Lord Spanky has once again punished his keyboard with an enormous response to my post on Richard Dawkins. I offer it to you in its unedited form and eagerly await your comments.
Begin Commentary:
This post will outline not evidence against evolution, but in favor of creation. I’m a firm believer that this whole debate between theism and atheism rests completely on evolution vs. creation (be it a literal six day creation or not). Think about it…it deals with our origins. If evolution (in its purest form) is true, then God is not, and if creation is true, then atheistic evolution falls by the wayside, at the very least.
Now, beginning, if creation is true then there are certain things that would inherently be true and we must see if they are. Now please don’t misunderstand some of this evidence as simply against evolution. I will present nothing that does not support creation, and I will demonstrate how it does. If creation is true, then the earth should be much younger than 4 billion years. There should also be clearly defined gaps between major taxonomic groups, due to the belief that everything would have been created completely formed. You following me? Also, there should be a virtually instantaneous appearance of organisms in the fossil record, NOT a gradual progression of any sort. This, to me, is a huge requirement, for if we were created, then life would have just appeared. Agreed? On to evidence.
We’ll begin with the age of the earth.
“It has been estimated that seventy volcanoes the size of Mexico’s Paricutin producing 0.001 cubic mile of water per year for 4.5 billion years of earth’s history could account for the 315 cubic miles of water in the oceans today. There are now approximately 600 active volcanoes and about 10,000 dormant ones. Six hundred volcanoes comparable to Paricutin could account for the present oceans in approximately 0.5 billion years.”
“Uranium salts presently appear to be accumulating in the oceans at about 100 times the rate of their loss. It is estimated that 60,000,000,000 grams of uranium is added to the oceans annually. Under uniformitarian rules, the total concentration of uranium salts of the oceans (estimated at less than 1E+17 grams) could be accumulated in less than one million years.
“The atmospheric content of helium-4 (the most abundant isotope of helium) has accumulated from the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium in the earth’s crust and oceans, from nuclear reactions caused by cosmic rays, and from the sun. If the present rate of accumulation has been constant throughout four billion years of the earth’s history, there should be thirty times as much helium in our present atmosphere as is presently there.”
“One estimate of meteoric dust settling to earth places it at 14.3 million tons annually. If this rate has been constant throughout five billion years of geologic history, one might expect over fifty feet of meteorite dust to have settled all over the surface of the earth. … The average meteorite contains about three hundred times more nickel than the average earth rock.”
“It has been estimated that four volcanoes spewing lava at the rate observed for Paricutin and continuing for five billion years could almost account for the volume of the continental crusts. The Colombian plateau of northwestern United States (covering 200,000 square miles) was produced by a gigantic lava flow several thousands of feet deep. The Canadian shield and other extensive lava flows indicate that volcanic activity has indeed followed an accelerated tempo in the past.”
“If humanity is really about 2.5 million years old (as claimed by Dr. Louis Leakey), creationist calculate from conservative population estimates (2.4 children per family, average generation and life span of forty-three years) that the world population would have grown from a single family to 10 to the 2700th power of people over one million years. The present world population is about 2×10 to the 9th power, an infinitesimal part of the 10 to the 2700th power.”
“It now appears that the C14 decay rate in living organisms is about 30 per cent less than its production rate in the upper atmosphere. Since the amount of C14 is now increasing in the atmosphere, it may be assumed that the quantity of C14 was even lower in the past than at the present. This condition would lead to abnormally low C14/C12 ratios for the older fossils. Such a fossil would be interpreted as being much older than it really is. … Creationists argue that since C14 has not yet reached its equilibrium rate, the age of the atmosphere must be less than 20,000 years old.”
THE FOSSIL RECORD
The Cambrian explosion – At the bottom of the geological column in the so called Cambrian rocks are found highly complex creatures: trilobites, worms, sponges, jellyfish, etc., all without ancestors. It’s as though you “turned the light on” in the fossil record. These are highly complex life forms appearing on the scene without forerunners. Trilobites for example, have compound lenses in their eyes that make use of Fermat’s principle and Abbe’s Sine Law. This is like entering the highway of life without an entrance ramp.
STEPHEN J. GOULD, HARVARD, “The Cambrian Explosion occurred in a geological moment, and we have reason to think that all major anatomical designs may have made their evolutionary appearance at that time. …not only the phylum Chordata itself, but also all its major divisions, arose within the Cambrian Explosion. So much for chordate uniqueness… Contrary to Darwin’s expectation that new data would reveal gradualistic continuity with slow and steady expansion, all major discoveries of the past century have only heightened the massiveness and geological abruptness of this formative event…” Nature, Vol.377, 26 10/95, p.682
Preston Cloud & Martin F. Glaessner, “Ever since Darwin, the geologically abrupt appearance and rapid diversification of early animal life have fascinated biologist and students of Earth history alike….This interval, plus Early Cambrian, was the time during which metazoan life diversified into nearly all of the major phyla and most of the invertebrate classes and orders subsequently known.” Science, Aug.27, 1982
RICHARD Monastersky, Earth Science Ed., Science News, “The remarkably complex forms of animals we see today suddenly appeared. …This moment, right at the start of the Earth’s Cambrian Period…marks the evolutionary explosion that filled the seas with the earth’s first complex creatures. …‘This is Genesis material,’ gushed one researcher. …demonstrates that the large animal phyla of today were present already in the early Cambrian and that they were as distinct from each other as they are today…a menagerie of clam cousins, sponges, segmented worms, and other invertevrates that would seem vaguely familiar to any scuba diver.” Discover, p.40, 4/93
Richard Dawkins, Cambridge, “And we find many of them already in an advanced state of evolution, the very first time they appear. It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history. Needless to say, this appearance of sudden planting has delighted creationists. …the only alternative explanation of the sudden appearance of so many complex animal types in the Cambrian era is divine creation…”, The Blind Watchmaker, 1986, p229-230
THE MAJOR TAXONOMIC GROUPS
SEPARATE LIVING KINDS” Stephen J. Gould, Harvard, “Our modern phyla represent designs of great distinctness, yet our diverse world contains nothing in between sponges, corals, insects, snails, sea urchins, and fishes (to choose standard representatives of the most prominent phyla).”, Natural History, p.15, Oct. 1990
similarity IS NoT genetic, Sir Gavin Debeer, Prof. Embry., U.London, Director BMNH, “It is now clear that the pride with which it was assumed that the inheritance of homologous structures from a common ancestor explained homology was misplaced; for such inheritance cannot be ascribed to identity of genes. The attempt to find homologous genes has been given up as hopeless.” Oxford Biology Reader, p.16, Homology an Unsolved Problem
Insects – When found in the fossil record, they are already developed without ancestors. Dragonflies are dragonflies, cockroaches are cockroaches. Instead of an evolutionary tree, we have only the leaves without the trunk or branches. To compound this problem the question of flight arises… when did they develop the ability to fly? There are no fossil intermediates in the record.
Invertebrates and vertebrates – Transitional forms leading to vertebrates are absent even though the transition supposedly took millions of years. It is theorized that life passed through a stage where a creature possessed a simple rod-like notochord. This has not been found.
Fish to Amphibian – Fin to feet… Evolutionist glibly cite a Fish –> Amphibian –> Reptile –> Mammal progression in their theory, however there is a large gap in the fossil record between fish and amphibians. Among other differences, fish have small pelvic bones that are embedded in muscle and not connected to the backbone unlike tetrapod amphibians which have large pelvises that are firmly connected to the vertebral column. Without this anatomy, the amphibian could not walk. The morphological differences in this gap are obvious and profound.
Mammals – Mammals just appear in the fossil record, again without transitional forms (Gish notes 32 such orders of mammals).
Marine Mammals – whales, dolphins, and sea cows also appear abruptly. It has been suggested that the ancestors of the dolphins are cattle, pigs, or buffaloes.
Also consider the enigma of flight – supposedly, insects, birds, mammals (bats), and reptiles, each evolved the ability to fly separately. In each of the four cases there are no series of transitional forms to support this assertion.”
I apologize for the references to evolution, but as you all must admit, proving creation and disproving evolution have become very much the same thing, no matter how flawed that thinking may be. If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask. All I would ask is that you read this objectively. I’ve pulled this from many sources in an attempt to remain as non-biased as possible, and thereby increase credibility, so please don’t accuse me of being biased. Science should look at all evidence objectively. Unfortunately, in our world today this is indeed a rare thing, no matter what circle you travel in. I can only say that I did my best with regard to this.
Related posts:
- Lord Spanky Speaketh The Truthiness
- Creation Fairy Tale Museum To Open In Kentucky
- Creation Science Cartoon

Hello J,
We seem to be on different time schedules. But that’s the beauty of the internet; we can still hold a conversation. In this post, I’ll only answer the question you directed toward me so that you can catch up with my last post.
Do I believe in both evolution and an intelligent designer? Hmm… That’s not an easy question to answer. Mostly it is because I view religion and spirituality as an intensely private matter. It is not something I like to share the details of on a public forum. However, I think I’m comfortable enough with the people who participate on this blog to share a little bit of my belief system.
I have a strong hope that the universe and all of its natural laws (including evolution) were designed by an intelligent creator. You might even call it a faith that the creator is intelligent. I don’t like to use the term ‘faith’ very much because I think it has been misused by religious people. They seem to think that to believe in something despite contrary evidence or affronts to their reason is faith. To me, faith is a belief in anything that we have no or scant evidence for but does not contradict existing evidence and/or reason. So the answer is yes, I believe in evolution and an intelligent designer, but my definition of ‘intelligent designer’ is quite different than the common one used by ID proponents. I don’t believe that God created every species that exists today ‘as-is’ so to speak. I do believe in a God that created a deterministic universe knowing that intelligent creatures would eventually be the result. Unlike a religious person, I do not claim that what I believe is truth because I cannot prove it logically nor can I provide evidence for it. Also, unlike a religious person, I would abandon my belief if convincing evidence to the contrary were to come to light.
hello sidfaiwu,
Thank you very much for sharing some of your belief system. It was quite fascinating and very informative.
I’m sincerely sorry if I am prying but i am very curious. You say:
“I have a strong hope that the universe and all of its natural laws (including evolution) were designed by an intelligent creator.”
Why do you hope evolution is true? Does it add something to the human experience or is it for some other reason?
“To me, faith is a belief in anything that we have no or scant evidence for but does not contradict existing evidence and/or reason.”
Yes! I really like this statement. I think your assesment of faith is very accurate. But at the same time I believe there can be a reasonable faith, meaning that one can believe in something unseen and/or does not have conclusive proof based on logical reasoning and evidence.
I think that we both agree that based on inferential evidence and logical conclusions, that some intelligent being or Prime Mover, if you will, must exist. Just for an example of inferential evidence here is this one post on another forum i visited and thought was interesting:
“Not all science deals in direct evidence, but only in circumstantial evidence and inference. Another example, they think that some stars have planets not because they can detect the planets directly, visually or otherwise, but because the way the star behaves something else seems to be having an effect on it.
They infer that this something else is a planet orbiting that star. Again, inferential evidence.
Some science isn’t even based on inferential evidence, only elegant mathematical theories that haven’t been verified by experiment, string theory, for example.”
I’m sure we will talk about this more as the discussion moves on.
But if you have anything more to add to this, go ahead before we move on to cosmological arguments, revelation, and God.
Hello J,
I only hope that the Creator exists. I don’t hope evolution has occurred (and continues to occur), I know it to be our best explanation for the origin of our (and every other) species.
Here is where I could research and provide evidence for evolution, but our conversation has taken a much more interesting turn. I’d much rather talk about philosophy than debate evolution vs. ID. Let’s return to that debate after we’ve discussed philosophy. How’s that sound?
to your father says
as far as i am aware ID is intelligent design-er which isn’t an ungraspable concept as it means, not created by chance which i personally can grasp quite easily.
to J
ok he’s not neccesarily forcing people to believe in him but for those brought up with religion he makes sure it’s a pretty damn scary concept not believing in him. also no i didn’t go through every example as i thought that would be tedious but if you would like quite a big example look at christianity (sorry to pick on that one but my knowledge of different religions is most extensive in that one) there are so many threats in the bible and not just about going to hell there are occasions when God himself will destroy you: 1 corinthians 3 v. 16-17
however you do raise a good point about free will “wouldn’t he have just not given us free will in the first place?” to answer i’m going to have to shift the analogy; imagine a child draws a ring of water around some ants and places a twig across it as a bridge, so in theory the smart ants should survive. however if God does exist the smart ants would be the religious, yet the ants knew of the bridge where as religion essentially relies on blind faith and for the other ants that were unaware of the bridge they were punished, not due to any fault of their own just because of a lack of knowledge. so basically He gaves free will beause He was curious and wanted to see what would happen- and no one can argue He isn’t curious or else He wouldn’t have made us, He would have carried on twiddling His thumbs for eternity.
Hello Sidfaiwu,
I think that sounds excellent. i like philosophy much better anyway. So, the cosmological argument…
I agree with the model cosmological arguemnt based on contingency. But there is another cosmological argument that I was mentioning first, namely, the temporal cosmological argument. I’m pretty sure you already know what this this so i will not rehash. There are a couple of reasons I can surmise why caused events cannot go back into infinity. (1) Mathematically, infinity is impossible. It leads to self-contradiction such as infinity minus infinity or infinity plus infinity. SO the universe must be finite, and thus, someone must have been there to start it. We have already ruled out random chance, so it would be reasonable to assume a designer.
(2) The argument fron singularity. I came about a fascinating debate the other day recorded online between William Lane Criag and Quentin Smith. If you’re interested here is the link:
http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/craig-smith_harvard00.html
Half of the debate is about the cosmological argument. Smith, who is an atheist, took the stand that the universe does not necessarily need a first cause because all the events could go back infinitly.
Craig’s answer:
“I assume that he’s talking about a simultaneity class of events, quantum events, perhaps, that are simultaneously related. But I think that we can avert this question by simply considering what is the cause of the initial cosmological singularity that spawned the universe. For the initial singularity is part of the universe. The universe is comprised of all its space-time points and its boundary points. The initial singularity is the beginning of the universe, the first state of physical reality. As Stephen Hawking explains, “All the matter and energy [were] compressed into a single point, or singularity . . . . the entire observable universe . . . started out compressed into such a point.â€{1} And since that point is not governed by quantum laws of physics, there cannot be this infinite regress of simultaneous causes at the singular state….
Moreover, there’s no reason to think it exists a se either. Quite the opposite is true: the singularity is the boundary of the space-time manifold; so if the manifold didn’t exist, neither would its boundary points. Quentin, in his written work{3}, admits that the space-time universe did not have to exist; but he imagines that its singular boundary point, like the smile of the Cheshire cat in Alice in Wonderland, would still continue to exist even in the absence of the reality it bounds! But there is no physical reason to believe such a remarkable assertion.
Now, if this is correct, then not only is there no inconsistency in the theist’s view that God created the singularity, but Quentin’s supposed argument for atheism actually turns out to be an argument for God’s existence. We can formulate such a contingency argument as follows:
1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in some external cause.
2. The universe (including any singular state) exists.
It follows from (1) and (2) that the universe has an explanation of its existence. Premiss (3) states:
3. The universe (including any singular state) does not exist by a necessity of its own nature.
4. Therefore, the universe has an external cause.”
All that being said, i think both the kalam and model cosmological events assist and compliment each other, as well as show why there must be a Prime Mover.
I will stop here before moving on and wait for your response before going on with post 45.
Hello J,
My guess would be that the universe does have a beginning and does not extend infinitely back in time. Thus my guess is that the Kalam cosmological argument holds. Your objection to the possibility of actual infinites actually touches on my area of expertise, mathematics! I actually hold a master’s degree in applied mathematics and can assure you that math does not preclude the possibility of actual infinites. The problem is that most people conceive ‘infinity’ as just another number. It actually does not represent a number at all, but a state.
I would bring to your attention the stereographic projection. It creates a one-to-one and onto mapping for every point on a plane with every point on a sphere. Click the link for a picture. The picture helps greatly. Geometrically, it creates this mapping by placing a sphere on a plane and drawing a straight line from the North Pole to any point on the plane. The line must pass through exactly one point on the sphere. You can now represent an entire infinite plane on a finite sphere! Notice that on this sphere, infinity in all directions are represented by the North Pole itself, a single point.
Also, because of only arithmetic and analytic geometry being taught to most students, a vast majority of people are only accustom to working with field like the real number line or maybe the complex numbers. There are other mathematical structures; such as a topologies. One such topology is the affinely extended real numbers which includes infinity as an element along with the rest of the numbers.
Enough about math. I have another possibility that would render the ‘first mover’ version of the cosmological argument invalid. That is the possibility of circular time. That is, the end state of the universe is identical to its beginning state. Put another way, the universe could be its own temporal cause.
I’m sorry if this post was a little dense.
Greetings Sidfaiwu
That was a very informative post. I am definately no expert in math, so i wanted to ask you a question. Yes, of course infinity is used as a number in theory, but can it be applied to the physical universe? You might have already answered that, but again, i am certainly not expert in mathematics. I read a quote from David Hilbert that goes “The infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. The role that remains for the infinite to play is solely that of an idea.”
I also wanted to know what you thought of the issue of singularity.
Now, on the circular causation…
Yes, you can argue circular causation. But if you picture it like a round circular-causing universe you can use the model cosmological arguement to say, why is the universe here in the first place. So, as i said, i think they both compliment each other.
Hi J,
I used the math to demonstrate that mathematics does not preclude the possibility of actual infinites. As you so rightly point out, math theory is fine, but that does not demonstrate the reality of an actual infinite in nature. The only actual infinite that I can think of observed in nature is a black hole. In a black hole, gravity has stretched space-time infinitely at a point, aka a singularity. This leads me into the next point.
I actually had the privilege of going to a huge philosophy conference in Washington DC (I think it was 1998). The highlight for our philosophy of religion class was a debate very similar to the one you linked. I cannot remember who the two philosophers were because I have a terrible memory for names, but I still have their papers somewhere around here. The result was that the theist won the debate, but more due to his speaking ability (the other guy was terrible at public speaking) than his position.
I agree that saying the universe spontaneously erupted from a singularity only begs the question. What, then, caused the singularity? Note, though, that the acknowledgment of a singularity admits the existence of actual infinites and opens the door for reality to stretch back in time infinitely. For we can answer the question that the collapse of a previous universe into a singularity is what caused the singularity in the first place. Since no information can survive a singularity, there is no way for us to prove or disprove the existence of a proto-universe that existed before ours.
And last of all, I agree with you that the two versions of the cosmological argument compliment one another. The Kalam version stands if there is a beginning to time; the modal version is successful if there was no beginning.
I’d be interested in your response to the end of post #45, where I point out the limits of what the cosmological argument can tell us about the nature of God.
Hello again Sidfaiwu,
You are indeed correct when saying that the cosmological argument (And revelation through nature in general) can tell us very little about the nature of this obviously very powerful supernatural being we agree would seem to exist. Here is where things get tricky. Once you establish that there is a god, one is led to ask, does this god intervene in human affairs or did he just “wind the clock” so to say; what is he like, etc. You have already mentioned you are a deist, i imagine because it would seem god is not visible or the fact that we do not always see him act in our daily live. we very rarely, if ever, see him act. There are also a great many religions, which one is right, if any? Since we have determined that natural arguments cannot go any further into revealing god, we must see if god has revealed himself in other ways to man.
I believe the Christian God makes sense and has revealed himself in the form of special revelation.
(1)There are objective moral values in the world. If God did not exist, there would be no objective moral values. We can recognize objective moral values without believing in a God. If God did not interact with the universe, I don’t know how objective moral values would exist.
(2)The historical evidence surrounding Jesus Christ’s life, death, and resurrection. This is really key, because no other religion makes a claim like this. That God actually came in the form of man to live, die, and show he was God by resurrection. Maybe a few other religions claim something similiar but none have the historical evidence to back it up. I would to wait before you respond before i go on with this point.
(3)Although this is not “proof” since many other religions claim to have a holy book like this, it does compliment the other point above. It matches with the objective moral values we know and the uniqueness of the Bible compared to any other hisorical book is extordinary. Written by 40 historical authors, no inconsistentcies except in interpretation, still copied down accurately through the years, translated into every known language. It is also one of the most historically accurate books written in regards especially to the events having to do with jesus.
i would like to stop here to see you respond.
I know all this sounds pretty cliche and very unscientific. Partly because that is what must be done in regards to special revelation (more emphasis on history, etc.) instead of natural revelation and partly because i was just giving a broad outline. Another part is that i am certainly no expert in anything.
@J
This point,
“(1)There are objective moral values in the world. If God did not exist, there would be no objective moral values. We can recognize objective moral values without believing in a God. If God did not interact with the universe, I don’t know how objective moral values would exist.”
Chafes my collar. To me, morality, subjective or objective is a matter which is under constant flux. What we perceive as moral today has been formed during the existence of societies and it will change still. Either in silence without notice or suddenly.
If you take a simple act of killing as example. It has not been considered immoral very long and even now it is seen acceptable or even commendable in certain areas or world and political world.
Killing was a mark of honour, the number of killed marked the proves of a man. Today politicians even use the number of people they have arranged to death-row as badge of merit.
Killing someone today is immoral, I would say. But killing someone belonging to such and such group is acceptable because of X, say world leaders.
Society and incidents in the world alter morality. After each atrocity people find the concept of killing the guilty to be just and right. The society is reformed by these acts and thus morality changes when act of killing is no longer seen as immoral as before.
Morality is in my view the most unstable of aspects in humanity or as one teacher of mine said, “Morality is like a wrap-around skirt. Now you have it but on moments notice you can take it off.”
Humanity does have moral codes and try to follow those but what those really amount is codes which allow co-existence where like minded people can live without constant fear of being subject of some one else’s morality.
My take on the point 1.
Hello Jagannath,
I am very tired currently but with try to respond accordingly. You bring up an interesting argument with some good point. But there is a flaw. You often use, “In my view” to justify your claims. For example “To me, morality, subjective or objective is a matter which is under constant flux.” or “Killing someone today is immoral, I would say.” Now, I am struggling to find the logic in your arguments. You have no basis for your arguments but the your own view. Well this creats a dilema. If everybody could create their own arbitrary standards based on their own view of morality, then, Nazis are justified for the Holocaust.
Also, the very fact that you call these things “atrocities” you show that there are moral objectives. Let’s say you take the usual atheist/naturalistic viewpoint that man evolved from animals, which I am assuming you do. Well, when an animal kills another one, it doesn’t murder it, it kills, not murders. Also, when a great white shark forces a female into submission it copulates, but does not rape.Animals are not moral agents with moral duties.
All that being said, actions like rape, child abuse, mass murder/torture, cruely aren’t just socially unacceptable behavior (or survival of the fittest to take it a step further) but they are abomination. You said so yourself. “Atrocity”. Good and evil do exist.
This probably has a lot of mistakes in it..oh well
Good Morning J,
It was nice that we found common ground on the topic of natural revelation, but special revelation is where we will likely disagree. I’ll start by discussing your point (1):
“(1)There are objective moral values in the world. If God did not exist, there would be no objective moral values. We can recognize objective moral values without believing in a God. If God did not interact with the universe, I don’t know how objective moral values would exist.â€
There seems to be two separate arguments in this statement. The first is another argument for the existence of God.
1a)
i: Objective moral values exist.
ii: The only possible source of objective moral values is God.
thus
iii: God exists.
and
iv: God has a set of moral values in mind for his/her/its creation.
The second is an argument that God interacts with his/her/its creation.
1b)
iv: (From 1a) God has a set of moral values in mind for his/her/its creation.
v: We are aware of the existence of objective moral values.
vi: We can only be aware of God’s objective moral values through interaction with creation.
thus
vii: God interacts with his/her/its creation.
Please let me know if I’ve decomposed your arguments incorrectly. It seems that Jagannath (hello Jagannath!) takes issue with premise i. I do not. I do think that objective moral values exist. Here is one that is universal: Do not needlessly kill innocent people. I also believe that relative moral values exist. For example, many moral values surrounding procreation are relative. Rules that promote reproduction are only moral if there is no local over population problem. Rules that limit reproduction are morally valid otherwise.
I take issue with premise ii. God is not the only possible source of objective moral values. Rationality and the observation of nature can also lead us to moral absolutes. Based on the observation of myself and others, I conclude that other people are very similar to me and, like myself, they display a desire to live. It is logical to conclude that they value their lives just as much as I value mine and it would be immoral to kill them needlessly if they are innocent. Notice that I arrive at the same objective moral value without God.
Here is another way to arrive at the same objective moral value. It is through evolutionary theory. Again, we’ve decided not discuss the validity of evolution, so let’s just treat this as a hypothetical. Suppose, for a moment, that evolutionary theory is real. Can we derive any moral values from evolution? The answer is yes. The driving purpose of every species under evolution is to survive as a species. Thus any action that promotes the overall survival of our species is a moral one. Needlessly killing an innocent member of our species is then immoral. Through evolution, we can arrive at the same objective moral value.
I also take issue with premise vi, but I’ll give you a chance to respond to my objections.
P.S. I am very much enjoying this conversation and hope that you (and any spectators) are enjoying it as well.
Hello Sidfaiwu,
Yes, I am very much enjoying this conversation. I love talking about these kind of things.
Hmmm…you bring up an interesting point in the paragraph directly after you put my arguments down. I’ll have to think about that for a while.
But on point number 2…The place that your argument leads is a kind of relative/postermodern area. First, we are not just talking about killing. If indeed the naturalistic view you hold to there in the area of morality is true, then why should people act morally if it conflicts with their self-interest? Also, people could come to a different conclusion than you. A society could believe that they are a more advanced race and should kill of all the others (Nazi-holocost), there is still no standard to say they are doing right or wrong based on the naturalistic view. Also, if you accept this point, basically anything could be legalized for any reason. Without a God, or standard of morality, we have no moral accountability and that is a scary thought. But we see this is not the case.
I also want to point out this : “to kill them needlessly if they are innocent”
Who is to define needlessly. Also, the bigger issue here is, how do you discrimate between innocent and guilty if there is no standard that is objective for all. You proclaimed them innocent, if the naturalistic view is true, why would they be guilty>
i have a little more to say but i will see what you think so far
Hello J,
I only have a limited amount of time to post because I have guests over right now. I’ll give a quick clarification so that you don’t have to wait till tomorrow to get my response.
I included ‘needlessly’ because it may be necessary to kill someone. That person may be about to set off a bomb that would kill dozens of people, for example. I included ‘innocent’ because some many people feel that the death penalty is morally permissible. Thus it would be ok to kill someone if it was necessary to save the live of others, for example, or to punish a murderer (though that is not my view).
I hope that helps for the time being. I’ll give a more full and thoughtful response later.
Hi again J,
I have more time to read and respond to your post. You are right; we are not talking just about murder when we are discussing ethics. The reason I picked killing is that it is the easiest to make the case that it is a moral absolute. If I were to use something like, say, pre-marital sex, there would be widespread disagreement as to whether that is an absolute or not. Also, to prove premise ii false, all that is required of me is to provide one counter example. In other words, all I have to do is demonstrate that any moral absolute can be discovered without God.
The wording ‘it is wrong to needlessly kill an innocent person’ was crafted to preserve the universality of the statement (so we can still call it an ‘absolute’). ‘Never kill another person’ is not a moral absolute. We are permitted to kill someone in self-defense, or in defense of other, innocent people (i.e., there is a ‘need’ to kill that person). Many people also claim that it is morally permissible to execute someone guilty of murder.
Also, you are correct that the way of deriving ethics through reason would lead to some relativistic morality. But what I demonstrated (and all I was required to demonstrate) is that it also leads to at least one moral absolute. Thus God is not the only possible source of moral absolutes and the rest of your argument falls apart.
I have a quick note on your counter example of a culture that decides that it is ok to kill others because the culture feels ‘superior’ or ‘more advanced’. They perpetrators of such a crime may be able to temporarily convince themselves that they are morally permitted to kill, but everyone else will see it for what it is, morally reprehensible. To use your specific example, Nazis are universally considered evil precisely because they needlessly killed innocent people. It seems that no matter how we derive that moral absolute, it is true in all cases (which is what makes it an absolute).
I find the notion of premise 2 downright offensive. Look into secular humanism, and you’ll find very large organizations of people everywhere who disagree with you.
Hello Sidfaiwu,
You bring up a very interesting point. It’s something I have never thought of before. Hold tight if you could on the morality issue while i reconstruct a few things in my argument. Morality is not as big as an issue as the one I want to bring up next because God providing objective standard of morality only shows evidence of an interacting God, not necessarily a certain religion.
You asked the question, why should you should be a Christian. I answered special revelation. The main reason we can know that God has revealed himself would be the historical facts around the historical person of Jesus. Most religions come from a person who called themeselves “prophets” or something like that. Christianity makes the stronger claim that christ was God, so this means that God did reveal himself in the person of Christ. This is a very strong claim and nobody would take him seriously if he did not “rise from the dead” or do the miracles he said he did. Before we go into these things I wanted to know what you think about this and what your assumptions would be about the person of christ.
Your Father Says,
really not sure what you’re talking about or what point your trying to make. Could you be more specific on why ad the reasons behind your claim?
Hello J,
Sorry that its taking me a while to respond. I want to respond thoughtfully and it is requiring some research.
Hello J,
I’ve had more time to think about your post. I’ll quote your point (2) for both of our conveniences and to make sure we are on the same page.
“(2)The historical evidence surrounding Jesus Christ’s life, death, and resurrection. This is really key, because no other religion makes a claim like this. That God actually came in the form of man to live, die, and show he was God by resurrection. Maybe a few other religions claim something similiar but none have the historical evidence to back it up. I would to wait before you respond before i go on with this point.â€
The idea of the death and resurrection of a god is not unique to Christianity. Apparently, the Egyptians had the idea first. But, as you said, there is no historical evidence to back the event up.
The main problem that I see is that while the historical documentation does confirm the existence of Jesus, it is much less reliable when it comes to his divinity/resurrection. Here, I’ll assume that you take the Gospels as your primary evidence for the divinity of Jesus.
There is debate as to when the Gospels where written. About 70 CE seems to be the pivotal date. That was the year that the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the Jewish temple; something that the Jews of the day would certainly put great importance on. Also, if the Gospels were written after 70 CE, then they could not have been written by eye-witnesses, thus degrading their reliability. Please note that the authorship of the Gospels is in question. Even if they were written before 70 CE, there is no way for us to know if the author(s) where eye-witnesses or not.
Christians will often use the fact that no mention of the razing of the temple is in any of the Gospels, thus they must have been written before 70 CE. This is inaccurate. The razing of the temple is in the Gospel. It is one of the ‘prophecies’ of Jesus (see Mark 13:1-2 for one instance). This suggests that the writer(s) knew about the razing because they wrote after 70 CE and added it in as a prophecy to bolster their claim of the divinity of Jesus.
Another problem with the Gospels as history is that they contain inconsistencies between each other. I’ll copy a portion of a post I previously made elsewhere:
…the Bible is clearly not historically accurate about all things. In the four gospels alone, there are a multitude of contradictions when detailing the life of Jesus. Here are just a few:
1. According to Matthew 2:1 and Luke 1:5, Jesus was born during the ‘days of Herod the king’, who died in 4 BCE. But according to Luke 2:1, his birth took place while Cyrenius was governor of Syria, a post which he took in 6 CE, 8 years after Herod’s death.
2. Matthew 2:14 has Jesus, Mary, and Joseph traveling to Egypt after Jesus’ birth. Luke 2:39 has them going back to Nazareth.
3. Matthew 3:7-11 has John the Baptist baptizing the Pharisees, Luke 7:29-30 says the Pharisees rejecting the offer of his baptism.
4. In Matthew 8:5-8, Capernaum asked Jesus directly to help his servant, in Luke 7:1-7 he sent ‘Elders of the Jews’ to ask Jesus to help his servant.
There are many more examples of these sorts of contradictions. Which of each of these contradictions is historically accurate? If Matthew is accurate, wouldn’t that make Luke historically inaccurate? And, thus the Bible must have historically inaccuracies. It cannot be trusted to accurately depict history.
Based on these two factors, the question of who wrote the Gospels and when, and the contradictions, I cannot accept the Gospels as a trustworthy source of history. Thus, Christianities claims of the divinity and resurrection of Jesus is suspect at best.
You are correct though, the Christian historical documentation of the resurrection of Jesus is much better than other religions’ miracles, but it still falls short of being reliable.
Hello sidfaiwu,
Thank you for putting up so much time into your response. But as a result, it will talk me some time to respond.
But from your post, a few things…
Could you post some of your sources, especially on the 4 historical inconsistencies. Also, im not sure if you looked a lot about the other source you cited, the site by Merle Herzler, but he is certainly not scholar. i would immediately question him because he is really no scholar, he really doesn’t site any sources for other articles, the sources he does use for that article are questionable as well and i didn’t really see that they refered to important points of his article. He is certainly suspect at this point, although i have not read the sit all the way through. I am just wondering if you think he is a reliable scholar and could you explain why he is?
Hello J,
All but the first of the four inconsistencies come directly from the Bible. I’ll give the passage links of from the New International Version of the Bible for the second example.
2) Matthew 2:14, “So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt”
Luke 2:39, “When Joseph and Mary had done everything required by the Law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee to their own town of Nazareth.”
I’ll leave it to you to look up examples three and four from above. Example one requires a little more research, and I simply cannot remember where I found the information (it’s been months since I originally posted this). I did, however, find a complete guide to all the potential problems with the Bible at The Skeptics Annotated Bible. It also has a similar annotated version of the Quran and Book of Mormon.
As for Merle Herzler, his information is correct. Here is another reference that has the exact same information in the first couple of paragraphs, but spins it differently. The rest of this new reference makes some bad assumptions, but I’ll only get into that if you ask about it.
Hello Sidfaiwu,
Finally I have found time to post a little bit. Just to let you know, your arguments are very good.
First, on when the gospels were written. There are two very important reasons that we can believe the Gospels were written before 70 AD.
We know that Acts and Luke were both written by luke and this is the main place we should look for the dating of the Gospels. We know the other gospels predate Luke and Acts. So when we look at the writtings of Luke, there are two reasons we can believe Luke and Acts were written before 70AD and possibly 60 AD. Thus if thiis is true, the other gospels were written earlier and give validity to the eye-witness accounts.
(1) There is no mention of the sacking of Jerusalem, which is in 70 AD. Luke would certainly have mentioned this in Acts when you look at all the historical information he gave in Acts.
(2)More importantly, Luke mentions no mentions of Paul’s death, which occured in 64 Ad. Luke would certainly have mentioned this because he tells basically everything else of Paul’s life and the other apostles deaths.
–On the razing of the temple-
You commit a mistake here. You have a presupposition that a prophesy is untrue so you write if off. This is not a good arguments when stricly talking about the historical accuracy of the gospels. Your point actually assists mine. The reason: I just demonstrated that we can have good reason to believe that that Acts was written before 70 AD, thus Mark was certainly before this. So this means that Christ REALLY DID prophesy about the temple and he was right.
I will write a short statement on biblical inconsistencies a little later.
But here is quite a good article on historical evidence for jesus and gospels.
http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/rediscover2.html
Hello J,
I haven’t heard about (2), it’s a good point and I’ll address it last. Your other two defenses, however, a have fundamental logical flaw. They are circular arguments: you assume what you are trying to prove.
Your first assumption is that Luke wrote the book of Luke. Obviously, if we knew that Luke wrote that book, it would have been written before 70 CE. Since scholars largely agree thatLuke was not the author, we cannot assume what you are trying to prove.
Your second assumption is that Jesus could prophesize, presumable because of his divinity, which is ultimately what you are trying to prove. Again, it is much more likely that the ‘prophecy’ was added by the author after the sacking of the temple with the conscious purpose of adding ‘evidence’ for the divinity of Jesus. Furthermore, there is evidence that Jesus was not divine. If Jesus were God, all of his prophecies would come to pass. Yet, the one he made in Matthew 12:28, and Mark 9:1 that did not come to pass. In those verses, Jesus predicts his return and the end of the world to happen within some of his listeners’ lifetimes. 2000 years later, they’re all dead and the world is still here.
Indeed, the very fact that Luke doesn’t mention this prophecy suggests that the author knew it did not come true. This would mean it was written after the deaths of Jesus’ contemporaries, including Paul. Furthermore, the author probably did not even know Paul personally. If he did, why would Paul be ignorant of many of the central aspects of Jesus’ life that Luke was, somehow privy to? Not knowing Paul personally would explain why Paul’s death was not mentioned.
Anyway, the dates of the Gospels’ authorship are the least of their problems. Even if we can establish that one of them was definitely penned before 70 CE, there is still no guarantee that they were written by an eye-witness or that it presents a historical account as opposed to a biased account. Indeed, the internal contradictions are more damning evidence. The ones I listed are only a small sample of all the contradictions that give us reason do doubt their historical accuracy.
Sidfaiwu,
I am very apologetic that i have not been able to respond much, i have been very busy. I can’t post too much right not but hopefully, perhaps tomorrow, i can say more.
I’ll talk about Luke first. I’m not exacly sure where you get the idea that Luke did not write Luke. Some positive evidence for why Luke did not write Luke would be appreciated. I’m really not sure where you are getting these sources from. Joseph Alward? Who is this? I tried to look him up to find some kind of credentials or something about him but could not find anything. Most of his articles are just posts or blogs or something. There is no indication of his information being correct that i can see.
There are many things that he assumes and does not think all the way through. For example, vague things like this “However, the evidence below suggests that the Lukan author was not the follower of Paul, who died around 67 AD. ” I don’t really see where he gets this notion from or what the “evidence” is.
Further, “The author of Luke addresses the “most excellent” Theophilus. The earliest record of a “Theophilus” is Theophilus of Antioch who was an early Christian patriarch who wrote around 180-185 AD2.”
This is absolutely proposterous. Even you admit the gospels were written at about 70 AD. There is no evdience whatseover of it being written THAT late. Christianity was becoming a world religious at that time. That part about Theophilus is absolutely a crazy piece. It’s like saying my friend named bob in this book i read is the only bob in the world.
Here is a very good piece from a reliable and well-known source William Lane Craig on a little bit from the luke problem.
“Now who was this author we call Luke? He was clearly not an eyewitness to Jesus’s life. But we discover an important fact about him from the book of Acts. Beginning in the sixteenth chapter of Acts, when Paul reaches Troas in modern-day Turkey, the author suddenly starts using the first-person plural: “we set sail from Troas to Samothrace,” “we remained in Philippi some days,” “as we were going to the place of prayer,” etc. The most obvious explanation is that the author had joined Paul on his evangelistic tour of the Mediterranean cities. In chapter 21 he accompanies Paul back to Palestine and finally to Jerusalem. What this means is that the author of Luke-Acts was in fact in first hand contact with the eyewitnesses of Jesus’s life and ministry in Jerusalem. Sceptical critics have done back-flips to try to avoid this conclusion. They say that the use of the first-person plural in Acts should not be taken literally; it’s just a literary device which is common in ancient sea voyage stories. Never mind that many of the passages in Acts are not about Paul’s sea voyage, but take place on land! The more important point is that this theory, when you check it out, turns out to be sheer fantasy.{4} There just was no literary device of sea voyages in the first person plural–the whole thing has been shown to be a scholarly fiction! There is no avoiding the conclusion that Luke-Acts was written by a traveling companion of Paul who had the opportunity to interview eyewitnesses to Jesus’s life while in Jerusalem. Who were some of these eyewitnesses? Perhaps we can get some clue by subtracting from the Gospel of Luke everything found in the other gospels and seeing what is peculiar to Luke. What you discover is that many of Luke’s peculiar narratives are connected to women who followed Jesus: people like Joanna and Susanna, and significantly, Mary, Jesus’s mother.
Was the author reliable in getting the facts straight? The book of Acts enables us to answer that question decisively. The book of Acts overlaps significantly with secular history of the ancient world, and the historical accuracy of Acts is indisputable. This has recently been demonstrated anew by Colin Hemer, a classical scholar who turned to New Testament studies, in his book The Book of Acts in the Setting of Hellenistic History. {5}Hemer goes through the book of Acts with a fine-toothed comb, pulling out a wealth of historical knowledge, ranging from what would have been common knowledge down to details which only a local person would know. Again and again Luke’s accuracy is demonstrated: from the sailings of the Alexandrian corn fleet to the coastal terrain of the Mediterranean islands to the peculiar titles of local officials, Luke gets it right. According to Professor Sherwin-White, “For Acts the confirmation of historicity is overwhelming. Any attempt to reject its basic historicity even in matters of detail must now appear absurd.”{6} The judgement of Sir William Ramsay, the world-famous archaeologist, still stands: “Luke is a historian of the first rank . . . . This author should be placed along with the very greatest of historians.”{7} Given Luke’s care and demonstrated reliability as well as his contact with eyewitnesses within the first generation after the events, this author is trustworthy.”
Hello J!
I actually found a day to catch my breath at work, so I can finally reply. I am going to have to cede the point to you. My knowledge on the subject is from actually discussions I had with a relative who was reading “Who Wrote the Bible” by Richard E. Friedman, who definitely is an expert on the subject. I accept it because I consider this particular relative a trustworthy source. But, since the knowledge is second hand and you don’t know my relative, I don’t expect you, or anyone else to accept it. I tried to gain first-hand knowledge via the web, but I couldn’t locate any trustworthy sources, as you pointed out. I’ll have to read the book myself if I am to speak on this topic with any authority. It seems that you have more first-hand exposure to the subject and will thus cede the point to you; at least until I can further educate myself.
To move the discussion forward, I ask you to respond to what I wrote in my last post:
“…the dates of the Gospels’ authorship are the least of their problems. Even if we can establish that one of them was definitely penned before 70 CE, there is still no guarantee that they were written by an eye-witness or that it presents a historical account as opposed to a biased account. Indeed, the internal contradictions are more damning evidence. The ones I listed are only a small sample of all the contradictions that give us reason do doubt their historical accuracy.â€
I’ll also list the contradictions again here for your convenience:
1. According to Matthew 2:1 and Luke 1:5, Jesus was born during the ‘days of Herod the king’, who died in 4 BCE. But according to Luke 2:1, his birth took place while Cyrenius was governor of Syria, a post which he took in 6 CE, 8 years after Herod’s death.
2. Matthew 2:14 has Jesus, Mary, and Joseph traveling to Egypt after Jesus’ birth. Luke 2:39 has them going back to Nazareth.
3. Matthew 3:7-11 has John the Baptist baptizing the Pharisees, Luke 7:29-30 says the Pharisees rejecting the offer of his baptism.
4. In Matthew 8:5-8, Capernaum asked Jesus directly to help his servant, in Luke 7:1-7 he sent ‘Elders of the Jews’ to ask Jesus to help his servant.
I love you sidfaiwu, so patient and logical; remind me to send you a gift basket of beer and cookies for making the world a better place.
hey sidfaiwu,
i’ve been waiting for your response for quite a while now. Thanks for not leaving the discussion because i think it has been really fruitful. I am a little busy at the moment and will have to do a bit more research before giving a (hopefully) good response.
Thanks Shaze! Though sitting here at work this morning, I feel like I had a little too much beer last night. I’m sure I’ll recover by tonight ;).
Hello J,
Please take your time. I’m going to be very busy for a while (I’m buying a house / moving this holiday month), so my responses may take a while. If work remains slow, I’ll be able to, but I can’t count on that.
i may get kicked out here, cause i don’t know nothing really about sources and stuff, but I am really philosophical, and evolution and creation is all about philosophy isn’t it (for now); some just more successful than others. I think it is great how our society has grown so much through the application of science and the scientific method, and I strongly believe that evolution through natural selection and random variation or mutation is a part of life in the past and present—just look at all the new flu strains and the “common cold’s” adaptability–all the different breeds and species of dogs, bears, cats, and squirrels and the like —plants too all the different marijuana variations now. Anyway,it seems creation focuses on beginnings only and the young earth; why do so many scientists like the discovery guys who have big degrees and credentials study and do so many experiments and stuff if they are STUPID or IDIOTS; that is ridiculous and exactly the reason proponents of “pure evolution” who have commmented here have to fight the creationists so much (they are just trying seem to be showing that their theory is plausible)…that attitude is hostile and completely a philosophical and ethical debate—not science. Science, as some “sane people” have stated encourages debate and “holes” in its portrayal of reality; I have read some of the “theories” of the creationists and see that they are scientific and have a point that the data obtained especially geologic data can have many other explanations that are plausible scientifically, but the creationists view as a theory may be plausible but has so much less evidence as does evolution’s theories on beginnings and ancient history it is one sided i guess. So, that may be because most scientists are atheist or agnostic? or that science and the scientific method “require” that the researcher only use observable and proven laws and facts for their research….I don’t know, but their research couldn’t be a conspiracy for atheism and the overthrow of all “dogma” and “religious assumption” could it?…i don’t think so…I just think it all could work in harmony and maybe we just all need to accept that our beginnings can’t be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt whether it was billion, millions, or several thousand years…”disproving the evolutionists” (which I believe is a pseudo-science while sticking with the “traditional” scientific method and way of thinking to prove their religion [i think that makes it a philosophy])is a viable and “UNSTUPID” endeavor that has some good points from a philosophical standpoint but i don’t think it discredits evolutionary theory but helps define it– and refine it—maybe some of the old earth stuff is wrong it is possible but unlikely according to modern scientific histories…. the proof for an old earth just isn’t there either it just seems to point to that with our limited knowledge now so maybe someday we will know for sure and the ID people won’t argue for a young earth and they will accept that we aren’t so special after but that doesn’t mean that God isn’t real just that he didn’t care as much as we thought—–a hard reality but the STUPID ones will adapt and “evolve” to accept it.
Hello ben,
No, it’s really tough to get kicked out of here. I think spamming is the only bootable offense. If you would like a good response, I would humbly suggest a multiple-paragraph format for future comments. It’s a bit tedious to keep one’s place while reading one large, monolithic paragraph.
Creationism, in some forms, is ontology, a branch of philosophy. But in the form used by most modern creationists, it is theology. Evolution, on the other hand, is science. Then again, all of science is really natural philosophy. So in some sense, they are both philosophies, but they are from separate areas of philosophy. Note though ‘creationism’ as understood by modern practitioners, is theology, and thus religious. Also, as you point out, some areas of philosophy are more useful then others.
Answer: $$$. Okay, that may not be completely fair. Some of them are afraid that ‘pure’ evolution is incompatible with their highly cherished religious beliefs. Thus promoting creationism is an intellectual defense mechanism. A another possibility is ignorance: they simply don’t know all the information. This doesn’t make them stupid or idiots, just ill-informed.
Evolutionary biologists are only hostile to creationism if people insist that it is science. It is not, it is theology (or ontology if treated correctly). If the proponents of intelligent design wanted to introduce ID (sans all religious and anti-evolution elements) as part of a high school philosophy class, scientists wouldn’t be nearly as upset if at all. In fact, I first heard of creationism outside of church in a college philosophy course in the form of the Teleological Argument.
You made some nice points there. I did a search on the subject and found mainly people will consent with your blog.
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