Let’s discuss that, shall we? I listed 3 points, all of which were discussed by Hank Haanagraff(sp) on his nationally syndicated radio show. It was not what I thought, it was what he said. I provided a link to his site. In the previous thread, I provided another link. Did you even bother to look?
**
<deep breath>
Regarding that unmitigated lie, I give it the full treatment it deserves here.
Fenris
Okay, everyone, please lets take a break. I think Coosa has been enlightened by all of us by now.
Fenris- your cites & quotes talk about Dinosaurs, and the Bible- not the Creation, per se. And, if you had started this op, a debate could have been- “this radio talk show host said “this”- i think he is full of it- what do you think?”. Maybe not our greatest debate- but a different tack on a horse that has been very badly beaten. However- again, after a while of no “pro” side, the 'debate" ceases to be, and becomes pointless. It starts to resemble the “slapping the hysterical woman” scene from “Airplane!”. 
I am certainly not a Creationist, by any means. And, when we have had a good “pro” side to the debate- I have usually jumped in on the “evolution” side of the debate. But for crikeys sake- there ain’t no debate here.
grienspace said:
Hey, the lions have to eat, too, ya know.
Well, maybe it’s out of proportion in your reality, but that doens’t mean the same is true of everybody else.
You also seem to be ignoring the fact that most threads don’t start with some evil-lutionist spouting off that creationism is wrong, but quite the other way around. If they’re going to play with lions, they shouldn’t complain when bitten.
Really? Can you please quote somebody around here saying that “more often than not”?
What, exactly, do you find admirable about somebody who ignores the scientific evidence?
[Moderator Hat: ON]
Fenris asked:
No. As you indicated, there is no real way to know.
Generally, if there is nobody to argue with you, the thread will die quickly. It kind of takes care of itself.
David B, SDMB Great Debates Moderator
[Moderator Hat: OFF]
Hi everyone - sorry it’s taken me so long to get back to the discussion, but I’m having problems with my ISP - it takes forever to load the board. It’s taken an hour and a half just to load and read this thread!
tbea925 said:
Oh, thank you! That is exactly the attitude of many of the literal fundamentalists that I’ve met. They seem to feel that they are superior to us ‘doubters’ in some way because they have held firm to their beliefs and refused to even consider any evidence to the contrary, and it is a point of pride with them. I’m afraid it rubs me the wrong way and makes it difficult for me to be reasonable. LOTS of these people around here. 
However, I can see where there is a basis for believing in the ‘test of faith’ theory. When God created the Garden of Eden, he placed within it the Tree of Knowledge,forbade Adam and Eve to eat the fruit, then allowed Satan to tempt them to do so. What was this, if not a test of faith? This would give one the idea that God is fond of ‘testing’, if he started out that way with the first two people! Maybe this the basis for this belief concerning fossils, etc.?
tracer: Thanks for the link. One of these days I’ll manage to read everything in the talk.origins archive - I actually remember seeing this before but I didn’t read it (the stuff about the cats caught my eye, of course!) because I was looking for something else at the time.
redtail23: Ah, I hadn’t heard that version before (Satan created the ‘misleading’ evidence). I can see where that could be considered in light of the story of Job. However, I was under the impression that Satan could not actually create anything? And then, there is the Garden of Eden and the Tree of Knowledge - while Satan tempted Eve to try the forbidden fruit, God is the one who both created the Tree and then forbade them to eat the fruit. (See my above reply to tbea925.) Maybe God and Satan are not really ‘adversaries’ after all, but work in collusion to weed out the unworthy?
Let’s see - God is such an honest and above-board guy that he doesn’t easily come up ideas to mislead people. (He IS God, after all.) Satan, OTOH, is a trickster with a devious mind, so God asks Satan for ideas on ways to ‘test’ people, selects the ideas he likes, and creates the necessary evidence. Hmm, I can go places with this - Satan takes a lot of pride in his work, God is happy with him because he’s helpful, plus he gets to torment the failures (Satan: "Hey, bozo! Look at you sitting in that lake of fire! Doesn’t feel too good, does it? And just think, all you had to do was believe that darn Bible and you wouldn’t be here! Don’t you feel like an idiot now? [Lots of devilish cackling].)
Sorry, sometimes my imagination runs away with me.
Okay, grienspace, you’re next! First of all, thank you for taking me seriously and giving a thoughtful answer. I promise not to consider your response as representative of all creationists. Perhaps we can discuss some of your statements?
Okay, I have some questions about this, if you (or anyone else) would like to take a stab at them. For clarification: there is then a distinction between someone who was once a ‘true believer’ that has abandoned their beliefs, and a non-believer who is aware of God, Christianity, etc., but still refuses to believe? So, a priest who has renounced his faith and become an atheist would be in a lot more trouble than I, who has never believed in God, even though raised in a Christian home?
I remember something similar being discussed to death in church when I was a child - what happened to, say, people who lived in the deep jungles of Africa and had never heard of the Christian God? Some claimed that ‘innocents’ like these went to Heaven, while those who had been made aware of God by missionaries or whatever yet chose to deny his existence went straight to Hell. However, why should these ‘innocents’ get the same reward promised to me for being faithful and strong, refusing Satan’s temptations, sacrificing to help others, etc.? Would they appreciate how wonderful God was to allow them in Heaven when they hadn’t done a darn thing to earn it? Will my Heaven be nicer than theirs, since I worked so hard to get there?
However, let me get back to your statement quoted above and put a sort of ‘atheist twist’ to it: (And please don’t take this personally - it is meant in just as general a manner as your statement.)
“Some atheists believe that Christians who have been educated about the theory of evolution and the scientific evidence that supports it, yet ignore these facts in favor of religious creationism, are far more stupid and close-minded than those who are aware that such a theory exists, but have never had it adequately explained to them.”
Is it any wonder that the two camps constantly butt heads?
Okay, this is getting kind of long, so I’m going to stop here and write another post while my server seems to be cooperating. 
Incorrect, I do respect you. I do not, however, have to respect beliefs of others that I find “preposterous and presumptuous.” Additionally, I respect your right to hold such beliefs - but that does not entail a respect of the belief itself. The evidence I have been presented with implies an evolutionary history of life on Earth - not a special creation - as the evidence also indicates the moon is not made of green cheese. That was my point.
But, who knows, maybe everytime we take a green cheese rock off of the moon, God turns it into what we now consider “moon rock” - thereby, denying us all knowledge of the actual composition of the moon (that being green cheese).
Something about you warms my heart Coosa, but then I have always had a soft spot for intelligent articulate women, their opinions not withstanding.Confining my comments to those Christians who have responded in this thread, I can find no basis for your impression that they take any pride in anything. Pride after all is sinful if you will remember.
I actually see a lot of humility which truthfully I wish I had more of.
A bit of a stretch.There are certainly tests of faith, but few believe in deliberate hoaxes by God .
Interesting conclusion.Maybe the Wiccans and the
Catholics can unite into the WC
There are hundreds of interpretations to this, but a common one is that once you are baptised or accepted Jesus in your heart, and then reject him you’ve had the biscuit. In some places you need to be shunned. But that view just doesn’t add up to the Shepherd going out after that one last sheep.It doesn’t add up to a prodigal son returning without anything being said of his sinful ways. Remember that in both cases they were already on the inside.
If there is any one out there who is slightly concerned about their rejection of their faith, I suggest you have a look at a site called Tentmaker. I was there several months ago. This person is way more up on the scriptures than I am, and I share his views on the ultimate salvation of us all.
Certainly, but I might add that there are very few Christians who feel the need to challenge the scientific evidence in order to justify their faith. Now I understand that in some parts of America, the possibility exists that literal Genesis creation is being pushed as part of the science curiculum. That is just absurd in my view and should be opposed by Christians. I can’t fathom that this would be an objective that Jesus had in mind, or has in mind now.
Nice talkin to ya.
Preview, Preview, Preview, dammit! Why can’t I remember that damn button is there?
Ben: Hey, I remember reading CMKeller’s post, quite a long time ago, and thinking that it was a reasonable proposition. Definitely falls in the ‘unknowable’ category - how would we ever determine whether or not the universe is as old as it seems, or ‘created old’? And of course, it doesn’t really make any difference, does it? (Except for curiousity’s sake.) We still need to learn as much as we can about the universe and its natural laws in order to properly do whatever it is God intends us to do, and no theory designed by scientists that is consistent with the so-far known facts is ‘against God’ in any way, because he intended for us learn these things. We have to deal with what God has given us. shrug But, of course, it still leaves open the possibility, since God is ‘fooling us’ with this age thing, that he is also ‘fooling us’ with the 6000 year bit too, and everything was created Last Thursday.
Ducky, I thought the LBMB was defunct? Are they back in business?
Okay, grienspace again:
Once again I’d like to do a little ‘role reversal’ trick with something you said. Please do not take this as a personal attack of some kind - I am not directing this specifically at you, I am only using some of your statements to illustrate a point.
My version:
“I think religion is an obsolete, silly superstition that any intelligent, objective, secure person would dismiss after only a cursory examination. Believing in magical, invisible spirits that supposedly created the entire universe and guides our daily lives is preposterous, and anyone who expects every one else to believe this and live their lives according to this imaginary ‘God’s’ rules is presumptuous of their alleged mental abilities.”
I may not be doing a good job of this, but do you see how arrogant both versions are? Do you see why ‘fundies’ are so often attacked and denigrated by their opponents? Many of them have no problem with attempting to force the rest of the world to comply with their beliefs, but consider themselves ‘attacked’ when the contrary view is taken with the same fervency.
It seems perfectly obvious to you that God exists and created the universe; it seems perfectly obvious to me that this is silly superstition left over from ‘caveman’ days, when humans had not yet learned about the physical nature of the universe.
How will we ever come to a ‘meeting of the minds’? Or is one required? I do not mean to denigrate your beliefs, or those of anyone else here - you may be right and I may be wrong, and neither of us will know the truth until we die - at which point, from my perspective, it won’t matter anyway. I feel that you are entitled to believe anything you want to, as long as you don’t try to force me to agree with you, or live my life according to what YOU believe.
That seems to be the cause of the entire conflict between fundamentalists/creationists and ‘science’ - science is not a belief system, it is our most logical explanation of the observations we have made of our universe. Scientists are not attempting to force everyone else to accept unprovable beliefs and conform their lives to rules based on those beliefs. Scientists are simply saying “Hey, everybody, we noticed that every time you drop something, it falls to the ground. Try it yourself! It appears that there is some kind of attraction between the earth and anything above its surface. Now that we’ve noticed this, we need to give this ‘attractive force’ a name so we will all know what we are talking about - how about if we call it ‘gravity’?”
So, my problem with fundamentalists/creationists is not what they believe - heck, you have the right to privacy of your own mind, and the right to associate with others who feel the same way, and so on. My problem is with their insistence that everyone else must think the same way, or at least act like they do.
(Heh, remembered that Preview this time!)
Well, now that you mention it, I dunno.
I found this http://www.leftbehind.com/messageboard.html by doing a Google search for “Left Behind Message Board”, so I suppose it’s possible it isn’t the same people. You have to register before you can look at the threads. I dunno, and I’m not interested enough to register and find out.
It brought up this Google hit:
Which leads to a “Page Not Found” with the leftbehind.com URL as “click on this and look for what you need”. Huh.
And they require an email address, rejecting Hotmail and Yahoo! and presumably other free accounts.
Oh, yeah, no question about it, they were loud and irritating and that got them lots of attention in their GD threads. But my point is, there were a lot of us lurking and listening, and every time DavidB the Resident Rottweiler bit a big chunk out of Jenkinsfan’s leg, the rest of us all flinched and silently vowed never, ever to enter a religious debate thread, no matter who or what the OP was. At the time, there were maybe 7,000 registered posters, of whom maybe only 50 or so were regular participants in the GD religious threads. That means there were a lot of posters like me who, for whatever reason, were keeping a real low profile.
And the same way that it’s only the Icky Factoid that sticks in your brain, it’s only the Horror Threads that we remember. I’m sure that there may have been some perfectly reasonable religious debates sponsored by Polycarp or somebody, but I sure can’t think of any, offhand.
See- you say that FoG and others were using 'dishonest debate tactics"- and i say that some of the attackers of FoG (& etc)were using dishonest debate tactics. If there is ony one “pro” debaters- and if you guys all ask him questions- how can one person respond to evryone to their satisfaction? And there is one type of poster, that asks some DOZENS of questions, many of them apparently rhetorical or off thread, and then complain loudly & constantly if every single one of these are not answered- immediately. It is NOT a dishonest debate tactic to ignore some questions- if that person is being deluged with queries, or if the questions appear rhetorical or off-topic. The dishonest debate tactic come sfrom those who are asking those questions- and demanding an answer or launching personal attacks.
And I did not use the word 'atheists" that you inserted in front of my quote- I was using you folks here as an example, not refering to atheists in general. This board is certainly wieghed in favor of the atheists- but there is no “anti-christian agenda”. There is just far more of the “con” side than there is of the “pro” side, which lends to that “ganging up” thing i mentioned.
Of course when someone posts an assertion they should be willing to back it up. Until & unles that “backing up” is also questioned, and so is that back up to the back up, and ad nauseum until we are so far off topic that no-one even remembers why we are there in the 1st place. Which, to some extent has happened here.
And to you all. Since I have clarifed my position several times- i think that repeating the comment that I said: “if there is no other side to the debate, you can’t start a thread on it” is an “unfair debating technique”. I repeat myself- there was nothing wrong with starting this OP (except that it has been done SOOOO many times, and recently)- as the OP had no idea there would be no-one showing up for the “pro” side. But after a while- it became clear to everyone but you guys on the “con” side- that you were argueing with no-one. That is when the “debate” ended (actually, it never really started). AGAIN- starting a debate, without anyone for the other side- is OK. But making up what you THINK MIGHT be the arguement for the other side, when no-one shows up to debate it, and then shooting those “straw-men” full of holes- is specious.
Would you care to back up your assertion? When have people here deluged someone with dozens of irrelevant questions and then attacked them for not answering every single one of them? Can you provide even one example?
-Ben
Duck Duck Goose said:
And you didn’t post in the thread, why, exactly? What did I say that was wrong? I’d like to see some specific examples, please. It’s all well and good for you to criticize, but without examples, we really have nothing to go on.
Yes, “for whatever reason.” We always have a lot more registered posters than actual regular participants. To imply, as you’ve done here, that they are in hiding because they’re afraid of us is simply ludicrous.
Danielinthewolvesden said:
And those tactics were what, specifically?
I don’t think anybody can reasonably expect that in most cases. But it’s also not our fault if somebody comes in and makes 10 ridiculous statements, and then complains he doesn’t have time to answer the questions about all 10 of them. He made the statements, he should be prepared to back them up.
Do you have an actual example of this?
Again, do you have specific examples of this?
David, I cheerfully admit to having not a single shred of evidence to prove that you’re the resident Rottweiler, and that I spent last spring and summer watching you and some of the others take chunks out of various Fundie legs. Totally subjective and ignorant–I know, I know. I should be ashamed to be walking around in Great Debates with such an ugly briefcase. Chalk it up to a malfunction in my tinfoil hat. You gotta go with Reynolds Wrap–that cheap Kroger stuff don’t cut it.
BTW, I did do a Search and discovered that JenkinsFan is still around, although he hasn’t started any more threads since 12/2, the “Does everyone have faith in something?” thread.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=49136
His last post was 12/21 in the “Star of Bethlehem” thread.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=51902.
Maybe he’s just having ISP problems. Personally, I thought he sounded kinda burned out.
DDG: Nice of you to avoid the questions I actually asked, and act as if I asked different ones. Let’s review.
I asked you: “And you didn’t post in the thread, why, exactly? What did I say that was wrong? I’d like to see some specific examples, please. It’s all well and good for you to criticize, but without examples, we really have nothing to go on.”
You addressed none of this, but instead acted like I had asked you to prove that I was the resident rottweiler:
I never denied that I debated various Fundies, etc. I asked you to back up your claims that I did something wrong in how I handled those debates. Instead, you just reiterate your original claim in a rather sarcastic manner.
Then you continue:
You’ll get no disagreement there.
Then I pointed out that “We always have a lot more registered posters than actual regular participants. To imply, as you’ve done here, that they are in hiding because they’re afraid of us is simply ludicrous.” This was in response to your general assertion that some Christians may be hiding somewhere because they’re afraid of us. Do you respond to that and admit how ridiculous your implication was? No. Instead you, for some reason, focus on Jenkinsfan and note:
So what, exactly, is your point? First, if it’s been a month since he’s posted, I don’t know that it’s correc to say he’s “still around,” but that aside, so what? Am I supposed to be upset because he said he’s “burned out”? Am I supposed to take it easy on people who promote ignorance at a site dedicated to fighting it just because one of them might “burn out”?
How about answering the questions this time instead of another sarcastic non-response, 'kay?
Maybe you guys should take this over to the pit.
Newton believed that God did exist BUT only intervened now and then, this fits in with both evolution theory and cosmic theory.
More interesting questions are things like, if there is one god then why does he allow different religions ?
I think a lot of the bible doesn’t make sense BUT other parts do, GOD is well, er, to be honest, VERY SMART, he isn’t going to give us a scientific layout of everything, he wants us to strive.
The Bible and other religous works are supposed to be guides, not direct text books.
If you take the idea of ‘do onto others as you would have done upon you’ and think about it then you will realise that its a HUGE concept and very hard to implement.
Once we can do that then perhaps we can tackle other things.
p.s. Newton eh, really smart and religous, born christmas day, god eh, he has a sense of humour, you gotta admit that.
[Moderator Hat: ON]
grienspace said:
Leave the moderating to the Moderators.
David B, SDMB Great Debates Moderator
[Moderator Hat: OFF]