The Bible is the claim, not the evidence

[Statler Waldorf]

So you are trying to argue against something known through deduction by pointing to something we know through induction alone. That makes a lot of sense.

Waldork you fucking asshole, you have proven time after time that you don't know shit about anything except ancient mythology and that is about as useful as a pair of balls on a cow.

Kindly stick your fucking bible up your ass along with your head and your god.

Learn something..if that's possible...about archaeology and then get back to me.

Classy old-timer. I know enough to know that you do not argue against deductive truths by appealing to inductive reasoning. Please tell me you knew that gramps….please…..

Actually thank you Waldorf the platypus denotes the reptilian ancestry of mammals quite aptly. Unfortunately it takes more then feature to denote a transitional form. Hence there is only one Dinosaur fossils considered a transitional form between birds and dinosaurs (archaeopteryx). So the platypus actually denotes a command ancestry between mammals and reptiles in much the same way the feathered dinosaurs above denote a common ancestry between birds and dinosaurs.

Nope, you’re not allowed to arbitrarily cherry pick which evidence supports your paradigm and which does not. You are arguing that animals possessing features from two different animal groups are evidence of descent. Therefore, a mammal possessing bird features must be evidence for the descent of mammals from birds or vice versa. Secondly-as I already pointed out-the majority opinion within the scientific community is that archaeopteryx is not a feathered dinosaur but rather a bird. Archaeopteryx would not be evidence that birds descended from dinosaurs anyways because it’s emergence postdates the allege bird/dinosaur divergence in the fossil record. This is why many secular scientists question the dinosaur to bird hypothesis, it is an ad hoc hypothesis that is simply not supported by the preponderance of the evidence.

Last time I checked the bible was penned by a bunch of scribes commissioned by Jewish tribal elders, and a bunch of Jesus cheerleaders. I didn't realise god authored the whole thing.

Are you really this ignorant of Christian doctrine?

Either way, it's not objective history.

You know this how?

No, it's an early bird that is considered by most to be a transitional species between feathered dinosaurs and early birds.

Nope, it postdates the alleged divergence between birds and dinosaurs so it cannot be a transitional form for that divergence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuvuuia_deserti - Here's some western scientists knocking around in Mongolia with a feathered dinosaur

I reference a peer-reviewed journal, you reference Wikipedia? Nice. Did you notice the terrible assumption? They believe it had feathers because they argue that an absence of alpha-keratin indicates the specimen had feathers. Of course there is no empirical evidence to suggest any such keratin could survive for millions of years so an absence of alpha-keratin proves nothing at all.

Waldorf, are we to take it that you value evidence despite your wildy inconsistent standards?

Yes I value evidence and no my standards are not inconsistent at all. If I were making an evidential claim such as dinosaurs having feathers I’d at least provide an appropriate level of evidence to support this claim.

A piece of religious propaganda (which most historians view with rational skepticism) constitutes direct evidence of authorship from god himself, for you.

Nice question-begging epithet. Where did I say anything like this?

Pen to paper (ink to parchment?) there are no known examples of any other written works coming in to being unless directly penned by human hands on to a suitable surface. If you've found some evidence to the contrary then by all means feel free to share it with us.

Again, this merely illuminates an overarching ignorance of Christian doctrine. God authored scripture by using physical human authors.

Can you just remind us all who was present at the tomb of Jesus when it was found empty, and whether or not a giant flying and talking cross came whizzing out of the tomb?

We’re never told how many people all were there, but we do know that Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, Salome, Joanna, and others were all there. As for the flying cross, I do not know what you are referring to.

Just as well you're not right then

..but I am.

If you can replicate natural conditions in a laboratory setting then it's not incorrect to posit that such a reaction could take place outside of the artifical lab setting.

BadWriterSparty says we do not know what the natural conditions were like 3.5 billion years ago but we can still prove RNA spontaneous generation could have taken place naturally back then so your proposal is not going to work.

Even if you can't replicate entirely the predicted natural conditions, you can show that a process can take place given certain conditions which means that they may be able to take place under other conditions as well.

Something taking place under certain conditions does not demonstrate it can take place under other conditions; that is a non-sequitur.

your god of the gaps theory, which can't be replicated, tested, measured or limited under any conditions, laboratory or otherwise.

Neither can the spontaneous generation of RNA 3.5 billion years in the past. You place your faith in man’s ability to perform induction; I place it in what we know to be deductively true through God’s revelation.

No comparison whatsoever, certainty in a number of given variables conforming to a certain pattern given the correct environment and sufficient time is not faith, it's a statistical likelihood, especially when we can accurately whittle the number of known ingredients down quite well.

How do you determine that it is a statistical likelihood? It absolutely is faith. How do you know what the conditions were at that time period? Has RNA ever been observed to spontaneously generate in Nature?

This in no way compares to faith in a deity which is based on completely insufficient evidence, no theoretical framework and no mathematics.

I do not believe in any such deity so that was a rather useless analogy.

If christians could even agree on any number of variables you could try making a start, but as it is you can't even reach your own consensus.

Again, that’s an irrelevant point. That’s like saying since all the children in the classroom disagree on the solution to “2+2=X” that believing “X=4” is irrational.

You know nothing about RNA.

How do you know what I know? Such arrogance.

There is more evidence for RNA forming under natural conditions, as stated above, than there is for an ill-defined deity creating matter where there was formerly no matter.

Demonstration needed.

Scientistis are constantly meeting their burden to progress and demonstrate. Christians on the other hand..........

According to whom? You?

We have evidence that a great number of processes take place in spite of god, not because of him, this at least cuts a magic god finger out of many equations if nothing else....

How do such processes take place without God? Do explain.

Urgh, we've already gone over this one, different senses can corroborate an experience, external agents can also corrorborate [sic] an experience.

And different books of the Bible collaborate other books of the Bible. We are talking about your senses as a whole, therefore any appeal to any sense is a circular argument.

If you want to transcend Solopsism [sic] entirely and posit that not even your own mind is certain, then this is all fine and dandy, but it completely whipes [sic] out anything you claim to be true, because the same rules would apply to your brain.

Nope, the existence of God is a necessary axiom within my conceptual scheme and if God exists then we can trust the reliability of our senses because He made both us and the Universe we live in.

In fact, given the content of your retorts, i'd [sic] say there is serious concern that your brain is indeed not functioning particularly well.

Do you often get destroyed in debates by people whose brains do not function “very well” or is this a first for you?

What?

Did I go too fast? Sometimes I go too fast.

Something that you severely lack

Are personal attacks all that you have left? That’s telling.

which scripture? They're all full of contradictions and ridiculous claims. Scripture was penned by humans.

All of original scripture.

Oh god not this one again. We can infer that a computer program is written because we are saturated with external evidence for such processes. We are familiar with microsoft, we may even know someone who programs computers personally (a real personal relationship).

Again, are you saying that if we did not know anything about programming, we did not know any programmers we’d be justified in believing that Windows 8 arose through purely unguided natural processes? Yes or no.

If we're going to liken computer code to human code then these are not reasonable comparisons.

You’re partially right; DNA is far more complex and sophisticated than binary codes. However, that only supports my argument.

DNA is not language because it does not follow a power law, it is cypher.

Even if this were true cyphers are still the products of intelligences so that was a poor example to use.

There is no reason to suspect a human was programmed because we cannot witness the programming process, replicate it, modify it etc.

I never witnessed the programming of Windows 8…

Comparing Visual basic or C++ with human design is like comparing a goldfish to a turd.

No, it’s more like comparing a sun dial to an atomic clock. DNA is so much more sophisticated than either of those programming languages are.

The presence (or lack of) of beta-Keratin helps when feathers are concerned.

I assume you meant lack of alpha-keratin.

Besides what's wrong with an artist drawing a picture? It's just like a human writing some words, in a desert, for the purpose of consolidating tribal power..........idiot.

Classy. So you are admitting that believing that dinosaurs had feathers is like believing in the Bible?

It's a more rational proposition, especially when married with techniques from other branches of science (radiometric dating etc), than filling gaps with a magic man in the sky. Collossal LOL.

Huh? So you’re saying its fine to be irrational as long as you’re not a Christian? That makes a lot of sense. Secondly, I never said anything about a magic man in the sky; I think you are getting your conversations confused.

Sorry I have to keep coming back to this one. You have no consistent standards of evidence. This is beyond humiliating.

This is what we call a bare assertion.

The bible has many authors, not one of them 'God'. So saying that the Bible proves the existence of God in the same way that the lord of the Rings proves the existence of Sauron is completely apt.

No, the Bible has many writers, it’s content has one single author.

Unless of course you can prove that 'God' wrote the bible.

He authored it’s content.

Oh and using the Bible as evidence that the Bible is true is just begging the Question.

I didn’t, I used it as evidence that God exists.

I was going to respond point by point, but I think Wes hit upon SW's refutations rather nicely.

I knew you’d do this.

Stat, if you hear the phrase "Laboratory-tested", do you immediately, every time jump to the conclusion that the results of said test are in some way unnatural?

Depends on what we are talking about.

You don't know with any amount of certainty that god authored the Bible because that is impossible to know without thinking that an invisible voice is telling you so; on the other hand, the evidence for human penmanship is not only likely, it is a knowable fact.

The inerrancy of scripture and its divine authorship is something we know deductively. Secondly, the Christian doctrine of inerrancy is not that the physical inked words were written by God, rather what the words actually say was.

Something you read in the bible and adhere to is a belief and not something you know to be true.

When someone who cannot lie and who knows everything tells you something it is knowledge, not belief.

The only evidence you point to for this rationality is a verse in your bible...and that's it.

Not at all, I also point to the fact that your espoused view of reality only makes sense if you also believe that God exists. This supports the fact that you really do know that He exists or else why would you adhere to such a hopelessly inconsistent view of reality? It’s like a mother who claims that her son is trustworthy, she knows he’d never steal anything but then she hides her credit cards from him. Your actions do not align with what you claim to know and believe.

In that case, you SHOULD believe us when we tell you that we in no way believe in your god; we have more than one source to uphold our position than your single, questionable, biblical source.

This is a non-sequitur, an infinite number of fallible sources will never refute one single infallible source.

Okay you want evidence for feathers on a oviraptor?

Yes!

Here is research done by western scientists. Actually read it this time

I did and I now suspect that you did not. The article presupposes that oviraptor had feathers and uses this presupposition to argue for possible uses of the pygostyle. The problem is that not all oviraptors had a pygostyle so this cannot be evidence that oviraptors had feathers. Secondly, flightless birds do not have pygostyles, so arguing that the oviraptors that did have pygostyles had to use them in the same fashion that birds do (for courtship) is fallacious.

Also oviraptor has three other characteristics key to birds. Itbhas a very birdlike ribcage, hollow bones, and a beak.

Again, the logic just does not follow. If having birdlike structures proves that an animal must have feathers or be an evolutionary direct ancestor of birds then turtles and squid must also have feathers and be ancestors that birds also descended from…..
I realize that you desperately want birds to have evolved from dinosaurs because it solves a lot of mysteries concerning the dinosaurs but cherry picking the evidence and begging the question is not going to establish anything.