Oh no I dont even know if i am game to ask what light you saw me in.

Wow Josie, you are amazing.

That is what I just said to a friend of mine a couple weeks ago. We were debating a rule of the Catholic church.

We both have strong faith but we disagreed on this and it got pretty heated. At the end I said that neither of us as a silver bullet we can fire that the other will all of a sudden change their belief to the other person. Everyone's belief stems from all they have seen, heard, done and read in their life. They believe what they believe. No amount of discussion, debate or argument will change that.

However, since everyone's beliefs are from all they have experienced in their lifetime, just the fact you are talking about it will affect your beliefs down the road. That is true for everyone in this thread.

Now how it affects your beliefs is what you choose to take from it.

sorry TexascScoundrel, but there is a much better chance of you converting to Christianity than there is of you convincing anyone here that you are right and the Bible is bunk. The people that believe in the Bible and what it says and stands for are not only looking at the Bible. You see it as a book with factual statements you can disprove therefore everyone will have to reexamine their faith and acknowledge they are wrong. But the Bible is only the background to their faith. It is what is relied upon for the Truth of their beliefs but it is not the core of their beliefs. That is why you won't convince anyone here that the Bible is wrong. No one here worships the Bible. That is the basis of your argument if you expect anyone to agree with you or even acknowledge you have a point.

For myself, by belief is in Jesus through personal experiences I have had and what He promises in the Bible which have been true throughout my life. There is nothing you can say that will make me now discard all those experiences and agree with you now. For the most part, most people here will only have their faith strengthened with this conversation.

Of course you can SAY that evolution is proven. By that logic I can SAY that Christianity is proven as well.

That simply does not make either one so.

As I said before it's about faith.

You see people have preconceived notions that dictates what they believe.

If you believe in evolution then creation is filtered out.

But there are things evolutionary theory cannot answer or solve.

Like how do you get life in the first place?

Where did water come from?

Not to mention my favorite, the evolution of the giraffe. Evrething needs water. The giraffe's neck is very long and has blood in it.
So by logic when he bends down to drink the water the blood should rush to his head and knock him out. Can you imagine? Every time a giraffe bends down to drink he passes out. The lions would just wait for him to drink and then have dinner!
Fortuatley they have a valve that shuts the blood off when the head goes down. What did they do before they evolved the valve?

Bacteria have a motor in their backside that moves them. What did they do before that?

The very leaves on a plant are there in increments. Exactly where they should be. If they came by sheer chance they would be in chaos.

Everything would be! Some of us would have to manny legs or not enough. Clods of dirt would come to life for no reason at all! One big bang could go off next to the solar system and destroy the entire thing!
What then mr scientist? The second big bang just destroyed the earth!

I could go on and on and on. But I have better things to do than discuss nonsense theories.

Call me when you think of something intelligent.

the thread has many intelligent people, they are just all convinced of their own perception of truth and 'logic'

That's it in a nutshell!

I agree. Now, you know, I am feeling a bit impish, so I have to tweak the evolutionaries. Tee hee!

You need to look at the whole quote. Couldn't figure out why a man of great faith would essentially say it makes no sense to have faith.

“Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has; it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but—more frequently than not—struggles against the divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God.”

—Martin Luther, Table Talks in 1569.

“Reason is the Devil’s greatest whore; by nature and manner of being she is a noxious whore; she is a prostitute, the Devil’s appointed whore; whore eaten by scab and leprosy who ought to be trodden under foot and destroyed, she and her wisdom… Throw dung in her face to make her ugly. She is and she ought to be drowned in baptism… She would deserve, the wretch, to be banished to the filthiest place in the house, to the closets.”

—Martin Luther, Works, Erlangen Edition v. 16, pp. 142-148.


That doesn't sound like a man that says reason is to be raised above all things. Think of it. If you ask any criminal why they committed a crime, they have a reason for it. To them the crime was the culmination of a reasonable thought.

You can reason yourself into any opinion. But reason must first discard the existence of God. Think of it, has anyone followed a thread of reason and thought of God in the process? If A=B and B=C then A=C. That is a reasonable thought. Where is God in it?

God made the A, B, and C.

As for evolution vs. creation. Darwin only showed that the same species had their inherent genetic traits weeded out given the right circumstances. The proof used to show evolution is reasonable is the example of black and white mice on a volcanic rock. The white mice will be spotted easier and killed before they can reproduce. Making the population a much higher rate of black mice than anywhere else. Hence, evolution must be possible. That is only weeding out specific inherent genetic traits. But that also doesn't mean that gene no longer exists. It is still there, just very diluted. Example:

pure black mouse BB with pure white mouse WW

their offspring are all BW

BW with BB (as all white mice are eaten)

Possible offspring 1) BB, 2) BB, 3) BW, 4) BW

Each of those mates with all black as well

Each of the four types of offspring have four potential offspring

1) BB, BB, BB, BB
2) BB, BB, BB, BB
3) BB, BB, BW, BW
4) BB, BB, BW, BW

So, in only 2 generations the white gene went from 50% of the population to 25% of the population.

That is all that Darwin proved. All the rest was speculation. It does take a lot more faith to believe in evolution. That belief means that every living thing on earth is a descendant from the first life on earth. From moss to the blue whale. All are genetic mutations generated from the same source or type of source. Following the Big Bang theory, at some point the earth didn't exist. So, when it did form, there was no way a dinosaur just happened to come together the same way as the planet did. That can only mean that some atoms had a chemical reaction that created living cells. How? But most people that believe in evolution don't want to contemplate the vast array of different life forms on this planet and conceive of a way all descended from the same type of source.

Just thought of something. The argument is that all life evolved. Why is it that only a tiny fraction of a percent of life has anything that resembles a previous species that evolved? Shouldn't there be evidence scattered around the world that shows this? Wouldn't someone have noticed before Darwin that species do evolve? Just how many years would it take for an amobea to have genetic mutations to evolve into a Grizzly bear, cat, giraff, owl, maple tree, fern, etc, etc. All of recorded history shows these existed in that entire time. No where in recorded history does it show a species exhibiting any traits that look like evolution. The argument is it takes millions of years for the changes. Fine, no problem. Except for the fact the earth wouldn't be old enough for a single cell to mutate enough times to create any life forms as we know it, let alone all of them. And even if it does take millions of years, with the millions of species in existence, not one has shown any signs of mutating to another species in the thousands of years of recorded history? What are the odds of that? With the earth only being 4.5 billion years old and the number of mutations required for a blue whale to come into existence, shouldn't we have seen at least one animal showing signs of evolution in that time frame if not an actual complete change?

Apply your reason to this and argue evolution is correct using reason. Why haven't we seen any changes in all of recorded history? How long would the fastest evolution occur? How many evolutions would you need to create all the different trees, bushes, grasses, moss, insects, birds, fish, mammals and reptiles? Can one of these species evolve in the time frame of the earth's existence? Why are there such a huge diversity of life forms on earth? Wouldn't survival of the fittest mean there should be only a handful? Can you answer these questions and still argue with a straight face that evolution is a reasonable theory?

Being extraordinarily generous and saying it takes only 10,000 years for a mutation, with the earth being 4.5 billion years old, that means there was only enough time for 450,000 evolutionary cycles. Would that be enough for an amoeba to evolve into a blue whale? But going with the evolutionary argument of millions of years. That would mean at most 4,500 evolutionary cycles. Defend that thought as science. Every single type of animal and plant evolved from amoebas to what we see today in only 4,500 changes in species types.

There is one other note regarding creation. God is all powerful. Who is to say God did not make the world the way it was yesterday. What would prevent him from creating the world with all it's flaws the way it is right now? The answer is nothing could. Our reasonable thought is that we have our memories of the past therefore He could not. Also, our reasonable thought would say that God would not create the world the way it is today. Why wouldn't He create a utopia?

Another point, even if evolution is true and can be proven, how does that prove God does not exist? Why couldn't He use evolution to create man. The Bible records creation in a way we can understand. How exactly did God create all the world with all the living things in it and then take dust and create man? There is no reason that He couldn't use evolution (assuming it is true) to create man.

Anyone that still claims evolution as a reasonable scientific theory is ignoring the time frames they themselves use. What they claim is not even close to being possible within the age of the earth. Or is it that magical, "somehow in the first few thousand years, amoebas evolved very rapidly to the basic life forms we know today..."

the term 'whale' is one interpretation, but the scripture doesnt specify whale anywhere,,,just 'big fish'

Alright, lets get the semantics out of the way.

http://wilstar.com/theories.htm

I didn't sign on to teach a class on evolution. You guys are either lack the educational background (this is not an insult) to understand what I'm talking about or you are being deliberately obtuse.

If any of you are truly interested in learning why evolution is the best game in town you can watch a series of videos called "Growing Up in the Universe." You can find them free on you tube.

I have always been the type of person that accepts nothing at face value. I question everything and look at the opposite point of view before deciding which side I land on.

I didn't believe evolution in the beginning either. But, the more I learned about it the harder it was for me to deny it.

I am a seeker of truth. I want to understand the truth even if it means everything I thought I knew is wrong. I am hunger for knowledge. You may find the videos above dull, but I LOVED watching them. I'd rather watch that kind of thing than anything else I can think of.

I almost forgot, if you want to know why evolution is taught in school and creationism isn't you can watch this:

http://video.pbs.org/video/980040807/

It's about 2 hours long. Enjoy!

Oh my gosh, yes I do lack the educational background to understand what you are saying,
However i do have quiet an extensive knowledge of the Bible, not because I have had formal training, but because i have lived a life with Jesus and God as my guidepost.
I have little knowledge of churches or religion, however I did attend a few churches but found that with all their teachings they had torn the bible apart and wandered off the true meaning of Gods word. some places picked a specific part of the bible to focus on but missed others, and so many people where hypocrites. Very few people lived a life where they genuinly cared for others, most people talked about others peoples failings others focused so much on finances that i could hardly see god through it.

So I decided that was a God I wasnt interested in and read through the bible myself, i have a very old bible that is hundres of years old, I have the hebrew translations as well to cross reference andything that I am not sure of, I have the amplified , the king james, and many others as i love seeing what each version has been translated to mean, then I look at what is actually been said,

I am not interested in haveing to work out if the bible is fact or not, I am interested in knowing god, so I loved to see what he was saying and use it through my life, in how I treat others and what I do.

Nothing can ever change my belief in Gods word, not because i dont have the understanding or educations to understand it, not because I am obtuse, but simply because Gods word is truth and I have a faith that wont be shaken, by anything.

So I do find what you say interesting, and i do enjoy reading your posts, but if you look closely at the scientific findings against evolution you will find that they are based on scientific facts as well.

I do respect your opinion but will never agree with it,

Do you believe in miracles or are they out now as well.

you and cowboy and miles always inspire me so much, your faith is a testament,,,,

Dont be inspired by me,my life has been so full of mistakes its like a road map to disaster.

I never learn and repeately make the same mistakes.
i have just found the only constant and never changing part in my life is God, and as long as we believe in Him we can get through everything else.

It's like people will always fail us hurt us and let us down, even if they dont mean to, nobody is perfect and eventually its going to happen. Its because of our human nature, we all let someone down, even ourselves, but with God he is always there always constant never changing, with your focus on him you can love and forgive everyone else so you dont get fulled with the yuck that comes with being angry and unhappy.

makes me wonder why I repeatly turn my back on him and do what I want.

That reminds me of Gandhi,

"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."
Mohandas Gandhi

It is so easy to believe compared to how hard it is to follow.

I still admire your faith,,,even if you dont FEEL like an inspiration

harmony I have loved reading you posts since I first came here, you are great

I'm not trying to change your faith. I'm simply pointing out that Jesus said things about the end of the world that didn't come to pass within the time frame he said. Does that mean everything he said is BS? No. The bible makes more sense if you acknowledge these inconsistencies.

In order to understand what the bible truly means, you must put the words in their historical context. This is what biblical scholarship is all about.

Why, for example, does the bible forbid wearing two different kinds fabrics of clothes at the same time? Or eating shellfish? Or, for that matter, homosexuality? To understand you have to put it in historical context. It could be there were issues at the time that made these thing a good idea, but things may be different today.

I also understand that just because something didn't happen doesn't mean the stories aren't true. Meaning the stories contain truths that may help people to live a better life.

What I said about lacking the educational background refers to the ones that don't understand what a scientific theory is. How can I make any kind of point when the meaning of the words I use is called into question?

Lastly, using the quote button makes it easier for others to read and understand.