RE: ICR - Jan 2005

Glenn,
 
I for one am certainly willing to listen to "all your views that people
don't like". But I think some statements you make below are a bit
unfair. You paint all TEs (although presumably you yourself are one of
them??) with a very broad brush, and it seems a bit negative to me. It
is unfair to say that all TEs, for example, make all their decisions
about how to interpret scripture based upon some goal that there cannot
be any errors in the bible. I think many TEs are certainly willing to
change their minds about things if new and compelling data are
presented.
 
With regard to your porosity analogy, the critical thing is how much do
you trust each of your measurements - which one is most likely to
contain the error. And of course, one would want to take a look at that
error and see how bad it really is. Did you get a value of 45%, or
35.2% (compared to your example of 35%)? That would be critical in the
decision making process, don't you agree?
 
Anyway, you didn't really answer my question or address the point that
I was getting at in my previous post. You seemed to say in your first
post that if we interpret Genesis as historical, then we'll do better at
convincing "the laity" (still wondering who that is) of the general
findings of science. But this doesn't make sense to me - I don't want
to make an interpretation just because it might get me a good result in
another area. An interpretation should be made properly based upon the
best information, and let the findings lead us where they will. If Gen
1-11 is historical, great, but if not, we have to be prepared to deal
with that fact.
 
All the Best,
Charles
 
 
 
 
<><<><<><<><<><<><<><<><<><<><<><<><
Charles W. Carrigan
Olivet Nazarene University
Dept. of Geology
One University Ave.
Bourbonnais, IL 60914
PH: (815) 939-5346
FX: (815) 939-5071
 

>>> "Glenn Morton" <glennmorton@entouch.net> 1/31/2005 9:35:26 PM >>>

1-31-05
Charles wrote: "So should we decide that Genesis 1-11 is historical
just so that we can "win the war" against creationists? Whether or not
Gen. 1-11 is historical should be decided based on the best that
scholarship can afford, not whether or not it pleases the laity (who is
that in this discussion anyway?), should it not? I guess I don't get
your point. "
 
 
You can do what you want. But I just sent something close to this to a
friend tonight. I will change some things a bit but the concept remains
the same:
 
You are correct that one can paint oneself into a corner IF one isn't
prepared to change views when new data comes in. The problem I have with
all the approaches to apologetics is that they seem to do everything to
avoid error in the Bible. I was shown a new technology in reservoir
simulation (the area I manage now) which illustrates the issue. I am
going to use an equation which ought to be familiar to a
geologist--Archies Equation. For those who don't know this equation
relates the resisitivity of a formation to the porosity.

Ro/Rw = F = 1/Phi^2
Where Ro is the Resistivity of a water saturated rock, Rw is the
resisitivity of the water itself, and Phi is the porosity of the rock.
For an oilman, porosity is king, or almost so. A high porosity means
that there is lots of volume to hold the oil. Now, we can simplify
Phi^2 = Rw/Ro
Now, Assume I know the porosity of the rock from core work, or maybe
God told me the porosity of the rock. Let's give it a really nice number
like 35%. I measure Rw and Ro and it doesn't divide out to 35% so what
do I do? Well I can assume that Rw is an erroneous measurment or I can
assume that Ro is an erroneous measurment. I can change one of them and
preserve my pre-existing concept of what the porosity is. This is what
we call cheating in Texas, but maybe in other parts of the country this
is normal. By protecting the above value of Phi, we are saying that that
my view of the porosity can't be wrong. It is an infallible value. It
is, like the Bible, error free in both math and measurment. In other
words we have adjustable constants which conveniently can hide any
problem.
The YECs maintain the truth of the Bible by denying everything that
violates their interpretation of the Bible. In the above analogy they
would say that the equation is uniformitarian in nature and thus is to
be ignored--God told us the value of the porosity. If observation comes
up with another value, that is placing man's reasoning above God.
The general TE approach is to maintain the truth of the Bible by making
every ridiculous statement they think they see, metaphorical. Talking
snakes are out (and a wee bit embarassing). In the above example, it is
equivalent to changing Ro or Rw to get the right answer---e.g. the Bible
is always true even if the Bible says that human noses have no bugers,
it can be 'adjusted' to be metaphorical and thus the Bible is still
'true'. It didn't mean actual bugers but spiritual bugers. I find that
kind of fix, well, circular and thus would rather expose the Bible to
actually being falsified. If I can't come up with a reasonable
explanation that fits the facts of history, science and what the
Scripture says, then the Bible SHOULD be called false and I should go
look for another religion. But that seems to be what both sides gag
on--they don't want anyone leaving the faith so they 'fix' the value of
Ro and/or Rw or simply ignore the equation altogether. Heads Christians
win; tails the non-believers lose. yippeee! How logical.
You wrote:For clarity in my mind - what are these views of your that
"people don't like"?
They don't like just about everything. They don't like how I form Adam,
they don't like the fact that I don't accept the Mesopotamian flood
concept but place Adam way back in time. they don't like where and when
I place the flood. From the TEs I am said to be too literal; from the
YECs, I am called apostate, heretic, like my father Satan etc. because I
believe that the Bible teaches evolution. If you want to see what my
views are, I would suggest two web pages for a start:
http://home.entouch.net/dmd/synop.htm and
http://home.entouch.net/dmd/daysofproclamation.htm
There are lots of theology papers at
http://home.entouch.net/dmd/theo.htm
Now hide and watch the reaction. I have been this road many many
times. :-)
 
Received on Tue Feb 1 00:20:36 2005