BCanr2d2 Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 The pervasive nature of the Christian dogma, is more due to the proliferation of the Roman civilisation into Europe, and it's marked effect on that area of the work, and the subsequent exploration of the remaining parts of the world. So, it is a mute point that Christian dogmas are such widespread, it is just that the Roman laws were based upon - It isn't called Roman Catholicism for nothing.... At first, by the Roman Empire of the time it was persecuted, but when the Roman Empire split into two, the West Roman Empire still didn't follow it, but the East Roman Empire, or the Holy Roman Empire took it as their religion. This was the last remaining and more widespread Roman Empire that left it's effects on the world. What are we trying to say, that because of the marked influence of one civilisation on the rest of the world, that somehow everyone seems to be latent christians? I would like to know why the Bible doesn't talk about areas of the world outside those of the Middle East? How do we know, according to the Bible that the flood covered all of the Earth... We have such a narrow viewpoint of the possible area of the Earth that was covered in water. We have beliefs based upon the accounts of such a small part of the world..... Why couldn't we have more of a calm approach towards differing religions, like the Muslim Ottoman Empire did in Istanbul, where they didn't deface St Sophia's, and placed the Islamic Icons without disturbing the Christian artwork. They just placed a thin layer of plaster over the artwork instead of painting directly over it. Now that is called acceptance... As for Muslim and Christianity - Muslim has an extra prophet or two, but the stories reported are the same, and have the same belief in what is in essence the same God.... I will continue to stick with the "Science and Religion Aren't Mutually Exclusive" line, that you don't have to ignore either one to not believe one of them. Creation can be explained by both science and religion, it is just that the FORCED dogma of Christianity is that of a LITERAL interpretation of everything, when all evidence points towards the writers natural writing style being that of parables..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C'jais Posted November 30, 2002 Author Share Posted November 30, 2002 What makes you Christians believe your religion is the true one? What if it turned out it's the Buddhistic or Islamic one? But if we only stop looking for Gods to explain what has not been explained yet, all disputes will end. If the doors of perception were to be cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is - infinite. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clem Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 im entering the thread to add a little light relief Too many X chromosomes spoil the primordial soup i did say only a little relief! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowTemplar Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by ZDawg Its better to make up God than make up some lame story that non-life can make life and that everything happened by chance and that we have no purpose. Why? In all frankness, men with purpose have a nasty habit of crashing planes into buildings. Those who cannot live with going without purpose, yet unable to find one, kill themselves, thereby solving the problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wacky_Baccy Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Posted by Clem im entering the thread to add a little light relief Too many X chromosomes spoil the primordial soup LMAO I hate you now ...I used to have a wit as sharp as that, but it's dulled horribly lately... *goes in search of wit-sharpener* Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clem Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 u want a wit-stone bit like a whet-stone ..... only funnyer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowTemplar Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by ZDawg How do you know that what the tests saying 15 million years old could really be only 15 years? The only reason for me to reply to this is to point out the blatant inconsistencies of your 'facts'. Earlier that figure said 'thousands of years'. To me it sounds as if you are making the whole thing up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wacky_Baccy Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Posted by Clem u want a wit-stone bit like a whet-stone ..... only funnyer I wondered if you might say that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clem Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 yeah right mr hindsight Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowTemplar Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 I have three more things to say on this subject: 1) This has ground into a stalemate. No-one is making any new points, all we seem to be doing is bickering over misread definitions and bad logic. I admit that it has gotten to my nerves, of late, and I have said things that were a little out of hand. Apologies to all concerned. 2) I use an external frame of reference. That is I act and think according to what my senses tell me. This is a VIP (Very Important Point). When using sensory perception (and lab equipment, which is essentially just enhancing your senses) as a common reference, you are sure that you have just that: A common reference. The following may ring a bell with some: He held up four fingers. "I see three fingers. Or I see five fingers. I see whatever number of fingers that the Party wants me to see. I may see four fingers, but I might just as well see both three, four, and five fingers simultaniously." I am paraphrasing an Orwell novel called 1984. Any of you who haven't read it should do so. It uses several terms that Orwell introduced himself, but the most relevant to our debate is no doubt 'Doublethink'. Doublethink is the skill of holding two mutually contradicting thoughts true at the same time. I'll not go into great detail concerning the kind of society that 1984 describes, but it's despotic, to say the least. Those in power systematically falsify every record, so that there are no records that contradict the dogma of the ruling cadre. Then the populace uses Doublethink to assimilate this knowledge unquestioningly. What is this rant leading up to, you may be asking yourselves. Well, it revolves around Doublethink. At the very core of that concept lies the denial of external reference. If the Party wants to, Up will be Down, Down will be Up, Light will be Darkness, and Darkness will be Light. They do this by denying external reference. According to our sensory perception Up is Up, not Down. But the Party ignores the senses, saying that the senses are part of the mind, and that the mind can therefore alter the senses. This means that they can claim anything and everything to be true. Ultimate power. Ultimate control. They dictate reality. This indoctrination means that it is impossible to rebel against the Party. Because rebellion will fail. That is just the way the world works, in the minds of their subjects. When you deny the usefulness of C-14 and other dating methods, you deny external reference. You do the math. This is what makes religion so dangerous. Equallity can only be ensured by having everyone firmly planted on a common ground. And the only (almost) common ground we have is that of our senses. 3) This is ShadowTemplar, signing out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elijah Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Shadow, I Still ask you to answer my question... I'd like one of your smart little scientific answers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheWhiteRaider Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by SkinWalker Jim Jones.... remember Guyana? See above. Jerry Falwell; Jim Jones; anti-apartheid cleric Allan Boesak; Rev. Dennis B. O'Neill (bottom of the page); James William Bell; Episcopalians; Rev. John Alexander; religious reform school exploitation; Baptist Foundation of Arizona; etc., etc., SkinWalker Now compair that to non-christains. Not just that there is no way to tell if they were true christains. I can put on baseball gear, but that does not make me a baseball player does it? Heck there are some people that call themselves christains and they do not believe in Jesus(Tell me how that one works out. Notice the "Christ" in "Christains".) Yet killing is wrong, no matter what, no? Am I wrong here? Oh but if there is no evil how can you call that wrong? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyrion Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by TheWhiteRaider Oh but if there is no evil how can you call that wrong? True.... Of course,we could just use morals..morals doesnt neccisarily mean evil and good... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkinWalker Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by Redwing While we can't be certain of the exact nature of the Flood, it certainly involved tsunamis (sometimes called tidal waves)—incredibly energetic shock waves in the ocean, traveling at the speed of sound, which pummeled the land with towering walls of water. Likewise, it involved underwater mudflows, which even today are known to flow at up to 100 miles per hour, following an underwater earthquake or other disturbance. Volcanism, tectonism, erosion, redeposition, etc., occurred at rates, scales, and intensities far beyond similar processes occurring today. Except that the geologic strata of the Earth's crust tells a vastly different story. NOTHING in geology happens fast. Even a "sudden earthquake" is the result of thousands, if not millions, of years of stress and tension that builds until a "rubber band" effect is created by the "snap" of the crust. Mudflows, while very rapid, are also the result of years of potential energy being stored. The interesting thing about mudflows is that they leave very tell-tale anomalies since they are flows of solid or semi-solid material (even if underwater). There are nearly always striations and banding that occurs when large objects (boulders, trees, etc.) are dragged along with the mud or silt. The real problem with the above "theory" is that the geologic occurance mentioned (volcanism, tectonism, erosion, depostion, and others) did occur. However, they occured slowly and consistently over 4.6 billion years. The whole idea that "massive amounts of marine life died at the same time and this is why we have fossils in the same areas" is ludicrous. Once the Cretaceous Period was established to have ended 65 million years ago (I won't bother to go into dating methods again... but suffice to say that enough were used in redundant fashion to eliminate most of their margins of error to say: "65 million years +/- a few thousand), it is a matter of comparing where in the geologic strata an object lies in order to estimate it's age. If I find a shark's tooth in the Eagleford Shale, which lies just below the Austin Chalk (Cretaceous), then I know that it is 8 million years younger than an oyster that I may find in the Walnut Creek formation, which is many layers below. Noah's deal was supposed to have lasted 40 days and a wake-up. Deposition is slow. A mudslide can account for some significant deposition in a VERY localized, specific place (and will have the anomalies I mentioned earlier), but depostion on as grand a scale as WORLDWIDE!? Nah.. Even if the mountains were leveled it wouldn't account for it. Noah's deal was also supposed to have occured a few thousand years ago... the only mountain of any significance created that fast was a mountain of garbage up north that they supposedly turned into a ski resort. Geology is SLOW. Originally posted by Redwing There is also the possibility that great amounts of vegetation were dislodged from the pre-Flood continents and remained intertwined during the Flood as floating mats. Many creationists feel that the decay and abrasion of these mats are responsible for our major coal seams, but underneath these mats, the turbulence of the surface would have been lessened. Perhaps many fish found shelter and nutrition under them, as insects may have, on the mats themselves. Many creationists seem to be creating a lot of general BS to attempt to explain what they are afraid to admit: a major story in the bible is crap. It doesn't pan out. Noah could not have possibly created a boat that would take on two of every species in the Dallas Zoo, much less the continent of Africa. What about the Native American and Asian people who were on the other side of the planet? What about the wildlife of Australia... so unique to the world that many species exist there that resemble no other on the planet? By the way, evidence has been discovered that puts human beings on the North American Continent up to 9, 000 years ago. Creationists attempt to rebuke dating methods because they're not "100%." What in life is? The margin for error of many dating methods is less significant that the margin for error of a police radar gun, but I bet you pay your ticket when you get it. Multiple dating methods are used and samples are dated repeatedly to ensure proper conditions. Methods such as Carbon, Potassium-Argon, et al are based upon half-lives of atoms, which are constants. If I attempted to explain the process here, I would create a post more boring that it already is, so I'll refer you to your local library/college professor. The methods are sound and reliable. If you really want, I'll scan texts I have and post them or attempt to find a source on the net. The bible cannot explain creation. It was written by men who had very little knowledge about the world around them. They were ignorant. They did the best they could and this sufficed for a thousand or more years, but, as a theory, it's revision time has come. Man is science. We strive to learn from the time we are children. As a society, our knowledge doesn't die as the generation dies, it increases exponentially. Man is logic as much as man is anything else. We strive to believe in ideas (spiritual, morals, passions, causes, etc.), but we also want to prove what we believe. The bible indicates that a huge fish swallowed an old boy named Jonah. Kept him for over 3 days and "spewed" him forth on land. Jonah survived. What kind of fish could do that? Was it a fish made specifically for Jonah? The bible says another character stopped the sun and made it stand still for the purpose of lengthening the day. Now, you have to imagine that this was written a few thousand years ago (old testiment if my memory of bible school holds) and people up until very recently in human history believed that the Sun orbited the Earth (we were, of course, the center of the universe). These are but a very few instances in which the bible is factually incorrect. Believers (interesting how this term fits those who are fanatical about UFO's, bigfoot, and Loch Ness monster) will rebuke by saying: "god willed it and thus it was so..... yada, yada, yada...." that seems to be the "believer" general statement of rebuke..... Cjais, enter that into record and accept it as so. Creation = unsupported BS, loosely postulated "theories," and fanatical devotion to a dogma proved to be inaccurate. Evolution = extensive set of complimentary theories, evidenced by extensive research and observation of geologic strata, biologic diversity, geographic placement, environmental concerns, etc. Cheers SkinWalker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkinWalker Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by TheWhiteRaider Now compair that to non-christains. Not just that there is no way to tell if they were true christains. I can put on baseball gear, but that does not make me a baseball player does it? Heck there are some people that call themselves christains and they do not believe in Jesus(Tell me how that one works out. Notice the "Christ" in "Christains".) Good. Then we are in agreement. Your faith has no bearing on whether you are a criminal. It's your value system that makes a difference. I'm sure that Jim Jones' value system was at least slightly of center. Jerry Falwell liked the ladies, but at least they weren't little alterboys. I know of many people who are christian and non-christian that have values and morals that far surpass those of everyday folk. I also know those in both groups that live amoral lives. Christianity has the advantage of being able to teach values and morals with an established structure, text, and with positive and negative rewards (eternal life -v- eternal damnation). The same values and morals can be taught without the same religious dogma, bible, reward system. Native Americans did it, buddists did it, atheists do it. In every group or societal classification on the planet, you will find "good and bad" people. I agree with Cjais to an extent that "good" and "evil" are subjective to ones value system. But I get more philosophical.... "evil" is a necessity. It defines "good." Without evil, society would not know what was to be considered good. Man assigns good and evil as he sees fit. Most of society agrees on most of the assignments because they're logical. Killing someone is evil. But it can be good, too. If the life you take saves two, then how can it not? Stealing is evil. But if the theif is 10 years old and an orphan who is trying to steal bread to feed a 7 year old sister.... what then? These questions are, of course, debateable. You may think the answer is without a doubt, clear. Others will have different opinions, but also feel that they are without a doubt clear. Good and evil are creations of man. We need these creations in society so that we may function effectively, but they are creations of man, non-the-less. SkinWalker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Redwing Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Originally posted by Redwing But not everyone can sense God, and no one can prove God. So if we draw the line there, this debate has no point. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yes, but that would be assuming and not sticking to what we sense - why should we draw the line there? To "prove" your beliefs? For the millionth time (give or take a few ), at least, I'm not trying to prove my beliefs here ^.^ quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- No. I already defined what makes a "real" Christian. Look earlier -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- But the people in the middle ages thought they were real christians too. WHo are you to judge them? Some day, the people in the future will look at you and say that you weren't any better than them, IMHO. Views changes, but in the present, it's all for real. I judged them according to the Bible. You could do it too. Anyone could. quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If they're defending innocent people, I don't see how that parallels the Crusades. Besides, I don't need to defend others' actions, especially when they don't represent those of my side ^.^ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yet killing is wrong, no matter what, no? Am I wrong here? BTW, I'm glad that you do not condone that act. Killing is not wrong no matter what, according to the Bible. quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Really? How much do you know about these religions anyway? Virtues like that are held in many places in everyday society, too. But everyday society isn't necessarily Christian, nor is morality, as you or someone else pointed out. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Exactly my point. We do not need religion for morals, nor society. However, modern society is in fact built on Christian dogmas. You can ask the people against abortion for evidence Modern society doesn't follow all of Christianity's dogmas, whether it was built on them or not ^.^ I have three more things to say on this subject: 1) This has ground into a stalemate. No-one is making any new points, all we seem to be doing is bickering over misread definitions and bad logic. I admit that it has gotten to my nerves, of late, and I have said things that were a little out of hand. Apologies to all concerned. I have to agree... My apologies as well. When you deny the usefulness of C-14 and other dating methods, you deny external reference. You do the math. This is what makes religion so dangerous. Equallity can only be ensured by having everyone firmly planted on a common ground. And the only (almost) common ground we have is that of our senses. You are making a false comparison. If C-14 is not a valid dating method past a certain timespan, it is not a valid external reference...it isn't to be compared with saying down is up. quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Originally posted by Redwing While we can't be certain of the exact nature of the Flood, it certainly involved tsunamis (sometimes called tidal waves)—incredibly energetic shock waves in the ocean, traveling at the speed of sound, which pummeled the land with towering walls of water. Likewise, it involved underwater mudflows, which even today are known to flow at up to 100 miles per hour, following an underwater earthquake or other disturbance. Volcanism, tectonism, erosion, redeposition, etc., occurred at rates, scales, and intensities far beyond similar processes occurring today. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Except that the geologic strata of the Earth's crust tells a vastly different story. NOTHING in geology happens fast. Even a "sudden earthquake" is the result of thousands, if not millions, of years of stress and tension that builds until a "rubber band" effect is created by the "snap" of the crust. The flood was the result of the firmament collapsing and enormous resovoirs of water being broken up. Mudflows, while very rapid, are also the result of years of potential energy being stored. The interesting thing about mudflows is that they leave very tell-tale anomalies since they are flows of solid or semi-solid material (even if underwater). There are nearly always striations and banding that occurs when large objects (boulders, trees, etc.) are dragged along with the mud or silt. The real problem with the above "theory" is that the geologic occurance mentioned (volcanism, tectonism, erosion, depostion, and others) did occur. However, they occured slowly and consistently over 4.6 billion years. The whole idea that "massive amounts of marine life died at the same time and this is why we have fossils in the same areas" is ludicrous. Once the Cretaceous Period was established to have ended 65 million years ago (I won't bother to go into dating methods again... but suffice to say that enough were used in redundant fashion to eliminate most of their margins of error to say: "65 million years +/- a few thousand), it is a matter of comparing where in the geologic strata an object lies in order to estimate it's age. If I find a shark's tooth in the Eagleford Shale, which lies just below the Austin Chalk (Cretaceous), then I know that it is 8 million years younger than an oyster that I may find in the Walnut Creek formation, which is many layers below. Noah's deal was supposed to have lasted 40 days and a wake-up. Deposition is slow. A mudslide can account for some significant deposition in a VERY localized, specific place (and will have the anomalies I mentioned earlier), but depostion on as grand a scale as WORLDWIDE!? Nah.. Even if the mountains were leveled it wouldn't account for it. Noah's deal was also supposed to have occured a few thousand years ago... the only mountain of any significance created that fast was a mountain of garbage up north that they supposedly turned into a ski resort. Geology is SLOW. The problem with what you are saying is that you are explaining what you think happened and saying it did. Geology happens slowly, yes, but a catastrophic, worldwide flood would have sped it up. Your evidence appears to be dating methods - dating methods which don't give consistent results. quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Originally posted by Redwing There is also the possibility that great amounts of vegetation were dislodged from the pre-Flood continents and remained intertwined during the Flood as floating mats. Many creationists feel that the decay and abrasion of these mats are responsible for our major coal seams, but underneath these mats, the turbulence of the surface would have been lessened. Perhaps many fish found shelter and nutrition under them, as insects may have, on the mats themselves. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Many creationists seem to be creating a lot of general BS to attempt to explain what they are afraid to admit: a major story in the bible is crap. It doesn't pan out. Noah could not have possibly created a boat that would take on two of every species in the Dallas Zoo, much less the continent of Africa. What about the Native American and Asian people who were on the other side of the planet? What about the wildlife of Australia... so unique to the world that many species exist there that resemble no other on the planet? By the way, evidence has been discovered that puts human beings on the North American Continent up to 9, 000 years ago. A) I kept my post insult free, kindly try to do the same...it's easier to reply to. B) The Native American and Asian people didn't exist yet. C) Not all wildlife necessarily had developed yet. Besides, "kinds" of animals is alot more all-encompassing than "species". Creationists attempt to rebuke dating methods because they're not "100%." What in life is? The margin for error of many dating methods is less significant that the margin for error of a police radar gun, but I bet you pay your ticket when you get it. Really? Source, please. Multiple dating methods are used and samples are dated repeatedly to ensure proper conditions. Methods such as Carbon, Potassium-Argon, et al are based upon half-lives of atoms, which are constants. If I attempted to explain the process here, I would create a post more boring that it already is, so I'll refer you to your local library/college professor. The methods are sound and reliable. If you really want, I'll scan texts I have and post them or attempt to find a source on the net. Well then. I agree it would be very boring. I actually tried to research dating methods on the Net, and so much conflicting information that I basically gave up. I would rather hear from an expert in the field, honestly. What I have seen says that the methods are not very sound and reliable, because you run out of half-lives. The bible indicates that a huge fish swallowed an old boy named Jonah. Kept him for over 3 days and "spewed" him forth on land. Jonah survived. What kind of fish could do that? Was it a fish made specifically for Jonah? If you really want to get into that, I will. To demonstrate my waning interest, I'll use someone else's explanation, again Skeptics ridicule many portions of Scripture and let's face it—some of them are difficult to believe. Certainly one that has received a major dose of such ridicule deals with Jonah and the whale (or great fish). How could a whale or fish swallow a man whole? How could a man survive in such an environment for any length of time? (...) First, let me say that the historicity of this account is vital to the Christian. Believing it is not an option, for Jesus Christ Himself believed it and made it a model for the doctrine of His resurrection. "For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth (Matthew 12:40). What kind of animal swallowed Jonah? In the passage above, the Greek word translated "whale" actually means a huge fish or sea monster. In the passage in Jonah (1:17; 2:1,10), the Hebrew word was the normal word for "fish," but here the word is modified by the word great. Our modern taxonomic system places whales among the mammals, sharks, among the fish and plesiosaurs among the reptiles, but, the Bible uses a different system. "All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men,another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds." ( I Corinthians 15:39). Evidently any living thing other than the creeping things (Psalm 104:25) in the seas is placed in the category of "fishes". In addition, there are several species of whale and of sharks alive today with gullets large enough to swallow a man whole. Among extinct animals like the plesiosaurs, the same could be said, and perhaps this was a heretofore unknown fish of large size. The point is, the story is not impossible. However, most importantly, the Bible says that "the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah" (Jonah 1:17). Clearly this event was miraculous and not a naturalistic phenomenon. Thus we don’t have to give it an explanation limited by modern experience or knowledge. Could a man survive in a fish’s belly? The Hebrew idiom "three days and three nights" has been clearly shown both from Scripture and other sources to mean a period of time beginning on one day and ending on the day after the one following. It doesn't necessarily mean three full days and nights. Furthermore, there have been several reported cases of modern sailors or other individuals swallowed by such an animal, only to be recovered many hours later. But again, this story involves the miraculous. It may be that Jonah actually died and was resurrected by God. This is implied in his description of his experience especially Jonah 2:2. Of course, resurrection is "impossible" but it clearly happened on several occasions in Scripture requiring miraculous input. (...) The bible says another character stopped the sun and made it stand still for the purpose of lengthening the day. Now, you have to imagine that this was written a few thousand years ago (old testiment if my memory of bible school holds) and people up until very recently in human history believed that the Sun orbited the Earth (we were, of course, the center of the universe). It says God did this. These are but a very few instances in which the bible is factually incorrect. Believers (interesting how this term fits those who are fanatical about UFO's, bigfoot, and Loch Ness monster) will rebuke by saying: "god willed it and thus it was so..... yada, yada, yada...." that seems to be the "believer" general statement of rebuke..... Cjais, enter that into record and accept it as so. What? I've only ever said "this is my position" not "this is my position and you HAVE to accept it". Creation = unsupported BS, loosely postulated "theories," and fanatical devotion to a dogma proved to be inaccurate. Evolution = extensive set of complimentary theories, evidenced by extensive research and observation of geologic strata, biologic diversity, geographic placement, environmental concerns, etc. Mudslinging is the last stage in an intelligent debate, which happens when almost all the arguments have been argued into the ground...I agree with Shadow now more than ever. Rather than join in, I'll just digress. (I know, I said I was going to earlier too...) Oh! One last thing: I'll post an article to answer this: I would like to know why the Bible doesn't talk about areas of the world outside those of the Middle East? How do we know, according to the Bible that the flood covered all of the Earth... We have such a narrow viewpoint of the possible area of the Earth that was covered in water. We have beliefs based upon the accounts of such a small part of the world..... Brackets indicate that I added, subtracted, or changed something One of the strongest [circumstancial] evidences for the global flood which annihilated all people on Earth except for Noah and his family, has been the ubiquitous presence of flood legends in the folklore of people groups from around the world. And the stories are all so similar. Local geography and cultural aspects may be present but they all seem to be telling the same story. Over the years I have collected more than 200 of these stories, originally reported by various missionaries, anthropologists, and ethnologists. While the differences are not always trivial, the common essence of the stories is instructive as compiled below: Is there a favored family? 88% Were they forewarned? 66% Is flood due to wickedness of man? 66% Is catastrophe only a flood? 95% Was flood global? 95% Is survival due to a boat? 70% Were animals also saved? 67% Did animals play any part? 73% Did survivors land on a mountain? 57% Was the geography local? 82% Were birds sent out? 35% Was the rainbow mentioned? 7% Did survivors offer a sacrifice? 13% Were specifically eight persons saved? 9% Putting them all back together, the story would read something like this: Once there was a worldwide flood, sent by God to judge the wickedness of man. But there was one righteous family which was forewarned of the coming flood. They built a boat on which they survived the flood along with the animals. As the flood ended, their boat landed on a high mountain from which they descended and repopulated the whole earth. Of course the story sounds much like the Biblical story of the great flood of Noah's day. The most similar accounts are typically from middle eastern cultures, but surprisingly similar legends are found in South America and the Pacific Islands and elsewhere. None of these stories contains the [clarity and level of believable detail] given in the Bible, but each is meaningful to their own culture. Anthropologists will tell you that a myth is often the faded memory of a real event. Details may have been added, lost, or obscured in the telling and retelling, but the kernel of truth remains. When two separate cultures have the same "myth" in their body of folklore, their ancestors must have either experienced the same event, or they both descended from a common ancestral source which itself experienced the event. [A] credible way to understand the widespread, similar flood legends is to [propose] that all people living today, even though separated geographically, linguistically, and culturally, have descended from the few real people who survived a real global flood, on a real boat which eventually landed on a real mountain. Their descendants now fill the globe, never to forget the real event. edit: I'm not going to philosophize much, sorry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SkinWalker Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by Redwing You are making a false comparison. If C-14 is not a valid dating method past a certain timespan, it is not a valid external reference...it isn't to be compared with saying down is up. Valid up to about 50, 000 years. After that, not enough radioactivity remains in the sample to be useful. The flood was the result of the firmament collapsing and enormous resovoirs of water being broken up. There is no scientific basis for "firmament." These "enourmous [reservoirs] of water" left no evidence of their existence. In order to create water of that magnitude, the existing hydrogen and oxygen on the planet would have to be "reassigned." I would have to do the math, but I would be willing to believe that the energy required to first create the water in under 40 days, then break it down so land will be available again, would be significant enough that some evidence would remain. The problem with what you are saying is that you are explaining what you think happened and saying it did. Could it not then be argued that we both are? Geology happens slowly, yes, but a catastrophic, worldwide flood would have sped it up. Your evidence appears to be dating methods - dating methods which don't give consistent results. My evidence is also physical "marring" of the land/seafloor, which would be present. We see evidence of glacial movement, mudslides, etc. from various periods in our past... but we don't see the vast amount of "marring" that appears to have occured at once as you suggest. The evidence would be there. As to dating methods... well, let's talk about Carbon-14, since that one keeps popping up. (remember, there are many others that can date further in the past). I'll follow your lead and use a quote to save time, but I'll post the source at the end of this message. Because the half-life of any particular nuclide is constant, the half-life can serve as a molecular clock to determine the ages of different objects. For example, carbon-14 has been used to determine the age of organic materials. The procedure is based on the formation of carbon-14 by neutron capture in the upper atmosphere: The carbon-14 is incorporated into carbon dioxide, which is in turn incorporated, through photosynthesis, into more complex carbon-containing molecules within plants. When the plants are eaten by animals, the carbon-14 becomes incorporated within them. Because a living plant or animal has a constant intake of carbon compounds, it is able to maintain a ratio of carbon-14 to carbon-12 that is identical with that of the atmosphere. However, once the organism dies, it no longer ingests carbon compounds to replenish the carbon-14 that is lost through radioactive decay. The ratio of carbon-14 to carbon-12 therefore decreases. By measuring this ratio and contrasting it to that of the atmosphere, we can estimate the age of an object. For example, if the ratio diminishes to half that of the atmosphere, we can conclude that the object is one half-life, or 5715 yr, old. This method cannot be used to date objects older than about 50,000 yr. After this length of time the radioactivity is too low to be measured accurately. The radiocarbon-dating technique has been checked by comparing the ages of trees determined by counting their rings and by radiocarbon analysis. As a tree grows, it adds a ring each year. In the old growth the carbon-14 decays, while the concentration of carbon-12 remains constant. The two dating methods agree to within about 10 percent. Most of the wood used in these tests was from California bristlecone pines, which reach ages up to 2000 yr. By using trees that died at a known time thousands of years ago, it is possible to make comparisons back to about 5000 B.C. (Brown, et al, 2000) A) I kept my post insult free, kindly try to do the same...it's easier to reply to. You're quite right. Please accept my apologies. I can be rather blunt sometimes, and I noted that this debate was saying the same things again and again. I have to bear in mind that my opinion could be viewed as contemptable to those that disagree. B) The Native American and Asian people didn't exist yet. Kennewick Man is dated to be 9, 500 years old. With a modest error of margin (it could go either way), he could be 9, 000 to 10, 000 years old. He was discovered in Washington state in 1996. The Xiao dynasty of China came into being in 2205 B.C., one would have to imagine that there were substantial numbers of people already there for some time in order to create a dynasty. As I understand it, theologians accept a period between 6000 to around 5,000 years ago as the period in which the flood occured. Then there is the that some theologians have.... I can almost accept this myself. C) Not all wildlife necessarily had developed yet. Besides, "kinds" of animals is alot more all-encompassing than "species". Really? Source, please. Heck, I don't know... I was going off of memory. C-14 has an accepted margin of either 5% or 10% depending on the amount of isotope remaining in the sample. Police radar has a +/- 2 mph right of the bat, has to be calibrated regularly, is affected by terrain/vector of approach/weather/size of target/localized relections/etc. Police will generally give a 5 + mph leeway to drivers, even though the margin for error is nearly always in favor of the driver. What? I've only ever said "this is my position" not "this is my position and you HAVE to accept it". . Good point. I've tried to maintain throughout that creation and evolution can co-exist. There is undoubtedly much about evolution that is unexplained. But just as evolutionists revise theories, so must creationists if they are to keep a following. Mudslinging is the last stage in an intelligent debate, which happens when almost all the arguments have been argued into the ground...(I know, I said I was going to earlier too...) I apologize if it appeared that I was "mudslinging," that's just how I see it and I see no reason to believe otherwise. There is just no factual evidence outside of an anthology of parables and stories that are dated (the Sun stopping story, for instance). I also agree, however, that all arguments have been put forth. SkinWalker Cited text --------------- Chemistry: the Central Science, 8th ed. Brown, LeMay, and Bursten. Prentice Hall, NJ 2000. pp. 816 - 817. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyrion Posted November 30, 2002 Share Posted November 30, 2002 Originally posted by Redwing C) Not all wildlife necessarily had developed yet. Besides, "kinds" of animals is alot more all-encompassing than "species". "developed yet"? Doesnt that mean that they havent evolved yet? So in other words, they did evolve and thus proves evolution a little more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheWhiteRaider Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 OK a few notes about the middle ages. 1. The Turks attacked first! At the time the Middle East was what was left of the East Roman(Byzantine) Empire. The leader at the time asked the other countries for help. That is why they went. 2. The most of the people at the time could not read. So they could not read the bible for themselves. 3. Most people only went to church for their reputation not faith. Please accept my apologies. Accepted. One thing I find impossible is that even if a cell came from goo is that the cell would be able to live. Just like if you made a computer it would not work with out programs correct? So where would the cell find how to stay alive? How would it even learn how to stay alive? How would the cell operate? What would it live off of? Also how would the world change from complete chaos to a world where it can support life? How did all the laws of the universe come about and so perfectly. But I bet you could not answer these. And may I remind you if you are going to call evolution science it must be subject to all things science. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandalorian54 Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 Cjas said somthin about right and wrong, that there is no wright and wrong only opinions. for one man killing is wrong and for another it is survival. Well even for the man who kills for survival don't you think the first time he did it he felt bad and somewhere deep down he knew it was wrong? but in time we push out our consience. Our concience is there for a reason. evryone knows that steeling is wrong weather they tell themselves it's right or not they still know it's wrong. as for the crusades, all we know is what we were taught in school. Who was taught what those people were thinking and acting on way back then? how does bickering over crusades help us hear? -------------- The sun decreases in diamiter 5 feet every day. If we add 5 feet to the suns diamiter every day to find out how large the sun was billions or millions of years ago you can clearly conclude that the sun would have been so big it would have melted all the planets. this is about all the info I need to figure out that evolution is false. buy I have many other reasons. your wasting your time trying to prove evolution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
man189 Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 ya mandolorian's right ...the sun contract under its owngravity ..i just checked in a web site ...they say the su 1.6 million years ago would have swallowed earth...... it also said earth's magnetism decrease of half every 1400 years ...so an insect a million years ago would have wieghted a couple of tons ...... i think evolution is only believed cause people dont want to admit they were made by a weird all-powerful mysterious creature ..... so they accept evolution which is as unsound Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
man189 Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 listen people ..... there's a chance on 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 (this is not just a number i guessed .....its been proved ....its a one with 64 zeros after ) for a 200 compound organism to perform ONE successful mutation ...... the simplest organisms on earth have more than 1000000 compounds .......... so just imagine the chances for .... the billions of mutation that brought us here ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyrion Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 Originally posted by man189 i think evolution is only believed cause people dont want to admit they were made by a weird all-powerful mysterious creature ..... so they accept evolution which is as unsound No,we came up with evolution because we wanted to prove things via science and actual proof,not believing in a book. Also, we are a BIG coincidence,didnt I say that already? Edit- Welcome to the forums! Have a custom filled spam basket. Make sure to look at our rules, and dont double,spam,or flame. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheWhiteRaider Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 Originally posted by Tyrion No,we came up with evolution because we wanted to prove things via science and actual proof,not believing in a book. And there is a difference how? *Off-topic* Welcome to the forums man189 *Off-topic* Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandalorian54 Posted December 1, 2002 Share Posted December 1, 2002 thats wonderfull and all tyrian exept that science doesnt prove evolution. thats the only problem. you seem to have selective memory, did you only read half of evry post or why do you ignore the sun and insect facts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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