A Conversation for The Freedom From Faith Foundation
Rabble-rousing :-)
Gone again Started conversation May 11, 2001
From sci.philosophy.meta, for your entertainment:
"Responding to faith-motivated scientific criticism
A Christian claims that the earth can not be five billion years old because the Bible says . . . , that stars can not be millions of light years distant because the Bible says . . ., that evolution should not be taught in schools because the Bible says . . .
A typical response: use evidence, scientific explanation and logical argument to defend scientific facts and beliefs.
A more effective response: go to the root of the matter, pointing out the Bible's contradictions, absurdities and, on occasion, outright lies.
The typical response is safer but often ineffective. The second response requires courage but is more effective because it addresses the root cause, belief in Biblical accuracy and truth, rather than the effect, faith-motivated scientific criticism.
If you have tired of the typical response, visit [URL removed by moderator]"
The poster, Arthur Avalon (possibly a nom de plume? ), seems to have written a book debunking the Bible: "TO JUSTIN, AGAINST CHRISTIANITY: ON CHRISTIAN DELUSIONS, DECEPTIONS, AND OUTRIGHT LIES", ISBN 0-7388-2517-4. Just what the world needed.
Personally, I've always questioned the sanity of those, for and against, who take the Bible (or any other holy book) literally. These are not matters for logical or intellectual examination, as we have discussed in the past, at some length. Still, I found parts of the website moderately interesting; YMMV.
Pattern-chaser
Rabble-rousing :-)
Blatherskite the Mugwump - Bandwidth Bandit Posted May 12, 2001
Too bad you lost the URL to the censors. Could you post it in a Guide article, like your homepage or a page for links? If I could get it from you and look at it, it might even merit inclusion on the FFFF page...
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ZenMondo Posted May 13, 2001
My main beef about those that advocate teaching Creationism in schools, is the audacity that the Judeo-Christian creation myth is the one to teach! There are other creation myths out there, why couldn't one of those be as valid as the Judeo-Christian creation myth.
When it comes down to it, there is not any truely scientific proof for Creationism, is there?
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Gone again Posted May 14, 2001
ZenMondo wrote "When it comes down to it, there is not any truely scientific proof for Creationism, is there?"
Neither proof nor disproof, as far as I am aware. An omnipotent creator could've created it to look just like it evolved, or not, depending on how She felt that day. Searching for (dis)proof would seem pointless (to me at least).
Regards to Phaerie and Connor.
Pattern-chaser
Rabble-rousing :-)
Gone again Posted May 14, 2001
Colonel Sellers wrote: "Too bad you lost the URL to the censors. Could you post it in a Guide article, like your homepage or a page for links? If I could get it from you and look at it, it might even merit inclusion on the FFFF page..." Hello Uncle Colonel! Here is a link to a Journal entry I just made: http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/F50717?thread=112601&post=966278#p966278 It contains the URL deleted by the censor(s). Why are they doing this? My own opinion of the website is that it is for entertainment only. YMMV. Pattern-chaser
Rabble-rousing :-)
Blatherskite the Mugwump - Bandwidth Bandit Posted May 15, 2001
That's a pretty good link, so I think I will add it to the main page. It's a collection of articles not too dissimilar from the kind of thing we've got here.
As for why they're doing it, officially, it's because they don't want to check and re-check the links in forums... after all, URLs can change to point to something not very appropriate at some time in the future. Unofficially, I think they're doing it to annoy us. Anyway, external URLs are allowed in Guide entries, but not forums, so I can put it up on the FFFF page without any trouble.
Rabble-rousing :-)
Twophlag Gargleblap - NWO NOW Posted May 24, 2001
I almost screamed the other day when a national Canadian debating forum tv show aired an hour-long segment on "creationism vs evolution". I'm so sick of seeing it come up over and over again... even in the dark ages of my youth when I was a believing Christian I never once took seriously the idiotic notion that OT writings were intended as, or best interpreted as, literal revelatory cosmology.
It has always struck me that a far more interesting way of looking at the question of design in nature is this: we would say that such things as snowflakes, trees, mountain ranges, the stars, have an aesthetic quality. Is that aesthetic quality inherent in the object being observed or is it integral to the interpretation of the being enacting the observation? We know that design is in some sense an integral subset of universal being... although it usually manifests as a secondary characteristic of that oddity called "life". Spiders, people, birds, beavers, design and engineer things... so this notion of "reality" that we have is in some sense inseperable from the examples of design that are intrinsic manifestations of it.
Key: Complain about this post
Rabble-rousing :-)
- 1: Gone again (May 11, 2001)
- 2: Blatherskite the Mugwump - Bandwidth Bandit (May 12, 2001)
- 3: ZenMondo (May 13, 2001)
- 4: Gone again (May 14, 2001)
- 5: Gone again (May 14, 2001)
- 6: Blatherskite the Mugwump - Bandwidth Bandit (May 15, 2001)
- 7: Phaerie (May 18, 2001)
- 8: Twophlag Gargleblap - NWO NOW (May 24, 2001)
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