[Elmer G. White]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

Scientific accuracy, such as the correct value of pi to 3 trillion places, is not essential to attaining eternal salvation and therefore it is understandable that the Bible would give an integral approximation to pi. The Bible teaches us many important things such as there is one God and that humans are made in the divine image. The categories, methods and mathematics of today's scientific enterprise would not have been understood by the people at the time the Bible was written.

1. The Bible teaches us that the Earth was Created in six days, the Sun later than the Earth and birds before land mammals. Science says it it not so. You accept this?
2. If the Bible was wrong about the value of Pi, can you be certain that it is correct about the One God and us being made in His image? How would the people being around at that time know these things if they were so ignorant in other issues?
3. The Gospels say that Jesus was God, that He suffered and Arose from the Dead. The combined forces of natural sciences, history, textual criticism, etc. say that this cannot be proven and that most of the stories in the Gospels are unlikely. If there was a historical Jesus, the Divinity can still not be proven. Do you accept this also, as it derives from the same scientific enterprise that would not have been understood by the people at the time the Bible was written?

Was there a Jesus? Did He say the things written in the Gospel? If He did, was He wrong when He referred to Adam, Noah, Jonah, etc.? If there was a Jesus, how can the atheist know that He was God if other parts of the Bible are unreliable?

1 Timothy 6:20
O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called:


Yours in Christ,

Elmer

[Didymus Much]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

...You'd think that he would be able to learn something when others used peer reviewed publications to support specific claims...

I'm not even asking for anything that rigourous, just something beyond his say-so. That's part of what I love about this place: when the True Christians™ claim that the Bible directs them to some behaviour that has everyone going WTF, they pull out the Scripture (IN CONTEXT) that supports it.

...he just stops pushing when he realizes that someone else actually knows more about the given subject and goes back to the same pseudo-scientific babbling, ignoring all of the evidence that was provided....

Oh, you should dig through the Landover archives. Some wonderfully foil-hatted characters find their way here (cursing my poor memory for failing to summon any specific names atm, let me get back to you).

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

As we have already established many posts ago, nobody cares about quotes that Someone Important said over coffee.

Let me repeat that: in science, nobody cares about quotes of famous people.
Nobody.

Here is the surprising fact about science: it is all about interpretations derived directly from data, presented in peer reviewed publications which also contain - wait for it, wait for it - supporting rigorous data.

Therefore, please refrain from posting anecdotes about people with high index of name recognition. Because nobody cares. Really. NOBODY CARES.

Please cite a specific article, not the entire damned database! Have you ever written a source-based paper in college? I guess the more important question is, have you ever made it to college? Seriously, backing your claims up with data is not that hard, assuming that such data actually exists!

Fixsen,D. J. (2009). "The Temperature of the Cosmic MicrowaveBackground". TheAstrophysical Journal. 707(2):916–920.


White,M. (1999). Anisotropiesin the CMB. Proceedingsof the Los Angeles Meeting, DPF 99. UCLA. arXiv:astro-ph/9903232 

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

If the Bible was wrong about the value of Pi,

As I already said, the Bible was correct about the value of pi to the nearest integer. There is no known value of pi because pi is a transcendental number and I don't think that anyone knows the value of pi beyond four trillion digits.

[Elmer G. White]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

Fixsen,D. J. (2009). "The Temperature of the Cosmic MicrowaveBackground". TheAstrophysical Journal. 707(2):916–920.

White,M. (1999). Anisotropiesin the CMB. Proceedingsof the Los Angeles Meeting, DPF 99. UCLA. arXiv:astro-ph/9903232 

Nice.

Now, could an omnipotent God have fixed these transfirmamental temperatures to show those values in the instruments without having to go through all the mess of the Big Bang? If He can fix the parameters of the Big Bang to unravel into this universe, why bother, as He could do all it is six days as easily? What kind of God is this (back to mindless suffering and eschatology that you have not assessed yet)?

Does the background radiation falsify a God who did it ex nihilo to look like that? Are these the only two options or are there more?

Matthew 21:42
Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes?


Yours in Christ,

Elmer

[Elmer G. White]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

As I already said, the Bible was correct about the value of pi to the nearest integer. There is no known value of pi because pi is a transcendental number and I don't think that anyone knows the value of pi beyond four trillion digits.

Do you still think that this is about the approximation of Pi (the Babylonians did that in your opinion better than God as they used 3.125 - you can look for the references yourself)? It is about trusting the Bible. Which are the parts that are reliable and how can you tell if you think that, e.g., the Genesis did not understand the Creation very well? Could the uneducated peasants of 33 AD then understand what happened during and after the Crucifixion?

How do you choose which parts of the Bible are literal and which are not? Jesus Himself emphasized the importance of Scriptures (OT) when it came to understanding His Resurrection.

John 2:22
When therefore he was risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them; and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.


Yours in Christ,

Elmer

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

How do you choose which parts of the Bible are literal and which are not?

This is an important question. I guess you already know that Catholics rely on Tradition, Biblical experts and common sense to help solve this issue.

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

Now, could an omnipotent God ...

I already said that I don't believe that your concept of omnipotence is correct. I don't believe that God can create a set of all sets which do not contain themselves as members.BTW, I am still getting cited for infractions, so I am not sure how long it will be before I am banned.

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

Do you still think that this is about the approximation of Pi (the Babylonians did that in your opinion better than God as they used 3.125 - you can look for the references yourself)?

I thought that a tablet from the Yale Babylonian Collection known as YBC 7302 had the value of pi as 3? It is true that later tablets had the value as 3.125.The fact is that any value of pi is going to be inaccurate. The closest value is given to about 3 trillion digits.

[Elmer G. White]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

This is an important question. I guess you already know that Catholics rely on Tradition, Biblical experts and common sense to help solve this issue.

Yes, I know.

You thus rely on modern science when it comes to the Genesis not being literal history. OK. This is acceptable. I don't endorse it and I think that it is perilous to your soul and to Christianity based on the issues I tried to make you assess (suffering and eschatology).

When it comes to choosing the parts that you like, however, you do not rely on modern science. OK. Your choice. Instead (from the perspective of methodological naturalism that is OK with Genesis) you choose to believe...

• Tradition (the ad traditionem fallacy, things don't have to be right even if many people used to believe them).
• Biblical experts (the ad verecundiam/appeal to authority fallacy - an issue can be wrong even if promoted by a prestigious figure, you might want to check the Nobel-Prize winner Montagnier and his opinions on water memory, if you're interested; and you could rely on the Bible instead of someone else's opinion on it).
• Common sense (the appeal to reason fallacy, for instance, QM and the theory of relativity and totally against common sense yet in those cases they're OK).

Verily, this is what I called special pleading earlier on. Different criteria to assess different issues. Still, please let me say that I appreciate your sincerity and our discussion, as you clearly have been forced to step out of your comfort zone. I urge you to re-assess the positions of tradition, your own musings (our cognitive faculties are notoriously unreliable) and reliance on authority and then think over the things we discussed. I am afraid that I'm seeing precedents of all this in the Bible.

1 Timothy 4:3
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;

I don't think I need to say more at the moment. I'm praying for you.


Yours in Christ,

Elmer

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

... I think that it is perilous to your soul and to Christianity based on the issues I tried to make you assess (suffering and eschatology).

I don't see eschatology as a serious disputed question, at least from the Catholic POV. The very serious question of suffering is one which does need to be discussed in detail.

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

Yes, I know.

You thus rely on modern science when it comes to the Genesis not being literal history. OK. This is acceptable. I don't endorse it and I think that it is perilous to your soul and to Christianity based on the issues I tried to make you assess (suffering and eschatology).

When it comes to choosing the parts that you like, however, you do not rely on modern science. OK. Your choice. Instead (from the perspective of methodological naturalism that is OK with Genesis) you choose to believe...

• Tradition (the ad traditionem fallacy, things don't have to be right even if many people used to believe them).
• Biblical experts (the ad verecundiam/appeal to authority fallacy - an issue can be wrong even if promoted by a prestigious figure, you might want to check the Nobel-Prize winner Montagnier and his opinions on water memory, if you're interested; and you could rely on the Bible instead of someone else's opinion on it).
• Common sense (the appeal to reason fallacy, for instance, QM and the theory of relativity and totally against common sense yet in those cases they're OK).

Verily, this is what I called special pleading earlier on. Different criteria to assess different issues. Still, please let me say that I appreciate your sincerity and our discussion, as you clearly have been forced to step out of your comfort zone. I urge you to re-assess the positions of tradition, your own musings (our cognitive faculties are notoriously unreliable) and reliance on authority and then think over the things we discussed. I am afraid that I'm seeing precedents of all this in the Bible.

1 Timothy 4:3
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;

I don't think I need to say more at the moment. I'm praying for you.


Yours in Christ,

Elmer

Obviously, tradition, common sense, and reliance on Biblical experts have their limitations in theological studies and our knowledge derived from these methods can frequently be improved. And this is also true for other areas of study. Take for example, Newton's gravitational laws which were thought to be the last word until relativity came about. Still, in college freshmen calculus and physics courses, students are asked questions about escape velocities and throwing a ball up in the air from a certain height and angle and asked to calculate when it will hit the ground (using Newtonian mechanics). Undergraduate physics majors generally study electromagnetism classically and do not get into quantum electrodynamics QED except at a more advanced level. So although our knowledge may be somewhat incomplete or limited, it is not useless. I think you are mistaken when you say that I do not rely on modern science or the scientific method. I am not sure why you would think so.

[Elmer G. White]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

Obviously, tradition, common sense, and reliance on Biblical experts have their limitations in theological studies and our knowledge derived from these methods can frequently be improved. And this is also true for other areas of study. Take for example, Newton's gravitational laws which were thought to be the last word until relativity came about. Still, in college freshmen calculus and physics courses, students are asked questions about escape velocities and throwing a ball up in the air from a certain height and angle and asked to calculate when it will hit the ground (using Newtonian mechanics). Undergraduate physics majors generally study electromagnetism classically and do not get into quantum electrodynamics QED except at a more advanced level. So although our knowledge may be somewhat incomplete or limited, it is not useless. I think you are mistaken when you say that I do not rely on modern science or the scientific method. I am not sure why you would think so.

My hopes are not high but your enthusiasm to continue discussing these things gives me strength to go on.

2 Samuel 22:33
God is my strength and power: and he maketh my way perfect.

First, "common sense" or "relying on authorities" are not scientific methods. That is why I mentioned that when it comes to assessing which parts of the Bible are True™ in your opinion, you rely on your feelings ("common sense") and hearsay ("tradition and authorities") and just give them fancy names. If you relied on the latest developments and improvements in studies on the historicity of Jesus and the process that became the Bible you would not be able to accept anything except a few geographical places beyond reasonable doubt. No, you don't seem to trust science there, which is good for you!

Second, classical mechanics were never dismissed but supplemented by relativity not because "relativity appeared" but because observations no longer supported classical mechanics and no matter how they tried, the photoelectric effect and the precession of the perihelion of Mercury, for example, could not be explained, and new theories were necessary. Of course, people are still taught Newtonian mechanics, as they work very well in everyday life and the effects of QM or relativity can be disregarded when you design a bridge.

I am not going to discuss any additional Gish Gallop examples of personal names. You trust your feelings and authorities regarding the Bible's Truth™ value. How can you know they were not deliberately or accidentally mistaken? How do you know those who claim that Jesus was a mythological figure who never walked on Earth did not get it right? How do you reconcile the mindless suffering and eschatology with the standard cosmological model. If all that is true, what's the point?

Based on the original source (the Bible) many scholars have written hundreds of thousands of pages explaining why Jesus did "not mean or say what He actually said". These accounts are widely divergent. The Catholic Catechism has but one interpretation. Is it more reliable than our Statement of Faith or feminist theology or process theology or OEC or JW or Mormonism or Urantia or liberation theology or 18th century Deism or the mythicist theory? How do you choose among these mutually conflicting interpretations?

Except by turning to the original source material. That's what we do!

Revelation 22:6
And he said unto me, These sayings are faithful and true: and the Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to shew unto his servants the things which must shortly be done.


Yours in Christ,

Elmer

[Thomas Taylor]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

So what remedy does True Christian™ Creation Science recommend for severe burns?

Mr. Much,


If you really want severe burns try an oxy-acetelene torch.


YIC
TT

[tomdstone]

Re: Ten points that CRUSH Atheism

The Catholic Catechism has but one interpretation. Is it more reliable than our Statement of Faith

I would say it is certainly more comprehensive and in any case is pretty reliable.