Can you be an Adventist and an Evolutionist?

[NightEternal]

DEBATE: CAN YOU BE AN ADVENTIST AND AN EVOLUTIONIST?

NO

By Clifford Goldstein

For me, the issue isn’t can one be an Adventist and an evolutionist. One can be an Adventist and believe in and do a lot of wrong things (after all, look at how many voted for George W. Bush—twice!—and for Hitler). What baffles me is, Why would anyone, believing in evolution, want to be part of an organization whose very name itself contains the idea of a literal six-day creation (Seventh-day, implying what?).
But there’s a deeper issue. How do folks who claim to believe in evolution regard the cross? For whom did Christ die? Highly advanced Neanderthals? In any one of its numerous incantations (constantly forced to change by the mounting evidence of just how fanciful the theory is), evolution demands a vicious cycle of death, death, and more death. Death is part and parcel of the system that God, in His infinite love, used to create humans—or at least that’s what Adventist evolutionists must believe. Which is problematic because Romans 5:12 states that “wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”
Now what came first—humans or death? According to Paul, a human—a fully developed human who had the ability to make moral choices (because otherwise there couldn’t be sin)— appeared first, and then there was death. Yet in any evolutionary schema, death, death, and even more death were the very means by which humans were created. Death had to predate us in order for us to even be here. Somehow, then, the Adventist evolutionist must interpret the words that “God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7) to mean something like God “used millions of years of violent and vicious death and struggle in order to create a fully developed and moral human.”
In this context, then, will Ervin please explain the cross and what happened there; Jesus must have accomplished something for us, didn’t He? I always thought that the cross was the means of solving the problem of death, which is “the last enemy” (1 Corinthians 15:26).
Enemy? How could the means by which God used to create us be the enemy? What am I missing here?
If someone takes the name Seventh-day Adventist, they should at least believe in what the name they profess implies.
Clifford Goldstein is the editor of the Adult Bible Study Guide for the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

YES

By Ervin Taylor

There are many members of the Adventist Church who have concluded that the contemporary neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory constitutes a highly successful scientific model that explains how life forms on earth developed over time. If we agree that this is a factually correct statement, then clearly one can be an Adventist and an evolutionist.
However, it appears that what is more at issue to Adventist writers such as Mr. Goldstein is whether you can be a “true” Adventist and an evolutionist. What determines whether one is such an Adventist?
From previous statements, I would assume that, to Mr. Goldstein, a “true” Adventist is one who believes in the entire Adventist package of theological propositions. Up until 2005, there were 27 “Fundamental Beliefs.” Now there are 28. At the time that the name “Seventh-day Adventist” was adopted in 1863, an original core Adventist belief about the “Shut Door” had been dropped. Several Adventist historians have noted that many Adventist pioneers would have rejected one or more of the current Adventist 28 Fundamentals—particularly the one about the Trinity. Some may also not realize that it was not until 1980 that Adventists included any statement about Creation in their list of “Fundamental Beliefs.”
Mr. Goldstein might object that this appeal to an “evolutionary Adventist theology” is silly and beside the point. He might insist that an evolutionary model of how life developed on this planet rejects the understanding of Paul in Romans and elsewhere in the New Testament concerning the relationship between human sin and death and the meaning of the Crucifixion. Given the great variability in how Christian theologians over the last two millennia have attempted to comprehend these complex topics, what might first be examined is the Adventist explanation of all of this—Ellen White’s Great Controversy theme.
The point of all of this is that the theological tenets of Adventism have been continually evolving and will continue to evolve. The preamble to the current “Fundamentals” states explicitly that all statements are subject to revision. The current set of Fundamental Beliefs represents the currently politically crafted consensus acceptable to a relatively small group of Adventist professional clergy. These statements should be respected for both what they are and what they are not. Given the history of our theological beliefs, a “real” Adventist— whether he believes in evolution or not—can perhaps be best defined as an individual who takes the reality of God’s “Present Truth” seriously.
Ervin Taylor is professor emeritus of anthropology at the University of California, Riverside.

http://www.atoday.com/magazine/2008/01/debate-can-you-be-adventist-and-evolutionist

 

[NightEternal]

Can You be an Adventist and an Evolutionist? The Debate Continues...

Rejoinder

By Clifford Goldstein~ Part II

Thank you, Ervin, for a nice discourse on a host of interesting topics, from the number of fundamental beliefs we hold, to the Shut Door theory, to how our beliefs are crafted. Just one small problem: not one word answering my original question about how one reconciles the biblical teaching (not the SDA teaching or the EGW teaching but the biblical teaching) of how sin came first, and then death--with evolution, which teaches there had to be death first, and then sin.
Why is it that no matter whom I ask this question to, I get a complete run around? Could it be that simple logic reveals that the two views (i.e., the biblical teaching that sin brought death, and the evolutionary premise that death was needed to create humanity) are mutually exclusive, just as the idea of being an Adventist and an evolutionist are too? Could it be that those so called “Adventists” who believe, as Ervin does, that “that the contemporary neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory constitutes a highly successful scientific model that explains how life forms on earth developed over time” simply refuse to acknowledge the absurdity of their stance? Could it be that they’re afraid to take their premises to their logical conclusion, which is that if evolution were true, then Adventism is a joke, a lie, a farce? I don’t know.
What I do know, however, is I’ve yet to hear anything even remotely logical that explains how one can reconcile the “the contemporary neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory” with Genesis, at least without turning Genesis into psycho-babble; nor, and just as importantly, have I heard anyone logically explain the meaning of the cross, and Christ’s sacrifice on the cross--which is to bring about an end to death, the enemy (1 Co 15:26)--in light of a belief that death was a key and crucial element in the creation of humanity. In fact, not only have I not heard anything logical about the latter question, I haven’t heard anything at all.
So, my dear friend, Ervin, please put aside all the talk about “the great variability in how Christian theologians over the last 2 millennia have attempted to comprehend these complex topics” and so forth, and answer one simple question, nothing else; How does one explain the cross, which is to eliminate death, with the evolutionary schema, in which death, and lots of it, was needed in order to create us?

Response

By Ervin Taylor ~ Part II

My answer to my right honorable friend's question is very simplistic and certainly not original with me. It has only two elements: First, the death about which we are here concerned involves only human death. Second, this death has nothing to do with physical death.
In contrast to a number of its other doctrinal positions, it seems to me that the small denominational tradition of which I am a member (Seventh-day Adventist Christianity) adopted a very reasonable position concerning the nature of the human "soul." We humans are "souls," we don't have "souls." There is no separate, intangible part of any human being that exists apart from its physical body or, more specifically, exists apart from certain elements of our brain function.
It seems to me that we exist as humans entirely by virtue of various biochemical characteristics of certain parts of our brains. Once these elements permanently cease to function, "I" cease to exist absolutely and totally. In some circumstances, other parts of our body including some parts of our brain structure may continue to function, but if what makes us human in our brain is permanently and unalterably disabled, the human "I" permanently ceases to exist.
Following that event, any posited future existence for that "I" is thus totally at the absolute discretion of God. Jesus said that there is a reality of some type beyond the grave. I have no idea how this reality might be constituted, and I don't think any other human does. God is the only one who has to know how it will work.
On the basis of this understanding, the "sin and death" connection is not a "sin and physical death" connection but a "sin and spiritual and ultimate death" connection. I am told by a distinguished theologian whose career has been spent studying the theology of Paul of Tarsus (and who knows several hundred orders of magnitude more about Paul's views than Cliff or I do or ever will) that Paul in his writings is talking largely about spiritual death in the here and now or, in more modern language, in the death of an authentic human being as well about our ultimate death. From that perspective, "The Cross" is totally and completely concerned with avoiding "spiritual death" now and "existential death" ultimately.
God has provided us with enough scientific data to know that physical death has been a part of the biological process God established on this planet billions of years ago. I'm reasonably sure Cliff would have to disagree because of his closed theological system, but to any reasonable person who considers the data without reading it through the dark lens of a sectarian ideology, the evidence for predation in the geological and paleontological record is a scientifically well-documented fact.
I do not argue that my simplistic response to this very complex question is the, or even an ontologically correct answer. I certainly do not urge it on anyone else. It would concern me not at all to be told that all of the purported "answers" and "explanations" that all Christian theologians and mystics have posited about the "meaning of the Cross" are mostly wrong in whole or in part. I'm sure God understands, and that's all that matters.

Rejoinder

By Clifford Goldstein ~ Part III

So, let me get this straight. Paul’s statement in Romans 5:12 means only human death? Let’s, for argument sake, accept this dubious proposition. This means, then, that God--in His infinite love and wisdom--used billions of years of the dog-eat-dog survival-of-the-fittest model of creation, out of which at some point over the eons a Neanderthal or Ramapithicus man (and woman too, because both had to evolve somewhat simultaneously, right?) crossed over the threshold and became Homo sapiens. It was only at that moment, once the amoral-moral line was crossed, that this primeval Adam sinned, and hence death arose? (I don’t mean to caricature this position, but what else could Erv mean?)
I fail, though, to see how even this model answers my question. In any evolutionary schema, death is the means to create life. So God still used death in order to finally create the first moral beings, who, then—because of sin—had to die, had to face the very horrible thing that God, in His love and wisdom, used to first create them? Doesn’t seem logical.
Oh, but it does, because Erv assures us, on the word of “a distinguished theologian,” that the death Paul is talking about “has nothing to do with physical death.” This death is, rather, the “spiritual death” of an “authentic human being” (sounds more like Jean Paul Sartre than Paul of Tarsus).
This position is quite profound, and very deep. May I, however, dare to raise one slight technical problem: the Bible? 1 Corinthians 15: 12-18 (Paul) says: “But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.”
Now, excuse my brash challenge to the authority of Ervin’s “distinguished theologian,” who knows “several hundred orders of magnitude more about Paul’s views than Cliff or I do,” but is not Paul obviously talking here about crude, hard physical death--corpses, tombstones, rigor mortis, and the like--as opposed to something more ethereal and esoteric like “spiritual” death and the ultimate demise an “authentic human being”?
Sure sounds like that to me.
Erv’s answer provides more proof of just how intellectually bankrupt all attempts to meld the neo-Darwinian synthesis with Christianity are. Choose one, or the other, but why continue the charade of thinking you can have both?

Response

By Ervin Taylor ~ Part III

Well, at least my right honorable friend is consistent—consistent in his efforts to keep Adventist theology in a closed and very tiny box. He certainly has every right to keep his own personal theology tightly constrained. And he should have the ability to attempt to persuade others of the rightness of his views. Regretfully, he has been given a position of trust in the church where his personal theology in some minds may get confused with what Adventists in general do or should believe.
My right honorable friend is also consistent in his use of his trademark “Goldsteinian” apologetic rhetoric. He states that my response to his question “provides proof of just how intellectually bankrupt all attempts to meld the neo-Darwinian synthesis with Christianity are.” (I must say that I very much cherish the phrase “intellectually bankrupt.” It is so “Goldsteinian” except for the fact that a reader is not forced to look up either of the words in a dictionary.)
He admonishes his readers to “[c]hoose one [neo-Darwinian evolution)] or the other [Christianity], but why continue the charade of thinking you can have both?” The last sentence says at lot about what seems to happen when one is forced by the constricted implications of a closed theology to argue that these two concepts are somehow polar opposites and thus one has to consider them in an absolutistic “either/or” context.
If Cliff had asserted that neo-Darwinian evolution and fundamentalist Christianity or fundamentalist Adventism are incompatible, then that would certainly have been an accurate statement. But both non-fundamentalist Christianity taken as a whole and other parts of Adventist Christianity encompasses a much wider range of understanding and more open spectrum of perspectives that any closed theological system has the ability or capacity to appreciate.
The original question posed in this debate was “Can you be an Adventist and an evolutionist?” The clear answer as a matter of objective fact is yes. There are a number of Adventists who have come to view natural selection and the other processes that are being studied by evolutionary biologists as accurately describing important parts of how God created life on our planet over billions of years.
That there are many Adventists who can not accept this understanding of the ongoing processes involved in God’s creation is not surprising. The Adventist Church has never set in stone an exact understanding of the nature of Christ. Adventists can believe a number of rather different understandings about that complex topic. One can be hopeful the time will come when Adventist understandings about how and how long it took God to develop life on this little planet will not generate the contentious debate within our little faith community that it currently occupies. I have faith that this day will come.

http://www.atoday.com/node/3207

 

[capnator]

lol You can label yourself anything you want... But what doesnt fit very well is saying the whole bible is inspired and believing in evolution. All the guys that wrote it were creationists.

 

[Avonia]

Using the words creationism and evolutionism with philosophical parity is misleading and adds to the growing divide we have between Adventist scientists and Adventist laypeople.

Evolutionism concerns allelic drift. It neither demands nor rejects divine intervention. You can hold to whatever belief you wish about origins and be an evolutionist.

 

[Jimlarmore]

Using the words creationism and evolutionism with philosophical parity is misleading and adds to the growing divide we have between Adventist scientists and Adventist laypeople.

Evolutionism concerns allelic drift. It neither demands nor rejects divine intervention. You can hold to whatever belief you wish about origins and be an evolutionist.

Let's put it in the correct venacular of what science really believes. When you say " allelic drift" what you should be saying is "mutation". Mutation is a cell's nuclear accident that can drastically change it's ability to function and in the case of stem cells that go into the formative parts of embryo/fetal developement it can and 99.99% of the time does cause death or and inability to reproduce. This is what Goldstein is referring to when he says death came before we did because it is a deadly accident and taking something out ( natural selection) that they claim made us what we are.

What sciencea also wants us to believe/swallow/accept is that something that for the most part causes death and chaos in nature is reponsible for all of the good and perfect design and diversity in the biota. It's actually a joke to clear thinking individuals who have deeply studied the complexities of the cell. I challenge anyone with a scienctific background to explain how something like Mitosis could have developed over long periods of time by mutational modalities. I invite anyone with a scientific background to explain how the Kreb's cycle could have developed over a long period of time.

In short the fact that irreducible complexity exists in nature ( abundantly present in the cell ) trumps and make macro-evolution impossible. Micro-evolutioin is indesputable and concerns the changes we see within a genomes ability to change. Good examples of micro-evolution is like what we see in the domestic dog or cat. What we do not see and there is no good example of this even in the fossil record is vast changes from one form of life to another or changes upper in the taxonomic ladder say clear up to phylum. All life did not come from a single cell that accidentally formed in a primordial pool that got struck several times by lightning.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[JonMiller]

I don't understand what you mean by evolutionist? Do you mean scientist or rationalist? I would say that yes, you can be a Christian (even an Adventist) and be a scientist and/or a rationalist (empiricist/materialist/etc).

Actually, adventism is a lot more freindly to materialism (monist) and reductionism then a lot of Christian denominations.

JM

 

[JonMiller]

lol You can label yourself anything you want... But what doesnt fit very well is saying the whole bible is inspired and believing in evolution. All the guys that wrote it were creationists.

The guys who wrote it weren't scientists or interested in science.

JM

 

[Avonia]

Let's put it in the correct venacular of what science really believes. When you say " allelic drift" what you should be saying is "mutation". Mutation is a cell's nuclear accident that can drastically change it's ability to function and in the case of stem cells that go into the formative parts of embryo/fetal developement it can and 99.99% of the time does cause death or and inability to reproduce.

What science wants us to believe/swallow/accept is that something that for the most part that causes death and chaos in nature is reponsible for all of the good and perfect design and diversity in the biota. It's actually a joke to clear thinking individuals who have deeply studied the complexities of the cell. I challenge anyone with a scienctific background to explain how something like Mitosis could have developed over long periods of time by mutational modalities. I invite anyone with a scientific background to explain how the Kreb's cycle could have developed over a long period of time.

In short the fact that irreducible complexity exists in nature ( abundantly present in the cell ) trumps and make macro-evolution impossible. Micro-evolutioin is indesputable and concerns the changes we see within a genomes ability to change. Good examples of micro-evolution is like what we see in the domestic dog or cat. What we do not see and there is no good example of this even in the fossil record is vast changes from one form of life to another or changes upper in the taxonomic ladder say clear up to phylum. All life did not come from a single cell that accidentally formed in a primordial pool that got struck several times by lightning.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

I'm not sure how your reply relates to my post. I wasn't making a case for or against evolution. I'm sure you will find plenty of takers for your debate.

 

[RC_NewProtestants]

From Taylor's response:

The original question posed in this debate was “Can you be an Adventist and an evolutionist?” The clear answer as a matter of objective fact is yes. There are a number of Adventists who have come to view natural selection and the other processes that are being studied by evolutionary biologists as accurately describing important parts of how God created life on our planet over billions of years.

The debate is not about atheistic evolution versus creation. That is an important point that I think Jim often forgets. Bioenergetics tells us there are two things need for living organisms. Energy and information. Neither of which naturally occur out of nothing. The theistic evolutionist sees these as the beginning process of creation. Just as energy changes form in life rather then being created or destroyed so information changes form It is part of the process that God set in place. Thus living organisms have the ability to change. We know they change we have seen them change. There is nothing contrary to Christianity that holds that God's process in creation must be de novo as life appears now. The Bible only presents views of what they saw at the time which by even short earth accounts is thousands of years after the fact. What we are dealing with is Christian perception and presupposition. The presupposition that the Genesis account is meant to be literal even when it is very hard to accept it as literal and even as the Sabbath School Quarterly edited by Goldstein said of day 4 of creation week we would have to wait until heaven to ask God what it meant. We don't know what the 'light" that was created on day one was either. So why hold all this stuff as literal when it makes not sense and when the story itself has such similarities to the other creation myths.

It all comes back to some people who claim they take the Bible literally. They don't they say that they take it literally unless it is clearly symbolic or metaphorical but when they do that they are merely claiming what is traditionally viewed as metaphorical etc. Saying that if you see something as other then literal and they have a tradition that it is literal their tradition trumps everything else. Well except where it disagrees with a denominational tradition verses some other Christian tradition such as torment in hell or consciousness after death. It is these exceptions that point out the nature of the presupposition. And makes this debate as Traditional Adventism verses more scientifically knowledgeable Adventism.

 

[Loveaboveall]

In my mind it boils down to one question....

Did God create something to die? If you can believe that your God created something with the intention of it dying then you should have no problem believing in Darwin's theory...

I for one cannot come to this conclusion from what I have learned from my God. He is not the creator of death but of life. He would not create something imperfect and then allow it to "evolve" over billions of years so that it then becomes perfect, as He wanted it to be... This does not harmonize with what I have learned about my God.

 

[RC_NewProtestants]

In my mind it boils down to one question....

Did God create something to die? If you can believe that your God created something with the intention of it dying then you should have no problem believing in Darwin's theory...

I for one cannot come to this conclusion from what I have learned from my God. He is not the creator of death but of life. He would not create something imperfect and then allow it to "evolve" over billions of years so that it then becomes perfect, as He wanted it to be... This does not harmonize with what I have learned about my God.

Really but it is ok for God to assign death to everything because a couple of people ate some fruit? In other words it is ok for God to set in place a world where the animals die and kill each other for food though they are just collateral damage caused by man's violation.

The problem of course is that the data is so very much against the idea of a perfect world. The record shows things like vast deposits of cyanobacteria without any trace of pollen, the evidence is powerful toward a progression of life. Now that leaves us with the understanding of God that is the question. which is why I asked the above question. Taylor answered Goldstein's objection about death coming before sin. That is really not the way Paul intended the verse because he was talking specifically about death to man through the action of one man versus life coming to man from the action of one man (Christ).

 

[Jimlarmore]

From Taylor's response:


The debate is not about atheistic evolution versus creation. That is an important point that I think Jim often forgets. Bioenergetics tells us there are two things need for living organisms. Energy and information. Neither of which naturally occur out of nothing. The theistic evolutionist sees these as the beginning process of creation. Just as energy changes form in life rather then being created or destroyed so information changes form It is part of the process that God set in place.

I think the bottom line is to determine what the real truth is here. That may seem easy to determine but when you really start to dig into it the truth can be an illusive thing. Science claims that all life came from a single cell that somehow managed to form itself in a primordial pool somewhere around 5 billion years ago. Since that time all life has spread and diversified from that single cell. By the way this life self forming from random undirected forces is called abiogenesis. Probability and statistics alone has proven beyond reasonable doubt that life could never have gotten started as we know it this way. Anyway, lets look at some of the thing RC has brought up.

RC says that energy and information are alike in that they change form as they enter life and it is this form change that theisitc evolutionist see as the beginning of creation. First off this is an invalidation or flat out rejection of the Biblical accout of fiat creation . We either take the Bible for what it says or we reject it outright. Theistic evolution tries desparately to marry a preposterous theoretical idea with another and in the process causes both to look rediculous and false.

Scientifically, energy is neither created nor destroyed and indeed does change forms as it passes thru biological entities. However, information is a different thing all together because it take intelligence to produce useable information. Information theory is a hot topic among debaters of creation vrs evolution. You can read about how science sees information here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory

Here's a look at information from a "shannon" sense.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Shannon

The way I see it is this. Information as it relates to life is only useful in the building of the DNA molecule. The Bible does not tell us that life developed over eons of time but that all life was created in a very short period of time. Some of us want to sit back and say,,, now we don't need to take the Bible as literal on this or that then come up with a lame idea like theistic evolution to soothe both sides of their curiosities.

Thus living organisms have the ability to change. We know they change we have seen them change. There is nothing contrary to Christianity that holds that God's process in creation must be de novo as life appears now.

There is something in the Bible that tells us that God created life very rapidly and from the Biblical account we know that many of the animals we have today were there at the beginning when God created them.

The Bible only presents views of what they saw at the time which by even short earth accounts is thousands of years after the fact. What we are dealing with is Christian perception and presupposition. The presupposition that the Genesis account is meant to be literal even when it is very hard to accept it as literal and even as the Sabbath School Quarterly edited by Goldstein said of day 4 of creation week we would have to wait until heaven to ask God what it meant. We don't know what the 'light" that was created on day one was either. So why hold all this stuff as literal when it makes not sense and when the story itself has such similarities to the other creation myths.

You will always find good reason to doubt my friend. Some of the things in the Bible takes faith. I have looked at both sides and I choose to accept the Bible as it reads instead of the scientific view of how life got started.

It all comes back to some people who claim they take the Bible literally. They don't they say that they take it literally unless it is clearly symbolic or metaphorical but when they do that they are merely claiming what is traditionally viewed as metaphorical etc. Saying that if you see something as other then literal and they have a tradition that it is literal their tradition trumps everything else. Well except where it disagrees with a denominational tradition verses some other Christian tradition such as torment in hell or consciousness after death. It is these exceptions that point out the nature of the presupposition. And makes this debate as Traditional Adventism verses more scientifically knowledgeable Adventism.

More knowledgeable Adventism? Yeah right!! I can hang with anyone here on any level of science and my knowledge of the Bible tells me that it's an inspired anthology set up by God Himself to be a guide to mankind. If you can't accept the literal accounts of the Bible on things like the flood or creation which Christ Himself supported then you stand at odds with the name sake of Christianity itself, Jeus Christ.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[Jimlarmore]

The problem of course is that the data is so very much against the idea of a perfect world. The record shows things like vast deposits of cyanobacteria without any trace of pollen, the evidence is powerful toward a progression of life. Now that leaves us with the understanding of God that is the question. which is why I asked the above question. Taylor answered Goldstein's objection about death coming before sin. That is really not the way Paul intended the verse because he was talking specifically about death to man through the action of one man versus life coming to man from the action of one man (Christ).

They have pollen from flowering plants in the pre-cambrian and even scales from fish embedded there. That means that there is evidence for modern animals that weren't supposed to be around for billions of years is there. Want to talk evidence, let's talk. Almost every geological strata that has been dug into yields fossils of animals that are not supposed to be there for that time frame. Just do a google search on "out of place fossils" and study up on it.

Want to know what they do when they find these fossils? Ignore it as a strange anomoly or try to cover it up. They have found fossilized bee's nest in petrified wood in Arizona. These petrified logs are supposed to pre-date insects by several millions of years. Polystrate fossils proove that slow accumulation of the stratified layering is not true at all. They have found things like silver jewelry and eating utensils like spoons and forks in coal. Pleochloric halos of polonuim in all of the granite world wide shows that the crust of the earth could not have formed slowly or cooled off slowly from a molten state. Veins of gold and copper nearly pure and pristine invalidate the idea that the crust was molten world wide. If only two or three of these things were true you should have room to doubt the current paradigm. To my knowledge all of them are true.

This does not even start with biological complexity that is irreducible which totally refutes unassisted abiogenesis.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[RC_NewProtestants]

More knowledgeable Adventism? Yeah right!! I can hang with anyone here on any level of science and my knowledge of the Bible tells me that it's an inspired anthology set up by God Himself to be a guide to mankind. If you can't accept the literal accounts of the Bible on things like the flood or creation which Christ Himself supported then you stand at odds with the name sake of Christianity itself, Jeus Christ.

I agree that the Bible is an inspired anthology, though the assertion that God set it up Himself is merely an assertion which I find doubtful unless you want to accept a God who said he regretted making man and a God who told Moses that was going to kill all of Israel and start over with Moses but changed His mind after Moses talked Him out of it. Nothing makes it incumbent upon a believer to accept the literal accounts of the Bible on the flood or creation Christ certainly referenced the stories but that does not make the stories literal just as Christ referenced the story of the rich man and Abraham's bosom. Referring to something does not mean you hold it literally.

What we do have here however is the demand by the Traditionalist that their view is the only view acceptable. Unless that fundamentalist notion dies the fundamentalist form of Christianity will shrink to nothing. It will impact upon modern man as much as a flat earth proponent on the faculty of a science department would. Not at all except as the subject of jokes. It is interesting that at one time the idea of a geocentric universe was that held as the only view by the Christian leaders. To counter it was to go against the literal Bible (Joshua having God stop the sun) it seems the fundamentalist always argue the same way. That is, it is that way because we say it is that way.

 

[Jimlarmore]

I agree that the Bible is an inspired anthology, though the assertion that God set it up Himself is merely an assertion which I find doubtful unless you want to accept a God who said he regretted making man and a God who told Moses that was going to kill all of Israel and start over with Moses but changed His mind after Moses talked Him out of it. Nothing makes it incumbent upon a believer to accept the literal accounts of the Bible on the flood or creation Christ certainly referenced the stories but that does not make the stories literal just as Christ referenced the story of the rich man and Abraham's bosom. Referring to something does not mean you hold it literally.

The fact that Christ referenced the flood as a literal event makes the account a literal account. He was not talking in a parable when He said what He said about the flood or the creation. You are grasping at straws my friend.

What we do have here however is the demand by the Traditionalist that their view is the only view acceptable. Unless that fundamentalist notion dies the fundamentalist form of Christianity will shrink to nothing. It will impact upon modern man as much as a flat earth proponent on the faculty of a science department would.

You gotta be kidding RC. The number of folks who accept the fundamentalist view of creation and a literal account of the Bible have increased in the last few years.

Not at all except as the subject of jokes. It is interesting that at one time the idea of a geocentric universe was that held as the only view by the Christian leaders. To counter it was to go against the literal Bible (Joshua having God stop the sun) it seems the fundamentalist always argue the same way. That is, it is that way because we say it is that way.

Now you are sounding just like the guys I debated on the atheistic infidels forum. The Bible has some metaphorical aspects to it and it has some aspects to it that you have to take into account the culture and knowledge base of those at the time. The fact that Joshua may have thought the sun went around the earth does not mean that this event didn't happen where the earth stopped it's circuit instead of the sun and made it appear the sun stopped.

To me the bottom line is this. It takes faith on both sides of this debate. You have to have a certain faith in the areas of evolution that is not supported by the evidence and we as Christians have to have faith in the areas that are not supported by the emperical evidence we know of at this time. I choose based on what I have studied to believe and have faith in the literal account of creation because a slow developement would not work for the cell or a host of other biological things. I know this to be a fact, it's not just true because I say it is.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[capnator]

are we talking An Adventist or a Seventh day adventist?

Exd 20:11For [in] six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them [is], and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

People who subscribe to evolution generally consider themselves to be logical thinkers. The belief of the whole bible being inspired and evolution doesnt gel, so you have to throw away bits of the bible to accomodate your beliefs. Once you throw away some of the bible how do you decide which bits you will believe? It turns into a make your own religion scenario, so sure you could make one....here's a good example its called Evolution believing Adventist.

 

[annie1speed]

by Avonia

Using the words creationism and evolutionism with philosophical parity is misleading and adds to the growing divide we have between Adventist scientists and Adventist laypeople.

Evolutionism concerns allelic drift. It neither demands nor rejects divine intervention. You can hold to whatever belief you wish about origins and be an evolutionist.

Genesis 1:24-25:

And God said,"Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every KIND: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every KIND." And it was so.

God made the wild aminals fo the earth of every KIND, and the cattle of every KIND, and everything that creeps upon the ground of every KIND. And God saw that it was good.

The argument between evolution and creationism hinges on what the word KIND means here. From my understanding, as long as a animals can make babies together, they can be classified as the same kind. For example different breeds of dogs, and different breeds of cats. Dogs and Cats do not make babies together and therefore are not of the same 'kind' as described in the Bible.

However, if a bird develops a particularly shaped beak, or color pattern which helps it's existence, that is not evolution - that is an adaptation. Perhaps this is what Avonia was referring to as allelic drift.

If by 'be an evolutionist' you mean believe that animals can make adaptations to help their existence I do not disagree, I believe they can. BUT the term evolution typically refers to the development of new and unique species (new KINDS) as the result of these 'adaptations'.

If we credit God for the creation of our world and all that is in it, how can we possibly believe also that new KINDS developed without Him? How can one believe in evolution according to the more commonly used definition, and also believe in creation? The two are in complete opposition.

 

[RC_NewProtestants]

To me the bottom line is this. It takes faith on both sides of this debate. You have to have a certain faith in the areas of evolution that is not supported by the evidence and we as Christians have to have faith in the areas that are not supported by the emperical evidence we know of at this time. I choose based on what I have studied to believe and have faith in the literal account of creation because a slow developement would not work for the cell or a host of other biological things. I know this to be a fact, it's not just true because I say it is.

No, how can that be...faith on both sides, you have simply told those who believe in theistic evolution that they can't because it does not fit with your fundamentalist interpretations. Whereas we have no problem when Jesus says he will be in the earth for 3 days as Jonah was in the belly of the fish that does not make the story of Jonah literal. Of course to the fundamentalist the idea that Biblical scholars are split 50/50 whether the story is a parable versus literal is not even acknowledged. Rather it is assumed that anyone who does not see it as literal is apostate. Yet they will acknowledge that even though Jesus said the seed dies He did not literally mean the seed died, because the science tells us that a dead seed with not grow a plant to be able to increase 10 or 100 fold.

The fact is you have to interpret the Bible with an eye to reality and not everything that is said is meant to be literal. In fact even if someone who wrote it thought it was literal that may not be the case.

It matters little what you choose to believe until you attempt to dictate to others what they must believe and there we get into the serious problems. And what you know of as a fact about evolution is based solely upon your believe that God could not be involved in the evolution. So as is the case in most of Jim's material he is arguing against theistic evolution with the atheistic evolutionary hypothesis.

 

[Bourbaki]

lol You can label yourself anything you want... But what doesnt fit very well is saying the whole bible is inspired and believing in evolution. All the guys that wrote it were creationists.

That's very well said. I agree.

 

[Bourbaki]

In my mind it boils down to one question....

Did God create something to die? If you can believe that your God created something with the intention of it dying then you should have no problem believing in Darwin's theory...

I for one cannot come to this conclusion from what I have learned from my God. He is not the creator of death but of life. He would not create something imperfect and then allow it to "evolve" over billions of years so that it then becomes perfect, as He wanted it to be... This does not harmonize with what I have learned about my God.

Channeled demons teach evolution. http://www.reinventingjesuschrist.com/
For me, the issue is in having to decide between the three angels' messages and the three demons' messages.