Different Opinions....Who is right?

[Dan From Smithville]

I sometimes wonder if you even read the articles you provide links for. Both just made me laugh. Suggestion masquerading as fact....nothing new. No handwave required....just read it and see how many suggestions there are that you would otherwise never see or acknowledge.

What is speciation? Seriously.....all speciation does is produce varieties within a well defined family of creatures. Adaptation is the mechanism, an inbuilt, programmed response to a change in environment or food source.....all well documented and observed.

What speciation will never do is change the taxonomy of any organism, as your constant reference to monophy demonstrates. Macro-evolution depends on changes in definitions of a “family”, by assuming that in the early process of evolution that a single cell found a way to keep changing (morphing) so that these moved out of their microscopic cellular existence to create all manner of living things. But, ‘amoebas to dinosaurs’ has NO real evidence to support it....none...zip....zilch.

Arguing on one end of this question does not explain how that first process, imagined by scientists, actually fits in with what they know, rather than what they imagine. It is wishful thinking at best, delusional at worst....but obviously convincing to a lot of people. Please don’t pretend that it convinces everyone.

If you have no proof for the beginning, what is the point of arguing about things at the end? What something became is moot if you have no idea how all these species found their way into their classifications in the first place? When did monophy kick in? How would you even know?

Denial and condescension. Let us not forget that. Plenty of that.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

Like you?

What he has to say is unimportant and I do not hear him.

 

[Deeje]

I have noticed that when examples of the behavior are noted, there is an increase in the application. As if a petulant child were responding to being admonished.

It seems to me that the petulant theistic evolutionists are throwing tantrums because the foot they have in both camps is being presented as a sad delusion. Apparently they don't like being admonished either....

A Christian believes Jesus....an atheist doesn't. At least an atheist has made a choice.

Matthew 19:4..."Did you not read that he who created them at the beginning made them male and female." Are theistic evolutionists calling Jesus a liar? He was there at creation...shouldn't he know how God created humans and everything else? Where did we "read" about that? Wasn't it in the Bible?.....why would God present false stories? Why not come right out and say that he did by evolution? Case closed. No further argument.

Clearly you deny evidence, create fallacious narratives and believe what you want. Don't drag the rest of us down with you out of spite for the validity of our views.

Oh, I see the problem now.....you think that believing in creation somehow "drags you down"....? In whose eyes?.....anyone important? Speaking the truth is now an act of spite? Oh boy....

How does a "Christian" deny the "evidence" when it all points to an Intelligent and purposeful Creator? Denying God the full credit for his creation, is denying the real evidence. The Artist has his signature on everything.....would you pay a lot of money for a reproduction...or something that was mass produced by a machine....or would you value only the real, hand made, one of a kind, artwork? God produced the originals and gave them the ability to pass on life to their offspring.....and no matter how long these creatures go on reproducing, they will never step outside of their "kind". They may make modifications based on environmental factors or food sources, but they will never become something other than what God created them to be. That is what the Bible teaches. I believe God.

All I have seen from you is wishful thinking, goalpost moving, false dichotomies, misinformation and a lot of useless tongue wagging in written form.

Funny....but this is all I see from evolutionists.....have theistic evolutionists ever asked themselves why they need evolution to be true, even though they claim to be "Christians"? Is it because they really believe that the scientists' "evidence" cannot be wrong? Is it a pride thing because they don't want to be seen as 'unscientific' in their evaluation of life here on Planet Earth? Is an each way bet really based on sound Christian teaching? Or does God require faith that what he says is true?

Can they in all good conscience remove the Creator from his own work in such a way as to include him, but only just.....not in the way the Bible says, but the way atheistic science teaches it "must have" happened?

I will let Jesus answer those questions....

 

[dad]

I cannot understand how anyone might suggest that evolution proceeds purely by 'fluke', if that is what is being suggested here. It would be simply mind-boggling that anyone could do that and still believe they were discussing evolution.

So what does it proceed by, a plan?

 

[dad]

Variations of these patterns over many years made those individuals more likely to survive compared to those that didn't got good camouflage and therefore they could pass on their genes.

You have been observing..how many years? Careful not to present your beliefs as fact.

 

[Nimos]

You have been observing..how many years? Careful not to present your beliefs as fact.

Personally I haven't observed anything, if that is what you mean?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I sometimes wonder if you even read the articles you provide links for. Both just made me laugh. Suggestion masquerading as fact....nothing new. No handwave required....just read it and see how many suggestions there are that you would otherwise never see or acknowledge.

This tells me you didn't read the articles.

What is speciation?

You have a population species A.
You split them up in A1 and A2, genetically isolate both groups and drop 1 of them in a somewhat different environment.

Slowly, they will diverge through the accumulation of genetic micro-changes.

At some point members of A1 will no longer be able to produce with members of A2.

Speciation.

Seriously.....all speciation does is produce varieties within a well defined family of creatures.

As per the law of monophy, yes.

Adaptation is the mechanism, an inbuilt, programmed response to a change in environment or food source.....all well documented and observed.

I wouldn't exactly word it like that, because it sounds a bit like you're saying that changes occur in function off the changes of the environment - as if it is reactionary.

The mutations are always random with respect to fitness. "fitness" in terms of selection pressures dictated by the environment.

What is actually affected by changing environments, isn't the changes being introduced... it's the natural selection process of these changes. It's selection that responds to environmental change...

(notwithstanding that there are off course circumstances that can affect mutation rate... but that still doesn't change anything about the fact that mutation is random with respect to fitness.. no matter the rate by which it occurs)

What speciation will never do is change the taxonomy of any organism, as your constant reference to monophy demonstrates.

Exactly. So asking for examples of "kinds" evolving into different "kinds" as if it supports evolution, is a strawman.

The law of monophy is a law of evolution.

Macro-evolution depends on changes in definitions of a “family”,

It does not, as I have explained so many times already.

by assuming that in the early process of evolution that a single cell found a way to keep changing (morphing) so that these moved out of their microscopic cellular existence to create all manner of living things. But, ‘amoebas to dinosaurs’ has NO real evidence to support it....none...zip....zilch.

Except for all the genetic evidence that actually demonstrates common ancestry to be a genetic fact, off course.

People, especially creationists, tend to think that "common ancestry" is also a theoretical concept of the theory of evolution. It is not. It is one of the facts that evolution offers an explanation for.

Evolution is a model that explains how a single species can give rise to a wide variety of sub-species.
That a single species can give rise to a wide variety of subspecies, is the main fact that evolution addresses.

Arguing on one end of this question does not explain how that first process, imagined by scientists, actually fits in with what they know, rather than what they imagine. It is wishful thinking at best, delusional at worst....but obviously convincing to a lot of people. Please don’t pretend that it convinces everyone.

Well, to be perfectly honest with you.....
The extreme vast majority of people that actually properly comprehend the theory, also accept it.
I know of almost nobody who actually understands the theory properly and who rejects it.

At the same time, it is also the case that the extreme majority of creationists show in every conversation on the topic, they do not belong to the group of people who properly comprehend the theory.

So really, yeah, I feel quite justified to state that as good as everybody that actually properly understands it, also accepts it.

If you have no proof for the beginning, what is the point of arguing about things at the end?

What "beginning"? Don't tell you me you are again going to start confusing abiogenesis with evolution?
Back to that strawman?

It's simply amazing.... Once more, you fall back to a PRATT that you have been explained countless times already.

Why do you insist on getting it wrong?

What something became is moot if you have no idea how all these species found their way into their classifications in the first place? When did monophy kick in?

The second reproduction started.

How would you even know?

I understand (or rather: I don't ignore) how biological reproduction works.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

So what does it proceed by, a plan?

Selection pressures dictated by the environment.

This is why everything looks as if it was "meant" to live in the habitat it is in.
Because through natural selection, it was literally guided to blend into that environment.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Who put these classifications together in the first place?

People who actually know what they are doing, and who can actually justify the classifications with actual genetic data. And who will happily change the classifications if the data so demands.

Who insinuates that because organisms are mammals that they must all be related?

Not "who". Instead "what". And the answer is "genetics".
You know... the same kind of evidence that we also use to determine if your siblings are your actual biological siblings, or your parents your actual parents, or your cousins your actual cousins...

In case you haven't noticed yet: DNA is a great tool to determine lineages and relatedness.

In Australia we have monotremes.....egg laying mammals. Where do they belong on the evolutionary tree?

Under mammals.

The classifications past "family" begin to have less and less evidence supporting them in any evolutionary sense.

That's just false.
There's the genetic record, the fossil record, comparative anatomy, comparative genomics, geographic distribution of species, geological & geographic distribution of fossils, tracing of genetic markers,...

All independend lines of evidence that all converge on the same conclusion of common ancestry.
There's no evidence contradicting any of this at all.

I have as much real "evidence" for the existence of an Intelligent Creator as you have for his non existence.

That's because the undetectable and the non-existant look very much alike.

Off course the burden of proof is on the positive claim. In this case the claim that a creator exists. So I guess this was you saying you have zero evidence. Got it. Claim rejected.

As for the claim that no creator exists... I don't make that claim, because I don't see the point of making unfalsifiable claims without evidence or any sort of rational justification. ;-)

I can say "might have" "could have" "leads us to the conclusion that..." and make a case

Not a valid case that holds up under scrutiny, though.
Let alone a case that actually makes usefull testable predictions.................

Ah Tiktaalik...lets talk about our first walking fish....

The one that was found by prediction?

I'll quote this National Geographic article on Tiktaalik because I want to highlight the obvious problems with assumption when describing something that supposedly existed 375 million years ago.....

"Our Fishy Ancestors Had Fins Made for Walking
One of the first creatures to live on land sported surprisingly strong hips and fins.

BY DAN VERGANO, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC
PUBLISHED JANUARY 14, 2014

ONE OF THE first "fish" to walk on land some 375 million years ago made its way with surprisingly strong hips and fins, report paleontologists.

Unearthed in the Canadian Arctic in 2006, Tiktaalik roseae, a genus of early land-walking fish, made headlines with news of its discovery, which was funded by the National Geographic Society. The new report fleshes out how our ancient four-limbed ancestors first made the move from water to land. (See pictures: "Nine Fish With 'Hands' Found to Be New Species.")

"They're big—the hips of Tiktaalik look very robust," says University of Chicago paleontologist Neil Shubin, who led the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The find suggests that the pelvic girdle changes that accompanied the move to land by vertebrates—animals with backbones such as Tiktaalik—"started in the water or, more accurately, in the swamp," he says. (Also see "Pictures: 'Walking' Fish a Model of Evolution in Action.")

Tiktaalik lived in marshy river settings resembling today's Amazon. Up to 9 feet (2.7 meters) long, the lobed fish hunted like a freshwater crocodile in rivers and inlets, and had a surprisingly agile neck and primitive lungs.

"We are really just getting a glimpse into one of the most fascinating transitions for vertebrates," says paleontologist Catherine Boisvert of Australia's Monash University.

A series of discoveries, including Tiktaalik and similar creatures over the past decade, she says, are opening up to scholars the time when animals—other than insects—first made the leap to land.

The newly discovered pelvis of Tiktaalik, pictured here between a life-sized reconstruction (left) and a cast of the skeleton (right).

PHOTOGRAPH BY KEVIN JIANG, THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO (See link for photos)

The discovery of additional materials from the hind fin of Tiktaalik roseae a 375 million year old fossil suggest it was able to to use its hind fins as props as well as paddles.

Tiktaalik means "large, freshwater fish" in the language of the Nunavut people, who live in the region near its discovery site on Canada's frigid Ellesmere Island (map).

Shubin has nicknamed Tiktaalik the "fishapod," a play on the scientific "tetrapod" designation given to all four-legged animals and their descendants. (See also: "Tiktaalik Discovery Among National Geographic's Top Grants.")

"Our original discovery of Tiktaalik was so big that we had to split it into two parts, because we didn't have enough plaster," Shubin says. "This was the back end, and we were surprised to find a pelvis inside."

In addition to being much larger, proportionally, than the rear fin-supporting pelvis bones of a fish, Tiktaalik's hips point outward, more like a land animal's. The suspicion is that the creature propelled itself over mud flats and shallows with large, surprisingly well-articulated rear fins.

Until now scholars have known very little about the anatomical bridges between ancient fish and the much larger land creatures that came later, notes paleontologist Per Ahlberg of Sweden's Uppsala University.

"With the Tiktaalik material the preservation is so good that it will be possible to reconstruct aspects of the pelvic-fin musculature and the range of movement of the fin," Ahlberg said by email.

"This will really help us to understand the locomotory transformation from fish to tetrapod."

Land Dwellers

Why fish made the move to land 395 million years ago remains a bit of a mystery, says Boisvert. At the time, the ancient supercontinent of Gondwana was drifting toward the proto-North American continent. (Also see "Oldest Animal Discovered—Earliest Ancestor of Us All?")

"This drift created many shallow-water habitats, hence perfect places for something crocodile-like to thrive," she says. "These environments are also at the equator at that time, so it is nice and warm and tropical."

But there wasn't a lot to eat on land at the time for Tiktaalik, aside from spiders, scorpions, insects, and a few plants. Fewer predators or a safer place to lay eggs may have instead driven land creatures to evolve, some suggest.

"What we are seeing is that the transition to land was a real transition, not from the sea to land in one fell swoop," says Shubin, author of Your Inner Fish: A Journey Into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body.

"Creatures moved from open water to shallows, to marshes, to edges, before moving to land in a long, slow transition."

Our Fishy Ancestors Had Fins Made for Walking

Everything in this article about Tiktaalik is guesswork and assumptions made to fit pre-conceived ideas about evolution.

Being incredibly intellectually honest again, I see.

Focussing on a couple pixels, misrepresenting those pixels and then lying about the whole thing.
Good job.

People like you make the job of people like me a lot easier.

How on earth does anyone know what a creature who lived 350 million years ago did or didn't do? Good grief!

By studying it's anatomy and environment it lived in.
You might not be familiar with this concept of "studying" though.

You believe what you want to believe......like we all do.

Projection.
At least you admit that all you have is some belief without evidence.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

It seems to me that the petulant theistic evolutionists are throwing tantrums because the foot they have in both camps is being presented as a sad delusion. Apparently they don't like being admonished either....

A Christian believes Jesus....an atheist doesn't. At least an atheist has made a choice.

Matthew 19:4..."Did you not read that he who created them at the beginning made them male and female." Are theistic evolutionists calling Jesus a liar? He was there at creation...shouldn't he know how God created humans and everything else? Where did we "read" about that? Wasn't it in the Bible?.....why would God present false stories? Why not come right out and say that he did by evolution? Case closed. No further argument.



Oh, I see the problem now.....you think that believing in creation somehow "drags you down"....? In whose eyes?.....anyone important? Speaking the truth is now an act of spite? Oh boy....

How does a "Christian" deny the "evidence" when it all points to an Intelligent and purposeful Creator? Denying God the full credit for his creation, is denying the real evidence. The Artist has his signature on everything.....would you pay a lot of money for a reproduction...or something that was mass produced by a machine....or would you value only the real, hand made, one of a kind, artwork? God produced the originals and gave them the ability to pass on life to their offspring.....and no matter how long these creatures go on reproducing, they will never step outside of their "kind". They may make modifications based on environmental factors or food sources, but they will never become something other than what God created them to be. That is what the Bible teaches. I believe God.



Funny....but this is all I see from evolutionists.....have theistic evolutionists ever asked themselves why they need evolution to be true, even though they claim to be a "Christians"? Is it because they really believe that the scientists' "evidence" cannot be wrong? Is it a pride thing because they don't want to be seen as 'unscientific' in their evaluation of life here on Planet Earth? Is an each way bet really based on sound Christian teaching? Or does God require faith that what he says is true?

Can they in all good conscience remove the Creator from his own work in such a way as to include him, but only just.....not in the way the Bible says, but the way atheistic science teaches it "must have" happened?

I will let Jesus answer those questions....

This sounds like a personal attack against someone and it has no place in the discussion. I assume that something someone said hurt your feelings and you are lashing out.

You claim to understand science, but clearly you do not. You cannot even fathom how millions that know Christ can understand and accept science.

I feel badly for you that you have to resort to this sort of post, but please do not make this thread into a bunch of smarmy and irrelevant personal attacks to make yourself feel better.

 

[cladking]

"best equipped for survival in the habitat they find themselves in as compared to their peers".

So you define "best equipped for survival in the habitat they find themselves in as compared to their peers" as survival of the fittest.

It remains a circular argument. I'm very sorry that reality is so complex but without understanding why one consciousness survives where another does not you can never understand how species change. We can someday model much of it and gain insights into past changes but not until we understand consciousness; not until we have defined and reduced "all" of the relevant parameters. You're just going to have to deal with this.

On the bright side we don't have to chuck out the few experiments that have been done, we merely need to chuck the conclusions and models. We get to keep the technology that has sprung from our (mis)understandings but we need to eradicate the silly beliefs and perspectives that have arisen.

ALL animals are fit. They are each different and equally fit. The idea that some are more fit than others is the greatest evil of our time and even exceeds the evil that we know everything. We murder billions in the name of our silly beliefs.

 

[cladking]

You didn't point out anything. You just made an assertion and I asked you to provide evidence in support of said assertion.

You are blind to arguments and evidence that don't agree with your thinking. You are blind to the metaphysics that drives the reductionistic perspective of reality. You do not only fail to address my arguments you fail to even see them. You fail to see religious arguments as well simply because it is faith based but then you don't see your argument is faith based as well. You have a faith in the nebulous concept of "science" that you don't comprehend and in language that means something different to every single user.

No, I'm not. Hypothesis / theories are meant to be explanations of sets of data / observations. It's kind of hard to come up with an explanation of data when no data exists to explain..............

Yes. Obviously you're right. The problem is you can explain anything with virtually no knowledge or understanding at all. 19th century scientists explained "gravity" quite glibly and still we don't really know what it is. Today we explain "evolution" yet don't even have a definition for consciousness!!!

Fitness and natural selection, isn't about become some type of indestructible creature that is immune to any and all deseases.

So you're suggesting you can predict the odds of a rabbit and her baby surviving an encounter with a bobcat without understanding the nature of consciousness.

I'm sorry reality is so complex and some things will never be understood through reductionism alone. This is reality where the evil can survive as the good perish or are otherwise changed. This is reality where the weak can flourish as the strong succumb. This is reality and beliefs play no role except to lead us straight back to these same beliefs in an endless circle.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

The theory and facts of evolution are not true out of anyone's need for them to be true. To say so defines an ignorance of science and a lust for a personal view to replace evidence and understanding. Science and acceptance of science is not rejection of God by default. That notion is ludicrous and without dignity.

Accepting science based on the evidence is no more difficult and against God than reviewing the evidence of a crime and coming to a logical conclusion about the guilt of a suspect. The conclusion comes from the evidence and not from a demand that a particular conclusion be true. That is the basis of the OP here. There is the claim of a desired conclusion and everything else has to fit that conclusion. Or be ignored, altered, misinterpreted, or manipulated using a number of logically fallacious methods.

 

[Dan From Smithville]

In an off topic aside, I have noticed that many claim to follow Jesus, but really worship the Bible. It is like eating the cookbook instead of the food that is intended to be made from it.

 

[metis]

In an off topic aside, I have noticed that many claim to follow Jesus, but really worship the Bible. It is like eating the cookbook instead of the food that is intended to be made from it.

And in many cases rely on secular right-wing sources and politicians than on either.

There simply is no way possible that one can believe in Trump and believe in Jesus: Matthew 6[24]"No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

 

[Bear Wild]

You don't need to be able to identify a common ancestor to know that one exists or existed.

For example, we could take a bunch of anonymous DNA samples and sequence them. From that data, we could determine how they relate to eachother. So we could for example pick out siblings. This would expose them to have the same common ancestor - WITHOUT being able to identify that common ancestor.

So yea, it's not at all the case that one must be able to identify a specific common ancestor in order to determine shared ancestry.

If you would understand phylogenies and how DNA testing works, you'ld know that.

The theory would collapse if the phylogenetic data wouldn't converge and expose common ancestry. But the phylogenetic data does converge and expose common ancestry.

​

For one, the reference YOU YOURSELF posted earlier in the thread.
Let me remind you:

Different Opinions....Who is right?

"Phylogeny diagrams
Phylogeny may be represented by a tree diagram called phylogenetic tree (also called evolutionary tree). The diagram depicts the relationships among organisms or the relatedness between taxa. It is created based on molecular phylogeny studies and on morphological data. "




Nope. As the reference YOU YOURSELF POSTED clearly states: they are created based on phylogenetic and morphhological data.



Objective evidence.



No. Objective evidence.




They are not.




Because between "100% proven" and "completely based on faith", there a is a whole range of "supported by evidence" that you insist on ignoring.

Not a single theory in science is "proven".
ALL are supported by evidence. Some better then others.
Not a single one of them, though, is based on faith.

Faith is reserved for supersitious beliefs like theism, homeopathy, crystal healing, fortune telling, tarrot readers, astrology, etc.




No. I'ld rather say that all religions are faith based beliefs, but not all faith based beliefs are religions.
Homeopathy for example is faith based, but I wouldn't exactly call it a "religion".




I don't think I ever said that.
I also don't quite understand what you mean by that.

In any case, even if I'ld accept that... being a substitute for something, doesn't mean that it therefor is the equivalent and with the same merrit or outcome.

For example, a friend of mine has quit smoking. He needed something to "fill the void". So he basicly substituted smoking with jogging.

I don't think you'ld say that jogging is the equivalent of smoking, right?
So even if you would call it a "substitute", that still doesn't make it "equal" or on "the same footing" by any stretch of the imagination.

The fact remains...
Science is evidence based.
Religion is faith based.




Now, you are confusing "passion" for "religious fervor".
You're being dishonest again. Your comparisions / equivocations are completely absurd.




It's not. Instead, it's based on legends, dreams, visions, anecdotes, bare assertion, superstition,... like all other religions.



Not even remotely, as you yourself demonstrate with every science-denial post you make only to uphold your religious beliefs.

If your religious belief was "totally alligned to science", you wouldn't feel the need to create a thread dedicated to arguing against established science.



Says the person who believes in miracles (=magic) performed by this god....




We don't have the same evidence, as your ilk ignores a whole bunch of evidence, like just about everything from phylogenies and associated material.

Furthermore, your "interpretation" is completely merritless. It makes no predictions, it's unfalsifiable, untestable and it flies in the face of all the evidence you ignore.

This is why paleontologists succeed in finding fossils like tiktaalik by prediction, while you can't even properly define what you mean by "kind".




Except that it is. Books are written by humans.




Ancient greeks knew the earth was spherical and had no problem finding that out without telescopes or satelites.

Meanwhile people that suggested heliocentrism were presecuted by the religious authorities for daring to go against "god's word".



At least you admit that the contents of the bible were compiled by ignorant folks, I guess.




No. Explanatory power has to do with the ability to predict testable outcomes.
Like when paleontologists predicted the geological rock, location and anatomical features of tiktaalik and then started digging and actually found it.



Evolution, like all scientific theories, depends on independent verifiability and data.



Questioning findings, is at the very heart of scientific inquiry.
The problem is that the "questioning" you do, is that it is based on sheer ignorance, strawmen and denial of evidence. That's not valid questioning. That's just being willfully ignorant and in denial.




No scientific theory can be proven. Only supported.
How many times have people already informed you of this?
How long will you remain willfully ignorant on that?
How long before you'll finally correct this mistake which you repeat ad nauseum?




Evolution theory is very concrete yes. But it is pretty much set in concrete because of the overwhelming amount of evidence in support of it, and it's immense explanatory power.




No scientific theory is ever considered proven.
Again: correct your misconceptions. It will make you say less stupid things.



Not proof. Evidence. And lots of it.




When you insist on ignoring the facts, you might off course miss how they support the science.
And how you misrepresent the science, has been made clear already in this thread alone.
I can't even count the amount of times I had to explain the law of monophy to you. And I'm absolutely 110% certain that sooner or later, you'll be back with that same already corrected claim which will once again call for the need to explain it all over again.

Because you can only argue against evolution by misrepresenting it.



A non-existing shovel suffices to burry a non-existing entity.
I don't require a shovel to burry a thing that can't be differentiated from the non-existing.
In fact, there isn't anything there to burry.



What you call facts, have been shown to be nothing but misconceptions.



Macro-evolution refers to evolution at the species level. ie, speciation.
You don't agree speciation happens?



"look at the birds"


Great argument you got there.

I am impressed and give you credit for handling her long, drawn out, exhausting posts!

 

[Bear Wild]

In an off topic aside, I have noticed that many claim to follow Jesus, but really worship the Bible. It is like eating the cookbook instead of the food that is intended to be made from it.

I like that comparison and reminds me of a similar phrase I learned while studying Zen Buddhism .
When the student asked the master about finding the truth in scriptures the master answered.
"Scriptures are like a man pointing to the moon. He who takes the hand to be the moon has no wisdom. "

 

[Bear Wild]

This sounds like a personal attack against someone and it has no place in the discussion. I assume that something someone said hurt your feelings and you are lashing out.

You claim to understand science, but clearly you do not. You cannot even fathom how millions that know Christ can understand and accept science.

I feel badly for you that you have to resort to this sort of post, but please do not make this thread into a bunch of smarmy and irrelevant personal attacks to make yourself feel better.

You have to understand it is one thing for deeje to argue with one of those awful atheist or heathens but argue with someone who accepts the Christian religion must make deeje nervous thus the increased irrational response.

 

[dad]

Personally I haven't observed anything, if that is what you mean?

You mentioned this

"Variations of these patterns over many years.." You can't say much about years except for as long as science has been observing. Not very long.

 

[dad]

There simply is no way possible that one can believe in Trump and believe in Jesus: Matthew 6[24]"No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

Not really. Believing people exist is not having them as masters.