Re: Firmament and the Water above was [asa] Re: Slug

Again my replies are in brackets {}.

Shalom
George
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
----- Original Message -----
From: "Glenn Morton" <glennmorton@entouch.net>
To: "'George Murphy'" <gmurphy@raex.com>; <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Sunday, June 18, 2006 9:31 AM
Subject: RE: Firmament and the Water above was [asa] Re: Slug

> -----Original Message-----
> From: George Murphy [mailto:gmurphy@raex.com]
> Sent: Monday, June 19, 2006 7:36 AM
> To: Glenn Morton; asa@calvin.edu
> Subject: Re: Firmament and the Water above was [asa] Re: Slug

> Thanks for a textbook example of chutzpah. You think you can
> get inside my
> head and tell me what I "want" even though I tell you it
> isn't what I want.
> Then you that ask that I "withdraw" my statement with no
> attention at all to
> the nuances I've given it. I've never said that your flood
> speculation is
> untestable in principle.

Well, I don't know how on earth to take what you said except as I did. If
this is a correction fine. But you are the one who said:
"Accepting as evidence pseudo-historical scenarios which in practice can
never be tested is an even easier way."

What exactly does it mean that it "can never be tested?" How can you now
say that you 'never said that [my] flood speculation is untestable in
principle.' ? You said exactly that.

Do you not remember what you write from hour to hour? If you believe my
views are untestable, then stand firm and defend it, but don't change a few
hours later. This question is different than asking how likely it is that my
views are correct. If you had said it would be unlikely that I would be
verified, I would have no quarrel with you, but you said, what you said.

> Of course a core in the right place
> might bring up
> an artifact like the log from "Noah's" ark if your scenario
> was correct but
> the possibility is so remote that your concordism is in
> practice safe.

Well that is quite a different thing from your erroneous statement that it
wasn't testable, which you now have denied saying.

{I had said "Accepting as evidence pseudo-historical scenarios which in
practice can
never be tested is an even easier way." Did you not see the qualification
"in practice"?}

 & I
> think it's interesting that you always want to talk about
> your "Noah" guess
> instead of your "Adam" one which is even more fantastic.

George, I am only using the conventional definitions of testability. I
don't care what you want. I do care that my views are testable. If you have
forgotten science since you left it, that isn't my problem.

I would also ask you what is the verse in scriture which tells us what Adam
looked like. It always amazes me that people give lip service to God taking
an ape and inserting a soul in it, but the only acceptable time frame is
within the past few thousand years (which seems strange given all the
opposition to YEC) and he better not look like an ape. And y'all call
yourselves evolutionists!

{If you'll read my recent PSCF article you'll see that I explicitly do not
commit myself to any particular date at which the 1st humans, in a
theological sense,
appeared. In fact, I cite your arguments about Bilzingsleben in note 41.}

>
> BTW I don't know if you got my extended demonstration that I
> don't "want the
> Bible to be false." My spam filter got my copy from the
> list. If you
> didn't get it & want to, let me know.

I don't use a spam filter. I think I got it.

> We've gone through this over & over. What frustrates me
> about the whole
> thing is your refusal to say anything about your own
> theological position
> or, for that matter, why you're a Christian. You wave off
> references to the
> cross & resurrection of Jesus & evidence for their
> historicity in an almost
> contemptuous way. You berate everyone who thinks he/she
> can hold an
> intelligent version of the Christian faith without accepting
> the historical
> character of Genesis but you make no attempt to explain how
> you think one is
> supposed to get from Genesis to distinctively Christian
> faith. You expect
> everyone else to present an argument for Christianity that meets your
> standards of evidence but you refuse to do that yourself.

My theological position is that religion better be TRUE. It can't be false.
The more falsity we impart to religion the less I believe it. I don't
believe the Greek Gods because they fornicated like bunny rabbits and I
don't think of God in that fashion. I wouldn't believe in a God who speaks
nothing but observational nonsense like many seem to. Why would I want to do
that? Religion better be true or it isn't worth the time we spend on it.
That is my theological position. I don't have a name for it. I feel certain
that you do. :-)

Why am I a Christian? Because I think it might actually be true. I
couldn't do as you and others do and be a christian in spite of how
observationally false you believe the Bible is. I have always felt that
following the logic was the best approach, and to revel in falsity of the
scripture (as some have but not you) have done recently seems to reveal a
profound lack of logic. I mean after all, celebrating that the Bible is
observationally false but believing it anyway. What illogic.

And I know you don't like me saying that you want the Bible to be
observationally false, but I keep coming back to the point that someone who
really doesn't want that tries to concord things. You don't. Logic tells me
that people fight for what they truly believe. If they don't care, they
don't fight. Clearly you care about your views, cause you fight for them,
but your views include that the Bible is observationally false and that
makes you appear to be fighting for that position. I simply don't know how
to run the logic chain in any other direction.

Of course, I have indicated that for about 10 years, but you want me to be
like you--hold to a Bible which has more factual holes than swiss cheese but
admiringly tell everyone how the holes don't matter. I can't do that. I
can't see why I should strive for observational truth in my small area of
scientific expertise and then on Sundays say observational truth doesn't
really matter. I have been there and done that as a YEC, living one way
Monday through Friday and then on weekends and evenings believing different
things.. I won't return to that kind of behavior. IF that is what is
required to be a Christian, then I don't want to be one.

As to your comment about the historical Genesis, I bet in your heart of
hearts you think the Mormons are poor deluded folk who can't see the fact
that their religion is hopelessly historically false, telling us of a
history that didn't happen. I bet you also think that the Scientologists
are a bit wacky because they have been taken in by a modern science fiction
writer. If you think these religons are true, please correct my
misperception. If you do think they are false because of their poor
observational concordism, isn't that nothing more than standing in a glass
house and throwing stones? (by the way a concordist can interpret Glass
Houses in a non-literal way).

{Sorry but this doesn't tell me anything. Your "theological position is
that religion better be TRUE"? Any Muslim, Hindu &c would say the same.
That's at best a meta-statement of your philosophy of religion. You're a
Christian "because [you] think it might actually be true"? What is "it"? I
don't know what you think it means to be a Christian other than that the
Bible is "true" & a Jehovah's Witness or Mormon would endorse that
statement.

Let me show you where I'm trying to go with this. A person who holds
anything like traditional Christian faith believes that because of the life,
death & resurrection he is freed from fear of death, his guilt is taken
away, or his life is given meaning - or some combination of the 3. (I'm
following Tillich's analysis.) Christians even claim to have some
"knowledge" that such things are the case. Why? There is historical
evidence related to those claims - about Jesus & the history in which he's
embedded - but not historical evidence for the faith claims made about the
meaning of Jesus for the person who believes in him. & if a person holds to
your criteria, he/she can never accept those faith claims!

What you seem to do is to focus singlemindedly in public on historical
evidence for Genesis, rejecting any reference to the meaning conveyed by
distinctively Christian claims. Then, having convinced yourself that you're
the only one holding to a tough & objective religious position you privately
believe things that you simply can't get to in your tough & objective way.
Or maybe not. Maybe you really do think that Christianity is a collection
of true historical facts & that's it, though I hope that's not the case.}

> Is it really possible? Yes, I guess maybe it is. Perhaps I
> have to explain
> the joke. I was parodying your "Adam" pseudo-concordism. I
> guess it was
> too much to hope that you would see how absurd it was rather
> than going off
> on a solemn argument about the Rahab texts.

Given that that post was about Rahab, and I didn't see a mention of Adam, it
is hard to see how it is a parody of Adam. Maybe I am congenitally dumb,
but Rahab as a proxy for Adam seems a wee bit of a post hoc stretch. Maybe
it went over my head; maybe you didn't communicate worth a bucket of warm
spit.

{Or maybe you're tone deaf when it comes to literature. You've said before
that you don't appreciate fiction - I recall long ago you mentioning The
Lord of the Rings in particular. You're smart, you understand the words,
but you just don't get the music. (I know that "literature" is a grandious
term for my little joke but it's technically correct.) It would be
interesting to know how many others who read my "converting" post did or
didn't realize that it was a parody. (Others, email me privately if you
wish.)

Did you actually believe that I thought that stuff was true? A mutant
intelligent dinosaur?

& I think that's part of your problem in reading the Bible. All the signs
of hyperbole, humor, &c in Jonah go right past you. It can't be "true" if
it's "just" fiction

The parody was of your _method_. & BTW, I don't think that the Rahab
passages are "accomodation" in the sense in which we've been using the term.
That was part of the setup for the parody.}

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Received on Mon Jun 19 07:57:33 2006