RE: Literal belief in the flood story
May 19, 2014 at 9:00 pm
(This post was last modified: May 19, 2014 at 9:12 pm by RobbyPants.)
(May 13, 2014 at 4:26 pm)orangebox21 Wrote: Not baseless. It is consistent with the account in question. Again, refer to burden of proof discussion and to previous discussion on evidence.
I'm not sure what you mean by "it is consistent with the account in question." The only time the Bible has ever explicitly said there were no children was during the creation story, as there were no people until Adam was created. Then they go on to... have kids. And they talk about the city that Cain started (a city populated with people, who presumably copulate). Then the world populates and becomes wicked.
I see nothing establishing "no children" as the consistent normal.
(May 13, 2014 at 4:26 pm)orangebox21 Wrote:
Sure. We can be responsible, but that is a separate issue from a disproportionate response. If we continue the analogy that my daughters misbehave so I drown them, then we start to get more to my point. If I instead drown a parent and their children for the mistakes that the parent alone made, then you see the other half. My complaint wasn't "person X misbehaves and gets punished: no fair!", it's "person X misbehaves and person X and person Y gets punished: no fair!".
(May 13, 2014 at 4:26 pm)orangebox21 Wrote:
No, you wouldn't. You're messing up set theory. You have shapes. Circles are shapes. Triangles are shapes. Circles are not triangles and triangles are not circles. Now, if I'm talking about triangles, you don't get to bring up circles and say "they're both shapes!". Just because they're both shapes doesn't mean that a circle has three sides and three points.
Likewise, when I'm talking about the story of the flood wherein God performs magic, you can't say "unicorns are also magical, therefore valid in the story.". There's no reason to assume unicorns, so just because they share some superficial traits doesn't mean they deserve consideration.
(May 16, 2014 at 4:44 pm)Rampant.A.I. Wrote: God lied to Abraham, and without a valid reason. Allegedly it was to test Abraham's faith; but being omniscient, God would have already known the extent of Abraham's faith.
So it seems God lied to Abraham because he wanted to deceive.
This is actually consistent with Christian apologetics, despite them not openly admitting it. God is pretty explicit when he tells us not to kill, yet he does it all the time. When pressed about it, Christians will say things like "God has no moral imperative not to kill us", or "those rules are for us, not God", or "Who are you to question the will of an infinite God?".
Similarly, God tells us not to lie. Now, the apologetics are pretty clear on this: God has no moral imperative not to lie to us, that rule is for us, not him, and hey, who are we to question him?