Begging the Question

[Zosimus]

Source ?

Well, I have already done so elsewhere in the thread, but I will accommodate you.

It is the standard orthodox Christian view that there was no death until after the fall. Even carnivorous animals did not eat meat before that time (same link). Presumably, after the second coming of Christ, it will return to that state. So since Adam was incapable of dying until he ate the forbidden fruit, what would have happened had he stopped eating and drinking for an extended period of time? No one knows, but Christian theology maintains that he would not have died because death before the original sin was impossible. Perhaps Adam would have been like a clock that had run down and had to be wound back up.

So was there radioactivity before the fall)? As we can see, many Christians insist that the answer is no. They reason "If God created a perfect world, how could things be decaying before the Fall since there was no death?"

Obviously, not everyone agrees. We can easily find articles ridiculing these ideas, but that does not mean that these ideas are not the standard orthodox Christian interpretation.

 

[Koldo]

Well, I have already done so elsewhere in the thread, but I will accommodate you.

It is the standard orthodox Christian view that there was no death until after the fall. Even carnivorous animals did not eat meat before that time (same link). Presumably, after the second coming of Christ, it will return to that state. So since Adam was incapable of dying until he ate the forbidden fruit, what would have happened had he stopped eating and drinking for an extended period of time? No one knows, but Christian theology maintains that he would not have died because death before the original sin was impossible. Perhaps Adam would have been like a clock that had run down and had to be wound back up.

So was there radioactivity before the fall)? As we can see, many Christians insist that the answer is no. They reason "If God created a perfect world, how could things be decaying before the Fall since there was no death?"

Obviously, not everyone agrees. We can easily find articles ridiculing these ideas, but that does not mean that these ideas are not the standard orthodox Christian interpretation.

I must say your use of term 'orthodox' sounds rather strange to me.
For some reason, it seems you relate it to fundamentalists that make use of literalism to interpret the bible to the point they conclude our dating methods must be completely off the mark. Either way, within this group there would most certainly be people that don't have a clue about dating methods and if shown evidence could change their minds. That's sufficient reason to elaborate on the subject.

 

[Zosimus]

I must say your use of term 'orthodox' sounds rather strange to me.

There's no reason it should. Orthodox comes from two Greek words: orthos, meaning straight, and doxa, meaning opinion or notion. I use it to mean the approved point of view.

For some reason, it seems you relate it to fundamentalists that make use of literalism to interpret the bible to the point they conclude our dating methods must be completely off the mark.

No, I use it to refer to the decision that came out of the Council of Trent, the 19th ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church. More specifically I refer to the Decree on the Dogma of Original Sin, promulgated 17 June 1546. Since radiometric dating was invented in or about 1907, the orthodox viewpoint can hardly be considered a reaction to your dating methods.

Either way, within this group there would most certainly be people that don't have a clue about dating methods and if shown evidence could change their minds. That's sufficient reason to elaborate on the subject.

This claim is completely irrelevant to the point in question. The question is whether the arguments commonly made in favor of an old Earth (against a young Earth) employ the logical fallacy begging the question.

 

[Koldo]

There's no reason it should. Orthodox comes from two Greek words: orthos, meaning straight, and doxa, meaning opinion or notion. I use it to mean the approved point of view.


No, I use it to refer to the decision that came out of the Council of Trent, the 19th ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church. More specifically I refer to the Decree on the Dogma of Original Sin, promulgated 17 June 1546.

Your use is not so straight-forward though.
Your first and most important source, in the other post, is Answers in Genesis. The author of that particular article is Bodie Hodge, and he doesn't stand by the decisions that came out of the Council of Trent. It is actually quite odd that you have picked the Council of Trent because that is exactly the high point of the Counter-Reformation.

So, what are you talking about ?
I still don't understand what you mean by 'Orthodox'.

Since radiometric dating was invented in or about 1907, the orthodox viewpoint can hardly be considered a reaction to your dating methods.

I am not saying it is a reaction though.

This claim is completely irrelevant to the point in question. The question is whether the arguments commonly made in favor of an old Earth (against a young Earth) employ the logical fallacy begging the question.

I find it very relevant.
So far I don't see why everyone that holds YEC as true would also necessarily accept the premise that 'The laws of physics radically changed at the time that Adam ate the forbidden fruit'.

 

[Zosimus]

Your use is not so straight-forward though.
Your first and most important source, in the other post, is Answers in Genesis. The author of that particular article is Bodie Hodge, and he doesn't stand by the decisions that came out of the Council of Trent. It is actually quite odd that you have picked the Council of Trent because that is exactly the high point of the Counter-Reformation.

So, what are you talking about ?
I still don't understand what you mean by 'Orthodox'.

Well, have you tried using a dictionary? It's a book that tells you what words mean. Here's an online version:

Definition of ORTHODOX

Orthodox = traditional view conforming to established doctrine.

What is the authoritative body that determines the established doctrine? Well, it depends. Catholics (and to a lesser extent Anglicans) have councils. Mormons have apostles. Evangelical Christians recognize the Bible (and, by extension, translators) as the authority in question. With that in mind, let's look at Romans 8:21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. wherein we read "...that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay...

So a simple reading of that verse (and those surrounding it) will lead one to believe that the Bible preaches that decay started when Adam partook of the forbidden fruit and that this bondage to decay will be reversed through the expiation of Christ.

So if you cannot read that verse and understand that there will be many (perhaps most) who read that verse and subsequently deny that radioactive decay has been ongoing for 4.5 billion years, then I don't know how to help you.

I find it very relevant.
So far I don't see why everyone that holds YEC as true would also necessarily accept the premise that 'The laws of physics radically changed at the time that Adam ate the forbidden fruit'.

Everyone? Where did I say everyone? Link me to the post in which I said everyone.

Before you try to attack the argument, maybe you should try to understand it, assuming, of course, that you are capable of doing so.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

Well, I have already done so elsewhere in the thread, but I will accommodate you.

It is the standard orthodox Christian view that there was no death until after the fall. Even carnivorous animals did not eat meat before that time (same link). Presumably, after the second coming of Christ, it will return to that state. So since Adam was incapable of dying until he ate the forbidden fruit, what would have happened had he stopped eating and drinking for an extended period of time? No one knows, but Christian theology maintains that he would not have died because death before the original sin was impossible. Perhaps Adam would have been like a clock that had run down and had to be wound back up.

So was there radioactivity before the fall)? As we can see, many Christians insist that the answer is no. They reason "If God created a perfect world, how could things be decaying before the Fall since there was no death?"

Obviously, not everyone agrees. We can easily find articles ridiculing these ideas, but that does not mean that these ideas are not the standard orthodox Christian interpretation.

So this works against the argument the earth was young. If radiometric dating and half life measurements don't work because they didn't start to die till after the fallt hen it would mean that the fall was just that much older!

If the radiometric dating measures a few million years and then someone says "wait though it didnt' start till after the fall!" would suggest that it would look younger rather than older.

 

[Koldo]

Well, have you tried using a dictionary? It's a book that tells you what words mean. Here's an online version:

Definition of ORTHODOX

Orthodox = traditional view conforming to established doctrine.

What is the authoritative body that determines the established doctrine? Well, it depends. Catholics (and to a lesser extent Anglicans) have councils. Mormons have apostles. Evangelical Christians recognize the Bible (and, by extension, translators) as the authority in question. With that in mind, let's look at Romans 8:21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. wherein we read "...that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay...

So a simple reading of that verse (and those surrounding it) will lead one to believe that the Bible preaches that decay started when Adam partook of the forbidden fruit and that this bondage to decay will be reversed through the expiation of Christ.

So if you cannot read that verse and understand that there will be many (perhaps most) who read that verse and subsequently deny that radioactive decay has been ongoing for 4.5 billion years, then I don't know how to help you.

People interpret scripture in multiple ways. How is that related to your use of 'Orthodox'? That's what I am trying to understand.
You mention Catholics, but Catholics don't have to believe in a literal reading of the bible.
You mention Mormons, but they don't have to believe in a literal reading either.
More specifically, those groups can believe in YEC or in OEC. There is no requirement one way or another.

When you use the word 'Orthodox' though, you refer only to people standing in the YEC side.
So, you aren't talking about Catholics nor Mormons in general. You seem to be talking about fundamentalists.

Everyone? Where did I say everyone? Link me to the post in which I said everyone.

Before you try to attack the argument, maybe you should try to understand it, assuming, of course, that you are capable of doing so.

If you agree that one thing doesn't entail the other, I fail to see on what grounds your rationale stands.
According to your reasoning, the arguments fail because they presume from the start that “The laws of physics did not radically change at the time that Adam ate the forbidden fruit.”, which means that if such a premise is the very conclusion of the arguments then there is a fallacy happening here.

But what if the arguments don't seek to establish that "The laws of physics did not radically change at the time that Adam ate the forbidden fruit.” ? If it is true that one can accept YEC and yet reject that 'The laws of physics radically changed at the time that Adam ate the forbidden fruit', then it is possible argument in favour of an old Earth without seeking to reach the conclusion that “The laws of physics did not radically change at the time that Adam ate the forbidden fruit.”.

As a final note on this post, I would like to suggest you to refrain from making personal attacks.
Let's keep it civil.

 

[viole]

This is not a sentence. It lacks a subject.


No, it's completely different. I was making the claim that the logic in use is bad whereas you are asking questions designed to tear down a straw man.


Incorrect. The arguments used to defend an old Earth are completely different from the ones I use. They are as different as night and day, but you are too ignorant about logic to understand that. Here's the argument for an old Earth.

Let P=The Earth is old.
Let Q=U238 dating shows a certain ratio of parent to daughter isotopes.

If P, then Q
Q
Therefore, P.

Here's my argument for a non-perfectly-flat Chorrillos.

Let P=Chorrillos is perfectly flat.
Let Q=A picture exists that shows otherwise.

If P, then ~Q
Q
Therefore, ~P.

Are they the same argument? No, they are completely different. The first argument is a formal logical fallacy called affirming the consequent. The second argument is a valid logical chain known as modus tollens. Since you have all the logical ability of a wet noodle, you think they are the same for no reason other than that they both contain premises.


You are a liar. I said quite specifically that eyes were not reliable. You have decided to extend this to an attack on all senses. Yet, that is not what I said. Were you here, you could walk from the beach up to the top of the cliffs and you would quite clearly know that Chorrillos is not perfectly flat. You would feel the strain in your muscles as you climbed. You would hear the grunts from your mouth as you exerted yourself. You could place a ball on the ground, release it, and when it bumped into your hand further downhill you would know that Chorrillos is not flat. Your argument seems to be that since some trivial knowledge can be gained through the senses, that this knowledge can be plugged into all kinds of bad logic forms and come up with true outcomes.


Whether "Chorrillos is not flat" is an analytic proposition is completely irrelevant to the issue at hand. What we are discussing is formal logical fallacies such as the ones you and your ilk rely on advance your fiction. Begging the question, straw man arguments, false dichotomies, and affirming the consequent are formal logical fallacies that are committed by pro-Darwinists with jaw-dropping regularity. These fallacies are bad because even if all the inputs are true, there is no guarantee that the conclusion will be true. The only response you can make is "Chorrillos is not flat is not an analytic proposition." Pathetic.


You are so stupid that you have constructed a self-defeating argument. You have just said that a cruel God has created you with a brain designed to see and sense only lies, but then you follow it up with the idea that you just had a divine inspiration from this cruel God revealing the truth of all of this to you. Yet, what makes you think that this cruel God is revealing the truth to you? If you have been created to see and sense only lies, then the divine inspiration you have just received is just one more of the only lies that you have been designed to sense.

Your problem is the Dunning-Kruger effect. In layman's terms, you are too stupid to realize that you are stupid. You are like the person who inspired the study, a man who knew that lemon juice could be made to create invisible ink. He, therefore, smeared lemon juice on his face and robbed a bank falsely believing that the lemon juice would make it impossible for the security cameras to record his image.

The point is, if you're incompetent, you cannot know that you're incompetent, because the very skills you need to assess your own competence are the skills that would lead you the right answer in the first place.

Lol, so spoke the man who believes that the probability of X, under the assumption of X, is zero.

Oh well. You are becoming pedantic and losing your cool, instead of addressing an issue that should be obvious enough. Good. You probably realized the corner you just got for yourself. Again.

So, let's remove the sentence "I just had a divine inspiration" if that disturbs you, forgetting for a moment that I could argue that divine inspirations act on the spiritual soul and not on the senses acting on the physical one. So, let me change it slightly in order to make it easier for you to understand what I mean (as if it were not obvious).I hope you will get it even without multiple choices.

My faith teaches that God manipulates our senses so that what we see is completely unreliable. This manipulation affects mainly what concerns the physical world out there. This God is so evil that He lets us sense some truths, without telling us which ones are truths and which ones are falsehoods. We believe He does that, so that we cannot even use inverse logic in order to estabilish truths about the physical world.

And, therefore, we have no clue whether what we sense, feel, see, hear, etc., about the physical world, represents the truth or not, and any attempt to estabilish such truths based on empirical inquiry is pointless. And therefore the true Chorrillos could be very well be perfectly flat, despite what we see, including balls rolling down. Call it orthodox violism if you want. Lol.

Now, try to focus and show to me that I am wrong: that Chorrillos is really not flat. Without begging the question, if possible.

In other words, I think your entire defense of the lack of flatness of Chorrillos is fallacious, or at least it should be considered equally fallacious by you, if you were capable of being intellectually coherent.

It is based on the same exact affirming the consequent fallacy you accuse others to use.

Namely,

If P then Q
Q
Ergo P

With:

P: Things that look and feel (not) flat, are truly and objectively (not) flat
Q: Our senses are reliable (for what concerns the flatness of things, at least)

Ciao

- viole

 

[viole]

With that in mind, let's look at Romans 8:21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. wherein we read "...that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay...

So a simple reading of that verse (and those surrounding it) will lead one to believe that the Bible preaches that decay started when Adam partook of the forbidden fruit and that this bondage to decay will be reversed through the expiation of Christ.

So if you cannot read that verse and understand that there will be many (perhaps most) who read that verse and subsequently deny that radioactive decay has been ongoing for 4.5 billion years, then I don't know how to help you.

For starters, you could help us understanding how you go from:

"A simple reading of that verse will lead one to believe that ... decay started when Adam partook of the forbidden fruit"

to

"Understand that there will be many who .... subsequently deny that radioactive decay has been ongoing for 4.5 billions years".

Do you think that most people believe that there is a relationship between the time a decay process starts and the time it takes to unfold?

Ciao

- viole

 

[gnostic]

To paraphrase Dr Ben Carson, he's God, he can create a universe that appears older than it is. And why not? In a created world, reality is determined only by the will of the creator- Likewise every human story, book, movie, begins with an established backstory to give the created world context.

That sounds like wishful thinking.

Yes, ignore evidences, and accept the make-believe fantasy. I am fine with this dishonesty and delusions coming from Young Earth Creationists.

It also make your God nothing more than a trickster, like Loki. In fact, God is the devil, tricking people into believing that the Earth and the universe only look old, but it is only 6000 or 10,000 years old.

And who said the devil or Satan is the father of lies. If that's true about Satan, then god is a granddaddy of a liar.