Deshong, you're really not going to be planting any seeds by telling people that they should be treated as second-class citizens. Or by talking about misinterpretations of Revelation. You do realize that Revelation was a series of letters written in code, sent to seven churches to warn them about the Romans, right? Not prophecy.

People should not be treated any different or less than how I would want to be treated. Whether they believe or not, they are people too. This includes the opposite side being judgmental to those who do not agree with their way of thinking or beliefs and thus label others as they see fit, even when they personally know absolutely nothing about them. The irony to blame others that spew "hate" usually are the very ones who display hate and/or no tolerance or just plain ignorance. Just because we don't see eye to eye, so be it, move on. Trying to insult others with pointless words and/or defame their character is of no use.

43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, 'Thou shalt love thy neighbor,' and 'hate thine enemy.'
44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; Matthew 5:43-44

Even though I have my beliefs, it didn't interfere with being friends with a gay man. He was the one who pursued a friendship with me and I am glad I met him. We had much fun and laughter regardless of our differences. We both respected each other and that's that.

Revelation = apŏkalupsis (602) = disclosure: -- appearing, coming, lighten, manifestation, be revealed, revelation. (From 601: apŏkaluptō = to take off the cover, i.e. disclose: -- reveal. )

Revelation 1:1-3

1 The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to shew unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John,

2 Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.

3 Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.

One who does not understand the beginning, cannot understand the end.

11 Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea. -Revelation 1:11

15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.
16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?
17 Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.
18 A good tree can not bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.
19 Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.
20 Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them. - Matthew 7:15-20

Those with the seal of God in their forehead know the truth and cannot be deceived.

To anyone who cares: It is so important to wake up now before it is too late. Repent for your sins and study God's Word with understanding so you will not be deceived by the anti-christ and his followers. Do not fall short of the knowledge God gives to all with an open mind, heart and soul. Read the letter with understanding He has given to you. God loves you and wants your love and obedience. God is life. Satan is death. Do not be delivered into the hands of the enemy.

But this isn't the place for a religious discussion. And this is also not the place to tell people that they should be treated poorly because your religious beliefs say so. Actually, there is not any place for that. Don't do it.

Well now it is in the right place for discussion...I think -_-

16 Having a good conscience; that, whereas they speak evil of you, as of evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ. -I Peter 3:16


Back onto the marriage thing, looks like only a few states are holding out now. Even Texas is issuing marriage licenses, though you have to find a clerk who's willing, because the AG is an idiot.

Back in the 80's, when states were refusing to raise the drinking age to 21, the federal government withheld funding for highways until everyone acquiesced. Think that's going to be necessary this time?

I think all the world governments are corrupt and will bring forth the one world system in which the anti-christ will come into. It's no secret that the biggest players are the ones in power to change things and/or influence the masses while at the same time desensitizing as many as possible.

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To further my feelings on religion and *some* believers' inability to accept questions or the views of others regarding their 'facts', let me tell you a story.

I was refused entry into the Catholic church by a priest at the time of my Confirmation because I asked the wrong questions during the religious studies classes. A mortal man (a so called instrument of God) denied me God.

15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.
16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?
17 Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.
18 A good tree can not bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.
19 Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.
20 Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them. - Matthew 7:15-20

Not all people who claim to be of God is actually of God. In fact this is true for some Christians. Some parade as a child of God but they are not and you will know this by their actions. For example:

13 If a man also lie with mankind, as of lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. -Leviticus 20:13

Obama supports homosexuality, therefore in order to discern according to God, he is not of God. Because if God says it is an abomination, then any true Christian will not support it. For we fear God. We make sure our names will be in the Book of Life.

29 But if from thence thou shalt seek the LORD thy God, thou shalt find Him, if thou seek Him with all thy heart and with all thy soul. -Deuteronomy 4:29


I was raised an Irish Catholic and as such I was party to many horror stories about my grandparents lives under the yoke of Catholicism in an Ireland that was as poor as a church mouse for Catholics. My grandmother had 14 children because under Catholic 'law' artificial contraception was at the time frowned upon - in fact you could not buy or even see condoms in stores. Artificial contraception was a sin. This was quoted as a fact. End of story. Furthermore, Catholic wives are not allowed to refuse their husbands conjugal advances. This is also a sin and a 'fact'. Take it or leave it. All sins have to be confessed to the priest - to leave sins unconfessed was a sin. Yet another 'fact'. A catch 22 type situation if ever there was one.

People should always question everything and anything to come to an understanding of whether it is true or false. For me personally I've come to know everything that God says is for our own good, as He is our Creator and would know what is best for us. I don't listen to man's traditions. I listen to Yᵉhôvâh.

Anyway .... During religious studies class I asked the priest what a woman was supposed to do about further babies if she and her husband were already too poor to feed the ones they had ... As was the case with my grandparents. They were so poor they slept on straw on the floor and their children went to school in the snow with bare feet. For this question I was told to leave the class and I was refused admission into the Catholic church on the basis of questioning 'facts'. The priest in question had a far more colourful explanation for refusing me God when my parents asked him why ... He said I was a sinner beyond saving for asking such a question and I didn't deserve God or 'salvation'. I was ten years old. So yes ... If I am dammed because I don't believe and if I am dammed because of my alternative lifestyle - all I can say is ... God started it.

16 For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved. -John 3:16-17

I'm confused when you say God started it. God created us all and we were all happy. But Lucifer allowed pride to overtake his mind, heart and soul and thus wanted to take the Mercy Seat for himself that he guarded and wanted to be like God. Because of this, this started a rebellion which Lucifer took one-third of God's children that sided with him. That is how the battle between good vs. evil started in the first heaven and earth age. God didn't want to kill the one-third, so instead He ended the first heaven and earth age and now we are here on earth for a purpose and a reason. This is all a test to see who will we side with. Since God erased all our memories when we are born here, we are all innocent coming into the world. We have no recollection of the first heaven and earth age, but we know about this because God tells us in the Bible. Whether people read it with understanding or not at all is up to them.

That's the whole point of free-will. Though there is an exception. Those who sided with God against Lucifer in the first heaven and earth age have no free-will. By this I mean, God remembers them and protects them from making and continuing dire mistakes. This is the only time He will directly intervene in someone's life (besides the events where God furthers His plan) since they have already proven to be with God. This happened to my mother when she was visited by an angel to tell her to stop using the Ouija board. This also happened to me around the time my mother was using the Ouija board and got curious of something I shouldn't have come in contact with and was protected from that evil. I was four and this was before I started going to church or knew much if not anything at all about God. Biblically, for anyone who is interested, read The Acts and take notice of Saul. Actually God intervened in quite a lot of lives directly in biblical times but these were people God knew He could count on, so I'm sure they also sided with God during the rebellion.

12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
13 For thou hast said in thine heart, 'I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of GOD: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:
14 I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the MOST HIGH.'
15 Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit. -Isaiah 14:12-15

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I feel a serious need to, as a Catholic (one of, I think, three theists on this thread) apologize for Deshong and Sims2Christian's bigotry.

You have no right to speak on my behalf. Speak for yourself! I do not apologize for God's truth. You don't have to believe, that is your free-will. But I am going to live my life as best I can according to God's way. Live your life however you want, you are you and I am me.

Rest assured that not all theists accept Church teachings without question. I'm personally pro-contraceptive, pro-gay/lesbian marriage, and pro-divorce (when necessary).

How you assume I don't question what I've been taught or that I believe everything that I learned from church. This is why I've been on my own journey to seek the truth and come to my own conclusions about what I believe. You don't know me nor my life experiences except which I tell but even that is limited, so don't act like you know me. The only person who knows my mind, heart and soul is God. And He knows everything I've been through as He always watches over me.

1 Judge not, that ye be not judged.
2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. Matthew 7:1-2

Yes. The devil CAN be manipulative. He's clearly manipulated many people into random needless prejudice and I, for one, don't like it.

The dragon is very clever. Not an enemy to underestimate.


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Ah, basing your laws on some so-called supreme being whose existence is never proven (even with humans being able to travel and look in space) and assumptions based on personal interpretations of ancient documents, written many years after the life of this prophet. I simply can not understand such things in the year of 2015 with all modern science and technology available. Than I prefer laws based on humans, well-founded by humans, the facts of life and science.

29 Jesus saith unto him, "Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." John 20:29

I don't have to see the wind to know it exists, I can feel it as well as see the effects of it all around me. Science and technology is Satan's plagiarism of God's work. There is nothing new under the sun.

9 The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.
10 Is there any thing whereof it may be said, 'See, this is new?' it hath been already of old time, which was before us. -Ecclesiastes 1:9-10

18 He that believeth on Him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. -John 3:18-21

When you say that giving people basic humans rights is a bad thing, you are saying that they should be treated badly and not like full humans. Don't complain that I pointed out what you said.

Okay, I doubt you're going to listen to anything that's not the bible, so let's go over that, shall we?

1:1 The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to shew unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass; and he sent and signified it by his angel unto his servant John:
1:3 Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.
Revelation 3:11, 22:7, 22:12: Behold, I come quickly.
22:20: Surely I come quickly.

Right. So according to these verses, the end of the world should have happened quickly. I mean, the time was at hand 2,000 years ago. But maybe "short" can mean thousands of years to an immortal being.

Oh, wait. There's more:

Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom. Matthew 16:28
But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God. Luke 9:27
Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things [tribulation, sign of Jesus, sun and moon darken, stars fall from the sky] be fulfilled. Matthew 24:34
Verily I say unto you, That there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death, till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power. Mark 9:1
Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, till all these things [tribulation, sun and moon darken, stars fall from the sky, Jesus comes]be done. Mark 13:30
Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all [woe to pregnant ladies, signs in the sun, moon, and stars, Jesus comes]be fulfilled. Luke 21:32
For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Hebrews 9:26 Note the verb tense. At that time, he had already come.

Okay, so what happened there? Jesus pretty clearly describes some of the same signs as in Revelation, but no dice. The stars still look like they're in the sky, and the world doesn't seem to have ended. Was Jesus lying or mistaken about the end of days? Did your god drop the ball? Are there 2,000 year old men running around? I expect they'd be rather wrinkly by now.

Oh, but the antichrist was around in biblical times. In fact, there were many of them.

1 John 2:18 Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.
But what does "antichrist" actually mean?
1 John 2:22 Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son.
1 John 4:3 And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.

I AM THE ANTICHRIST! The bible says so.
And those are the only verses that use the word "antichrist". It doesn't appear at all in Revelation.



“Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he shall commend you. For he is God’s servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is god’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. There fore it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience.

This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes, if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.”

Romans 13: 1-7

So... your god deliberately set up corrupt governments? Because according to that, he's the one who set up every single government and gave them power. It's not possible for someone to have governmental power otherwise. That's what it says.



Actually, no. Not sure if this will show up...
יג וְאִישׁ, אֲשֶׁר יִשְׁכַּב אֶת-זָכָר מִשְׁכְּבֵי אִשָּׁה--תּוֹעֵבָה עָשׂוּ, שְׁנֵיהֶם; מוֹת יוּמָתוּ, דְּמֵיהֶם בָּם.
Assuming that shows up properly, that is what was originally written. It doesn't say that.
"And a man who will lie down with a male in beds of a woman, both of them have made a ritual impurity; dying they will die. Their blood is upon them."
That is what it says. It does not mean that two men having sex is wrong. It means they can't be in a woman's bed when they do it. Again, this is because the ancient Hebrews were obsessed with keeping things separate. Men were not allowed to do anything in a woman's bed except have sex. Even sleeping in your wife's bed was wrong.
A lot of that section is mistranslated. See, the Hebrews had a lot of weird laws that the people who do the translations didn't believe, so they went to the nearest interpretation.

Or are you saying that the Word of God is wrong? If you're holding a mistranslation above the real Word, then isn't that idolatry?

Oh, and here's a passage you might find interesting:
18:1 And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul.
18:2 And Saul took him that day, and would let him go no more home to his father's house.
18:3 Then Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him as his own soul.
18:4 And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to his bow, and to his girdle.

20:41 And they kissed one another, and wept one with another, until David [gadal].
Gadal means "became large". He got a boner. This word is also used in the Song of Solomon, by the way.




So... your god did not want to kill rebelling angels, so he decided to put humans on earth, knowing that the vast majority of them would be tortured for eternity?!

What the hell?! Your god is a sadist! And you worship that thing?!

Let's look at the past 2,000 years. For a few hundred years, Christianity was only found in one tiny corner of the world. Everyone who lived too far to heard of that corner during that time? Tortured forever. After that, Christianity was only as big as the Roman Empire. Everyone else? Tortured forever. Christianity, for the longest time, was only found in Europe and the Middle East. Everyone else? Tortured forever.

You are telling me that your god put people on the planet during that time, knowing that they would never hear of Jesus or the bible or whatever. He put them down, and they could not in any way know what he was. They were all condemned to eternal torture because he put them there, knowing they would be tortured forever because they never had a choice to choose him. They were too far away to hear the earthly word.

Why should I worship a being that deliberately condemns people to eternal torture because they were given an impossible test to pass?





You do realize that those things are completely harmless, right? They don't do anything. Ouija boards work when you put your hands on the pointer. When your hands shake, the pointer moves. When it starts moving, you think something else is doing it because you aren't aware of the tiny hand movements. When it seems to go in one direction, your brain takes note and thinks of what it could be headed toward. As it's doing that, it unconsciously makes the pointer move in that direction. That's it.

Well, that or the other person with their hand on the pointer is moving it to screw with you. Those things are entirely useless.



Behold, I will do a new thing. Isaiah 43:19

For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth. Isaiah 65:17

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 2 Corinthians 5:17

Hey, wasn't the sun created before the animals?

1:16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
1:17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
1:18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
1:19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
1:20 And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

Well, that's confusing. God created the whales and all other animals after the sun, so the animals were new under the sun. So were humans.

But that's not the point. If science and technology are the devil's work, then what the heck are you doing on a computer? Computers are technology.
Not to mention that science is integral to how our brains function. Science is when a human (or other being) uses an experiment to gain knowledge. If you decide to use fertilizer in one section of the garden to see if it'll make your garden grow better, that's science. If someone tests if a rock is magnetic by holding a magnet next to it, that's science.
You can see babies performing science when they learn to walk! They test out different forms of steps and different ways of holding their body until they figure it out! Are you telling me that babies are influenced by the devil when they learn to walk?



Science is the process of questioning everything and learning what it has to say!

How can you question the world if you think that questioning the world is wrong?


Quoting verses at people isn't going to get them to convert. Bible verses are only convincing if you believe that the bible is holy. Prove that the bible is holy. And no, quoting a verse that says it's holy won't work. If I don't believe it's holy, I'm not going to believe it just because it says it is.

*nods*

Pretty much every time I try to read bible verses and people's interpretation of them, my brain turns it all to white noise. I've taken it as a sign that I shouldn't bother with them, other than maybe as a historical curiosity.

This god of the bible is a funny thing, creating humans with free will and then demanding they follow all these rules, raiging from sensible to utterly stupid. If they follow, they get sky cake, and if they don't they get eternal flames. And then there's some nonsense about him loving the people he made, but only if they do these good things. And let's not forget he created man in his image - doesn't matter if you're straight, gay, white, black, always nice, or the biggest jerk imaginable - there's got to be a little of all that in this god; and if you create something, well then don't be mad at your creation for turning out differently than you expected. Somewhere in it all you're supposed to turn the other cheek and be nice - but the god needs not to bother, as he can punish people in any way he sees fit, ranging from world-wide floods to killing off kids and other innocent people who didn't do anything bad, presumably as a "test".

I wouldn't have followed such a person if they were a regular human being, and I certainly wouldn't have prayed to them or worshipped them.

I think it's much more sensible to follow two simple rules: Take good care of yourself, and be nice to people, animals, and the rest of the world around you. That should cover the basics. For the rest, most people have a brain that should be capable of logic thoughts.

6Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you. -Matthew 7:6

Case in point. However for those who want to learn God's truth, seek God with all thy heart and soul and He will lead you to it. Tender Loving & Care.

Anyone is more than welcome to continue to discuss their beliefs if they so wish to.

What, that's it? Aren't you going to kill me and burn down the city I live in?

Anyone arrogant enough to reject the verdict of the judge or of the priest who represents the LORD your God must be put to death.
Deuteronomy 17:12

Suppose you hear in one of the towns the LORD your God is giving you that some worthless rabble among you have led their fellow citizens astray by encouraging them to worship foreign gods. In such cases, you must examine the facts carefully. If you find it is true and can prove that such a detestable act has occurred among you, you must attack that town and completely destroy all its inhabitants, as well as all the livestock. Then you must pile all the plunder in the middle of the street and burn it. Put the entire town to the torch as a burnt offering to the LORD your God. That town must remain a ruin forever; it may never be rebuilt. Keep none of the plunder that has been set apart for destruction. Then the LORD will turn from his fierce anger and be merciful to you. He will have compassion on you and make you a great nation, just as he solemnly promised your ancestors. "The LORD your God will be merciful only if you obey him and keep all the commands I am giving you today, doing what is pleasing to him." Deuteronomy 13:13-19

If your own full brother, or your son or daughter, or your beloved wife, or your intimate friend, entices you secretly to serve other gods, whom you and your fathers have not known, gods of any other nations, near at hand or far away, from one end of the earth to the other: do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him, but kill him. Your hand shall be the first raised to slay him; the rest of the people shall join in with you. You shall stone him to death, because he sought to lead you astray from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery. And all Israel, hearing of this, shall fear and never do such evil as this in your midst.
Deuteronomy 13:7-12

Suppose a man or woman among you, in one of your towns that the LORD your God is giving you, has done evil in the sight of the LORD your God and has violated the covenant by serving other gods or by worshiping the sun, the moon, or any of the forces of heaven, which I have strictly forbidden. When you hear about it, investigate the matter thoroughly. If it is true that this detestable thing has been done in Israel, then that man or woman must be taken to the gates of the town and stoned to death. Deuteronomy 17:2-5

Cursed be he who does the Lords work remissly, cursed he who holds back his sword from blood. Jeremiah 48:10

And you expressly stated that you expect modern Christians to follow Leviticus, so don't give me the "that was the OLD Testament" speech. Or the "let he who is without sin" thing. I mean, Jesus died for your sins and you believe that you can repent of them by worshiping him. Therefore, you are without sin. Stone me.

Here, have the first stone.

I've always been of the opinion that when people answer with bible verses for every single thing they write on the web (or elsewhere), they can't coherently string two sentences together to create an opinion of their own, or at least not one that isn't already in the bible (or other holy book of choice).

Anyone can quote a book, but plenty of people do it without even having a clue what they're actually quoting. These people often have an annoying knack of sounding like a parrot repeating phrases without understanding the meaning behind their words.

However, if they can manage to strip down the bible verse and form it in their own words, in something resembling language from this century - then I might actually bother to read what they're saying, instead of trying to decipher all the white noise.

I'm a lot more impressed when people actually have a coherent and well-formed opinion on things that doesn't require them to quote or use bible verses in any way. It's so much more interesting to read. A person able to use sound logic and to think for themselves often see the world with different eyes than someone who sees through a thick fog of religious beliefs.

Of course, not all religious people are so immersed in their holy book of choice that they couldn't see the truth if it slapped them in the face, but even those with vague beliefs (like believing in heaven and hell, or thinking there's some being 'up there' doing whatever it's doing, but not actually taking anything in the bible literally) often have a limit in their way of thought. If you think there is a life after this, you may not quite appreciate the life you have here and now. And that's the only life you know you have.

Deshong, do you have your own summary or is it only spamming around texts from the bible I can read for myself, if I want to?

If someone doesn't believe in the existence of something use something they do know to show them your reasons for believing.

I don't believe in Evolution.
We have the same facts, the same repeatable science, but I cannot see any viable evidence for evolution.
A mule for instance.
The cross between a male horse and a female donkey.

I interpret that event of repeatable hybridization as the Horse and Donkey belonging to the same Biblical kind because of their ability to breed with one another, even if the offspring aren't fertile.

An Evolutionist would see Hybridization in a similar way but instead of the word kind it would be species or family according to the observational genetic and phenotypic features.

The conclusion is that they have a common ancestor. This is a fact based on the physical evidence, that correctly show speciation has happened.

At the point of where did the original creature come from is where opinions divide. I believe that it was from the Ark when the whole world was flooded and that the creature had more genetic information, losing it over time due to the curse, the genetic population and the environment that it is in, thus speciating into Horses and Donkeys.

An Evolutionist could believe that it was formed from the dog like Eohippus, which would have less information to evolve into the Horse we see today. thus it is still 'evolving via speciation' into the Horse and donkey species, due to genetic isolation and geographical isolation between the two groups.

The thing is that while both the speciation explanations are the same operationally (via speciation), they are not coming from the same belief backgrounds and so it is hard to even use the physical evidence to change someone's beliefs. As Abraham said in Christ parable of Lazurus and the rich man "If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, if one rise from the dead." Not even the physical evidence is enough.

Speciation is the loss of genetic information, It cuts the genetics of the original specie.

Heading from the population bottleneck at the Flood, and the new vastly different world full of niches to be occupied, plants and creatures would have florished. Many would have been seperated similar to when a bee colony becomes too large for the survival of the group, along with genetic and geographical separation. Occupying colder niches would have killed off those who didn't have the genetics able to cope with such temperatures, they were selected againest where as the others would have survived. In a few generations, new species would have emerged, having less genetics than the ones before.

This above is my historical understanding of the science since the flood till now. It is based on what I know and believe, it is testable through the Bible and many ancient documents but not by operational science and is such historical science. It involves a lot of unrepeatable events, namely the Noahic Flood.

An evolutionary understanding requires that creatures gain many mutations to convert from one primitive creature to one more advanced, that through the food and chemicals it engests it's offspring will become more advanced than it (hundreds of generations down the line) and be genetically superior in the 'arms race' of life. Speciation will still occur of course but won't be overall beneficial for the creature's evolution as it does the opposite of what evolution requires.

This is also historical science. It is untestable by operational science, unrepeatable, but is testable via textbooks and science journals that refer to it.

We all have the same operational science but it is our interpretations of the history behind the facts that gives us our views as to the origins and may be an influence as to whether God does or does not exist.

Um, you're not showing your reasons for believing. You're showing that you don't understand evolution.

First, there is no such thing as an "evolutionist" in science. There are biologists, who study living creatures. There are geologists, who have measured the age of the earth. There are astrophysicists, which have measured the age of the universe.

Second, you're right that horses and donkeys have a common ancestor. However, "speciation"? No. I have no idea what you mean by "genetic information". Genetic information is DNA. The amount of DNA you have does not determine anything. Humans have 46 chromosomes. Other apes have 48 (due to chromosomal merging in human ancestors - scientists have tracked parts of each ). An Australian daisy has two chromosomes while a field horsetail has 216.
Slime mold at 12 chromosomes sits between the swamp wallaby with 10/11 chromosomes (11 for the male, 10 for the female - does that mean one is genetically more advanced than the other?) and the Tasmanian devil at 14.
There is also a genetic disorder where creatures can be born with more chromosomes than the average member of their species. They die because their body malfunctions.

The amount of DNA a creature has is not in any way correlated to how "advanced" the creature is.

"I believe that it was from the Ark when the whole world was flooded and that the creature had more genetic information, losing it over time due to the curse, the genetic population and the environment that it is in, thus speciating into Horses and Donkeys."
"Speciation is the loss of genetic information, It cuts the genetics of the original specie."

Horses and donkeys have 99.9% similar DNA. They have the exact same amount of genetic information. Nothing was "lost".

Third, mules actually can have babies. Male mules are infertile. Female mules can have babies, though their fertility is shakier than a mare's or a jenny's.




Historical science does not exist. What you refer to as operational science is the only science. And you can test your claim by using science.

Your claim is that at some unspecified point in history, a flood covered the entire planet. To survive it, the ancestors of all animals traveled to one point on the planet and everything else died.

There are several ways to prove that claim.

First, mitochondrial tracking. If you're correct, then all animals of a "kind" are descended from the female animal on the ark. Mitochondrial testing means that we can pinpoint the era that the last common ancestor of each kind lived. If you're correct, then we should be able to track all animals to the exact same point in time.

Second, fossils. According to you, all animals had to be on the ark to survive the flood. That means that samples of every living creature - including ones found on other continents like platypi and new world monkeys - were, at some point in time, in an unspecified point in the Middle East. Because the platypus is a pretty unique mammal - it's one of two mammals that lay eggs, and you'd probably argue that it's the same "kind" as the other one, the echidna - let's use that. It would take far more than one generation for a platypus to get from the Middle East to Australia. There would be platypus bones stretching in a straight line between the Middle East and Australia, including the bottom of the ocean.
So, to prove you're right, you would need to find a set of bones from a creature that should not be in the Middle East in the geologic layer that corresponds to the era you claim the flood occurred in.

Plus, because all animals come from the ark, we should be able to track all animals to a single point on the planet. The bones will stretch in a straight line from the point of the ark to where they finally made their home, and the bones would be spread out in a predictable pattern. We would be able to figure out exactly when the first bones from each animal would appear in the geologic record, because that's the amount of time it would take for them to migrate there from the Middle East.
And we would easily be able to find the ark, because it would be at the center of that pattern.

Third, you could find evidence of the flood itself. Because a worldwide flood would wash away all all the loose rock, including that found on mountains, that would mean that there's a huge cache of sedimentary rock on the ocean floor. After all, if all the loose rock found on our mountains are still left, imagine how much of it was swept away in the flood.
I could give you more tips on this if I knew what time period you thought the flood occurred in.

Also, the "losing genetic information" thing is completely testable. We have genetic samples on record of as many animals as possible. In fact, we have genetic material from hundreds, thousands, even millions of years ago. We can easily compare that with modern animals and see if they have fewer chromosomes or peptides than the ancient ones.



False. Creatures do not become "more advanced". That implies that there are levels of evolution, which is blatantly not true. Creatures adapt to their environment. Suppose a species of fish finds itself in a cave where there is no light. Over time, a fish is born with no eyes - not because it "lost" genetic information, but because that information is presented differently. Because it has no eyes, it does not need to support the useless eyes. It will survive better, because it will not need as much food to survive. It will be more likely to survive to breed and pass on its genes. Some of its offspring will have the genes that cause no eyes, and the ones with no eyes will be more likely to survive. Soon, most of the population will have no eyes, because those are the fish that are more likely to survive to breed.

That is evolution. The fish have not become more advanced, but they have adapted to their environment.

Seriously, I don't understand this. You did a surprisingly good job describing animals adapting to their environment and then you come up with that? Stop presenting evolution as your idea and claiming that evolution is something other than what you're saying it is.



No. The food a creature eats does not have an effect on its offspring's DNA. The combination of sperm and egg does. The food the mother eats may have an effect on the way the genetics are expressed, but not the genetics.

And "genetically superior"? Did you do your research on one of those idiotic sites that claims Hitler invented evolution?



"What evolution requires"? What the heck are you talking about?

Evolution is the process by which a species adapts to its environment. The ones that have mutations that allow it to survive will have more babies, because it will survive longer. This is beneficial to the species, because the ones that can survive in that environment will do so.

If a species is not adapting to its environment, then that would be the opposite of "what evolution requires". Do you have any examples of a species that is growing in such a way that its changes are making it ill-suited for its environment?



False. It is testable and repeatable. We have access to creatures with dramatically shorter lifespans than ourselves - insects. It is entirely possible for us to breed insects and watch them evolve over hundreds of generations. In fact, every single biology lab that is properly equipped to do so is running the experiments as we speak.

For that matter, there are also experiments that have created DNA from inorganic matter. Given enough time, we can definitely replicate the evolutionary process from start to finish.

Also, textbooks are not proof of anything. Neither is the bible. What you refer to as "operational science" is the only scientific test method.

Hugbug993
you're right about me not stating my reasons for believing in the God of the Bible.

I see that you are referring to the definition of evolution being simply change.

Sorry, I was focusing on the evolution of bacterium to man. That is what I mean with Speciation being the opposite of what evolution requires. A Bacterium doesn't have the same genetics as a Cow, as you pointed out with the Chromosome count.
Those eyeless fish have the practically the same genetics as the eyed ones in the same specie.I understand that you may not be Christian but here is a science based Christian site with information about those blind fish and the inhibitor mutation. http://creation.mobi/new-eyes-for-blind-cave-fish

An Evolutionist is someone who believes in (molecules to man) Evolution, whether they are a biologist, doctor or layman.

I know about the Chromosomes and the unfortunate duplicating or loss of chromosomes that can happen during cell duplication, (didn't know about swamp wallabies having 10/11 thank you)

Hinnies can have babies yes but only when back crossed to ethier parent specie (horse or donkey) due to the partal of 32 horse and 31 donkey chromosomes that make the mule. When back crossed to a donkey the mule's donkey Chromosomes will line up with donkey ones, the (at least 1)horse chromosomes along with the corresponding donkey ones will be left over. This produces donkey offspring with some horse chromosomes. This is known as 2nd generation hybridization which is unfortunately as you said shaky.

The genetics can be expressed differently yes but Horses and Donkeys do have slightly different genetics to express different genotypes and also because they are not the same specie. If they were the offspring would be perfectly fertile.

The amount of DNA is not related to the Advancement of the creature. You're right there. It is that every kind of creature (and futher specie and subspecie) has a different set of chromosomes than other kinds. Canines having completely different genetics compared to Mankind is one example which are both different to octopi.

Mitochondrial 'DNA' has a higher mutation rate than our biological DNA and it has been traced to a single woman (Eve) who lived around 6500 years ago.

Floods deposit scary amounts of mud and can weaken building structures severely. The global Flood would have drowned and destroyed everything it involved volcano forming under the ocean, massove fountains of the deep and Forty days and Forty nights of rain. Trilobites, being ocean floor dwellers would have been one of the first to be affected and quickly become extinct that is why they will often be found lower along the geological scale. Thousands of fossils have been found throughout the fossil record in an asphyxiated state (lack of oxygen), hundreds of fossils found have food, births and even muscles still within the bones. These fossilisations were quick and unexpected. I agree that it would take many generations to leave the Ark and reach the current location that they live in. However as The Flood lasted for almost a year it would have created the majority of the fossil record. So the majority of creatures that died since the flood would have been scavenged after death. Very Few fossils would form after the flood compared to the ones from the pre flood time that died in it.

The mountains and vocanoes that create the current world would have formed after the end of the Flood year. So yes the flood would have stripped the land away as it receded. For example Ayers Rock in Australia shows what the level of the land was, at the end of the flood the water would have torn away all the looser soil leaving Uluru (Ayers rock) remaining.

Hitler didn't invent Evolution nor did Charles Darwin. but he created the entire Nazi regime based upon blue eyed and blond being more advanced than the Jewish people which was completely false. He said that they were a race of some kind but certainly not Human.

No matter what creature you breed no matter how many generations you breed it for, they can speciate but will always remain a part of the same kind.

You are right about operational science being the only science, because science is absolutely repeatable.

Thank you for pointing out my fallacies surrounding my definition of evolution.

Cheers Sims2Christain

Evolution is not a belief, it's a theory. Your thinking about it is incredibly muddled.

Just because you personally don't believe in evolution, does not mean it's not real. That's not how the world works. Likewise, the Earth doesn't flatten and move to the center of the solar system just because you might believe it should be so.

A scientific theory is not the same as having a belief. A scientific theory has to be testable and repeatable, and thereore falsifiable if new proof is brought to the table or if the theory is false. You can't test whether or not there is a god. Science also cares shit if you 'feel' there is a god. And there aren't really miracles. There are just currently unexplainable happenings that science can't explain (yet!).

As for evolution, science has finally fond sound proof that humans and great apes share a common ancestor, and it's readily available in our genes. Two genes combined to make one. We also share some 90% of genetic material with them. My explanation skills aren't that great, so here's a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zi8FfMBYCkk.

So basically, if there was a god who created everything perfectly, why do humans have tail bones when we don't have tails? Why do we have the appendix, which is useful for grassing animals, but not for humans? Why do most mammals and fishes look nearly identical in the first embryotic stages?

I'm not saying I understand evolution perfectly, but I understand it enough to realize animals and plant life didn't just 'poof, appear!', as described in the bible. I can look at the proof and see with my own eyes the flaws a mostly random process would have gathered, as opposed to what should have been a 'perfect' creation if there was a creator. I also know things don't just 'poof, appear!' in everyday life. Richard Dawkins has a nice video explaining the difference between thinking in evolution terms and thinking in creationist terms here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbNcgClV5Ho

As for mules, horses and donkeys probably have enough similar genes to be able to have offspring, but since mules have a tendency to be infertile, horses and donkeys are clearly not very compatible as mates. It even happens in humans, when people get an extra pair of chromosomes, or lack a pair. These people are often, but not always, infertile. It's simply evolution's natural way of saying 'stop - something is wrong here!'
I'm assuming it's something similar to why two different species, such as cats and dogs, don't generally mate and have some kind of catdog offspring. They're simply two different animals with different genetic codes. If one animal has 30 pairs of chromosomes and another has 40, then there will be something wonky if they try to have offspring.

Here's a list of chromosome pairs in different animals, in case you're interested.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_...hromosome_count
Humans come somewhere in the middle, and we've got less evolved species both over and under us, so the amount of chromosomes don't matter the least. As for amount of DNA, I don't think it even matters.



- Everyone on Earth is related in some way. It's just a matter of going far enough back.
- It's not the biblical Eve, they just named the woman Eve when they found out about her.
- Humans existed before 6500 years ago. It's just how far back they ahve found evidence there was some human women are related to. I think they found a man they called Adam, who was apparently related to all men, but he was some 3-4000 years old (or thereabout - I don't go around remembering these things).



I would like to know what you mean about historical science. Nearly everything in the bible is either untestable or there's no historical proof outside the bible for anyone to figure out if it actually happened. There are very few, if any, historical facts described in the bible, outside of things like how people lived and what they ate. If it's not even valid as a book of history, then how can the rest of the texts be viewed as the truth? I can see how the book would ave some moral value, much like Aesop's fables and fairytales, but other than that it lacks heavy on the fact side. Just the mention of people living until they're well over 900 should be a great big screaming clue. It happens in my fantasy books, but not in real life.

Since anything can be written in a book, no scientific theory is testable via book information only. Sorry, but that's not how it's done. To find proof, you have to actually test the theory. You can't veryfy gravity by looking it up in the library, and say 'yes, there is!'. But you can drop a bowling ball to the floor and see with your own eyes that it falls down, not up.

You can't test the bible by pointing to the bible. I migh as well read a book about unicorns, and say they're real because the book says they are real. To test something you need references outside of the theory you are testing. Like finding a unicorn wandering around in the woods. Since no one to this day have actually found proof of the existence of a unicorn, I'm inclined to beleve there aren't any. I'm of the same mindset when it comes to gods.

First off, not bacteria. Prokaryotes are a common ancestor for humans and bacteria, but bacteria are a separate family tree.

Interesting link. Especially the bible verses that that article cites for the "curse" - Genesis 3:19 and Romans 8:20-22.

Genesis 3:17 “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it, cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
18 thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Those verses talk specifically of the curse on Adam. Sure, it mentions a curse on the ground, but nothing about any other animals.

And if animals get the same curse humans have:

Genesis 3:16 "“I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for [or against] your husband, and he shall rule over you.”

1. Humans are the only creatures that experience that type of pain in childbirth. Baby heads are too big for the pelvis. All other animals are able to give birth easily.
2. Very few animals are monogamous. You could make a case for swans, as they mate for life, but they're an abnormality. (Also, swans often have same-sex pairings. Does that mean animals can sin?)
3. How many people have died in childbirth because of that ruling? Women die in childbirth because of the too-big heads, babies die if their heads get crushed on the way out - which means your god has murdered babies because one woman ate a fruit.

And for the Romans verses:

20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope
21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.

Humans are the only ones who experience that pain in childbirth. They're clearly not referring to the whole of creation, but to the humans on this planet. If you think about it, the majority of creation is space. Is space groaning with childbirth? Are stars getting labor pains?
No, that is only referring to humans.

But let's put the bible aside for the moment. According to that site's hypothesis, all mutations are caused by a loss in function. Current evolutionary theory states that what you consider a "loss" is one way that creatures adapt to their environment. Thus, we only need one example where a mutation causes a gain in function.

Now, let's talk about James Harrison.

His body contains a mutation where his body produces RhoD, which prevents Rh disease. You know about blood types - positive and negative, right? That is the rhesus factor. If a mother is negative while the father is positive, the baby has a chance at being born positive. If that happens, the mother's rhesus antibodies will identify the positive rhesus factor as a threat to the body and attack the fetus's blood cells, causing it to be born anemic. That is Rh disease.

Now, let's talk more about James. The factor found in his blood will prevent a mother's body from attacking the fetus's blood cells. Now, that factor isn't that useful to him, but if he passed it on to one of his daughters, she would be able to have healthy children with Rh-positive men. So, that mutation theoretically allows him to have more, healthier grandchildren, which means healthier descendants. Granted, we can prevent Rh disease through medicine today, but this mutation would have been extremely useful back before we had blood tests.

For another human example, Apolipoprotein AI-Milano. Apolipoprotein AI is a protein that regulates cholesterol. AIM is a mutation that allows the body to produce the upgraded protein, which has an improved ability to scrub cholesterol from the body, meaning that the humans with it are less likely to die from heart disease. Plus, the protein acts as an antioxidant.

Or how about tetrachromatic vision? All humans have three kinds of cones in the eyes, corresponding to red, green, and blue. Blue is found on chromosome 7, but red and green are on the X chromosome. That's why men are more likely to have color-blindness than women are: women have a second X chromosome so if there's a problem with red and green, they can get the right genes from the other X.
Tetrachromy occurs when red or green gets mutated on one X chromosome. The normal red or green gets backed up from the other X, but that still leaves them with the mutated receptor - a fourth.
That is proof positive for a gain caused by mutations.



False. Mitochondrial Eve has been traced to a woman who lived 200,000 years ago.
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1987Natur.325...31C
http://www.leeds.ac.uk/news/article...gration_history

So here's a question: as a YEC, how do you explain the vast amount of mutations taking place in that little time? We have records and sketches of animals going back thousands of years. If a sixth of their development from the ancestor of animals to the modern animals occurred in that time, then how come we see the modern animals reflected in the ancient texts?



Yes, floods deposit a lot of mud, but they also carry away a lot of loose stuff, including rock. My area was recently flooded during way more than 40 days of rain. If the flood covered everything, then it would have picked up a ton of rock and carried it away, back into the oceans.



Ah, the "hydroplate" story. I've heard this one before. Let me see if I can elaborate.

- Before the flood, there were huge reserves of water under the ocean, covered by a "skin" of rock.
- During the flood, volcanoes erupted underwater, which caused the water underneath to boil.
- Because of the pressure, the water broke through the rock layer and came shooting up into the oceans.
- The heat of the water caused it to vaporize and come up as steam, causing the 40 days and nights of rain.

You know, I actually have more respect for people who just say it was a miracle. At least they have enough self-awareness to say "it was magic" without twisting their everything into pretzels to try and justify what they believe.

1. How did the rock get there? It could not have happened naturally. Rock is denser than water, so it sinks. A layer cannot form on top of water. Did your god put it there just so that he could kill the world at a later date? That implies that he knew this was going to happen from the beginning, before he created humanity. That means he created humanity knowing that they would fall, and he knew about every single death he was going to cause.

2. The ocean could not have naturally produced that much rain. Just look at the climate of Hawaii. It would have had to have been boiling to produce that much vapor. That would have killed all the ocean creatures and Noah. You can get burns from steam in a boiling pot. Noah and all the animals of the ark would have been poached.
If only the depths of the ocean were hot, then there would have been no vapor. It would have cooled down long before reaching the surface.

3. Related to the above, if volcanoes kept the ocean floor heated enough that the ocean stayed that high for a year, then the entire ocean would have heated up and begun to boil. There would have been a second great rain, and Noah would have been poached.



Wrong. I can disprove that with simple hydraulics.

Put a pound of bronze and a bone in a bathtub. Which reaches the bottom first? The bronze, because it is heavier.

Your claim is that the flood stirred up the earth and the bones drifted to their layers. When the waters receded, the dirt and the corpses fell to their current locations.

Heavy things sink. When the flood waters rose, the pressure from the volcanoes at the bottom of the ocean would cause all things to shoot to the top of the ocean, including the trilobites. As the pressure tapered off, the larger things would have sunk first, and the smaller things last. This means that the geologic record would start with the lightest things in the earliest days, and then the heaviest on the bottom. It also would mean that fossils were found indiscriminately, instead of in groupings. After all, the currents would carry them all over the world. Instead, we find horse fossils in the places where wild horses live today. We find platypus fossils in Australia, where platypi live today, and nowhere else. Was the flood kind enough to deposit platypus corpses only in the places that their descendants would one day live?

This would also mean that bronze-age artifacts would not be found near the top of the geologic layer. After a year of floating in the ocean, most things would be degraded to just the bones. Bronze, however, is very heavy and it lasts much longer than bone. This means that we would be finding bronze artifacts down at the bottom of the geologic records. Instead, it's all near the top. Was the flood kind enough to leave bronze artifacts near the top in case Noah and his descendants needed them?

Here's another question: we've found bones dating back 10,000+ years in burial mounds, along with some personal effects like jewelry. Was the flood kind enough to give them a nice resting place in shallow soil and leave their stuff with them?

Also, in case you want to claim that the corpses were buried in the order things died: that would mean that we found fossils in order of mobility. Birds would be at the very top, because they can fly. Things that climb trees or that lived on mountains would be next, and then things that can run fast. Instead, we find dinosaur fossils - including flying ones - all in the same layers, regardless of how quickly they can move.



Why? Fossils can form for any number of reasons. Getting buried is one of them, but they landed in the desert. A good sandstorm can bury anything and even dehydrate the corpse to mummify it. We should be able to find not only fossils, but intact mummies of every single animal in the world.
For that matter, not many predators go after the bones. The bones - which make fossils - would still be around and they could get buried by a sandstorm.



First, don't steal Aboriginal myths. They do not like it.
Second, according to local myths, it was built up by giant boys playing in the mud, not by a flood.

Third, how? You cannot form mountains like that in 6,000 years. And you can't make mountains from a massive-world-wide flood. We can use computer models to find that out.

Erosion does not work that way. If the flood waters caused all erosion we see in the world, then why isn't it consistent? The Appalachian mountains are much more eroded than the Rockies, yet they're roughly equal distances away from the ocean.
Sure, sudden large amounts of water flowing across it can cause erosion. Like Mount Saint Helens. But when you look at all those examples, you notice one thing: they're all straight. But things like the Grand Canyon are not. Have a video.

How did the ice caps form? They would have melted during the flood, and 6,000 years is not enough time to form new ones.

How did the forests and jungles grow so quickly? 6,000 years is not enough time for that much diversity to take place. Maybe in insects, but trees have a much longer lifespan than insects.

And just one more question, even though there are plenty of logic fails: the pyramids were made, what, a few generations after the flood reportedly took place? How did only a few people make those? And how did we get so many people just a few generations after that?

Yeah, your hypothesis makes no sense to me.

This is what I've been talking about. We have the same facts but different interpretaions and believe different things about the history behind these facts.

How valid are the dating methods?
carbon dating
potassium argon dating
(There is one other that I cannot remember)
For a clock to work perfectly the events mustn't change in slow then rapid fashion.

None of these methods work perfectly. Carbon dating is the most close in terms of a creationist time scale. If a dinosaur is at least 65 million years dead then it shouldn't contain any carbon 14, it should have all decayed to C12 andvthe like. Yet plenty of fossils have been discovered to contain heaps of C14. This drastically reduces their age.

Also how can Evolution be true if dinosaurs ate birds? Birds supposedly evolved from dinosaurs so the shouldn't be lunch for one.
http://creation.mobi/3-birds-in-a-dinosaur

What about young islands popping up everywhere? http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-31848255

The grand canyon yes. Water finds the quickest way to gravity. Canyons aren't always straight as you pointed out. https://www.probe.org/the-grand-can...e-of-the-earth/

Floods actually create the right conditions for mini ice ages. At least with the biblical geological model it only needs to be explained once. https://answersingenesis.org/enviro...onary-ice-ages/

The longer an organism lives the longer it has time to breed and many genetic mutations will take place. Trees and Plants were not needed aboard the Ark, aside from being food. Many insects, plants and aquatic creatures would have survived the flood.

Mutation rates can have significant changes in a small amount of time, yet A fly remains a fly after hundreds of generations http://www.icr.org/article/5779/295/

The intelligence of man hasn't improved greatly, the Egyptians knew how to build the pyramids. the Flood was circa 4500 years ago that gives a lot of time for population to increase in size and it will happen in an ununiform rate. That is the answer to your last question.

Ps the Flat Earth Society are atheists. The world being flat is completely unbiblical. The circle of the earth is seen from any high position, when watching a ship fade into the horizon. If the world was flat you could still see it with a very high powered telescope when it is at it destination hundreds of kilometres away.

No, we do not have the same facts. You copy off of sites that have no idea what they're doing, so you do not have facts. Do you do any research into what scientists say, or do you only study what those sites tell you?
I understand what I'm talking about. When you ask me a question about science, I can answer it and tell you why it works. When I ask you a question, you either direct me to a site or refuse to answer.



No, there is no carbon in fossils. The bones have long since decayed, but they create a cast for certain minerals to fill. That's what modern fossils are. However, to protect the fossils, they put a coating on it that contains carbon 14. If you send a fossil off to get carbon-tested - even though there is no carbon in fossils - then you will get a result back on the age of the coating.

They're pretty solid. While there are exceptions - the reservoir effect, some animals like snails absorbing carbon from other sources into their body, etc. - these have all been tested and replicated in lab conditions.

Really, nobody has found any proof that radiometric dating doesn't work. Your lot claims it because they don't want it to be true, and they think if they close their eyes and wish real hard, it will go away.



Yeah, that's a documented part of geology - one of two ways to form a mountain, actually. When volcanoes erupt underwater, they send a lot of rock into the ocean. This cools and forms a layer. Rinse and repeat a few thousand to million times, and you have an ever-growing mountain. Eventually, it will reach the surface. It didn't "pop up", the volcano was always there. This time, however, it broke the surface.
That's why the article states that it's not a good idea to visit the island. It's still an active volcano, and there's no telling if it'll erupt again.

When it happens above-ground, you get cinder cones. I recently visited one of those, actually. It was cool.

So what exactly is that supposed to prove?



Now, if that were true, one side of the river would be much deeper than the other. It would have been flowing off the land, creating a huge delta. That would also mean that the part of the river near the delta would be far deeper than the mouth, because the amount of water rushing through would taper off as the waters drained and most of the force would be near the delta. Instead, the river at both sides of the Grand Canyon is fairly close together.
But, like you said, water finds the quickest way to gravity. That would be a straight line. If it were close to the height of the rest of the land, then all of the water would go over the river, not through it.
It doesn't add up.

Now for the article. They mention the Coconino Sandstone and the large unconformity.

For the sandstone, it is very obvious that it comes from an ancient desert. That is because it is in an ancient desert. The sandstone is found over Arizona, Utah, Nevada, and Colorado. That entire area is part of the Great Basin Desert.

For the unconformity, the area between the Tonto Group and the Basement Rocks is a nonconformity, which means that it's simply not there. The area between the Tonto Group and the Grand Canyon Supergroup is an angular unconformity, which means that it has alternating layers of rock instead of only one.
What this means is that some geologic upheaval happened - probably the breaking up of the continents - and caused the layers underneath to split. The sediment in that area fell into the cracks, causing angles of alternating layers. Exactly what we see.

This part, however: "In recent years, however, evolutionary geologists as well as old-earth creationists have abandoned this scenario because it just isn’t supported by the evidence."
That is blatantly false. Some people in 2012 proposed that the canyon could be 70 million years old. However, the prevailing theory was that it was closer to 6 million years old. 70 million was never an official number.

This sort of mistake would never be made by someone who actually know what they were talking about.

For the rest of it, watch the video I linked. It's not a mystery.



No. That is completely stupid, as usual for that site.

"Increased tectonic activity with associated volcanic eruptions—described in the Bible as the “fountains of the great deep” breaking up (Genesis 7:11)—would have heated the ocean waters causing much greater evaporation of water. The volcanism would also have blasted enormous amounts of dust into the air, blocking much sunlight and cooling the world. (Ice cores do reveal evidence of much volcanic activity during the Ice Age.) Cold continental masses and air containing an enormous amount of water vapor is the necessary combination to produce the amount of snow required to rapidly build up the ice sheets of the Ice Age."

Heating it for that long would have caused the oceans to boil. If you heat it from the bottom, the heat will dissipate into the colder top, and that will cause the entire thing to slowly heat up. Sure, there would have been evaporation - in the form of scalding steam.

No, it would not have blasted dust into the air. The volcanoes were underwater. Underwater volcanoes do not blast dust into the air, because the heat from the dust would dissipate into the ocean, cooling it and warming the ocean, and that would cause it to float back down as sediment. This is how that island was formed: the underwater volcano slowly built it up over time that way.

The air would not have been cold. It would have been extremely hot from the boiling oceans.
Also, considering that mammoth bones - and other creatures that lived during the ice age - have been found up to 4.5 million years ago, wouldn't that indicate that the ice age happened before the flood? I mean, according to you, creatures of a "kind" "speciated" in order to adapt to different environments. If the ice age occurred after the flood, then mammoths would have adapted - but the bones that were scattered by the flood indicate adaptation to an ice age.
You aren't even keeping your own story straight here.

What? No. I'll grant you the aquatic animals, even though it would have killed all the freshwater fish.

The plants would all have died. Combine clouds covering the earth with around 1,000 to 7,000 feet of water (the latter being about how high the water would have to be above sea level to cover the entire world) and the plants will get absolutely no sunlight. 40 days without sunlight will kill all the plants. Plus, because of all the water, they will not be able to absorb water. They will also drown. And that's assuming that the floodwaters - which you claim are strong enough to carve the grand canyon - doesn't root them all up.
Seriously, how is the receding of the waters strong enough to give the entire planet millions of years of erosion, but not pull every single plant up by its roots?

And the insects. Very few of them can fly. Of those that can? Insects need to rest. The only resting place would be the ark. The only food would be the ark. If they weren't on the ark, then they wouldn't have survived.



Really? Then how did it "speciate" in less than 6,000 years? Seriously, if a fruit fly came from a common insect ancestor, then how did it arise from its "kind"?

And that study...whoever did it does not understand how to do a study.

"The UCI scientists compared the DNA sequences affecting fruit fly growth and longevity between the two groups. After the equivalent of 12,000 years of human evolution, the fruit flies showed surprisingly few differences."

Right. So they looked at two of the thousands of sequences of a fruit fly and they concluded that there had been no meaningful changes. That is like me looking for instances of the word "the" in the bible and concluding that the old and new testaments are the same because they both use the word at the same rate.

And that still doesn't answer my question. If animals changed so drastically over what you claim is 4,500 years, then why were the animals recorded in texts 2,000 to 4,000 years old described as exactly the same animals?



That does not answer my question. Actually, I did some research. The first pyramid was built in the 2700's, BCE. The last one was built the 1700's, BCE. According to you, the flood, being 4,500 years ago, happened around 2485 BCE. That means that the first pyramid was built before the flood and the last after.
...So according to you, Egyptians existed both before and after the flood.



Oh, really?
http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/...ory-and-mission

"The modern age of the Flat Earth Society dates back to the early 1800s, when it was founded by Samuel Birley Rowbotham, an English inventor. Samuel Rowbotham's Flat Earth views were based largely on literal interpretation of Bible passages."
"Flat Earth theory spread to the United States, largely in the town of Zion, Illinois where Christian Catholic Apostolic Church founder John Alexander Dowie and later Wilbur Glenn Voliva promoted Flat Earth theory."

Daniel Shenton, the modern leader of the society, is a Christian, and so are most of his followers. There is one society that exists to mock the others that is probably atheist, but it's satire, not genuine belief.

You mean the sphere of the earth. It is not a circle. The bible used the word for a disc - chuwg - not for a ball - duwg. They thought it was actually flat, or they would have said it was a ball. Or at least created a word derived from "ball", as they had no other word for a sphere.

And the Greeks were describing the earth as a sphere at the same time. Did you know that Columbus had nothing to do with proving the earth was spherical? It was common knowledge at the time. The reason his expedition was turned down was because his estimate of the size was a third of conventional knowledge.
And Columbus was a terrible person. He found groups of natives, read out a proclamation that they needed to convert to Christianity - in Spanish, which they couldn't have known - and used the fact that they didn't convert on the spot to justify killing and enslaving them. He even sold girls as young as nine as sex slaves. And that is why I don't celebrate Columbus Day.


Now, there are a number of things you didn't comment on.

Those bible verses do not say that the land is cursed.
Didn't answer my question of if animals could sin, since they get into homosexual relationships and have sex with others of the same gender.
Didn't answer my question of how many babies your god killed through making childbirth painful - or even give an excuse.
Tetrachromy is proof positive of something getting added through mutations. Didn't say anything about that.
Didn't dispute the age of Mitochondrial Eve.
Didn't answer why so much sediment was on land and not swept away by a flood strong enough to carve canyons.
Did not answer my questions regarding hydroplate theory.
Did not comment on the fact that keeping the waters that high for a year would have boiled the oceans.
Did not comment on the fact that heavy things sink more quickly, so the heaviest creatures and bronze artifacts should be at the bottom instead of the small things like trilobites.
Or that we've found burial mounds older than the supposed flood.
Or that fossils exist where the modern day creatures live, instead of scattered across the world.
Or when I asked why fossils of the creatures coming off the ark couldn't have been formed.
Or when I asked how mountains sprung up in 6,000 years, considering that the flood would have washed everything away.

This is what I meant when I said that you either direct me to sites that have no idea what they're doing or refuse to answer what I ask.

We do have exactly the same facts. We just interpret the history differently.

I am clearly not going to change anyone's mind, even with using something they know about. Nor do I have all the answers you want, unfortunately.

Sorry for wasting your time.

THIS. So much this. By cherry picking points from less-than-reputable "scientific" sources and trying to force them to fit a narrative, all that is achieved is demonstrating that there's a fundamental lack of understanding of the scientific processes at work, but that at the same time, there's not enough faith in the story to simply say, in essence, "A wizard did it, and since you can't prove that's not what happened, you can't say I'm wrong!"

I kind of worry about this whole thread though... the sticky religion thread was locked for a reason.

Really, sourcing Answers in Genesis or Institute for Creation Research should be an automatic lose condition.

But religion threads always end badly because no matter what position you take, you can almost never convince the other side to accept your reasoning. At least, not by quoting scripture or reputable sources at your opponents.

I prefer science over creationism, mostly because too many creationist viewpoints love negative proof and circular reasoning (the Bible is the word of God, and the word of God is infallible, thus, the Bible is infallible because it is the word of God and the word of God is infallible, thus, the Bible is infallible because it is the word of God and the word of God is infallible, thus, the Bible ... etc, and so on and so forth like a Sugababes song). So you frequently end up with wars of attrition where it's like 'oh yeah? well refute THIS load of turnips that Ken Ham/Kent Hovind/Michael Behe posited!' until one side gives up or the thread's locked.

But it can still be fun if you like bingo, just pick your favourites for each space:

Indeed. Most often, particularly if they didn't pay enough attention in science class, the creationists in particular will completely avoid answering the actual question of "how?" and instead answer with "this is how I think it is", and insist that's a good enough answer.

As for the banana, I've seen videos of creationists try explaining how it is such a perfect fruit. The thing is, most often they use the kind of banana we humans have cultivated. Wild bananas are small, have large seeds, and don't taste particularly good (apparently). Very little of the food we in the western world eat today is in its original form. We've either cultivated the heck out of it to take away most of the seeds, made it bigger, taste different, be more resistant to insects, or any other trait we'd like the food to have, or we've taken it through processes to make it edible after it's harvested.

Some people who insist they've had visions or a sense of something 'greater', or they think they've seen a miracle happen - they most often fail to realize that we can in some cases sense things that aren't there. If you've ever been alone at home at night, your sense of logic tells you you're completely alone, but your instincts will still play tricks on you and insist ther are anything from burglars to monsters nearby. Visions of angels or other supernatural beings can just be halllucinations or daydreaming, or waking up from a dream. We don't always know what we see or percieve. Someone with a scientific mind might wave it away as a curiosity for later research, while someone inclined to believe in the supernatural will jump to that conclusion before they even imagine there might be a perfectly logical explanation.

People with naturally warm hands with 'healing' powers could just be a coincidence paired with the placebo effect. Medical miracles happen all the time, and some of them aren't even miracles. If you survive because of CPR, it's not because god did it. It's because doing CPR has proven to be a lot more effective than just praying for the person. If you survive an accident, it could be sheer luck, sitting in a spot that didn't quite take as big a hit as the rest of the car, or getting to the hospital in time, or getting an operation just in time. It could simply be that some people have a stronger survival instinct than others, or their bodies have a better base for healing itself. As for cancer - tumors can disappear on their own, being fought off by the body or being starved out. They're not even cancer all the time. We've got tumor-fighting cells in our body taking care of tumor cells (or mutated cells) all the time. It's when these fail to do their job fast enough we get cancer in the first place. It may seem like a miracle, but it's basically just chance and luck. Even psychic people have been debunked again and again. Maybe some have better senses than others, but most often I think they just are very good at reading people. If you know what to look for, you can figure out a lot about a person before they even open their mouth. The rest seem to be guesswork. Most of the time, the believers will hang on to what was right and ignore the heap of wrong information.

If anyone really wants to convert me or other sciency non-believers, then show us photo proof of angels. Show us healing that can't possibly be done by medical science (like a human amputee growing back a limb). Show us a miracle presumably done by some supernatural being that simply can't have a valid logical scientific explanation. Show us hard proof there is a god (preferably the actual god). Show us an animal that evolution theory can't explain the existense of. The fact is, to this day no one has managed any of this.

Science is the one doing all the miracles nowadays. We can breathe life into people who should have been dead. We can make large objects fly. We can turn water into fuel. We even shape nature into our needs. Humans are creators almost by default, and therefore almost automatically think we must have been created to be this way. As far as we know, we're the only creatures on Earth having such high thoughts about ourselves, because ever since we started evolving away from the monkey stage, we've vastly developed and expanded the brain section that likes to do this kind of thinking. Our brain is almost 'too big' for our heads compared to our bodies, leading most of the brain development to happen after birth (one of the reasons why it's so painful to push out a baby - their heads are gigantic compared to their body, particularly if you look at other animals). This brain with its higher functions allows for wider thinking than just survival, and lets us have more complex social structures, have appreciation of beauty, ponder on the meaning of life, and other thoughts we believe other animals don't have. Lions, monkeys, insects and fish are mostly busy just staying alive.



In case anyone is interested, there's a ood video that describes the so-called 'nothingness' of the universe, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbsGYRArH_w

The funny thing about religion VS science, is that science actually have the decency to say "I don't know, but I can try to figure it out" when faced with a difficult question. Religion takes the easy way and automatically jumps to the spiritual answer, usually not even bothering to make it sound logical and believable.

Science is knowledge-based. Scientists come up with theories and then try to figure out through methodical trial and testing whether it's true or false. The sciency theories that are not proven yet are debatable and stand as the current theory unless something else is proven to be the truth. And even if a theory is proven to be true, it is still debatable, so if someone comes along with a better explanation that is also proven to be true, then that might very well be what is taught in science class the next generation. As good as nothing is firm and solid in science, and there's nearly always some way to find new information to add to the table as science and technology moves on.

Religion and creationism in general is faith-based. You live by a 'theory' and stick with it no matter if you're proven wrong, usually because a supernatural being said you should do so. If anyone else comes around and presents their 'theory' to you, then their theory can't possibly be true because your 'theory' is the only truth.

I think I have a complete line here Fentonparkninja - where's my prize?

I like to quote from the Harry Potter novels when someone quotes the bible at me. .... No real contribution to the debate, I'm pretty much with hugbug about everything, and quoting the bible is useless since everyone who claims to be a disciple of Jesus cherry picks the parts of their religion they wish to acknowledge/follow anyway. If you ignore the text and/or don't even bother to go to the source, you're not really in it to win it, you're in it to preach at others and feel superior to them in some way.

I usually only use quotes I fully understand, and they must have a meaning to me that I can relate to. I don't care if it's from a fantasy book, a scientist, some age-old philosopher, or something someone random, mostly unknown person once said that stuck with me. The source doesn't matter all that much as long as there's something meaningful and true in the words.

Bible quotes often tend to sound like they're preaching the truth from a high horse, and I'm not too fond of being looked down onto like an unruly child who does not know better and needs to be reprimaded. Their language is almost always difficult and muddled, and people have so many opinions about their meaning that the original message gets lost in translation. Some bible verses are even delivered in the next breath after saying the complete opposite is true.

In my opinion, a good quote has one or two meanings at the most - one of them in the text, and perhaps one hidden between the words as a comedy twist or a twist on the person's words. The main message should be understandable in pretty much the same way by anyone reading it, and not so open to translation you can put anything you want in there. A good quote delivers its message, and that's that.

Having the same facts - not that I believe we do - does not matter if you can't understand the underlying principles. You don't understand, for instance, how much energy it would take for underwater volcanoes to flood the earth and how much that would heat up the oceans. You want to change my mind? Do the calculations. Find out how much pressure underwater volcanoes have to exert to raise the sea level 7,000 feet for one year. Find out how much heat that would release into the ocean. Prove to me through math that it's possible, not by telling me that it is or directing me to a site. Post your work. If you do the math properly and it proves that it's possible, then I will seriously consider your hypothesis.
You must cite your sources for each number you use, such as the average heat of a volcano or the pressure it releases. You may not cite any bible-based sources. Those are the standards scientists are held to, so they shouldn't be too hard for you.

If you want to convince me, do the work to understand exactly what you're saying. Don't just copy and paste from someone else and call it a day.



One thing I really want to try next time that comes up is explaining how to open a banana.
See, one of the things creationists claim is that the tab is there because their god created it for us to easily open. Thing is, it's actually easier to open it at the other end. Pinch the black spot at the "bottom" of the banana once or twice and it will pop open. Then you can peel it easily. Never fails. The tabs, on the other hand, fail at least half the time for me.

I looked up wild bananas after this - very interesting and that argument just makes the person who originally made it look like a twit. Really funny ignorant twit. It was kind of embarassing actually.