>Ross quotes a date for the beginning of farming that is much later than it
>would have to be under your flood scenario, and you go to the literature
>and pull out a figure that is later than his to refute him. I understand
>you want to show he's not reading the literature -- at least not carefully
>-- but this makes it look as though you're abandoning your claims.
>...
Here is what I find problematical. Hugh Ross wrote:
>Some time before about 35,000 years
>ago, humans and civilization sprang up in the Mesopotamian flood
>plain, centered in Babel. Roughly 33,000 years ago, humans began
>to spread out over Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe.
This is stated in two declarative sentences which imply that this is the way
things happened. The problem is that Mesopotamia and Turkey have been studied
archaeologically for 150 years. Current evidence from this well studied area
say this is not what happened. If Ross wanted to say that his view predicts
that farming started 35,000 years ago, then he should say that. That would be
fine, as, that is a prediction. He states it like it is fact.
This is the difference between what I hope I am doing vs. what Hugh did.
>
>>ANOTHER EXAMPLE
>The question we ought to be asking is how can we, not as TE's, EC's, PC's
>or whatever, but as Christians who believe that all truth is God's truth,
>persuade Christian publishers to check the facts in their books more
>carefully?
Unfortunately, Christians have a different "reality" than do "secular" folk.
For the past 150 years, Christians have been telling the flock that one cannot
trust what the scientist says. Paul Steidl wrote:
"The entire scientific community has accepted the great age of the
universe; indeed, it has built all its science upon that
supposition. THey will not give it up without a fight. In fact,
they will never give it up, even if it means compromising their
reason or even their professional integrity, for to admit creation
is to admit the existence of the God of the Bible." Paul M. Steidl,
_The Earth, The Stars, and The Bible_ (Phillipsburg: Presbyterian
and Reformed , 1979) p. 94.
When we tar our adversaries, honesty, motives etc. we can't even
get to a discussion of the facts, because no one will believe the
facts a person presents. And if we do not believe the facts that scientists
present, then we must come up with our own. One of which is this business
about the existence of the geologic column. It is a "fact" among christians
that it doesn't exist; it is part of the "reality" we must deal with. And
publishers are going to check a book's facts against the "reality" they
believe.
glenn
Foundation,Fall and Flood
http://members.gnn.com/GRMorton/dmd.htm