inconsistent Creationists

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Lol yes and I've made that comparison too. I was debating a Creationist named Kay in comments to A Different Kind of Blog two or three years ago and started calling her "The Black Knight." The founder(s?) of the blog later decided to ban religious discussion (it mainly being a political blog), and it seems comments to the blog then died. It seems very difficult to separate one's religious or spiritual beliefs from one's politics, which makes sense to me.

I have been invited (more than once) to contribute articles to that blog, and my web site is on their blog roll (last time I checked it was still there), which is an honor because it is a good blog with contributing editors of differing (and conflicting!) political and religious beliefs. It just seems it used to be a lot more happening place before the ban on mentioning religion kicked in (they do have a separate blog for religious discussion). Apparently some of the regulars have since moved their debating to The Huffington Post instead.

You know what's REALLY funny though? After I had made the comparison of Kay to Monty Python's Black Knight, I googled the term and found a creationist who was comparing evolutionists to The Black Knight. Denial runs deep!

was just gonna say..about that last point... they constantly project themselves onto the opposition. Saying evolution "is a fairytale for adults"as that apocalypic author said ( Hal Lindsey? I think that his name).

Or a certain PPR member who refuses to debate you unless you accept the premise that "evolution is on its deathbed in the intensive care ward". But in the same thread the same guy said "the Bible is not hard to believe"( a story that has talking snakes, the Sun standing still in the sky, and dudes living to be 900 is NOT hard to believe).

At least that funny guy in that film clip about the museum tour freely admited "that we do have some problems (like humans and dinosaurs never being in the same strata)". Ill give that guy points for honesty.

Lol!

Wrong....again. Burden of proof is held by the one who makes the fantastic claim. You claim that there is a non-physical world...YOU prove it...I make no such claim as observation does not suggest its existence. Don't lecture us on what is or is not Science.

But exactly what is a "fantastic claim"? To me, a world without God is an extraordinarily delusional idea. To me, understanding that God exists is just good sense. YOU bear the burden of convincing me otherwise.

'Just good sense' doesn't cut it in the scientific community. Empirical evidence is required. Creationists don't submit hypotheses that can be tested, don't accept the results of testing when it does occur, and won't submit to peer review outside of their own circles. Their science is, therefore, invalid until or unless they're willing to stand up to the rigors of the scientific method.

It all comes down to evidence. 'Fantastic' claims are claims made without evidence to back them up. If evidence is found, it stops being a fantastic claim and starts becoming a testable statement. Otherwise, it's in the same category as pyramid power, psychic dolphins and Elvis being alive - bunk.

It does more than you'd like to admit, though. For example, at some point, someone had to make some determination as to the "what" and "how" of research and experimentation methodology.


How did someone arrive at this conclusion? Is this an idea that can be empirically tested?


OK, fine, then that just means that what they're doing isn't scientific. Big deal. Just because it ain't "science" doesn't mean it ain't true. Lots of things are beyond the scope of empiricism to test; that does not negate their existence.

One huge problem here is that creationism is specifically touted by Christians maintaining consistency with a Biblical worldview, particularly the idea that God created the heavens and the earth. That worldview includes the fall of man, the need for atonement, and the remedy for sin's consequences. What you're basically saying is that things like that have to be empirically tested before we're allowed to trust in them. When you consider the consequences for failing to believe, eternal separation from God and ensuing torment are simply not worth a lifetime of waiting for unbelievers to finally coming around to the idea that what we already know is true.


You mean like an empty tomb? Yeah, we have that. You mean like people who were there and wrote down what they saw and experienced? Yeah, we have that, too. The statement "God created the heavens and the earth" is a testable one: the heavens and the earth DO exist. If God created the heavens and the earth, then the creation is evidence of a creator. Therefore, the idea that God doesn't exist is not a scientific idea...it is a theological one.


I see. So Christianity isn't fantastic. Very good. That's a relief.

So when are you going to provide testable evidence that there is no God?

Here's a thought: An idea can only be tested IF the idea is actually true. Suppose you have a covered bowl, and someone claims that there are no oranges in the bowl. All you'd have to do to test this claim is uncover the bowl.

But what about the opposite? Someone makes the claim that there are no oranges in the bowl, just as before, but, indeed, there really ARE oranges in the bowl. Can't you just go on insisting there are no oranges in the bowl? Of course you can! You just can't prove it. And you can't prove it not just because evidence seems to indicate otherwise...you can't prove it because it is false. You couldn't even claim "extraordinary claims..." because no amount of evidence, no matter how extraordinary, is going to prove something isn't there if it IS there.

You cannot disprove God's existence. The reason for that is God exists, and there is nothing fantastic or extraordinary about it. The claim that there is no God seems to me quite an extraordinary one. Evidence, please, unless you're willing to concede that the non-existence of God cannot be empirically tested.

Similarly I believe a pink fluffy unicorn lives in my kitchen cupboard. It can't be disproved. Besides I sometimes hear it scratching about in there at night and it sometimes steals small pieces of cheese. It can also do miracles because it makes little black currants appear from nowhere on the shelves! All hail the pink fluffy unicorn, the creator of all.

Whilst I generally agree with your point, you cannot ask for observations of something non-physical. That's analytically impossible to find, because we can only observe what is physical.

If there is to be a proof of God's existence, it must either be some physical manifestation (a booming voice, a burning bush), or a ratoonal argument. Rational arguments are perfectly valid. If I make the statement "all unmarried men are bachelors", I don't need any proof, because it is simple logic. Whilst I think a rational proof of God's existence would be much more complicated (Anselm's search for simple proofs was laughable), that is what is needed to prove that something non-physical exists, not empirical evidence.

In other words, science is not the only way of gaining knowledge about the world!

Years of this argument have gone by and still AngelRho has yet to present a single piece of evidence for God, instead asking everyone else to "disprove it". What a crock of s**t

There is loads of evidence for God, it's just none of the evidence contradicts mainstream science and we have more evidence for the BBT, evolution, etc. The existence of the cosmos in the first place is "evidence for God"- it's also evidence for the BBT, the idea that the universe hatched out of an egg, and so forth.

The existence of the cosmos is evidence for the existence of the cosmos.

Yes, it is. However, if the universe didn't exist then that would severely undermine the case for God, or at least the cosmological argument (ignoring the fact that there would be nobody to make the case )

If I propose the hypothesis "the universe was created by God"- well, yep, the universe exists. We can't say whether it had a beginning, whether it was created, or whether any creator was the Judeo-Christian God, but there is some evidence to support the hypothesis.

What evidence? Is there any way to experimentally verify this? How does the mere existence of the universe point to a guiding intelligence? Only people that require everything to have an intelligent cause think this, that does not count as evidence, merely inherent bias; humans are intelligent, and "do things". The universe is a "thing". Men did not make it, therefore someone else had to have "done it".

I cannot disprove the existence of God, nor do I want to. I'd like to believe in a God that loves us and has good plans for us. However, I KNOW the fundies are wrong about evolution because their lies are so easily found to be lies. Since they are so wrong about something so easily checked that has so much evidence showing they are wrong, I am much less likely to take their word on spiritual matters. Fool me once, shame on me etc.

I do not have omniscience and cannot absolutely say the fundies are wrong about evolution. Maybe Genesis IS an accurate account of God's creation. If so then, that would make GOD a liar for planting so much false evidence that falsifies that interpretation. So the fundies would still be wrong because they'd be asking us to worship a malicious prankster instead of a loving God.

What I can say absolutely is that so far in my decades of study, I have seen mountains of evidence for evolution and no evidence for the young earth creationist viewpoint. I have also seen young earth creationists make incredibly ignorant claims about the evidence for evolution that I *know* are false, and I've also seen them quote many scientists out of context in a blatantly dishonest (or incredibly stupid) way to make it look like they have support from the scientific community.

So AngelRho (and others), please explain to me how to reconcile this. How do I believe in a literal account of Genesis when all the evidence of the physical world says something different? How do I trust creationist sources about salvation when I catch them spreading lies and distortions, "quote mining", and showing abysmal ignorance of what evidence exists for evolution and how science works?

The existence of the universe is NOT evidence of the Christian God. Maybe it always existed. Maybe some another religion's God (or something unknown to humans) created it. It might not have been "created" in the first place, and even if it was, that does not automagically mean the Creator is the God of the Bible. I wrote more about this a few years ago in an essay on the Meaning of Life.

"The empty tomb" is not evidence either. There are many stories told by many different peoples. Just because a story is told doesn't make it true. Even if this is eyewitness testimony, what many Christians don't realize is that is the least reliable form of evidence. Twenty different people can see the same thing and give different and sometimes conflicting accounts of what they saw. Also, the Gospels were not written until decades after the supposed events took place, and there are no contemporary records outside the Bible of certain important events in the life of Jesus that should have been noted by historians of the time. So no, Christians do NOT have any evidence that Jesus even lived, much less that He is who He (or others) say He is. As for their lives being changed once they accept Christ, well, people are capable of incredible flights of fancy and delusion.

Maybe Christ is real. It might be nice if there really is a loving God looking out for humanity's best interests. But some of those who profess Christ the most also try to tell me things about the physical world that I know are false, and I catch them being either blatantly dishonest or incredibly stupid in how they present their arguments, so please, again, tell me, how do I reconcile this? Please....

Last edited by TheBicyclingGuitarist on 05 Aug 2012, 6:43 pm, edited 6 times in total.

You seem to be confusing "evidence" and "proof".

Mountains are "evidence" for the "shrivelled prune" model of the globe. They are also evidence for the (correct) model of continental drift. Other observations combine with the existence of mountains to prove that continental drift is right and "shrivelled prune" is wrong.

If a stranger breaks into the house tonight and stabs my parents with a knife from out kitchen, there will be loads of evidence that I did it- my fingerprints will probably be on the knife, my DNA will be all over the room. That doesn't mean I did it!

Does it matter? I'm a spiritual (not affiliated) person myself, so I do believe that there's a higher power. I don't however disbelieve evolution as a result. The Bible isn't part of my beliefs any longer, but even when it was I saw it as symbolic, allegorical, not literal truth. So even then the whole Creationism argument didn't make sense to me. I think, well of course everything is created. Including the order in the Universe that we explore via Science and are still trying to figure out. But I don't consider it necessary for anyone to believe in a higher power.

Science makes sense. Evolution makes sense. If something doesn't make sense to me, I pretty much dismiss it. I don't understand why you (the OP) waste so much of your time reading through materials that on the whole you don't agree with. And I've seen some of that kind of material, so I realize how mind-bending it can be, all the twisting and warping of facts to try to make them fit.

Is this a a special interest for you? That would make sense to me. But if it's just a misplaced feeling that to be fair you have to read it all, forget it. You don't owe the person who emailed you that kind of time. He obviously can't stand it that anyone doesn't believe as he does. That's his problem, not yours.