I have a question.
Do you refuse to use the terms “up” and “down” in daily speech? If you do not refuse to use them, then YOU must be a flat-earther, since “up” in your location would be “down” in a location antipodean to you if the earth is round!
How do you know that you woke up this morning? You could have been created half a nanosecond ago, with everything being pre-aged to look proper and you full of false memories? How do you know you actually existed to read the previous sentence? Perhaps it was implanted in your memory when you were created half a nanosecond ago (no, not that earlier half nanosecond, this half nanosecond).
I don’t know how anybody can take the story of creation seriously. To me it is clearly nothing more than myth. I find it odd that people try to reconcile the story of creation with evolution, because they simply do not mesh. Once you get into ideas of interpretation it starts to get silly. One day actually means several million years . . . etc. Once you take that route, you can interpret anything to mean anything you want it to.
Of course, if Satan is that powerful, then could he not have also invented a false “messiah” who went around under the name of Yshua (Jesus), spouted a bunch of ambiguous statements, committed a bunch of false miracles specifically in order to lead people astray from the truth? So a few demons were “cast out”. If Satan is so powerful as to be behind all those fossils, plants, animals, proto-humans, etc, that “confuse” everybody, he could certainly be smart enough to have some decoy demonic possessions that were planned to be voluntarily abandoned specifically as a ruse.
Really, when you come down to it, if satan is so powerful and cunning as to invent a whole planetful of false evidence for evolution, then he’s sufficiently powerful and cunning to promulgate a false “messiah”.
Me, since I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as the true Son and true Messiah, I reject the idea of such a powerful and cunning satan.
The “Satan made the fossils” dodge is a 20th-century invention, not at all a doctrine of the ancient Church. It is, therefore a “tradition of men”, to use a favorite fundy buzzphrase.
So, lynn, as I said before you are free to believe whatever you want. However, it is dishonest to claim you are believing in something true when it is actually something that is wrong. In principle, there are many people who believe in things that are wrong, but I’m not sure such beliefs can be called knoweldge.
You should know that there are “scientists” that believe in wrong things. It takes a straightforward and dispassionate evaluation to determine what the evidence shows. You can “interpret” evidence away as much as you want. I could argue that there is no evidence to disprove the human-beings-flying-by-flapping-their-arms hypothesis and tell you that the evidence against it can be explained differently. You are doing the same thing by referring to fallacious arguments and interpretations of evidence that have been roundly shown to be false by numerous people. We have even shown you the evidence and shown how there are correct conclusions and there are wrong conclusions. A literal Genesis is a wrong conclusion.
And as for the “men weren’t there” argument: men also aren’t at the sun, yet we know things about the sun. Men aren’t at the center of the atom, but we know things about the center of the atom. Just because we aren’t physically “there” doesn’t mean we can’t figure things out about them. In fact, you do this whenever you talk about something that you haven’t directly witnessed. For example, I could argue that there is no reason for me to believe in your religion because you aren’t there and I’m not there to actually witness the miraculous events that you rely on for your faith. Unless you want the objections applied equally to your beliefs, don’t use them against the truth.
Well, now you’re just being silly. Everybody knows god likes to get his work done early, while he’s feeling fresh. 
I’m always amused by this line of argument. I like to point out that no one alive today actually witnessed the (US) Civil War. Therefore I shall state my equally well-founded position that the Civil War never happened.
Lynn73, rather than “hearing”, try *reading that Book you cite so often. If you can’t lay your hands on it at the moment, here’s a link to Genesis Chapters 1 and 2. It’s even a link to the King James Version you prefer. Note that Genesis 1:27 says “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them” (emphasis mine). How can that be reconciled with God creating Eve, the first woman, from Adam’s rib? In Chapter 2, God creates man before he creates plants; in Chapter 1, He creates man afterwards. Why do you claim the former, not the latter? Actually, it’s a curious hodge-podge – 6 days of creation from the version in Chapter 1, yet Eve created from Adam’s rib from Chapter 2.
Also, when belief in Young Earth Creationism is used to make the way science is taught in schools conform to one religious sub-group’s beliefs, it does do harm. That may not be your intent; indeed, people who try to keep evolution from being taught in schools may be trying to prevent harm from coming to young people, but that is the result.
Paul talks of different people being given different gifts. Some of us are given lively and questioning minds. Since my church prays “Give her an inquiring and discerning heart” when a child is baptized, it appears we regard that as a good thing (although I swear the priest must have stuttered at my baptism and given me a double dose!;). I realize you are not as comfortable questioning things as I am; indeed, my habit of questioning must appear as frightening and impossible to you as your habit of obeying without questioning seems to me sometimes. Still, if I do not question, if I do not seek answers. If I do not open a book or a Book and ask, “Why?” I am burying my talents in the ground. There’s a parable about that somewhere.
For me to shut my mind down and to accept what someone else tells me the Bible says without questioning would be for me to dishonor and disobey God. For me not to read of evolution or of plate tectonics would be to risk diminishing my awe and wonder at the glorious complexity that is God’s creation. For me, the more I learn of science, the more my faith in increased, not decreased. The God I worship is vast enough to create the wondrous depths of inter-stellar space, yet close enough to have chosen to live within the failings and limitations of a human body. A God who could be harmed by such trivia as evolution is far too small for me. As a human being, I am sometimes all too uncomfortably aware of my limits. I take comfort in a God who has none. For you it is different, and I do try, within my human limitations, to understand that. I only ask that you not impose your limits on me. Among other things, I’ve got plenty of my own! :rolleyes:
Respectfully,
CJ
You can extend the argument further than that; there truly is no such thing as direct, contemporaneous observation - even when you sit in the bath and watch the dripping tap, you are only observing fossil traces of the light that bounced off the drips; the ‘sound’ that reaches your ears is not the actual sound of the water dripping, but a relic - the motion of air molecules knocking together, originally set in motion by the falling drip. This is without mentioning all the stages of filtering and processing that occur once the stimulus actually enters your perceptual systems.
All observations are inference; they only differ by degree of separation and quality.
Lynn, I have purposefully been remaining outside this thread since you began posting in it, since I cannot find it in myself to address and treat you as our Lord commanded, since the assortment of incidents in which you maltreated Siege (which I see in the Pit you and she have more or less resolved) and the “interesting” feedback I’ve gotten about how my name has been dragged through the mud on other boards you frequent.
But it appears that my sister-in-spirit has found in herself something I cannot, and I politely ask you to “read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest” the things she has said above. Because they speak volumes on how a true Christian confronts questions of Scripture vs. secular evidence.
And pray for me, including that I may find grace to forgive you and treat you as our Lord said I should.
Your once and hopefully future friend and brother in Him,
Polycarp
Sure, CJ.
Hello, Polycarp.
I don’t plan on being a big problem to you guys here because I spend most of my time at what I consider to be my “home board.” I just come over here every once in awhile. I really didn’t mean to be posting this much: here and in the Pit. It’s too bad this board doesn’t have private messaging because there are things I could try and talk to you about but not on the open board. It probably wouldn’t be a good idea anyway I guess.
Sorry for the slight hijack from the OP.
Empirically, this isn’t the case. If you wish to take issue with empiricism, I believe this is a thing to do in another thread.
I find this line-of-reasoning fascinating. If you believe in this, why stop with evolution and cosmology? I mean, maybe Satan is the Father of Science! Why not shun all technology and all non-religious thought? Why not abandon literature and the arts and philosophy that are not connected explicitly with Christianity?
But perhaps your argument is that you can never know when something is a deception or when something is real. Or, better yet, you might believe that discernment is all that is required. If this is the case, then there can be no common ground of empirical knowledge whatsoever because whenever you disagree with somebody you can use your discerning powers to determine that they are either deceiving or being deceived through the cunning prowess of Old Nick.
This is an extremely dangerous opinion to hold, in my estimation, because it perpetuates self-justification without any means of external evaluation. It’s so insular as to be meaningless to anyone but those privvy to the closed community’s arrangements of belief.
This is rich: evolution occurs but it is the work of Satan. Wow. That’s a bit of bend-over-backwards apologetics on par with contemporary Mormon explanations for explicit problems with their “Israel in the Americas”.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Susanann
If you make a man, he will look 30 years old one second after he(Adam) was created. It is impossible to create an adult man who looks only a second old. When Eve was created, she also appeared to be an adult woman a single second after she was made.
No. I dont see your comparison at all. Adam was created as an adult male(not a one second old fertilized egg), there is no suggestion/implication at all that he was given a memory of him being a child. I imagine that he was given a bare minimum initial amount of knowlege to allow himself to get by in the Garden of Eden, and a knowedge of speech.
If Adam was given a memory/brain/street smarts that most 30 year olds have, he would have eaten from the “Tree of LIfe”, BEFORE he ate from the “Tree of Knowledge” - thus preventing his destruction/death.
You cant use rocks, because we have no known samples of rocks that are 1000, 10000, 100000, 1000000 and 10000000 millions years old for comparison. Geologists are only guessing how old rocks might be different from older rocks. There are no objective standards/examples of different ages of rocks.
Testing the oceans is the best objective way to determine the age of the earth.
If the earth was really millions of years old, the mineral contents and sediments in the oceans would be far more than what is there.
We can calculate the annual mineral runoffs of the world, add them up, and then multiply them by millions to see if we have millions of years of content in the oceans - we dont.
We onlysee about 5-10 thousand years of summed runoffs collected and measured in the oceans.
Cite!!!
Dear Susanann,
You are embarking on a battle you are gauranteed to lose. Be that as it may…
Quite incorrect. We have plenty. All you need to do is read a bit on the subject. For example: here. Susanann, if you find an error in that site, please tell us, otherwise it stands that your claim that there are no objective standards/examples of different ages of rocks is shown to be categorically false.
This is an outline/conclusion fraught with peril. From this site:
Actually, by your own stated methods, this is categorically incorrect.
Again, quoting the site above.
In other words, Susanann, you are just plain wrong.
Sorry guys but I didn’t say that Satan created anything, not evolution or fossils. Only that he used or manipulated the earth’s natural processes to his advantage. He may have picked certain species and developed them for his own use. That use being, to confuse mankind.
One of the major conflicts/contradictions which separate men from GOD has to do with our attempt to explain the universe. Science has attempted to explain the universe but it is incomplete and often confusing. Constantly contradicting itself with the “new” theory or evidence, science is by no means GOD. (Hmmm, then again the bible is a bit contradicting of itself as well.)
and BTW I seem to recall the OP saying.
Meaning…this isn’t a debate whether GOD exists or not. It is a question about whether GOD used evolution or was creation a six day event.
To this I say, it’s both. Thing were as HE intended in six days. However, nowhere do I recall a passage saying GOD quit after six days, only that he rested. IIRC didn’t he create Eve afterwards? Therefore the creation wasn’t finished in a week. Evolution is a natural process which might be affected, manipulated or disrupted by any number of causes whether they be natural, human, or other.
My intent earlier was to provide an alternative explanation for those who are literal creationists. I have no desire to separate anyone from their deity. That is a matter of their belief and faith. However, maybe this approach can ease some of the angst felt when confronted with questions such as this.
Arguing belief systems scientifically is usually not a worthwhile cause. It was obvious (to me) from the OP that the condescension by some atheists would not be appreciated. Take care y’all…t-k 
Blatantly false statements about science usually draw some amount of deserved condescension. Religion actually has a long history of being able to pretty much say whatever it wants to, without bearing any burden of proof. Not here though, thank God. 
bolding mine
I can appreciate your perspective in this regard. However, this OP was not in question of science nor did it deny evolutionary theory. It is IMO a question of theology and literal interpretation of scripture. A person’s belief in GOD doesn’t require them to consider science to be false. Although their religion might, depending on how orthodox they are.
Any statements made by me, (if any) that deny the scientific method and/or its vastly superior application in modern society should be taken in context of the OP. Damn, the board is getting bad about taking things out of context and/or misquoting what people ACTUALLY say. Worse yet, chastisement without cause or provocation and in a debate thread (NOT the pit). This is the moderator’s responsibilities, not members.
Faucet Don’t disappear from the SDMB thinking you can’t freely discuss your beliefs here. Well, maybe not as freely as you should be able to, provided you don’t troll for responses. You asked…
After rereading and gathering a bit of evidence, I think it is still both. I assume you aren’t a literalist regarding Genesis. In the first creation story (Genesis ch.1 vs. 27-31) God made man and woman BOTH on the sixth day and told THEM to go forth and multiply and gave them dominion over his creation. I assume this could mean that the human race was created on the sixth day.
In Genesis ch.2 The creation is finished and God rested on the 7th day. AFTER this “there was not a man to till the ground” Then Adam was formed out of the dust. The Garden was planted and Adam was put there. Later when God saw Adam had no mate he made Eve.
These two stories indicate to me that the Creation as a whole was completed in six days. Yet on a smaller scale GOD made changes and additions to HIS Creation over time. Mass extinctions as per the flood also provide evidence of an evolving creation. The mention of strange beasts no longer found could be interpreted as evolutionary evidence.
I’m gonna have to go…don’t have time to finish or even proof. Be back asap, t-k