Creationists: Here's your chance

[tumbleweed41]

Can you explain to me the predictability of a particle when observed?
I changes! But can you predict the action it will take? No, You can't.
Is this magic?
No.
You see, an actual cause must have a predictable action.
This is why Newton stated that every action has an equal and opposite reaction.
However, at the Quantum level, we do not see this. The Heisenberg Principle is in direct contrast to Newtons Laws. Yet it is an observable phenomenon that you yourself have used as an example. Without predictability, cause is unnecessary.

When you hit a nail with a hammer, you have a predictable action. the nail is driven further into the wood. At the quantum level, the "nail" could go into the "wood", or the "nail" could move to a different spot in the "wood". Or the "nail" could disappear altogether, only to reappear days later imbedded in the "hammers" head.
And at the quantum level, the "nail" may do all this without any action from the "hammer" at all.
Again, without predictability, one cannot posit a cause.

There, I have used the "Quote Function" so others can see what you seem to be randomly replying to.

Just because you cannot understand the quantum level, does not mean it has no reasons or causes for why it does it’s weird stuff!

Once again, without predictability, one cannot posit a cause.

This is one thing about materialistic science that ticks me off, anything they don’t understand, they fill the gap in with “cause is unnecessary” or “junk DNA” or “vestigial organs and structures”. When will that nonsense stop? If someone does not know something or understand something, they should not act like they know it already.

• No cause has been shown to be necessary at either the quantum level or beyond the Universe/Singularity. This is a fact.
• Junk DNA or Noncoding DNA are components of an organism's DNA sequences that do not encode for protein sequences This is a fact.
• Vestigial organs and structures, such as the human appendix, blind mole rat eyes, and whale hind leg bones are organs and structures which have no current use to the organism. This is a fact.

Do you really want to go into "filling the gaps"?

By saying they don’t understand the quantum level, then in the next breath say they understand that there is no way to understand it, that asserts to understand it. By saying they don’t know the cause, but then say in the next breath, no cause is necessary, that is a contradiction.

Silly Creationist.
No cause has been shown to be necessary at either the quantum level or beyond the Universe/Singularity.
Further research may, or may not change that.
See, no contradiction.

How do they know that no cause is necessary? They don’t know that, they just know that they don’t know what the cause is. But not knowing what that cause is, does not mean there is no cause.

I know, this is the third or fourth time I have repeated this in this post alone but, no cause has been shown to be necessary at either the quantum level or beyond the Universe/Singularity.

 

[Amill]

Plus again, you assume it appears billions of years old. We would have to get into all those dating methods.

Or we can just look at the stars:bow: God didn't exactly tell us how he made stars and galaxies visible when they're tens of thousands to billions of light years away(we can use math to get distances). We shouldn't even be able to observe the light from stars at the center of our own galaxy.

I mean if we witness a supernovae explode in a distant galaxy... did that star even ever exist? If god had to make the light from the explosion start 10,000 years ago or whatever that star was never actually there... how could that make sense?

And why would god make all these observable processes and forces to sustain his creation, but use magic to bring it about. Is it really that far fetched to think that since he uses these processes to sustain creation...that he used similar observable processes to bring his creation to life?

 

[tumbleweed41]

Just because you cannot understand the quantum level, does not mean it has no reasons or causes for why it does it’s weird stuff!

This is one thing about materialistic science that ticks me off, anything they don’t understand, they fill the gap in with “cause is unnecessary” or “junk DNA” or “vestigial organs and structures”. When will that nonsense stop? If someone does not know something or understand something, they should not act like they know it already.

By saying they don’t understand the quantum level, then in the next breath say they understand that there is no way to understand it, that asserts to understand it. By saying they don’t know the cause, but then say in the next breath, no cause is necessary, that is a contradiction.

How do they know that no cause is necessary? They don’t know that, they just know that they don’t know what the cause is. But not knowing what that cause is, does not mean there is no cause.



Either you’re not understanding my question or you’re unwilling to answer the question. I am not asking you to ADMIT that my view IS plausible, I am asking you which view out of all the views that are on the table besides the “I don’t know” is most plausible out of all of them? Saying which view out of all of them is more plausible then the rest is not an admittance that you think it is plausible in and of itself, it just means that your saying it is more plausible then this view or that view and this view. You get me?



Yes, we agree there, the multiverse THEORY is philosophical, but notice it is a THEORY. And some scientists resort to believing in the multiverse theory. Science mixes science and philosophy together many times.



Yes, but it all depends on what you mean by it. Before you jump the gun on me, define for me what those words mean to you?



I didn’t just make a statement or claim. I told why a God being infinite is greater or above a finite god or a finite being period. You did not address my reasons for saying this claim.



Yes to me it is suicidal in a different sense of the word. I don’t understand why it’s not suicidal to you though? You consider it wanting to KNOW FOR SURE BEFORE you COMMIT to anything. But it IS suicidal because if you NEVER come to know before you die and if I am right and you know I COULD VERY WELL BE RIGHT, therefore you are taking a gamble and this is suicidal.



And what if he gave you that philosophical level of evidence, what would you tell him then? Would you refuse to address those SAME arguments that you refuse to address to me?

Also what if he said “ok, here I am, God, you see me, you are talking to me and I with you, now you know, I am real, I exist, was there for eternity, do you accept the evidence in front of you right now?” what would you tell him then?



Fascinating, if after you die you appear before God and he sends you to hell, you would then NOT be concerned?....... WHY?



I am dumbfounded that you are dumbfounded, for real though. But to answer your question God cares about faith because he set up the universe in such a way to where we HAVE to have an ELEMENT of faith, not PURE faith, but an element of it, because it’s faith based on that which is MOST plausible out of all the views on the table. And God also cares about faith because faith is not just about making the right decision, but is also about having a TRUSTING relationship with God. After all, good relationships are based on trust (faith) right? Well anyway, faith also is a virtue because it exercises COURAGE. Here is what I mean by that, suppose someone does not WANT (volitional) to believe in God because they want to be their own boss, so they choose to believe that which is most comfortable to there WANT’S. That is not COURAGE if we base ANY belief on our desire or wants. So faith is a VIRTUE because it exercises courage to go against the grain of our selfish desires.



This does not answer or address what I said.

“Also did it ever dawn on you that there IS evidence for God, just not TANGIBLE evidence? The evidence is of a philosophical nature. Did that ever dawn on you? Therefore assuming a God at judgment day for you, if you use the excuse there was not enough evidence, that WON’T CUT IT before his court room. You have no excuse.”

That statement has nothing to do with me knowing the mind of God, I said ASSUMING that God exists and will judge, then the evidence for him is not tangible, but of a philosophical nature, therefore you have no excuse.

Also for the record, yes I do know the mind of God when he reveals it, but it’s NOT because I said the above statement. The above statement has nothing to do with me knowing the mind of God.

For the record, this seems to be addressed to The Evelyonian in reply to this post.

 

[painted wolf]

Ok, give me a hypothetical example of a climate shift in the water to where all the fish would need to get out of the water?

Actually it didn't start with the need to get out of the water... just the need to improve ones ability to function in less ideal situations. For example, situations where the oxygen levels were not as high (such as slow moving or stagnant water)... fish can find plenty of insect prey here, but they need to adapt to the lower availability of oxygen. Many modern fish benefit from these adaptations today... such as goldfish (and other carp) who can gulp air over their gills... to lungfish who have functional lungs for breathing air.
Lungfish are master survivors of arid places that other fish can't survive. Being able to breath air lets them survive stagnant water and even seek out new pools by wriggling over dry land.

Also if they don’t all get out of the water RIGHT AWAY, but it takes many generations, perhaps millions of years of transitional time to get out, why do they not ALL die off before they get out of this bad water change? The same would be for the predator, would not the predator eat them all before they get out, thus there is no more fish to get out. Thus, the end of evolution?

because the situation wasn't adapting to an immediate emergency...it was adapting to take advantage of an empty niche. A place where they would have less competition.

hope this helps

wa:do

 

[The_Evelyonian]

Is gravity capable of being perceived, capable of being treated as fact; is it tangible? And don’t tell me about the EFFECTS of gravity, I mean actual gravity, is it tangible?

This is just words, is there tangible evidence for gravity, if yes, where is it? And if no, then why do you believe that gravity exists? What because Einstein said so?

Do you believe things that have no TANGIBLE evidence for them? Like gravity?

Gravity has tangible evidence for its existence. The Theory of Relativity tells us that what we perceive as gravity is caused by an object "warping" the space around it. The greater the object's mass, the more severe the warping effect. We can actually see this warping by watching the light from a distant object as it passes behind the sun or a galaxy. The light is seen to "bend" around the object it passes behind.

To illustrate what I'm talking about, here is a simulation of the galaxy as it passes behind a black hole. The effect is known as "gravitational lensing"

Why deny it if you don’t know it’s wrong?

Why do you deny the pink unicorn or the spaghetti monster or the celestial teapot?

Something is eternal, and something has to be a first cause too. It’s just the way it is.

So you continue to say yet you've given no evidence or even a plausible reason why this is the case.

What conditions?

Depends on the experiment

Well you should be because science mixes philosophy and science all the time.

No, it doesn't. A theory, like the multiverse, isn't scientific until there is good, solid evidence to back it up.

No it don’t.

Yes, actually, it does. If complexity is design, as you said it is, then the first cause cannot be complex, otherwise it would be designed as well.

Something has to be eternal and something has to have a first cause.

So you say.

I was saying all complexity APART from God is designed. I did not contradict myself. Now you may say that poses a problem, why would the universe be designed because of its complexity but God not designed because of his complexity? Well to answer that, SOMETHING has to be ETERNAL and SOMETHING has to have a FIRST CAUSE.

"Something musta dunnit" doesn't solve your problem. You can't just ignore it and make it go away. You must either address the massive flaw in your claim or abandon said claim.

How do you know you don’t know?

You're joking, right?

I was not asking you what one you would COMMIT to following, I was asking you that out of all of them, if you had to choose which one you THINK is most plausible out of all of them that are on the table, which one would you choose? Choosing one is not meaning your committing to one, it just tells me which one you think is most plausible out of the ones on the table (apart from the “I don’t know position&#8221.

and I've already said, "Without evidence, I'm not interested in picking one."

Uncertain means one does not know, but just because you don’t know, does not mean there is NO CAUSE.

This is absolutely false, false, false, and more false. And to me it is so obvious why it’s false. To me this is like black and white easy to figure out kind of false. Just because you cannot predict something, does not mean it has no cause. Holy smokes. Sometimes I do stupid silly stuff to my wife that she would NEVER predict I would do. Does that mean the silly stuff I do to her has no cause for it? Of course not!

So, I'll just add quantum physics to the list of things you don't understand.

One more time, the laws that we are used to; up and down, left and right, before and after, cause and effect, DO NOT APPLY on a quantum level.

 

[Jose Fly]

Absolutely, we deserved it. But, no, God is not a bioterrorist. Let me explain. God does not do justice out of the motivation to terrorize people, he does it because you broke his law and he is a God of discipline and justice. You MUST pay for your crime. He is not doing it to make you afraid, he is doing it to show you that you committed a crime against him (the source of all that is best in morality) and therefore you must pay.

So the little 1 week old girl who gets malaria and dies deserved it; the boy stillborn due to a viral infection deserved it; the girl born blind because of rubella deserved it.

That's disgusting.

Let me ask you this, why do you mock his justice?

Because it's not "justice" in any sense of the word. It's absurdly cruel, arbitrary, and inhumane.

According to your mythology, two people disobey a god thousands of years ago, and in response this god afflicts the rest of humanity with the sorts of things we've been talking about, and you call that "justice"? So if I came to you and said, "Your grandfather stole $5 when he was 10 years old, so I'm going to cut off the hand of every one of his descendants", would you see that as just?

First off, no it’s NOT the same. God directly creating AND activating the curse is different than God setting it up to where if one commits a sin, that sin ACTIVATES the curse. Although the sin does not create the curse. There is a slight difference. But yea, either way God sets up this system of justice.

Yup. Either way, the god you believe in and worship deliberately set up a system whereby children--before they've even done a single thing--are stricken by pathogens created by the same god.

If a person did anything at all like that, we'd lock them up and view them as a horrible monster. But for whatever reason, you hold your god to a lower standard of ethics than people.

Also by you saying “your god intentionally created terrible, horrible diseases” that does nothing to dampen the character of God. People in prison think it’s terrible and horrible to be there, but they are there because they deserve it and it is justice to them. They must pay.

Do you go to the children's ward at hospitals and tell the kids and their families, "You deserved this"?

He is worthy of worship. On the contrary, a God who would not do justice and who would let people do anything they want, that kind of God is NOT worthy of worship.

So you are unable to imagine any system of justice other than what your Bible describes? Really?

No, Satan has no power to create, he has power to manipulate that which is already created in order to INVENT something bad.

But the biochemical pathways and such that allow pathogens to cause disease weren't all there to begin with. They had to come from somewhere, and if Satan can't create, then under your belief the only alternative is your god intentionally creating those things with the express purpose of causing disease.

If a person did that, we call them a bioterrorist and lock them up. But you hold your god to a lower standard of ethics than people.

If I seen an organism macro evolve right before my eyes, I would believe it, and on top of it, I would call it magical that it happened. Unless God would have done it, then it would not have been magical.

???????? You're not making the slightest bit of sense.

No one has seen anything macro evolve before their eyes. Yes we see variations from the parents.

It's easy to say that when you have no idea what "macro evolve" means. Curious...what do you think it means?

Sure.

(Beneficial mutation) Increase in life span and limited tumor growth

Evolution of resistance in HIV

(Beneficial mutation) Resistance in weeds

(Beneficial mutation) Resistance to male sex pathogen

Gene duplication = morphological variation in tomatoes

Direct observation of horizontal gene transfer

Rapid evolution of structures in introduced lizards

We could go on and on almost forever, but you get the point (maybe). All we've seen is evolution...evolution of new traits, abilities, and even species:

Finches

Fruit flies

Fruit Flies

...and so on and so on.

So how do new traits come about? The evolve. How do new species come about? They evolve. How do new genetic sequences come about? They evolve.

Notice anything? Where's the direct observation of your god creating anything? So when we ask ourselves: How did things come about in the past, which is the more logical inference, evolution (which is all we've seen) or creation by your god (which we've never seen)?

Wow, so in other words you cannot account for why vital complex systems came about?

I just did. You claimed that everything in biology is vital and complex, and I just showed you multiple observed cases of biological traits and species coming about via evolution.

Let me clarify my question. I am NOT asking you if macro evolution happens by natural selection and variations and mutations and adaptations over much periods of time. I am asking you how did vital complex organisms come to be in the first place?

Ah, so you've backpedaled to "how did life first start". Ok, for the sake of argument, I'm perfectly willing to grant you that a god zap-poofed the very first self-replicating organisms onto earth 3.8 billion years ago.

Problem solved.

If you say all the vital parts of the complex system just hit together or self assembled by itself without intelligence, just by chance, well, the odds of that happening are too way too low, near to zero. Do you believe in chance doing it?

Chance? Who said anything about "chance"? All the hypotheses about the origins of life revolve around chemistry. Do you honestly think chemistry occurs by chance?

Chance? Or intelligence?

So you do think chemistry occurs by chance? Really?

 

[DeitySlayer]

I am not asking whether PRESENT already EXISTENT complex organs and structures can adapt and evolve into BETTER or STRONGER organs and structures, I am asking, how did the actual complex system come about in the first place?

I would explain about abiogenesis, vesicles, nucleotides, polymerization, replication, and so on...but I kind of get the feeling it would be lost on you.

Concerning evolution from a common ancestor...we have observed changes in species, e.g. MRSA, fruit flies, bacteria which gained the ability to digest nylon (note that nylon is not found in nature and so this is NEW genetic information, not recycled/adapted old information). Saying that evolution from a common ancestor is impossible in light of this information is like saying you can walk from your doorstep to your front gate, but you can't walk from your doorstep to the bus-stop.

 

[The_Evelyonian]

Just because you cannot understand the quantum level, does not mean it has no reasons or causes for why it does it’s weird stuff!

This is one thing about materialistic science that ticks me off, anything they don’t understand, they fill the gap in with “cause is unnecessary” or “junk DNA” or “vestigial organs and structures”. When will that nonsense stop? If someone does not know something or understand something, they should not act like they know it already.

By saying they don’t understand the quantum level, then in the next breath say they understand that there is no way to understand it, that asserts to understand it. By saying they don’t know the cause, but then say in the next breath, no cause is necessary, that is a contradiction.

How do they know that no cause is necessary? They don’t know that, they just know that they don’t know what the cause is. But not knowing what that cause is, does not mean there is no cause.

Tumbleweed41 already posted a good reply to this.

Either you’re not understanding my question or you’re unwilling to answer the question. I am not asking you to ADMIT that my view IS plausible, I am asking you which view out of all the views that are on the table besides the “I don’t know” is most plausible out of all of them? Saying which view out of all of them is more plausible then the rest is not an admittance that you think it is plausible in and of itself, it just means that your saying it is more plausible then this view or that view and this view. You get me?

I get you fine but apparently you don't understand my stance on the matter.

I will not choose one of your views unless there is evidence for it, period.

Yes, we agree there, the multiverse THEORY is philosophical, but notice it is a THEORY. And some scientists resort to believing in the multiverse theory. Science mixes science and philosophy together many times.

So, because some scientists mix science and philosophy, that automatically means that science, as a general rule, does too?

Well, since some christians endorse killing people who don't agree with them, then we can safely assume that christianity, as a general rule, does too.

Yes, but it all depends on what you mean by it. Before you jump the gun on me, define for me what those words mean to you?

Omnipotent = All-powerful

Omniscient = All-knowing

Do you believe that these are two of the attributes that god possesses?

I didn’t just make a statement or claim. I told why a God being infinite is greater or above a finite god or a finite being period. You did not address my reasons for saying this claim.

You spouted a lot of nonsense about a finite god being contained in space and an infinite god being outside of space, whatever that means...

Yes to me it is suicidal in a different sense of the word. I don’t understand why it’s not suicidal to you though? You consider it wanting to KNOW FOR SURE BEFORE you COMMIT to anything. But it IS suicidal because if you NEVER come to know before you die and if I am right and you know I COULD VERY WELL BE RIGHT, therefore you are taking a gamble and this is suicidal.

Perhaps, but the way I see it the odds are so heavily stacked against a god that, to me, it's a safe assumption that he's not there.

And what if he gave you that philosophical level of evidence, what would you tell him then? Would you refuse to address those SAME arguments that you refuse to address to me?

No, I would expect a god to make sense.

Also what if he said “ok, here I am, God, you see me, you are talking to me and I with you, now you know, I am real, I exist, was there for eternity, do you accept the evidence in front of you right now?” what would you tell him then?

If god appeared before me and said, "Okay, here I am. Here's the proof you wanted so badly." then, if I could be certain that it wasn't a hallucination, I would believe in god.

Fascinating, if after you die you appear before God and he sends you to hell, you would then NOT be concerned?....... WHY?

Because, if I die and god says, "You're going to hell." there would be nothing I could do to change that. So what good would concern do me?

I am dumbfounded that you are dumbfounded, for real though. But to answer your question God cares about faith because he set up the universe in such a way to where we HAVE to have an ELEMENT of faith, not PURE faith, but an element of it, because it’s faith based on that which is MOST plausible out of all the views on the table.

So is god hiding himself from those of us who seek real evidence?

And God also cares about faith because faith is not just about making the right decision, but is also about having a TRUSTING relationship with God. After all, good relationships are based on trust (faith) right?

There's a difference between trust and faith. Trust is something which is based on past experience; faith, at least in it's purest sense, is not.

Well anyway, faith also is a virtue because it exercises COURAGE. Here is what I mean by that, suppose someone does not WANT (volitional) to believe in God because they want to be their own boss, so they choose to believe that which is most comfortable to there WANT’S. That is not COURAGE if we base ANY belief on our desire or wants. So faith is a VIRTUE because it exercises courage to go against the grain of our selfish desires.

But what of those of us who simply don't believe because there is no evidence? Disbelief like that isn't based on hate, or malice, or jealousy, or a need to rebel. It's based on intellectual honesty. If someone can look out at the universe and see evidence for god, that's wonderful for them. It's something I can't do. I can't force my mind to accept something that, for lack of a better term, it won't accept; I can't force myself to believe.

Believing isn't something you can choose to do.

This does not answer or address what I said.

“Also did it ever dawn on you that there IS evidence for God, just not TANGIBLE evidence? The evidence is of a philosophical nature. Did that ever dawn on you? Therefore assuming a God at judgment day for you, if you use the excuse there was not enough evidence, that WON’T CUT IT before his court room. You have no excuse.”

That statement has nothing to do with me knowing the mind of God, I said ASSUMING that God exists and will judge, then the evidence for him is not tangible, but of a philosophical nature, therefore you have no excuse.

Also for the record, yes I do know the mind of God when he reveals it, but it’s NOT because I said the above statement. The above statement has nothing to do with me knowing the mind of God.

Ah, so god took you aside and privately revealed his will to you, is that it?

 

[The_Evelyonian]

Ok, so if you say something in your whole life that is error, that is grounds for at least questioning the validity of everything else you said and did through your whole life?

You see how silly that is?

If a book that claims to be the perfect word of god is found to be wrong on one thing, that is grounds for questioning the rest of it.

"If the bible is wrong on this, what else could it be wrong about?"

See what I mean?

Yes, unless the cover was lying.

So, we have a book that tells us the earth is only a few thousand years old, and mountains of evidence from numerous independent scientific fields that tells us the earth is billions of years old. To any reasonable mind, it's a case that the book cannot win.

Wrong, he would not be intentionally deceptive because he TOLD US HOW HE DID IT IN GENESIS. That is not being deceptive.

It doesn't matter if Genesis says how he did it or not. The concept is very simple, god is telling us one thing and creating evidence for another. HE'S BEING DECEPTIVE.

If someone stumbles over that one fact and is lost because of it, it's god's fault, plain and simple.

"God, I would have believed your book but the earth looks so much older than your book says it is. Why did you make it look so old?".

Watch this: “I am lying that I have brown eyes”. < did I just lie or did I tell the truth? Of course I told the truth and I was not deceptive at all, and you know I don’t have brown eyes based on the statement.

It's a flawed analogy. I have no way of knowing if you're being truthful or not.

If I told you, "I have brown eyes." you''d have to take my word for it. However, if you were to meet me and see that I have blue eyes, you'd know I was lying to you.

That's the problem with saying that god made the world look older than it really is. The evidence for an old earth is there. If god put that evidence there and someone then stumbles over that evidence and god sends them to hell for it then he's condemning them for something HE did. How is that just?!

Really? How does it not change anything?

I just explained it.

No, it’s their fault because they did not believe him when he said he did it in 6 days.

The evidence is there to prove otherwise.

Based on your reasoning, God would have been deceptive just by creating Adam and Eve to have fully matured bodies when he created them. Because they APPEARED to look about 20 to 25 years old, but in fact they were only 1 day old. So God must have been INTENTIONALLY deceptive when he created their bodies because they APPEARED to be many years old, but in fact was only 1 day old.

You see, that is silly.

There is a massive amount of difference. If Adam and Eve actually existed, which I sincerely doubt, they could see god face-to-face and have him tell them personally how he did it. We don't have that luxury. We are instead expected to simply take the word of an iron age book.

See the difference?

Plus again, you assume it appears billions of years old. We would have to get into all those dating methods.

Yes, we have one book that says the earth is young and numerous independent dating methods that say it isn't. To any rational mind, it's an open and shut case.

No I am not preaching, I am making a valid point and I am WONDERING why you won’t take responsibility IF I am right after you die. So far you have told me if I am right that you would tell God “not enough evidence” and that he is a deceiver and so you would take no responsibility for yourself. And to top it off, you also would STILL not have any concern.

And you wonder why I am baffled about that? I am extremely baffled.

I already explained why I have no concern.

Well just listening to debates on youtube, one I thought was very good, by Stephen C meyer and Peter ward and it is 11 videos. And to be honest, just putting aside my own belief and listening with an open mind to both sides debate and discuss back and forth, I have to honestly say, Peter ward did a TERRIBLE JOB. But at the same time, I’m SURE he represented YOUR side quite well.

Thanks for capitalizing the words in that last sentence. Really shows your objectivity.

Saying natural selection is not chance nor intelligent and then calling it unique does not say anything. Why is it unique from chance and intelligence?

Because it's not chance and it''s not intelligent

Biological machines, they would engineer the genes.

and the idea of those machines being intelligent is laughable.

How do you know natural selection is unguided?

Because the process doesn't behave in an intelligent fashion. Evolution has made numerous mistakes. If there is a designer then we should expect to see better work (unless he is just incompetent)

It doesn’t appear so? I am skeptical about that.

Do you have a source that maps absolutely EVERYTHING about that experiment? I mean a source that offers no other references at the bottom because it is THEE source of sources for the experiment?

Not as such. However if any had stood out I'm sure AIG and creationwiki would have been all over it, especially in that article.

He does not know 100% unless he became a scientist and did experiments himself in the lab and actually LOOKED at it himself. If he does not look at it himself, he has to take the scientists word that he is presenting everything honestly without any biases.

And when one side is shown to be biased?

Ok, this is good, I can build more questions and pry more answers so as to understand exactly where your coming from based on you elaborating on this hypothetical story.

Ok, give me a hypothetical example of a climate shift in the water to where all the fish would need to get out of the water?

Also if they don’t all get out of the water RIGHT AWAY, but it takes many generations, perhaps millions of years of transitional time to get out, why do they not ALL die off before they get out of this bad water change? The same would be for the predator, would not the predator eat them all before they get out, thus there is no more fish to get out. Thus, the end of evolution?

painted wolf already answered this.

 

[The_Evelyonian]

Ok, in this hypothetical story, give me an example of a bad mutation the fish undergoes.

A fish born with two heads would be an example of a bad mutation.

Next give me a hypothetical example of a GOOD mutation that the fish undergoes. Also keep it simple.

A good mutation is anything that helps the fish survive and outdo it's competition. A sleeker body, better eyesight, a pouching in it's GI tract that allowed it to continue supplying its bloodstream with oxygen even when it was out of water. All of these would qualify as good mutations.

Perhaps mudskippers were already designed that way from scratch.

But anyway, apart from that, HOW does the fish which from scratch DOES NOT have the ability to take in air through the skin, GET this ability? I still do not understand how a &#8220;GOOD&#8221; mutation can do this? Also from my question above, give me a hypothetical example in the story of a good mutation for the fish.

This is hard to put simply because it isn't a simple subject.

Genes are the instructions for building a living thing. When an animal reproduces, its own genetic "instructions" are copied and passed down to the new generation. However the copies are not always perfect. When the genetic instructions are flawed, that is a mutation, and thus the new generation will be different from the previous.

Since the new instructions are flawed, the new animal will be built in a different way than its parent. The nature of the difference depends on the mutation. Most mutations are neutral and don't affect the animal one way or another. Some mutations are harmful and, if the effects are severe enough, the animal will die before it can reproduce. The mutations that help the animal survive are the ones most likely to be passed down.

In the case of our fish, mutations which help them breathe out of water will be the most likely to survive. If one fish's capillaries are closer to the skin then it might make cutaneous air breathing easier for that fish and he could spend more time out of water than his competitors.

Ok, for the moment I understand natural selection and variations of offspring, but mutations? I don&#8217;t quite get that one yet. I need the question about this answered above.

Explained above.

O, why your at it answering my question about giving a hypothetical example of a good mutation for our fish here, here is a NEW question on top of that. Since these &#8220;GOOD&#8221; mutations are RARE, and most are bad per your own admittance this would mean the &#8220;good&#8221; mutations would need to go in both a male AND a female fish, in the SAME generation otherwise the offspring of the one mutated fish may receive more of the trait of the none mutated parent. And not only is that feat to be pulled off (which is crazy in itself) but these two fish need to MEET each other (talk about crazy off the wall coincidence!) then they have to mate and produce a kid and then that kid has to receive that good mutation and hopefully nothing goes wrong in that transfer. Then that kid has to find a mate who also has this good mutation. Talk about tons of crazy coincidences that have to happen. How do you explain that these feats could also be pulled off?

The mutation need not be present in both parents in order to be passed down. It need only be present in one parent.

Also, just FYI, I never said that most mutations are bad. You said that.

Don&#8217;t fish have slight gradual variations from their parents, but are STILL FISH? Down the line a million years, there will be a variation of all those offspring, but won&#8217;t they still be a fish?

No, and I just explained why. The evolutionary process has no limit. Given enough time It can depart in endless ways from a parent's original form.

If we take the fish that we started with and put her next to her offspring and then that fish next to its offspring and so on and so on until we reach our land animal, you'll find that, at no point in the line did one animal give birth to something entirely new, it's simply that the gradual changes in each generation slowly added up until the form we ended up with looked nothing like our original form.

That is macroevolution. The slow build up of gradual changes.

For them to change into something else, the information would have to increase in the DNA, or the information would have to CHANGE in the DNA. O, mutations? The good ones? I hope you give me one hypothetical example, so I can build a further response to it.

For them to change from one form to another, the information in the DNA would simply have to change. Mutation does this. It can add information and it can take information away.

 

[The_Evelyonian]

Jollybear, I want to come back to your first post because I really didn't address it all that well. I simply asked "What caused god?" and we've been going in circles ever since.

Emphasis added by The_Evelyonian

Here is tangible evidence, the world, the universe, life is all complex, vitally complex, extremely complex. One vital part taken away will cause the whole thing to collapse. Emphasis on the word VITAL.

First off, how do you define complex? Complexity is in the eye of the beholder, so I must ask, complex how?

All that complexity implies design, thus a designer

That's a non-sequitur. Complexity in no way implies design. There are many complex things we know of that are not designed.

chance cannot design or cause complex stuff to come to be because first, chance is not goal oriented

Irrelevant. A river isn't goal-oriented but it carves the canyon just the same.

second, chance does not even exist, people just use it as a gap for their lack of knowledge about something.

You're confusing chance with god.

There is your evidence that God exists.

Where? I see nothing even resembling evidence.

There is more, but this is the one I will state for now. I have another thread I am debating on with someone, but our points are all over the place with all the evidence there is to deal with. So, I don’t want to make another BIG one on here like there, so I will state just one evidence, this is it. Complexity is design.

Tell me how complexity is NOT design.

It's still a non-sequitur. A snowflake can be called "complex", but a snowflake is not designed.

The human eye can be called "complex" but again, it isn't designed.

Just in case you disagree here; know this. The mistakes made within the eye tell us that, if it in fact was designed, the designer is amazingly incompetent.

 

[Jollybear]

Painted_wolf

So... "GCA" is information

Yes, more like a CODE of information. If I remember correctly from an article I read, kinda like a computer code of information in a hard drive.

Also just because it has three letters GCA does not mean it&#8217;s not information, remember, it&#8217;s not English, it&#8217;s a different KIND of information or language.

But my point is, if it&#8217;s not information, why call it information? Or what is the difference between information and&#8230;information?

Why is GCA becoming GCAGCC not adding information?

Has a scientist actually taken the time to look at the HUGE encyclopedia of the DNA? Of course not, it&#8217;s too big. The scroll of DNA is the length from here to the moon many times over. So how is he to know if GCAGCC was added? Is he counting? Or am I just misunderstanding the whole thing? If so, please educate me.

I always thought it was like this

I&#8217;ll just make the first one longer then GCA, ok, here we go &#8220;GCACAG&#8221; now a mutation comes along let&#8217;s say and turns it to I don&#8217;t know let&#8217;s say &#8220;GCGACG&#8221; it did not ADD anything, it just scrambled a letter.

Kinda like this, if I were to say in English &#8220;hello&#8221; then it gets scrambled to &#8220;holle&#8221;

Also if I may add, even if your correct that DNA WORDS are being added to GCA to become &#8220;GCAGCC&#8221; still that does not necessarily mean adding more information, it could mean just adding more words.

For instance

&#8220;today I got up and cooked 4 eggs&#8221; and now watch this I will speak the SAME information, I am not ADDING information, I am just adding an extra word, but it does not change the information &#8220;today I got up and fried 4 eggs&#8221; or I could say it like this &#8220;today I got up out of bed and cooked 4 eggs&#8221;.

The information is the SAME. Yea, a few more words, but that is not MORE information, because it&#8217;s still informing of the same thing.

Like I said, if you will give me some time assemble this sort of thing. I'm getting ready to graduate and I don't have a lot of free time to put together such an involved post.

That&#8217;s cool, respond on your own time, I&#8217;m not going anywhere.

here is a quick image of some of the better known hominids:

The problem with this is it&#8217;s very subjective bones. Actually some of them are not subjective, some look as if they would be fully human and some fully ape and some are subjective. Does that mean that the subjective ones are transitions between human and ape? Not really, it would only mean that we don&#8217;t know what they would look like if they had flesh on their face; after all, it&#8217;s decayed. One would have to interpret based on their imagination. And you and I both know that imagination is not proof. Also some bones can be mutated bones of either ape or human, thus making it appear as something we don&#8217;t know off. I mean I would like to see many different modern human skulls of variations both healthy and mutated and have them lined up to compare with these and just see how similar they all are. And also to have modern apes and gorillas both healthy and mutated lined up as well for comparison.

But how do you educate that guess? You don't accept morphology, taxonomy, genetics, paleontology... ?

No, no, no, I accept PRESENT scientific observations, that deals with genetics, taxonomy, morphology and paleontology. But, those observed facts have to be interpreted. I challenge the interpretation of macro evolution and the evolution of the cosmos and atheistic origins. That is what I challenge.

What is this limit and how is it enforced? Is it genetic in basis?
I agree God is a genius... that is why I appreciate evolution so much.

It&#8217;s enforced by the information in the DNA.

Why should I invent a metaphor when I showed you the real thing? We can totally avoid any mistakes in my story telling.
here, I'll show it again... no need for potentially misinterpretation of metaphors.

Metaphors are still good, they help people understand things that they cannot identify with. They are pretty good actually, in my book, they are VERY good. And if you know your subject well, you can apply a good metaphor to teach it, and if it is the right metaphor, it won&#8217;t be misinterpreted and if it is, then you just correct or help give understanding to the person better. To me that is the hallmark of a good teacher.

As you can see from this illustration, the number of chromosomes ends up doubled in the final offspring. From 6 to 12... doubling the amount of "information" in the genome.

Ok, why is this doubled?

 

[Jollybear]

Tumbleweed41

Once again, without predictability, one cannot posit a cause.

Says you, I disagree with you though. I told you why I disagree, you don&#8217;t address my reason. Ok, well if you don&#8217;t address my reason, I am not going to argue with you, I&#8217;m not interested in arguing, but only DEBATING. Debating and arguing are different, by how I define them in this context. Debating is addressing the person&#8217;s reasons for disagreeing.

So my reason is, let me repeat it, hopefully you address it. Just because someone cannot make a right prediction to something, does not mean it has no predictable action, it just means that the person who cannot predict it, does not understand it. If they can&#8217;t predict it, it means they don&#8217;t understand it. If they don&#8217;t understand it, that does not = it having no cause or reason for why it does what it does.

You cannot say NO cause is necessary if you don&#8217;t KNOW that no cause is necessary.

I mean, how obvious is that? This should be so obvious.

I mean I am disagreeing with you guys on a lot of issues, but this one tops HIGH RANK in my disagreement with you. When I say high rank, I mean this is one of the most obvious things to me that I see you wrong about.

I don&#8217;t know, maybe we are passing each other on this, but if we are, then please for the sake of understanding, address my reasons for why I am disagreeing with you.

No cause has been shown to be necessary at either the quantum level or beyond the Universe/Singularity. This is a fact.

No cause has been shown to be unnecessary at either the quantum level or beyond the universe/singularity. This is a fact.

Junk DNA or Noncoding DNA are components of an organism's DNA sequences that do not encode for protein sequences This is a fact.

How do you know it&#8217;s a fact? You don&#8217;t know that it&#8217;s actually JUNK. Just because you don&#8217;t know the USE of something does not make it JUNK or USELESS.

Vestigial organs and structures, such as the human appendix, blind mole rat eyes, and whale hind leg bones are organs and structures which have no current use to the organism. This is a fact.

I read a study once about the human appendix and that it was more used in none developed countries then in developed ones. I remember reading about it. So, the appendix is vestigial huh? Plus I also read if I remember correctly (been awhile since I read that article) about it helps the immune system slightly better.

Do you really want to go into "filling the gaps"?

Yea I do, evolution also at one time predicted there would be simple things found in the small world, but that was wrong, complex things were found, not simple. Another thing they did where they did not know and then posited and acted as if they did know. Or another way of putting it, they made a wrong prediction.

Silly Creationist.
No cause has been shown to be necessary at either the quantum level or beyond the Universe/Singularity.
Further research may, or may not change that.
See, no contradiction.

Right, but no cause has been shown to be unnecessary at either the quantum level or beyond the universe/singularity. Further research may, or may not change that.

I know, this is the third or fourth time I have repeated this in this post alone but, no cause has been shown to be necessary at either the quantum level or beyond the Universe/Singularity.

If everything around us has a cause, it&#8217;s most plausible then that at the quantum level it also has a cause. If we are going to choose to believe something or have a view, lets pick the most plausible one based on what is commonly known.

 

[Jollybear]

Amill

Or we can just look at the stars God didn't exactly tell us how he made stars and galaxies visible when they're tens of thousands to billions of light years away(we can use math to get distances). We shouldn't even be able to observe the light from stars at the center of our own galaxy.

I mean if we witness a supernovae explode in a distant galaxy... did that star even ever exist? If god had to make the light from the explosion start 10,000 years ago or whatever that star was never actually there... how could that make sense?

And why would god make all these observable processes and forces to sustain his creation, but use magic to bring it about. Is it really that far fetched to think that since he uses these processes to sustain creation...that he used similar observable processes to bring his creation to life?

As much as I would like to discuss and debate young earth creationism, I just cannot keep up with all the discussions on so many issues. To keep things simple and to keep preserving time, and keeping the momentum of the discussion going, I have to fall away from answering this right now. I mean I could give a simple answer, but then more then likely you will rebut it back, and then I will have a whole new debate going on, on top of what I already got going on right now. If I do that, I won&#8217;t have a life left. I did say

And mind you, I am not diverting from answering this because I don&#8217;t have an answer, keep that in mind.

 

[Jollybear]

Painted_wolf

Actually it didn't start with the need to get out of the water... just the need to improve ones ability to function in less ideal situations. For example, situations where the oxygen levels were not as high (such as slow moving or stagnant water)... fish can find plenty of insect prey here, but they need to adapt to the lower availability of oxygen. Many modern fish benefit from these adaptations today... such as goldfish (and other carp) who can gulp air over their gills... to lungfish who have functional lungs for breathing air.
Lungfish are master survivors of arid places that other fish can't survive. Being able to breath air lets them survive stagnant water and even seek out new pools by wriggling over dry land.

Ok, so let me verify back to see if I understand you correctly. Some fish can both breathe on land and in the water?

What if we put a fish that can ONLY BREATH IN WATER on dry land, it will die right? Or what if we put some kind of creature that cannot breath in water, in water, it will die right? Of course right.

So, how do you know that some fish that can breathe both on land and in water were not ALWAYS like that from scratch?

And even if they were not like that from scratch, tell me now what would make this fish breather on land and water change to something else that can only breath on land ALONE now?

because the situation wasn't adapting to an immediate emergency...it was adapting to take advantage of an empty niche. A place where they would have less competition.

I don&#8217;t get it?

 

[Jollybear]

The_Evelyonian

Gravity has tangible evidence for its existence. The Theory of Relativity tells us that what we perceive as gravity is caused by an object "warping" the space around it. The greater the object's mass, the more severe the warping effect. We can actually see this warping by watching the light from a distant object as it passes behind the sun or a galaxy. The light is seen to "bend" around the object it passes behind.

To illustrate what I'm talking about, here is a simulation of the galaxy as it passes behind a black hole. The effect is known as "

gravitational lensing"

Ok, do you have a picture or a video that we can actually SEE gravity with the NAKED EYE? Yes or no? Not a simulation, actual footage? And not any EFFECTS gravity HAS on objects, but ACTUAL gravity SEEN itself? Do you have that?

Why do you deny the pink unicorn or the spaghetti monster or the celestial teapot?

I already told you why I deny the pink unicorn and the spaghetti monster and the celestial teapot. I told you why and I keep telling you why and you keep ignoring my reason. You don&#8217;t address my reason, all you keep doing is saying that my reason don&#8217;t make sense without addressing WHY it don&#8217;t.

If that is how you want to debate, well, by the standards of debate, you lost.

Let me tell you AGAIN, why, and hopefully this time you address my reason or at least make an effort to rebut it without just saying it&#8217;s wrong.

The reason why I deny the pink unicorn and the spaghetti monster and the celestial teapot is because first off, they are complete mockeries, and secondly, even if they were not mockeries, they are FINITE and my God is INFINITE. A finite god cannot be the source creator of all things. Something finite cannot be eternal because it is contained WITHIN space, therefore must have a cause. And if it is contained in the space that we know of, then it is not the creator of space.

Now if you define the pink unicorn as being INFINITE, then you are then calling my God a different name, namely the pink unicorn. If that is what you want to do, FINE, as long as we define our terms, that is FINE. You call him pink unicorn, I call him Jehovah. It&#8217;s then settled. We are talking about the same God, just labeling him different names.

Now if you&#8217;re going to say my reasoning is flawed, then say WHY it is. Don&#8217;t just say &#8220;well that don&#8217;t make sense&#8221; because to me IT DOES make sense, and perhaps to many other believers it makes sense too, maybe not to you it don&#8217;t, but to us it does. So therefore, don&#8217;t just give us the cold shoulder, tell us WHY this reason does not make sense to you.

So you continue to say yet you've given no evidence or even a plausible reason why this is the case.

Yes, the plausible reason for something being eternal and something being a first cause is because something coming from NOTHING is LEAST plausible.

I told you already, there is only 6 views on the table, as much as you don&#8217;t like any of them, ONE of them is more plausible then the rest of them.

Depends on the experiment

What conditions does my view have to meet?

No, it doesn't. A theory, like the multiverse, isn't scientific until there is good, solid evidence to back it up.

True science and philosophy are different, but the field of science mixes them a lot. Yes, they do.

Science is facts; philosophy is explaining or interpreting those facts.

Yes, actually, it does. If complexity is design, as you said it is, then the first cause cannot be complex, otherwise it would be designed as well.

Says you, but why do you think your right about that? God is complex, but he is not designed, the universe is complex and is the only thing that is designed. There is one thing that is complex and is not designed, it&#8217;s God. There has to be something that is eternal and there has to be a first cause.

So you say.

Yes I say, BECAUSE if SOMETHING is not eternal, then the universe came from NOTHING for no reason (is that what you believe?). Also if there is not a FIRST cause, then the eternal something would have an infinite regression of events, thus all events would never happen, or there would be no motion.

How do you deal with that? Oh, I know, you DON&#8217;T deal with it, you dust it under the rug. And then shout &#8220;where is the evidence, where is the evidence&#8221; < those words are becoming quite meaningless.

"Something musta dunnit" doesn't solve your problem. You can't just ignore it and make it go away. You must either address the massive flaw in your claim or abandon said claim.

Ok&#8230;.I&#8217;ll tell you what I am going to do. Listen to this: if &#8220;something&#8221; musta &#8220;dunnit&#8221; this NARROW&#8217;S the PROBLEM down. Here is why, if SOMETHING and then this something DONE it, that means the universe was not just always here, because if it was, then something could not have DUNNIT, because it would always have been here. And if the universe came from nothing, then that would not be SOMETHING dunin it.

If you say something that does not have a mind did it, then the question would be, did that something come from nothing, or was it eternal? Both ways pose a problem. If you say something came from nothing, that poses a problem. If you say the universe was just always here, that poses a problem. If you say the universe is not here, that poses a problem. If I say God did it, you say that poses a problem.

Look, there is no WAY OUT FOR YOU. You&#8217;re hemmed in on EVERY side with all the options on the table. There is no 7the view and never will be. I don&#8217;t just say that now as a prediction, I say it as a fact, because there is NO CONCIEVABLE way for there to BE a seventh. If you say God did not do it, nor mindless eternal energy, nor nothing, nor is the universe an illusion, nor did it make itself, nor was it just always here, then there is NOTHING ELSE LEFT.

You can&#8217;t say there will be a 7th in the future, there is NOTHING else LEFT. Nothing else. There is no other SIDE or POINT or angle to cover, there is NOTHING left.

 

[Jollybear]

You know what, I want to say this now before I forget too. I have learned two things from this debate that I never learned before in all the debates I have ever done. You probably were not even TRYING to teach me this, but it&#8217;s just something I learned or it just dawned on me without me looking for it. Which I am SURPRISED that I learned this. But you actually HELPED me learn this without even trying to help me learn it.

The first thing I learnt is this: there is no way for a 7th view to exist or ever exist by fact.
Secondly, to love those who contradict themselves with more ease.

I gauss this brings a whole new meaning to the thread mickiel made here http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/general-religious-debates/96783-atheist-thats-other-side-mirror.html which I thought was quite interesting. This relates.

You're joking, right?

No, I am actually serious, I know it sounds strange, but for real, how do you know that you don&#8217;t know the truth?

and I've already said, "Without evidence, I'm not interested in picking one."

I was not asking you to pick one in the sense of committing to it, or even AGREEING with it. I was only asking you which one out of all the 5 views besides the &#8220;I don&#8217;t know&#8221; do you think is more plausible then the rest of them? That in itself does not mean that you think it is plausible in and by itself, it just means that you think it is more plausible then the rest mentioned.

So that being said, why won&#8217;t you answer my question here? Because there is no evidence for none of them? That has nothing to do with my question though, for to say which view is more plausible then the rest is not an admittance that this view has evidence, but that you just think it is more plausible then the rest of them, not that it is plausible in and of itself though.

Do you understand?

So, I'll just add quantum physics to the list of things you don't understand.

One more time, the laws that we are used to; up and down, left and right, before and after, cause and effect, DO NOT APPLY on a quantum level.

You act like you own the subject. It&#8217;s you that does not understand something here, not me. A reason applies for the weirdness that goes on in the quantum level.

You&#8217;re wrong.

I get you fine but apparently you don't understand my stance on the matter.

I will not choose one of your views unless there is evidence for it, period.

Again I am not asking you to commit to one, or even admit one is plausible, I am only asking you to say which one you think is more plausible out of all the others.

But if you don&#8217;t wish to tell me, that is your choice. So, I will leave this request be.

So, because some scientists mix science and philosophy, that automatically means that science, as a general rule, does too?

No, not as a general rule. But probably most times, because macro evolution, the big bang and all of that stuff are inferences, and that is based on philosophy.

Well, since some christians endorse killing people who don't agree with them, then we can safely assume that christianity, as a general rule, does too.

I get your point and I agree with it. Science is facts, philosophy is a means to explain the facts. Macro evolution is not science, it is philosophy mixed with science, yes it is, because it is inferred. Funny thing is, Jose_Fly even admitted it was inferred and he believes it.

Omnipotent = All-powerful

Depends on what you mean by all powerful. God is not powerful enough to make himself none existent, if that is what you mean. But he is all powerful to create and manipulate the laws he created and thus do miracles.

Omniscient = All-knowing

Again it depends on what you mean by all knowing. He does not know what it is like to actually sin, he does not know what we will choose, if he did then we would have no free will. He knows all things that can be known.

Do you believe that these are two of the attributes that god possesses?

Yes, but it depends on how you detail what you mean by &#8220;all&#8221; knowing or &#8220;all&#8221; powerful. Define &#8220;all&#8221; for me?

You spouted a lot of nonsense about a finite god being contained in space and an infinite god being outside of space, whatever that means...

First off, it&#8217;s not nonsense, second of all, if you call it nonsense, why don&#8217;t you say WHY (WHY, WHY<) it&#8217;s nonsense? Why is it nonsense to you?

There you go saying whatever that means and I explained it. Finite means contained in space, infinite means space less, not contained. An image is finite, a body is finite. My God is infinite. Therefore finite gods are not above him and are thus created beings.

 

[Jollybear]

Perhaps, but the way I see it the odds are so heavily stacked against a god that, to me, it's a safe assumption that he's not there.

The perhaps part is not a perhaps, it&#8217;s a SURE deal, you are suicidal when it comes to this gamble. Because you see, the odds are NOT heavily stacked against god, the odds are heavily FOR his existence. Also if you&#8217;re going to stick in the &#8220;I don&#8217;t know&#8221; position, then you cannot be acting like you are so SURE he is not there. It&#8217;s NOT a safe assumption, there are only 6 views on the table, there is no 7, there cannot be a 7 and I told you why. Your not making a SAFE assumption. Even if your assumption were to be correct, it&#8217;s still not a SAFE one because there is only 6 views on the table and you don&#8217;t know if your assumption is correct or not, therefore it&#8217;s not safe. That is the biggest delusion of all, is going through life care free and unconcerned. I am not being an advocate to be a worry wort either and try to control things we can&#8217;t, I am simply saying there should be more concern and reverence for the issue.

No, I would expect a god to make sense.

I didn&#8217;t ask you if you would expect him to make sense or not. I asked you
&#8220;And what if he gave you that philosophical level of evidence, what would you tell him then? Would you refuse to address those SAME arguments that you refuse to address to me?&#8221;

I am making an argument based on assuming that I am right for the moment, if you die and find out I am right and he gave you this same philosophical evidence for his existence, what would you tell him, how would you address that evidence?

What would you say to it?

If god appeared before me and said, "Okay, here I am. Here's the proof you wanted so badly." then, if I could be certain that it wasn't a hallucination, I would believe in god.

What would it take for you to believe you were not hallucinating? Would you have to be out of your DEAD body UNTIL it fully decays, then if your still conscious after that and seeing God or hell or whatever, THEN you would believe you&#8217;re not hallucinating? Or would you think that after suffering in a hell for a year that you would still be hallucinating?

Because, if I die and god says, "You're going to hell." there would be nothing I could do to change that. So what good would concern do me?

If God would offer you parole, THEN would you be concerned? Concern would simply show him that you care about his authority and about your own soul. That is what concern would be good for. Now true, if he offered no parole, then concern would do not an ounce of good, your right there. But that is not my question, I am saying IF he offered parole, what would you feel then?

So is god hiding himself from those of us who seek real evidence?

He hides himself from those who accept gravity as having evidence and then in there next breath refuse to realize that the evidence for his existence is just as real as the evidence for the existence of gravity. Those who do that, he hides himself from them, and the reason why is because that is just absolutely foolish. Because gravity is NOT tangible, and even if it were, we have no evidence that it IS tangible. You can&#8217;t see it, nor touch it.

There's a difference between trust and faith. Trust is something which is based on past experience; faith, at least in it's purest sense, is not.

Yea, and there are many people who have &#8220;experienced&#8221; God, including myself, so we have trust (faith) in him based on the experience and based on history and on a philosophical level as well.

Plus, trust is not necessarily always based on past experience. For instance, when I first meet people I give them my trust right away, they don&#8217;t have to earn my trust at all (now that does not mean I am going to be nieve and stupid either) but if they do anything to break that trust, THEN they have to EARN it back. If they don&#8217;t, then I stay away from them.

But what of those of us who simply don't believe because there is no evidence?

Again, there is evidence; it&#8217;s just not tangible, like gravity. You can say all you want gravity is tangible, you&#8217;re wrong, simply wrong. You can&#8217;t see it, touch it or smell it.

Disbelief like that isn't based on hate, or malice, or jealousy, or a need to rebel. It's based on intellectual honesty.

No it&#8217;s not based on intellectual honesty, it&#8217;s based on intellectual weakness, because you see, the evidence for God is just like the evidence for gravity. Gravity is not tangible, God is not tangible.

Plus if you want to insist your basing it on intellectual honesty, well I am also intellectually honest and I believe he exists. So will you then say I am intellectually dishonest? Or intellectual weak?

If someone can look out at the universe and see evidence for god, that's wonderful for them.

No, it&#8217;s not wonderful, it&#8217;s only wonderful if they experience this God. True, seeing the evidence gets them on the THRESHOLD to an experience, but it&#8217;s not the ACTUAL experience of God itself.

It's something I can't do.

No, wrong, it&#8217;s something you WON&#8217;T do.

I can't force my mind to accept something that, for lack of a better term, it won't accept; I can't force myself to believe.

Yes you can, because your mind does not FORCE you to choose something, YOU are the one who chooses what you do. If a thought comes into my head to eat ice cream, is my mind forcing me to go eat it? Of course not, I have my own will, I can say &#8220;the heck with you, I am not eating ice cream&#8221;. Come on now, you know what I am talking about. Your mind can do whatever it wants to do, you don&#8217;t have to FOLLOW IT. You have your own choice. It don&#8217;t choose for you. Seriously, that&#8217;s like saying &#8220;well I eat the ice cream, but my hand and my lips made me do it&#8221; FOOLISHNESS!

Believing isn't something you can choose to do.

Oh, so you don&#8217;t have a choice or free will then? This is absolute nonsense. Atheists and agnostics never cease to amaze me with how far they will go in believing one delusion after another one and then another one on top of it again and again and then yet another.

Ok, after being absolutely amazed at your statement, I have to recover myself and go on the objective now. Why do you have no choice to believe in what you do? I gauss that means you have no choice in believing macro evolution and believing in the &#8220;I don&#8217;t know position&#8221; too huh? I gauss I also had no choice in believing in God you would say? Or do I have a choice, but you don&#8217;t?

Come on now I want some answers to these questions, or will you dismiss them like most of my questions and arguments?

 

[Jollybear]

Ah, so god took you aside and privately revealed his will to you, is that it?

In my case he did not take me aside and reveal his will to me. He just revealed his will to me, but without taking me aside part. However SOME people he HAS taken them aside and revealed his will to them. Again, it depends on how receptive and close one is to God. And it also depends too on his sovereign purposes. So yes, he has revealed his will to me many times in my life, but just not in spectacular ways, like for instance I did not see a big huge curtain open in the sky and there see tons of angels come down and there is God right after beaming with light and then he say &#8220;hello Jollybear, I have something to tell you&#8221;. No, in my case it was not like that. But for some, it was. But I have had some experiences that are very real none the less. But REAL does not always mean spectacular in nature.

If a book that claims to be the perfect word of god is found to be wrong on one thing, that is grounds for questioning the rest of it.

"If the bible is wrong on this, what else could it be wrong about?"

See what I mean?

Yes, I see what you mean, and it would be a valid point, BUT&#8230;BUT&#8230;being wrong in one area does not make it wrong in ALL areas.

See what I mean? &#8220;what else could it be wrong about&#8221;? yea, you could ask that question, and it be alright to ask it, but the question does not make ALL of it wrong. One or two or many more things being wrong is not grounds for it being ALL wrong on everything it says.

Just like what I said about you, if you said something wrong in your life, that does not make everything you said and did wrong that you ever did or said.

So, we have a book that tells us the earth is only a few thousand years old, and mountains of evidence from numerous independent scientific fields that tells us the earth is billions of years old. To any reasonable mind, it's a case that the book cannot win.

Ok, but just because a book is wrong in one area does not make it wrong in all areas. Plus, that assumes it&#8217;s wrong in the area of the age of the earth. I don&#8217;t agree with you, I believe it&#8217;s right. Also if I may add, I was not even debating the age of the earth, just simply the fact that the earth is designed.

It doesn't matter if Genesis says how he did it or not. The concept is very simple, god is telling us one thing and creating evidence for another. HE'S BEING DECEPTIVE.

No, creating something with the appearance of maturity is not intentionally creating the evidence for it to look old, because you see, he don&#8217;t CARE if it looked old or not, he just wanted to create it with a maturity of appearance. Like saying, what came first the chicken or the egg? Well, God does the chicken. The chicken looks old, but, he did the chicken first, was he concerned that it looked old or not, no, he did not care about that. But by doing the chicken first, it will look old, but his intention was to create it with maturity and start the process that way. So that is not being deceptive at all.

If someone stumbles over that one fact and is lost because of it, it's god's fault, plain and simple.

Again you&#8217;re taking no responsibility and that is not right and it will work against you if I am right. And if you are to get parole, you will CERTAINLY need to take responsibility, and not only that, you will have to REALLY, TRULY BELIEVE that your responsible, you won&#8217;t be able to lie your way out of hell by saying &#8220;God, I was wrong, it was my fault&#8221; God can see if your lying or not.

"God, I would have believed your book but the earth looks so much older than your book says it is. Why did you make it look so old?".

Because he made it in its matured state, he did not make it through a bang over billions of years of cosmic messy evolution. If he made it in it&#8217;s matured state, then it&#8217;s going to LOOK OLD. Plus all your dating methods are not perfect as you think they are.

That is probably something he would tell you.

It's a flawed analogy. I have no way of knowing if you're being truthful or not.

Ok, forget the brown or blue eyes. I am lying that I have NEVER debated with Evelyonian. < now you know that this sentence was not a TRUE lie, but was the actual truth. In the same way, God told you he made it in six days. He is not being deceptive. My NEW analogy works just fine, forget the brown or blue eye part of it.

If I told you, "I have brown eyes." you''d have to take my word for it. However, if you were to meet me and see that I have blue eyes, you'd know I was lying to you.

That's the problem with saying that god made the world look older than it really is. The evidence for an old earth is there. If god put that evidence there and someone then stumbles over that evidence and god sends them to hell for it then he's condemning them for something HE did. How is that just?!

God does not send someone to hell for believing the earth is billions of years old. God is merciful, but there is a MARGIN of error that you are safe with, and there is a boundary to what you can believe and then the mercy is cut off. If you believe the earth is billions of years old, you can still make it to heaven, if you believe God created death, then that starts getting a little more dangerous.

The evidence is there to prove otherwise.

Imperfect dating methods. That&#8217;s not proof. Also he gave you his word, if you don&#8217;t believe him, then you&#8217;re calling him a liar. That&#8217;s your fault. Now if you seriously THOUGHT his word MEANT it was old (old earth interpretation of genesis) then that is a different story. But if you down right call him a liar, you&#8217;re in hot water.

 

[Jollybear]

There is a massive amount of difference. If Adam and Eve actually existed, which I sincerely doubt, they could see god face-to-face and have him tell them personally how he did it. We don't have that luxury. We are instead expected to simply take the word of an iron age book.

See the difference?

Yes I see the difference, but if you were given the same experience Adam was given, you may say your hallucinating, so it really would not help even if God did show up and tell you how he did it. Jesus was right when he said &#8220;if they don&#8217;t believe in Moses and the prophets, they surely won&#8217;t believe even if someone rises from the dead&#8221;. You fit that description perfectly.

Yes, we have one book that says the earth is young and numerous independent dating methods that say it isn't. To any rational mind, it's an open and shut case.

Ok, I am going to hit this at a different angle now. Let&#8217;s assume genesis MEANT it was OLD (even though I don&#8217;t believe that, but some do) ok, so who cares at the moment about young earth creationism. Ok, God made the earth OLD. Case shut, your now still accountable to God.

Thanks for capitalizing the words in that last sentence. Really shows your objectivity.

Capitalizing the words I did does not show me as having not been objectively listening to both of them debate. Actually, I listened to the debate TWICE. I actually plan on listening to it again a third time because I thought it was SO good. I was listening to both sides objectively. Peter did a TERRIBLE JOB, but I am sure he represented your side correctly, he is both a scientist and a believer in your side of this. But putting myself OUTSIDE both their positions, he did a TERRIBLE job, debate wise. Just by the standards and principles of debate, I think he did a terrible job. Personally I wish there would have been someone more better to debate Stephen then peter.

I&#8217;m not lying to you, I really thought he did a bad job, and it&#8217;s NOT because of what he believed, but because of his debate skill just was bad. Now true enough, a wrong believe will DAMPEN a person&#8217;s ability to debate, perhaps that was the reason he was so terrible at it, but again I won&#8217;t assume anything, it could have been just simply because he was not very good at debating. Either way, I just wish IF it happened to be that it was a issue of low debate skill that they would have gotten someone better for Stephen. I do think that an evolutionist could do better then what he did. I don&#8217;t think they could win, but I do think they could have done better. At least a little bit better.

Because it's not chance and it''s not intelligent

Ok, your hopping all over the place, first you say it&#8217;s unique, now you go back to saying it&#8217;s not chance nor intelligence. Ok, what is it then?

and the idea of those machines being intelligent is laughable.

I find your sentence laughable, how&#8217;s that? You saying my sentence is laughable does not address my actual sentence, which seems to be a standard tactic of yours. Never answer any of my questions or arguments. Nice job.

Here is a question for you, if evolution can create intelligence (people) why can&#8217;t it create intelligence on a biological level with the micro machines? There&#8217;s one for ya.

It bewilders me why you don&#8217;t laugh at the idea that evolution could create intelligent beings like ourselves, but yet you laugh at the idea of it being so on a smaller level.

Absolutely amazes me.

Because the process doesn't behave in an intelligent fashion. Evolution has made numerous mistakes. If there is a designer then we should expect to see better work (unless he is just incompetent)

Hold on there, intelligence does not mean GENIUS, it just means intelligence. At the moment I am not arguing that God is a GENIUS (although I believe he is, and I can make arguments to back that up too) but at the moment I am just arguing that there is intelligence. Bad work is still intelligence BEHIND the work. BAD DESIGN is STILL DESIGN. You see? Now you still have not answered my question. You keep hopping around, is natural selection chance or intelligence or something else? And if you say something else, define it, and don&#8217;t define it as &#8220;unique&#8221; that says nothing.

Also if it does not behave in an intelligent fashion then does it behave in a luck fashion, if not, then what fashion does it behave in then?

Not as such. However if any had stood out I'm sure AIG and creationwiki would have been all over it, especially in that article.

Maybe there are other articles exposing it. I will have to look.

And when one side is shown to be biased?

Let me give you my take on bias. A person who believes something IS BIAS. That means EVERYONE on the planet is biased about something. I am biased because I believe in God, an atheist is biased because he don&#8217;t believe in God. Ok, now that I made that clear, let me explain something else. A person who is biased is NOT necessarily dishonest. You can be biased WITHOUT being dishonest. Let me explain. If the scientist let&#8217;s say publishes his discovery, well of course he is going to have his own views on what he discovered or looked into or witnessed. And that is his bias, but for him to remain HONEST, he MUST separate his views from the facts and he must not WITHOLD ANY of the facts, but must show ALL the facts surrounding his discovery or what he witnessed. When he publishes something, he must STATE clearly when he is presenting pure facts, and he must state clearly when he is presenting his VIEWS OF the facts. He must make that known very clearly. However if a person mixes the facts WITH their views and does not distinguish to the reader the fact from the view and thus leaves the reader in confusion or asking questions, THAT person is not only bias, but is DISHONEST.

It&#8217;s dishonesty that SUCKS and gets in the way of things. And I absolutely hate that.

There is no reason for anybody to lie or corrupt things.

So to your question, what if there bias and DISHONEST? In that case you really can&#8217;t do anything about them, all you can do is try to look at the pure data yourself and not take their word for it. Personally people who are dishonest with their bias, should be FIRED from their job as a scientist because that is POOR work. Warned them first, then if they continue, fire them. There is no need for blatant dishonesty.

Also here is one more thing about bias. One can be objective even if they believe (bias) something. How can this happen? Simply by putting your belief on the shelf and stepping back and observing and listening to both sides.