the illusion of Evolution

[lifepsyop]

It may be surprising to learn that the apostle Paul was contending with evolutionists two thousand years ago. The Epicureans show up in the city of Athens, in the book of Acts chapter 17. Epicureanism is one of many ancient models of the naturalistic or evolutionary metaphysics and cosmology. They believed that all objects in the universe were essentially cobbled together by the innate properties and propensities of matter. The same fundamental materialistic creation story held by modern evolutionists today. There is nothing new under the sun.


Much has been said about the blinders or tunnel vision of evolutionists. No matter what phenomena they observe, they cannot help but see a mystical chain of materialistic origin. The origin of your own human hand must trace back to the gaseous clouds of elements dissolving and coalescing in the infant universe many eons ago. They cannot see reality any other way.


When observations are made, evolutionists cannot help but force them into this model of reality.


A popular atheist argument is that one’s religion depends upon the culture in which they were raised. If you grew up in a Christian society then you’re a Christian, if it is a Muslim society, then you become a Muslim, etc.


(For now let’s set aside the awkward fact that this argument is self-defeating for the atheist, as the vast majority of them were indoctrinated into a materialistic / evolutionary worldview through public schools.)


If the conditions of your upbringing were different, so would be your beliefs.


In a similar way, if the conditions found on earth were different, we’d have a different model of evolution.


If mammalian fossils were strewn about Devonian rock layers, we’d have a modern theory of evolution that mammalian body plans emerged in early earth history.

If fossil human bones were routinely found alongside dinosaur remains, then we’d have a theory that says humans and dinosaurs evolved and coexisted alongside each other.


If the conditions were different, we’d have a different Evolution theory. If the pioneering paleontologists of earlier centuries had discovered a vastly different pattern of animal fossils throughout the “geologic column” than what we find today… those conditions would simply be translated into a story of Evolution that reflects them. We’d be walking through modern museums with giant murals of mammals frolicking throughout an earlier period of earth. It would just be the way it is.


This is the illusion of Evolution.


Now evolutionists will claim there are all sorts of rigorous independent lines of evidence that confirm their materialistic creation story. If you look close enough, you will find that such confirmations do not exist. “Molecular clocks” were once held up as powerful evidence that confirmed the appearances and divergences of different animal types throughout evolutionary history. Evolutionists themselves now quietly admit that no such discernible molecular clocks exist.

Even when animal types appear vastly out of order with the ancestor-descendant relationships they’re supposed to have with each other, evolutionists will simply imagine that a “ghost lineage” must have existed for which there is no actual fossil evidence for. That is one of the dirty little secrets of Evolution… that fossils don’t even have to be in the same order as the presented story of how things evolved.


The independent lines of evidence for Evolution do not exist. There is only the story.


Just as an atheist will argue that your chosen religion will conform to your community, so the ancient tradition of evolutionary belief conformed to the community of discovered fossils. If the fossils were different, the story would be different.


The same logic extends to all things in our universe, not just earth history. If other planets looked different, we’d have a different story of how they evolved.


This is the tragic spell that the modern world has fallen under, ironically dubbed The Enlightenment which was actually a return to pagan religion and cosmology. Ancient Epicureanism in modern packaging.


The truth is that the history of this world is nothing like what the evolutionists believe now, or what they believed two thousand years ago on the streets of Athens. The apostle Paul revealed us the truth. Christ crucified. The God of this world who walked among us, and died for us on the cross, and walked out of the empty tomb resurrected. God has been working in our world since its beginning. Marvelous works. Jesus talked all about it.


For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?” - John 5:46-47

 

[Trusting in Him]

I have worked for much of my working life as a design engineer and I can see the handiwork of a designer in all of God's creation. There is nothing remotely random about any of it. It's like all of creation is shouting "God made me!" I know that God made everything! Those who choose to believe otherwise, just don't want to accept God's rule in their lives. The testimony of all creation is the God reigns, not only in the whole universe, but also in the affairs of men!

Romans1:19-20 Because that which may be know of God is manifest in them; for God hath shown it unto them. For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse.

Not only that, but God's word in the bible tells me that in accepting Him, I can have eternal life and be with Him for all eternity. What you believe in this life has consequences for where you will spend enernity in the next life.

 

[Gottservant]

By the same token that Evolution is illusory, the Faith looks overzealous (selah).

We have to find a way to love Evolution, or our words will fade into obscurity.

Perhaps waiting for the Holy Spirit will prove efficacious?

 

[coffee4u]

By the same token that Evolution is illusory, the Faith looks overzealous (selah).

We have to find a way to love Evolution, or our words will fade into obscurity.

Perhaps waiting for the Holy Spirit will prove efficacious?

Why would you want to love a satanic teaching? The devil laughs as Christians again and again prove to have no faith in scripture.

Revelation 18:4
Then I heard another voice from heaven say: “’Come out of her, my people,’ so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues;

 

[Gottservant]

Why would you want to love a satanic teaching? The devil laughs as Christians again and again prove to have no faith in scripture.

Revelation 18:4
Then I heard another voice from heaven say: “’Come out of her, my people,’ so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues;

Sure but which scripture?

The things concerning Me have an end? (1)

If they remember My words, they will remember yours? (2)

He who compels you to go one mile, go with him two? (3)

The beginning has an end (1); the more memorable, the more trustworthy (2); shared wisdom, is better than isolated loneliness(3)?

I mean these are interpretations of interpretations and I still don't think we would adequately be defending the Holy Spirit, when God says "wait for power"

What do you think: if the faith all waits for power, at every opportunity, Evolutionists will have nothing to add?

I mean is that the difference between me and evolutionists: that I am prepared to add the power of scripture (and still produce testimony to Christ).

Actually, that's what you were saying in another thread: we need to revolve around Christ - maybe that should be "we need to perpetually revolve around Christ"!

 

[Job 33:6]

.
In a similar way, if the conditions found on earth were different, we’d have a different model of evolution.
If mammalian fossils were strewn about Devonian rock layers, we’d have a modern theory of evolution that mammalian body plans emerged in early earth history.
If fossil human bones were routinely found alongside dinosaur remains, then we’d have a theory that says humans and dinosaurs evolved and coexisted alongside each other.
If the conditions were different, we’d have a different Evolution theory. If the pioneering paleontologists of earlier centuries had discovered a vastly different pattern of animal fossils throughout the “geologic column” than what we find today… those conditions would simply be translated into a story of Evolution that reflects them. We’d be walking through modern museums with giant murals of mammals frolicking throughout an earlier period of earth. It would just be the way it is.

Is there something wrong with letting evidence tell the story? What's wrong with the ideas noted above?

Human fossils aren't found alongside dinosaurs, so we conclude that they didn't live together.

.
If the fossils were different, the story would be different.

That's how science should work, you let the evidence tell the story.

 

[Gottservant]

That's how science should work, you let the evidence tell the story.

Every observation, provides a choice (more or less).

Telling the story, is a snare, if you don't do it for the people you are meant to be saving.

I'm not saying we are the ultimate story-teller, I'm saying people need to hear the story for their own reasons - compounding that with wayward facts, hurts everyone's salvation (not just the lost).

 

[lifepsyop]

Is there something wrong with letting evidence tell the story? What's wrong with the ideas noted above?

Human fossils aren't found alongside dinosaurs, so we conclude that they didn't live together.

It is not 'wrong' to construct a model based off of the data in an ad-hoc manner. However it is deceptive to then teach that your model or theory predicts or particularly aligns with that data as if it is a confirmation of it.

I use the well-known "Your religion matches your cultural upbringing" example because atheists and evolutionists are well aware of the logic of the argument: A believer invokes their faith as evidence for their religion while the atheist says they would have believed in a different religion if they had grown up in a different part of the world.

It's the same logic. If early discoverers had unearthed different patterns of fossils, we would simply have a different modern theory of Evolution.

In one sense this is obvious and unremarkable. But then you realize that in textbooks and classrooms and internet forums around the world, students are being taught that this particular pattern of fossils that we do find in the rock layers represent a magnificent confirmation of Evolution theory. This is THE most popular argument for evolution. "We have the fossils, we win!"

And it's all an illusion.

That's how science should work, you let the evidence tell the story.

In real life, what usually happens is that you start with a certain metaphysical or philosophical worldview and then search for evidence to confirm it. The scholarly world of the 18th and 19th centuries were obsessed with the philosophical idea of a universe and world which had progressively evolved all of its major features over time. Ideas drawn from the cosmological tradition of the ancient world, such as the Epicureans whom the apostle Paul conversed with.

 

[lifepsyop]

As people of the world, we love Evolution. Even professing believers love Evolution, because it pushes God's judgment into the background, into the realm of symbolism or fantasy.

As natural rebels against God, we hate the idea that the Creation was once perfect, and that we screwed it up. We hate the idea that God virtually wiped us all out with a flood because of how wicked we are. Evolution wipes the slate clean and puts us humans back in the seat of authority, and we get to decide who God is and what he can do.

The truth of our reality hinges on Jesus Christ the King of Kings and He was not confused about history.

As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. - Matthew 24:37-39

People want to say Jesus was just reminding his audience of the moral lesson of Noah's time but that claim doesn't hold water. Noah's family is the genealogical root of all the nations of the earth, which scripture records in great detail. God established a covenant with Noah. If this covenant is an invented story, if all of those genealogies are invented stories, then all of the Bible is an invented story.

So that's the choice. Believe God or believe Man.

One thing I love about God is how he doesn't allow much room in the middle. You either love Him and put all your faith in Him, or you believe what gains you respect and admiration in this world. The more you believe in God's word, the more you will be hated and mocked for it, and this is all to the praise of His Glory.

People will hate you for reminding them of what God did to the earth, and how it waits again for his judgment. It's not a dispute over science and evidence. People just hate to be reminded of the judgment, and they promote stories like Evolution to push the truth of judgment as far away from them as possible so that we can rule in our little kingdoms here on earth the way we please.

 

[coffee4u]

Sure but which scripture?

The things concerning Me have an end? (1)

If they remember My words, they will remember yours? (2)

He who compels you to go one mile, go with him two? (3)

The beginning has an end (1); the more memorable, the more trustworthy (2); shared wisdom, is better than isolated loneliness(3)?

I mean these are interpretations of interpretations and I still don't think we would adequately be defending the Holy Spirit, when God says "wait for power"

What do you think: if the faith all waits for power, at every opportunity, Evolutionists will have nothing to add?

I mean is that the difference between me and evolutionists: that I am prepared to add the power of scripture (and still produce testimony to Christ).

Actually, that's what you were saying in another thread: we need to revolve around Christ - maybe that should be "we need to perpetually revolve around Christ"!

What I meant is that all Christians (even those who have have been fooled into evolution) should be able to unite around Christ. For me this isn't enough to simply say well it doesn't matter, because I believe it does matter. It isn't about creation as much as it is about sin and death and how they came to be. You can't have evolution without millions of years of death. Only creation allows for no death before sin, so creation is what is upon my heart so this is what I post mostly about. I know from my own experience that peoples perception can change if they are not too deep along the path of evolution. Maybe someone on here will be like I was, assuming evolution is correct because they have not given it that much thought. So I keep trying, keep giving them something else to think on, a different perspective. If they still want to place more faith on radiometric dating or star distances at least I tried.

Evolution will not go away, it is how the ungodly hold onto their ungodliness. How else can a person believe there is no God without evolution to prop it up? The lies of evolution allow them to believe the world makes itself without a God and that man is but an advanced animal who answers to no one but himself.

 

[Derek1111]

It is not 'wrong' to construct a model based off of the data in an ad-hoc manner. However it is deceptive to then teach that your model or theory predicts or particularly aligns with that data as if it is a confirmation of it.

I use the well-known "Your religion matches your cultural upbringing" example because atheists and evolutionists are well aware of the logic of the argument: A believer invokes their faith as evidence for their religion while the atheist says they would have believed in a different religion if they had grown up in a different part of the world.

It's the same logic. If early discoverers had unearthed different patterns of fossils, we would simply have a different modern theory of Evolution.

In one sense this is obvious and unremarkable. But then you realize that in textbooks and classrooms and internet forums around the world, students are being taught that this particular pattern of fossils that we do find in the rock layers represent a magnificent confirmation of Evolution theory. This is THE most popular argument for evolution. "We have the fossils, we win!"

And it's all an illusion.

I honestly don't understand your point here. If you want to disprove the Theory of Evolution, you can do exactly what you are proposing: unearth a different pattern of fossils. If you could show no change in the fossil record over time, for example, you would disprove the ToE. It's not really a question of winning.

In the same way, Christianity is an historical faith. If someone could prove that Jesus had never existed, then our faith would fall away. It would simply be meaningless. Or as 1 Cor 15 has it, if He had not been raised from the dead, we would be most to be pitied in our faith.

There's little point arguing with history; but if you can disprove popular notions of it, then it is the honest thing to do.

 

[Job 33:6]

It is not 'wrong' to construct a model based off of the data in an ad-hoc manner. However it is deceptive to then teach that your model or theory predicts or particularly aligns with that data as if it is a confirmation of it.

Ok, so put into real life terms, dinosaur fossils are found in mesozoic rock, human fossils aren't found until the late Cenozoic. Therefore they didn't coexist.

The theory of evolution concludes that they didn't coexist, and therefore is constructed based on data.

Much further, the theory of evolution concludes that mammals evolved from reptiles and therefore mammals like humans shouldn't predate reptiles such as those of the carboniferous. And the data demonstrates that they don't, thereby confirming the theory.

So what piece of this, do you feel is in conflict with the theory of evolution? Or what of this logic is incorrect?

As if developing a theory based on data is a bad thing.

 

[public hermit]

It may be surprising to learn that the apostle Paul was contending with evolutionists two thousand years ago. The Epicureans show up in the city of Athens, in the book of Acts chapter 17. Epicureanism is one of many ancient models of the naturalistic or evolutionary metaphysics and cosmology. They believed that all objects in the universe were essentially cobbled together by the innate properties and propensities of matter. The same fundamental materialistic creation story held by modern evolutionists today. There is nothing new under the sun.

I understand the desire to link evolution and Epicureanism, but your attempt to identify the two is dubious and anachronistic. Part of the problem is your more fundamental identification of evolution with atheism. Plenty of Christians accept the theory of evolution as a significantly probable account of the evidence. In other words, they don't see Jesus Christ and evolution as incompatible. Your account doesn't allow for that possibility, but simply assumes their incompatibility.

The exegetical move you're making is also dubious. In Acts 17, Paul's target audience was much more general than just Epicureans even if they were included. Paul was not contending against evolution, not even if we consider Epicureanism since their link to the theory of evolution is scantily possible, but of not much interest in the best case scenario. It seems you're trying to tackle atheism, evolution, and materialism as if they are inseparable. But of course, not all evolutionists are atheists, and not all atheists are materialists.

Much has been said about the blinders or tunnel vision of evolutionists. No matter what phenomena they observe, they cannot help but see a mystical chain of materialistic origin. The origin of your own human hand must trace back to the gaseous clouds of elements dissolving and coalescing in the infant universe many eons ago. They cannot see reality any other way.


When observations are made, evolutionists cannot help but force them into this model of reality.


A popular atheist argument is that one’s religion depends upon the culture in which they were raised. If you grew up in a Christian society then you’re a Christian, if it is a Muslim society, then you become a Muslim, etc.


(For now let’s set aside the awkward fact that this argument is self-defeating for the atheist, as the vast majority of them were indoctrinated into a materialistic / evolutionary worldview through public schools.)


If the conditions of your upbringing were different, so would be your beliefs.


In a similar way, if the conditions found on earth were different, we’d have a different model of evolution.


If mammalian fossils were strewn about Devonian rock layers, we’d have a modern theory of evolution that mammalian body plans emerged in early earth history.

If fossil human bones were routinely found alongside dinosaur remains, then we’d have a theory that says humans and dinosaurs evolved and coexisted alongside each other.


If the conditions were different, we’d have a different Evolution theory. If the pioneering paleontologists of earlier centuries had discovered a vastly different pattern of animal fossils throughout the “geologic column” than what we find today… those conditions would simply be translated into a story of Evolution that reflects them. We’d be walking through modern museums with giant murals of mammals frolicking throughout an earlier period of earth. It would just be the way it is.


This is the illusion of Evolution

Your argument:
1. Evolution is a theory based on evidence.
2. If the evidence were different, the theory would be different.

Conclusion: Evolutionist are under an illusion.

Your conclusion doesn't follow. 1 and 2 could be true and yet it also be the case that evolutionist are tracking the evidence (and, perhaps, the way things are). Negate the conclusion and see if it leads to an unavoidable contradiction (indirect proof). I don't find that it leads to a contradiction because your conclusion doesn't follow.

You say evolution is a theory based on evidence. If the theory is based on evidence, and the evidence changes, it follows that the theory changes (otherwise it would be based on something other than the given evidence). If we negate your conclusion, and say evolutionists are not under an illusion (meaning-they are tracking the evidence), we do not obtain a contradiction with the premises you have given.

The independent lines of evidence for Evolution do not exist. There is only the story.

I wish you could say more here. This has to do with evidence, and it would be helpful to see more of what you're thinking on this point. How much can you show that evolutionists aren't tracking the evidence? A developed argument on this point would be interesting.

This is the tragic spell that the modern world has fallen under, ironically dubbed The Enlightenment which was actually a return to pagan religion and cosmology. Ancient Epicureanism in modern packaging

This needs to be unpacked. Pagan religion and cosmology? Again, this is such a dubious and anachronistic claim. But maybe you have a convincing argument, which would be interesting to hear?

The truth is that the history of this world is nothing like what the evolutionists believe now, or what they believed two thousand years ago on the streets of Athens. The apostle Paul revealed us the truth. Christ crucified. The God of this world who walked among us, and died for us on the cross, and walked out of the empty tomb resurrected. God has been working in our world since its beginning. Marvelous works. Jesus talked all about it.

The truth of Christ crucified is not incompatible with evolution. If it is, you have not shown that. It's clear that you assume they are incompatible, but you have not gone very far in showing why. I think a significant point is your identification of evolution and atheism. If an evolutionist can have faith in God, in Christ, then you need to show how that could not possibly be.

 

[coffee4u]

In the same way, Christianity is an historical faith. If someone could prove that Jesus had never existed, then our faith would fall away. It would simply be meaningless. Or as 1 Cor 15 has it, if He had not been raised from the dead, we would be most to be pitied in our faith.

If someone came along and 'proved' that Jesus never existed and your faith disappeared then you didn't have faith to begin with, you had belief, belief that was contingent on factors around you. Faith and belief are two different things. If you believe in God only because of facts and proof then you don't truly have faith. Faith isn't conditional nor does it need to be propped up by words of men. It is your spirit communicating to God's spirit. Faith lives in the absence of proof.
It seems people these days don't get that.
Those who would fall away are showing they have more faith and trust in the fallen human being who holds out the proof to them then they do in God.

Psalm 146:3-7


3 Do not put your trust in princes,
in human beings, who cannot save.
4 When their spirit departs, they return to the ground;
on that very day their plans come to nothing.

 

[lifepsyop]

I understand the desire to link evolution and Epicureanism, but your attempt to identify the two is dubious and anachronistic.

Modern Evolution theory and Epicureanism share the same metaphysical idea of naturalism, that the world has developed from the innate properties of matter being acted upon by axiomatic natural forces over time. They also share a more direct connection as Epicureanism and similar ancient belief systems were the philosophical well that early evolutionists, such as Erasmus Darwin were drawing from. It’s not anachronistic, it’s a philosophical tradition carried over from the ancient world.

Part of the problem is your more fundamental identification of evolution with atheism.

I would not identify Evolution exclusively with atheism, as it’s a generally deistic and pantheistic worldview as well. Evolution just buries its god inside the language of natural laws or fundamental properties or forces, which themselves have no natural explanation.

Plenty of Christians accept the theory of evolution as a significantly probable account of the evidence. In other words, they don't see Jesus Christ and evolution as incompatible. Your account doesn't allow for that possibility, but simply assumes their incompatibility.

Because they are incompatible. Evolution is thoroughly non-biblical. No question at all. Evolutionary cosmology and Biblical cosmology contradict each other in almost every way imaginable. Denial of the Genesis account is just as incompatible as a Christian denying that God brought Israel out of Egypt and parted the Red Sea. We are reminded again and again throughout scripture to remember and praise God for the works that he did on the earth.


Christians, drawing from the Jewish tradition, have often been found mixing different belief systems in an effort to get along with the surrounding culture.

Mormons and certain Gnostics claim the name of Jesus Christ as well, but those belief systems are just as clearly non-Biblical as Evolution is.

I wish you could say more here. This has to do with evidence, and it would be helpful to see more of what you're thinking on this point. How much can you show that evolutionists aren't tracking the evidence? A developed argument on this point would be interesting.

I gave the example of “molecular clocks”... Evolutionists once had high hopes that they would be able to show how molecular divergences of different animal types would basically match the proposed morphological divergences found in the fossil record. Since Evolution isn’t true, this was never going to be possible. Similar types of animals have similar molecular structures but there is no coherent pattern when comparing what should be more ‘ancient’ body plans to more ‘recently evolved’ forms of life.


There are explanations of course, (some genes must have been more conserved than others), but then it’s just back to the same issue with the fossil record itself; the data set could be completely different and yet still absorbed into the theory.


The phrase “tracking the evidence” you keep using is a bit amorphous. I think most parties would claim they are tracking the evidence. Young earth creationists ‘track the evidence’ as well. YEC’s refine their theory around the data just as Evolutionists refine their own around data. However, neither YEC’s nor evolutionists ever really use data to challenge their own respective creation philosophies.

This needs to be unpacked. Pagan religion and cosmology? Again, this is such a dubious and anachronistic claim. But maybe you have a convincing argument, which would be interesting to hear?

It’s not dubious. Enlightenment age philosophers were directly inspired by these ancient cosmologies. Evolution emerges out of the realm of pantheism. Nature itself as a god-like destroying and creating force that separates and combines its own elements to produce progressively new objects and forms of life.


Modern evolutionists fully committed themselves to these philosophies and began mapping out the way in which they thought it must have happened. This is where you’d say they began “tracking the evidence”, but really they were just writing a story around whatever data they found.


The issue is that Evolution is such a broad metaphysical idea that such a story could be written so many different ways, that it was never really being tested by the data. So the present story of Evolution goes that there were long ages, hundreds of millions of years of earth history where only certain types of aquatic life existed. Yet if early paleontologists had instead discovered those same rock layers teeming with the remains of terrestrial life, the story of Evolution would have simply been written that way instead, with many scholarly books discussing the apparent ‘explosion’ of biological diversity on land in the early stages of life on earth.

The truth of Christ crucified is not incompatible with evolution. If it is, you have not shown that. It's clear that you assume they are incompatible, but you have not gone very far in showing why. I think a significant point is your identification of evolution and atheism. If an evolutionist can have faith in God, in Christ, then you need to show how that could not possibly be.

I didn’t say they can’t have faith in Jesus. Mormons believe in Jesus, too. It doesn’t change the fact of how incompatible the Evolutionary or Mormon worldview is with the Biblical worldview.

The Biblical worldview is the setting for the Cross. The Bible lays out the need for the Cross in the history of God's relationship to humans, it describes the salvific 'logic' of what Jesus' sacrifice on the cross does for us, and it prophetically points forward to the cross and the future beyond. When you deny scripture, you're denying the entire foundation of who Jesus is and why we need him.


One of the most prominent themes of the Bible is how God instructs his people to remember his works upon the earth. (e.g. the events in the Exodus) … denying God’s works, it has to be said, is in some part a denial of Him. How else should it be said? The whole point of salvation is that we have a hope that God fulfills his promises, his covenants, that he reigns supreme over the creation, and that he revealed these truths for us.


Christ is the Word of God made flesh. The Cross is the fulfillment of scripture. Jesus lived and breathed the scriptures. He said that Moses was writing about Him. On the road to Emmaus, Jesus opened the disciples eyes to the fact that all the scriptures were about him. Jesus’ own genealogy is traced back to Abraham, Noah, and Adam. Read the book of Hebrews. Read the apostle Peter’s letters. The certainty of God’s future judgment on the world is directly compared to the judgment in Noah’s day. This is the Word of God, the only reason we know of salvation by Jesus’ death and resurrection.


According to Christian evolutionists, Jesus(God) and the Apostles were just hopelessly confused about history because they had not yet been enlightened by modern “science”.

 

[lifepsyop]

Ok, so put into real life terms, dinosaur fossils are found in mesozoic rock, human fossils aren't found until the late Cenozoic. Therefore they didn't coexist.

The theory of evolution concludes that they didn't coexist, and therefore is constructed based on data.

This is like the atheist pointing out that Jimmy is only a Christian because he was raised in a Christian community and culture. If Jimmy had grown up in a Muslim community then he would believe in Islam. Jimmy is simply a product of the circumstances.

So if early paleontologists had found patterns of dinosaur and human fossils mixed together in mesozoic rocks, then the following story of Evolution would be that humans and dinosaurs coexisted at the time these layers were deposited. That only sounds weird to us because we are so familiar with our current evolution theory. Just like Jimmy couldn't imagine himself as a Muslim because he happened to grow up surrounded by Christian culture. If the circumstances were different than Jimmy's belief would be different.

Since "Evolution" could conceivably occur in countless numbers of ways due to countless possibilities of chance events and selection pressures, then it's just a matter of forming the general evolutionary story around whatever particulars are discovered.

After a century of the public wandering through fancy museums with great artistic murals depicting the Evolution of man alongside dinosaurs, then today it would just seem to be the way that it is... just as we are so accustomed to our particular Evolution story today that has dinosaurs and man separated by many millions of years.

 

[Derek1111]

If someone came along and 'proved' that Jesus never existed and your faith disappeared then you didn't have faith to begin with, you had belief, belief that was contingent on factors around you. Faith and belief are two different things. If you believe in God only because of facts and proof then you don't truly have faith. Faith isn't conditional nor does it need to be propped up by words of men. It is your spirit communicating to God's spirit. Faith lives in the absence of proof.
It seems people these days don't get that.
Those who would fall away are showing they have more faith and trust in the fallen human being who holds out the proof to them then they do in God.

Psalm 146:3-7


3 Do not put your trust in princes,
in human beings, who cannot save.
4 When their spirit departs, they return to the ground;
on that very day their plans come to nothing.

So you don't believe 1 Cor 15, then? You don't believe "And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith"? You don't believe "And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins"?

There's no point in discussing with someone who doesn't believe the Bible.

 

[Derek1111]

This is like the atheist pointing out that Jimmy is only a Christian because he was raised in a Christian community and culture. If Jimmy had grown up in a Muslim community then he would believe in Islam. Jimmy is simply a product of the circumstances.

So if early paleontologists had found patterns of dinosaur and human fossils mixed together in mesozoic rocks, then the following story of Evolution would be that humans and dinosaurs coexisted at the time these layers were deposited. That only sounds weird to us because we are so familiar with our current evolution theory. Just like Jimmy couldn't imagine himself as a Muslim because he happened to grow up surrounded by Christian culture. If the circumstances were different than Jimmy's belief would be different.

Since "Evolution" could conceivably occur in countless numbers of ways due to countless possibilities of chance events and selection pressures, then it's just a matter of forming the general evolutionary story around whatever particulars are discovered.

After a century of the public wandering through fancy museums with great artistic murals depicting the Evolution of man alongside dinosaurs, then today it would just seem to be the way that it is... just as we are so accustomed to our particular Evolution story today that has dinosaurs and man separated by many millions of years.

What are you arguing with? Yes. If paleontologists had found a fossil record that indicated dinosaurs and people were alive at the same time, in the same place, they would legitimately infer that they coexisted. That they have never found this, enables them legitimately to infer that they have never coexisted outside of the Flintstones.

However, this is not sensible: "Since "Evolution" could conceivably occur in countless numbers of ways due to countless possibilities of chance events and selection pressures, then it's just a matter of forming the general evolutionary story around whatever particulars are discovered." You seem to be arguing that the material world's origins are inexplicable, and science cannot use any discipline(s) to explore this. That is palpably untrue.

 

[lifepsyop]

What are you arguing with? Yes. If paleontologists had found a fossil record that indicated dinosaurs and people were alive at the same time, in the same place, they would legitimately infer that they coexisted. That they have never found this, enables them legitimately to infer that they have never coexisted outside of the Flintstones.

Yes, either way we'd have "Evolution" as the explanation. Regardless of where fossils are found, the inference will be in support of a philosophical commitment to Evolution.

Contrast this with the way Evolution is commonly taught to the public, as if the fossil record points indisputably to an evolutionary history. You yourself can see that an entirely different fossil record would just produce a different story of Evolution.

The Evolution story is just people wanting to believe that the world made itself and that they don't need to worry about judgment from their Creator. As a prideful civilization, we demand Evolution as our creation story because it gives us permission to live our lives any way that we choose.



This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

- 2 Peter 3:1-7

 

[The Barbarian]

Since "Evolution" could conceivably occur in countless numbers of ways due to countless possibilities of chance events and selection pressures, then it's just a matter of forming the general evolutionary story around whatever particulars are discovered.

That's pretty much how all of science works. Fit the theory to the evidence. Probably seems like cheating to creationists, who try to make the evidence to fit the doctrine.

Bottom line, the evidence overwhelmingly shows common descent of living things on Earth. Not surprisingly, when the function of DNA was discovered, genetic analyses showed the same relationships between living things that had been inferred by anatomy, fossil evidence, and other data.