Evidence for creationism

[Tani Coyote]

While I'm eager to continue discussing this topic, I'd propose taking it to this thread, which was made to discuss the nature of God: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=395536

Testing people and torturing them forever if they fail isn't ethical or loving. It's psychotic.

My perception of God is not anything like that though, so this is irrelevant. I think Purgatory is more accurate to what God would have in terms of punishment.

Most people would be punished, but like criminals on the mortal plane, be given a chance to redeem themselves at the end.

Only the most evil, incapable of any form of penance would be sealed away forever.

Then what, pray tell, of the freedom of all the people in the Bible he "stepped in" for all the time?

The God I refer to is not bound to any religious faith; it's moreso a name used for convenience, but it has nothing to do with the Bible.

Where do you get this idea of god having a fetish for free will.

My mother's not religious, but her mother is, and so she remembers it all. My grandmother is Pentecostal, and I assume they teach the importance of free will in God's plan. My mother often answers many of the same questions you would pose - when I pose them - with "free will." It's the answer to "why doesn't God intervene in the horrors of the world?" and "Why does God allow Satan to tempt man?", etc.

God, or whatever you wish to call him, placing free will above almost everything makes logical sense if one thinks about it. If the supreme diety is like a parent, he is firm - hence his punishments - but at the same time, and only wants the best for his child - hence his guidance. But, he also wants them to be free.

God gives the power to choose, and the choices to choose from.

This principle on which you seem to base your theology appears to the outside observer to be entirely made up.

Sure, maybe it's not in any major religious dogma. But all major faiths were small at one time and all began with one preacher.

I came to my theories on the divine through independent thinking and reading of other ideas. I think taking in information from a variety of sources and coming to your own conclusions and ideas is a very important thing.

But then he doesn't know everything, and therefore is not God.

He does know everything in a way - he knows all that could possibly happen, what is happening, and what has happened.

There's also the whole idea that maybe God isn't 100% perfect. Maybe there's not even just one! Maybe there's multiple?

I'm not a Christian, nor am I religious and/or dogmatic.

Unconditional love? Have you ever even READ the old testament?

No. I'm not Christian. Maybe I have Christian influences, but I don't read the Bible.

I also think that if the Judeo-Christian God is real, most incidents described are metaphorical and not literal.

So imprisoning SaTan and his demons and imps to a burning prison called Hell isn't punishment enough?

I say God merely for convenience; I don't mean the bipolar celestial dictator that some Christians throw out.

I think Hell would only exist for people being unable to repent, such as those who are so evil to the core they can't even try to be good. I imagine it's more like a sentence of x number of years rather than afterlife imprisonment. You do your time, and are given a chance to repent.

 

[kill fire]

He does know everything in a way - he knows all that could possibly happen, what is happening, and what has happened.

But if he doesn't know which one will be the one that actually happens, then he doesn't know everything.

There's also the whole idea that maybe God isn't 100% perfect. Maybe there's not even just one! Maybe there's multiple?

Fair enough. I've always said if there's a God he's probably either incompetent or sadistic. But to the best of my knowledge the traditional Christian God is supposed to be perfect in every way, and be the only God, and that's the theory I was referring to.

 

[Smidlee]

eg, arguing from ignorance. That phrase doesn't mean you're standing around talking out your backside, but that you are pointing to things without adequate explanation and saying, "that couldn't happen by natural occurrences, ergo god" That's a dreadful view of the world as it stymies any new thought. Why try and understand why bacteria develop resistances to antibiotics? The answer is obviously because god wants them to.

Again stating what we do know and what we don't is not argument from ignorance. Saying "scientist so far haven't figured out how to turn off gravity" is not the same as saying "scientist will never learn how to turn off gravity."
I proclaiming what we know so far. What we don't know is anyone guess.
When scientist uses the "unknown" as a defense it reveal they are shooting in the dark hoping to hit something.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Doing a parabolic dive turns off gravity...

 

[kill fire]

Again stating what we do know and what we don't is not argument from ignorance. Saying "scientist so far haven't figured out how to turn off gravity" is not the same as saying "scientist will never learn how to turn off gravity."
I proclaiming what we know so far. What we don't know is anyone guess.

Technically we know nothing so far, as certainty is impossible.

 

[emzie]

Again stating what we do know and what we don't is not argument from ignorance. Saying "scientist so far haven't figured out how to turn off gravity" is not the same as saying "scientist will never learn how to turn off gravity."
I proclaiming what we know so far. What we don't know is anyone guess.
When scientist uses the "unknown" as a defense it reveal they are shooting in the dark hoping to hit something.

Yes it is! You are saying X isn't explained and then are using the unexplained nature of X as evidence against the theory of evolution! That's not how falsification works!

Doing a parabolic dive turns off gravity...

No more than flying an airplane turns off gravity.

 

[Smidlee]

Yes it is! You are saying X isn't explained and then are using the unexplained nature of X as evidence against the theory of evolution! That's not how falsification works!

If the unexplained X is contradicting evidence than it should be used against the theory. If contradicting evidence is not allowed to be used against a theory then it's unfalsifiable. Evolution is having trouble explaining all the contradictions and tries to use both "A" and "not-A" as evidence.

 

[Traitorfish]

If the unexplained X is contradicting evidence than it should be used against the theory. If contradicting evidence is not allowed to be used against a theory then it's unfalsifiable.

Absence of evidence is not evidence itself, and so cannot form part of a contradiction.

 

[Arakhor]

I know it's fashionable to conflate "anti-evolutionism" and creationism. I assume that's because a 6,000 year-old Earth completely defies any attempt at geological, biological or physical theory?

 

[ParkCungHee]

Yes, I never understood why refutation of Darwinian Evolution wouldn't cause us to fall back on Lamarkian Evolution.

 

[Seon]

Yes, I never understood why refutation of Darwinian Evolution wouldn't cause us to fall back on Lamarkian Evolution.

Because that would go against all we know about genetics?

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Crap, nevermind.

 

[El_Machinae]

According to 2 Peter 2:4: "God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into chains of darkness to be held for judgment."

That's right, chains and prisons ... for them. No iron fortresses, no fiery thrones, no mention of Satan ruling the cell block ... all of that is from the Bible's extended universe and fan fiction."

2 Peter has no input on the debate. I was written by someone impersonating Paul. We know that 2 Peter has no insight into the nature of reality, because it makes a classic mistake in assuming that Adam, Eve, and Noah were real history.

 

[Akka]

Whether passive or active, this temptation just shows God being willing to respect free will

No, free will is letting people making their own informed decision, not trying to trip them down and punish them for it if they do. Get your logic straight.

He'd interfere with freedom of action if he stepped in all the time.

If he's created the world, he created the need to prey on each other, so you, again, fail at logic.

Minor mutations over time is not enough for evolution to work. Instead massive improbable mutations are necessary for life forms to change and to exist in the first place. The ATP synphesis is a very complex miniscule protein motor in every cell that generates energy for the cell. It is totally implausible that mutations could have formed this protein motor and then replicated it in every cell, much too complex for it to be mathematically possible, yet life cannot exist without it. It is the complexity of the inner cell workings that are the best evidence for a designer and therefore for creationism.

Have a look at the video posted before, it perfectly illustrate how simple rules ends up making complex mechanisms.
Saying it's not possible shows only the narrow limit of your understanding, nothing more.

You have to believe by faith since the only known physical life known to man requires today's laws of physics.

Sorry to disappoint, but common sense and logical deduction don't require faith. On the contrary, faith gets in the way.

This is the problem ToE has always been too simple to explain the complexities of life. Also the point of the video was the watch example was a straw man just like your "wooden fence" was a straw man above.

No, it's the simplified illustration of a concept - as said again, only the narrow limits of your understanding prevent you from getting the bigger picture.

Again so far studies have not proven time is on evolution side.

Yes they did, but your faith gets in the way of your acceptance. You can't show to someone who refuse to see. Facts are here, if you're too blind to accept them, your loss.

 

[ParkCungHee]

2 Peter has no input on the debate. I was written by someone impersonating Paul. We know that 2 Peter has no insight into the nature of reality, because it makes a classic mistake in assuming that Adam, Eve, and Noah were real history.

Okay, so then you have no reference to Satan being hell, much less sadistically torturing people there.

 

[Arakhor]

Hell was an invention of the Catholic church, not the Bible.

 

[El_Machinae]

Okay, so then you have no reference to Satan being hell, much less sadistically torturing people there.

Huh. Funny that. It's almost as if the mythology being taught to children is a house of cards built upon bad scholarship.

Now, whose fault is it that these kids are being taught this groundless mythology?

 

[ParkCungHee]

Huh. Funny that. It's almost as if the mythology being taught to children is a house of cards built upon bad scholarship.

Now, whose fault is it that these kids are being taught this groundless mythology?

People who are extremely lazy while reading Dante and Milton.

 

[MobBoss]

2 Peter has no input on the debate. I was written by someone impersonating Paul. We know that 2 Peter has no insight into the nature of reality, because it makes a classic mistake in assuming that Adam, Eve, and Noah were real history.

/oh brother.

I would appreciate it if you would ease up on referring to my faith largely as 'mythology'. As a practicing christian, its more than a little insulting to me to be honest. Its gotten to the point that even though I am not a biblical literalist, its crossing the line. Give it a break.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

2 Peter has no input on the debate. I was written by someone impersonating Paul. We know that 2 Peter has no insight into the nature of reality, because it makes a classic mistake in assuming that Adam, Eve, and Noah were real history.

Don't you mean someone impersonating Peter?

It is thought my many experts that 2 Peter and Jude are have the same author, probably at least a century after the Apostle's death. These are the 2 most dubious books in the canon of the New Testament, which were omitted by some church fathers and criticized for containing false doctrine by others.

The verse in question is the only place in the bible using the term Tartaroo, a corruption of the Greek Tartarus, the place below Hades where Zeus imprisoned the Titans and the worst of all human sinners for torment. Tartarus is very much the model of the common conception of hell, but seems to have no parallel in Jewish or early christian thought. The most common term for hell remains Hades, which is more literally just The Grave, or the state of not being alive. It is a morally neutral place to which both sinners and saints go while they await the resurrection. The other term is Gehenna, the landfill of Jerusalem where incinerators were constantly burning trash, which seems symbolic of annihilation rather than torment.

Also, the angels in question here are believed by many to be those that Jewish folk lore taught mated with human women before the flood and produced giants as offspring. This was to many Jews and alternate myth explaining the origin of evil, linking good with genetic purity and excusing genocide of certain peoples based on the claim of their demonic ancestry. The view requires that angels be able to marry and father children, which directly contradicts the words of Christ.