Books By Creationists?

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However, reading it specifically to debunk it and show where it is wrong, even before opening a single page, and certainly NOT to just understand what creationist actually think, comes by as dishonest to me. (just think of how you would view a creationist reading an evolutionists book with this attitude)

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I don't see why that would be dishonest in itself. Misrepresenting the book to debunk it would be dishonest, but I can't see anything wrong in the intent to debunk the book. And if I would think differently of a creationist it is only through long experience with creationists and their habit of misrepresentation, not because it is inherently wrong to be hostile to the work being read.

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Well what is honest/dishonest is a relative measure, of course, and if you don't see it as dishonest I guess it is your position. I may have a higher threshold of what is honest, because I would certainly view it as a dishonest thing to do.

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But you've offered no reason to consider it dishonest. And without a valid reason, your claim of a "higher threshold" or even that your position is relative would be false (and arguably dishonest).

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But, even then, I would think (personnal speculation here) that the probability of misrepresenting a book is much higher when you have already intended to debunk it even before reading the first page. And so, even if it would not be dishonest in itself, if it does lead to a higher probability of being dishonest about it afterwards, then you could as well consider the act of juding the book by it,s cover a dishonest thing itself.

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I would agree with the first part but obviously not the second which is simply wrong. People who live in deprived urban areas are more likely to commit crimes, but that does not make living in a poor urban area criminal.

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You talk about the creationist bad habit of misrepresentation. Would this be caused, at least in part, by this same habit of wanting to 'debunk' evolution, even before starting reading ?

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I would say that a cavalier disregard for the truth is a more important factor even in that situation. And I wouldn't even call that dishonest per se, even though it is almost certain to lead to misrepresentation.

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And once again, if we take an example from another context, if I, as a scientists, would
review scientific papers with the intention of debunking it even before reading it ? Why would it be dishonest in that case, but not in the other ?

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Has anyone said that it is ? If not then what is the point in raising it ?

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Well, I'll first note that you haven't really offered a whole lot of reasoning also, simply saying ''no I think it wouldn't be dishonest ... ''

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I can hardly refute a reason that you haven't given. So why would I need to give a reason?.

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But beyond that, you quoted my reason to view it as dishonest. If you adopt an attitude that makes it more likely for you to misrepresent it, then that attitude is dishonest, in the sense that it lacks fairness.

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Of course it is not true that that attitude is unfair in itself, so you do not have a valid reason to claim that it is dishonest.And if going into any research with a predetermined idea of the conclusions is dishonest in itself then an awful lot of creationist work is dishonest. Or did you think that the creationists working on the Noah's Ark paper that you cited today expected to show that the Ark was unseaworthy ? And that is if it is honest in every other respect!My position is that at worst it creates a risk of dishonesty, but one that can be resisted.There's no need to cite your other "examples" because just moving the same behaviour into different contexts doesn't change anything. My point remains that honesty and fairness must be judged on the outcome, not the attitude taken going into the investigation. Indeed, your attitude appears to be nothing more than an attempt to prejudge the outcome, and since you will not permit the actual outcome to change your mind it is itself extremely unfair, and if used to dismiss a valid critique it would be a clear example of dishonesty.

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Your example here shows that you do not distinguish the difference I am trying to make between too situations that are similar, but not the same.

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I an not saying coming in with already an idea of the conclusion, is dishonest, I am saying having a firm decision on what the conclusion will at the very beginning is dishonest.

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I'd say that the authors of that paper had a very firm idea of their conclusion. So by your standards I should consider them dishonest, even if there is nothing wrong with their paper.

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And yet I emphasised a portion here where what you say comes down to exactly what I have been trying to say.

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Someone who approaches a book, having already concluded what the outcome will be(not simply having an idea of what it will be), is exactly the same attitude as someone who ''will not permit the actual outcome to change [his] mind'', which is an attitude you jsut said is dishonest.

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Well here YOU are being dishonest. Firstly it is NOT "exactly" the same, because even a firm idea is not the same as an unchangeably closed mind. Secondly, I did NOT describe even that as dishonest as can be plainly seen.

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I wonder how you could ever know how ''firm'' their idea of the conclusion was beforehand, so we have no way of saying if they were dishonest or not.

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Since I didn't claim to KNOW your wondering is irrelevant speculation. However the fact that they cling to the literal truth of the Bible's Flood Myth is strong evidence for their attitude.

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And there comes a point where the two are one and the same, and trying to differentiate between the two simply becomes playing on words.

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I think this point is reached in a situation where someone has laready made up his mind on, and planned that he will debunk, a book before even reading it.

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So according to you someone who goes into a book with the intention of debunking it has an unchangeably closed mind even if, when they do the work they actually change their mind. That's obviously false.And since telling if their mind is unchangeably closed is even more difficult than telling their attitude it is obviously more sensible to judge the work rather than the attitude - even if you had a good reason for calling the attitude dishonest - and you don't.

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Maybe my english comprehension failed me, but I thought you were saying that at that point it was dishonest.

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Since I quite clearly did not your English comprehension failed you very badly, to the point of misrepresentation. What I said would be dishonest, would be to dismiss a valid critique on tha basis of your spurious idea of "dishonesty".

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Then you are suffering from memory loss, because that is exactly what you said:

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Thanks for proving that I did not claim to know - although I have to ask how you can get the idea that I am suffering from memory loss when I remembered correctly.

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No, I'm saying that if someone approaches a book having already decided that he will debunk it afterwards, that such an attitude prevents any type of evidence from ever affecting what he has already decided to be true.

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Then that "No" should be "Yes". You have prejudged the outcome, rather than waiting to see what it is.

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The first part of that sentence certainly doesn't make sense to me.

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There should be a comma after the "not" . Aside from that you only need the context.

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And thanfully no one has done that here yet.

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But why else would you want to label a fair and accurate critique as dishonest ?

More to the point, doesn't this statement of faith give us a good reason to think that they have firmly decided their conclusions before they start any study ? And according to Slevesque that means that they are dishonest (and unchangeably closed-minded, even if they are not).Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

Look at the facts Slevesque. In this thread you have produced a highly dubious criterion for dishonesty, and one which seems intended for use against critiques which are both fair and accurate (since if they are not, then you need no further ammunition).You seem very reluctant to apply this seem criterion to creationists, although there is plenty of evidence that creationists are far more highly biased than the people you are attacking. The statements of faith. The fact that practically every creationist "expert" starts with religious belief, the fact that many Christians who do not adhere to YEC theology have no problems with an old Earth. The fact that mainstream science explains many things which YEC belief has no adequate explanation for. Distant starlight. The order in the fossil record. The consistency of many independent dating methods, all agreeing that the Earth is older than YEC belief allows.

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The same way you think about creationism, the same way I think of evolution. Every which way I turn it, I see it as being falsified by all angles. That is to say, even if I was not a creationist, I would be not thin kthe ToE would be true.

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And yet there are very many people, far more familiar than you with the evidence who accept evolution and reject creationism. How many people can you find were converted to creationism by the evidence ? I'd say none whatsoever - for the simple fact that the evidence is so heavily against creationism. Can you give any objective reason to think that your claim is true and not the product of a massive bias ? (Which you call dishonest)

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These are not ad hominem arguments, nor am I questioning the honesty of evolutionists and atheists. I am just pointing out that there exists a causal relationship between atheism and evolutionism, and that because evolution is such an important underpinning to an atheists worldview, that the ''worldview bias'' (if you could call it that way) is just as present in an atheist then in a theist when taling about theories of origins.

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Now you are being dishonest again. Firstly you DO equate the level of bias that you (falsely) ascribe to atheists with dishonesty. This is what you've been claiming throughout the thread. Secondly your claimed link ignores all the many mainstream Christians who accept evolution and reject YEC - and even those Christians who reject evolution and accept an old Earth.The only point of your argument is to try to pretend that your opponents are just like you. You have to wonder why somebody with a strong position would think that a good argument.

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The thing is that this great debate requires that I read more about how Behe and the IDers developped the complex of IC and also I need to read about your arguments, such as the evolution of the mammalian middle ear. I didn't forget it, and I will come back to it at some point in the near future

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Actually you don't. The IC argument is a simple in-principle argument which applies equally well to mechanical structures as it does to biochemical systems (I think you will find that Behe says as much in Darwin's Black Box). The only good reason for using biochemical examples are that Behe is a biochemist (the fact that biochemistry does not fossilise is convenient to creationists but a good reason for preferring other examples !)That argument has been refuted because it took an overly simplistic view of evolution which is why Behe has rather retreated from using it except in certain special cases. In fact Behe has retreated a long way from creationism, currently arguing that God only intervenes by providing a few mutations now and then. If the evidence is so strongly against evolution and for creationism then you have to ask yourself why Behe is no longer a creationist and accepts so much evolution.In fact I think you have been rather dishonest even in the arguments preceding the Great Debate thread - it's clear that you didn't even know what the argument stated although you were happy to accuse others of being ignorant of it. But then that's rather typical behaviour for a creationist.

Their list of "scientists" includes Jack Cuozzo. If they have to pad their list with someone who is NOT a scientist, and is in fact nuts, how can the list be taken seriously ?But here's better evidence. The evolution train’s a’comin which attempts to argue: Which in fact means "Natural Selection works in exactly the way evolutionists say it does" Yes, it's the old "natural selection doesn't create" argument (complete with the pretence that evolutionists say that it does). So the article is actually claiming that natural selection works in the RIGHT direction for evolution. True the article does claim that mutation doesn't produce "new information" but that's another dishonest creationist claim. (Creationists have never produced any sensible measure of "information" for this argument so strictly speaking it is nothing more than a vague assertion which cannot even be tested). And in fact we know of a mechanism - genetic duplication and diversification - which adds information by any reasonable standard.So, while CMI might be better than other YEC organisations, saying so hardly paints a rosy picture of YEC. It seems that the best that can be said of them is that they recognise that some arguments are too weak to be used (true they got into a fight with Kent Hovind over that and it might have contributed to the acrimonious split with the U.S. branch but that only reinforces my point.).