Biblical circularity.

[Statler Waldorf]

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Sorry to point it out to you, but your argument revolves around 'the bible says this and the bible says that'. Of course there is a neutral ground, what of somebody hearing it for the first time, they cannot be 'for' it, as they're only just coming in contact with it, nor can they be against it for the same reason. They may remain undecided for awhile, during which time, they are neutral. Surely you accept this? The bible may indeed say that one must be for it or against it, but it's not a philosophically sound position to take. If you try and refute this with 'I believe the bible and the bible says...' we really can't have a discussion about it, or at least not a constructive one. Will you not even consider that it could be false?

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Well scripture says that Creation itself so attests to God’s existence that nobody has an excuse to not believe in a Creator. So even if a person has never heard the Gospel, they are still expected to believe in the Creator God. So when you say that the person who has not read the Bible is neutral if they do not believe in a Creator you are saying that scripture is wrong which of course makes your position not neutral. So if the person says, “I am neutral on this matter, I think the Bible is wrong when it says people cannot be neutral.” Is that person actually being neutral? I would say that they are not because they are taking a position against a truth claim scripture makes. We can certainly have a constructive conversation, and I feel we have done so up to this point. I am just saying that there really is no middle ground to meet on this issue. This does not mean we cannot discuss the issue though right?

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About the senses, you have no choice in accepting them, one cannot live one's life if one chooses to reject sensory information. You could in fact be a brain plugged in to a sense creating computer, and of course there's no way of knowing, but there's no alternative to accepting the reality your senses present. There is an alternative to accepting the bible however, so the comparison doesn't hold.

Edited spelling.

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I think your reasoning here violates the Principle of Sufficient Reason. You are saying that we have to accept our senses are reliable in order to obtain knowledge, I completely agree, but you do not give a reason as to why our senses would be reliable given your worldview and presuppositions. The Christian worldview can certainly account for the reason why someone’s senses are generally reliable; I am not so sure an atheistic worldview could. Please explain if you disagree though.

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To say that there is no middle ground assumes that anyone interpreting the bible is under the assumption that it either is or isn't the word of god. My point was that it's entirely possible to read the bible open to either interpretation, which I would call a middle ground.

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I would disagree though, before I became a Christian I was opposed to and an enemy of God, after my conversion I was adopted as God’s child through Christ. So even the person who claims to be open-minded and neutral on these matters is really not neutral because they are claiming that scripture is wrong when it says there is no neutrality.

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I think here you are confusing being predisposed to think one way or the other to taking a presupposed stance on the bible. In the end, we only have our perceptions to interpret scripture which are always going to be biased and cause us to tend to think towards one end of the spectrum or the other with regards to religion. As long as the person is consciously trying to keep an open mind while coming to a conclusion on the bible, I do not see that as biased regardless or the conclusion reached.

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You are one of the straightest shooters on this site , and I really appreciate it. I think we are arriving at a similar conclusion but by different means. I say the playing field is equal because everyone is biased, you say the playing field is equal because people on both sides are not biased. Either way I think we can agree that both sides are allowed to use their own ammunition right?

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It is definitely necessary to make certain presuppositions but to come to a conclusion that is true to your personal pursuit of truth, one cannot presuppose either way whether the scripture is truthful or not. One loses all objectivity if not being open to either interpretation.

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You see what I am saying is that if scripture were inerrant there would be no way to test for this. So I think it really has to be a presupposition. However, I do not believe this is incorrect reasoning because presupposing that scripture is what it claims to be offers a foundation for a host of other presuppositions that are also required to gain knowledge. I actually cannot think of a way to account for these other presuppositions in a world that the God of the Bible does not reside over.

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Eight people on the Ark. Procreation after first generation impossible without recourse to adultery or incest.

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Incest was not forbidden until after Noah’s time. In fact in the “Sexual Orientation” thread on here I learned that most atheists on here don’t even believe incest is wrong, so not sure what your point is. The Human Genome would have had so few mutations in the time of Noah that incest would not have produced any birth defects.

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Why does God need us to worship him if he is omnipotent ?

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Where in scripture does it say God needs us to worship Him?

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How can he exist outside of space and time when that is physically impossible ?

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That’s like saying Walt Disney cannot exist outside of a sheet of paper because Mickey Mouse can only exist on the paper he is drawn onto.

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Adam lived to 930 / Methuselah lived to 969 / Enoch never died at all.

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So?

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Good point. And the Adam/Eve common ancestor also means we're products of incest. The authors of the book of Genesis clearly didn't think that one through.

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So does evolutionary theory, so what’s your point? In fact you can’t escape the fact that we all arose from incestual relationships somewhere in the past, so it is not a matter of not “thinking things out” but rather a matter of fact.