Creationism or Creatorism?

Science is out to explain natural processes, how things got to be the way they are, or why they do the things they do, etc. From my own Christian stand point, it is not out to explain away God's part in creation, just how that creation came about and so on.When I use the word "creation" I by no means am using the word "creationISM." When I say "creation" I merely mean God's created universe, or the "natural world," or simply the act of creating. So what I mean by "they are not mutually exclusive" is that evolutionary theory does not exclude God's hand in creation, if you choose to believe in God. If you don't believe, evolutionary theory remains the same anyhow.When I look around at the world, I ask "What is all this?" The answer, to me, is that it is God's "creation." This is not a scientific answer, of course, it is a statement of my faith. But evolutionary theory answers the question, "How did all this come to be?" or "How did God create all this?" depending on whether you believe in Him or not. I agree with you that "CreationISM" answers nothing of the sort.Bottom line: I do not accept Creationism. I might not, however, be a very good communicator. My apology.One reason I am interested in this debate is that I have been exposed to some congregations and fellowships of Christians that simply turn my stomach with their approaches to the truth. "Creation science" is one of these approaches. And I am already a Christian! I understand what a non-believer must go through when he hears this kind of rhetoric from Christians, and he certainly would not want to become one or have anything to do with the religion if that stuff is what he's used to hearing from Christians.

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One reason I am interested in this debate is that I have been exposed to some congregations and fellowships of Christians that simply turn my stomach with their approaches to the truth. "Creation science" is one of these approaches. And I am already a Christian! I understand what a non-believer must go through when he hears this kind of rhetoric from Christians, and he certainly would not want to become one or have anything to do with the religion if that stuff is what he's used to hearing from Christians.

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I wholly agree. What some christians may not realize is that "creation science" is actually hurting their evangelism. Anyone with a logical, scientific mind will look at their science and project this onto their theology. They assume that if someone is willing to twist and distort science in such a way, what is stopping them from doing the same thing to the Word of God.The great thing about science is that you can believe anything you want, but what you put forth as science has to be grounded in data and observable evidence. Christians would be much better off teaching about the teachings of Jesus than the teachings of creation scientists. They can profess their personal beliefs about the timing and mechanisms of creation, but they shouldn't expect other people to accept them or to pin their relationship with God on their unsupported pseudo-scientific theories. My belief in the existence/non-existence of God does not hinge on the inerrancy of the Genesis account, and I really can't see why it should. It is too bad that other people do, both christians and non-believers alike.

Flies, you need to refer to msg 1 and 4 of this topic. That is where I warned about the use of the word "creationist" in a different way.Your confusion is a result of a non-usual use of the word.

I think creationism also has some good points:

• It gives an alternative, some competition, that is strengthening both theories. The evolution theory isn't convincing everybody and that is not always because they are not smart enough or twisting and distorting science.
• If you accept a literal meaning you don't have to find out the truth behind the words yourself (indeed, for example, why not have gnostic ideas about Christ).
• If you see Adam as a group of man/ape ancestors, it's difficult to explain the origin of death, of evil (the aim of Genesis 3 according Paul).

I agree with you. Mankind have to believe in the living God and His living Word. That's enough, but his word of paper is important too, as is prayer for example (what you can see as the 'unsupported pseudo-scientific theory' of the placebo-effect).

Of course, good critism of ideas help to strengthen them. However, I am not away of any helpful critisism that has been generated by the creation "science" camp.If you have some it would be interesting to discuss it.

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It gives an alternative, some competition, that is strengthening both theories. The evolution theory isn't convincing everybody and that is not always because they are not smart enough or twisting and distorting science.

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A competing theory needs data, of which creationism has little to none. Instead, it is primarily a theory of posturing and calling names. Ignoring evidence, as creationists so often do, does not futher science. In fact, could you give me one example of creationism furthering science?

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If you accept a literal meaning you don't have to find out the truth behind the words yourself (indeed, for example, why not have gnostic ideas about Christ).

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Yes, why isn't the gnostic gospel included in the bible (Gospel of Thomas). Way off topic, but since you mentioned it. If you accept a literal meaning, then allegory and parables lose the explanatory power. The poetry of the bible loses its meaning as well. There are also contradictions that arise when reading the Bible literally. Translation from allegory to the moral being taught is a large part of the Bible, which seems to be lost to some literalists.

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If you see Adam as a group of man/ape ancestors, it's difficult to explain the origin of death, of evil (the aim of Genesis 3 according Paul).

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I see the start of sin as the beginnings of sentience. As soon as we were able to lie in order to fulfill our selfishness, this was the beginnings of sin. As God is portrayed in the Bible, he can not be in the presence of such behavior, hence it is called sin. We are just plain sinful, nothing we can do about it. In the words of Charlton Heston, "Damn dirty apes."

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I agree with you. Mankind have to believe in the living God and His living Word. That's enough, but his word of paper is important too, as is prayer for example (what you can see as the 'unsupported pseudo-scientific theory' of the placebo-effect).

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I don't think it is necessary for mankind to believe in God. A majority of mankind since the beginning of civilization did just fine without him for many thousands of years. What I see the Bible as is an attempt to relate to God. Afterall, the Bible was inspired, not dictated. As to placebo affect, it is psychosomatic self delusion, just part of the human psyche. Sometimes we delude ourselves into thinking things and feeling things that just aren't there, that is placebo-effect.

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It gives an alternative, some competition, that is strengthening both theories. The evolution theory isn't convincing everybody and that is not always because they are not smart enough or twisting and distorting science.

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It is not merely an issue of intelligence but it is a distortion (or more accurately an error) to call creationism a competing theory. There is no theory of creationism. There is not even a scientific hypothesis of creationism. For that one needs a testable and falsifiable hypothesis which to date, no creationist has ever provided. That is why creationism is not science and why it is not competition for the theory of evolution.

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If you accept a literal meaning you don't have to find out the truth behind the words yourself (indeed, for example, why not have gnostic ideas about Christ).

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If you accept a literal meaning, you to ignore incredible amounts of evidence that is non-supportive of what you have chosen to accept i.e. deny reality. Considering the variety of different ways different non-agreeing groups of fundamentalists pursue this..it does not seem to work very well.

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If you see Adam as a group of man/ape ancestors, it's difficult to explain the origin of death, of evil (the aim of Genesis 3 according Paul).

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Why would human origins be the focus of study or understanding of a concept like death..or do you think that non-human primates or other animals are immortal?

Because Gnosticism at its root says that Man will find God through our own innate wisdom vs divine impartation. Traditional and (my belief) Orthodox Church teaching says that we are saved by Communion with Christ and that it is His impartation and NOT our own "divine" wisdom that is our source.
By the way, when I say Orthodox, I do not mean Eastern or Russian Orthodox religion. The term, orthodox, means "right teaching." The word catholic means universal. In a funny yet true sense, you may classify me as an orthodox catholic protestant!

Hi NosyNed:Thanks for the "heads up". I assume we're talking about creatorism vs creationism. I must admit, I have a difficult time when reading the terms. Not because I don't understand the difference between the two, but because I physicaly read them as the same word.
And I agree, that even when we do differintiate (sorry ) the two, it doesn't really clear things up.

Hello Again:Thanks for the response. It does clear thing up somewhat for me. However, can I pry a bit deeper? (Hey, if it's none of my business, please just tell me so, ok.) What I'm wondering is "where" do you insert the creator? I mean , one could argue that they are a "creatorist", not a "creationist", but still claim that God created man relatively recently, and in his present form (you know...Adam and Eve). I don't think you fall into this category, but then I don't think you have never really said if you accept the ToE or not. Reading this leads me to believe that you are a "Big Bang" type creation person. God started it all with the Big Bang and let things go from there. Is this a correct assumption?You see, I personally thinks it's important to separate the two things out...a creator and science. I do not think one can say that they do not accept creationism if they also claim that God can direct evolution. IMHO, if you accept scientific principles, then God cannot really have an "active" role beyond the Big Bang. I don't know, there may be some "wiggle room" here, but certainly one cannot accept the ToE if they believe that Gods handiwork plays a part there.Anyway, these are just my personal views on the idea of a creator, and how it fits with science.

The data is the same. The idea of catastrophes (YECS often believe in the deluge too, isn't it?). Because God's Word doesn't contain wrong ideas? Strange question, I should ask you. Jesus said he was speaking by parables. So, there have to be an explanation for it. Real things can tell about a higher reality as well, but that doesn't mean that they didn't happen. You mean translation errors? Sin detected, but origin unknown... Couldn't God create a world without survival of the fittest? Is it strange that we got selfishness? If we can do nothing about it, why did God make us like that? You know there is a lot of evil in this word, you even defined mankind as plain sinful and you're saying that it just goes fine? When I pray I'm just thinking things and feeling things. How can I know that they aren't real? You can explain it by a placebo-effect (the real scientific theory with lots of evidence and based on facts only). For me, prayer versus placebo is like creationism versus evolutionism.

Creator(ism) is simply the belief that God created all things in the manner He chose. That God is not a mere impersonal force but is a personal reality that interacts with some of us on the planet who have "met" Him. And that the Bible is not to be taklen as Literal, yet is inerrent in its message. Above human wisdom.
Creationism is what Answers in Genesis talk about. Are we clear?

Of course. And even the non believers here don't have much arguement with your POV. However, since that is mainstream Christianities POV why make up a new, slightly confusing, word for it.

Hello:I think NosyNed pretty much answered the same way I would have. Still, I feel that I should say something just so you don't think I'm ignoring you.Like I said to godsmac...I really think the difference between your "creatorism" and a typical "creationist" could be a very fine line. It all depends on how and where you insert the need for a creator. So, to compliment NosyNeds ideas, why muddy the waters with such similar terminology? I do, however, understand what you yourself mean when you call yourself a creatorist, but that may not be the same for others that want to invoke that terminology. For example, you said: A creationist could say the same thing, but with a completely different meaning than what you claim.

The hypothesis of the creation proposes degeneration and gives other hypotheses about for example the existence of pseudogenes.Many times I saw the existences of shared pseudogenes used as evidence for evolution, here you can see for example a table of olfactory pseudogenes shared by primates. (I really have to like the underdog to not be convinced )Doesn't the evolution theory predict that we shouldn't share pseudogenes with 'distant' species at all? Assuming they are functionless.For example human - rabbit:
"A rabbit dynein pseudogene AF005066 (possibly annotated in Gene 214, 67-75 1998) has an identical region of homology to human chr 20."
SourceI see two possibilities, that you shouldn't choose
1. They have a function at least
2. They have no function, but they are appearing parallel, because there are certain hotspots.
(Because that explains sharing of pseudogenes for creationism too).Edit:
- Example[This message has been edited by Saviourmachine, 02-20-2004]