Here is a recent exchange with another ID fan in response to my blog yesterday. This type of thinking really scares the hell out of me for the future of this country as a global technology leader:
“So do the math and by multiplying by millions of years, and use a calculator if you must, to see how the earth is constantly changing over time.”(From my blog-EJB)
“but you are assuming that the area the mountain is in now was once flat. If God created the mountain at a certain height 6,000 years ago then it growing today does not tell us how old the earth is.” – McCoville, Intelligent Design advocate.
My Response – You’re right if you assume god had a certain sensibility regarding landscaping but the presence of marine fossils on the top of certain mountains indicates that they were once at sea level and with their present rate of accretion that had to be more than 6,000 years ago.
And lets take this out of the realm of the earth for a moment. Look at the lunar landscape with its myriad craters that you can see with your naked eye. Now if you follow the Bible the moon was also created six thousand years ago, actually after the earth on the fourth day according to Genesis and all of those meteorite and asteroid collisions had to occur in that tiny time frame. Why isn’t the earth pockmarked to the degree the moon is? Why? Because those impacts occurred billions of year ago and the forces of atmospheric erosion, which are lacking on the moon, eroded most of their presence on the earth over that time.
If you don’t believe in an old earth you now have to account for the moon being created at a different time before the earth and I don’t believe that is the normal reading of scripture. Or you have to create a scenario in which god bombarded the moon but chose to spare the earth, you know one of “his” miracles. Not to be blasphemous but god was pretty liberal with his miracles during biblical times but you have to admit “his” modern day miracles have kind of paled in comparison. Or just maybe god likes craters and he created the moon that way just to mess with us. Funny, we just witnessed a comet collision with Jupiter during our lifetime though so that thinking is a bit suspect. Kind of convoluted thinking in any case wouldn’t you say? Sorry, you have to face it, the Bible makes for a very poor science book.
My last comment said it all. Where do these Creationists learn science? Did they just fall asleep during the geology lectures in school or were they never taught any critical thinking because they were home schooled? How do they selectively turn on and off what they consider true science or do they care? Do they just listen to Rush Limbaugh on the radio? I don’t get it but almost half of Americans reject evolution. That means half of all Americans are not capable of critical scientific thinking.
Now their comment to me is that I am the one who has been spoon fed and accepted the humanist belief system including Darwinism without my own critical review or personal introspection. Not true, I spent some time in Catholic School and immediately began discounting everything they taught me the minute I escaped their clutches, including the concepts of heaven and hell. I did so as I slowly began to find my way in the real world. First, the natural world just did not make sense to me as taught by the priests and nuns. Furthermore, their shocking abuse of parochial school students as personally observed did not jive with me either. And while I did not experience the sexual abuse that was inherent in the Catholic School system, I can tell you that nobody, including myself, was exempt from the numerous forms of physical punishment that was perpetuated upon the student body by the clergy. I can also tell you that celibacy gives you a lot of pent up energy and a certain zeal that needs to be vented upon unwary sinners. In my case, being left-handed I was subjected to regular physical beatings because I had the temerity to use my left-hand to write and draw. You know, the old school superstition regarding the left-hand being sinistral or evil thinking from the middle ages.
So did I reject god? No, I rejected the men who claim to speak for god. Every major religion has the stink of man about it and not the rarefied air of god. To me, nature speaks more of god than any holy book as interpreted and manipulated by mortal man. So again, I ask what of science in America?
Here was McCovilles response:
“Marine fossils at the top of the mountains…. Noah’s flood. Again, the moon has the marks because that is how God made them, have you seen the meteorites hit the moon or are you taking the words of men by faith that it happened? God’s miracles continue to happen today, you fail to recognize them as such. I never said the Bible was a science book, I only stand by the claim that it is infallible and science continues to agree.”
Should have seen the proverbial flood coming but you can see my response in the blog. In any case, if 50% of Americans are thinking like this then we are so screwed as a nation.
For those that care my first novel in the Trilogy, Flores Girl: The Children God Forgot, is now available on Amazon for the Kindle Reader at a very reasonable price:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001UE6MDY
Enjoy!
Erik John Bertel
Thank you for writing a post about our exchange, makes me feel special. But you got me all wrong, and if you are an adult you should know it is not safe to speak as if you know someone until you do.
After reading this post of yours I am saddened by the apparent direction this country is heading as atheists gain more and more influence. Do you not see how quickly you dismiss any idea that does not agree with your beliefs? Do you not see how you cover up your inability to debate a topic with name calling? Does everyone that disagree with you automatically get classified as unintelligent?
If you are not willing to openly and fairly discuss a topic you should disable comments or not respond to comments posted.
Funny that you complain about name calling but you automatically resort to branding any person professing to have a Darwinist or Evolutionist viewpoint as an atheist. Talk about the armadillo telling the turtle it is too hard shelled! I am neither an atheist nor an agnostic but choose to keep my beliefs to myself and do not consider them to be valid expressions of science. As to “unintelligent”, I never used that descriptor either. Creationists and fundamentalist are not inherently unintelligent but there is a strong streak of ignorance within those movements.
“you automatically resort to branding any person professing to have a Darwinist or Evolutionist viewpoint as an atheist.”, I don’t remember making that claim. I know of several people who call themselves Christian that believe in Darwinian evolution. I also do not remember stating that I knew what your religious beliefs where, all though you dismiss God’s work enough that I would say it is safe to say you do not follow Christianity.
Wrong again but the bigger question is anybody else reading this stupid blog besides Mcoville?
You know, I read these posts about ID, creationism, evolution, etc…and I’m glad I did because I was feeling down and needed a good LAUGH. The commenter who thinks the Earth is only 6K years old says that the ‘scientific’ opinion about Earth being far older is simply a theory which cannot be proven. Well how much evidence do you need? It’s totally intellectually dishonest to point to a few poorly-reasoned refutations and say the theory hasn’t been proven. For example, scientists have measured the speed of light. Using that number, they can calculate all sorts of other fun things such as how far away stars are and how LONG it took their light to reach us here on God’s green Earth. And believe you me, in many cases it’s much longer than 6,000 years. The creationists’ response to this is probably to say “well, maybe the speed of light wasn’t always constant!” That’s an interesting burden of proof. I would call it proof beyond an UNreasonable doubt.
My point is that anybody is entitled to believe what they want. MCOVILLE, I don’t care if you even believed that the moon was made of cheese and the Earth is filled with a delicious, gooey chocolate and nougat center. But don’t mistake faith for science. Science has rigor and it furthers humanity. I am quite fond of light bulbs, penicillin, retractable ball point pens, MRI scanners, satellites and the laptop upon which I write this waste-of-time comment. Since I would like more of these things in the future, I hope that people learn in school the tools to actually create them. No doubt that people should learn ABOUT religion in school, but the dogma itself has no place in a public school.
Well, all this writing has made me thirsty. I’m going to get myself a glass of New York state tap water. Thank you, Catskill mountains that are millions of years old!
Well put but remember the Mcovilles of the world have their faith so rational arguments are a waste of breath. But you did answer my bigger question about somebody else reading this stupid blog!
I just realized the irony that I will see you and the rest of the fam on Easter Sunday. Ha ha.
On second thought, maybe not so ironic since I am capable of holding two opposing viewpoints at once.
“Well how much evidence do you need?”, what do you have?
And to avoid wasting more of your time do not use radiometric dating (potassium/argon or any other) as there is enough evidence, in my opinion, that it does not work.
As a side note, technological advance will continue without the theory of evolution so you do not have to worry about your laptop being upgraded in the future when evolution is no longer entertained by serious scientists.
Since you claim that the Bible is infallible, then what is the point of me providing any other source material? Unless those sources happen to agree with your interpretation of the Bible, then they must be wrong. So, if you were to agree with any evidence in support of my argument you would be contradicting your faith, and I don’t think that’s gonna happen. I will save my energy instead.
plz read some greatly inspiring celibacy quotes here: http://gopal4mission.wordpress.com/2009/04/04/greatly-inspiring-brahmacharya-quotes/. Hope you find this link useful.
Okay, we have a celibacy link. Spam? Hidden message? You decide but I am not a big fan of celibacy and believe in the middle way.
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