In the beginning...

[gluadys]

Have I seen this argument? Depends on which expert on the "Science" of evolution that you read. Some swear by it, some do not.

But in this case the "expert" was the originator of the theory. Wouldn't he know what his own theory says?

 

[lucaspa]

It's a theological basic in Christianity called "the incarnation". There are the implications thereof (to which I have reffered twice in previous posts).

Having God part of Creation is theologically distinct from the Incarnation. However, you seemed to be referring to Jesus when talking about a "genetically flawed" God.

But Jesus was conceived by miracle and, while Mary was his birth mother, there is no indication that she contributed any of the DNA to Jesus.

However, by standard Baptist doctrine of the Fall, if Jesus had half of Mary's DNA, that would have given him "genetic flaws" from her sinful human fallen nature. So, it is not evolution that gives you the problem, but the Baptist doctrine of the Fall.

 

[lucaspa]

I find it interesting though that no one really questions the parting of the red sea or any of the other miracles and yet there is such controversary (from what I've seen on CF) on the account of creation.

The reason is simple: the parting of the Red Sea and other miracles didn't leave evidence we can study today. Creation did. Creationism (the theory of literal 6 day creation of instantaneous formation in present form) would have consequences that we can see today. So we can apply deductive logic to it and look for the consequences. True statements can't have false consequences. Since creationism has false consequences, it is false.

However, what consequence of the Parting of the Red Sea has lasted to today? The sea has covered all the evidence; the bodies have decayed, the chariots rotted, the iron rusted away, etc. So ... there is no scientific evidence to counter it. Same for the other miracles. Lazarus long ago died a second time due to old age and we don't have his body to study, for instance. Therefore God's Creation can't comment on these events.

 

[lucaspa]

I believe in a literal 6 day creation. I have studied creation science and feel that it is true, we live on a young earth that was created somewhere around 8000 years ago (give a couple of thousand or so...no more than 10000 years surely).

What matters in science is not the evidence "for". If you only look for evidence for, you will always find it. What matters is evidence against. And there is evidence in God's Creation that simply can't be there if a literal 6 day creation less than 10,000 years ago is true. This was realized by Christians by 1831. It was Christians who disproved creation science.

There is actually enough "evidence" of creation to refute any evolutionary theory (big bang).

BB is not an 'evolutionary theory' in that it is not part of evolution. Nor is it an atheistic theory. See www.reasons.org.

The evidence of a 6 day literal creation is the Bible. Which, is good enough for me.

If so, why do you look for scientific evidence? However, what you mean by "the Bible" here is your interpretation of Genesis 1. Unfortunately, Genesis 2:4b contradicts Genesis 1.

 

[lucaspa]

One (of many) example of science pointing away from evolution and to creation....

The Second Law of Thermodynamics (which you will learn in any and every school)

In a simplified statement the second law of thermodynamics (which is universally accepted as true):

The universal principle of change in nature is downhill, not uphill, or, "All matter changes from stability to instability, or from order to chaos."

That isn't the SLOT. If it were, snowflakes can't form. They are more ordered than the water vapor that they changed from.

1. Classical Thermodynamics
"In any physical change that takes place by itself the entropy always increases." (Entropy is "a measure of the quantity of energy not capable of conversion into work.")

Again, that is not true as stated. The entropy of a system can decrease as long as the entropy of the system and surroundings increase.

In chemistry this does not apply at all (and life is chemical reactions) due to enthalpy and the relation of enthalpy and entropy in Gibb's free energy (a measure of whether a chemical reaction happens by itself).

BTW, quoting out of context does not show your point. It is simply a form of false witness. All the quotes used went on to describe how in a system in which energy can be exchanged with surroundings, the entropy of the system can decrease. Again, if this were not true, refrigerators would not work. Nor would you be able to grow from a single cell to an adult.

 

[lucaspa]

If you accept evolution is any way, you accept the following:

1. God prefers the "survival of the fittest" over the weak, blind and lame.

"fittest" is relative. What God command is compassion and care of the weak, blind, and lame. He does not comand that they survive or that they have kids. God commands our ethical attitude towards other people

2. Death is a good thing.

Why is death a bad thing?

3. Jesus was not the perfect man, He was only an inferior version of an ever-changing gene pool.

Jesus was conceived by miracle. However, by creationism this statement is true because Mary was a fallen human, degraded from the "perfect" Adam and Eve.

4. God used mutations in the genetic code, leading to deformities and inferior species to somehow effect a change in evolutionary advancement (although no such "positive mutations" have ever been documented or observed).

Mutations conferring new traits and characteristics have indeed been observed. One of the most famous is one giving a population of bacteria the ability to digest nylon. Others are in humans, 2 give immunity to HIV, 1 gives stronger bones and resistance to osteoporosis, another eliminates vascular disease, and one permits complex speech. The assumption you are operating from here is that mutations are universally "bad". But the reality is quite different. Only 2.6 per thousand mutations are actually harmful.

5. "The first Adam" is a misnomer which casts aspersions of the concept of "the last Adam".

This is the key that concerns you. Paul was trying to explain Jesus to Gentiles in relation to Jewish theology. You don't need Jesus to be the "last Adam" for him to be Savior. Jesus died for your sins, not Adam's.

6. Cain didn't murder his brother, he merely decreased the surplus population during a time of competetive consumption. The fittest survived.

Excuse me, but there was no "surplus population" at the time or competitive consumption. There was more than enough resources for all. You need to read your Bible closer; Cain killed Abel over jealousy, not competitive consumption. Also, murder is an ethical issue, not a scientific one.

7. Evolution is extremely inefficient (if possible at all). Taking the curse of sin out of the equation (which is necessary before Adam), you have God creating a sloppy world full of death and horrible mutations.

Darwinian (natural) selection is the only way to get design. Even if it takes place in the mind of God, it is an inefficient process as God (or humans) throw up ideas, test them mentally, and discard most of them. So, having Darwinian selection work in nature is a way for God to get designs. Most mutations are not horrible. That is your mistaken assumption. After all, the mutation rate is over 1 per individual. You have at least one mutation. Is it "horrible"?

8. Death before sin? That destroys the entire reasoning of the Book of Romans and touches directly on the death burial and resurrection of Christ!

Paul is clearly talking about spiritual death, not physical. Just as Genesis 2 is talking about spiritual death. Read Genesis 2:18. If Adam's death was supposed to be physical, then God lied, because Adam lived 950 years after eating the fruit, instead of dying "in the day" he ate. However, notice that Adam and Eve immediately hid from God. They were spiritually dead "in the day".

9. Jesus "conquered death"? But why? In evolution, death is not onlt necessary for the "strong" to survive, it is a "good" thing because it eliminates the "weak"!

Again, spiritual death, symbolized by physical resurrection. Remember, after we die we go to God, right? So why do you think death is a bad thing? You are working with a strawman version of natural selection. Individuals with the best designs do better in the competition for scarce resouces. The competition is metaphorical, not literal. Death happens in nature because more are born than the environment can support. Part of God's "be fruitful and multiply". By your reasoning, God should have restricted procreation in plants and animals so that there would not be the situation of more individuals than can survive. Natural selection preserves the best designs among the individuals. It is a method of preservation, not "elimination".

It's funny (odd) how those who are supposedly the most compassionate among us, believe in a theory whose primary tenet is based on the idea that the strong must eliminate the weak;

The paradox is solved because natural selection doesn't say this. Also, we don't commit the naturalistic fallacy like you are doing. What you are saying is that what is is also what ought to be in human behavior. That was the failing of Social Darwinists. What happens in nature does not translate to how humans should interact with one another.

Kellogg properly taught in his textbook (with David Starr Jordan) that Darwinism cannot provide moral answers:
"Some men who call themselves pessimists because they cannot read good into the operations of nature forget that they cannot read evil. In morals the law of competition no more justifies personal, official, or national selfishness or brutality than the law of gravitation justifies the shooting of a bird."
Stephen Jay Gould in the essay "William Jennings Bryan's last campaign" in Bully for Brontosaurus, 1991, pp. 429-430.