One question for Christians

[Bad Writer]

When we’re dealing with the feasibility of a particular story that’s all we need.

It's also all you've got. Feasibility =/= it really happened.

Abiogenesis is not a proven theory though, you’re beginning to sound like Texas Sailor, that guy has all sorts of faith in abiogenesis even though it’s never been demonstrated to even be remotely possible.

When something has been scientifically proven to be possible then there is no reason to have faith in the theory. If he just has faith in the theory, then he needs to read up on it a bit more to solidify his position on it.

Going with the idea that I defend weak Atheism, I will never tell you, for example: "Yes! Life on this planet started because of Abiogenesis!" I can't prove that, and neither can the scientists that proved how Abiogenesis is possible.

Kudos to these guys for playing "god". Here's a list of current Hypotheses someone recently compiled:

Abiogensis List

We don't have a half-billion years to play in a lab, so there is no way to empirically test these ideas. Are these scientists wasting their time trying to figure out which ones work the best?

We know the ark could have survived very tumultuous oceanic conditions because of it’s dimensions, so I am not sure what else it’d have to survive.

We know this? We still don't even know there was an ark!

I think you need to reconsider what constitutes and outrageous claim and what doesn't? So if you think that the story of Noah's Ark being true isn't outrageous, then perhaps you'll find the stories of Alien Abductions pretty believable too. You'd be surprised at the level of detail that some of the supposed victims weave into their stories. These stories almost become...well...feasible.

A man building a boat, loading it with animals, and surviving a global flood is far more feasible than the physics involved with aliens visiting Earth. Alien abductions are merely a retelling of “old hag” stories (see Old Hag Syndrome) from the time period before Roswell.

And you could say the Flood story is the retelling of...well...the story of the Cross-Culture Deluge (thank you for all the different examples). Both are still outrageous, but you can disagree all you want.

What constitutes an outrageous claim for you?

Something with neither Biblical nor scientific support; alien abductions

How do you know those aliens aren't just Angel agents from God? Angels are biblically supported. Would the tales of the abductions cease to be outrageous if this were the case?

Star Trek is an admitted work of fiction, so it’s not proper to compare it to scripture which claims to be true. You’d actually need some actual evidence suggesting the Noah account is a fabrication, but to the contrary it’s very well supported by cultures around the world.

Sorry, bub. This one is yours to prove since it's your claim that the Bible isn't fiction. I see a book, a story, and no proven method of telling whether or not it's true except through study and prayer, apparently. At least Star Trek doesn't lie about its fictional qualities.

“One such legend, related by Buffalo Bill in his autobiography centers on a creation myth."

Oh boy...a legend. How is it that you don't believe in alien abductions? This is all very interesting...it would be even better if that old giant bone were still around to show people. Is it?

"He remarked that since their expedition had no wagons with them and the thighbone was very large, it had to be left behind.” –Encyclopedia of the Great Plains

I guess we'll just have to take it on faith then, just like Joseph Smith's Golden Plates.

There are over 500 documented versions of these flood legends; all of them describe a single catastrophic flood event. From a Biblical perspective this makes perfect sense, but how do you explain them?

Since I'm not trying to prove a Biblical claim, I don't try to explain them. I will say it's all interesting to note, but all you've proven is that there is a flood story that might have a connection between many different lands and cultures. Why would you say the correct version is the one in the Bible as opposed to how it went in the Epic of Gilgamesh? What if every single one of them is a bastardization of an ancient catastrophic event?

There is nothing wrong with operational and empirical sciences which rely upon direct observation and repeatability.

Tracking so far.

This branch of science is the strongest and coincidentally does not conflict with scripture. In fact, its God’s existence that makes this sort of science even possible.

So without God there is no science? Yeah, I'm done talking about this with you. That's like saying without the Flood there are no rainbows. Does not conflict with scripture my ass...many laws of physics would have had to be changed just to accommodate the introduction of light refraction following the Flood if we are to believe that this is the first instance of one. I can't help voluntary ignorance.

How can something be a creature (that which is created) and not have a creator?

Seriously, you're a riot sometimes. If you're serious about this question, then I'll answer it in my follow-up post, but I'm going to take it as a Statler-Waldorf joke for now.

We’re using the term merits differently, that’s where the confusion lies.

We are? Let's see.

When I say, “the merits of an argument” I am referring to its veracity. Apparently when you use that term you’re referring to it’s ability to persuade.

We are talking about different things. The part you're talking about is what you want to be right. I would not be so presumptuous to say that we could know everything for a fact, including whether or not the sources of points in an argument are complete truth or not. In the end, it all comes down to human judgment, right?

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So can every Felidae interbreed? Every Carnivora? Can every different type of fly breed with another naturally out in the wild? How exactly are the biblical "Kinds" the same as "Families", when the definition you've provided gives the prerequisite of having to be able to breed with each other?

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I never said it was synonymous with “family”, I just said in most cases its closer to Family than it is Genus, in some cases not though. Remember, the classification system was developed thousands of years after the Bible, so you’re not going to find a direct lining up. Not only this, but all we have today to examine are the ancestors of the Biblical kinds which have undergone thousands of years of selection and genetic reduction. Creationists are working on gaining a better understanding of which animals would have been in each Biblical kind, by examining present day animals and extinct animals they now believe there were about 1,000 different Biblical kinds of animals.

This makes me happy knowing that Creationism is not a science.

I am not aware of any land dwelling animal that requires a specialized climate controlled habitat.

And this has become your issue, not mine, since you've decided to tell us that the Biblical account of the Flood is true. Start making a list and come back when you've figured this one out.

In order to keep plants fresh you really only need a cellar system. You act as if nobody ever embarked upon long sea voyages prior to the invention of the refrigerator.

Did I say something about a refrigerator? Here, I'll do some work for you. Perhaps the rain waters were the source of fresh water?

Still...I don't think green plants would last all year in a cellar system, would they? My refrigerator can barely keep my lettuce fresh for a week. And where is Biblical proof of a cellar system?

We’re not sure what type of wood was called gopher wood.

Extinct after the flood?

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Yes, there are several factors contributing to longer lifespans, a Human genome nearly devoid of genetic mutations would be one factor (Noah was only a few generations removed from Adam and Eve), there are also theories about different length telomeres (cancer cells that are not capped by telomeres are essentially immortal if allowed to continue replicating), and pre-flood climates with lower levels of solar entropy that also make a lot of sense. People don’t live that long today because of the genetic drift associated with the bottleneck event at the flood would have affected our genetics, solar entropy is greater today, and our genome contains hundreds of times more copying errors than it would have back then.
The Bible is not the only source mentioning such lifespans, the Hebrew source “The Book of Enoch” also describes such long lifespans. In Chinese culture, Zuo Ci was believed to have lived for over 300 years during the Three Kingdoms Period. During the Yin Dynasty, Peng Zu was believed to have lived for over 800 years. Emperor Jimmu and Emperor Kōan were both believed to have reigned for over a century in Japan. Taejo of Goguryeo reigned in Korea for 93 years. According to Pliny, the Roman census carried out under Vespasian recorded numerous people living in Italy who were close to 150 years old. According to the ancient Greek historian Lucian, Tiresias, the blind seer of Thebes, lived to be over 600 years old, Nestor lived to be over 300 years old, and Epimenides of Crete lived to be almost 300 years. In what is now the Czech Republic, Praotec Čech lived to be 338 years old, and Přemysl, lived for more than 180 years. Saint Servatius, Bishop of Tongeren lived for 375 years. Welsh bard Llywarch Hen lived to be 150 years old. The Maharishi of Kailas was said to be over 300 years old. According to Islamic tradition, Abdul Azziz al-Hafeed al-Habashi lived to be nearly 675 years old. Devraha Baba was rumored to be over 700 or even over 750 years old. In Hinduism, Trailanga Swami lived to be 279 years old, the sadhaka Lokenath Brahmachari lived to be 160 years old. The Buddhist, LP Suwang was believed to have lived for 444 years. Documented in the county census of Yong Tai in Fujian Province, Chen Jun was born during the Tang Dynasty and died during the Yuan Dynasty, making him over 400 years old. Even the United State Social Security death index has records of two women, Anne Feinseth and Elizabeth M. Mahony living over 190 years.

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We must be doing something wrong today if we can barely scrape past 100. McDonald's, anyone?

I do not know how Noah looked, but he had children when he was over 500, and built a giant boat, so it makes sense that he’d appear middle aged, because he was aging slower than we do today.

Psuedo-science sucks. It's okay to say that you simply don't know.

Depends on what we’re looking at, most people arrive at the existence of a single creator by examining the world around them.

Except the ones that don't and instead come up with other ideas...but please continue.

The world makes far more sense when examined through the Biblical perspective.

Or when viewed through the Star Trek perspective. Maybe it makes more sense when viewed through the Harry Potter perspective. No...wait! I got it! The Elder Scrolls perspective has got to be the right one!

You interpret the evidence in a manner that is consistent with your materialism, whenever there is evidence that appears to contradict that viewpoint I am sure you write it off or give it a purely natural or material explanation.

Nope. I say I don't know enough to address that issue. Am I wrong to do that?

Yes, I reject Big Bang cosmology, abiogenesis, and common descent to name a few. Notice, none of those are empirical sciences though.

So you probably think Lawrence Krauss is a whack-a-do.

Who did Moses kill besides the Egyptian guard? To answer your question, it was not morally wrong for the Israelites to wage war and destroy the enemies of God because morality derives from the nature of God.

Justify it all you want. You only think morality is derived from the nature of god, but you can't prove it. So why was it moral for Abraham to obey god's command to slay Isaac?

To answer why I think God is immoral, I think killing people for not believing, for being homosexual (even though he supposedly made them that way), and for worshiping other gods is downright immoral, for he's getting rid of the competition, he's getting rid of people he doesn't like, and this is very much akin to what Hitler tried to do with the Jews during the Holocaust. Do you believe Adolf Hitler was moral?

You think those things are immoral? Why would your opinion of what is immoral apply anymore to God than my opinion of what is immoral?

It's important because we as humans have a natural tendency to share ideas, and many things we hold to be moral are considered thus in many areas of this world. I care what you think not only because it interests me, but because I need to know if there's some nugget of information that is either useful or detrimental, especially since we live in and share the same world.

Nobody was killed for being homosexual, they were killed for engaging in sexual relations with other men, so whether you believe people choose to be gay or are born that way is irrelevant because nobody is forcing them to sodomize one another.

You mean God didn't foreordain them to Sodomize each other?

...

That was a joke, sorry. I actually have a clear understanding of foreordination and free will in that both can be independent of each other but work at the same time...as long as there's a extra-temporal being hanging around making the rules, that is.

So then why doesn't God punish animals who sodomize each other?

God has the prerogative to destroy His creation;

So do you think we have the prerogative to kill the children we create? Do you think that we should let the Muslim fathers and brothers continue killing their daughters because they were raped?

Hitler does not have the prerogative to destroy God’s creation and will be judged for doing so. As a Christian I take comfort in knowing that Hitler will receive justice for what he did even though he never got it in life, a materialist can find no such comfort.

You mean I can't understand that shit happens? That some people are bad? How do you know I'm a materialist (you keep calling me this, so something I said must have triggered this assumption).

You mean logical contradictions like how Yahweh is both Merciful and Just? Seems like we're still doing science just fine.

Being merciful and also being just is not a logical contradiction.

Oh, so he has a time-share personality.

Yes, we’re doing science because we live in a Universe created by Yahweh.

Or we're doing science, and this phenomenon has nothing to do with a creator god.

Do you see my point about the law though? Why would gods have to obey a law outside of themselves? Laws seem to require law givers.

Why would you have to obey the laws of gods? Why not make your own? If there was a polytheistic system, you are so used to the one-god system that you assume there must be a higher law that everyone is bound to. You have the presupposition that such things are black and white...what if there were many gods (that were real) and each one had his/her own system? What then?

Mormons are some of the nicest people around though; I just think they’ve been deceived.

How do you keep from being deceived then?

Whether you ascribe to its teachings or not, you have to admit that Christianity is the most consistant of the Western religions...

Granted, Mormonism falls apart really easily, and all they have to fall back on is "Well, just read the Book of Mormon and pray about it, and the Holy Ghost will reveal the truth of these things to you." But...



Scientology isn't consistent? Jehovah's Witnesses aren't consistent?
Seventh-Day Adventists aren't consistent? (Yeah, the last two are forms of Christianity, but I'd say they're far enough off the track to be taken for something different.)

“Let’s have the intellectual integrity to look at the responses that the Christian Philosophers have made…the point is that Christians have got some grown up answers to these sorts of things. I think Dawkins does a disservice to non-belief by not being prepared to take seriously the types of things believers believe in.” - Dr. Michael Ruse, Philosopher of Science

I don't speak for Dawkins, but I'm never surprised when he scoffs at claims of a deity. To take these claims seriously is to then give merit to other outrageous claims such as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and Alien Abductions, mainstream though you claim Christianity to be. Do you not consider Islam's claims to be outrageous? You certainly feel this way about Mormonism, don't you?

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Why don't you look a little harder? Atheism is not the same all across the board. There is strong Atheism and weak Atheism. Weak Atheism is the easiest to defend because it doesn't go down the route of Strong Atheism by asserting anything. The definition you provided is for Strong Atheism, and they do have a burden of proof, as it is a positive assertion. Which Atheist position do you think I take?

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No, the definition I provided was just for atheism, and it’s still the accepted definition today.

By people trying to label atheists. I'm done with this one. You want me to take your claims seriously, but you can't take my position in the same attitude? I'm afraid this is turning out to be a wasted debate.

Oh, so the external sources that link to the content is wrong too?

Yes...

I'm afraid any debate with you is pointless if you take this kind of attitude with valid sources.