Reasons for Creationist Persistence

The lessons learned in Kansas and other places, taught the Biblical Creationist, ID cult that even controlling school boards is not sufficient. The current plan is to make yet another end run, bypassing even that level. Instead, the plan is to isolate the children into thought limiting Church Schools and Home Schools. That way the children can be kept in near total ignorance.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Not at all, it is not an indictment of Christian/Creationist positions at all. In fact I am a Christian Creationist. It is an indictment of the Christian Cult of Ignorance which would include all YECS, Biblical Creationists and most ID supporters. Again, an example of the Christian Cult of Ignorance tactic of sleight of hand and misdirection. No scientific advance has ever been made based on Christian belief or theology. Again, the Christian Cult of Ignorance tactic of misdirection and sleight of hand can be seen.I do NOT discount home schooling. In fact I believe that real schooling is best done at home. What I say is that the Christian Cult of Ignorance has decided to use home schooling and church schooling as tools to promote ignorance and to isolate their children from any possibility of being exposed to truth.It is not home schooling or even church schools that are the problem, but rather the perversion of those tools to allow the Christian Cult of Ignorance to maintain control of the children's access to information. I have no issues with either home schooling or church schools. I personally am a product of Church Schools and much of what I know is a direct result of things taught to me at home. Well, supporting evidence is the fact that there are people who believe in a Young Earth and Biblical Creationism. Such people are either ignorant, deluded or liars.The reason that the Christian Cult of Ignorance is turning to Church Schools and Home Schooling is that they know that their core beliefs, Biblical Creationism and or Young Earth, can not stand up to examination. They know from experience that if children are allowed to learn the truth, they will abandon such nonsense. In addition, they know that society will watch their efforts in a more open environment such as the public school system.The only hope for the Christian Cult of Ignorance is to isolate the kids, to keep them in intellectual bondage as long as possible, to give brainwashing and indoctrinating the best chance and to keep the children from developing critical thinking skills.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

The posts from DorfMan in this thread are a classic example of the tactics, very successful tactics, of the Biblical Creationist.They operate on several levels. One is to inject as many spurious and irrelevant side issues into a discussion as possible in order to disrupt any possible reasonable conversation on their targeted subject. The second is to try to manipulate the discussion so that they will force the opposing side to disproportionate response. It is the classic tactic of all terrorist throughout history.The content of DorfMan's posts shows that the goal of the Christian Cult of Ignorance is not to increase knowledge, learning or understanding but rather to disrupt efforts at learning and promote ignorance.If people like DorfMan are sanctioned or banned, it simply promotes their end.There is no doubt that DorfMan can post many silly and nonsense message during his irregular hit and run attacks on EvC. But those posts cause only a small amount of damage and also create a great and good opportunity.The record stands for all to read.People will see DorfMan's posts. They will also see the responses of others.But if we ban DorfMan, it simply makes him yet another Martyr which is what the terrorists want.Biblical Creationists are Persistent because the tactic works. Like all Terrorists, they try to cause a small annoyance that results in their target over responding.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I am a Creationist.That said, anyone who believes in a Young Earth, or a Biblical Creation, or Special Creation, or the Biblical Flood, is simply wrong.Those folk though continue to try to con the public by misdirection. They make claims, as you have, false claims, such as the DI list of "Creation Scientists" implying that there is anyone who has done "Creation Science".The fact is that no one has ever presented a model that explains the evidence seen using theology, beyond the simple assertion that Goddidit, which explains nothing.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

So you assert. Looks a lot like the typical Fundy assertion though.I believe in Creation, that GOD created all that is, that will be.Science is just a way of us learning how GOD did it.You are free to pretend any definition you come up with is valid, but when presented with evidence that conflicts with your definition, is it time to reevaluate your assumption?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

They also play fast and loose with the facts in those videos, not even coming close to the truth, and those videos are great examples of trying to con the gullible.There is NO Science in those videos, only shell games. But worry not. They got their money which is all they wanted.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Welcome Home.!

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

One problem is that in religion there is no internal ethics policy or procedure.That may sound contradictory and an extreme claim, that religion is without ethics, but let me try to explain.In the world of science, you are expected to make your finding public and freely distributed throughout the community, for the purpose of criticism, testing and replication.This means that you must publish both that data which supports your conclusion as well as the data that does not support it.Someone in science who publishes false data or even withholds negative material, when discovered, is sanctioned. Sanctioned not for being wrong, but for being dishonest. In addition, the sanctions are extreme and far reaching.If a scientist is discovered simply withholding data, or worse falsifying or misrepresenting data, it is very likely that not only will they be thrown out of the profession, every single piece of work they have done in the past will be called into question.There is nothing comparable to the ethics system found in science in the realm of theology.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Again, only SOME Christian Schools.I am pretty much the product of Christian Primary School education so I can speak with some reliability about at least one such school. The reality there was that there was no isolation from secular views or science.BUT...... there are also the Christian Avoidance Schools, many, many here in the US. They really began expanding about 1958 over here and at first were simply opened so little Johnny or little Sally wouldn't have to go to school with black kids.As color gradually became less and less a factor for the kids themselves, some new enemy was needed to keep the schools filled and the money flowing in. Science was a great substitute even though they did not set bigotry aside, just redirected it towards other populations such as atheists and homosexuals.What you describe though is representative of the Christian Cult of Ignorance.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Very true. Peer pressure and support is extremely important in many such cases, particularly when there is only a weak sense of self as espoused in so many Christian Cult of Ignorance Churches.It begins with the indoctrination that all mankind is evil and born sinful and unable to control their own behavior (add a u on your side of the pond) or beliefs, that to question "Authority" is wrong.A somewhat funny aside, speaking of cliques.As at all schools, my class broke down into cliques. Two stand out in my memory, "The Gross Four" that had six members and the "Elite Eleven" with fifteen members.The situation you picture though is magnified over here on this side of the pond. Here, nearly every church, particularly the Christian Cult of Ignorance Churches, has a school. They are everywhere. The sole purpose of these schools is to isolate the kids from any information that might conflict with dogma.We also have the home school phenomena exemplified at it's worst by the curriculum from Beka Academy. The kids that are being brainwashed under systems such as ABeka Books have almost no chance of ever learning the truth about either science or Christianity and all too often, should they actually get exposed to truth the result is a total abandonment of their religious beliefs.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

An interesting collection of typical assertions and nonsense. Tell a half truth and hope the mark doesn't notice that you palmed the pea. But there are ways to test many of the claims. For example, a theological position that the Earth is only 6000 years old is factually wrong. Again, what is "Orthodox?"The article itself is simply a collection of lies. Lies couched in convenient rhetoric to try to misdirect the reader.Some examples: False dichotomy. Endlessly questioning is does not exclude finding answers. By endlessly questioning you find the answers and then go on to find even more answers.The writer even admits that he is lying to the audience in the very next sentence... A deeper understanding. So you don't stop at the surface answer "Jesus is the Answer" but go on to ask "What does that mean?"A couple paragraphs later the author once again lies to the audience whe he says... That again is simply false. We can do more than just "opinion" we can have "opinion backed up by fact or reason." In fact, you can have a whole series, a body of knowledge backed up by fact or reason yet still go on questioning.The rest of the article is simply more lies based on the initial con job.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Good. Nothing should be questioned more or more often than any foundational beliefs.The foundation is what everything else rests on so only a damn fool doesn't question and test the foundation.But look at your example, the old Biblical Christian Cult of Ignorance fall back trick of spouting "including whether you even exist or not" as though it even made sense or had significance. They trot this old piece of dead meat out just like they trot out the dead meat of Absolute Morality andf Absolute Truth. It's just another method to misdirect folks attention while the conman palms the pea.Whether you exist or not is irrelevant. It's the kind of thing philosophers bring up to hide the fact that they really have nothing worthwhile to contribute. Whether you exit, or you are just some figment or heartburn from eating too many tamales, your experiences are all you have to go by.It doesn't matter if they are real or not... they are all you got. Deal with it.Bringing up an example such as that is just part of the Christian Conman misdirecting you so you don't see him palming the pea.It is part of his brainwashing you and in reality it means "Don't question what I tell you and ignore the man behind the curtain!"The problem is there is no Ethics Committee in religion that will catch folk lying like that and sanction them as there is in science.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

In your example that YOU presented and that YOU alleged was from some Christian source. You found the example. You supposedly provided a quote.The person you were quoting was lying, was pulling a con, was trying to misdirect the audience. Sorry but that is a pretty good description of much of Christianity. You picked the example. I based my comments on the actual text YOU supplied. Irrelevant and absolutely unrelated to anything I've said.Phat, you chose and presented the comment in Message 199 AND you asked me to comment on it.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Beka Books is an outgrowth money maker for Pensacola Christian College, another of the Unaccredited Christian Cult of Ignorance Schools.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

But so far what you have presented has been. Irrelevant.The source you quoted was lying, was committing a fraud, was misdirecting the audiences attention and was asserting a falsehood.You are totally refusing to even address the issues in the very material you presented.You are also pulling the old Gish Gallop. Instead of addressing the issue you simply deny there was a problem and then toss out yet another pile of spaghetti. Why? Only if YOU wrote what my imagined answer would be.Let's look at your answer as YOU provided them. What is it in the passages that provides any support for your position? Do you know the required qualification for a Priest or to preach in the Temple during Jesus life? No where in the passage does anyone answer his question. But no one has said that; I certainly have not said that. What I have done is analyze the material that YOU provided and pointed out exactly how it was either a lie or willfully ignorant, which is simply lying to oneself.Deal with it. Very unlikely and actually a really ignorant assertion. This goes back to the very first part of the quote from Matthew... Now let me ask you a question.Why would the priests ask that question?Finally you posted this jewel. Come on Phat. Again, that is totally refuted by the very material you presented. Read it. Stop just grabbing soundbites.From your quote. There is no honesty in their response. Like today's Biblical Christian Cult of Ignorance Preachers, they based their answer not on the merit of the question itself, but rather on the perceived results of a given response.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion