Evolution

[reallyRyan]

Smaller chairs refer to species such as micro organisms with much shorter generations and thus we have seen speciation as a result of evolution in such species. The big chairs would refer to species with longer generations and thus where would not expect to see such a process as speciation over such short period of time as the few millenia of human history.

That is all well and good, we see speciation in dogs, they have longer generation times. But, you see speciation isn't at issue, that still only gets you from one kind of dog to another kind of dog. We see in bull dogs that there is a line beyond which you can push evolution too far and the species is no longer able to reproduce. The same is true for micro organisms.

The fossils show a history of change in the whole landscape of biological species that include a branching of different forms that compete until branches become exinct. The genetics shows relationships between species and differences within separated species that is exactly as expected in a snapshot of a long term process in which there is speciation and a divergence of forms.

What proof is there of genetic relationships? If you are saying a percentage of similarity, that in and of itself doesn't compel the conclusion that they shared a common ancestor. The same with form, a similarity in form doesn't in itself compel the conclusion that they are related ancestrally.

Well now the ball is in your court to describe these "various other models" that you claim to exist.

OK, well let me ask you first, what do you consider "magical creation"? Or in your view is anything outside evolution considered magic? Its far too easy to slap the magic stamp on things in my opinion. So let me ask it a different way, why is Jesus being raised from the dead not magic, but God creating life in various forms (sans evolution) rightfully labelled magic?

I have explained my view in the other evolution topic but will re-explain it here if you like.

This is my favored model: instead of chemical evolution or something else in the place of abiogenesis (not making a point about this just starting at the beginning), what we see is God creating minimal kinds (minimum 4 - but no definable upper boundary) through what mechanism or method I don't know and won't presume to know or even guess at, at this time. I can only take Genesis and see it in light of God forming them from the dust of the ground and breathing life into them. From that point, evolution produces greater variety over time. As some go extinct, others are introduced. The hierarchy laying down ground work for what is coming next. A rudimentary example would be stromatolites or something similar producing oxygen which makes multi-cellular life possible. Genetics are shared and there are common ancestors, but each stage in the hierarchy would go back to a minimal set, instead of one base on the tree, you would have multiple trunks, and look like a bush or multiple bushes really, with multiple interlacing branches and dead ends.

A common designer, like with humans, creates using a common template, so it would only be fitting to find similarities between them. Gene expression would play a much stronger roll in my mind, and in fact we do find that gene expression is pivotal. Is it possible some of those branches do traverse the land/sea boundary, in principle I don't see why not, but I am reserving judgment. The above is very crude, to do it any kind of justice, I really would need much more time and space and I don't want it to sound like "magic", rather it would be more akin to what happens in the lab, where chemicals, nutrients, expression etc are added at the right time to get a desired outcome. You might say that from our vantage point it is indistinguishable from evolution by natural processes maybe, but I can think in general terms of some discoveries (some having to do with gene expression) that could provide a "finger print" of sorts to an intimately guided process.

Now, the above is still consistent with the data that we have in scientific disciplines, but anyone can just call it magic because it starts with miraculous beginnings, ie God creating. Both abiogenesis and creation by God would be equally miraculous events. Why is divine creation without chemical evolution (or similar methodology) magic, while life from non-life via a step wise method is not? Every good magic trick has steps leading to the reveal. There is a difference between magic and miracle and I am sure you will agree with that. But notice that even though I am a creationist, I am not saying that evolution is false on its face, I am questioning what evolution does and does not do. Evolution plays a role, but what role is where we disagree.

[mitchellmckain]

That is all well and good, we see speciation in dogs, they have longer generation times. But, you see speciation isn't at issue, that still only gets you from one kind of dog to another kind of dog. We see in bull dogs that there is a line beyond which you can push evolution too far and the species is no longer able to reproduce. The same is true for micro organisms.

Such classifications are simply arbitrary artifacts of human language and different languages don't use the same ones. The only measurable distinction is that of speciation and once two populations cannot reproduce with one another then they are biologically distinct, what we call them is irrelevant.

What proof is there of genetic relationships? If you are saying a percentage of similarity, that in and of itself doesn't compel the conclusion that they shared a common ancestor. The same with form, a similarity in form doesn't in itself compel the conclusion that they are related ancestrally

Only a small portion of the genetic similarities have anything to do with similarities of form and function. The proof of all the things in science is that it works. The fact that it works is why people use these similarities to test for paternity and forensics use these similarities to identify perpetrators. Like I said there is no way to prove that the world wasn't created this morning, there simply is no useful reason to ignore all the evidence that it has existed for some time.

OK, well let me ask you first, what do you consider "magical creation"?

Magic derives from a child's view of the world. The child lacks much in the way of ability and knowledge and thus get things by making the right noises. But as we grow up we learn that the world operates by certain rules and so we increase in ability and knowledge and thus are able to make things for ourselves. Thus what I consider a "magical creation" is an explanation that is devoid of any ability and knowledge but which simply defers to a higher power. "Goddidit" is the the basic magical explanation of theism. It doesn't actually explain anything, however true it may be, and this is why science exists -- to set aside such pointless answers and ask concrete questions of how it happened. There is nothing atheistic in this, for science was not an invention of atheists. The theist simply says so what if Goddidit, God is responsible for everything, but we don't have to accept this as an excuse for remaining in ignorance. I can see and describe the chain of physical events and causality by which my prayers were answered and so I can also look at the chain of physical events and causality by which the species came into being.

Or in your view is anything outside evolution considered magic?

An explanation that ignores everthing we have discovered about the world through the objective methods of science will be a magical one, and one that seeks consistency with such discoveries is not.

Evolution is the scientific theory that the evidence supports. Alternate theories such as spontaneous generation and Lamarkism are not historically considered magical per se but simply theories that the evidence did not support. From our perspective today however they can be considered somewhat magical because they posited things with no concrete explanation of how such things could occur.

So let me ask it a different way, why is Jesus being raised from the dead not magic, but God creating life in various forms (sans evolution) rightfully labelled magic?

Jesus being raised from the dead might indeed be magical in the way that many believe and explain it. I do not favor a magical explanation however. God's creation of living things that insists that it is all done by unknowable divine powers would be a magical explanation but an explanation of God's work of creation based on an understanding of what God was trying to accomplish and the process by which He did, such as evolution, would not be a magical explanation.

A magical explanation is in its essence a refusal to explain anything. It basically attempts to say that there is no explanation that we can understand. This is for example the essence of arguments for intellegent design by irreducible complexity. It is an anti-science explanation responding to a religious desire that there be no explanation. It is the kind of wishful thinking that runs from one gap in science to another as each gap disappears.

The only explanation that "Goddidit" provides is that "it is God's will". However full of piety such may be, as explanation it is useless. It is answer that can be given for absolutely anything because it draws no conntections in the world. It provides no conclusions but attributes everything to a will and power that are unknowable. Its only purpose is to silence questions not to answer them.

Why is divine creation without chemical evolution (or similar methodology) magic, while life from non-life via a step wise method is not?

Because one explains and the other does not. One is just hand waiving and rhetoric and the other aims to show us how what happened produced the results that we see. Divine creation with no explanation or declaring that explanation is impossible is magic. Divine creation while looking at the how evidence suggests that things happened is not. A working theory of abiogenesis will show how life differs from non-life and thus provide an authentic understanding of what life actually is, rather than simply giving a descriptive definition listing a lot of attributes that we typically see living things have. It should equip us with the ability to see and understand when something is alive even if it is completely outside our previous experience. That is what scientific theories do -- they provide a theoretical framework to take us beyond the raw data of our experiences to see how things could be if we go beyond them and thus prepare us for when we encounter things we have never seen before.

Every good magic trick has steps leading to the reveal.

But the magic trick requires misdirection so that the audience does not see what is happening. If an explanation is given then it isn't a magic trick any more. Thus magic is not only founded upon ignorance but upon the intention of keeping us in the dark.

There is a difference between magic and miracle and I am sure you will agree with that.

Yes but remember that I do not accept the definition of a "miracle" as something that violates the laws of nature - something that I do not believe that God ever does.

[reallyRyan]

Such classifications are simply arbitrary artifacts of human language and different languages don't use the same ones. The only measurable distinction is that of speciation and once two populations cannot reproduce with one another then they are biologically distinct, what we call them is irrelevant.

I don't disagree with that. My point had nothing to do with terminology, it had to do with the substantive issue. Species can be biologically distinct and yet still reproduce. A zebra and a donkey are biologically distinct (they don't even have the same number of chromosomes) but they can still reproduce - coincidentally they are separate species. Speciation can occur and create biologically distinct creatures, but they can still reproduce (as in the example of the dogs). Speciation has nothing to do with the non-ability to reproduce, but there are clear boundaries around speciation in practical real world experiments (like dog breeding), when characteristics are taken too far in a population it produces animals incapable of bearing young or surviving on their own. In order for large wholesale changes to take place in a population, it would be necessary to have characteristics taken to extremes otherwise you never end up with a land-hand to fin development.

What proof is there of genetic relationships? If you are saying a percentage of similarity, that in and of itself doesn't compel the conclusion that they shared a common ancestor. The same with form, a similarity in form doesn't in itself compel the conclusion that they are related ancestrally

Only a small portion of the genetic similarities have anything to do with similarities of form and function. The proof of all the things in science is that it works. The fact that it works is why people use these similarities to test for paternity and forensics use these similarities to identify perpetrators. Like I said there is no way to prove that the world wasn't created this morning, there simply is no useful reason to ignore all the evidence that it has existed for some time.

I don't disagree with that, but you haven't offered any evidence in support of macro changes, you have only supported micro variations thus far. If you are proposing that micro variations end in macro changes, then please support it with some compelling evidence.

An explanation that ignores everthing we have discovered about the world through the objective methods of science will be a magical one, and one that seeks consistency with such discoveries is not.

Right, but where are the discoveries evidencing macro changes that are sufficient to account for the reigning paradigm? All I hear from others is evidence that can be interpreted various ways.

Evolution is the scientific theory that the evidence supports.

Right, it has evidence to support micro variations resulting in speciation, where is the evidence compelling macro changes? Intelligent Design proponents say the same thing that you say of evolution. Why is it one or the other and not a both/and?

Jesus being raised from the dead might indeed be magical in the way that many believe and explain it. I do not favor a magical explanation however. God's creation of living things that insists that it is all done by unknowable divine powers would be a magical explanation but an explanation of God's work of creation based on an understanding of what God was trying to accomplish and the process by which He did, such as evolution, would not be a magical explanation.

OK, so what is the non-magical explanation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ? By your definition, knowing the process of something removes it as a magical explanation? Then tell me, if I state from Genesis the process, God formed man from the dust of the earth and breathed the breathe of life into his nostrils - that is a process by which God did something, so its no longer magical?

A magical explanation is in its essence a refusal to explain anything. It basically attempts to say that there is no explanation that we can understand.

But above is an explanation that anyone can understand - it includes a process by which the creation was accomplished. Why does that explanation need to be coupled with a naturalistic description of abiogenesis?

The only explanation that "Goddidit" provides is that "it is God's will". However full of piety such may be, as explanation it is useless. It is answer that can be given for absolutely anything because it draws no conntections in the world. It provides no conclusions but attributes everything to a will and power that are unknowable. Its only purpose is to silence questions not to answer them.

I think that explanation (as given) is far from useless, it answers the most fundamental question and draws a connection between every person, animal etc in the universe - past present and future. So, why is that answer not good enough?

Why is divine creation without chemical evolution (or similar methodology) magic, while life from non-life via a step wise method is not?

Because one explains and the other does not. One is just hand waiving and rhetoric and the other aims to show us how what happened produced the results that we see.

Explain what exactly? And which one is hand waiving and which aims to show us what produced the results that we see?

Every good magic trick has steps leading to the reveal.

But the magic trick requires misdirection so that the audience does not see what is happening. If an explanation is given then it isn't a magic trick any more. Thus magic is not only founded upon ignorance but upon the intention of keeping us in the dark.

That is my point exactly. So is it not possible that philosophic naturalism is doing just that with macro-evolution and abiogenesis? How are we to know that its not just a bunch of steps and a misdirection so that the audience does not see what is happening? The world is not becoming a better place or growing closer to God because of abiogenesis and the evolutionary paradigm is it? No, in fact for the majority of people who embrace it, it leads to a falling away from faith. Why then should it be embraced by those who do have faith? Jesus said we would know false teachers by their fruit. What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

There is a difference between magic and miracle and I am sure you will agree with that.

Yes but remember that I do not accept the definition of a "miracle" as something that violates the laws of nature - something that I do not believe that God ever does.

OK, first, and I think you will agree, not all miracles are of the same variety. God has clearly done miracles within the laws of nature (Joshua's long day, the plagues, parting the Red Sea) so I will grant that a miracle isn't defined by a violation of natural law. But, there are other miracles that clearly do violate natural laws (virgin birth, resurrection, healing the blind by proclamation, raising Lazarus by proclamation). If God never violates the laws of nature, then please help me understand your statement. What natural law permits a clearly transcendent miracle, like the four above (virgin birth, resurrection, healing the blind, raising Lazarus)? Further, in our discussion of the resurrection, you have repeatedly stated (and I agree) that a spiritual body is not bound by natural laws. If a spiritual being is not bound by laws of nature, then he can and does violate them at will, and according to your own admission he has in and after the resurrection. If God does not violate any laws of nature in his miracles, then by definition he has bound himself by them. If that is the case, that is, if God does not violate the laws of nature, then I am not sure what purpose there is what you have said - that a spiritual body is not bound by the laws of nature.

[mitchellmckain]

I don't disagree with that. My point had nothing to do with terminology, it had to do with the substantive issue. Species can be biologically distinct and yet still reproduce. A zebra and a donkey are biologically distinct (they don't even have the same number of chromosomes) but they can still reproduce - coincidentally they are separate species. Speciation can occur and create biologically distinct creatures, but they can still reproduce (as in the example of the dogs). Speciation has nothing to do with the non-ability to reproduce, but there are clear boundaries around speciation in practical real world experiments (like dog breeding), when characteristics are taken too far in a population it produces animals incapable of bearing young or surviving on their own. In order for large wholesale changes to take place in a population, it would be necessary to have characteristics taken to extremes otherwise you never end up with a land-hand to fin development.

This is another excellent example of what you would expect if evolution is true. Even though the whole process takes a very long time, you would expect to see various stages of the process in the present. Thus horses, zebras and donkeys are at one stage of speciation where offspring between them can only reproduce themselves very rarely.

I don't disagree with that, but you haven't offered any evidence in support of macro changes, you have only supported micro variations thus far. If you are proposing that micro variations end in macro changes, then please support it with some compelling evidence.

The amount of compelling evidence is overwhelming. Everything you expect to see if it is true, has been seen. None of the evidence contradicts it.

All I hear from others is evidence that can be interpreted various ways.

You mean like the way that the Bible can be interpreted in so many different contradictory ways? The difference is that we are not talking about religionists, lawyers and car salesmen who look for any evidence they can find to support their conclusion. Science doesn't work that way. It proposes an hypothesis and a means of testing it and follows the proceedure and accepts the results.

Intelligent Design proponents say the same thing that you say of evolution. Why is it one or the other and not a both/and?

One is science and the other is anti-science. Science looks for an explanation. Anti-science manufactures rhetoric to support the wishful thinking that explanations cannot be found.

OK, so what is the non-magical explanation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ?

"It is sown a physical body, it is rasied a spiritual body. ... The last Adam became a life giving spirit." A spiritual entity being defined as outside the mathematical relationships of the physical universe means that there can be no inconsistencies with the discoveries of science.

By your definition, knowing the process of something removes it as a magical explanation?

A non magical explanation can demonstrate how the state of things resulted from the process that produced them. A non magical explanation is useful in science as a tool for futher scientific inquiry. A magical explanation is a scientific dead end because it is useless for scientific inquiry. It provides no way to conduct any further objective inquiry into the subject.

Then tell me, if I state from Genesis the process, God formed man from the dust of the earth and breathed the breathe of life into his nostrils - that is a process by which God did something, so its no longer magical?

If we treat this as a scientific theory then no, it explains nothing for there is no evidence to agree with such a description. What shall we predict from such a description? That man is made of dust? But man is not made of dust. A very large part of household dust derives from human skin but that skin is only a small portion of the what the body is made of. Shall we predict that we will see other cases of dust forming into creatures? So such event has ever been observed. As an explanation it is thus utterly useless to the process of scientific inquiry and so yes, it is indeed a magical explanation if it is taken literally in that manner. But fortunately only a small part of modern Christianity has adopted this willfully ignorant anti-science literalism, and other Christians read it very differently.

For example, I read this as saying that God formed man from the physical substance of this world (i.e. atoms and molecules) using the natural physical laws that govern the behavior of physical things (i.e. including evolution), and then God added something else, "the breathe of God" also know as inspiritus or inspiration. God spoke to us and communicated with us, teaching us to be human beings and thus givng birth to the human mind.

But above is an explanation that anyone can understand - it includes a process by which the creation was accomplished. Why does that explanation need to be coupled with a naturalistic description of abiogenesis?

It doesn't. That is an explanation that is suitable for sunday school and for that purpose in doesn't require suplimentation with a scientific explanation. It serves a religious purpose. But it has absolutely no value whatsoever to the task of scientific inquiry.

I think that explanation (as given) is far from useless, it answers the most fundamental question and draws a connection between every person, animal etc in the universe - past present and future. So, why is that answer not good enough?

Good enough for what purpose? For the purpose of getting everyone to praise God, it is just fine. But I have absolutely NO wish to return to the middle ages when praising God was practically the only thing that people could do.

So is it not possible that philosophic naturalism is doing just that with macro-evolution and abiogenesis?

Entirely possible. But I have no interest in philosophic naturalism. My interest lies with both science and Christianity. I see the value of both these things and thus do my best to stand against the manufactured rhetoric of those who tear these things down when they have no objective foundation for doing so.

How are we to know that its not just a bunch of steps and a misdirection so that the audience does not see what is happening?

Magicians shroud what they do in trade secrets. Scientists pubish their work for all the world to read and test for themselves.

The world is not becoming a better place or growing closer to God because of abiogenesis and the evolutionary paradigm is it?

Yes. I believe that God is in control of the direction that the world is going, however much the emnity of the religionists seek to oppose the will of God. All throughout history (both Biblical and otherwise) the demonstrable behavior of the religious establishments has been to defend their tools of power and manipulation.

No, in fact for the majority of people who embrace it, it leads to a falling away from faith.

Yes it leads to a falling away from faith in the legalistic religions of men. But some eventually (or sometimes it is only their children like me who) recover from the damage that such relgions do and learn that despite all that garbage, there is after all value in religion, theism and Christianity.

Why then should it be embraced by those who do have faith?

The blind faith taught by the religions of men serve nothing but self-deception and ignorance. The honest faith such as we see in scientists pursuit of the truth, however, is a faith with eyes wide open and that is a faith that will well serve those who seek the kind of faith taught in Romans 10.

Jesus said we would know false teachers by their fruit.

Yes indeed, and the people of this forum are well aware of the fruit of the legalistic relgions of men and thus they know that they are false just as I do.

What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

science? The honest search for the truth.

There is a difference between magic and miracle and I am sure you will agree with that.

Yes but remember that I do not accept the definition of a "miracle" as something that violates the laws of nature - something that I do not believe that God ever does.

OK, first, and I think you will agree, not all miracles are of the same variety. God has clearly done miracles within the laws of nature (Joshua's long day, the plagues, parting the Red Sea) so I will grant that a miracle isn't defined by a violation of natural law. But, there are other miracles that clearly do violate natural laws (virgin birth, resurrection, healing the blind by proclamation, raising Lazarus by proclamation). If God never violates the laws of nature, then please help me understand your statement. What natural law permits a clearly transcendent miracle, like the four above (virgin birth, resurrection, healing the blind, raising Lazarus)?

There is nothing in the spiritual resurrection that Paul describes in 1 Cor 15 that violates the laws of nature.

As for the virgin birth, do we not have artifical insemination? But do I believe that Jesus did not have a physical father? No I do not. Yes a miracle occurred and a virgin gave birth but no I do not think that automatically means that God altered or set aside the laws of nature.

Doctors have healed blindness and the blind have recovered their sight and I would call it miraculous but I don't think that natural law was set aside in these cases.

People have been resuscitated after being thought dead and I would call it miraculous but I don't think that natural law was set aside in these cases.

I don't believe that Jesus, while He was in the form of a man in a physical body, did a single thing that other human beings could not do or that other human beings have not done. He said so Himself in John 14:12.

I believe that these laws of nature were created by God and I do not believe in a whimsical inconstant God who contradicts Himself. I believe that God created the laws of nature for a very good reason and those reasons remain unchanged in all circumstances and thus I do not believe that God sets them aside - ever. What I see instead is that God made the laws of nature in such a way that He can interact with the world to make miracles without breaking the laws which He has made.

Further, in our discussion of the resurrection, you have repeatedly stated (and I agree) that a spiritual body is not bound by natural laws. If a spiritual being is not bound by laws of nature, then he can and does violate them at will

No a spiritual being does not. The laws of nature simply do not apply. The laws of nature govern the mathematical relationships of time and space in which physical things have their being and substance. But spiritual things have no part of such relationships and have existence apart from this, so the laws of nature do not apply.

If God does not violate any laws of nature in his miracles, then by definition he has bound himself by them.

No, God has integrity, goodness and consistency because He chooses to, not because he is bound by any theological definitions or "natures" that human beings decide to bind Him to. People lie, cheat and break their own rules because they want to have their cake and eat it too, and sometimes they imagine false gods that display the same lack of character. But God is consistent because He knows what He wants to accomplish and He remains true to His goals until the very end.

I am not sure what purpose there is what you have said - that a spiritual body is not bound by the laws of nature.

The point in that case was to explain the difference between a spiritual body and physical body. But to explain further...

A spiritual body does not exist by mathematical relationships of time and space and the mathematical equations that govern the changes of those relationships. It does not in fact exist or act by anything outside of itself. The spirit is and acts according to its own nature alone. It is in that sense, like a universe unto itself. But that is the danger for us right there, for life is a process of relationship with things outside of oneself. Thus if the spirit does not internalize and make a part of itself the life giving relationships with others then it is dead and without a relationship with an infinite God there can be no eternal life. Paul explains that Jesus became a life giving spirit, which is to say that he walked that path by which a human being can become a spirit that has that unending fountain of life within in it, which only a relationship with God provides.

[reallyRyan]

I don't disagree with that. My point had nothing to do with terminology, it had to do with the substantive issue. Species can be biologically distinct and yet still reproduce. A zebra and a donkey are biologically distinct (they don't even have the same number of chromosomes) but they can still reproduce - coincidentally they are separate species. Speciation can occur and create biologically distinct creatures, but they can still reproduce (as in the example of the dogs). Speciation has nothing to do with the non-ability to reproduce, but there are clear boundaries around speciation in practical real world experiments (like dog breeding), when characteristics are taken too far in a population it produces animals incapable of bearing young or surviving on their own. In order for large wholesale changes to take place in a population, it would be necessary to have characteristics taken to extremes otherwise you never end up with a land-hand to fin development.

This is another excellent example of what you would expect if evolution is true. Even though the whole process takes a very long time, you would expect to see various stages of the process in the present. Thus horses, zebras and donkeys are at one stage of speciation where offspring between them can only reproduce themselves very rarely.

Right, but see you are still only talking about speciation, micro changes, changes that result in closely related species - some form of wild horse to zebras and donkeys. You haven't done anything to evidence macro changes - say a land mammal to whale.

The amount of compelling evidence is overwhelming. Everything you expect to see if it is true, has been seen. None of the evidence contradicts it.

Well, if that is true, then because you are the one making the positive claim here, it would benefit everyone to hear some of that evidence. As of yet I have not encountered any evidence that can only be interpreted from an evolutionary paradigm. What I would expect to see if it is true of my view, has been seen as well. None of the evidence contradicts it.

OK, so what is the non-magical explanation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ?

"It is sown a physical body, it is rasied a spiritual body. ... The last Adam became a life giving spirit." A spiritual entity being defined as outside the mathematical relationships of the physical universe means that there can be no inconsistencies with the discoveries of science.

That is the same thing that the "magical" explanation says. God is beyond the laws of the physical universe so nothing is off limits. Why is it ok for you to say that here, but not in regards to the evolution/creation topic?

By your definition, knowing the process of something removes it as a magical explanation?

A non magical explanation can demonstrate how the state of things resulted from the process that produced them. A non magical explanation is useful in science as a tool for futher scientific inquiry. A magical explanation is a scientific dead end because it is useless for scientific inquiry. It provides no way to conduct any further objective inquiry into the subject.

And if true, would that be a problem?

For example, I read this as saying that God formed man from the physical substance of this world (i.e. atoms and molecules) using the natural physical laws that govern the behavior of physical things (i.e. including evolution), and then God added something else, "the breathe of God" also know as inspiritus or inspiration. God spoke to us and communicated with us, teaching us to be human beings and thus givng birth to the human mind.

That is what the other interpretation views it as as well. No one says, we will find evidence that we are dust and that creatures will spontaneously rise from the dust as a normal course of action. To say that it is, is a serious misstatement of the alternative view point.

But above is an explanation that anyone can understand - it includes a process by which the creation was accomplished. Why does that explanation need to be coupled with a naturalistic description of abiogenesis?

It doesn't. That is an explanation that is suitable for sunday school and for that purpose in doesn't require suplimentation with a scientific explanation. It serves a religious purpose. But it has absolutely no value whatsoever to the task of scientific inquiry.

OK, so then there is no option in your view other than natural processes?

I think that explanation (as given) is far from useless, it answers the most fundamental question and draws a connection between every person, animal etc in the universe - past present and future. So, why is that answer not good enough?

Good enough for what purpose? For the purpose of getting everyone to praise God, it is just fine. But I have absolutely NO wish to return to the middle ages when praising God was practically the only thing that people could do.[/quote]
What do you mean by that?

How are we to know that its not just a bunch of steps and a misdirection so that the audience does not see what is happening?

Magicians shroud what they do in trade secrets. Scientists pubish their work for all the world to read and test for themselves.

All the world can't understand their trade secrets, and certainly can't test it for themselves. I don't know anyone with a super collider, or a DNA lab in their basements. Most of the time, you have to have special training to even understand the methodology. What is the difference between that and shrouding it in trade secrets?

Why then should it be embraced by those who do have faith?

The blind faith taught by the religions of men serve nothing but self-deception and ignorance. The honest faith such as we see in scientists pursuit of the truth, however, is a faith with eyes wide open and that is a faith that will well serve those who seek the kind of faith taught in Romans 10.

Confident trust in a reliable source? I don't know anyone who believes blindly, yet there are many who have a confident trust and are skeptical of abiogenesis and macroevolution.

Jesus said we would know false teachers by their fruit.

Yes indeed, and the people of this forum are well aware of the fruit of the legalistic relgions of men and thus they know that they are false just as I do.

Couldn't that finger be pointed as much at science?

What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

science? The honest search for the truth.

That is a high ideal, but does it really happen? The honest search for the truth isn't fruit anyway, that isn't the end result, its the branch so to speak its a pursuit of knowledge. Isn't the want for knowledge the catalyst that drove sin into being in the first place? I am not saying all science is evil, I am saying that there are clearly boundaries to what we can know or should seek to know. Abiogenesis doesn't come out of a philosophy where God exists, it comes out of a pure materialism. It starts in philosophic naturalism, the same that Darwin held to, not theism. But views like Wallace's are just as consistent with the data, yet do not view it all with the same philosophic naturalism that Darwinism does (in any of its forms). Wallace of course had twice the field experience as Darwin and was every bit as science minded, but held to intelligent design. You can say it Intelligent Design isn't science, but Wallace probably one of the most influential scientists in Darwin's own time, would disagree with the suggestion. Darwin of course told Wallace that he wasn't a doing good science because he wasn't a naturalist. That is the philosophy from which the current paradigm comes. Wallace of course didn't disbelieve in evolution driving speciation to closely related species, nor do I - but with a lack of convincing evidence to take it beyond that point, there is no reason for me to adopt the naturalistic viewpoint that is required to believe that abiogenesis and macroevolution are valid processes. Simply, if God exists, there is no reason that should be necessary, or even expected. We can theorize all we want, that isn't the issue, but a theory without evidence is just as much hand waiving and rhetoric as any other fundamentalist. Forcing the naturalist view isn't an honest search for truth, its wanting an explanation to satisfy the view one already has adopted - which is the same thing that the Intelligent Design people are accused of. How can one be science when the other is not if they both do equal but opposite things? Either they are both science or they are both not and this idea that science is an honest search for truth is just that, an idea. Science after all shares some very common themes with organized religion, both are organized to serve a purpose and both exist only within the people who do them. People who by your own admission, "lie, cheat, and want to have their cake and eat it too". Since science is really just a collection of humans involved in a methodology, the collective is not above these things any more than religion is. Serving a naturalist paradigm and God reminds me that you can't serve two masters... you will either serve the one and not the other or you will love the one and not the other. Seeking after knowledge is a lot like seeking money in that regard.

As for the virgin birth, do we not have artifical insemination? But do I believe that Jesus did not have a physical father? No I do not. Yes a miracle occurred and a virgin gave birth but no I do not think that automatically means that God altered or set aside the laws of nature.

So, let me see if I understand you. Are you saying that God took a sperm and implanted it into Mary's ovum?

Doctors have healed blindness and the blind have recovered their sight and I would call it miraculous but I don't think that natural law was set aside in these cases.

Of course a doctor healing blindness doesn't violate natural law because they would do it via medical treatments, by physically injecting photoreceptors or hooking the patient up to a device. I have not seen a doctor ever do it via proclamation the way that Jesus did, have you? Or did Jesus use drugs and medical treatments, or physically manipulate the man's eyes? If that were the case, Luke (a physician) would have been amazed, sure - but, I doubt he would have seen it as proof of Jesus being anything but a very good doctor.

People have been resuscitated after being thought dead and I would call it miraculous but I don't think that natural law was set aside in these cases.

So I should ignore the context of Lazurus' resuscitation, by Jesus' proclamation? How long was Lazurus dead? Four days right? Four days goes beyond a natural resuscitation. The context of course was to point to Jesus' divine authority by demonstrating that he had power over death, what is divine about a natural resuscitation? How was a natural resuscitation, on a four day old corpse, accomplished from outside the tomb? To say that no natural law was set aside I think is just reaching beyond reason.

I don't believe that Jesus, while He was in the form of a man in a physical body, did a single thing that other human beings could not do or that other human beings have not done. He said so Himself in John 14:12.

12 “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.13 Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.14 If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.
John 14:12-14 (ESV)

Doesn't it say that its because of Jesus that we would do them? It doesn't say we can do them because we are able of our own accord, does it? Its because we will ask in his name and he (not we) will do them. Peter walked on water (however briefly) because he trusted Christ, not because he had that power in himself - that is clear in the text because he starts to falter in his faith (trust) and began to sink.

I believe that these laws of nature were created by God and I do not believe in a whimsical inconstant God who contradicts Himself. I believe that God created the laws of nature for a very good reason and those reasons remain unchanged in all circumstances and thus I do not believe that God sets them aside - ever. What I see instead is that God made the laws of nature in such a way that He can interact with the world to make miracles without breaking the laws which He has made.

OK, I think that is self defeating considering that God is not subjected to natural law and there is no reason he should be and no reason why it would be "inconstant" for God, not subject, to violate a boundary that he made for his creation, not for himself. Therefore, there is nothing contradictory about God doing works outside of them, beyond them or allowing a violation of the boundary to serve a specific purpose. But we will have to agree to disagree since neither of us believe in a whimsical inconstant God who contradicts Himself.

Further, in our discussion of the resurrection, you have repeatedly stated (and I agree) that a spiritual body is not bound by natural laws. If a spiritual being is not bound by laws of nature, then he can and does violate them at will

No a spiritual being does not. The laws of nature simply do not apply. The laws of nature govern the mathematical relationships of time and space in which physical things have their being and substance. But spiritual things have no part of such relationships and have existence apart from this, so the laws of nature do not apply.

If they do not apply, what is wrong with the idea that God "doesn't ever set them aside"? This is what is wrong with it, they aren't set aside if they don't apply to Him.

If God does not violate any laws of nature in his miracles, then by definition he has bound himself by them.

No, God has integrity, goodness and consistency because He chooses to, not because he is bound by any theological definitions or "natures" that human beings decide to bind Him to. People lie, cheat and break their own rules because they want to have their cake and eat it too, and sometimes they imagine false gods that display the same lack of character. But God is consistent because He knows what He wants to accomplish and He remains true to His goals until the very end.

I agree with that 100% That is why I said "he has bound himself" if your view is correct. But integrity, goodness and consistency have nothing to do with whether or not he can do something in or with His creation that His creation itself can or should not do. Every parent, no matter how good, has different boundaries for their children than they do for themselves, if for no other reason than the child's own safety (although there are other rightful reasons). Its not inconsistent with integrity and goodness to put valuable boundaries around less capable beings. If that were the case, then I would be guilty every time I took my dog for a walk on a leash. The length of the leash isn't inconsistent with my goodness and consistency with wanting my dog to have free will, its for her own safety and the safety of others around us - but I don't have to wear a leash myself, I hold it and I can let it go any time I want to.

But you have brought up an interesting subject here. Please help me understand - saying that God doesn't violate natural laws - how is this different than using "theological definitions or "natures" that human beings decide to bind Him to." Aren't you saying that there is is a theological definition of integrity, goodness and consistency that you have in mind and binding God to them in your theological view? If you have a source for the claim that God doesn't violate natural laws, then please share it because I would like to examine it myself.

I am not sure what purpose there is what you have said - that a spiritual body is not bound by the laws of nature.

The point in that case was to explain the difference between a spiritual body and physical body. But to explain further...

A spiritual body does not exist by mathematical relationships of time and space and the mathematical equations that govern the changes of those relationships. It does not in fact exist or act by anything outside of itself. The spirit is and acts according to its own nature alone. It is in that sense, like a universe unto itself. But that is the danger for us right there, for life is a process of relationship with things outside of oneself. Thus if the spirit does not internalize and make a part of itself the life giving relationships with others then it is dead and without a relationship with an infinite God there can be no eternal life.

[/quote]So read these two statements... "It does not in fact exist or act by anything outside of itself"... "without a relationship with an infinite God there can be no eternal life" which one of those statements is true? They can't both true because they are both mutually exclusive, unless of course you are using them with different intentions - Is it to say that a spiritual body is not bound by anything, not even a spiritual dimension (for lack of a better term)? I can't agree or disagree with it unless there is a source of this teaching that I can examine. Is there one?

"Thus if the spirit does not internalize and make a part of itself the life giving relationships with others"

Which "others" are we talking about here?

Paul explains that Jesus became a life giving spirit, which is to say that he walked that path by which a human being can become a spirit that has that unending fountain of life within in it, which only a relationship with God provides.

I am not sure what you mean by "he walked that path by which a human being can become a spirit that has that unending fountain of life within in it" Where does Paul say that? I see Paul saying the "fountain of life" is external to the one being sustained by it? That is that the fountain of life is found in Christ and sustains the other spiritual bodies? We have no hope of walking the sinless path that Jesus walked, do we?

[mitchellmckain]

You put me in an awkward position. You have this black and white, either or attitude that suggests that if I prove that evolution is correct then you are no longer going to believe in God or Christianity. Well I have already told you that I consider a relationship with Jesus to be far more important. So why should I persue this discussion???

Why? Because I have faith in God. I have faith in the truth. I have faith in love.

Can I ask you to pray before continuing. If God does not want you to listen. Then by all means stop right here.

Right, but see you are still only talking about speciation, micro changes, changes that result in closely related species - some form of wild horse to zebras and donkeys. You haven't done anything to evidence macro changes - say a land mammal to whale.

This sounds like a chant that you are going to repeat no matter what evidence is put before you. Well if that is what you are going to do then you might as well be thorough. Check out the following list of some of the overwhelming evidence for macro evolution:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

For example, if common descent is true then we would expect that on occasion animals would be born with features of those common ancestors. Well what do you know, they are. Humans are born with tails. Not only that but we have identified the genes that are responsible for tails and ALL HUMANS HAVE THEM. Why??? Magical creationism's best explanation is that God put them there in order to mislead us. The explanation of evolution is that common descent (what you call macroevolution) are all part of that Genesis 2:7 forming man out of the dust of the ground according to the laws of nature.

AND by coincidence we have an example of very case you have brought up, sometimes whales are born with extra set of limbs to show that they are descended from four limbed land creatures rather than their ancestor never having more than the two limbs that nearly all whales have. The genetic instructions for growing those extra limbs are right there in the DNA but the process of evolution has selected the development of mechanisms that prevent those instructions from actually being used -- most of the time.

Well, if that is true, then because you are the one making the positive claim here, it would benefit everyone to hear some of that evidence. As of yet I have not encountered any evidence that can only be interpreted from an evolutionary paradigm. What I would expect to see if it is true of my view, has been seen as well. None of the evidence contradicts it.

All the evidence contradicts it. The fact that you can come up with excuses and rationalizations doesn't change that one little bit.

By your definition, knowing the process of something removes it as a magical explanation?

A non magical explanation can demonstrate how the state of things resulted from the process that produced them. A non magical explanation is useful in science as a tool for futher scientific inquiry. A magical explanation is a scientific dead end because it is useless for scientific inquiry. It provides no way to conduct any further objective inquiry into the subject.

And if true, would that be a problem?

1. If it is true then we will not find explanations, but the fact is that we keep finding explanations and the gaps keep disappearing which is why a religion that tries to hide from the truth in such gaps with wishful thinking is doomed.

2. The problem is in believing that no explanation is possible when this is false because if you don't believe then you don't look and thus you don't find. The problem is that I don't want to live in the dark ages of mankind when peole insisted on believing that no explanation was possible instead of looking for one.

That is what the other interpretation views it as as well. No one says, we will find evidence that we are dust and that creatures will spontaneously rise from the dust as a normal course of action. To say that it is, is a serious misstatement of the alternative view point.

But that wasn't the point. The point was that the magical view has no value for scientific inquiry. It has no purpose but to say "praise God".

The problem is that people can say "praise God" while refusing to take responsibility for the suffering of people in the world by using ALL that God has given them for that purpose. It is like someone saying "I will pray for you but I won't give you a hand", like saying "I will go to church with you but I will not use my money to help you", like saying "I will read the Bible to you but I will not give you the medicines I have to cure your illness", like saying that "I will smile and talk with you in church, but I will make no effort to figure out how to solve the problems in your life."

It doesn't. That is an explanation that is suitable for sunday school and for that purpose in doesn't require suplimentation with a scientific explanation. It serves a religious purpose. But it has absolutely no value whatsoever to the task of scientific inquiry.

OK, so then there is no option in your view other than natural processes?

Not in science no, because as I have tried to explain to you numerous times, it is the very nature of the scientific methodology that it is blind to things which cannot in principle be manipulated. Its methodology is specifically designed to discover the natural processes and is incapable of discovering anything else.

That is what science is. It is not everything. It is JUST science. It is a VERY useful tool. But it is NOT life. That is the lie that the philosophical naturalists will try to pass off on you. I see it all the time. They ask me how can I be a scientist and yet believe in the things of christianity, and they only ask such a question because they confuse science with life itself. Science is not a life commitment. Do not make me laugh. It is just a skill that you spend a lot of time learning to use. But as I explain to them, it is an undeniable FACT, that life cannot be restricted to objective observation (where what you want and believe doesn't matter), but absolutely requires subjective participation (where what you want and believe is essential).

Good enough for what purpose? For the purpose of getting everyone to praise God, it is just fine. But I have absolutely NO wish to return to the middle ages when praising God was practically the only thing that people could do.

What do you mean by that?

When you don't understand anything about how the world works, like when you are a child, then the only thing you can do is ask what you need from those that do. In the dark ages, the explanations "Goddidit" and "ItsGodsWill" were all they had and these were a fine reason to praise God and pray that He would provide. But I don't believe that the dark ages were any example of heaven on earth no matter how much praising and praying were going on. I believe that God wants us to grow up and to use all the abilities that he has given us, both to understand the world and to use the laws of nature to serve other people.

All the world can't understand their trade secrets, and certainly can't test it for themselves. I don't know anyone with a super collider, or a DNA lab in their basements. Most of the time, you have to have special training to even understand the methodology. What is the difference between that and shrouding it in trade secrets?

People not understanding is hardly a new thing. The same thing is true of Christianity. A great MANY people look at the Bible and see nothing that they can understand. Others look at all the disagreements in Christianity and find that even more confusing and incomprehensible.

Did people understand what Jesus was talking about most of the time? Did even the 12 apostles understand? No.

If you can't then you can't. But here is the good news. It doesn't matter. Salvation doesn't depend on your understanding but upon God's understanding. All you have to do is choose.

But then why bother trying to understand at all? Because that is a choice much like the guy in the parable of the talents who buries his talent. If you don't bother trying to understand then your choice is that you don't even value the truth. Its the wrong attitude. If you do things because of what they will get you then you are not living by faith and if you live that way then you are on your own living by the law. The point is that what you accomplish is not what really matters. The accomplishments really belong to God anyway because you don't accomplish anything without His help. What matters is the choices you make and how you define yourself by the effort you put into things.

What is the difference between that and shrouding it in trade secrets?

All the difference in the world. Nobody is trying to hide anything. On the contrary,there are all kinds of people ready to help you if you are willing to take the time to get the training and make the effort. Whining that its too difficult for you is really a lousy reason for anything.

The blind faith taught by the religions of men serve nothing but self-deception and ignorance. The honest faith such as we see in scientists pursuit of the truth, however, is a faith with eyes wide open and that is a faith that will well serve those who seek the kind of faith taught in Romans 10.

Confident trust in a reliable source? I don't know anyone who believes blindly, yet there are many who have a confident trust and are skeptical of abiogenesis and macroevolution.

But it is not just trust in a reliable source, it is trust in a method that grounds its conclusions in concrete evidence rather than empty rhetoric.

As I am constantly telling the atheists, skepticism is a valuable tool, but it is a pretty poor philosophy of life. Skepticism encourages you to to ask questions and then to look and see if you can find the answers to those questions. I know you probably face a lot of unbelievers who think that if they can ask ten questions for every answer you give then skepticism has one the argument. But you and I both know that this is a dishonest tactic, and using skepticism just to shoot down everyone else's answers to questions is just pathetic frankly.

Jesus said we would know false teachers by their fruit.

Yes indeed, and the people of this forum are well aware of the fruit of the legalistic relgions of men and thus they know that they are false just as I do.

Couldn't that finger be pointed as much at science?

EXACTLY my point!!! The kind of finger which they are pointing can indeed be pointed both ways. The fact that religion can be abused and misused no more means that everything in religion is completely wrong than the fact that the discoveries of science can be abused and misused means that science is wrong. If you would complain about the asymmetry here it is because while religion represents many competing voices, science has a means to achieve a greater amount of consensus than has ever been seen in other endeavors of man.

What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

science? The honest search for the truth.

That is a high ideal, but does it really happen?

Yes it does. And the results are everywhere in the world around us to testify to this.

The honest search for the truth isn't fruit anyway, that isn't the end result, its the branch so to speak its a pursuit of knowledge.

It is the end result for science. That is the only thing that science is after.

Isn't the want for knowledge the catalyst that drove sin into being in the first place?

No it is not. Mankind did not gain any great knowledge of good and evil by what Adam and Eve did. We don't see it in Adam and Eve and we don't see it in the history that follows. What see instead is that people were put in the position of dictating good and evil to other people when they had no real understanding of it at all. If Adam and Even wanted a greater knowledge of good and evil then the place to get that would have been God Himself and growing in a relationship with Him. Looking for that knowledge in a fruit you can reach up and pluck is looking for a shortcut. And the shortcut they found was the BS of "authority", that is being put in the position of teaching what is good and evil to others before they really understood it themselves.

I am not saying all science is evil, I am saying that there are clearly boundaries to what we can know or should seek to know.

I do not believe that.

Again you confirm that your image of God is that of a tiny light in endless darkness and so you call everyone to follow you towards that light. But my image of God is different, where the darkness is small and it is God who is an endless light that surrounds us in all directions. We have dug ourselves into a deep dark hole hiding from Him and the deep hole may look like the whole world to those who are in it and all they can see of God is this point of light high above them. But as they call everyone to follow them, what they do not understand is that everyone isn't underneath them in the hole they have dug. Other people are in a hole of their own or in their own place in the same hole and so following you is only too likely to lead them farther into the darkness rather than out of it. So I do not call you to follow me, for I cannot save you, I tell you to look for God and follow Him.

I believe that we are the children of an infinite God and the essence of eternal life is the fact that there is no limit to what this divine parent has for us. The things that we desire and think to be so important are really rather small and empty compared to what He has waiting for us. So no, I do not believe that there are things we cannot know or should not seek to find out. The means we use to find the answers to questions is a different matter in which there certainly are ethical issues involved.

Abiogenesis doesn't come out of a philosophy where God exists, it comes out of a pure materialism.

Nonsense. It comes from facing the questions with honesty and faith rather than hiding ones head in the sand and insisting that we accept answers that do not explain anything at all.

It starts in philosophic naturalism

If so then God Himself is a philosophic naturalist, because He is the one who created those laws of nature.

But views like Wallace's are just as consistent with the data, yet do not view it all with the same philosophic naturalism that Darwinism does (in any of its forms).

Alfred Russel Wallace is one who came up with the mechanism of natural selection independently of Darwin. He was the one who thought of the phrase "survival of the fittest" and sent the idea to Darwin.

In this work, and in many of his subsequent publications, Wallace differs from Darwin on certain points. Thus the two concluding essays contend that man has not, like the other animals, been produced by the unaided operation of natural selection, but that other forces have also been in operation. We here see the influence of his convictions on the subject of "spiritualism."

More recently he expressed his dissatisfaction with the hypothesis of "sexual selection" by which Darwin sought to explain the conspicuous characters which are displayed during the courtship of animals. The expression of his opinion on both these points of divergence from Darwin will be found in Darwinism (1889), a most valuable and lucid exposition of natural selection, as suited to the later period at which it appeared as the Essays were to the ealier.

All this indicates is that Wallace had his criticisms of Darwinism JUST AS I DO. There is a big difference between the scientific theory of evolution and the philosophy and atheistic rhetoric known as "orthodox darwinism". But there is absolutely no reason to say that Wallace proposed a alternate theory to that of evolution, for the truth was that he himself played a crucial role in developing that theory as have many other scientist since. This is not to say that I would take the side of Wallace in any controversy with Darwin. I am all too likely to disagree with both them because a great deal has been discovered since their time.

The most significant thing that I see in the contrast between Darwin and Wallace is that while Darwin saw in evolution a reason to lose faith, Wallace did not, but that Wallace already having given up on seeing any value in revealed religion found within science his own reasons to believe in a non-physical aspect to reality.

Simply, if God exists, there is no reason that should be necessary, or even expected.

Yes a magical view doesn't answer questions but silences the mind and keeps it from asking any. Scientific explanations have the opposite effect of causing one to ask many more questions.

So I should ignore the context of Lazurus' resuscitation, by Jesus' proclamation? How long was Lazurus dead? Four days right? Four days goes beyond a natural resuscitation. The context of course was to point to Jesus' divine authority by demonstrating that he had power over death, what is divine about a natural resuscitation? How was a natural resuscitation, on a four day old corpse, accomplished from outside the tomb? To say that no natural law was set aside I think is just reaching beyond reason.

No you should not ignore the context. He was thougt to be dead and he was resuscitated four days later. But it is not like he was examined by a modern medical team or that he flatlined on a EEG. Another day in the tomb and he may well have been dead, and thus without Jesus' intervention Lazarus was for all intents and purposes dead. But no it does not mean that the laws of nature were set aside in this case.

I don't believe that Jesus, while He was in the form of a man in a physical body, did a single thing that other human beings could not do or that other human beings have not done. He said so Himself in John 14:12.

12 “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.13 Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.14 If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.
John 14:12-14 (ESV)

Doesn't it say that its because of Jesus that we would do them? It doesn't say we can do them because we are able of our own accord, does it? Its because we will ask in his name and he (not we) will do them. Peter walked on water (however briefly) because he trusted Christ, not because he had that power in himself - that is clear in the text because he starts to falter in his faith (trust) and began to sink.

That is exactly right. Jesus did these things not because He was God but because He asked the Father to do them.

OK, I think that is self defeating considering that God is not subjected to natural law and there is no reason he should be and no reason why it would be "inconstant" for God, not subject, to violate a boundary that he made for his creation, not for himself. Therefore, there is nothing contradictory about God doing works outside of them, beyond them or allowing a violation of the boundary to serve a specific purpose. But we will have to agree to disagree since neither of us believe in a whimsical inconstant God who contradicts Himself.

No there is nothing self-defeating in believing that God abides by the laws which He Himself decrees unless like the religionists you want people to believe that you have God at your disposal to do whatever you say. It doesn't defeat me in any way at all because I don't believe in God as a tool of power and manipulation as the religionists do. I believe in a living God that acts and speaks for Himself without any need of human beings to do anything for Him.

If they do not apply, what is wrong with the idea that God "doesn't ever set them aside"? This is what is wrong with it, they aren't set aside if they don't apply to Him.

Right they do not apply to Him. They apply to physical things because those laws are their very substance. But no God does not take away the foundations of the world and the substance of physical things in order to perform miracles. No different then from now. No God will NOT change the rules of life in order to answer the nonsensical childish demands of whiners. God will help, but he will not alter the rules He set down that because they were made for our benefit and altering them will not help anything, no more than cheating on a test really accomplishes anything.

So read these two statements... "It does not in fact exist or act by anything outside of itself"... "without a relationship with an infinite God there can be no eternal life" which one of those statements is true? They can't both true because they are both mutually exclusive

No they are not mutually exclusive because you can make a relationship with someone a part of yourself. The very substance of your spirit is the choices you make. That is what makes the spirit what it is. This is why God keeps telling us that we cannot ignore other people. He makes it clear in Matthew 25 that your relationship with Him and your relationship with others in need are one and the same. Unless you make helping other people a part of your life, part of who you are then your spirit will not have any connection to anything outside itself and without that there is no life.

This is the whole reason why we have the laws of nature in the first place. It is why we exist in this physical world where everything exists by these external laws. It is a womb that provides the things we need for life when we cannot do it ourselves to give us the time to develop what we need to live when we leave it. Just as in the womb, where the mother does our eating and breathing for us, so also in this world we have life and relationship by virtue of these laws of nature that God has provided. This gives us the time to make our own choices. It give us the chance to make the things of life a part of us.

This is why it is not a matter of appeasement and you cannot buy your way into eternal life. The relationship of life has to be a part of you or when the umbilical cut at physical death, no source of life will remain to you.

Is it to say that a spiritual body is not bound by anything, not even a spiritual dimension (for lack of a better term)? I can't agree or disagree with it unless there is a source of this teaching that I can examine. Is there one?

There is no source of this for me but God and the Bible.

I am not sure what you mean by "he walked that path by which a human being can become a spirit that has that unending fountain of life within in it"

I mean that I am not an adoptionist (as in adoptionist Christology). I do not believe that Jesus became God. I believe that Jesus is and was always God. But as Philipians 2 explains, He counted the power and knowledge of God as nothing and cast it aside to become a helpless innocent human infant to grow up as one of us. Thus when Paul says that He became a life giving spirit, Paul doesn't mean that Jesus was never a life giving spirit before. God was always a spirit and always living and always life giving. So what it means is much the same as what it means in Luke when it says that Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature. It means that Jesus showed us the way. He showed us that it can be done and how. And YES, a VERY BIG part of that is making God a part of your life. So Jesus said in John chapter 5 that he does nothing except what God tells Him to do. And YES, Jesus did these miraculous things by asking the Father just as we must do.

We have no hope of walking the sinless path that Jesus walked, do we?

Just because nobody ever has, does not mean that we have no hope of doing so. God does not command us to do things that we cannot do. But yes people have the habit of saying things like what you just said. They make excuses. They say that they cannot do it when this is a lie. They choose to do the wrong thing because it is easier and they are just plain lazy. They blame everyone and everything else for such choices, saying that they had no hope of doing what is right. But the cross doesn't accept such excuses. You nailed him to the cross with such excuses and you nail him to the cross again every time you make them, pushing God out of your life and refusing let Him get at the sin inside you. Until you accept that the problem is you and you alone then how can you let God in to change the real problem?

[reallyRyan]

You put me in an awkward position. You have this black and white, either or attitude that suggests that if I prove that evolution is correct then you are no longer going to believe in God or Christianity.

That isn't what I said, I said I would believe in aboigenesis and macroevolution if there was compelling evidence. I would still believe in God and Christ because of the same reason, because there is compelling evidence (both objective and subjective). In essence, if you showed me evidence of your view, and I found it compelling, I would believe as you do. That shouldn't be an awkward position at all.

Right, but see you are still only talking about speciation, micro changes, changes that result in closely related species - some form of wild horse to zebras and donkeys. You haven't done anything to evidence macro changes - say a land mammal to whale.

This sounds like a chant that you are going to repeat no matter what evidence is put before you. Well if that is what you are going to do then you might as well be thorough. Check out the following list of some of the overwhelming evidence for macro evolution:[/quote]
Its the same chant because its the same problem. What you have provided is not overwhelming at all. Everything listed on the website you provided can be looked at from two perspectives which lead to two very different conclusions.

For example, if common descent is true then we would expect that on occasion animals would be born with features of those common ancestors. Well what do you know, they are. Humans are born with tails.

That isn't exactly true. Humans are not born with tails. The tail bone plays a vital roll in allowing us to sit up straight, because some people are born with an elongated tail bone is not evidence of an evolutionary past, any more than a person being born with 6 fingers is evidence of a primitive 6 fingered ancestor. The elongated tail bone found in patents suffering from metatropic dysplasia is not a true tail, its cartilage - a far different structure than a tail.

Not only that but we have identified the genes that are responsible for tails and ALL HUMANS HAVE THEM. Why??? Magical creationism's best explanation is that God put them there in order to mislead us. The explanation of evolution is that common descent (what you call macroevolution) are all part of that Genesis 2:7 forming man out of the dust of the ground according to the laws of nature.

There is an explanation for that. Gene expression plays a vital roll in humans, the people born with metatropic dysplasia don't suffer from this gene being expressed. It just sounds like a jump to conclusions that the gene, no matter how it is expressed, is evidence of common decent.

AND by coincidence we have an example of very case you have brought up, sometimes whales are born with extra set of limbs to show that they are descended from four limbed land creatures rather than their ancestor never having more than the two limbs that nearly all whales have.

And sometimes people are born with 6 fingers, one eye, no feet, no hands... all are evidence of deformity, not an evolutionary throw back. The "extra set of limbs" aren't really limbs in the way that a limb is a limb. Its an elongation or deformation of the structure that is already present - there is nothing overwhelming here.

1. If it is true then we will not find explanations, but the fact is that we keep finding explanations

Explaining a thing doesnt necessitate that the explanation is true though

But that wasn't the point. The point was that the magical view has no value for scientific inquiry. It has no purpose but to say "praise God".

That is you imposing a stereotype, the fact is that there are many ID proponents who are scientists.... they value scientific inquiry as much as you do.

The problem is that people can say "praise God" while refusing to take responsibility for the suffering of people in the world by using ALL that God has given them for that purpose.

What does that have to do with evolution? You are talking about a human problem, and there are humans in science who do the same thing... there are people in every group that do that same thing (although they praise their "god" whatever that "god" may be)

It is like someone saying "I will pray for you but I won't give you a hand", like saying "I will go to church with you but I will not use my money to help you", like saying "I will read the Bible to you but I will not give you the medicines I have to cure your illness", like saying that "I will smile and talk with you in church, but I will make no effort to figure out how to solve the problems in your life."

And are you saying everyone in science is just altruistic? Again, people of all types have this problem, only replace the theology related topics with the things centered around any other specific group and you will find people who do one thing and say another, refuse to help and are in it for self gain... what is your point here?

Not in science no, because as I have tried to explain to you numerous times, it is the very nature of the scientific methodology that it is blind to things which cannot in priciple be manipulated. Its methodology is specifically designed to discover the natural processes and is incapable of discovering anything else.

If that is true Mitchell, why would I trust a methodology that is blind to some of the most fundamental principles? That is like following a blind man into a ditch.

It is what science is. It is not everything. It is JUST science.

Then why are we bound to accept the answers that a naturalistic science provides when that isn't all there is?

Science is not a life commitment.

There are thousands of scientists who would disagree with you on that.

All the world can't understand their trade secrets, and certainly can't test it for themselves. I don't know anyone with a super collider, or a DNA lab in their basements. Most of the time, you have to have special training to even understand the methodology. What is the difference between that and shrouding it in trade secrets?

People not understanding is hardly a new thing. The same thing is true of Christianity. A great MANY people look at the Bible and see nothing that they can understand. Others look at all the disagreements and find it just as confusing and incomprehensible.

Did people understand what Jesus was talking about most of the time? Did even the 12 apostles understand? No.

If you can't then you can't. But here is the good news. It doesn't matter. Salvation doesn't depend on your understanding but upon God's understanding. All you have to do is choose.

How do you choose something that you can't understand? How can you trust something you don't understand? That is the very definition of blind faith. But understanding a part and then trusting the one that gave you what you could understand, to be faithful in what you don't understand is a different thing. Jesus made this clear when talking to Nicodemus. If you can't believe him in earthly things (things you can understand) how can you believe him in heavenly things (things you can't understand)?

But then why bother trying to understand at all? Because that is a choice much like the guy in the parable of the talents who buries his talent. Its the wrong attitude. If you do things because of what they will get you then you are not living by faith and if you live that way then you are on your own living by the law.

But you see, both sides are trying to understand the evidence. But we don't agree on what the evidence concludes. You seem to be saying that if people don't accept your interpretation of evolution, they are willfully ignorant and have no intention of trying to understand... that simply isn't the case.

All the difference in the world. Nobody is trying to hide anything. On the contrary,there are all kinds of people ready to help you if you are willing to take the time to get the training and make the effort. Whining that its too difficult for you is really a lousy reason for anything.

I am not whining that its too difficult. As I have said many times, I study much of these topics for several hours every day. I am trying to point out to you that there are two sides to every coin and while I try to understand what evidence naturalism sees for abiogenesis and evolution, the path leads back inevitably to a philosophic presupposition and a methodology that is plagued by the same issues that you complain about in regards to religion.

The blind faith taught by the religions of men serve nothing but self-deception and ignorance. The honest faith such as we see in scientists pursuit of the truth, however, is a faith with eyes wide open and that is a faith that will well serve those who seek the kind of faith taught in Romans 10.

Confident trust in a reliable source? I don't know anyone who believes blindly, yet there are many who have a confident trust and are skeptical of abiogenesis and macroevolution.
[/quote]
But it is not just trust in a reliable source, it is trust in a metholody that grounds its conclusions in concrete evidence rather than empty rhetoric.[/quote]
You didn't understand what I said... Romans 10 doesn't talk about trusting a methodology, it talks about trusting a reliable source - God. Confident trust in a reliable source is the kind of faith talked about in Romans 10. Are you saying that those who are skeptical of abiogenesis and evolution don't ground their conclusions in concrete evidence rather than empty rhetoric?

As I am constantly telling the atheists, skepticism is a valuable tool, but it is a pretty poor philosophy of life. Skepticism encourages to to ask questions and then to look and see if you can find the answers to those quetions.

Isn't that what I am doing here?

I know you probably face a lot of unbelievers who think that if they can ask ten questions for every answer you give then skepticism has one the argument. But you and I both know that this is a dishonest tactic.

No, I don't know that asking 10 questions for every answer is a dishonest tactic if the questions are valid, then its valid and I encourage unbelievers who I engage to ask them.

If you would complain about the asymmetry here it is because while religion represents many competing voices, science has a means to achieve a greater amount of consensus than has ever been seen in other edeavors of man.

I call you on that, true science encourages descent, not consensus.

What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

science? The honest search for the truth.

That is a high ideal, but does it really happen?

Yes it does. And the results are everywhere in the world around us to testify to this.[/quote]"honest search" evidenced in "the world around us" I haven't seen any evidence in the world of honest search... help me out and give me an example.

Isn't the want for knowledge the catalyst that drove sin into being in the first place?

No it is not. Mankind did not gain any great knowledge of good and evil by what Adam and Eve did. We don't see it in Adam and Eve and we don't see it in the history that follows.

What are you talking about? Genesis clearly states that their eyes where opened and they understood good and evil. Where does it say otherwise? God himself says "Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil." Genesis 3:22

Again you confirm that you image of God is that of a tiny light in endless darkness and so you call everyone to follow you towards that light.

Tiny? Endless? No. A great light in a world of darkness... "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it." John 1:5 And I don't ask anyone to follow me, I ask that people follow Christ.

But my image of God is different, where the darkness is small and it is God who is an endless light that surrounds us in all directions.

Then yes, we have a different image, to say the darkness is small is to underestimate the darkness and to say light surrounds us (humans) in all directions is misunderstanding that there is only one light, the light that came into the world and shines IN the darkness OF the world.

I believe that we are the children of an infinite God and the essence of eternal life is the fact that there is no limit to what this divine parent has for us.

Yes, but how does that have anything to do with evolution?

Abiogenesis doesn't come out of a philosophy where God exists, it comes out of a pure materialism.

Nonsense. It comes from facing the questions with honesty and faith rather than hiding ones head in the sand and insisting that we accept answers that do not explain anything at all.

Well, we will have to agree to disagree on that then.

But views like Wallace's are just as consistent with the data, yet do not view it all with the same philosophic naturalism that Darwinism does (in any of its forms).

Alfred Russel Wallace is one who came up with the mechanism of natural selection independently of Darwin. He was the one who thought of the phrase "survival of the fittest" and sent the idea to Darwin.[/quote]
I think I said that.

Simply, if God exists, there is no reason that should be necessary, or even expected.

Yes a magical view doesn't answer questions but silences the mind and keeps it from asking any. Scientific explanations have the opposite effect of causing one to ask many more questions.

That is taking it a step farther than any creationist I know. Asking if abiogenesis is true is different from saying it must be so.

No you should not ignore the context. He was thougt to be dead and he was resuscitated four days later. But it is not like he was examined by a modern medical team or that he flatlined on a EEG machine. Another day in the tomb and he may well have been dead, and thus without Jesus' intervention Lazarus was for all intents and purposes dead. But no it does not mean that the laws of nature were set aside in this case.

So you are saying that he wasn't dead, but in the tomb for four days? Then there are only a handful of options: are you saying John (who was there) was mistaken about what Jesus said, or are you saying the text was altered, or you are saying that Jesus himself was mistaken? The last option is that you are mistaken.
"Then Jesus therefore said unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe. John 11:14 & 15A.
This is what I mean about the context. If I don't ignore the context, and still want to get to a point you suggest, were Lazarus is not dead and just "swooning" or something along those lines and its a natural resuscitation, we have to explain away what Jesus said plainly - that Lazarus was dead and that he was going to raise Lazarus so they could believe. Explaining it away with the above options leads here: if John was mistaken, then what else is John mistaken about? If Jesus was mistaken, how can we believe the other things he said? If the text was altered, there is no evidence of it, but what else has been altered and why should we trust any of it? But (and I think this the more likely case) what if you are mistaken and Lazarus was dead, as Jesus said he was...??

Is it to say that a spiritual body is not bound by anything, not even a spiritual dimension (for lack of a better term)? I can't agree or disagree with it unless there is a source of this teaching that I can examine. Is there one?

There is no source for this but God and the Bible.

So, where does it teach that in the Bible?

We have no hope of walking the sinless path that Jesus walked, do we?

Just because nobody ever has does not mean that we have no hope of doing so. God does not command us to do things that we cannot do. But yes people have the habit of saying things like what you just said. They make excuses.

I am not making excuses... after coming to the knowledge of God we are to walk blamelessly, but since we have already sinned, its impossible to change that. You can't undo what has been done. It's not an excuse, its a simple truth. Jesus was without sin since the beginning, therefore, if I have sinned previously, I have no hope of being eternally sinless as he was and walking the same exact path, but I rely on his promise to cover my sin and accept responsibility for my sin and pick up on the road - not at the beginning, but somewhere in the middle and struggle to walk the narrow path, often tripping along the way. It isn't an excuse to live in sin at all, quite the opposite, its a call to get on the narrow path and do everything possible to stay there.

They say that they cannot do it when this is a lie. They choose to do the wrong thing because it is easier and they are just plain lazy.

Are you sinless? What is the "they" thing? From time to time I do the wrong thing not because it is easier or because I am lazy but for a whole lot of other reasons as well, including that I am just weak. If its possible to live sinless, are you doing it? If not, why not?

You nailed him to the cross with such excuses and you nail him to the cross again every time you make them, pushing God out of your life and refusing let Him get at the sin inside you. Until you accept that the problem is you and you alone then how can you let God in to change the real problem?

But I don't make excuses for my sin Mitchell, I own every one of them, every day of my life and fully acknowledge that I am a worm.

[mitchellmckain]

For example, if common descent is true then we would expect that on occasion animals would be born with features of those common ancestors. Well what do you know, they are. Humans are born with tails.

That isn't exactly true. Humans are not born with tails.

No you are misunderstanding because you took it out of contexts. SOME humans are born with tails. It is rare. But it happens. It happens because the gene senquence is the there. It is not the same as being born with 6 fingers. Of course we have the gene sequence for fingers. The question is, WHY DO WE HAVE THE GENE SEQUENCE FOR TAILS? NO not for tail bones but for TAILS. Why do we have this gene sequence just like all the other animals for tails but in our case those genes are inactive except for very rare cases when the suppression of those genes fail?

There is an explanation for that. Gene expression plays a vital roll in humans, the people born with metatropic dysplasia don't suffer from this gene being expressed. It just sounds like a jump to conclusions that the gene, no matter how it is expressed, is evidence of common decent.

Which just goes to show that you can rationalize anything if you insist on something regardless of the evidence. It is why the Flat Earth Society exists. And it is just as pointless talking to you about the evidence of macroevolution as it is to talk to them about the reality of the earth.

Not in science no, because as I have tried to explain to you numerous times, it is the very nature of the scientific methodology that it is blind to things which cannot in priciple be manipulated. Its methodology is specifically designed to discover the natural processes and is incapable of discovering anything else.

If that is true Mitchell, why would I trust a methodology that is blind to some of the most fundamental principles? That is like following a blind man into a ditch.

No it is like following a blind man in place where they have the advantage, such as in a place where there is no light. In that case we SHOULD follow the blind man because they have compensated by developing their other senses while we are helpless because we are too dependent on something that is of no use in that situation.

It is what science is. It is not everything. It is JUST science.

Then why are we bound to accept the answers that a naturalistic science provides when that isn't all there is?

It is only reasonable to accept its conclusions where the methodology works because its conclusions don't depend on what people want or believe and is the result of following a written proceedure that gives the same result no matter who does it.

Science is not a life commitment.

There are thousands of scientists who would disagree with you on that.

Huh? WRONG! That is just bullshit! Scientists KNOW what science is. It is a matter of training not a way of life and they KNOW that. They KNOW that your religious beliefs are irrelevant. Scientists KNOW that science is a methodology that you learn to use as a tool not a way that you live your life. Science is NOT a religion. Not to the scientists. It is only a religion to the philosophical naturalists who imagine the scientists to be the high priests of some imaginary religion. Thus it is only the BS artists of this ridiculous religion that delude themselves into thinking that religious people cannot be scientists. It is completely delusional because it doesn't agree with the facts. Just as delusional as the people that refuse to listen to the evidence that the earth is round or to the evidence for macroevolution.

It doesn't help us understand how to treat illnesses, or feed people, or end poverty or cure cancer and AIDs.

Yes it does. Evolution is the only theoretical framework that we have for biology which is the science behind medicine and agriculture and it is that theoretical framework that has been responsible for developments in medicine and agriculture ever since, no less than the modern theories of physics has led to technological developments in other areas.

How do you choose something that you can't understand?

Salvation doesn't depend on understanding the words of human beings and making the choices that they demand. God can speak for Himself and it is the choice that He demands that counts. You can boast of your understanding of the Bible and the words of your pastors until you are blue in the face and it will get you nothing more than all the other things you do to suck up to God and win His favor. The choice that God demands of you is not the one you give to the people at church but the answer you give to Him and I quite confident that what when He puts this choice before you then you WILL understand what you are choosing.

But He will use the words that HE chooses. For example, one way I see Him putting this choice to people in the Old Testament, is when He says, "I put before you life and death, therefore choose life." Frankly, I have little difficulty in seeing how for many atheists their choice was a choice against the legalistic religion of death in which they were raised, to choose life instead.

You seem to be saying that if people don't accept your interpretation of evolution, they are willfully ignorant and have no intention of trying to understand... that simply isn't the case.

But that is exactly what they are doing. The whole point of their rhetoric is that the don't want there to be a scientific theory for the orgin of life and the species. They want there to be a gap in science which they can build their church in. A church founded on ignorance and worshiping a god of ignorance, who they say wants people to always be ignorant.

I call you on that, true science encourages descent, not consensus.

Incorrect. It encourages skepticism that leads to testing a hypothesis and seeing what the evidence shows and it is that methodology that produces consensus on things, because the physical universe really is governed by these mathematical laws that do not change and do not depend on what the person doing them believes or wants. BUT, that only works for these mathematical laws of nature. Trying to use science for something else just isn't science at all.

What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

science? The honest search for the truth.

That is a high ideal, but does it really happen?

Yes it does. And the results are everywhere in the world around us to testify to this.

"honest search" evidenced in "the world around us" I haven't seen any evidence in the world of honest search... help me out and give me an example.

I told you the evidence is in all the uses that people make of the discoveries of science. You are using them right now. Instead of insisting, for example, that some old book (like Aristotle's) is the source of all truth, the scientific method tested the claims and found them to be false, and thus we have equations for how gravity works and the truth of it is demonstrated in a thousand different ways by the technology that you use.

What are you talking about? Genesis clearly states that their eyes where opened and they understood good and evil. Where does it say otherwise? God himself says "Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil." Genesis 3:22

But we don't see any evidence of any real understanding of good and evil in Adam and Eve or later generations. They did not learn about good and evil from God but from some kind of shortcut and so they may act like they know what is best, but it is clear that they did not know what is best at all. The fact is that people quickly turned the whole world into a living hell where the thoughts and imagination of their hearts was only evil continually.

The fact is that you don't get real understanding of good and evil by eating a fruit. There is no short cut around developing a relationship with God which Jesus constantly makes crystal clear is the ONLY way to really know the good way to live your life from the bad way.

So yes they did indeed take a shortcut to very superficially "be like god knowing good and evil", taking on themselves the responsibility to teach good and evil to others, which is what parents do. And like I said, that is also what we see happening all throughout history, is people taking upon themselves the authority to dictate to others how they should live their life, when the fact is that they don't have a clue about what is really the best way to live ones life.

Then yes, we have a different image, to say the darkness is small is to underestimate the darkness and to say light surrounds us (humans) in all directions is misunderstanding that there is only one light, the light that came into the world and shines IN the darkness OF the world.

Wrong! The darkness is big compared to US but the darkness is tiny compared to God. God is infinite and the darkness is not. That is why eternal life can ONLY be found in God.

But I am absolutely glad that you finally do understand that we do have a different image of God, because I think this is obvious.

There is only one light in the sense that God is the ONE source of life. But God is an infinite source of light and bigger than all the world and bigger than all our imagination. So no matter how big the darkness in the world or rather the hole we have made this world into for ourselves, God is much much bigger than that and God most certainly is not limted to that tiny light you see at the top of your hole. You certainly have no choice but to follow that light, but it cannot make you a guide to others. God is the only savior and His light really is in all directions, pouring down truth and inspiration in a countless ways because He is NOT confined to any dogma and ideology that any human can speak of.

God is not confined to the Bible. He is not confined to Christianity. Yes Jesus is the way the truth and the life and nobody comes to the father except through Him but that is because Jesus IS God. But you and all the Christians are NOT God. You don't speak for Him. He can speak for Himself. And Jesus made this all crystal clear in Matthew 23, just as Paul made in clear in his letter to Timothy when he said, "There is ONE mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." Since Jesus IS God that means that God requires no mediation, and thus Christianity is NOT a gatekeeper controlling access to God. That is a LIE that the enemies of God - the religionists had told to turn all of these things into tools of power and manipulation -- something that the whole world has seen and because of it they blaspheme God because of them.

But they truly do not control the access to God and thus no matter how these religionists poison the name of God and turn christianity into a holocaust and tool for enslavement and slaughter of the innocent, God finds a way to speak the hearts of people in spite of this whether they be atheists, or pagans, Buddhists or whatever.

I believe that we are the children of an infinite God and the essence of eternal life is the fact that there is no limit to what this divine parent has for us.

Yes, but how does that have anything to do with evolution?

We were talking about your ideology for the promotion of ignorance that teaches a god that wants people to remain ignorant. I don't believe in such an ideology or in such a god.

Well, we will have to agree to disagree on that then.

Agreed.

So you are saying that he wasn't dead, but in the tomb for four days? Then there are only a handful of options: are you saying John (who was there) was mistaken about what Jesus said, or are you saying the text was altered, or you are saying that Jesus himself was mistaken?

Nope I am simply stating the obvious fact that our understanding of the line between life and death is very much different than it was 2000 years ago. It doesn't change the fact that according to the understanding of the people at the time, Lazarus was dead, but it does mean that the laws of nature were not necessarily violated when he was rescusitated.

Is it to say that a spiritual body is not bound by anything, not even a spiritual dimension (for lack of a better term)? I can't agree or disagree with it unless there is a source of this teaching that I can examine. Is there one?

There is no source for this but God and the Bible.

So, where does it teach that in the Bible?

It is the whole thing, but read with a mind that not only hears just the literal words (as Jesus said that people often do in Matthew 13) but understands what is being communicated in the whole picture.

Jesus was without sin since the beginning, therefore, if I have sinned previously, I have no hope of being eternally sinless as he was and walking the same exact path, but I rely on his promise to cover my sin and accept responsibility for my sin and pick up on the road - not at the beginning, but somewhere in the middle and struggle to walk the narrow path, often tripping along the way. It isn't an excuse to live in sin at all, quite the opposite, its a call to get on the narrow path and do everything possible to stay there.

That is correct, and here you make my point. This is why Jesus showed us the way.

Are you sinless?

Nope. As with every human being except for Jesus, by the time that I was old enough to speak and answer the question, I had not only already sinned but made a habit of it. But I will not say that I had no hope to do otherwise. My sin were commited by my own choices and my habits are of my own making.

But I don't make excuses for my sin Mitchell, I own every one of them, every day of my life and fully acknowledge that I am a worm.

Welcome to "Wormville" then. LOL You may hear me speaking on the behalf of atheists a lot, for because the way that I was raised, I understand them only too well, but in the end, I myself am Christian and I see the problems and misunderstandings in both worlds.

[reallyRyan]

For example, if common descent is true then we would expect that on occasion animals would be born with features of those common ancestors. Well what do you know, they are. Humans are born with tails.

That isn't exactly true. Humans are not born with tails.

No you are misunderstanding because you took it out of contexts. SOME humans are born with tails. It is rare. But it happens. It happens because the gene senquence is the there. It is not the same as being born with 6 fingers. Of course we have the gene sequence for fingers. The question is, WHY DO WE HAVE THE GENE SEQUENCE FOR TAILS? NO not for tail bones but for TAILS. Why do we have this gene sequence just like all the other animals for tails but in our case those genes are inactive except for very rare cases when the suppression of those genes fail?

No, I understood your context, disagreed with it as a valid context and explained it as such. The gene sequence that codes for tails in primates is the same gene sequence that is claimed to code for the coccyx in humans. The coccyx is what is claimed to be the vestigial structure, not some missing tail that pops up in a handful of subjects with congenital anomalies. This claim that we have a genetic code that codes for tails, that is turned off and is sometimes turned on resulting in true tails, is absolutely fallacious - were is the documentation for such a claim? The gene sequence is not inactive in humans, rather the genes are expressed differently than in primates, with different genes being turned on and off to produce a similar but different structure. The genes that are turned on in primates and turned off in humans, are not simply dormant genes in humans, work within the last 5 years suggest that they provide a whole host of other function including determining the cellular volume of the structures present. There is a lot more to learn about how gene expression works so at this point the presence of a gene isn't clear evidence that one gave rise to the other, only that the coding is similar in key areas, but different in other key areas. Even in those cases (100 documented) where humans were born with "pseudo-tails", there is no evidence that the gene that codes for the coccyx was being expressed as it it was in ancestral primates. In fact, the evidence shows that it is still expressed as it is in humans, but that there is an abnormality in the structure whether it is a genetic disorder, physical or mechanical injury, morphogenesis errors, infection or chromosomal abnormality, just like the 6 fingered example. Just because two things look similar doesn't provide convincing evidence that it was shared in an evolutionary sense and just because a code looks similar doesn't mean it is the same code. A common designer can account for the evidence as easily as common decent does. They are both valid interpretations of the same evidence.

But, you can't know if a structure is truly vestigial unless you know it was inherited from a common ancestor, but evolutionary theory says its from a common ancestor so its vestigial. Isn't that like saying that we know they come from a common ancestor because they come from a common ancestor? Asking why we have a particular gene is a valid question, no doubt about it - but saying the reason we have a gene is because we come from a common ancestor and we know we came from a common ancestor because we have this gene, well isn't that circular reasoning?

No it is like following a blind man in place where they have the advantage, such as in a place where there is no light. In that case we SHOULD follow the blind man because they have compensated by developing their other senses while we are helpless because we are too dependent on something that is of no use in that situation.

Then by all means, follow the blind man if that is how you see it. I don't see it that way, I see that there is light on the subject from nature and scripture in tandem and therefore there is no need to wonder back into darkness to follow the blind man into his interpretation of things when he can't examine the whole picture.

It is what science is. It is not everything. It is JUST science.

Then why are we bound to accept the answers that a naturalistic science provides when that isn't all there is?

It is only reasonable to accept its conclusions where the methodology works because its conclusions don't depend on what people want or believe and is the result of following a written proceedure that gives the same result no matter who does it.

Mitchell, there is no written procedure for interpreting the evidence that is sitting on the table. The evidence doesn't say "macroevolution" it says, tail bones, eyes, hands, flippers etc. Where is the methodology for interpreting it as macroevolution? The evolutionary paradigm is not the evidence in question, the evidence is the evidence, and only trained biologists, anthropologists etc have the necessary experience to question if the methodology for gathering the evidence is valid or not. I don't question the evidence or the method of gathering it, I assume that the methodology used to gather it is correct until such time as it is proven otherwise... what I question is the interpretation of said evidence and yes the interpretation does depend on what people want to believe - or rather the worldview that they hold.

Science is not a life commitment.

There are thousands of scientists who would disagree with you on that.

Huh? WRONG! That is just bullshit! Scientists KNOW what science is. It is a matter of training not a way of life and they KNOW that.

Well now you have said something different. A life commitment entails something you intended to do for life, where as a way of life denotes something else entirely. I agree, science is not a "way of life" but for a true scientist, it is a life commitment... that is unless of course you think that an honest search for the truth (which is how you described it - whether or not it actually exists) is something you only devote a few years to. If you meant something different than that initially, sorry.

Evolution is the only theoretical framework that we have for biology which is the science behind medicine and agriculture and it is that theoretical framework that has been responsible for developments in medicine and agriculture ever since, no less than the modern theories of physics has led to technological developments in other areas.

Yes, biology in general is responsible for those things and with or without interpreting the data from the evolutionary perspective, biology is still capable of those same developments in medicine and agriculture. I have friends who work in biochemistry for medical study, when they sit down to develop a new medication, they don't say, "well now, Lucy being a common ancestor, we would need to add X to Z so that our histamine blocker works." No, they study humans in the here and now to see what will work and what doesn't.

How do you choose something that you can't understand?

Salvation doesn't depend on understanding the words of human beings and making the choices that they demand. God can speak for Himself and it is the choice that He demands that counts.

You aren't providing any clarity here. You say someone should choose what God demands, but if you don't understand the options, how can you choose? So, yes I am saying that God speaks for himself and he did it through Christ and we receive it via scripture which came through the pen of human beings. You are right, it doesn't depend on understanding the words of human beings, but we receive the word of God primarily through human beings. Yes there are other vehicles and when we respond to light, we are given more light. But faith comes by hearing. Otherwise, everything that the apostles struggled and died for had no real value.

You can boast of your understanding of the Bible and the words of your pastors until you are blue in the face and it will get you nothing more than all the other things you do to suck up to God and win His favor.

I don't boast in my understanding of the Bible or the words of my pastor... I boast in the grace, patience and glory of God.

The choice that God demands of you is not the one you give to the people at church but the answer you give to Him

And what may I ask is the difference between those two? I don't offer a choice to the people at church that I didn't answer myself. That is to hear and accept the Gospel, repent of sins, and believe that Christ is the way, the truth and the life and that there is no way to the Father, but by him and to pick up our cross and follow. What other choice am I giving at church?

and I quite confident that what when He puts this choice before you then you WILL understand what you are choosing.

I am quite confident in that as well.

The whole point of their rhetoric is that the don't want there to be a scientific theory for the orgin of life and the species. They want there to be a gap in science which they can build their church in. A church founded on ignorance and worshiping a god of ignorance, who they say wants people to always be ignorant.

Who are "they" Mitchell? I have never met any one like that. Those of us who are skeptical of evolution aren't wanting gaps in science. Rather what you are saying is that people don't want there to be a "natural theory for the origin of life and the species", whether I want it or not adds nothing, but wanting there to be a "natural theory for the origin of life and the species" simply force fits the data into the interpretation. What those of us who are skeptical of evolution (and by this I mean the paradigm and common starting from LUCA - not evolution as a mechanism of biological change) search for is what happened, whether it be natural or supernatural - thus far I see nothing that can't be seen as valid from both perspectives. If we discount the one explanation before we begin we end up with the other by our own design.

What kind fruit is being produced by those teachings?

science? The honest search for the truth.

That is a high ideal, but does it really happen?

Yes it does. And the results are everywhere in the world around us to testify to this.

"honest search" evidenced in "the world around us" I haven't seen any evidence in the world of honest search... help me out and give me an example.

I told you the evidence is in all the uses that people make of the discoveries of science. You are using them right now. I see a whole lot of greed and very little honesty in what Instead of insisting, for example, that some old book (like Aristotle's) is the source of all truth, the scientific method tested the claims and found them to be false, and thus we have equations for how gravity works and the truth of it is demonstrated in a thousand different ways by the technology that you use.

Mitchell, you said "honest" not "utilitarian" You have shown that the search is utilitarian (whether that serves towards profit or benefit or luxury), but where is the honesty? Or, are you saying that if it works, it must have been sought after honestly? I don't think that is necessarily true, we can trip over truth in a non-honest pursuit and robbing banks works when it comes to getting money, but it isn't an honest way to do it. Honest would be to say that there are things you don't know and that the explanation you have based on nature alone, might not be the right one. That would be the honest search. When it comes to evolution, that kind of honesty is completely absent, the backlash is evolution by common decent from LUCA and abiogenesis, and if you are skeptical of it, you are ignorant. Is that what we are calling an honest pursuit of truth?

What are you talking about? Genesis clearly states that their eyes where opened and they understood good and evil. Where does it say otherwise? God himself says "Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil." Genesis 3:22

But we don't see any evidence of any real understanding of good and evil in Adam and Eve or later generations.

We do see it in scripture. Adam and Eve hid themselves. Cain, killed his brother and hid his body and lied about it because he knew what he did was wrong. There are examples all the way through Genesis of people from Adam on (and outside the Bible - right down to you and me), who act in an understanding of good and evil, sometimes going the evil route by choice, sometimes hiding what they are doing because they know its wrong and sometimes doing right because they know it is right.

The fact is that you don't get real understanding of good and evil by eating a fruit.

I am not saying the fruit had some magic powers, I am saying that they did something that they were told not to do and that act opened their eyes to knowing the difference between good and evil. It has little to do with the fruit, they took something that wasn't theirs to take. It could have been, "don't slap your wife", or "don't yell at me", but in essence was "this is something I don't want you to have, so don't take something that doesn't belong to you". The fruit is just the object, sin - doing what God asked them not to do - is the subject. So yes, you do learn about good and evil by eating a fruit, if and only if God told you not to eat it. It is the act of eating, not the fruit that caused the sin. God had a reason for asking them not to eat it, they gave in to temptation and ate it and there by learned what it was to do wrong and understand good and evil.

Then yes, we have a different image, to say the darkness is small is to underestimate the darkness and to say light surrounds us (humans) in all directions is misunderstanding that there is only one light, the light that came into the world and shines IN the darkness OF the world.

Wrong! The darkness is big compared to US but the darkness is tiny compared to God. God is infinite and the darkness is not. That is why eternal life can ONLY be found in God.

Mitchell, I didn't say the darkness was big compared to God, I said it was not small IN the world. God being bigger than the world (infinitely bigger) the darkness is a blip in comparison to him and I thought that went without saying. But we are in the world and the darkness is in the world and is all around us IN the world. And God's light shines in the darkness that is in the world.

But I am absolutely glad that you finally do understand that we do have a different image of God, because I think this is obvious.

That isn't to say we disagree on everything, or I think we are worshiping different gods, but we have a different image of some important things non-the-less.

But you and all the Christians are NOT God. You don't speak for Him.

I never said I was and I never said I did. All I can do is simply point out what he has already said.

We were talking about your ideology for the promotion of ignorance that teaches a god that wants people to remain ignorant.

I don't promote ignorance Mitchell and I don't think God wants people to be ignorant. Quite the opposite actually.

So you are saying that he wasn't dead, but in the tomb for four days? Then there are only a handful of options: are you saying John (who was there) was mistaken about what Jesus said, or are you saying the text was altered, or you are saying that Jesus himself was mistaken?

Nope I am simply stating the obvious fact that our understanding of the line between life and death is very much different than it was 2000 years ago. It doesn't change the fact that according to the understanding of the people at the time, Lazarus was dead, but it does mean that the laws of nature were not necessarily violated when he was rescusitated.

I think Jesus' understanding of life and death is better than ours, but look at it as you will. Seems to me like an eisegetically forced interpretation of a very clear passage. You have effectively strained out the gnat of "miracles violating natural law" and instead swallowed the camel of interpreting a clear passage despite all the evidence being contrary to what you are reading into the text. There is nothing in the text that tells us that he was not dead and just swooning but all the evidence that is present, including Jesus' own words, say he was dead. Why don't you apply this interpretation to Jesus' resurrection as well? Lazarus was in the tomb a day longer than Jesus was. Forcing this view of miracles onto the text takes Jesus' words and basically says he isn't going to do what he says he is going to do. Right before he raised lazarus he said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” John 11:25-26 In relation to this miracle if Lazarus has not been truly dead for the four days he was in the tomb, then isn't saying he is going to raise him from the dead, when he isn't actually dead, little more than a parlor trick? I honestly hope you think about this passage more and the implications your interpretation has.

But I don't make excuses for my sin Mitchell, I own every one of them, every day of my life and fully acknowledge that I am a worm.

Welcome to "Wormville" then. LOL You may hear me speaking on the behalf of atheists a lot, for because the way that I was raised, I understand them only too well, but in the end, I myself am Christian and I see the problems and misunderstandings in both worlds.

As do I, I was raised by a Christian and an Atheist (not Emery and Scott lol) and both are now Christian as well. I understand both worldviews from that vantage point and understand the struggle with the evidence. And even though I am arguing against macroevolution and abiogenesis, I am playing advocate a little because I do see if from both vantage points but I am skeptical that common decent is the best explanation. That isn't to say that if I see convincing evidence that I wouldn't believe in it, but as of yet I see nothing that can not be interpreted validly from both perspectives but I do favor one to the other at this moment in time.

[mitchellmckain]

But, you can't know if a structure is truly vestigial unless you know it was inherited from a common ancestor, but evolutionary theory says its from a common ancestor so its vestigial. Isn't that like saying that we know they come from a common ancestor because they come from a common ancestor? Asking why we have a particular gene is a valid question, no doubt about it - but saying the reason we have a gene is because we come from a common ancestor and we know we came from a common ancestor because we have this gene, well isn't that circular reasoning?

There is no such reasoning. Science is not a matter of such syllogistic proofs but of evidence. The way scientific evidence works is by looking at what we can expect if the hypothesis is true. Then if we find such expectations are met then that is evidence that the hypothesis is correct. The fact is that this has been done over and over and over again, for this theory more than any other in science and the result is always that the evidence agrees with the theory not the other way around.

I agree, science is not a "way of life" but for a true scientist, it is a life commitment...

Hogwash! It is a skill that can be taught. No life commitment is required. One can be a selfish bastard or a religious monk who cares nothing about science and if you follow the methodology it will still work the same. Sure for many people it is a difficult skill to learn that takes a big portion of their life in order to do it, but for others it may be trivial and the easiest thing in their lives. So no, any role that commitment may play is incidental.

that is unless of course you think that an honest search for the truth (which is how you described it - whether or not it actually exists) is something you only devote a few years to. If you meant something different than that initially, sorry.

Science may indeed be something you only devote a few years to, and then you may look to something else entirely in your honest pursuit for the truth, as John Polkinghorne did. But he did not cease to be a scientist because science is not some religion you have to remain faithful to in order to be a scientist. He remains a scientist because he learned the skill and he used to make a contribution to the body of scientific knowledge.

It is preposterous to claim that whether something is scientific depends on ones devotion and life commitment to science. LOL Whether something is scientific only depends on whether it follows the methodology and that is ALL!!! So I don't care whether Dawkins says he has made science his life, that doesn't mean his shallow theological opinions are scientific, because they most certainly are NOT! Likewise the work of Mendel was no less scientific because he was an Augustinian friar.

How do you choose something that you can't understand?

Salvation doesn't depend on understanding the words of human beings and making the choices that they demand. God can speak for Himself and it is the choice that He demands that counts.

You aren't providing any clarity here. You say someone should choose what God demands, but if you don't understand the options, how can you choose? So, yes I am saying that God speaks for himself and he did it through Christ and we receive it via scripture which came through the pen of human beings.

And I am saying that this is just how God has spoken to YOU and that you cannot limit God in such a manner.

But faith comes by hearing.

No it does not. Faith comes by choosing, whether you can hear or not.

Otherwise, everything that the apostles struggled and died for had no real value.

Salvation does not come by what the apostles accomplished. That is a "the apostles are the mediator between man and God" theology. What the apostles struggled and died for had real value for them because it came from their faith in following God. It is an example that we can learn from to be sure. But salvation is the work of God Himself. Sure He may use the Bible and preachers and even you or me as tools for this, but He does not need to for God is not limited to these things.

Who are "they" Mitchell? I have never met any one like that.

You are the one that tried to tell me that God didn't want us to know and understand things.

Mitchell, you said "honest" not "utilitarian" You have shown that the search is utilitarian (whether that serves towards profit or benefit or luxury), but where is the honesty? Or, are you saying that if it works, it must have been sought after honestly? I don't think that is necessarily true, we can trip over truth in a non-honest pursuit and robbing banks works when it comes to getting money, but it isn't an honest way to do it. Honest would be to say that there are things you don't know and that the explanation you have based on nature alone, might not be the right one. That would be the honest search. When it comes to evolution, that kind of honesty is completely absent, the backlash is evolution by common decent from LUCA and abiogenesis, and if you are skeptical of it, you are ignorant. Is that what we are calling an honest pursuit of truth?

I said that the pursuit of truth in science is honest but that the evidence (for most people) is found in its usefulness. The scientific methodology is one that insures objective observation and that makes it honest, but the proof of it in the fact that it works, and over and over and over again it reveals new and unexpected things about the world that are proven in the uses we make of them every day.

But we don't see any evidence of any real understanding of good and evil in Adam and Eve or later generations.

We do see it in scripture. Adam and Eve hid themselves. Cain, killed his brother and hid his body and lied about it because he knew what he did was wrong. There are examples all the way through Genesis of people from Adam on (and outside the Bible - right down to you and me), who act in an understanding of good and evil, sometimes going the evil route by choice, sometimes hiding what they are doing because they know its wrong and sometimes doing right because they know it is right.

So you are saying that the fruit which they were forbidden was the ability to know when they had done something wrong? You are saying that the great sin of mankind was that they acquired a conscience? Sorry but that looks like the greatest foolishness I have ever seen and I don't buy it. Yeah I KNOW what you are saying! That until they did something wrong then they couldn't experience the feeling of having done something wrong, but the problem is the whole idea that making a mistake any mistake at all is fatal and for that we must be damned. I repudiate this theology as not only fundamentally unsound but as pragmatically catastrophic. We are CHILDREN and it is perfectaly NATURAL and GOOD that we make mistakes because THAT IS HOW WE LEARN! Thus I utterly repudiate this theology that God would create children and would not understand or not expect that they would ever be disobedient or make mistakes. That is complete NONSENSE! God created children NOT robots, and the what went wrong in the Garden of Eden was NOT the fact that we disobeyed or that we made a mistake and certainly was NOT that we acquired a concsience.

What happened is that we created this "no win senario" where God's presence in our life was no longer in our best interest. That is the ONLY thing that could sever the relationship between parent and child. And this didn't happen when they disobeyed God but rather when they blamed Him for their own mistakes. Is quite typical that children will miss the point and misunderstand what went wrong and blame the wrong thing. They may well think that it is because they made a mistake and that's why daddy cannot love them anymore. But that is a childish misunderstanding. But the real problem was not that they made a mistake but that they refused to acknowledge it so that they could learn from it. The problem was not understanding that they did something wrong but that they hid it from God, when what they should have done was bring it to God. A good theology teaches the lesson that actually should be learned from the story rather one that sounds a great deal more like the accusations of the enemy.

I am not saying the fruit had some magic powers, I am saying that they did something that they were told not to do and that act opened their eyes to knowing the difference between good and evil. It has little to do with the fruit, they took something that wasn't theirs to take. It could have been, "don't slap your wife", or "don't yell at me", but in essence was "this is something I don't want you to have, so don't take something that doesn't belong to you". The fruit is just the object, sin - doing what God asked them not to do - is the subject. So yes, you do learn about good and evil by eating a fruit, if and only if God told you not to eat it. It is the act of eating, not the fruit that caused the sin. God had a reason for asking them not to eat it, they gave in to temptation and ate it and there by learned what it was to do wrong and understand good and evil.

Yes I am familiar with that theology and I do not agree with it. I do NOT believe that God gives arbitrary commandments just for the sake of testing whether people will be obedient. God created children not robots, and so it is NOT about obedience. I deny this utterly. God is just a parent, and like any parent He MUST give us parental commandments for that is the only way for children to make the transition to being responsible for themselves. And the commands that a parent gives are not arbitrary at all. God's commandment was very much like one that we give to our own children, "Do not play in the street or you will die." God was warning them of a danger that was inherent in life itself, by which they could lose the most precious thing that they had, the source of eternal life itself.

God being bigger than the world (infinitely bigger) the darkness is a blip in comparison to him and I thought that went without saying. But we are in the world and the darkness is in the world and is all around us IN the world. And God's light shines in the darkness that is in the world.

But the point is that God is NOT a small light in the darkess. God really is everywhere behind everthing. No it is not a matter of choosing whichever way we want to go. For us personally there is only one way and that is the way that God tells us to go. Only by following the living God Himself will we leave the darkness. The difference (the point I am making) is that God cannot be confined to our particular path and vision. God may indeed set boundaries to what YOU can know or what YOU should seek to know, but it is mistake to think that the path on which God is leading you is the path for everyone. There is a bigger picture in which there are no limits at all to what God has for us.

I don't promote ignorance Mitchell and I don't think God wants people to be ignorant. Quite the opposite actually.

Yes but my theology is consistent with this understanding of God, where the story doesn't begin with God forbidding human beings from seeking an understanding of good and evil but rather from taking shortcuts by which they would "be like God" in the sense that people will look to them as the authority on what is good and evil. Likewise Genesis 11 isn't about God being angry that his children would dare to accomplish great things, but rather that they were going down the same path that led to the flood and God wasn't going to let things happen that way again.

I honestly hope you think about this passage more and the implications your interpretation has.

The implications are that God created the laws of nature and He does not set them aside for our convenience or wishful thinking. If you step off a building. You will fall because those are the rules of life that God has set down. Looking for God in the BREAKING of His own rules is simply INSANE! Jesus addressed this very thing in Luke 4:12. The implication is that you most definitely should NOT test God with such a thing or demand that God prove Himself in such a way because you will get a flat "No" and He WILL stick the laws of nature that He created. It is a wicked generation that seeks such signs (Luke 11:29) and what they will find if they keep doing this isn't God but indeed nothing but parlor tricks by magicians and con men. Yes God will answer your prayer, not by changing the rules but by helping you to live according to those rules, because those rules are the foundation of life itself and it is by them that God upholds the world.

[reallyRyan]

There is no such reasoning. Science is not a matter of such syllogistic proofs but of evidence. The way scientific evidence works is by looking at what we can expect if the hypothesis is true. Then if we find such expectations are met then that is evidence that the hypothesis is correct.

Well, syllogism has been in science since Aristotle - there is even a special class of syllogism called scientific syllogism which is incorporated into the scientific method not to mention syllogism is foundational to science (caused events are viewed by science and science observes caused events) (only natural events can be observed by science and science only observes natural events) so saying science isn't a matter of syllogistic proofs is about as helpful as saying science doesn't attempt to interpret data or use deduction or build cumulative cases or has no perimeters which are built into it as a method of collecting data... not to mention you yourself used syllogism to describe how scientific evidence works (if the hypothesis is correct we expect certain kinds of evidence, if we find certain kinds of evidence then the hypothesis is correct) that is evidence as syllogistic proof... but I digress.

You say, if we came from a common ancestor, we expect that we will see that there are similar gene sequences and similar structures, is that correct?
Why would you expect to see that?

Can someone looking at it from a creation perspective not expect to see such things?

The fact is that this has been over and over and over again, for this theory more than any other in science and the result is always that the evidence agrees with the theory not the other way around.

Is that a fact? Seems to me that the interpretation of the evidence agrees with the paradigm. Another interpretation of the same evidence disagrees with common decent from a universal common ancestor. You seem to be ignoring that data doesn't just open and tell you what it means, it has to be interpreted... not only that but the very evidence you point to, genetics, is largely based on statistical algorithms, and as a programmer and have written algorithms myself it is something I know about and am in a position to question professionally. The assumptions that go into a genetic model (or any bioinformatics model) based on statistics are not always correct, nor can the conclusions be accurate unless both the assumptions and the algorithm are accurate. Genetics requires hugely complex algorithms and prominent paleontologists like Bernard Wood and Richard Klein are also beginning to complain about the methodology, because the conclusions regularly mis-match with the fossil record. Richard Klein has said there is a "tendency for geneticists to ignore fossil and archaeological evidence, perhaps because they think it can always be molded to fit the genetics after the fact." If a geneticist assumes that the gene does X and that there was an ancestor that existed at the right time and place and assumes that the only method for that gene being introduced other than inheritance, then they find said gene in the sampled sequences... well "bingo bango bongo" you have a conclusion that matches the theory, even if it doesn't match the fossil record and even if they were wrong about the gene function and even if there is another method for the gene to be introduced (or even a piece of DNA being turned the wrong way making it look older than it really is).

And I am saying that this is just how God has spoken to YOU and that you cannot limit God in such a manner.

I haven't limited God, I said the primary way is via scripture. Obviously if there is a primary way, there is a non-primary way.

But faith comes by hearing.

No it does not. Faith comes by choosing, whether you can hear or not.

"So faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ." (Romans 10:17)

I will say it again, faith comes by hearing.
You can't have faith in something you have never heard, can you?

Faith comes by hearing and the choice is the outworking of faith. Choosing is a work, works are a product of faith, not a means to come to faith.

Otherwise, everything that the apostles struggled and died for had no real value.

Salvation does not come by what the apostles accomplished.

I didn't say that it did. The apostles didn't struggle and die to get salvation, they already had that and anyone who accepted Christ had it. What they struggled and died for was spreading the gospel so others could hear and follow Christ too. If hearing the gospel doesn't matter, if it isn't how one comes to faith, then there was no need for the apostles to spread the message and no reason for them to die for it and no reason to call it good news. The fact is, that because faith comes by hearing the word of God, and the word was delivered through what Christ had said and done, then spreading that message has infinite value.

Who are "they" Mitchell? I have never met any one like that.

You are the one that tried to tell me that God didn't want us to know and understand things.

No, I said "there are some things we can't know and some things we shouldn't know" and that is because of our position while in this world. But, what you said is: "They want there to be a gap in science which they can build their church in. A church founded on ignorance and worshiping a god of ignorance, who they say wants people to always be ignorant." I don't know anyone who wants gaps in science or believes God wants us to remain ignorant, so they can build an ignorant church and worship a god of ignorance who wants people to be ignorant. But, wanting to know a thing doesn't make it possible or even good to know it. Are you saying all of our questions are supposed to be answered in this life? When God talked to Job, he didn't explain himself, he doesn't have to. He pointed out that there are things we won't know nor can we know in this life and that very fact should humble us. That isn't wanting a gap in science so we can build an ignorant church, its being realistic about our position while in the world and humbling ourselves before God.

I said that the pursuit of truth in science is honest but that the evidence (for most people) is found in its usefulness. The scientific methodology is one that insures objective observation and that makes it honest, but the proof of it in the fact that it works, and over and over and over again it reveals new and unexpected things about the world that are proven in the uses we make of them every day.

Then, as I pointed out, the usefulness (the fact that it works) is not evidence of honesty as you said it was. Those don't flow one to the other. Evidence "for most people" is not objective evidence, it is subjective and I can simply subjectively deny your claim to proof of the honesty and you have no recourse but to say, "well other people do". So what? Further, I can make objective observation, but if I plan on only interpreting what I see in one way, and then planning on calling that interpretation unbiased or objective, then there is nothing honest about that, is there? That is science, it can only interpret things from the naturalistic view point, it might attempt honesty, it might attempt a search for truth. The attempt is noble, but science can't explain everything since nature is not all there is. It is objective in the sense that it looks at objects, and objective in the sense that it already has a goal in mind (to find a naturalistic explanation), but it is not unbiased nor objective in the sense that it is not independent of the human mind needed to interpret it. Calling it a fact, when it requires the philosophy behind it to be true and that simple premise is in question... how is that honest if in fact the naturalistic view is not all there is?

So you are saying that the fruit which they were forbidden was the ability to know when they had done something wrong?

No, go back and read what I said again. There was nothing within the fruit that gave them anything, the fruit had the ability to be whatever fruit it was, poisonous or otherwise - and that is the only ability the fruit had. It was the decision to disobey that gave them the ability to know good and evil, not to know when they had done something wrong, they knew they shouldn't do it before they did it, Eve even explained that they weren't supposed to do it, but couldn't truly know what evil was until they did the thing they shouldn't have done.

You are saying that the great sin of mankind was that they acquired a conscience?

No, the sin was disobeying God. They already had a conscience (see above), they had the concept of right and wrong. But after disobeying they knew good and evil and their conscience could respond to it so they hid themselves. They had been good, now they had been evil, that is true knowledge, not just and idea or concept. Knowledge, true knowledge isn't just a justified belief, it is being one with the thing that is to be known. I guess the easiest way to point that out is to say you don't know really know a dog, you know what a dog looks like, what it eats, how it moves, but unless you are a dog, you don't really know what a dog is, you don't now what it thinks, what it dreams, what it feels, you just have an external concept. Similarly unless you have done evil or had evil done to you (as Satan did in the same event), you don't really know evil, you haven't been in it and felt it and experienced it in any real way, you only have an external concept of it.

Yeah I KNOW what you are saying!

Obviously you didn't know what I was saying, or you wouldn't have misrepresented it as you did.

but the problem is the whole idea that making a mistake any mistake at all is fatal and for that we must be damned.

It wasn't a mistake. A mistake would be tripping over a log and landing face first in the fruit and eating it by accident, and saying "oh my gosh, I ate the fruit!". The sin was a conscious decision to do what they were told not to do, that sin then led to another in blaming everyone but themselves and then another and another and another. But, there is no "we must be damned" for it, the gospel of Christ says that clearly we are not if we put our trust in the one who has provided for our salvation.

I repudiate this theology as not only fundamentally unsound but as pragmatically catastrophic.

I agree, the way you misrepresented my view would be a fundamentally unsound and catastrophic view.

We are CHILDREN and it is perfectaly NATURAL and GOOD that we make mistakes because THAT IS HOW WE LEARN!

Its perfectly natural to make mistakes (oops I accidentally knocked the milk over) and now with sin in the world it is also perfectly natural for children to disobey, but it isn't good. When you tell your kids not to do something, and they do it anyway, do you think that is good? If its good then you should be encouraging children to disobey their parents, shouldn't you?

Thus I utterly repudiate this theology that God would create children and would not understand or not expect that they would ever be disobedient or make mistakes.

Of course he understood and expected that they would be disobedient, that is where the gospel message is found. Before the foundation of the world, he had prepared a way to remedy the disobedience, restore the relationship and bring an end to evil and sin.

But the real problem was not that they made a mistake but that they refused to acknowledge it so that they could learn from it.

"Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’" (Gen 3:17)

Where does it say "because you refused to acknowledge what you did wrong and hid it from me?"

A good theology teaches the lesson that actually should be learned from the story rather one that sounds a great deal more like the accusations of the enemy.

Yes, you are very right. I don't say, "hey son, go ahead and continue to disobey me, as long as you acknowledge you dun wrong." No, I say "Listen to me because you are only 4 years old and I know the dangers of what you are doing, but now that you did it, own up to it, apologize for not listening and show me you mean it by stopping your rebellious ways and doing right from now on." That is the lesson that should be learned from the story, God knows better, has told us what is right - its in our conscience and God has written it on our hearts and in scripture, trust he is right and good, but now because you have already done wrong, repent (take responsibility, ask forgiveness turn away from your transgressions and do right in the future).

I do NOT believe that God gives arbitrary commandments just for the sake of testing whether people will be obedient.

Who claimed the reason was arbitrary? First, we don't know what kind of fruit it was, it could have been something that wasn't intended as food (ever let your kids eat crayons?). Further, if God made it and was claiming a special right to it, that is His property, eating it is theft, that alone is enough to make it a valid commandment. When your kids were young (assuming you have kids of course), did you let them play with anything they wanted or were some things your possessions and you had a privileged right to them?

God created children not robots, and so it is NOT about obedience. I deny this utterly.

OK, then its ok to be disobedient, since it has nothing to do with it - right or wrong?

And the commands that a parent gives are not arbitrary at all.

Right, assuming we are talking about a good and morally perfect parent as God is. I know plenty of parents (maybe even you) who do give arbitrary commands (in the sense of "because I don't want you to right now"), but they aren't perfect and neither am I.

God's commandment was very much like one that we give to our own children, "Do not play in the street or you will die." God was warning them of a danger that was inherent in life itself, by which they could lose the most precious thing that they had, the source of eternal life itself.

Yes, that is the reason he warned them, as I explained already, using similar examples in my previous post. So I agree, it isn't arbitrary.

But the point is that God is NOT a small light in the darkess.

Why do you keep coming back to that? I never said God was a small light in the darkness. I said his light is infinite and that it shines in the darkness that is in this world. Where do I say small? Continuing to bring this "small light" thing back is an attempt at setting up a straw man that we have both agreed is knocked down already. Can we put it to bed?

Likewise Genesis 11 isn't about God being angry that his children would dare to accomplish great things, but rather that they were going down the same path that led to the flood and God wasn't going to let things happen that way again.

As of yet, I hadn't mentioned Genesis 11, so I agree - in a sense. But we know from a study of archaeology that the ancients were fond of building ziggurats, which were popular throughout the ancient world. They were basically a very tall structure with a winding staircase which ended in a shrine or temple at the peak. It was man's attempt at "raising themselves" to the height of God, but rather than to show praise and glorify God, it was something akin to "Don't call us, we'll call you" or attempting to put a gate between God and man, thus the thinking was, when man wished to contact Him, He was easily accessible, but when they didn't He was behind the gate. They were also intentionally refusing to fulfill God's instructions to spread out and fill the earth. "lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth"

Building something great is great, if the intention is right. In this case, it wasn't - so I agree, He wasn't angry that they were accomplishing something great, the they weren't accomplishing the right things nor in the right way, further the text doesn't say God was angry, rather he did was give motivation to do what he had told mankind to do and give them more freedom to accomplish what he had intended.

I honestly hope you think about this passage more and the implications your interpretation has.

The implications are that God created the laws of nature and He does not set them aside for our convenience or wishful thinking. If you step off a building. You will fall because those are the rules of life that God has set down. Looking for God in the BREAKING of His own rules is simply INSANE! Jesus addressed this very thing in Luke 4:12. The implication is that you most definitely should NOT test God with such a thing or demand that God prove Himself in such a way because you will get a flat "No" and He WILL stick the laws of nature that He created. It is a wicked generation that seeks such signs (Luke 11:29) and what they will find if they keep doing this isn't God but indeed nothing but parlor tricks by magicians and con men. Yes God will answer your prayer, not by changing the rules but by helping you to live according to those rules, because those rules are the foundation of life itself and it is by them that God upholds the world.

You must have missed my point, because you didn't address it at all, other than to wave your hand at it with an a priori belief that God doesn't do something and a healthy amount of rhetoric. I can't force you to re-examine your ideas, that is your responsibility - just as it is my responsibility to examine my beliefs. Blowing it off because you have already decided its insane doesn't benefit anyone. People surely have thought many true things were insane, including the resurrection and it benefits us to re-examine our beliefs about that, doesn't it?

Look at it this way, you say that looking for God in the breaking of his own rules is simply insane, yet you have said before that God is not bound by those rules because he is spirit... so why is it insane for God to break rules that only apply to the creation and not the Creator? Which is it, is God bound by the laws of nature or not bound? If he is not bound, then it is not insane to look for evidence where those rules are superseded by spiritual works. No one demanded that God prove Himself in such a way, Christ demonstrated it willingly so that we could believe. No one ever claimed that God changed the rules, they aren't rules he is obligated to follow, thus nothing needs to change about the rules to accommodate the miracles. I would remind you that the laws of nature are not the foundation of life, God is the foundation of life and it is in Christ that all things are held together.

[gary_s]

I've been following this "discussion" a bit, and I know I'm not welcome in this section, but I'll keep it brief and to the point, one post only.

I've had many serious disagreements with Mitch along the way, mostly regarding his disregard for the feelings of others, but NOT on the validity or details of science, nor on the idea of honest consideration of spirituality. On those things I almost totally agree with him. And I can say that this conversation is going exactly as it goes with all die-hard legalistic theists, better known as Creationists. Yes, I know Ryan doesn't consider himself to be a creationist, but it's clear that he is practicing the mantra in these statements:

I am not saying all science is evil, I am saying that there are clearly boundaries to what we can know or should seek to know.

Isn't the want for knowledge the catalyst that drove sin into being in the first place?

Abiogenesis doesn't come out of a philosophy where God exists, it comes out of a pure materialism.

That isn't what I said, I said I would believe in aboigenesis and macroevolution if there was compelling evidence.

These comments make it clear that Ryan is not approaching science or religion with an open, honest attitude, but rather a pre-determined position on which he is not the least bit flexible. And I applaud Mitch's responses to them, but it appears they are in vain. It's clear to me that absolutely nothing could make Ryan understand his misconceptions. For a True Believer, there is no possible alternative view, which is what makes them dishonest. When I engaged him on this same subject, I was under the impression that this was not the case, otherwise I wouldn't have wasted my time. There's no point in doing so with True Believers. If my own opinions were so blind and closed, I wouldn't be willing to accept the possibility of a god, or that such a god could participate in our lives. I do accept this possibility and I would never argue against it in the same dishonest manner.

That's all I wanted to say. I just find it dishonest for people to approach a subject without declaring their absolute rejection of it a priori if that is the case.

[reallyRyan]

I just find it dishonest for people to approach a subject without declaring their absolute rejection of it a priori if that is the case.

Gary, I don't know why you wouldn't be welcome in this area. As far as I am concerned you are welcome to comment on anything I say here. But let me explain that haven't declared my absolute rejection if macroevolution and abiogenesis a priori because I haven't absolutely rejected it - nor do I see a time in my foreseeable future where I will reject it absolutely. I have stated time and again that its not only possible, but valid from the perspective of naturalism and I am personally undecided on the issue and am advocating for the counter view of creation which I favor at this time. I have openly voiced my skepticism of both naturalism and Mitchell's version of theistic evolution (or natural theology if that be a better fitting title). Also, I do consider myself a creationist because I believe there is a Creator. How that creation unfolded is a different matter and one on which I do not hold hard and unwavering opinion.

Further, if I said, and you quoted me, " I would believe in aboigenesis and macroevolution if there was compelling evidence" then how is that proof of an a priori rejection? Its a statement that if I found the evidence compelling I would accept it. But, saying that there are limits to what we can know, and that the idea of abiogenesis comes from naturalism doesn't mean it is wrong per se nor does my counter argument totally discount it as a possibility. All my counter argument does is offer that there is a second valid viewpoint to account for the data. It continues by saying that I recognize that I don't hold said philosophy and therefor I don't have to interpret the information from said philosophy. But, yes I have openly stated my rejection of naturalism as the only viable option. I think it rather self apparent that I am a theist and interpret information via the theist view that I do hold.


As of yet, no one has offered compelling evidence of evolution from LUCA or abiogenesis that can not be viewed equally from two different and opposing perspectives leading to two different and opposing conclusions. That isn't an a priori rejection, in fact it isn't a rejection at all - but I fully acknowledge and defend that it isn't acceptance. Continuing on, I am not anti-evolution as I have said before, but accept evolution as a true mechanism that is seen in real world experiments, but remain skeptical of the paradigm that says it extends to a universal common ancestor. Mitchell and yourself are advocating that view, so there is no need for me to continually build it up, that is the mantel that both of you (and the majority of people on this website) have taken up, which frees me to focus on advocating the other equally valid alternative. If that makes it sound like an a priori rejection then I apologize, but I don't see that it can be avoided without saying time and again that its valid if the premise is valid, which is the frame work which is under dispute.

As Richard Feynman (and Dawkins and Russell and Oppenheimer and Sagan and others have) said - "Keep an open mind – but not so open that your brain falls out" In this instance I can have an open mind to abiogenesis and macroevolution but still recognize the limitations of the method used to verify them, the underlying philosophy and even the possible futility of the adventure. There is no need for me to swallow the blue pill where I stay safely within naturalism, and thereby put science so high up that it is untouchable and beyond criticism.

If that approach be dishonest, what would the honest approach be? (if you respond to nothing else, please help me in approaching it honestly by answering this)

Thank you for your comments, and again, whether or not anyone else thinks you are welcome here in the "Christian" section (and again, I don't know why you wouldn't be), you are free to challenge anything I say, anywhere I say it and actually I encourage you to do so.

[mitchellmckain]

It is important that it is understood that Christians are not required to defend their claims to atheists in the Christian section just as atheists are not required to defend their claim to Christians in the atheist section. Those types of encounters are what the General Discussion section is for. These other sections of the forum exist to enable members of the same group to discuss things with the possibility of some shared premises.

I did not immediately have any objection to gary's post, but now I realize that this is because it wasn't my position he was challenging. Therefore I would fully support reallyRyan if he wanted to object to this post by gary. We must remember to tread lightly and humbly when we go into these special sections where we don't technically belong in order to preserve the function for which these sections were created.

I know that the difference in the attitudes between gary and me on the issue of evolution is probably a subtle one. But nevertheless, there are arguments that won't stand up very well in the General Discussion section that might be accepted in the Chrisitan section. We really do need these section for discussions like that where we don't have to "watch our back" as it were, and this becomes even MORE important as we become more aware of the viewpoint of the other side.

[gary_s]

I just want to make it clear that I'm not asking anyone to defend their arguments here, and whatever Ryan wants to believe is fine with me. It's just that I was under the impression that his discussion was on an honest (open) level, but it's clear to me that he wasn't approaching it that way at all, based on the comments I referred to before. I suppose I should have asked for some clarification before engaging in the debate in the first place. But it was not my intention to demean anyone for their beliefs. I just don't want to spend time discussing it when the answer is always going to be the same, no matter what. It's clear to me that this is the case. Mitch, you have thrown the kitchen sink at ryan (and me as well) yet he is sticking to the same basic form of denialism, dismissing the evidence for various irrelevant reasons. So, that's his belief. It's not about the facts at this point.

It is interesting that this thread began as a referendum on the role of god in evolution (a valid topic that I find worthy of exploring), but it has clearly migrated to a question of whether evolution is adequately supported, which Mitch and I have virtually no disagreement on. I found the former interesting, but the latter boring because it's so obvious. So, please continue and don't mind my intrusion. It's of no consequence.