Subject:
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Re: A question about this creationism/evolution debate
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Sat, 10 Feb 2001 19:38:06 GMT
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Viewed:
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160 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Tim Culberson writes:
> Christopher Tracey wrote:
> >
> > There is no conflict that I can [see] between evolutionary theory and
> > religious beliefs.
>
> Unless you believe the Bible. The Bible tells VERY clearly how and when
> earth was created, and if you don't believe that then you don't have to
> believe anything else the Bible says.
Here's the point--literal interpretation. Most evolutionary
scientists and cosmologists are Christians, and quite a few of
my acquaintance are deeply religious. The argument isn't between
religion and evolution, as much as Young-Earth Creationists would
like it to be, but it's between their movement and a reified image
of all evolution as atheistic and materialistic. (In fairness,
there are some folks who incorporate evolution into their world-
view for that reason, but then their philosophy is *using* it, not
embodying it.)
Not believing an account literally does not make it false--that
would be placing our modern understanding of text and truth on
a document canonized over 2200 years ago, and first penned in
a language that is imperfectly known. And who says that allegory
isn't truth, or that believing that the oldest parts of the OT
are allegorical--who are we to say how God spoke before Man, or
what He meant?--and that the rest and the NT are factual as
understood by those who lived it?
By the way, I must disagree that Genesis is clear. It's clear
only from a theological and "layman's" standpoint. *Scientifically*,
it's clear as mud and about as comprehensive as a book-flap quote.
> There are multiple conflicts
> between the Bible and the Evolutionary theory. The whole creationism
> debate is about 98% based on information found in the first book,
> Genesis. Almost every other book in the Bible refers to Genesis at some
> point. If you don't believe Genesis then why should you believe
> anything else the Bible has to say? The Bible clearly states that God
> created everything in 6 days (the 7th a day of rest) and if we follow
> Bible timeline we can infer that it happened around 6000 years ago
> (possibly as much as 10000, although most Creationists have settled the
> most probable figure at 6000). You're saying Evolution fits this
> criteria? I doubt it. (1)For more info specifically on this subject
> and why some "combination" theories are invalid, see here:
> http://www.christiananswers.net/creation/menu-bible.html#supposedbiblescienceconflicts
In the interests of equal time:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-god.html (for compatibility)
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/interpretations.html (for how Genesis
has been worked out; fair warning, some interpretations
deny biblical inerrancy, which is a central tenet to YEC and
to the Fundamentalist Christianity from which it hails)
http://www.best.com/~atta/what.htm#continuum (My favourite, the
"Creation-Evolution Continuum," which shows that the
picture is not Manichaean but rather gradated, from atheist
materialists at one extreme to biblical Geocentrists at
the other)
I'll take a look at christiananswers.net later--it appears to
have crashed sometime in the last hour, always a bad thing on
the weekend because some folks don't come back until Monday! :(
> > My methodist minister father-in-law believes in
> > evolution. The Presbyterian minister that married my wife and I has a
> > collection of fossils in his church office along with copies of books by
> > SJ Gould (He also has one of those Darwin Fish stickers on his car :).
Watch out--the loving, kind religious folk of Georgia vandalized
a colleague's car for having one of those on it! I have yet to
see the opposite happen to an Alpha-festooned car...even in Boston.
(heh)
> My father is a Baptist minister, and he was probably one of the most
> vocal against Evolution in the small town where we lived for the past
> ~10 years or so....just because someones a minister doesn't mean I think
> they're automatically correct.....ministers are just people (although it
> is often true that they're good sources of Biblical knowledge and
> guidance).
The denominational difference explains a lot with regard to
the differing positions of the two, though--I'd bet that it
extends to theological matters as well as the issue of science.
I agree, however, being a minister does not automatically make
one's opinions on science correct (just as a scientist's take
on theology is not necessarily correct).
I hope I've stayed sufficiently on-topic for the original poster!
best,
LFB
n.b.: I inserted the [see] in the original msg text wayyy up
top.
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