Rejection of evolution correlates with racism

[Hans Blaster]

I agree with the general thrust of your statement here, but you all too quickly turn it into a political maneuver by injecting the singular term "genocide" into what would otherwise be a straightforward, scientifically valid statement.

What else do you call an incident where all but 8 people on the entire planet are killed?

I also used that term, because the genetic evidence doesn't invalidate the flood claim, it only invalidates the mass slaughter claim associated with the same story.

Moreover, then, to accept your statements above as a truth about the reality of our natural past isn't to also imply anything about the nature or truth of biblical faith. It also doesn't demonstrate that the varieties of the fields of Ethics, Hermeneutics, Historiography or the Philosophy of History have been fully engaged by atheistic natural scientists who eschew the Biblical literature.

My statement was based on the efforts of population geneticists, I said nothing about the *nature* of faith in the bible (only that post-flood creation of genetic information is unsurprisingly not mentioned in said text.)

Also: "atheistic natural scientists", really?!?

If you would like a better word for science try "secular" as science is indifferent to the existence of any god. Science does not require one to reject god or not believe in one (depending on your preferred definition of atheist), but it does not use as a component. (Unless you have a natural god you'd like us to test...)

 

[Subduction Zone]

SZ, I agree. There is no geological evidence of a singular, world-wide catastrophic flood. I'll agree, too, from the more limited studies I've done, obviously much less than your own, that the genetics of mankind is being reported in the sciences as not reflecting the outcomes of a Great Flood.

However, when you then say that history books [i.e. of today] do not apply, I'm going to take a half-way position between you and @myst33 on this point regarding the essence and nature of the 'writing of history.' There is more involved here in how we as human beings reflect upon, inquire into, and understand our natural past.

My point is this: To articulate and write the statement ,"We can tell from genetics that mankind was not threatened in the manner given in Genesis," is to make a statement regarding the nature of the past and, thereby, to make a historical statement, more particularly--two statements. Maybe more.

I would disagree with that. History technically refers to the written record of man. Anthropology deals more with the pre-written record. If one was talking about the history of man then you would have a valid point but we were using the word "history" without any qualifiers. It is similar to the term "evolution". Evolution without a qualifier refers to the biological evolution of life. One can still talk about stellar evolution etc., but that is again using a qualifying term.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

What else do you call an incident where all but 8 people on the entire planet are killed?

I also used that term, because the genetic evidence doesn't invalidate the flood claim, it only invalidates the mass slaughter claim associated with the same story.

So, you're main aim and intent here in pointing out the deficiencies of a Fundamentalist reading of the Great Flood is a political one rather than a scientific one? I'm not assuming that it is, but you can correct me if I'm somehow misconstruing your aim and intent here.

As for the "incident," I'm not going to call it a "genocide" because we're not beginning from a metaphysically absolute nor ethically profound position in saying so. To do so ignores a whole host of philosophical problems with the whole God concept in the first place. I think it also puts the cart before the horse by placing Axiology before Epistemology, and I don't think we can do a good service to either modern science or modern religion (even Christianity) by trying to nakedly assert some unspoken moral position that isn't in itself absolute, let alone proven.

My statement was based on the efforts of population geneticists, I said nothing about the *nature* of faith in the bible (only that post-flood creation of genetic information is unsurprisingly not mentioned in said text.)

Also: "atheistic natural scientists", really?!?

If you would like a better word for science try "secular" as science is indifferent to the existence of any god. Science does not require one to reject god or not believe in one (depending on your preferred definition of atheist), but it does not use as a component. (Unless you have a natural god you'd like us to test...)

I kind of disagree with this, and I think that the finer analytic qualities involved here as to discerning the level of "scientific indifference" to divine entities will themselves be arbitrated according to the degree one bends between Methodological Materialism and Philosophical Materialism.

 

[AV1611VET]

Of course, anyone here is free to counter or supplement what Montgomery has to say since he's just one geologist, with his own professional point of view.

Well, that was a waste of six and a half minutes.

But seriously, thank you for sharing it.

 

[AV1611VET]

What else do you call an incident where all but 8 people on the entire planet are killed?

Judgement?

 

[2PhiloVoid]

I would disagree with that. History technically refers to the written record of man. Anthropology deals more with the pre-written record. If one was talking about the history of man then you would have a valid point but we were using the word "history" without any qualifiers. It is similar to the term "evolution". Evolution without a qualifier refers to the biological evolution of life. One can still talk about stellar evolution etc., but that is again using a qualifying term.

Sure. That's a good point. But I guess it goes without saying that I'm here to sometimes rock the boat where philosophical categories and taxonomies are concerned, particularly where World Religion is concerned.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Well, that was a waste of six and a half minutes.

But seriously, thank you for sharing it.

I do appreciate the fact that you took the time to watch that 7 minute video, AV, but why do you say it was a waste?

 

[2PhiloVoid]

Judgement?

See? As surprised as you may be, we do have a literary conclusion in common here about the moral nature of the Flood narrative, AV.

I'm not a total loss.

 

[Skye1300]

There is no evidence of a huge flood at the beginning of civilization that would have threatened man. Correct. There is only evidence against it. We can tell from genetics that mankind was not threatened in the manner given in Genesis. History books do not apply here. We are talking about an event that supposedly happened before history was a thing.

But if scientists don't know how much diversity was among humans and animals BEFORE the flood then they can't say for sure if there's a so called bottle neck or not. What we see today could be the bottleneck. For all we know there could have been purple, orange and green humans, hairy humans and completely hairless humans and all kinds of unthought of diversity and all that's left is the diversity we see today. Science is not perfect and can't answer EVERYTHING. A lot of what science thinks it knows is all based on how they choose to interpret the data.

 

[Skye1300]

I do not share your firm belief in our current state of knowledge as being the final one or complete.

Scientists do not even know what we should eat and when, not to say what happened or not so back in time. Its all just some possibilities and hypothesis.

Exactly!

 

[Hans Blaster]

I kind of disagree with this, and I think that the finer analytic qualities involved here as to discerning the level of "scientific indifference" to divine entities will themselves be arbitrated according to the degree one bends between Methodological Materialism and Philosophical Materialism.

The statement I made before reflect my scientific training. Not once did we ever consider any theological position when considering the natural explanations for various phenomena. Theological positions were omitted and ignored. I did not know the theological positions of my colleagues (with the exception, presumably, of those I saw at mass) nor they mine. The same was true of any journal article we would read or write. No statements of faith were included. No one said they rejected gods either in such writings. That's just not how it was and is done.

Methodological Naturalism (or if you prefer, I don't) Methodological Materialism was the core of the scientific process and no concerns about anyone's shading toward Philosophical Naturalism were needed or wanted.

 

[AV1611VET]

I do appreciate the fact that you took the time to watch that 7 minute video, AV, but why do you say it was a waste?

His approach to the Flood was a purely natural one; talking about natural dams bursting and flooding local areas.

Nothing about it raining or the ground being broken up ... and he leaves God out of the picture altogether.

The earth, if it was an apple, is not an all naturally-grown organic apple.

It is an apple created ex nihilo: fully-mature, ready to eat, but having no history.

 

[Subduction Zone]

But if scientists don't know how much diversity was among humans and animals BEFORE the flood then they can't say for sure if there's a so called bottle neck or not. What we see today could be the bottleneck. For all we know there could have been purple, orange and green humans, hairy humans and completely hairless humans and all kinds of unthought of diversity and all that's left is the diversity we see today. Science is not perfect and can't answer EVERYTHING. A lot of what science thinks it knows is all based on how they choose to interpret the data.

No. We understand how diversity enters the genome. At what rate. There is far too much diversity in the human genome for there to have been a population bottleneck of only 8 a few thousand years ago. There is too much diversity for a population bottleneck of 8 even a hundred thousand years ago.

You are making a very bad conclusion. Science cannot answer all questions. That does not mean that scientists cannot answer some questions. We do have an example of a species that did undergo such an event. And that left a clear mark in their genome. Transplants are very easy with cheetahs. They had an extreme population bottleneck event. Humans are very difficult to do transplants on. We did not have an extreme population bottleneck.

 

[Astrid]

True, but it remains exceedingly implausible that tens of thousands of highly trained experts would be wrong about evolution. Anyone can merely claim that people are deluded - it is easy to just float a claim like "the people who believe the moon is made of rock and not green cheese are deluded". It is quite another to make the case that people are indeed deluded.


Strawman - the theory of evolution does not say this.

Neither does anyone else except a few creationists
SO uninformed that they think it does.

 

[Astrid]

But if scientists don't know how much diversity was among humans and animals BEFORE the flood then they can't say for sure if there's a so called bottle neck or not. What we see today could be the bottleneck. For all we know there could have been purple, orange and green humans, hairy humans and completely hairless humans and all kinds of unthought of diversity and all that's left is the diversity we see today. Science is not perfect and can't answer EVERYTHING. A lot of what science thinks it knows is all based on how they choose to interpret the data.

Nobody says its perfect or knows everything.
You seem to think it knows nothing.
What does your not- so- infallible bible resdin' know?

You think there was really a world wide flood?

It does not take much science to disprove
that.

Have you figured how antarctic ice could
survive your "flood"?

 

[2PhiloVoid]

The statement I made before reflect my scientific training. Not once did we ever consider any theological position when considering the natural explanations for various phenomena. Theological positions were omitted and ignored. I did not know the theological positions of my colleagues (with the exception, presumably, of those I saw at mass) nor they mine. The same was true of any journal article we would read or write. No statements of faith were included. No one said they rejected gods either in such writings. That's just not how it was and is done.

Yes, I can very well understand your point here. My gripe with your earlier comments, though, have to do with the fact that you cited the Great Flood "incident" as a genocide. I disagree on two points here since I don't think one can invoke either science or ethics to call the Flood a genocide. And if you're going to insist that you should do so, then I'm going to have to decline in agreeing with you on that designation, and I will mainly do this because if there was no actual incident of a historical nature, then there was no actual genocide. Secondly, applying Methodological Naturalism does not require an exacting subscription to any specific ethic, other than simple honesty in observation and reporting. To cite the Biblical Flood narrative as a "genocide" is to make a moral judgement upon that ancient account, one that comes out of Ethics and outside of Methodological Naturalism and, with the context in which you used it here in a post above, becomes a kind of insinuated political statement.

Methodological Naturalism (or if you prefer, I don't) Methodological Materialism was the core of the scientific process and no concerns about anyone's shading toward Philosophical Naturalism were needed or wanted.

Ok. Next time you see Richard Dawkins or Jerry Coyne, please remind them of this difference you have with them.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

His approach to the Flood was a purely natural one; talking about natural dams bursting and flooding local areas.

Nothing about it raining or the ground being broken up ... and he leaves God out of the picture altogether.

The earth, if it was an apple, is not an all naturally-grown organic apple.

It is an apple created ex nihilo: fully-mature, ready to eat, but having no history.

I guess there's always the slight possibility that the Universe and the Earth were created as you say. It's just that there's really no evidence of this. Or of a Global Flood.

So, on some level, I personally feel that (as the scientifically leaning Existentialist I am) we'll have to handle the Bible as "it is" rather than how we'd "like it to be." At the same time, I'll have to grace Parker and Morris, or even Ken Ham, among many others, with askance upon their methods of Hermeneutics and of their understanding of not only various scientific methods, but also of how they perceive the nature of science itself.

At some point, you're going to have to realize I've read quite a bit to come to my present conclusions, AV. But that doesn't mean I feel I have to prove you wrong. It just means we're both Christians and we have different approaches to how we perceive our faith in Christ, our trust in the Bible and how we think we each need to "put it all together."

Does this make sense?

 

[AV1611VET]

Does this make sense?

What specific denomination are you?

I'm Independent Fundamental Baptist.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

What specific denomination are you?

I'm Independent Fundamental Baptist.

I'm with the Historic Church of the Existential Wanderers. [ That's a bit of humor...]

But more seriously speaking, my past affiliations have been with PCUSA, Southern Baptist and the Christian Church/Instrumental (i.e. conservative Disciples of Christ).

Despite all of that, I've always been an Existentialist Christian, with strong shades of Pascal and some Kierkegaard. As you know, this means that some of my fellow Christians, like Norman Geisler, have a rather strong distaste for my style of theology, but I just chalk all of that up to yet one more interesting piece of social philosophy to contemplate in my own Christian experience. It doesn't stop me from extending my hand in fellowship with more Fundamental thinking Christians.

 

[Hans Blaster]

My gripe with your earlier comments, though, have to do with the fact that you cited the Great Flood "incident" as a genocide. I disagree on two points here since I don't think one can invoke either science or ethics to call the Flood a genocide. And if you're going to insist that you should do so, then I'm going to have to decline in agreeing with you on that designation, and I will mainly do this because if there was no actual incident of a historical nature, then there was no actual genocide.

It's just a matter of definition:

GENOCIDE:

noun

1. the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group

All humans are certainly a group of humans. It fits the definition. It is not a matter of moral judgement or ethics or science. Just the modern usage of that modern term.