Topic awaiting preservation: Evolution vs. Creationism (Page 1 of 13)

After all the...different views of late, involving Evolution vs Creationism, maybe we should start a thread solely dedicated to the subject. In light of this website National Center for Science Education (which I find posts some pretty alarming stuff), I feel that the importance of Evolution is not being properly understood. In fact, in light of this website What Is the Political Program of the Creationist Movement? where such

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"Cast your vote for creation or evolution. Where do you stand in this vital debate?

1. Do you agree with 'theories' of evolution that DENY the Biblical account of creation?

2. Do you agree that public school teachers should be permitted our children AS FACT that they are descended from APES?

3. Do you agree with the evolutionists who are attempting to PREVENT the Biblical account of creation from also being taught in public schools?" (TV Guide, June 13, 1981, p. A-105)

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is being actively promoted, is very dis-informative. However, maybe you Creationists disagree with me

Some Evolution links :

Understanding Evolution
Evolution is a Fact and a Theory
Biology and Evolutionary Theory

I find the above links very informative, regarding Evolution.

Some Creationism links :

The Collapse of the Theory of Evolution. A fascinating look at evolution from the Islamic viewpoint.

Dharma vs. Darwin? - A Hindu perspective

Answers in Genesis

(Edited by WebShaman on 11-16-2004 12:51)

Um...you realise how many threads there have been dedicated to this very subject, each and every one of them resulting in insults, fights, childish name calling and in two instances even murder involving a broom handle and a stuffed toy?

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Better here, in one thread, than spread out across several, don't you think?

God creates; we evolve, based on that creation.


< Ozone Quotes >

or we evolve, we create the concept of God. End of the story.

Nice one liners. Care to back up your...theories?

The poster has demanded we remove all his contributions, less he takes legal action.
We have done so.
Now Tyberius Prime expects him to start complaining that we removed his 'free speech' since this message will replace all of his posts, past and future.
Don't follow his example - seek real life help first.

Which god, Ini?

Ok, this is interesting Checking We're Right About The Icecap Dating. That with the carbon Dating of the pollen in the different layers machted with the other methods was pretty interesting.

All in all, fascinating.

Dating the Earth - how all this Science gets used to do it

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Tree Rings

Dendochronologists can gain an idea of the climate over the last 10,000 years or so by analysing tree rings that are accumulated on a yearly basis. The basic process (though there are some complicating factors) is a matter of counting annual layers revealing the approximate time period that each layer existed. Wet seasons are characterized by wide layers whereas dry seasons typically produce narrower layers. The Shulman Grove area in California are known to possess living trees exceeding 4,500 years old in addition to dead trees preserved by the cold climate that push the chronology back further than 8,000 years. The layers on these specimens were also cross calibrated with carbon 14 dating. The significance is that we have an independent tool to check the accuracy of radiometric dating. This is significant as many Christians have been told that radiometric dating methods are for a multitude of reasons completely unreliable and entirely untestable ? clearly false claims. If these criticisms were actually correct, than it is surely an astounding coincidence to say the least that the tree ring chronology correlates with the carbon 14 dating results. We also have additional data derived from European Oak where the chronology can be extended back to 11,000 years.



It is also important to note that climatic information from tree rings of differing species and different locations are giving similar accounts of the Earth?s climate over the past 10,000 years. Well known historical events such as massive volcanic eruptions can also be calibrated with the tree ring data. This is because these enormous volcanic eruptions ejected so much material into the atmosphere, a mini ?nuclear-winter? existed for a number of years resulting in extremely poor plant growth - including crop failure and mass starvation. The recorded years of these events correspond to extremely thin tree rings for these years.



Ref: Pinus Longaeva D.K. Bailey 1970 http://www.biologie.uni-hamburg.de/b-online/earle/pi/pin/longaeva.htm and

Useful Tree Species for Tree-Ring Dating http://www.ltrr.arizona.edu/lorim/good.html


Varve Layers

A varve is a pair of thin layers of sediment that forms in freshwater lakes that tend to freeze over in winter. Typically, one band of the varve is light and composed of sand and organic material (eg pollen) while the second layer is dark and composed of very fine clay particles.
Varves are formed by seasonal variations in sedimentary deposition. The lighter band is laid down during the summer when a greater flow of water from inflowing streams brings coarse, sandy material into the lake. The larger particles settle rather quickly but the tiny clay particles remain in suspension due to the agitation of the lake water caused by the inflowing streams and also by wind. In winter, the lake freezes over and so the effect of the wind is not felt and inflow from streams ceases. Because the water is no longer being agitated, the fine clay particles can slowly settle to the bottom of the lake, right on top of the coarse sand layer. Next summer, when the lake thaws, the cycle begins over. Each varve couplet, therefore, typically represents a single year. One can determine the age of a varve formation by simply counting the number of couplets, just as one can determine the age of a tree by counting its rings.

Varve deposits display great age. The Salido, Castile, and Bell Canyon formations of west Texas contain 260,000 couplets. Hence, this formation is most naturally considered to be 260,000 years old. The famous Green River Shales which span three US states contain about 7.5 million paper-thin couplets.

Dr. H. Kitagawa and his team have established a chronology of varve layers containing diatoms (unicellular algae) in Japan that calibrate the Carbon 14 dating technique back to 45,000 years ago. The spring season layers were recognised by dark coloured clay with white layers due to an increase in diatom growth. Carbon 14 dating (Accelerator Mass Spectrometry was the exact method used) of organic material in the layers has confirmed the accuracy of this dating method to beyond that predicted by most young earth models. It is also important to note that this study revealed similar climate details to European marine sediments of coral dated with Uranium and Thorium methods as well as carbon 14. Their results also were in agreement with the tree ring C-14 results.



Tree-ring data presents a serious problem for young earth/global flood proponents. (Most YECs believe that the large majority, if not all of the earth?s geological record was deposited in around 12 months during Noah?s flood at no more than 5,000 yrs ago.) Varves must give those YECs familiar with them nightmares. How can a global flood that is incomprehensibly catastrophic and haphazard carefully deposit thousands and in some places even millions of very thin and fragile but perfectly alternating and chemically distinct sedimentary layers in an organised fashion that just coincidently happens to correlate with annual seasonal changes? How did the flood insert fluctuating amounts of diatoms into each layer which amazing just happen to correlate with what we would expect from changes in season? But much more amazingly, how did this global flood manage to sort these trillions of diatoms in the correct layers according to the proportion of carbon-14 within their bodies so that modern scientists would be deceived into thinking the varves represented thousands of years of seasonal freshwater lake.



Ref: H. Kitagawa and J. van der Plicht Atmospheric Radiocarbon Calibration to 45,000 yr B.P.: Late Glacial Fluctuations and Cosmogenic Isotope Production 1997

http://www.acad.carleton.edu/curricular/BIOL/classes/bio375/pdfs/c14%20calibration.pdf


Ice Cores in Greenland

There are two ice cores drilled in Greenland called the Greenland Ice Sheet Project (GISP) and the Greenland Ice Core Project (GRIP) both 30 km apart and nearly 3 km deep giving the same paleoenvironmental record back to 110,000 years ago. The ice layers tend to trap tiny bubbles of air, including the impurities that are indicative of volcanic eruptions and other climatic events. An example would be the oxygen isotope ratios of the heavier oxygen-18 to the lighter oxygen-16. As the temperature increases, the heavier isotopes would be more readily precipitated (as part of H2O) than the lighter isotopes and thus the ratio of oxygen isotopes found in air bubbles in the ice provide a signature for past climate changes. Deuterium, also known as Hydrogen-2 is another isotope that provides clues for temperature ranges at each period represented by the respective ice core layers. Studies of CO2 levels in the trapped air bubbles in the ice has enabled scientists to plot the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels over recent millennia which is of obvious importance to the earth?s increasing Greenhouse Effect.



Increases in acidity are the hall-mark for volcanic eruptions such as the eruption at Vesuvius in A.D. 79. Evidence for this eruption shows up in the Greenland ice core. Historically documented events like Vesuvius serve as independent tools to date the layers of ice. Though the eruption was less than 2000 years ago and thus not long enough to discriminate between young and old earth creation models, it does provide us with great confidence that the ice layers are accurate recorders of time. Hence the layers that precede A.D 79 to a time of 100,000 years ago can be accepted as accurate.



More extensive though less detailed ice cores were those drilled at the Vostok Station, Antarctica to a depth of more than 3.5 km. Placed in the Antarctica region on the opposite side of the globe, affords an excellent position for strategic sampling of past global climatic trends. The project was a joint initiative of Russia, France and the USA. The snowfall record reaches back to 420,000 years ago, yielding data on dust and sea salt levels, aerosols and global levels of methane and carbon dioxide. Climate details such as oxygen isotope abundances correlate nicely with the GISP2 levels. Some of the age measurements from different research groups are as follows:



Six measurements at 1934 m: ? 136,758 years (Sowers)

? 141,804 years (Lorius)

? 137,725 years (Jouzel-1)

? 135,018 years (Jouzel-2)

? 140,243 years (Waelbroeck)

? 135,507 years (Petit)



Five measurements at 2082 m: ? 164,433 years (Lorius)

? 155,785 years (Jouzel-1)

? 150,957 years (Jouzel-2)

? 152,239 years (Waelbroeck)

? 151,721 years (Petit)



Four measurements at 2757 m: ? 261,787 years (Jouzel-1)

? 242,235 years (Jouzel-2)

? 243,004 years (Waelbroeck)

? 237,975 years (Petit)



One measurement at 3310 m: ? 422,766 years (Petit)



As if the evidence was not already strong enough to demonstrate the earth is older than 6,000 years, we can collaborate the Milankovitch astronomical cycles with the climate variations that we observe in ice and marine cores. The earth?s surface records the processes that astronomers predict from variations in eccentricity (where the orbit deviates from circular) every 100,000 years, obliquity (a slight variation in the Earth?s 23.5 degree tilt) every 41,000 years and precession (where the degree of Earth?s angular tilt remains the same only the direction of the axial tilt is altered like the wobbling of a spinning top as it slows down) every 23,000 years. These variations manifest in the form of climatic shifts and can be catalogued in the various ice and sedimentary layers layered down on Earth.



Ref:Sigfús J. Johnsen The Greenland Ice Core Records 2002 http://www.gsf.fi/esf_holivar/johnsen.pdf

Vostok Ice Core NOAA Paleoclimatology Program 1998 http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/vostok.html and

Vostok Time Scales ftp://ftp.ngdc.noaa.gov/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/vostok_time.txt



Coral Layers

Like the layers of tree rings coral layers vary in density according to seasonal changes. The unique gift they offer to researches is that they not only present us with annual bands but also daily bands. In other words, for every yearly band found we also detect 365 daily bands. This is an indirect way of telling us that the lengths of each day are 24 hours long.



Astronomers have made measurements using atomic clocks on the rate of deceleration of the rotation period of Earth. The results present a deceleration time of 0.000015 sec per day. Although we would have reason to expect fluctuations in this rate we can estimate that at 10 million years ago the length of a day would have been approximately 200 seconds less. Extrapolating from this figure back we would expect the Devonian period (360 ? 410 million years ago) to be characterised by days of 21.8 hours in length or 400 days per year.



Ancient coral layers dated to the Devonian era via thorium 230 and protactinium 231 radiometric methods provide an independent test for the astronomical calculations mentioned. The exciting discovery from ancient coral was that daily growth lines counted between the extreme values of 385 and 410 leaving us with an average for that period that correlates very well with the astronomical methods. Coral from the Pennsylvanian (late Carboniferous: 290 ? 325 million years ago) era from two different geographical regions gave 390 and 385 lines per annum. These results imply that the lengths of each day have increased as the earth has slowed down over the 100 million years since the Devonian period and provide further collaborative support for uniformitarian processes.


Ref: John Wells Coral Growth and Geochronometry 1963 http://freepages. genealogy.rootsweb.com/~springport/geology/coral_growth.html

New Discovery

The exceptionally thick Antarctic ice have provided researchers with an opportunity to drill a core 3 km deep into Dome C, high on the East Antarctic Ice Sheet.ntnumber2Strezz According to the report, the earth has experienced 8 ice ages throughout the last 740,000 years. The study confirmed that the obliquity cycle and the eccentricity cycle that occur every 41,000 and 100,000 years respectively have a major influence on climatic conditions. This study reveals even more headaches for a young earth creation model since the core now reaches further back in time than ever before and receives collaboration from various astronomical cycles. This study also supported evidence from prior research that the last 10,000 years of human history (Holocene period) has been exceptionally benign climatically, providing a unique environment for human civilisation to flourish.


ntLaurent Augustin, et al., ?Eight Glacial Cycles from an Antarctic Ice Core,? Nature 429 (2004), 623-628.


number2 Jerry F. McManus, ?A Great Grand-Daddy of Ice Cores,? Nature 429 (2004), 611-612.


Strezz Gabrielle Walker, ?Frozen Time,? Nature 429 (2004), 596-597.

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From here.

(Edited by WebShaman on 11-16-2004 15:59)

WebShaman: " Nice one liners. Care to back up your...theories? "

I think I already did in another thread. Whatever, in short, the concept of deity spawned in the mind of primitive hominids/humans. Which hominids/humans believed, for example, that you just have to dance in circle to please a divinity and make the rain fall*. Notice that the religious beliefs brought some rituals and a social hierarchy that helped to create many societies and civilisations but on the other hand they also lead to the Creationism. Since then the Science have prevailed. The Evolution is only denied by individuals like "Dr Hovind" and people blinded by their religious beliefs and/or lack of education that prevent them from understanding the aspects of Science behind the Evolution.

Anyway, Science still leaves many doors open for the believers to put a God behind many things. What I strongly reject is the literal interpretation of the Genesis.

Of course all this is just my own opinion based on my education, culture, life.

(*) I don't mean don't insult the American Indians, but that's the kind of ritual and belief that come to my mind when thinking to the earlier forms of religious beliefs as we have no clear testimony of the rituals praticed tens of thousand years ago.

Here is an answer from the Creationists refuting a young Earth (and therefore a literal belief in the Bible) - Tidal Slowdown, Coral Growth, and the Age of the Earth

poi,

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we have no clear testimony of the rituals praticed tens of thousand years ago.

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The Aboriginals of Australia represent such (at least 20,000+ years).

Interesting... http://www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org/

While I still won't agree with some of the conclusions of people who will jump on the "intelligent design" bandwagon, I do think this is a better approach to the issue. The idea that many of the things we see in nature are evidence of a designer should not be ruled out of our discussions.

The main problem is really that some people believe that science can or does prove there is no god and many theists think their views prove there is. Science should be used for what it is, a tool for learning, understanding, and manipulating our physical universe for our benefit. If we could just let it do that and move our debate about the deity to where it belongs, I would be happier.

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The main thrust of this ?intelligent design? argument is that life is so complex it cannot just appear by itself and that there must be some guiding force. But then the question is, if life which is so complicated needs a guiding force (God), who created that guiding force?

Who created God?

If the answer is God is always there, then if one can accept that God which is presumably more complicated than mortal life can always be there and God was not created by some guiding force, then what is so difficult about accepting that life arises without such guiding force.

I think this sums it up

quoted from SEB

The point is to not rule out design or chance, Ruski. I don't think science will ever be able to answer which conclusively so it need to be left up to individuals to decide which is more likely the case.

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I don't think that Science per se proves or disproves an intelligent design. As Bugs mentioned, it is just a tool.

On the topic of design, I believe that we (and everything else) are products of a natural process. The real interesting question is perhaps God also a product of a natural process? Now that I find interesting!

" On the topic of design, I believe that we (and everything else) are products of a natural process. "

I believe that too. It's proven that there is some carbon composites in the meteorites, and that this composites not only resist to extremely violent impacts ( such as an impact on the earth ) but react to form some proteins ( some really big molecules ) that are the bricks of the amino acids. With the number of impacts of stellar objects in the early days of the earth ( just look at the moon to get a little idea of this number ) it's quite likely that life "spawned" like that, then multiplied and evolved naturally.

I think what people call God is the natural process itself.

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poi said:

I think what people call God is the natural process itself.

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That's just another way of saying there is no god... unless you believe god *is* the universe like pantheists do.

The Jewish/Xian/Muslim understanding of God is that he is *independent* from his creation. He exists regardless of whether we, or the universe, exists. This view of God injects purpose into the equation and seeks to answer the "why" of the process where science works to explain the "how" of that process. That is why science and religion must go hand in hand and not oppose one another.

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Bugimus said:

The Jewish/Xian/Muslim understanding of God is that he is *independent* from his creation. He exists regardless of whether we, or the universe, exists. This view of God injects purpose into the equation and seeks to answer the "why" of the process where science works to explain the "how" of that process. That is why science and religion must go hand in hand and not oppose one another.

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Bugimus said:

I don't think science will ever be able to answer which conclusively so it need to be left up to individuals to decide which is more likely the case.

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ehh...?


so, bugs you think that your or jewish or muslim religioin is out there to explain to me why things happen the way they do?

like you said I would rather save it for individuals....and not make faith and science to go hand in hand...

Science must be completly independed from faith or religion.

(Edited by Ruski on 11-16-2004 19:54)

(Edited by Ruski on 11-16-2004 19:55)

Ruski, science can only be used to answer some questions that you as a human being will face in life. Religion and philosophy can be used to answer others. When I say they go hand in hand I don't mean that they interfere with one another. They both seek to answer separate and important questions.

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Like air and food go "hand in hand" to keep us alive.
Used correctly, we'll breathe and be full.
Too much interference, however, leads to choking and lots of gas. =)

Yep!!!

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Bugs, being the product and part of a natural process also explains the why and the how.

In that case, it does not explain why there is a natural process. Does it?

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Of course it does. A natural process is a natural process. We covered how this could happen, with the Big Bang, and how it is possible for it to happen - Guthrie's Grand Guess, remember?

If you mean something deep and meaningful, then no. It is, what it is.

I mean "why" as it relates to purpose. If that is deep, then yeah I guess that's what I'm saying. Saying that this is the product of that, explains to me how it happened and with what material, but it does not tell me if there is any purpose to that process. Again, I think we're dealing with definitions a bit here.

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Not really. Do you ask the purpose behind the Laws of Thermodynamics? Or the purpose behind Gravity? A natural property exists, because that is how it came into being, from this thing, that led to that thing. I find the thought fascinating, that through a natural process, matter and energy could develope to a point where it can direct other matter and energy with a concious purpose, and predict cause and effect.

And in that, the why is there. For me, it is perfectly understandable, beautiful, and makes sense.

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Um...you realise how many threads there have been dedicated to this very subject, each and every one of them resulting in insults, fights, childish name calling and in two instances even murder involving a broom handle and a stuffed toy?

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You're a poopy pants!

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funny websites | funny signatures | funny jokes

Ozone Asylum KILLED my inner child.

I am very short on time lately, but I'd like to add my take on the whole c vs. e debate.

My main question is why must the two be separate? God or science, creation or evolution. I believe that God set the laws of science in motion. God created what we refer to as science.

I do not believe in a young Earth as many do, but that the days of creation were not days in the literal sense. The Bible in many places does not speak of days in a literal sense. For instance, the "Day of the Lord" refers to a seven year period of time.

Some other examples include:

1. Genesis 2:4 refers to all 6 days of creation as one day, "This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made earth and heaven."

2. The seventh day of Genesis is not closed. In all other days, "there is the evening and the morning, the n day." Which to me means we are still in the 7th day.

3. The apostle Peter wrote that with God "A thousand years is as one day" (2 Peter 3:8).

4. The third day must have been longer than 24-hours, since the Bible indicates a process that would take a year or longer. On this day, God allowed the land to produce vegetation, tress and fruit. The text states that the land produced the vegitation (indicating a natural process) and that it all occurred on the third day. Obviously, such a "day" could not have been only 24 hours long.

5. The events of the sixth day of creation require time beyond 24 hours. On this day, God created the mammals and mankind. He also planted a garden, watered it, let it grow, and put man in it, with instruction on its care and maintenance. Then God brought all the animals to Adam to be named. This job, in itself would take many weeks or months. Next, God put Adam to sleep and created Eve, from a rib (DNA to us sophisticated folk). It is very unlikely all of this could take place in 24 hours, since much of it was dependent upon Adam, who did not have the abilities of God.

6. The Bible states that the covenant and laws of God have been proclaimed to a "thousand generations" (Deuteronomy 7:9, 1 Chronicles 16:15, Psalms 105:8). Even if a generation is considered to be 20 years, this adds up to at least 20,000 years. A biblical generation is often described as being 40 years, which would represent at least 40,000 years. However, since the first dozen or more generations were nearly 1,000 years, this would make humans nearly 50,000 years old, which agrees very well with dates from paleontology and molecular biology.

In any case, these debates are unecessary IMO because there really is not much to disagree on when the religious side acknowledges the science side and uses it as a compliment to understadning the Bible. The reverse of that statement also holds true. The whole debate begins when organized religion has an agenda because it sees science as a threat when it is not. Carry on.

Ramasax

(Edited by Ramasax on 11-17-2004 00:34)

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The whole debate begins when organized religion has an agenda because it sees science as a threat when it is not.

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Couldn't possibly agree more.

As much as I hold true that there is no god, nothing that science tells us can in any way prove or even suggest that there is no god (except in the sense that since we have no evidence to support god's existence, we must assume [scientifically] that he/she/it does not exist...).

I think that to say that nature proves god's existence because it is so complex and beautiful is just plain silly. To say that there must have been 'intelligent design' makes no sense. because we don't understand, it 'must have been god'? No...no more than there must be little imps pulling my hand when I stick it out the car window while driving...

But, there is absolutely nothing to say that god *is* not there behind it all.

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I think that to say that nature proves god's existence because it is so complex and beautiful is just plain silly.

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Well said. I find that nature's complexity and beauty is even moreso, when one considers it a natural process.

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Ramasax said:

The whole debate begins when organized religion has an agenda because it sees science as a threat when it is not. Carry on.

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The threat seems to be, that if "there is no damnation of a mankind and original sin, why there should be a salvation?"

If science makes old testamen/torah/jewish literature look as if it is a metaphorical tale...how does "salvation" fit in?

that's by far one of the logical questions/explanations I have heard from True Believers? relating to science and their faith.


added: nd Bugs as for "why?" well you can always come up with an answear yourself, it's not that hard.

(Edited by Ruski on 11-17-2004 13:54)

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Bugimus wrote:

I mean "why" as it relates to purpose.

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Part of the reason that there is such a difference of opinion is because most people have to believe that we were put here for a purpose.
They cannot seem to be able to function unless there is a reason for us to be here.
They cannot bring themselves to think that maybe there is no purpose, no destiny, no grand scheme, no guarantee that humankind will prevail.
It is inconceivable to them to think that:
> we are just here;
> we are an accident of the evolutionary process;
> our only real goal is the same as the goal of every living thing -- to perpetuate our own kind;
> when we die, that is the end, we stop being and there is no more.

So people hear a story they like and they cling to it.
Someone wrote that God said "Believe in me and you will live forever", and hey, that's better than the alternative, so its got to be true.
These stories are ingrained in us as we grow up and we hold on to them.
And it is easier to cling to them than it is to accept any alternative that doesn't allow for us to live forver.




(Edited by briggl on 11-18-2004 06:54)

Purpose?

As a species - survival and the accumulation of knowledge. And to evolve. (IMHO).

As a person - I think this is better individually defined. My purpose is to better myself, without cost to others (at least as little as possible), and the raising of my children.

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poi said:

What I strongly reject is the literal interpretation of the Genesis.

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Hmm, that's funny, cause that is exactly the opposite of what I believe.

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Bugimus said:

If we could just let it do that and move our debate about the deity to where it
belongs, I would be happier.

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Me too, the only problem with that is that you can not entirely remove God from science and science from God, it is impossible.

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Ruski said:

If the answer is God is always there, then if one can accept that God which is
presumably more complicated than mortal life can always be there and God was not
created by some guiding force, then what is so difficult about accepting
that
life arises without such guiding force.

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I just want to say nicely done. That is a very good counter to that argument. I still have to check if your reasoning is correct, but I think it might be.

Well, actually it is difficult because of one word that you used, "mortal." If God is more complicated than mortal life, and He does not have a creator Himself, then maybe life which is mortal does need a Creator to make sure things fit right.

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poi said:

I think what people call God is the natural process itself.

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Yup, all inclusive in six days Poi. (sorry, I just had to say it)

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Ramasax said:

The Bible in many places does not speak of days in a literal sense.

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It is true that the Hebrew for day can mean an age or a time period, but the six Hebrew days in Genesis are 24 hour days. They contain morning, number evening and night, and thus can be rationalized as being 24 hour days.

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Ramasax said:

Which to me means we are still in the 7th day.

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So God the Omnipotent is still resting from His hard 6 days of work? I know people who work many long weeks and take only a day or two of rest, not billions of years .

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Ramasax said:

"A thousand years is as one day"

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Context...
He said:

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2 Peter 3:8
But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day.

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He is actually talking about the last days and not the first, how God is patient and He doesn't rush things.

Your 6th point is quite true, about God proclaiming to a thousand generations. If you do take it that way, it would be 1,000 generations from the point He said it, not from the proposed beginning of the Earth. The scholars who have gone through and tried to pinpoint a date of birth for the Earth is somewhere between 10,000 and 5,000 years, not nearly back enough for the 1,000 generations.

I prefer to look at that as a massiva amount. I don't have my Hebrew Bible yet, but as soon as I do I will look into whether that extends the day of Tribulation, or if it just means a "really long time."

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DL-44 said:

because we don't understand, it 'must have been god'?

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Actually, have you ever heard of miracles DL? We have one recent walking talking miralce in our church right now. Even the doctors said it was a miracle. He was supposed to die. He didn't. Can you explain that? I can't. Not without God.

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briggl said:

So people hear a story they like and they cling to it.Someone wrote that God
said "Believe in me and you will live forever", and hey, that's better than the
alternative, so its got to be true.These stories are ingrained in us as we
grow up and we hold on to them.And it is easier to cling to them than it is
to accept any alternative that doesn't allow for us to live forver.

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Hey, you read "Owww....it hurts" I didn't get saved because I was worried where I was going when I died. That wasn't the issue. The issue, like with many other people, is the here and now. The other stuff we can't see happening, we don't know it is true, we just believe that it is, we hope. the stuff that Jesus saved me from was the here and now: loneliness, depression, suicide, addictions, lust, etc. I didn't really care much about the here after, I cared more about the here now. Jesus said He could lift my burdens and He delivered.

Now that I think I have disagreed with everyone here on a topic or two and made many people a little ticked (please don't be ticked, this is stuff from God that I have taken liberty of peicing together for you. If you are going to get mad get mad at me and not Him).

Ok, WebShamman. Here is your part. I think by now you know my stance on Creation, and that no amount of debate and argument are going to change it for worse. They may strengthen it, but not change it much. I just want to say a couple things:
First: I thought you were tired of these kinds of posts. Did you get an extra push from somewhere?
Second: I agree, there have been many posts about this, and it is good that they are all on one thread this time.
Third: what is your personal stance on the matter. If you post that for me I promise I will use all my strenght to stop myself from picking it apart. Deal? I just would like to understand what angle you are coming from.
Fourth: Thank you very much for this thread, I was able to get all of my thoughts out at once.

As a little parting thing because I may not be able to post anything anytime soon, I would like to tell everyone that I commented on, that my comments are largely my oppinion and my findings from research in and about the Bible. I want you all to know that your oppinions are yours and I don't want you to think that I hate you all and think you should go to Hell. Quite the opposite. This is really one of the few ways that I know of getting my oppinions out is by making counters to other's arguments. I'm really sorry if I offended someone, but my comments can be offensive sometimes. I just want you all to know that maybe you are not wrong and maybe you are 100% correct. Maybe I am the one in error, I don't know. I won't know until I go up to be with God and He reveals these things to me personally. That is when I will no for sure whether or not I or you were right. Maybe we are both wrong, I don't know yet. All I do know is that the Bible is the only thing I have to go on as far as God's "meat and potatoe" Word's, and that is what I consider truth. If you can find instances in the Bible to prove my comments wrong I would love to hear them. Please WS just none of that stuff that proposes to prove the Bible wrong. I am still getting answers for a few of them, and I won't know for a while.

I guess what I am trying to say is that Jesus is the Ultimate Authority in my life, and I love Him. It is out of that love that I follow Him. All of my comments and suggestions are just secondary and do not really count compared to Him.

Do not rebuke a mocker or he will hate you, rebuke a wise man and he will love you.

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He was supposed to die.

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Says who? That's an opinion...not a fact.

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Can you explain that? I can't. Not without God.

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That still doesn't make 'god' the answer.
Even if the answer *is* something supernatural, it does not in any way shape or form speak of the existence (or lack thereof) of your god.

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Actually, have you ever heard of miracles DL?

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Yep, that's where you take something you don't understand and say "god did it!". =)

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DL-44 said:

Yep, that's where you take something you don't understand and say "god did it!".
=)

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That's the idea. Seriously, though, it is actually a "Godly" miracle (at least the one I am refering to) becasue it was prayed about. It wasn't just spontaneous, and happened, then we said "Praise God!" We said "Praise God" because we knew it was Him and not some other "supernatural force."

Do not rebuke a mocker or he will hate you, rebuke a wise man and he will love you.

Gideon do you realize the god you worship actually has a begining? There are documents that began in specific time, documenting your deity, simply put there is a development process of that diety and it holds many similarities with cultures before it and and how they influenced the development of your particular diety. Before people would praise somethign else, specific god(s) of their culture including fertility diety (which was ussually a female, because logically women give birth) and later it all developed into male dominant dieties. Well...but most of them are known as myth today in western world.

If you care to look up some information on development of dieties and concept of god over time a good start would be here:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/god_devel.htm

The bible you ohh so literary fallow how its process of development as well. The documents were specifically chosen by Roman rulers. I am sure DL already poited you out to early christian writtings that never before made it to the present bible,because they simply say a diffenrent story.

There is in fact the development of an image for Jesus Christ. In early days of rome he was portrayed as a young clean shaven Roman man. Later the image was redesigned because it didn't portray Jesus wise/powerful/whatever enough.
They added to beard to resemble roman emperor, which at that time and before that time was know to symbolized power.
The purpleand gold roman toga was also a cloth of emperor and was very much adopted for imagery of jesus during the byzantine times.

There is so much more you simply are unaware of, it saddens me. The worth part is, so is 75% of the world.

(Edited by Ruski on 11-20-2004 08:17)

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Me too, the only problem with that is that you can not entirely remove God from science and science from God, it is impossible.

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Uhhh...wrong. So, so very wrong. Not only doesn't that make sense, I can and will remove your "god" from science. I can demonstrate enough theory that excludes your "god" entirely.

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If God is more complicated than mortal life, and He does not have a creator Himself, then maybe life which is mortal does need a Creator to make sure things fit right.

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Again, incorrect - if we produce AI, in a form that can renew itself (and therefore be "immortal") then your example is null and void.

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Actually, have you ever heard of miracles DL? We have one recent walking talking miralce in our church right now. Even the doctors said it was a miracle. He was supposed to die. He didn't. Can you explain that? I can't. Not without God.

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Maybe you can't, but my people can. And they certainly don't explain it with your "god".

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Ok, WebShamman. Here is your part. I think by now you know my stance on Creation, and that no amount of debate and argument are going to change it for worse. They may strengthen it, but not change it much.

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If this is the case, then you may never learn the truth, because with this statement, you tell me that you have shut out ANY possibility of examining things OUTSIDE of your faith. It is also a polite way of telling me to shut up. I personally find this type of attitude very, very typical of "your" type of believer...so go on and keep your fingers in your ears. You are demonstrating here, that you are not open-minded, contrary to what you say.

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First: I thought you were tired of these kinds of posts. Did you get an extra push from somewhere?

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Yes, there used to be a lot of such in the old asylum, but apparently much of the threads from then didn't make the grade to the new aslyum. So, I decided to put it all in one area, so that I could reference it in the future, as the case comes up!

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I just want you all to know that maybe you are not wrong and maybe you are 100% correct. Maybe I am the one in error, I don't know.

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I'm not sure what to make of this. First, above you say you will not be swayed, that you "know" the truth...then you say this. They contradict one another. In other words, you are full of s**t! I do expect you to corrigate your illogic here.

That may be harsh, but Gideon, you can't have it both ways! Either, you stop speaking in absolutes (and follow this line of thought - "I could be wrong") or you leave such remarks be.

The evidence is overwhelming, that the Bible can't be taken literally. Just one mistake, and it is wrong. I have already demonstrated mistakes in your logic (the snake, for example, is a carnivore - yet you say that the animals on the Ark were all herbivores.) There are other examples...like the fallacy of the gaots and their colors being decided by some sticks in the ground...we know that is not true. Thus, these cannot be the literal words of "god", otherwise it is wrong!

The truth is, you will NEVER be able to answer all my points, without referring to the old "god did it" - which is not a valid arguement, because it cannot be falsified.

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becasue it was prayed about.

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and what does that have to do with anything???

Because you expressed that you wanted this peron to get better, and they did, it's a "godly miracle"? c'mon, man....

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Gideon wrote:

Seriously, though, it is actually a "Godly" miracle (at least the one I am refering to) becasue it was prayed about. It wasn't just spontaneous, and happened, then we said "Praise God!" We said "Praise God" because we knew it was Him and not some other "supernatural force."

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1) So people prayed for the guy to recover, then he spontaneously recovered by whatever means, so therefore God saved him.

2) You knew it was Him because that is what is ingrained in you by your religious training as you were growing up, not because of any facts that this was so.

Oops, I forgot, everything else in life we require facts to believe, but God we are supposed to just believe in because someone wrote some stories and parables a few thousand years ago to explain things that they couldn't explain otherwise.