Bullet Points

Happy birthday!

Happy Birthday! Glad you were born.

How old are you now?

this is twitter calling… we want you.

Happy Birthday to you….

Happy birthday, mate! I’d send you cash, but… I’ve got college to pay for, plus I’m looking at a bass in the music shop in Springfield…
Oh, and it sucks not having internet… fortunately, I’m getting cable internet very soon! Not only is it better than no net at all, it’s also better than my old 768k DSL service (5.3 megabits better, in fact). I hope your internet situation is fixed soon too…

Oooh I’m late on this one but happy birthday just the same!

Happy Birthday. Sorry I’m late saying that. I’ll be returning to the US in September. Hope to see you when I get to visit SC.

Jonathan Hall

Happy birthday man… 22 years, eh? What great life lessons have those 22 years taught you?

I feel like a bad person for neglecting the blog for so long. ”

No, you are a bad person because you think you have to tend to this blog every minute of the day, because you are obsessed with an ignorance of your own faith, and feel that the best way to alliviate yourself of the angst of that struggle by making everybody else in range of your words suffer with the same confusion and ignorance. Forget about trying to figure out the creationist problem by using any of the current theories man. You’ll save yourself years of time and lots of spitual agony, unless you are a freaking christian masochist and just love getting abused by child-fucking priests and money-hungry pastors.

Go back to the basics, actually forget it, just give up. Unless you have someone to teach you the basics, you ain’t ever going to get it. I had one of the best mentors in the world and it took me 20 years to understand the basics, and then to move on to solving real issues.

Christinaity is based on false doctrines (for example they have no meaningful doctrine of creation, which ought to be one of the first principles). Example: if you sat down with an unbeliever and opened the Bible to Genesis 1, and they said, “okay, show us your doctrine of creation like a scientist would show us his,” and you would be bankrupt on page one. But you don’t believe that. ou keep telling yourself the empty rhetoric you espouse somehow has deep meaning. It doesn’t. Not to materialists. They want to know by reason why you believe in a traditional cosmogony, and if you can’t supply that explanation which you cannot, nor can any of your christian counterparts), they will write you off as just another uneducated superstitionist.

Second, christianity has no doctrine of free-will. Christianity, ALL OF IT, preaches forms of determinism like double predestination and foreknowldge arguments. They are so blind with stupidity they can’t see their own logical fallacies in the arguments.

without a doctrine of free-will, determinism eliminates the God-hypothesis as a contender, and neo-Darwinism is the only possible theory left to believe in that matches the data of nature at every turn.

The elements themselves will cause you to reject your God.

And without thinking through the consequences of your own theology, you contribute to the damnation of fellow human beings. But you won’t believe that. you won’t take responsibility for that. You’ll laugh at that, and continue on sowing confusion as others follow you like a drunken sailor through the streets, looking for your ship which eludes you.

Whatever, man. I could go on and on, like how christianity teaches the Cross as the center of Christian doctrine. Wrong. That’s why there is no free-will doctrine in christianity. If Adam really could have chosen to obey, the Cross would never have happened. But because they teach that God foreordained Christ to go to the cross, even before he decreed to create man (that’s how the decrees work, look it up), there can be no free-will. Don’t look to foreknowldge, that’s a false doctrine taught by those who didn’t like the implications of double predestination, and so created a teaching that is nothing more than the same thing, with a false caveat of foreknowledge. Immutability however destorys that option, but these guys (the arminian theologians) are not very good theologians. but people still mimic their stuff and think they have solved the problem. Thus, even the great doctrine of the Cross is undefendable by christians, because they don’t know their own faith system well enough to defend it properly. BTW, the Incarnation is the central doctrine, or should have been, and you can solve all these problems through Incarnational Theology, but Christianity believes in it’s own infallibility of the Church, so instead of admitting the mistakes and fixing them, they just thumb their nose at truth and carry on passing out the money plates and screwing their neighbor’s wives.

Only good doctrine sanctifies people dude, not false doctrine. You want holiness from me? You want me to stop cursing and being so blunt? Tell the pastor to stop fucking his sister-in-law. tell thse two youth pastors to stop molesting teens in their homes for five years while the dumbass christians in the church claim they never noticed. Tell the Creationist money-changers to stop lying to millions of people just to keep selling their books, even when they know their assertions have been proven wrong by scientists, and admitted such more than 15 years or 25 years ago. Yet they sell the false arguments perpetually, infecting whole generations of christians to regurgitate and confuse themselves. Tell the officers of the churches to stop enriching themselves by taking $500,000 and million dollar salaries off their churches, and on top of that spend the tihes of their members on luxury vacations (meetings), liquor (which they tell their members to not touch), prostitutes, jewlery, and huge retirement packages and paid for mansions, etc. etc

eah, tell the priests to stop buggering the kids, and tell the cardinals to stop shuffling the pedophiles to other parishes so they can do it again, and tell, tell, tell, tell……..

Youn wonder why I’m pissed? You want to talk about creation to unbelievers? With all that going on and with no sound doctrine and no creative theology? What the fuck are you thinking?

Judge thyself dude, don’t even look to me to throw any criticism. A little colorful language is the least of what I imagine throwing at you pricks.

Because you are ignorant of how much damage christians like you are doing, led by older christians just like you, I’ll let it slide. You are 22 years old. You know NADA about this subject, dude.

Christianity has created a serious impediment to the understanding of believers (their sanctification process) and to the salvation of unbelievers.

You don’t want to know what I think we should do with those whom you mentioned i’m railing against, but just imagine that I place them in the same category as radical liberals and communists, of which half or more of the Congress is comprised of.

I’ve personally killed more communists in my lifetime than you could comfortably count, in Latin America, Africa, and Asia. You ever killed a man, young buck? You ever snuffed out his lights as he was looking you right in the eyes, and you knew that he knew you were sending him to eternity?

Let me tell you what you see in his eyes, two things:

1) surprise

2) horrific fear

This is just a hobby to you. So you think you can afford to fuck around with it.

It isn’t a game, it’s life and death. Let me give you some advice young man,

DON’T TRY TO TEACH OTHER PEOPLE BEFORE YOU KNOW MORE THAN THEY DO, BEFORE YOU KNOW YOU ARE RIGHT AND INSPIRED TO DO SO.

Good answer. Ok, you start. Let’s pretend I’m God, or an agent of God, say like an angel or something. You are….you. You are a curious, um…son of a gun. You have questions, I have answers. There’s a catch. You are allowed to question the answers, but only as it relates to a new question. Start pontificating like you know something and the heavens will return to brass and you’ll return to being just one more unenlightened christian numnut.

For example, question one 1. God (or, Mr. Angel), the physical record of the cosmos appears to contradict the testimony of scripture (give a specific example). Why is this?

Answer – XXXXXXXXX Second Question 2. Well, God (or Mr. Angel), that contradicts the supposition given by X creationist model (give a specific example). What about their belief or supposition is in error?

I don’t have any weird agenda here about using the God/angel thing, I just thought it would be fun, and take you out of your comfortable, falsely polite little boxes so you can think a little instead of regurgitating more stuff you’ve memorized by the false prophets of churchianity.

wHAT WOULD YOU ASK, MY SON?

Good question. The answer to that question is on the prohibited list of knowledge allowed for human consumption, sort of like asking me, “Do I exist” and providing you with evidence for such existence. If I were to do the latter, I would remove a necessary part of the Gospel requirement for human beings to believe by faith and repent of their sins based on that faith that I eaist and they are in need of redemption based on my Word. Without human ignorance of certain facts of the universe in which they live, my system of communication with man will break down their free will, and thus will negate their humanity. If you want to ask “what about Adam and Eve, they knew you. Did they have free will? What about angels?” ask it in another question, only one at a time.

Now to your topic. I’m going to make an exception in your case, as long as you promise not to tell anyone else. Otherwise I’ll have to kill you, like having some bears run out of the woods and eat you on your front lawn one day or something spectacular like that. Or maybe I’ll go the opposite way and just have you choke on a chicken bone. The problem with your question is that it shows an ignorance of the difficulty of answering your question based on reference. Which calender could I possibly use as a reference to give you the answer you want? If you know anything about the nature of human measurement of time, you’ll understand my response. You’re likely to stupidly (and dangerously I might add) accuse the omniscient Deity of the universe of being wrong because you lack critical thinking skills.

List of calendars
Main article: List of calendars
Anno Domini Christian Era
Aztec Calendar
Bahá’í calendar
Bengali calendar
Buddhist calendar
Calendar of saints
Chinese calendar
Christian calendar
Darian calendar
Discordian calendar
Eastern Orthodox liturgical calendar
Ethiopian calendar
French Republican Calendar
Gregorian calendar
Hebrew calendar
Hindu calendar
Samvat
Iranian calendar
Islamic calendar
Japanese calendar
Julian calendar
Liturgical year
Maya calendar
Malayalam calendar
Nanakshahi calendar (Sikh calendar)
Pawukon calendar of Bali
Perpetual calendar
Runic calendar
Wall calendar
Zoroastrian calendar

Let me help you a little. How about the sidereal calendar?

13.7 billion years isn’t close enough?

Sonny – you’re acting like a madman. Please stop. This is coming from a militant atheist with no compunctions about religion.

Jesus, I offer to answer a question no one else in the christian world dares to answer specifically, and you pass that up?

Who’s the madman?

Asking for a calendar reference is a simple logical and sane thing to start with, dummy, but your tiny brain didn’t recognize the complexity of your own question.

Now, if your friends want to speak for you, I will address them. Otherwise, please continue.

If you’ll excuse me for a few minutes, I have some godlike business to attend to. I have a tropical depression over Mexico I need to dissipate a bit, and there’s also a severe thunderstorm about to hit near Sonny’s house that will produce 60+ MPH winds if I don’t do something about it in a hurry.

I’ll beback after dinner.

In reference to the creation of human beings, how much time (in the terms we use today as specified above) passed between the initial creation of matter/energy and the creation of human beings?

Dumb move changing your mind like that. The answer is 5 days. Or 2 days if you start measuring time at the fourth day Biblical standard of times and seasons (solar, lunar, starlight)

You should have stood pat on your original question, it was a good one, all you needed to do was give me your preferred reference mathematics to answer it. Geez, you are a fickle guy, that would have been an excellent line of questioning, now squandered.

Next question please.

Huh… this guy even has ‘Dawkinsian’ atheists like Ubuntu/Trent and myself puzzled. Sonny, could you please focus on one issue at a time?

Ok, reading over some of this guy’s comments about killing communists and such, I feel pretty well convinced that he’s a troll. I don’t think anyone could fault you for banning him.

I answered the man specifically, on both occasions. what’s your problem with that? Would any scientist do less? Nathan and I are having a discussion. Butt out. When he tires of it, he’ll let me know.

I think Sonny may have some good ideas. I can almost peer through the cloud of his bitterness and see them. But this man cannot communicate those ideas without his anger getting in the way.

I, too, am frustrated with the inequity in some men’s explanations of the doctrines of Christianity. But if I were God, I’d tell Sonney that he is very welcome to reject Me and go his own way. But don’t be bitter with Me because of some ignorant things men say about Me.

Right on, who said I was bitter at God? Where did you get that idea?

Anyway, the point of the first exercize has been lost on these guys I guess, it was simply to accentuate the obvious:

Nathan asked what date and time God created the universe. I can’t very well answer the question specifically without using a calendar reference, it’s impossible. He wasn’t aware of what he was asking, specifically, he was genralizing. If he were actually to ask God the same question, any intelligent being would respond the same way, respond to his question, not assuming he meant one thing or another.

Then he changed his question, and I think he didn’t realize he was changing it. but I answered that question specifically anyway.

I am a six-day creationist who accepts the evolutionary evidence. how I can do that is written in a theory of mine called presuppositional creationism. It is not an evidentialist methodology, it is theology. I show traditionalists how to defend their view of Genesis while conceding the physical evidence supports evolution, which it does.

nathan doesn’t know what he believes. He’s like other christians out there being led by the nose by hucksters who pretend they know something, but who’s evidentialist systems are bankrupt and everyone in the scientific community knows it.

The exercize is to start at Genesis 1 and step by step move into the theology and the evidence to show why it is impossible for creationists to win a debate against evolution. Yet, while I believe that the physical record of the evidence of evolution in the cosmos is a result of the Fall, I do not believe of course, that molecules to men macroevolution has actually occured. But were a darwinist to ask me if I would agree that the evidence shows that fact, I would say absolutely.

Anyway, I think you are the only one so far to get the point, which is not uncommon. There is practically no one out there who really has his mind around the problem with christian doctrine and theories. I DO.

I don’t know when the universe was created, that’s obvious. My point was to start there and have you concede by doing a little research into the problem of human measurement of time even going back just a few millennia. The difficulty of reference is not just a problem of determining which type of calendar to use in such an effort (for Christians that is), but also in that even were we to choose one and set a date of creation, we have no physical references from which to defend such views. For example the Biblical chronology of Ussher was used for many years. But after a time it was concluded that whole generations of descendants are missing from them, thus nullifying any attempt at using biblical lists as reference points.

Yet, clearly the Bible supports a point of creation vastly different from the modern scientific one. So, Christians set out to solve that disparity. Morris, et al, attempted to sidestep the Biblical problems with rtime by generalizing the early dates, and simply called for a supposition of between say, 6-10k years or thereabouts. He then took it upon himself to make the evidence conform to that supposition, rather than letting the evidence speak for itself. This is a self-contradicting materialist view. If you think not, reread his textbooks on flood geology where he states that his suppositions are not based in the Bible, but in materialistic science. Yet if it really was based in the materialist view, he would never have a need to revise the science, and round and round they go.

Other creationists use a different materialist view. They adopt a portion of science’s conclusions and reject others, bifurcating their acceptance based on their biblical compunctions, like the progressive creationists like Hugh Ross. He loves to talk about chemical evolution, but not biological. That’s because his theory breaks down when discussing biological sciences and anthropology. It is literally half a theory. Yet millions of Christians follow it, because he sounds smart.

Framework theologians do the same thing, accepting to bifurcate their acceptance of some science while rejecting other’s, but on what basis they do this is left unsaid.

Presuppositional Creationism, which is solely my invention, does none of these things. It accepts ALL of the science, and figures out why the Bible contradicts that science theologically.

First, we have the problem of the Fall of man. In none of the other theories in creationism is the Fall taken seriously. For example in YEC, the Fall is accepted to have altered the nature of man and the universe, but then practically they forget this provision and talk about the defense mechanisms in animals and insects and claim that God created those mechanisms (“previenient design in nature”). Read their magazines and you’ll see what I mean. But death before the Fall clearly negates clear teachings of scripture. But YEC once again is hypocritical on this view, because the science traps them because of their methodological materialist position on attempting to overthrow evolutionary theory with physical flood geology.

Progressive creationism rejects that the Fall had any effect on the cosmos, and is merely a moral construct. But this is not what the Bible clearly says. THORNS AND THISTLES. That’s clear. Paul said that the creation groans and travails for recreation, this is a dominant theme in John and much of the Old Testament Hebrew theology as well, particularly in Isaiah.

After the Fall, creation underwent significant changes, violence fell upon the earth to the point where God felt it necessary to wipe out the whole thing and start over, to save the line of the Messiah. How much of the physical creation was altered is simply left untold, another one of those things on the list of prohibited knowledge.

The Bible says that Noah’s name means “one who will comfort us from the toil and pain of the curse of the ground.” Not the curse of the flood, mind you, which came from God, but from the curse of the GROUND.

Dinosaurs, trilobites, cavemen, all these things we see in the physical record of the world are alterations of the original “very good” universe that God created. Think of a Black Hole. Hugh Ross loves black holes! Oh they are majestic and wonderful creation of God! Insane! Black holes are a destructive force sucking in other whole galaxies, and if we pretend there are aliens civilizations in those galaxies it accentuates my point! LOL! You think God’s glory is meant to be seen in stars colliding and exploding, and stuff like that?

The processes at work before the Fall were different than after. That’s the clear record of Genesis. To what extent we cannot know because the original reference is GONE, AND WE’LL NEVER SEE IT AGAIN UNTIL AFTER CHRIST RECREATES HEAVEN AND EARTH.

Actually, and let’s not go there right now, it will begin in the Millennium when the rolling back of the curse of sin and of the ground begins to happen. Those points of my theory become an eschatological exercise as well, so when one attempts to change their view from the patently failing ones like YEC or Progressive creationism, one has to realize that they are going to have to revise their views on lots of things as well, theologically speaking. This is not a view meant to challenge materialists, it is meant to challenge Christians who are playing the fool by following these other materialist Christians down a path of getting their asses kicked by evolutionist scientists and educators.

How much evidentialism is righteous in a defense of the Gospel? Paul used a mixture of evidentialism in defending the resurrection. A balanced understanding of the changes in epistemology between Paul’s era and now must be established. Can the resurrection of Christ be proven? Of course not. Would we want to? Of course not. The Gospel calls people to believe by faith in the Spirit’s voice within, that is in their heart. What’s a microscope got to do with that?

By adopting non-biblical methodologies, we are harming the transmission of the Gospel not helping it.

Think about the examples I gave before in other posts, like John the Revelator telling us that the Beast/Antichrist system will gain the fealty of the population at that time by making a statue speak or calling down fire from heaven. That is clear reference to empirical proofs. If we train believing and unbelieving world to believe only in empirical proofs that the church creationists can provide them, we will have set the church up for apostasy in the later days. Empiricism is the enemy. Another reference biblically is Moses and the magicians of Pharoah using the material world to oppose the people of God, they change rods into snakes and so forth. The enemy can use, to some limited degree, the elements themselves to deceive mankind, the Bible teaches.

Yet, we have a problem in this after the Fall/before the Escaton period of law discontinuity. Naturalistic science works. Some of it is good, much isn’t. how do we know the difference? Let’s talk about sanctification. Are microwave ovens sanctified use of God’s created elements? I don’t know, are they?
Are thermonuclear bombs? I don’t think many people would say yes, though I have no qualms killing God’s enemies.

My point is that we live in an age when because of that dang list of stuff that we aren’t allowed to know, Christians cannot play the methodological materialist role and act like they are going to tell the materialist a thing or two. It doesn’t work for them. The materialist is free to go anywhere the data leads him, he has no theological boundaries. The Christian on the other hand does have serious boundaries of theology, and of the physical world contradicting those boundaries, and thus is limited in ways the unbeliever is not.

My theory was posted for over two years on the net, was reviewed by several talk origin scientists and an Oxford historian on creationism for originality and was concluded to be original, not restating some old ideas. Various professors reviewed it for contextual and logical errors and only the area of law discontinuity came up, which I can do nothing about but expand on. I base my theory on rational non-realism, which was the epistemological preference of Thomas Kuhn. One university in Ohio teaches it as part of the valid theories of creationism, but I never published because I wanted to polish it, ended up becoming sick for a number of years, still am, and the whole thing has become a sour point with me. Morris and those jerk offs kept lying right up to the day he died, Hovind is in prison, and yet the websites collecting the money contributions are still there, look them up. It makes me sick. I sacrificed myself because I was concerned for other Christians ability to maintain there traditional beliefs in the absence of a consistent model. I got stomped for it, believe you me. Those guys are lucky I got a family, or they would all be ……well, let’s not go there.

I’m not a crazy, a slouch, I’m a serious man. I just sound nuts sometimes, which when dealing with people who are crazy and try sounding sane, is quite an interesting flip flop. They don’t get it, I do. I ‘m just beat up by Christianity that is hell bent on destroying the testimony of Christ with their frivolous insanity all the while acting all holy when everyone else knows they are full of crap.

Christianity is in serious need of an overhaul doctrinally. The current teachings are patently illogical, and it stunts their ability to deal with both the old world and the new at the same time. They need to be
ret aught or there will be serious consequences for Christians down the road, eschatological speaking.

Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot the Omphalos reference. No, the physical record is not an illusion, to say such would be to negate God’s nature and is patently stupid.

The physical record is a result of the Fall, unfortunately the reference (the original before Fall creation) we would need to quanitfy those diffences are gone. The best we can do is conjecture.

We didn’t get into starlight and time issues, and other interesting things, but you can’t post everything at once.

I realize it’s the holiday weekend and everybody’s out having fun, so i don’t expect to resume any discussions until tuesday, but i wanted to give you a little background. I’m not going to talk much about myself personally, because I’m ill, I don’t want attention, and I’d rather remain anonymous from now until the end.

I began my journey with christianity at age 17, while in the military. Between classified campaigns and home, I was indoctrinated into the world of christian insanity from the pentecostal movement up through working with some of the world’s leading theologians. I educated myself, and through college, all the while until I came to a level of knowledge that enabled me to criticize my own beliefs and those of my christian friends. I was (still am although my mind is becoming more unclear all the time) an expert, one of the best, on comparative christian sects and on the issue of creationism, but I was out of the mainstream in that I was never a part of any group, that was my strength as a believer all of my life was knowing that it was a mistake to get involved in their heirarchy’s or become paid by them, because to do so garuntees one’s inability to break free of self-deception and hypocrisy.

I watched as I pleaded with my relatives who were pastors, and friends who were pastors, get sucked up into movements and churches that became serious manipulators of millions of people, eventually blowing up as their leaders fell into sin and disrepute.

although all the while being right on these issues, my friends and relatives still continue to move from moovement to movement, abusing other christians, and they villify me as ineffectual and uninformed. It is really amazing. They steal from their churches, they commit sexual sins amongst the fellowshipof believers, they deny that they are hypocrites, it is disgusting.

I could rail on, taking you from movement to movement where I have personal experiences from the Catholic Churches to the Discipleship Movement to Pentecostalism to the Saddleback Church-growth Movement (progressive churches, seeker sensitive, whatever), to the Messianic Jewish movement, the Word-Faith Movement, Creationism, etc, God has providentially ordered my life, even as a child, to have been involved in every major movement of the past 40 years.

I have seen it all.

ICR (Institute for Creation Research) was literally in my grandmothers backyard in El Cajon, Ca. Tim Lahaye was pastor at that time when i was a young man first meeting Henry and Duane, and my discussions over the years with them left me an expert on that movement as well as my discussions with other YEC “scientists” such as Andrew Snelling and others. Later on, when I became an editor and religion columnist for a major newspaper I began to publish series of articles by main creationist organizations and authors. Jim Stambaugh (PR guy for ICR then) wrote the YEC positions, Richard Bube of Stanford (professor of materials science) was the leading evangelical theistic evolutionist at the time wrote the theistic evolutionary positions, John Rankin of Harvard wrote the Framework Hypothesis position, Aand i worte the larger piece that tied tham all together in overview of creationist defenses. This was during a critical time when their were several key supreme court cases on creationism going on.

Later, after having been converted to seeing that the materialist evolutionary position was undeniable by Lippert, Izzak, Shcadewald and other people, I set out to discover why the evidence contradicted the Bible, and thus my theory came about.

One thing I have to tell you, between being treated the way I have been treated during my experience in christianity, and knowing how universally the evidence is against christian philosophy and theology, and knowing how badly the church is treating it’s own contraditions, and knowing how universal the ignorance is in christianity……you know what is the ONLY thing keeping me a Christian?

Well, two things. First of all is the strength of my original born-again experience. Things happened to me during that early period of my life tht are impossible to explain naturalistically. But they are personal, they won’t help anyone except myself.

Second, Christian theology interprted correctly, which i know how to do, is absolutely superior to any other philosophical system on earth.

And I always say that if i have to make a choice between choosing the evolutionist universe to live or the Christian, I choose the Christian. The other has no hope, and is a terrible thing to think of.

Living in an evolutionary world is simply unthinkable, I would rather be deluded than accept that “fact.” So i presuppositionally find a way to believe in God’s universe.

But at least i do it HONESTLY.

Oh, sorry, I forgot your question about public schooling. the answer is that we have no alternative method to teach other than the current materialist one. So, it isn’t an issue of equal time, there is no equality possible because no other system is known that tests and utilizes the data.

The current scientific method is desribed as:

Elements of scientific method
There are multiple ways of outlining the basic method shared by all of the fields of scientific inquiry. The following examples are typical classifications of the most important components of the method on which there is very wide agreement in the scientific community and among philosophers of science, each of which are subject only to marginal disagreements about a few very specific aspects.

The accepted definition of the scientific method involves most of the following basic facets:

Observation. A constant feature of scientific inquiry, observation includes both unconditioned observations (prior to any theory) as well as the observation of the experiment and its results.
Description. Information derived from experiments must be reliable, i.e., replicable (repeatable), as well as valid (relevant to the inquiry).
Prediction. Information must be valid for observations past, present, and future of given phenomena, i.e., purported “one shot” phenomena do not give rise to the capability to predict, nor to the ability to repeat an experiment.
Control. Actively and fairly sampling the range of possible occurrences, whenever possible and proper, as opposed to the passive acceptance of opportunistic data, is the best way to control or counterbalance the risk of empirical bias.
Identification of causes. Identification of the causes of a particular phenomenon to the best achievable extent. For cause-and-effect relationship to be established, the following must be established:
Time-order relationship. The hypothesized causes must precede the observed effects in time.
Covariation of events. The hypothesized causes must correlate with observed effects. However, correlations between events or variables are not necessarily indicative of causation.
Elimination of plausible alternatives. This is a gradual process that requires repeated experiments by multiple researchers who must be able to replicate results in order to corroborate them.: All hypotheses and theories are in principle subject to disproof. Thus, there is a point at which there might be a consensus about a particular hypothesis or theory, yet it must in principle remain tentative. As a body of knowledge grows and a particular hypothesis or theory repeatedly brings predictable results, confidence in the hypothesis or theory increases.
Another simplified model sometimes utilized to summarize scientific method is the “operational”:

The essential elements of a scientific method are operations, observations, models, and a utility function for evaluating models.[citation needed]

operation – Some action done to the system being investigated
Observation – What happens when the operation is done to the system
Model – A fact, hypothesis, theory, or the phenomenon itself at a certain moment
Utility Function – A measure of the usefulness of the model to explain, predict, and control, and of the cost of use of it
One of the elements of any scientific utility function is the refutability of the model. Another is its simplicity, on the Principle of Parsimony also known as Occam’s Razor.
The following is a more thorough description of the method. This set of methodological elements and organization of procedures will in general tend to be more characteristic of natural sciences and experimental psychology than of disciplines commonly categorized as social sciences. Among the latter, methods of verification and testing of hypotheses may involve less stringent mathematical and statistical interpretations of these elements within the respective disciplines. Nonetheless the cycle of hypothesis, verification and formulation of new hypotheses will tend to resemble the basic cycle described below.

The essential elements[3], [4], [5] of a scientific method[6] are iterations [7], recursions[8], interleavings, and orderings of the following:

Characterizations (Quantifications, observations[9] , and measurements)
Hypotheses[10] (theoretical, hypothetical explanations of observations and measurements)[11]
Predictions (reasoning including logical deduction[12] from hypothesis and theory)
Experiments[13] (tests of all of the above)

No creationist system can observe, quantify, and utilize the data of nature because they are all suppositionally comitted already to an end result, their claims notwithstanding. Anyone who is versed on this topic and is honest with themselves knows this is true.

However, what can can do is teach classes to Christians about how to think through the ethics, that is God’s ethics, of a given scientific utility. We teach them to think incarnationally, which we haven’t discussed yet, so that they can apprehend what would a godly science look like in a pre-Fall or no-Fall world? In other words, we theach them to think Gods thoughts after Him. how to do that is part of my theory, but I admit that I am limited in my ability to do all this thinking myself, people smarter than I who are not prisoner to the current Christian false system of doctrine would have to oommit their lives to such a philosophy. I think rather than attempting to replace or introduce failed or practically useless creationist models in schools, this would a more useful thing to do. Then as those students grow into full-fledged scientists, perhaps they can deuce better methodologies in the future, or better analysis of the science that science does produce in this fallen world.

Second, Christian theology interprted correctly, which i know how to do, is absolutely superior to any other philosophical system on earth.

And I always say that if i have to make a choice between choosing the evolutionist universe to live or the Christian, I choose the Christian. The other has no hope, and is a terrible thing to think of.

Living in an evolutionary world is simply unthinkable, I would rather be deluded than accept that “fact.” So i presuppositionally find a way to believe in God’s universe.

But at least i do it HONESTLY.

So essentially, Christianity is flat-out untrue and utterly contradicted by the facts, but you choose to believe it anyway because it makes you feel better.

Now, if you mean can I prove christianity to be true, no i cannot. Neither can anybody else, except christ himself. That much is clearly the case, as we have had 2000 years in which for people to do so, and they have never come close.

So yeah, essentially, though my Issac were to be slayed, I believe.

Anything wrong with that?

Please excuse my many misspellings and grammar errors folks, I used to be pretty concerned about all that stuff, now I couldn;t give a shit

Now, surely the people on this bloggerthon are well enough educated to know that we are talking in terms of the larger ontological debate between materialists and presuppsositionalists, namely Christians.

His assertion that “Christianity is flat-out untrue and utterly contradicted by the facts” is of course non-sequitur. In fact, Christianity is by far the most logically and scientifically supported religion on the planet.

1. The Bible is by far and away the most scientifically supported holy book in the world, in terms of the archeological sciences, and the phiolosophical sciences.

2. More of its claimed historical figures have been proven to have existed by archeology and other facts as any other religion.

More world-class philosophers theologians, and scientists have been spawned with a Christian religious unprbringing than any other religion on earth.

4. The world for the past 2,000 years has followed Judeo-Christian theonomy and philosophy, and the clutural arts and classics of the centuries have been based in it’s wisdom.

Just because we are discussing some ontological issues, don’t for a second think I discount the serious nature of Christianity’s contributions to history. Just because the development of theology and science has left christianity temporarily unable to defend itself against “seemingly” bright thinkers such as yourself, you mistake that for weakness. That would be a foolish thing to do, son.

1. The Bible is by far and away the most scientifically supported holy book in the world, in terms of the archeological sciences, and the phiolosophical sciences.

The Qu’ran is actually quite a great deal more historically accurate, and basically all of its truth claims, so far as the physical world is concerned, can be checked. The majority of the Bible’s historical claims have not and likely never can be examined. The Qu’ran, of course, has the advantage of having been written recently, relatively speaking, and of coming from a single source. The degree of historical accuracy in any book claiming to divine perfection matters not, however; either the book is 100% accurate, or it is flawed, which brings its divine origins into serious doubt. The Bible is undoubtedly in the latter category; no serious historian, even among those of the Christian persuasion, considers it entirely accurate.

As far as the philosophical aspects, well, there are frequent and large sections of the book I, and many other people who consider themselves moral, find utterly distasteful. In fact, God himself seems to be very nearly amoral throughout the whole of the old testament up to the book of Isaih.

2. More of its claimed historical figures have been proven to have existed by archeology and other facts as any other religion.

But few other ‘holy’ books deal so heavily in temporal subjects, and as I mentioned previously, practically every temporal character and event in the Qu’ran is known to have existed. Further, The Chronicles of Narnia references a number of real historical personages and events. How much credibility would that lend it, were we to take it as non-fiction, to its segments with talking lions? Absolutely none. The fact that the Bible does reference things that actually happened does not lend any credibility to its other, more outlandish claims.

More world-class philosophers theologians, and scientists have been spawned with a Christian religious unprbringing than any other religion on earth.

Because more people on Earth are Christian than any other religion. So? In the past half-century, more world-class scientists have been non-religious than religious. That doesn’t make atheism more correct. 3000 years ago, more world-class philosophers, theologians, and scientists were pagan. Again, your point?

That would be a foolish thing to do, son.

Please refrain from patronizing me.

This type of apologetics is very cappably handled by any first year theology stsudent, so I feel reasonably certain the fellas here at Nathan Rice can handle you without my help.

I will instead prefer to answer intelligent questions that these guys might have for me, on issues that I can provide a new angle on. While I don’t claim my theory is correct, I do know that it is interesting, and can help people think through issues they have never considered before. I know that because others have told me so, some very smart people I might add.

I’m going to be out of it for awhile later in the day, perhaps for a few days, and unless I can get free wi-fi in the hospital, I may not respond after 4 pm MST. (Arizona time)

This type of apologetics is very cappably handled by any first year theology stsudent, so I feel reasonably certain the fellas here at Nathan Rice can handle you without my help.

Ah, projection… how disappointing. You’ve committed fallacies that anyone with even a passing knowledge of formal logic could spot, and I’m the one who could be handled by a first-year theology student. As they will tell you if you ask, Ben and Nathan are in fact unable to answer a great deal of my theological questions. Matthew and I have quite long and interesting debates, but those are over matters of science rather than theology, which I assume you would not care to engage in as you are so vehemently opposed to Christians engaging scientists on the latter’s intellectual turf. If my ‘apologetics’ are so easy to handle them, why not bend down to my level for a minute and give it a spin?

before i leave, i want to provide you with some food for thought.

First of all, let’s give old George a taste of his own medicine for a moment, just for fun:

Though Bertrand Russell would later question God’s existence, he fully accepted the ontological argument during his undergraduate years:

“ For two or three years … I was a Hegelian. I remember the exact moment during my fourth year [in 1894] when I became one. I had gone out to buy a tin of tobacco, and was going back with it along Trinity Lane, when I suddenly threw it up in the air and exclaimed: “Great God in Boots! — the ontological argument is sound!”
Bertrand Russell

Now let’s move on.

Presuppositional creationism is a difficult concept to get your mind around, but i’d like to help while i’m gone to give you some things to think on your own.

It is so difficult to teach this idea, becaude in order for one to even consider its principles one must

1) be thinking at a high level of apologetics to begin with
2) be aware of the weaknesses of the current creationist theories and be beyond just attempting to defend them because you have nothing else
3) also be aware of the weaknesses in current christian doctrine and not be opposed to looking at alternatives to those doctrines using scripture and reason and eschewing tradition

One of the greatest problems we have as christians is that our leadership utilizes the same tactics of control as most other false systems in this world, they simply stomp out any critical thinking and make you adhere to a traditionalist set of creeds and doctrines. Throw them off. Your salvation is not going to be affected because you seek knowledge about God and his Word that the church hypocrites are not giving you. If you are a solid and educated christian, you’ll know what sounds acceptable and what doesn’t, after you have had time to digest it. You will not be sucked away into cultism, if you are that weak, christianity as it exists won’t help you much anyway, most of it teaches many false doctrines as it is.

Ok, so let’s start:

Let’s imagine for a moment that I’m correct and the other creationist evidentialist models really are bankrupt.

What then?

Well, we would have to come up with some kind of answer, an interim answer let’s say, as to how we can intellectuly maintain a traditionalist view of the Bible’s testimony about creation.

1) what type of apologetic model would you choose, if an evidentialist one were not viable?

To aid you, please read the article on apologetics at wikipedia here is the address: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_apologetics

2) Incarnational theology asks this question: “if adam had obeyed God and not sinned, would the Incarnation still have happened?”

why is this question necessary to start thinking about? Because in order to solve the problem of theodicy that is inherent in the argument of creationism, that is, why we have difficulty proving God’s existence, we must first understand something new about theodicy that christian theology is missing. It did not develop and so we have to think it out ourselves. Part of this involves the some theodicy concerning humanity and free will, angels and free will, the creation and it’s “groaning and travailing” waiting for redemption (Rom. 8). Part of this theodicy involves escahtological issues, which again harkens to the whole idea of if their was no sin, would christ still have Incarnated, and if so, how does that kind of eschtology work itself out? By thinking through from Adam to Eschaton (Parousia), ask yourself the foloowing questions:

1) go through the major events of the Bible and try to imagine what would stay, and what would go, if there was no such thing as SIN.

Look, I’m out of time, believe me this exercize solves problems and my wife is screaming at me to get off and she’s taking me to the hospital now, later guys.

let me give you a quick example

what about work? is work based on sin or not? Adam worked naming the animals (science) before he sinned.

What about sanctification? Is sanctification sin-based or not? When Christ was baptized by John, was it for sin or sanctification?

Ok, she’s really on me now

how about law? Sin-based or not? There was law in the garden before sin wasn’t there? Don’t eat of that tree

You seem to have utterly ignored my points. Exactly what am I supposed to take from the fact that Russell once accepted the ontological argument? What is that intended to convince me of? Surely you do not think it a valid proof of God’s existence?

Well, we would have to come up with some kind of answer, an interim answer let’s say, as to how we can intellectuly maintain a traditionalist view of the Bible’s testimony about creation.

But as an atheist, I am not interested in maintaining a traditionalist view of Genesis, intellectual or otherwise.

Good for you. You are not who I am talking to, because you are just an asshat (atheist). I already said I’m not interested in attempting to convince you one way or another, but I know you will not accept that fact. You will also not be satisfied that I have already conceded the larger issue to you on the materialist superior argument against creationism. No, you’ll keep talking just like the YEC believer keeps arguing with you, figuring that if he can just wear your ass out, you eventually go away. SHUT THE YOU KNOW WHAT UP.

Oh, and with the help of some Wild Turkey and demerol chasers, I’m good for a couple days. I’ll let you know when I’m gonna be out for the count.

You are a very polite person, and a humble man, and I appreciate that, it actually tames me some. I however, have no clue whether you just said I’m banned or what?

Anyway, if creationists would like to respond to my ideas and wish to ask further questions, I’m here, for now. I’ll tow the line with nice people like you, but when challenged by aggression, i tend to fall back on my lessor holy training.

I don’t know what you want, from that post, I’ll just let you guys lead. If you don’t address me specifically, adios amigo.