Creationists: How do you test for "truth"?

[Polymath257]

By the word of God. How do you have the "Word of God" without a God? In the word of God, it's said God created it and God has no reason to lie.

People can *claim* a writing to be the 'Word of God' even if no God exists. They can still claim it and be wrong.

That is how you can have a 'Word of God' and not have a God.

 

[Polymath257]

I think most people get that it does claim to be the word of God.

2 Cor 2:17 Unlike so many, we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, as those sent from God.

! thessalonians 2:13 And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe.

So I guess you've heard wrong, as an unbeliever the word is not "at work within you". You're blind to it and everything you read you see as an error, flaw or contradiction.

Given that the Bible didn't exist when those verses were written (obviously), they *cannot* mean the Bible when they talk about the 'Word of God'.

In fact, if you learn what they *did* mean, it simply means that they *believed* what they said was in agreement with what, in their beliefs, God told them.

No matter what, you are relying on fallible humans to convey any word of a deity.

 

[Polymath257]

Credibility of the witness

What *human* witness is credible enough to establish this?

 

[blü 2]

Same as Pilot i guess. I don't think Pilot was mocking Jesus, he seriously could not find anything wrong with him. Pilot would have set Jesus free but the Jewish leaders wouldn't have it.

But Pilate is simply setting the scene here. The question is, what test do Creationists use to decide whether something is "true" or not eg whether the bible is inerrant?

 

[Polymath257]

Obviously if God created everything he was there to witness its creation. How much more can you add to that?

Now, the issue is whether the book you read actually *is* the 'Word of God' as opposed to the writings of men who believed (rightly or wrongly) in what they wrote.

 

[Polymath257]

science constantly being revised, upgrade very few permanent elements - this is nature of science , very good feature of honest science. No self-respecting scientist would say that non - material world does not exist,

Nor would they say that it does.

 

[socharlie]

Nor would they say that it does.

well, I Know a few who say it does.

 

[blü 2]

why can't you guys both be right? To me, I see no difference between some one that says they are there own authority and what they say is the authority and those that project that authority outwardly and then tells you what that authority's rules are.

One difference is that the correspondence method allows for testing and demonstration. For example, the earth is not flat, whatever the bible says. And this compels Creationists to pretend that the bible actually agrees with reality, when plainly it doesn't, a problem they encounter again and again.

 

[Polymath257]

well, I Know a few who say it does.

Then they cannot be speaking as scientists.

They may be speaking as lay people with an opinion. But then, a scientist could also say there is no non-material word on the same basis.

Neither way is a scientific position at this point, although there are deep philosophical problems with even the notion of a 'non-material' world.

 

[blü 2]

which reality?

Objective reality ─ the reality that exists external to your sense of self, the reality reported to you by your senses.

 

[blü 2]

No, I am a thinking being. I am the test.

Does that mean 'truth' is whatever you tell me it is?

That truth is untestable, has no relationship with objective reality?

That if you and I disagree on what's true, the question of being right or wrong is irrelevant?

That all criminals who plead not guilty must therefore be not guilty?

Since the people who wrote the texts don't understand the texts leaves one explanation God 100 and Mankind 0.

So, you say, the bible doesn't mean what its authors intended?

Wow!

If that's true ─ an accurate statement about reality ─ then the words of the bible don't mean what they say, and no one can know what the bible means. You say there's no other alternative.

 

[socharlie]

Objective reality ─ the reality that exists external to your sense of self, the reality reported to you by your senses.

Non-Computability of Consciousness | Song | NeuroQuantology some kind of still undecided about that,

 

[blü 2]

I think most people get that it does claim to be the word of God.

2 Cor 2:17 Unlike so many, we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, as those sent from God.

! thessalonians 2:13 And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe.

So I guess you've heard wrong, as an unbeliever the word is not "at work within you". You're blind to it and everything you read you see as an error, flaw or contradiction.

Those quotes are not claims that the Tanakh was written by God, and they can't be claims that the NT was written by God because no NT existed when Paul was writing.

As @Subduction Zone mentioned, nowhere in the bible is there a claim that it was written by God. Nor does it ever claim to be inerrant.

And even if the bible contained such claims, they'd have no value unless and until they were objectively verified. All snake oil salesmen constantly assure their listeners that they speak only the truth, for example.

 

[shunyadragon]

science constantly being revised, upgrade very few permanent elements - this is nature of science , very good feature of honest science.

True, but science advances more than it changes. The knowledge of science mostly evolves by addition of knowledge.to the foundation. Your side stepping many issues concerning science.

No self-respecting scientist would say that non - material world does not exist,

Many self respecting scientists reject that non-material worlds do not exist. The important issue is based on Methodological Naturalism virtually all 99%+ agree on the foundation of the present knowledge of science including evolution, regardless of their religious beliefs.

 

[Polymath257]

Non-Computability of Consciousness | Song | NeuroQuantology some kind of still undecided about that,

Well, *that* was a complete waste of time.

Sorry, but the author clearly doesn't understand enough quantum mechanics to talk coherently about the subject. And the journal is not a very good one either.

 

[Father Heathen]

"Since the bible is written by the creator who was there to see and know how creation happened,"

What method did you use to determine the truth of the above statement?

 

[Hawkins]

What is truth? said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer.

─ Francis Bacon, 'On Truth'​

Dear Creationists

My own view is that truth is conformity with reality. This, often called the 'correspondence' view, means that if you want to know whether a particular statement is true or not, you check how accurately its report corresponds to objective reality. Thus truth can in principle be objectively verified ─ a wholly admirable quality, surely you agree, for any claim of truth to have.

You must use this definition of truth at least part of the time, even if just to know that it's true it's daytime, you're in Kamloops, those are Bikkios on the supermarket shelf, and so on.

But then you add a wholly different concept of 'truth' ─ that the bible is inerrant and therefore all its factual statements are necessarily 'true'.

What truth test did you carry out on the bible to determine that it's inerrant?

Let me show you the big picture first.

You need to first understand what humans can do and can't. Humans are basically blocked from the direct access of both the past and future. It is a kind of delusion (as a result of being brainwashed by education) to think that evidence can lead us to the past efficiently while it's not. As an individual, you can't even remember what you yourself did today but a month (or a year ago). If you can't recall what you did or said efficiently, it means that on that particular day, we have 7 billion humans lost their memory. If you did only one thing or said only one speech, we have 7 billion odd cases per day which can hardly be evidenced. To put it another way, if you can't provide the evidence of your own deed/speeches on a daily basis, nor can the 7 billion humans. We thus have billions after billions of human actions/speeches can never be evidenced in our past. There's how the availability of evidence comes scarcely and rarely.

For the same reason (of lacking access to both past and future), humans seldom rely on evidence to get to a truth, a truth virtually of any kind.

Category of truths:

1) a scientific truth
May be to your surprise, humans in majority seldom rely on evidence to get to a scientific truth. That's why among the 100% humans (virtually all humans in modern societies) who know for a fact that black holes exist, 99.99% of them don't have the evidence!

Humans almost exclusively employ faith in a "middle man" (literally his credibility) as the eye witness to get to a truth. In the black hole case, we rely on the "middle man" our cosmo scientists as the eye witnesses for us to believe them with faith to get to such a truth. It is so because we believe that our scientists are maintaining a direct contact with the truth, and they are deemed to be credible for us to put faith in them to get to the truth. We (99.99% humans) don't examine the evidence of black holes ourselves. The cosmo scientists will do the job for us, and for us to put our faith in to get to the truth.

2) present occurrence
We rely on putting faith in our media to get to a truth occurring around the world on a daily basis. It is so because our media made up of reporters and journalists are believed to be maintaining a direct contact with the eye witnesses, and they are deemed credible for us to put our faith in to get to the truth. We (99.99%) humans don't examine evidence behind each piece of news.

We can't however examine a scientific truth and any present occurrence if we wish to. This is due to the nature of these two category of truths. A scientific truth can be repeated infinitive number of times for us to do our speculation. While a present occurrence may (or may not) leave trails for us to do our speculation.

3) historical occurrence
We rely on putting faith in what have written by historians to get to such a kind of truth. The historians are not necessarily credible, especially in the case of ancient history. This is so because it's out of humans' capability to access the past to confirm their credibility. Sometimes and in front of ancient history, if we choose to reject it, say due to lack of tracked credibility of the historians, it only means we won't have that part of history at all. Under most circumstance we only loosely check the credibility of the authors and will accept its legitimacy simply because we don't have an option!

History can hardly be evidenced. Even the videos of WWII are not evidence strictly speaking. They are part of the human witnessing process, as what we trust with faith is not the videos themselves but the credibility of those behind the videos. We watched them from credible media channels such as National Geographic for us to deem them credible. We could have more videos of UFO, they are however not deemed as truth due to the lack of the credibility. If one day they are broadcast by NASA (a credible agent) we can thus deem them as a truth!

Archaeology on the other hand is about trails left (usually by a fluke) by mass human activities such as war scenes. It's not for the deeds and speeches of individual historical figures. Even when archaeology is taken into account, it's yet another form of human witnessing as 99.99% humans don't dig up in archaeology sites. It's the "middle man" our archaeologists who do the job for us to believe with faith.

4) future occurrence
It's cut from our direct access more completely. The only way left for us to reach the future is by putting faith in the "middle man". If this "middle man" is a direct eye witness of the truth, or he's a direct witness of God (if God exists). You can examine into the credibility of this "middle man" to make your own decision on whether to put faith in or not. Anyhow, putting faith remains the only way to reach the whole category of this kind of truth!

The truth of a religion (assume there's a truth for the sake of argument), is a mixture of 3) and 4). It's a "history" plus an advocate about the future. The different between the "history" of a religion and human history is that human history are the claimed recordings/testimonies of human deeds/speeches which are lying within our comprehension and understanding. The "history" of a religion however is the claimed recordings/testimonies of God's deeds, which are thus not necessarily lying within humans' comprehension and understanding.

Nevertheless, shall there be any truth out there the only possible means for humans to reach such a truth is through putting faith in the "middle man". Unless the god behind chooses to show up in front of all mankind. If the god has a good reason (you may examine to see if the reason provided by the religion is good enough) to hide behind, putting faith remains the only way for humans to reach such a truth.

The "good reason" for the Christianity God to hide behind is that all mankind has a covenant for them to be saved by faith. So if God shows up to everyone, it means all mankind cannot be saved by this covenant. If on the other hand, He doesn't show up to any humans at all then no humans even know of the existence of such a covenant. The only way which works is for God to show up in front of the chosen eye-witnesses (God's prophets and apostles) and for them to write down the "history" of religion, then for the rest of mankind to believe with faith!

 

[Subduction Zone]

Let me show you the big picture first.

You need to first understand what humans can do and can't. Humans are basically blocked from the direct access of both the past and future. It is a kind of delusion (as a result of being brainwashed by education) to think that evidence can lead us to the past efficiently while it's not. As an individual, you can't even remember what you yourself did today but a month (or a year ago). If you can't recall what you did or said efficiently, it means that on that particular day, we have 7 billion humans lost their memory. If you did only one thing or said only one speech, we have 7 billion odd cases per day which can hardly be evidenced. To put it another way, if you can't provide the evidence of your own deed/speeches on a daily basis, nor can the 7 billion humans. We thus have billions after billions of human actions/speeches can never be evidenced in our past. There's how the availability of evidence comes scarcely and rarely.

For the same reason (of lacking access to both past and future), humans seldom rely on evidence to get to a truth, a truth virtually of any kind.

Category of truths:

1) a scientific truth
May be to your surprise, humans in majority seldom rely on evidence to get to a scientific truth. That's why among the 100% humans (virtually all humans in modern societies) who know for a fact that black holes exist, 99.99% of them don't have the evidence!

Humans almost exclusively employ faith in a "middle man" (literally his credibility) as the eye witness to get to a truth. In the black hole case, we rely on the "middle man" our cosmo scientists as the eye witnesses for us to believe them with faith to get to such a truth. It is so because we believe that our scientists are maintaining a direct contact with the truth, and they are deemed to be credible for us to put faith in them to get to the truth. We (99.99% humans) don't examine the evidence of black holes ourselves. The cosmo scientists will do the job for us, and for us to put our faith in to get to the truth.

If one takes scientists at their word that is hardly "faith". One can always check their work or the evidence if one cares enough. Or one can even see some of the most obvious evidence where published in non-scientific sources. For example this is a computer animation of the motion of stars around the black hole in the center of our galaxy:

If one cared one could go and read the original peer reviewed article. Trusting scientists that have put their work through the wringer of peer review is not "faith". Scientists in general have an earned trust, not faith, based upon their body of work. Now if one was lazy I suppose that would be faith, but the simple act of turning on a TV confirms much of the work of many scientists. Perhaps you are jealous since there really are no concrete examples that confirm your own person religious views.

 

[Hawkins]

If one takes scientists at their word that is hardly "faith". One can always check their work or the evidence if one cares enough. Or one can even see some of the most obvious evidence where published in non-scientific sources. For example this is a computer animation of the motion of stars around the black hole in the center of our galaxy:

If one cared one could go and read the original peer reviewed article. Trusting scientists that have put their work through the wringer of peer review is not "faith". Scientists in general have an earned trust, not faith, based upon their body of work. Now if one was lazy I suppose that would be faith, but the simple act of turning on a TV confirms much of the work of many scientists. Perhaps you are jealous since there really are no concrete examples that confirm your own person religious views.

This is so by nature of science as a category of truth. Not all categories of truths can be examined this way. I already explained this clearly in my post. We can choose to examine a scientific truth simply because by the nature of science it's always about something which can be repeated infinitive number of times for humans to confirm its truth. Not all kinds of truths can be repeated this way.

 

[Subduction Zone]

This is so by nature of science as a category of truth. Not all categories of truths can be examined this way. I already explained this clearly in my post. We can choose to examine a scientific truth simply because by the nature of science it's always about something which can be repeated infinitive number of times for humans to confirm its truth.

So why the incorrect claims of "faith" when it comes to accepting the work of scientists?