>Our faith deals in the realm where we exercise our free will in making moral
>decisions. Such is not the realm of science. The interpretation of the data
>is what is crucial. For instance, in cosmology people accept the
>inflationary model of Alan Guth where a fast expansion is postulated to
>solve certain know puzzles in the observed data. Could the six days of
>Creation be the analog of the inflationary expansion posited in cosmology?
>What I want to reconcile are questions which arise when Christ says: " Have
>you not read, that He who created them from the beginning made them male and
>female." Matt. 19:4. Christ must have been referring to the Book of Genesis.
>I am sure that Christ also made references to the Flood. Is Christ trying to
>deceive us? What is He saying?
No, Christ is not trying to deceive us. A reference to the flood, which
Christ does mention, does not give enough detail to determine whether he
beleived in a global or local flood. We are deceiving our selves if we
think that the Bible teaches either view. The passage CAN be interpreted
either as global or local, but the YECs insist on global. And yes God did
create male and female. Does Math 19:4 say HOW God created? No. You are
reading that INTO the passage and deciding that God only could have created
as a magician does, by pulling a rabbit out of a hat. By deciding that, you
are deciding against God creating via evolution which could be likened to
the way an engineer creates something, i.e. over time or via a genetic
algorithm.
>
>>Or are you suggesting that if evolution is true, then Christianity is wrong
>>and we shouldn't try to "salvage our faith"?
>
>If our existence can be proven on the basis of physics and chemistry, then
>our thoughts of God is a total delusion. Of course, one can invent all sorts
>of hybrids of evolution/christianity in order to justify anything.
>
Please quit confusing evolution with explaining our existence only "on the
basis of physics and chemistry". Nowhere did I say that evolution requires
atheism or reductionism. You are the one who is claiming that, yet it is
not true. Find a verse in the Bible that says "animals reproduce animals
after their kind." By that I mean a sentence with animals as the subject
and animals as the object. You can not find such a verse. To hold that the
bible rules out evolution is to go way beyond the actual Biblical passages
>People like Phillip Johnson are not surrendering but fighting at the correct
>front. Christians have been forced to fight the misuses of observational
>data and the destruction of our public educational system.
>
My pick with Phil is that when he wrote his book he relied on a 24 year old
paleontology book, made numerous factual errors, like rodents give rise to
whales (Darwin on Trial p. 87) and then goes on to treat the scientists as
if they don't know anything. I find it is usually better to get ones own
facts correct prior to telling someone else that they don't know anything.
What are we to do with Phil's misuse of observational data?
>>How can they when there is not enough information content in the genes to
>>specify the brain? That dog won't hunt.
>
>Isn't the genetic code of an individual sufficient to reproduce the
>individual? What is all the cloning all about, then? Enlighten me. The brain
>is physical, thoughts are something else.
>
I am not going to reproduce the post on the information required to wire a
brain that I posted about a week ago. You can find it in the archives or I
will send it to you privately if you wish. But the point is that there is
about 100,000 times more information required to wire a human brain than is
held in the human geneome.
As to thoughts, we don't know what thoughts are. If God decided to make us
entirely physical who is the pot to say to the Potter, "Why have you made me
thus?"
>>>Long ago Descartes said that "matter cannot think" and so it is. Perhaps
>>>C.S. Lewis said it best when he said that "reasoning is supernatural." It is
>>>so obvious that a purely scientific approach to the whole of reality is apt
>>>to lead to all sorts of nonsense. For instance, if evolution is true, why
>>>not help it. Wasn't that the logic of Hitler? If evolution is true, is it
>>>possible that some races are less developed than others?
>>
>>So why did good southern Baptists in the south own slaves last century? They
>>didn't believe in the humanity of blacks either and they didn't believe in
>>evolution. Why would my mother's southern Baptist church in 1963 refuse to
>>let blacks worship with them? No one in that church believed in evolution!
>>What was their problem? This whole "racism comes from evolution" argument is
>>highly flawed and pays no attention to the Christian examples of racism. How
>>about the (former? I don't know if they changed) policies of Bob Jones
>>University? They actively taught that evolution was wrong but wouldn't allow
>>any blacks into their school.
>> Racism comes from sin--the sin of pride and the sin of hate--nothing
more.
>
>Their practical Christianity was lacking! Also, they misused the Declaration
>of Independence and our Constitution in order to justify their actions. Much
>as it is done today with abortion which is legal by declaring humans non
>persons. You know full well that the same action can have two widely
>different reasons.
Those Christians were sinning.
If you are an atheistic scientist, then helping evolution
>is the correct thing to do. Isn't that what is actually taking place in our
>society today? Why cloning people without head? That is good science. Isn't
>it?
Believe it or not, most evolutionists I know aren't into eugenics. So most
atheists I know are not trying to help evolution along.
>I did not say that past racism comes from evolution, I said future
>control of who is born and who is not will come from idealogies that fully
>accept evolutionary views.
I quote you from above:
>>>If evolution is true, is it
>>>possible that some races are less developed than others?
This strongly implies that evolution breeds racism and says nothing about
who is born!
>You raise the issue of sin but that word means
>nothing to those who do not believe as we do. To those people science is God
>and the uses of science with no moral conscience will give rise to a society
>which will make Sodom and Gomorrah look like Paradise.
So what? Even if the word sin means nothing to them, that is not the issue.
Evolution does not breed more racism than sinning Christians do. Evolution
does not breed more killing than the "Christian Ku Klux Klan" did. How about
the Christians who baptized the Incas then marched them off to their deaths?
My point is, that you can not show that Christians are pure where it comes
to racism, abortion, etc and the evolutionists are the bad guys. We have
all fallen short of the glory of God.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm