I have several points I wish you would address.
At 04:31 AM 7/19/99 -0300, Guy Blanchet wrote:
A moderate amount of thought suggests
>that the sort of environment that existed in Eden during the pre-sin era
>is one in which neither man nor beast thought of hunting down and eating
>one another. Eden was a happy place but not of the happy hunting ground
>variety.
The fossil record, as far as we go back and as deep as we observe shows
examples of animals eating animals. Where do these examples fit in?
"Another Permian formation from which several tracksites have recently
been reported, for the first time, is the Cedar Mesa Sandstone. One
locality near Hite, Utah, has produced a particularly interesting set of
footprints. The trackway, imprinted in a dune environment, shows evidence
of a small animal being consumed or snatched up by a larger trackmaker.
The large tracks are the Anomalopus type, usually attributed to primitive
mammal-like reptiles known as pelycosaurs. The small tracks resemble the
type known as Stenichnus, which, according to some authorities, are
probably attributable to a primitive reptile (protorothyrid) or a small
amphibian (microsaur). The trackway map shows that as the larger
trackmaker converged with the smaller animal, all traces of the latter
disappear near the point where the two trackways intersect. This suggests
that the smaller animal was snapped up and eaten or carried off."M. Lockley
and Adrian P. Hunt, Dinosaur Tracks, (New York: Columbia University Press,
1995), p. 55-56
"Recently Kaufman and Kesling (1960) reconstructed the fantastic pursuit of
a cephalopod by a pursuing swimming reptile more than 100 million years
ago. Only the fossil shell of the cephalopod has been found but its study
show that the reptile was able to sink its teeth into the shell of the
cephalopod sixteen different times during the chase. From the study of the
tooth points, the investigators were able to tell the direction and
effectiveness of the various bites as well as the identity of the species
of swimming reptile which was doing the biting. Evidently, the cephalopod
was a good match for the reptile, at least for a while. The overlapping
tooth prints on the cephalopod shell were interpreted in their
chronological order indicating a final and sixteenth bite ended the chase.
This final bite severed the entire body chamber of the cephalopod with all
of the vital soft parts."~ David L. Clark Fossils, Paleontology and
Evolution 2nd. ed. Dubuque: William C. Brown Co. Publishers 1976 p. 104-105
"6. Dorsal exoskeleton of Elrathia kingii (Meek) with arcuate, healed bite
mark and regenerated spine on one right pleura; Wheeler Formation, House
Range; KUMIP 204733." ~ Richard A. Robison, "Middle Cambrian Biotic
Diversity: examples from four Utah Lagerstatten," in Alberto M. Simonetta
and Simon Conway Morris, ed. The Early Evolution of Metazoa and the
significance of Problematic Taxa (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1991), 87
Where does the fossil record fit into your scheme?
>So, in the begining, God created a perfect Earth within a perfect
>universe. This is why He is noted to often say "it is good". God being
>Holy would not be able to call "good" something which is evil.
So why didn't God use the Hebrew word for 'perfect' instead of the Hebrew
word for 'good'? If the world was perfect, why didn't God proclaim it
perfect? God could have used Tawmiym which means perfect and was used of
Noah and the Pascal lamb. God chose to use the word Towb, which means good
and is what Lot used when he said, Do what is good in your eyes to my
daughters.
Did God choose the wrong word in inspiring the writer?
>
>So, as a result of sin, man, animals and nature are all fallen. And
>there is nothing that excludes the idea that nature includes all of the
>universe. A bit of thought suggests that God most likely heralded the
>post-sin era with His principle of entropy. From that time on, the
>stars including our Sun were also doomed to die because the universe's
>supply of useful energy began depleating i.e. ceased to be upheld by
>God.
Where in the Bible does it say that entropy began the day of the Fall? Name
a verse. It doesn't seem to be in my Bible.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution