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 DogofWar1 wrote:
distinguishing between the two is crucial for this debate

Not if the debate is between creationism on the one hand and science on the other.

The only time the distinction between old and young earth creationists matters is when they are debating each other.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Ken Hams video is so wrongIt goes ut of its way to insult and demean people.

The same is true of Bill Nye's video.

Yesterday, CNN published this from Ken Ham:

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2014/02/03/why-im-debating-the-science-guy-about-creationism/?hpt=hp_t2

Ken Ham wrote:Ultimately, I have decided to accept an authority — our infallible creator and his word, the Bible — over the words of fallible humans.

Genesis was written by human beings who had no concept of our modern materialist-literalist world view. It is historically impossible that the people who wrote any book of the Bible intended the meaning that Ken Ham ascribes to it. (This is the same mistake Hive Fleet Plastic made yesterday by asserting that the claim that Jesus was resurrected is a scientific claim.)

 Manchu wrote:
Not if the debate is between creationism on the one hand and science on the other.

The only time the distinction between old and young earth creationists matters is when they are debating each other.

But that's the whole damn point. Creationists who believe god is non-interventionist for the most part are on the side of science. They want to discover how the universe began, and how it functions, how evolution works, what's inside of atoms, etc. etc. What about agnostics, how do they fit into things?

In essence, many realistic creationists hold EXACTLY the same views and opinions on science as atheists. Lumping them in with people who deny basic facts of science is extremely condescending. You're essentially saying that in debates involving science, there is no distinction to be drawn between a theist who accepts EVERY scientific tenet and fact you do, and someone who denies those facts because the Bible says otherwise.

Your opinion turns Newton, Faraday, Kelvin, Mendel, and many others into enemies of science. As such, your opinion, that no distinction should be made, is pretty much absurd.

You either accept that the materialist perspective is the only scientifically appropriate one ... or you don't. This is not a matter of opinion.

Again, "God pressed the start button" is meaningless from a scientific perspective. If you believe that it is scientific then you do not understand what science is any more than a young earth creationist.
And no I am not failing to distinguish between a theist who accepts science and a theist who rejects it. A theist who accepts science cannot say that "God pressed the start button" is a scientifically relevant claim. If he does so, he rejects science just as much as a young earth creationist.

This is why I have spent so many electrons trying to explain the distinction between faith claims and scientific fact claims.

As a Christian, I confess that God is the Creator. I do not, however, believe this confession has any relevance whatsoever to the scientific investigation of reality.

This is different from those who insert God as a factor into a materialist account of the universe: e.g., God is responsible for the Big Bang. This is the "God of the Gaps" fallacy, which basically substitutes the non-scientific claim "God did it" for the scientific conclusion "we don't know."

As I have painstakingly explained over the last few pages, creationism is the ideology that non-scientific claims (specifically, about God) are essential to understanding the factual history and nature of the universe.

It does not matter in the slightest if you only want to throw in one non-scientific claim (your "realistic" creationism) or a whole truckload of them (dinosaur bones are satanic tricks, etc, etc), by doing so you are rejecting the fundamental premises of science.

Therefore, there is no meaningful difference between old and young earth creationists when the debate is about science.


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 DogofWar1 wrote:
Your opinion turns Newton, Faraday, Kelvin, Mendel, and many others into enemies of science.

Please explain to us all how the lasting contributions of any of these scientists depended on the explanation that "God did it."

 Manchu wrote:

This is different from those who insert God as a factor into a materialist account of the universe: e.g., God is responsible for the Big Bang. This is the "God of the Gaps" fallacy, which basically substitutes the non-scientific claim "God did it" for the scientific conclusion "we don't know."

This seems to be the main sticking point of this debate, but you keep failing to account for Christians who are not immovable when new discoveries are made.

There is a not insignificant group of Christians who (even if they can't articulate the point themselves) believe that God is POTENTIALLY responsible for all the things we can't explain. As we explain more and more things, what He is directly responsible for becomes less and less, and that is incorporated into our understanding of the universe.

If, at some point in the future, all the gaps are filled in and there is no room for God, then fine, that finding will be incorporated too, and a not insignificant number of creationists would become atheists.

The problem is, you're viewing the whole spectrum of creationism as a group that holds a view anathema to scientific investigation. But a large chunk of that spectrum doesn't stand in the way of science. A large chunk of that spectrum supports more scientific investigation. A large chunk of that spectrum accepts new findings and moves their beliefs out of the way to account for that.

As such, lumping this large chunk in with the other chunk who do actually hold an immovable view anathema to scientific discoveries and investigations is hardly fair.

 DogofWar1 wrote:
you're viewing the whole spectrum of creationism as a group that holds a view anathema to scientific investigation

Creationism is anathema to scientific investigation preceisely because it inserts non-scientific claims into scientific accounts. Again, it does not matter if you only insert one or many non-scientific claims.

 DogofWar1 wrote:
If, at some point in the future, all the gaps are filled in and there is no room for God, then fine, that finding will be incorporated too, and a not insignificant number of creationists would become atheists.

Such people have never believed in God to begin with. At most, they believe in some kind of magic. More likely, they are simply thoughtless.

"I don't know" is a scientifically meaningful statement.

"God did it" is a scientifically meaningless statement.

They are not interchangeable. They do not mean the same thing. It is not "realistic" to pretend they are equivalent. It is just as silly as claiming the earth is 6000 years old.

"God did it." and "God could have done it, maybe, we're not sure how much He actually did" are different statements with different levels of certainty. Neither is "scientific" in nature, but one is a claim that would deny certain scientific discoveries, one is not.

Saying that people with a willingness to incorporate new facts into their beliefs never believed in God in the first place is pretty ridiculous as well. So you can't be a theist unless you lock yourself into some view that you are unwilling to change even in the face of facts to the opposite?

This whole debate at this point reminds me of some arguments I've gotten into with sports fans about fandom, and how some people believe you are only a "true" fan if you love your team with all your heart and never question them. Lord help you if you became a fan of a team as an adult, because even if you're 70 and have rooted for the team for 40 years, according to some, because you joined when you were 30 because you liked some QB who has long since stopped playing, you still aren't a TRUE fan.

Basically, stop trying to define the boundaries of other people's faith for them. Their faith is their own to define. Some boundaries of faith DO stand in opposition to scientific discovery, some do not.


Anyways, I think, at the end of the day, this whole debate is pointless anyway for the discussion of Young Earth Creationism vs. Science.

In the discussion of scientific concepts like evolution and the forces of the universe, many creationists, theists, or what have you, stand against Ken Ham's YEC views and stand with the scientific community. If you want to lump them in with the YEC bunch as being anathema to science, that's your opinion, but that doesn't mean we're not making the same points the atheists are making about how the universe works.

 DogofWar1 wrote:
Neither is "scientific" in nature

That is the beginning and the end of the analysis. From a scientific perspective, there is no difference between "God did it" and "God could have done it." They are equally meaningless claims.

 DogofWar1 wrote:
Saying that people with a willingness to incorporate new facts into their beliefs never believed in God in the first place is pretty ridiculous as well.

Not at all. Using the word "God" as a label for whatever you or people generally do not know is superstition, semantics, or some mix of them; but it is not Christian faith.

 DogofWar1 wrote:
This whole debate at this point reminds me of ...

I think that line of thought shows you do not understand what I am saying. I honestly cannot put it any more simply than I already have so at this point I can only counsel you to carefully re-read my previous posts.

 DogofWar1 wrote:
many creationists, theists, or what have you, stand against Ken Ham's YEC views and stand with the scientific community

So first, let's be specific: creationist and theists are not the same category. Going back to my Venn Diagram explanation -- the two circles overlap but they are separate circles. Second, some creationists may disagree with certain of Ken Ham's specific points. But all creationists agree on at least one broad point: that inherently non-scientific claims are relevant to a scientific understanding of the natural world.

No matter how you try to twist it, that is why creationism in all its varieties stands apart from and against science.

 Manchu wrote:

 daedalus wrote:
What's wrong with humanism?

Ham thinks Nye and the American Humanist Association "have an agenda to teach children not to believe in God," which doesn't seem totally far-fetched TBH.

There is a huge difference between not wanting God (of any religion) taught in public class rooms and not wanting kids to believe in God (any God) at all. I'm in the former camp, and against the latter camp.

Yeah, as I mentioned, I think (1) there is a camp that believes children should be taught (by parents and others) to not believe in God and (2) the American Humanist Association may be in that camp or have some significant overlap with that camp. But I don't think Bill Nye said that in his video. Why would he? Ken Ham basically said that what Bill Nye doesn't want you to know is that he's in that camp, I guess based on the fact that the American Humanist Association presented him with their annual award.

Isn't that essentially an ad Hominem attack though? Why does it matter if Nye wants schools to teach non-belief or not? How does it make the issue at hand more or less true?

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Isn't that essentially an ad Hominem attack though? Why does it matter if Nye wants schools to teach non-belief or not? How does it make the issue at hand more or less true?

It is exactly an ad hominem attack.

You mean, why aren't they debating about science?

Well, we know why Ham is not debating about science -- because his view is fundamentally non-scientific. He willfully has no capacity to debate science.

As for Nye, it's a little less excusable for him. The obvious answer is that it's pretty difficult to debate about science with someone who does not know what it is and refuses to learn what it is.

But the more important answer is, I doubt this debate was ever about science for either party. Rather, it's about ideology.

On the one hand, you have the ideology purporting that non-scientific claims are relevant to scientifically understanding the natural world. That's obviously not science.

On the other side, you have the ideology purporting that the materialist-rationalist account of the universe is exhaustive. That's not science, either. To clarify, Bill Nye did not explicitly say that. But Ham is basically accusing Nye of that position and I don't think it's a very far-fetched accusation.

Any update on Spot the lovable TRex?

 Frazzled wrote:
Any update on Spot the lovable TRex?

Like spam, he is just an invention of the devil to tempt us away from the true discussion at hand. Keep Rule Number Three in mind please!

The debate just started. You can watch it at http://debatelive.org/

And I'm facepalming already...

I don't understand his distinction before historical and observable science. His use of example of the textbook I feel just literally disproved his theory. Like his Grand Canyon theory. If the rocks take x amount of time to be worn away, why would it take shorter in the past? If the Half-Life of an element is x, why would it be any different from the past? What exactly is he trying to prove with this distinction? And how is the evidence he is bringing up helping him? Help me understand, because I am confused.

He says we can't apply the natural laws we observe in the present to account for the past of the natural world. He says this is because we cannot observe the past.

But...what? How could he assert that? Why aren't natural laws just changing willy nilly then? How could science even..,be if that was the case? We base so much on natural laws. (Sorry if I'm asking to much. Just trying to understand the other side better.)

DjPyro3 wrote:
But...what? How could he assert that? Why aren't natural laws just changing willy nilly then? How could science even..,be if that was the case? We base so much on natural laws. (Sorry if I'm asking to much. Just trying to understand the other side better.)

It's mostly faith, and making the science fit his viewpoint to be honest. After all, he can't know what happened in the bible is true because he wasn't there by that logic.

Who is that guy that just got to commit Career Suicide?

He seems to believe that there was two of every species on the ark, despite that being a commonly known misinterpretation.

Referencing some paper doesn't give credence to your statement either. "This paper backs up my claims", yes, as does the one entitled Ken Ham is amazing.

Is there a reason for Ken Ham's repeated citing of their being engineers who are creationists? How much bearing would elements have whether they were created by a god or naturally on one's designs and their implementation?

The twisting of facts and disproved information is a little silly thus far, and we've not even gotten past the presentation stage.

Oh so now there are two kinds of science. So its okay to make gak up if its a different kind of science.

I don't like the fact he basically used a 19th century textbook as an example.

DjPyro3 wrote:
I don't like the fact he basically used a 19th century textbook as an example.

It doesn't matter that much. Science evolves and can even contradict what it said previously. That is normal in science.

I knew the "evolution is a religion" line was coming sooner or later...

 Mathieu Raymond wrote:

DjPyro3 wrote:
I don't like the fact he basically used a 19th century textbook as an example.

It doesn't matter that much. Science evolves and can even contradict what it said previously. That is normal in science.

I know. That's why using such an outdated example bothers me. It's outdated for a reason. None of the stuff in that book matters anymore because we have disproved everything in that book. Also he jumped from marriage to euthanasia as if that was a logical step. Or I might have missed what he said.

Say "indoctrination" again.

Apparently without religion we'll be killing people like animals (though that begs the question why animals aren't dying in droves). A point levelled in tandem with the marriage of those who don't follow it as the bible states. Nice to see a bit of stealth homophobia there.

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:
I knew the "evolution is a religion" line was coming sooner or later...

Well to be fair it is a belief. Not proven fact. The theory of Evolution is just that, a theory.

These examples are useless in the face of the way the other guy is framing things. "How do you know those snow layers took a whole summer-winter cycle to form 4,000 years ago. You can't. That's "Historical Since" it's a faith-based-naturalist-religion that hates children; INDOCTRINATION"