How evolutionism destroys SDA theology

[karl]

>>For instance, God says that death came to the flora and fauna of this earth after man sinned about six thousand years ago.<<

I'd be interested in the text(s) which sustains that thought.

Start with this one:

Romans 5:12

Wherefore , as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned :

[jasd]

>>Romans 5:12

Wherefore , as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned :<<

I dwelt, somewhat, upon Romans 5:12 in a prior post: I've forgotten which, whether it was post #317029 - 01.03.10 or post #318588 - 01.07.10

[Dr. Rich]

Sorry jasd, but sin did NOT enter into this world by one man--what Paul thought and taught were his own ideas and many were not correct. Clearly, Satan had already sinned and it was his evilness and through him that sin entered into this world.

[WayneV]

Sorry jasd, but sin did NOT enter into this world by one man--what Paul thought and taught were his own ideas and many were not correct. Clearly, Satan had already sinned and it was his evilness and through him that sin entered into this world.

Dr. Rich,

Where do you find this in Scripture? The way I understand it, satan's sin occured in Heaven when he sought to "be like the most high." Sin entered this world through Adam. In this world, satan initiated temptation, not sin.

Agape`

[karl]

Originally Posted By: Dr. Rich

Sorry jasd, but sin did NOT enter into this world by one man--what Paul thought and taught were his own ideas and many were not correct. Clearly, Satan had already sinned and it was his evilness and through him that sin entered into this world.

Dr. Rich,

Where do you find this in Scripture? The way I understand it, satan's sin occured in Heaven when he sought to "be like the most high." Sin entered this world through Adam. In this world, satan initiated temptation, not sin.

Agape`

The bottom line, and the question in regards to the competing religions of creationism and evolutionism is whether millions of years of death (while natural selection of transitional forms was doing the "creating") are compatible with the creationist understanding that death originated with man's sin here on earth and all forms of life on the planet have been getting weaker and worse ever since.

There is absolutely no compatibility between these two religions unless the only evolution you are talking about is the microevolution we have observed (which is mostly destructive.) In this instance, we are not talking evolution - we are talking devolution.

Evolutionism and creationism are 180 degrees opposed. They start in diametrically opposed ways and they continue in diametrically opposed ways. One is a continual mindless upward tropism. The other is a mind-of-satan-driven downward tropism.

We need to stop trying to marry these two. They are not a good match. Marriage counseling, no matter how well-intended, will not help.

[WayneV]

The bottom line, and the question in regards to the competing religions of creationism and evolutionism is whether millions of years of death (while natural selection of transitional forms was doing the "creating") are compatible with the creationist understanding that death originated with man's sin here on earth and all forms of life on the planet have been getting weaker and worse ever since.

There is absolutely no compatibility between these two religions unless the only evolution you are talking about is the microevolution we have observed (which is mostly destructive.) In this instance, we are not talking evolution - we are talking devolution.

Evolutionism and creationism are 180 degrees opposed. They start in diametrically opposed ways and they continue in diametrically opposed ways. One is a continual mindless upward tropism. The other is a mind-of-satan-driven downward tropism.

We need to stop trying to marry these two. They are not a good match. Marriage counseling, no matter how well-intended, will not help.

Karl,

What you have written may or may not be true. However, it was a misdirect that did not in any fashion address my question to Dr. Rich. Therefore, I am at a loss as to why you replied by quoting our posts.

Agape`

[phkrause]

Originally Posted By: Dr. Rich

Sorry jasd, but sin did NOT enter into this world by one man--what Paul thought and taught were his own ideas and many were not correct. Clearly, Satan had already sinned and it was his evilness and through him that sin entered into this world.

Dr. Rich,

Where do you find this in Scripture? The way I understand it, satan's sin occured in Heaven when he sought to "be like the most high." Sin entered this world through Adam. In this world, satan initiated temptation, not sin.

Agape`

Very good point WayneV

pk

[jasd]

>>Sorry jasd, but sin did NOT enter into this world by one man--what Paul thought and taught were his own ideas and many were not correct. Clearly, Satan had already sinned and it was his evilness and through him that sin entered into this world.<<

Indeed: a loaded observation – depending upon the criteria utilized. If we speak of that which the NT informs, sin did enter through an act of the man Adam. If we speak of sin entering into this world through that intrinsically attending the creature Satan rather than by any particular act of his thereafter, then indeed – that is also true.

I am of the opinion that fallen spirits entered this realm upon the second day of Creation. Gd forbore proclaiming that day in particular – “good”. It was the day in which He created the firmament, of which it is later said that Satan is the Prince of the power thereof.

[jasd]

>>...are compatible with the creationist understanding that death originated with man's sin here on earth...<<

The creationist holds some few beliefs that may be best characterized as suspect or dogmatic.

>>There is absolutely no compatibility between these two religions...<<

There is that shared – faith; however, with the creationist – it is faith, indeed.

>>...unless the only evolution you are talking about is the microevolution we have observed (which is mostly destructive.)<<

Funny, you should mention that: there is occurring within our lifetime – matters which concern our children; that is, the matter of the increasing numbers of Indigo children being born, and the rapidly increasing numbers of our children being born autistic. Devolution? Perhaps, however, they share a certain commonality –

Savantism!

Good? Bad? Maybe, simply evolutionary, not the sort that occurs over eons of time but within several generations. Perhaps, it is that

our children shall lead us...

>>Evolutionism and creationism are 180 degrees opposed.<<

Of a certainty? Okay, but does that nullify the entirety of one or the other?

I pulled the following from the thread Theistic evolutionism hits brick wall in Last day Events -- #271214 09.04.09

“...that Nimrod became afflicted with a retrovirus that integrated with his genome and, in essence, “rewrote” his genetic makeup, fashioning him into a “fit extension” for an under-worldly spirit. When I asked Sharon Gilbert, author of The Armageddon Strain whose formal education includes molecular biology and genetics if she thought this was possible, she said, “Absolutely, Tom. Retroviruses essentially inject single-stranded RNA strands into somatic (body) cells during ‘infection’. These ssRNA strands access nucleotide pools in the host cell and form a double-stranded DNA copy. This dsDNA can then incorporate itself into the host chromosome using a viral enzyme called ‘integrase.’ The new ‘fake gene’ then orders the cell to make more mRNA copies of the original virus RNA. These then travel out of the cell and infect the next cell, and so on.” ”

Might it not obtain that – given the numbers of successful ‘in vitro applications’ churning out genetically-modified or ‘chimeric’ creatures – there exists some credence in the fact that “a retrovirus may integrate with a host’s genome and rewrite the specimen’s DNA”? (we might want to rethink ‘receiving the mark’ – should it be legitimate architecture in concept mapping – and what that might actually entail; such as, its rendering the recipient bestial-like, an inhuman creature)

Mechanics aside, I tend towards the idea that we are about to witness ubiquitous ‘evolution’. Operative terminologies would center upon how ‘evolution’ will be incorporated in our common conversation – should the above obtain.

>>We need to stop trying to marry these two. They are not a good match. Marriage counseling, no matter how well-intended, will not help.<<

Assuming that the above is simply dialogic, I suppose it may suffice as an example of how the absolutist might sometimes misconstrue Gd’s very words.

[John317]

...sin did NOT enter into this world by one man--what Paul thought and taught were his own ideas and many were not correct. Clearly, Satan had already sinned and it was his evilness and through him that sin entered into this world.

Paul would not disagree with your statement that Satan had already sinned and that it was through Satan's work that sin entered into this world. But that does not in any way contradict what Paul says about sin entering into the human experience through Adam. If Adam had not disobeyed God by eating of the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, the Bible is clear that humans would not have fallen.

By allowing Satan to tempt Adam and Eve, God was not guaranteeing that the human race would fall into sin. Humans could only fall into sin by Adam's failure to pass the test of obedience.

But you are right that sin was already in the universe before Adam's existence. Paul is talking about the human race, not the universe as a whole.

[Guest]

Yeah Rich! bonehead.....

[Dr. Rich]

Look, you guys can believe anything you want and then make excuses for your belief. Paul wrote what he did--period! So don't apologize or try to weasel your way around it.

Do your own research PLEASE! You will see in the Old Testament that God said that Satan deceived EVERYONE on the earth! All of the Nations were toast! And if you actually want to believe that all man kind and all races came from Adam--that is entirely up to you. Science and the Septuagint will prove otherwise. But hey??? who the heck am I to attempt to teach anyone who refuses to want to know the truth???

So tell me, why would God put Adam in a protected garden and then create new animals and have him name them and then look around for a suitable mate for Adam and not find one??? What was God thinking? Perhaps a horse or dog would make a good mate? Come on man, there were NATIONS and other races outside the garden that God had created many years earlier in the 7 day creation! God needed a witness to bring the truth about who He was to these sinners. No wonder Satan had to get to them asap! Satan got the early believers (THE WAY) too, by the way of Saul/Paul. And then he got to the early KOH (SDA) by the way of the women found in Rev. 2:18.

So please believe what you want--it does not bother me one iota!

[Guest]

My what a huge chunk of baloney you have bitten off Rich. That's going to be hard to swallow. Tell me Rich, what is really bothering you? And why do I hear the music from the twilight zone playing in the background?

[John317]

Do your own research PLEASE! You will see in the Old Testament that God said that Satan deceived EVERYONE on the earth!

Yes, Satan and his evil angels have so far deceived every person who's ever been born, except for Christ. But the point here is that Satan never deceived any humans before he tempted Adam and Eve.

Quote:

All of the Nations were toast!

Sure, after Adam, they all were, but not before.

Quote:

And if you actually want to believe that all man kind and all races came from Adam--that is entirely up to you. Science and the Septuagint will prove otherwise.

As far as I know, science says all humans are related. What science do you refer to?

In any case, I prefer to put my trust in the Bible rather than in science. We need to learn to trust the Bible rather than our own senses, particularly when it comes to a knowledge of salvation history. If we put our trust in human reasoning and not in Scripture, we'll be sitting ducks for Satan's deceptions. This is one lesson we should learn from Eve's experience at the tree of knowledge. She threw God's word to the wind and trusted her own senses and her reasoning instead. It should be obvious to all that she made a big mistake.

Could you tell the verse or verses in the LXX which you believe teach plainly that some humans alive today did not originate from Adam?

Quote:

But hey??? who the heck am I to attempt to teach anyone who refuses to want to know the truth???

You're not alone. You've probably noticed quite a few people on the forum who seem to feel the same way.

Quote:

So tell me, why would God put Adam in a protected garden and then create new animals and have him name them and then look around for a suitable mate for Adam and not find one??? What was God thinking? Perhaps a horse or dog would make a good mate? Come on man, there were NATIONS and other races outside the garden that God had created many years earlier in the 7 day creation!

I believe your problem here is that you're interpreting the second chapter of Genesis as if the events were recorded in the order in which they occurred. Chaper One gives us the order in which God created the world, and chapter II is a retelling of the creation but it gives us us details that were lacking in the first chapter, and it is told from the viewpoint of the humans. So Chapter One is objectively told, whereas chapter II is narrated from a more subjective point of view.

You ask, what was God thinking? He wanted Adam to be aware of his need of a companion so that when he finally got her, he would appreciate her that much more. This is brought out in Genesis 2: 23. When God introduces the man to his woman, the man exclaims that here at last is one who exactly fulfills his desire.

[Dr. Rich]

John, I never said that there were humans living today that did not come from Adam's line. Clearly, Noah came from Adam's line and therefore so did everyone living today.

However the blood of those living prior to Adam are also in the blood line today because of the wives Noah's sons had with them. This blood line was separated into races at the time they were building the tower to heaven when God gave them there different languages.

If you had pure water in one cup and added pure water to it, you would always get pure water. Same goes for the blood line. If everyone came from Adam's blood, then there would NEVER be any race change.

If you take a perfect white male and a perfect white female and NONE of their blood line ever mixed with others, please tell me when and how you could ever have a black human in this group? My answer is that it would be impossible!

I have heard all kinds of theory about how the races got here, but all of them have to do with evolution in some respect. The Septuagint presents a creation where God made mankind (man and their kind) to fill the whole earth, just as God did with the reptiles and beasts. But don't take my word for it, do your own research.

[SivartM]

Uh, Adam and Eve were probably not white. They were probably medium-brownish, as far as genetic speculation goes.

[jasd]

>>So tell me, why would God put Adam in a protected garden...<<

Gen 2:4 These [are] the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,

Gen 2:5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and [there was] not a man to till the ground.

These two texts follow Gd’s declaration re the Seventh day wherein He rested. Verses 4 and 5 seems to indicate a summation rather than prologue to a recitation; moreover,

There is the clause advising us that [there was] no man... Following, Gd creates a man by breathing into his nostrils; whereas, we’ve already been informed that

mankind, male and female, had been spoken into existence. Hmmm. Two creations, two species?

I admit I’ve been puzzled...

>>...the way of the women found in Rev. 2:18.<<

The ‘woman’(?) in Rev 12:18? [sic]? Perhaps, you meant the woman in Revelation 12:1. If so, one must bear in mind when expositing the text – that she bore the signifiers of the COI, as set forth in the dream of Joseph.

>>So please believe what you want--it does not bother me one iota!<<

However, it might oughta stir you to rebuttal.

>>This blood line was separated into races at the time they were building the tower to heaven when God gave them there different languages.<<

I have problems with the idea that Genesis 10 was a pre-summation listing that, which should have followed the telling of the events of Genesis 11 – before the fact, as it were. I mean,

Genesis 10 informs us that all the nations were already “divided in the earth” before those who formed the band that “journeyed from the east” attempted to erect the ‘window to heaven’.

>>...then there would NEVER be any race change.<<

I read a number of years past – that, under certain circumstances, the kidneys excreted a chemical affecting dermal pigmentation. It was, at that time, suggested that sometime future the chemical would be synthesized and marketed as an ‘easy suntan’. Anyway, another theory suggests that isolation of small groups of people encouraged a form of inbreeding or genetic reinforcement of particular (or peculiar) characteristics.

And then there’s atavistic emergence of latent or suppressed genes.

[jasd]

Maybe, with a pronounced tendency towards red, as in Edom/Adam – Edom being red, of course.

White Supremists use the red factor to discriminate between the Biblical ‘line’ and what they refer to as ‘mud people’, or, as they say, “Confusion of faces.”

You might note that they get a bit confused, as they have great antipathy toward Edomites - who epitomize 'red'.

Oh well, some mother's children.

[karl]

Just for fun, here is a non-christian reporter's commentary on some evolution issues. He believes evolutionism is a religion.

URL to this plus index of many other articles is here: http://www.fredoneverything.net/FOE_Frame_Column.htm

Bacteria More Respectable

by Fred Reed

October 16, 2005

I read with what would be despair if I cared enough that the courts, this time in Pennsylvania, are again getting their knickers in a knot over Evolution. Oh help. There must be another planet somewhere upon which to hide. Oprah, Rush Limbaugh, singing commercials, delayed flights, and Evolution. Anyway:

Why, oh why, are the curricula of the schools the business of the courts? If Pennsylvania wants to mention Creationism, or to require three years of French for graduation, it seems mightily to me that these things are the business of parents in Pennslyvania. Yes, I know: In practice, both freedom of expression and local government are regarded as ideals greatly to be avoided. The desire to centralize government, impose doctrine, and punish doubt is never far below the surface, anywhere. Thus our highly controlled media, our “hate-speech” laws, our political correctness and, now, Evolutionary Prohibition. The Catholic Church once burned heretics. The Church of Evolution savages them in obscure journals and denies them tenure and publication. As a heretic I believe that I would prefer the latter, but the intolerance is the same.

I note that Compulsory Evolutionists are fellow travelers of the regnant cultural Marxism, though I don’t think that they are aware of it. They display the same hermetic materialism, the same desire to suppress dissent by the application of centralized governmental power, the same weird hostility to religion. They do not say, “I think Christianity is nonsense and will therefore ignore it,” but rather “These ideas shall not be permitted.” The justification often is pseudo-constitutional: “the separation of church and state.” Neither the phrase nor the idea is found in the Constitution. If, for example, it is unconstitutional to have a nativity scene on a town square, why did no one notice this, certainly to include the Founding Fathers, until at least 1950? One might point out, fruitlessly, that Creationism, communism, Christianity, and capitalism are all major intellectual currents and therefore ought to be explained to the young. Not likely. The free market of ideas applies only to one’s own ideas.

Now, what grave consequences are thought to await if children hear briefly in school an argument that they have heard a dozen times in the course of ordinary life? Will the foundations of civilization crack? The birds of the air plunge, appalled, to earth? The planets shudder in their orbits and fall inward in dismay? Surely everyone short of the anencephalic knows of Creationism.

Or is it thought that kids attracted to the sciences will abruptly change their course through life and enter the clergy? That applications to graduate school in biochemistry will cease? Children learn (or did) of the Greek gods and goddesses, and that ancient people believed that the earth rode on the back of a giant turtle. I have not heard that they now sacrifice oxen to Athena.

One plausible explanation for this rigid evolutionary monotheism, though I think an incorrect one, is a fear that the children might come to believe in Creationism. Unlikely, but again, so what? A belief in Creationism does not prevent one from working in the sciences. A goodly number of scientists, to include biochemists, are in fact Christian and, some of them, Creationists. Others presumably are Buddhists or Hindus. The only thing for which acceptance of Creationism renders one unsuitable is…Evolutionism.

A more likely explanation is a fear that children might realize that a great deal of Evolution, not having been established, must be accepted on faith, and that a fair amount of it doesn’t make a lot of sense. While Creationism is unlikely to convert children into snake-handlers, it does suggest that orthodox Evolution can be examined critically. Bad juju, that.

Now (and I hope this doesn’t bore those who have read me before on the matter), an entertaining way to study the politics is to ask the Evolutionists questions that a scientist would answer (since scientists are not ashamed not to know things), but that an ideologue can’t afford to. They are simple. (1) Has the chance occurrence of life been demonstrated in the laboratory? Yes or no. (2) Do we really know, as distinct from guess, hope, or imagine, of what the primeval seas consisted? Yes or no. (3) Do we know, as distinct from guess, pray, wave our arms, and hold our breath and turn blue, what seas would be needed for the chance formation of life? Yes or no. (4) Can we show mathematically, without crafted and unsupportable assumptions, that the formation of life would be probable in any soup whatever? Yes or no.

I once posed these questions in a column on Fredoneverything.net and, in another place, to a group of committed evangelicals of Evolution. A tremendous influx of email resulted. Much of it was predictable. Many Christians congratulated me on having disproved Evolution, which I had not done. The intelligent and independent-minded wrote thoughtfully. Of the Knights Templar of Evolution, none—not one—answered the foregoing yes-or-no questions. They ducked. They dodged. They waxed wroth. They called names.

This is the behavior not of scientists but of true believers. I have spent countless hours as a reporter talking to scientists, as distinct from zealots with a scientific background. Without exception that I can remember, they were rational, honest, and forthcoming. Yes, they were often trying to establish a pet theory. But they said, “I think this is so, and here’s the evidence, and I think it’s pretty solid, but I still need to show this or that, and no, we haven’t, but I hope we will.” If I expressed doubts, they either showed my clearly and civilly why I was wrong, or said, “Good point. Here’s what we think.” Parenthetically, my impression, based on a small sample, is that the more incensed of the Evolutionists tend to be either of the hard Right or the hard Left: those who need to believe one thing categorically seem to need to believe other things categorically. Which means that if they are wrong, they are unlikely to notice it.

And this is what disturbs me about them. I do not object to the content of Evolutionism. Some, all, or part of it may be correct. I would like to know. A more fascinating question does not readily come to mind. But dispassionate discussion with them is not possible, anymore than it is with Gloria Steinem or Herbert Marcuse or Cornell West, and for exactly the same reasons. They are the same people.

[karl]

Here's another Fred Reed column on evolution. Even if you don't agree with him it is a fairly enjoyable read. The URL for this article and an index of his articles which take shots at just about everything in our culture is here: http://www.fredoneverything.net/FOE_Frame_Column.htm

A Gas-Station View Of Evolution

by Fred Reed

I'm trying to believe in the theory of evolution. It's tough going. I have to squinch up my eyes and imagine real hard. But I'm determined to do it, because it's the Right Thing To Do, and keeps people from yelling at you.

Trouble is, I keep running into bumps and potholes.

For example, I worry about The Amoeba In The Soup. We're told that a jillion years ago all sorts of glop and gunch sloshed around in the primeval seas, and lo! a little amoeba-thingy accidentally assembled itself, the way a car does when you shake a bin of parts. It then evolved furiously into Bill Gates.

OK. Fine by me. I can believe that Bill has amoeboid ancestry. Except: How do we know that the amoeba happened? Other than by blind faith?

Be patient with me. Permit me a few rude questions about the Soup, such as might be asked by a garage mechanic. Maybe I'm being uncouth, but I don't know any better.

(1) Do we have any evidential reason for believing that the Soup ever existed? Do we, for example, have residual pools of the Soup? Dried deposits somewhere? No. Do we know enough about the formation of planets to know what the soup had to be? No. Then how do we know that the Soup, if any, was the right kind?

Ah. We know it, say evolutionists, because life appeared, which it couldn't have done without the Soup. Therefore the right Soup must have existed.

Good try. But this is reasoning from a previously accepted theory to nonexistent evidence, or, more bluntly, imagining evidence to support a theory that we are determined to believe. Scientifically, this is bad juju. One derives theories from evidence, not evidence from theories. (If memory serves, it is also precisely the Catholic proof of the existence of God: The world is here, something must have created it, therefore God. Or the Soup. Personally, I incline to a primal Salad.)

(2) Well, if we don't know that a workable Soup existed, then surely the formation of life has been demonstrated in the lab? No. You can put various forms of goop and degradation in a flask, and heat it, and run sparks through it. You get chemicals found in living things. You don't get life.

(3) OK. No doubt you can show mathematically that, given time, the amoeba (or Gates) would be likely to form? No, actually. Statistical chemistry isn't that good.

Evolutionists love time. It covers up fundamental implausibilities. All those gazillions of atoms and molecules, sloshing for billions of years. Surely an amoeba would have to clot out of it, if not a bull elephant. Billions of years, mind you. Virtually anything would have to form in so much time. No?

Not necessarily. Probabilities can be more daunting than one might expect. Things that seem intuitively likely sometimes just flat aren't. To illustrate the point:

We've all heard Sir James Jeans' assertion that a monkey, typing randomly, would eventually produce all the books in the British Museum. Sound reasonable? Sure, at first glance. But would the monkey in fact ever get even one book?

No. Not in any practical sense.

Consider a thickish book of, say, 200,000 words. By the newspaper estimate that there are on average five letters per word, that's a million letters. What's the likelihood that our monkey, typing randomly (ignoring upper case and punctuation) will get the book in a given string of a million letters?

He has a 1/26 chance of getting the first letter, times a 1/26 chance of the second, and so on. The chance of getting the book in a million characters is one in 26 to the millionth power. I don't have a calculator handy, but we can get an approximation. Since 26 = 10 exp(log 26), then 26 exp(1,000,000) = 10 exp(log 26 x 1,000,000) . Since log 10 = 1 and log 100 = 2, log 26 has to be between, somewhere on the low end. Call it 1.2.

The monkey thus has one chance in 12 followed by 1,000,000 zeros. (OK, 999,999 for the picky.) That's what mathematicians call a BLG (Brutishly Large Number). For practical purposes, one divided by that rascal is zero. If you had a billion billion monkeys (more monkeys than I want) typing a billion billion letters a second, for a billion billion times the estimated age of the universe (10 exp 18 seconds is commonly given), the chance of getting the book would still be essentially zero.

Now, does the problem of accidentally getting an amoeba involve similar improbabilities? We don't know. A conclusion: Appealing to billions of years of sloshing is not a substitute for knowing what you're talking about.

To sum up all of the foregoing: We don't know that a suitable soup existed. We can't reproduce the evolution of life in the lab, from any Soup. And we can't show it to be mathematically plausible.

Might this not be grounds for withholding judgement?

Naw.

Another point--tricky, crucial, and carefully overlooked--is that we don't really know what life is. Evolutionists assume that life is purely chemical: that if we could somehow assemble an artificial cat atom by atom, and then set it to reacting, we would have a genuine, living cat, that would eat mice and miss its litter box. But would we? All known life has come from previous life. Is life merely a complex of chemical reactions? Or is it something that inhabits certain complexes of reactions? Or something else entirely?

We don't know. But we have ample room to suspect that it is something else entirely. Or at least that more is involved than chemistry.

Such as consciousness. If anything exists at all, consciousness does. We are all conscious, with the possible exception of network anchormen. Consciousness affects matter: If you will your arm to move, it does. Matter also affects consciousness: If you drop an anvil on your foot, it will decidedly affect your consciousness.

But, though it clearly is an important aspect of life, and clearly influences the physical world, consciousness has no scientific existence, being instrumentally undetectable and having no operational definition. So scientists ignore it.

Ignoring things seems to me a funny way to understand them, but then I always did like my lunch box better than my book bag, and maybe I just don't think right. But I'm still working on believing in evolution. I'll get there. Any day now.

[Guest]

Here's another Fred Reed column on evolution. Even if you don't agree with him it is a fairly enjoyable read. The URL for this article and an index of his articles which take shots at just about everything in our culture is here: http://www.fredoneverything.net/FOE_Frame_Column.htm

A Gas-Station View Of Evolution

by Fred Reed

I'm trying to believe in the theory of evolution. It's tough going. I have to squinch up my eyes and imagine real hard. But I'm determined to do it, because it's the Right Thing To Do, and keeps people from yelling at you.

Trouble is, I keep running into bumps and potholes.

For example, I worry about The Amoeba In The Soup. We're told that a jillion years ago all sorts of glop and gunch sloshed around in the primeval seas, and lo! a little amoeba-thingy accidentally assembled itself, the way a car does when you shake a bin of parts. It then evolved furiously into Bill Gates.

OK. Fine by me. I can believe that Bill has amoeboid ancestry. Except: How do we know that the amoeba happened? Other than by blind faith?

Be patient with me. Permit me a few rude questions about the Soup, such as might be asked by a garage mechanic. Maybe I'm being uncouth, but I don't know any better.

(1) Do we have any evidential reason for believing that the Soup ever existed? Do we, for example, have residual pools of the Soup? Dried deposits somewhere? No. Do we know enough about the formation of planets to know what the soup had to be? No. Then how do we know that the Soup, if any, was the right kind?

Ah. We know it, say evolutionists, because life appeared, which it couldn't have done without the Soup. Therefore the right Soup must have existed.

Good try. But this is reasoning from a previously accepted theory to nonexistent evidence, or, more bluntly, imagining evidence to support a theory that we are determined to believe. Scientifically, this is bad juju. One derives theories from evidence, not evidence from theories. (If memory serves, it is also precisely the Catholic proof of the existence of God: The world is here, something must have created it, therefore God. Or the Soup. Personally, I incline to a primal Salad.)

(2) Well, if we don't know that a workable Soup existed, then surely the formation of life has been demonstrated in the lab? No. You can put various forms of goop and degradation in a flask, and heat it, and run sparks through it. You get chemicals found in living things. You don't get life.

(3) OK. No doubt you can show mathematically that, given time, the amoeba (or Gates) would be likely to form? No, actually. Statistical chemistry isn't that good.

Evolutionists love time. It covers up fundamental implausibilities. All those gazillions of atoms and molecules, sloshing for billions of years. Surely an amoeba would have to clot out of it, if not a bull elephant. Billions of years, mind you. Virtually anything would have to form in so much time. No?

Not necessarily. Probabilities can be more daunting than one might expect. Things that seem intuitively likely sometimes just flat aren't. To illustrate the point:

We've all heard Sir James Jeans' assertion that a monkey, typing randomly, would eventually produce all the books in the British Museum. Sound reasonable? Sure, at first glance. But would the monkey in fact ever get even one book?

No. Not in any practical sense.

Consider a thickish book of, say, 200,000 words. By the newspaper estimate that there are on average five letters per word, that's a million letters. What's the likelihood that our monkey, typing randomly (ignoring upper case and punctuation) will get the book in a given string of a million letters?

He has a 1/26 chance of getting the first letter, times a 1/26 chance of the second, and so on. The chance of getting the book in a million characters is one in 26 to the millionth power. I don't have a calculator handy, but we can get an approximation. Since 26 = 10 exp(log 26), then 26 exp(1,000,000) = 10 exp(log 26 x 1,000,000) . Since log 10 = 1 and log 100 = 2, log 26 has to be between, somewhere on the low end. Call it 1.2.

The monkey thus has one chance in 12 followed by 1,000,000 zeros. (OK, 999,999 for the picky.) That's what mathematicians call a BLG (Brutishly Large Number). For practical purposes, one divided by that rascal is zero. If you had a billion billion monkeys (more monkeys than I want) typing a billion billion letters a second, for a billion billion times the estimated age of the universe (10 exp 18 seconds is commonly given), the chance of getting the book would still be essentially zero.

Now, does the problem of accidentally getting an amoeba involve similar improbabilities? We don't know. A conclusion: Appealing to billions of years of sloshing is not a substitute for knowing what you're talking about.

To sum up all of the foregoing: We don't know that a suitable soup existed. We can't reproduce the evolution of life in the lab, from any Soup. And we can't show it to be mathematically plausible.

Might this not be grounds for withholding judgement?

Naw.

Another point--tricky, crucial, and carefully overlooked--is that we don't really know what life is. Evolutionists assume that life is purely chemical: that if we could somehow assemble an artificial cat atom by atom, and then set it to reacting, we would have a genuine, living cat, that would eat mice and miss its litter box. But would we? All known life has come from previous life. Is life merely a complex of chemical reactions? Or is it something that inhabits certain complexes of reactions? Or something else entirely?

We don't know. But we have ample room to suspect that it is something else entirely. Or at least that more is involved than chemistry.

Such as consciousness. If anything exists at all, consciousness does. We are all conscious, with the possible exception of network anchormen. Consciousness affects matter: If you will your arm to move, it does. Matter also affects consciousness: If you drop an anvil on your foot, it will decidedly affect your consciousness.

But, though it clearly is an important aspect of life, and clearly influences the physical world, consciousness has no scientific existence, being instrumentally undetectable and having no operational definition. So scientists ignore it.

Ignoring things seems to me a funny way to understand them, but then I always did like my lunch box better than my book bag, and maybe I just don't think right. But I'm still working on believing in evolution. I'll get there. Any day now.

This is good karl.

[Dr. Rich]

I was not suggesting that Adam and Eve were white at all when I wrote about a perfect white male and female and their offspring. It is clear that Adam and Eve had the exact blood line because both came from one.

And yes, Gen. 10 gives proof that the nations and races existed way before the time of the tower.

I am sure that Moses did not put in a chapter break in the book of Gen. So when you read the Septuagint you will see that things were done in an orderly fashion. But the account of "THE MAN" in the Garden reflects a change in things. Please look at your bible and you will also see a change of the name of the entity that did the creation between the two chapters. There is "God" in the first chapter and then there is "The Lord God" in the second chapter. Why?

Why did God put a mark on Cain IF no one else existed other than the family of Adam?

Why would God form a Garden with different animals in it if He had told 'THE MAN' to fill the whole earth and to rule over all of the beasts and fish in the world? How could 'THE MAN' do this while stuck in the Garden? What 'sister' of Cain's would 'marry' him knowing he killed her brother?

Why did 'The Lord God' make 'The Man' pass a test?

Oh, and the woman found in Revelation 2:18- means the one found in the verses after 18--the one God called 'Jezebel'.

Again, I invite you to check out what is written in the Septuagint. I found it very interesting and cleared up many questions.

[John317]

I invite you to check out what is written in the Septuagint. I found it very interesting and cleared up many questions.

Could you give the verses in the LXX that you're referring to? You might just cite them and then briefly describe what you believe they signify. I'm aware of some of the differences but I want to be sure I understand how you arrive at your conclusions.

[karl]

And yes, Gen. 10 gives proof that the nations and races existed way before the time of the tower.

[BobRyan]

Still enjoying "Fred's" article posted by Karl.

Quote:

Another point--tricky, crucial, and carefully overlooked--is that we don't really know what life is. Evolutionists assume that life is purely chemical: that if we could somehow assemble an artificial cat atom by atom, and then set it to reacting, we would have a genuine, living cat, that would eat mice and miss its litter box. But would we? All known life has come from previous life. Is life merely a complex of chemical reactions? Or is it something that inhabits certain complexes of reactions? Or something else entirely?

We don't know. But we have ample room to suspect that it is something else entirely. Or at least that more is involved than chemistry.

Such as consciousness. If anything exists at all, consciousness does. We are all conscious, with the possible exception of network anchormen. Consciousness affects matter: If you will your arm to move, it does. Matter also affects consciousness: If you drop an anvil on your foot, it will decidedly affect your consciousness.

Getting back to that "chemical" problem. When you kill a chicken egg with just the right amount of radiation - what "chemical" is missing in the egg? What chemical can be added to make the egg "alive again"?

in Christ,

Bob