Creationist Equivocation

[Objectivist]

Hello all,

I'm not new here, although I haven't posted in a long time.  

I want to discuss the fact that creationists are guilty of the fallacy of equivocation.  They pack two different meanings into the concept of 'creation' and don't seem to think that this is a problem for them.  

When someone creates something, they take existing materials and rearrange them into a new combination or form such as when a tree is cut into lumber to build a house, stones are mortared together to make a wall, or sap from a rubber tree is made into a tire.  This is the objective meaning of the concept 'create' that is informed by countless examples that we can observe.  

When creationists use the concept 'create' they mean something very different.  They mean that a supernatural consciousness brings something into existence from nothing by essentially wishing it into existence.  I think this is an insurmountable problem for them because they ignore the fact that their worldview forces them to pack a duplicitous meaning into the concept.  The watchmaker argument is a classic example of this.  

I want to know what evidence they have for this double meaning.  When I pick up a piece of rhyolite in my backyard, what evidence or reason is there to suppose that it was wished into existence by a supernatural consciousness?  Can the creationist provide a single example of something being created out of nothing by conscious will alone?  If they can't then they have no rational warrant to use the concept 'create' as they do.

[Belacqua]

Hello all,

I'm not new here, although I haven't posted in a long time.  

I want to discuss the fact that creationists are guilty of the fallacy of equivocation.  They pack two different meanings into the concept of 'creation' and don't seem to think that this is a problem for them.  

When someone creates something, they take existing materials and rearrange them into a new combination or form such as when a tree is cut into lumber to build a house, stones are mortared together to make a wall, or sap from a rubber tree is made into a tire.  This is the objective meaning of the concept 'create' that is informed by countless examples that we can observe.  

When creationists use the concept 'create' they mean something very different.  They mean that a supernatural consciousness brings something into existence from nothing by essentially wishing it into existence.  I think this is an insurmountable problem for them because they ignore the fact that their worldview forces them to pack a duplicitous meaning into the concept.  The watchmaker argument is a classic example of this.  

I want to know what evidence they have for this double meaning.  When I pick up a piece of rhyolite in my backyard, what evidence or reason is there to suppose that it was wished into existence by a supernatural consciousness?  Can the creationist provide a single example of something being created out of nothing by conscious will alone?  If they can't then they have no rational warrant to use the concept 'create' as they do.

Christians and others have long differentiated Creatio ex nihilo from Ex nihilo nihil fit.

So people who have studied the issue, and debated it from about 500BC, are clear on the difference and don't conflate the two.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creatio_ex_nihilo

[Anomalocaris]

The double meaning is concocted to avoid having to produce the slimmest of evidence.   If evidence for it is not there, then it must be something else, banish the thought that it simply wasn’t.

Using a Latin term makes nothing sound less like nothing.

[Belacqua]

 two different meanings into the concept of 'creation'

Basically the issue comes down to whether you think the universe has always existed, or whether it came into being at some point. 

If it has always existed, then everything that's made is made of pre-existing materials. If it came into being at some point, then all the stuff in the universe appeared ex nihilo. Naturally people who believe in God will say "created" ex nihilo, while others will prefer a different verb. "Started" maybe. Or whatever word you use for the Big Bang. 

As far as I recall, Greek philosophers reasoned that the universe had no starting point. They talk about "creation," but this always means the imposition of order on preexisting stuff. So for example Hesiod says that in the beginning was chaos -- but chaos is something. Over time the chaotic stuff that was floating around started to form shapes, thanks to Eros, the attractive force. Eventually you got the world as we know it. Plato's creation myth is sort of similar. There are atoms pre-existing (he doesn't call them atoms, but they are tiny particles that come in a variety of shapes) and the atoms get organized into recognizable objects, due to the Forms, through the agency of the Demiurge. 

The Jews seem to have debated whether creation was ex nihilo or not. The first chapter of Genesis seems to suggest that "the face of the waters" was there before God made the other stuff, but this was not enough to cause the author of Maccabees and Philo of Alexandria to believe in a universe with no beginning. They argued for creatio ex nihilo. (Another case where a sentence in Genesis was read metaphorically very early on.)

Later theologians have been very careful to differentiate creation from existing material from creation from nothing. One particular heated debate took place around the iconoclasm controversy in Byzantium. These issues prompted careful thinking about what it means for one thing to be an image of another, and what degree of creativity human beings might have. While they said that human creativity is a part of what it means for us to be made in the image of God, they were careful to specify that an image is not the complete reproduction of the original, which means that human creativity must always employ preexisting materials, while God's creation did not. 

This particular discussion was renewed when the Romantic poets began to make creativity the most important virtue of the arts. Before this, skillful mimesis was generally thought to be most important, but the Romantics emphasized originality. Coleridge in particular wrote carefully about different levels of the imagination, and to what extent it could be creative. He also concludes that the human imagination can only recombine preexisting elements, and that God alone works ex nihilo.

So I certainly understand that if you're not a Christian or a Jew you wouldn't accept the idea of God creating everything from nothing. But I don't think it's fair to say that Christianity in general equivocates or uses the terms carelessly.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Hello all,

I'm not new here, although I haven't posted in a long time.  

I want to discuss the fact that creationists are guilty of the fallacy of equivocation.  They pack two different meanings into the concept of 'creation' and don't seem to think that this is a problem for them.  

When someone creates something, they take existing materials and rearrange them into a new combination or form such as when a tree is cut into lumber to build a house, stones are mortared together to make a wall, or sap from a rubber tree is made into a tire.  This is the objective meaning of the concept 'create' that is informed by countless examples that we can observe.  

When creationists use the concept 'create' they mean something very different.  They mean that a supernatural consciousness brings something into existence from nothing by essentially wishing it into existence.  I think this is an insurmountable problem for them because they ignore the fact that their worldview forces them to pack a duplicitous meaning into the concept.  The watchmaker argument is a classic example of this.  

I want to know what evidence they have for this double meaning.  When I pick up a piece of rhyolite in my backyard, what evidence or reason is there to suppose that it was wished into existence by a supernatural consciousness?  Can the creationist provide a single example of something being created out of nothing by conscious will alone?  If they can't then they have no rational warrant to use the concept 'create' as they do.

That's not the fallacy of equivocation, which means assigning different meanings to the same word in different parts of the same argument. There is nothing wrong with how creationists are using the word 'create', there's no double meaning involved.

In any case, I'm not sure that pointing out supposed logical fallacies is the way to attack creationism. I support the much more direct method of hitting them over the head with bags of fossils (metaphorically speaking) (sort of).

Boru

[Ahriman]

Beating up on creationists is low hanging fruit. It's boring.

[LinuxGal]

I want to know what evidence they have for this double meaning.  When I pick up a piece of rhyolite in my backyard, what evidence or reason is there to suppose that it was wished into existence by a supernatural consciousness?  Can the creationist provide a single example of something being created out of nothing by conscious will alone?  If they can't then they have no rational warrant to use the concept 'create' as they do.

According to their own scripture the conditions at the beginning of the universe were thus: It was dark, there was nothing but water everywhere, and God’s spirit moved around in it. It doesn’t say that God created the water, for all we know it the water is “co-eternal” with God.  Ex nihilo creation is an extra-Biblical tradition.

[emjay]

[...]
In any case, I'm not sure that pointing out supposed logical fallacies is the way to attack creationism. I support the much more direct method of hitting them over the head with bags of fossils (metaphorically speaking) (sort of).

Boru

I love that turn of phrase lol, but it wouldn't have worked on me when I was growing up a creationist... I was completely oblivious to any argument against it. You guys would have had a field day with me as a chew toy if I had been around here then, but at the same time I would've been completely indifferent to the criticism. I still remember the look of absolute frustration on the face on one of my atheist friends, well friends of friends, at the time. Pretty much exactly the same look as one of the Monty Python's, Michael Palin I think, had on his face during an interview with a theist about The Life of Brian. I remember both well and it makes me cringe to think about it.... and my part in it, back then.

[Jehanne]

 two different meanings into the concept of 'creation'

Basically the issue comes down to whether you think the universe has always existed, or whether it came into being at some point. 

If it has always existed, then everything that's made is made of pre-existing materials. If it came into being at some point, then all the stuff in the universe appeared ex nihilo. Naturally people who believe in God will say "created" ex nihilo, while others will prefer a different verb. "Started" maybe. Or whatever word you use for the Big Bang.

Read the introductory undergraduate text Fundamentals of Physics by Halliday, Resnick, and Walker. A third answer exists, which says that the question is meaningless akin to asking, "What color is Saturday?" There is, perhaps, simply no "before" the first moment of time. In this respect, the Universe is its own cause.

[Objectivist]

Hello all,

I'm not new here, although I haven't posted in a long time.  

I want to discuss the fact that creationists are guilty of the fallacy of equivocation.  They pack two different meanings into the concept of 'creation' and don't seem to think that this is a problem for them.  

When someone creates something, they take existing materials and rearrange them into a new combination or form such as when a tree is cut into lumber to build a house, stones are mortared together to make a wall, or sap from a rubber tree is made into a tire.  This is the objective meaning of the concept 'create' that is informed by countless examples that we can observe.  

When creationists use the concept 'create' they mean something very different.  They mean that a supernatural consciousness brings something into existence from nothing by essentially wishing it into existence.  I think this is an insurmountable problem for them because they ignore the fact that their worldview forces them to pack a duplicitous meaning into the concept.  The watchmaker argument is a classic example of this.  

I want to know what evidence they have for this double meaning.  When I pick up a piece of rhyolite in my backyard, what evidence or reason is there to suppose that it was wished into existence by a supernatural consciousness?  Can the creationist provide a single example of something being created out of nothing by conscious will alone?  If they can't then they have no rational warrant to use the concept 'create' as they do.

Christians and others have long differentiated Creatio ex nihilo from Ex nihilo nihil fit.

So people who have studied the issue, and debated it from about 500BC, are clear on the difference and don't conflate the two.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creatio_ex_nihilo

Well, creation ex nihilo is a made-up term that has no meaning.  They steal meaning from the legitimate concept 'create'.  As I asked, what evidence is there that anything, a speck of dust even, was created out of nothing by wishing it?  What evidence is there that someone said let there be dust, and there was a speck of dust that came into existence?