Monday, May 29, 2017

... on Tower of Babel - a Classic (quora)


... on Tower of Babel - a Classic (quora) · ... on PIE · Historic Linguistics as Viewed by a Creationist (Featuring Proto-Languages, on quora) - 8 questions + update · ... on Bread and Comparative Linguistics

Q
Why must we believe that, according to the Bible, all the world languages started from the Tower of Babel? Is there any archaeological evidence and plausible facts to support this?
https://www.quora.com/Why-must-we-believe-that-according-to-the-Bible-all-the-world-languages-started-from-the-Tower-of-Babel-Is-there-any-archaeological-evidence-and-plausible-facts-to-support-this/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl


Hans-Georg Lundahl
Studied religions as curious parallels and contrasts to Xtian faith since 9, 10?
Answered 3m ago
If you believe the Bible, you must believe this. Wait, I’ll come back to a little proviso.

Even without archaeological evidence, even without support.

Now, what we must believe is that all the ORIGINAL 72 world languages started out at Babel (except Hebrew continuing from before Babel, but that could be a 73:rd one).

We are NOT in any way, shape or form obliged to believe French and Spanish are immediate products of the punitive miracle of Babel rather than the results after centuries of an earlier language known as Latin. We are not even obliged to think Latin as we know it, or Mycenean Greek as we know the oldest Greek, are immediate products of the punitive and protective miracle at Babel.

Some say Proto-Indo-European was one of the languages resulting from Babel, but one problem is, if so it displaced a lot of other ones.

Greek would have been spoken by descendants of Iavan, Latin by descendants of … well, a mixture of diverse peoples, Gaulish, Irish, Cappadocia, and presumably Hittite by descendants of Gomer. Yet all these are counted by most linguists as descending from Proto-Indo-European.

One solution is that Iavan and a lot of other ethnic tribes splitting up after Babel did sacrifice their own language or get invaded by one or other of the other ones.

Another solution is that instead Iavan’s and Gomer’s and the Semite Lud’s and a few more languages influenced each other in an Indo-European melting pot, and once we see them historically, they have all been Indo-Europeanised. That is my position, with option of Hittite acting as a kind of catalyst for the melting pot. Other option, Indo-European was a lingua franca, an Esperanto, that failed. These are not mutually exclusive.

Since Proto-Indo-European is not a documented language (unless identic with Hittite), but a reconstructed one, other reconstructions of the scenario of how Indo-European language family came to be are possible.

With Romance language group, we know they all came from Latin, the older language is preserved and so are the delays between people in the countries obviously speaking Latin and them obviously speaking some other thing.

With the Balkan language group, we know they all came from diverse languages, Turkish from Central Asia, Bulgarian from Russian steppes, extinct Uralian Bulgarian language from Asia, anything on Serbocroatian and Slovenian scale from Russian steppes, Greek had been there in the South, most traits of Romanian are from Romance language group, i e from Latin, Albanian could be the Illyrian which had been there north of the Greeks and so on. THEN they started acquiring common traits, borrowing from each other.

With the West European language group we know both Latin and later French acted as matrices for influencing other languages, due to being spoken by élites.

With the Indo-European language group, either one is missing such a scenario in the Hittites, or one does not know what it really looked like, and either way all three possibilities can be considered as per our real present knowledge - even if only the parallel to the Romance language group is being generally presented as, not just a plausible reconstruction from our knowledge, but even part of our knowledge.

In fact, if, as I suppose, Babel was Göbekli Tepe, the archaeological span of 9600 - 8600 BC identic to the traditionally 40 years of Tower of Babel - City, there is indeed some supporting evidence : most old Indo-European languages start showing up to the West of it, to the North you have Uralic and Altaic languages hovering without writing for some time, to the East you have Semitic and other Oriental languages.

This would be at least consistent with any new languages after Babel walking out in directions radially outwards from it.

Update
Monday, St Vincent's Day, January 22, 2018.

Tony Trupp
Thu
“Babel was Göbekli Tepe”

What evidence are you basing this upon?

My understanding of gonekli tepe is that was not a tower. Furthermore, if the tower collapsed, the gobekli tepe would be much less intact than what was found. It would be a pile of absolute rubble.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Just now
“What evidence are you basing this upon?”

Carbon date of Göbekli Tepe is between those for Abraham’s time (c. 1000 extra years when he’s 80) and those of Flood (30 - 40,000 extra years).

But Peleg comes between Shem and Abraham, therefore …

Furthermore, if Shinar is not read as Sumer but as Mesopotamia, Göbekli Tepe is within the ancient definition, since East of Eurphrates and West of Tigris.

Furthermore, it is bigger than other old cities back then from that area, like Nevali Çori or Çatal Höyük.

Furthermore, posing Tower of Babel as Ziggurat of Ur is a time paradox, since Ziggurat of Ur had a post-Babel, Sumerian speaking, building master.

“My understanding of gonekli tepe is that was not a tower.”

Read the text again.

It speaks of both a city and a tower.

It says they ceased to build the city, not that they ceased to build the tower.

It also does not say the tower in its entirety shall reach into heaven, but according to their plans, its top should.

At take off, a three step rocket looks like a tower. The part which gets into space is the top part of the “take-off-tower”.

And before you ask, no, I don’t think the top would have reached heaven if they had not broken off, it did much later at Cape Canaveral. And Bajkonur. Or, not at, but from.

Believers in Ancient Astronauts theory, notably Graham Hancock have noted GT looks like a launching ramp. This similarity can be used for my theory too, and that is what I do. But Nimrod would have used the wrong fuel and blown himself up with nearly everyone else, if God hadn’t stopped him.

... on Quoran Questions Needing Improvement




Here are links to the questions needing improvement, and two of them were probably in restricted access for other reasons:

Q I
To creationists: Do you think that the penguins travelled all the way from Antarctica to the Middle East in order to hitch a ride on Noah's boat?
https://www.quora.com/To-creationists-Do-you-think-that-the-penguins-travelled-all-the-way-from-Antarctica-to-the-Middle-East-in-order-to-hitch-a-ride-on-Noahs-boat?__filter__&__nsrc__=2&__snid3__=1100200354


Hans-Georg Lundahl
Blog : "http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com".
Debating evolutionists for 15 years +.
Answered May 12
I don’t know where penguins lived in the pre-Flood world, just that they gravitated to one edge (Tierra de Fuego and Antarctica) after it.

As to how they came to the Ark, God led them.

He could have either led some couple from very far away, or they could have lived nearer, or they could have come from a Nodian zoo, which they ran away from a few days before the Flood, nearby.

God knows how to arrange that kind of things.

[God led them = God sent angels to lead them.]

A Login
Answered May 1
From what I have read there seems to be good evidence of a single continent in ancient history called Pangaea, so no Antarctica before the Noahic flood. It would still be a long way for Penguins to walk (across half a large continent maybe), but not quite as far as today’s Antarctica.

One hypothesis is that the continents formed during after the flood through a mechanism called Catastrophic Plate Techtonics.

Lucha Tijuanera
Updated 12h ago
We do not know if it was a local or a general deluge.

If it is was general, there is nothing impossible to God. He has angels that could bring the pengüins from Antartica or even from beyond.

[I upvoted the last one here, because of angels. Not because of local flood.]

Q II
Can someone help translate the attached words to Latin?
https://www.quora.com/unanswered/Can-someone-help-translate-the-attached-words-to-Latin?__filter__&__nsrc__=2&__snid3__=1101844110


  • spirituality without religion
  • my individuality resolute
  • will of the 3 indisputable


[It seems that the question was already improved, since the words as I saw them were in a sequence, as if one sentence.]

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Studied religions as curious parallels and contrasts to Xtian faith since 9, 10?
Answered 1h ago
I am sorry, but I think Google translate has garbled a Latin sentence for you.

And I think it is unmendable.

Do you have the original Latin yourself?

If so, tell me when you disclose it!

[Actually, when I saw it, it was given as "back to Latin" and "without Google tran", so it would have been a Google translate from one Latin phrase, as it read. That did need improvement if really three diverse phrases as here. Other answerer gave answers as if translating three separate phrases into Latin.]

[Reedited:]

Can someone help translate the listed words into Latin?

  • spirituality without religion
  • My individuality resolute, the will of the 3 indisputable


Q III
I am 16 years old, what books would you recomend me to read? (science, philosophy and something to make you more knowledgeable)
https://www.quora.com/I-am-16-years-old-what-books-would-you-recomend-me-to-read-science-philosophy-and-something-to-make-you-more-knowledgeable?__filter__&__nsrc__=2&__snid3__=1102116215


Hans-Georg Lundahl
Writing? I've been doing that for some time.
Answered 13m ago
Chesterton, and then let it branch out.

Not just Father Brown and novels, but also his essays and monographic books.

G. K. Chesterton's Works on the Web
http://www.gkc.org.uk/gkc/books/


I think the last one was marked as needing improvement, because I recommended Chesterton.

Perhaps some nincompoop following me around thought I needed clarifications on knowledgeable, or was confused in answering Chesterton, who is best known for Father Brown. But really and truly, even by reading Father Brown, you are conducted to some themes where he was more knowledgeable than his Protestant ceontemporarty public, and if you add to that his non-fiction, of which there is plenty, reading Chesterton and branching out from him, is a very good general education.

And the first one was probably marked as needing improvement because of angels being mentioned in answer, some clearly atheistic minded thinkers would have considered the answer as not serious or showing mental confusion. If those were the reasons, quora has a problem with the moderation team.

... on Restrainer and Pre-Trib, Disagreeing with Chuck Missler


Video
The Antichrist and The Restrainer - Chuck Missler
Koinonia House
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCg-ymuG-NU


6:05
You think the Church is the restrainer?

No. The Roman Empire (ended in Russia October 1917 and in Austria-Hungary in 1918) is.

6:36
The specific event [CM had said taking away of restrainer was a specific event, not a gradual petering out.] was most likely when Karl von Habsburg left Hofburg - or will be a future impossibility of restoration or failure of restoration of Roman Imperial dignity.

Haydock : "St. Jerome indeed, and others, thought that the Roman empire was to subsist till the antichrist's coming, which by the event most interpreters conclude to be a mistake, and that it cannot be said the Roman empire continues to this time."

If it didn't subsist to the coming of the final Antichrist, it subsisted to the coming of clear precursors, such as Vladimir (not the Vladimirovich, as yet) and Bela, after Nicolas and Karl were taken out of the way.

In my study of how WW-1 echoes Apocalypse 19 verse by verse, I find Bela Kun rather than Lenin the closest parallel to Antichrist.

[Did I miss posting the link or did they edit it out? I am posting this Monday and was commenting this one Saturday. Here it is, anyway:]

Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : War of 14 a Rehearsal for Harmageddon?
http://filolohika.blogspot.com/2015/04/war-of-14-rehearsal-for-harmageddon.html


[And I do think I did post a link to the Haydock commentary. But not seeing one now. Here it is:]

2 THESSALONIANS - Chapter 2
http://haydock1859.tripod.com/id224.html


[If not, that was a bit clumsy, since I actually quoted from it.]

7:30
If the Holy Spirit were the restrainer, He could not be taken away.

As you said, He is given without repentance, and this to a Church which also is always there. Matthew 28.

seq
As there were Roman Emperors up to end of WW-1, and as the world has been going very rapidly downhill since then, I think Roman Emperors is pretty right.

Also, confer the fact that the four beasts of Daniel reappear as composite beast of Antichrist - missing precisely one animal component : it has no eagles' wings.

Czarist Russia had eagles' wings as a symbol, but Putin hasn't got them.

seq
And no, Roman Emperors in the Christian sense have not been promoters of sins, fomentors of social problems or eager to profit from these to increase central power.

Even a Pagan and a persecutor of Christians, Diocletian, said "I hate nothing as much as change".

In other words, they were very Constitution abiding, generally - if you except Peter the Great in Russia and Joseph II in Austria.

8:52
Only God has ever restrained sin as sin.

Perhaps a point.

But even sinners have restrained lawlessness as lawlessness. Even Theseus, who believed he was a son of "Posei-don" (in his day "potei Daon" = "lord Dagon") and allowed a demon to act that part, even Theseus restrained the lawlessness of a man like Procrustes.

9:12
God's protection of Job against Satan can be involved in the actvity of the restrainer, but, God is not the restrainer, rather the restrainer is one whom Satan at first cannot remove, like at first he could not give Job plagues, and then finds he can remove, like Satan gave Job sores.

9:25
[The restraining of Antichrist is] "an agency of the Holy Spirit".

But the Holy Spirit can act through evil men!

He spoke the Gospel through Kaiaphas. He preached repentance to Ninivites through a man who did not want them to regain His grace and who rebelled against His mission.

Therefore, while the Restrainer is such thanks to the Holy Spirit, it can be a man or a series of men, and of men who are not always themselves holy.

Not always - but usually. Most prophets were holier than Jonah. Most kohanim were holier then Kaiaphas who maybe even knowingly murdered God.

Note that the Holy Spirit is symbolised by olive oil, and that not just prophets and priests, but also certain rulers, kings, and Holy Roman Emperors too, from Charlemagne to Karl of Habsburg, from Justinian to Nicolas II, unless I misrecall are chrismated, are anointed with oil, since the Church (Catholic Church and Orthodox Church, the right Church and a very close rival) is asking the Holy Ghost to help them in restraining lawlessness.

Or were so doing, up to 1917-1918.

10:22
The Church is not having a pre-Trib rapture.

The saints are however in some sense beaten by Antichrist - like an army is beaten.

Hence, while the Church is not itself a military unit in the most literal battle field sense, it involves one, which Antichrist can beat.

He can't beat the Holy Spirit. He can't beat the faithful of the Church as faithful of the Church, at least not those who most are willing to sacrifice. But if the saints have an army, it can be beaten, they can be considered as beaten by its defeat.

When the Czarist army under Denykin was beaten by Trotski's Red Army, in a sense, that was a prefiguring of Antichrist beating ... whatever and whoever is the Army of the Saints.

11:07
A person can be grammatically neuter whether naturally masculine or feminine. In German, Hänsel and Gretel are naturally masculine and feminine, but through the [German dialectal diminutive] ending -el, they are both neuter.

11:33
So, the restrainer, in masculine, is NOT the Holy Spirit.

12:12
If the Restrainer is Holy Roman Emperors, the man of sin can already be revealed.

12:48
No, you are wrong in believing a pre-Trib rapture for all of the Church and you are also wrong to consider that as the Restrainer being taken out of the way.

And so, the restrainer can well have been already taken out of the way, about 100 years ago.

St Paul did not say the Man of Sin would be revealed immediately after the taking away.

12:56
"Don't look for him, we look for the coming King"

Well, but the King won't be coming until the Man of Sin comes ... and that one will deceive a lot ... and it was told to count the number of his name (Apocalypse 13:18).

Saturday, May 27, 2017

... on Sufficiency of Scripture and Bible Canon (feat. our very special guest star : J. P. Holding)


Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : ... on Sufficiency of Scripture and Bible Canon (feat. our very special guest star : J. P. Holding) · Great Bishop of Geneva! : Answering a Page about "Apocrypha"

For some who are not familiar with the genre I am using here (and no, it is not the dialogue which is default genre on this blog), you first listen to the video. You then read the text of my comments. The hours after I publish this, the text will probably still be top of comments, but when there are 1000 plus comments, you will need to go here to read them. In each comment I give time signature, often an indication of what J. P. Holding was saying at that point, and my response to it. So, the genre is not "dialogue", but detailed comment including in some places refutation.

TL;DR of below : J. P. Holding misconstrues what "sufficiency of Scripture" was about, and also partially refutes both this heresy and gives me opportunity to refute the heresy he is promoting on so called "Apocrypha" or "Deuterocanonic Books".


Video
Punch Bowling #1: The Sufficiency of Scripture
tektontv
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvn8lKwa3ks


1:52
The wonderful summersaults of Reformation ideology!

If Luther as a disciple of fairly recent Erasmus who had been alerted by also fairly recent Valla* (all of the three Catholic priests before writing, and the two non-Luther remained so!) that details about less recent and closer to Gospel times Roman Antiquities* were being gotten wrong makes a contextualising comment from purely human scholarship, that is fine with "sufficiency of Scripture".

B u t if Erasmus responds (like he did in De Libero Arbitrio, I think) about the need of reading much less recent and much closer to the Gospel times Church Fathers, like St Jerome, oh, no, that is "human traditions"!

* Valla specialised in showing what the Roman currency of money really was like. De Asse et Partibus eius. I am not making this up! Really relevant for a full understanding of any Gospel text involving Shekels, I suppose, but perhaps a bit superfluous to understanding the theological part of it.

1:58
Catholics rely on specific extra-Biblical, but Biblically endorsed information sources, like St Jerome. Lutherans rely on specific extra-Biblical, Biblically not endorsed information sources, like Valla. And for that matter Erasmus, when it came to pronouncing Koiné as Attic was pronounced by Plato, except where spelling differs.

2:14
"The Original Writings were Greek."

OK, I am into the LXX too, as a good substitute for the lost Hebrew "Vorlage" of it, but LXX is after all a translation ...

Irrelevant to the point? Well, so could Valla's De Asse be irrelevant to any point about parables or events involving money in NT. While the theological analysis by Sts Augustine, Jerome, Chrysostom could be very relevant - the precise thing Luther jettisoned.

If you actually said "Greek and Hebrew", I am watching this in sound off with subtitles. A neat lesson about computers not at all getting language.

2:39
But the "sufficiency of Scripture" was NOT in response to the texts some Catholics term Deuterocanonical and Protestants usually term Apocrypha (a term also covering heretical and spurious wrtitings like infamous Gospel of Thomas, not meaning the Childhood Gospel of St Thomas, but the other one). We had TWO distinct disputes. Just on Scripture.

Sufficiency of Scripture, aka Sola Scriptura, condemned by Trent responding Scripture must be interpreted according to the Church, Fathers as history of the Church being, whenever agreeing, nearly on par with Scripture, Magisterium of the present as rulers of the Church being the present mouthpiece of both.

Judaising OT canon, motivated by St Paul saying they back then received Moses and Prophets from the Jews (who up to very recently - indeed childhood of St Paul himself - had been the true Church of God) and pushed into meaning Reformers ought to take the OT canon from Masoretic version, from Jews having been not the true Church for 1400 and some years. Except the Reformers even then didn't quite do that. This was condemned by Trent responding by reaffirming canonicity of ALL books mentioned by the council of Carthage.

Yep, the very same ancient Church Council which first in so many words gave you 27 books of NT, also in so many words included I and II Maccabees in OT! And Trent stood by it.

Note, I am not sure whether Council of Carthage also said all other books are non-canon, but Trent did not. At least not explicitly.

Depends on exact status of dioceses like Iasi admitting III and IV Maccabees or Susdal/Moscow admitting "I Esra" (in another sense than we use I Esra as your Esra, Russians call that II Esra. Our II Esra and their III Esra is your Nehemia). Or Aksum admitting book of Henoch. Because Trent explicitly stated "as received by the Church".

Argue Orthodox and Monophysites are quite outside the Church and there was no proof these books were admitted by the dioceses before they became Schismatic or Heretic, well, that proves 73 books ("72 books, or 73 if Baruch be counted separately from Jeremiah") are all [there is of the] canon.

Argue either they somehow remained in the Church or the books were at least received by them before the separation from Church, you open up at least some possibility for Catholic Church to confirm these books.

But the question between sufficiency of Scripture vs sufficiency of Scripture, Fathers and Magisterium is separate from the other question about which books belong to the canon.

2:47
That "specific set" of authoritative texts:

  • did not exist on the Christian side, since all Christians previous to Reformation admitted Deuterocanonical texts (unless you count as Christians Albigensians who threw out most of both OT and NT, like Marcion!)
  • did not exist on the Jewish side either, since the Jews obviously did not admit any of the 27 NT books
  • but was a Judaeo-Christian hybrid canon.


3:10
"The Psalms are poetry, not didactic instruction"

While the specific layout of any psalm follows a poetic plan which might be somewhat confusing to certain didactic purposes, the genres do NOT exclude each other.

In other words, the statements in the psalms shall all be taken as true, and at least most of the time even literally true.

I'll give you an example of didactic literature formulated as singable poetry:

A false witness shall not go unpunished:

New blog on the kid : A false witness shall not go un punished, and he that speaketh lies shall not escape ...
http://nov9blogg9.blogspot.com/2017/03/a-false-witness-shall-not-go-un.html


3:18
"There is nothing in the text which says Scripture has a magical power to educate or to find responses to anything and everything ..."

well, neither in the Psalm, nor in the Classical Protestant "proof text" for sufficiency : "all Scripture is useful" etc. Thank you very much for shooting Reformation in the foot once again!

3:35
None of those passages was written after the Bible was finalised!

No shit, Sherlock! I think St Robert Bellarmine and a few more would have said that to Protestant apologists (including, in the case of St Robert, [to] James VI & I of Scotland and England).

4:11
From text given in video, not [from] subtitles.

"1) The doctrine of sufficiency of Scripture wasn't formulated to exclude contextual helps."

Not some of them, not those of the Valla and Erasmus type. To exclude some others, yes, very definitely yes.

"2) The Holy Spirit isn't a magic fact-dispensing-on-request gunball machine, and is never protrayed as such."

Well, there is this text about [Matthew 10:19] : But when they shall deliver you up, take no thought how or what to speak: for it shall be given you in that hour what to speak. Just note, this does not exclude reading apologetics way before that hour, way before being delivered up. But yes, in some context the Holy Ghost will indeed dispense answers when needed. And is here portrayed as going to do so.

Friday, May 26, 2017

... on Discrepancies in the Bible (or supposed such, on quora)


Q
Are there any discrepancies in the Bible?
https://www.quora.com/Are-there-any-discrepancies-in-the-Bible


Hans-Georg Lundahl
Studied religions as curious parallels and contrasts to Xtian faith since 9, 10?
Answered just now
Apparent ones, yes.

But all resolvable.

I will be watching this question to see which ones other people bring up.

Piet Bakx
Retired psychiatrist
Answered 1h ago
Many. This one is interesting. Allegedly the same author. The gospel according to Luke. The day that Jesus arose is the day that he also left. Luke 24 is an ongoing tale everything is happening within one day.

In Acts 1:3 he appears to the Apostles for forty days.

The gospel according to Mark shows a tale that the whole story of Jesus was happening in one year. The Gospel according to John makes the story happening in three years.

The family trees of Jesus in Matthew and Luke are not the same. Both indicated to Joseph as the father of Jesus. Contradicts the Virgin Birth.

Does it matter? Does it change your faith that living according to the teachings of Moses, Jesus love thy neighbor, decalogue, mercy instead of rough justice, forgiveness is the right way? So do not worry about discrepancies. Like Jesus take the bible with a pinch of salt.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Just now
“ The day that Jesus arose is the day that he also left. Luke 24 is an ongoing tale everything is happening within one day.”

Doesn’t say so.

“In Acts 1:3 he appears to the Apostles for forty days.”

Which means that this is where St Luke is giving specific information on time span.

“The gospel according to Mark shows a tale that the whole story of Jesus was happening in one year. The Gospel according to John makes the story happening in three years.”

It happened in three years and some months.

St Mark omits so many things the remaining ones could be from a single year, but they aren’t.

“The family trees of Jesus in Matthew and Luke are not the same. Both indicated to Joseph as the father of Jesus. Contradicts the Virgin Birth.”

Neither contradict the Virgin Birth, since St Joseph was legally Christ’s father.

People have diverse genealogies along diverse lines, and in this case, one of the Gospels goes with someone’s real and other with someone’s step father - who was related as real ancestor of the Blessed Virgin.

“Does it change your faith that living according to the teachings of Moses, Jesus love thy neighbor, decalogue, mercy instead of rough justice, forgiveness is the right way?”

It would, if really a discrepancy, chance my faith in an inerrant Bible, written ultimately by the Holy Ghost qui locutus est per prophetas.

“Like Jesus take the bible with a pinch of salt.”

He didnt.

With your inability to correctly take in information provided by other than yourself, I dread how many you may have misdiagnosed while not yet retired!

Sam Adams
Answered 8h ago
There are a lot of discrepancies - the bible is full of so called “doublets” where the same story is told twice and the two versions don’t agree.

If you want an obvious example, consider the creations stories - there are two distinct (and inconsistent) stories in Genesis alone. And there are a number of other stories scattered thru the bible.

But you might want to try this quiz. See how well you know the gospel story.

http://exchristian.net/3/

Hans-Georg Lundahl
7m ago
“the bible is full of so called “doublets” where the same story is told twice and the two versions don’t agree.”

Did Jesus multiply bread and fish once only and the versions about it disagree, or did He simply do so (at least) twice?

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Just now
“If you want an obvious example, consider the creations stories - there are two distinct (and inconsistent) stories in Genesis alone.”

Genesis 1 gives a broad panorama, Genesis 2 gives details for day 6. No inconsistency.

Paul Farr
Marketing Director
Answered 8h ago
Yes there are a few discrepancies in the Bible.

However, these are only a problem for modern Christians who accept the (relatively) modern doctrine of Biblical inerrancy or divine authorship — a doctrine not espoused by, for example, Paul of Tarsus (who never imagined his letters would become scripture and who always distinguished his word from the word of the Lord) or Jesus of Nazareth.

For Biblical scholars, these discrepancies are clues that allow us to better understand who wrote the books of the Bible and when and where.

There has never been a time when Jews or Christians were all in agreement about theology. There have always been sects and schisms, and always will be.

The Bible is a testament about God (and other things) written by people. Once you accept that, the discrepancies become something to study and learn from, not something to deny or to bash other people over the head with.

[Missed one link]

Hans-Georg Lundahl
10m ago
First supposed discrepancy from your link:

GE 1:3-5 On the first day, God created light, then separated light and darkness.
GE 1:14-19 The sun (which separates night and day) wasn't created until the fourth day.

Solution : light and separation of night and day were there before Sun took over the role of giving light and having its shadow on other side of Earth constitute night.

Second one:

GE 1:11-12, 26-27 Trees were created before man was created.
GE 2:4-9 Man was created before trees were created.

First passage refers to trees in general, second to specific trees involved in the garden of Eden.

Same goes for discrepancies 3 and 4:

GE 1:20-21, 26-27 Birds were created before man was created.
GE 2:7, 19 Man was created before birds were created.

GE 1:24-27 Animals were created before man was created.
GE 2:7, 19 Man was created before animals were created.

Five:

GE 1:26 Man is to have dominion over fish, birds, cattle, and all wild animals, yet--
GE 2:15-17 It is wrong to be able to tell good from evil, right from wrong.

In order to hold dominion, it was only necessary for man to know good, not to know both good and evil.

Ben Powell
Have spent 50+ years trying to figure out which bits of Christianity were true.
Answered 7h ago
Of course there are, and more than a few.

But after all, how could it be otherwise?

Except for a few very odd-ball exceptions, even the most conservative Christians recognize that the Bible is made up of

  • Translations of . . .
  • Edited and corrected compliations of the best readings of hundreds of ancient manuscripts, roughly ranging from 200 BC to 600 AD . . .
  • Written in languages that we only imperfectly understand today, and . . .
  • These manuscripts being themselves copies, or copies of copies, or even copies of copies of copies of copies . . .
  • of original manuscripts written, roughly speaking, variously from 1200 BC to 100 AD


Even if you believe, as many American evangelicals do, that the manuscripts in step #5 above were perfect and without error, you still have to acknowledge that errors could, and did, creep in at each other the other steps:

  • translation,
  • textual selection, compilation, & correction,
  • lexicography (determining what THAT word, in THAT syntax might mean), and
  • transmission or copying.


That said, it is my understanding that the Bible is — by far — the best attested ancient manuscript collection that exists. That means it is likely a closer replica of what was originally written than almost any other ancient document you might examine.

But a highly accurate replica is NOT the same as a perfect replica. And given what is required from to bring us such a huge collection of ancient documents, and translate them into contemporary vernacular, it would actually be evidence AGAINST the Bible, if there were no discrepancies, since a Bible free of all discrepancies would point to very recent ‘editing’!

Unfortunately, more that a few American evangelicals, even including many ministers, have confused their doctrine of inerrant original manuscripts, with a doctrine of Biblical inerrancy . . . even though they acknowledge, in their own commentaries and textbooks that there WERE errors in translation and transmission.

The plain fact is, any doctrine claiming that any particular complete Bible is inerrant is CONTRARY to settled and accepted evangelical doctrine. However, acknowledging the presence of errors in translations and copies greatly complicates the preservation and protection of the denominational peculiarities of particular churches, since these doctrines often depend on just one or two verses in the whole Bible.

By contrast, the [o]rthodox doctrines, taught in the three Ecumenical Creeds, and accepted by all [o]rthodox churches, whether Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Protestant — those [o]rthodox doctrines rest on concepts found scattered throughout the Bible, and are untroubled by uncertainties about a particular verse.

TL;DR:

So,

  • Yes, there are discrepancies in any Bible you can actual pick up and read, since it is a product of both translation and transmission.
  • And yes, these uncertainties render many denominational peculiarities uncertain and indefensible,
  • But these discrepancies are really no hindrance at all to the acceptance of what CS Lewis called ‘mere Christianity’, or Christianity minus the sectarian oddities.


Hans-Georg Lundahl
14m ago
It is interesting that you argue there must be discrepancies, but do not name even one.

It is also interesting that you consider “mere Christianity” as sth which needs to cut off supposed but unnamed discrepancies of the Bible.

In it you mention Ecumenical Creeds, and one of the articles is “qui loquutus est per prophetas” (and by extension through the NT authors as well, even if only 3 of the 8 were actually prophets (Sts John, Peter - the vision of unclean animals - and Paul).

Wednesday, May 24, 2017

... on Plagiarising Sermons (quora)


Q
A senior pastor keeps plagiarized sermons, but a group of fellow church members protect him. Is plagiarism fine as long as the sermon is effective?
https://www.quora.com/A-senior-pastor-keeps-plagiarized-sermons-but-a-group-of-fellow-church-members-protect-him-Is-plagiarism-fine-as-long-as-the-sermon-is-effective/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl


Hans-Georg Lundahl
Studied religions as curious parallels and contrasts to Xtian faith since 9, 10?
Answered just now
I did not know sermons fell under intellectual property rights.

If he seriously took them from another pastor, or huge paragraphs from a blogger, I think he should say who he took it from in case that other wants credit (as I as a blogger do), but not necessarily if he doesn’t.

And if it is from my blogs he took chunks from his sermons, he is apart from crediting me also very welcome to do a few sermons from my blog defending Catholicism as opposed to Protestantism:

Great Bishop of Geneva!
http://greatbishopofgeneva.blogspot.com/


On the other hand, the person who is plagiarised may simply be another pastor, who has his flock and income and doesn’t either need any credit to get an income or disagree with the theology of your pastor.

If you know for certain he plagiarises sermons, why not challenge him to make a sermon on plagiarism in sermons? And on what other pastors’ sermons he is plagiarising?

Obviously, if he plagiarises Church Fathers without distorting them, so much the better for the flock! That would mean you could even go Catholic (or at worst Russian Orthodox) within a year or two.

On the other hand, if he is plagiarising John Knox or John Calvin or Bucer or Luther or Jack Chick, you might do very well to leave him due to his bad theological taste, compared to which a charge like “plagiarised sermons” is simply inane.

Murder? No problem. Arson? OK, we can live with that. Jaywalking …. ghaaaaaaaa! Let’s get outa heeere!

And plagiarising a sermon is to heresy what jaywalking is to murder or arson.

... on Original Sin vs Old Earth, my debate with Suzanne Fortin


Q
How do you reconcile an old earth with the original sin?
https://www.quora.com/How-do-you-reconcile-an-old-earth-with-the-original-sin/answer/Suzanne-Fortin


Suzanne Fortin
Papist
Answered Mon
I simply believe that at some point, a pair of beings with rational souls came into existence, and they performed the first sin. Who this couple is, we will never know because there is no way to verify who had a rational soul in the distant past.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Tue
"I simply believe that at some point, a pair of beings with rational souls came into existence,"

A being or a pair of beings with a rational soul does not "come into existence", they need special creation.

"and they performed the first sin."

Adam and Eve did that, among men (they were later than angelic sinners).

"Who this couple is, we will never know"

But we do know it from the Bible, as exposed by the Church Fathers.

"because there is no way to verify who had a rational soul in the distant past."

If they could talk, they had one.

Suzanne Fortin
18h ago
“come into existence” and “special creation” are the same thing. There is nothing that says one excludes the other. Speech is not absolutely essential to possess a rational soul. The unborn do not have speech but they have rational souls. There is no way to empirically verify in the distant past who had a rational soul and who didn’t.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
16h ago
While someone can accidentally lack speech and have a rational soul, it is impossible to have speech and lack a rational soul.

If you think computers have speech, think again:

Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : On not trusting automatic translations!
http://filolohika.blogspot.com/2017/04/on-not-trusting-automatic-translations.html


And history is empirical in nature, therefore Biblical history will certainly do as who had speech!

Suzanne Fortin
14h ago
While those who have speech are humans, it does not follow that those who DON’T have speech aren’t humans. We simply can’t go back and time and “hear” who had speech, and of course they didn’t have writing. Of course, there was art, but cave art is the earliest example of art *we know of*, There may have been earlier examples. It is simply impossible to empirically and scientifically determine who had a rational soul.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
3m ago
"it does not follow that those who DON’T have speech aren’t humans"

On the individual level you are right, but on the level of a population this is not so.

"We simply can’t go back and time and “hear” who had speech,"

We cannot go back in time and verify anything as first hand observers.

"and of course they didn’t have writing."

What exactly are you basing that on?

"Of course, there was art, but cave art is the earliest example of art *we know of*, There may have been earlier examples."

Most cave art would be post-Flood, and within a few centuries, perhaps even by same artist, when it comes to the paintings of animals.

This I am not basing on going back in time in a time machine, but on comparing the carbon 14 dates, via hypothesis of a rising carbon 14 level after Flood, with Biblical dates.

And no, presumably pre-Flood art is known from Neanderthals too : a flute of bones and mascara.

"It is simply impossible to empirically and scientifically determine who had a rational soul."

Scientifically is not just empirically, but rationally.

And empirically is not just scientifically but historically.

We do not know any other kind who can make art, whether fine art or tools. When you deliberately shape a tool (like flaking out a flint knife) you need to have a mental template of what the result shall be. Therefore it is impossible for non-human kinds to do this. So, any flint tools which don't look like they could have been made as chance results of apes just playing with flint knocking, are a sure sign there was some man with a rational soul around to produce them.

Our history goes back to the beginning of time, minus most of the six days. Whether Adam and Eve invented writing or not, they are in terms of minimal overlaps not further than 8 to 12 generations* from Moses.

Citing Haydock:

Concerning the transactions of these early times, parents would no doubt be careful to instruct their children, by word of mouth, before any of the Scriptures were written; and Moses might derive much information from the same source, as a very few persons formed the chain of tradition, when they lived so many hundred years. Adam would converse with Mathusalem, who knew Sem, as the latter lived in the days of Abram. Isaac, Joseph, and Amram, the father of Moses, were contemporaries: so that seven persons might keep up the memory of things which had happened 2500 years before. But to entitle these accounts to absolute authority, the inspiration of God intervenes; and thus we are convinced, that no word of sacred writers can be questioned. (Haydock)


GENESIS - Chapter III.
http://haydock1859.tripod.com/id329.html


As to question whether they had any writing, I have a suspicion Adam on the one hand did invent some writing, but on the other hand just used initial letters for mnemonics help when pupils were taught this or that (especially genealogies) by heart.

Adam, Cain, Henoch etc would have been written on some rock in Nod as ACH.

Adam, Seth, Enos etc like ASE.

A boundary stone between Nod and the land of Sethites (if any) would include a sign meaning boundary and one one side of sign S, on one side C or on one side AS, on other side AC.

Or, after Flood, Noah, Seth, Arphaxad given as NSA, Noah, Cham, Canaan, as NChC etc.

AND one certain von Petzinger did work showing palaeolithical art shows 32 signs repeated all over, again and again. 32 signs are about the right size of an alphabet, plus, if a proto-version of Hebrew alphabet, there would be some more signs for other things - and one of the signs looks as if it meant "branching out of human tribes".

Here is her video:

Why are these 32 symbols found in caves all over Europe | Genevieve von Petzinger
TED
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJnEQCMA5Sg


[And here are my comments on it:]**

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : ... on Genevieve von Petzinger's 32 late palaeolithic signs
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2017/03/on-genevieve-von-petzingers-32-late.html


Own answer***

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Studied religions as curious parallels and contrasts to Xtian faith since 9, 10?
Answered Tue
By taking Original Sin as fact and “old earth” (as in milions or billions of years) as fairly bad fiction.


* Haydock says 8 generations, but with LXX it might be closer to 12. He is using the overlaps according to Vulgate / Douay Rheims as calculated by Ussher.

** I broke off the copy-blueing before the link and forgot to separately copy-paste the sentence between the links. Hence [in brackets] as not direct quote.

*** The general content of my own answer could presumably be deduced from my comments under Suzanne Fortin's, but I give it anyway, just because I am an egotist.

Tuesday, May 23, 2017

... on Sacramental Requirements and David Bawden / Pope Michael, with Al Lundy


Q
According to Catholic doctrine, would communion work with anything other than the normal host? For example, Oreos, Twinkies, etc?
https://www.quora.com/According-to-Catholic-doctrine-would-communion-work-with-anything-other-than-the-normal-host-For-example-Oreos-Twinkies-etc/answer/Al-Lundy


Al Lundy
Practicing Catholic for 60 years, Deacon, servant of God
Answered May 5
No. With all Sacraments in the Church there are specific conditions that must be met in form and matter for the sacrament to be valid.

The required form for the host is unleavened wheat bread unless it is not available then there are option forms of unleavened bread that can be used.

Also you must use red wine and not ice tea or grape juice etc.

The reason is quite simple Jesus used unleavened bread and wine so the Church uses unleavened bread and wine.

Had Jesus used Oreo cookies and grape juice then the Church would use them instead.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
16h ago
Red wine is a necessity for licitness, but not for validity.

I have been around when white wine was considered as OK.

Al Lundy
16h ago
upvoted by me
My apologies. I should have said simply “wine made from grapes. And not specified red.

Here is what the Canon of the Church says in paragraph 924.3

The wine must be natural from the fruitof the vine and not spoiled.

I apologize for any confusion I may have caused.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
2h ago
However, red wine is a good custom, and I think it was canon law previous to new rite / still is where Pope Michael is concerned.

Reason : should any be spilled, it must be easy to identify.

However, this pertains to licitness, not to validity, I think.

Al Lundy
1h ago
You lost me at Pope Michael. That troubled fellow has no authority in the Church and never has.

You cannot speak of validity and David Bawden at the same time and retain credibility.

Validity and licidity in the liturgy is determined by the Magisterium of the Church, not some delusional fellow in Oklahoma.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
1h ago
“troubled” - No more troubled than anyone else who doesn’t seem to take offense at the mere mention of AA / Twelve Step.

“has no authority in the Church and never has.” - Depends entirely on who is the Pope.

Which in turn depends on whether the Holy See was vacant in 1990, for instance.

“You cannot speak of validity and David Bawden at the same time” - even if you deny validity of his jurisdiction, you cannot deny validity of his orders, since he was ordained and consecrated in 2011 on Gaudete weekend.

“and retain credibility.” - Before whom?

“Validity and licidity in the liturgy is determined by the Magisterium of the Church,” - True enough.

“not some delusional fellow in Oklahoma.” - Now, “delusional” sounds a bit like a modernist diagnostic criterium in psychiatry …. I am reminded of Matthew 5:22.

Oklahoma? Don’t know who that would be though.

Neither I, as adherent (provisionally at least) of Pope Michael, nor he are based in Oklahoma.

Al Lundy
1h ago
Perhaps he is in Kansas now. It isn't relevant nor is Bawdens opinions as to what is valid liturgy. He is no more Pope than you or me. And at least I am ordained in the Catholic Church which is more than can be said of Mr. Bawden.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
[It seems he deleted my comments defending the fact that David Bawden was validly ordained priest and consecreted bishop on Gaudete weekend 2011]

Comment deleted*

Al Lundy
32m ago
David Bawden is irrelevant to this conversation. Please return to the actual topic. If you want to discuss Mr. Bawden I see two choices. Post a separate question about him on Quora or a similar site, or contact Mr. Bawden. I have no doubt that he has a lot of free time on his hands dispite his self proclaimed position.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Just now
I already am in contact with him.

I also find your dealing with his adherents (including one with some residual reservations about his orthodoxy on other matters, like AA) clearly discourteous.

I think that in 1400 adherents of one or other Pope were a bit more courteous to each other than some of you are to “Bawdenites” (as you might term us) now.

Also, his position - unlike ordination not from 2011, but from 1990 - was not self proclaimed. He tried to get sufficient people to an emergency conclave not to be elected in it and failed.


* The deleted comment involved references to the episcopal lineage which Pope Michael eventually got ordained and consecrated in, as being undoubted in validity by Al Lundy's Vatican, while his own ordination as deacon would have been in new rites promulgated by Paul VI, and that might cause some at least doubt of his validity in the eyes of my own Vatican in Exile (will be checking with Pope Michael in a moment).

Monday, May 22, 2017

... on AiG, contra CosmicSceptic


12 Arguments Evolutionists Should NEVER use! (Apparently)
CosmicSkeptic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0H9JzW9Sz8


1:14 That you can't observe an occurrence doesn't mean you can't directly observe evidence of that occurrence. Thank you! You have just made an argument for God. You cannot directly observe God turning the universe around Earth, but you can directly observe the Universe turning around Earth. You cannot directly observe God how He works when curing a leper, but some have observed God - a k a Jesus - curing a leper. So, just because a story involves a causality which is unobserved, it doesn't mean the evidence of that causality is also unobserved. A v e r y good point!

[Short debate:]

MaxwellsDemon
Hans-Georg Lundahl

"You cannot directly observe God turning the universe around Earth, but you can directly observe the Universe turning around Earth."

From observation, the universe does not turn around Earth. In fact, we know that the earth turns around the sun.

"You cannot directly observe God how He works when curing a leper, but some have observed God - a k a Jesus - curing a leper."

NO, some have claimed that they have observed Jesus curing a leper. That is not an observation. That is just a claim.

"So, just because a story involves a causality which is unobserved, it doesn't mean the evidence of that causality is also unobserved."

Based on this reasoning, do you believe in all types of stories?

So there is still no direct observation of the evidence of god.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"From observation, the universe does not turn around Earth. In fact, we know that the earth turns around the sun."

From observation, as it is observed, the universe does turn around Earth.

Your knowledge or pretended such that Earth turns around the Sun is not directly derived from the most obviously relevent observations.

"NO, some have claimed that they have observed Jesus curing a leper. That is not an observation. That is just a claim."

It is not an observation I or you are making. It is an observation I am accepting as an observation due to claims I find trustworthy. Precisely as complete globality of Earth (curvature I could deduce from watching ships a few decades ago a fine day or more of them) from claims I find trustworthy about Geography or about Magellans voyage. Or about day and night in the seasons at Tierra del Fuego.

If I am only stuck with my own observation, so are you with yours, and therefore neither of as can prove that Earth is a complete globe.

If we can prove it due to claims by others, then we can also prove other things by claims by others.

"So there is still no direct observation of the evidence of god."

There is no direct observation of God, but there is observation of the evidence for Him.

You are worse at logic than Alex J. O'Connor, whatever your name might be.

"Based on this reasoning, do you believe in all types of stories?"

If seriously claimed to be true and I find no reason to consider the man making the claim either mistaken or lying, yes. If I disbelieve a story as a whole, often it is because everyone knows from start it is fiction.

1937 no one believed The Hobbit was actual history or biography of anywhere, anywhen or any real Bilbo Baggins having ever lived. (If the Tolkien's did, they kept it a well guarded secret).

If a story is seriously claimed to be factual, before I dismiss even part of it, I want to see at least a possibility of how the man making the claim could be wrong or why he would be lying.

MaxwellsDemon
Hans-Georg Lundahl
"From observation, as it is observed, the universe does turn around Earth."

NO, from observation, the universe does NOT turn around the Earth.

"It is an observation I am accepting as an observation due to claims I find trustworthy."

You are accepting a claim of an observation. Therefore, it is NOT an observation.

"There is no direct observation of God, but there is observation of the evidence for Him."

NO, there is no observation of the evidence for god. You haven't provided any observation of the evidence.

You are really very bad in science, reasoning and logic.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"If seriously claimed to be true and I find no reason to consider the man making the claim either mistaken or lying, yes."

Again, believing in a claim is not an observation of evidence.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"NO, from observation, the universe does NOT turn around the Earth."

We can both observe Earth standing still below us.

We can both observe Sun or Moon moving against fixed objects on Earth.

We can both observe Stars turning around North Star, when comparing for instance Orion (or any other recognised constellation) against any fixed object.

I e, we can see Sun, Moon and Stars move around us. These things are observations.

"You are accepting a claim of an observation. Therefore, it is NOT an observation."

Not on my part. Neither are most other things we know or think we know.

"NO, there is no observation of the evidence for god. You haven't provided any observation of the evidence."

I have provided two, Universe moving around us and Miracles. You attack Universe moving around us, you are certainly attacking observation as such. You attack historic miracles, you are attacking history and any observations made by other people than yourself. At least on the grounds you are pretending to now.

"You are really very bad in science, reasoning and logic."

[Feel like eating pop corn]

"Again, believing in a claim is not an observation of evidence."

Believing in a claim of an observation is distinct from doing the observation onself, true. And very banal.

Have you yourself done the geographic observations necessary to proving Earth is a full globe? Or are you believing claims of others to have done so?

Believing in a claim of an observation, implies believing there is an observation someone else made. If you can't believe that, you can't know anything.

So, in order to dismiss miracles, you need to provide specific evidence why the specific claim is not trustworthy. Not just general gas about the claims being about observations you and I did not make ourselves.

MaxwellsDemon
Hans-Georg Lundahl
"I have provided two, Universe moving around us and Miracles."

Geocentricism has been debunked a long time ago. No miracle has been substantiated.

You are really very bad at science and logic.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"Geocentricism has been debunked a long time ago."

Not by direct observation.

"No miracle has been substantiated."

Not by scientists, but by historians (not of the atheistic or Humean schools, obviously)

"You are really very bad at science and logic."

Too bad I have no opportunity to eat pop corn here. You are nearly entertaining with your ad hominems!

MaxwellsDemon
Hans-Georg Lundahl
""Geocentricism has been debunked a long time ago." - Not by direct observation."

Yes, it certainly was by direct observation. Have you never heard of retrograde motion of the planets?

You are really bad at science.

""No miracle has been substantiated." - Not by scientists, but by historians"

LOL!!!!! Another word, No miracle has been substantiated.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"Yes, it certainly was by direct observation. Have you never heard of retrograde motion of the planets?"

I never said that retrograde motions had not been directly observed.

I said that Earth moving around the Sun has not been directly observed.

Retrograde motions were well known by lots of Geocentrics, they are not a kind of new discovery which somehow invalidated a thitherto fine Geocentrism. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are all visible from Earth by the naked eye, they all have retrogrades (unlike the PLANETS Sun and Moon which haven't), and this was never a problem to Geocentrism.

"You are really bad at science."

[Wd like a bit of pop corn to enjoy this comedy a bit more!]

"LOL!!!!! Another word, No miracle has been substantiated."

Baseless allegation, plus you show you are committing a mistake of category.

Btw, medical miracles in Lourdes have been substantiated by medical doctors, i e by scientists.

MaxwellsDemon
You said that you can directly observe the Universe turning around Earth. There are no observation that the Universe turning around Earth.

As I said you are really very bad at science. Go and attend a basic science class.

"Baseless allegation, plus you show you are committing a mistake of category."

No, it shows that you are really very bad at philosophy.

"No miracle has been substantiated" is a fact.

"Btw, medical miracles in Lourdes have been substantiated by medical doctors, i e by scientists."

Did they investigate amputees growing their legs?

LOL!!! What an idiot

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"You said that you can directly observe the Universe turning around Earth. There are no observation that the Universe turning around Earth."

I can at least observe each visible part of it going around Earth.

"As I said you are really very bad at science. Go and attend a basic science class. ... No, it shows that you are really very bad at philosophy. ... LOL!!! What an idiot"

You are on the other hand very good at ad hominem and intimidation ... except you choose the wrong guy.

"'No miracle has been substantiated' is a fact."

... -oid.

"Did they investigate amputees growing their legs?"

There is an example of a man with crooked legs being healed so he could walk. The legs were still crooked afterwards and the bones are on display (he died since then), but bent into a position which allowed him to walk without crutches.

MaxwellsDemon
"I can at least observe each visible part of it going around Earth."

No, you cannot. Which visible part of the universe are you talking about?

You are really very bad at science. LOL!!! What an idiot

"There is an example of a man with crooked legs being healed so he could walk. The legs were still crooked afterwards and the bones are on display (he died since then), but bent into a position which allowed him to walk without crutches."

You really have a very low bar for your miracles. LOL!!!

It must be amazing miracles when you find your car keys or a parking space. It must be amazing miracles for the sole survivor of a plane crash killing hundreds.

"No miracle has been substantiated' is a fact.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"No, you cannot. Which visible part of the universe are you talking about?"

Moon, Sun, Fix Stars, and, with retrogrades, Planets.

Whichever of these is visible can be observed circling the Earth in more or less 24 hours.

"You are really very bad at science. LOL!!! What an idiot"

[Ad hominems make me year for some pop corn!]

"You really have a very low bar for your miracles. LOL!!!"

No. We are talking a miraculous orthopedy which all orthopedists among medical specialists had failed at.

We are talking a crookedness showing original fault and followed up below by straight lower legs allowing a man to walk.

"It must be amazing miracles when you find your car keys or a parking space. It must be amazing miracles for the sole survivor of a plane crash killing hundreds."

Why not add the Jesuits who were neither killed nor irradiated while praying Rosary, while a US Air Force was bombing Little Boy over Nagasaki (or was it Big Boy over Hiroshima, no, Nagasaki is more like a Catholic sancturay in Japan, due to the Nagasaki martyrs).

"No miracle has been substantiated" is a fact-oid.

MaxwellsDemon
"Moon, Sun, Fix Stars, and, with retrogrades, Planets.

Whichever of these is visible can be observed circling the Earth in more or less 24 hours."


LOL!!! You are really a science illiterate and an IDIOT. Bye.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
"LOL!!! You are really a science illiterate and an IDIOT. Bye."

Wait, no more ad hominem's from you?

I'll have to reread it next time I come across an opprtunity of both accessing internet and eating popcorn!

[link to this post:]
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.fr/2017/05/on-aig-contra-cosmicsceptic.html


[End of short debate.]

1:31 Yes, right.

If in the middle of a desert I saw exactly one tree, which is very improbable, since trees in deserts tend to be in oases, and it had leaves of a certain shape and colour and a leaf of same colour and shape were lying under the tree, you could be rather sure that the leaf fell from that particular tree.

At least if it was fresh and of a type which soon dries.

Now, in a real oasis, you would probably be making a hasty conclusion, since other trees of same type would be around. A n d, guess what, the leaf could have come from any of these too.

And we are still supposing a rate of travel which is premodern.

Suppose someone had taken a leaf like that, committed a poison murder with it, taken it away with gloves, and wanted to hide it, where hide it better than under a tree of same type far from the murder? Or what if it was not far from the murder, what if the body had just been found in same oasis?

1:35 Inductive reasoning was not the exact thing you were speaking about, it was more like causal logic and could be formalised as deductive hypothetic syllogisms:

  • A - If the leaf could come from the tree by falling and from no other tree, it came from the tree by falling.
  • B - But it could come from the tree by falling, since of the same kind as the tree
    • AND It could not come from any other tree, since no other tree was around.
  • C - Therefore it came from the tree by falling.


1:40 "it goes without saying that nobody was around to observe the creation myth"

If you mean parts of six days prior to Creation of Adam, God and His angels were around to observe them.

If you mean from the creation of Adam on, Adam, the first human, was also around - meaning we have human eyewitness account, if genuine.

All subsequent events - fall, Cain and Abel, Flood, Babel - had human observers to main events (a human observer could not have seen God speaking with God - i e Father speaking with Son and Holy Ghost - about confusion of tongues, but a prophet present could have, it could also have been a good deduction by a Hebrew ancestor of Abraham present, and one confirmed by God to Moses).

1:49 Inductive reasoning is very great for basing scientific laws on - and laws which do not go beyond observations involved in induction.

Water boils when heated. But sometimes not - and then it is less hot.

Water boils when heated to 100° C (whatever that is in Fahrenheit).

But in some places it boils when heated to 90° C - and then cooking takes longer time. These places are high above the sea, like in the Andes or Himalayah.

These are natural scientific laws which can be established by induction, i e by confirming same scenario each time you look.

So ... induction is great for establishing science about what is true always, everywhere, necessarily. It is not so great about establishing "science" about what could have gone otherwise:

  • in the past
  • in the future
  • somewhere else
  • about sth hidden.


And guess what evolution is about? Events in the past (and even very distant past) which theoretically could have gone otherwise, with results right now which theoretically could have another explanation (like God did it).

1:52 Is falsifiable?

Here is a somewhat falsifiable prediction from evolution, which so far as I looked has been consistently falsified:

"since life has been around in various shapes differring from each other by a chronological succession, and since this at each point has statistically a certain chance to leave a trace, there is a certain chance that somewhere land vertebrates would leave traces in two layers above each other, like Triassic above Permian"

And before you tell me this prediction has been verified in Karoo, I have checked Karoo already. The Triassic fossils are in geological gobbledigook "stratigraphically above" the Permian ones, since found in "outcrops". But no where did I find even one Triassic fossil being found at one level and a Permian one under it after digging some feet deeper.

Why did I specify land vertabrates? Well, you have found trilobites under elasmosaurs in Bonaparte Basin, and could presumably find trilobites some places below fossil whales as well - but this could reflect where in the water the creatures were living when the Flood struck.

Why did I specify vertebrates? Well, when it comes to invertebrates, you do find Danian / Triassic invertebrates above Maastrichtian / Cretaceous ones in Yacoraite. But you could not tell which ones were which from the look of them, I presume (I asked an Argentinian University and got no answer), and they are presumably diagnosed as Creataceous or Triassic in accordance whether they are below or above an Iridium layer.

Someone also said my prediction is not reasonable, since even one level of fossils is so clearly improbable from any given time (but there is very much time added and accumulated, which would accumulate chances).

I did a model on this:

Creation vs. Evolution : Probabilities in reference to question of finding fossils all three major levels (PMC) a place
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2016/07/probabilities-in-reference-to-question.html

[PMC here not pmc as in "percent modern carbon", but "Palaeozoic, Mesozoic, Cenozoic".]

I am not sure the likelihood of my already having falsified evolution is minuscule, but the likelihood of evolutionists admitting I did it is of course very minuscule ;)

2:01 If you did the book experiment in front of me, we were standing close enough, you would not be sure it would drop to the ground, depends on my talent of catching it first!

2:59 I used to be very well educated in precisely evolution, at least for my age, and probably already then for many even adult believers in evolution, before I rejected it in two steps :

  • I became Christian
  • I saw problems of reconciliation AND other problems, like explaining language, origin of genetic code etc a bit after that (after really trying some to reconcile my older and my more recent learning).


But AiG is making the point that some people who are well educated precisely in evolution are in fact rejecting it.

3:09 "Almost unanimously" - do you have precise stats or are you judging from the small media coverage Creation Scientists (not to mention Creation Science Amateurs like myself!) get from the media you look to answers for?

3:22 It is perfectly true that a non-evolutionists knowing the evidence will for instance not allow for Lucretius' Geocentric universe with rotations around Earth happening by accident or everything staying basically the same for all eternity past or future is possible, will be a kind of Theist. Even Pantheists often do favour evolution.

Are you saying that this other thing they have in common totally discredits their conclusions about evolution?

3:33 Isaac Newton died 1727, 131 years before Charles Darwin published Origin of the Species.

Well, instead of "all scientifically educated people accept evolution" you suddenly have "all scientifically educated people after Darwin (or after Darwin + n years of debate) accept evolution".

For one thing, you are not any longer using the exact same argument as AiG told you not to use, and for another, you have just used a worse one : you are saying that progress in sciences eradicates freedom of academic debate.

3:43 "We judge people's intelligence by the standards of the time"

No. We judge them by standards of intelligence. And agreeing with your time is normally not one of them, which means you cannot judge a creation scientist now as stupid - or you would have to judge James Hutton as having been stupid when inventing deep time, since the standards of his time (in the West) were Young Earth.

3:49 "Albert Einstein ... could not even name who the 42:nd president of the US was"

Well, that kind of judgement totally demotes evolution from the kind of facts (if such) you can reason out by good logic any time to the kind of facts you happen to know about if you come across them.

And you can be very sure that if your scenario is true, no Homo Sapiens came across either the démise of the dinosaurs or the rise of the primates! It's as inaccessible to coming to know about, as the six days previous to Adam's creation some time into day six were accessible to Adam's direct observation : he could only know them, by trusting the One who told him about them.

4:23 No, what AiG is saying is not that pre-existing beliefs were adapted to new evidence, it is that evidence already available to creationists (like first Geologist Steno was one) were judged in a new way due to a shift in paradigm which had happened for clearly other reasons.

4:31 For some reason, I never saw visits by Father Christmas (evne when done with a bearded mask) as evidence of Father Christmas.

If Narnia Chronicles had been history and I could talk to Susan Pevensie or her son or daughter, perhaps I could ask how sure she was and why that she met Father Christmas on the way from Beaversdam to the Stone Table.

4:36 "in science" - for one thing, in science, there is no thing as "adult" and "childish" point of view and no "growing out of" an older paradigm.

You can refute some of the older paradigms, but you cannot just grow out of them. Check Phlogiston in history of chemistry!

I think there is some less credibility to Phlogiston after Lavoisier.

But that is not "growing out of", that is deductively refuting Phlogiston.

4:40 "new evidence always supersedes old ideas"

New evidence may certainly supersede an idea which was formed before the evidence came up.

Say, water boils at 100° C everywhere ... supposed by someone who has not checked out the Andes or Himalayah.

But the new evidence did not simply contradict the old idea, it refined it:

"water boils at 100° C if in air pressure of 1 at" (add that considerably lower air pressure in Nepal and Chichen Itza (? or whatever that place is called?) can be verified in support of this refined version of precisely the old idea).

4:48 "I would love to see some evidence for your world view which doesn't rely on the Bible"

Well, take a good look at fossil find places. Fossils being mainly from Flood explains why you don't find Mammoths straight above Brontosaurs straight above Tiktaaliks - so check that out, and don't look into the Bible when checking, look into places where you can find accounts of exact locations where fossils were found!

BUT you said that straight in same breath as just having said "when the old idea and the evidence are contradictory" ... you leaped very closely between evidence of absence (of Biblical story) and absence of evidence (for same).

5:20 "evolution is not historical science"

If you mean "evolution" as in Lenski experiment, or as in dog breeds (ok there is some historic knowledge involved in the science, but there is not a science made to reconstruct a lost history), AiG agree this is not historic science, but operational. They just refuse to term that evolution.

When it comes to goats or men evolving from protists, that is indeed a very long story which has only been - if at all - truly recovered by ... historical reconstruction by means of science, a k a "historical science".

5:25 That evolution is still happening today, on scales of Lenski experiment and dog breeds, we agree, except as to term evolution.

That evolution in the more long term perspective "is still happening today" is an inference which only adds future predictions (like "will men evolve to beardlessness") to the projections into the past which are "historic science".

On the scale of actually observed evolution today, the evolution on the scale of man from amoeba is NOT happing today and cannot be observed.

5:27 "we're just one step along the evolutionary timeline"

In other words, your pseudo-science is futuristic and not just historic ... sorry for snark, but you actually missed the point why the distinction was made.

And your exact words are not an observation which can be scientifically made by induction today, it is a piece of ideology, depending on the historical part of your science.

5:43 "it's a red herring ... and THAT is the context in which the two are compared"

OK, two ideas which have been compared in one context may not be compared in any other one? And if they are, that is a red herring? Sez hoo?

6:00 In actual fact, we can not "observe the results of Newtonian gravity" or "observe the results of Einsteinian gravity" in everyday life, we can only observe the results of "whatever gravity actually ultimately is".

The parallel would be, we cannot observe the results of evolution as those of evolution or of creation as those of creation (except language and mind!) we can only observe the results of "whatever ultimately caused biology and its diversity".

6:15 "all you need to do is observe evidence in favour of its existence"

Or rather "evidence very clearly in favour of its existence", please!

But thank you for bringing up this important pro-God point!

Some people waste their time and mine with saying "you can't use God as an explanation, in science we need observable and repeatable explanations".

While the book falling (I'm not sure I'd so much like to save Jefferson another fall) is very repeatable, gravity, if Newtonian, simply is there, unobserved, so neither observed, nor repeated, neither observable, nor repeatable.

6:18 (or a bit before) "and that is what we have for evolution"

Me and AiG would beg to disagree.

6:54 Any sphere is by definition also circular (several times over).

Take a look at Ancient Texts. Some describe Earth as a surface in the process of being spread out over some presumably flat underlying surface, and therefore as presumably flat itself.

The closest the Bible comes to this is saying Earth is spread out over waters - except that if waters could be spherical, so could Earth. Context is not clear cut enough to establish a flat earth is actually meant.

Some describe Earth as proven to be round.

The Bible doesn't do that either. It is between Phenicians and Greeks saying "earth is spherical" and Kemetistic Egyptians and Mardukistic Babylonians saying fairly clearly "earth is flat".

So, either this item argues it is written by an all knowing God - or it was written by a human people shrewd enough to remain on the hedge when their neighbours disagreed and no direct evidence of Magellan type was available.

In fact, two of the terms used to describe earth in Bible together, but especially one of them only together with modern geographic knowledge, argue the earth is spherical.

If you check modern Flat Earth maps, you might notice they have three corners, unless you very generously make Australia count for two. All of them are also South Corners, centre being North Pole.

But if you check a globe, you will find that Old World, while not flat, has a somewhat rectangular surface, i e has four corners, NW, NE, SE and SW : British Isles/Greenland, Sakhalin, Australia/New Guinea, Cape of Good Hope.

Also, if you have "circle" and "four corners" in same corpus considered as infallible, you will want to harmonised, consider both as true, which is evidently less easy if they describe same flat surface.

7:12 "and orbitting the sun"

Sorry, here I disagree with AiG. Round, yes, orbitting the Sun, no. That is deduced from certain views on how motions like day and night, years and seasons are explained, but it is NOT observed and a Christian may very well not share those views.

7:21 "have you ever been to space"

Good point, but even that would not be enough. Suppose Armstrong did sea Earth from Moon and saw it as turning. I don't believe that is out of the question, I don't believe it is a clear fact either, but for argument's sake, suppose he did.

Would that prove Earth was rotating around itself? Or could it be that Moon rotates around Earth every 24 h 50 minutes, so Armstrong was in fact viewing Earth from different directions?

7:30 Ships disappearing bottom first over horizon proves Earth is some kind of bent, not in itself fulness of globe. Earth's shadow on Moon could theoretically be the shadow of sth else - like Hindoo flat Earth lore says, planet Rahu comes above rim of Earth just in time to produce solar and lunar eclipses, and Rahu is circular (they also believe Meru is a mountain middle/North, which is incompatible with Biblical four corners).

You have to have a complete geographical circumnavigation, which is relying on ... tradition, from observations of other people.

I am not Magellan, I was not in his ship, but I trust those who were. Etc. for other voyages.

7:43 "shooting yourself in the foot here"

Well, not for Biblical History, since most of it (including most of 11 first chapters, excluding days 1-5 and first beginning of day 6, excluding the Divine Conference above Babel) was as accessible to participants then (if any) as Magellan's ship was to one aboard it from beginning to end of voyage. And in both cases, I trust tradition.

8:18 You seem to be misunderstanding the argument.

When a common trait is present in two diverse kinds, evolution argues as if common ancestor were only possible explanation and as if common creator was out of the question.

They were not saying that any specific point of past evolutionary history was predetermined, that is not the point of their argument.

8:30 No, we are not saying we conclude Biblical History from even necessities of Theistic types.

Biblical History is, like Geographic Knowledge, an observation available to men there and then, and therefore not a conclusion from effect to necessary one and only possible cause.

When it comes to excluding materialism when it comes to theory of mind, we do have such arguments too.

It is not about "there is only one way in which mind could arise from matter" (with you offering several other options), it is about "there is no way at all in which mind could arise from matter" (including all offers you give, either not arriving at mind or not starting from mindless matter).

8:39 "you are basing this on the Bible which completely contradicts this many idea"

No, there is such a thing as observed facts superseding a manifold of theoretical options.

4 could indeed come either from 2+2 or from 5-1, but if I saw four packages of ammo in a corner, when I arrived there, the man who was there before I arrived could certainly tell me (supping he wnated to and I was curious) whether he had seen:

  • a) first a jeep delivering 2 packages, then another jeep delivering other two
  • OR b) first a jeep delivering 5 packages, then a company of men taking one away with them on a motor cycle.


Once that information was given, unless I had reasons to mistrust the informant, I would know exactly how the 4 packages of ammo arrived, despite fact that more then one scenario were possible.

8:39 "again, this shows your complete lack of understanding of"

This comment shows your complete disregard of respect due to people arguing for something different before you start arguing with them.

8:39-42 I don't think AiG are either ignorant of evolutionary biology or of logic law of contradiction, I think you just managed to strawman them. Was it just by accident?

9:24 "natural selection is the process by which evolution takes place"

Place a child on a battle field. Let someone shoot in his direction - OK, don't do it! - and then say "if he doesn't develop the skills of a fighter or a good shelter taker within 15 minutes, natural selection dooms him to death, therefore, I predict he will next 15 minutes develop good skills as a fighter or shelter taker".

Do you find it possible that this prediction will come true of a toddler? I don't (I also don't want Illuminoids to do any practical research on topic!).

So, natural selection is not a process by which a protist will - if natural selection is repeated often enough - ancestral of a man. Natural selection is a process by which protists will rather be eliminated without ever evolving to man.

At least that is how natural selection operates in observable cases, everything you have on natural selection doing opposite in cases between protist supposed ancestors and human supposed descendants is deducted from an evolutionary world view, well above what can be observed about natural selection.

9:26 "if you take natural selection and extend it over a long enough period of time"

You will have death, not evolution. That is the rational prediction.

9:29 "then evolution will be the logical result"

You just failed logic forever!

9:50 God knew environments would be shifting a lot, for instance more salt in seas since Flood (deduced, not Biblically attested) or spreading to lands which had been altered by Flood and so on.

Hence a certain variability. And one can even give a fairly clear cut answer to limits of it.

Organs can be varied if existing in parental population, they can be lost, but they cannot be regained from scratch.

In case of blind fish cross fertilised with other blind fish, eye was dysfunctional in different genes, but it was functional in same genes in opposite populations.

Variability does for instance not involve evolution of eye from scratch.

9:53 "retain the climate entirely"

Not an option with a mankind to punish and safeguard against itself (I suspect nuclear stupidity aligned with evil twice over) with Flood and with Ice age, against Nodian corruption and against Tower of Babel.

10:00 "survival of the fittest, that is deaths of the unsuitable"

Yes, that latter would be the real name of the game - which is why it is not productive to results like those of evolution.

10:10 God is very certainly deciding who lives and who dies.

Or who lives longer and who dies earlier, since all who die have lived, and all who live will die.

He is deciding that by His own standard.

10:17 Random biological factors could explain mainly the kind of variability which involve losses. As in mutations, usually they tend to lose sth.

The variability beyond that would be epigenetic. One could also reason, in cases when mutations or "chromosomal mutations" (not same thing!) are beneficial, God is triggering the right ones in the right moment, rather than having previously given one.

But either of these, random biological factors cannot be responsible for assembling, I will not say "part after part of the eye", but rather "gene after gene IN part after part of the eye" from starting from nothing.

In a study of blind fish, I saw that just one part of the formation of an eye, production of this or that, depended on successive activation of TEN genes having to function correctly (or eight?).

So, in the overall picture (unless you prefer Epicure to Evolution) random biological factors are not slightly more but very much less likely.

10:52 Circular proof is not "subtle circular reasoning". Evolutionists are certainly themselves from time to time using the word or phrase "design features".

So, your first point off.

No, "design features" are not what we are "trying to prove". The text you read was not even trying to prove a designer behind design features. The text you read states, correctly, that a common designer is as logical an explanation for "common design features" or "common features" as a common ancestor is.

Meaning, if you are using these as proof of evolution, you are committing circular proof:

  • all living beings evolve from a latest universal common ancestor
  • therefore this feature found in two but not in certain other ones argues they had an even more recent common ancestor
  • therefore we have a tree of life
  • which points back to a latest universal common ancestor (which is where your conclusion touches too incestuously with your premiss)


If that is not how YOU are reasoning, fine, then the argument was not against you.

11:04 OK, you are not considering common features a proof, just an inspiration.

I think I caught AronRa or someone else doing otherwise (but it was a year ago or longer).

Then you are not using the argument they warn against. Are you sure noone else is?

11:20 Not one of them ... perhaps not in Oxford (just checked your site), but perhaps sth else is going on in Texas (check out AronRa's phylogeny challenge, I think I recall someone else too).

11:58 The heaps of indedependent researchers were in our days perhaps very independent from each other - but certainly NOT from their cultural background reaching back to James Hutton.

They share a common background as researchers.

They share more of it than what is minimally needed to be a researcher (compare them to Medieval researchers on natural science, you will notice a difference, and it is thanks to Medievals that optics and corrective glasses exist, so you can't say they were not researchers).

I argue, so does of course AiG, they also share more than is needed to be a researcher taking into account what has been discovered between the Middle Ages and now. AND this common cultural background (lots of it leading back to Russian revolution and via Commies to a certain type of Kabbalah) gives certain misleads in common to this heap of researchers.

As to the question itself, check all this heap if you find one place on earth where they first dug down to a mammoth, then down to a brontosaur - not even walking away a few yards, just digging deeper - and under the bronto a dimetrodon. I checked, I checked in sources you can't suspect of creationist bias, there is no such place, or if there is, it is very well kept secret for such a sensational thing, compared to all the other places.

As I already mentioned a bit earlier.

12:16 Your book falling to the ground can be evidence for any theory of gravitation among those of:

  • Aristotle
  • Newton
  • Einstein


The fossils we dig up are evidence for EITHER of two:

  • very long ages
  • very drastic conditions in Flood


I actually gave you a challenge which would, if succeeding fit the evolu pattern better then the Flood pattern. So far, you have not succeeded - which you should have done by chance, if it had been the case.

12:19 Fossils are indistinct evidence for EITHER Flood OR "geological long ages".

Traditions all over the world are - like the tradition on geography from Magellan's voyage - evidence of the Flood. If AiG is not providing a list of Flood legends, I think that both CMI (creationist) and TalkOrigins (evolutionist) are providing such lists.

12:25 "evidence to the contrary of a global flood at the time which"

Only if you confuse carbon dated time with real time.

Standard Creationist explanation on carbon dates (those relevant to cultures 2400 - 3200 BC, Flood dates according to several versions of Biblical chronology) seems to be completely ignored by you.

Sure, the archaeological material in Early Dynastic Period of Mesopotamia is dated to 2900—2350 BC, which takes care of Masoretic based Flood dates, while Jemdet Nasr period is dated 3100–2900 BC, taking care of St Jerome's LXX based date (2957 BC) and 4000–3100 BC is Uruk period, taking care of Syncellus and liturgic Byzantine dates of Flood (3258 / 3266 BC).

And yes, this archaeological material is indeed incompatible with a world wide Flood occurring in these times ... that is the times given in names, not dates!

Because, the standard creationist reply, which you seem to ignore, is that Uruk period and all the rest are solidly post-Flood, as is at least Upper Palaeolithic. Meaning that carbon was rising and earlier lower levels are causing a systematic and radically higher misdatng the further you go back.

This I have dealt with in my tables for carbon rise, here are some of the latest, but, with earlier tables more precise on especially later times, close to Troy:

Creation vs. Evolution : On Request : If we were 5777 Anno Mundi
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2017/05/on-request-if-we-were-5777-anno-mundi.html


Creation vs. Evolution : What about Ussher and Kent Hovind? Checking with Troy
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2017/03/what-about-ussher-and-kent-hovind.html


Creation vs. Evolution : Around Five Thousand Years Ago, There was a World Wide Flood?
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2017/03/around-five-thousand-years-ago-there.html


Creation vs. Evolution : About 5300 Years Ago There was a World Wide Flood? Iffy ...
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2017/03/about-5300-years-ago-there-was-world.html


The abbreviation pmc [here, as most usually] means "percent modern carbon". Stopping after argument 9.

[Resuming after stop:]

12:51 "peer reviewed studies which all point to the same conclusion"

  • 1) You were not there making these studies. So, you are relying on someone else's claim that observations were made.

    Check that one out, and compare Maxwell'sDemon's inane comments about Gospel miracles not being observation!

  • 2) When you say they all point to the same conclusion - are you relying for conclusion as well as for observations?

  • 3) You forgot to mention which specific new functions have been produced before our eyes by mutations.

  • 4) Perhaps the load of peer reviewed articles weren't even all concluding that, but most of them just presuming it and concluding other things - or perhaps some were concluding that from evolutionary suppositions about creature x descending from creature y by way of mutations.


13:15 "Note the wealth of evidence and ... examples in presenting the case"

If you want the specific evidence, how about going to pages which Argument 10 links to instead of just reading Argument 10?

13:34 "some mutations are good, some mutations are bad, most mutations" [are neither]

Well, the problem is that EVEN the good mutations are not of the type which the evolutionary scenario would require!

Take mutations observed in blind fish. These mutations are bad. On a VERY general level, you might just possibly imagine the same mutations going in reverse to achieve the good result of seeing fish.

There was just one part of the fetal development process which goes to building an eye, it was building just one part of the retina, and there were ten genes involved.

One or two or even more genes mutating to dysfunctional explain why there are blind fish.

But how would you explain all ten of them mutating into existence?

13:41 "Given enough time, you will start to see changes within a species in relation to their environment"

True! Excellent. Especially the "within a species" part!

Now, how would a Creationist Genetician (and specialist in plant genetics) like Maciej Giertych explain those changes?

  • Genetic drift : random culling by sheer chance in propagation of certain genes (in populations small enough for chance to play a role);
  • Natural selection : non-random culling by disadvantages certain individuals suffer due to certain genes in a new environment the genes are not adapted to;
  • Mutations : I don't think he even mentioned them, but in the case of information, it is mainly about loss. You can lose wings if you are a beetle, you can lose eyes if you are a fish, but we never see any beetles or fish getting wings or eyes from scratch. The best beetles and fish can hope for is more like getting back functions due to crossbreeding with varieties not suffering same bad mutations (you can even cross breed to blind fish and get seeing fish - provided they were blind due to different mutations : cross-breeding in such a case restores original gene pertinent to eye-sight).


What you do NOT get is mutations driving any invention of new organs or organelles.

13:45 Geographical isolation was certainly accounted for by Maciej Giertych and it does NOT invent new organs.

14:19 "A noticeable lack of supporting evidence here."

Look, I actually looked up the original article on their site. On EACH of the 12 arguments they think Evolutionists should not use, they DO link to one or two other articles about that particular aspect.

Here are the relevant links from 10, 11:

Answers in Genesis : Chapter 7
Are Mutations Part of the “Engine” of Evolution?
by Bodie Hodge on February 18, 2010
https://answersingenesis.org/genetics/mutations/are-mutations-part-of-the-engine-of-evolution/


Answers in Genesis : Monkeying with the Media
A Case Study of the Scopes Trial and the Media's Impact
by Rick Barry on June 7, 2007; last featured July 12, 2009
https://answersingenesis.org/scopes-trial/monkeying-with-the-media/


Answers in Genesis : Inherit the Wind
A Lesson in Distorting History
by Dr. Jerry Bergman on March 31, 2010
https://answersingenesis.org/scopes-trial/inherit-the-wind/


So, if you really want to be smart, and not just look smart to those who don't bother to get to originals, how about making new videos adressing the articles linked to?

14:25 "the Scopes trial has absolutely nothing to do with the scientific legitimacy of evolution"

Now, here you showed you have a totally British, not at all American perspective.

You are right.

But that is not how the US American public, including US American atheists and evolutionists see things.

14:32 "You will never see a biologist use etc"

No, but I have seen some internet evolutionists such as yourself use trials that way - BOTH Scopes, which Evolution lost, AND later ones (Kitzmiller vs Dover) which Evolution won.

14:39 "basing arguments on emotion not reason is not a trademark of science, but of faith"

For all that, quite a lot of evolutionists do show that trademark of "faith".

Also, "emotion, not reason" begs the question on how much reason is involved in emotions.

14:52 Flipping the coin is sometimes a good exercise, but you did not do it.

England has in very recent years seen worsened conditions for Creationists.

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : ... on Bias of Alice Roberts
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2017/05/on-bias-of-alice-roberts.html


I believe, Alice Roberts and her fellows had their way. Even private, even not state financed schools are forbidden Creationism in science classes.

And when it comes to her use of Johnny Scaramanga ... well, I'd say her appeals to emotion were unfortunately exclusive of some good reason which could have weighed in.

15:30 one being that every living thing had a sudden distinct origin less than a few thousand years ago

You are quite sure the diverse European 'edge'ogs are diversified more than 2000 years ago?

I'm not. I am however certain 25 species of 'edge'og all originated from a single couple on the Ark.

15:39 "realise that Genesis is not a literal account even if it was originally written with that intention"

Hogwash.

If it was originally written with the intention of being literally true, it is a literal account insofar as it is either living up to intention by being literally true, or failing it by being literally false.

You can't have "well, Moses of Esra or someone thought he was doing a good reconstruction, we know it is not, but we can still use it as edifying moral tales".

For one thing, account of Original Sin is only edifying if thought to be literally true. You can explain man's sufferings and shortcomings by a fall which did occur, but if you say it did not occur, you can no longer use it to so explain the human situation - I think even you or especially you should understand that point!

15:53 "the first thing you have to drop the theology"

If you mean apostasise, I hope that you realise that is over the top.

If you just mean to make a case without directly involving theology in its arguments against evolution, I already did.

Evolution makes a prediction about geological column, which fossil finds are falsifying.

Come on, scroll up the comment thread and refute that if you can!

Considering the last point, perhaps you would be afraid to lose patronage of Robert and some more?

Try asking St Robert Bellarmine for his patronage!