There are no eyewitness accounts of Jesus in the New Testament

[Subduction Zone]

It is evidence enough to rest rest a faith upon.
Denying the evidence seems to come from a place of wanting to say that anything other than the supernatural is a better explanation.

That is hardly "evidence". Or at best it is very poor evidence. Evidence is supposed to be rational and your argument is definitely not rational.

 

[Brian2]

No, please do not make false claims about others and learn some history. And your question is poorly formed. It is an attempt to shift the burden of proof.

You have no evidence to support the idea that a God is not needed.

Wrong again. If one cannot test claims about the past then that is not science. And those ideas are tested again and again.

Science cannot test the ideas that it has about what happened in the past.

And please try to be honest. You used a strawman argument.

What strawman argument? I just said what happens.
Science does not say that God is not needed or is needed. Science does not cover that subject. Too many people seem to think that science does cover that subject.

 

[Trailblazer]

You have no evidence to support the idea that a God is not needed.

We could only know that a God is not needed if there was no God.

 

[Brian2]

That's where one is very likely to find people claiming to be certain.

I think I may have answered these before. But here goes again.

Even? You mean between religion and science, only science is tentative.

No I don't mean that. I mean that science is also tentative.

Skepticism, by which I mean the choice to not believe claims unless they are sufficiently evidenced, and belief by faith are mutually exclusive. Skeptics don't take leaps of faith and people who do aren't skeptics.

We all take leaps of faith. Sufficiently evidenced is just a subjective and arbitrary place to leap from.

What you call evidence for god is the same evidence that leads the atheist to naturalism. The usual evidence believers offer are biblical prophecies, medieval arguments, and the complexity of reality. None of these are sufficient evidence to justify a god belief.

The leap of faith into naturalism. Naturalism seems to be present in the atheist also.
But yes the evidence you cite is not sufficient for you to believe in God. Maybe it is also not sufficient for me to believe in God, but I do believe.

This is similar to your ignorantiam argument above. You seem to think that not demonstrating that gods exist means that you are justified in believing that they do.

@Subduction Zone seemed to be saying that science has shown that God was not needed, I was just contradicting him with the truth, that science has not shown that.
IOW it is a lie to say that science has shown that God is not needed.

There is no need to show that gods aren't needed to remain agnostic about them. To change that in the mind of a critically thinking empiricist, you need to provide a compelling argument that they are.

If people want to remain naturalistic in their approach to evidence, and to see any potential naturalistic answer as better than a supernatural answer, that is fine.
It is not needed to provide compelling arguments that God is needed, that is just one of the possible answers that exist and the idea that there is the supernatural and God is an answer that has evidence in the history of human experience.
Being a naturalist and rejecting the supernatural is a leap of faith.

 

[Brian2]

Why would anyone desire faith? It is not a pathway to the truth.

How do you know that?

By forming proper scientific hypotheses. That is an explanation that can be tested. The tests are based upon the predictions that the hypothesis makes, and it must be denovo knowledge. Or in other words,it is cheating to make predictions that one already knows the answers too.

For example, humans have one less pair of chromosomes than other great apes have. That means for human evolution to be true either two of our chromosomes joined or one of theirs split. Three different times. And apparently the same ones. That was very unlikely. When we could sequence the human genome this was put to the test. If a clear sign of a join could not be found the human part of evolution would be rather dubious. But in our number two chromosome they found both an abandoned centromere and telomeres inside of our chromosome where they didn't belong.

OK that is fairly convincing and most Christians might believe something like that also.
There is nothing like that for all ideas of what happened in the past and it does not eliminate God from the process.

 

[Brian2]

Hello Brian, and thank you for the trouble that you took with that long post.
That is a difficulty that I can see in the above sentence alone, that Jesus never did tell any such thing in plain 'direct' speech. Christianity wants to tell that this is a primary communication, the 'by grace' message, but if that was true then Jesus would have said outright and no need for joining anything together.

On the other hand, those things that Jesus DID say outright were dismissed, overlooked and gainsaid.

I do believe that those such as Paul, the new churches and the author of G-John/Revelation spun this all together.

I don't think that the early church changed the teachings of Jesus. They knew the teachings of Jesus and it was a message of faith and grace and not one of working for forgiveness or salvation. Also Paul agreed with the gospel that the apostles had been preaching. IOW the idea that Paul was contradicting and at odds with the apostles is just not true.

 

[CG Didymus]

I have seen appeals to scripture, which is circular reasoning. I have seen appeals to personal experience, which is unreliable by nature because humans notoriously misinterpret what they sense.

It is evidence enough to rest rest a faith upon.
Denying the evidence seems to come from a place of wanting to say that anything other than the supernatural is a better explanation.

I have no doubt that you feel Jesus in your heart, that you know you have changed, and you know from Scripture that what you believe is true. But so do those other Christians that believe a little to a lot different than you. They all know it and feel it.

The Catholics have their beliefs and know they are true and feel it their hearts. Fundamentalist and Evangelicals that don't believe that the gifts of the spirit are for today. Those Charismatic and Pentecostal that speak in tongues and believe in all the gifts of the spirit. Then those other Christians that some feel aren't part of being "true" Christians, but they certainly feel like they are true Christians... Groups like the JW's and Mormons. They too believe they know Jesus and feel him in their hearts.

Why so many sects of Christianity? Because each has a good reason to believe their version is true, and that the other sects are doing something wrong or believing something wrong. It doesn't give us doubters a good reason to believe any of them.

But you know the main complaint... How can Christians believe things like the Creation story, the Flood, the parting of the seas, Jesus walking on water and rising from the dead, and dead people coming out of their graves and walking around? When a sect takes those stories literally, it makes it hard for some of us to take them serious. It all sounds like myth to me.

But I know, for many Christians, believing the Bible is literally true, or at least as literal as possible, is the foundation of their beliefs. But believing those stories as being literally true is the foundation of why some of us don't believe in Christianity.

 

[Subduction Zone]

How do you know that?

I assume that you believe the Christian God is the right one?

OK that is fairly convincing and most Christians might believe something like that also.
There is nothing like that for all ideas of what happened in the past and it does not eliminate God from the process.

Oh, it is possible for a God to exist. But if one does science tells us how he did it. At least the parts that we understand. It also tells us what part of the Bible did not happen as written literally.

 

[oldbadger]

I don't think that the early church changed the teachings of Jesus. They knew the teachings of Jesus and it was a message of faith and grace and not one of working for forgiveness or salvation. Also Paul agreed with the gospel that the apostles had been preaching. IOW the idea that Paul was contradicting and at odds with the apostles is just not true.

I definitely think that the church DID spin it's own Jesus, and nothing like the real Jesus. The gospel of John was surely written with Church influence, and the whole picture was changed to fit in with what was needed. Just compare it with the account shown in the gospel of Mark.
It was disciples that supported and followed Jesus, not 'apostles', and Paul certainly could not have claimed to be a disciple.
It had become necessary for a female 'Goddess' to be part of the new religion, preferably with an infant child in arms, and so Mary was drawn in to the story and placed down by the cross, and a blood brother was magicked on to the scene in place of the disciple, maybe? Jesus had been estranged by all his family.

The list is huge but there are just some examples for you.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

We all take leaps of faith.

I don't.

You seem to think that it is unavoidable. One can learn to not believe without sufficient evidence as a habit of thought as automatic as saying please and thank you or looking both ways before crossing.

Of course, you might be conflating justified and unjustified belief. Unfortunately, as different as those things are, they are both called faith. But justified belief is not guessing, whereas faith that an idea is correct without good evidentiary reason to believe so is guessing as surely as picking lottery numbers is guessing. That kind of guessing is fine as long as one remembers that he is just guessing and probably won't win the lottery.

The leap of faith into naturalism.

There is no leap of faith there. Nature is here. It is everywhere. Our only experience is of nature. Adding supernaturalism to the mix is where the leap of faith comes in.

Being a naturalist and rejecting the supernatural is a leap of faith.

Disagree. It is foundational to critical thinking and empiricism that we do not accept insufficiently evidenced claims. That's how we keep false and unfalsifiable ideas out of our belief set.

it is a lie to say that science has shown that God is not needed.

What would a god's job be? The planets orbit their stars without apparent intelligent oversight. Trees and grass grow on their own. Rain falls on its own. Water freezes and melts whenever possible without intelligent oversight.

Gods appear in none of our scientific laws or theories because they would add no explanatory or predictive power to them. The time to start considering gods seriously is when we discover something not potentially explainable without them. That's what the ID people were doing when looking for irreducible complexity, the finding of which points to intelligent design, as blind, unguided nature can't generate irreducible complexity.

the idea that there is the supernatural and God is an answer that has evidence in the history of human experience.

Disagree. It's an ancient belief, but not supported by evidence. In fact, if by "God" you mean the god of Abraham, who is said to have created the world including the first two human beings in six days, we know that that god doesn't exist, because we know that those things didn't happen.

 

[Tony B]

I don't.

You seem to think that it is unavoidable. One can learn to not believe without sufficient evidence as a habit of thought as automatic as saying please and thank you or looking both ways before crossing.

Of course, you might be conflating justified and unjustified belief. Unfortunately, as different as those things are, they are both called faith. But justified belief is not guessing, whereas faith that an idea is correct without good evidentiary reason to believe so is guessing as surely as picking lottery numbers is guessing. That kind of guessing is fine as long as one remembers that he is just guessing and probably won't win the lottery.

There is no leap of faith there. Nature is here. It is everywhere. Our only experience is of nature. Adding supernaturalism to the mix is where the leap of faith comes in.

Disagree. It is foundational to critical thinking and empiricism that we do not accept insufficiently evidenced claims. That's how we keep false and unfalsifiable ideas out of our belief set.

What would a god's job be? The planets orbit their stars without apparent intelligent oversight. Trees and grass grow on their own. Rain falls on its own. Water freezes and melts whenever possible without intelligent oversight.

Gods appear in none of our scientific laws or theories because they would add no explanatory or predictive power to them. The time to start considering gods seriously is when we discover something not potentially explainable without them. That's what the ID people were doing when looking for irreducible complexity, the finding of which points to intelligent design, as blind, unguided nature can't generate irreducible complexity.

Disagree. It's an ancient belief, but not supported by evidence. In fact, if by "God" you mean the god of Abraham, who is said to have created the world including the first two human beings in six days, we know that that god doesn't exist, because we know that those things didn't happen.

How do we know those things didn't happen? that's simply a belief isn't it?

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

How do we know those things didn't happen? that's simply a belief isn't it?

That was a reply to, "if by "God" you mean the god of Abraham, who is said to have created the world including the first two human beings in six days, we know that that god doesn't exist, because we know that those things didn't happen."

Here's what AI says:

"The universe is approximately 13.8 billion years old, as determined by various observations such as the cosmic microwave background radiation and the expansion rate of the universe. Earth is estimated to be around 4.5 billion years old, based on radiometric dating of meteorites and rocks from the Earth's surface. The evidence supporting these age estimates comes from multiple fields of science, including astronomy, geology, and physics, and has been corroborated by independent lines of research. These age calculations are fundamental to our understanding of the history and evolution of the cosmos, providing crucial insights into the origins of life and the development of the universe as we know it today.

"While some religious beliefs hold that all humans are descendants of a literal Adam and Eve, the scientific consensus is that there were never just two human beings from whom all people are descended. Genomic studies have shown that the human population has always been comprised of thousands or even tens of thousands of individuals throughout history.

"By examining mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosome markers, scientists have traced human ancestry back to a diverse population of early humans who lived in Africa around 200,000 years ago. This supports the theory that human evolution involved a gradual process of genetic diversification and population expansion rather than originating from just two individuals."​

If you'd like to know more about how those conclusions were arrived at - if you'd like to be included in the we of how do we know those things - you'll need a foundation in the sciences, especially Big Bang cosmology and the theory of evolution.

To understand radiometric dating, you'll need a little chemistry (isotopes) and physics (radioactive decay).

To understand how the expansion rate and age of the universe were determined, you'll need a little astronomy (red shifting, standard candles).

Understanding why there were never just two humans is a problem in philosophy called the sorites paradox and deals with imprecise predicates like human being.

 

[Tony B]

That was a reply to, "if by "God" you mean the god of Abraham, who is said to have created the world including the first two human beings in six days, we know that that god doesn't exist, because we know that those things didn't happen."

Here's what AI says:

"The universe is approximately 13.8 billion years old, as determined by various observations such as the cosmic microwave background radiation and the expansion rate of the universe. Earth is estimated to be around 4.5 billion years old, based on radiometric dating of meteorites and rocks from the Earth's surface. The evidence supporting these age estimates comes from multiple fields of science, including astronomy, geology, and physics, and has been corroborated by independent lines of research. These age calculations are fundamental to our understanding of the history and evolution of the cosmos, providing crucial insights into the origins of life and the development of the universe as we know it today.The age ​

The age of the universe is based on pseudo science such as radiometric dating, which is demonstrably full of holes and assumptions and frankly laughable when it comes to accuracy, this has been demonstrated many times and by many examples, the Turin Shroud being the most notable.

​

"While some religious beliefs hold that all humans are descendants of a literal Adam and Eve, the scientific consensus is that there were never just two human beings from whom all people are descended. Genomic studies have shown that the human population has always been comprised of thousands or even tens of thousands of individuals throughout history.​

Ah, the laughable catchall known as 'consensus'. You know the argument has failed when that joker has to be produced. The human genome project is a failure, so simply more pseudo science I'm afraid. It's also interesting to note that when maths is applied to the increase in population from Adam and Eve, the rate of decay caused by the fall, and including the great flood, then we arrive at the population of earth as it is today.

​

"By examining mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosome markers, scientists have traced human ancestry back to a diverse population of early humans who lived in Africa around 200,000 years ago. This supports the theory that human evolution involved a gradual process of genetic diversification and population expansion rather than originating from just two individuals."​

Simply more pseudo science based on huge assumptions and 'consensus'. Since Darwin's hilarious tome we have seen how science is owned and manipulated by the same people with the same agenda. Even Darwin couldn't substantiate his own work in the Origin of the Species, so others were used to promote the lies.

If you'd like to know more about how those conclusions were arrived at - if you'd like to be included in the we of how do we know those things - you'll need a foundation in the sciences, especially Big Bang cosmology and the theory of evolution.

To understand radiometric dating, you'll need a little chemistry (isotopes) and physics (radioactive decay).

To understand how the expansion rate and age of the universe were determined, you'll need a little astronomy (red shifting, standard candles).

Understanding why there were never just two humans is a problem in philosophy called the sorites paradox and deals with imprecise predicates like human being.

The fact you place all your faith, and yes it is faith, in AI, which is produced by the very same people responsible for all the pseudo science you have been indoctrinated with, speaks volumes to the level of critical thinking you have employed here, or rather the absence of it. The appeal to authority is also rather telling.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

The age of the universe is based on pseudo science such as radiometric dating, which is demonstrably full of holes and assumptions and frankly laughable when it comes to accuracy, this has been demonstrated many times and by many examples, the Turin Shroud being the most notable.

Ah, the laughable catchall known as 'consensus'. You know the argument has failed when that joker has to be produced. The human genome project is a failure, so simply more pseudo science I'm afraid. It's also interesting to note that when maths is applied to the increase in population from Adam and Eve, the rate of decay caused by the fall, and including the great flood, then we arrive at the population of earth as it is today.

Simply more pseudo science based on huge assumptions and 'consensus'. Since Darwin's hilarious tome we have seen how science is owned and manipulated by the same people with the same agenda. Even Darwin couldn't substantiate his own work in the Origin of the Species, so others were used to promote the lies.

The fact you place all your faith, and yes it is faith, in AI, which is produced by the very same people responsible for all the pseudo science you have been indoctrinated with, speaks volumes to the level of critical thinking you have employed here, or rather the absence of it. The appeal to authority is also rather telling.

So no counterargument - just angry outrage at my answer to your question? It didn't take much to set you off. Were you offended by my answer? Is your faith that fragile?

You got AI because that's all I was willing to do for what appeared to be a creationist before I saw a sincere interest in learning. Had you expressed that, I would have walked you through much of that information, but you were only pretending to be interested, a common creationist ruse, as in "Where's your evidence" coming from somebody who doesn't use or respect it and has no intention of looking at it. I've learned long ago not to spend time trying to teach creationists, so AI is all you get. I just need to call up a bookmarked site, enter a question, and copy-and-paste it. And you blew a gasket.

I just posted this yesterday to an educated theist frustrated by trying in vain to teach people like you. I explained to him why it was a waste of his time:

My other purpose was to call out a creationist asking for evidence that I know he isn't interested in and won't devote any time in reviewing. I would recommend that since it frustrates you to stop answering the creationists as if they were sincere about learning. Isn't that all we ever see? You don't need to be Charlie Brown to their Lucy:

 

[Tony B]

So no counterargument - just angry outrage at my answer to your question? It didn't take much to set you off. Were you offended by my answer? Is your faith that fragile?

The counterargument is quite simple, you made the statement that we know your claims to be true and then produced the usual litany of pseudo science and 'consensus' based nonsense that is always trotted out. There was nothing there that proved knowing at all, for instance it is well established that the dating methodologies are deeply flawed, if you think otherwise feel free to explain away all the assumptions they employ.
Whatever gave you the idea I was 'offended'? I simply pointed out the inadequacies of your argument. My faith is rock solid and does not rely on winning any debate, however, scripture does instruct me to speak the truth and challenge deception, and evolution is a huge deception which does not survive the slightest true scientific scrutiny (missing links absolutely everywhere for instance). The Ark and speciation perfectly explains the natural world, there are no random increases in information in the gene pool, anywhere.

You got AI because that's all I was willing to do for what appeared to be a creationist before I saw a sincere interest in learning. Had you expressed that, I would have walked you through much of that information, but you were only pretending to be interested, a common creationist ruse, as in "Where's your evidence" coming from somebody who doesn't use or respect it and has no intention of looking at it. I've learned long ago not to spend time trying to teach creationists, so AI is all you get. I just need to call up a bookmarked site, enter a question, and copy-and-paste it. And you blew a gasket.

That is a terrible excuse for a terrible argument. The fact your presupposition is that you're absolutely right and are 'teaching' others speaks volumes. I am always open to evidence and a well constructed argument, you simply didn't present any evidence of one.

I just posted this yesterday to an educated theist frustrated by trying in vain to teach people like you. I explained to him why it was a waste of his time:

My other purpose was to call out a creationist asking for evidence that I know he isn't interested in and won't devote any time in reviewing. I would recommend that since it frustrates you to stop answering the creationists as if they were sincere about learning. Isn't that all we ever see? You don't need to be Charlie Brown to their Lucy:

The fact you believe that all the millions of processes all working together to keep your body functioning just happened by chance, and simultaneously, is absurd, and no expert in probability would suggest otherwise, as is the suggestion that there was some random explosion in the void and everything came from nothing. God even gives you the answer in scripture;

Romans 1:19-20​

19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them.​

20 For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.​

 

[IndigoChild5559]

It is evidence enough to rest rest a faith upon.
Denying the evidence seems to come from a place of wanting to say that anything other than the supernatural is a better explanation.

I am not opposed to faith at all. I support YOUR faith. I am a woman of faith myself.

My only point is that those of us who do have faith need to be honest with ourselves that we do not have sufficient evidence to prove it. Knowledge (knowing a fact) and faith (trusting that something is true despite lack of sufficient evidence) are not the same thing.

 

[IndigoChild5559]

I have no doubt that you feel Jesus in your heart, that you know you have changed, and you know from Scripture that what you believe is true. But so do those other Christians that believe a little to a lot different than you. They all know it and feel it.

Exactly. Indeed, not only do other Christians share that same experience, but so do people in other religions. Mormons feel the "burning in the bosem." Muslims feel the same way about Islam and the Quran. And in these other religions, there are also those who have changed lives.

Why so many sects of Christianity?

Most groups will have a few sects. We Jews do. Buddhists do. Muslims do, etc. But yeah, you are right, it is NOTHING like the gazillion denominations of Christianity. Christians don't realize how much this destroys their credibility.

The blame is clearly placed on Protestantism's "Sola Scriptura." Bible only cannot produce a united church. Scripture must be interpreted. Without any interpretational authority in a religion that is belief based, you will have oodles of splits.

Because each has a good reason to believe their version is true, and that the other sects are doing something wrong or believing something wrong. It doesn't give us doubters a good reason to believe any of them.

Yeap, exactly. Like I said, they lose their credibility.

 

[Tony B]

Exactly. Indeed, not only do other Christians share that same experience, but so do people in other religions. Mormons feel the "burning in the bosem." Muslims feel the same way about Islam and the Quran. And in these other religions, there are also those who have changed lives.

Most groups will have a few sects. We Jews do. Buddhists do. Muslims do, etc. But yeah, you are right, it is NOTHING like the gazillion denominations of Christianity. Christians don't realize how much this destroys their credibility.

This really is a misconception, the main differences between different Christian Churches are small differences in the sacraments, the main schism is between Protestants and Catholics. Protestant Churches are pretty much all on the same page in principle, the exceptions being churches being eroded by 'cultural Christianity' and deviating from scripture (The Anglican Church for example). Mormons and Jehovah's witnesses are really considered to be cults by the rest.

The blame is clearly placed on Protestantism's "Sola Scriptura." Bible only cannot produce a united church. Scripture must be interpreted. Without any interpretational authority in a religion that is belief based, you will have oodles of splits.

Yeap, exactly. Like I said, they lose their credibility.

The Bible can absolutely produce a united Church, it's man that messes this up. The interpretations have been done to death, there isn't much to disagree about as evidenced by the various Bible translations.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

you made the statement that we know your claims to be true

Yes, I do as do many other educated people.

There was nothing there that proved knowing at all

Agreed. The AI explained what is believed by the scientific community in general terms.

If you were expecting me to try to teach you, you're probably disappointed that I didn't. I also explained to you why I'm not willing to invest more effort in teaching creationists.

evolution is a huge deception which does not survive the slightest true scientific scrutiny (missing links absolutely everywhere for instance)

The theory will remain when your religion is as insignificant and irrelevant as Druidry and Zeusism. There is no controversy over its correctness in the main except from creationists, whose opinions don't matter: natural selection + genetic variation + time = the tree of life r.

But don't feel picked on. The opinions of lay people like me who happen to be educated in the science and accept its validity also don't matter to the scientific community of experts.

You're fighting a losing battle. Even were the theory somehow falsified tomorrow, although it would indicate that a deceptive intelligent designer was involved and got found out, we still wouldn't turn to supernaturalism for that intelligent designer. The leading scientific hypothesis would invoke a superhuman alien intelligence that itself arose by abiogenesis and evolution and visited earth eons ago to perpetrate that deception.

The fact your presupposition is that you're absolutely right and are 'teaching' others speaks volumes.

Thanks. I'm a critical thinker and an empiricist, which makes it possible for me to be correct and to know that I am. I can say unequivocally that the creation myth in Genesis is as incorrect as the Viking and Mesopotamian creation myths.

You still don't seem to understand that I am not trying to teach you anything. Your education is YOUR responsibility just as mine was mine. Plus, you head is filled with mythology that you treat as science and history.

The fact you believe that all the millions of processes all working together to keep your body functioning just happened by chance, and simultaneously, is absurd, and no expert in probability would suggest otherwise

Except that the experts in biology agree with me, not you.

And that is a common creationist double fallacy - [1] incredulity and [2] special pleading:

[1] That you can't imagine how life came to be without a god is a reflection of your shortcomings. Others don't have a problem.

[2] And if life is improbable without an intelligent designer, how much more unlikely is it that a god exists uncreated and undesigned?

God even gives you the answer in scripture;

You're quoting scripture to me? Please allow me to reciprocate with something I expect you will find equally meaningless as I telepathically petition Raël to focus the yin and yang of his inner eye on your chakra and astrally project your aura to the ninth cloud of Kolob.

You give no respect, and you get none in return.

Since I am unwilling to repeat myself any further, if you do post something in reply, it will undoubtedly be more creationist apologetics, which mean no more to me than scholarship means to you and would likely get no reply. You've presented your mythology, and I've rejected it, so what is there left to say?

 

[Tony B]

Yes, I do as do many other educated people.

Yet you cannot explain logically how 'you know', because that is not true, you do not know, for instance how many of your claims are labelled 'theories'? Big bang? evolution? shall I go on?

Agreed. The AI explained what is believed by the scientific community in general terms.

The community that is paid dependent on them pursuing the prevailing narrative? that community? And the people at the top? the people programming the 'AI'? Have you ever had an original thought in your life?

If you were expecting me to try to teach you, you're probably disappointed that I didn't. I also explained to you why I'm not willing to invest more effort in teaching creationists.

I most certainly had no expectations about you teaching me anything, that's an ego based narrative you're promoting, you haven't disappointed me either.

The theory will remain when your religion is as insignificant and irrelevant as Druidry and Zeusism. There is no controversy over its correctness in the main except from creationists, whose opinions don't matter: natural selection + genetic variation + time = the tree of life r.

The theory only remains with those who have zero ability to think critically, it's so debunked it's difficult to know where to start, even Darwin knew it.

But don't feel picked on. The opinions of lay people like me who happen to be educated in the science and accept its validity also don't matter to the scientific community of experts.

More narrative insertion, why should I feel 'picked on'? you're no intellect clearly, you can't even question basic logic, where are those missing links? Piltdown man didn't really cut it did he, nor all those other ape skulls they like to pretend prove it, but get debunked almost immediately. Can you tell me how information evolves from matter? no-one seems to be able to answer that question so far.

You're fighting a losing battle. Even were the theory somehow falsified tomorrow, although it would indicate that a deceptive intelligent designer was involved and got found out, we still wouldn't turn to supernaturalism for that intelligent designer. The leading scientific hypothesis would invoke a superhuman alien intelligence that itself arose by abiogenesis and evolution and visited earth eons ago to perpetrate that deception.

Wow, you've gone full Isaac Asimov there, why would the fact that Evolution is pure nonsense prove a 'deceptive designer'? It is nonsense and we know God doesn't make mistakes, the science you cling to is full of lies and deceptions, and they're not even well hidden. Go and look up the virus 'isolation' process and tell me how 'scientific' that is, even John Enders seminal paper that started the whole scam off admits he didn't prove what the abstract seems to claim, it's comedy gold. How about the comedy gold that oil is a 'fossil fuel? rather than what it is actually is, which is an abiotic and an abundant natural resource, but let me guess, you also believe CO2 is a toxin that is destroying the earth? am I right? tRuSt tHe sCiEnCe right?

Thanks. I'm a critical thinker and an empiricist, which makes it possible for me to be correct and to know that I am. I can say unequivocally that the creation myth in Genesis is as incorrect as the Viking and Mesopotamian creation myths.

You can't even defend Evolution theory so I'd put the bunting away if I were you, you're failing miserably like all self appointed experts do.

You still don't seem to understand that I am not trying to teach you anything. Your education is YOUR responsibility just as mine was mine. Plus, you head is filled with mythology that you treat as science and history.

You don't seem to understand that you couldn't teach me anything, so step away from your ego please.

Except that the experts in biology agree with me, not you.

Another bold unsubstantiated claim, no expert with a brain is going to admit that the human body miraculously just started functioning simultaneously all at once, it's so utterly absurd. Which came first? the chicken or the egg? it's really easy for me, God created them at the same time, just as the Bible says, for you that's a bit tricky isn't it, just apply Occams razor and you'll get there.

And that is a common creationist double fallacy - [1] incredulity and [2] special pleading:

[1] That you can't imagine how life came to be without a god is a reflection of your shortcomings. Others don't have a problem.

[2] And if life is improbable without an intelligent designer, how much more unlikely is it that a god exists uncreated and undesigned?

God was never uncreated or undesigned, life was never improbably without a designer, it was impossible, because information has never come from matter, but if you think it has, please explain when and how.

You're quoting scripture to me? Please allow me to reciprocate with something I expect you will find equally meaningless as I telepathically petition Raël to focus the yin and yang of his inner eye on your chakra and astrally project your aura to the ninth cloud of Kolob.

This is about as truthful as anything else you've claimed to be fair.

You give no respect, and you get none in return.

I give respect where it's due, I never ask for respect, I never expect it, Christ told us and showed us what to expect for telling the truth.

Since I am unwilling to repeat myself any further, if you do post something in reply, it will undoubtedly be more creationist apologetics, which mean no more to me than scholarship means to you and would likely get no reply. You've presented your mythology, and I've rejected it, so what is there left to say?

This is quite simple, if you continue to try and patronise me I'm likely to respond with more truths for you, if you don't then we're done. You are right about scholarship though, based on the current state of 'science', and a population so dumbed down that it lives in a state of perpetual cognitive dissonance I'm very glad not to be associated with such an all time low level of critical thinking. Calling it 'scholarship' is about as ironic as it gets.