Creationists: This is your chance to prove yourselves.

Post Reply New Topic

Let's be honest. If I went through all the problems with creationism, we'd be here all day.

For example, most creationists believe that all prehistoric creatures lived on earth together at the some time. That's a rather extreme and unrealistic level of biodiversity.

I mean, I'd love to watch a tyrannosaur fight a mammoth, but that's what comic books are for.

The problem with these creation vs. evolution debates is, when creationist are also adherents to scientific theory, is the conversation inevitably branches out into fields that the individuals on either side are really qualified to discuss in any depth, and few people would be, even in academia.

Even when academics really discuss these things, they often have to review and study before hand.

I don't know if it's just me but I have a hard time distinguishing, qualitatively, between 6,000 year old earth and flat earth - ie. which is more roundly debunked or absurd. I think it's one thing for a person to make an archetypal argument for Christianity, a completely different thing for them to build the natural world from the bible outward.

Here is the "real" Earth. The white cake frost around the edge is the continent of Antarctica.

Why do you think mammals had to be small and sprite during the Mesozoic?

The dinosaurs, that's why!

Well....

No one has taken up your invitation.

I mention something to a particularly religious person i live with: "look you can see Saturn in the night sky", he responds "thats one of God's creations", and that just kills the conversation for me so I just walk out.

Those of us with reasonably strong faith feel no need to prove anything, because faith is not about proof. If we had proof, it wouldn't be faith. It does seem like there are a lot of misconceptions about Christians, and the religious in general, that are floating around. The "creationists" this topic is clearly leveled at are what are known in my circle as "New Earth Christians", meaning they believe Earth is only roughly 6000 years old. I am what is known as an "Old Earth Christian" in that I don't believe in the dichotomy between the Bible and Science that many people on both sides believe in. And yes, there is a divide between Old and New Earth Christians, though it's not nearly as pronounced as the divide between sects like the Catholics and Protestants.

Anyways, I believe in evolution too, and that God created the universe. Fun fact, I found out only a few years ago that the original Hebrew word for "day" in whatever old dialect is used in the bible, is the same word used for "era". It sounds way more lit to say "God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh" than if you replace the word "days" with the word "eras", so it makes sense that the first chapter of Genesis in the English bible would read that way. Besides, even if you use the word days, God didn't create the sun until the fourth. If a day is defined as a rotation of the Earth as it revolves around the sun, then those first few days aren't necessarily days. It's also worth noting that animals came first, then humans.

But, I feel no need to justify my faith. Maybe someone who specializes in apologetics could post a reply, but that really isn't my cup of tea at all. God has proven himself to me many times, but all I have is qualitative data of personal accounts. I also don't believe "does God exist?" is the right question to ask anyways. Maybe try "would my life improve if I let God in?"

Besides, I believe it's the onus of those actively trying to disprove God's existence to prove their point beyond a reasonable doubt using empirical evidence as they're the ones forcing their ideas on others. Anything that proves God is improbable is simply inadequate. I believe in an improbable God. For the record, I also believe in Stephen Hawking's theory that the universe was created by two tiny, microscopic, specks colliding, and the particles from that collision expanding outward. That actually sounds just like how God would work. It's also believed that those specks no longer exist and there is no way to determine where they came from or how they came to collide with one another. Does anyone here know something the top scientists in the world don't?

Note, I'm not really challenging anyone. I can't prove God's existence any more than anyone can disprove it (although if you truly have uncovered the mystery of the universe, a lot of people would like to hear from you, myself included). All I've proven is that both theists and atheists are at an impasse. I prefer to practice my faith in peace, alongside those who also practice it, and I would prefer if those who have different beliefs would stop trying to force them on those of us of faith. I've also established that I'm very much in both the "creationist" and "evolutionist" camps. If you want a serious debate, find someone else to have it with.

What's crazy-making is that the circumstantial evidence, not yet scientific per se, does point to something one could theoretically call God (although it would clearly fail Epicurus's four-fold exam), just that... well... the earth also looks like this and we're strapped into something where it's a constant cold war, within species as well, that has genocidal ends. It's incredibly difficult to figure out what one grabs onto for hope when every study of the physical yields chaos and total war of all against all as the state of creation.

Naive materialists IMHO actually have a teddy-bear of sorts to hug and it's the belief that no self-aware being is overseeing this or that as apes we simply cease to exist after this. Add that your immortal and that there is such a being and all of this actually gets a lot more painful. While I give devout Christians credit for trying to find a system that will psychologically keep them alive in good shape through this madness I think it is in a place where the fundamental moral concerns probably do need to map on to the current state - even less over certain moral issues becoming less relevant but more over certain moral issues not found in the bible being of ten commandments level importance right now. If anything the success of Christianity is that it its moral tenets were successful hedges *against* the mechanics of creation, forces which also really do their best to give to the strong, murder the weak, and enslave most of those between.