why everything was created?

[Gwenyfur]

Please rephrase those questions. They are difficult to understand as written.

If you are not for G-d you are ________ G-d.
If science is not for G-d it is ________ G-d.

Fill in the blank

 

[gluadys]

Thanks for once again twisting my words, and adding to them. I see G-d's handiwork in everything around me...that doesn't mean I have to lay on the altar of science and deny that He was capable of creating the world just as the Bible says, complete, in 6 days.

I don't think anyone denies that God is capable of creating the world by any method or in any time frame God wants to.

The question is not what God can do, but what God did do.

It is God's own creation that tells us it did not appear in its current form in such a short time. The earth has a long history.

 

[Dannager]

If you are not for G-d you are ________ G-d.
If science is not for G-d it is ________ G-d.

Fill in the blank

If a person is not for God, you may be able to (questionably) make the argument that they are against God.

If a concept is not "for" God, you cannot make the argument that it is against God.

If you feel that science should not be agnostic towards God, you need to work on redefining the entire basis of science. Whatever you come up with, though, it will not be science as it is defined today.

 

[shernren]

See, we have here a classic "God of the gaps" fallacy. The argument goes, "For science to explain the origins of life, robs God of His glory of creating it!" The argument is fallacious because:

1. A valid theory of proximate cause never conflicts a theory of ultimate cause.

In other words, just because we know the natural cause of something does not mean that we cannot ascribe any supernatural causes to it. There are enough examples in history to prove my point. We all know and perfectly understand how an atom-bomb works and how it ended WWII. And yet nobody doubts that it was God's will for the war to end quickly and for Hitler's evil Axis to be overthrown. We all know and perfectly understand why George W. Bush won the last election (after all, if there was no good reason it would not be a fair election). And yet there are Christians who will say that it was because God wanted him to be the president.

We all know and perfectly understand just what Jesus did that caused Him to be opposed by the Pharisees and ultimately rejected by the people. And yet we all believe that Jesus' crucifixion wasn't just a political blunder, it was the will of God.

We TEs partially know and understand the mechanisms by which our current beautiful biodiversity evolved from the first life. And yet we all believe as Christians that it was all God's doing and we praise Him for His glorious creation.

Valid proximate causes never contradict ultimate causes.

2. There is a conflict between the rationality of the Creator God and the irrationality of His revelatory Creation.

Throughout Christian theological history nobody has seriously denied that Creation proclaims the glory of God. Except YECs with their "God-of-the-gaps" ideas. When YECs say that an understood Creation does not glorify God anymore, they tacitly say that Creation must be left ununderstood in order to glorify God. Creation must be irrational so that we rational humans cannot understand it, and then only is it of any use to know God and His glory.

But what sort of a God communicates His glory through an irrational Creation?

3. The doctrine of occasional supernatural intervention necessitates the doctrine of normal natural non-intervention.

In other words, the God-of-the-gaps hypothesis must suggest that since only something which is recognizably supernatural and un-understandable can be considered to be caused by God and be something for which He is responsible, therefore anything which is recognizably natural and understandable must be considered to not be caused by God and not be something for which He is responsible.



Science and God are not enemies unless one makes them so. Shame that Christian theology, having been the bedrock of solid modern science for nearly two millenia, should now suffer people's attempts to force it to oppose science instead.

Jesus Himself said that "He who is not against me is for me."

 

[artybloke]

If you are not for G-d you are _neutral about_______ G-d.
If science is not for G-d it is __neautral about______ G-d.

Fill in the blank

There. Done it. Now, about that definition of evolution you supposedly know so much about?

 

[chaoschristian]

We need to start compiling and indexing responses such as this for future use.

See, we have here a classic "God of the gaps" fallacy. The argument goes, "For science to explain the origins of life, robs God of His glory of creating it!" The argument is fallacious because:

1. A valid theory of proximate cause never conflicts a theory of ultimate cause.

In other words, just because we know the natural cause of something does not mean that we cannot ascribe any supernatural causes to it. There are enough examples in history to prove my point. We all know and perfectly understand how an atom-bomb works and how it ended WWII. And yet nobody doubts that it was God's will for the war to end quickly and for Hitler's evil Axis to be overthrown. We all know and perfectly understand why George W. Bush won the last election (after all, if there was no good reason it would not be a fair election). And yet there are Christians who will say that it was because God wanted him to be the president.

We all know and perfectly understand just what Jesus did that caused Him to be opposed by the Pharisees and ultimately rejected by the people. And yet we all believe that Jesus' crucifixion wasn't just a political blunder, it was the will of God.

We TEs partially know and understand the mechanisms by which our current beautiful biodiversity evolved from the first life. And yet we all believe as Christians that it was all God's doing and we praise Him for His glorious creation.

Valid proximate causes never contradict ultimate causes.

2. There is a conflict between the rationality of the Creator God and the irrationality of His revelatory Creation.

Throughout Christian theological history nobody has seriously denied that Creation proclaims the glory of God. Except YECs with their "God-of-the-gaps" ideas. When YECs say that an understood Creation does not glorify God anymore, they tacitly say that Creation must be left ununderstood in order to glorify God. Creation must be irrational so that we rational humans cannot understand it, and then only is it of any use to know God and His glory.

But what sort of a God communicates His glory through an irrational Creation?

3. The doctrine of occasional supernatural intervention necessitates the doctrine of normal natural non-intervention.

In other words, the God-of-the-gaps hypothesis must suggest that since only something which is recognizably supernatural and un-understandable can be considered to be caused by God and be something for which He is responsible, therefore anything which is recognizably natural and understandable must be considered to not be caused by God and not be something for which He is responsible.



Science and God are not enemies unless one makes them so. Shame that Christian theology, having been the bedrock of solid modern science for nearly two millenia, should now suffer people's attempts to force it to oppose science instead.

Jesus Himself said that "He who is not against me is for me."

 

[shernren]

it's mostly a rehash and personal re-interpretation of this: http://brownalumnimagazine.com/storydetail.cfm?Id=1838 which vastly increased my scope of perspective on the interplay between science and religion when I first read it.

 

[tjnesbitt]

Revelation 4:11

For thou has created all things, oh Lord, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.