IMHO the scientific evidence is a picture of an emerging humanity,
not necessarily a full humanity (except that the Neanderthals may
have been fully human).<<
Since when has worshipping the one true God been the definition of fully
human?
While on vacation, I found the reference to the Golan Venus I was looking
for.To refresh memories, it is the oldest art object in the world and is
housed in the Jerusalem museum. I found it in a bookstore on the California
Coast. A picture can be seen on p. 188 of Desmond Morris' book, _The Human
Animal_ . I do not know the publisher, I did not buy the book, since I think
I can get it from the library and this is all I want from the book. That
object is 330,000 years old and is a venus figurine. It may or may not be
the same object referred to by Stringer and Gamble _In Search of the
Neanderthals_ (New York: Thames and Hudson, 1993), p. 161 which cites a
possible figurine from > 230,000 years from Berekhat Ram.
At 330,000 years, the figurine is older than the oldest Neanderthal and was
probably produced by an archaic modern.
Now, my question is if we are to exclude these early moderns from the human
table, on what basis do you do this? Animals do not produce art in the form
of sculpture. I would consider this figurine supportive of my views rather
than any view which believes that humanity was created very recently.
In another post Stephen asked:
>>I wonder if Glenn's pre-Adamite hominids had epiphanies? :-) <<
I do not consider those PEOPLE pre-adamite. No human is.
Stephen wrote:
>>Yes. Glenn completely ignores PC interpretations. For him the only
alternative is YEC. This leaves his view the winner in what Macbeth calls
the "best-in-field" fallacy:<<
Stephen, do you believe that soul-less beings create art? I have not ignored
PC views. Most PC views, like yours, Custance's, and Hugh Ross believe that
man was a recent creation and thus can not explain why art was produced
330,000 years ago! I would suggest that you might be ignoring the scientific
data, contrary to what you say.
Stephen wrote:
>>The bottom line is this. Few if any students from Christian homes
could accept an Adam and Noah who lived 5.5 million years ago. If
forced to chose between Ussher and Glenn, most would chose Ussher!<<
Then we would be rejecting every thing that can be observed. Light from
distant stars and galaxies can not be that far, inspite of the fact that
geometrical triangulation (surveying by the same geometry the Egyptians used)
has been accomplished for objects at a distance of 13 million light years
(SeeN. Bartel et al, "The Shape, Expansion Rate, and distance to Supernova,
1993J from VLBI Measurements," Nature, April 14, 1994, p. 610. YEC
literature will tell you that no star farther than 700 light years has been
measured by direct geometrical triangulation.). Radioactive dates can not be
that old. Footprints up and down the entire geologic column can must be
produced at superfantastic speeds to deposit them in a year. Is this what
the God of the Universe really wants? He wants us to reject everything we
can observe and reason about? Does He want us to believe that He made a
universe in which no observational data can be trusted?
If so, then, how can you trust the observational data which tells you what
the Bible says when you read it?
JIm Bell wrote:
>>JB>It doesn't. Your personal belief system is one thing; your
>position re: the data is another. The latter is indistinguishable
>from atheistic Naturalism, and suffers from the same problems.
Stephen Jones replied:
>>For once I disagree with Jim here and side with Glenn. We must
acknowledge that Glenn *does* believe in the Bible, in the
supernatural creation of man, and in the Flood. His position is
therefore not entirely "indistinguishable from atheistic Naturalism".<<
Thank you, Stephen.
Stephen wrote:
>>However, his position is no threat to "atheistic Naturalism", either.
At least the atheists sit up an take notice of YEC which they perceive
as a genuine competitor. One suspects they would have a tolerant
contempt for TE views?<<
Atheists do not view YEC as a genuine competitor. They view it as an object
of ridicule and a reason to reject Christianity. YEC does not even get the
scientific data correct even in little things like the existence of the
entire geologic column. YEC's say it doesn't exist. I have oil well logs
from North Dakota which drill through the entire column.
My view might be more of a threat to the atheistic rational for rejecting
Scripture than you can imagine.
glenn