My Day One Challenge

[AV1611VET]

Poisoning the well.

LOL -- solid gold.

You believe what you want to, Kylie, and I'll believe what I want to.

How's that?

 

[Kylie]

LOL -- solid gold.

You believe what you want to, Kylie, and I'll believe what I want to.

How's that?

When did I ever say that you are not free to believe whatever you want?

I'm simply pointing out the logical fallacy you are using. The fact that you are using such fallacies (as well as the fact that you apparently are unable to respond to any of the other points I raised) is there for all to see and make up their own minds.

 

[AV1611VET]

I'm simply pointing out the logical fallacy you are using. The fact that you are using such fallacies (as well as the fact that you apparently are unable to respond to any of the other points I raised) is there for all to see and make up their own minds.

Indeed it is.

And I think also that I have gained a little more insight into why you think the way you do.

You apparently get your theology from a circle of traditionalists who ... it sounds to me like ... tell you what you want to hear.

 

[Kylie]

Indeed it is.

And I think also that I have gained a little more insight into why you think the way you do.

You apparently get your theology from a circle of traditionalists who ... it sounds to me like ... tell you what you want to hear.

What makes you think I want to hear a Christian perspective? If you think I pick and choose what I want to believe about Christians so I can continue to think of them as uneducated or something, then you are sorely mistaken. I'm simply pointing out that the majority Christian position is that Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament.

 

[AV1611VET]

I'm simply pointing out that the majority Christian position is that Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament.

You left two key words out, didn't you?

Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not God, wrote Genesis.

We call that "blasphemy".

1 Thessalonians 2:13 For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.

 

[driewerf]

LOL -- solid gold.

You believe what you want to, Kylie, and I'll believe what I want to.

How's that?

Sure. You believe what you want. As long as you limit yourself to believing, you are harmless, innocuous.

The problem is that neither you nor your brethren limit yourself to believing. You also find the need to spread your creationist nonsense. Like you do here. And creationists elect other creationists at education boards, disrupt science classes or incite students to disrupt science classes. Lawmakers try time after time to block the teaching of good science and push their creationist idiocy. Creationists cause trouble in natural history museums. Harass the staff of science museums.
That is the big problem of creationists.

 

[driewerf]

You left two key words out, didn't you?
"Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not God, wrote Genesis."
We call that "blasphemy".

And why would Kylie have to add the "not God" stipulation? Isn't the mentioning of Moses not enough to exclude all the other. In your opinion, she would have to write
Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Joseph Stalin, wrote Genesis.
Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Greta Thunberg, wrote Genesis.
Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Franklin Roosevelt, wrote Genesis.
Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Josephine Baker, wrote Genesis.
Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Charlemagne, wrote Genesis.Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Isaac Newton, wrote Genesis.
Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not Stephen Jay Gould, wrote Genesis.

and so on ad nauseam.

 

[AV1611VET]

You also find the need to spread your creationist nonsense.

Who baited creationist teachers by hiring someone to teach evolution, then got the ACLU involved, culminating in a famous monkey trial in 1925? Hmmm?

 

[AV1611VET]

And why would Kylie have to add the "not God" stipulation?

She didn't add it.

She took it out.

First she said ...

Sorry, last I heard, Christian tradition held that Moses, not God, wrote Genesis.

Then, after I replied, she said ...

I'm simply pointing out that the majority Christian position is that Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament.

Notice how she changed "Christian tradition" to "majority Christian position" and took out "not God"?

 

[Kylie]

She didn't add it.

She took it out.

First she said ...

Then, after I replied, she said ...
Notice how she changed "Christian tradition" to "majority Christian position" and took out "not God"?

You're right.

When I speak of what Christians tend to believe, I should go with the smallest, most obscure interpretation... Because who cares what the majority thinks?

 

[AV1611VET]

Because who cares what the majority thinks?

Joshua and Caleb.

The other ten spies gave a bad report, and because of it, the Jews were punished and had to wander in the wilderness for forty years.

 

[driewerf]

Who baited creationist teachers by hiring someone to teach evolution, then got the ACLU involved, culminating in a famous monkey trial in 1925? Hmmm?

Creationist teachers? Creationist obscurantists will be more accurate.

 

[DialecticSkeptic]

For anyone committed to the Bible, I think they should accept YEC as a creation myth.

I'll take the bait.

I am committed to the Bible. Why should I accept young-earth creationism (YEC) as a creation myth?

 

[DialecticSkeptic]

And why would Kylie have to add the "not God" stipulation?

Because she made a claim about what "Christian tradition" holds regarding Scripture. Since a significant portion of Christendom holds that God was involved in the writing of Scripture—from Roman Catholics to Protestants including Lutherans, Reformed, evangelicals, and even neo-orthodoxy (e.g., Emil Brunner)—the fact that she said "Moses, not God, wrote Genesis" is fairly relevant and even important, as is the fact that she quietly removed that clause. The Nicene Creed, for example, affirms the belief that the Holy Spirit "spoke through the prophets"—and mainstream Christianity is Nicene Christianity. [1] And let's not forget that Jesus said, in reference to Scripture (emphasis mine), "Have you not read what God said to you?"

It is Liberal Christianity and Progressive Christianity that rejects the idea that the Bible is divinely inspired (ibid.).

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References:

[1] It's interesting to observe that nowhere in that Wikipedia article is any credit given to Gail Robinson and her book Mass Communication and Journalism (2019), even though much of it is pulled directly from it (pp. 96-98).

 

[DialecticSkeptic]

You guys want to debate the question of once-saved-always-saved? Good. Fine. But the moment you cross the fence and make statements about the physical world you enter science's realm and play by science's rules.

I'm sorry but the moment you start making statements involving inductive inference, logical realism, the uniformity of nature, etc.—apart from which science would be a performative contradiction—you enter the unceded territory of theology and play by its rules. The preconditions necessary for the intelligibility of human experience are missing apart from the triune God of Christian orthodoxy.

I agree that the job of science is to describe and explain the physical, the material, the real world. However, it can't do its job apart from inductive inference, logical realism, the uniformity of nature, etc. No one builds a roof without walls.

As someone once said, "If you don’t want to stick with these rules, then don't cross the fence." I agree that good fences "clarify the rules by which the discussions are to be held."

The changing of water into wine at the wedding at Cana? A very material thing. Hence, you play by science's rules.

This would follow only if we wanted to know how that miracle happened. And let's not forget that "I don't know" is a perfectly reasonable answer—and an expected one for historical one-offs.

But if we want to know whether or not the miracle happened, that's not a question for science but rather history.

Scientism is intellectual suicide. [1] Let's avoid it.

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References:

[1] Scientism is "the improper use of science or scientific claims ... where science might not apply, such as when the topic is perceived as beyond the scope of scientific inquiry, and in contexts where there is insufficient empirical evidence to justify a scientific conclusion."

 

[durangodawood]

I'll take the bait.

I am committed to the Bible. Why should I accept young-earth creationism (YEC) as a creation myth?

Because theres too much evidence all around us that it cant possibly be literally true.

 

[DialecticSkeptic]

Because theres too much evidence all around us that it cant possibly be literally true.

Ah, I see. So, you were emphasizing the "myth" part and meant it as "not true." In other words, you were saying something like, "Anyone committed to the Bible should accept that YEC is a piece of fiction."

I had misunderstood your question because I took "myth" in its scholarly sense of "an origins story" (i.e., concerning the early history of a people and involving supernatural beings or events). So, what I heard you saying is that anyone committed to the Bible should accept YEC as an origins story. Since I don't accept YEC and think it's a piece of fiction, I was wondering why you believe I ought to accept it.

So, the misunderstanding was truly ironic.