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Creationism - good or bad?

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crawfish

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So? Why does logic make any difference? Your logic is based on what would make the most sense assuming your presuppositions are correct.
Why are we not looking at fact first? Why not first prove that the interference doesn't exist? Why not prove that the tens of millions did not die due to demonic influence upon Nazi Germany?

Huh? The only presupposition I have is that if we attribute something to God's supernatural influence simply because we cannot explain it, we might find out that there is a perfectly natural explanation at some point in the future. That's hardly dogma.

What is wrong with my logic, anyway? You will admit, I presume, that there is consistent, repeatable, testable natural law that leads to certain phenomena. So, there is natural law alongside the supernatural. Why should one receive preference as being God's handiwork over the other? Why is the latter more impressive than the former?

Finally, you CANNOT prove a negative. You cannot prove that Nazi Germany was acting under demonic influence any more than you can prove it was not. You cannot prove that the supernatural has caused ANY event, because you cannot test it. And it is against scripture that you SHOULD attempt to test it:

Luke 4:12 said:
Jesus answered, "It says: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.

The only way to "prove" something did not have a supernatural cause is to show that it could happen by natural means. Evolutionary theory has fit this bill quite nicely.
 
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busterdog

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Just to be sure what "proof" you need: Can you tell me how you would know the difference between an evil Hitler, and a not-evil Hitler controlled by an evil supernatural force?

If you can't tell me, then we are not ruling out enormous supernatural influence in all aspects of our life.

The question is not fair to you, nor should it be. You must prove the negative. Logic itself dictates the difficulty of your task. That is the point of the question.

Once we have established that the negative cannot be proven, then we might look at whether Hitler was demonically influenced. However, looking at your question, it is hard to imagine how anyone would find any kind of a workable worldview for ordinary evil that kills millions due more to bad luck (or just mental illness) rather than demonic influence. How exactly could that happen?
 
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busterdog

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Huh? The only presupposition I have is that if we attribute something to God's supernatural influence simply because we cannot explain it, we might find out that there is a perfectly natural explanation at some point in the future. That's hardly dogma.


Finally, you CANNOT prove a negative.

Sure its dogma.

You translate a "might" into the functional equivalent of "never happened." Why does the possibility of a future discovery have anythign to do with what you now know? That is nonsense.

Understand what I mean by "nonsense". This is a question of a "rule out" diagnosis. Ie, you have a broken bone. The history of trauma is unclear. The health of the patient suggests that you "rule out" bone cancer. The fact that you might later be able to rule out cancer has nothing to do with how you presently assess your state of knowledge. The state of knowledge we presently have is that everything may be controlled and caused by God, angels, devils, etc. Do you worry about devils when you read an MRI? Not necessarily. But your problem is that the idea of creationism is talking about everything. All knowledge. All of creation. This isn't reading an MRI. Its a rather broad field in which to rule out anything.

Of course you can't prove a negative. That is why you can't rule out creationism for being too "Supernatural."
 
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gluadys

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That doesn't follow at all. Superstition means believing in the supernatural.

That would make the statement in the OP a tautology.


The OP argument is that creationism promotes too much use of the supernatural.

And on that point, I would agree with it, but I would not charge "establish[ing] the supernatural in the worldview" as inevitably promoting superstition.

Because, in theory every thing we see (arguably) has an immediate and supernatural cause -- to a far greater degree than any natural cause we can account for.

But that does not put the supernatural cause at odds with the natural cause. The problem with creationism is that it wants to introduce this conflict between natural and supernatural cause, such that the supernatural cause invalidates what we know of natural cause.

How are they sufficient? How could they be?

They are sufficient in that we do not logically need to introduce any additional factor to explain the observation.

Whether that makes them ontologically sufficient is another matter. Does any natural cause exist without the support of supernatural cause? I don't think that can be established.

Simple question: Why aren't you and I both in hell right now?

:D Do you know that we are not? Prove it.

One can say grace. Well, grace is an enormously supernatural force that has an awful lot to do with why things are as they are.

And, AFAIK, nothing to say about the findings of science. Grace explains in general why we have a universe, why we have a habitable planet, why we exist as creatures capable of knowing and loving God, and equally capable of denying and resisting God.

But what does grace have to say about the workings of the atom, the force of gravity, the size and structure and age of the universe?


That wasn't exactly what I had in mind. I simply wanted to establish that recognition that mystery is real is a reason to embrace creationism.

I would say it is a woefully insufficient reason to embrace creationism. TEs do recognize that mystery is real. Perhaps it is a failing of creationists that they do not recognize this.


I am comfortable with the idea of having half the picture, though I suggest it is far less.

Yet you specifically dispute the half of the picture we have. (And I would agree, we probably have much less than half.)

The idea that we can eliminate mystery is hopeful at best, pretentious at worst and the OP is an example of one or the other.

I don't think anyone is trying to eliminate mystery. Let's just stop pretending we have mystery where the mystery has already been revealed.

If you can't exclude or account for the supernatural, you don't really know why you are here today.


On the contrary, without being able to exclude or account for the supernatural, I do know why I am here today.

1. Naturally, I am here because I was born and have not yet died.

2. Supernaturally, I am here because God placed me here and sustains me in being.

Do these perspectives conflict with each other? I think not.

That is why you can't rule out creationism for being too "Supernatural."

I don't think the problem with creationism is being too supernatural. It is the tendency to equate "divine" with "supernatural" and only the supernatural.

Creationists seem to assume that God cannot be seen in anything natural. And therefore to ascribe any phenomenon to natural causes amounts to an assertion of atheism.
 
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busterdog

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And on that point, I would agree with it, but I would not charge "establish[ing] the supernatural in the worldview" as inevitably promoting superstition.

Whether creationism is too superstitious is one issue that is down the road apiece. It would appear that the first consideration is whether we really have a handle on how things are. You take the position that rocks tell us enough that we needn't worry whether our measurements, logic or the rocks themselves are influenced by devils or whatever. There is a whole host of other issues where there is enough complication that deciding what is real is far less easy than looking at a fossil and measuring the isotopes present. Sin. History. Crime. War. Love. These are mysteries.

Creationism has a lot to say about all of these things, and most of it is "supernatural."

But that does not put the supernatural cause at odds with the natural cause. The problem with creationism is that it wants to introduce this conflict between natural and supernatural cause, such that the supernatural cause invalidates what we know of natural cause.

Indeed we do. Why not put aside the question of whether starlight is influenced by the supernatural (or the process of coming up with index fossils)? Doesn't creationism as an origin story, describing a fall, describing a corrupt world as distinct from a ordered world of people at peace with God, doesn't that tell us a lot of supernatural things about why there is war? What about the story of Babel, about man presuming to reach Gods by his methods, his man-made religion? Doesn't that tell us a lot about the nature of war, national pride and ultimately, the judgment of nations.

How about the history of the Jacob/Esau and Isaac/Ishmael? That models fits the current middle east conflict pretty darn well. Again, this a supernatural event.

There is a history of sexuality in Genesis. Homosexuality is an offense with supernatural consequences according to Genesis. Now, you can say that we know better now. But, that is an entirely made-up pseudo science quite unlike looking at rocks and measuring isotopes.

Must Canada be incinerated like Sodom because it has outlawed preaching from the Bible against homosexuality? The attempt to compare Canada to Sodom requires many comparisons that we are ill-equipped to make. ("I will not destroy it for ten righteous.") But, scripture suggests great peril. Could you simply say that Rome fell because of economic problems and bad leadership? The factors involved in the fall of a nation are so overwhelming to the human mind. There is no way to exclude judgment due to sexual immorality as one among many factors.

They are sufficient in that we do not logically need to introduce any additional factor to explain the observation.

Except that you have a really hard time extrapolating forward more than a very small bit, which reveals the trouble with the presumption that you have all the factors covered. Clearly there are other factors at work.

Whether that makes them ontologically sufficient is another matter. Does any natural cause exist without the support of supernatural cause? I don't think that can be established.

But, if it can't be, your sample is suspect and probably contaminated.

:D Do you know that we are not? Prove it.

Well, that's part of the logical problem, isn't it?

And, AFAIK, nothing to say about the findings of science. Grace explains in general why we have a universe, why we have a habitable planet, why we exist as creatures capable of knowing and loving God, and equally capable of denying and resisting God.

Yes, but grace is not amorphous. Grace caused a land bridge to form in the Red Sea years before God moved the water away from the relative shallows to allow Israel to cross. Grace is a matter of enormous complexity. It is theoretically a matter that could be studied scientifically, but it would take eternity, possibly much better minds and certainly far more data than we have now. This is at least the functional equivalent of the "supernatural."

But what does grace have to say about the workings of the atom, the force of gravity, the size and structure and age of the universe?

If the field is too complex to allow us to account for all of the data, what else do you have but a supernatural event?

I would say it is a woefully insufficient reason to embrace creationism. TEs do recognize that mystery is real. Perhaps it is a failing of creationists that they do not recognize this.

Well, you needn't "embrace" it. But, how do you avoid giving it the smallest benefit of some doubt under these circumstances?

Yet you specifically dispute the half of the picture we have. (And I would agree, we probably have much less than half.)

Fine. Let's assume that your limited data is correct on index fossils, etc. Does your half of the data really allow you to extrapolate on questions of why human history is as it is, why sin does what it does. Does it tell you how history will end?

I think part of the problem, and creationists have said this time again, is that once you assume you can correct God on the time frame in the Bible, you will assume that everything else is in play. Perhaps that is the heart of the problem. Is that really a fair assumption? Should it be in a world dominated by supernatural influence.

I don't think anyone is trying to eliminate mystery. Let's just stop pretending we have mystery where the mystery has already been revealed.

If we admit mystery, all of statements have an asterix, which says, well, the world appears to be old, but the witness of the Bible, which we can't rule out says that maybe we are wrong.

Where else should we place an asterix because of "creationism" (as encompassed by the whole of Genesis).

Can we rule out that Israel's current persecution is related toa supernatural problem?

Or, on the question of war., we think Hitler simply had a serotonin problem and was halucinating from lack of sleep, but maybe he was possessed and his citizens subject to deceiving spirits.

On the contrary, without being able to exclude or account for the supernatural, I do know why I am here today.

1. Naturally, I am here because I was born and have not yet died.

2. Supernaturally, I am here because God placed me here and sustains me in being.

Do these perspectives conflict with each other? I think not.

If you know so well why you are here today, then you must know enough to guarantee that you will be here tomorrow or a year from now. (And, God forbid that you should be otherwise than here, unless He takes His whole Church home.) Since you don't know, again, the complexity exceeds our ability to understand it.

Biblical belief is the shortcut that one takes due to that complexity.

I don't think the problem with creationism is being too supernatural. It is the tendency to equate "divine" with "supernatural" and only the supernatural.

Creationists seem to assume that God cannot be seen in anything natural. And therefore to ascribe any phenomenon to natural causes amounts to an assertion of atheism.

To the extent that you really can't see clearly without the "supernatural" revelation on which you measure all other observations, I would agree. Creationism assumes the ability to see, but it requires the right perspective or foundation or worldview, failing which there is deception.

And even then, the picture is quite limited. For example, will the world suffer catastrophic, worldwide drought five years from now? Science can't say for sure. But, there is some evidence for the proposition. The Bible says at some point, the rain will indeed stop.
 
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gluadys

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You take the position that rocks tell us enough that we needn't worry whether our measurements, logic or the rocks themselves are influenced by devils or whatever.

I take the position that we can trust God's creation to be what God intended it to be. That includes being orderly and intelligible. Orderly because God created his world to be habitable, and a world without order is not; intelligible because God gave humanity the mandate to govern the earth and management (even mismangagement) is not possible without intelligible information.

There is a whole host of other issues where there is enough complication that deciding what is real is far less easy than looking at a fossil and measuring the isotopes present. Sin. History. Crime. War. Love. These are mysteries.

Granted, but where, on these issues, do evolutionary and non-evolutionary creationists differ? These mysteries do not compel a commitment to creationism.

Creationism has a lot to say about all of these things, and most of it is "supernatural."

Creationism, as far as I can see, has nothing to say about these things that is not said by the whole Christian community.

Why not put aside the question of whether starlight is influenced by the supernatural (or the process of coming up with index fossils)?

Because that is the point at issue. This is the point, and the only point, where creationism departs from other Christian perspectives. It is here or nowhere that creationism stands or falls.



Doesn't creationism as an origin story, describing a fall, describing a corrupt world as distinct from a ordered world of people at peace with God, doesn't that tell us a lot of supernatural things about why there is war?

No, because this is not a creationism story. This is the whole biblical meta-narrative that is common to evolutionary and non-evolutionary creationists alike, to literalists and non-literalists (yes, even we liberals) alike. Creationists err when they claim this story exclusively for themselves and deny it to other Christians.

But, that is an entirely made-up pseudo science quite unlike looking at rocks and measuring isotopes.

So, you admit that looking at rocks and measuring isotopes is not pseudo-science?

Except that you have a really hard time extrapolating forward more than a very small bit, which reveals the trouble with the presumption that you have all the factors covered. Clearly there are other factors at work.

Moving the goalposts. Your question was why am I here today, not can I predict I will be here tomorrow. Other factors are not needed. There are quite enough natural causes that could snuff out my life between now and tomorrow's dawn which I cannot control or prevent.

That does not eliminate any supernatural factors that may also be involved, but it does mean we have a logically coherent and sufficient explanation of biological life and death without them.

But, if it can't be, your sample is suspect and probably contaminated.

Strange reasoning. What would make it suspect? What would contaminate it? Until you can set up a controlled experiment which discriminates between the presence and absence of supernatural factors, there is no basis for this presupposition. (I expect you would also have to be able to discriminate between malevolent and benevolent supernatural factors as well.)

Show us how to do that, and you have a scientific case. Without that, you have only baseless speculation.

If the field is too complex to allow us to account for all of the data, what else do you have but a supernatural event?

You have a natural event that is not fully understood yet. In addition, creationists do not limit their incredulity to fields that are too complex to account for all the data. Evolution is a clear case in point. The existence and basic mechanics of evolution are well-understood. The primary lines of historical development are well-founded and supported by all evidence found to date. We will, no doubt, improve our understanding of evolution by leaps and bounds as we delve further into micro-biology and ecological studies, but this is hardly a field in which the theory does not account for observed data. Yet it is the primary locus of creationist incredulity.

Well, you needn't "embrace" it. But, how do you avoid giving it the smallest benefit of some doubt under these circumstances?

If creationism were only a matter, as you seem to suggest, of recognizing 1) that we do not know everything, and 2) there are mysteries beyond the comprehension of natural explanations, I could go along with it.

But you know that it is more than that. Creationism, especially in the YE version, requires the rejection of established knowledge about the created world. With that, it requires the rejection of the God-given capacity of human sense and reason to know the world.

To me, this flies in the face of the very doctrine of Creation which creationists claim to uphold. To me, this suggests that creationists do not believe God really made a real world. The world, in a creationist model, becomes 'maya', an elaborate illusion in the best Hindu-Buddhist tradition.

Fine. Let's assume that your limited data is correct on index fossils, etc. Does your half of the data really allow you to extrapolate on questions of why human history is as it is, why sin does what it does. Does it tell you how history will end?

No, of course not.

But is that an adequate reason to reject what index fossils tell us? Does the fact that paleontology is not philosophy or theology or prophecy rule out its competence as paleontology? Because that is what creationism demands: that it be incompetent in its own field.

I think part of the problem, and creationists have said this time again, is that once you assume you can correct God on the time frame in the Bible, you will assume that everything else is in play.

First you have to establish that the creationist time-frame is God's time-frame.

If we admit mystery, all of statements have an asterix, which says, well, the world appears to be old, but the witness of the Bible, which we can't rule out says that maybe we are wrong.

First, you have to establish that this is the witness of the Bible.

Where else should we place an asterix because of "creationism" (as encompassed by the whole of Genesis).

We should place it everywhere. To place it here and not there is to invite god-of-the-gaps theology.

Biblical belief is the shortcut that one takes due to that complexity.

:scratch: Why take shortcuts at all? Can you really understand complexity if you refuse the scenic route?

To the extent that you really can't see clearly without the "supernatural" revelation on which you measure all other observations, I would agree.

I am not sure what you are agreeing to here. Are you agreeing that to a creationist "divine" = "supernatural" and only "supernatural"; that the divine is not to be seen in anything natural?

For example, will the world suffer catastrophic, worldwide drought five years from now?

Given the slowness (and still resistance) with which we have responded to climate change, the probability is very high indeed.

Now, that is something the churches should be pondering seriously. What do Christians have to say about taking in ecological refugees? How will they advise their governments on the question? How should we respond to a growing scarcity of arable land, of land itself (minus islands and coastal areas) and the inevitable competition for remaining resources. What can we/ought we to do to preserve as much biodiversity as possible?

The next century will test our humanity to its limit. Is this God's judgment on us? I wouldn't be surprised.
 
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crawfish

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Sure its dogma.

You translate a "might" into the functional equivalent of "never happened." Why does the possibility of a future discovery have anythign to do with what you now know? That is nonsense.

Understand what I mean by "nonsense". This is a question of a "rule out" diagnosis. Ie, you have a broken bone. The history of trauma is unclear. The health of the patient suggests that you "rule out" bone cancer. The fact that you might later be able to rule out cancer has nothing to do with how you presently assess your state of knowledge. The state of knowledge we presently have is that everything may be controlled and caused by God, angels, devils, etc. Do you worry about devils when you read an MRI? Not necessarily. But your problem is that the idea of creationism is talking about everything. All knowledge. All of creation. This isn't reading an MRI. Its a rather broad field in which to rule out anything.

Of course you can't prove a negative. That is why you can't rule out creationism for being too "Supernatural."

You miss the point. We don't rule out Creationism because it's too "supernatural". We disagree because there is strong - nearly irrefutable evidence that creation did not happen the way an uber-literal reading of the bible would indicate.

Take your Hitler example. What if the "demon-possessed" claim included the additional claim that he was working directly with the Dali Lama to undermine Christianity through his actions. We might be able to build up enough evidence that we can reliably believe the two had never spoken or corresponded through known itineraries and writings; we might be able to determine that in no place or time did the Dali Lama publicly espouse the methods used by the Nazis. So, while we could not disprove the "demon-possessed" charge, we could disprove the physical claims of such a charge.

A few thousand years ago, one might claim that tornadoes are sent supernaturally by God to punish the guilty. We know better now. Why must we continue to keep giving God credit for supernaturally causing those things we can't explain? Why not just give Him credit and not worry whether the cause is natural or supernatural? Why does a "natural" cause make God's part seem smaller to you?
 
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Paul365

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If you can't tell me, then we are not ruling out enormous supernatural influence in all aspects of our life.

The question is not fair to you, nor should it be. You must prove the negative. Logic itself dictates the difficulty of your task. That is the point of the question.

Once we have established that the negative cannot be proven, then we might look at whether Hitler was demonically influenced. However, looking at your question, it is hard to imagine how anyone would find any kind of a workable worldview for ordinary evil that kills millions due more to bad luck (or just mental illness) rather than demonic influence. How exactly could that happen?
As a Christian, I'd say: by sin. But that's just my opinion. A psychologist would give you another answer and a historian a third.

The point is whether your belief in demons is just a personal belief, or if you want to have it considered by others as a serious theory. In that case it's up to you to prove that Hitler was influenced by supernatural demonical forces. When the existence of your demonical forces can neither be proved nor disproved, then there's not much point in discussing them.

Science does not require that you prove a theory, but that you provide a method to falsify it. Otherwise the theory is worthless.

Personally, I don't think that belief in demonical forces is very Christian. I am aware that some people believe that, and I have to respect that, but normally you'd link demon belief more to a pagan religion than to Christianity.
 
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busterdog

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A few thousand years ago, one might claim that tornadoes are sent supernaturally by God to punish the guilty. We know better now. Why must we continue to keep giving God credit for supernaturally causing those things we can't explain? Why not just give Him credit and not worry whether the cause is natural or supernatural? Why does a "natural" cause make God's part seem smaller to you?

Because you have never explained why tornados happen.

How can you possibly know anything you claim here?

Where is your evidence?

You want to say "common sense" and thus beg the question, go ahead.

But, you haven't the slightest proof that tornados are not caused by an angered Elohim, ashtoreth, beelzebub, satan or the wrath of Khan.
 
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busterdog

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As a Christian, I'd say: by sin. But that's just my opinion. A psychologist would give you another answer and a historian a third.

The point is whether your belief in demons is just a personal belief, or if you want to have it considered by others as a serious theory. In that case it's up to you to prove that Hitler was influenced by supernatural demonical forces. When the existence of your demonical forces can neither be proved nor disproved, then there's not much point in discussing them.

Science does not require that you prove a theory, but that you provide a method to falsify it. Otherwise the theory is worthless.

Personally, I don't think that belief in demonical forces is very Christian. I am aware that some people believe that, and I have to respect that, but normally you'd link demon belief more to a pagan religion than to Christianity.


In other words, you have no idea but lots of speculation.

Fine.
 
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Dannager

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In other words, you have no idea but lots of speculation.

Fine.
Better to speculate on the side of parsimony. You saying "You have no idea but lots of speculation!" is like saying "You're only speculating that leprechauns don't exist! You've got no proof that they don't!"
 
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shernren

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- Creationist attempts to let their world view look as 'scientific' as possible, such as the Creation museum, can rise an overall interest in science.

Actually, I kind of like this point. I was once a creationist; I think reading creationist literature as a kid turned me on to science in general.

Having said that, creationism - in your well chosen words - attempts to let their world view look as 'scientific' as possible, which means "looking" scientific to the general populace - and to them science is really a morass of memorized trivial factoids. I've argued before that this wrong view of science underlies a lot of what people see as science, whether they are creationist or not. I learned almost nothing of scientific value, whether in terms of facts or of methods, from creationists or creationism. The little that I have learned as a result of creationism is when I have had to read scientific journals in order to respond to creationists; universally, the results achieved are directly opposite to what creationists claim they are, and in any case I could have gained as much even if I had not read them to answer creationism.

So even there, creationism does more harm than good.

As for the rampant charges of anti-supernaturalism, I offer this defence:

What would you say to someone who had told you that Jesus had destroyed Mount Everest?

Obviously that isn't true. But we would discount the person, not because we doubt that it could happen, but because we doubt that it did happen; not because Mount Everest cannot fall, but because we can see it standing right now; not because miracles never happen, but because this miracle doesn't seem to have happened.

In the same way, we stand against creationism not because creationism posits miracles, but because creationism consistently posits miracles that are either completely unevidenced or completely evidenced against. And neither category of miracle is Scriptural in any shape or form.
 
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WarEagle

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Homeschooling children in a sole Creationist world view leaves them uneducated in important fields of biology, geology and astronomy.

I wouldn't tell that to my thirteen year old son, who's been homeschooled and taught creationism.

He's a science wiz.

Just a couple of months ago, he beat out dozens of government high school juniors and seniors to come in second in a science competition.

The only person to beat him was another homeschooled kid who was taught creationism.
 
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Mallon

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I wouldn't tell that to my thirteen year old son, who's been homeschooled and taught creationism.

He's a science wiz.

Just a couple of months ago, he beat out dozens of government high school juniors and seniors to come in second in a science competition.

The only person to beat him was another homeschooled kid who was taught creationism.
Out of curiosity, was their science fair project in geology, biology, or astronomy?
 
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shernren

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I wouldn't tell that to my thirteen year old son, who's been homeschooled and taught creationism.

He's a science wiz.

Just a couple of months ago, he beat out dozens of government high school juniors and seniors to come in second in a science competition.

The only person to beat him was another homeschooled kid who was taught creationism.

I won plenty of chemistry and physics quizzes as a creationist kid.

But the simple fact of the matter is that science quizzes simply aren't how science is done. To be blunt about it, most, if not all, science quizzes are really just science-based trivia quizzes. A kid who wins a science quiz won't necessarily go on to be a good scientist, or even a well-scientifically-informed general person. I can attest to that: I know plenty of facts, but even after finishing first year in uni, the scientific method doesn't come easily to me in experiments.

You see, real science doesn't sit for tests and quizzes. Real science isn't a matter of how many facts you know. The person who remembers stuff isn't necessarily advantaged in the scientific field - after all, you have to cite everything you refer to anyway, so there's no point memorizing too much. (Using certain facts constantly brings memorization, not the other way around, anyway - I can tell you off the top of my head what the mass of an electron is, even though nobody ever told me to memorize it.) Real science is a matter of how many facts - how many features of physical reality - a theory can "know" in advance.

On the count of skeptical inquiry, I think the whiz-kids don't actually do so well. They will tell you that everything is made of atoms. Do they actually know why? Can they tell you how people decided to believe that was true? Or are they simply regurgitating what they've been taught?

Whiz-kids will tell you that electrons and protons make up an atom. But do they actually know why? Can they tell you how people decided to believe that was true? Or are they simply regurgitating what they've been taught?

Can your son, in other words, justify anything he's been taught? Can you justify what you've been teaching? Because I know that when I was fifteen, when I was a creationist and more knowledgeable about science (or so I thought) than anyone else I knew, I couldn't justify a single thing I thought I knew, whether it be the truth about atoms or creationist lies about dinosaurs and bombardier beetles.

You may think you're teaching your child to be skeptical when you teach him to reject evolution. I personally find it fairly weird, as a to-be-physicist, that people will reject evolution and yet accept quantum physics and relativity. Sometimes I feel like I'm pulling a fast one over on people when I tell them about physics. Apparently if you go fast enough, you can stop time and become skinnier; and if you are small enough, you can't know where you are without your speedometer going haywire. I'm always amazed that these things are true. I'm even more amazed that non-physicists blindly accept that these things are true. And I'm most amazed of all that the same people who will accept relativity and quantum physics, such bizarrely inapplicable theories, will not accept evolution which we can see with naked eyes.

Can your son formulate a hypothesis?
Can he propose evidentiary tests of those hypothesis?
And can he recognize when a hypothesis has been falsified?
And can you?

If so, I'd love to walk you both through the evidence for evolution.
If not, then there really isn't any science in your picture of the world.
 
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Paul365

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I wouldn't tell that to my thirteen year old son, who's been homeschooled and taught creationism.

He's a science wiz.

Just a couple of months ago, he beat out dozens of government high school juniors and seniors to come in second in a science competition.

If your son is this talented, I do not fear for him. He'll certainly inform himself about the missing parts sooner or later and will make his way (probably also away from Creationism).

The problem is with kids that are not this talented. I have to agree to the other people's posts that being left uneducated in important fields of science can seriously impair their future way in life.
 
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