The Bible is the claim, not the evidence

[orangebox21]

If you can provide a thousand or so witnesses to attest to this... in.

*Takes a deep breath.*

You can't provide thousands of witnesses ...

It was an illustration. Saying the validity one man's testimony of a gold mine is equal to the validity of the testimony of the Bible is not of equal comparability (one man's testimony at one point in time vs. many throughout history, etc). But for fun:

You can't provide thousands of witnesses, since they're all dead.

Witnesses don't need to be alive to be witnesses.

You can't provide an account explaining anything about creation, because the bible limits itself to "godidit" and never explains how.

The account is not justified by the "how". My car moves when I step on the gas regardless of my understanding of "how".

You can't confirm the existence of the gospel authors

No more or less so then anyone can confirm the existence of anyone dead.

and even if you could you're living in a world where the martyrs of every other religion still exists, so stow this "cost them their life" crap right now.

Just trying to weed out the those willing to lie for the gold mine owner and say he owns the gold mine when in truth it doesn't exist. Plenty of people lie, most people when faced with death would abandon said lie rather than than be killed just to deceive me (again an illustration).

The popularity of a book says nothing about it's factual accuracy, fiction books are popular too.

The popularity of a book says a lot about the factual accuracy of a book claiming to be non-fiction. Few people would continue to buy any book once it was found out that it was full of factual inaccuracies. Fiction books claim to be fiction which excludes them from being held to factual accuracy and so are not relevant to this discussion. I do agree with you that popularity does not equal proof. I was again illustrating that a book written even by one author, and not only surviving two thousand years but being the most purchased book of that period of time would be enough for me to take that gold mine owner on faith and invest that ten grand.

And the fact that a religiously motivated government, several centuries into your religion, decided to plaster propaganda of it over their measurement of time means what, for the factual accuracy of the accounts?

Depends how bad the gold mine owner wants my investment.

You're thinking of abiogenesis, not evolution, genius.

If abiogenesis is not your origin of life please define where evolution begins. Where does life begin so that evolution can occur?

Water isn't oxygen, and yet oxygen can exist above water, in the atmosphere.

That is a true statement but doesn't address the issue. There is an oxygen molecule in water and through hydrolysis it has the same effect on the bonds of amino acids.

And that's just ignoring the fact that fiat assertions made from a guy with a proven disdain for science when it disagrees with things he wants to believe aren't evidence. You've really shot yourself in the foot, following up a post about how we should distrust science since it's always wrong, with one telling us how your magic claims are scientifically valid. Hypocrite.

Never said science is always wrong. There is plenty of great science to go around. To qualify, my disdain is not for natural science (which is observable and repeatable) but rather for speculative science (some would call it historical science or the science of origins). If no one was there to observe it, scientifically speaking it's just speculation not science.

And you used an argument from ignorance, just to cap it all off.

What was my argument from ignorance?

[Mudhammam]

Never said science is always wrong. There is plenty of great science to go around. To qualify, my disdain is not for natural science (which is observable and repeatable) but rather for speculative science (some would call it historical science or the science of origins). If no one was there to observe it, scientifically speaking it's just speculation not science.

Innovation in all fields of study, including abiogenesis and even the empirical sciences, which leads to more discoveries and vindicated hypotheses, tend to be borne out of an informed imagination. Unscientific conclusions are reached when the imagination frees itself from the evidence, forcing into it an interpretation that only marginally succeeds to account for all the given data, rather than allowing the evidence to conform and inform the imagination, which strives to leave nothing unaccounted for.

[Ryantology]

Funny thing is, we only have the claims of people long after the alleged fact that there were any witnesses to any of the stories the Bible depicts. None of them are contemporary events. There is also no mechanism to determine that any of them told the truth or correctly interpreted what they did see. Every single story in the Bible is in no way distinguishable from fiction.

And yet, to you, this is a more reliable indicator of past events than 'historical science'.

gufaw

[WesOlsen]

What happened to Waldorf salad? I was just beginning to enjoy taking a shat on his dishonest flaunting of deductive 'proof'.

[Bad Writer]

I think he finally got in to surgery. Probably recovering now.

[Ryantology]

Finally got that lobotomy?

[Bad Writer]

Finally got that lobotomy?

If it helps him shed the YEC persona, I'm all for it. A brain tumor that causes intellectual dishonesty is a nasty business.

[Chas]

You're thinking of abiogenesis, not evolution, genius.

If abiogenesis is not your origin of life please define where evolution begins. Where does life begin so that evolution can occur?

Evolution occurs when there is replication with variation.

Please define 'life'. Are replicating molecules alive?

Water isn't oxygen, and yet oxygen can exist above water, in the atmosphere.

That is a true statement but doesn't address the issue. There is an oxygen molecule in water and through hydrolysis it has the same effect on the bonds of amino acids.

There was no free oxygen in the atmosphere or the water when life started. None.

The molecular oxygen in our atmosphere and in the oceans is a product of life.

[orangebox21]

Except that life likely began in the deep ocean with cyano bacteria.

If you believe that cyano bacteria is the origin of life there are certain givens that need to be addressed.
1. You believe that something (in this case cyano bacteria) has always existed. You believe in eternal matter.

-or-

2. You believe something (cyano bacteria) came from nothing. That it wasn't and then was.

-or-

3. You've misunderstoond my question about "origin" and you've cited something that is life but is not itself the origin of life.

I will rule out #3 and assume you understood the question. I will also rule out discussing #2 here as well with the hope that we can all agree that it is impossible for something to come from nothing. Science rules out the possiblity that nothing produces something, it has never been observed, measured, nor repeated.

As far as #1 is concerned if you believe in eternal matter the question then becomes what created time? For without time there can be no evolutionary processes (the eternal matter would simply continue to exist as it always had and always will be) and with time evolutionary processes would have been going on eternally and so the universe wouldn't be billions of years old it would be eternally old and so there would be no way to quantify the age of anything. Eternity is eternity.

So back to the initial premise: cyano bacteria has eternally existed (outside the confines of time), then at the origin of life "time" was created and then the evolutionary process began and has now continued. What created time so as to seperate eternity from finite?

[downbeatplumb]

Except that life likely began in the deep ocean with cyano bacteria.

If you believe that cyano bacteria is the origin of life there are certain givens that need to be addressed.
1. You believe that something (in this case cyano bacteria) has always existed. You believe in eternal matter.

-or-

2. You believe something (cyano bacteria) came from nothing. That it wasn't and then was.

-or-

3. You've misunderstoond my question about "origin" and you've cited something that is life but is not itself the origin of life.

I will rule out #3 and assume you understood the question. I will also rule out discussing #2 here as well with the hope that we can all agree that it is impossible for something to come from nothing. Science rules out the possiblity that nothing produces something, it has never been observed, measured, nor repeated.

I dont think Cyano bacteria would have been the first kind of life it would have probably been far simpler the development would have been slow, possibly the moment when organic material became life would be almost impossible to discern but we know it happened because we are here and the alternative explanation that "magic man done it" is silly.

Something from nothing is a possibility.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/201...130038.htm

under just the right conditions -- which involve an ultra-high-intensity laser beam and a two-mile-long particle accelerator -- it could be possible to create something out of nothing, according to University of Michigan researchers.

As far as #1 is concerned if you believe in eternal matter the question then becomes what created time? For without time there can be no evolutionary processes (the eternal matter would simply continue to exist as it always had and always will be) and with time evolutionary processes would have been going on eternally and so the universe wouldn't be billions of years old it would be eternally old and so there would be no way to quantify the age of anything. Eternity is eternity.

We don't have enough evidence to answer this question. Any answer other than we don't know is likely to be wrong.

So back to the initial premise: cyano bacteria has eternally existed

No one has suggested this apart from you.

(outside the confines of time), then at the origin of life "time" was created and then the evolutionary process began and has now continued. What created time so as to seperate eternity from finite?

Threre are many possible explanations for the beginning of the universe.

http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=befo...65FC0DAE88