Evidence for creationism

[Chukchi Husky]

I'm sorry.

 

[_random_]

I'm sorry.

No worries. You were misinformed, and you spread misinformation on the internet. Now that you know that your source was incorrect, you can refrain from bringing it up in the future.

 

[Brian Shanahan]

I'm sorry.

Don't be, just be a lot more sceptical about what other people tell you (including me). We all get it wrong sometimes, even when we are certain we're right.

The whole line of "Blessed is he who has not seen and yet believes..." is probably the most evil line ever written, as it allows for unquestioning obedience without thinking, which is always bad.

 

[Chukchi Husky]

It seems like everything I find out ends up being completely wrong and I get in trouble for it.

 

[carlosMM]

It seems like everything I find out ends up being completely wrong and I get in trouble for it.

Trouble?
What trouble?

Hey, you think you have good info, it turns out to be bad info, you now know more.

 

[Arakhor]

If everything you ever find out is untrue, then yes, this might be the case. I suggest actually doing some factual research next time.

 

[Chukchi Husky]

Any research that I attempt ends up being wrong.

 

[cardgame]

you must be using yahoo

/rimshot

 

[Brian Shanahan]

Any research that I attempt ends up being wrong.

Probably because you're doing all your research at the University of Someone in The Pub Told Me, followed by confirmation in the Institute of Well Everybody Knows That... (more Discworld references).
The main point is that you listen to hearsay, and self-referential arguements, which are always bad for finding out the truth, as they don't ever change the conclusion to fit the evidence, they change the evidence to fit the conclusion.

 

[Tacitusitis]

It says near the end that even if it did happen, then there would be no way of knowing because there is no frame of reference.

Trust me dude! We would know!

If the earth stopped rotating:

First, every object not carefully nailed down to the ground would go flying tangentially eastward along the earth's surface at a speed equal to ~1000mph times the cosine of latitude. So the Mediterranean Sea would form an approximately 800mph tsunami (faster than the speed of sound) rushing eastward over the Middle East. Kind of overkill for Joshua's enemies!

Second, the Earth's rotation stores energy of 2.14x10^29 J. If the Earth stopped rotating all that energy would be released as heat. Some quick calculations show that this is equivalent to dropping 2.853x10^15 copies (three million billion) of the Hiroshima bomb.

I think it's safe to say that the earth stopping, or even slowing down for a day, would be an extinction level event for all life on the planet.

While it's a fun story, the chain email of people at NASA finding a missing day is a good example of people once again "Lying For Jesus."

 

[Chukchi Husky]

Probably because you're doing all your research at the University of Someone in The Pub Told Me, followed by confirmation in the Institute of Well Everybody Knows That... (more Discworld references).
The main point is that you listen to hearsay, and self-referential arguements, which are always bad for finding out the truth, as they don't ever change the conclusion to fit the evidence, they change the evidence to fit the conclusion.

There was one time that I used to read reference books, but then I was told that they were all wrong.

 

[Haseri]

By who? And what did these reference books say?

 

[Chukchi Husky]

The books were mostly basic things about history and science. I had one book about evolution and another on physics. Most of those books I don't have anymore.

 

[Haseri]

Right. Well, like a book, one should be sceptical of what other people say, and you should never be afraid to doubt what is in front of you.

You don't even have to believe what we are saying, but if you do decide to do that, go and look at some other sources. Nothing is Gospel.

 

[Tacitusitis]

Nothing is Gospel.

Well, except...

 

[Berzerker]

I backed it up right in the next part of that post... of course if you fly off the handle and reply to my post without reading the whole thing then you might miss that...

I read your post, it was hypocritical BS without any reference to the science I cited in support of Genesis.

You are wrong twice.

1: Democritus believed in a flat earth as attested in Aristotle's On The Heavens.

2: Plato believed in a spherical earth as attested in his dialogues Phaedo and Timaeus. Although Pythagoras had come up with the idea earlier, Plato and his student Aristotle were the main popularizers of the notion that the earth was spherical.

You got a quote or did he "imply" that too? Popularizing doesn't mean Plato (or Pythagorus and Aristotle) invented the idea... Long before Plato showed up peoples all over the world were sailing the seas...without falling off the edge. To even suggest ancient mariners were ignorant they were on a globe is laughable.

Before this time, in the era in which Genesis was written, the notion of the earth as flat was simply taken as a given. Prove me wrong with a citation from ancient texts or stop talking about what you don't understand.

Yes it does. This part of the Genesis narrative comes from the Egyptian creation myth which speaks of a primordial mound, the first dry land, rising out of cosmic waters.

I already gave you a link to a cylinder seal and you ignored it... Abraham was a Sumerian, not an Egyptian. And no, Genesis 1:9-10 does not say the "Earth" was flat, it says it became "dry". And thats what happened, plate tectonics built the continents and that process began soon after an intense bombardment 4 bya. But the Hebrews and Egyptians were not alone, much of the world's creation myths say the Creator produced the land from a water covered world.

The earth's flatness is clearly implied throughout the narrative by the presence of a domed firmament. If the earth were spherical, half of it would have no sky.

The Egyptians, Hebrews, and Babylonians all believed in this cosmology. There was no competing idea that would have necessitated the author to clarify that he believed in X as opposed to Y. The author saw no more need to make the earth's flatness explicit than he saw a need to make the sky's blueness explicit.

The narrative is one sentence and a "domed" firmament says nothing about the shape of the world. You said the word "flat" was used to describe the Earth, but now the author saw no need to mention it? You're adding words to the text and accusing me of cherry picking.

Science tells us the opposite of Genesis in nearly every line. Do you really want to analyze the text and compare it to scientific findings? Let's start with the problematic cosmology. Flat earth, domed vault sky, both wrong.

I already did, you ignored my analysis and accused me of cherry picking "non-science-ness". Neither Heaven nor Earth are defined as a domed vault sky or flat. The "heavens" became synomynous with the sky but that aint Heaven...

The dry land arose out of water - wrong.

The sky separates "water from water" - wrong.

The first life was land plants - wrong.

You never heard of plate tectonics? And no, the Heaven separated the waters above from the waters below. The Heaven is in the sky, but it aint the sky (or the universe). And I didn't mention plants, I'm dealing with the first 10 verses that describe the creation of Heaven and Earth.

Genesis 7:11, Genesis 8:2, Job 37:18.

Once again, this was not a theory or hypothesis among the ancient Hebrews. It was received, standard, accepted, given knowledge, that is referred to tangentially in the same way that the Bible only tangentially confirms that things fall vertically to the ground when not held up by something.

You're cherry picking again and you aint even using the right verses. I didn't say everything in the Bible is scientifically accurate, I said our current science supports the creation story of Heaven and Earth in Gen 1:1-10.

This is a circular argument. You know there is no literal firmament, hence the Bible must not literally mean a firmament... because the Bible is scientifically right... then you go on to cite the text to show how much the ancient Hebrews knew

Calling a "window" in the sky a metaphor is a circular argument?

None of this word salad contests my point.

There is evidence the Hebrews were technologically inferior to neighboring civilizations through the Bronze and Iron Ages. Hence it is a safe inference that their knowledge of science at the very best extended no further than their contemporaries... that inference is then backed up in spades by their version of cosmology evident in the Tanakh.

The creation story in Genesis is a condensed and modified version of Mesopotamian cosmology. It doesn't matter if they knew anything about science or the world around them. If you want a more detailed version that describes the solar system (and check it against that cylinder seal) you can google the Enuma Elish and see what the Sumerians and Akkadians etc said about creation. Or not, seems you've already made up your mind its all nonsense.

You claim that Genesis is talking about a spherical earth, planetary collisions, and plate tectonics?

You should stick with less stupid and more believable notions, like the idea that Moses invented the jetski.

I didn't say Genesis refers to a spherical (or flat) Earth, I've repeatedly said the Earth is the name God gave to the "dry land" when it appeared from under the waters. And how did the dry land appear? Plate tectonics built the continents. Thats what the science says... Please dont speak for me any more, all I see are insults based on strawmen.

... the story of Joshua is a myth and didn't happen. It's like saying "Hercules passed around the stories of the ancient people"

Myth or not, those words are attributed to him and Abram was a Sumerian (maybe he's a myth too) so their fathers did live in the land of the 2 rivers, according to the author anyway.

 

[El_Machinae]

If Joshua was a myth, and the exodus was a myth, why would you think that Abraham was real?

 

[Arakhor]

You also still haven't proven how modern science at all proves the first ten verses of Genesis 1.

 

[Tacitusitis]

Berzy, that post didn't contain much. For example instead of citing a source earlier than Plato and Aristotle for the earth as a globe, you just rely on an argument from incredulity. That's not good enough in a debate.

You continue to contradict key findings of Old Testament scholarship, such as that the Tanakh was written after the Exodus and hence influenced by Egyptian myth (Abraham's nationality is irrelevant as he was already, if he ever existed, a mythic figure when Genesis was written); and that the firmament of Genesis, Job, Ezekial and Isaiah refers to the same cosmological concept - a real, physical, solid firmament - as found in contemporary surrounding myth.

As well, you just keep on going with that "dry land arising out of water = plate tectonics" idea. I think this is the third time I'm repeating this: the scientific finding is the opposite, the oceans condensed on a cooling, molten earth. But you will keep on with "your version" of science because it's the one that you imagine reifies your Biblical worldview.

Finally by denying a discussion of the rest of the first chapter of Genesis, you're basically admitting you will only defend the text insofar as you can make up a scientific "just-so" story (a story that is itself, apparently unknown to you, riddled with science errors)... and you can't think of anything to excuse the obvious errors of Gen 1:11-31?

Your writing embarrasses both theology and science.

 

[Veritass]

All interesting discussions, but is ANYBODY going to post EVIDENCE FOR CREATIONISM?