Should we teach both evolution and religion in school?

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I suggest that there is no way a person could ever know the age of a geological formation by being there or studying it, no matter what methods you use.

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You may suggest anything you like. But you can't expect to be believed without providing solid arguments to convince us that we cannot trust the evidence.

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On the other hand we have the testimony of the best and most trustworthy witnesses that put the Flood about 4300 years ago and all the facts hang together very nicely.

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And this is false. You have a myth, which you call witness testimony. The facts do hang together - but they point to the views of conventional geology. That is WHY they are the views of conventional geology.If the evidence really supported the Flood, early scientists like Cuvier and the later Agassiz - both in the ICRs list of Creationist scientists (or were the last time I looked) - would have seen it. In reality, Cuvier realised that a single flood could not explain what he saw, and Agassiz provided the final nail in the coffin of the Flood by understanding that the deposits attributed to the Flood were in fact deposited by glaciers.

The only answer needed to this post is to point out that Mikey has made absolutely NO attempt to find out why people reject the Flood myth.So of course, he gets it all wrong.It's pretty hard to believe that anybody with any interest in this debate could not know that the geological and fossil record are represented as evidence AGAINST the Flood. And anyone who is at all honest and informed would have to admit that there are features of both that fit perfectly well with conventional geology but not with the Flood (the order of the fossil record, radiometric dating and evaporites to name just three).Mikey claims that we won't read the "best" creationist sources (which, of course is just his invention) - but he won't even pay attention to the debates here.Mikey, you shouldn't use Hovind as an example of a creationist not worth bothering with. On the basis of this performance you should point to yourself.

No, they were "hindered" by their belief that they should actually investigate and understand the evidence.That is how they found out that there was no world-wide flood in the recent past, and how they found out that the world was a lot, lot older than 10,000 years

Shouldn't you be pointing out that Mikey's hypocrisy is exactly the sort of behaviour that paints Creationism in a bad light ? Isn't that what you should be trying to stop or at least disown if you want people to get a good impression of Creationists ?But no. Mikey is not right. Mikey is ignorant and hopelessly wrong.And you've been shown that.

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But the evidence does not exist.

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So you're saying that geology is a fantasy that has been maintained since the 19th Century ? How did that happen ? How come even the creationists with training in the field haven't noticed it ?Let's start with the order of the fossil record. Are you saying that it doesn't exist ? You can point to mammals in the Cambrian, for instance ?And the evaporite deposits. Are you saying that they don't exist either ?

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The only evidence there is that is really evidence is the dating methods, and they are obviously in error because every thing fits the Flood beautifully otherwise

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I think you know that isn't true. Denying the existence of the evidence doesn't make it go away.

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Except for a small glitch here and there, very minor, that's all, to be ironed out eventually

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Except for major problems that haven't been adequately answered and don't look like ever being adequately answered.

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There is no evidence against it really, just another whole interpretive system that happens to be preferred

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Really Faith you would think that the fact that I mentioned some of the evidence only a few hours ago - in a post you replied to - would be enough for you to realise that isn't true. Message 463

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ABE: ALL the old Floodist ideas were dumb, inadequate, some very silly, EXCEPT the one that takes the whole geologic column into account.

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ALL Floodist ideas are dumb and inadequate. We can forgive the older ones since they didn't have access to the knowledge available today. The more recent versions have no such excuse.

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You know the bottom line here is that what the Creator God says is the standard to which science must conform and if it doesn't conform it's in error, Period. There isn't any way to get around that.

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Of course there is. It is men who claim that the Creator God said that, and men can be wrong.And of course if that were the real bottom line you would have no need to deny the evidence or seek to suppress it.It seems more like your bottom line is that nobody must be allowed to know that your idols are wrong.

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Look, the Bible, meaning God's own word, says there was a worldwide Flood. Worldwide, not local

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Even if it was God's own word - and it certainly doesn't claim to be - it doesn't mean that the story is intended to be literally true. And we've found out that it isn't.

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There has to be evidence on the planet for such an enormous event.

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There would have to be if it happened. Unless it was miraculously tidied up (which, to be honest makes more sense if the survivors are going to go on surviving). But there isn't any such evidence.

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If you don't think it's the strata and the fossils then what is it?

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There isn't any. Your assumption that the evidence has to exist is wrong.

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If the older Floodists had come up with another explanation for the Flood that would be fine, as long as it sufficed to explain what the Bible reveals. But instead of that they just drop the Flood altogether, just dismiss it as all of you do. This will not do

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If your best argument is to assert that everybody has to agree with you then you haven't got a case.

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There was a worldwide Flood and the strata and the fossils are TERRIFIC evidence for such an event

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The fossil record obviously wasn't formed by a flood over a short period of time. So it isn't evidence for the flood at all.

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Once God has spoken that's it

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Are you asserting that God TOLD you to deny the evidence against the Flood ? Because I don't believe that the Christian God would tell you to say things that aren't true.

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I've done all the arguing of particulars I want to do, and I think I did a pretty good job, but that's the end of that, bottom line is there was a worldwide Flood and the strata and the fossils are the evidence for it.

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No, you did a miserable job. Trying to pretend that the evidence doesn't exist - to people who know that it does - isn't exactly a sensible move. Claiming to speak for God - when you can't back it up - isn't exactly going to convince people to reject the truth either.

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I'm no longer trying to argue the science issues, been there done that, and I still think rather well,

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I don't think that telling obvious lies is doing "rather well". If you're reduced to trying to pretend that the evidence doesn't exist, then you really don't have a rational case.

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the point is that God said there was a worldwide Flood, and the numbers of years calculable from His word show it occurred about 4300 years ago

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That's the interpretation you prefer of words that you attribute to God. You've not made any sort of case for either being certainly true.

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This is the testimony of the most trustworthy of witnesses and I believe Him and since your observations are at odds with His you need to rethink them.

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In other words, since the evidence is in conflict with the claims of the men you worship we seriously ought to consider lying and suppressing the evidence. And why should we ? Come to that, why should you, if you really are a Christian ?

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She's not lying. She's honestly misguided. She's also perfectly logically consistent.

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Unfortunately that's not true. And no, she isn't consistent either. Like most apologists she will say anything to pretend she's right.

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Logically consistent. That's not the same as being consistent.

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Not as different as you seem to think.Of course logical consistency is a low bar. But one I'm sure that she has violated. In fact I'm sure that she has no problem with contradictions.While not the best, here's one example:She claimed that absolutely every part of the Bible is important for doctrine.
In the same conversation I was pointing out that the opening of Luke was at odds with her ideas of how the Bible was written.
If she was logically consistent she couldn't just wave that away - those verses are important. But she did.I won't count her claims to believe in the Doctrine of Election while openly disagreeing with it, because I'm sure that she doesn't know what that doctrine says. But it is funny.I would count her claims to believe in Sola Scripture AND Biblical Inerrancy. She doesn't have to acknowledge the contradiction for it to be there.

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Her position is that her interpretation of her version of the bible is the ultimate authority. If the authority is wrong for absolutely any reason, then the reason is at fault, not the actual authority.

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That isn't quite right. It would be more true to say that any belief that she really, really, likes is true to her - and any excuse that she makes up to protect those beliefs is also true to her, even if it contradicts other things that she believes.

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She'll say anything because everything is suspect except her authority

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Now we get to it. Yes, it's much more about her pride than it is about the Bible. She only cares about the Bible because of her beliefs about it - which are much more important to her than the Bible. But that is true of all inerrantists.

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I've known her to repeat things she's been told are untrue. I've known her to be called a liar. She's been known to make outrageous and outlandish claims. She's been known to change her arguments. But I've never known her to actually say something that she herself did not believe to be true

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To the point where she will honestly, truly believe that she didn't say what she said ? Where she will claim that she obviously didn't mean what she obviously did ? She's done that. She will rewrite the history of past interactions to paint herself as being in the right and everyone who disagreed with her as being irrational and wrong.And, of course, I'm not using quite the same definition of "lying" as you are. I don't require that she knows that what she says is false at that time, only that she has damn well ought to know that what she says is false. It's a more practical standard on a forum like this.

Of course, I can back it all up.

And there you go throwing false accusations for no good reason. As I said, I can back up everything I say. And if I can't I'll admit it. Whcih is more than you will do.

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Paul, you don't know how to read the Bible.

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No, you mean I don't follow your "rules" for reading the Bible. Now if you want to argue that your "rules" are correct that would be a fine topic and one that is not science.

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You have the usual unbeliever's bizarre ideas about what parts of it mean

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I do ? I guess that I have to do what you should have done and ask you to support that.

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you think the first verses of Luke contradict the idea of Bible inspiration, they don't, but you'll insist on it anyway.

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There's nothing bizarre about noting that your ideas of Biblical inspiration are completely absent from Luke 1:1-4. Not a formal contradiction, but when you add in the idea that those verses are doctrinally important then you really have to take that omission seriously. You don't.If you want to answer that, you're really have to do better than insisting that you're right.

Mike, that fact that I criticise you does not in any way disprove the substantive points I made. Does the fact that you attack your opine to disprove your posts ?It's interesting that you focus on a reply to Faith rather than the earlier reply I made to your post. Does it make it easier to ignore the points I made there?And let us look at a sample of your arguing style:

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If you are logically "correct" and thus, NOT ignorant, and NOT wrong as you IMPLY - then please SHOW how an animal preserved in the suffocation position would NOT be the kind of evidence someone would expect from a catastrophe?

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Of course I don't have to. You don't get to dictate my position. My point is that the whole question is a red herring intended to misrepresent your opponents. There's no need for me to argue against that point because my position strongly implies that we SHOULD find such fossils. Why should I argue against my own beliefs? Why would you expect me to ?

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Now you feel it is unfair, because I did not select the "meat" of your posts, but instead I chose to refute the question-begging-epithets, and ad hominem statements.

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There is a simple response to that. You First. if you want "reasonable" replies the. Write reasonable posts. What you write does influence the responses you get.

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Nice try, but addressing you ad-hominem, question-begging-epithets isn't a red-herring, I am directly addressing things you stated that were false, such as, "behaviour", "ignorant".

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And yet this "nice try" was argued, without ad hominem. I pointed out the rather obvious fact that we should expect fossils found in suffocation positions if the scientific view of Earth's history is true. We expect that many, many catastrophes have occurred. Why should we try to argue otherwise ?

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E P I T H E T S. For by and large, I am not an ignorant person. This is a red-herring, because it IMPLIES I am ignorant, and thereby, you are not - but you didn't prove I am ignorant and you are not. So in debate, it is still an equal burden.

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If you say something that is obviously untrue, should I assume that you know that it is untrue ? Or would you rather I thought that you did not ?