Apes vs. Man What are your thoughts??

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That is my problem right now, I'm not sure if Jesus was misquoted or if he was just not right.

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If he was misquoted then the NT is a sham. If he was wrong, then he's not much to place your faith in for salvation. The manuscript evidence for the New Testament far outweighs any piece of historic literature. The New Testament has far better textual support than do the works of Plato, Aristotle, Herodotus, or Tacitus, whose contents no one seriously questions. Sir Frederic Kenyon, former Director of the British Museum, comments: "The interval between the dates of the original composition and the earliest extant evidence [i.e. our oldest manuscripts] becomes so small as to be negligible, and the last foundation for any doubt that the scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written has now been removed."

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So as a person who is very evidence-based I guess the bible doesn't offer a very good case

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Can I assume that you don't believe in the virgin birth or the resurrection?To LudvanB:

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they wont present any evidence however and when you will present evidence of flaws in biblical statements,they'll just re-interpret them to mean something different.

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Sorry if I mis-understand. Are you saying that if you find what appears to be a flaw in a biblical statement, a YEC will help you try to understand the passage more clearly? Or do you really mean that as someone who discounts the Bible you are better qualified to interpret its meaning?

Ah, so you have faith in the infallibility of the Bible. So you also have faith in the hundreds of people that have translated the Bible for you. Including corrupt Church authorities and politically saavy Roman emperors?Since when did the Bible become the fourth member of the Godhead? It seems to be headed in that direction.

[QUOTE][b]In every one of these cases the fact that something was written in the Bible was treated as a guarantee that it was true. [/QUOTE][/b]That's how Jesus put off premature execution, whenever the priests challenged him he confounded them with Scripture. [QUOTE][b]Matthew 21:42[/QUOTE][/b]Refers to Messianic prophecy, not Creation. [QUOTE][b]John 5:39[/QUOTE][/b]Deals with Messianic prophecy, not Creation. [QUOTE][b]Matthew 22:29[/QUOTE][/b]Is a rebuttal of the priests for their corruption, selling things in the temple, etc. Not Creation.

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Mark 14:49

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Refers to Messianic prophecy, not Creation. [QUOTE][b]The fact that something was predicted in the Bible was, for Jesus, enough to guarantee that it would happen.[/QUOTE][/b]The Bible did not exist in the time of Jesus. [QUOTE][/B]Luke 24:25[/QUOTE][/B]Refers to Messianic prophecy, not Creation. [QUOTE][b]The sum of these statements is to show how Jesus taught that the scriptures to which he had access were inspired by God and were fully authoritative.[/QUOTE][/b]Fully authoritative at the time perhaps, but not necessarily literally correct. The parable of the prodigal son may be "fully authoritative" but that doesn't mean it literally happened. [QUOTE][b]no part is omitted, which shows that Jesus accepted all of it as God's word.[/QUOTE][/b]And what Jesus said is God's word. But not all that Jesus said actually happened, he used parables. [QUOTE][b]The way that the quotations are used shows that Jesus did not only accepted them as moral guides. He also accepted the Old Testament descriptions of history[/QUOTE][/b]Aside from references to people which were smitten and prophecies that refer to him in particular, Jesus doesn't spend a lot of time talking about history. And the references to Sidon, Tyre, Sodom, and Gomorrah, and the people of Noah's time, are in the context of comparing them to his contemporaries, ie, "If you thought they had it bad you just wait till you see what's waiting for you...", much like the story of that prodigal son or the gardener whose heirs were murdered by his tenets so that they could take his grapes. [QUOTE][b]and its prediction of events yet to come.[/QUOTE]All the prophecies you mentioned were in relation to him. Creation was, strangely, absent. [QUOTE][B]Jesus believed every part of the Scriptures to be inspired and that no part of the Bible can be ignored. If we are to be true followers of Jesus, true Christians, we must accept the teachings of Jesus.[/QUOTE][/b]Accepting the teachings is not the same as accepting everything he said as being literal. See Matthew 13:13. The importance of any religious instruction is in the moral, not the story. That's why Jesus taught in parables rather than specifics. Why then is Creation not a parable?Finally, Jesus spoke of Genesis as well. [QUOTE][b]Matthew 19:3—6[/QUOTE][/b]Is not an endorsement of Genesis but the obvious fact that people were made as males and females.Also remember that he was answering to the learned priests, so naturally he would demonstrate that he knew Scripture, and would do his best to use their own material against them. [QUOTE][b]Luke 17:26—32[/QUOTE][/b]Used Noah as a parable, and the people as a comparison to the generation of his time. That might as well have been a reference to fictional literature, the same point would have been conveyed. Since it was a comparison, he did not state that it actually happened. Compare this to his other parables. [QUOTE][b]John 5:46—47[/QUOTE][/b]Is another reference to Moses' Messianic prophecy, not Creation. Though it was supposedly written by Moses, it still is probably allegory. If Jesus can use parables, so can prophets. [QUOTE][b]If you can't bring yourself to believe the Old Testament then you must believe that Jesus was either misquoted or lying.[/QUOTE][/b]I think you are misquoting him. I also think that you should not view the whole Bible as being intended literally.

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Originally posted by Punisher:
Sorry if I mis-understand. Are you saying that if you find what appears to be a flaw in a biblical statement, a YEC will help you try to understand the passage more clearly? Or do you really mean that as someone who discounts the Bible you are better qualified to interpret its meaning?

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No,i am saying that the Bible is clearly and without question the work of a PRIMITIVE culture whose superstitious beliefs fill almost every pages of this book. If it is the writen word of God,its impossible to tell because of all the obvious cultural and ignorant bias cluttering it. There is some wisdom in there somewhere but most of it is primitive mythology. I see no more reason to believe in 6 day magical creation and global floods to punish mankind than i do to believe in greek Gods or Norse mythology and until someone can bring me scientific evidence that would lend credence to YEC,its unlikely that my position would change on the subject.

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Originally posted by mark24:

Schraf, Joz,

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The "defective" gene has a 32 base pair deletion & about 10% of the caucasian population has that gene. It is a co-dominant gene, meaning if you are homozygous (have two of the mutant genes) you are even better protected against developing full blown AIDS. As Joz says, only 1% ish of caucasians get the double whammy protection (due to homozygosity). This rather puts paid to the idea that HIV/AIDS is a punishment from God, when there's a protection passed on genetically, itself subject to the random vagaries of mate selection.

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The gene is very rare in other races, meaning the 32 base pair deletion occurred after the migration from africa. It is thought that the genes relatively high frequency could not be a result of AIDS, but must be a result of selective pressure due to other pathogens.

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Mark

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Like, cool.

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Originally posted by LudvanB:
No,i am saying that the Bible is clearly and without question the work of a PRIMITIVE culture whose superstitious beliefs fill almost every pages of this book.

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Sorry Ludo, that's rubbish. There are undoubtedly primitive elements in the Bible, but there are also elements of great sophistication, for example the Gospel of John which is profoundly informed by the contemporary Graeco-Roman philosophy of the time. Much of the poetry in the Psalms and the Song of Songs is sophisticated indeed for its time, and the religious expositions of say, the Book of Job, is a subtle and sophisticated moral fable which moral philosophers and writers still find of significance today.[b] [QUOTE]I see no more reason to believe in 6 day magical creation and global floods to punish mankind than i do to believe in greek Gods or Norse mythology and until someone can bring me scientific evidence that would lend credence to YEC,its unlikely that my position would change on the subject.[/b][/QUOTE]For sure, hold that opinion of YECs and their literal mangling of the books of the Bible, but don't let that blind you to the depth and power of the salvation history it contains, its moral and religious expositions, and the beauty of its poetry.

My comment was directed at the more technical(read:scientific) elements of the Bible,most of whom are innacurate or downright wrong and absurd. But you are right of course...as a treatese of philosophy,it does have great value. It is not however a codex of real life historical accounts and those who claim otherwise are simply advertizing their own ignorance.

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Originally posted by Fred Williams:

To summarize, when scientists compare DNA between humans and simians, they arrive at a mutation rate that requires at least 40 offspring per couple average through the lineage! A recent study cited by evolutionist Scott Page yields a requirement of ~250!

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Surely the calculations in the article you provided a link to
suggest that any offspring has a 1 in 40 chance of NOT being
subjected to a deliterious mutation, rather than that 40 offspring
would be required for this.The odds aren't stacked that badly in favour.Could you tell me how 'bad mutation' rates are calculated,
and how we detect 'good mutations' to suggest that they are more
rare ?I also noted that in the article you cited a 25 year generation.
What basis is there for this. In more primitive cultures (and even
not so long ago in western history) girls were normally expected
to start producing children much younger than 25.In prehistoric times one would tend to expect females to produce
offspring from the onset of sexual maturity at 11-14 (if the ages
were as now). Would this have an effect on the analysis ?And how do we know anything of the life-spans, sexual maturity, and
mutation rates in now extinct populations ?

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[This message has been edited by Peter, 03-01-2002]

Since the originating biology thread is still strong I think maybe we should yield to them.

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Allison: 1) Why is it that, even though you admit to having minimal scientific knowledge, you feel comfortable dismissing the Theory of Evolution? If you dismiss it on religious grounds, I have no complaint, but to make the kind of statements from personal incredulity that you have implies that you also somehow are attempting to object to the Theory on logical grounds, even though you admittedly do not know much about it.

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I admit to not being a scientist;

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I also admit to not being a scientist.

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not that I am ignorant of the subject. My name is not Richard Petty but I can drive a car. My position of YEC comes from both my religious position and my study of the subject.

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I think that your driving analogy is not quite right.I think a better one is, "you can drive a car but you really don't know how the engine, transmission, or suspension, etc., work. Nonetheless, you feel comfortable holding strong opinions about exactly how to perform auto repairs.At any rate, why don't you explain what study of Biology you have done which hasn't been from a religious source?

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Allison: 2) Since you are using the word "kind" in what seems to be a somewhat scientific sense, perhaps you can define "kind" for me.

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What I really want to be able to do is to know how (what parameters and criterion to use) to tell one "kind" from another.

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Do you think a chicken and a pig are the same kind?

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I could answer this in many ways, but I'll choose two.1) Yes. They are both of the same 'warm-blooded vertebrate' "kind".2) You didn't answer the question. You answered my question about exactly which criterion to use to determine what "kind" an animal is by basically asking me to make up my own criterion.Specifically, are a chimp and an orangutan the same kind, [b]and how do you know without using the Bible?[b][QUOTE]Do you think an ape and a human are the same kind? What criterion would you use?quote: If you want to use the word "kind" in a descriptive, scientific way, first you must define it.[QUOTE]

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Perhaps we should define "kind" as those species which can reproduce together.

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If this is your definition, then we have observed the evolution of new kinds. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.htmlNow, do you want to change your definition of "kind"?

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I would say that a dog 'kind' and a cat 'kind' are two different 'kinds' because they cannot produce offspring together. Would you agree?

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Sure, if that's how you want to define it.

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So, apes and humans are different kinds.

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Actually, it is not known if apes and humans could reproduce or not, so you cannot say that they are different kinds.Also, ability to reproduce does not address other criterion, such as the field of genetics.How do you account for the shared identical retroviral inserions in both the human and chimp genomes? Are you going to ignore this evidence?

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As stated earlier, although we see great variety within a 'kind' of species, there is no evidence to suggest that there is an evoulution to a different 'kind'.

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Wrong, as you have defined "kind". We have observed speciation. Here is a single example: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html"Three species of wildflowers called goatsbeards were introduced to the United States from Europe shortly after the turn of the century.
Within a few decades their populations expanded and began to encounter one another in the American West. Whenever mixed populations occurred, the species interbred (hybridizing) producing sterile hybrid offspring. Suddenly, in the late forties two new species of goatsbeard appeared near Pullman, Washington. Although the new species were similar in appearance to the hybrids, they produced fertile offspring. The evolutionary process had created a separate species that could reproduce but not mate with the goatsbeard plants from which it had evolved."------------------
"We will still have perfect freedom to hold contrary views of our own, but to simply
close our minds to the knowledge painstakingly accumulated by hundreds of thousands
of scientists over long centuries is to deliberately decide to be ignorant and narrow-
minded."-Steve Allen, from "Dumbth"

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[Actually, it is not known if apes and humans could reproduce or not, so you cannot say that they are different kinds]Why is it that we don't know this yet?? Moral Ethical Reasons??
I think that would be an interesting experiment to conduct. Then of course you would have to deal with the repercussions if the two species could interbreed. Would they produce a fertile or a sterile offspring?? And if it were fertile then would it be a sub-species of human or Ape?? Just thinking out loud, but interesting none the less

Bucane: I think you're right - there would be no intrinsic reason why such an experiment could not take place. Since to the best of my knowledge it HASN'T, there must be some extrinsic reason. My guess is your thoughts about moral, ethical, etc proscriptions are probably correct.

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Originally posted by bucane:
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[Actually, it is not known if apes and humans could reproduce or not, so you cannot say that they are different kinds]

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Why is it that we don't know this yet?? Moral Ethical Reasons??[/QUOTE]

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Yes, exactly.

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[QUOTE]I think that would be an interesting experiment to conduct. Then of course you would have to deal with the repercussions if the two species could interbreed. Would they produce a fertile or a sterile offspring?? And if it were fertile then would it be a sub-species of human or Ape?? Just thinking out loud, but interesting none the less[/b]

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Dunno, but we do have different numbers of chromosomes (chimp and human) so we would probably produce infertime hybrids.

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[This message has been edited by schrafinator, 03-03-2002]

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Originally posted by schrafinator:
Dunno, but we do have different numbers of chromosomes (chimp and human) so we would probably produce infertime hybrids.

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True, but the differing number of chromosomes is not as significant as it first appears. The evidence is very strong that human chromosome 2 is comparable to a fusion of chimpanzee chromosomes 2p and 2q.

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See http://www.gate.net/~rwms/hum_ape_chrom.html

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Unfortunately my technical expertise is insufficient to let me copy the diagram into this post, but I highly recommend the figure on the web page - it's worth its thousand words.

schrafinator:What is an "infertime hybrid"??