "the lithosphere," you're referring to the earth, as in Genesis 1:24:
And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
But I'm not seeing, in any of the verses, how you would get "the atmosphere" from any context that speaks of the "bringing forth" of birds. From verse 20, in fact, it rather appears that it is the waters—your "the hydrosphere"—that is "bringing forth" or "producing" the birds.
Also, notice that, in the text, by "bring forth," it is not meant that the waters, or the earth, as the case may be, are generating, or begetting the various living creatures spoken of. In Genesis 1:20-21, the Hebrew word rendered "brought forth" in some English texts is the verb, שָׁרַץ (sharats; to swarm, teem), which, in the NASB, is rendered "Let the waters teem with swarms." Were I to build an aquarium, I could stock it with lots of fish, so that that fish tank would more or less teem with fish; it would be asinine to imagine that, since the fish tank was teeming with fish, the fish tank, itself, must, therefore, have generated, or begat, those fish.
Similarly, in verse 24, by "bring forth," it is not meant that the earth (your "lithosphere," I take it) generated, or begat, "the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind." The "bring forth" verb, there, is יָצָא (yatsa; to go or come out), and it seems there is no necessary implication of the begetting, or generation of life inherent in it. In fact, in the entry for this word on the Strong's Concordance website I'm looking at, it seems that it is a somewhat flexible word, judging from the large list of various English renderings given for it.
But not such that they generated, or begat those animals.
Could you give some examples of what you have in mind?
So, in your way of thinking, not only is God an element, but He is just one of four elements (with the other three of which you seem to suggest He worked synergistically, to generate animals)? Not to mention, in that case, He'd be an element in which, so far as I know, not many, if any, living things live, or can live—much less can any living organisms be teeming, or swarming, in fire.
God is uncreated. Now, since you say that God is one of four elements, do you say that He created the other three of them?
"Nature"? Precisely what are you referring to by that?
If you mean the earth, sea, and sky, well, again, we do not get it, from the Bible, that either the earth, sea, or the sky generates, or begets living things. Rather, all we find is that living things live—have their habitats—in those (as you say) elements, and have done so since God first created them.
Of course, no one is obligated to be beholden to what you choose to call "evidence," or "Biblical scholarship," or "science," or "the experts," or "the authorities." Probably, if you've spent any time wrangling with those who reject what you want them to accept, you're already aware of the general uselessness of the tiresomely common, popular tactic of using props like, "Science dictates...", "According to scientific consensus...", etc.
Barbarian
Member
Seem extremely agitated.
Stuff like this:
Or any of us. God created us, did He not? And yet, He uses nature to do it, except as the Bible notes, each of us receives a living soul directly from Him, apart from nature.
As He says, the earth brought forth living things. So yes, that's nature, and God created living things that way.
Yep. As you see, the transcriber was inspired to use a metaphor of the four elements and the Hebrew meaning of the number four to establish God as the Creator, and that the world and all other things were made by Him.
I'm merely taking Him at his word, here.
I first heard that question as an argument from a creationist. Just saying. I pointed out to him that he was assuming God to be just a much greater being than we are. And God is singular in all respects, so the question is meaningless.
He had no answer for me, so I guess it worked.
Doesn't matter. YE creationism is a modern revision of Genesis, no older than the last century. It was never Christian orthodoxy. Which is not to say YE creationists are valid Christians. They just have some misconceptions about things that have nothing to do with their salvation.
Parables are descriptions of things, but the "yom" (which can mean "always" "forever" "in my time", and so on) are clearly a description of different aspects of creation. The representation of the four elements in Genesis as creation, along with the number four as representing completed creation and "world", make that very clear. How could any Hebrew scholar miss it?
As you see, this is a parable of creation. I doubt very much if the person transcribing this even knew precisely how different taxa evolved. Why would God tell him? The symbolism was important; God created all things, not merely taking stuff that existed apart from him, as other Middle Eastern stories had it. The four elements, and the symbolism of the numeral 4 made that very clear to any Israelite of the time.
The "waters above the earth." Hence from whence the birds come. Remember, in the Bible, the sky is represented as a dome, like a beaten-out bowl holding back the waters above. The atmosphere.
No more than the pillar of fire that led the Israelites was God. Rather, it's a representation of God. He is often so represented in scripture. The burning bush, the pillar of fire, the Pentacost, etc.
Jesus is not merely a lamb. God is not merely fire. That is just a symbolic description.
I'm not sure you understand what "synergism" means. Notice that the use of the numeral 4, is symbolic of the creation, and the entire world. Nature only responds because God made it so.
No. Remember, Jesus isn't really a lamb. You're confusing metaphors with the actual person.
Nature is that which God made for us. It's just one of His creations. Why is it a surprise that He would use it to create things?
Barbarian
Member
Generally, people who argue with that, instead of facts, don't know much about science. There is a scientific consensus, but it depends entirely on evidence. And science never dictates. There are no deciders, no official theories, only evidence to the point that it makes dissent unreasonable.
Someone who simply demands you accept it because "science dictates" is no different than "you don't accept God's word", when the person means "you don't agree with me on what I think it says."
Paul E. Michael
Member
No they don't. No I don't. See, you're bursting at the "seem" on account of your faulty perception. You're someone who is extremely eager to try to smear those who say what you don't like to hear with baseless ad hominem attacks such as, "They seem extremely agitated."
Stuff like this shows that you are needy and insecure, champing at the bit to fling baseless ad hominem against me:
IOW, for someone to express dissent from what you want they should assent to, or for them to express disapproval and criticism of stuff you say, or of stuff you like to hear said, is for them to seem extremely agitated—or, at least, it is for them to trigger you into saying that they seem extremely agitated.
You already said, in your previous post, "God created living things through nature". And, in my reply, I asked you, "What do you mean by that?" I'm sorry, but instead of answering my question, you simply, essentially handed me back a slightly differently-worded reiteration of the very thing I asked you about with that question.
- "God created living things through nature"
- "He uses nature to [create living things]"
Each of us living souls receives a living soul?
But, would you say the earth is a living thing? If the earth is not a living thing, then whatever is meant by the earth's "bringing forth living things," it is clearly not meant that earth, a non-living thing, "brought forth living things" in any sense in which it might be said that a living thing has "brought forth living things".
So far, you've not described any way in which God created living things.
No, I don't see that any of what you have said in this self-incoherent, "four elements" business you've handed me has anything to do with the text of Genesis. Not that you had any chance with it, before, but even if you had, nevertheless, when you then said that God, Himself, is an element—and just one of four elements, at that—you would have, by that stroke alone, summarily destroyed any hope of that excursion being taken seriously by any rationally-thinking person.
Sorry, but you never got any warrant for shoehorning the number four into this discourse, though you tried to get warrant to do so out of thin air. You said there were "three elements," and then, to get the number four you apparently wanted, you simply asserted that God, Himself, is an element: ta-da, a "fourth element".
To what "word" are you referring, here? Some metaphor? Maybe you meant to say "I'm merely taking Him at his metaphor, here"? When someone's word is a metaphor, how does one go about "taking" that, uh, metaphoricist "at his word"? I mean, if Joe who's not speaking metaphorically says "A dog barked," to take Joe at his word would be to believe that a dog barked, right? So, if Jim, speaking metaphorically, says "A dog barked," how does one go about taking Jim at his word? Could you please describe the make-up of taking one at his word when his word is a metaphor?
#1 What question? I, for one, never said that "Can God create a rock He can't lift?" stupidity I mentioned is a question. It's absolutely not a question; it is nonsense, and what is nonsense is no question.
#2 What argument? "Can God create a rock He cannot lift?" is not a question, nor is it an argument.
#3 I first heard that all non-creationists steal soup from the Salvation Army, and feed Alka Seltzers to seagulls on a weekly basis—from a non-creationist. Just saying.
You're right that what you are calling "the question" is meaningless. But you're mistaken in using the word, "question," to refer to it, since it, being cognitively meaningless, is not a question: it's a non-question.
I don't get it. When you say he was "assuming God to be just a much greater being than we are," are you saying he is wrong to think that God is a much greater being than His creation? Or, is your word, "just," important here? In order to correct his "error," pursuant to your counsel, should he have switched from assuming God to be "just a much greater being than we are" to assuming God to be, say, "a MUCH, much greater being than we are"?
What "four elements" are being represented in Genesis "as creation"? You said God is one of these "four elements". Last I checked, in Genesis, God is represented as the Creator, and not as some fourth part of His own creation.
The noun, 'yom,' can be used to mean what the adverb, 'always,' can be used to mean, and to mean what other words that are not nouns can be used to mean? From what you've been handing me, it seems like you'd be wanting 'yom' to be able to mean 'aspect,' such that , "...and the evening and the morning were the first [aspect]."
Your phrase, "the representation of the four elements in Genesis as creation," corresponds to nothing in Genesis; rather, it's gobbledygook.
And in this "parable of creation" you speak of, would you say the word, 'create' (as in "and God created...."), is being used metaphorically? If so, then metaphorically for what?
I'm surprised you did not choose to say "this is a parable of evolution," instead of what you did choose to say.
What do you mean by "the person transcribing this"? What person are you talking about? Transcribing what? And transcribing from what, to what?
.........
Paul E. Michael
Member
This is you admitting that, when someone does not bow down and submit to you by calling what you choose to call "facts" and "science," "facts" and "science," you're done—you've exhausted your arsenal. That's your ultimate ploy—the most powerful "argument" you'll ever come up with out of your bag of tricks—to sit there and dictate that what you and those of like mind with you call "facts," "evidence," and "science" are, ipso facto, facts, evidence, and science.
All you mean by that is that there is a convention among some people of like mind with you, that what y'all choose to call "scientific" is scientific. I guess it must do something for your morale whenever you're preaching to your own choir, to trumpet about your "scientific consensus". Obviously it's useless and without benefit for you, beyond that, since, once you've played that joker card and failed to garner to your dictates it any of the reverence you demand for them, why, you're right back to sniping at those irreverent by throwing ad hominem attacks at them such as, "They seem extremely agitated".
Yet you're sitting there dictating to the rest of us what, according to your fancy, should be called "science," and what should not be called "science".
Every last person (and they are legion) with whom I've ever wrangled, whose way of thinking is more or less of the same stamp as your thinking exhibited, here, has consistently demonstrated that, when it comes to being rigorously questioned regarding their fashionable use of words like "evidence," "proof," "prove," and some others, all they/you can do is either to corner yourselves by your self-inconsistency and incoherence in your attempts to deal with such questioning, or to (whether silently or noisily) stonewall against the questioning.
Can you think of anything dumber, and more irrational, than going around trying to make an impression on people as to how oh so dear to you is the word, "evidence," and then being unable to avoid total shipwreck when cornered with inconvenient, scrutinizing questions about the ways in which you use that very word in your various utterances? I, for one, can't think of anything dumber than that.
I guarantee you that, were I to confront you with such questioning in this forum as to your use of your cherished word, "evidence," you will, as a matter of course, EITHER end up displaying yourself in a total meltdown brought on by the friction you would generate by working against yourself, should you actually try to deal with my questions, OR avoid such a self-embarrassment as that by, instead, only by playing deaf to my questions, never responding to them (maybe even never replying to any further posts by me, or altogether assigning me to your "ignore list").
And, bear in mind that, so long as you can't speak rationally to elementary questions about your use of your cherished word, "evidence," you, naturally, have claim to no audience whenever you decide to preach (whatever the topic) that "The evidence shows...."
But those of your way of thinking sit there and demand that people accept your dictate that what you call "science" is science...I mean, if they don't accept it, then there is but one decree for them: y'all will resort to trying to demean them by attacking them with ad hominem falsehoods like, "They seem extremely agitated". I hate to break it to you, but that's dictating, my friend: "You shall call what we/I choose to call 'science,' 'science,' OR ELSE we/I shall look down our/my nose at you and say that you're of discomposed mentality, and call you names like 'science-deniers'."
So, when you call Ken Ham a
—you just mean that Ken Ham doesn't "agree with [Barbarian] on what [Barbarian] think [the Bible] says"? Got it.
(By the way, since you give lip service to the fact that the word, "create," is in Genesis, as in "God created..." why do you choose to repudiate the term, "creationist," rather than to take hold of it and call yourself "creationist," complaining that Ken Ham has misappropriated the term?)
Compare your "you don't accept God's word"
with your "[Ken Ham] doesn't approve of the way God says He did it."
As is on record, here, you don't scruple against using the latter to attack someone who dissents from what you want he should assent to, yet you pretend to repudiate the former, despite the transparent fact that those two things are essentially the same. Which cognitive dissonance is why your pretense to a repudiation of "science dictates" will merely ring hollow with anyone who thinks analytically about stuff people say.
Barbarian
Member
I'm just showing you the facts.
You'd be more effective if you were more specific and included some facts. There is a scientific consensus, but it depends entirely on evidence.
Here, you're confusing science with facts. Facts just are. They are evidence. Science is a method used to understand the facts.
You seem to bring that up a lot more than I do. Just saying.
Well yes, that seems to be what's going on...
Well, you seem to be pretty shy of facts here. And when did I write "prove" or "proof?" Maybe you're confusing me with someone else?
We certainly should avoid those, shouldn't we?
So far, I've never had to do that. Let's see how that plays...
We'll start at the beginning. Darwin's four points of evolutionary theory. Which of those do you think there is no evidence to support?
Then we'll move on. And then you get to ask a question. Or if you like you can ask one first and then you answer mine. Whichever. You're up.
Barbarian
Member
Maybe one of us is.
Hopefully. Now realize that when Ken Ham says the same things about people who don't agree with him... Got it?
I promise you that you'll get a more receptive audience if you try to deal with the evidence, rather than spending verbiage on the Evil Barbarian©.
Paul E. Michael
Member
What you're doing is, you're just saying stuff. Is that what you call it whenever you just say stuff: "showing the facts"? Barbarian, do you imagine that what you're doing, there, is somehow a difficult thing for other people to do? To just say stuff, and then to say more stuff by calling your saying of that first stuff, "showing the facts"? Do you imagine you're the only person capable of doing that? Do you not, rather, understand the obvious, elementary fact that anyone who can speak and/or write can do that, and that, thus, your ability to do it, and your doing of it, do not in any way elevate you over anybody else?
Think about when someone says things of which you do not approve—things of which you would say, "That's not a fact/those aren't facts"—and when they then say about their saying those things of which you do not approve, "I'm just showing you the facts": what sort of an impression does such a performance make on you? Does it make you change your tune from, "Those things you are saying to me are not facts," to "Those things you are saying to me are facts"?
Think about when someone says things of which you do not approve—things of which you would say, "That's not a fact/those aren't facts"—and when they then say about their saying those things of which you do not approve, "I'm just showing you the facts": what sort of an impression does such a performance make on you? Does it make you change your tune from, "Those things you are saying to me are not facts," to "Those things you are saying to me are facts"?
What do you imagine you have achieved, here, by merely repeating, verbatim, the very thing you had already written in your previous post? In saying "There is a scientific consensus," all you're doing is telling us that your crowd—Darwinists—agree to choose to use the phrase, "scientific consensus," as an alternate name for your Darwinism.
I'm not confusing what you call "science" with facts. Nor am I confusing what you call "science" with science. Nor am I confusing what you call "facts" with facts.
Are what? Facts just are what? You've given no predicate, here. Can't you finish your sentence? You need to finish it in order to be expressing a proposition, in order to be speaking in a cognitively meaningful way, in order to be predicating. In order to finish it, you'll need to include a predicate. To finish your sentence, fill in the blank with whatever predicate you meant, but forgot to include: "Facts just are ____________."
Facts just are evidence? Is that how you meant to fill in the blank and finish your sentence?
Now, you say facts are evidence, and the dictionary says evidence is facts: "the available body of facts or information indicating whether a belief or proposition is true or valid."
So, when you call something "evidence," you are claiming that what you are calling "evidence" is fact, no? And, when you call something "fact," you are claiming that what you are calling "fact" is evidence, no?
Oh, you never wrote "prove" nor "proof"? Why not?
In order to start at the beginning, you're going to need to explain what, according to you, it would be for something to "evolve". Would you deny that at the very heart of the language game that is your evolutionism is one or both of a pair of common verbal forms, "____ evolved into ____" and "____ evolved from ____"? Now, if, whenever you say such things (however you choose to fill in those blanks) you are not, therein, speaking in a cognitively meaningful way, then by your failure to do so you demonstrate that what you refer to by your phrase, "evolutionary theory," is cognitively meaningless, and is, thus, no theory. Note that, in a previous post, you wrote
Observe, here, that, instead of having written "Taxa evolved into ____" (like "Fish evolved into humans,") or "Taxa evolved from ____" (like "Humans evolved from fish"), you merely wrote "[T]axa evolved." Is taxa "evolving" something different from taxa "evolving from ____," and from taxa "evolving into ____"? Is "Birds evolved" said in order to signify something different from what is to be signified by "Birds evolved from dinosaurs" and from what is to be signified by "Dinosaurs evolved into birds"?
Do you not think it of utmost priority to 1) be speaking in a cognitively meaningful way when you use the verb, "evolve," and to 2) be able to explain what you mean by it, if you are, indeed, using it meaningfully? Do you not consider these elementary conditions absolutely essential to be met before you can even begin to be taken seriously by rationally-thinking people when you start throwing around your slogan phrases, "evolutionary theory" and "the theory of evolution"?
Almost invariably, because Darwinists qua Darwinists cannot get their Darwinist language to work for them (instead of against them) whenever they are asked elementary questions such as these, about the ways in which they are choosing to use the words they are choosing to use, it so happens that they resort to expressing their frustration about this Darwinism-embarrassing fact by trying, in futility, to make something like "That's merely semantics!" to function as though it were somehow pejorative. Only those who know that they must founder when asked questions about whether or not they are speaking meaningfully in certain things they choose to say—only such people are those who feel an impulse to point out the fact that their interrogators are concerned with questions of semantics, and who imagine that that fact somehow reflects poorly on the mental workings of their interrogators. On the contrary, it is those who think a concern with applying questions of semantics to what others say, misguided, who are really the misguided ones. "That's semantics!" invariably equals "I want you to go away, because, to my embarrassment, I can't answer the questions you've asked me about my utterances, because I was not speaking meaningfully, therein."
Paul E. Michael
Member
What are you calling "evidence"? (I promise you that you'll get a rightly ridicule-dispensing audience from rationally-thinking people if you react to this question by saying something along the lines of, "I am calling evidence, 'evidence'.")
According to your use of the word, "evidence," what would you say something must do in order for you to choose to refer to it by the word, "evidence"?
When you can't deal with elementary questions such as these—questions about how you choose to use the word, "evidence"—I promise you that you'll be laughed off your platform by rationally-thinking people when you, nevertheless, jump from revealing your inability to answer them right into meaninglessly pontificating with your words, "Try to deal with the evidence".
Parrot: "Try to deal with the evidence!"
Rationally-thinking person: "What do you mean by your word, 'evidence'?"
Parrot: "You're obsessed with semantics! Try to deal with the evidence!"
Rationally-thinking person: "But, by your inability to answer the question you were just asked about you use of the word, 'evidence,' you just demonstrated that you are using your word, 'evidence,' meaninglessly. So, it appears you are not even demanding anything of me."
Parrot: "Try to deal with the evidence! Squaaaaaawck!"
You can see how easy it is for the parrot to always have the last word, whenever he wants to, because the parrot, being a proud despiser of questions of semantics directed at his own utterances, never even cares a whit about whether or not his first word was meaningful, and is not about to show any scruples against merely repeating it, again, and again, and again... despite the fact that, every time he repeats it, he is speaking just as meaninglessly as he has been at all the other times.
So, again, I ask you this very fundamental question: What would you say something must do in order for you to be willing to refer to it by the word, "evidence"?
Anyone who cannot rationally respond to this question has no right to be taken seriously whenever they say things like
- "Try to deal with the evidence!"
- "That is evidence!"
- "That is not evidence!"
- etc.
Barbarian
Member
We'll start at the beginning. Darwin's four points of evolutionary theory. Which of those do you think there is no evidence to support?
Then we'll move on. And then you get to ask a question. Or if you like you can ask one first and then you answer mine. Whichever. You're up.
Your turn. Which of Darwin's four points of evolutionary theory do you think we have insufficient evidence to support?
Then we'll move on. And then you get to ask a question. Or if you like you can ask one first and then you answer mine. Whichever. You're up.
Good question. First, it's important to remember that organisms don't evolve; populations do. And evolution is a change in allele frequencies in a population. Or as Darwin put it, "descent with modification."
Your turn. Which of Darwin's four points of evolutionary theory do you think we have insufficient evidence to support?
Barbarian
Member
Logical certainty is not part of science. Science is primarily inductive; that is, it makes inferences from evidence. You see, we can only "prove" things for which we know the rules and use those rules to determine the particulars. In science, we observe the particulars and infer the rules.
This might seem wrong to you, but nothing else humans can do works as well for understanding the physical universe.
Facts. Things observed. The genomes of different populations of a given species, for example. Or (as your fellow YE creationist Dr. Kurt Wise observes) the many, many transitional forms in the fossil record.
Evidence is not tautology.
It must be observable. Would you like some examples from genetics or fossil transitionals?
Barbarian
Member
Actually, humans evolved from other primates. Yours is one of those odd misconceptions that creationists have about evolution.
Barbarian
Member
Yeah. Like "humans are people." And "people are humans." There's a lot of those things.
But these tautologies are based on observable realities. So, for example, a fact must be observable. If you can't actually observe it, it's something else. As Dr. Wise points out, transitional fossils are a fact. What they mean, is a matter of analysis and that involves theory. He's honest enough to admit that these many transitional series are "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory", even as he suggests that there may well be a day when there will be a good creationist explanation for these facts. He points out that the fact of fossil whales appears to make no sense from a creationist standpoint, since they would be in what amount to "flood deposits" according to creationism. He still thinks there might be a way to explain that, even if no one presently knows what that might be.
Does that help?
Barbarian
Member
I don't remember anyone here, myself included, saying I was elevated above anyone else. I happen to be a biologist, so I know some things about it. And I have a degree in systems, so I know about things like information and how biological populations and systems work.
I wouldn't presume to tell Jason about Florida history; he's obviously my superior in that way. Pretty much every human on Earth is my superior in something or other.