Origins TheologyForum for the discussion of Creation Science (Young/Old) vs Theistic Evolution. Discussion of Atheistic Evolution should be taken to the Discussion and Debate forums.
lucaspa has the following as a signature in his post;
"If sound science appears to contradict the Bible, we may be sure that it is our interpretation of the Bible that is at fault." Christian Observer, 1832, pg. 437
Now considering that the resurrection contradicts science...then we must be interpretating the Gospels incorrectly. Or so the above quote would seem to indicate.
I do find it rather odd how some "christians" can carry this double standard.
The Ressurection does not contradict science. It makes no scientifically testable claims. Science can say that there have been no scientifically documented cases of ressurection and that there is no observed mechanism that could ressurect someone, but it cannot say that Jesus was not ressurected or that ressurection is impossible.
I will not try and defend this quote, as I may disagree with it a bit myself - or at least suggest the statement was poorly worded.
But your main point, which I have seen you make on other occasions, is why do Christians not accept a litteral reading of Genesis on the basis that it clashes with science but do accept a litteral reading of the resurection story despite the fact that this too seems unscientific. I realise this could seem very odd to YECs and I thank you for the chance to clear up the confusion.
First of all, science is intrinsically agnostic - it does not and cannot consider the question of the existance of God. There are many scientists who are Christian, many of other faiths and many atheists and agnostics. It is unable to deny that there might be a creator God who has power over His creation and is able to make it act in a different way from the way in generally appears to function.
So science does not deny God and for reasons beond science many scientists believe in God - specifically the Christian God for the purpose of this thread. Scientists who are Christian accept that God may act in His creation and do things that seem 'unscientific'. So, we believe that He could have created the Universe in 6 days had He wished. However, we see no reason why He would do this and then alter what He had created to make it appear that creation had occured in a different way - i.e. the way the vast majority of scientific opinion says it did with a 'Big Bang' 13.7 billion years ago, abiogenesis and evolution. So, although God could have created 'unscientifically' as the YEC position states - the data collected by scientists trying to determine how the Universe began and life came about would have looked very different. This is what we mean by saying creationism has been scientifically falsified.
Now, Jesus' resurection was 'unscientific' in so far as there is no mechanism in scienctific knowlege by which it could have occured. But science does not rule out a God who could have worked a miracle and raised Him from the dead, and by faith scientist Christians believe this happened. BECAUSE although His resurection was miraculous there is plenty of ordinary evidence that it happened. People actually saw Him after the resurection and left eyewhitness accounts. He was seen to physically eat fish, people touched Him, one even placed his hands in His wounds. If some advanced alien life in a nearby star system has been observing Earth through some 'super telescope' they would have actually seen the resurection take place and their scientists would accept it as fact because it had been scientifically proven. Had they recorded it we could see it ourselves. THIS is the difference between accepting YEC and accepting the resurection.
I am wondering why your profile used to claim you were a 'science teacher' and now says nothing?
Was the claim false? Or are you embarrassed since reading your posts shows very little science understanding and just a lot of science bashing.
Why are you trying to insult me? Do you think this is the proper christian attitude?
Just because I find many flaws with evolutionism doesn't mean I don't understand science....that is, just because I disagree with your INTERPRETATION of science doesn't mean I don't understand it.
The Ressurection does not contradict science. It makes no scientifically testable claims. Science can say that there have been no scientifically documented cases of ressurection and that there is no observed mechanism that could ressurect someone, but it cannot say that Jesus was not ressurected or that ressurection is impossible.
The resurrection does contradict science. Once you're dead, especially for 3 days you stay dead....or do you disagree? Can you come back to life? Despite the dead brain cells? Despite the pooling of your blood? Despite the rigamortis? Despite the corpse beginning to rot?
I will not try and defend this quote, as I may disagree with it a bit myself - or at least suggest the statement was poorly worded.
snip
So science does not deny God and for reasons beond science many scientists believe in God - specifically the Christian God for the purpose of this thread. Scientists who are Christian accept that God may act in His creation and do things that seem 'unscientific'. So, we believe that He could have created the Universe in 6 days had He wished. However, we see no reason why He would do this and then alter what He had created to make it appear that creation had occured in a different way - i.e. the way the vast majority of scientific opinion says it did with a 'Big Bang' 13.7 billion years ago, abiogenesis and evolution. So, although God could have created 'unscientifically' as the YEC position states - the data collected by scientists trying to determine how the Universe began and life came about would have looked very different. This is what we mean by saying creationism has been scientifically falsified.
snip
I hope this has cleared things up.
Shalom,
YN.
I think good argument could be made against this so-called old earth/universe argument.
Personally I think it looks young and have seen scientific evidence that clearly shows the earth can't be as old as those that accept evolutionism claim. Of course that is another topic and the real answer to your reply about what scientific evidence reveals follows.
In the bible we read that there once was wedding which took place at Cana in Galilee. During the wedding the servants gave the master of the banquet some wine to taste. The master of the banquet seemed to really enjoy the taste of the wine. As a matter of fact the master of the banquet took the bridegroom aside and complimented him on bringing out the better wine near the end of the wedding.
If you were to test the wine that the servants gave to the master of the banquet to taste, you would have laboratory results returned to you that indicated it was indeed a beverage that came from a fruit that use to hang on a vine in a vineyard. For all practical purposes the wine had a history. The test results would be irrefutable scientific proof. If you could extract the DNA from the beverage it would be an identical match to the grape DNA. The history of the wine would lead to a grape vine. The wine would indicate apparent age, yet we know it to be moments old.
But what is the truth? Did the wine really come from a grape vine? The bible tells us in John 2 that the wine did not have its start on a grape vine as the scientific test would have concluded but rather Jesus turned some water in clay jars into the wine. Water to wine was its simple history.
It appeared old in the minds of the scientific, but was not in reality.
For some the anology can be related directly to the six day creation.
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Now once again, when you view this water to wine story against the opening quote in this thread...once again we see that we have interpreted the bible wrong for we all know water can't become wine.
I think good argument could be made against this so-called old earth/universe argument.
Personally I think it looks young and have seen scientific evidence that clearly shows the earth can't be as old as those that accept evolutionism claim. Of course that is another topic and the real answer to your reply about what scientific evidence reveals follows.
In the bible we read that there once was wedding which took place at Cana in Galilee. During the wedding the servants gave the master of the banquet some wine to taste. The master of the banquet seemed to really enjoy the taste of the wine. As a matter of fact the master of the banquet took the bridegroom aside and complimented him on bringing out the better wine near the end of the wedding.
If you were to test the wine that the servants gave to the master of the banquet to taste, you would have laboratory results returned to you that indicated it was indeed a beverage that came from a fruit that use to hang on a vine in a vineyard. For all practical purposes the wine had a history. The test results would be irrefutable scientific proof. If you could extract the DNA from the beverage it would be an identical match to the grape DNA. The history of the wine would lead to a grape vine. The wine would indicate apparent age, yet we know it to be moments old.
But what is the truth? Did the wine really come from a grape vine? The bible tells us in John 2 that the wine did not have its start on a grape vine as the scientific test would have concluded but rather Jesus turned some water in clay jars into the wine. Water to wine was its simple history.
It appeared old in the minds of the scientific, but was not in reality.
For some the anology can be related directly to the six day creation.
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Now once again, when you view this water to wine story against the opening quote in this thread...once again we see that we have interpreted the bible wrong for we all know water can't become wine.
I say again, I will not try to defend this quote as I do not quite agree with it myself.
And again, all science does say that so far we 'know' (as in can scientifically prove) there is no mechanism for water to turn into wine. But it does not and cannot say that there is no God who can perform miracles in His creation therefore it does not and cannot say that "water can't become wine". Many scientists may make this as an off-the-cuff statement, but if pressed would have to admit that they cannot say this for certain as they cannot for certain disprove the existance of God.
On to the wine...
Funnily enough I just heard that this morning - it was the gospel reading for the day in the traditional Anglican litturgy
What you say about the DNA testing is true. However, if you were to ask the servants they would be able to tell you Jesus just created it. If you were to check the books of the wine merchant you would find he had not sold this wine to the house. If you were to see if the DNA exactly matched that of any plants in the local vinyards, or indeed any in the world, you might well find it did not exactly match any. It might, but there would be no need for God to make it so. And again, if our alien civilisation had been watching through their super telescope they would have actually seen it change. So, the seum total of the evidence would be contradictory, and so a theist would conclude a miracle had been performed. (Sure, an athiest would twist out of that conclusion somehow, but that is their problem).
But, IMHO, there is no evidence that supports a YEC position. When we look through our super telescopes we see something quite different. I realise you disagree, but if you do not want to discuss science of YEC vs TE here that is fine - as you say it is not the point of the thread.
However, I do hope I have answered the point. Would you please not conceed that it is not automatically and totally contradictory for Christians to accept a litteral resurection and yet deny YEC on the basis of science? That is not asking a lot and involves absolutely no concesion whatsoever on your YEC views - just an acceptance that the views of others are not a nonsense.
Why are you trying to insult me? Do you think this is the proper christian attitude?
Just because I find many flaws with evolutionism doesn't mean I don't understand science....that is, just because I disagree with your INTERPRETATION of science doesn't mean I don't understand it.
i expect an apology from you.
It was a question. Why do you expect an apology for a question?
Again, are you a science teacher and pray tell, what science do you accept because it seems you reject anything in regards to evolution, cosmology etc?
It was a question. Why do you expect an apology for a question?
Again, are you a science teacher and pray tell, what science do you accept because it seems you reject anything in regards to evolution, cosmology etc?
To be fair, it may have been a simple question but it had nothing to do with the topic of the thread. And it did seem to me to be a little bit inflamatry - and I hugely disagree with Ark Guy on scientific matters.
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