Re: Will Creationists Admit They Are Wrong and Apologise?
Posted: Fri May 06, 2011 2:28 am
by Legatus
A reply to the original poster at the top here.
What does the bible ACTUALLY say about the creation of life? Is the problem that people are taking the bible too literaly, or that they are, in fact, not taking it literally enough, and, rather than reading every word and eccepting only what it actually says, and also noting what it DOES NOT SAY, rather than reading something into it not stated? So lets look at it with exact literalness, as if, as it states, every jot and titel were exact.
"Gen 1:11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass" etc.
What it does NOT say: It does not say HOW God did this, no method is specified or denied, thus, up to this point, evolution is allowed. It most specifically does NOT say that God made plants from nothing, or fashioned them from clay and breathed life into them, or anything else. It does NOT say whether they started out very simple and later became more complex, or how long it took to get to all the more advanced plants we have today, and it does NOT say how long it took to get there. It should be noted, that the bible was written to humans, who live during the breif period that humans have lived on this earth, which both the bible and science say is shorter than the total time the earth has been here. Thus the bible speaks of that plants we know on land where we live, and does not go into any great detail of exactly how long it took to get to the plants we know, or speak of plants in the sea, especially not microscopically small ones which most people throughout history who read the bible would not have a clue about anyway. Conclusion, from what the bible does not say, it does not deny evolution.
What it DOES say: It says God and THE EARTH. In other words, it says God did it, but by an EARTHLY, ie natural, as in natural laws, method. As you see above, it does NOT state that it was a miricle, a breaking of natural laws, instead, it specifically states that it WAS natural, "earthly".The bible also says "Rom 1:19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. Rom 1:20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." The bible says, therefore, that "from the beginning" evidence for God can be "clearly seen" " from what has been made". What kind of evidence would there be if plants were made from nothing, a breaking of natural law, a miricle, answer, none. The bible states that there IS evidence that proves God, therefor, it cannot be a miricle, which leaves no evidence, being from nothing, and there being no witnesses.
In short, genesis, and Romans, do not deny evolution, in fact, they demand it.
That only leaves one teeny tiny little problem...science. Science so far has totally failed to discover how life evolved from non living matter. In fact, to get life from random chance so far has proven so improbable that it cannot happen in this universe ot any other. But having something so statistically improbable as to be impossible happen anyway may not seem so strange when you realise that the creation of this universe is exactly the same, it obviously happened, yet has now been shown to be statistically impossible. The bible, reading it with COMPLETE literelness, states that the universe had a beginning, and that it expanded, which we now call the big bang. Currently, the chances of having any such bang create a universe with the properties we see is so extremely small that scienctists who wish there to be no god have invented the fantasy of an infinite number of universes, I say fantasy because there is exactly zip zilch zero nada evidence of any of these other universes. Scientists thus have at least an excuse, although an unproven and rather thin one (it's really nothing more than a lot of hand waving), with their infinite universes, but the problem of life from non living matter is vastly harder, so many complex things must happen in one place at one time in exactly the right sequence for life to happen that it may even be harder that the big bang problem, and there IS NOT either infinite time, only a few billion years tops, and certainly not infinite space, being limited only to this one small planet. Thus, when you look at scientists description of life from non living matter, they can tell you far less than they can about the big bang, they cannot even tell you what this life was like or how it happened, all they can say is "it happened", without ever being able to tell you what IT IS.
Conclusion, for this universe to come out of the big bang like it did is so improbable as to be impossible, yet it happened anyway, without breaking any natural laws (such as they were back then). It lookes like an infinatly intelligent being did it, not by random chance, but by skill, by dreaming up an infinite number of possible universes, and creating the one that actually works as desired, an act of infinite finess. If you can do such a thing by pure skill, why not do it again? Thus, the problem of creating life from non living matter without breaking natural laws is not a problem of time and chance, but of pure raw skill.
Imagine, if you will, a man. he stands in a football field with a barrel next to him full of coins, all with heads on one side and tails on the other. He flips these coins, one after another, high into the air. They land and roll and bounce around, and then always land heads up. And oh yes, when he has emtied the barrel, they for a picture of the mona lisa. If you can imagine the skill it would take to do this, how you would have to be able to obsorve each and every force on each coint in both time and space, observing them from a vantage point outside of this univers so that your observation would not change those forces, and also imagine the infinite intelligence it would take to imagine all possible forces on those coints (including the force of your thumb) so as to see exactly how and when to toss each coin, you can begin to see the sort of idea I mean. I would call this a NATURAL MIRICLE, where no natural laws are broken, yet something happens that cannot happen randomly, but MUST be planned if it is to happen at all. Basically, God took that barrel of coins (it may be a very BIG barrel), of different colored head or tails coins, thew them "up" at the start of this universe, they bounced and rolled around for billions of years, and not by chance, but by skill, all arrive at one place at one time, land heads up, and form a picture of the mona lisa. That is pretty much what MUST happen for life to arrive from non living matter, the 'heads or tails" part being literally true when it comes to left handed amino acids, which if created by random chance come out half left handed and half right handed, just like coins come out heads or tails. The mona lisa part is there because you must not only get these acids and many other complex and often very rare naturally chemicals to arrive all in one place at one time, but you must also somehow get them all conected to each other exactly right. They must also have DNA (or equivilent) WITH the proper encoding on it, otherwise, this thing will just die eventually, leaving no offspring, and that will be the end of that.
This idea came, first, when I looked at how the big bang to a universe like this one is so very improbable, yet it obviously happened anyway. I then ask myself the question, if you can do that once, why can't you do it again? The second question is, if you can walk on water, and thus break natural law, and can feed thousands from a few loves and fish, and thus create matter from nothing, if you are going to create life, why take billions and billions of years to do it when you could do it instantly? This is the problem of the current crop of "theistic evolution", since it cannot happen by random chance, they say that God reaches down and "cheats", breaks natural law, and changes stuff. But why do it that way, and over such a long period of time, something that you could do instantly? Thats just silly. You could, if you are God, instead, say, aim a cosmic ray to arrive at just the right place and time to create the desired mutation, planning that so that, when you first create the universe, you plan that ray to be created and to travel and arrive just so. You should also see another possible reason why God might do these things entirely using natural laws and pure skill, frankly, for a God who can do it easily by breaking natural law, cheating and doing so is simply too easy. Breaking natural laws would be like cheating at a game, would you really feel a sence of accomplishment if you cheated. But, now, doing it WITHIN the rules, now THAT shows real SKILL. Thus, God may have chosen to do it without breaking natural laws simply because it gave him more artistic pleasure.
But wait, there's more! God doesn't just stop there, specifying that it was an EARTHLY process, but just to make sure we don't miss it, he goes on to describe, from the start, the big bang, planetery formation, formation of a stable atmosephere and water system, continental formation, then life starting with plants, only then fish (starting with tribolites) and birds (starting with dinosaurs), then other animals, and finally man, all in what we now know is the correct order from the fossil record. If the bible is not being exactly literal here, how would this very old, pre science book get all this right. Especially, how would it get even the parts that ancient man cound not possibly now about, such as an expanding universe, continental formation, etc? That sure don't sound "mythical" to me. In short, this shows that this part of the bible, the first two chapters of Genesis at the very least, MUST bew taken literally, because comparing it to known science shows that it IS, in fact, all ltierally true.
Finally, you might ask, what about mankind? if we stop at Genesis the first chapter, mankind could be said to have evolved, however, it goes on to chapter two. There, it specifies a very specific, definatly non natural creation of first Adam and then Eve. This makes sense when you think about it, if sentient creatures are given souls that can live with God forever, what do you do with half sentient creatures? This problem "forced" God to "cheat".
Conclusion, YOU ARE RIGHT, creationists SHOULD apologise, not only to man, but also to God. They DID have poor theology and poor science, for the theology all that is really needed to do is ONLY read EXACTLY what it says, and most especially NOT add in any idea that it does NOT say. The last few chapters of revelations specify penalties for adding to or subtracting form scripture, they should have read them.
Second conclusion, YOU ARE WRONG, Genesis is not "mythical", the problem is NOT that it was interpreted too literally, but that it was not interpreted literally enough, or with a comparison of what it exactly (NO MORE AND NO LESS) actually says with current, modern, and especially verified by the scientific method science (the verified part is a smaller subsection of evolution, especially when we get to the creation of life from non living matter, where mostly the "sceience" has actually been falsified, or at the very least not even close to verified). The current "creationism" is bad theology, it adds to and subtracts from what the bible does say. "Rev 22:18 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. Rev 22:19 And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book." In addition, when the Gen record talks of scientifically verified things, like the big bang, formation of a stable atmosephere and water system, continental formation, and evolution in exactly the right order, does that sound like "mythical" to you? So, now, you say that evolution is mythical? Make up your mind! Don't sound like myth to me, sounds like science.
To most or all everyone else here besides the original poster, you may not like this idea. Ask yourself though, is this what the bible says? Can you show that it is not what the bible says? Could I see the exact words in the bible that prove this? Can you tell me exactly how evolution can happen if there is no god? You have already eccepted the idea that the big bang cannot produce a universe like this by pure random chance (at least, if you have kept up with the science at all), if the impossible (by random chance) happened anyway because of God, could that same idea, substituting God for impossible random chance also be true of evolution? If God did it once, what is to stop him from doing it again? If God started out doing things that way, doesn't it seem likely that he would continue to do so, since that is seen as his preferred method of doing it? If you say "evolution is impossible", I ask, is anything impossble with God? Could both the Intelligent design people, who can pretty much prove scinetifically (at least from life from non living matter) that it can't happen BY RANDOM CHANCE be right, AND the evolutionists be right that it happened anyway (even if, on the life from non life part, they have no clue how)? They both seem to have a lot of evidence to back them up, do you care about evidence? What does Romans say about that evidence (see above)?
Or do you wish to hang on to the idea 'evolution is evil", because it gives you a great feeling being better than "those evil, godless evolutionists"? Is that what christianity is about, being better than others? Isn't the central idea of christianity that you are a sinner just like those "evil godless evolutionists", which means that the only real way you get to heaven is, not by being better than "those evil godless evolutionists" but by being forgiven? Isn't that idea, that you are better than those others over there, in fact, the EXACT OPPOSITE of everything that christianity is about? Do you think this feeling of superiority over those people over there comes from God? If not, where does it come from? Do you enjoy it? Should you?
And how has this creationist idea been for the cause of Christ anyway? Has it not brought great disrepute on the name of Christ, making christians look (and often act) like ignorant, unscientific boobs? Are not many saying "those christians are still living in the dark ages"? Have they not been relegated to the status of a kooky minority because of their "rejection of science"? "Be on guard against giving interpretations of Scripture that are farfetched or opposed to science, and so exposing the Word of God to the ridicule of unbelievers." St. Augustine. Has it not caused many christians to give up on science, and kept christians from becomeing scientists, where they could actually FIND the evidence that Romans says is there for God and his attributes? If God actually did it using evolution, might christian scientists be able to find out how, and tell others, and show them the evidnece, thus fulfilling the great commision, and giving them a REASON for the hope within them? Has it not casued many christians to withdraw from the world, and wall themselves in little enclaves seperate from the world, and thus no longer interact with it? Then what about the great commision? The bible says you should be not of this world, but it also says you should be IN IT, if you wall yourself off, are you not no longer in it?
Or do you think that the idea of turning it from a miricle to a natural process is wrong. What, walking on water, feeding thousands from a few loves and fish, healing the sick, curing the blind, and even rasing others and even himself from the dead was not enough? Even when it was done in the presence of mutiple witnesses, sometimes thousands, some of whome were hostile to him and still admitted he did miricles in records we can see to this day (see the essenes)? I mean really, WHAT DO YOU WANT? How many miricles are enough for you? Why must you insist on miricles that no one ever saw whan you have ones that mutiples saw? And, scientifically speaking, how is the impossible happening, like evolution from non living matter, NOT a miricle, even if it does not break natural law? How is it not an even greater miricle if God does it "the hard way", sticking to the natural laws rather than 'cheating"?
Or do you think that your christian friends will disown you and shun you if you dare to go against the prevailing idea of not being one of those "evil godless evolutionists"? Does it matter? Should it? Were the prophets popular? What about the apostles? What about Jesus? Did everyone agree with Martin Luther when he started the Great Reformation? What do you think of him now? If Martin Luthor were around today, would you be for or against him? Are you sure about that? Is it time for another Great Reformation?
I think it is time for this site to change it's spots, at least about evolution. If it is what both the bible AND science says, why not? And what will happen to all those "evil godless evolutionists" when they suddenly discover that they have changed sides? Now won't THAT be a fine kettle of fish!
Well, I've thrown the idea out there. if you can show me, BIBLICALLY why it is wrong, go for it. If not, but you reject it anyway, exactly what are you rejecting, and why?
As far as I'm aware I was merely making mention of the fact that sola scriptura requires us to be more diligent when it comes to reading scripture. Removing an infallible church authority from the equation means that no single human authority can prescribe the correct interpretation. I don't see a major problem with this rather obvious and inevitable outcome, since it seems that on all the essential matters, like the doctrines of justification by faith alone and the supreme authority of scripture, Protestants are by and large in agreement. I'd say that these fallible Christians have done a splendid job in unlocking the scriptures. But I'm not sure a fresh discussion is required from these commnents.