Given some of the innane debates I have read here, I understand the perspective. People joining for the express purpose of prosthyletizing also annoy me, particularly when it spoils a good conversation.
It is important to remember that all knowlege rests on a bed of uncertainty. As explainations become more and more detailed they also tend to become more tentative. Consider the regression involved in your example: "Bob shot Jane." Explainations start with human motivations, go on to anatomy, then to biology, then to chemisty and finally rest on physics. That's pretty long chain of reasons. Even the most educated person cannot be an expert in all the disciplines involved to fully explain "Bob shot Jane." Even then, each discipline continues to wrestle with problems within their field. Doubt and disbelief can be cast on nearly everything known.
That should give pause to those who demand that every claim be unassailable from every concievable angle. Such demands often include vulger insults and attacks on the sanity of anyone that dares to suggest the involvement of a diety or some transcendent principle with reality. A little humility is in order for both parties to the conversation.
This does not justify "god-in-the gaps" justifications. I have no idea why debates about evolution/creation in particular are so viceral. In one thread I mentioned a study concerning a completely natural mechanism with teleological implications. Presumably because I'm a Christian the very real scientific evidence I presented was dismissed by one of our more vocal atheist members. That is until a more level-headed atheist pointed out that later studies seemed to support the idea I mentioned. While I believe the claims of Dempski's "Design Inference" go way too far, he still raises and interesting question: how do we recognize things that are designed versus those that occur naturally? On what basis do we conclude that something is a pot shard and not a naturally shaped piece of clay? Asking the question does not make one irrational. Refusing to even consider it and mocking the questioner is irrational and unwarrented.
We should respect the idea that each person has to decide for themselves what degree of evidence is needed to move forward with whatever they use for their working hypothesis. I recall one post that said something like, "provide any evidence outside the NT that Jesus even existed." That's not even reasonable. It's like saying, "provide evidence outside the Platonic dialogs that Socrates existed." Just because I am willing to accept the Gospel accounts as acceptible evidence that a Jewish carpenter named Jesus once walked the earth does not make me any less rational than anyone else on this forum.
It is important to remember that all knowlege rests on a bed of uncertainty. As explainations become more and more detailed they also tend to become more tentative. Consider the regression involved in your example: "Bob shot Jane." Explainations start with human motivations, go on to anatomy, then to biology, then to chemisty and finally rest on physics. That's pretty long chain of reasons. Even the most educated person cannot be an expert in all the disciplines involved to fully explain "Bob shot Jane." Even then, each discipline continues to wrestle with problems within their field. Doubt and disbelief can be cast on nearly everything known.
That should give pause to those who demand that every claim be unassailable from every concievable angle. Such demands often include vulger insults and attacks on the sanity of anyone that dares to suggest the involvement of a diety or some transcendent principle with reality. A little humility is in order for both parties to the conversation.
This does not justify "god-in-the gaps" justifications. I have no idea why debates about evolution/creation in particular are so viceral. In one thread I mentioned a study concerning a completely natural mechanism with teleological implications. Presumably because I'm a Christian the very real scientific evidence I presented was dismissed by one of our more vocal atheist members. That is until a more level-headed atheist pointed out that later studies seemed to support the idea I mentioned. While I believe the claims of Dempski's "Design Inference" go way too far, he still raises and interesting question: how do we recognize things that are designed versus those that occur naturally? On what basis do we conclude that something is a pot shard and not a naturally shaped piece of clay? Asking the question does not make one irrational. Refusing to even consider it and mocking the questioner is irrational and unwarrented.
We should respect the idea that each person has to decide for themselves what degree of evidence is needed to move forward with whatever they use for their working hypothesis. I recall one post that said something like, "provide any evidence outside the NT that Jesus even existed." That's not even reasonable. It's like saying, "provide evidence outside the Platonic dialogs that Socrates existed." Just because I am willing to accept the Gospel accounts as acceptible evidence that a Jewish carpenter named Jesus once walked the earth does not make me any less rational than anyone else on this forum.
