YEC approaches to empirical investigation

Been reading through this thread and decided to break my silence briefly to disagree with this forensic model of the problem.It is not that YECs "have some data and a known conclusion" and "work at determining what's in between." When it comes to the Flood, I think a better comparison would be with the archaeological approach to finding where an ancient city is buried.That is, we KNOW there was a worldwide Flood from an ancient document just as an archaeologist may know from ancient documents that there was once a city in a certain place and set out to find it. The physical clues in the document may be frustratingly sparse and the area very broad where the city's ruins might most likely be found, but there is no doubt it existed and theoretically could be found.My position on this thread and the previous one opened by IRH titled Attention Faith... was that for debate to be possible at all, the YEC premise that there WAS a worldwide Flood is not to be challenged on threads designated for the debate about the interpretation of the data. Other threads may be used for that purpose, but concerning the signature debate of this forum, HOW certain geological phenomena can reasonably be explained by a worldwide flood or not is all that is open to argument. As I said over and over, this probably makes debate impossible here, although it is the ONLY basis on which it would be fair at all.Cheers.This message has been edited by Faith, 11-15-2005 10:00 PM

The usual nonsense jar. If God said it, it is not only good theology it is an ironclad scientific premise. You don't have to believe God said it, and you may argue it on threads dedicated to that purpose, but to argue the scientific questions fairly with YECs who do believe God said it, you have to grant the assumption or there is no meaningful debate. As I'd been pointing out for some time to the usual deaf and biased ears, you simply insist that your premise prevail and that's stacking the deck.
Cheers,
Faith

Irrelevant as usual PaulK. What archeologists assume about an ancient text or the particulars about any supposed city, have nothing whatever to do with the fact that YECs take the Bible as inerrant. The analogy I made does not concern the premise of inerrancy but the conduct of the inquiry from that point, whatever the premise is. My point was that the model of archaeology is more descriptive of YEC methodology than Ben's model of forensics and that remains true.Those who truly know the God of the Bible DO KNOW that the flood occurred and that is not for you to judge. Argue it on threads for the purpose if you like where YECs are free to ignore you.And I already acknowledged many times in this argument that a genuine acceptance of the YEC premise would indeed weight the argument on the YEC side and this is why time after time I said that this debate is impossible if conducted fairly.

I don't need to support what God said. What God said trumps all challenges of any sort. In a debate you either agree to accept your opponent's premise or not. My point is that this is the YEC's premise and if the debate is to have any pretense to fairness that premise must be accepted. As things stand this premise is denied across the board and the evolutionist assumption that it is all open to debate prevails, and that is stacking the deck against YECs. And this IS the evolutionists "insisting their position is sacrosanct" -- it should be obvious though you deny it as usual. It's a very simple point.

So what? Those are your premises and you may require an opponent to accept them for a particular debate it seems to me, but what happens is that your premises are acceptable here and mine aren't so I am TACITLY required to accept yours while my own are consistently denied.I'm spelling out the YEC premises and making the case that EvC rejects them a priori and that that is stacking the deck. Again, there may be no way to have them accepted within the parameters of the debate as conceived here. The fact remains that this IS the YEC premise and as long as it is rejected the debate is unfair.

If the true God said it, that IS empirical. Yours said nothing by the way, only the God of the Bible has spoken.

This is simply not so. Creationists do not EXPLAIN anything as supernatural. This is an evolutionist hallucination. The Flood is explained in purely natural terms. The premise being discussed is that it occurred because God said it did, and that whatever can be known about it from the Bible must be taken into account. You are refusing even to think about what creationists say, just inventing a straw man. This is absolutely false. Nobody has ever required anyone to accept any of these things in a debate here. But they could be proposed as premises and the opponent required to accept them for a given debate. What normally happens is that YECs must not only defend HOW the Flood happened but that it happened at all because that's the EvC premise which prevails here and is imposed on YECs automatically. It's ridiculous to deny it. Sure, you can stack the deck by poisoning the well too, that is, by calling your opponent's premise that God has spoken a mere fairy tale. There's no need to debate anything then of course, as the EvC assumptions prevail. That's what I'm talking about. No, what happens is that YECs HAVE to accept the EvC's premises, they don't bother to ask us to agree to them. That IS what happens at EvC, certainly. If that's what you want, as clearly it is, don't expect YECs to bother to continue in the so-called debate for long. This has simply never occurred. Evidence and logic have been amply provided by creationists here but the evo side has this strange inability to recognize real evidence when it doesn't support their assumptions. Funny how that goes.

I'll give it some thought but it's probably not a good time for the rigors of a Great Debate. Wait until after the holidays. Right now I have time to shoot off an answer as it occurs to me here and there, but not to concentrate on a particular designated topic.

Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah, everybody just wants to assert their own pet assumption and ignore the topic here which is about how the YEC premise always gets overridden by the EvC premises. So that's your premise and I disagree with it. What now?

My, how difficult it is for an evo to follow simple logic. The word of God DOES trump all contradictions of course. Truly, this ought to be obvious and indisputable. God made it all, God knows what it's all about, so true science, logic and reason are on the side of God's word. Logically this is impeccable reasoning. How can you deny it? No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that at present evolution's premise is accepted a priori and enforced with rigor shall we say, and the YEC's denied a priori. I'm merely pointing this out and suggesting that fairness requires that the YEC's be given equal time. Or not even equal time. ANY time at all would be an improvement on the fairness scale.This message has been edited by Faith, 11-21-2005 12:42 PM

Fascinating how logic-challenged you all are. This is YOUR premise, and it opposes mine. God's word does not need support, it is the PREMISE, get it? We reason FROM God's word, and all things follow from it. Evos here always dispute God's word in the science debates, and that's OK for debate purposes too, as long as it's up front, but when it is the only acceptable position, as it is at EvC, it amounts to stacking the deck. The Flood is taken for granted by YECs and here and there it would only be fair -- if you have any pretense to fair debate -- to accept this premise. But as I've also said, I know this is simply impossible at EvC, it would violate too many of your own assumptions you are just as unwilling to give up as a YEC is to give up the Flood.This message has been edited by Faith, 11-21-2005 12:47 PM

By refusing to recognize the YEC premise you do indeed demand that I accept the evo premise. THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT.

Perhaps this is formally true. In other words we are not debating the Flood but the validity of God's word over and over and over again. So there is no debate here about evolution or the Flood or anything really except the validity of God's word, and that's fundamentally not open to debate for a YEC, though of course we will do what we can to argue for it as well. Once again, if God said it, the God who made it all, there is no possible debate along the lines EvC conceives of it. God trumps science, and science is idolatry if it dares to contradict God.

Follow the logic. IF God has spoken on a subject, not accepting what God has said is not an option.

I don't know if I'm coming back Ian. Just in a mood to get my two cents in today. Must be bored.