Creation "Science" And The Flood of Noah.

[Urban Ranger]

Dino,

You posted some link and that counted as your "rebuttal?" Should I find some other website that contains material that counter yours and post that? Is this War of the Hyperlinks?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
You posted some link and that counted as your "rebuttal?"

I posted a link in order to avoid the parade of the pedants that is currently going on. So, sue me.

[November Adam]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
Umm...

Try Mao, NA. He's the one with the little red book from 1966.

Ah... what are these in hotel night stands in China?

[Zealot]

Originally posted by Zhu Yuanzhang
"And since many of the prophecies in Isaiah and Daniel have already occured and are historical accurate, I give a lot of credit to the Bible."
Its very easy to predict things that have already happened. Isaiah was written by two (possibly three) seperate authors (not including editors small interpolations etc.). One lived during the last days of the Davidic Kingdom, the other(s) lived during/after the exile.

No, the book of Isaiah was written by Isaiah himself!
You say that the book was written by several authors, but the unity of this book can surely be pointed by the expression "The Holy of Israel" which shows up 12 times from chapters 1 to 39, and 13 from chapters 40 to 66, in a total of 25 times. In the rest of the OT this expression only appears 6 times.
Even the Apostle Paul testifies the unity of the book and that Isaiah wrote his book :
Romans 10:16 -"But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report?" KJV
Romans 10:20 -"But Esaias is very bold, and saith, I was found of them that sought me not; I was made manifest unto them that asked not after me."

Since 1947 some old documents were found in some caves near Khirbet Qumran, near the north-west coast of the Dead Sea. They are the Rolls (I don't know the precise name in english ) of the Dead Sea, and is written in a well conserved pre-massoretic hebrew, and it's dated to be from the end of the second century BCE. Its text is, therefor, 1000 years older than the oldest manuscript existing from the massoretic text, in which are based the modern translations of the OT. I think this is a convincing evidence that our Bibles today have the inspired, original message written by Isaiah. Likewise, these ancient rolls refute the critics theory of two "Isaiah", since the first sentence of chapter 40 starts in the last line of the column that contains chapter 39, and ends in the beginning of the next column. So it's evident that the "copy-writer" didn't take into account a supposed change of writer or any division of the book in this point.

But there's other evidence of Isaiah's book authenticity. Beside Moses, he's the most quoted by the Christian Bible writers. And there's abundant evidence in history and archeology which prove that the book is genuine, such as the historical narratives of the Assyrian Monarchs, and the hexagonal prism of Sennacherib, king of Assyria, who made his own writtings about Jerusalem's siege (also in chapters 36 and 37 of Isaiah).

There are other archeological findings, but I really have to go. I'll continue this later.

Originally posted by Zhu Yuanzhang
Daniel was probably written only shortly before the Macceabean revolt, which is about three hundred years after it claims to have been written. This can be seen in the fact that the Jews stuck it in the "Writings" section of their bible along with lots of later work instead of the earlier-written "prophet's section." Also half of the origonal was written in Aramean and the author seems to struggle with Hebrew, and Aramean only became the first language of Palestinian Jews comparitively late. And finally, the author is extremally hazy about the world in in which he supposedly lived, which would only make sense if he was writing a fictional accounts of events that took place hundreds of years before he wrote Daniel.
some examples:
1:1-2 he claims that Nebuchadrezzar beseiged and conquered Jerusalem in the third year of Jehoiakim's reign, when in fact he did so years later under the reign of Jehoiakim's son Jehoiachin.
1:1 He calls Babylonia "Shinar" (ie Sumer), which is extremally anarchonistic.
2:2 He refers to Chaldeans as magicians, which was how the term "Chaldean" was used in the 2nd century BC and later, while in all texts that're really as old as Daniel claims to be Chaldean is simply the Babylonian nationality.
2:4 The Chaldean King has his Chaldean magicians talk to him in Aramean, which makes no sense except insofar as the author of Daniel is more fluent in that language.
5:1-2 he refers to Belshazzar as the king and son of Nebuchadrezzar, when it fact he was no relation and was never a king.
5:31 He claims that Darius the Median conquered Babylonia and was then followed by Cyrus the Persian. This is hopelessly muddled. There was no Median King named Darius and the Medians never conquered Babylonia. If he's talking about the Persian Darius then he not only gets his nationality wrong, but his father, and Darius came AFTER Cyrus in any case.
8:16 He mentions the angel Gabriel by name, and you don't find angels mentioned by name until very late in the development of Judaeism (ie not until after some Zoroastrianism rubbed off).


Also, the only mention of Daniel in the OT is as an ancient paragon of wisdom (Ezekiel 14:14 and 28:3 for example), while if you follow the cronological information in the book of Daniel, the fictional subject of the Book of Daniel was a younger contemporary of Daniel.

Daniel will have to be for some other time. I have to see my mother sing in her choir!

[Lars-E]

This is not a thread about evolution, but anyways:

Looking at a cat, yourself, and a tree - you believe we all came from the same amoeba? By random evolution and mutations?

We know from modern day experiments that most mutations die or degenrate. But we believe we mutated from the same amoeba. Amazing!! What ppl will believe!!

[ranskaldan]

Originally posted by Lars-E
This is not a thread about evolution, but anyways:

Looking at a cat, yourself, and a tree - you believe we all came from the same amoeba?

mmm yes, actually we do. And I don't think 'amoeba' is the right term. But oh well.
And oh yes, you make it sound like myself, the cat, and the tree just suddenly sprung from a lowly amoeba... which doesn't fit "evolution" in the sense of "evolving", does it?

By random evolution and mutations?

Evolution is not random. Mutation is, but natural selection isn't. See below.

We know from modern day experiments that most mutations die or degenrate. But we believe we mutated from the same amoeba. Amazing!! What ppl will believe!!

Mmmm. you used the word *most*.
Amazing, you just defeated your own argument.

Let's say 100000 mutations occur. Just 1 of them is beneficial.... that fits the word 'most' that you used.
Then the individual(s) with that 1 beneficial mutation will be able to survive longer and better thru simple probability.... and thus will leave more offspring.
Thus, although that initial 1 gene is only found in 0.001% of the population, the proportion will increase...
and increase...
and increase...
until the entire population more or less has this gene.
EDIT: oh yes.... in case you're wondering. the other 99999 mutations which are harmful will fade away because the individuals who have them can't survive as well, thus they will leave less offspring, etc etc.
multiply this by three billion years, which, btw, is a very very long time. There's enough time for many of the genes to change many many times. Genes are what differentiate species.

Mmm..... I don't see how hard this is to believe. Every single step of the way is perfectly reasonable and more importantly, we don't require any outside factors that don't already exist. All we need is a lot of mutations and environmental pressure, and the process will work.

Compare that to creation, which requires.....
a workman who can't be shown to exist...
creating life thru methods that can't be shown to exist...
and leaving no evidence whatsoever.

[Dauphin]

They are the Rolls (I don't know the precise name in english ) of the Dead Sea

That would be "Dead Sea Scrolls".

three billion years, which, btw, is a very very long time

I would never had guessed.

[ranskaldan]

Originally posted by Sagacious Dolphin

I would never had guessed.

Creationists seem to think that evolution is a sudden, spontaneous, amoeba>monkey>human metamorphosis. If evolution were that ridiculous I would be a creationist too.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by ranskaldan


Creationists seem to think that evolution is a sudden, spontaneous, amoeba>monkey>human metamorphosis. If evolution were that ridiculous I would be a creationist too.

Well there are many who believe that, not just creationists.

Many also believe that evolution is directed to a "final creation", which is equally absurd. Which, coincidently, is why the anthropic principle has to be invoked to explain human presence.

[ranskaldan]

Originally posted by Sagacious Dolphin


Well there are many who believe that, not just creationists.

Yeah... there are a lot of people i know who were taught evolution from young and believes in it like a religion. They have no idea how it works and they genuinely believe that it is a 'metamorphosis' thing...

Many also believe that evolution is directed to a "final creation", which is equally absurd. Which, coincidently, is why the anthropic principle has to be invoked to explain human presence.

I think that's a holdover from the era when people believed themselves to be the pinnacle, the ultimate design of the universe...

[Lars-E]

Evolution is not random. Mutation is, but natural selection isn't. See below.

Of course.

Mmmm. you used the word *most*.
Amazing, you just defeated your own argument.
Let's say 100000 mutations occur. Just 1 of them is beneficial.... that fits the word 'most' that you used.
Then the individual(s) with that 1 beneficial mutation will be able to survive longer and better thru simple probability.... and thus will leave more offspring.
Thus, although that initial 1 gene is only found in 0.001% of the population, the proportion will increase...
and increase...
and increase...
until the entire population more or less has this gene.
EDIT: oh yes.... in case you're wondering. the other 99999 mutations which are harmful will fade away because the individuals who have them can't survive as well, thus they will leave less offspring, etc etc.
multiply this by three billion years, which, btw, is a very very long time. There's enough time for many of the genes to change many many times. Genes are what differentiate species.

Beneficial mutation?
Any modern day experiments confirm your theory of beneficial mutations?

I 'accept' your long and theoretical argumentation. But that's my point. You're getting very theoretical. And when we look at the world is it very likely that it can be applied?

Creationists seem to think that evolution is a sudden, spontaneous, amoeba>monkey>human metamorphosis. If evolution were that ridiculous I would be a creationist too

What about 'evolution by leaps' which seemed to be a new craze a few years ago?

[Guynemer]

Lars,

I'm sorry, I'm not quite following your argument. Are you questioning whether beneficial mutations have taken place?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Lars-E
Defeat my own argument? Nah not really. But I accept your long and theoretical argumentation. But that's my point. You're getting very theoretical. And when we look at the world is it very likely that it can be applied?

Lots of scientific theories are, eh, theoretical. Just look at Newtonian Mechanics, for example.

Originally posted by Lars-E
What about 'evolution by leaps' which seemed to be a new craze a few years ago?

You mean Punctuated Equilibrium (PE), a hypothesis submitted by Stephen Gould et al as an explanation to the Cambrian Explosion?

It's still around. What about it?

[Joe R. Golowka]

Evolution has been definitively proven. It has been observed to occur many times. For example, Biston betularia, an English moth, has two different races. One is dark colored and the other is light. H. B. D. Kettlewell found that prior to 1848 fewer then 2% of its population were dark colored moths. In 1898 95% of the moths in Manchester and other industrial areas were dark colored. During this time England was going through the industrial revolution, and the amount of black soot being sent into the air was increasing. The light colored moths stood out against the black soot and were caught more often by predators. This is proof of evolution.

There have also been cases were viruses have evolved resistance to vaccines and flies in the laboratory have evolved different characteristics.

You can find several examples of macroevolution at http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html

[Ramo]

Where do we find these guys?

I 'accept' your long and theoretical argumentation. But that's my point. You're getting very theoretical. And when we look at the world is it very likely that it can be applied?

This has got to be one of the most hilarious things I've read on the board!

I wonder how this'll go over with my Physics prof: "the Schrodinger Wave Equation is obviously bullocks 'cuz it's theoretical."